Chase Elliott arrived at Richmond Raceway looking for playoff points in the penultimate race of the regular season. Instead, a pit road penalty and a multi-car wreck derailed his race. What was shaping up as a solid points day turned into his first DNF of the season.Saturday’s Cook Out 400 began with a bold strategy call from Elliott’s crew chief Alan Gustafson. Instead of pitting during the opening stage break, the No. 9 team chose to stay out with just five other drivers, preserving an extra set of tires. It was a calculated risk, sacrificing track position and stage points in favor of a long-game tire strategy.That plan initially paid off. Elliott managed to hang on to 13th by the end of Stage 1 despite being hounded by faster cars on fresher tires. He was the highest finisher among those who chose to gamble. But when he pitted at the stage break, the night took a turn.What happened to Chase Elliott on pit road at Richmond Raceway?Chase Elliott (9) and Harrison Burton (21) during the 2024 Pala Casino 400. Source: GettyThe issue came as Chase Elliott tried to guide his Chevrolet into his pit stall. Richmond's pit lane is notoriously tight, with boxes stacked closely together. Elliott's entry forced him to clip Chase Briscoe's No. 19 pit box while turning in, an infraction known as vehicle interference. NASCAR officials flagged it immediately, sending Elliott to the tail end of the field before the start of Stage 2.The rule states that drivers must stay within their own assigned stall area when entering or exiting, without obstructing another team’s pit crew. At Richmond, with narrow lanes and pit boxes often bunched in awkward spots, even small misjudgments can draw penalties. The call was made from the Pit Road Officiating trailer, where officials monitor real-time video feeds to catch such infractions.Chase Elliott explained after the race that he wasn't trying to interfere but simply avoiding boxing himself in (via NASCAR):"I would never intentionally do that or try and make them get further left.... I just don't want to get in a position where I'm angled so far in, that now I've blocked him in and we have a bad angle for our stop. So all I was trying to do is just take as much room as I could to get back straight and not cause another issue at the end of the pit stop."From that point forward, the Hendrick Motorsports driver was in recovery mode, trying to climb back through heavy traffic.Any hope of salvaging the race disappeared after a restart in Stage 2. Running in the middle of the pack, Elliott initially threaded through chaos when Chase Briscoe spun across the field after contact from Kyle Busch. Just as Elliott thought he had cleared the wreck, Busch's car slid back down the track and clipped him in the right rear.Elliott's Chevrolet shot into the outside wall nose-first, ending his day on Lap 198. It was his first DNF of the year after a streak of completing nearly every lap in 2025.William Byron, meanwhile, managed to bring the car home 12th despite suffering contact in the same wreck. That finish was enough for him to secure his first-ever regular season title.For Chase Elliott, though, the story was different. Instead of closing the gap on Byron, he now sits second in the standings with just Daytona left to set the playoff grid.