NASCAR Cup Series: Will Alex Bowman earn his first victory in 2019?

Alex Bowman has never won a NASCAR Cup Series race in 117 career starts. Will he earn his first victory in the 2019 season?

Three of the 17 drivers who drive for one of the top five teams in the NASCAR Cup Series, including Stewart-Haas Racing, Joe Gibbs Racing, Hendrick Motorsports, Team Penske and Chip Ganassi Racing, are set to enter the 2019 season having never won a race before.

Hendrick Motorsports’ Alex Bowman is one of these three drivers. Bowman has competed in the Cup Series on some level in four of the last five seasons. After competing full-time for BK Racing in the 2014 season and Tommy Baldwin Racing in the 2015 season, he competed in 10 races in the second half of the 2016 season as the replacement for the injured Dale Earnhardt Jr. behind the wheel of the #88 Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet.

After Earnhardt Jr. announced that the 2017 season would be his final season competing in the Cup Series, Bowman was named his full-time replacement behind the wheel of the #88 Chevrolet starting in the 2018 season.

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While the 25-year-old Tucson, Arizona native has competed in 117 races, he has only driven for a top-tier team in 46 of them, his 46 starts as a Hendrick Motorsports driver, so it wouldn’t be fair to judge him in any way based on the fact that he never finished higher than 13th place in any races in the 2014 or 2015 season.

Bowman recorded three top 10 finishes in his 10 starts in the 2016 season, and he took the pole position for the November round of 8 playoff race at Phoenix International Raceway (now ISM Raceway) en route to a then career-high sixth place finish in that race. However, he led 194 of that race’s 324 laps and appeared to be the driver to beat.

In the 2018 season, Bowman took the pole position for the season opener, the Daytona 500, at Daytona International Speedway and went on to record three top five finishes, including a career-high third place finish in the July race at Pocono Raceway, and eight other top 10 finishes.

While Bowman finished in 16th place in the championship standings, which was the worst position among the 16 playoff drivers, he exceeded the expectations that many people had for him by advancing to the round of 12. He was one of only three Chevrolet drivers to do so.

As a whole, Chevrolet teams and drivers struggled mightily to get a handle on the new Camaro ZL1 in the 2018 season. The fact that Bowman was able to do as well as he did in his first season driving full-time for Hendrick Motorsports shows that he has the potential to start winning races in the near future.

What may also play to his advantage is the fact that the one driver who seemed to get a handle on the new Camaro ZL1 was Chase Elliott, one of Bowman’s three teammates. Elliott accounted for three of Chevrolet’s four victories in the 2018 season, and he earned them all in the second half of the season. He did so despite the fact that he entered the season having never won a race before.

Elliott’s breakout season could mean that more success is on the way for Hendrick Motorsports, and with Bowman having had a solid first full season driving for the team, he could benefit greatly from the team’s clear improvements.

The fact that Bowman and the team now have a full season of using the Camaro ZL1 under their belts should also play to their advantage. The 2018 season was the worst season for Chevrolet teams and drivers since the 1982 season, so the odds that they will struggle as much as they did in the 2018 season again in the 2019 season are small.

It seems like it is only a matter of time before Bowman finds victory lane for the first time in his Cup Series career. Expect him to earn at least one victory in the 2019 season.

Will Alex Bowman earn the first victory of his NASCAR Cup Series career in the 2019 season? The 36-race season is scheduled to get underway from Daytona International Speedway in Daytona Beach, Florida on Sunday, February 17. Be sure not to miss the season opener,the 61st annual Daytona 500, and be sure not to miss any of the other 35 races on the 2019 schedule, either.