Getty Timmy Hill races at the Charlotte Roval in 2022.
MBM Motorsports has made a significant move for the 2023 NASCAR Xfinity Series season. The team has made series history by signing Baltazar Leguizamon.
MBM Motorsports announced the news on December 23 and confirmed that Leguizamon is set up to become the first driver from Argentina to make a start in NASCAR. Pending sponsorship, he will break new ground for the sport at Circuit of the Americas on March 25.
🇦🇷 Very excited to have the first Argentine #NASCAR driver, 22-year-old @baltaleguizamon, joining our organization in 2023!
Pending sponsorship, he will make his @NASCAR_Xfinity debut with us @COTA in March.
Leguizamon will also attempt to secure enough sponsorship for the other six road courses on the 2023 schedule, as well as the first-ever Chicago street race.
“I am really proud to be the first Argentinean with a NASCAR national series license,” Leguizamon said in a press release from MBM Motorsports. “It’s been a long way on my career living my dream in international motorsports. All the hard work is paying off right now.”
Leguizamon Has Numerous Wins in Other Series
GettyDavid Starr races for MBM Motorsports in 2021.
While the Argentine has not made any starts in NASCAR, he has achieved success in other motorsports series. He has made 165 starts across multiple continents, and he has secured 56 podium finishes.
An example of this success took place in 2018. Leguizamon finished first in the Atlantic Championship Series. That same year, he finished second in the F3 Americas Championship powered by Honda. In 2019, Leguizamon made eight starts in the F3 Americas Championship, and he secured five podium finishes.
The 2022 season has seen Leguizamon competing across multiple racing series, such as Turismo Carretera Mouras, Super TC2000, and Top Race V6. All of these series took place in Argentina. Now he will attempt to take on a new challenge.
“I am very thankful to everyone involved with this project: the NASCAR administration; my manager of eight years, Bruce Bohlander of Legacy Autosport; and Carl Long of MBM Motorsports, who opened this door for me and is helping me to reach this level,” Leguizamon added in the press release. “We’ve won in seven different series, and we want to keep going at this very seriously. Still, we need to find sponsors.”
MBM Motorsports Has Relied on Multiple Drivers
GettyNatalie Decker races at Atlanta Motor Speedway.
The addition of Leguizamon continues MBM Motorsports’ trend of relying on multiple drivers. The organization, which competes in both the Xfinity Series and Cup Series, has not shied away from providing opportunities to multiple options.
There were only two drivers that made starts for MBM Motorsports during the 2022 Cup Series season. Boris Said took on Circuit of the Americas while JJ Yeley joined the team for the spring race at Talladega Superspeedway.
The Xfinity Series lineup, for comparison, featured eight drivers. Yeley made the most starts at 30 while Timmy Hill took on nine Xfinity Series events for the team. Yeley secured two top-10 finishes while Hill finished second overall at Daytona International Speedway.
The list of guest drivers also included Dawson Cram (one start), Natalie Decker (two starts), Chad Finchum (two starts), Matt Jaskol (two starts), Akinori Ogata (two starts), and Will Rodgers (one start). Provided that he can find sponsorship, Leguizamon will now join this list of guest drivers while simultaneously making NASCAR history.
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MBM Motorsports Makes NASCAR History With New Driver