RELATED: Complete race results | Updated series standings

ELKHART LAKE, Wis. — All the positives — the determined late-race comeback, leading the most laps, moving up a rung in the standings — meant little to Chase Elliott in the immediate aftermath of Saturday’s matinee at Road America. His own harshest critic, Elliott didn’t hold back in giving his performance a scathing review.
 
“Absolutely terrible job on my part,” Elliott said after a fourth-place finish in the Road America 180 Fired Up by Johnsonville. “That was the worst race, just beyond way too many mistakes. Just absolutely screwed that up, so terrible day for me. I hate it for my guys. I had such a good car and I let ’em down.”
 
The clouds that hung over the 4.048-mile road course were missing the silver linings, according to the defending NASCAR XFINITY Series champion, who guided the JR Motorsports No. 9 Chevrolet from 11th place over the final four-lap stretch to the checkered flag in the 45-lap event. That span was part of an even bigger rally, from 23rd place after his final pit stop on Lap 30, just two laps after an off-course excursion at Turn 11 that cost him plenty of momentum.
 
Both comebacks left him with little consolation.
 
“Top five’s not a win,” Elliott said. “Have to be honest with yourself. I screwed it up.”
 
The negative side of Elliott’s day didn’t resonate as strongly with crew chief Ernie Cope, who discussed the race at length with the 19-year-old driver in the XFINITY garage.
 
“He is hard on himself. He expects to win and he doesn’t want to let us down, which he didn’t,” Cope said. “He came back in three laps and went from (11th) to fourth, so I look at that. I mean, we were pinned back there and then passing about seven cars in three laps. I mean, you’re going to have altercations during it.”
 
The ending was a sharp contrast to how Elliott’s day started. The youngster started on the front row after Coors Light Pole Qualifying was scratched by rain, then jumped out to lead the opening 12 laps. After briefly giving up the top spot on an early exchange of pit stops for fuel strategy, Elliott reassumed the lead, stretching it to more than 12 seconds during the dominant first half.
 
“It was as good as it looked and by far I feel like the best road race car I’ve ever had,” said Elliott, who led 23 of the 45 laps. “I was beyond pleased with the race car. It wasn’t the race car’s fault, I can tell you that.”
 
Elliott pitted after putting all four tires into the grass off the 14-turn circuit’s kink, apologizing to his JRM crew over the radio after leaving pit road back in the pack. From there, though, his comeback trail began, only to be stemmed by a six-lap caution period — a seeming eternity on the lengthy course — after multiple breakages and fluid leaks in the pack delayed the final restart.
 
“They’re going caution after caution after caution, but I still feel like we would’ve had time to get back up there and have a shot at winning as good as the car was,” Cope said. “You just don’t know how they’re going to fall. It was just a bad storm.”
 
Once the clouds lifted, Cope took solace in the big-picture plusses. With 10 races left in the season, Elliott now sits in second place in the standings, supplanting Ty Dillon, who took 10th Saturday.
 
Elliott’s top-five result, combined with series leader Chris Buescher‘s ninth-place run, chopped his deficit to just 16 points heading to next weekend’s event at Darlington Raceway.
 
“Looking at the positives, we gained seven, but it was a day we could’ve gotten 15,” Cope said of the points tally. “But it’s all good. We’re right where we need to be. That puts us back (to) second, we’re only 16 out of it and we’re going to go stomp their asses at Darlington.”

RELATED: See how Smith won at Mid-Ohio

ELKHART LAKE, Wis. — Regan Smith used a bit of bumper two weeks ago to become NASCAR’s most recent road-course winner, shoving road-racing veteran Alex Tagliani in the last lap at Mid-Ohio to take his first XFINITY Series victory of the year.
 
With the final road-course race of the season looming at Road America, Smith said he doesn’t have regrets about the late-race contact, which left Tagliani steaming with cross post-race words.
 
“I think if you’re in that same situation, you’ve got to do what you can do to go for wins,” Smith said before opening XFINITY practice Friday at the 4.048-mile circuit. “I guess in that circumstance in that situation, I didn’t wreck him, just had a little bumper tag there and we came out as the beneficiary of it. I have not spoken to Alex and didn’t really figure he’d be in the mood right after the race to talk at all, so I think possibly down the road, we will. He’s somebody that I’ve raced with a few times now and enjoy racing with him. I think he would understand the scenario of going for wins and doing what we’ve got to do there. 
 
“It’s a fine line. There’s wrecking a guy and there’s moving him and getting the position. We see the moving all the time. It’s not anything new. It’s been done in our sport for a thousand times and a thousand more times in the future, I’m sure. The feedback I got from drivers, crew members, you name it, they thought it was a good move and they thought it was fine. I didn’t really hear too much negative about it.”
 
Smith’s victory helped bolster the JR Motorsports driver’s case for a series championship. Though he ranks fourth — 51 points behind series leader Chris Buescher — he noted that plenty can change with 11 races remaining on the calendar.
 
“I think we’re still in it,” Smith said. “We’re racing like we’re still in it, and the mindset is to go out and do everything we can to lead laps and win races. And if you’re doing that, you close up on points even quicker than you can imagine.”
 
While the title fight for this season has ramped up, Smith has also kept a focus on making his 2016 plans final. His recent remarks about his potential free-agent status have sparked interest into what next season might hold, plus in which series he’ll be competing.
 
Smith reiterated his goal of returning to the Sprint Cup Series, where he’s performed admirably in fill-in roles the last two seasons — including three races this year in place of the suspended Kurt Busch and one race after Kyle Larson‘s fainting spell on the eve of the first  Martinsville race of 2015.
 
“Working hard every day to figure out 2016,” Smith said. “I think I’ve been clear for the better part of two and a half years now that I want to get back to Sprint Cup and do that at some point, so I’m fortunate to be in fast race race cars at JR Motorsports right now and have an amazing opportunity here and definitely don’t take that for granted. At the same time, I want to give myself that opportunity to get back to the other series. As soon as all that stuff plays out and I have answers, then I’ll given them as soon as I can.”