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Yates Racing on solid footing heading into 2009
by Rea White, NASCAR Scene, FOXSports.com
Team patriarch Robert Yates retired following the 2007 Cup season, turning Robert Yates Racing over to his son, Doug, and former Roush Fenway Racing official Max Jones. The pair renamed the organization Yates Racing and staged a somewhat epic effort in 2008.
They entered the year with a new alliance with Roush Fenway that helps with equipment and technical support. Yates Racing then managed to field two cars full time throughout the 2008 Sprint Cup season despite somewhat spotty sponsorship over the course of the year.
Travis Kvapil, 32, finished 23rd in the series driver standings while teammate David Gilliland, 32, finished 27th.
After an offseason of revamping once more, the team enters the 2009 season with the sponsored car of Paul Menard running the full season, an alliance to run the Hall of Fame Racing car with Bobby Labonte and Kvapil in the No. 28 once more, though he is not guaranteed a full-time effort. The team also still has Gilliland under contract.
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Doug Yates, who has years of experience working with his father's team and maintaining the Roush-Yates engine program, admits that it has taken quite a bit of effort to keep his team on the track.
Now, with numbers switching around — Menard will drive the No. 98 that has inherited the points from Gilliland's No. 38, while Labonte is in the 96 with points from Kvapil's No. 28 — and other changes the team has undergone, even Yates admits there could be some confusion.
But he also sees a team on more solid footing that it enjoyed entering 2008.
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"There have been some trying times, but there's been a lot of hard work and effort by many people," Yates says. "Max Jones and myself had a vision that we were going to get this team back to where it once was, and some days are tougher than others, but we had some really bright spots last year. Our car finished second at Infineon (Raceway) and sat on the pole at Talladega, and through all that, we had a lot of sponsors. The guys gave me a picture at the end of the year, and I think there was something like 30 different sponsors that were partners with us last year. I want to say thanks to all of those guys.
"Travis Kvapil and David Gilliland did a great job, and now we sit here and a lot of things have changed. The 38 is now the 98, and (we have) the 96 and the 28, so I think I need a scorecard, but I'm so excited to have Paul Menard and Menards sponsorship and Ask.com with Bobby Labonte, and to have Travis back. ... (Now) here we are with two fully sponsored cars, and we're ready to try to continue on what my dad built with Robert Yates Racing, and I'm really proud of that."
The drivers and owners express excitement about the coming year — as does Kvapil, who once more finds himself needing sponsorship as the year begins. After being in this same spot in the past, though possibly with more confidence that he would run the full year, it's understandable why Kvapil believes this will all work out.
"The first part of the season is just to continue our performance and get recognized and create a buzz and try to get some attention to our team," Kvapil says. "I felt like we did a pretty reasonable job last year, and it's discouraging that we are in the same situation and we've got to kind of start over from what we built off last year. I've got a great attitude, I've got a great drive, and I'm just really excited to get to Daytona."
Labonte and Menard appear recharged entering the year. Menard, and his family sponsorship from Menards, left Dale Earnhardt Inc. at the end of last season to shift into Fords at Yates. Like the rest of the team, he'll have the benefit of Roush technology and the engines created by an alliance between the two lead Ford teams.
Labonte was a late addition to the group. Though he competes for Hall of Fame Racing, his team comes out of the Yates Racing shop, and his cars will be prepared by that group. So he is, essentially, the group's third car.
He's ready to get back on track. After announcing plans to part ways with Petty Enterprises during the offseason, Labonte found himself trying to land a solid ride in tough economic times. Sponsorships are hard to come by these days, so he felt both a sense of satisfaction and one of relief in signing with Hall of Fame and sponsor Ask.com.
He said he then found that everything in the Yates shop was ready for him, including a partnership with crew chief Todd Parrott once more.
"They're ready," Labonte says. "Max and Doug are going to be running the deal as far as that goes, and (Hall of Fame owners) Tom (Garfinkel) and Jeff (Moorad), they're a partner in it,, and they have a lot to bring to the table and a lot to offer, but as far as the race cars go and the team and the personnel and everything, it was all in place."
Now, the organization just wants to keep growing and moving in the right direction. Menard is going to run 16 Nationwide races under the Yates' banner as well and Jones seems confident that it can keep the No. 28 on the track for the season.
The entire group is ready for the 2009 season and the chance to put its teams on the track — and to keep growing back to the level of prominence the organization once had. Yates' won the 1999 championship with driver Dale Jarrett and at least one race a year from 1989 to 2005. It has three Daytona 500 victories to its credit.
"We're trying to grow and we've grown a little bit over the last year, and we'll just keep digging," Jones says. "We're real excited to go racing."
Rea White is a writer for NASCAR Scene, which is published weekly, 50 weeks per year. Visit www.scenedaily.com for more information.
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