Matt Weaver is a Motorsports Insider for Sportsnaut. Follow him on Twitter.
Mark J. Rebilas-USA TODAY Sports
That’s a wrap.
Forty weeks later, the NASCAR season has come to a close with Ryan Blaney and Team Penske claiming the Cup Series championship in the most modern way possible.
It was, holistically, a directionally positive season on several fronts from the on-track product, television contract, star-building performances and the overall presentation of the sport. There were some setbacks, of course, highlighted by Chase Elliott missing seven races and failing to make the playoffs.
There are still some things to learn in the coming weeks, in terms of silly season leftovers and the Cup Series television contract, but speaking overall, NASCAR’s diamond anniversary campaign was an entertaining wild ride.
There is so much to unpack, items that also warrant a deeper dive, but here is a broadly speaking list of things we learned this season.
Kevin Harvick has set sail into retirement and will join the FOX Sports television booth next season, while Denny Hamlin and Martin Truex Jr. missed out on the final four over the past two weeks. Put it together and this genuinely feels like the start of a new era. Harvick, after all, was the last remaining Winston Cup Series driver in the sport. It’s time for the likes of Blaney, Elliott, William Byron, Christopher Bell, Ross Chastain and Bubba Wallace to define what comes next. There are now races in downtown football stadiums, city streets and maybe even an international destination. NextGen has truly arrived.
You never count out Team Penske and Ford, right? For the second year in a row, the summertime narrative was just how far behind Ford Performance had fallen to Chevrolet and Toyota but eventually won championships with Joey Logano and Blaney regardless. But really, multiple Ford teams took steps forward this year with RFK Racing really breaking through in the second half this season. The only question remaining is how the new Dark Horse Mustang body will change the game for the manufacturer next season.
The sport shouldn’t revolve around one guy but it became apparent just how much NASCAR relies upon Chase Elliott each season. Say what you will about his public persona, how low-key he chooses to be, but fans are invested in the 2020 Cup Series champion. Ratings were down double digits when he was out of the car and that carried over to a degree in the playoffs. Fans of other drivers will probably retort with something best articulated as Elliott fatigue but NASCAR does seem more relevant when Clyde is in the mix.
To that point, NASCAR needs more big personalities. Harvick had a big personality from Day One and carried it through a two-decade career at the highest level. Hamlin moves the needle with every press conference and podcast drop. While respectful and professional, the final four drivers this season all speak softly and carry a big figurative shifter. It’s undeniably true that NASCAR needs some more big personalities to offset that reliance on Elliott. Maybe Corey Lajoie takes a step forward this year. Maybe Noah Gragson, for all the baggage, can be competitive and elicit feelings from the fanbase. Ryan Preece is a big personality waiting to show out if Stewart Haas can return to form. Maybe Ross Chastain will finally embrace the spotlight and play whatever role is asked of him. There is a lot of potential in the current Cup Series roster, but it’s just a matter of certain guys breaking out competitively, with others feeling more comfortable being a boisterous or outspoken character.
This is the best intermediate track product in the past 20 years of NASCAR Cup Series racing. It’s almost enough to make you want to find room for Chicagoland and Kentucky down the road, especially to replace tracks that might not warrant two dates anymore, a testament to what the NextGen car does really well. Remember that this car was designed to produce 550 package style racing on intermediate tracks but drivers pushed back and forced NASCAR to increase horsepower and decrease downforce, creating a fantastic compromise product on a group of tracks that are collectively starting to age into its sweet spot too.
The past two weeks at Martinsville and Phoenix have gone a long way towards making everyone feel better about the short track racing product at NASCAR’s highest level. Listen, these cars still make too much grip, create too much dirty air, stop too well and don’t have enough horsepower, and NASCAR is committed to working on it but what Goodyear has done to close out the season is enough to give everyone a little bit more patience to get it right.
We like what we’re seeing became the sarcastic rallying cry for NASCAR fans who felt like the sanctioning body were oblivious to their own racing product from 2019 to 2021 during the 550 package era. It wasn’t just the fans, either. The garage felt like NASCAR officials were living in their own world when it came to the on-track product. The past two years has shown a NASCAR more willing to listening to driver and team feedback, especially with the creation of a driver advisory council that regular meets with competitors. The constantly improving racing product is a reflection of that dialogue and open-mindedness.
The championship race on Friday night certainly accentuated it, but the Truck Series race craft is at an all-time low right now. Part of it is the culture, actions that are tolerated at the short track and ARCA levels then making its way to the third-tier national tour. Some of it is the racing platform, a low horsepower, high drag truck that makes restarts hugely important because passing gets increasingly difficult deeper in a run. Most importantly, this isn’t a training ground, and team owners are going to have to demand better from their clients, which is exactly why this is so challenging in the first place. When young drivers bring money, they are the boss, and it makes it hard to have teaching moments. NASCAR stepping in isn’t palpable either as garages should be self-policing but conversations about the division need to take place over the summer.
Here’s to hoping that the current second-tier division platform doesn’t undergo any significant changes anytime soon. It remains the best on-track pound-for-pound product in NASCAR. There are already talks of how to incorporate the current Cup Series wheel and tire on the Xfinity Series car for practical reasons and that would be unfortunate. The Xfinity Series has a really unique identity as a cross-section between emerging top prospects and veteran series mainstays in a car that provides a throwback NASCAR experience in the NextGen era.
He didn’t feel that way upon returning home to start the offseason, but Bubba Wallace should feel proud of a breakthrough season in which he posted career bests in laps led, average finish and a top-10 championship finish. Their no. 23 car was especially competitive over the final 12 races, becoming true threats to win even after their playoff elimination. Perhaps not winning a race stings but that group looks closer and closer to breaking out next season.
It’s easy to see a monster season coming from Roush Fenway Keselowski. Chris Buescher advanced all the way to the Round of 8. Each of his three wins came with Brad Keselowski in the mix too. Even as Buescher faltered in the Round of 8, Keselowski surged. It’s really easy to see, especially if the Dark Horse body style is immediately competitive where both the 6 and 17 cars are in the mix for wins on a weekly basis.
There is no way of quantifying the best race car driver in the world but Kyle Larson is still the best multi-discipline star in modern motorsports. He ultimately finished second in the Cup Series championship, won a Sprint Car championship, his second Knoxville Nationals and passed rookie orientation for the Indianapolis 500. He’s doing things not accomplished since AJ Foyt and living the kind of life Tony Stewart wishes he would have been allowed to do at his physical peak while driving for Joe Gibbs Racing.
The first year of the NextGen, especially earlier in the 2022 season, frequently felt like the winners by blind dart throws. There was a real separation in the pack this year with certain teams enjoying more speed than others in the second year of this still evolving platform. With that said, the Cup Series still featured a healthy amount of parity with Michael McDowell of Front Row winning at the Indianapolis Road Course, AJ Allmendinger winning at the Charlotte Motor Speedway ROVAL and Ricky Stenhouse Jr. winning the Daytona 500. The gap between first and last still remains closer than any point in NASCAR history for ways both positive and negative. The positive is that even the least competitive teams feel like it will not take a huge financial commitment to get where they want to be while such parity also has a way of stifling on-track action.
Matt Weaver is a Motorsports Insider for Sportsnaut. Follow him on Twitter.