Bowyer will be happy to see hometown fans at Kansas Speedway farewell this weekend
This weekend was supposed to be a homecoming at Kansas Speedway for NASCAR’s Clint Bowyer.
Instead, it will be a farewell.
Bowyer, a 15-year NASCAR Cup veteran from Emporia, surprised the racing world last week by announcing he was retiring from fulltime competition and will be joining Fox’s television booth and studio shows in 2021.
So Bowyer, 41, will likely take his final laps at his home track during Sunday’s Hollywood Casino 400.
Unlike the Cup race last July at Kansas Speedway, when fans were not allowed because of the pandemic, a limited number of 10,000 fans will be in the stands on Sunday. And the gregarious Bowyer will claim knowing most of them dating to his days as a short-track champion at nearby Lakeside Speedway.
“Being able to have your family and friends there is everything,” said Bowyer, who is 13th in the standings after failing to advance to the Round of 8 in the NASCAR playoffs. “It’s such a special place for me with family and friends there and fans to watch us do what we do.”
Bowyer’s one-year contract with Stewart-Haas Racing was set to expire at the end of the 2020 season, and it became apparent that SHR Xfinity driver Chase Briscoe, who has eight wins and leads in that series’ playoffs, was being groomed for the No. 14 Cup car Bowyer has driven since replacing Tony Stewart in 2017.
Bowyer said he had spoken with Stewart-Haas as well as some other race teams about continuing his driving career, but called the position with Fox, “an opportunity of a lifetime” and realized it was time to make a career change.
“It was an opportunity to stay part of the sport for many years to come,” Bowyer said. “That’s the coolest thing about it. The picture just became so much clearer for me after the weeks went by what to do once the opportunity with Fox came to the forefront.”
Bowyer has previous media experience as a co-host of a NASCAR podcast and served as an analyst with Fox Sports when the network aired iRacing event when NASCAR shut down for several weeks in the spring due to the pandemic. He will join Mike Joy and Jeff Gordon in the Fox booth, filling the spot Darrell Waltrip vacated after the 2019 season.
“I have a wife and kids …” said Bowyer, who began racing in motocross events in the Midwest in 1985. “This enables me to take my family on a weekend and figure out what normal people do and still be a part of the sport. Since I was 5 years old, I’ve been in a motorhome at a racetrack somewhere. I was getting close to getting ready (to retire). Was I ready after this pandemic and year of no fans for a weird way to go out? No, and I don’t think Jimmie Johnson was either. But I was looking for that next moment.
“Everybody in life wants one more race, one more year, one more lap … and you might pass by that golden opportunity. If this opportunity with Fox didn’t come to the table, I was going to be in a car somewhere, somehow.”
Bowyer has 10 career Cup wins and finished a career-best second in the 2012 standings. He’s made the playoffs in each of the last three seasons, though he hasn’t won a Cup race since 2018. Bowyer also won the Nationwide (now Xfinity) Series championship for Richard Childress Racing in 2008, five years after catching the eye of Childress when Bowyer finished second in his ARCA Racing debut at Nashville Superspeedway.
When Childress contacted Bowyer at the Emporia dealership body shop where he worked and offered a Nationwide ride, Bowyer thought it was a crank call and hung up. Childress called back and through clenched teeth still offered the job to Bowyer, who would go on to win eight Nationwide races in six years and then make 537 NASCAR Cup starts.
And he now owns that dealership, the Clint Bowyer Autoplex, which sits across the street from the Clint Bowyer Community Building, built in 2012 thanks to a $1.5 million donation from his foundation.
“I don’t any regret anything,” Bowyer said of his career. “I’ve probably had more fun than about anybody out there these last 16 years. Probably too much fun sometimes. But would I go back and change anything? Absolutely not. We got close (to a Cup championship) once, finishing second.
“Did I win as many races as I would have liked? No. But I had wonderful opportunities. I won races for all three manufacturers. That was cool. I’m proud of what I’ve done.”
Bowyer, of course can’t imagine ending his career on a better note than winning a Cup race at Kansas Speedway, which by his own admission is one of his worst tracks. Bowyer won a trucks race at the track in 2011, but failing to win a Cup race in 24 starts at Kansas is still unfinished business.
“I have said many times that I think after a Daytona 500 victory, the race I would most like to win is back home at Kansas Speedway,” said Bowyer. “That place is home. I grew up around here and everyone who helped me early in my career lives here.
“My first memory of Kansas Speedway was 2001 sitting on top of a motorhome with a beer in my hand watching Jeff Gordon win the first race. Now I’m going to be lining up with him in the booth next year.”
Kansas Speedway TV schedule
Friday: 7:30 p.m., ARCA Menards Series Kansas 150, FS1 or FS2
Saturday: 3 p.m. NASCAR Gander RV & Outdoors Truck Series Clean Harbors 200, 3 p.m., FOX
Saturday: 6 p.m. NASCAR Xfinity Series Kansas Lottery 300, NBCSN
Sunday: 1:30 p.m., NASCAR Cup Hollywood Casino 400, NBC
Clint Bowyer, by the numbers
537: NASCAR Cup starts
10: NASCAR Cup wins
82: NASCAR Cup Top Fives
225: NASCAR Cup Top 10s
3,179: NASCAR Cup laps led
2: Best finish in Cup standings, 2012
1: NASCAR Xfinity Series championship, 2008
8: Xfinity Series wins
3: NASCAR trucks series wins