By Mike Finney

DOVER — Not only did Chase Elliott snap his winless skein by driving to victory in Sunday’s rain-delayed Duramax/Drydene 400 at Dover Motor Speedway, he added to his lead in the NASCAR Cup Series points standings.

Elliott left Dover with a 50-point lead in the point standings over Ryan Blaney, who struggled for a 26th-place finish at the Monster Mile.

“As always, I’m just really proud of my team and excited to get a win,” Elliott said. “It’s still fairly early in the season. That’s always a good thing.

“It’s a good opportunity to build some more wins and bonus points before we get to the playoffs. There’s a lot of racing left, though, for sure.”

Elliott assured everybody at Dover that he remains as committed as ever to winning races.

Prior to winning on Monday, the last time he had hoisted a trophy was July 4 of last year at the Road America road course – 26 races ago.

“Yeah, look, I want to win always,” he said. “My drive to win, to do my job to the best of my ability, (and that) doesn’t change whether we are struggling, whether we are doing very good, whether I’m in a contract here, whether I’m not, whether my teammates have won and I haven’t.

“Those circumstances are fine and cool and great, but I want to do my job to the very best of my ability all the time no matter what, no matter the track, no matter the circumstances, always.”

Wild day for Hamlin

It was a wild up-and-down rollercoaster ride for Denny Hamlin in the Duramax/Drydene 400 Cup Series race at Dover Motor Speedway on Monday afternoon.

Hamlin, driver of the No. 11 FedEx Office Toyota for Joe Gibbs Racing, saw his fortunes change wildly over the course of the rain-delayed race.

Hamlin, who led 55 laps out of Sunday’s 78 that were completed before the rain postponed the race, drove past eventual winner Chase Elliott for the lead on the inside lane coming off the fourth turn on lap 93 on Monday.

He held the lead until the end of the race’s first stage at lap 120, however, during the ensuing pit stops, his pit crew failed to secure his left-front tire and it bounded off the car as he headed off pit road. He fell back to 29th place.

Hamlin managed to rebound from that incident and climbed back to fourth place but suffered more bad luck when Cody Ware spun coming of the fourth turn and hit the wall on lap 243

Ware, who was three laps down, then collided with Hamlin, who was running fourth, as he came down the track on the front straightaway.

Despite an encouraging start to the race, Hamlin wound up in 21st place despite leading the race two times for 67 laps.

Stuck at three

Past series champs Kevin Harvick, Kyle Busch and Martin Truex Jr. boast the most NASCAR Cup Series wins among active drivers at Dover – all with three victories each.

They remained stuck at three, far behind Jimmie Johnson’s record 11 Dover wins, following Monday’s race at Dover.

Busch led the trio with an eighth-place finish, while Harvick finished ninth and Truex was 12th.

“We just lost the car right there at the end of the second stage and it was plowing tight,” Harvick said. “We never really were able to find anything to make it any better.I’m not sure what happened.

“We’ll try to figure that out and go back to work for Darlington next weekend.”

Cindric last of the bunch

Austin Cindric, who won this year’s season-opening Daytona 500, posted the fastest average lap speed (157.846 mph) set in Saturday’s brief practice session for the Cup Series at Dover Motor Speedway.

However, while he did not know it, he might have foreseen his Dover destiny that day.

“I do love this racetrack,” Cindric said on Saturday. “This is a really tough racetrack for cars and we’re going a lot faster than I thought we would. It’s fun, but the fun can end pretty quick.”

Ironically, Cindric had the distinction of finishing in last place among the 36 drivers that started Monday’s rain-delayed race.

Cindric’s No. 2 Ford spun sideways entering the third corner and made contact with the outside wall just three laps after the Duramax Drydene 400 restarted following Sunday’s postponement.