Stewart-Haas Racing has announced the end of its NASCAR Cup operation at the end of the 2024 season after competing for several years.
Stewart-Haas Racing will close its NASCAR operation at the conclusion of the 2024 season, co-owners Tony Stewart and Gene Haas announced Tuesday. “We have made the difficult decision to close Stewart-Haas Racing at the conclusion of the 2024 season. It is a decision that did not come easily, nor was it made quickly.
“Racing is a labor-intensive, humbling sport. It requires unwavering commitment and vast resources, with a 365-day mindset to be better than everyone else. It’s part of what makes success so rewarding. But 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.
“We’re proud of all the wins and championships we’ve earned since joining together in 2009, but even more special is the culture we built and the friendships we forged as we committed to a common cause — winning races and collecting trophies. That is the same commitment we made to our personnel, our partners and our fans coming into this year, and that commitment will remain through the season finale at Phoenix.
“We have tremendous respect and appreciation for all of our employees, and we will work diligently to assist them during this transition to find new opportunities beyond the 2024 race season,” the statement read.
Stewart-Haas Racing’s four-car Cup team currently fields the Nos. 4, 10, 14 and 41 Fords for drivers Josh Berry, Noah Gragson, Chase Briscoe and Ryan Preece, respectively. Two Xfinity Series teams also carry the SHR banner (Cole Custer, Riley Herbst).
Haas has fielded Cup Series entries each season since 2002, originally under the banner of Haas CNC Racing. In 2008, eventual NASCAR Hall of Famer Stewart joined forces with Haas to form SHR for its inaugural season in 2009, starting with a two-car outfit with drivers Stewart and 2008 Daytona 500 winner Ryan Newman with a technical alliance with Hendrick Motorsports.
Stewart scored the program’s first victory in the 2009 NASCAR All-Star Race exhibition, then went to Victory Lane at Pocono Raceway to net the team’s first points-paying victory three weeks later. Stewart ultimately scored four wins in the team’s inaugural campaign in the No. 14 Chevrolet.
Their success continued in 2011, when Stewart and outgoing crew chief Darian Grubb won five of the 10 races in the NASCAR Playoffs — including the season finale — to claim Stewart-Haas Racing’s first NASCAR Cup Series championship, edging Roush Fenway Racing’s Carl Edwards (a Class of 2025 NASCAR Hall of Fame inductee) for the title in a tiebreaker.
Stewart-Haas Racing expanded to a three-car team for the 2013 season with Danica Patrick in the No. 10 car before adding a fourth car in 2014. Kevin Harvick shifted from Richard Childress Racing to SHR’s renumbered No. 4 car with crew chief Rodney Childers after Ryan Newman’s departure from the No. 39, and 2004 champion Kurt Busch, who slotted into the team’s new No. 41 car.
In their first year together, Harvick and Childers rocketed to a five-win campaign that resulted in a Cup championship. The pairing lasted a decade, culminating in 37 of Harvick’s 60 career wins before his retirement after the 2023 season. Busch added a milestone win to his resume — as well as Stewart’s — by winning the 2017 Daytona 500 with crew chief Tony Gibson atop the pit box. Stewart never won the “Great American Race” as a driver but celebrated the triumph as a team co-owner in his first season after his Cup driving retirement.
Additional drivers through SHR’s Cup tenure included Clint Bowyer, Aric Almirola, Daniel Suárez and Cole Custer. While Stewart-Haas hasn’t won at the Cup level since August 2022, when Harvick scored consecutive victories at Michigan International Speedway and Richmond Raceway, the company has collected 69 wins, 339 top fives and 695 top 10s through the 2024 Coca-Cola 600 at Charlotte Motor Speedway.
The team expanded in 2017 to the Xfinity Series, where SHR has accumulated 22 wins, 104 top fives and 181 top 10s in a combined 294 starts through last weekend’s race at Charlotte. Custer, who drives its No. 00 Ford, won the Xfinity Series championship in 2023.
[Note: The story is as per press release]