Preview: Championship Is the Goal for Hall, JRM Late Model Team in 2025

MOORESVILLE, N.C. (Feb. 5, 2025) – There is a new look for the championship-winning Late Model team at JR Motorsports this season.

With Carson Kvapil’s ascension to the NASCAR Xfinity Series, Connor Hall will take over the Bass Pro Shops/TRACKER Boats Chevrolet, running for the zMAX CARS Tour Late Model Stock Car championship and the Virginia Triple Crown. But first, Hall kicks off his JRM tenure this weekend in the Icebreaker 125 at Florence Motor Speedway behind the wheel of the No. 88 for JRM.

Caden Kvapil, who filled in for his brother Carson twice last season, will also compete at Florence this weekend in the No. 8 Chevrolet with sponsorship from JRM partner Carolina Carports. The young driver will run a limited schedule in the second car throughout this season.

For his part, Hall can’t wait for the weekend to arrive.

“First, I don’t know if I ever been chomping at the bit to get a season started like I am this year,” he said. “Usually, you’re like, ‘oh man, the offseason has come and gone so fast, we’ve got to get everything ready’ and there’s so much pressure just making the first race. I feel like we are so prepared and have done everything we’ve needed to do so well so far that I’m really ready to get back to the race track and kick off the year. We have put in a lot of good work and effort over the offseason to be ready to perform.”

The goal this weekend, Hall said, was to make sure all the pieces are working together and getting the season started on the right foot.

“My wants and wishes, other than the obvious of performing well enough to win, are to go in and strengthen the thought process between me and Bryan (Shaffer, crew chief) and work efficiently and effectively with him and the team,” Hall said. “We have prepared an amazing Bass Pro Shops/TRACKER Boats Chevrolet. This is the one opportunity to get the ball rolling before the CARS Tour season begins (March 1), and I’m excited to seize another opportunity to grow in my new role here.”

Some would see his first race as the full-time driver for JRM as a pressure situation. Hall doesn’t.

“It’s not pressure,” he said. “I would say it’s expectation. I feel the same amount of pressure to win every week no matter the situation. I want to race to win. It’s not a shotgun approach; I want to go in, do the job, keep it neat, don’t have mechanical issues. I’ve been there before a million times and we’ve done our prep for this. Bryan has everything where it needs to be, and we need to just go and execute.”

Under the tutelage of Shaffer, the crew chief and team manager, Hall stepped into the legacy JRM Late Model last season at Hickory (N.C.) Motor Speedway, winning the annual Fall Brawl at the historic track. That experience gives Hall a good idea of what he can expect this season in terms of what he has underneath him on the track.

It also gave him a taste of what having Shaffer in his corner really meant.

“I just kind of took the shut up-and-drive approach,” Hall said of his first drive at Hickory. “Who am I to come in there to be the guy trying to diagnose this or that? I went there and just tried to learn as much as possible. Pride can get in the way of learning and I am here to learn, not to be prideful. I have pride toward this program but I want to be better.”

Shaffer, who oversaw the legendary Dick Trickle’s only two NASCAR victories, has tutored all of JRM’s Late Model drivers, and Hall is next in line. The lineage of the Late Model program at JRM is rich indeed, starting with Josh Berry and including William Byron, Sam Mayer, Anthony Alfredo and both of the Kvapil brothers.

“His understanding of every part of the car and what it takes to produce a winning team, his understanding of the ‘KISS’ principle is what he’s about,” Hall said of Shaffer. “He’s done it for so long and he knows what it takes, and if it isn’t something that’s part of that, he’s done it for so long that he’s weeded out all the distractions that could get another crew chief off the mark.

“Anything I ever run into working in the shop, like thought processes or steps, he’s a walking almanac of car knowledge. I think he’s a very good teacher, if you take the time to curate some questions and ask him. He’s helped my understanding of a lot of things already.”

A native of Hampton, Va., Hall has been a consistent challenger for the CARS Tour title in recent years, finishing twice in the runner-up position in the championship standings. In his career in the series, Hall has won five times, earned seven poles and notched 26 top-five and 29 top-10 finishes.

Hooking up with JRM is huge for the 27-year-old driver from a personnel perspective, too.

“I think we have some of the most talented people in the business here, like Slim (Josh Tarratt-Hill), Justin Keeley, Ernie Mayo, and my spotter, Bo Gurkin,” Hall said.

Winning a CARS Tour championship and a certain big race at Martinsville is the goal, and Hall said the approach to it is pretty simple. “I would say it is about limiting our misses. Miss small, don’t get caught up in the junk.”