Bob Pockrass gives a MAJOR update on Ryan Preece’s SHR future
Ryan Preece is the only SHR driver without a top-10 finish in the 2023 season.
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Ryan Preece (Credits: racedayct.com)
The 2023 season hasn’t been kind to most of the Ford drivers, and Stewart Haas Racing’s Ryan Preece is among the few who have suffered the most. Tony Stewart gave Pareece a shot at redemption in the Cup Series. He replaced Cole Custer in the No:41 Ford Mustang after the latter was demoted to the Xfinity Series.
His 2023 season, like all his teammates other than 2014 Cup champion Kevin Harvick has been a story of inconsistency. He hasn’t scored a single top-10 finish so far this season, and the best finish he could salvage came at Phoniex, where he secured a P12, which also helped him to end a poor start of consecutive finishes outside the top 20.
He showed a sign of consistency starting from Darlington, as he secured six back-to-back top 20s before securing back-to-back finishes outside the top 20 at Atlanta and this Monday at New Hampshire, his home track. The poor have stimulated speculations that SHR might look to replace him. But Fox Sports Bob Pockrass has reported that Ryan Preece might get one more season in the No:41 car.
He was quoted saying by Sportsnaut that even if Preece doesn’t secure the finish better than P25 in the championship as he wants, he still might get another shot. Pockrass noted, “While (Ryan Preece) would like to be higher than 25th in the standings in his first full season at (Stewart-Haas Racing), it appears SHR will give him at least one more year.”
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Cole Custer and Aric Almirola will be a major factor in deciding the No:41 rides future
Since his demotion to the No:00 car in the second tier of NASCAR, Cole Custer has been trying to prove himself. The 2019 season Cup Rookie of the Year is motivated to secure the Cup seat once again, and the best way for him to do that will be to win the Xfinity title he lost in 2018 despite winning eight races.
Custer is currently P5 in the Xfinity Series championship table with two wins, including the rain-shorted Chicago Xfinity Series win. He has been a contender in most of the races and is among the front runners in the fight for the title. One big disadvantage he has is the lack of backing from a strong partner, which Preece currently has.
If veteran Aric Almirola decides to end his full-time Cup career finally, Ryan Preece has a seat fixed for him for at least two more years as a third veteran driver will be a big blow for the team. Harvick is already set to retire at the end of the year. If Almirola decides to leave, SHR will lose the lucrative Smithfield Foods sponsorship. So ousting Preece and losing his sponsorship isn’t a good situation for the Ford team.
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Justin P Joy
(4872 Articles Published)