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3 Reasons Chase Briscoe Is The Feel-Good Story Of The 2025 NASCAR Season

Jared Turner Written by Sports EditorJared Turner
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Chase Briscoe

Just about everybody loves a feel-good story, right? Well, if that’s you and you’re like most people, you ought to love Chase Briscoe.

As one of two drivers to already punch a ticket to the NASCAR Cup Series’ Championship 4, Briscoe is enjoying a career season in his first year at the controls of the No. 19 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota.

But will he ultimately walk away with the title?

Whether Briscoe claims the championship mantle or comes up short, here are three compelling reasons he’s the feel-good story of the 2025 NASCAR season.

1. He’s the clear underdog

Of the eight drivers in this penultimate round of the Cup Series playoffs, guess how many have made at least one previous appearance in the Championship 4.

The answer is seven.

The one driver yet to compete for a title alongside three other championship finalists?

Well, that would be Chase Briscoe, who’s also the only driver in this round who doesn’t own double-digit career victories in NASCAR’s premier series.

With a paper-thin resume that included just two Cup Series wins before 2025, Briscoe didn’t get the call to replace retiring Martin Truex Jr. at Joe Gibbs Racing because of his record. No, JGR tabbed Briscoe for one of the sport’s most coveted rides because team owner Joe Gibbs thought he had untapped potential.

So far, Briscoe hasn’t disappointed. Along with becoming the second driver to qualify for the Championship 4, he’s posted a career-high three wins this year. That’s more than the number of victories he earned over his previous four seasons in the Cup Series combined.

2. He’s overcome major adversity

Both on and off the racetrack, Chase Briscoe has been no stranger to hard times.

Outside of racing, he’s grieved the loss of multiple miscarriages his wife, Marissa, has suffered.

Briscoe’s life inside of the sport hasn’t been a bed of roses, either.

Just last year, he lost his ride at Stewart-Haas Racing due to no fault of his own. It happened because the Tony Stewart-led organization made a business decision to cease operations at season’s end.

And even early this season, his first with JGR, Briscoe struggled a bit before finally hitting his stride early in the summer with a breakthrough win at Pocono Raceway. Since then, he’s been consistently fast and picked up two more victories.

“The first kind of couple months of the year I was like, ‘This is way harder than I thought it was going to be,’” Briscoe said.

At least his growing pains at JGR didn’t persist.

3. He’s Remained Humble

Through all of his success in 2025, Chase Briscoe has stayed very grounded. Now, being in such elite company in the Round of 8 seems to have only made Briscoe even more unimpressed with himself.

“Certainly, when you look at the eight guys that are in this round in general, I feel like it’s the eight strongest drivers and teams in our sport,” he said. “Just to even be associated with those guys is an honor for me and a privilege.”

Along with not letting his accomplishments this season go to his head, Briscoe hasn’t forgotten the sacrifices he had to make to reach this point in his career.

“When I moved to North Carolina, I slept on a couch for three-and-a-half years, was scrapping money to go to be able to pay $50 rent,” Briscoe said. “I was doing it in the hopes of one day hopefully being a champion.

“This is the first time in my life I’ve been like, ‘Man, you could actually win the Cup Series championship.’ In the past, I didn’t really believe it, just because of the uphill battle we were fighting.”

Growing up as a small-town kid from Mitchell, Indiana, Briscoe seemed like an unlikely candidate to ever battle for NASCAR’s biggest prize. But battle he will next weekend at Phoenix Raceway, site of the Cup Series finale. And he couldn’t be more thankful to be in the fight.

“I have an incredible opportunity that hundreds of thousands of race car drivers would kill to be in,” Briscoe said. “Just need to try to make the most of it.”

Jared Turner Written by Sports EditorJared Turner
Jared Turner is a motorsports writer who has covered NASCAR for 20 years. He has interviewed over 20 NASCAR Hall of Famers and around 100 drivers, crew chiefs, and team owners, both past and present. He has also covered the sport for FOX Sports (where he was a two-time recipient of the FOX “X” Award for “Xtraordinary” job performance), NASCAR.com, Sporting News, NASCAR Pole Position Magazine, the SPEED network, and plenty of other online and print-only publications throughout his career. Notably, Jared has penned dozens of articles for NASCAR souvenir programs, including several featured prominently in Daytona 500 keepsakes. A Virginia Press Association award winner and former member of the National Motorsports Press Association (NMPA), Jared has racked up accolades both for his writing and his academic work. He studied both Communication and Psychology at Virginia Tech, where he was permanently enshrined in Phi Beta Kappa — the nation’s oldest and most prestigious academic honor society. Jared excels at feature writing and opinion writing, much of which stems from his dedication to all levels of racing.
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