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Ross Chastain’s move to Martinsville last October to qualify for the NASCAR Cup Series Championship 4 went viral. Although now illegal, it served a greater purpose.
“Did everyone see that? Because I won’t do it again.” – Captain Jack Sparrow and now probably Ross Chastain.
Ross Chastain’s epic move in the final round of the NASCAR Cup Series Round of 16 at Martinsville Speedway last year to advance to Championship 4 went so viral that he made the top two of the SportsCenter Top 10 the next morning, and He wasn’t second either, which is quite a feat considering it happened on an NFL Sunday.
The move that saw Chastain not take off as he went over the perimeter wall on lap 500 of 500 on laps three and four of the four-turn, 0.525-mile short track at Ridgeway, Virginia, gave fans one of those rare moments in more recently, when the eyes of the sporting world have been mostly focused on stock car racing.
This led to Chastain ironically advancing to Championship 4 Joe Gibbs Racing’s Denny Hamlin, with whom he had plenty of track run-ins during his first year with the Trackhouse Racing Team.
Given the nature of the move and the fact that Chastain himself has spoken out against even the idea of doing it again, NASCAR eventually banned it.
There will be no “Hail Melon” replay at Martinsville Speedway for this Sunday afternoon’s NASCAR Cup Series race, the NOCO 400.
We recently spoke to Chastain about this move and whether or not he had ever thought about it prior to that final round.
He explained it was nothing more than desperation.
“It was the hot moment in turn four as we got into the last lap,” said Chastain Beyond the flag. “The white flag was up, we had done 499 laps and were getting ready for the final 500th lap. And it popped up in my head. I confirmed that we had to make up two places and they said yes and I totally said yes.
“Never thought about it [before that]. I said in my stuff after the race that maybe the GameCube was there at the time [my brother] Chad, but man, that was so long ago. I would have been 10 years old. I never considered doing it again in NASCAR. I don’t know why it crossed my mind, other than I was just looking for a way to gain two places.”
As it turns out, due to the post-race disqualification of Brad Keselowski’s #6 RFK Racing Ford and the points/stage point changes associated with that disqualification, Chastain didn’t actually have to make that move to advance to Championship 4.
So, in a now illegal move, he effectively averted a potential controversy, as there would certainly have been some level of repercussions had Hamlin originally advanced to Championship 4 – and then been replaced by Chastain hours after the race thanks to an independent disqualification.
Separately, Chastain admitted that short distances are the one area where he feels he and the No. 1 team need to improve the most during the 2023 season.
“Short distances, of course,” he said. “And this new aero package throws in a whole new curveball. But Trackhouse and GM put a lot of effort into it. It’s not like I expect it to just switch. We can’t win every race, that would probably be very greedy of us, but we’ll try.”
Tune in to Fox Sports 1 this Sunday afternoon at 3:00 p.m. ET for live coverage of the NOCO 400 from Martinsville Speedway. If you haven’t started a FuboTV free trial yet, take advantage of this offer and do it now!