There are few better stories in sports than when an underdog shocks the world and pulls off an upset. NASCAR is no different, with dozens of shoe-string budget teams rolling out every week and competing against the money-factories of JRM, Kaulig, Gibbs, and the rest of the big-time organizations. As we approach the start of the 2024, I wanted to take a look the Davids, and how they fared in their fights against the Goliaths last year – and how their prospects look this year.
For each team, I will wrap up how their 2023 seasons went, what their plans are for 2024, and do a bit of prognosticating on what expectations should be. Teams will be ordered based on their owner points standings from 2023.
Jordan Anderson Racing
2023 Owner Points:
#27: 12th
#31: 18th
2024 Drivers:
#27: Jeb Burton
#31: Parker Retzlaff
In just their third year of Xfinity Series competition, and after putting together mostly middling results with occasional flashes in 2022 with Myatt Snider at the wheel (four top-10s, one top-5) this team looked for both more consistency and for continued growth. To do this, they picked up series veteran Jeb Burton, and fielded a second car for one of the sport’s most interesting prospects, 19-year old (as of last offseason) Parker Retzlaff.
Safe to say, both moves worked out well for the young team, as the they were one of the two underdog teams to make the playoffs by virtue of Jeb Burton’s win at Talladega, and both cars finished top-20 in owner points.
In the #27, Jeb Burton’s above mentioned win propelled the ream to a surprise playoff berth. While hopes were understandably high, the wheels fell off in round one following two finishes outside of the top-30, and Jeb wasn’t able to rebound to anything better than the basement of the playoff grid. Still, a 12th place points finish with a win and six top-10s is a great season for this team!
Meanwhile in the #31, Parker Retzlaff put together a solid rookie campaign in his first full-time season, picking up seven top-10s, including a fourth place effort in the season opener at Daytona. While he ultimately missed the playoffs, he was at least in the hunt all year, and came home a respectable 16th in driver points.
Both drivers will return to the team in 2024. This actually marks the first time in Burton’s career, at any level, that he will be with the same team for consecutive full-time seasons! In another bit of exciting news for the team, Jordan Anderson will be piloting a third entry for his namesake team, with his father in law Larry McReynolds serving as the crew chief.
This group looks well positioned to continue their upward trajectory, and are approaching the territory of being an *expected* playoff participant.
Big Machine Racing
2023 Owner points:
#48: 13th
#5: 48th
2024 Drivers:
#48: Parker Kligerman
#5: Not returning
While Jordan Anderson Racing was the only underdog team to qualify for the owner’s championship, Big Machine Racing and Parker Kligerman joined them in the driver’s championship playoffs after qualifying on points – and had a more impressive showing, coming home 10th in the final standings. In fact, they only just missed out on a round of 8 appearance with their runner up finish at Texas in the round of 12.
After a hectic 2022 that saw the team transition from what was initially meant to be a full-time campaign for Jade Buford to an “all-star car” which fielded TEN different drivers, Parker Kligerman provided a sense of stability for the team that it desperately needed. And as many of us expected, he also provided some incredibly competent racing, picking up a whopping 18 top-10s eight top-5s, and a very impressive stretch of races to qualify for the playoffs.
The team also fielded a second car for former driver Jade Buford for two races. He finished 25th at the season opener at Daytona, and 36th at Talladega.
Kligerman was unsurprisingly tabbed to return to the team for another full-time campaign in 2024, and expectations are understandably high. In just their fourth year of competition, these guys a pretty close to shaking the “underdog” moniker – if they haven’t already. I full well expect Kligerman to be a playoff contender.
AM Racing
2023 Owner Points:
#25: 17th
2024 Drivers:
#15: Hailie Deegan
#25: Part-time, TBD
A Truck Series competitor since 2016, AM Racing had a pretty solid debut season in the Xfinity Series.
The team tabbed 2018 Truck Series champion Brett Moffitt to pilot the #25 car. While Moffitt has struggled to find a permanent home in NASCAR, he proved that he is still an incredibly talented wheelman in 2023. In the first truly full-time season of his Xfinity Series career, he picked up nine top-10s – including a top-5 at the Chicago Street Course – and finished 15th in drivers points. Additionally, the team finished inside the top-20 in just over 60% of the races on the year, a welcomed result for a new team.
Their solid 2023 has established AM Racing as a proper up & comer in the Series… and things are likely to be particularly interesting in 2024.
