Posted on by Staff Report

The NASCAR Cup Series enters Round 2 of the 2025 In-Season Challenge this weekend, with the streets of Chicago acting as host for Sunday’s race (2 p.m. ET, TNT Sports/truTV, HBO Max, MRN Radio, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio).

QUALIFYING ORDER: Cup Series | Xfinity Series 

All 41 cars will have a chance to post a qualifying time Saturday (2 p.m. ET, truTV, MRN Radio, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio), with one open team failing to make Sunday’s main event.

Saturday’s qualifying session will consist of one round, split into two 20-minute groups. The groups below are determined via a metric that combines the previous race finish by owner (70%) and current owner points position (30%).

MORE: How to watch on TNT Sports | Weekend schedule

# denotes series rookie
(i) denotes ineligible for driver points

Pos.Car No.DriverMetric ScoreGroup
113Will Brown58.71
233Austin Hill (i)41.61
367Corey Heim (i)41.01
466Josh Bilicki (i)33.81
599Daniel Suárez32.51
62Austin Cindric 30.51
735Riley Herbst #30.11
812Ryan Blaney30.11
922Joey Logano28.51
1021Josh Berry28.11
1119Chase Briscoe27.51
124Noah Gragson27.41
1334Todd Gilliland27.31
1488Shane van Gisbergen #26.41
1524William Byron26.21
161Ross Chastain25.51
177Justin Haley25.11
1842John Hunter Nemechek25.11
1941Cole Custer23.51
2011Denny Hamlin22.91
2120Christopher Bell22.51
2278Katherine Legge (i)22.32
233Austin Dillon21.82
248Kyle Busch20.72
2551Cody Ware19.92
2623Bubba Wallace19.62
2771Michael McDowell19.22
2854Ty Gibbs17.02
2960Ryan Preece15.02
3010Ty Dillon14.92
3116AJ Allmendinger13.52
325Kyle Larson12.82
3338Zane Smith12.42
3477Carson Hocevar12.42
3547Ricky Stenhouse Jr.10.52
366Brad Keselowski9.52
3717Chris Buescher9.02
3843Erik Jones8.32
3948Alex Bowman5.72
4045Tyler Reddick4.62
419Chase Elliott1.32
Posted on by Cara Cooper

Seekonk Speedway’s championship format resembles that of the NASCAR Cup Series. The top finisher among the final four in points in the last race of the season wins the title.

Dylan Estrella finished second in the final race of 2024 to win his first Pro Stock championship at Seekonk, a NASCAR Advance Auto Parts Weekly Series track in Massachusetts. But if the track were going by points, he would have finished second overall.

This year, Estrella wants to leave no doubt.

“As a racer that came up always being behind the point system where it was however well you did throughout the year that’s where you finish. … It felt great to obviously have that championship, but it’s like a little bit unaccomplished in my mind just because I wasn’t the points leader at the end of the year,” he said. “You still do have to do the best out of those guys for the last almost month, month-and-a-half of racing, so obviously nothing to take away from it, it’s just my own fixed-goal self of wanting to be the points leader and win at the same time like they did in the old days.”

Estrella has not yet reached Victory Lane this season, but he has finished in the top five in four of Seekonk’s five Pro Stock races. His 220 points place him sixth in the track’s standings, just eight points back from the lead.

Last year delivered Estrella’s first Pro Stock title at Seekonk, but he’s no stranger to the track. He’s won three other titles — two in the Late Model division and one in Mini Cup — and has been driving there for nearly two decades.

“My dad worked on a Pro Stock when I was a kid, and Seekonk had their youth division, they ran Mini Cup,” Estrella said. “They’re like younger kids. I think it was anywhere from the ages of like 10 to 18. And I ended up seeing those on a Saturday night show and I asked my dad if I could try one. He knew someone that had one, and once I got behind the wheel, it was kind of off into the sunset from there.”

Twenty years later, Estrella’s dad is still his crew chief, and the team has grown but stayed close-knit. Another friend, Jim, has also been there for years and is “basically an all-around guy,” Estrella said, helping with everything from working on the car to helping get tires ready.

“Pretty much anything you can think of, he gets his hands in it,” he added.

Seekonk Speedway
Seekonk Speedway (Photo: Jaiden Tripi/NASCAR)

Estrella’s best friend, Mike, is also there every week as the team’s tire guy and spotter.

“He’s been with us forever, since I was running late models,” Estrella said. “Anywhere between probably 10 to 12 years with us. It feels like forever.”

Even the girls in the Estrella family are at the track every week.

“My mom has been to every race. Never misses them,” Estrella said. “She video tapes every one. My wife goes to every single one, and we just had our daughter last year, so last year was kind of getting our feet wet, bringing the little one around, and I know it was really hectic for her, but she didn’t miss a race.

“And my sister’s always there, and bunch friends come because we’re only probably about 30 minutes from the track, so it’s easy for everyone to get out there.”

As much as Estrella enjoys winning and taking home titles, it’s the chance to share the sport with friends and family that keeps him coming back.

“That’s definitely a lot of the reason why I do it,” he said. “Obviously anyone that gets behind the wheel falls in love with it. You love driving and the competition, but a lot of it is knowing that I’ve got family members that I don’t get to see very often, that’s my time to go and see and hang out with them.”

