Eyes on Xfinity: Sam Mayer Wants a Cup Ride

After winning last Saturday’s (June 15) NASCAR Xfinity Series race at Iowa Speedway, Sam Mayer made it clear he wasn’t happy. Of course, he was thrilled with the victory, but when he was asked about whether he feels he should be considered for a NASCAR Cup Series ride, he was unequivocal.

“Yea, it kind of pisses me off to be honest with you,” Mayer said. “I feel like we’ve proved ourselves a lot more, like I’m dead serious, it makes me so mad that my name isn’t in more hats with race teams. So, hopefully today kind of put my name in a couple of them. We’re working really hard, I want to go Sunday racing obviously one day. How soon? I don’t know.”

The Franklin, Wis., native will turn 21 years old on June 26. Among the top 15 in the Xfinity Series driver points, only Sammy Smith and Jesse Love are younger. Mayer is in his third full-time Xfinity season, but he is still young and a far cry from slipping into lifer status in the second series.

Mayer’s JR Motorsports team has served as a pipeline for drivers to learn their craft, compile wins, and get promoted to Cup. Josh Berry was the most recent graduate, a unique situation to be sure; Berry was already 33 years old when he made the jump. Before Berry was Noah Gragson, who spent four seasons with JRM before running full-time in Cup beginning in 2023 at the age of 24.

The last major Cup rookie class came in 2020. That season saw Tyler Reddick, Christopher Bell, John Hunter Nemechek and Cole Custer all move up to the big show. That quartet had an average age over 23 when they began their rookie campaigns in Cup.

So why the urgency from Mayer? Why does he feel he’s not received the recognition and consideration he deserves? I have theories.

Mayer Versus Gibbs

There is a Cup rookie from the 2023 class that didn’t get mentioned above: Ty Gibbs. Mayer and Gibbs have been rivals going back to at least 2018 when they both ran full-time in the CARS Late Model Stock Car Tour. That year it was Mayer, at the ripe old age of 15, who out performed Gibbs, who is almost nine months older than Mayer. Gibbs went winless that year, while Mayer collected one win and four more top 10s. This young gun duo kept battling throughout 2019 and 2020.

In 2021, Mayer’s career growth started to fall behind that of Gibbs. Both drivers ran part-time Xfinity schedules. Each ran 18 races, but Gibbs had four wins to Mayer’s zero. Gibbs also continued to run the full ARCA schedule and won the championship in one of the most dominant seasons we’ve ever seen.

Mayer was seventh in the Xfinity standings in 2022. He did not win a race, but still, not bad for a rookie. Gibbs meanwhile? He had seven wins and won the championship, along with 15 Cup starts in relief of injured Kurt Busch. That was two seasons ago, and as of this writing, Mayer has yet to enter a Cup race.

Gibbs hasn’t been afraid to mention his faster career progression either. After Mayer bumped Gibbs out of the way at Watkins Glen International last season, he reminded everyone what the scoreboard looked like between the two.

“He has more starts than I do and it’s his second win,” Gibbs said. “So, congratulations to him on his second win and definitely wish I could’ve gotten my 13th there.”

If Gibbs’ ascendance and success has contributed to the feelings that led Mayer to say what he said after his Iowa Speedway win last weekend, can you blame him? Put yourself in his shoes. Would you want to get left behind while your biggest rival races on Sundays? In defense of Mayer, Gibbs has an obvious and gigantic advantage: His grandfather. Not many young hotshots get access to the support system and opportunity that comes along with such a relationship.

Truck Series Threats

There is another factor at play besides the rivalry with Gibbs. Take a look at this year’s Cup rookie class. Carson Hocevar and Zane Smith are competing against Berry for Rookie of the Year. Back in 2022, Todd Gilliland competed against Austin Cindric and Harrison Burton for the rookie honors.

Hocevar, Smith and Gilliland have something in common with another driver who is currently thought to be the top prospect for a Cup ride next season. Unlike Mayer, Corey Heim already has Cup starts under his belt. If silly season plays out the way a lot of people expect, he’ll be a Cup rookie in 2025 without ever running a full Xfinity season. As of now, it doesn’t seem like Mayer will be joining him.