AM made a huge splash in the off-season, announcing that one of the sport’s biggest prospects – both in terms of expected competitiveness and marketability – Hailie Deegan will pilot a full-time entry for the team for multiple seasons starting in 2024. The marketability of Deegan alone will likely provide a huge financial boon to the small team.
Meanwhile, the #25 car will be operating only on a part-time schedule. After initial expectations that AM would try to field two full-time entries, they have opted to go in another direction – and importantly, leave Deegan, a series rookie, without a teammate to lean on. The #25 will not be fielded at Daytona, and they’ve yet to announce who will pilot the #25 car in later efforts.
Personally, I don’t have particularly high expectations for this group in 2024. While Deegan impressed in her lone Xfinity Series start last season (P13 at Las Vegas) she was largely a non-factor from a competition standpoint for the last three years in the Truck Series, picking up only five top-10s across three full-time seasons in top tier equipment. While there’s always the possibility that the more… we’ll say “refined” driving style in the Xfinity Series relative to the chaos of trucks will allow her to be more competitive, expectations should be tempered here.
Sam Hunt Racing
2023 Owner Points:
#26: 19th
#24: 25th
2024 Drivers:
#24: Part-time, TBD
#26: Corey Heim, Jeffrey Earnhardt, Sage Karam
Arguably the best SHR in NASCAR, 2023 marked Sam Hunt Racing’s fifth season competing in the Xfinity Series, but their first fielding one driver for a full-time effort as Kaz Grala piloted the #26 for all 33 races. Meanwhile, the #24 car was split between five drivers – Connor Mosack (22 races), Parker Chase (4), Corey Heim (4), Tyler Reddick (2), and Sage Karam (1).
In the #26 camp, 2023 marked the return of Kaz Grala to full-time competition, running his first full-time season at any level since his 2017 Truck Series campaign with GMS Racing. The 24-year old put together a respectable season for the team, picking up nine top-10s, two top-5s, and a top-20 points finish. That’s four more top-10s than the team collected in 2022. His final results would likely have been better if not for the nine DNF’s he suffered throughout the year.
In the #24, their host of drivers only managed to secure four top-10’s, though two of those were top-5s. One of those top-5s was collected by Connor Mosack, while the other was picked up by road course ringer Sage Karam in a one-off effort at Road America. All told, three of the team’s four top-10s came at road courses.
In fact, between both teams, SHR picked up seven top-10s and three top-5s at road courses, proving to have one of the best road racing programs in the series.
Surprisingly, this team will not be fielding a single driver for a full-time effort. Instead, they will host a stable of drivers in the 26 car – amongst them one of Toyota’s higher touted prospects in Corey Heim, and previous SHR drivers Jeffrey Earnhardt & Sage Karam – while presumably having a second part-time entry in the 24 car, though official plans for that ride have not been announced.
This is a team that seemed to be right on the verge of being serious contenders, putting together several good runs over the last two seasons – but not locking down a single driver for a full-time effort, and stepping away from one of their full-time cars altogether doesn’t seem like a step in the desired direction – though maybe they are trying to allocate more resources to a “lead car”. I’ll be curious to see what they’re able to do this year.
RSS Racing
2023 Owner Points:
#39: 20th
#28: 22nd
#38: 30th
#29: 41st
2024 Drivers:
#28: Kyle Sieg
#29: Blaine Perkins
#38: CJ McLaughlin
#39: Ryan Sieg
In what had become one of the most “sneaky competitive” underdog entries, 2023 was a bit of a down year for RSS (with one exception), as only one of their three full-time entries cracked the top-20 in owner points.
Even then, in that lone entry to do so, the 20th place effort of the #39 car (piloted by Ryan Sieg in all but one race) was it’s lowest owner points finish in it’s decade of full-time competition. Results were much more inconsistent for this bunch in 2023, as they only picked up four top-10s (down from 12 in 2022) while also recording 15 finishes outside of the top-20, the most in one season for this car since 2017.
Things were no better in that regard for the #28 entry, as they recorded 21 finishes outside of the top-20. However, this bunch was also responsible for the high-point of the season for RSS – and debatably the high point in the organization’s history – as Aric Almirola piloted the entry to a surprising win at Sonoma in an SHR supported effort. Outside of that win, the #28 picked up two other top-10s.
The team also fielded the #38 car on a full-time basis, mainly for Joe Graf Jr., who did not produce good results, picking up just three top-20s in 25 races, while also posting five DNF’s.
The team’s fourth entry, the #29 car, ran seven races, picking up three top-20s, all courtesy of Kyle Sieg.
