By Mike Harris
Associated Press
CONCORD ó Amid all the economic turmoil in NASCAR, fans can take some comfort knowing Richard Petty is still around.
Petty, stock car’s king and at 71 still the most recognizable face in racing, will have a presence under a rebranding of the new team created by the merger of his organization with Gillett Evernham Motorsports.
The new team will be called Richard Petty Motorsports (RPM), capitalizing on the seven-time champion’s marketability. The announcement was made Monday during the first day of the annual NASCAR Sprint Media Tour hosted by Lowe’s Motor Speedway.
Petty and GEM principal owner George Gillett agreed to merge their teams this month in a partnership that keeps the sponsor-strapped Pettys in racing. Reed Sorenson will drive Petty’s famed No. 43 Dodge for RPM this season. Petty’s No. 44 Dodge will be run by A.J. Allmendinger in at least the first five races of the season as the team attempts to find more sponsorship.
Those two drivers join GEM holdovers Kasey Kahne and Elliott Sadler, who both have full-time rides.
The Pettys first sold controlling interest in the 60-year-old Petty Enterprises team to the financial company Boston Ventures last summer before working out the merger with GEM.
But that’s just one result of the escalating costs of racing combined with a severe shortage of sponsorship money and the ongoing troubles of Detroit’s General Motors, Ford and Chrysler, along with Toyota ó the four manufacturers racing in NASCAR.
Dale Earnhardt Inc., the team started by the late Dale Earnhardt, the only other seven-time Cup champion, has merged with Chip Ganassi Racing. Bill Davis, whose team ran two cars in Cup and also won the truck championship last season, has sold his team.
Other teams, including Richard Childress Racing and Roush Fenway Racing, have had to find partners with ready cash to remain competitive.
Meanwhile, teams in both the second- and third-tier series ó Nationwide and Camping World Trucks ó have found it increasingly difficult to find sponsorship, meaning their race fields are likely to shrink this season.
“There have definitely been a lot of major changes,” said Robbie Loomis, moving with Petty to become director of racing for RPM. “I think this winter has probably been exhausting for everybody, just trying to keep up with the changes. You have to keep up with the changes minute by minute rather than day by day.”
But the GEM-Petty merger was a natural, considering the organizations have worked closely together for several years, with GEM providing engines for the Petty team.
“When it came down to it, the merger itself, on the track and with the race staff, it was a fairly easy process since it had already been working that way for years,” explained Foster Gillett, George’s son and the team spokesman. “And Richard and George had always had a communication and they remained friends. A few months ago, they had a conversation and this was created from that situation.”
In August 2007, the Gilletts bought controlling interest in Evernham Motorsports, begun by former championship crew chief Ray Evernham, who remains a consultant with the merged team. But the deal with the Pettys erases both the Gillett and Evernham names from the title.
“It comes with no sadness from my family,” Foster Gillett said. “It comes with a great deal of burden of expectation. We look forward to trying to live up to this great legacy. We look forward to transitioning into this new organization and trying to help Richard and Richard Petty Motorsports be as successful as they can.”
He also insisted that putting Petty’s name on the team was not just an attempt to use the racing icon to attract sponsorship.
“It’s much more about a partnership with Richard himself and having him help us,” Gillet said. “We’re new in this sport. We’re new owners and we have a tremendous amount to learn, and Richard’s probably the best to learn from.”
Petty noted that the team’s new red, white and blue logo is similar to one used for decades by Petty Enterprises. But he said that was no surprise because he knew that George Gillett had not changed the historic logo of the NHL’s Montreal Canadiens after he bought that team in 2000.
“They had a footprint in hockey and we’ve got a little bit of a footprint in racing. … We’ve been in this stuff for 60 years now, Petty said.
“I had talked to George a couple of years ago about trying to join up with them and it just didn’t work out that time,” he added. “But, as the economy and the sponsors and everybody gets to going, we felt this would be better for both of us. George wanted to grow a little bit and we needed someplace to sort of stick.”
It appears Petty and Gillett got what they were after, and NASCAR fans still have The King.