Friday’s Coca-Cola 600 practice session at Charlotte Motor Speedway gave Chase Elliott more time work with cousin Trey Poole, who is now serving as Elliott’s spotter.
Elliott needed a new spotter after NASCAR and Hendrick Motorsports indefinitely suspended Eddie D’Hondt on Wednesday for being arrested May 12 and charged with assault on a pregnant woman.
D’Hondt has a court appearance June 7 for the misdemeanor battery of an unborn child. D’Hondt has a court appearance June 30 for the misdemeanor assault on a female charge.
D’Hondt had been Elliott’s spotter since Elliott entered Cup. The team replaced D’Hondt with Poole, who was one of the team’s additional spotters last week at Circuit of the Americas.
Elliott, who is coming off his win at COTA, said it was an easy choice to select Poole.
“He knows me as well as anybody,” the reigning Cup champion said after practice Friday. “I know him as well as anybody knows him. He’s been to enough races, and he knows how this works and knows what’s important and what’s not. He’s fit in with our team.”
As for how long Poole will serve as spotter, Elliott said he isn’t sure.
“Trey does have other jobs and other things going on,” Elliott said. “I hope we can keep him until we figure out what’s going on down the road. I don’t see why we wouldn’t do anything different at this point.”
Poole also served as Austin Hill‘s spotter in the Camping World Truck Series race on Friday.
Elliott was 12th in practice. Qualifying is at 11:05 a.m. ET Saturday. The Coca-Cola 600 is at 6 p.m. ET Sunday on Fox. Austin Dillon was the fastest in practice.