Last year was Estrella’s first back at Seekonk after spending three seasons traveling across New England to race.

He came into 2025 with largely the same car and setup as he used to win the championship last season.

“To be honest, we just did everything exactly the same,” he said. “We had a good car at the end of the year, and we wanted to start off that way and hopefully just build off of what we had last year. And so far it’s been going pretty good.

“Hopefully me going into this year with a different mindset… just finish every race and see where we end up at the end.”

While Estrella is hoping to improve even more on his 2024 title, he’s making sure to keep fun at the forefront of his mind both on and off the track.

“We haven’t had any major issues or anything like that. It’s been good clean racing, a lot of green flag laps at Seekonk. Nothing really to complain about so far,” he said.

“It’s just one of those things for us, we’re not really making a killing and a living off of it. We’re just doing it for fun. So try and keep it at a fun level so it’s at least something to look forward to every weekend and you’re not stressed out about it.”

Posted on by Dustin Albino

Food often brings people closer together. Just ask NASCAR Hall of Famer Matt Kenseth and three-time Cup Series winner Erik Jones.

Kenseth joined Legacy Motor Club as a competition advisor toward the end of the 2023 season. One of his first calls was to Jones, who, roughly six years earlier at Joe Gibbs Racing, replaced the 2003 Cup Series champion in the No. 20 Toyota.

RELATED: Chicago schedule | Cup Series standings

The new teammates settled on Flatiron, a restaurant in Davidson, North Carolina, as their meetup location. Over nearly two years, they’ve established a close-knit relationship, with Kenseth even attending Jones’ surprise birthday party in late May.

“Erik and I have always gotten along, but we never really knew each other at a high level at all,” Kenseth told NASCAR.com. “It was somewhat interesting because when I left Gibbs, they decided not to bring me back. I wholeheartedly wanted to be back for another year or two before I retired, and they replaced me with Erik, which makes it kind of interesting. The same thing happened with him.

“I think he had a lot of apprehension because he didn’t know me that well, and he took over that car when I wasn’t there.”

During Jones’ rookie campaign in 2017, when his services were loaned to Furniture Row Racing, he occasionally interacted with Kenseth as quasi-teammates. Jones was also Kenseth’s fill-in driver late in 2015 when the 39-time Cup winner was suspended for deliberately wrecking Joey Logano — another former No. 20 car driver — at Martinsville Speedway.

Kenseth believes Jones was a bit anxious when they first met for lunch, unsure of how the situation would unfold.

Jones, a fellow Midwesterner like Kenseth, admits replacing a former champion at JGR made it tough to connect. At the same time, Kenseth never feared a younger driver in a manufacturer’s system as he always believed in his own ability. Still, JGR opted to go in a new direction after Jones took the Craftsman Truck Series and Xfinity Series by storm, collecting 16 victories, including the 2015 Truck championship with Kyle Busch Motorsports.

“Matt knew that he was the guy that was going to be out in that situation and ended up moving to make room for myself coming up through there,” Jones said. “That made it harder to build a relationship. I don’t know that there was any animosity from him towards me, and obviously, there was none from me to him. But when you’re getting replaced, it’s never an easy situation.”

There was no angst from Kenseth.

“I’ve been around it for a long time, and the owners and other people make those decisions,” he said. “It’s not like the driver did it, or he was the owner and let me go.

“To be fair, Erik was Toyota’s guy at the time. He was Kyle’s [Busch] guy, Coach’s [Joe Gibbs] guy and was running really well and having a ton of success. I wasn’t exactly a spring chicken, so if you look at it, objectively, you can’t really blame anyone for that.”

Aside from lunch, Jones can’t recall exactly how the duo struck up a friendship. While befriending each other, it became apparent they had interchangeable personalities.

“I see a lot of my younger self in Erik, for sure,” Kenseth added. “He’s not nearly as funny, but other than that, there are a lot of similarities. There are certainly a lot of differences, too, but there are a lot of similarities, which helps me with him because I see a lot of things where I feel like I’ve learned from in the past: good, bad or indifferent.

“Same thing with John Hunter [Nemechek]. I can say certain things or act certain ways that I can sympathize with what they are saying, but I can also live through a lot of it and help them from making the same mistakes, wrong judgments or whatever that I did.”

Away from the track, Kenseth has turned Jones into a fitness guru. Jones doesn’t think he will ever get to Kenseth’s level as he’s an avid long-distance runner, having competed in several marathons. Their longest run together is roughly four miles.

With guidance from Kenseth, Jones aims to continue improving his health through regular gym visits. Mentally, he’s found it helpful in getting through certain races.

“I think I’m in the best shape I’ve been in through racing,” Jones said. “Thirty-six to 38 races per year is hard on your body. When you’re 20 years old, it’s easy to hop in a car and go and feel good about everything. When you’re on the backside of 20, it’s not as easy to recover, not as easy to get through some of these days.

“That’s the biggest thing for me, just feeling better the day after these days and recovering faster has been the biggest bonus.”

MORE: Cup Series schedule

Recent structural changes within Legacy Motor Club have elevated the team on the track, too. With six consecutive top-20 finishes, highlighted by a fifth-place effort last weekend at EchoPark Speedway (formerly Atlanta Motor Speedway), Jones has skyrocketed 13 positions in the regular-season championship standings to 16th. Technically, he’s tied with Austin Cindric for 15th, but the Talladega Superspeedway victor holds the tiebreaker.