Cup teams appear to be more willing to pull their rookie talent from the third-tier Craftsman Truck Series than in years prior. This adds to the pressure on the Xfinity drivers to perform. This is more than a coincidence of small sample size. Anthony Damcott covers the Truck Series here at Frontstretch, and when asked about drivers skipping Xfinity, his answer was pretty simple.

“Xfinity cars just drive different,” Damcott said. “The Next Gen drives more like a truck.”

After winning at Iowa, Mayer went on to say, “There’s so many people in the top five, top 10 that have something to prove. If you can be top dog in those guys, I feel like you deserve it.”

We’ve got several recent examples where beating the Xfinity competition isn’t always enough. With the truck being more similar to the Next Gen car, you need to stand out enough to keep the Truck drivers from skipping past and leaving you in the dust.

Looking Inward

When a teenager such as 2018’s 15-year-old CARS Tour race-wining version of Mayer started to imagine what his career could look like, it’s easy to see how he could put so much pressure on himself that mistakes could follow, along with statements like the one that inspired this column.

Mayer didn’t immediately respond to our inquiry for this story, but I think if we asked him what he still needs to get better at, consistency and race craft would be on the short list. In the 29 races since his epic first career Xfinity win last year at Road America, not far from where he grew up, Mayer has experienced some major highs and lows. During that span he’s won six races, more than any other driver. The first three wins came on road courses, the next two came on intermediates and now a short track. You can see the growth in progress.

In the same amount of time, the lows have been lower than you’d expect for someone aiming for a Cup ride. This season Mayer has seven top fives, which is tied for most in the series. But what about when things aren’t going right?

Well, they’re going very wrong. Mayer has only nine lead-lap finishes so far this season. There have only been two races where he turned a non-top-five run into a lead lap result. Those other six races? Five finishes in the 30s with a best of 28th and an average of 33.6. That is about as boom and bust as it gets in this business.

A lot of the pieces are already in place. There is still time for Mayer to put the rest of them together. We’re just shy of halfway through the season and with two wins already in the bank and top fives in seven of the last nine races, we are starting to see it. The willingness to make the statement he did about Cup racing shows he is confident in his abilities, an important part of not only making it to Cup but succeeding at that level.

Remember when Chase Briscoe talked about needing to win eight races to prove himself worthy of a Cup ride? He called his shot, won nine races that year, and moved up to Cup. If Mayer could reach the Briscoe level of eight or more wins this year, he could force the hand of those Cup owners he wants to drive for.

Being such a prolific winner in Xfinity this season will not be easy. He has to beat steady series veteran Justin Allgaier in equal equipment, one heck of a measuring stick. Speaking of Allgaier, you have to wonder how Mayer felt when he didn’t get the opportunity to fill-in for Kyle Larson at Charlotte, while his 38-year-old teammate did (admirably, I might add).

Defending series champion Custer is trying to repeat in his last hurrah with Stewart-Haas Racing and prove he too belongs (back) in Cup. The other SHR driver, Riley Herbst, has sponsorship behind him, but is continuing to improve and try to show he’s worthy of the next level. The Toyota brigade is being led by Chandler Smith, whom if I had to bet today, will secure a Cup ride before Mayer too.

When we get to the road courses where Mayer has been so good, he has to compete against world-class talents like Shane van Gisbergen and AJ Allmendinger.

Don’t forget those pesky Buschwackers. Eight wins sounds like an onerous task.

The key to Mayer’s progression might not be eight wins, though of course it would help. Rather, it’s what he does on those days where he doesn’t have a car capable of winning. As strange as it may sound, Cup owners need to see Mayer putting up some 10th to 15th place finishes more frequently. When he encounters adversity and has to restart in the back and ‘run with the squirrels’ as some say, can he make it through patiently and unscathed to salvage a decent day out of it?

Along those same lines is his need to improve where he’s been the worst: superspeedways. His average finish at Daytona International Speedway has been 26.3, better than only Talladega Superspeedway where it’s 26.6. He’s only been running at the finish in one of his five starts there.

The results and their trajectory prove Mayer is justified in his comments, but should still embrace the opportunity to refine his craft in Xfinity while he can. Even if he does really well this season, he might not get to Cup until 2026 or later.

He is talented, confident, good natured, and versatile. His future is bright. If there is something he can improve upon to move up among Cup prospects, it’s bringing the car home clean in the top 15 even on a bad day.

Once he gets that part figured out, watch out.