A joint statement from Tony Stewart and Gene Haas, the co-owners of Stewart-Haas Racing, regarding the future of our team following the 2024 season. pic.twitter.com/S9hkjnTNXi
— Stewart-Haas Racing (@StewartHaasRcng) May 28, 2024
All the rumors became official at 4:33 PM on May 28th 2024. Stewart-Haas Racing is shutting down at the end of this season. They are selling all four charters. SHR is even done with the Xfinity Series as well, where they are the defending champions. The rumors started with a couple of charter sales. Then in the past couple weeks people began asking, “Is Stewart-Haas shutting down?”
At worst, I think many people assumed they’d be done with Cup series racing. I certainly didn’t think they’d get rid of their Xfinity operation as well. The organization was still doing well in Xfinity. Then again, Stewart-Haas looked like they were starting to improve in Cup this year as well. Perhaps, I just didn’t want to believe the rumors about Stewart-Haas shutting down.
This has got to be a tough situation for all their employees and fans. There are plenty of questions left for which we can all theorize and ponder upon. Obviously, there is the question of where will the drivers end up. Rodney Childers, crew chief of the #4 car is definitely going to be one of the top SHR employees sought by other teams. Who buys the charters? Right now, I’m only interested in one question though. What does losing a top team like Stewart-Haas Racing say about the state of NASCAR?
1 championship, 37 wins, 25 poles, 151 top 5s, 235 top 10s since the 4 team came together at SHR. And we are just getting rolling with @joshberry .. But most of all, we have been a family. A family that truly cares and loves every person.. WE aren’t done! pic.twitter.com/VPRF9zGZUM
— Rodney Childers (@RodneyChilders4) May 28, 2024
How the loss of Stewart-Haas Reflects on NASCAR
First, SHR is a top tier team. Sure, they went winless last year, but every team struggles from time to time. In 2020, they won 10 Cup series races. True, Kevin Harvick won nine of those ten, but Cole Custer won one as well. In 2021, Harvick went winless but finished 5th in the points. Meanwhile, Aric Almirola won a race at New Hampshire in 2021. In the 2022 season, Chase Briscoe won at Phoenix and Harvick won back to back races at Michigan and Richmond. The 2023 season was their first winless season since Tony Stewart became a part owner.
This isn’t Rick Ware Racing leaving the sport. This is Stewart-Haas shutting down. Yes, Tony Stewart is more into drag racing these days. Furthermore, Gene Haas is more into Formula 1. Still, this is a successful team in a a rebuilding year deciding against remaining in the sport. What does this say about the current state and direction of NASCAR?
First, it says that two hands-off owners have decided that what they could get out of the charters was worth more to them than continuing in the sport. Tony Stewart didn’t just up and decide on his own one day that he was tired of NASCAR. NASCAR has seemingly gone out of their way to ensure the level of dominance that SHR had in the late 2010s and in 2020 is next to impossible to achieve in the Next Gen era. Let’s not forget that there were some penalties that certainly appeared to only be applicable to SHR (manipulating the outcome of a race.)
NASCAR is moving from a Gritty Racing Culture to a Sterile Corporate Culture
I’m just going to come out and say it. In my opinion, NASCAR leadership is most likely happy with this outcome. If there was a black hat team in NASCAR, it was Stewart-Haas Racing. To SHR it was about chasing trophies and winning races, even if some rules had to be bent just a little bit. Furthermore, Tony Stewart was never one to hold back on criticizing NASCAR.
Honestly, NASCAR doesn’t even seem to be about racing anymore. It seems to be about artificially squeezing the field together to create the illusion of parity. Occasionally, you get a super close finish. Most of the time you end up with it being difficult to pass. Still, anyone can win any week, but no one can become a superstar.
Honestly, the sport is headed in a direction that they’ve been desperate to get to since the early 00s. There was a big culture shift then towards a more corporate culture. Stewart-Haas Racing just isn’t a team that belongs in that environment. SHR was a place for second chances. It was the team where drivers came for a second chance or to get un-cancelled. NASCAR probably doesn’t want a team like that floating around. Such teams are difficult to micro-manage. After all, NASCAR is becoming an authoritarian sterile corporate sport.
