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Richard Childress Racing to field third Cup Series car for multiple races in 2025, announces crew chief

JHby:Jonathan Howard•12/09/24•

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Richard Childress
© David Yeazell-USA TODAY Sports

Next season Richard Childress Racing will have a third Cup Series team in NASCAR. They will run multiple races and drivers in 2025. The number for the car has not been announced and that could mean a special return for RCR fans.

Richard Childress Racing made a competition change at the Cup and Xfinity Series level. Most notably, they have named Andy Street as the crew chief of the third open team.

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Andy Street will not only have duties in Cup but also limited Xfinity Series races. Street spent the last three seasons as crew chief of the No. 21 team with Austin Hill. Chad Haney will replace Street on Hill’s team.

Danny Stockman will continue to work with Jesse Love on the No. 2 team.

There are a couple of things to note about this announcement. A number has not been announced for the team yet. This year, Kaulig Racing will only race the 16 and the 10 cars. They have given up their claim to the 31 – could we see that number return to Richard Childress Racing?

Will Brown, 2024 Supercars champion, also wants to return to the Cup Series. He had an ill-fated start at Sonoma last year that was plagued by electrical issues in his No. 33 Chevy. Brown has his eyes on Chicago.

This also begs the question, how many Daytona 500 entries are we going to see in 2025? With 23XI Racing and Front Row Motorsports potentially running six open teams next year, that could be a huge storyline.

Richard Childress Racing: Will Jesse Love gets Cup start?

In the press release from Richard Childress Racing, the big man himself had a quote about the competition moves. Childress understands that his Cup program did not live up to expectations last season. This hire should help.

“Andy Street brings a wealth of knowledge to our NASCAR Cup Series program as we continue to evaluate ways to build a deeper bench and promote from within,” Childress said. “This move gives Andy the chance to gain NextGen experience and have a bigger opportunity on the Cup side while contributing to our Xfinity Series program and working with our alliance partners.”

Build a deeper bench? Promote from within? Could the third Richard Childress car be more for testing Austin Hill and Jesse Love at the Cup level than bringing over a Brodie Kostecki or Will Brown from Supercars? Perhaps.

Richard Childress Racing has an aging Kyle Busch and a driver in Austin Dillon who is perhaps past his best by date in the Cup Series. Hill is a potential Cup driver. Love is seen as a future star in this batch of drivers who are 18-23 years old coming through the ranks. Seeing him in Cup action next season wouldn’t be the most surprising thing.