Key Takeaways
- NASCAR is synonymous with in-your-face advertising, especially on the cars themselves.
- Most teams use a variety of different paint jobs over the course of a season.
- We poured over hundreds of NASCAR photos to choose our favorite paint schemes of the 2022 season.
If you’re familiar with NASCAR, you know that advertising is a huge part of the sport. Sponsorship logos are plastered everywhere, both at the track and on TV. You’ll be bombarded with brand names — on ball caps, helmets, stitched onto driver’s suits, all over the venue, and, of course, on the cars themselves. For the non-cynical fan, the colorful paintjobs are just another sight to behold on race day.
Some cars change up their paint schemes often, offering a new look every few weeks. Others stick with a single look or two for most of the season. It can be a lot for your eyeballs to take it. However, there are a few paintjobs that stand out from the pack every season. Here are, in our humble opinions, the best of the best when it comes to NASCAR paint schemes in 2022.
Joe Gibbs Racing No. 11 Coca-Cola – Atlanta
It’s hard to go wrong with a classic. Coca-Cola Classic, in this case. Driver Denny Hamlin drove this old-school looking red and white No. 11 Toyota during the Quaker State 400 at the Atlanta Motor Speedway in July. Along with supporting sponsor logos like FedEx and SportsClips, the N0. 11 car looks sharp as it sped around the track that weekend.
Hamlin managed an eighth place finish, picking up three points for this racing team. This car’s FedEx and SportsClips paint schemes also looked pretty fresh this season. However, we simply had to place the classic Coca-Cola classic scheme above the rest.
Getty Images23XI No. 45 Jordan Brand – Kansas City
Kurt Busch is one of the biggest names in NASCAR. So it’s perhaps fitting that he partnered with one of the biggest names in basketball for the AdventHealth 400 in Kansas City this summer. Yeah, Michael Jordan himself (or at least his iconic Jumpman logo) adorned the hood of Busch’s Toyota back in May.
We really appreciated the simple design of a grey hood with the bright red Jordan logo. Even the “textured” grey and black along the sides complements the red and white ’45’ on the doors and roof nicely. In a Jordan-like performance, Busch actually won the race day. We’re not sure if there’s a huge crossover between NASCAR fans and NBA fans, but this paint job was a slam dunk in our books.
Getty ImagesTrackhouse Racing No. 1 Howler Head Bourbon — Los Angeles
For the record, Howler House Bourbon is an alcoholic beverage with a faint taste of banana. Some people swear it’s great, while others can’t stand it. (For the record, we’ve never tried it.) This isn’t about the product though, it’s about the paintjob. Frankly, Trackhouse Racing’s No. 1 has never looked better than it did at the Busch Light Clash in L.A. in February.
Red and yellow is a hard scheme to attempt. It’s simply too hard to avoid the obvious comparisons to McDonalds (or old school Hulkamania, brother). Somehow, though, the Trackhouse team pulled it off with ease. They kept the concept simple and the logo huge. Driver Ross Chastain
Getty ImagesJoe Gibbs Racing No. 18 Ethel M Chocolates Scheme — Las Vegas
This is actually the first of two entries for the Joe Gibbs Racing No. 18 car. Kyle Busch’s Chevy has been lucky enough this season to receive variety of great paintjobs. They stand out both for their unique coloring, but also their non-standard sponsors. Plenty of NASCAR rides are sponsored by motor oil companies or insurance companies. But chocolate? That’s a rare one.
The minty-green and brown Ethel M Chocolates paintjob that Busch used in Las Vegas definitely stood out. Was the sweet scheme (pun intended) the reason that Busch finished fourth, narrowly missing the podium? Probably not, but we can pretend he was inspired to grab a post-race Ethel M snack as he sped over the finish line.
Getty ImagesJTG Daugherty Racing No. 47 Sunny D — Las Vegas
Does anyone associate that delicious orange-flavored drink with NASCAR races? Probably not, at least not until Ricky Stenhouse Jr. showed up with this Sunny D themed ride at Las Vegas in June. The bright finish was a nice change from the standard red, white, blues, and blacks that a majority of the cars use.
Stenhouse used his Chevy to qualify in 9th that day, but the race went down quicker than a cold glass of Sunny D on a hot summer day. He ended up finishing a disappointing 21st overall. Still, the No. 47 Sunny D paintjob remained a real winner.
Getty ImagesHendrick Motorsports No. 48 Ally — Fontana
“Do it right” might be Ally’s slogan, but it was apparently also the instructions for this paint job. And they definitely did it right. It’s a simple white and purple look, with spots of pink and teal. It’s not too crowded or busy, with an obvious lack of smaller logos along the rear fenders or bumpers.
Driver Alex Bowman has sported a few different Ally paintjobs this season, including one that predominately dark purple and pink. However, we prefer this one with the white background. Bowman finished middle of the pack that day, in 25th place. However, he did win in Las Vegas with the same paint scheme.
