After a two-year absence, Stanton Barrett will hope to make his NASCAR Xfinity Series return at Watkins Glen International on Saturday. He is scheduled to drive the #47 Chevrolet Camaro for Mike Harmon Racing.
Barrett’s last Xfinity appearance came at Watkins Glen in 2019, where he finished twenty-third for MBM Motorsports. He has competed in the series since 1992, at the age of nineteen, with seven top tens and a best finish of fifth (1996 Atlanta) in 204 career starts. His best run at Watkins Glen in five tries is eighteenth in 2014.
The 2019 WGI start came after another multi-year hiatus as his last Xfinity race prior came in 2016. During that stretch, he did one-offs in the Cup Series for Rick Ware Racing and Spire Motorsports at the Charlotte Roval (fortieth in 2018), Talladega (thirty-fifth in 2019), and the Daytona Road Course (thirty-eighth in 2020); even that Cup stint occurred after a decade away from the series. However, his time in the Cup Series has been exclusively in inferior equipment as he never finished higher than thirtieth.
While his NASCAR résumé has mostly been limited to sporadic starts, he makes his living as a Hollywood stuntman. Recent productions for which he lent his services include the television shows NCIS, Star Trek: Picard, and Stranger Things, as well as movies like Black Panther: Wakanda Forever, Captain Marvel, Logan, and John Wick: Chapter 3. Barrett made his début as a film director with Navy Seals vs. Zombies in 2015, and it served as his sponsor for his first and only career Camping World Truck Series start at Talladega that year.
Since 2021, Barrett’s racing has mainly come in the ARCA Menards Series and Stadium Super Trucks. He ran the Mid-Ohio ARCA races in 2021 and 2022 for Fast Track Racing, whose owner Andy Hillenburg is also closely involved with the film industry, with top tens in both including a sixth in 2022. Barrett recently contested the SST round at the Music City Grand Prix in the #F26 truck (intended to honour the late dirt racer Mark Fields), his second career weekend, finishing seventh and fourth in two races.
The #47 is not locked into the race, meaning Barrett will have to qualify on time. This, however, will be a tall order for a small team that has only made eight of twenty-one races so far in 2022 with five different drivers. MHR’s lone qualified road race came at Portland in June, where Ryan Vargas finished twenty-third. Others to pilot the car include Brandon Brown, Gray Gaulding, Bobby McCarty, and Brennan Poole.
