NASCAR Cup Series driver Ty Gibbs. Jim Dedmon-Imagn Images

Ty Gibbs earns first top-10 finish of the season at Darlington

By Samuel Stubbs | Last updated Apr 6, 2025 9:57 PM ET

The first seven races of Ty Gibbs' third NASCAR Cup Series season could best be described as a hellscape for the 22-year-old driver.

After a first-round playoff exit and a less than stellar conclusion to 2024, Gibbs was hoping to get off to a hot start in 2025 and find some momentum.

Over the first seven races, however, Gibbs failed to finish inside the top-10. His best finish was a 13th-place effort at Martinsville, which was only his second top-20 finish of the season.

On Sunday, Gibbs broke through for both his first top-10 of 2025 and his first top-10 result since Kansas in September — 13 races ago.

After finishing 33rd in Stage 1, a well-timed caution flag during green flag pit stops got Gibbs and the No. 54 team much-needed track position. A seventh-place finish in Stage 2 — and four valuable stage points — followed, with Gibbs taking the checkered flag in ninth.

.@TyGibbs earns his first top 10 of the 2025 #NASCAR Cup Series season, and @ZaneSmith recaps his day after batting back from bad pit cycle to finish 13th.

: @PitLaneCPT & @soundlink_trent pic.twitter.com/BEbYxzeskz
— Frontstretch (@Frontstretch) April 7, 2025

"it was nice for sure," Gibbs said of his ninth-place finish. "I know we'll get a lot more of them. My confidence is fine. We had a great run today, (we) struggled in the first half and came back."

Gibbs went from 34th to 26th in the Cup Series points standings on Sunday afternoon, and is currently 46 points out of the 16th and final Cup Series playoff berth with 18 regular season races remaining.

The Cup Series' next stop on the schedule is Bristol Motor Speedway, where Gibbs finished fifth in March 2024.

Samuel Stubbs

Hailing from the same neck of the woods as NASCAR Hall of Famer Mark Martin, Samuel has been covering NASCAR for Yardbarker since February 2024. He has been a member of the National Motorsports Press Association (NMPA) since October of 2024. When he’s not writing about racing, Samuel covers Arkansas Razorback basketball for Yardbarker

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