Getty ImagesRichard Childress Racing No. 3 Get Bioethanol — Madison
Austin Dillon was the driver of this snazzy looking No. 3 car at the Enjoy Illinois 300 in Madison, Illinois in June. This black and mint green paint job was super easy on the eyes, with sponsor logo Get Bioethanol emblazoned firmly along the sides and hood. Dillon’s Chevy looked great that weekend, even if results didn’t match up. He qualified in 29th and finished 15th.
Get Bioethanol is actually a sub-brand of Get Biofuel, a company that supports the increasing use of plant-based ethanol fuel. The irony (or cleverness) of an environmentally focused biofuel organization sponsoring a stock car race is not lost on us. And while many still view all motor racing as needless pollution, NASCAR is indeed making efforts to go green. They use solar power at many tracks and actually do use biofuel — a 15 percent ethanol blend — in their cars.
Getty ImagesRoush Fenway Keselowski Racing No. 6 Violet Defense — Phoenix
We’re just suckers for non-standard colors. This purple and yellow Violet Defense No. 6 Ford driven by Brad Keselowski in Phoenix was easily one of the best paint schemes of the 2022 season. The bright yellow ‘6’ on the hood provides a great contrast to the darker purple number on the sides. With a couple white-ish wisps travelling down to the sponsor name, the whole thing is just ultra stylish.
Keselowski didn’t have the best day on the track, though. He qualified in 18th and finished 23rd in the Final Stage. As for his sponsor, they make lighting products that promise to use ultraviolet rays to disinfect interior spaces like homes, businesses, or classrooms.
Getty ImagesJoe Gibbs Racing No. 18 M&M Crunchy Cookie – Atlanta
Someone at Joe Gibbs racing must have a sweet tooth. Their previous entry on this list (Ethel M Chocolates) was pretty good. However, it’s hard to beat the cartoonish joy of the paint scheme Kyle Busch used in Atlanta. This M&M Crunchy Cookie themed Toyota looks like it belongs in a Saturday morning cartoon more than in a serious NASCAR race. And we don’t mean that as an insult — this car is both insanely silly and insanely cool, at the same time.
Despite the support of sentient candies painted on the outside of his car, Busch didn’t perform up to expectations at the Quaker State 400. After qualifying in 19th, he actually dropped one spot to finish 20th. At least he has one of the best looking cars that day. Busch previously used a different M&M paintjob this season, which we also really enjoyed.
Getty ImagesStewart Haas Racing No. 4 Subway — Virgina
Kevin Harvick is a NASCAR veteran. He makes our list for driving this Subway sponsored No. 4 Ford at the Blue-Emu Maximum Pain Relief 400 at the Martinsville Speedway in Virginia. The scheme doesn’t really need much explaining. It has the iconic green and yellow of the popular fast foot sandwich shop, with the alternate logo across the hood.
There’s also a smaller Busch Light logo near the rear wheels, perhaps suggesting that Harvick’s favorite post-race meal is a footlong and a cold one? Or maybe a cold cut trio fueled Harvick to a strong performance, qualifying in 6th and finishing in 14th that day. Harvick’s Mobil1 paint scheme at Daytona, with a gorgeous desert landscape under cloudy blue skies, was also a treat.
Getty ImagesSpire Motorsports No. 7 WWE SummerSlam – Pocono
We’re pretty sure the Venn diagram of people who love NASCAR and people who love professional wrestling is almost a perfect single circle. It makes perfect sense for Peacock to remind everyone to stream WWE SummerSlam with this psychadelic paint scheme on Corey LaJoie’s No. 7 Chevy at Ponoco in July.
The hood featured the faces of main eventers Roman Reigns and Brock Lesnar. The rest of the paintjob featured colourful design work and SummerSlam’s beach-party-like logos. Reigns managed to beat Lesnar to retain the championship at WWE’s premier summer event, but LaJoie didn’t fare quite as well. He finished middle of the pack. At least this sports entertainment sponsored look was a winner.
Getty ImagesTrackhouse Racing No. 99 Tootsie’s Scheme — Daytona 500
This paint scheme is, as the kids say, a complete vibe. NASCAR is, in many ways, an extremely macho sport. It’s a bunch of good ol’ boys, hopped up on testosterone and horsepower, hurling themselves around an oval track at 200 mph a couple hundred times to declare a winner. So for Daniel Suarez to rock this purple and pink look for Tootsie’s Orchid Lounge, a live country music hotspot in Nashville, was a total shift from the norm.
This scheme is just everything. The colors are bright and vibrant. The cursive Tootsie’s logo fits perfectly. The white Orchid flower adds a nice touch. And best of all? It doesn’t even tell you what Tootsie’s is. We had to look it up, which is probably exactly the point of this marketing effort. It’s a true 10/10 paint job, well done to everyone involved.
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