Will Chevrolet continue to be NASCAR Cup's dominant power in 2024? Yes and no. Here's why

Look for Ford and Toyota to likely be more successful than 2023 -- both in victories and individual driver success

Although it may seem the 2023 season just concluded with Ryan Blaney taking home his first career NASCAR Cup Series Championship, the beginning of the 2024 season is right around the corner. We are less than three weeks away from the third annual Busch Light Clash at the Los Angeles Coliseum.

After that exciting race to kick the season into gear, the NASCAR Season will really begin on February 15th with the Duels at Daytona. Just two years ago RFK swept the board with the Duels, and just last year Joey Logano and now retired Aric Almirola swept the Duels for Ford.

Fast forward to the end of the year in both of those seasons and it was a Ford driver -- or more precisely a Penske driver, namely Ryan Blaney, who won the championship in the end.

While Blaney enjoyed a late-season surge that not only got him into the playoffs (winning the fall race at Martinsville), he rode that surge all the way to the championship. But frankly, if Blaney has designs on winning a second title in 2024, he's going to have a much stronger season overall, instead of worrying about rallying literally at the last minute to not only make the playoffs, but also the Championship 4 round.

With that being said, are the Duels at Daytona a precursor for the season to come? Speaking of Ford, that is exactly where we want to start the preview for the year, with the battle of the manufacturers.

Even though Ford has won the last two seasons, it's been mostly Chevy-based teams who grab the wins throughout the year. In fact, last season Chevy won 18 of the 36 races (plus the All-Star Open and All-Star Race). Toyota won 10 and Ford on the other hand won 8. The difference for Ford is that from those eight wins, six of them came from July 30th and on, meaning Ford caught speed at the end of the year. Toyota on the other hand was consistent with speed all year, equally splitting all 10 wins between the first half and second half of the season.

With that being said, where do the trends point for 2024? The easy way out would be to point at Ford and say that they would have speed to start the season. In fact, as mentioned before, Ford has dominated Daytona in the last five years, while sweeping the last 4 Duels, but ... we must not forget the changes that happened with the manufacturers in the offseason.

Zane Smith swaps from Ford to Chevy to drive for Spire Motorsports. Stewart-Haas lost Kevin Harvick and Almirola and replaced them with Josh Berry and Noah Gragson respectively. Legacy Motorclub leaves Chevy to join Toyota, giving the manufacturer more assets this season.

All that being said, the manufacturers feel a bit more balanced this year. Toyota continues putting in more chips, and now with eight charters in the Cup series, they have more of a share on the grid.

Even though some people look at Legacy and say "This team won't even win a race. How does this help Toyota?" Well, that is where we have to dig deeper.

In races like the Daytona 500, and the five other superspeedway races, eight cars now allow Toyota-based teams to run a better pit strategy. The flaw in the past at these races with Toyota cars is that they would have to split apart and team up with other manufacturers in order to not fall behind in the draft. Now, with eight cars, assuming they are all in the race at a given point, they can now run a strategy like Ford and Chevy and prevent themselves from falling behind.

That's not to mention with two more teams, that allows data and employees to move around to make everyone better. While I'm not sure if this means Toyota gets more wins in this season, I do believe this is the right step for Toyota and they will be in a better place going forward.

So where does Chevy sit now?

Considering Chevrolet lost a few teams and drivers, their share of the grid has decreased, but the main "money makers" of the group still remain at their teams. Chevy has a hot new prospect in Carson Hocevar, but that's about it for the bow tie group.

Chevy usually grabs the most wins in a given year, while the loss of the bottom teams for Chevy shouldn't change that. Teams like Hendrick Motorsports, Trackhouse and RCR (more specifically Kyle Busch) will win most if not all of the races for Chevy this year, and those teams remained unchanged, so a move up or down for Chevy more than likely won't happen.

Finally, for the Blue Oval team, Ford is perhaps the most interesting of the group because it finished the year off strong, but it's important to take a step back a bit before throwing all your chips on Ford.

Penske should lead the way for Ford but Austin Cindric will need to pick up the pace this year to ensure all three Penske drivers make the playoffs. Ford has the best second tier team in RFK Racing. Chris Buescher was on his best form last year with three wins, and Brad Keselowski raced the best he's been in the last couple years, even though he failed to get a win.

Heading into this year it would be a surprise if RFK doesn't get multiple wins. The strong part for Ford is that they have SHR as another strong team, but the Tony Stewart co-owned group perhaps has the most questions out of everyone. Without Harvick last year, SHR would have just been another lower team, not to mention a four-car team without anyone making the playoffs.

Heading into the year, there are many questions if Berry or Gragson can get caught up to speed, and if Briscoe and Preece can have better seasons.

SHR is a big question mark because if it can turn things around, Ford would have three top teams. But at this current moment, only about four cars can be favored to win a race, which isn't the greatest given the share of the grid they have.

Our preseason pick is that we will finally have a close battle between all three badges. Instead of an 18, 10, 8 win split, it's still very likely Chevy will have the most wins, but Ford and Toyota will challenge with some of the best drivers. Out of the 16 playoff drivers, we predict six will be powered by Toyota, four by Ford, and six will have the always potent Chevy powerplant under their hoods.

