Christian Eckes, the 2019 ARCA Menards Series champion.Michael Self finished second behind Eckes in the championship by just 25 points.Bret Holmes finished third in the championship.
On February 9, 2019, hours before the season-opening Lucas Oil 200, ARCA announced that the series would be renamed to the ARCA Menards Series for at least 2019 and 2020. Menards had previously been a presenting sponsor for ARCA.[1]
KBR Development announced a full schedule for 2019 with technical support from GMS, up from a three-race venture in 2018 with a renumbered 28 car. To help the effort, KBR purchased some assets of MDM Motorsports.[4]
Drivers
On October 24, 2018, it was announced that Christian Eckes will run full-time for Venturini Motorsports in 2019. Eckes had run part-time with VMS in 2016, 2017 and 2018.[5]
On October 26, 2018, Corey Heim announced a schedule of thirteen events for the 2019 season in the No. 22 for Chad Bryant Racing.[6]
On November 2, 2018, it was announced that Chandler Smith would return to Venturini Motorsports for the 2019 season for 11 races. Smith will run mostly short track events due to age restrictions.[7]
On November 24, 2018, it was announced that Carson Hocevar and KBR Development will run the Sioux Chief Short Track Challenge in 2019.[8]
On November 30, 2018, it was announced that Natalie Decker will run a partial schedule with DGR-Crosley in 2019. She ran full-time for Venturini Motorsports in 2018.[9]
On January 10, 2019, it was announced that Harrison Burton will drive the Venturini Motorsports No. 20 Toyota for five races in 2019. Burton drove for MDM Motorsports in 2018.[10]
On January 11, 2019, Michael Self announced a full-season schedule with Venturini Motorsports in the organization's No. 25 entry. Self ran half the 2018 schedule with Venturini.[11]
Connor Okrzesik announced that he will make his ARCA debut in the race at Five Flags Speedway on March 9.[12]
On March 1, 2019, it was announced that Hailie Deegan signed a six-race deal to drive for Venturini Motorsports in the 2019 season.[13]
On March 26, 2019, Venturini Motorsports and Gavin Harlien confirmed a 3 race deal in the No. 55 entry.[15]
In April 2019, it was revealed that Tommy Vigh Jr. would run the full season with Fast Track Racing in the No. 10 car and run for Rookie of the Year after running a partial schedule with the team in 2018.[16]
The full schedule was released on November 21, 2018.[20] The schedule remains largely unchanged from 2018. Although some tracks swapped dates throughout the season, the only track from 2018 to be excluded in 2019 was Berlin Raceway. In turn, the only track to be added to the schedule was Five Flags Speedway. For the first time in series history, every race was aired live.[21] 12 races were broadcast on MAVTV, while 6 were covered by FS1 and the last 2 was covered by FS2.[22][23][24]
† – Christian Eckes, C. J. McLaughlin, and Don Thompson all received 25 points for attempting practices. However, they didn't compete in the race; Eckes due to illness, and McLaughlin and Thompson due to crashing their primary cars and not having backups for the race. ‡ – Benjamin Peterson received the points of a 22nd-place finish; however, he didn't start the race due to crashing his primary car in qualifying and not having a backup for the race.
