NASCAR is as much about racing talent, skills, and determination as it is about finances and economics. No matter how good one is as a driver, in order to keep racing, especially in relatively smaller and less successful teams, a driver needs to bring cash and sponsors. And this is what 21-year-old Ryan Vargas has not only understood, but he’s gotten quite good at.

Vargas races for JD Motorsports in NASCAR Xfinity Series. The young driver has known right from that in NASCAR, success comes from opportunity, which, in turn, comes from sponsors. In order to generate sponsors, Vargas has made himself a brand and taken on the job to find sponsors himself, simply because he can’t ‘afford’ to hire a professional to do it.

“When it comes to doing sponsorship, there’s so many marketing groups and agencies and all this stuff, and some of them, most of them have really good intent and a lot of them do a really good job, but I just simply can’t afford it. I can’t afford to have someone go out there and represent me,” Vargas said, as reported by Forbes.

He uses social media to promote and market himself and whenever a potential sponsor shows interest, the young driver attends the meeting himself.

The sponsors Ryan Vargas has acquired on his own

In the last season, Ryan Vargas has got sponsored by a range of companies and brands in different industries.

From a security company, Swann, to Big Squeezy, a beverage chain owned by an NFL player, to an online retailer Newegg Commerce, Vargas has “got’em all.” Vargas was even sponsored by social media giants TikTok at one point in his career, which was a key sponsorship for him to attract his current sponsors.

Yet even with all the sponsors, Vargas knows that it’s not just a space on the car that companies are after, they need results. And this is what he is striving to do, to race and to win those races.

Ryan is the best example for anyone who wants to race in modern-day NASCAR. Because sponsors have always been important, but getting them is relatively easier than before. That is if you’ve ‘got it’, and Vargas has got it.

In his three-year-old career in the Xfinity Series, he has finished with more points at the end of the season than the season before.

At only 21, Vargas has a long way to go in his career. But considering his self achieved marketability as a brand and his progress as a driver, the path seems to be clear, all because of his love for racing.

“I’m doing this all to keep myself in a racecar.”

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