Richmond may have ended in chaos, but Alex Bowman has quietly built a season of consistency in the No. 48 Chevrolet, collecting 14 top-10s in 2025. As the regular-season finale at Daytona approaches, he stands on the edge of heartbreak or long-earned redemption. During a media scrum, Bowman offered a rare glimpse into the pressure simmering beneath his calm exterior.

Rain and lightning turned out to be a stroke of luck for Bowman as the weather wiped out qualifying for Saturday night’s Coke Zero Sugar 400. Instead of rolling mediocrity into the back, Bowman earned a golden ticket, starting on the outside of the front row next to Ryan Blaney in a race that will seal the final two postseason spots.

“We’re doing a lot of the right things,” says Bowman amid playoff pressure

When qualifying gets nixed, NASCAR resorts to its metric formula, blending owner points, last race finish, and fastest lap set in the grid. Bowman enters the final 60 points clear of the cut line. And if any one of the 15 drivers above him pulls off a last-minute win, he remains above the cut line on points. The tension couldn’t be higher heading into this must-watch showdown.

Bowman reflected on the heat he has felt all season, saying, “Yeah, I think we have continued to grow as a team, continued to improve. I feel like our race cars have gotten better. You know, I feel like I’ve worked really hard at getting better. So yeah, we’ve done a lot of really good things. I would say post trying to knock the wall down at Michigan has been pretty good. So yeah, it’s nice to have that.”

Let’s talk Michigan, where everything went sideways. On lap 67 of the FireKeepers Casino 400, Bowman was caught in a brutal multi-car pile-up. After getting tangled in traffic, his No. 48 drive rocketed head-on into turn 2; the impact was so severe that the rear tire was lifted off the ground. He was checked and released.

The 36th-place result was just another tough blow in a season riddled with setbacks. However, Bowman has shown greater performance, finishing P3s and P2s; he has collected 6 top-fives this season. Sitting P9 in the standings, Bowman isn’t letting the points pressure kill the good vibes he has built with his team all summer.

Alex Bowman added, “I think for us, like internally in the race team, we know we’re doing a lot of the right things, but it is hard to view it that way with the point situation and that big deal going into this weekend. So it’s hard to look at it as success when you’re in that scenario. But at the same time, if we just run average instead of crashing every week for April and May, we would be in an entirely different situation.”

The shadow hanging over Bowman is clear: if a driver currently below the cut line wins at Daytona, either he or Tyler Reddick will be knocked out. Reddick starts from 27th and holds a precarious 29-point lead over Bowman. Meanwhile, the Richmond Race proved frustrating for Bowman, as he finished P2 while contending for the win, as he unleashed his fury on Shane Van Gisbergen and others who came in his way. However, Daytona is a new venue for Bowman the Showman to shine once again.

The Hendrick Motorsports driver concluded, saying, “So yeah, just proud of my guys for the summer we’ve had. Statistically, myself, we’ve had terrible summers for the last eight years or whatever. So to have a really good summer has been nice. And hopefully we can just finish it off, get in the playoffs this weekend and put together a really strong playoff run.” But the No. 48 driver is really feeling the pressure and has now confessed to his inhibitions heading to Saturday’s race.

Alex Bowman opens up about his stress amid playoff hopes

Despite racking up 14 top 10 finishes this season, second only to Kyle Larson’s 15, the 32-year-old finds himself in a precarious position. If a driver currently outside the playoff cut line manages to steal a win in the closing laps of Saturday night’s Regular Season Finale, Bowman could see his shot at the Bill France Cup slip away.

During a Friday media scrum at the Daytona International Speedway media center, Bowman admitted, “It’s just stressful, right? And I’m going to stress myself out about whatever our situation ever is.” Still, Bowman insists that whatever happens at Daytona won’t diminish what he, crew chief Blake Harris, and the No. 48 Hendrick Motorsports team have accomplished this year.

He explained, “I think the best way to look at it is like, if we were running 25th and we showed up here in a must-win situation, that would be one thing. But we’re running really well and doing a lot of really good things. Don’t want tomorrow night’s result kind of mess that all up if it’s not what we want. There’s so much outside of our control.”

Super speedway racing is one of the most unpredictable arenas in professional sports. Every lap carries the looming threat of the big one, a massive crash born from tightly packed fields and the horsepower restrictions unique to this style of racing. The combination of potential carnage and the aerodynamic draft, which can turn the entire field into contenders, means Alex faces perhaps the most uncertain night of his season and possibly his career.

To keep his head in the game, Bowman has zeroed in on what he can control. He said, “For me, I just focused on preparing as much as I could, being super-prepared to go into tomorrow night and execute on all of the things I can control, correctly, and kind of go from there.” Moreover, Alex Bowman is the only Hendrick Motorsports driver who has not secured a win or a playoff spot this season. As he starts Saturday night’s Coke Zero Sugar 400 in the front row, all eyes will be on the No. 48.