Nick Sanchez to debut in Xfinity in 2022 with McLeod

Nick Sanchez has joined B.J. McLeod Motorsports for his first foray into the NASCAR Xfinity Series in 2022. On Tuesday, BJMM announced Sanchez will drive for the team on a multi-race schedule, though specific dates were not immediately revealed.

Sanchez currently competes full-time in the ARCA Menards Series for Rev Racing. After completing seventeen of nineteen races (he skipped the two dirt rounds), he is third in points with twelve top tens, eight top fives, and a best race finish of third three times. He first began racing in the series in 2020 with four starts. 2020 also saw him finish third in the ARCA Menards Series West standings.

“We are really excited to have Nick make his Xfinity Series début with us,” BJMM team owner B.J. McLeod stated. “We’re really looking forward to helping him grow in his personal and professional goals as he makes this next step in his career which we are so proud to be a part of.”

The Cuban-American is a member of NASCAR’s Drive for Diversity, which seeks to promote minority and female drivers; Rev Racing is closely connected to the D4D as a sort of works team for the programme. Sanchez is not the only D4D alumnus who will begin racing in the Xfinity Series in 2022 as Rajah Carruth will do the same for Alpha Prime Racing. Carruth celebrated Sanchez’s news by joking that the two will be equivalent to the friendships between Jack Harlow and Druski, and that of rappers Lil Baby and Lil Durk.

The D4D has also featured graduates like Cup Series points leader Kyle Larson, seven-time Trans-Am Series champion Ernie Francis Jr., 2016 Xfinity champion Daniel Suárez, and Cup race winner Bubba Wallace. Cup veteran Aric Almirola, who entered NASCAR through Joe Gibbs Racing’s own diversity programme, is like Sanchez in being of Cuban descent.

“The significance of this next step is very meaningful for me,” commented Sanchez. “It’ll obviously be my first time participating in one of the top three series of NASCAR, which is something I’ve always dreamed of ever since I started racing. Since the day I first met B.J., we’ve always been on the same page. We both share the same collective goals for next year and I feel he and his team have made significant strides in performance each year they’ve been in the series. My main goal next year is to learn and get the most out of the car’s performance, hopefully. yielding some good finishes for myself and the team.”

Sanchez is the second confirmed BJMM driver for 2022 alongside Stefan Parsons, who will run the full schedule.