NASCAR: Joe Gibbs Racing bring back old car for 2023

Joe Gibbs Racing are bringing back a car that sat out the 2022 NASCAR Xfinity Series season, one that had been on the team’s roster for more than two decades.

Joe Gibbs Racing solidified their full-time driver lineup for the 2023 NASCAR Xfinity Series season this week, confirming Sammy Smith and John Hunter Nemechek as the replacements for the Cup Series-bound Ty Gibbs and the JR Motorsports-bound Brandon Jones.

Smith and Nemechek both spent time behind the wheel of the “star car”, which had been the No. 18 Toyota, during the 2022 season, but neither one is set to utilize a car number that was utilized by Gibbs or Jones in 2022.

Gibbs drove the No. 54 Toyota, which had been the “star car” in 2020 and 2021, while Jones had driven the No. 19 Toyota since 2018.

The No. 54 Toyota will not be used by the team in 2023, while the No. 19 Toyota is now set to become the “star car”, with Ryan Truex having become the first confirmed driver. Truex is set to drive the car in six of 33 races on the 2023 schedule, meaning that further confirmations about the plans for that car are forthcoming.

Smith is set to drive the No. 18 Toyota full-time in 2023, while Nemechek is set to drive a car that was not used by the organization in 2022.

From 2001 to 2021, the No. 20 Toyota was a part of Joe Gibbs Racing’s lineup every year. But after Harrison Burton left the team after two full seasons to join Wood Brothers Racing in the Cup Series following the 2021 campaign, it was not used in 2022.

Now it is set to return, with Nemechek behind the wheel. The No. 20 Toyota was driven by a full-time driver in nine of the 21 seasons from 2001 to 2021, first in 2003 and most recently in 2021.

It was fielded as a full-time rotational ride in eight of the other 12, first in 2007 and most recently in 2017, and it was fielded as a part-time rotational ride in the other four, first in 2001 and most recently in 2012.