NASCAR: Chase Elliott is fired up to take down Kyle Busch

Chase Elliott is fired up to beat Kyle Busch in the NASCAR Truck Series for $100,000 on Tuesday night at Charlotte Motor Speedway.

At the end of Wednesday night’s rain-shortened Toyota 500 NASCAR Cup Series race at Darlington Raceway, Kyle Busch made what he described as incidental contact with Chase Elliott as Elliott, on newer tires, began to blow by him for second place.

Elliott was on much newer tires than race leader Denny Hamlin and likely would have won the race if not for this contact, given that rain started to fall on the four-turn, 1.366-mile (2.198-kilometer) egg-shaped oval in Darlington, South Carolina shortly thereafter.

After Elliott’s #9 Chevrolet spun across the front straightaway, slammed into the inside retaining wall and came to rest after skidding toward turn one, he emerged from it and gave Busch the middle finger salute as he drove by.

Busch apologized multiple times for the incident afterward, but Elliott only discussed the matter publicly for the first time earlier today after Busch said that the two had talked about it and had a good conversation.

Elliott believes Busch that he did not maliciously wreck him. As for whether or not there will be retaliation, only he truly knows.

But he is still fired up to beat the Joe Gibbs Racing driver.

And not just in the Cup Series.

Elliott, who had not posted to his Twitter account since the wreck occurred, broke his social media silence on Friday afternoon with this message.

He is, of course, referring to the bounties placed on Busch by fellow full-time Cup Series driver Kevin Harvick and Truck Series title sponsor Gander Outdoors CEO Marcus Lemonis.

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Before the coronavirus pandemic, Harvick placed a $50,000 bounty on Busch for any full-time Cup Series driver who could beat him in any of his remaining four Truck Series starts.

This started after Busch dominated the Truck Series race (still the most recent Truck Series race) at Las Vegas Motor Speedway back on Friday, February 21 for his seventh consecutive win at NASCAR’s third highest level going back to July of 2018.

Lemonis added $50,000 to that bounty for a total of $10,000.

Elliott had initially been slated to challenge Busch in the Truck Series races at Atlanta Motor Speedway on Saturday, March 14 and Kansas Speedway on Saturday, May 30.

But the former was postponed due to the coronavirus pandemic, and the latter has since been postponed as a result of its date now being used as a date for one of the races that had been previously postponed by the pandemic.

So Elliott is now set to challenge the two-time Cup Series champion at Charlotte Motor Speedway on Tuesday, May 26 in what is slated to be the first Truck Series race in over three months, the NC Education Lottery 200.

Fox Sports 1 is set to broadcast the NC Education Lottery 200 live from the four-turn, 1.5-mile (2.414-kilometer) oval in Concord, North Carolina beginning at 8:00 p.m. ET on Tuesday evening.