Ross Chastain will head to Trackhouse Racing after the 2021 NASCAR Cup Series season ends and will take over the No. 1 Chevrolet Camaro for 2022 and beyond. The organization will be different, but Chastain will continue to work with crew chief Phil Surgen.
Surgen broke the news during an appearance on SiriusXM NASCAR Radio on Monday, October 25. The “Late Shift” hosts asked Surgen if he had anything to announce about the 2022 season, and the crew chief responded by revealing that he will continue his working relationship with Chastain.
“I’ll be working with Ross again next year at Trackhouse [Racing] on the No. 1 car,” Surgen said during his appearance. “And everything is starting to come together and gel up for next year right now, and we’re really looking forward to the future.”
Trackhouse Named Chastain As the Second Driver in August
The Justin Marks-owned Cup Series team announced the purchase of Chip Ganassi Racing’s NASCAR operation on June 30, which included two charters. Marks confirmed that the team would move forward with two drivers for the 2022 season with a newcomer joining Daniel Suarez.
Trackhouse Racing waited until August 3 before revealing that Chastain would be the second member of the two-car team. The team released a special video formally introducing the Watermelon Man and revealed that he will switch from the No. 42 to the No. 1 at the start of the 2022 campaign.
The Cup Series team did not provide any information about Chastain’s partners or his crew chief, only saying that they would reveal this information at a later date. Instead, Marks chose to explain why he specifically targeted Chastain as his next driver.
“Well, he’s got a lot of fight and a lot of want in him. And I tell people this,” Marks explained during a press conference on Tuesday, August 3. “When there’s a nuance when you’re looking at drivers and you’re trying to determine what skill sets they’ve got and what kind of potential they have. To me, I’m a huge fan of people that have had to work hard against adversity and against odds to try to get there they have gotten in their careers.”
Chastain & Surgen First Joined Forces in 2021
Chastain moved from Kaulig Racing and the NASCAR Xfinity Series after the 2020 season and 15 top-five finishes. He moved to the Cup Series and signed with Chip Ganassi Racing. Chastain took over the No. 42 Chevrolet Camaro and became the official full-time driver.
Chastain joined forces with Surgen — a race engineer who became a full-time crew chief at the end of the 2020 season — and kicked off the year with a seventh-place finish in the Daytona 500. This performance created optimism about Chastain’s prospects and whether he could contend for a playoff spot. Though the early portion of the season featured two finishes outside of the top-30 and a 23rd-place run at Las Vegas.
While Chastain and Surgen only combined for one top-10 in the first 13 races, they began making waves at Circuit of the Americas. The No. 42 team showed up to the Texas road course with a fast stock car, and Chastain used it to secure a fourth-place finish. He added seventh-place runs at Sonoma and Road America, as well as a runner-up at Nashville Superspeedway.
Chastain has yet to win in the Cup Series, but he set career-highs in multiple categories. He has eight top-10 finishes and three top-fives with two races remaining in the season, and he will potentially add to these numbers at Martinsville Speedway and Phoenix Raceway.
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Ross Chastain Has His Crew Chief for 2022