RIP SHR
Finally, this is a sad day for NASCAR. Personalities like Tony Stewart are one in a million. NASCAR doesn’t seem to want any larger-than-life personalities anymore though. I’d like to thank Stewart-Haas Racing for all their wins, questionable actions, controversies, and everything they brought to the sport of “stock” car racing. NASCAR will not be the same without you. Congratulations to Tony Stewart and Gene Haas on getting out. This was probably best for everyone involved.
Give ’em hell in this last season!
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SHR leaving the sport is a death nail that no one in NASCAR will acknowledge. The Corporate suits of NASCAR have always had a hand in many aspects of regulation of rules.
In 1979 NASCAR was on the verge of collapse at a half sold out Daytona 500 “THE SUPER BOWL OF AUTO RACING”. It was the first flag to flag NASCAR event televised to a live audience. If it wasn’t for the last lap Cale Yarborough and Donnie Allison crashing each other out on the back stretch and Richard Petty, who was a half a lap behind them, winning the race NASCAR wouldn’t have made it any further than that season. The Big fight that ensued on the entrance to Turn 3 is what made NASCAR what it was for the next 35 years. It would have been everyone back to Dirt Track Racing had that not happened live on Television. NASCAR then became the Rock Stars of auto racing.
Car owners had chassis builders, panel hangers, engine builders, suspension specialists, and they would rent time from places that had wind tunnels so they could “tweak” a car to run fast in the stream Bill Elliot set the NASCAR Speed record at Talladega on April 30, 1987 with a single car speed of 212.809 Miles per hour. Then NASCAR thought drivers were too dumb to slow down to make the corners if they were drafting. They instilled the rules of Restrictor Plates to slow the boys down and really get them bunched up. That leads to “THE BIG ONE” every restrictor plate race has. But tracks like Michigan that are just a 2 mile oval can run speeds well into the 200 mile per hour range and not be restricted.
NASCAR over the next 35 years let the boys be boys where RUBBIN is RACIN!! Did fights happen? Oh yeah they did. Boys were boys and they proved it on the track. That was in 2001 when we lost Dale Sr. Then in 2009 came Tony. Nobody drove like Tony. Nobody got mad like Tony. Nobody would get out of a car and thrown his helmet at another car still in the race like Tony. Tony was unfiltered and people loved him for it. Tony was Kyle Busch before Kyle Busch started getting Salty. Joey Logano would not have lasted a single Bitch slap from the Intimidator or Tony at the time of their peak. But now days Boys being Boys isn’t cool in the corporate world.
Just to drive in NASCAR now it doesn’t take talent. It’s spoiled kids with Daddy’s dollars that pay for their rides. Talent has nothing to do with it anymore. There are kids driving at Dirt Tracks that have more talent in their left hand than half of the NASCAR drivers as a whole. That’s why NASCAR has slowed the cars down to the equivalent of a lawn mower race. It’s why NASCAR has made the Stages rules. It’s why the races appear to be close. It’s why they, for the most part, finish the race running single file. NASCAR cars at one time were over 800 Horsepower. Now they are down to SUB 500 Horsepower. Any schmuck can drive a cup car now as long as someone, besides the owner, comes up with enough cash to stick their ass in a seat.
Gone are the days when a driver could drop the hammer and get his car loose on purpose. I mean really. NASCAR has a driver whos only experience before driving in NASCAR was behind the wheel in I-Racing for Christ sakes.
I’m not saying NASCAR will be totally wrecked by the decisions they are making but soon it will be back to those 1979 numbers where no one cares anymore. Buy your Chassis from NASCAR, Buy your Body panels from NASCAR, Buy your Suspension from NASCAR, Buy your engine from NASCAR, Buy your transmission from NASCAR, Buy your Brakes from NASCAR, Setup your car only the way NASCAR wants it. That’s not competition, that’s corporate interference. People who are NASCAR old school fans are leaving for local Dirt tracks for thrills and emotions. NASCAR doesn’t realize that fight in 1979 is what drew people to NASCAR and kept them there. They didn’t care about parity and political correctness. They cared about passion and grit.
SHR leaving the sport is a call to arms to NASCAR that they need to get back to what made them what they were 15 years ago. Still gritty even with the thoughts of Dale Senior on our hearts.