MOORESVILLE, N.C. — Chase Briscoe earned rookie-of-the-year honors in the NASCAR Cup Series this season, giving the Indiana driver the hat trick as he had previously won top rookie honors in the NASCAR Camping World Truck Series and the NASCAR Xfinity Series.
“I never in a million years thought I would get to run one Truck Series race let alone win the rookie of the year now in all three,” Briscoe said. “It’s super humbling. It’s super special to be able to be one of the few guys that have won it in all three is really special as well. I’m glad that the first year is over. There was definitely a lot of growing pains and things to learn, but hopefully, this is just the first of many years in the Cup Series and something that I can continue to do.”
Driving the No. 14 Ford for Stewart-Haas Racing, Briscoe acknowledged moving from the Xfinity Series to the Cup Series was a difficult transition.
“The biggest thing is just how competitive it is. You hear all the time how tough the Cup Series is and, for me, that was very real, just how good everybody is and if you think about it, everybody at the Cup level from first place to really the top 30 has won at every level they’ve been in and have been guys that have won their entire career,” he said. “It’s just a really competitive series.
“I feel like the racing for 20th place in the Cup Series is some of the hardest racing you’ll do anywhere in the world, so, for me, that was the biggest thing is just how perfect you have to be,” Briscoe noted. “There’s a rare group of guys, I’d say only four or five guys week in and week out that can have penalties, have things go wrong in the race, lose all their track position and still drive back to the front. Outside of that, you have to do everything perfect to have a shot to even get in the top 10 and get that track position.”
Briscoe acknowledged that Stewart-Haas Racing’s overall performance was disappointing this season, but pointed out that everything will change for next season with the debut of the Next Gen race car in February.
“On the performance side, it wasn’t the year that any of us hoped for or even expected,” Briscoe said. “I know that we’re trying to turn that around and I heard you say what direction are we going in, I don’t know if anybody knows what the right direction is with this car yet, but I will say that I feel like so far how the Next Gen tests have gone, I feel like we’ve been really good on speed.
“You never know what guys are showing or what guys aren’t showing, but I do feel like we’re at a good place right now. I guess we’ll know more this Wednesday and Thursday when we go to test, so hopefully we’re continuing to be fast, but I do feel like we’ve been really good from a speed standpoint so far, but it’s hard to say what’s gonna happen.
“Nobody knows what this car is going to be like or what it’s gonna drive like 100 percent,” Briscoe added. “Whatever team figures it out, is going to have a huge advantage for a while, I think. Hopefully, we’re that team and we’ve definitely been putting a lot of time into this car and trying to figure out what it likes, so hopefully we can be that team that finds it first.”