Though the move is no longer legal, the “Hail Melon” still resonates for Ross Chastain.
The Trackhouse Racing driver’s world-famous wall ride at Martinsville Speedway catapulted him into the Championship 4 last season, and its memory remains fresh nearly a year later for NASCAR drivers and fans who reflect on his daredevil bravado with disbelief, respect and wonder.
“There must have been 10 million people at that track because I swear I’ve had that many tell me that they were there that day,” Chastain told NBC Sports. “It’s so cool.”
Chastain needed to gain two spots on the final lap to advance. By driving into the wall through Turns 3 and 4 at more than 50 mph above normal speed on the 0.526-mile oval, he passed five cars. His 18.845-second lap was the fastest in Cup history at Martinsville (the track record was 18.954 seconds) – and likely will be cemented in immortality after NASCAR (citing safety) outlawed the move before the 2023 season.
Chastain still enjoys soaking in the myriad perspectives on the move that was inspired by playing a NASCAR video game with his brother on a Nintendo GameCube in the mid-2000s.
“Seeing the fans’ cell phone video from the grandstands from different angles, and then hearing the crowd, it was wild,” Chastain said. “You can hear people asking each other what happened. Some are saying, ‘I missed it. What happened?’ Seeing just those grainy, shaky videos was probably the coolest part.
“And then hearing my family, my friends and where they were. My Uncle Richie had walked out of the room when we took the white flag, because he thought we were done. And he came running back in when my cousins went to screaming. It’s cool to hear those stories.”
Several drivers from Formula One and IndyCar also offered plaudits for Chastain’s real-life confirmation of a move that many of them had tried virtually.
“Seeing the people from around the world in the racing community interact with it is awesome,” Chastain said. “That some icons in the industry and in racing saw it and actually said good things. Some people said bad things. It’s OK.”
Yet even some who initially were turned off by the no-holds-barred maneuver have softened their tact. Among the biggest detractors in the immediate aftermath of the move, Kyle Larson has come to respect Chastain’s gumption.
“I just couldn’t believe immediately that a move like that would be legal,” Larson told NBC Sports recently. “I was pretty harsh about it and didn’t think it was the fairest way to advance to the final four. But when you really think about it, he raced between the wall and the apron, so I guess it could be considered legal. And it put a lot of eyes on our sport. So as time has gone on, and knowing that a move like that is never going to be allowed in the future, I’m more OK with how it happened and kind of put Ross Chastain and Trackhouse and (team owner) Justin Marks on the map. So that’s great for the sport.
“But I’m also happy that NASCAR has made a rule on it that you can’t pull a Hail Melon anymore.”
Larson nearly executed a similar move to win the 2021 Southern 500 but backed off to winner Denny Hamlin shortly after putting his car in the Darlington Raceway wall. “I could have won at Darlington doing it,” Larson said. “It’s just once I got in the middle of doing the move, I was (thinking), ‘I don’t really want to win this way.’ I’m glad I didn’t.
“It was crazy. It’s wild when you look at the data. (Chastain) legit clicked a gear — and you never run fifth gear at Martinsville — he went to fifth and held it wide open around the wall. That part is crazy and takes balls and imagination, too, for sure.”
Starting with the main character, here’s what Cup drivers told NBC Sports about what they remember from the last lap at Martinsville and how they processed what was happening:
Chastain: “Coming off Turn 4, I took the white flag, and Brandon McReynolds, my spotter, says ‘White flag, we need two spots.’ I confirmed it down in 1 and 2 because I knew the math. I knew we were out from five to go to 1 to go. But off Turn 4, as he said that, I thought about running the wall. I never thought about it in Turn 1. I’m glad I didn’t because now knowing how the car was, it wouldn’t have made it to Turn 3. And then (crew chief) Phil Surgen said, ‘Yeah, need two. Got to get them.’ And I never wavered.
“I don’t know what the rationale was in my mind, but probably just the short amount of time I had to think about it. I didn’t have any reasons why not to do it. I only had potential upside for gaining those spots, and I knew partway through the corner that I had not slowed down very much because it was a really vicious ride inside the car. It was really the longest crash I’ve ever had. It was almost 5 seconds long of crashing. And as I saw the sun in my eyes, everything was blurry. I knew I was getting close to Turn 4 and the gate. I let go of the wheel part way through the corner, and then I grabbed the wheel getting back on the straightaway when I felt it really compress. The first clear thing I saw out my window net was a No. 11, and I knew we’d done it.”
Bubba Wallace: “It was a blur. It was a massive blur. I was running eighth or ninth. Something just whizzed right by me, and I was like, ‘What is that?’ I was the middle of 3 and 4, and I finally have seen that it’s Ross, and I was like, ‘Wow.’ That was pretty impressive. Pretty smart move.”
Martin Truex Jr.: “I was just maybe barely coming off 2, and I just seen him flying through the middle of the corner, and it looked like he was going a million mph. I’m thinking, ‘Holy hell. What in the hell is going on up there? That is insane.’ I think the same reaction as everyone else. ‘What just happened?’ It was crazy how fast it looked like he was going, even from being in the car a straightaway back.”