While the two-chartered team has taken big steps forward, Kenseth remains a realist. In his advisory role, he assists Legacy’s drivers, attends competition and engineer meetings, mingles with sponsors and frequents roughly 10 races throughout the season. He gets a firsthand glimpse into how the team operates.

“To be totally honest, we started the year not taking as big of a step forward as I expected or was hoping we would take,” Kenseth said. “I feel like we took a pretty big leap within the last [seven or eight] weeks. We’ve had cars — both or one of them — that were capable of running in the top 10. I don’t know if we had cars last year capable of running in the top 10, but once or twice.

“It’s been a big leap, but there’s a long way to go to get to where we want to be.”

With eight races remaining in the regular season, Jones ranks 18th on the playoff grid, 49 points below current bubble driver Bubba Wallace.

Posted on by Dustin Albino

When Taylor Gray tackled a partial Xfinity Series schedule during the 2024 season, he knew what the future held. Ultimately, the prospect transitioned to a full-time promotion with Joe Gibbs Racing in 2025.

Gray, 20, has been best friends with Ty Gibbs for as long as he can remember. The duo grew up competing against each other. So, when Gray was announced as the full-time driver of the No. 54 Toyota, the same ride in which Gibbs led to a dominant 2022 championship run, Gibbs was listed as the car owner in a full-circle moment for both of them.

RELATED: Xfinity Series standings | Chicago weekend schedule

“Going back and forth between the truck and an Xfinity car last year hurt me [with] the Xfinity car a little bit,” Gray told NASCAR.com, as he nearly missed out on a Championship 4 berth last fall at Martinsville Speedway. “I’ll be very honest, I’m not as good as some other guys that are out here that are able to switch back and forth between cars, whether it’s because I’m younger and still need some time to learn or what.”

Gray followed in his brother–Tanner Gray’s–footsteps. The duo started racing in the Ford camp with Tricon Garage and shifted to the Toyota pipeline when the organization switched manufacturers ahead of the 2023 season. Gray had to sit out the opening three races of his rookie campaign in the Craftsman Truck Series, as he didn’t turn 18 years old until late March.

Maturity has never been an issue for Gray. His veteran crew chief, Jason Ratcliff, saw the wisdom from the time they met. He appreciates the way the rookie driver analyzes data and how he isn’t afraid to be vocal.

Tyler Allen, who won eight races last year in the Xfinity Series, was originally slated to be Gray’s crew chief. However, a personnel shuffle at JGR moved Allen to the Cup Series, and Ratcliff stepped in to fill the role. Currently, he’s only working with Gray for 2025 after earlier announcing his retirement from the pit box late in 2023.

“It worked out and it was so late in the game that Coach called me and said, ‘Hey, what do you think about this?’” Ratcliff remembered. “I said, ‘Under these circumstances, I believe in Taylor and believe that he has what it takes to be successful and win. I like the race team that’s going to surround him. If you need me to come out for a year and do this thing and see if we can make a go of it, then let’s do it.’”

MORE: Taylor Gray’s driver page

With one of the Xfinity GOATs of crew chiefs — Ratcliff has won 57 races — atop the pit box, Gray felt a sense of comfort entering his rookie year.

“Before I knew [Ratcliff] was going to do this, I was a little nervous about it,” Gray added. “I had faith and wasn’t stressing it too hard. I was happy for Tyler. I was happy for him and there’s no bad blood there at all.”

After eclipsing the halfway point of his first full season last weekend at EchoPark Speedway, Gray jumped four positions in the regular-season championship standings to eighth, with a 28-point cushion over the elimination line. The No. 54 team had a standout run at Martinsville Speedway, leading a career-high 87 laps, only to be dumped by Sammy Smith on the final lap. He finished second to Cup Series star Kyle Larson at Texas Motor Speedway. And in the series’ return to Autódromo Hermanos Rodríguez, Gray raced clean with Daniel Suarez on the final lap to finish as runner-up. That started a streak of three straight top-10 finishes, including a stage win at Atlanta.

Despite a solid start to 2025, Gray would argue that it should be better.

“We’ve had a lot of bad luck,” he stated. “We’ve had speed everywhere we’ve shown up. There have only been a handful of places where we’ve shown up and been legitimate outside the top five car. Most places that we go to this year, we should have finished top five and for sure won a race by now.

“I think it’s been a good year. It seems like we’re starting to get luck back on our side a little bit and have to keep putting together these races and stringing them along.”

Ratcliff is pleased with the No. 54 team’s performance. The group has done what it’s set out to do, minus capturing a checkered flag, which he believes will come sooner rather than later.

“All in all, [Gray is] doing a nice job as far as being a rookie in this series,” Ratcliff noted. “When you look at the statistics side of it, we’ve run up front. We haven’t finished where we feel like we’ve raced every week, but it’s been dumb stuff that takes us out of it. Some of it is our fault and we didn’t execute like we needed to. We sit down each week and talk about those things and what we can do better. When we look at things and say, ‘This is what we need to improve,’ typically, we improve. I like that. It’s the sign of a strong team.”

Being close to victory on multiple occasions has stung, but Gray isn’t concerned that he will not experience the thrill of Victory Lane this season. He expects to win multiple times.

