Tony Stewart let go of long-time driver Donny Schatz earlier this week and many speculated that Stewart might end up shutting down his entire sprint car program. However, Stewart has made it clear he has no plans to do so.
First, when Stewart was asked by Sprint Car Unlimited on whether he might shut his program down said, “That’s the same dumbasses that I talked about in my NHRA interview after Chicago. That’s people who have never owned a race team. I’ve already read the comments, ‘Oh, ever since he met Leah, he shutting this down, he’s shutting that down, and that’s Leah.’ She has nothing to do with it. Leah’s been supportive of every aspect of motorsports that we’re part of, from Eldora to the All Stars, to SRX, to the Outlaw program, everything that we have. She’s a racer, and she loves it as much as I do. So, when I read stuff like that, it’s the frustrating part for me. People who want to point fingers at this or that, they have never owned a race team. Most of them don’t own a business. They don’t know what it takes to do anything, but yet, they’re an expert with their keyboard.”
As for what his plans are he shared, “We’re still figuring it out. Somebody had to make the tough call to make a change, and that’s what I did, and where it’s going to lead, I don’t know. We’re going to analyze quickly what’s going and what we’ve got.”
He reiterated and elaborated on these comments in a separate interview with FloRacing’s Kyle McFadden, but definitively declared he’s not leaving the sport, “This isn’t a situation where we’re trying to leave the sport.”
As for what his first steps are with Schatz no longer behind the wheel, he shared, “The first thing we need to do is get somebody else in the car that can help us evaluate where a program is. It’s like, where are we? Where are we at? What do we really need to work on? And so we’ve got to reevaluate our program at this point before we worry about next year, we got to figure out where we’re at.”
He went on to share that he will likely keep the No. 15 number for the rest of the season due to World of Outlaws owners point, but he “can see going back to the 14. I would love nothing more for Donny to be able to have his number at the end of the year.”
As for who might hop in the ride at the end of the season, Stewart didn’t provide any clues, but he did share, “My phone’s been very busy, so there’s a lot of interest out there, which makes me feel good.”
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