23XI Racing's Corey Heim became the first driver since A.J. Foyt in 1965 to win twice in the first 15 starts of his NASCAR Cup Series career, and he has now won twice in his three most recent starts.
He earned his first win the inaugural race on Naval Base Coronado in June, and he won in his first ever Cup start at Indianapolis Motor Speedway, giving him a crown jewel victory in the Brickyard 400 before he ever even became a full-time Cup driver.
Heim is ineligible to score points in the Cup Series, since he's scoring Craftsman Truck Series points in his part-time deal with Tricon Garage (and has won three races in six starts there as well).
But what if he were scoring Cup points?
While Heim isn't scoring Cup points, he is still scoring points for the No. 67 23XI Racing team in the owner standings. And with 228 points in just eight of 22 races, the No. 67 team is still ahead of multiple full-time Cup teams.
The No. 67 team is 45 points ahead of the No. 51 Rick Ware Racing team of Cody Ware, which isn't exactly surprising. But it's also 12 points of the No. 88 Trackhouse Racing team of Connor Zilisch.
Zilisch, who entered the year has one of the preseason championship favorites, has had a disastrous rookie season. Perhaps there's no better way to describe that than by the fact that he's the sport's only rookie, yet he's trailing a driver who hasn't even become a rookie yet in total points scored, despite the fact that that driver has literally missed 14 races.
With 228 points, Heim has averaged 28.5 points per race. Over 22 races, that'd be good enough for 627 points, which would put him seventh in the standings, notably two spots ahead of reigning champion Kyle Larson, and 109 points above where the playoff cut line would be. That's despite the fact that none of his first five starts of the year produced a finish of higher than 15th.
Heim has already been announced as the new full-time driver of the No. 35 Toyota currently driven by Riley Herbst for 2027, and based on everything he has shown at the Truck and Cup levels thus far, it feels like it goes without saying that Denny Hamlin and Michael Jordan have gotten the real deal.
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