“We’re capable of winning and we’re a winning team,” Gray added. “I know it’s going to come. I’m not sitting here like, ‘that was our only shot to win.’ We’re going to have a lot of wins this year, so I’m not too worried about it.”

Next up is Saturday’s Chicago Street Race (4:30 p.m. ET, The CW, MRN Radio, Sirius XM NASCAR Radio). Ratcliff has noticed Gray’s prowess on road courses and wouldn’t be surprised if the No. 54 car is in the mix again this weekend.

Posted on by Seth Sharp

To celebrate 75 years worth of memories, the legendary Wood Brothers Racing team will be celebrated throughout the summer with “Wood Brothers Wednesdays” on The NASCAR Channel.

Wood Brothers Racing has been around since 1950, when Glen and Leonard Wood teamed up to pioneer a legacy that has transcended time.

Glen was behind the wheel of their car at Bowman Gray Stadium in 1960 and took the Wood Brothers Racing team to Victory Lane for the first time. The team scored its 101st NASCAR Cup Series victory in 2025, when Josh Berry took the checkered flag at Las Vegas Motor Speedway.

Bookending those victories were triumphs everywhere from Daytona to Darlington to Rockingham and everywhere in between. Twenty of NASCAR’s 75 Greatest Drivers have piloted a car for the team throughout their storied history, one that is well worth celebrating.

RELATED: How to watch The NASCAR Channel

This Wednesday’s content will highlight the 1991 Champion Spark Plug 400 from Michigan International Speedway.

Dale Jarrett raced full-time in the Xfinity Series from its inception in 1982 until 1987, when he also made 24 starts in the Cup Series. The son of two-time Cup Series champion Ned Jarrett, Dale finished fifth or better in the Xfinity Series standings from 1983 to 1987, while winning two races.

It led the second-generation driver to make those 24 starts in the 1987 Cup Series season for Eric Freelander. He showed tons of promise on short tracks, compiling a 10th-place finish at both Bristol Motor Speedway and Martinsville Speedway, while also finishing 12th at North Wilkesboro Speedway.

He split the 1988 season between the No. 29 car for Cale Yarborough and the No. 1 for Hoss Ellington. Jarrett and Yarborough split the No. 29 car that season, and Jarrett later raced for Yarborough’s team full-time in 1989 following Yarborough’s retirement from driving.

He picked up five top-10 finishes in 1990 but was replaced with veteran driver Dick Trickle for the 1991 season, leaving Jarrett without a Cup Series ride and forcing him back to the Xfinity Series.

Jarrett didn’t let the setback put him down, as he started the season with four straight top-10 finishes and found himself on top of the series standings. Fast forward to April 1, 1990, and Neil Bonnett, who at the time was driving the No. 21 for Wood Brothers Racing, was injured in a crash at Darlington Raceway.

Bonnett was knocked unconscious in a 13-car crash at the track, sustaining total amnesia due to the incident. It was the fourth time in five years that Bonnett was hospitalized with injuries. This left the legendary team without a driver as Bonnett recovered at home in Alabama.

Enter Jarrett into the picture once again.

He finished out the 1990 season with the team as the partnership grew stronger throughout the year. Jarrett finished the season with four top-10 finishes over his final seven races; he entered the season with just eight in his career.

Hopes were high for the 1991 season when it was announced that Jarrett would continue to race the iconic No. 21 for Wood Brothers Racing that season.

The team put up a handful of solid runs throughout the first few months of the season, notably notching a sixth-place finish in the Daytona 500, a fifth in the Coca-Cola 600 and then three straight top 10s heading into the August date at Michigan.

Jarrett, who sat 13th in the standings, qualified 11th for the race.

The 34-year-old Jarrett finally had a chance at grabbing that elusive first checkered flag of his Cup Series career after so many years of working to get to the Cup Series. The race came down to Jarrett trying to catch Davey Allison, whose father had also won a championship.

The two drivers ran side by side over the final few moments of the race, making contact several times. Jarrett inched in front of Allison at the last moment, finally taking the checkered flag in a thrilling finish.

The victory was not only significant for Jarrett but also for his team. It was the 95th win for the Wood Brothers Racing team, but the first in 154 starts since Kyle Petty won at Charlotte Motor Speedway in 1987.

Jarrett credited his team with making the call not to take tires, which gave him the best shot at finally driving into Victory Lane.

It was also bittersweet for the Jarrett-Wood Brothers combination as Jarrett had already announced that he would be leaving the team at the end of the season to join the new Cup Series team owned by Super Bowl champion coach Joe Gibbs.

In addition to the exciting race at Michigan, there will also be a documentary titled “The Wood Brothers” on the schedule to watch.

The NASCAR Channel delivers 24/7, always-on content, featuring the latest news and information from around the sport, original programming and race replays.

It is a FAST channel (Free-Ad-Supported Television) and can be watched on your TV or mobile device via one of its streaming partners, such as Tubi or Xumo Play.

Posted on by Team Release

DETROIT — Foxxtecca, an experiential media and events company that bridges mobility, tech, culture, and motorsports, is proud to announce its sponsorship of Lavar Scott’s debut in the NASCAR Xfinity Series. The partnership is in collaboration with Alpha Prime Racing, marking a bold new chapter in the company’s efforts to support rising talent and increase representation in motorsports.

