NASCAR on TV this week

NASCAR Hall of Fame Class of 2025: Carl Edwards, the Star Who Walked Away

It all began with handing out business cards to anyone and everyone who would take one while he raced dirt tracks all over his home state of Missouri.

That self promotion paid off for Carl Edwards in 2002 when he snagged a chance to run select NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series races for MB Motorsports. In those seven races, he scored a best finish of eighth at Kansas Speedway. Meanwhile, in that same season, he made a single start in the NASCAR Xfinity Series at World Wide Technology Raceway at Gateway, where he finished a dismal 38th.

The following year, he joined Roush Fenway Racing to run full time in the Truck Series. Behind the wheel of the No. 99 Ford, he won three races, including his first career victory at Kentucky Speedway. He finished eighth in the championship standings but walked away with 13 top fives and 15 top 10s along with Rookie of the Year honors.

See also
Here's What Happened This Week With the 23XI/FRM Lawsuit (Jan. 4-Jan. 10)

In 2004, Edwards once again raced in the Truck Series full time, this time finishing fourth in the standings with three more wins and 17 top 10s. Additionally, he made his NASCAR Cup Series debut at Michigan International Speedway and finished 10th. He went on to make 13 starts for RFR that season and scored five top 10s, including a best finish of third at Atlanta Motor Speedway.

During his first full-time season in the Cup Series, Edwards ran all year in the Xfinity Series as well. He made history, sweeping the Xfinity and Cup races at Atlanta Motor Speedway in March in what was the first time a driver had ever won in both series on the same weekend. He went on to end the year with four wins in Cup and five in Xfinity, though he came up short in the championship battle in both.

Edwards went on to race full time in Xfinity for six more years through the 2011 season, winning a lone title in 2007 and finishing runner-up in the rest. Through 245 Xfinity starts, he scored 38 wins, 130 top fives and 174 top 10s.

Edwards ran full time in Cup from 2005-2016 in a time when two drivers accounted for nine of the 12 championships he raced for, and he finished runner-up twice. The first came in 2008 when Edwards scored a series-high nine wins and took the title battle to the last race. Despite winning the season finale, he still came up short to eventual champion Jimmie Johnson.

The next one was in 2011, a playoff season anyone who was around the sport at the time will remember quite clearly as the one that ended in a tiebreaker, with Tony Stewart coming out on top. Stewart entered that title race — which at the time, was determined through a 10-race shootout among 12 drivers — seeded as a four-way tie for last. He turned up the heat, winning five of the final 10 races of the season and ended the year tied in points, giving Stewart the edge with his five victories compared to Edwards’ one.

His final run at the championship came in 2016 when he made his first Championship 4 appearance. Running as the top driver of the four competing for the title for much of the season finale at Homestead-Miami Speedway, a restart crash following a late caution ended Edwards’ race and his championship hopes.

At the time, no one knew it would be the last race for the then-37-year-old. After all, he seemingly had several years ahead of him before he’d retire.

See also
NASCAR's 5-Year Facelift

But the following January, the NASCAR world was rocked by the announcement that Edwards wouldn’t be returning to JGR for the 2017 season. Instead, he opted to walk away from the sport to for what he outlined in three reasons.

“I’m satisfied with my career,” Edwards put simply to sum up a longer winded explanation. “I’d like to spend time on other things outside of it, and my health is important to me. I am healthy.”

His accomplishments statistically in the sport may pale in comparison to names like Richard Petty, Dale Earnhardt, Johnson and Jeff Gordon, to name a few, but his impact remains.

“I am so fortunate,” Edwards said in closing out his announcement. “I’ve had the most support ever. I think everything happens for a reason, I really do.”

Special Projects Director at Frontstretch

7 Comments
Inline Feedbacks
View all comments
Echo

He made tons of money and happened to marry a sports doctor who makes tons of money. Why risk serious injury if your healthy. 37 and setup for life isn’t to shabby. Neither is a couple thousand acres of farmland.

Jeremy

I’m actually surprised more drivers don’t do this. Sure, they love to race, but there’s plenty of dirt tracks out there to scratch that itch when and where you want to vs the weekly grind of the NASCAR schedule. Granted, the money ain’t what is used to be, but there’s still plenty there to afford an early retirement if one plans well.

Echo

Me too. 37 is young, why wait till your 45..

DoninAjax

Looks like Carl saw the writing on the wall and didn’t like it and got out before the lunatic inmates started running the asylum.

Echo

Kyle Larson. I think he’s 32, I think he will retire from NASCAR younger than Carl did.

EndTheFed

He ran away from the sport because a Phantom caution by NASCAR changed the 2016 Championship Winner.

Mike Adams

The race was rigged so Jimmie could win a 7th championship.
Jimmie had a junk car all the race, the yellow came out and guess who’s car was inline for a great start at the green flag?
I believe Carl was told to crash and let Jimmie win so it would create more attention for Nascar.
Sorry Jimmie … you really only have 6 championships that were earned !