Jay Robinson Racing may not return to Nationwide Series in 2010

By Lee Montgomery - Associate Editor

Wednesday, December 09, 2009

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Jay Robinson Racing officials said Wednesday that the NASCAR Nationwide Series team may not return for the 2010 season.

Driver Kenny Wallace said at Homestead-Miami Speedway last month that he would drive for the team for the full schedule, though only eight races had been sold. The team said Wednesday, however, that it “does not have a deal for 2010 at the time.”

Team owner Jay Robinson said a news release was issued Wednesday because many thought JRR’s plans for next season were set in stone.

“Jeff [Spraker] calls me up, ‘Congratulations,’” Robinson said in a phone interview. “I said, ‘For what?’ He said, ‘Well, you got your deal all put together.’”

Well, no. Robinson said others called, too, expressing similar sentiment. One, Robinson said, was a driver who was trying to put together a deal with JRR.

“I’m afraid that what was out there was making people think that we’re not available,” Robinson said. “I don’t want anybody thinking that. Right now, I don’t have anything at all to go to any race.”

Wallace has driven for JRR for most of the last two seasons, with U.S. Border Patrol as the sponsor. But Robinson said the Border Patrol may not return for next season, leaving Robinson searching for other sponsors.

“We would love to have Kenny back,” Robinson said. “There’s no negative to Kenny at all. If we could find somebody who wants to sponsor a car with Kenny driving it, I’m all in.”

Robinson said he and Wallace talked toward the end of the season about the possibility of Wallace continuing to drive for JRR, though without a sponsor, Wallace’s salary would have to decrease.

Wallace said at Homestead that he and Robinson shook hands on a deal for 2010.

“We were in Phoenix, up in my hauler,” Wallace said then. “… Jay said, ‘I’d like to talk about next year.’ We agreed that we would do exactly what we’re doing this year. I would race for Jay, there would be no start-and-parking.

“But one thing we agreed on was that I would be happy with the moving target. I said, ‘What’s a moving target?’”

A moving target means Wallace and the team will race only with the money they have.

“If we go to California, and we can only afford three sets of tires … I said, ‘OK, I’m all in,’” Wallace said. “We shook hands in front of everybody and made it official.”

Robinson said Wallace may have misconstrued what he meant with the discussion.

“Kenny, I don’t know where he got all these ideas,” Robinson said with a chuckle. “There’s no contract signed. Kenny and I had a conversation about 2010, but the conversation was about his salary.

“I knew I was going to be talking to some folks about deals for next year. But they were less than half of the money of what we had last year. I was questioning whether he was a candidate to drive those cars because his salary wasn’t going to be what it was this past year. Somehow out of that, he took it that he was driving all year.”