A two-race commitment to Lavar and Alpha Prime, Foxxtecca will serve as a secondary sponsor during Scott’s NASCAR Xfinity debut at the Betrivers 200 on July 19 at Dover Motor Speedway and a primary sponsor for the race at World Wide Technology Raceway on September 6.

“Over the past couple of years, I’ve had the chance to get to know Lavar, and he’s truly a dynamic individual,” said Chris Harris, co-founder of Foxxtecca. “When he brought us the opportunity to sponsor, it immediately felt like the right fit. This collaboration isn’t just about putting our name on a car, it’s about aligning with good people who share our values.”

RELATED: ARCA Menards Series standings

Scott currently competes in the NASCAR ARCA Menards Series, where he earned the 2024 Rookie of the Year title. As of this announcement, he is ranked second in the ARCA championship standings, continuing to demonstrate his growth, consistency, and future potential in the sport.

“Supporting Lavar in his Xfinity debut is an extension of our commitment to creating more space for diverse voices in motorsports,” Harris continued. “After speaking with Tommy Joe Martins from Alpha Prime Racing, it was clear that we’re all on the same page when it comes to representation, opportunity and building something meaningful. That kind of synergy made the decision easy.”

Representation has become a staple of the Alpha Prime Racing driver lineup over the organization’s four years in the NASCAR Xfinity Series. Young star Rajah Caruth was the first driver signed by the team in 2022 and debuted at his home track of Richmond Raceway in the spring of that year.

Alpha Prime Racing team president Tommy Joe Martins sees Lavar as one of the sport’s most promising young drivers.

“We’ve been really lucky to have some great young drivers come through our team, and I’m very excited to be adding Lavar to our roster,” said Martins. “He’s come through the same development ladder as Rajah [Caruth] with Rev [Racing], and you can see how competitive he’s been in ARCA the past few seasons at all different types of race tracks. And he’s got all the intangible stuff, too. Great attitude, work ethic, very humble. He’s going to go far. And it’s a big deal to me and Caesar [Bacarella – Co-owner of Alpha Prime Racing] to create a team that gives opportunities to drivers like Lavar.”

Lavar Scott was equally thrilled about the opportunity to race at the NASCAR national series level.

“Making my NASCAR Xfinity Series debut is a huge step forward in my career, and I’m incredibly grateful for the opportunity. This is a moment I’ve worked toward for a long time. Having the support of Foxxtecca and Alpha Prime Racing means the world to me, not just because they believe in me as a driver, but because they’re committed to creating real change in this sport. Together, we’re not just racing, we’re moving the culture forward, and I’m proud to be a part of that.”

The collaboration reinforces Foxxtecca’s commitment to empowering new voices in racing while building authentic partnerships that reflect its mission: pushing culture forward through mobility, media, and meaningful representation.

Posted on by Zack Albert

Trackhouse Racing and Daniel Suárez announced Tuesday that they had mutually agreed to part ways at the end of the 2025 NASCAR Cup Series season, marking one of the first dominoes in the annual “Silly Season” shift of personnel.

As driver of the No. 99 Chevrolet, Suárez scored both of his Cup Series victories under the Trackhouse banner — Sonoma in 2022 and Atlanta last season — and his looming departure at year’s end creates a vacancy at one of NASCAR’s fastest-growing organizations. Suárez currently ranks 29th in the Cup Series standings at the season’s midpoint.

RELATED: Cup Series standings | Chicago weekend schedule

Suárez joined the Justin Marks-founded team as the driver for the team’s inaugural season of competition in 2021, when it forged into the Cup Series as a single-car operation. The organization has since grown to three chartered teams, with Suárez aligned with teammates Ross Chastain and Shane van Gisbergen.

“The role Daniel has played in the Trackhouse origin story and its first five years will remain a valued part of the company’s history forever,” Marks said in a statement. “His commitment, work ethic and dedication to the effort is one of the most impressive things I personally have seen in my career. We will forever be thankful and honored that Daniel chose to spend many incredible years with us. We are proud of his wins, his successes, the growth of his brand, and his emergence as a valuable athlete in America’s greatest motorsport. But, most of all, I’m proud of him as a friend. I’m truly excited to see what awaits him in the next chapter of his amazing career. We are grateful for the professionalism, effort and heart he’s brought to our organization.”

Suárez released his own statement shortly before the announcement as “a message to my amigos.”

“Trackhouse and I have mutually agreed to part ways at the end of the 2025 season,” Suárez said. “I’ve had some of the best years of my Cup Series career at Trackhouse. We had great successes as a team and I gained some incredible friends. We took a team nobody had even heard of in 2021 and in just a couple of years we were winning races and running up front on a weekly basis. Just like the seasons in a year, sometimes things change and we have mutually agreed to each go in our own direction. I wish Trackhouse nothing but the best, this 99 team will always be special to me. And like I always say, the best is ahead!”

Suárez has yet to qualify for this year’s NASCAR Cup Series Playoffs, needing a victory in the final eight regular-season races to reach the postseason. Both of his teammates have clinched playoff berths, with Chastain winning the Coca-Cola 600 in May and SVG prevailing in Suárez’s home country of Mexico three weeks later.

