What’s Happening?

As the 2025 NASCAR Cup Series draws closer, it’s time to familiarize yourself with the lineup. Next season, several veterans will line up to start races. Here are those veterans.

• Our list will consist of those drivers who have raced for five or more consecutive full-time seasons in the NASCAR Cup Series.
• This list will count the seasons competed in prior to the 2025 season. So, for example, 2025 will be Tyler Reddick’s sixth full-time season. However, he currently has five.
• This list excludes seasons where a driver missed time due to injury or suspension. However, if a driver was released during that season, for example, Kyle Larson in 2020, they will not be included.

5 to 9 Full-Time Seasons

• 5 Seasons – Tyler Reddick and Christopher Bell
• 6 Seasons – Corey LaJoie
• 7 Seasons – Alex Bowman, Bubba Wallace, and William Byron
• 8 Seasons – Daniel Suarez, Erik Jones, and Michael McDowell
• 9 Seasons – Chase Elliott, Chris Buescher, and Ryan Blaney

This group consists of the future of NASCAR and some great underdog veterans who had late starts to their careers. For example, the youngest driver in this group is 27-year-old Willaim Byron, and the oldest is 40-year-old Michael McDowell. Among these drivers are two Daytona 500 winners, two Regular-Season Champions, and two NASCAR Cup Series Champions.

10 to 14 Full-Time Seasons

• 11 Seasons – Austin Dillon
• 12 Seasons – Ricky Stenhouse Jr

These two drivers have both managed to race for a combined three teams in their NASCAR careers. Dillon has raced with his grandpa’s team, Richard Childress Racing, since 2014, and Stenhouse raced for RFK Racing from 2013 to 2019 and has raced for HYAK Motorsports since.

Both drivers are former Daytona 500 champions and Xfinity Series Champions. Each driver also won a race in 2024 but did not qualify for the playoffs despite these wins.

  15 Full-Time Seasons or More

• 15 Seasons – Brad Keselowski
• 16 Seasons – Joey Logano
• 19 Seasons – Denny Hamlin
• 20 Seasons – Kyle Busch

These drivers are the new veterans of the series. Kyle Busch leads the way as he enters his 20th season of full-time Cup Series competition with Richard Childress Racing. Busch lost his record 19-season winning streak in 2024 and, hopefully, will begin a new one in 2025.

The two team owners, Brad Keselowski and Denny Hamlin, continue to win late into their careers. While Hamlin does so with Joe Gibbs Racing, Keselowski races for his team RFK Racing. Keselowski broke a two-season losing streak in 2024 with an improbable win at Darlington.

Joey Logano won his third NASCAR Cup Series championship in 2024. This followed a difficult regular season with lots of made-up ground in the Playoffs. Joey looked to struggle early last season. Perhaps this won’t be the case in 2025 as he chases a second Daytona 500 and a fourth Cup Series championship.

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