Earnhardt Jr. considering moving JR Motorsports to Cup

By Kenny Bruce - Assistant Managing Editor

Saturday, May 17, 2008

Jason Smith
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CONCORD, N.C. – Dale Earnhardt Jr. said Friday that his JR Motorsports team could move from the Nationwide Series up to the Sprint Cup level as soon as 2009. But the popular driver said such a move would occur only “if the right opportunity comes along with the right sponsorship and driver.”

However, former teammate and good friend Martin Truex Jr. wouldn’t be on his short list of potential drivers should his team make the switch. Truex is currently in the final year of his contract at Dale Earnhardt Inc.

“Why would he want to come drive for me?” Earnhardt Jr. asked. “He’s in good stuff now and he’s going to have great opportunities from other people. And I would never do that to him.

“For the first year coming out of the box, man we’ll struggle like hell. Come on, man. He’s going to have deals offered to him by these great companies around here and from DEI. I’ll be at the bottom of that list, right there with Haas [CNC Racing] and a couple of other people. I don’t know with Tony [Stewart] if he goes [to Haas CNC], he might be able to talk Martin into it. But I don’t know, man. I mean no way would I even do that to Martin, even if he wanted to.”

But it’s clear that moving his JR Motorsports outfit to Cup is something Earnhardt Jr. has considered.

“We’d love to do it,” he said.

While Earnhardt Jr. competes in Sprint Cup for Hendrick Motorsports, his JR Motorsports team fields one Nationwide Series car fulltime for driver Brad Keselowski and a second car on a fulltime basis with multiple drivers. JR Motorsports combined its Nationwide program with Hendrick Motorsports prior to the start of the 2008 season.

“I used to say ‘No way, no way,’” Earnhardt Jr. said. “But it’s almost as expensive to run in the Nationwide Series. And they’re going to bring a [car of tomorrow] in and we won’t be able to race in the Nationwide Series with [it] probably. That’ll just be too expensive to switch all that over.”

Earnhardt Jr. said the funding costs would be about the same.

“And the COT program is going to be too expensive for me to justify creating a whole new program with COT stuff, so I’d just as soon go into the Cup Series or get out of the Nationwide Series altogether,” he said.

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1 response to "Earnhardt Jr. considering moving JR Motorsports to Cup ".

1

Jack Winsor said:
Jul 2, 2008 at 3:31 PM
If Dale Jr could move up Jr Motorsports, with Brad Keselowski and Martin Truex Jr and maybe even Landen Cassil that could be very cool.
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