The 33-year-old veteran said June 4 that his free-agent status was a complication ahead of the NASCAR Cup Series’ first event in Mexico City. “Definitely, it’s a distraction,” Suárez said. “I won’t sit here and tell you that it doesn’t really matter. It’s definitely a distraction, but I’m trying to be as smart as possible and to put all this stuff on the side and to just do my thing on the track.”

Suárez’s most recent contract extension with Trackhouse was announced in August 2024, a one-year deal that kept him in the No. 99 Chevy for a fifth season. But in reaching that agreement, Suárez said that he hoped for company-wide performance gains to sustain their relationship.

“There is a lot of things in Trackhouse that are adjusting and changing,” Suárez said then. “Performance-wise, we’re not exactly where we want to be — not just in the 99 but in Trackhouse as a company, and we have to make sure that we fix that before we want to go any longer. This goes really both ways.”

The growth of Trackhouse has been steady. The organization expanded to two teams in 2022, adding Chastain in the first season of NASCAR’s Next Gen car. The team also founded Project 91 that year as an avenue to attract global motorsports stars to NASCAR’s top series, setting a course to becoming a three-car operation this season with SVG’s promotion to Cup.

The team also signed teenage prospect Connor Zilisch to a developmental deal, partnering with JR Motorsports for a full Xfinity Series campaign this year. The 18-year-old rookie, who has made three Cup starts for Trackhouse this season, is a top candidate to replace Suárez in the No. 99. He ranks fifth in the Xfinity Series standings with two wins (COTA, Pocono) and a series-leading four pole positions this year.

Suárez is in his ninth season of Cup Series competition. He was promoted to NASCAR’s top division after winning the Xfinity Series championship in 2016, called up by Joe Gibbs Racing after the abrupt retirement of Hall of Famer Carl Edwards. Suárez spent two years with Gibbs before single-season stops at Stewart-Haas Racing and Gaunt Brothers Racing.

When Trackhouse Entertainment Group first announced its big-league NASCAR effort, Suárez was tapped as its first driver. “We are building a team of winners and Daniel has delivered just about every time he’s sat in race-winning equipment,” Marks said in a statement at Trackhouse’s launch in October 2020.

Posted on by Chris Murdock

Although Chase Elliott was the one celebrating in Victory Lane at the end of Saturday’s drafting-style showdown at EchoPark Speedway (formerly Atlanta Motor Speedway), it was Alex Bowman who played a vital role in securing the win for Hendrick Motorsports.

RELATED: Atlanta race results | In-Season Challenge hub

Bowman finished in the top 10 across all three categories tracked by NASCAR Insights metrics from EchoPark, with his best ranking being third in Restart Rating, enabling the driver of the No. 48 Chevrolet to stay competitive during the final-stage restarts. Bowman was one of only two drivers in the top-five finishing order to rank in the top five in the restart category — the other being Elliott.

The other category in which the driver from Tucson, Arizona, shone brightly was his Passing Rating, where he ranked fourth, and it was showcased in those final laps, maneuvering through the field with his Hendrick Motorsports counterpart in the No. 9 Chevrolet and eventually propelling Elliott past Brad Keselowski for the race win.

After helping Elliott to Victory Lane on Saturday, Bowman now becomes the only driver in the Hendrick Motorsports camp who is winless for the 2025 season. Fret not, Bowman fans, the race on the streets of Chicago on Sunday (2 p.m. ET, TNT Sports, TruTV, HBO Max, MRN Radio, Sirius XM NASCAR Radio) is where he secured a win last year that put himself in the postseason conversation.

Bowman’s third-place finish at EchoPark also advanced him into the second round of NASCAR’s inaugural In-Season Challenge, eliminating No. 25 seed and defending Cup Series champion Joey Logano. Bowman now squares off against No. 9 seed Bubba Wallace at a track where the two had a slight dustup on the cool-down lap.

Other notables from last weekend’s race:

  • Zane Smith’s second-place ranking in Restart Rating allowed the driver of the No. 38 to stay up front, being one of three Fords to finish inside the top 10.
  • Carson Hocevar’s first-place ranking in Passing Rating indicated that, despite the damage from in-race incidents, he was still able to position his car for a top-10 run.
  • AJ Allmendinger’s ninth-place ranking in Restart Rating put him in position to vault past Michael McDowell and move on to Round 2 in the In-Season Challenge.

Posted on by Zach Sturniolo

Alex Bowman is heading back to the streets of Chicago with the wind in his sails after a third-place finish in Saturday night’s In-Season Challenge opener at EchoPark Speedway. And with three straight top-15 finishes, perhaps Bowman has finally shed the horrible luck he had through the spring after pushing Hendrick Motorsports teammate Chase Elliott to the win at the track formerly known as Atlanta Motor Speedway.

NASCAR.com’s Zach Sturniolo ranks the top 20 Cup Series contenders after The Quaker State 400 at EchoPark Speedway and before Sunday’s Chicago Street Race (2 p.m. ET, TNT Sports/truTV, HBO Max, MRN Radio, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio).

