In April 2023, Tickford Racing’s Cam Waters made his way from Melbourne to the paper clip short track called Martinsville Speedway over in the US – having taken a closer look of Riley Herbst’s No.98 Ford Mustang Xfinity Series race car from Stewart-Haas Racing. Then he came back to America again as a spectator during the 2023 regular season finale at Daytona a few months ago and here he is now ready to expand his love of NASCAR this time as a race car driver where he will be returning to Martinsville next weekend by driving the No.66 Ford F-150 for ThorSport Racing in the Craftsman Truck Series.
It’s so fitting for Waters to begin his NASCAR debut at a place he first came there a year ago & there wouldn’t be any issues at all to begin his oval racing career since he will be racing on a short track/0.5 mile oval. If he wants to run superspeedways at some point, no problem. But he can go take part in the season-opening ARCA Menards Series round at Daytona in February next year (surely that won’t affect his Supercars commitments short-term) in order to pass the rookie orientation test & race on the big tracks as Shane Van Gisbergen (currently at Kaulig Racing in the Xfinity Series while still being tied up under Trackhouse) had to do 1-2 months ago regardless of his race result (an early crash sadly saw him limping down in 29th).
Looking at Waters’s ambitions with NASCAR, he’s almost age 30 with another good 10-15 years left as we also know that he is on RFK Racing’s radar who might as well give him a partial Cup ride later this year in the 3rd No.60 Ford Mustang race car for three races – most likely in the road course events like the Chicago Street Course & maybe one short oval one. He’d be a great long-term replacement there should the co-boss Brad Keselowski eventually calls it a day in the No.6 team or the team can see the potential 3rd charter happening to expand into three full-time Cup cars someday, but Xfinity would be a great start with a good midfield team like RSS & AM Racing who can give him the resources to run upfront and win races from there.
Now looking at his Supercars record, it’s not bad having finished 2nd twice via the Drivers’ Standings in the Supercars championship before back in 2020 and 2022 to both NZ drivers who now ply their trade in the US such as Scott McLaughlin (Dick Johnson Racing, now at Team Penske in IndyCar) and SVG (Triple Eight, now racing NASCARs full-time as above) respectively. Don’t forget he also finished 2nd twice at the Bathurst 1000 back in 2020-21 as well. Yes, he has won a couple of races there before but still has unfinished business though after an up and down start so far this Supercars season despite a good qualifying run last weekend at Albert Park that saw him win the pole award for Race 2. A Bathurst 1000 win would be great while catching up with the drivers’ standings in the hope of at least walking away with one series championship before he can think real big full-time in the US. For now, we wish him good luck as a Top 15-20 run would be a great start on debut.