NASCAR Cup Series

Best of the rest: Aric Almirola's year in review

Published Dec. 13, 2015 9:00 a.m. ET

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The 2015 NASCAR Sprint Cup season was kind to Richard Petty Motorsports driver Aric Almirola, just not as nice as 2014.

Last season, Almirola scored one win and made the 16-driver Chase for the Sprint Cup field. This season, Almirola went winless and was the first driver outside the cut to make the Chase field.

Starting the season out with a 15th-place finish in the Daytona 500, Almirola was inside the top 16 in points for much of the regular season. However, an engine failure at Pocono Raceway in June led to a 43rd-place finish and a 38th at Indianapolis put the No. 43 team on the edge as the Chase cutoff race at Richmond International Raceway approached.

Almirola did all he could over the final weeks of the regular season, finishing 11th with a throwback mustache and paint scheme at Darlington and fourth in the cutoff race at RIR, but ended up 16 points behind Clint Bowyer in the standings at missed out on the Chase.

The fourth-place finish at Richmond was the best of Almirola's season.

"I am really proud of all my guys," Almirola said after that Richmond race. "We worked our guts out all year long, and tonight was no different. I feel we have overachieved this year and really maximized our results week in and week out. I am disappointed to come up a few spots short, but we gave it all we had and that is all we can do."

With three top fives and six top 10s, Almirola earned his best career average finish (17.9) and had more lead lap finishes (25) ever before. 

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