By David Morgan, Associate Editor
HAMPTON, Ga. – They knew he was here.
While the final rundown shows the No. 7 Chevrolet in 21st place, that doesn’t tell the whole story of the run by Corey Lajoie and Spire Motorsports on Sunday at Atlanta Motor Speedway.
After finishing fifth at the track back in March, Lajoie was confident they could be a factor again this time around, even starting deep in the field in 30th place.
By the end of the second stage, Lajoie had worked his way into the top-10 and had no plans of stopping there.
Taking over the lead for the first time on lap 192 after a fuel only call on pit road, the Raze Energy sponsored machine would be a fixture at the front of the field for the remainder of the race. Swapping the lead with eventual winner Chase Elliott over the course of the next 13 laps, Lajoie relinquished the lead to Elliott with 55 laps remaining, but stayed in the mix up front.
When the 11th caution of the day came out on lap 252, Lajoie was able to wrestle the lead away from Martin Truex, Jr. as less than 10 laps showed on the board.
For the next seven laps, Lajoie held serve in the lead, but the penultimate caution of the day set up a three-lap dash to the finish, where he would have to hold off Elliott, Truex, and others to try and score his first NASCAR Cup Series win.
Lajoie put up a hell of a fight, but Elliott was a man on a mission, powering into second-place with a bold three-wide move and keeping a head of steam as the swept around Lajoie on the high side to take the lead entering Turn 1 with two laps to go.
Giving it his all, Lajoie had a push from Erik Jones to try and retake the lead from Elliott on the last lap, but Elliott moved up to block and Lajoie wound up in the wall, eventually losing control of his car to bring out the final caution flag.
In the blink on an eye, he went from battling for the win to watching the No. 7 tumble down the leaderboard, ending up in 21st when all was said and done.
Even though he was disappointed to not be the one celebrating in Victory Lane, Lajoie held his head high given the run his team had delivered.
“I felt that was the only shot I had,” Lajoie said. “I’ve been in a position at a speedway once before where I felt like I didn’t take the one run I had and that was my one run. They covered it and I got caught in the fence. Running second might do some good for our team, but it doesn’t move the needle in terms of really…
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