Grading ARCA Drivers’ 2024 Seasons

The 2024 ARCA Menards Series platform season is over.

Andres Perez became the second-ever winless champion in ARCA history, giving Rev Racing two driver championships in three years. In the ARCA Menards Series East, William Sawalich won the season finale and points leader Connor Zilisch wrecked out. As a result, Sawalich snatched the title away from Zilisch. In the ARCA Menards Series West, Sean Hingorani successfully defended his series title.

Frontstretch graded drivers’ seasons after 2023. Now with ’24 in the history books, the ARCA team of Mark Kristl, Josh Calloni and Luke Wingard graded the top-five finishers in the main series as well as the top two from the East and West.

Andres Perez: A

After entering the season as one of the odds-on favorites, Perez pieced together an incredibly consistent campaign in 2024 to clinch the ARCA championship. Propelled by 17 top 10s, 10 top fives and an average finish of 6.5 across this season’s 20 races, Perez won the title by a relatively comfortable margin of 41 points over Rev teammate Lavar Scott.

Although it is hard to criticize any season that culminates in a series title, there is still one jewel missing from Perez’s ARCA crown: a race winner’s checkered flag. While it is an issue that seems to come up a lot with Perez, and it may seem to be a somewhat unfair criticism given the equipment disparity in ARCA, it is important that Perez exhibits the ability to get to victory lane.

Although Perez’s Rev No. 2 entry was always toward the front of the field, it never seemed to be at the very front of the field. With 21 laps led and three runner-up finishes on the season, it would appear on paper that Perez flirted with several wins, but this wasn’t the case. Although the potential to win races is there with Perez, it remained unrealized in a very successful 2024 season for the young Mexican driver. – Luke Wingard

Lavar Scott: A

In his rookie year, Rev’s Scott was one of the most consistent drivers on the ARCA circuit in 2024. While he did not find victory lane, he came close on quite a few occasions.

No race was closer than the Aug. 3 race at Elko Speedway, when Scott, Sawalich and Kris Wright wrecked across the line three-wide for the win. That night, Scott led 100 laps, nearly taking home the win.

Outside that race, Scott finished inside the top five nine times and scored top 10s in 15 of the 20 scheduled races. Included in that consistency was a fourth-place finish at Lucas Oil Indianapolis Raceway Park on a day when he led 44 laps.

While the race at Elko highlighted the year for the 21-year-old rookie, season-long consistency kept Scott in contention for the championship for nearly the entire season, ultimately falling short. He ended up 41 points behind Rev teammate Perez, finishing second in the overall standings. In all likelihood, Scott will return to ARCA in 2025 in an attempt to not only find victory lane but to compete for a championship. – Josh Calloni

Kris Wright: C

Wright entered 2024 with 40 combined starts across the NASCAR national divisions and the ARCA platform. Given his experience and piloting a racecar for reigning organization Venturini Motorsports, Wright should’ve been a contender for wins and the championship, right?

Wrong.

Instead, he notched eight top fives and 12 top 10s with zero laps led. He had a shot at the victory in the famed ending at Elko, though wound up third. His best finish of the season was at Talladega Superspeedway where he finished second. However, he ensured teammate Jake Finch won the race, forfeiting points for himself.

Yes, Wright finished third in the points and was the best of the Venturini full-time drivers. However, his No. 15 finished sixth in the owner’s standings, the third-highest from the VMS stable.

Where did it go wrong for Wright? After all, his two most memorable moments were when he was involved in a wreck with Cody Dennison at Iowa Speedway and when he supposedly wrecked Alex Clubb at the Illinois State Fairgrounds, leading Clubb to have a humorous decal about Wright.

Wright started races well with an average starting position of 6.4, third best of the top-10 finishers. His finishing position was a slide back to 10.2. Imagine if he gained an average of two more positions per race. He would have been in firm contention for runner-up in points and have a slight chance of the title.

On the contrary, he wound up 79 points behind Perez. Wright’s 2025 plans are not yet known. It’d be intriguing to see him return to Venturini to see if he’d improve as a driver. – Mark Kristl

Toni Breidinger: C+

Where Breidinger seemed to have improved last year and started to progress up the running order, she seemed to regress toward the mean in 2024.

In limited starts in 2023, Breidinger racked up four top-five finishes, including a third at Kansas Speedway. Across her full-time season in 2024, Breidinger failed to score a top five, with her best finish being a sixth (twice, at both Berlin Raceway and the Springfield Mile). Her top-10 total rose from seven in ’23 to 11 in 2024, but her 2024 total came in seven more starts.

While injury and other variables may have hindered her performance at certain points this year, it is hard to deny that her results haven’t been up to the lofty Venturini standard. Although a fourth-place points finish may sound impressive, the only full-time team anywhere near the caliber of Breidinger’s No. 25 entry that she outperformed over the course of the season was Amber Balcaen, who also had extensive struggles in 2024.

