Image Reference: TaurusEmerald via Wikipedia, CC BY 4.0 International
Ryan Preece has received a confirmation from Stewart-Haas Racing today during a radio interview with Dave Moody and he will be back for another year in the No.41 Ford Mustang, even though things were slow and difficult for him this season other than the 5th placed finish at Richmond Raceway back on July 30th in Virginia.
So things will still need more time for him to make a more consistent impact as he’s currently 25th on drivers points right now, with three places behind team-mate Aric Almirola in the No.10 car & five places up of another team-mate Chase Briscoe in the sister No.14 car. All in all, it’s hard to see him be at Ross Chastain’s level, whom they’ve both raced not just on the dirt tracks but also showed some talent on these low-budget race cars via Xfinity Series level in the past. However, the results is just not there right now where Ryan can hopefully turn things around starting with these Top 10 results in 2024.
If not, we’ll have to wait & see what happens as SHR is open to selling up to 2 charters. I don’t think the fire sale will happen just yet for at least another year when you got the experienced veteran Aric Almirola holding the glue as Kevin Harvick will step away for good at season’s end in November at Phoenix, with Josh Berry replacing him in the No.4 team soon.
I also don’t think Almirola will retire just yet as well when he initially announced his retirement at the end of last season but then he changed his plans & continued to race for SHR under a multi-year deal where he will want to stick around for one more year, then retire this time for good.
That way, it would be perfect timing for the team to sell the No.10 charter to Richard Childress Racing for Austin Hill as well as the No.41 charter if the results still not good to any one of the current two-car teams ahead of the next TV rights contract to start from the 2025 season.
