NASCAR drivers Chase Elliott and Austin Cindric will join Travis Pastrana’s Nitro Rallycross (Nitro RX) November 11-13 at Wild Horse Pass in Phoenix, Ariz. for Rounds 5 and 6 of the 2022-23 season. This marks the second appearance for Elliott in the short-course rally series. Cindric will make his debut.
Elliott’s guest appearance was first disclosed in August. Cindric is a late addition to the lineup with this week’s announcement.
Elliott’s series debut in 2020 was a qualified success. He beat Tanner Foust, a more experienced rally racer, in a head-to-head matchup but was later penalized for avoidable contact. Elliott finished eighth in Nitro Rallycross’s premiere Group E feature.
“I appreciate Travis and everybody for having me,” Elliott said at the time. “ASHOC is kind to let me expand my horizons on getting outside of my comfort zone. It’s been a lot of fun and I appreciate their partnership. The learning curve’s been steep. I’ve never driven a car like this before, so that’s a little different.
“I’ve never jumped anything that far before, so I was a little nervous about that yesterday. I got to the point where I was like you just got to do it. The longer I sit around here and think about it worse it’s going to get. The learning curve’s been steep, but it’s been fun.”
While Cindric has not yet raced in Nitro RX, he has experience in GRC Lites, Global Rallycross and tested Nitro RX’s FC1-X electric rally car along with his NASCAR teammate Joey Logano earlier this year.
In GRC Lites, Cindric earned four wins in 2015.
Elliott and Cindric will each try to become the fifth different winner in five rounds of the 2022 season. Fraser McConnell won in the most recent outing at Glen Helen ahead of series points’ leader Robin Larsson.
The race at Wild Horse Pass will mark the third and fourth rounds in the United States after the series opened in the Unted Kingdom and Sweden. It is also the final round in 2022 before Nitro RX heads to Canada for a pair of races in 2023 and then closes their season at a to-be-announced location in America.
Kyle Busch also raced with the series in 2021 and “brought a little bit of NASCAR” with him to the show when he finished fourth in the Main.