SAM MAYER - 06/26/2003
A young man from Franklin WI, Mayer got off to an early start in racing, at the age of four when he began racing the Kid Karts at Badger Raceway in his home state of Wisconsin. Although his father, Scott Mayer, was an open-wheel racer, Sam chose in his preteen years to focus on stock car racing. Over the course of the 2017 summer, during which Mayer turned fourteen, he spent the summer in Charlotte to race Legends cars; he won the Young Lions division of the Charlotte Motor Speedway Summer Shootout. He also raced in a Limited Late Model and won at Greenville-Pickens Speedway to become the track's youngest winner. He came back to Wisconsin and won a September Midwest Truck Series race at Dells Raceway Park in his first series start. In 2017, Mayer came in touch with industry veteran Lorin Ranier, who eventually landed Mayer a late model ride with JR Motorsports in the CARS Tour for 2018. Ranier is the son of Harry Ranier, a former NASCAR team owner for drivers such as Buddy
Baker, Bobby Allison, Benny Parsons and Davey Allison among others. Mayer's late model racing also brought him to the World Series of Asphalt, where he finished second to Stephen Nasse. Ranier also led Mayer to MDM Motorsports for a limited slate in the ARCA Racing Series and NASCAR K&N Pro Series East in the back half of 2018, with age restrictions being a factor in which races Mayer could run, as both series only let 15-year-old competitors race on certain tracks. In his first ARCA race, Mayer ran as high as third and finished inside the top-ten. After the CARS Tour season was over, Mayer was voted the series' Most Popular Driver for 2018. The CARS Tour season included one victory, at Wake County Speedway. On December 5, 2018, it was announced that Mayer would run a full NASCAR K&N Pro Series East schedule with GMS Racing as part of a 2019 schedule that would also include seven ARCA races and
Kids Karts 2016
Legends series 2017
four NASCAR Truck Series races with the team. All four of the Truck races came after Mayer turned sixteen; his debut is slated to be at Bristol Motor Speedway in August. He ran well but got involved in a crash with just a couple laps remaining and ended up 21st. Mayer scored his first K&N East win at Bristol on April 6, 2019, leading every lap. He nearly scored his first ARCA Menards Series win at Gateway in June after a late pit gamble, but was moved up the track by Ty Gibbs in the final set of corners and was relegated to third. In October, he won the 2019 K&N East championship to become the youngest NASCAR champion at 16 years, 3 months, and 8 days; the previous record was 16 years and 5 months by Todd Gilliland in 2016. Mayer ended the 2019 season with four wins and Top 10s in all but one race. On September 15, 2020, Mayer and JR Motorsports announced an agreement to have him drive
one of the organization's NASCAR Xfinity Series cars part-time in the latter portion of 2021 and full-time in the 2022 season. Two days later, Mayer swept the night at Bristol, winning both the Truck Series and ARCA race. He made 18 starts in the Xfinity series in 2021, with his first start at Pocono. He started 20th and finished 18th. He would get his first Top 10 finish with a ninth place run at Atlanta; and his first Top 5 when he finished fourth at Martinsville. Michael Annett has announced he will retire at the end of 2021; so it is Mayer who took over the wheel of the #1 JRM car in 2022. Mayer finished 30th as the season opener
CARS Series 2018
First Truck Series start - Martinsville 2019
at Daytona. He got a sixth place finish at Fontana; but followed that with three runs finishing outside the top 20. He got his first top five of the year at COTA; and had his career best finish (at the time) the following week at Richmond coming in third. At the Martinsville spring race, on April 8, Mayer finished fifth after doing a bump and run on Ty Gibbs on the final lap. After the race, Gibbs attempted to spin Mayer out during the cool-down laps before both drivers engaged in a fistfight on pit road. He was up and down throughout the year, finishing near the top ten; but had other races he crashed out early. He accumulated enough points to make the chase for
the championship and got on a roll of posting nice finishes. He finished 11th, ninth, and fourth in the three races heading into the playoffs. He was eighth at Texas when the playoffs kicked off; and followed that up with a career best finish of second at Talladega. He advanced to the next round of the playoffs when he finished second at the Roval. In the round of eight; Josh Berry won the first race locking himself into the Championship four. Noah Gragson won the next week at Homestead-Miami also locking himself into the finals. At Martinsville, Ty Gibbs would win and claim a third automatic berth into the finals. So even though Mayer finished seventh; fifth and sixth in those three races; he failed to advance to the final four as he was out-pointed by Justin Allgaier. Mayer was caught up in an accident midway through the race and lost
2019 K&N Champ
First Truck series win - Bristol 2020
several laps; finishing 34th when the checkered hankie flew. He was back with JRM in 2023 to look to claim his first win; and Mayer had a good year. After three second place finishes, and eighth top three’s he finally broke through and got his first win. The win came at Elkhart Lake when he edged out Parker Kligerman by just over a car length. Just three weeks later, again on a road course; this time at Watkins Glen. He got by Ty Gibbs on a restart and scooted out to the lead. He beat Sheldon Creed who finished second. In Charlotte, at the Roval, Mayer won again. His previous wins had locked him into the playoffs, but in the Round of 12 he had started off with finishes of
35th and 38th. He was in a must-win situation heading to Charlotte, and got it done. This time holding off Cole Custer. Somehow he seemed to have flipped a switch and become a road course ace. He won at Homestead in the playoffs and locked himself into the championship race at Phoenix. But in that race, no one had anything for Custer as he led 96 of 202 laps and was crowned the 2023 Xfinity champion. Mayer finished fifth in the race, and third in the points championship. He will be back with JRM at the controls of the #1 in 2024. Some info from Wikipedia.
Xfinity win - Charlotte Roval 2023
All Photos copyright and are property of their respective owners