Jeff Gordon sends warning to NASCAR rivals with | Sports News

Hendrick Motorsports vice chairman Jeff Gordon warned the NASCAR Cup Series discipline that brighter days are seemingly forward for Chase Elliott.

Elliott’s 2025 marketing campaign was crammed with twists and turns as he amassed 19 top-10 finishes and 11 top-five finishes — stats which might be eerily equivalent to his output from a yr prior. Yet the No. 9 Chevrolet driver confirmed indicators of turning a nook within the latter half of the season, giving many inside the Hendrick Motorsports building hope that he’ll return to his championship-contending kind in 2026.

For proof, Gordon pointed immediately to Elliott’s efficiency within the NASCAR Cup Series Championship Race. The already-eliminated 30-year-old led for 30 laps at Phoenix Raceway en route to settling for a P10 end — a outcome that doesn’t precisely soar off the web page upon first look.

Yet in accordance to Gordon, Elliott raced higher than his Hendrick teammates William Byron and Kyle Larson, each of whom superior to the title race. “When you put a race like that together, and you do that over enough races, it builds confidence,” he informed ESPN’s Kelly Crandall. “And when you have the final race of the season go like that, even though you’re not in the championship hunt, you build on that over the offseason.”

Though Elliott’s three race wins during the last two seasons are a far cry from the 18 victories he recorded from 2018-2022, the most well-liked driver on the conclusion of the 2025 marketing campaign possesses a number of positives that may be constructed off of.

After qualifying for the Cup Series Playoffs for the ninth time in his 10-year NASCAR profession, Elliott amassed six top-10 finishes during the 10-race playoff — together with a victory at Kansas Speedway within the Round of 12. He was finally eradicated within the Round of 8 finale upon settling for third at Martinsville Speedway.

“I thought we were getting closer, for sure,” Elliott mentioned when trying back on the finish of 2025. “You always have high expectations of yourself and of your team, so it’s always tough for me to answer that. I guess defining form, that’s tough. It’s always a ‘What have you done lately?’ That’s in life and certainly in sports.

“It’s more about placing your self in place persistently and each week than it’s the precise win. You’re going to get your flip. You will get your alternative. It’s not at all times going to work out for you. … But should you put your self there usually enough, it should, and that is more of what I need to see and what our definition of being in kind is.”

As the season drew to a close, Gordon observed an inherent change in Elliott’s approach each day. “More engaged, stepping in, elevating the workforce, the knowledge he is bringing and actually feeling like that is home for him,” Gordon said. “I inform him all of the time, ‘You’re a franchise man. This workforce is your workforce.’

“He and Alan [Gustafson] have a very highly effective relationship. Alan is an extremely gifted man, and I feel generally it simply takes getting all the fitting items in place on the proper instances. But I used to be very impressed with what they did final yr. I feel it was a new look and perspective of their dedication to each other, to what they need to do, the main points of what it takes to push your self, push the automobiles and what our rivals are doing.”