RELATED:  2025 Cup Series schedule | Full Cup Series standings

Analysis: Welcome back to Victory Lane, Mr. Consistency. The man with the best average finish in the NASCAR Cup Series (10.3) finally has a win to go along with it after a last-lap pass on Brad Keselowski for his second win at his hometown track. The No. 9 team has been hot lately and heads to Chicago with three straight top-five finishes after snapping a 44-race winless streak. The city streets have been hit-or-miss for Elliott in NASCAR’s two trips — third in 2023 and 21st in 2024 — but with seven career road-course wins, Elliott is still the series’ current road-course king. And oh by the way — Elliott is the only race winner this year to advance to Round 2 of the In-Season Challenge.

Analysis: By the No. 5 team’s (unrealistically high) standards, the last month and a half has been a roller coaster for Larson. In six races since winning on May 11 at Kansas, Larson has three top 10s and two finishes of 36th or worse with zero laps led since the Coca-Cola 600 on Memorial Day Weekend at Charlotte. He was caught in a couple of melees in Saturday’s calamity at Atlanta but recovered enough for a 17th-place finish. The good news is he was very good in his street-racing debut at Chicago in 2023 and finished fourth. The bad news is the rain got the best of him in 2024, leading to a head-on collision with the tire barriers en route to a 39th-place finish last year.

Analysis: Another team that’s a victim of its own success is the No. 24 Hendrick Motorsports team with driver Byron. The scoresheet doesn’t tell the full picture here. Yes, he has now finished 27th or worse in three of the last four races. But the Cup Series points leader led 98 laps at Michigan just four races ago and was just two laps of fuel short of scoring his second win of the season, instead finishing 28th after needing to hit pit road. Strategy gone wrong at Pocono and the ‘Big One’ at EchoPark have ultimately cost Byron significant points in his chase for the regular-season championship, but the Chicago Street Course offers a reset for the No. 24 team, which has finished 13th (2023) and eighth (2024) in two starts.

Analysis: Hamlin’s white-hot streak of top-three finishes cooled off pretty abruptly when his No. 11 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota was turned to trigger the 19-car melee at EchoPark on Saturday night. With 57 career Cup wins, Hamlin has proven he can win just about anywhere. But in 57 combined starts across road courses and street courses, Hamlin has just one victory — a Watkins Glen win in 2016. Still, Hamlin qualified on pole for the inaugural Chicago Street Race in 2023, so maybe the vet still has some tricks up his sleeve.

Analysis: A fourth-place finish at EchoPark was exactly what Reddick needed. That marked the No. 45 team’s first top five since Darlington back in April and only its second top 10 within that 10-race stretch. The defending regular-season champion could use a turn of momentum here and he just might get it, returning to the streets of Chicago where he finished second one year ago — which could be bad news for his next opponent in the In-Season Challenge, No. 26 seed Carson Hocevar.

Analysis: The last stretch of races have been relatively quiet for Bell and Co., who have finished 16th or worse in three of the past four races. The one exception? A runner-up result at Autódromo Hermanos Rodríguez in Mexico City, the most recent road course on the schedule. It sure doesn’t hurt that Bell is averaging a 1.5 finish on road courses this year after his March win at Circuit of The Americas. The question remains, though, whether he can score his first Chicago top 10 this weekend.

Analysis: The steady climb up the leaderboard continues for Buescher, who now sits ninth in the regular-season standings. In fact, according to Racing Insights, nobody has scored more points across the past five races than Buescher and the No. 17 RFK Racing team with 183 points scored in that frame. Buescher heads to Chicago with four straight top 10s behind him, eyeing yet another one ahead at another road course, where Buescher has been excellent. He’ll also have extra incentive this weekend as Buescher goes head-to-head with Front Row Motorsports’ Zane Smith in Round 2 of the In-Season Challenge.

Analysis: Even with a win and two top fives in his last five races, it feels like there is just no luck lately for the No. 12 team. Blaney finished shotgun on the field Saturday night after a wreck at Lap 57 ended his night early for his sixth DNF of the year. Chicago was decent for him a year ago with a 10th-place finish, and things aren’t all bad for the 2023 Cup champ: Blaney has scored the fifth-most points of all drivers over the past five races.

Analysis: The Pocono winner had nowhere to go at Atlanta when the field wrecked in front of him, relegating Briscoe to a 35th-place finish at EchoPark Speedway and ousting the No. 2 seed from the In-Season Challenge in an upset to No. 31 Noah Gragson. Road and street courses typically haven’t been Briscoe’s forte in years past, but he has fit into the No. 19 JGR team well in two efforts so far this year, finishing 14th at COTA and seventh in Mexico City. There’s a chance his first Chicago top 10 is next.

Analysis: It’s been a tough few weeks for Chastain with three straight finishes outside the top 15, and two straight beneath the top 25 with just 15 total points scored in the past two weeks. Deuces are wild, though, because in two starts at Chicago, Chastain has finished 22nd both times. Maybe he breaks that streak this time around.

Analysis: Bowman has finally put the doldrums of spring in his rearview mirror. After a dismal spell that featured seven finishes of 27th or worse in nine weeks, Bowman has turned things around with two top fives in the last three races, separated only by an 11th-place finish at Pocono. The No. 48 Hendrick Chevy has led 15 or more laps in each of the last two races and netted 41 points exactly in two of the past three events. Bowman still sits 15th in the playoff standings, only 39 points above the provisional elimination line, but the best news for him is the next track on the schedule is the Chicago Street Course, where he won in 2024 to snap an 80-race winless drought. Can he end a 34-race spell this time around?

