Tony Stewart did not sound impressed by NASCAR’s latest leadership reset. The Hall of Famer has said the sport still needs more change at the top after NASCAR handed the CEO position to Steve O’Donnell, first from outside the France family.
Jim France stepped away from the CEO role and NASCAR announced that Ben Kennedy was named chief operating officer on April 25. NASCAR then followed up with a broader executive team that includes Greg Motto as chief financial officer, along with senior leaders in brand, media, legal, strategy, people, and administration.
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During the recent episode of Rubbin is Racing, the 54-year-old reacted on whether things would be any different with the recent shakeup.
“They need to make another CEO change, in my opinion,” Tony Stewart said.
Stewart referred to former NASCAR commissioner Steve Phelps, who resigned in January this year following the settelment with NASCAR team 23XI Racing and Front Row Motorsports in the anti-trust lawsuit. As part of the legal discovery process, private text messages from Phelps were made public. But Stewart believes not all real faces were revealed during the lawsuit.
“Obviously Steve Phelps stepped down, Jim stepped down now. You know, they both were great for the sport, but obviously there were a lot of things that came out during the lawsuit that showed people’s true colors, and it showed some, it didn’t show all of them. But even in Steve’s case here, in the new Steve’s [O’Donnell] case, he probably needs to be the next one,” he added.
Meanwhile, Stewart has also recently hinted at another possible return to NASCAR.
Tony Stewart revealed ‘the moment’ he decided to step back from racing full-time in NASCAR
Tony Stewart retired from racing full-time in 2016. During the same podcast episode, the NHRA Top Fuel driver revealed that he and about 20 top drivers representing every team and car brand in the Cup Series picked five clear ideas that they believed would improve NASCAR and took it to senior NASCAR officials in the mid-2010s. The response from NASCAR leaders put Stewart’s retirement into motion.
“They basically shot down all five things we said and basically acted like none of us knew what the hell we were talking about. That was the moment, when I left that meeting, that I decided I was working on a retirement plan,” Tony Stewart said (1:10:27 onwards).
But Stewart is not ruling out another NASCAR return following his one-off Truck Series race at Daytona earlier this season. He had signed up for a race with Kaulig Racing and Ram but has shared interest to “do it again,” this time with Kevin Harvick.
Edited by Pranay Bhagi
