In an alternate timeline, Connor Zilisch would be a Ferrari or Red Bull Racing driver in Formula 1. But fate pulled him towards stock car racing and he is one of the brightest youngsters in NASCAR Cup Series now.
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Talking to Kevin Harvick and Will Buxton in the latest episode of SPEED, he explained how his path traversed so deep into stock car racing when his ambition lay in open wheels.
Formula 1 is an expensive affair for anyone to indulge in. Drivers typically pass through karting, Formula 4, Formula 3, and Formula 2, before reaching the final step of the ladder. This path can cost in excess of $20 million and finding sponsor as a teenager from the United States is an excruciating challenge. This was a reason for Zilisch not choosing F1. But it wasn’t the only one.
He said, “A lot of it, I owe it to Kevin [Harvick]. In 2021, I was racing go-karts and a little bit of sports car stuff. Nothing at a high level. At that point, the opportunity to go open wheel racing wasn’t there. I didn’t have the family money to go do it. It was very expensive. Even the open wheel feeder stuff. There was not much opportunity.”
It was Harvick who acted as a mentor to him at this juncture and showed him that there existed a path in NASCAR. Zilisch found that a sensible step to take and took maximum advantage of every car he got into. In 2023, he became the Trans Am TA 2 champion. In 2024, at the age of 17, he won the overall 24 Hours of Daytona LMP2 class.
These achievements grabbed eyeballs from around the world, including the ones at Formula 1. He continued, “I started to make a name for myself here. The doors on the other side of the world, or in the other paddocks, opened up. But at that point, it was not really an option. I love what I am doing here in NASCAR.”
