TALLADEGA, Ala. (AP) — When he fired the engine on his race car before last year’s NASCAR finale, Chase Briscoe sat inside the cockpit and cried like a baby.
As an Indiana native aspiring to make it to the
top levels of motorsports, he gravitated to Tony Stewart, a fellow Hoosier, three-time Cup champion and NASCAR Hall of Famer. It was a dream come true when Briscoe, couch-surfing in North Carolina while trying to crack his way into NASCAR, got a seat in 2020 at the team co-owned by Stewart.
But come the 2024 season finale, Stewart-Haas Racing was closing after the race and Briscoe’s full circle career moment would end.
“I remember sitting on the grid after we fired engines and just crying for my whole childhood. I idolized Tony, he was my hero,” Briscoe said.
Briscoe had already lined up a new job at Joe Gibbs Racing, where Stewart had won two of his titles in the first part of his NASCAR career, but after four seasons driving Stewart’s No. 14, he was unsure of what life would be like inside a totally different organization.
He was picked to replace Martin Truex Jr., who was retiring, moving from Ford to Toyota and wouldn’t have his hero around for guidance. It was an emotional moment, part reflection and part fear, for Briscoe.
“Just knowing that chapter of my life was ending, not knowing what the JGR chapter was really going to look like,” Briscoe said. “You never know going to a new place. If I don’t go win, I’m never going to get hired again because the expectation is you have to go to JGR and win.
“If you can’t win in a JGR car, why would anybody hire you for another team?”
Briscoe has nothing to worry about for the foreseeable future. His victory Sunday at Talladega Superspeedway locked him into the championship four and he will return to Phoenix Raceway a year after splitting with Stewart with his first chance to win a Cup title.
Briscoe joined teammate Denny Hamlin in the championship field, with the final two slots to be filled this Sunday at Martinsville Speedway in Virginia. Christopher Bell, the final JGR driver still eligible to race for the title, holds a one-point edge over Kyle Larson for the final two spots in the winner-take-all decider.
It would be the first Cup title for any of the three Gibbs drivers — assuming Bell advances — but Briscoe is the only one making his championship debut. His chance at the Cup comes at the same Phoenix track where he won his first Cup Series race, in 2022 driving for SHR. A recent return trip back to the track caused him to reflect on how his career has developed and what is now at stake.
“I stood on the front straightaway, I hadn’t done that since I won there. I kind of thought how that day felt, winning my first Cup race,” Briscoe said. “Next time you stand here, you might be a champion.”
Briscoe has thrived in his move to JGR, where Talladega gave him his career-best third win of the season. He leads the Cup Series with seven poles this season as qualifying has been his strong suit and contributed to 15 top-5 finishes through 34 races.
Briscoe has been in the thick of this title race all season, even if he is overshadowed at JGR by his teammates. He’s admitted that he feels every week driving for Gibbs is an audition to keep his job, a notion Gibbs himself dismissed after the victory when he said “I think right now he can get anything he wants. I’ll put it that way.”
Perfect timing because Briscoe’s wife, three children and his extended family in Indiana now all need to find transportation to the Nov. 2 finale in Phoenix.
“I’m going to call him real quick,” Briscoe said when he heard of Gibbs’ vow. “I need to see if one of them will fly my whole family to Phoenix. Because me and (wife) Marissa, we’re already talking about how chaotic that’s going to be, flying commercial with three toddlers. Maybe I can get lucky and see if they can let me go on one of their planes.”
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