JR Motorsports is going Cup racing with 2025 Daytona 500 entry

With an ownership group that includes Dale Earnhardt Jr. and sister Kelley Earnhardt Miller, JR Motorsports has been a staple in the NASCAR Xfinity Series for nearly 20 years. To-date, JRM has four driver’s titles, winning in 2014 with Chase Elliott, 2017 with William Byron, 2018 with Tyler Reddick, and lastly, 2024 with Justin Allgaier.

2024 was Allgaier’s first Xfinity championship after 14 full-time seasons of competition and now, he’ll get the chance to take on NASCAR’s crown jewel event as the latest announced in a stacked open field of drivers. The deal came as a bit of a surprise to Allgaier, who didn’t expect to be offered the chance to pilot JRM’s first ever Cup entry when he was brought into the JRM office. 

Justin Allgaier, JR Motorsports, BRANDT Chevrolet Camaro

Photo by: Danny Hansen / NKP / Motorsport Images

“This is a big opportunity,” said Allgaier in a Wednesday press conference. “I take a lot of pressure on myself in that moment to see this organization compete on the grand scale of the Cup Series. Something that I am surprised has never come to fruition before this point.”

Allgaier went on to talk about the battle to make the 500 with up to nine open entries potentially fighting for the final four spots on the grid, touching on how he nearly crumbled under the pressure in last year’s Xfinity title-decider before making a remarkable comeback to secure the crown.

“Phoenix is a great example of what not to do in those moments,” laughed Allgaier. “I think one of the things for me that has been ultra important — I think your mindset has to be to try and go qualify. That has to be number one. That’s the easiest way to do it because then you can race the Duels in a different capacity. You can allow yourself to do a little bit more learning and some of the things that are going to be keys for the race in the 500 … If you don’t qualify in and you have to race your way in through the Duels, I think your mindset changes. We all understand what can happen in the Duels … we’ve seen it time and time again. I remember watching last year with Jimmie Johnson trying to race his way in and I remember thinking to myself if you were in that position and you know you’re going to have to go for it, you have to throw caution to the wind and try to see what you can accomplish.”

A very capable crew chief leading the effort

Allgaier will be piloting the No. 40 JR Motorsports Chevrolet with veteran crew chief Greg Ives atop the pit box. Of note, Ives has been the crew chief for eight Daytona 500s, putting his car on the front row an astonishing six times. 

“I saw how many times he’s qualified a car on the front row at Daytona,” smirked Earnhardt Jr. when asked about the decision to bring in Ives. “It’s like, ‘you got any magic left Greg? Let’s go to the track and see what we can do.’ But being an open car, there’s some challenges to see what we can do to get into the field. It won’t be easy. There’s some very tough competition. I was confident that Greg understood better than anybody the things we would all need to gather into place to go there with the best opportunity we could. And me and him are just really great friends and I trust him wholeheartedly. And I don’t think he’ll be too annoyed with me standing over his shoulder throughout the whole process, asking him all kinds of silly questions.” 

Backing from a country music legend

The car comes with sponsorship from singer Chris Stapleton’s Traveller Whiskey brand. Stapleton was present for the announcement, saying that it hasn’t fully sunk in yet as he embarks on this new adventure.

“I was thinking, what is the coolest thing we could do with the whiskey brand,” explained Stapleton. “Well maybe we should put it on a race car and I happen to know Rick Hendrick [owner, Hendrick Motorsports]. Rick hooked me up with Dale and this opportunity came up and I thought we got to do that. I went and talked to my partners and said ‘hey, we got to make this happen. Let’s make this happen.’ And they agreed. This is the best possible way we could introduce our brand to the fans of the sport and beyond that, it’s just super cool to see it on the car. Selfishly, that’s one of the things I wanted out of it the most. Just to see this thing happen and now, reality is setting in. Like oh, we’re entering a car into the Daytona 500. It’s going to be a lot of fun. I’m excited to see what happens … the whole experience of it.”

Allgaier has two previous starts in the Daytona 500, running the event in 2014 and 2015. He has 82 total Cup starts total, but his most recent appearance came in last year’s Coca-Cola 600, subbing for Kyle Larson in the No. 5 Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet while he was competing in the the Indy 500.