Amid the highest of highs marked by the birth of Tony Stewart’s first child in November, the lowest of lows were soon approaching—another child was about to lose a parent. After a 22-year run, the curtains were about to close on a team once synonymous with success.

“These guys were so overwhelmed and overjoyed with winning a race that it brought tears to their eyes.” Tony Stewart’s words of farewell last year after the team’s lone Cup Series win with Chase Briscoe, offered a hint about the winning legacy that his team had established. With 70 race wins and two championships over 16 years, the team’s closure was hardly what fans had anticipated especially after the team’s effort at a revamp ahead of the 2024 season. However, after another lackluster season—except Briscoe’s antics at the Southern 500 at Darlington Raceway in the regular season finale—there wasn’t much that could’ve been done.

With heavy hearts, and new fatherly duties demanding a majority of Stewart’s time, the team quietly stepped away. “Racing is a labor-intensive, humbling sport…and we’ve reached a point in our respective personal and business lives where it’s time to pass the torch,” a statement had clearly noted leaving little room for speculation. The twister? Gene Haas wasn’t going anywhere. With renewed hopes, operating a two-car NASCAR Xfinity Series team and retaining a single Cup charter, Haas would create the Haas Factory Team for 2025. Unfortunately, though, the new spin-off is far from doing it any justice. Looks like Stewart’s former partner Gene Haas may not have imagined the crippling results that would follow in Stewart’s absence.

The team that grew from SHR’s ashes is way off the rails on NASCAR’s premier level, even with Cup driver Cole Custer. The 2023 Xfinity Series champion was a force to reckon with 15 race trophies and three runner-up finishes on the championship standings. And now he’s that same person who’s yet to find that mojo in the Cup Series—a fact further amplified by a NASCAR insider with brutal and heartbreaking honesty.

The No. 41 Ford has barely scraped the news across five races this season. Cole Custer’s Daytona run was commendable until he incurred a wreck and finished 21st place. That has been his best finish so far, unfortunately. In a YouTube video, NASCAR expert Eric Estepp ominously doled out the rest of Custer’s depressing stats. “Cole Custer – 35th in points with the newly rebranded Haas Factory Team. Not that there was much of a bandwagon, but I’m off whatever there was. Two DNFs – I mean, look at the numbers. He qualifies 25th and runs 25th every single week.” 

Notably, the 27-year-old is yet to register a Top-10 finish, let alone a Top-5. At Daytona 500, he started P30 to end with a P21. Next week, it was more or less the same with a P23-P36 ratio at Atlanta, followed by P30 start and a P23 finish at the Circuit of the Americas. And then there was Phoenix Raceway where Custer ran from P23 and settled for a 32, followed by another P26-P26 start-finish ratio at Las Vegas. Clearly, the racer seems to be struggling, and so is his team—with Estepp didn’t shy away from pointing out with brutal honesty…

Clearly, Tony Stewart‘s absence is deafeningly loud for the Haas Factory Team. When Stewart-Haas Racing first came into existence, Stewart immediately launched into a glorious streak. He won his first race for SHR during the 2009 Pocono race. By 2011, he had become a three-time Cup Series champion after defeating Carl Edwards on a tie-breaker. In comparison, HFT seems to be dragging along very slowly in the sport. Estepp continued: “There’s just nothing inspiring about this team right now. I hope they find their footing and improve. But right now, I forget that they’re on the racetrack every other week. Rough start to the year for Cole Custer and Haas.”

During the recently concluded Las Vegas race, Cole Custer gave a solid effort. Within the first 40 laps of the Pennzoil 400, he drove from 26th to as high as 13th. However, car handling issues seeped in as he tried to navigate the high-banked, sweeping corners. To roll the turns and carry momentum, Custer needed to turn the car more. Despite several chassis adjustments throughout the day by crew chief Aaron Kramer, Custer could wash up where he started – in 26th.

Yet sponsors are still lining up to support Custer. Ironically one of them was prominent during Tony Stewart’s era in NASCAR.

An old benefactor has Custer’s back

Earlier this week, the Haas Factory Team announced a major partnership for the 2025 season. Autodesk will serve as the primary sponsor for its No. 41 Ford Mustang and driver Cole Custer for two Cup Series races. They will debut this weekend at Homestead-Miami Speedway and they will also adorn the hood at Sonoma Raceway on July 13th. What is more important, Custer and Autodesk’s familiarity goes back to when Tony Stewart was in the sport. The design company adorned its logo on Tony’s cars in the Cup Series from 2020 to 2022, as well as in the Xfinity Series from 2018 to 2019. Furthermore, Custer also captured a Cup Series win during a season when Autodesk was present.

During the 2020 Quaker State 400 at Kentucky Speedway, Cole Custer leaped to glory. After restarting fifth with two laps to go, Cole Custer beat three veterans – Martin Truex Jr., Ryan Blaney, and Kevin Harvick. The four-wide pass on the lead lap landed him his first Cup Series victory. Custer ecstatically said back then: “Obviously it wasn’t the easiest track to pass on so we were kind of stuck back there, but that was the best car I’ve ever driven in my life…It’s unbelievable. We had a great car all day, one of the best cars I’ve ever driven in my life. It was hard to get to the front. Once we got there, we took advantage of it and I just can’t thank everybody at the [Stewart-Haas Racing] shop.”

With Stewart-Haas Racing being a distant reality, Cole Custer’s glory also seems to be the same. Hopefully, the Haas Factory Team will devise new strategies to improve their finishes soon.