Chase Elliott and Joey Logano wrecked on Lap 104 in the Pennsylvania 400 on Monday at Pocono Raceway.
Elliott appeared to get too close to Denny Hamlin’s No. 11 Toyota before his No. 24 Chevrolet slid up the track and into Logano’s No. 22 Ford, pushing the Team Penske vehicle into the outside wall in Turn 2.
“Yeah, we came off of Turn 1 and those guys were three-wide,” Elliott said. “I thought Denny (Hamlin) had the best run, so I elected to push him down the back, down there at the exit of Turn 1; I thought that would be a good move to kind of get him passed, that hopefully he’d drag me by; and I was just still next to him and got in there. I thought I slowed down enough to not get loose, but got loose and collected Joey.
“So, I apologize to those guys. It was completely my fault. And I apologize to my guys. Man, they gave me a good car. I need to re-think my evaluation of how I’m going to approach these races because it’s not working out right now.”
Logano was not in the lead at the time of the wreck, but had led a total of 38 laps in the scheduled 160-lap event. Logano went to the garage, but returned to the race on Lap 128, 23 laps down. He finished 37th.
“We were able to drive up to the lead a few times,” Logano said. “Only if it had rained a little earlier we would have had a lot different outcome. We had a new rear carrier today and he came out of the gate swinging which is awesome. I am super proud of that. There were a lot of positives today.
“We just ended on a negative note racing hard and trying to get back up there after that caution. We all had to pit because we tried to win the race when it rained and we lost our track position and then the 24 got loose under me. It is just part of racing. It stinks to be on this end of it. It is just part of it.”
Elliott entered today’s race in 12th place in the provisional Chase Grid, but his 33rd-place finish pushed him down to 14th place.