The Rise Of Michael McDowell
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If you said the name Michael McDowell a few years ago, pretty much everybody would think of the worst and most notable moment of his career. McDowell was qualifying for his second career NASCAR Cup Series race at Texas in the spring of 2008 when he got loose entering Turn 1 and shot up the track into the outside wall which caused the car to flip upside down. The #00 Toyota then barrel rolled down the track’s banking and came to a stop on the apron completely destroyed, leaving everyone at the track in shock. This crash proved that the Car Of Tomorrow was the safest car that NASCAR ever developed as McDowell quickly climbed out of the battered machine unharmed and this was his only moment in the spotlight during his Cup Series career for quite some time.
After his time at Michael Waltrip Racing ended, McDowell raced in the Xfinity Series full time for a couple of seasons, scoring six top tens and placing 13th and 21st in the standings for 2009 and 2010 respectively. During this time, McDowell also started driving for “start and park” teams in the Cup Series and these were small teams that just wanted to make the race for the pay money as they would pull out of the race early on to keep their equipment from being damaged or overused. Since he was driving for start and park teams, McDowell did not score his first Cup Series top ten finish until the 2013 Daytona 500, where he took the checkered flag in ninth place for Phil Parsons Racing.
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After the 2013 season, McDowell joined Leavine Family Racing and this was where the results started to improve for him as this was the first time since his rookie year that he was not driving for a start and park team. During his four seasons at Leavine Family Racing from 2014-2017, McDowell got his first career top five finish and he added four top tens to that as well. McDowell also picked up his first career Xfinity Series win during this time as he won at Road America in 2016 while driving for Richard Childress Racing. In his final season at Leavine Family Racing, McDowell had his best season of his career thus far, finishing 26th in the standings with an average finish of 22.3 and getting his best career Cup Series finish of fourth at the summer Daytona race.
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After the 2017 season, McDowell moved on to Front Row Motorsports where the #34 team continued to be a mid-pack ride but McDowell continued to shine on superspeedways, finishing fifth at the 2019 Daytona 500 and at Talladega in the playoff race that same year. In 2020, McDowell had his best points finish of his career, 23rd, and his best average finish of his career too, 20.9, despite battling through the COVID-19 pandemic so it was clear that Front Row Motorsports was slowly making strides in the Cup Series garage.
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The next season, Michael McDowell’s career changed for the better as he shocked the motorsports world by winning the 2021 Daytona 500 in dramatic fashion and this finally gave him his first career win in the Cup Series. McDowell followed up his win with top ten finishes in the next two races and his Daytona 500 win clinched him his first ever trip to the NASCAR playoffs which ended in the Round of 16 unfortunately but this gave the organization a lot of confidence heading into the NextGen car era.
The NextGen car was seen as a “great equalizer” which would level the playing field and it would also handle better on road courses, which suited McDowell’s open wheel racing background. In the 2022 season, McDowell may have missed the playoffs but he put up an impressive 16.7 average finish, the best mark of his career by far, and he had a career best 12 top ten finishes after his previous best total was five in 2021. As for this season, McDowell and the #34 team have continued to be one of the best road course cars in the Cup Series today and they have been right around the playoff cutline for most of the summer.
However, after a couple of mediocre runs at Richmond and Michigan, it seemed McDowell’s playoff chances were beginning to dwindle but then he came into Indianapolis and ran the best race of his career, leading 54 of the 82 laps to secure a playoff spot with his second career win. McDowell also won a stage and came one point short of earning the max amount of points handed out in a race (60) so now everyone is wondering if McDowell can go on a run in the 2023 playoffs and eventually build Front Row Motorsports into a championship contending team.
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McDowell will be 39 in December so he most likely only has four or five years left in his career but he has come such a long way and I would not rule out him winning another three or four races in his career. He has won his two Cup Series races at the two most prestigious tracks in America, Daytona and Indianapolis, which is a rare and spectacular achievement to accomplish. McDowell will also continue to mentor his teammate Todd Gilliland, as they are both returning to the team next year and Gilliland has definitely improved from his rookie season last year. One thing is for certain, Michael McDowell is at the top of his game right now and it will be exciting to see what can do on the race track for the rest of the 2023 NASCAR Cup Series season.
