CHARLOTTE, N.C. – Alex Bowman’s playoff motivation runs deep.
There's the motivation to end the five-year full-time partnership with Greg Ives on as strong a note as possible and the motivation to prove the pundits wrong by making a deep run in the 2022 NASCAR Cup Series playoffs.
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The Bowman-Ives partnership has produced seven wins together – the fifth-most among active driver-crew chief pairings. Five of those wins have come in the last two seasons and that is the third-most wins among drivers during that span.
"Trying to end Greg’s tenure as a crew chief on a high note is important to me," Bowman said. "Super focused on kicking butt for the next 10 races."
Bowman is a perfect five-for-five in making the playoffs during his time at Hendrick Motorsports. That has all come with Ives atop the pit box for his team – first on the No. 88 Chevrolet and then on the No. 48 Chevrolet.
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The Tucson, Arizona, native enters this year’s 10-race playoff as the 15th seed with 2,006 points, one win, three top-five finishes and 10 top-10s. A summer stretch was a rough patch for Bowman and the team and that has left him as something of a sleeper.
"We’re under the radar," Bowman said. "We’re the underdogs. It doesn’t matter how much we win, it gets discounted somehow. We’re here to prove people wrong."
He won at Las Vegas Motor Speedway in March – a track that is part of this year’s Round of 8 – but it’s an earlier playoff 1.5-mile track that stands out for the driver of the No. 48. Kansas Speedway has been one of Bowman’s best tracks at Hendrick Motorsports. He has six top-10 finishes in his last 10 starts there, including a nine-place run this spring in the Next Gen car.
"I really enjoy Kansas," Bowman said. "It’s a fun place. I just like that you can move around a lot. I’ve won some races there in different race cars. It was one of the places we were successful together at in 2016. The options that that racetrack gives you is really cool."
The 29-year-old’s best playoff result to date was reaching the Round of 8 in 2020. He has reached the Round of 12 in 2018, 2019 and 2021. Those past playoff trips have helped him take note on several lessons to apply during the elimination format.
"I don’t think you can try to go do anything more than you have all year," Bowman said. "You just have to go run well. You can’t turn it up. You got to be ready to go when those 10 weeks show up. We’ve been able to put together some really good runs through the playoffs in the past, so hopefully we can have another good one."
Bowman and the No. 48 team will kick off the playoffs at Darlington Raceway on Sunday, Sept. 4, at 6 p.m. ET on USA Network, MRN Radio and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio (Channel 90).