Ty Gibbs has struggled mightily to start the 2025 NASCAR Cup Series season. Through the first half-dozen races, the Joe Gibbs Racing driver has managed just a single top-20 result, the season opener at Daytona where he finished 16th.
Since then, the next best result for the No. 54 driver was a 22nd at Las Vegas. All other finishes have been 25th or worse for an average finishing position of 25.7, with only Shane van Gisbergen, Cole Custer and Cody Ware behind him.
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On Thursday, Larry McReynolds and Danielle Trotta had a segment on their SiriusXM NASCAR Radio show titled, “Confident, Confused and Concerned,” where fans called in and discussed drivers and assigned them one of the labels.
Unsurprisingly, there’s been concern with the 22-year-old driver’s sub-par performance early in the 2025 campaign and America’s Crew Chief shared his thoughts on the topic.
Ty Gibbs races at Homestead-Miami Speedway.Sam Navarro-Imagn Images
“When you’re struggling, it’s even more of a struggle if your teammates are struggling, ’cause then you start questioning everything,” McReynolds said. “You start questioning engine. You start questioning setup and chassis. You start questioning aero. But if you can look across the shop and you see someone like the 20 that’s won three of our six races, you go, ‘The good thing is we know it’s obtainable. We know it’s possible with what we have.’
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“But yeah, (crew chief) Tyler Allen is not trying to set up a race car for Christopher Bell. He’s not trying to set a car up for Denny Hamlin or Chase Briscoe. He’s trying to set up a car for Ty Gibbs. But here we go, the same old theme, over and over and over.
