Chase Elliott’s return to JR Motorsports proved to be a one-race affair, as the team has officially confirmed that Rajah Caruth will drive the No.88 Chevrolet in Saturday night’s Focused Health 250 at EchoPark Speedway in Atlanta.
The winner of the 2020 NASCAR Cup Series championship, Elliott, raced in his first race of the O’Reilly Auto Parts Series of 2026 on the previous weekend at Chicagoland Speedway and clinched a second-place finish. This was the first time Elliott competed in the O’Reilly Series for JR Motorsports since 2021.
Nevertheless, this switch was always planned as part of the driver rotation process. Now that Elliott has completed his one-off race stint, Caruth resumes his driver seat again.
Caruth opened the season with an eighth-place finish at EchoPark Speedway in February and has split time between JR Motorsports’ No.88 and the No.32 Chevrolet for Jordan Anderson Racing.
In nine starts in the No. 88, he has four top-10 finishes, which has helped his team stay second in the owner’s points in the O’Reilly Auto Parts Series.
As it stands now, Caruth is currently 14th in the points and 48 points behind the cutoff for the playoffs, with just four races left until the end of the regular season. The upcoming race on Saturday will be an important chance for him to catch up at a track where he has shown that he can compete.
Elliot is not competing this weekend as his O’Reilly Series schedule isn’t finished yet. The Cup Series star is expected to make one more start in the no.88 later this season at Indianapolis Motor Speedway, giving him two scheduled appearances for JR Motorsports in 2026.
For now, fans are focused on Caruth as Focused Health 250 live coverage begins Saturday, July 4 at 7:00 PM ET on the CW Network, with streaming available at Fubo TV.
2026-07-10 23:24:00
