Well, there seems to be one NASCAR team that won’t need to worry about the introduction of electronic fuel injection in 2011. Richard Petty Motorsports appears to be financially insolvent. Team members were told on Thursday morning that they may not be employed past this weekend’s race in Martinsville, which will be a media circus for the organization, we can only imagine.
In a report for FoxSports.com, respected NASCAR journo Lee Spencer claims that the RPM engine supplier, Roush Fenway Racing, has cut the team off from motors and was repossessing race cars as well. The team also released driver Kasey Khane from his contract on Wednesday. The team’s remaining drivers nearly all have contracts with other teams to drive for in 2011.
We have to wonder what the point is for the team to continue on, scraping by with barely enough resources to haul a car to the track, let alone compete. If by some miracle Richard Petty Motorsports is able to score an infusion of cash to carry them through the end of the year, it would at least secure the jobs of crew members who make their living working for the team.
Things have been on a slippery slope since Petty and team owner George Gillett hooked up in 2008. This sure seems like a sad way for the Petty legacy in NASCAR to come to an end. To quote the T.S. Eliot poem, The Hollow Men, “This is the way the world ends. Not with a bang but a whimper.”
We’ve got a fingers crossed for RPM, but is a bleak looking situation.
Thanks for the tip, Charles Wickam!
Source — FoxSports.com — RPM May Not Run Past Martinsville
