Stewart released from contract, will go to Stewart-Haas ESPN reports

[VilleneuveTracy]

CHARLOTTE, N.C. -- Two-time NASCAR champion Tony Stewart has been granted a release from the final year of his driving contract with Joe Gibbs Racing after 10 seasons with the team, sources close to Stewart confirmed for ESPN.com Tuesday night.

Stewart will formally announce his departure from the team Wednesday.

On Thursday at Chicagoland Speedway, Stewart will formally announce a move to Haas/CNC Racing as co-owner and driver, sources close to Stewart said.

Haas/CNC, which currently fields the Nos. 66 and 70 Chevrolets, will be renamed Stewart Haas Racing in 2009.

http://sports.espn.go.com/rpm/nascar...ory?id=3479199

Best of luck, TS! It takes courage to risk leaving a top team for a start up team of your own and try to build it up to contender status! Hopefully it works, although the records of DW, Elliot, Rudd as owner-drivers is not encouraging and of course in F1 there was that BAR fiasco.

Stewart will have 50% ownership and the team will continue to be a Hendrick satellite, similar to how Yates is a satellite of Roush. It will continue to receive Hendrick engines and chassis.

[FIRE]

Get satellite teams like Haas and Yates the same chassis and engines as respectively Hendrick and Roush?


Logano replacing Stewart?

[mattcat]

Ah...now for the downward spiral. I've been waiting for this for a long time. I wish no ill on the Haas organisation, but Stewart...yea.

I'm pretty sure Logano is a shoe-in for the ride.

[Cuckoo]

Joey Logano to replace Smoke at Joe Gibbs, and Ryan Newman to be Tony's teammate at Hass / CNC.
Also a fair few sponsorship moves
Office Depot moving from the 99 team to sponsor Tony Stewart
Also Rumour has it that Robby Gordon will run a second Nationwide series car for Villeneuve if he can bring along sponsorship.
And get ready to change your favourite tipple Bud will no longer be the official beer of NASCAR and we will all have to get used to Coors lite!!!!YUK

[VilleneuveTracy]

Yes, unlike F1 in NASCAR satellite teams get the same stuff as the main teams. Many small teams get their engines from a major team and this provides a great source of revenue for them. If they gave them junk engines those teams would simply contract with another big team for engines. Haas, and before them MB2/Ginn also receive Hendrick chassis, and Yates and the Wood Brother's #21 also receive Roush chassis in addition to engines. I think Petty also gets GEM chassis but I am not sure about that. Hendrick has a rule that all engines leaving the shop must be within a certain number of HP of the strongest engine, and this rule applies equally to customer engines as it does to engines HMS will use. I never understand why teams like Ferrari are unwilling to give equal engines to customers. Does anyone really expect STR to beat Ferrari's drivers and its chassis if it had the same horsepower as Ferrari?

What about the record of satellite teams? Obviously Yates has been able to have top 20 cars despite having no sponsorship due to being a Roush satellite. MB2 won a race in 2005 with Joe Nemechek and in 2002 with Johnny Benson. They finished 11th in points in 2001 with Benson and 6 top 5's and 14 top 10's. In 1998 Ernie Irvan had 3 poles and 11 top 10's but missed a few races due to injury I believe and finished low in the standings. Ken Schrader was 18th in points in 2000 and 19th in 2001 for MB2. Nemechek was 19th in 2004 with a win, 3 top 5's, 9 top 10's, and 2 poles and 16th in 2005 with 2 top 5's, 9 top 10's, and a pole. He actually entered Richmond with an outside shot at making the Chase. of course, these were all with mediocre drivers. The high water mark for a satellite team was Ginn's performance with Mark Martin last year. At the time of the merger with DEI last summer Martin, if he had run all the races, would have been 4th in points after the Chicago race. I think that is a better gauge for what we can expect from Stewart than the performances of Nemechek, Schrader, Benson, and co.

Note: Yates didn't decline to being a satellite team until recently so I didn't include its past performance. Yates from 2004-2005 was a partner, not a de facto satellite of Roush.

[V8thunderfan]

I am a big fan of Tony, To be honest I never thought he would part from Gibbs .. That like Junior not driving for DEI .. oh wait ha ha ha
Thinks change I wish Smoke all the best on his new venture lets hope it works out. Although parting company with Home Depot is a shock .. I would guess that to be more a cost cutting exersize for a credit crunch hit retailer. Shame the reason I started follow Stewart is because of that funky orange car... Oh and he was a fiery Indiana lad.

[Neil22]

I would think Home Depot would follow Smoke where ever he goes due to the amount of advertising he does. I don't see Joey talking home repair on the tube.

[fieldodreams79]

it is baffling to me that people still try the owner/driver thing. the again, you are your own boss. it is VERY difficult but i would think smoke, if anyone, could be "successful".

if Logano don't get the 20 ride, something is amiss. i think he'll make a splash reeeeal quick.

[FIRE]

Office Depot and Old Spice to serve as co-primary sponsors for
Stewart beginning with 2009 NASCAR Sprint Cup Season. Two-time Sprint Cup Champion to drive No. 14 Chevrolet.

Full press release

[fieldodreams79]

....the #14 in honor of his (and my dad's) childhood hero...AJ Foyt.

[Speedworx]

I like the look of Tony's cars.

[FIRE]

Ryan Newman confirmed at Stewart-Haas. Sponsor still unknown.

I am curious about how much time they need to transform the team into a frontrunning and winning team.

[johntt]

Haas have lots of very good development equipment and they source their cars from Hendrick, the problem has been the personnel and drivers.