Looking Back at Joe Gibbs Racing’s ARCA Successes

The news is indeed true: Joe Gibbs Racing will not field an entry in the ARCA Menards Series in 2027. It’s a shock that the organization, which just won the owner points title in 2026, is closing that arm of its program. The NASCAR Cup Series team clearly has the resources, equipment, and funding to field an ARCA entry.

So why close?

“At the end of the day, we made a really difficult decision to close the ARCA Menards Series program at the end of the season,” Steve deSouza, Executive Vice President of O’Reilly Series and Development for JGR, told JosephSrigley.com. “As we went through the evaluation of this year, and as we start to plan for 2027, we just determined it was important to place our focus, and the resources we have available, on making significant improvements across our O’Reilly Series program. It’s pretty obvious we’ve been struggling there a little bit, and we need to really ramp that back up.”

Max Reaves, current JGR development driver, has not announced his 2027 plans. He previously indicated to Frontstretch that he would return to ARCA next year.

As time unfolds, that equipment will be sold, Reaves will announce his plans, and hopefully those employees will find work elsewhere as people with knowledge of the situation informed Frontstretch that those JGR employees will be without jobs after this season.

For the second time in two years, a big-name ARCA team has closed its doors, as Venturini Motorsports was sold to Nitro Motorsports following the 2025 season.
While Venturini arguably has the greatest resume in ARCA team history, JGR sure made a statement in its 10 years of ARCA competition.

It entered the ARCA field in 2017 with Riley Herbst. The late Coy Gibbs, Ty Gibbs’ father, was listed as the car owner. Herbst gave the team its first triumph of many at Pocono Raceway. His crew chief that year? Shannon Rursch, who just won the 2026 title with Thomas Annunziata. Herbst finished fifth in the standings in ’17, then third in 2018.

2019 was when the organization began to shine. Ty Gibbs debuted that year and he immediately grabbed headlines with his last-lap maneuver on Sam Mayer to capture his first ARCA triumph.

Gibbs won at Gateway and Salem Speedway.

Then, 2020 arrived. While the COVID-19 pandemic took fans away from most racetracks, the No. 18 team burst forth with multiple wins.

Gibbs won the ARCA Menards Series East race at Toledo Speedway en route to second in those points.

In the main series, he captured a series-high six trophies; Herbst also won at Michigan International Speedway, and the No. 18 team won the owner points championship. It was the first of five for the team.

Gibbs wasn’t done, though. He staged a season-long memorable battle with Corey Heim for the title. Heim scored six wins and 20 top 10s – zero finishes outside the top 10. Pretty good, right? Not enough to topple Gibbs, though. He won 10 times, led 1,689 laps, and emerged with a 37-point championship. JGR swept the owner and driver standings in 2021.

Furthermore, that was the year that began the JGR vs. VMS rivalry, one which ended only when Venturini exited the series.

While they banged fenders in other races, the most memorable battle between Gibbs and Heim occurred at Winchester Speedway. Heim led with two laps to go, but Gibbs spun him.

As a result, Gibbs won and Heim wound up third. It was a perfect reflection of their season. They raced each other hard all year. They hated each other by season’s end. That’s partly why Heim has never driven for JGR in his career.

Regarding allegations of cheating that year, I know that series officials thoroughly inspected Gibbs and Heim’s racecars. If anything, their teams got away with less than the others, because their cars were so much faster.

For JGR, it also won the ARCA East title that year with Sammy Smith. At Bristol, after Gibbs won the race and Smith won the East championship, they celebrated with tandem burnouts. It was cool to watch.

We know Ty Gibbs’ story afterward. As for the No. 18 ARCA program, it changed names to Kyle Busch Motorsports in 2022, due to sponsorship. Smith piloted it for the bulk of the season, and he delivered another crown to the team with the owner’s title on the strength of six wins. He won the East championship again as well.

Toledo hosted the season finale, and it was a classic. Smith used the bumper of his No. 18 to win, and post-race antics ensued.

After Smith departed, William Sawalich joined the program for two straight years. The No. 18 team went back to the JGR name, and Sawalich won back-to-back East titles. He compiled 25 total wins across the ARCA platform – national division, ARCA East and West combined. He was very vanilla, though, in his interviews.

So, then we met Reaves. Armed with family business Cook Out funding, Reaves is not vanilla. He is still only 16 years old. And he made headlines.

Yes, Brent Crews raised a few eyebrows with his 2025 win at Phoenix Raceway, but Reaves brought back shades of Ty Gibbs. Young, talented, rich, arguably arrogant or cocky, and unapologetic. On track, he is fast, aggressive, impatient, though not wholly reckless as he has rarely wrecked his racecar.

Now JGR is out of ARCA, and Reaves has 12 ARCA trophies.

JGR brought resources, equipment, and funding that raised the bar for the frontrunners. For example, Pinnacle Racing Group duo Carson Brown and Tristan McKee are development drivers for Richard Childress Racing and Spire Motorsports, respectively, so they benefited from support from those two teams. Nitro Motorsports went 1-2-3 in the driver’s standings, but driver’s champion Annunziata only won once this season.

On one hand, JGR’s departure could open the door for more different winners next year. Or Nitro and PRG could dominate the series.

JGR raised the bar to succeed in ARCA. Brenden Queen and Jesse Love’s titles came facing JGR drivers, so they had to work harder for their wins. Likewise, Smith piling up wins affected the 2022 championship outcome. It was still quite memorable. The threshold to win was raised, and it’s a testament to the JGR drivers, who had to pilot the No. 18 Toyota on track, after all.

Look at JGR’s ARCA graduates. Gibbs is a current Cup Chase driver and Herbst is a full-time Cup driver who will move to Legacy Motor Club in 2027. Smith has three NASCAR O’Reilly Auto Parts Series wins and four straight postseason appearances. Sawalich won for the first time in his O’Reilly career this season and will return to his ride next year. Even though Crews and Gio Ruggiero only ran a handful of races for the team, they too are full time in the NASCAR national series.

No, JGR’s exit will not save ARCA, as social media commentariat rejoicefully thinks. ARCA is not perfect, but teams have left ARCA before; the series will celebrate its 75th year in 2027.

Yes, the difference between the top-tier teams and the underdogs will continue to exist. An underfunded team’s budget does not change because of this news.

Personally, while Reaves can be off-putting at times, and although Gibbs had his moments where he needed to grow up – he was still a teenager racing in ARCA – I will miss the JGR brigade. deSouza, Matt Ross, Bobby Labonte, and the team were always friendly in the ARCA garage, willing to chat about the race at hand, talk about upcoming races on the schedule, or simply chat.

We’ll say goodbye to the JGR ARCA team in the ARCA Menards Series West race at Phoenix. That will take place on Saturday, Oct. 17. In the meantime, the West field will visit The Bullring at Las Vegas Motor Speedway on Friday, Oct. 2. The green flag will fly for that one at 9 p.m. ET, with live coverage provided by FloRacing.