NASCAR: 5 bold predictions for the 2022 season

NASCAR bold predictions: No. 4 – Hendrick Motorsports won’t win eight races

Hendrick Motorsports, as an organization, had perhaps one of the best seasons in the modern era of NASCAR last year.

The organization scored 17 wins in 36 races with four drivers, including 10 with Kyle Larson, the most for any driver since Jimmie Johnson won 10 races for the team in his 2007 championship season.

Larson also scored the organization’s 14th Cup Series championship and 269th win in the series behind the wheel of the #5 Chevrolet, making them the winningest team in Cup Series history; they now have 280 wins.

Chase Elliott, after winning the championship for Hendrick Motorsports in 2020, was able to score Chevrolet’s 800th win in his #9 Chevrolet, powered by Hendrick. He won a total of two races in 2021, while Alex Bowman won four and William Byron won one.

The organization’s successes in the past two years came after a number of seasons in which they were winning very few races. From 2016 to 2019, they won a total of 17 races and did not win more than five in a single season during that four-year span.

It forced the organization, as well as Chevrolet, to revamp their programs. With their focus on improving the sixth-generation car, it could very well hinder the team’s performance on the new car in 2022. Prior to 2021, they hadn’t won more than seven races in a season since 2015, and they will be held under eight — less than half of their 2021 total — again in 2022.