MARTINSVILLE, Va — So much throughout its history, Hendrick Motorsports has rolled into Martinsville with a perfect recipe on how to win at the iconic short track. After qualifying all four of its cars in the top 10, it felt like a 30th grandfather clock was heading back to Concord.
On paper, two top fives would be a mighty day for any organization, but it’s far from the dominance that Hendrick set a year ago with a 1-2-3 finish.
While it wasn’t the complete performance that the four-car stable would’ve hoped for at a circuit where the organization scored its first win, there are some gains Hendrick can take away from Sunday’s showing and bank some notes as the season treks into April.
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Chase Elliott carried the Hendrick banner all day after starting second, then taking the lead from teammate Alex Bowman on Lap 94 to establish control early in Stage 2. After a caution flew for Burt Myers, who came to a complete stop at the exit of pit road, Elliott pitted with the majority of the leaders, except eventual race winner Denny Hamlin which allowed him to inhert the lead on older tires and essentially check out for the second half of Sunday’s 400-lapper.
Despite ranking first in passing and second in speed in the race, according to NASCAR Insights, Elliott still felt he couldn’t “control” the event as much as he would’ve liked to get back up to Hamlin in the later half of the race and battle for the win.
“When you have control like that, it makes a big difference,” Elliott said after the race. “You can control your run and having that clean air, not having that one guy in front of you, it makes a huge difference.
“We really needed control there. When you get into the second half of these races, it just gets so hard to make ground up. You saw that with Christopher (Bell) pressuring [Hamlin]. It just means a lot to have control, and unfortunately, I couldn‘t get that back for us. But overall, it was a really good effort.”
The driver of the No. 9 ended up leading 42 laps at one of his best tracks on the calendar and wheeled to match his season-best result of fourth. Elliott also continued his top-20 streak and improved his average finish to 11.9, setting himself up nicely to keep building off a strong start to the season.
Right behind Elliott, Kyle Larson finished fifth after quietly spending most of his day as a top 10 car. Larson also ranked in the top five for passing and speed, according to NASCAR Insights, but admitted he could never quite get to the front to take a swing at Hamlin and the other Toyotas.
“I think just track position,” Larson said. “We maybe could have called the second stage a little bit different. Potentially the first stage, too. I think maybe if I could have gotten to the lead, I would have stayed in the top two or three. I feel like everyone‘s cars were really equal. The No. 11 [Hamlin], I‘m sure his car was equal as well, but he‘s just a really good short-track racer. He can keep the tires on it and get through track position really well.
“I thought my car was really good. I just don’t do a good job being able to pass. It’s hard for anybody, but like, Denny and Chase are really good at it and that’s just an area that I need to get better.”
Although Larson leaves Martinsville without a second win in a row, he still felt that the top five day continues his season momentum with the next few tracks setting up well for him in Darlington and Bristol.
It was, however, a different story for the other two Hendrick drivers. Both William Byron and Bowman ended the day with results outside the top 20 due to separate issues on pit road.
Byron — who won last year’s spring race — cracked the top 10 early on, but after a holdup on the right-front tire during the first round of pit stops, he could never make up enough ground to contend with the leaders. However, his 22nd-place finish is enough to keep him atop the standings,
As for Bowman, he looked strong during the first stage, finishing second behind defending series champion Joey Logano. But exiting his pit stall under yellow, Bowman paused on pit road, losing five spots. He came down pit road again three laps later, which sealed his fate with a 27th-place finish.
While Larson and Elliott look to keep making gains next week, Byron and Bowman hope to bounce back at Darlington Raceway (3 p.m. ET, FS1, MRN Radio, Sirius XM NASCAR Radio)
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