NASCAR: Elliott and Blaney crash

Sprint Cup Series Rookie of the Year front-runners Chase Elliott and Ryan Blaney made contact with each other on lap 88 of the Quaker State 400 and both ended up behind the wall as a result.

The incident took place shortly after a restart when Martin Truex Jr. backed up from second and stalled the progress of a suging Elliott. That allowed Blaney to get under him on the backstretch and Greg Biffle took them nearly three-wide going into Turn 3.

That's when Blaney tagged the left rear of the Elliott car sending both sideways and backwards into the outside retaining wall. Both contenders were inside the top-10 at the time of the incident.

"That restart was pretty hectic from the beginning with (Truex) getting loose and it kind of put everybody in a bad spot and it wound up with us being in the middle of three-wide into three," Blaney said. "It's so hard to get into that corner all night with a car close to behind you and outside of you, and no one lifting either, and it's just an unfortunate spot we got put in and I hate to see two really good cars tore up.

"We were both very fast tonight and it's just a really unfortunate deal, but we'll try to get it fixed and get back out there and make some laps."

Blaney had considerably more to lose as he entered the race 15th in the championship standings and the holder of the final provisional spot on the Chase Grid. He was four points up on Jamie McMuray. Elliott was eighth in the standings and more than a full race up on the bubble.

Elliott said the incident was largely the result of a chain reaction that began with Truex in Turn 2 off the restart.

"I just got taken three-wide, had a bad corner there in (Turn) 2 and got us bottled up," Elliott said. "Once that happened guys obviously tried to pounce and make things happen. For me, I was kind of the guy on the outside lane. I tried to get out as far as I felt like I could without getting up in the grey.

"I know every time somebody has got in the grey this weekend it has been bad news. I was trying to stay out of that myself. I guess Ryan got loose in the middle and that is an easy thing to do. It's slick out there."

Elliott also has a 48 point advantage over Blaney in the Rookie of the Year standings.