The Worst Performers in Each NASCAR Series This Year (So Far)
What’s Happening? Floundering early on during the NASCAR season is not fun for anybody. While racing is a sport of streaks,…
There’s no pressure like the pressure applied by NASCAR fans to a highly touted driver. Year in and year out, top prospects, up-and-comers, and series veterans fall short of loft expectations placed on them by fans. So, as we approach the tenth week of the season, who are some drivers not living up to the hype in 2025?
These drivers are not the worst in each series; rather, they are those who aren’t exactly meeting expectations. These expectations can come from their current team, past success, or even hype. If you want a list of the worst two drivers in each series, we have a feature covering them, which is linked below.
Love her or hate her, Toni Breidinger worked hard to make it to the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series after years in the ARCA Menards Series. Now a full-time talent for the premier Toyota Truck Series team, Tricon Garage, her year has not been anywhere close to what most fans expected.
While she struggled in limited appearances in past Truck Series seasons, now a full-time driver, most expected her to at least find some form of the groove at NASCAR’s third-highest level. After an impressive part-time 2023 season in ARCA, Breidinger’s stats fell off slightly in her full-time 2024 season.
Most fans were curious to see if this was an overall performance drop or if she would recover after finally receiving a promotion. This has not been the case, and there is a lot of work to be done at the No. 5 camp.
What’s Happening? Floundering early on during the NASCAR season is not fun for anybody. While racing is a sport of streaks,…
Though he is in top equipment, Andres Perez de Lara’s start to his rookie year in the Craftsman Truck Series has been rather quiet. Coming off an ARCA Menards Series career in which he won a title and finished in the top ten in 33 of 41 career races, the Mexico City native currently finds himself second in rookie of the year standings.
Once again, it’s not that he’s had a bad year. Rather, he’s just had a bit of a disappointing start. There were a lot of high hopes for the No. 77 team, but now they find themselves behind Giovanni Ruggiero, who would be the clear front-runner in any rookie race at this point in the season.
Once again, the team has been solid. However, the team and driver have been almost radio-silent throughout the season. Perhaps as we roll into the summer months, they can make a little noise on track to make their presence known.
What’s Happening? The Rookie of the Year battle is one of the best battles throughout the NASCAR season. The award, given…
It’s always tough when a fan driver loses a Cup Series ride due to poor performance; however, unlike other drivers, Matt Dibenedetto opted to step down to the Truck Series and now finds himself in a stable position in the NASCAR Xfinity Series.
This year, after racing with RSS Racing last season, Dibenedetto finds himself racing with the newly formed Viking Motorsports. While most expected the team to underperform in their first season as an independent program, there were still some high hopes for their performance this year.
Dibenedetto finds himself on this list thanks to these high expectations set on him and this new team. Though Dibenedetto has quietly had a better season than he had last year. He’s not exactly lighting up the stat sheet. Perhaps as the year goes on, the number 99 team can find their groove; for now, they have had a rather disappointing go of it.
NASCAR fans didn’t really know what they were getting with William Sawalich this season. The young driver put on a master class in past seasons racing in the ARCA Menards Series (winning just under half of his career starts.) However, he struggled in limited appearances in the Craftsman Truck and Xfinity Series starts last season.
However, hoisted immediately to the NASCAR Xfinity series this year, most were interested to see if this would translate to NASCAR’s second-highest level in top-tier equipment from Joe Gibbs Racing. We can now say that his performance this season is far from even being lackluster. In fact, it could be considered one of the worst starts to an Xfinity Series season for any driver at JGR.
A driver once thought to be a future rival of top-tier Xfinity Series talent like Connor Zillisch and Carson Kvapil finds himself sitting 23rd in points behind drivers like Jeremy Clements and Parker Retzlaff. While he has a lot of room to improve from his start to the season, it looks like Sawalich will not be anywhere close to the talent we once saw in ARCA.
What’s Happening? NASCAR hosted a lackluster yet emotional race weekend at Bristol. Kyle Larson walked away a double-winner but fell short…
The dialogue surrounding Shane van Gisbergen prior to the start of the season was that the New Zealander was a hands-down favorite for the playoffs. Well, that still may be the case, with multiple road courses on the way. As of right now, SVG is off to a miserable start this season.
While you could blame a stark downturn in performance from Trackhouse Racing, having to adjust to full-time action in the Cup Series Next Gen car, or just a lack of experience, the clear statistical outlier is his poor performance on ovals. Not only does SVG run in the back of the pack at ovals, but he frequently fails to improve on his starting spot, something he did so well during his 2024 Xfinity Series campaign.
The 88 team could very well be a lock for the 2025 playoffs, that’s for sure. But should SVG do so and continue this poor performance on ovals, he should face the same scrutiny that Harrison Burton faced last season.
Last season felt like a breakthrough year for RFK Racing’s No. 6. While the renovation of RFK went relatively quickly, Brad Keselowski’s establishment as a winner felt like a long time coming. His emotional and locky win at Darlington last spring felt like the reintroduction to bad Brad.
Nonetheless, Brad is off to what is easily his worst start to a season since winning his lone championship in 2012. His 25th-place average finish and 23.4 average starting spot are career worsts (minus two races in 2008 campaigns), and he has yet to finish in the top ten during a race weekend.
This season felt like a fresh start for the former champion; now, it feels like a sign that the owner-driver may want to look at becoming a full-time owner in the near future.
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