We’re now in the final hours of 2018 and as we all reflect on its highs and lows, it’s time to follow-up on one lingering thread from the beginning of the year.
On Jan. 2 we published a post looking at how many Twitter followers each full-time Cup driver had that day.
Now we’ve gone through and tallied up their totals 12 months later.
These numbers come with a bit of an asterisk. In July, Twitter undertook a campaign to purge the social media platform of bot accounts and the accounts of NASCAR drivers and teams were not left untouched.
On Jan. 2, Jimmie Johnson led all full-time Cup drivers with 2,636,014 followers. According to Kickin’ the Tires, Johnson lost roughly 60,000 followers in the purge, putting him at around 2.6 million. At press time on Dec. 31, his follower count had risen to 2,645,151. He’s the only active Cup driver with more than a million followers.
Overall, Chase Elliott and Bubba Wallace had the largest net gains in followers. Elliott added 74,572 followers in the year where he was voted the Cup Series’ Most Popular Driver. Wallace added 57,163 followers in a year where he finished second in the Daytona 500 and was the subject of a Facebook Watch series that documented the build up to his start in the race.
Denny Hamlin saw the largest net loss of followers. On Jan. 2 he had 763,325 followers. Five months after the purge, Hamlin has 721,289 followers for a let loss of just over 42,000 followers.
Here’s each Cup driver’s follower count on Jan. 2 and their count 12 months later (post bot account purge).
Driver Jan. 2 total Dec. 31 total
Jimmie Johnson – 2,636,014 2,645,151 (Net gain of 9,137)
Kasey Kahne – 963,189 985,387 (Net gain of 22,198)
Kevin Harvick – 954,433 981,109 (Net gain of 26,676)
Kyle Busch – 899,151 897,231 (Net loss of 1,920)
Brad Keselowski – 766,394 756,456 (Net loss of 9,938)
Denny Hamlin – 763,325 721,289 (Net loss of 42,036)
Chase Elliott – 733,157 807,729 (Net gain of 74,572)
Clint Bowyer – 626,345 666,390 (Net gain of 40,045)
Joey Logano – 472,237 481,538 (Net gain of 9,301 in title season)
Martin Truex Jr. – 423,074 446,344 (Net gain of 23,270)
Ryan Newman – 367,002 360,882 (Net loss of 6,120))
Kyle Larson – 349,659 395,424 (Net gain of 45,765)
Kurt Busch – 342,699 376,789 (Net gain of 34,090)
Jamie McMurray – 317,209 317,617 (Net gain of 408)
Trevor Bayne – 272,939 260,528 (Net loss of 12,411)
Austin Dillon – 270,967 278,484 (Net gain of 7,517)
Ricky Stenhouse Jr. – 227,632 228,456 (Net gain of 824)
AJ Allmendinger – 217,197 216,738 (Net loss of 459)
Ryan Blaney – 161,730 213,678 (Net gain of 51,948)
Ty Dillon – 156,602 159,270 (Net gain of 2,668)
Darrell Wallace Jr. – 126,473 183,636 (Net gain of 57,163)
David Ragan – 121,643 120,490 (Net loss of 1,153)
Aric Almirola – 112,423 127,860 (Net gain of 15,437)
Michael McDowell – 88,435 88,340 (Net loss of 95)
Alex Bowman – 58,194 77,965 (Net gain of 19,771)
Erik Jones – 53,041 68,140 (Net gain of 15,099)
Matt DiBenedetto – 49,495 59,864 (Net gain of 10,369)
Daniel Suarez – 41,081 52,589 (Net gain of 11,508)
Chris Buescher – 38,981 27,868 (Net loss of 11,113)
William Byron – 36,169 55,416 (Net gain of 19,247)