Trackhouse Racing’s Ross Chastain smiled and conceded his 2023 season has been, “up, down, left and right” following a breakout year in 2022 when he advance to the NASCAR Cup Series Championship Finale for the first time in his career ultimately finishing runner-up to Joey Logano for the big trophy.
Last season the 30-year old Floridian earned his first two wins in the series – at the Circuit of the Americas (COTA) road course and then on the Talladega Superspeedway big track – and a career best 15 Top-5 finishes and 21 Top-10 showings leading a career best 692 laps.
This season, he earned his first career pole position – at Nashville – and turned it into his only victory so far. He’s ranked sixth in the Playoff standings with a 12-point cushion above the eighth place cutoff position. Eight drivers advance to the penultimate stage of the Playoffs following next week’s race at the Charlotte ROVAL.
Chastain has a pair of Top-10 finishes in the opening four Playoff races with a best showing of runner-up just last week at Texas insisting he had “no pre-conceived expectations.” Asked this week if he was concerned about his Playoff hopes this season, Chastain looked calm.
“Not really, we just go race, that’s what we do,’’ Chastain said. “They give out the same amount of points in every stage and every race in every one of these rounds. If we finish the race and run up front we get more points, if not, we know we get less.
“We just go race and that’s what’s so great about what our sport offers right now and what these playoffs offer. They give us a chance after three races they give you a chance and then after three races if you make it, they give you another chance and no matter how it went, as long as you beat four guys. We’ll go see how many points we can scrap up.’’
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