Look who is back to race a few for Rick Ware Racing this year at Cup level? It’s Ryan Newman. He too will begin his part-time campaign next weekend in the throwback Goodyear 400 event at Darlington Raceway as the pilot of the No.51 Ford Mustang with more to come later on.
He has been so busy outside of NASCAR since he no longer races full-time after Ryan left Roush at the end of 2021 such as racing in the legends Superstar Racing Experience series, as well as modified stock cars, spending quality time with his two daughters & many more. He will be a great addition to RWR with valuable & veteran Cup experience, having won 18 races in the past through a few top-tiered teams out there. Plus, he was recently named as one of NASCAR’s greatest 75 drivers as part of their milestone this year.
It’s going to be a while for Newman to get back into the race car with the practice & qualifying being an added bonus after NASCAR temporarily put them on hold back in 2020-21 due to COVID. But I’m sure he will help RWR grow as a competitive Cup team on-track, having seen them post some great results so far earlier this season. So Top 20-25 or even higher than that would be a great start in the hope of proving other critics wrong who want RWR to sell their charters to an established mid-pack organization. Plus, it remains to be seen what will happen to the No.51 entry going forward since Cody Ware has been suspended by NASCAR right now due to his arrest a few weeks ago.
Yes, I’m all for competitive teams & it’s not easy for RWR to find a decent 1-2 full-time drivers + sponsorship to suddenly make their way through the field by battling for top-half places overnight – Look at Front Row Motorsports as an example with Michael McDowell since his 2021 Daytona 500 breakthrough by battling occasional Top 10s + they also got two young talented drivers in Todd Gilliland & Zane Smith & they got championship-winning Truck Series program with Zane right now.
If one team should sell their charter then it would be Live Fast Motorsports by handing it over to Legacy Motor Club or RFK Racing. Nothing against them but they haven’t been really competitive or serious enough to justify their participation at Cup level unlike Trackhouse & 23XI Racing. The last thing they may want to do is to be offered the most amount of charter money like $15-20 million, accept the offer & run by shutting it down.
StarCom Racing exactly did that when they were backmarkers for the whole time (2018-2021) before they sold their charter to 23XI to expand their 2nd full-time entry at the end of the 2021 season in time of the current NextGen race cars era. I probably see the same thing happen for LFM once the current 10-year TV rights contract expires next year before BJ McLeod can invest all that money on improving his Xfinity Series organization.
And while the No.7 Chevy car has been good as always with Corey LaJoie over at Spire, but the sister No.77 entry can do better by getting more funding and/or competitive support from Hendrick if they wish to keep their 2nd full-time charter.
