On May 28, co-owners Gene Haas and Tony Stewart issued a joint statement announcing the closure of SHR at the conclusion of the 2024 NASCAR season. That involves four full-time Cup Series teams and a pair of full-time Xfinity teams (although they are expected to continue in a different form in 2025).
“The commitment needed to extract maximum performance while providing sustainability is incredibly demanding, and we’ve reached a point in our respective personal and business lives where it’s time to pass the torch,” the statement said in part.
With the retirement of SHR veterans Kevin Harvick and Aric Almirola at the end of the 2023 season and SHR’s deal with Ford Performance entering its last year with no renewal in sight, the organization’s viable future was already a hot topic of discussion entering this season.
Still, the finality of the decision seemed jarring – and with it left many questions, the exact answers to which may never truly be known.
Even with SHR’s future announced, its present comes with a difficult road ahead for its drivers and employees as they try to finish out the year while at the same time working to secure new homes for the future.
The signs were clear the end was coming for SHR, but the reasons behind it were much cloudier.
The unusual pairing
The idea of Stewart, then a two-time Cup champion driving for Joe Gibbs Racing, sharing ownership in a Cup team with billionaire machine-tool businessman Haas, seemed to come out of nowhere in 2008.
Haas had owned a two-car Cup operation called Haas CNC Racing that had a technical alliance with Hendrick Motorsports, but it never had attracted top-level drivers or been able to win on a consistent basis.
Stewart, a hard-nosed driver prone to controversy off the track, had burst into NASCAR with Joe Gibbs Racing straight from the IndyCar Series with great success in 1999.
Stewart-Haas Racing Chevrolet of Tony Stewart detail
Photo by: Eric Gilbert
The two seemed an unlikely pairing but Stewart provided what Haas needed most – a reason for the best in NASCAR to want to work with his racing team – and Stewart would have the opportunity for autonomy in the decisions that would forge his NASCAR future.
Haas was willing to invest the money – both in people and equipment – to win and Stewart’s commitment to excellence would help attract sponsors and some of the best talent in the NASCAR garage.
To kick off the 2009 season, the newly…
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