Analysis: In recent years, EchoPark has treated Logano pretty wonderfully. Not Saturday night. The No. 22 Team Penske Ford was another one of the many drivers collected in the ‘Big One,’ dropping Logano to a 36th-place finish — his fifth finish of 16th or worse in the past six races. It’s hard to say whether his fate his due to change in Chicago, where he finished eighth in Year 1 but 23rd in Year 2.

Analysis: EchoPark was fairly forgettable for Wallace after a 22nd-place finish, but now the focus shifts to the streets of Chicago, where Wallace had a strong run going in 2024 until late contact with Bowman cost the No. 23 Toyota critical track position. While Bowman scurried to the win, Wallace finished 13th that day. In a wonderful coincidence, No. 9 seed Wallace and No. 8 seed Bowman now head to Chicago as In-Season Challenge rivals for Round 2 of the bracket-style tournament.

Analysis: Despite spinning through the ‘Big One,’ Preece left EchoPark Speedway with another solid day in the No. 60 RFK Racing entry and escaped with a 15th-place finish, his sixth top 15 in the past seven races. Preece is on track for his best career average finish at 17.8, three full positions better than his previous best of 20.8 set in 2023. He was 15th that year in Chicago, too. And his current RFK Racing team with crew chief Derrick Finley charged to a fourth-place result with driver Joey Hand in last year’s street race.

Analysis: Jones and Legacy Motor Club continue to impress with a mighty charge up the standings leaderboard in full swing. After finishing fifth at EchoPark, Jones is averaging an 11.0 finish across the past six races, and according to Racing Insights, has scored the fourth-most points of any driver in the last five races. Jones was 29th in points leaving Kansas Speedway on May 11. He enters Chicago 16th in the standings — a 13-spot leap — second beneath the provisional elimination line to the playoffs by 49 points.

Analysis: Another quiet and steady week at EchoPark left Allmendinger 12th at the checkered flag for his sixth straight finish of 21st or better. The No. 16 Kaulig Racing crew still has work to do to make the postseason, entering Chicago with Allmendinger as the third driver outside the provisional playoff field by 59 points. But two road courses are directly in front of Allmendinger, a road-course ace. And there’s no better way to make a dent in your postseason dreams than by winning now to clinch a playoff spot early.

Analysis: EchoPark Speedway proved to be a step backward for Cindric, an unusual result considering his past prowess on the Georgia high banks. Of course, it was no fault of his own after the field wrecked in front of him. But the No. 2 team’s results have been quite up and down lately: In the eight races since winning at Talladega Superspeedway, Cindric has four top 20s and four finishes of 25th or worse. That victory means he doesn’t have to worry about points, but he and his team would love to build some consistency over the next eight weeks in the buildup to the playoffs.

Analysis: Similarly to Cindric, Berry doesn’t have a ton of momentum on his side heading to the streets of Chicago. The No. 21 Wood Brothers Racing team has three finishes of 30th or worse in its last five starts — but that’s coupled with four finishes of 12th or better in their last seven races. Road courses have never been great for Berry, who finished 26th at both COTA and Mexico City this year, so these next two weeks could be tough for this spring’s Las Vegas winner.

Analysis: EchoPark wasn’t a horrible day for Busch, but he’s sure had better ones after a 21st-place result and a spin into the wall during the ‘Big One.’ That marks three straight weeks finishing 20th or worse for Rowdy as he falls to 21st in the provisional playoff standings, 72 points beneath the elimination line. But fear not, Rowdy Nation: Chicago could be the place he turns things around. The streets have been surprisingly kind to Kyle, who has finished fifth and ninth in his two visits to the Windy City.

Analysis: SVG found himself in trouble at EchoPark a couple of times but persevered for a 24th-place finish. The oval results aren’t great as the rookie still finds his footing there, but this weekend returns Van Gisbergen to his street-course roots. He wowed the stock-car world in 2023, winning his Cup Series debut in NASCAR’s first trip to the city streets and reminding everyone in Mexico City he’s just as good now as he’s ever been. Don’t be surprised if Van Gisbergen storms to his second Chicago win Sunday afternoon.

Posted on by Staff Report

The NASCAR Cup Series heads back to the “Windy City” for the third annual Grant Park 165. This Sunday, Round 2 of the In-Season Challenge will also take place at the Chicago Street Course, where 16 drivers will compete head-to-head to advance and keep their $1 million hopes alive (2 p.m. ET, TNT Sports/truTV, HBO Max, MRN Radio, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio).

ENTRY LISTS: Cup Series | Xfinity Series 

Current Truck Series points leader Corey Heim is back behind the wheel of the No. 67 23XI Racing Toyota for his third Cup Series start of 2025. Xfinity Series standout Austin Hill also returns to the No. 33 Richard Childress Racing Chevrolet for a double-duty weekend. Reigning Supercars champion Will Brown will drive the No. 13 Kaulig Racing Chevrolet, and Katherine Legge will pilot the No. 78 Live Fast Motorsports Chevrolet. Josh Bilicki will be in the No. 66 Ford as well this weekend.

RELATED: 2025 In-Season Challenge hub 

With those five Open entries, 41 cars will attempt to qualify for the 40-car field, meaning one will fail to make the show.

View the full entry list for this weekend’s event: