There’s no sugarcoating it: Riley Herbst believes he needs to win in the NASCAR Xfinity Series. In 116 starts, he’s yet to stand triumphant in Victory Lane.
But winning isn’t something he stresses much about. It wasn’t long ago when he was barely a threat for the top 10 with Joe Gibbs Racing. He had a disappointing first year in 2021 with Stewart-Haas Racing, taking over the No. 98 Ford that won nine races the previous season with Chase Briscoe behind the wheel.
“In 2020, I had some speed in the 18 car but would put myself in bad positions and wrecked,” Herbst recalled to NASCAR.com. “In 2021, in the 98, we were not that great. We got a pole, but we weren’t good.”
Ahead of the 2022 season, Herbst signed on with Kevin Harvick Inc. Management as a client. Being in the Stewart-Haas family, it was an easy transition, already having a relationship with Harvick himself.
Over the past 14 months, Harvick has stressed to Herbst the importance of finishing races. He believes that to be frequently running inside the top five, you must first place inside the top 10. And to even sniff a win, the team must be consistently in the top five.
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“He’s done great; you’ve got to take what it will give you,” Harvick said. “He’s doing exactly what he needs to do, and it’s been a great start to the season and seems comfortable.”
Comfortable, indeed. Before getting spun by Brandon Jones and finishing 23rd at Richmond Raceway last weekend, Herbst was the lone driver to have top-10 finishes in the opening six races of the 2023 season. Comparing his average finish of ninth through seven races to 14.3 in the same amount of events last season — and 22.1 in 2021 — it’s easy to tell the Las Vegas, Nevada native has made great strides for SHR. He is coming off leading a career-high 27 laps at Richmond, in what he says is his favorite track on the schedule.
“I think the only way we could have started the season better was being in Victory Lane,” Herbst said. “Other than that, we’re doing well in stage points, we’re finishing well and that’s what we planned for. We want the best, but we’re doing what we planned.”
Richard Boswell, crew chief of the No. 98, credits Herbst’s preparation to the team’s early season success. It doesn’t hurt to have another year of experience under his belt and be among the longest-tenured drivers with a top team in the series, either.
“Things are just starting to click,” Boswell said. “He’s not making mistakes that he made before. He’s learned from those mistakes and has taken good notes going back to tracks. He’s progressing as a driver.”
Like many young drivers, Herbst doesn’t have a multitude of laps on tracks, given most weekends have between 15 and 20 minutes of practice. In his first two seasons, there was little to no practice because of COVID-19.
By Boswell’s tally, Herbst is just getting to the number of laps that a typical second-year driver would have in previous seasons. And progress is evident.
“That preparation and experience is coming together,” Boswell noted. “It’s a testament to everybody working hard and keeping a good core group together for a couple of years.”
Herbst stated that he began focusing on things that mattered and not reading social media. In the past, comments from people who already have him “labeled” weighed him down. But even away from the race track, his personal life is thriving. Coming full circle, he believes that also boosts his confidence.
“It took me a while to understand that I’m Riley,” Herbst said. “I’m not Cole Custer, I’m not Chase Briscoe. Once I felt like I got that settled and would be able to be myself, have fun and try to drive the race car the way I want to drive the race car, things started to turn.
“I have so much confidence in Richard and everybody on the 98 team. I know that they have confidence in me, and that’s what matters.”
MORE: 2023 Xfinity Series schedule
Herbst knows he will have naysayers no matter what the stat sheet reads. But as he said, “I’ve grown to laugh at it now because I went from getting hate because of wrecking race cars to now I’m getting hate for getting too many top 10s. If I start winning every week, then I’ll get hate from winning too much.”
Candidly, Herbst believes his No. 98 team can win at just about any circuit. He has top-five finishes this season at two distinctly different race tracks in Phoenix Raceway and Atlanta Motor Speedway. Before Richmond last weekend, he put together a streak of nine straight top-10 finishes, which is tied for the longest in SHR’s Xfinity Series history.
But that win still eludes him. He believes it’s the only thing he has left to check off. His next try comes in two weeks at Martinsville Speedway, where he finished third last fall.
“I wouldn’t be surprised if we won any of the next five races; if we won all of them, if we won one of them,” Herbst said. “It doesn’t matter because I know the progression that we’re taking and where we want to be when it comes late summer.”