NASCAR Silly Season Reaches New Level with In-Season Cup Driver Swap

• Corey LaJoie, who announced in July that he wouldn’t return next year to the No. 7 Spire Motorsports Chevrolet, will begin driving the No. 51 Rick Ware Racing Ford at Kansas Speedway.

• Current Ford driver Justin Haley will move from the No. 51 to Spire’s No. 7 with RWR’s blessing.

• The drivers’ last race with their current teams was Saturday’s Bass Pro Shops Night Race at Bristol Motor Speedway.

In one of the most unique business deals ever in NASCAR Cup racing, two teams fielding cars from two different OEMS have traded drivers before season’s end in an effort to become more competitive.

Corey LaJoie, who announced in July that he wouldn’t return next year to the No. 7 Spire Motorsports Chevrolet, will begin driving the No. 51 Rick Ware Racing Ford at Kansas Speedway, while Justin Haley will move from the No. 51 to Spire’s No. 7 with RWR’s blessing. The drivers’ last race with their current teams was Saturday’s Bass Pro Shops Night Race at Bristol Motor Speedway.

“It’s unique. It’s unconventional,” RWR president Robby Benton said. “I think you could see more of this.

“We’re trying to take advantage of an opportunity that I think helps everyone. This is a much different Cup Series than it has been. We operate quite a bit differently. You have to get 1% better (each) week just to keep up. The Cup Series has become a very exclusive arena. You cannot get comfortable just participating.”

Spire co-owner Jeff Dickerson said the smaller teams must make “unconventional moves … do things differently” to be competitive. He noted Hendrick Motorsports and Joe Gibbs Racing would never instigate a trade like the one RWR and Spire conducted.

The unique arrangement was set in motion during the two-week break for the Olympics. That’s when Haley told Benton he had a long-term opportunity that would benefit his career. However, the trade that was announced Friday at Bristol Motor Speedway came together in less than a week.

LaJoie described the “unconventional” swap as “bittersweet”.

“It’s bittersweet because you leave familiar faces,” said LaJoie, a third-generation driver. “You leave familiar trucks and lounges and cars and switches. You’re going to miss those guys, but you’re going to rub shoulders and now we’re frenemies for the rest of the year and years to come. There’s a lot of those bonds that you can’t break because they’re your buddies.”

Dickerson said Haley would remain in the No. 7 in 2025, a team that veteran crew chief Rodney Childress is scheduled to oversee. However, Benton didn’t commit to LaJoie continuing in the No. 51 next year.

“It’s very unscripted for us at this point,” said Benton, who also noted no decision had been made regarding next year’s full-time driver for RWR’s No. 15 Ford.

“It gives us the last part of the season to evaluate how well we work together. That’s the unique opportunity we can take in these last seven races. This is still a business. I’ve known Corey for 15 years. I’ve changed tires for Corey when he first started racing. We go way back, but we haven’t worked together.

“Our future is not laid out quite as neatly as Justin and Spire. Maybe we don’t live up to Corey’s expectations. We’re going to take the opportunity to see what we can do together, understand what we can do for each other, and see where that takes us.”

It’s no secret that the small Cup teams struggle to compete against the larger organizations. Haley, who has recorded two top-10 finishes this year, admitted the transition to RWR this season was a much bigger one than he anticipated. It was the first time he had driven a Ford during his Cup career, so he had to adjust to the OEM’s SIM software, and the engineering side of things. The procedures were completely different, as were the engine operations.

“We’re still the smallest Cup team,” Haley said. “We have no direct manufacturer support. We’re racing against teams that have a lot more resources than we do.”

RWR has an alliance with RFK Racing, but Haley said, “I think people probably think that’s more than what it is.”

“We still build the race cars ourselves,” Haley continued. “We still mount the bodies ourselves. RFK gives us general setup info, and then I personally do simulator work with RFK every once in a while to help them.”

Haley said the team doesn’t receive information directly from Ford.

“Definitely our relationship with RFK helps a lot. Without that, we have nothing,” Haley said.

Ricky Stenhouse Jr. said JTG Daugherty, a single-car team, doesn’t receive notes from the OEM when there’s a manufacturer test.

“We have our Hendrick (Motorsports) alliance, which definitely helps a good bit compared to not having that alliance,” Stenhouse said. “It’s tough when you come to new places or you’re trying to evolve a setup.”

Stenhouse described the support his team receives from Hendrick as “generic.”

More Silly Season News

In addition to the Haley-LaJoie swap, other driver news directed toward the 2025 season:

• Bubba Wallace has signed a multi-year extension with 23XI Racing. The team announcement regarding Wallace came about two weeks after Wallace voiced concern that he still didn’t have a contract due to it being tied to the teams’ charter agreement with NASCAR. Thirteen of the 15 charter teams in NASCAR’s Cup Series signed the new agreement that goes 2025-2031. Front Row Motorsports and 23XI Racing are the only two teams that haven’t signed the new charter agreement.

• Nick Sanchez is replacing Parker Kligerman at Big Machine Racing in NASCAR’s Xfinity Series. Team owner Scott Borchetta announced Sanchez would be his organization’s full-time driver about a week after Kligerman said he would not return in 2025 as a full-time driver.

• Current Cup Series Playoff qualifier Harrison Burton will remain a Ford driver in 2025, driving for AM Racing in NASCAR’s Xfinity Series. The family-owned operation moved into the Xfinity Series in 2023 after several years in NASCAR’s Craftsman Truck Series.

The team, which was established in December 2015, will have a technical alliance with Haas Factory Team. Hailie Deegan began the 2024 season with the organization but was released after 17 races. Her best finish was 15th in the season’s third race at Las Vegas.