After nearly a decade of extending its race-winning pedigree into the ARCA Menards Series, Joe Gibbs Racing (JGR), the only NASCAR Cup Series team with a direct line to ARCA, is shuttering its program at season’s end, the championship-winning organization tells JosephSrigley.com
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Steve DeSouza, Executive Vice President of O’Reilly Series and Development for Joe Gibbs Racing, told JosephSrigley.com on Wednesday that the “really difficult decision” was made as the organization reallocates its resources to focus on making a significant step forward in the NASCAR O’Reilly Auto Parts Series, where it put only two of its four full-time entries in the Chase this season.
“At the end of the day, we made a really difficult decision to close the [ARCA Menards Series] program at the end of the season,” said DeSouza. “As we went through the evaluation of this year, and as we start to plan for 2027, we just determined it was important to place our focus, and the resources we have available, on making significant improvements across our O’Reilly Series program. It’s pretty obvious we’ve been struggling there a little bit, and we need to really ramp that back up.”
— JosephSrigley —