Last year, former Cup Series champion Chase Elliott won the season-opening Cook Out Clash, leading a total of 171 laps and holding off Ryan Blaney by 1.333 seconds. With this year’s event right around the corner, the Dawsonville native is ready to defend his crown.
Elliott was the pole sitter in 2025. Some would say his track position catalysed his show-stopping performance. However, Elliott himself thinks that track position isn’t everything at the iconic Bowman Gray. But it sure helps.
Speaking with Bob Pockrass on X, Elliott said,
“I don’t think that’s the end-all be-all. I think Ryan (Blaney) kind of debunked that with his performance in the main, but certainly it would be nice to get off to a good start again this year… and I think we can do that.”
“I thought that the atmosphere was great and obviously we won and that was awesome but you know taking that out of the equation I really thought it was. I thought it was a great and very energetic turnout for what we had going on,” he added.
Chase Elliott will be back in his No. 9 Hendrick Motorsports Chevy in 2026, marking his 11th full season in the NASCAR Cup Series. He is a 21-time winner, besides an All-Star victory which came back in 2020 at Bristol Motor Speedway.
Elliott finished his 2025 season eighth in championship standings with two wins, 11 top fives and 19 top-10s. He now has 21 career wins in the NASCAR Cup Series. Last year, Elliott also won his eighth consecutive Most Popular Driver Award, an honor his father and NASCAR Hall of Famer, Bill Elliott, won a record 16 times.
Chase Elliott Weighs in on The New NASCAR Championship Format
Former NASCAR Cup Series champion Chase Elliott praised NASCAR for bringing the sport back to the previously used Chase format. NASCAR had the Chase in place from 2004 to 2013, and according to Elliott, the new format is kind of a “nice compromise.”
“We often times forget just how good we had it through those years of ‘The Chase’ format,” Chase Elliott said in a statement. “And I really do think it is a really nice compromise.
“I think getting a full season was going to be a really big challenge. I’m not sure if there’s really a better place to land than a true 10-race chase, really similar to what we had through those years of the epic battles that we saw,” he added.
The new format will consist of the 10 final races of the season, right after the regular season ends. 16 drivers with the most points will compete in the ‘Chase’, and the best driver will receive a 25-point advantage over the second seed. This means that winning a regular-season race will not guarantee a playoff berth like it used to.