Running three full-time entries in a NASCAR National Series is incredibly demanding for a small team, a fact RSS learned last season in their first season doing so. They will presumably take those lessons and look to bounce back in 2024. The Sieg brothers will be returning to their namesake team, while also welcoming some new faces. 23-year old Blaine Perkins made the move over from OUR Motorsports and will be piloting the #29 car in a full-time effort, while CJ McLaughlin will be behind the wheel of the #38 for a part-time effort.
Jeremy Clements Racing
2023 Owner Points:
#51: 21st
2024 Drivers:
#51: Jeremy Clements
The driver that I would go so far as to categorize as the “Ultimate Underdog” in all of NASCAR, Jeremy Clements will enter his 14th season behind the wheel of his namesake team’s 51 car.
Unfortunately, 2023 was for all intents and purposes the worst season in the team’s history. For the first time since their debut in 2011 the team failed to collect a single top-10 finish, and Clements came home 19th in driver points (his previous low with JCR was 16th in 2013). While they did manage to finish in the top-20 in more than half of the races (18 out of 35) they simply lacked the speed we’ve come to expect from them – not even on road courses or superspeedways, which are usually JCR’s bread & butter.
As Clements enters his age 39 season, this crew will look to step it up and rebound from an off year. They were close at times, but never quite had things break their way. But these guys more than just about any other team know what it’s like to be the underdog – and they know that all it takes is one break and you go from zero to hero.
DGM Racing
2023 Owner Points:
#92: 23rd
#91: 26th
2024 Drivers:
#91: Kyle Weatherman
#92: Josh Bilicki, others
Entering their tenth year of full-time competition in the Xfinity Series, DGM Racing has been holding serve as one of the more solid small operations in the series for the better part of that decade.
After moving on from Alex Labbe who had run full-time for the team in four of the last five seasons, 2023 was a solid if not unspectacular year for DGM. Josh Williams drove the #92 car to three top-10s, and 16 top-20s en route to a 23rd place finish in owner points. Meanwhile, a host of drivers – including among others both Chastain brothers – picked up two more top-10s for the bunch, including an impressive P4 finish at Watkins Glen for Ross Chastain, which was enough to get the team to 26th in owner points.
Easily the most memorable moment of 2023 for DGM however came at Atlanta, when Josh Williams “parked” this small team securely in all of our hearts with his spirited objection to a NASCAR ruling that claimed his damaged car did not meet minimum speed. Williams’ proverbial “one finger salute” to NASCAR struck a chord within the garage area AND in the stands, and turned him into a cult favorite overnight. One could even argue his sudden star status is one of the main reasons he locked up a full-time ride with elite Kaulig Racing in 2024.
Speaking of 2024, DGM made what I think was one of the more under the radar great moves of the silly season, and tabbed Kyle Weatherman to pilot the #91 car full-time.
2024 marks the best opportunity of Kyle Weatherman’s career. Widely considered to be one of the most talented drivers in all of NASCAR in terms of raw driving ability, the 26-year old has simply never had a “true” opportunity to show it in even halfway decent equipment across a full season – now he does. Even though DGM is a mid-pack team at best as it sits, I think Weatherman will be able to will the team to some more-solid-than-the-equipment-deserves runs. Look for him to push for spot in the top-20 in owners points – and I wouldn’t be surprised if he pulls a Josh Williams, and parlays his time at DGM into a spot on a bigger team in the future.
DGM has pretty much maintained as a quintessential “mid-pack” team since their inception. They put up decent runs and compete for top-20s more often than not – but in the entire history of the team they’ve only picked up three top-5s, all at road courses. Time will tell if they are able to meaningfully improve this year – I think Weatherman behind the wheel positions them well to do so.
B.J. McLeod Motorsports
2023 Owner Points:
#78: 24th
#99: 51st
2024 Drivers:
#78: BJ McLeod – others possible
#99: Not returning
Moving now to one of the more respected operations in the world of small teams, BJ McLeod Motorsports is coming off of one of their best campaigns in team history, as the #78 car piloted by Anthony Alfredo managed to pick up two top-10s and 11 top-20s and came home 24th in owner points, tied for the team’s best ever such result (t-2020).
This operation, however, is kind of shrouded in mystery for 2024. Alfredo is not returning to the team as he managed to parlay his solid 2023 into a full time ride with Our Motorsports, and the team has not announced a replacement, even as we approach the Daytona 500. BJ McLeod himself will pilot the #78 at Daytona, but beyond that the team has not announced any plans.