William Byron: “Yeah, it was insane. That year was just crazy in general, all the things that were happening during the playoffs. It was just as expected. Props to him. It was a super brilliant move that he made there. I think a lot of people didn’t know how to feel about it. But for me personally, it was just a big brain move. It won’t happen again this year, but it was crazy seeing him come off Turn 4 and be that much faster. I’ve done some crazy stuff on iRacing. The people on there know that. I don’t know if I’ve ever ridden the wall in a race. But I definitely have tried it in practice sessions.”
Kyle Busch: “When I saw the Chastain move at the end of the Martinsville race, it made me think back to the year prior where I needed to win to get into the playoffs for the championship race at Phoenix. And I was running second to Alex Bowman on a couple of those late-race restarts, and I was not enough points ahead, positions ahead to point ahead of Truex, so I needed that win, and I kind of thought about it. I was like, man, what if I … I was just never, I guess, gutsy enough to make the move. But then I saw it be done by Ross to get himself those positions and get him into the final round, the championship race at Phoenix. And I’m like, ‘Damn it!’ I wish I took that moment, but I didn’t, and so he owns it. It was cool for what it was and what it accomplished and what it got him. You’ve got to put it all out there on the line. He put it all out there on the line and made something of it.”
Michael McDowell: “It wasn’t that far ahead of me. I came off Turn 2, and I saw a car ride the wall, I was like, ‘Oh man, a throttle stuck.’ It looked like somebody hung a throttle. I saw it on the replay, and it was the wildest thing I’ve ever seen. It was so perfectly executed, but it didn’t look real. It looked like someone was literally hitting a fast forward button. It just did not look real. I think it’ll still go down in history as one of the greatest moves and just a cool moment to see it.”
Tyler Reddick: “I had gotten rear-ended on a restart and wasn’t feeling good, so I was out of the race. I went and got checked out, and everything looked OK. I was just on the way home, watching the race on my phone. When I saw it the first time, I was like, ‘Oh damn, my head is messed up.’ But it was real. In hindsight, it was crazy to see but really smart. It’s one of those crazy things that even I was a little bit jealous of Ross. It’s something when I’ve just gotten to the end of the race, I’ve thought about doing it, especially with this Next Gen car. But he made it work when the moment mattered the most and made it through to Phoenix.”
Ryan Blaney: “I was running third, and I looked in my mirror into 3 coming to the checkered. I was just going to see where Brad (Keselowski) was. He was like 5-6 car lengths back of me, but I just wanted to peek. And I didn’t see anything as I entered the corner. But I looked in my mirror in the middle of the corner for some reason and just saw just this black dot, and I saw smoke, dust, paint, debris. Like when (Chastain) was hitting the crossover gate, and I was like, ‘What the heck was that?’ I didn’t know what it was. I knew there was a car up there, but I didn’t know that’s what he did. I thought someone just got moved and hit the fence. It was crazy watching the replay. It didn’t look real to me. It looks fake. It looks like someone just fast-forwarded his car and left everyone else the same. It was just the craziest thing to me. I saw glimpses of it in my mirror, but I didn’t really know what happened. I think everyone else was thinking the same thing. ‘What was that?’ You’ll never see it again. He made history on that one.”
Brad Keselowski: “I did not see the ‘Hail Melon’ move by Ross Chastain in real time. The only real glimpse I had of it was I entered Turn 3 with Denny Hamlin right behind me on my bumper, and I exited Turn 4 with Ross Chastain on my bumper, and I remember when the race was over, as we were cooling down the car and pulling into the garage area, thinking ‘Where did he come from?’ And then someone came over the radio and said, ‘Oh, you’ve got to see this move that Ross made!’ And I just thought maybe he did a bump and run on Denny Hamlin, and that he was behind him. And then I saw the video on the way home, and I thought, ‘Whoa, that was a ballsy move.’”
Joey Logano: “He took my top five away. He passed me off of 4, and he was going so much faster than I was. It was crazy. I’ve thought of doing it before, but I don’t think I’d ever be in position to have to do something like that and then do I have the cojones to do it. And Ross did it. I give him a lot of credit for doing it. And I’m glad they made a rule to where we can’t do it anymore. Because I don’t want to have to do that. He definitely opened a can of worms with that move, but it was one of the funniest, coolest things that I’ve seen, because it didn’t affect me. If it knocked me out of the Championship 4, and that was the move that did it, I would be pretty angry about it. But for me, I lost one spot because of it, and it was amazing to actually see happen.”
Denny Hamlin (bumped out of the Championship 4 by Chastain’s move): “Our car was so good, we drove through the field and gained the spots we needed to get in the (championship race), and then at that point, I managed my gap to (Chastain). They said, ‘White flag, you’re up by 2,’ I knew there was no way he was going to gain two spots in the last lap, and he found a way. I had to just applaud the move. He did what he had to do. Forward thinking by him for sure. It just came at my expense. Obviously, a novelty move that we’ll never see again, but hey, it just was another part of The Denny Hamlin Playoff Story.”