NASCAR Cup Series: When will Chase Elliott earn his first victory?

After 92 career NASCAR Cup Series starts, Chase Elliott is still seeking his first victory. When will he end up in victory lane?

Chase Elliott, 22, has driven full-time in the NASCAR Cup Series since the start of the 2016 season. Prior to making his full-time Cup Series debut, he drove in five races in the 2015 season as a part-time driver. In all 92 of his career Cup Series starts, of which 87 have come during his tenure as a full-time driver, he has driven for Hendrick Motorsports.

Elliott drove the #25 Chevrolet in his five starts for the team in the 2015 season. He drove the #24 Chevrolet full-time for the team in the 2016 season and the 2017 season, and he currently drives the #9 Chevrolet for the team and has done so in each of the 15 races that have taken place so far this season.

Despite the fact that he has finished in the top 10 in the championship standings in both of his seasons as a full-time Cup Series driver so far and the fact that he finished in fifth place in the standings last season, Elliott has still not won a Cup Series in 92 attempts.

But while he hasn’t yet won a Cup Series race, Elliott has certainly come close. In fact, it’s hard to not come close to winning a race and still finish in fifth place in the championship standings as the only driver to finish in the top 10 without a victory.

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Elliott has 45 top 10 finishes and 25 top five finishes in his Cup Series career thus far. Seven of those top 10 finishes and three of those top five finishes have come this season. All three of the top five finishes that he has recorded so far this season have been podium finishes.

Of Elliott’s 25 career top five finishes, eight of them have been second place finishes. One of those second place finishes has come this season, and four came in last year’s playoffs alone. Two of those second place finishes in the playoffs came after he was passed for the lead with barely any laps left in both races, so they both could have very well been victories.

Elliott’s 27th place finish at Martinsville Speedway in Ridgeway, Virgina in the round of 8 of the playoffs also could have been a victory that would have sent him to the Championship 4, but Denny Hamlin spun him out with just over two laps to go.

While Hendrick Motorsports have struggled so far this season, they are certainly improving. The fact that Elliott has finished on the podium three times so far this season and the fact that he sits in 13th place in the championship standings with an average starting position and an average finishing position of 13.6 despite the fact that the team have struggled shows that he could very win his first Cup Series race in the near future, perhaps before this season ends or perhaps even before the regular season ends.

It seems like it is a matter of “when” and not “if” as far as Elliott winning a race goes, and this seems to be getting reiterated fairly often, which shows just how close Elliott appears to be to winning his first Cup Series race.

Sure, this seems like it has been the case for quite a while now, but it really hasn’t been. Chase’s father Bill Elliott finished in second place eight times before he won his first Cup Series race. He won his first race at the age of 28 and ending up going on to win 44 races and a championship in his career. Chase is still 22.

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When will Chase Elliott earn his first career victory in the NASCAR Cup Series? He has come close to doing so several times, but he has yet to actually do so. Will he get to victory lane at least once before the 2018 season comes to an end with the season finale at Homestead-Miami Speedway in Homestead, Florida in mid-November?

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