By Justin Segar -
It's Chase Elliott's world, and we're all living in it. After a dominant performance Chase Elliott wins the race, and the 2020 Cup Series Championship. Phoenix Raceway hosted the championship race for the first time in the tracks history, and I do not think that it lived up to expectations, nor did it live up to the standard of a championship race. It was incredibly hard to pass, and it made the race come down to the race off of pit road, and restarts.
Although the stages don't matter much at all for those in the Championship Four Chase Elliott destroyed the field after he started in the back for failing pre race inspection twice. The remaining three drivers in the Championship Four largely controlled the race especially Joey Logano who lead basically the entire stage. Brad Keselowski's biggest struggle during the race showed up early, his pit crew being a tad slow on pit road.
Stage Two changed up the Championship Four contenders. It evolved into a two man race between Chase Elliott, and Brad Keselowksi. Brad Keselowksi had a wild last lap pass to beat Chase Elliott in stage two. Joey Logano started to fall behind the leaders, but still looked like a threat. However it also became more and more apparent Denny Hamlin would not have the speed to win, unless there was a crazy late race restart.
Stage Three was the Chase Elliott show... once he grabbed the lead he set sail and never looked back. The race never really looked all that competitive, and up until stage three it was a very clean race, and that trend continues into stage three. Chase Elliott simply drove away and earned his championship. The biggest story line outside of the Championship Four was Jimmie Johnson finishing fifth in his final Cup Series race.
Chase's championship and Jimmie's retirement from full time Cup racing it felt like a changing of the guard moment, and NASCAR is starting its next era with Chase Elliot as the sports biggest star.