McLeod was previously quoted as saying his goal for the team is to be able to consistently compete for top-15s, but if they cannot find the right fit for 2024 he would be open to running a partial schedule. With the presumed influx of cash from the selling of his Live Fast Motorsports charter, one would think this could be a team on the rise and a desirable landing spot for a free agent. But just a few days before the season opens they don’t have a driver locked up, so… stay tuned I guess!
Alpha Prime Racing
2023 Owner Points:
#45: 27th
#43: 28th
#44: 35th
2024 Drivers:
#43: Ryan Ellis
#44: Brennan Poole
#45: Caesar Bacarella, Brad Perez, others
A fan favorite amongst many small team enthusiasts, Alpha Prime Racing once again proved to be one of the more fun-to-follow and reasonably competitive small operations in 2023.
In the #45 car we got to see a host of drivers including part-owner Caesar Bacarella, hot prospect Rajah Caruth, road course ringer Sage Karam, and four others. The split-effort wasn’t able to produce any top-10s, but it did pick up the team’s highest owner points finish in 27th thanks to five top-15 finishes – two of which were just outside of the top-10 in 11th.
In the #43 car, we got to see the outright resurrection of Ryan Ellis’ career. Not too long ago relegated to the role of GoFas Racing’s PR guy, Ellis took his part time deal and ran with it. He impressed enough – both through his on track performance, and his off track courting of sponsorship – to secure a full-time ride in 2024. While he didn’t manage to pick up that elusive first top-10, he finished as high as 11th and brought home nine top-20s to finish 25th in driver points. Caesar Bacarella also managed to pick up APR’s lone top-10 on the year in the #43 with a P6 effort at Talladega.
Things get a little sad with the #44 car though. 2023 was meant to be a full-time campaign for Jeffrey Earnhardt, but he was bumped from the #44 to the #45 for owner points reasons after finishing outside of the top-25 seven times in the first 10 races. He was then bumped from a ride entirely after seven more mostly sub-par races. He would go on to run eight of the final 16 races, and while he would manage to collect three top-20s and a season best 11th place finish across that stretch, there is no denying that 2023 was a huge disappointment for him. Beyond Earnhardt, a whopping TWELVE other drivers would wheel the #44, most notably Rajah Caruth, Daniel Dye, and Brad Perez – all of whom picked up a combined five additional top-20s.
2024 is an exciting year for APR. They “got their guy” as Tommy Joe Martins said and signed former CGR prospect Brennan Poole to wheel their #44 car, and re-signed the aforementioned Ryan Ellis to the #43 car. The #45 car will be moving to a part time schedule, allowing APR to allocate more resources to their two full-time operations. Caesar Bacarella will run the #45 in select races, as will friend of the site Brad Perez – who was also named the teams official reserve & developmental driver. Don’t be shocked if these guys put up a few top-10 runs… or even steal one!
JD Motorsports
2023 Owner Points:
#6: 29th
#4: 34th
2024 Drivers:
#4: Dawson Cram Dawson Cram (if you know, you know)
#6: Garrett Smithley, others possible
A stalwart in the Xfinity Series, this is a team that’s just hanging on as of late. As recently as 2019 these guys were generally a mid-pack organization that could occasionally compete for top-10s, and hung out about 15th-20th in owner points. The last couple of years however have not been particularly kind to the organization.
After collecting only two top-10’s in 2022, the team only managed to pick up one in 2023 – an admittedly impressive p5 at Talladega for Brennan Poole. Beyond that fifth place run though, 2023 was not much to write home about for this bunch.
In the #6, Brennan Poole ran all but one race, and picked up eight top-20’s (including the aforementioned P5 run). Beyond that though, he also collected a DNQ, five DNFs, and sixteen finishes outside of the top-25. All told for Poole, given the quality of equipment the performance wasn’t all that bad – he did after all manage to bring home a top-30 finish in owner points in the same car that finished 34th in points in 2022. So… could be worse, right?
The #4 car… was worse. In an effort split between six drivers, the #4 camp also put up sixteen finishes outside of the top-25, but they also collected six DNQs – five of which went to Garrett Smithley. The lone bright spot for this operation was a stretch by Kyle Weatherman in which he picked up five top-20s over his first six races with the team.
This is a team that needs a shot of life to get back to at least the respectable mid-pack status it had five or so years ago. They will turn to 22-year old rookie Dawson Cram to try to right the ship, while presumably hosting a slate of different drivers in the #6. With only 43 national series starts under his belt, only two of which were inside of the top-15, it will be interesting to see what kind of effort Cram can put together.
