August 15, 2022 | By Lee Spencer

Retirement? Don't give Aric Almirola his gold watch just yet

RICHMOND, VA.--Aric Almirola may want to hit the "pause" button on his retirement tour.

Not only has the driver of the No.10 Smithfield Ford begun backing off of his rock-solid retirement plan at the end of the 2022 NASCAR Cup season, but Almirola also is bringing his best self to the race track.

And Sunday’s performance at Richmond Raceway was no exception. Almirola rallied from a 32nd-place qualifying effort on Saturday to run in the top five before he finished eighth in the Federated Auto Parts 400.

“Man, I felt like our car was so good at the beginning of the race, and then as the clouds came in and it cooled off, we just lost the handling,” Almirola said. “It just the car changed so much. We didn't have nearly as good a car as we did at the beginning of the race. I thought we were probably the best race car on the track, but, ugh, it was a good fight.”

By the end of the first stage on Lap 70, Almirola had gained 20 positions. He ran as high as third on Lap 172 and was sixth when Stage 2 concluded on Lap 230. With 80 laps remaining in the contest, Almirola still had a presence in the top five, but the weather, the track, and the complexion of the race changed. Joey Logano, who had led 222 laps, started a slow descent as did Kyle Larson, Ryan Blaney and Almirola—who was clearly taxed after battling valiantly to hold onto his seventh top 10 of the season.

“This is a great place for us, and I had really high hopes of coming here,” Almirola added. “I thought we were going to be able to challenge to get us a win. Just came up a little bit short, but proud of the guys. We’ve got a couple more races…”

And a couple of opportunities to qualify for the Playoffs. Almirola’s first chance will come this weekend at Watkins Glen. In 10 starts at the track, his top result is 12th in 2019. Daytona International Speedway might provide a better option. Almirola scored his first Cup win at Daytona in 2014 behind the wheel of the No. 43 Richard Petty Motorsports Ford.

“There are no guarantees,” Almirola said. “This is a really tough sport, and just because you've had past success at a particular place doesn't guarantee future success. We'll have to go to Daytona, hopefully with a win already--but if not--we'll go to Daytona like we always do with a real fast Smithfield Ford Mustang. 

“And if I do all the right things inside the race car--and we have some luck go our way—yeah, we'll have a shot.”

In 11 full seasons of Cup competition, Almirola has advanced to the postseason five times—including the last four seasons he’s been with Stewart Haas Racing.

Since his reunion with crew chief Drew Blickensderfer, Almirola, 38, has enjoyed an extremely consistent season. Prior to being swept up in wrecks at Indy and Michigan, the No. 10 team was 13th in the standings. In a normal year, his performance would have been strong enough to advance to the Playoffs. But with 15 different winners in the first 24 races, 2022 has been anything but normal.

“I think everybody expected going into this season with this new car there would be a lot of unknowns, right,” Almirola said. “You see it all the time when we show up to a race track that we've never been to, or we show up with no practice, there's surprises throughout the field. 

“So I think showing up this year with new car, never been to any of these race tracks with this car and everybody trying to figure it out, I felt like we all went into the season kind of feeling like the parity was going to be a lot closer and there would be a lot more surprises--and we've seen that.” 

On January 12, Almirola announced he would step away from full-time Cup competition at the end of the year. But over the last six weeks, his resolve toward retirement has softened. What would it take to get Almirola to return in 2023?

“I don’t know, we’re still talking about it,” Almirola said. “There's a lot of factors. There's a lot of moving parts. There's a lot of people involved in the decision-making process. I'm one small part of it, so I've been listening, and I've been a part of the discussions--and we'll see.”