Hailie Deegan’s NASCAR career has hit a rough patch, with nearly three months since her last official race. After parting ways with AM Racing in July, following a disappointing season marked by finishes of 20th or worse in 17 races and an average of 26.8, her future in NASCAR remains uncertain. However, Deegan hasn’t completely disappeared from the scene.

Despite stepping away from the spotlight, she continues to engage her fans through her strong social media presence. She’s been leveraging her platform for various campaigns, keeping her followers connected and invested. Recently, she found a way to merge her love for racing with her online influence. While her next steps in NASCAR are unclear, Deegan’s commitment to her brand and her fan base shows she’s still very much in the game.

Hailie Deegan reveals a racing antic

Although times are low at present, Hailie Deegan’s initial journey was remarkable. When she competed in the ARCA Menards Series West in 2018 and ’19 for Bill McAnally, clinching three trophies there. Then Deegan was crowned the 2020 ARCA Menards Series Rookie of the Year due to her outstanding performance and P3 in the point standings. So despite her poor runs in subsequent years, Deegan knows what it is like to get behind the wheel and zoom around the racetrack.

And her driving prowess also requires a unique practice. Hailie Deegan recently did a promotional video with Idahoan Foods. Answering a slew of questions prodding into her personal life, Deegan also provided a looking glass into her racing habits. Pre-race rituals are very important for drivers, as they determine how their runs are going to look. For Deegan, it involves simple hydration. She said, “The only ritual I have is I have to take a sip of water right before the green flag drops.”

Indeed, fluids sustain you through interminably long races that may span 500-600 laps. For instance, hydration helped Tony Stewart pull off his successful Double attempt in 2001. He came prepared after his 1999 attempt when he was on the brink of dehydration and severe sickness after running both the Indy 500 and the Coca-Cola 600 races.

So Hailie Deegan’s simple race ritual is actually infinitely important in NASCAR’s world of high-speed racing. However, despite her accurate understanding of the sport, Deegan’s NASCAR prospect is yet to stabilize.

A costly mistake in the past

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As we all know, NASCAR is mostly a male-dominated sport. Female racers are rare, and if they do come, they rarely put up strong performances. Hailie Deegan was an exception, as she took the world by storm with her illustrious road racing career and shining ARCA resume. She joined Toyota’s development program in 2017 but may have made a crucial mistake in shifting to Ford in 2019. Following that shift, her Craftsman Truck Series run (2021-23) was average, posting only one top-five finish and six top-10 finishes.

Veteran racer Kevin Harvick believes that crucial OEM change in 2019 may have led to Deegan’s bleak scenario. “The big mistake here was getting out of the Toyota development system. I think Ford has the worst development program as far as their drivers go. I think Toyota has the best, and I think Chevy is somewhere in the middle. Getting out of that Toyota development program with all the resources, and they’re willing to give time. I think that she needed more time in the Truck Series, getting that guidance and mentorship that she needed in order to develop into what she needed to be a NASCAR race-car driver.”

Right now, Hailie Deegan spends time rooting for her brother and sifting through options. Although the Haas Factory Team initially drummed up interest in her, now that is no longer a possibility. Let us hope that NASCAR’s female racing sensation can get competitive on the racetracks soon enough.