Welcome to the official NASCAR 25 Career Mode walkthrough! In this series, we’ll give you the inside line on making the most out of your NASCAR 25 career, working your way up from a start-up team in the ARCA Menards Series to the upper echelons of the NASCAR Cup Series.
This week, we explore the next step in your career after you conquer ARCA: the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series. This step on the ladder introduces some exciting new challenges to your team management.
Reaching a Milestone
When you surpass certain Reputation milestones, a new series will unlock for the following season. Your Agent will inform you that a new sponsor is waiting for you next year—to advance, you’ll need to wrap up the current campaign. Stockpile as much money and all the extra RP you can to get a jump start on the new season! (Note that if your Reputation Points pass the threshold through actions between races, such as a Turning Point or PR opportunity, you’ll have to complete the next race for the new series unlock to register.)
After the season ends, you’ll see a recap of your stats and winnings, and if you’ve earned the chance to move up, this is when you’ll set up your new team. Before you start the next season, you’ll be able to choose which series you intend to race—you can choose any of your previously unlocked series, or to just focus on the highest ranked one. Running two series at once is a great way to boost your Reputation faster, but your choices will lock in until the next offseason, so there’s no bailing out of the commitment.
Next-Level Management
A new series means a new shop and a new Crew Chief and Agent, and additional new PR Manager and Mechanic hires down the road. It also means some new managerial challenges. In the Truck Series, you’ll be managing two vehicles—one that goes to the track, and one that undergoes work so it can run the following race.
With multiple vehicles to manage in the Truck Series, your Work Points distribution strategy may need to change. If you rely on your Crew Chief to pick the work, they will give you the option to focus work on this week’s entry, the most damaged vehicle, or balance things evenly between both. You can still assign work yourself as well.
At the Truck Series level, parts go up to Level 6, and Rebuilds are also introduced. A Rebuild restores your parts to the beginning of their life, saving you money on needing to replace Worn parts. However, Rebuilds come at a larger Work Points cost that may be prohibitive to more routine repairs on other parts.
Having two trucks also means, for those who like extra customization, another slot in the Paint Kit. You may want to create subtle visual differences between your two trucks so you can better keep track of which is which.
Pulling Double Duty
If you’re running two (or more) series at once, you may encounter weekends where they run together. On double duty weekends, you’ll head to the track with both of them and take on their sessions in order, just like a real driver pulling double duty would. Likewise, your post race recaps will include all of the series that ran on any given week on screen together. Weekends where only one series runs will function much like they did during your first ARCA season; you’ll only manage one set of tasks.
The financial advantage to running multiple series at once is, if your equipment is in great shape in one, you can use your winnings to subsidize the other. However, you won’t be able to unlock top tier parts right away in any new series, and you’ll also need to choose which vehicle gets any new part you buy if you choose to install right away.
Want to size up your top competition in the new series? Head over to Standings in the Race Shop and toggle between seasons. You’ll be able to see how everyone raced in Trucks while you were competing in ARCA and find out who the defending champion is.