While Breidinger’s season may not have been unproductive, it was underwhelming for her Venturini team and must not garner a very high grade. – Wingard

Christian Rose: C+

Rose’s second year in ARCA paralleled his first in many ways. His overall points position took a step back, from third to fifth, though that includes a deeper field of competition in 2024. However, he still recorded a top-five finish at year’s end and did so while having a career high in top fives with three, besting last year’s mark of two.

Rose’s specialty seemed to be the superspeedways of Daytona International Speedway and Talladega, recording top fives on both tracks by finishing fourth and fifth, respectively. His other top five in 2024 came at Salem Speedway, a night in which he finished fifth.

For 2025, Rose is expected to be elevated to the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series in some capacity, though no official announcement on that has been made. If his time in ARCA has concluded, the colorful West Virginia Tourism paint schemes displayed on his No. 32 AM Racing Ford will certainly be missed. – Calloni

William Sawalich: A+

Sawalich’s second year in the ARCA platform was perhaps better than his first, which is quite the feat. After winning seven races across the three regional series in 2023, Sawalich followed up in 2024 by winning 11 times. He found victory lane nine times in the national division of the series, and once in ARCA East and West, respectively.

Further, he was crowned repeat champion of the East Series at Bristol Motor Speedway in September after a season-long battle with Zilisch. Perhaps the most impressive part of Sawalich’s ARCA domination was his sheer consistency. He finished just two races outside of the top three this season, a 17th at Dover Motor Speedway after a crash and a fourth at Sonoma Raceway in the West division.

Now that Sawalich has a full-time NASCAR Xfinity Series ride lined up with Joe Gibbs Racing and a part-time Truck Series ride with TRICON Garage, it seems likely his time in ARCA has concluded. While he never competed for a national division title, he certainly left his mark. He found victory lane 18 times in two seasons, won two championships and had an average start and finish of third or better across each of the three divisions of the series. Simply put, no one has come remotely close to comparing to the 18-year-old in that time. – Calloni

Connor Zilisch: A+

There aren’t many positive superlatives left that media members have not used to describe Zilisch’s 2024 season. It has been well-publicized how sensational the young driver was this year across many series, including all ranks of ARCA, as Zilisch won East, West and national series races in his breakout campaign.

In the East, Zilisch won four of the eight races and finished top five in all but one (a misfortune Bristol race that cost him the title). In his one and only West start, Zilisch led 99 of 100 laps en route to a convincing win in the season finale at Phoenix Raceway.

In the national series, Zilisch racked up five more wins across eight races and once again only finished outside the top five once.

While Zilisch saw the East Series title slip away at Bristol through an incident with a lapped car, it is hard to find any other demerit on his incredible 2024 season.

Perhaps more impressive than his race-winning pace in his transition from other forms of racing to stock car racing is his consistency and versatility. From Dover to Michigan International Speedway to IRP, Zilisch excelled at every track type ARCA had to offer. Zilisch ran up front and won at every track type imaginable and did so weekly, earning himself an impressive season grade. – Wingard

Sean Hingorani: A

Hingorani drove for four organizations and still successfully defended his West Series title. It’s the fifth time in West history that a driver piloted a racecar for at least two teams and won the championship.

Hingorani’s trio of trips to victory lane came in Venturini racecars. He swept the doubleheader at Irwindale Speedway and won the penultimate race of the season at Kevin Harvick’s Kern Raceway.

He accrued 15 bonus points in his four races with VMS, 78.9% of his championship margin.

The adversity he overcame wasn’t from his competitors; rather, it came from his original team, Hattori Racing Enterprises. He was supposed to drive full time for HRE. Instead, Hattori took his sponsorship money but did not bring a racecar to the racetrack for him. He scrambled together a race with Sigma Performance Services for the second race of the season, then split his season between Jerry Pitts Racing and Venturini.

Hingorani showcased his talent throughout the year en route to a hard-fought championship. To boot, now he doesn’t know his 2025 plans yet either. – Kristl

Tyler Reif: A-

Reif won a championship for his team Central Coast Racing. It just wasn’t the driver’s championship. Reif brought home the owner’s title for CCR.

Reif led the points for five races in the season, lastly after Tri-City Raceway. An ignition issue left him with a 14th-place DNF at Madera Speedway. He followed it up with two top fives and three top 10s, but Hingorani bested him by 13 points in the season’s final three races.

Reif won twice for CCR, the first trophies for the team since team owner Todd Souza won in 2008.

Reif entered the season wanting to win the championship. His performance garnered his No. 13 a 28-point win over Trevor Huddleston’s No. 50 in the owner standings, but he was unable to beat Hingorani in the driver standings.

Reif also dabbled in an ARCA national event, running the No. 23 for SPS at Bristol. He piloted it to a sixth-place result, showing he can race against the top drivers nationally. As a 17-year-old who won’t turn 18 until June 5, 2025, hopefully, Reif competes in more ARCA races in 2025. – Kristl