NASCAR Cup Series: Will Chevrolet bounce back in 2019?

Chevrolet teams and drivers had a historically bad 2018 NASCAR Cup Series season. Will they bounce back in the 2019 season?

Chevrolet teams made the switch from the SS to the new Camaro ZL1 for the 2018 NASCAR Cup Series season, but the season did not end up going according to plan. To put it bluntly, the season was a historically terrible disaster for them.

After the 2017 season resulted in no Chevrolet drivers competing in the Championship 4 for the first time since the Championship 4 was introduced ahead of the 2014 season and thus no Chevrolet drivers finishing in the top four in the championship standings for the first time since the 1999 season, the 2018 season yielded even worse results.

Only two Chevrolet drivers found victory lane in the 2018 season, as Richard Childress Racing’s Austin Dillon earned his second career Cup Series victory while Hendrick Motorsports’ Chase Elliott earned the first three victories of his Cup Series career.

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Not since Jeff Gordon won 10 races and Terry Labonte won one race in the 1997 season had only two Chevrolet drivers found victory lane in a single season.

Chevrolet’s win total of four in the 2018 season was also the lowest since they earned just three victories in the 1982 season. Dave Marcis earned the fifth and final victory of his Cup Series career while Bobby Allison earned two victories that season.

Meanwhile, seven Ford drivers combined to earn a total of 19 victories as well as the championship while three Toyota drivers combined to earn a total of 13 victories this past season.

Will the Chevrolet teams and drivers bounce back in the 2019 season?

It would be shocking if they didn’t. First of all, they had several potential victories slip away throughout the season. Chip Ganassi Racing’s Kyle Larson alone let five potential victories slip away from him.

It looked as though the 26-year-old Elk Grove, California native was on pace to win the April race at Bristol Motor Speedway, the May race at Kansas Speedway, the July race at Chicagoland Speedway, the September race at Darlington Racing and the September race at the Charlotte Motor Speedway roval.

Larson, whose laps led total of 782 this past season trailed only the laps led total of the four Championship 4 drivers — Stewart-Haas Racing’s Kevin Harvick (1,990), Joe Gibbs Racing’s Kyle Busch (1,469), Furniture Row Racing’s Martin Truex Jr. (1,016) and Team Penske’s Joey Logano (934) — finished the season with zero victories after potential victories in each of those five races slipped away from him late for one reason or another.

With that in mind, Chevrolet could have easily walked away from the 2018 season with at least nine victories.

Secondly, the 2018 season was the first full season for two notable Chevrolet drivers driving for Hendrick Motorsports, the sport’s top Chevrolet team. Alex Bowman replaced Dale Earnhardt Jr. as the full-time driver of #88 Chevrolet while William Byron replaced Kasey Kahne as the full-time driver of the #5-turned-#24 Chevrolet.

Bowman recorded a career-high third place finish in the July race at Pocono Raceway while Byron recorded a career-high sixth place finish in the same race. While Byron failed to qualify for the playoffs, Bowman had an impressive and rather unexpected run to the round of 12. Both drivers should take big steps forward in the 2019 season.

Thirdly, Chase Elliott. The 23-year-old Dawsonville, Georgia native who critics previously referred to as “Chokin’ Chase who can’t win a race” proved that Chevrolet drivers can, in fact, win races on, at the very least, a semi-regular basis,

Elliott accounted for 75% of the manufacturer’s victories in the 2018 season despite the fact that he entered the season with a huge monkey on his back to earn his first career victory after letting numerous potential victories slip away from him in the 2016 and 2017 seasons, his first two seasons as a full-time driver in the sport, as well as the fact that he did not earn his first victory until the 36-race season’s 22nd race at Watkins Glen International in early August.

Finally, the new rules package for the 2019 season should serve as somewhat of an equalizer among the sport’s top Chevrolet, Ford and Toyota teams. There should be a wider variety of drivers competing at the front, and that in itself should allow Chevrolet teams and drivers to earn a few extra victories here and there.

In the 2019 season, Chevrolet likely won’t return to the level they were at from the 2003 season through the 2015 season when they won 13 consecutive manufacturer championships, but they certainly shouldn’t have anywhere near as disastrous of a season as they had this past season.

Will Chevrolet teams and drivers bounce back in the 2019 NASCAR Cup Series season after what was very much a disaster of a 2018 season? How many victories will they earn next year? How many, if any, Chevrolet drivers, will reach the Championship 4? Will a Chevrolet driver be crowned champion?