SS GreenLight Racing
2023 Owner Points:
#08: 31st
#07: 36th
2024 Drivers:
#07: Patrick Emerling (24 races)
#14: Daniel Suárez, others
After picking up their first win in 2022 thanks to a one-off with Cole Custer – and five other top-10s thanks to a host of drivers – SS GreenLight took a big step backwards in 2023. Across two full time entries, the organization only managed to pick up TEN top-20 finishes. For context, this same organization in 2019 managed to pick up FIFTY top-20 finishes between Gray Gaulding and Ray Black Jr. – talk about regression.
In the #08, thirteen different drivers got behind the wheel on the year – most notably amongst them Aric Almirola. This was the better of the two efforts for the team, as this bunch did at least manage to pick up three top-10s – two at super speedways by Gray Gaulding, and one by Mason Massey at New Hampshire. beyond those top-10s, the #08 only finished in the top-20 four other times – and again, two of those were by Gray Gaulding – dude’s a stud!
The #07 put up even worse numbers, as across fifteen different drivers, this effort only managed to crack the top-20 three times – all three of which were P19 finishes. It also collected five DNQs – yuck!
Moving away from the negatives, this team is responsible for one of the more interesting moves of Silly Season, in which they tabbed former Emerling-Gase co-owner Patrick Emerling to run 24 races for the #07 car. They are also fielding a car for Daniel Suárez at Daytona in conjunction with Kaulig Racing – though when I say “in conjunction with” really all I mean is they are lending the 14 car their owner points from 2023 to help them qualify — it’s a Kaulig effort pretty much all the way. It was announced though that the 14 car will be a recurring entry, so keep an eye out for that.
This is a team in desperate need of a shot of life. Can Patrick Emerling provide that? If his past record is any indicator (one top-15 in 32 Xfinity Series races), probably not – but who knows?
Our Motorsports
2023 Owner Points:
#02: 32nd
2024 Drivers:
#5: Anthony Alfredo
Entering their fifth year of full-time operation, what looked to be a team on the rise took an absolutely massive step backwards in 2023. Here are Our Motorsports’ owner point standings results in each of their first four seasons:
2020: 15th
2021: 16th & 20th
2022: 17th, 18th, & 20th
2023: ….32nd!
Knowing nothing internally about their financial situation, it looks like they may have scaled up to a three car operation too early, and had to scale WAY back in 2023.
Our fielded three drivers to wheel their #02 car in 2023: David Starr (two races), Kyle Weatherman (five races), and Blaine Perkins (26 races). While the season didn’t start out too badly (four top-15s in the first 10 races), the wheels soon fell off, as over the season’s final 23 races, the team only collected three top-20 finishes, six DNFs, a DNQ, and ten finishes of 30th or worse.
These results would be bad even in a vacuum, but when you consider how solid this team had been over the previous three seasons it paints an pretty bleak picture for the team’s immediate future.
Our Motorsports will remain as a one car operation in 2024, and will turn to their former driver Anthony Alfredo to try to right the ship in their newly formed #5 car. In 2022, Alfredo wheeled the #23 for Our to a 17th place owner points finish by virtue of a top-5, four top-10s, and 23 finishes inside the top-20. Having Alfredo back should serve as a good “barometer” for the beleaguered team. A direct comparison to two years ago with the same driver should allow us to really see where this team is at.
Joey Gase Motorsports
2023 Owner Points:
#35: 33rd
#53: 37th
2024 Drivers:
#35: FRANKIE MUNIZ (Can you tell I’m excited?)
#53: Joey Gase
Formerly Emerling-Gase Motorsports, Patrick Emerling decided to leave the operation to run for SS GreenLight Racing, leaving Joey Gase alone to field his own team.
So what does one do in that situation? Well, naturally, you make the most intriguing move of the entire Silly Season.
After waiting all winter to see if child actor turn NASCAR driver Frankie Muniz would be able to land a national series ride, we finally got our answer when it was announced that he would attempt to make the season opening Daytona race with Joey Gase Motorsports, and that he would run a partial schedule for the team in 2024.
After collecting 11 top-10s across 20 races and coming home fourth in points in the ARCA Menards Series in 2023, race fans are dying to see if Muniz is the real deal. Will we really be able to gauge that with him behind the wheel of a car that came home 33rd in owner points last year? Probably not… but, JGM *does* have a halfway decent superspeedway program, as their lone top-10 last year, and five of their nine top-20s came at superspeedways – so let’s see what he can do!
