Stewart ready to turn the page on NASCAR: "I'm fine being done with this"
Today at 02:47 PM
As Tony Stewart counts down his final weeks as a NASCAR team co-owner, he says he's at peace with his decision to shut the doors on Stewart-Haas Racing.
In its 16 seasons, Stewart Haas won NASCAR Cup Series titles in 2011 (with Stewart himself) and 2014 (with Kevin Harvick), and the team has three more opportunities to add to its current tally of 70 victories.
“This is the right time," Stewart told Harvick's “Happy Hour” podcast. "This was never a part of a master plan. But as this year has gone on, this has become very clear that this is the right time for me to get out of the sport. There's things that I see that I definitely don’t like. And I’m happy doing the stuff I’m doing now. I’ve always been somebody that’s ran all kinds of different series.”
Against the background of ongoing struggles to secure sponsorships and manufacturer support, SHR's 300-plus workforce was informed of the team's impending closure in May.
“The reason we did the announcement early in the season was to try to take care of all of our people,” Stewart said.
“I got so blamed for people losing their jobs. Well, there’s companies left and right that shut down. Look at COVID: How many people had to shut down? Nobody was screaming about how employees weren’t taken care of and what it did to their families. We did what we did to take care of our people, and we created great severance packages for them to take care of them and their families… I would say over 80 percent of the employees at SHR have found homes for next year.
"The bashing I got online and on social media was very unjust through the process. It’s easy to sit on your ass, on a chair, on your couch in your mom’s house and sit there and tell us how we’re doing it wrong. But nobody can seem to sit there and come in on Monday morning and tell us how to do it right."
Stewart said he recently visited the SHR headquarters to farewell some of the staff.
“Knowing that when I left the building there, here's some of those people I’ve known for 16 years, and I may never, ever see them again, unfortunately," he said.
“I don’t know that it’s even bittersweet. It’s more bitter than sweet. It’s a tough decision. But things in life change. Your priorities change, and variables outside of your control change as well.”
Some of the current SHR employees could remain in the building beyond this year when it is taken over by the new Haas Factory Team, which will utilize the one SHR Cup Series entry that co-owner Gene Haas will retain. As for Stewart, the focus will switch to his NHRA program and sprint car teams.
“(NASCAR is) going to be healthy, it’s going to survive,” he said. “It always has. It always will. But I’m happy at this point in my life to make this change… It wasn’t that way at the beginning of the year.
“We had different reasons for why we had to shut down at the end of the season, but as time has gone on and watching the owners and NASCAR fight and just the chaos that’s going on over there, I’m fine being done with this at the end of the year.”
