Michael McDowell will remain with his crew chief, Travis Peterson, when the Front Row Motorsports driver moves to Spire Motorsports for the 2025 NASCAR season.
The pair have worked together at Front Row Motorsports for the past couple of seasons and will continue to work together in the NASCAR Cup Series on the No. 71 Spire Motorsports car.
The highlight of their time together remains reaching the playoffs last season after taking victory at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway Road Course.
McDowell has also been fast in qualifying under Peterson’s guidance, taking three pole positions while driving the No. 34 car.
Spire Motorsports president is eagerly anticipating Travis Peterson’s arrival
Spire Motorsports president Doug Duchardt is looking forward to bolstering his lineup of crew chiefs which already has two impressive members in Luke Lambert and Rodney Childers.
Duchardt said via motorsport.com: “It’s exciting to have Travis Peterson join Spire Motorsports. The first time Travis and I worked together was when Greg Ives and Travis came to Hendrick Motorsports to be the crew chief and the engineer for the No. 88 car with Dale [Earnhardt] Jr.
“He’s going to add tremendous depth to our crew chief lineup and be a great compliment to Luke and Rodney. I’m really excited to see what those three can do together.”
McDowell will be transitioning from Ford to Chevrolet ahead of the 2025 season and will be hoping to learn from Peterson’s experience working with Chevrolet engines.
The crew chief worked with Chase Elliot in 2014 during his Xfinity Series title run with JR Motorsports as well as Earnhardt Jr from 2015-2018 on the No. 88 Hendrick Motorsports car.
McDowell has had an indifferent season so far, sitting in 21st in the standings with a best result of second place at Sonoma.
Peterson is looking forward to working with McDowell in 2025
Peterson will keep working with McDowell for the third consecutive season and he praises the culture and atmosphere at Spire Motorsports.
He said: “It is a very exciting opportunity. Michael and I had the opportunity to meet with Doug and [Jeff] Dickerson and they really sold us on the vision of where Spire is going and how we could be big role players in building the organisation.
“I think having that skin in the game was important to both of us. The opportunity in front of us has all the potential to be very rewarding. That was a huge part of it. I love the energy right now and the overall culture around Spire Motorsports.”
Victories have been few and far between in recent years for Spire Motorsports, with their only win coming in 2019 at the Coke Zero Sugar 400 at the Daytona International Speedway.
The team haven’t yet taken a pole position in the NASCAR Cup Series but have been slightly more successful in the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series, taking four pole positions and five race wins.