Chase Elliott finally had enough, Truex and Chastain go fishing, and Bill Elliott returns!

Put away the pitchforks and halt the picketing for a few weeks, because Chase is back!

And, frankly, NASCAR's Most Popular Driver has had enough of the nonsense. 

"Yeah, look, I want to win always," Elliott said after running away from the field Monday at Dover. "There's a lot of noise. I understand you guys are doing your jobs. I respect that.

"But at the end of the day, I want to win just as bad at Daytona at the start of the season, when no one has any stickers on their cars, just as bad as I do when we get to Phoenix at the end of the season, regardless of what has gone on."

Welcome back to Victory Lane, Clyde!

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Chase Elliott owns the Monster Mile ... so did Jeff Gordon!

We (I'll include myself here, Chase. You're right. I jumped the gun!) probably should have seen this coming, right? Despite not winning on an oval since Phoenix in 2020, if Chase was ever going to break out of this slump it was going to be at Dover. 

The Monster Mile is one of Elliott's best tracks and he probably should have at least three wins there now — we all remember him blowing that huge lead to Kyle Busch a few years back, right?

In any event, Chase has now tamed the monster twice, due in large part to a couple dominant restarts over Ross Chastain late in Monday's race. 

A big credit to you, Clyde. 

"I feel like Jeff (Gordon) and Alan (Gustafson) had a great package here to start really before I came along," Elliott said of his Dover dominance. "I would say that probably falls under that category more than anything I do special behind the wheel."

Fine. I take it back!

Ross Chastain gets a talkin' to from Martin Truex Jr. 

While Chase was running away from Ricky Stenhouse Jr. (where did he come from?), Chastain was mixing it up with Martin Truex Jr. for third. 

A quick recap: MTJ got a run on Ross, Chastain slammed the door, Truex rammed into the back of him and eventually spun out coming to the checkers. 

All right, Ross ... what was that post-race conversation with Truex like, because it looked heated. 

"Well, we were talking about where we were going fishing next week," Chastain told Fox Sports right after his ... debrief ... with Truex on pit road. 

Yes, Chastain did eventually acknowledge he should have left Truex a little more room. And no, I don't have any soundbites from MTJ himself, but I can confirm he did, um, use some creative language when talking about Chastain over the radio during the race. 

Is Truex Jr. retiring? NASCAR Silly Season taking shape

Speaking of Truex ... 

Are we sure the 41-year-old ain't riding off into the sunset after this season?

Reportedly, Truex is still deciding whether he wants to continue racing next season. If he does, most expect him, and his sponsors, to remain in the No. 19 car with Joe Gibbs Racing. 

But if Truex does decide to call it quits after 2022, the Coach does have some intriguing options to replace him — starting with grandson Ty Gibbs. All he's done is win seven races in 28 career Xfinity starts. Not bad!

I know it's a little early for Silly Season talk (although, it's never too early if we're being honest), but some other names I'd keep an eye on over the summer months: Erik Jones, Tyler Reddick, Ricky Stenhouse Jr., Ryan Preece and Noah Gragson. 

Bill Elliott, Richard Petty and Clint Bowyer in the same room?

Before we throw it ahead to Darlington, let's throw out one more stat for Hendrick Motorsports. 

Thanks to Chase finally getting his act together, HMS now becomes the first team ever to have four different drivers win in the first 11 races. Remember when Hendrick was going through those down years and would never get back to its former glory?

Me neither. 

Anyways, on to Darlington, where we get the annual throwback weekend (although it was better during the Labor Day race). There won't just be nostalgia on the track for this one, either!

Bill Elliott, Richard Petty and Bobby Labonte will be guest analysts in the Fox booth throughout the race, joining Clint Bowyer and Mike Joy at different times. 

Not sure Bobby's gonna be able to match Bowyer's enthusiasm level (he won't), but do yourself a favor and turn the TV up when Awesome Bill's on the mic. 

Thank me later.