Until 2025, a win in the regular season of the NASCAR Cup Series could get a driver a direct ticket to the playoffs. With no stress of winning once again to prove themselves. Now, as the sport’s gone back to the Chase, winning the races has become even more important than it has been. But for Ross Chastain, that importance never went away in the first place.

A win, as mentioned, might not give a driver the qualification anymore, but no driver in the world does not want to win the race, something Ross Chastain wholeheartedly believes. Despite the wipeout of the ‘win-and-you’re-in,’ Chastain is still as motivated as ever, and he opened up on how the ‘fake’ sportsmanship has no place in the sport.

Ross Chastain comes clean on the objective of winning

From their early days in karting or junior series, the drivers step down to race with just one objective — to win and be the best. Anyone who says otherwise is not telling “the truth,” reckons the Trackhouse Racing star.

“In my opinion, a win is so massive in life, to win in the Cup Series, that every driver that straps in on race day is willing to do whatever it takes,” Chastain said in a recent interview at the North Wilkesboro Speedway.

“Any of them that say they won’t try to win and…everything they know how to do, I don’t think is telling the truth. So not that anybody’s doing that, but I just think that a win in the Cup Series means so much that it doesn’t matter the points. In that moment, you’re worried about winning, and that’s why we’re all here.”

The chatter around points, standings, and all of that is fine. But when you’re in the car, nothing else matters more than that win, which is what Chastain feels. Be it any driver.

“That’s why we started racing as kids and kept trying to move up, and we wanted to win at a higher level, we chased that. Next series, the next class. At least that’s what I did, and that’s what I see. A lot of my competitors did as well when I look back at their upbringing. So I think that we’re all here, we’ll all do whatever it takes. It’s that special to win these Cup races,” Chastain further added.

That mindset of winning develops from the very core. From karting and local tracks to the Cup Series, drivers are conditioned to chase victories at every level. Just because the stakes get higher on each level, that winning mindset remains constant as you step in that car.

And within this journey they have to additionally fight the multiple hurdles that come through, be it qualifying, clashes, cautions, and what not.

All of this goes on to show how prestigious the wins can be, especially at the sport’s iconic places like the Daytona 500 at the Daytona International Speedway, Coca-Cola 600 at the Charlotte Motor Speedway, or the Jack Link’s 500 at the Talladega Superspeedway.

And Ross Chastain is as hungry as ever. In fact, he also wants to venture into the Truck Series for wins, as the Cup Series might not be enough.

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Ross Chastain set to compete in NASCAR Truck Series in 2026

Keeping aside his full-time NASCAR Cup Series ride with Trackhouse Racing, Ross Chastain will also take on the workload of working in the Truck Series. He will race for Niece Motorsports and drive the #45 Chevrolet Silverado Truck.

“It’s great to be back with Niece Motorsports in a larger capacity this year,” Chastain said in a team release. “When I heard about the rule change, I knew we had to run more races together. We’ve got a great core group of people here in Salisbury (N.C.), and I want to bring them all back to Victory Lane.”

Interestingly, this isn’t the first time the 33-year-old will be racing in the Truck Series. Besides Cup and O’Reilly Auto Parts, he has 117 Truck Series races under his belt, where he won five times, took four poles, and has 53 Top 10s.

With that pumped up motivation, it will be interesting to see how well Ross Chastain manages to convert that into wins this season, in both series.