Parker Kligerman isn’t sure what’s next, but “is good” stepping away from a full-time racing career

In June, fresh off of an eighth-place finish in the NASCAR Xfinity Series race at Portland International Raceway, Parker Kligerman went for a run in the mountains. He’d spent years chasing the top levels of motorsport, reaching them, falling out of them, then climbing them again. During that time, he’d have waves of emotions about how his driving career would end. When morale was low, he’d think: “Damn it, you probably should stop chasing this.” 

But it wasn’t until this year, amid a steady Xfinity Series career and a top-10 run in the series championship, that Kligerman reached the top of that mountain and had a moment of clarity.

“I was just like, ‘I think I’m good,’” Kligerman told Motorsport at Phoenix Raceway, his final race as a full-time driver. “And that was it.” 

A couple weeks later, Kligerman, 34, talked to Scott Borchetta, his team owner at Big Machine Racing. Borchetta was “very supportive,” they worked out the details of Kligerman’s departure, and the team signed 23-year-old Nick Sanchez for 2025. Kligerman announced the end of his full-time driving career in September, three months after that post-Portland run. 

When it came to the final race of the season in Phoenix, Kligerman wasn’t visibly sad. He said he mostly felt grateful and accomplished, especially after meeting fans over the weekend who thanked him for his presence in the sport.

“Like, I did this,” Kligerman said. “I got here. Even though I’m not racing for a championship today, and I haven’t been as successful as I wanted, I do feel accomplished to have done this — and done it at a really high level, for really storied organizations — and worked with some of the best in the sport. The kid who saw this on TV at 9 years old somehow made it all work.”

Kligerman’s career has been a zig-zag. He ran his rookie season in NASCAR’s fourth-tier series, ARCA, as a 19-year-old development driver for powerhouse team Penske Racing. That year, he won nine of 21 starts. 

In the decade that followed, Kligerman raced every NASCAR national series — Trucks, Xfinity, and Cup — for major teams like Penske, Brad Keselowski Racing, and Kyle Busch Motorsports, as well as underfunded ones like Swan Racing. The amount of races he ran fluctuated each year, and he supplemented drier spells with other work, such as being a presenter on NBC’s…