Creed Fired Up For Playoffs; Eager For Haas’ Xfinity Future

Sheldon Creed (Peter Casey/Nigel Kinrade Photography)

KANNAPOLIS, N.C. – Sheldon Creed’s motivation for success in the upcoming NASCAR Xfinity Series playoffs is two-fold with Haas Factory Team.

On one hand, the 27-year-old from Alpine, Calif., is as hungry for a breakthrough victory as he’s ever been at the sport’s second-highest level.

His 14 runner-up finishes without an Xfinity Series win are a record in that category, and Creed has been oh-so-close so many times, with no trophies to show for his efforts.

On the other hand, Creed is fired up to pursue a championship for Ford Motor Company before HFT shifts manufacturers and rejoins Chevrolet starting in 2026.

It’s a goal that he and teammate Sam Mayer set for themselves when the pair was first announced as drivers for owner Gene Haas 13 months ago, and it’s a mission Creed wants to make good on.

“First is to get that win finally. It’s been a challenging three-and-a-half years [in the Xfinity Series],” said Creed Tuesday during Xfinity Series Playoff Media Day. “We’ve been close numerous times, but haven’t been as close lately. I think I’d be lying if I said we were right on the edge [of victory lane] lately, but I think the first goal is to win. Then the second goal is just to be able to score as many points as possible and get our team to the Round of 8, and then refocus from there on where we think our strengths are.

“Whether it’s in [Las] Vegas, Talladega or Martinsville, if we can win at any of those tracks, then the focus goes to Phoenix on how we are going to win there. It’s all a process, but this is our chance to win an Xfinity Series title for Ford before the [manufacturer] switch and we want to get that job done.”

After tenures in Richard Childress Racing Chevrolets (2022-‘23) and Joe Gibbs Racing Toyotas (2024), the Haas outfit is Creed’s third team and manufacturer in the Xfinity Series in four full-time campaigns.

Creed made the playoffs each of the past two seasons, with both RCR and JGR, but tipped that this year’s road to the postseason with HFT “hasn’t been all that different” in the feel of the regular season.

“All of them are different just in the way they operate,” he explained. “All three manufacturers I’ve been at have been different teams, so the cars drive differently, and they each make speed in different ways. Fortunately, I’ve been able to make speed in all three

“It’s also been nice this year to be able to go into [20]26 knowing I’ll be with the same team so we can keep building on our notebook and what we’ve learned over the course of this year,” Creed added. “But they all are different in their own way.”

After a less-than-stellar regular season by his personal standards, with just five top fives and 12 top 10s in the first 26 races but seven DNFs all due to crashes, Creed views the seven-race playoff stretch as a sort of reset for his No. 00 squad.

It’s a time of year when the excitement level increases and drivers’ passion becomes more evident than ever as the pressure of a title tilt takes center stage.

Sheldon Creed hopes to notch his first NASCAR Xfinity Series win during the postseason. (Matthew Thacker/Nigel Kinrade Photography)

“I get excited for playoff season. I think everyone in the shop gets more motivated, and there’s definitely a lot more time devoted to making sure everything is exactly as it needs to be for us to succeed,” said Creed, who enters the first round just two points below the cut line. “I’m not saying there’s not a lot of time spent in preparation before the playoffs, but it just gets that much more serious.

“I’ve been fortunate to perform well through the playoffs, and hopefully, we can do that again this year,” he continued. “I think it’s going to be tough, and I think we have a lot of work ahead of us [to get to the highest level]. But I believe this team can do that.”

Creed and others have pointed out that JR Motorsports’ Connor Zilisch – the Xfinity Series regular season champion who has won nine races this season – is the unbridled championship favorite entering the playoff stretch run.

But Creed does think that Haas’ two-car attack is capable of great things, and that much of his regular season struggles came down to circumstances, rather than a lack of pure pace.

“I think we’ve showed that we do have speed that we unload with, but sometimes it takes us all weekend to [get to] the third stage [of races] … and get ourselves toward the front,” Creed noted. “Of course, then [at World Wide Technology Raceway] ended up having a mechanical issue in the transmission. But I do think we’re capable. … I think we have a lot to prove in the playoffs.

“I think Cole [Custer] and Riley [Herbst] showed last year that the team and the guys in the shop are really good at their jobs, so I think we know what we need to work on,” he continued. “I think Sam and I fight a lot of the same things [in the race cars], but I certainly think we can make a strong run in the playoffs.”

And beyond this season, Creed is optimistic about his upcoming reunion with the ‘Bowtie Brigade’ next year, considering that he won a Craftsman Truck Series championship with Chevrolet and GMS Racing in 2020. That won’t be the full focus, however, until after his Xfinity Series title pursuit is closed out.

“Right now, we’re just focused on going as far as we can in these playoffs and trying to make the final four and having a shot at a championship with Ford. That’s still the immediate goal,” he affirmed.

“But I am excited for what’s on the horizon; I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t. We’re already working on things for next year and just trying to improve the whole program. It can only get better from here.”

Broadcast coverage of the Xfinity Series’ playoff opener, the Food City 300 from Bristol (Tenn.) Motor Speedway, airs Friday night, Sept. 12 at 7:30 p.m. ET on USA, the Performance Racing Network, and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio, channel 90.