But the four Ford drivers will have a much better chance of having all four in the round of 12. Out of the race wins, from 36 I think it will be much closer to everyone having 12 wins, but I will predict Chevy to lead the way with around 13-15.

Let's talk about a few drivers looking forward to this season...

John Hunter Nemechek:

Perhaps the most intriguing move on the grid goes to the newly christened Toyota team. With Legacy moving to Toyota, a move up in series is the perfect situation for John Hunter.

If you took a look at the 2023 Xfinity season, JHN was the best driver -- even though he lost out to SHR driver Cole Custer in Phoenix. This move to the Cup series should be much more successful than his previous run in the Cup circuit. He joins a solid group at Toyota that will provide him with all the resources needed to push for results in 2024 and on.

John Hunter Nemechek is back in the Cup Series and returns to Toyota power as well in 2024, like he previously had during his Xfinity Series tenure. (Photo by Jared C. Tilton/Getty Images)

Now, let's not jump the gun because we must consider Ty Gibbs just last year missed out on the playoffs, and JHN joins a Toyota team that isn't on the same level as Gibbs. But who's to say Legacy doesn't build momentum throughout the year to give itself a chance for something later on. We have seen this in previous years with Trackhouse and Front Row, so why can't it be Legacy next year? More on JHN in an upcoming piece.

Brad Keselowski:

Last season was the best we have seen from Brad in a couple years, even though he failed to get a win. Keselowski qualified and finished an average of 14th position, but he had seven top 5s and 16 top 10s. The fact he didn't pick up a win is beyond me, but let's not forget Buescher got all those wins for RFK and Brad even pushed Buescher across the line in Daytona in August.

Chris Buescher celebrates with RFK Racing co-owner Brad Keselowski and crew chief Scott Graves after winning the NASCAR Cup Series FireKeepers Casino 400 at Michigan International Speedway. (Photo by Jonathan Bachman/Getty Images)

Will 2024 be the same for Brad? Well, he sure hopes so -- but with one key difference: he wants wins, and lots of 'em. It would be great to see Kez back in victory lane multiple times.

But there's one caveat: it could still be hard for Keselowski to find that same or greater success in 2024 that he saw in 2023, even with not reaching victory lane, especially with the moves that have happened around the grid -- but the stats show no reason for Keselowski to be left behind.

In our judgment. RFK as a whole will have those top 10's coming to them throughout the whole year, but its chances for wins may be lowered because of the heavy hitters on other teams.

Chase Elliott:

NASCAR's most popular driver will look forward to having a full season again -- providing he doesn't go snowboarding again (and you can bet Rick Hendrick is enforcing that stipulation in Elliott's contract this year and beyond).

Chase Elliott failed to make the NASCAR Cup playoffs for the first time in his career in a season he'd likely rather forget, which includes missing six races recovering from a snowboarding accident and resulting surgery. (Photo by Sean Gardner/Getty Images)

If not for his incident, Elliott would have easily made the playoffs. This year Elliott should be focused on getting a win again, something that didn't happen in 2023. It would be a big reach to say Elliott won't return to form in 2024. It would be surprising if this year goes on and Chase doesn't have three or more wins. Last season was an anomaly for HMS considering both Elliott and Alex Bowman's injuries. We should see a return of all four HMS drivers in the playoffs again -- providing they all stay healthy.

Elliott showed a regression in 2023 with an average finishing position of 13th, but if he raced a full season that still would have been good enough for the playoffs, not to mention even with his layoff, he still had 7 top 5s. Based on those numbers and the fact he'll be fully healthy for 2024, we should expect a return to the normal Chase Elliott we are used to seeing.

Ty Gibbs:

Rookie sensation Ty Gibbs had a very solid opening season in Cup. It wasn't on the same level as Denny Hamlin's 2006 rookie season, but Gibbs was racing in the top 10 consistently in the 2nd half of the year. While he ultimately would miss the playoffs, he still did better than most expected. In 2023 Gibbs finished with an average position of 18th, but towards the end of the year, that number jumped up to an average of 14th. Gibbs showed signs of greatness as well, considering he had four top 5s.

For 2024, Gibbs will be looking forward to building on the confidence and experience he now has racing in the Cup series at such a young age. Jumping into a top team is never easy, but we have full confidence now that Gibbs can get the best out of his equipment.

Ty Gibbs just missed the Cup playoffs in his rookie season last year. But at age 20, he showed great promise for a long and very successful career in the Cup series. Will he be able to beat NASCAR's Cup's notorious sophomore jinx in 2024? Time will tell. Photo: Maddie Meyer / Getty Images

In 2024 his goal should be to cut out as many of those 20-30th place finishes he had at the beginning of the year and achieve more top 10s. He has the speed and equipment to do that. If he does those two things, Gibbs should find himself in the postseason in his sophomore career. Otherwise, he could become the latest victim of NASCAR's notorious sophomore jinx.

To conclude, 2024 is set to be another fantastic year in the Cup series, with even more parity than the last. Who's your sleeper pick in 2024 to take home the coveted championship? Will Toyota finally get back to that top step or will Ford make it a 3-peat?

Whatever you choose, AutoRacingDigest will have the coverage all year!