Beyond Muniz undertaking a part-time effort, the only other plans announced for this crew are that team owner Joey Gase will pilot the #53 entry – whether that will be a full-time effort or not though is not known at this time. The 31-year old ran 14 races for his namesake team in 2023, collecting a top-10 at Talladega, and two top-20’s at Daytona. 2024 will mark the veteran’s 14th season of competition in the Xfinity Series.
Motorsports Business Management
2023 Owner Points:
#66: 39th
2024 Drivers:
#66: David Starr, others expected
After Timmy Hill ALMOST did the funniest thing ever in 2022 by finishing second at Daytona, things were nothing but slow for MBM in 2023.
Fielding the #66 car for 12 different drivers, the team failed to qualify for 13 of the 30 races they attempted to make, with their lone bright spots on the year being the return of Ryan Reed, who picked up the team’s lone top-20 in a 20th place effort at Las Vegas, and a cameo appearance by Ryan Newman at Homestead that unfortunately resulted in a DNF.
But even then, Reed’s race was a collaborative effort with Alpha Prime Racing. However, MBM has to be given their flowers on making that feel good story a possibility – as APR team owner Tommy Joe Martins was quoted, “If it wasn’t for Carl helping us with this effort, it wouldn’t be possible… He’s a racer through and through and I have a ton of respect for him and his race team.”
David Starr has been announced as the driver for the season opener at Daytona, but beyond that no additional plans have been announced. With that said, I would expect to see Starr, Timmy Hill, and a host of other drivers behind the wheel of the #66. In fact, here’s my “bold prediction” for this team – Matt DiBenedetto runs at least one race for MBM in 2024.
Mike Harmon Racing
2023 Owner Points:
#74: 47th
2024 Drivers:
#74: TBD
Rebranded back to Mike Harmon Racing from their temporary moniker of CHK Racing, 2023 opened with hopeful expectations of improvement for Mike Harmon’s team. Unfortunately, it ended up being a qualified nightmare.
After initially tabbing Ryan Vargas to be the “anchor driver” for the team, CHK moved on from Vargas after they opened the season with three DNFs. All told on the year, the team only managed to qualify for seven of the 24 races they attempted to make, collecting a best finish of 21st courtesy of Dawson Cram, who ran all but one of the team’s seven races.
Mike Harmon Racing will look to put 2023 securely in their rearview, and try to put up more competitive numbers in the year ahead. As recently as 2020, the team was at least semi-competitive, putting up 22 top-20s across two full-time entries that year, including a top-10 – they can get back there if the resources are available.
Young’s Motorsports
2023 Owner Points:
N/A – New team!
2024 Drivers:
#42: Leland Honeyman Jr.
The new kids on the block for 2024, Young’s Motorsports – which has been competing in the Truck Series since 2012 – has made the jump to the Xfinity Series.
A perennial mid-pack team in the Truck Series (best owners points finish in trucks is 15th, three straight seasons from 2015-2017) they are an unknown quantity. Notably, they are fresh off their worst owner’s points finish in team history of 28th. Let’s be honest though, that’s largely because they had Kris Wright as their driver for the first 11 races. That said, it’s not like there was any noticeable improvement after moving on from him.
Speaking of unknown quantities, they’ve tabbed 18-year old Leland Honeyman Jr. to pilot their inaugural entry. Honeyman made eight starts in the Xfinity Series in 2023 – seven for Alpha Prime Racing, and one for MBM Racing after failing to qualify in the #44 for APR, but replacing Timmy Hill in the #66. Across his eight starts he collected four top-25s, and a best finish of 21st – not fantastic numbers by any stretch, but he also didn’t finish any worse than 28th.
Notably, Honeyman finished third in the ARCA East Series in 2022, losing out to Sammy Smith & Taylor Gray. That effort was also in a Young’s Motorsports car – so safe to say, this team believes in him.
Expectations should be tempered for the new operation. The team is new, their driver is an 18-year old rookie (he’ll be 19 on February 23rd – happy birthday Leland!), and they are still fielding a full-time truck series team for Mason Massey (i.e. resources are being pulled in multiple directions). This should be one of the more interesting teams to follow as they navigate the growing pains of trying to establish themselves – particularly, attempting to do so with an unproven, teenage rookie behind the wheel.
Photo credit: Patrick Vallely, unless noted otherwise
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