Mark J. Rebilas-USA TODAY Sports

Watch: Alex Bowman admits he was ‘terrified’ to break the news about his back injury to Jeff Gordon and Rick Hendrick

Originally posted on FirstSportz | By Justin P Joy | Last updated 12/28/23

The 2023 NASCAR Cup Series season was a nightmare for Hendrick Motorsports’ Alex Bowman . He missed out on the playoffs for the first time in his HMS career and ended the year winless for the first time since his debut season with Rick Hendrick’s team. He was able to score just 10 Top-10s from the 32 races he started in a season that saw Willaim Byron and Kyle Larson scoring a combined 10 wins.

The primary reason for his poor season was the back injury that cost him four Cup events and the All-Star race. He got into a wild sprint car accident in teammate Kyle Larson’s High Limit Racing series. Bowman wasn’t the only HMS driver to miss races in 2023. Chase Elliott also missed six events due to injury. This puts HMS management in a tough situation.

Before going to the sprint event, Rick Hendrick gave Bowman just one advice, don’t get injured. But he did exactly that and to call Hendrick and Vice-Chairman Jeff Gordon to inform them about was a terrifying experience for him. But to his surprise, the owner duo of the team was incredibly supportive of him despite the team suffering losses and helped him overcome the pain.

Calling Jeff and Mr. H, I was terrified because when I first asked Mr. H about it he was like, ‘Yeah, you can do whatever you want but don’t be dumb enough to go and get hurt’. And look what I did. But they couldn’t have been more supportive. They were incredibly supportive throughout the whole thing. Just helped me however they could. Bowman told DIRTRACKR.

Alex Bowman has dropped all the sprint car racing plans for the near future

Bowman in the same interview confirmed that he won’t be racing in Sprint car events anytime soon. He sees it as the best decision for the future and the HMS management has also confirmed the call. Both the team and driver are taking a cautious approach going into the 2024 season.

I won’t be in a winged sprint car for the foreseeable future […] I made the decision and then my decision got reinforced by management.

Bowman’s primary goal going into the 2024 season will be to discover the form he had at the start of the season and end his winless streak. He also needs to reestablish himself as a vital driver for HMS by performing well next year as all of his teammates have upped their performance in the Next-Gen era.

This article first appeared on FirstSportz and was syndicated with permission.

More must-reads: