Erik Jones was less than one full lap away from putting the historic No. 43 back in Victory Lane at Talladega Superspeedway, but some frenzied moves behind him resulted in a series of events that saw Ross Chastain make a late pass through traffic to win Sunday’s race.
Jones, who led 25 laps on the day, unofficially finished sixth place.
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“We’ve been close here so many times,” Jones said. “That last lap we were single file and I felt pretty good about it. Looking back I wish I had stayed on the bottom and let the 1 (of Ross Chastain) push me. … I was just trying to win the race. Happy to run up front and lead laps, but really would love to get the 43 in Victory Lane. I thought today might be the day.”
It looked that way.
Jones was holding off Kyle Larson on the low lane down the backstretch when the drivers behind him began to make moves. Larson jumped out of line coming into the trioval, taking his No. 5 Chevrolet to the top line in an attempt to make a pass for the win. Jones went with him in an attempt to block, and Chastain simply powered to the lead from the low lane.
“I should‘ve just faked going high and then went back low,” Jones said. “We had a shot. Just didn‘t quite close it out.”
The car No. 43, made famous by team co-owner Richard Petty, is sitting on 199 wins in NASCAR’s top series.