Brad Keselowski is leaving the team that carries his name. RFK Racing, short for Roush Fenway Keselowski, announced Tuesday that the 2012 Cup Series champion will leave the No. 6 Ford after this season and give up his other job there, head of competition, the post that oversees the team's racing side.
He is also one of the team's owners, and that part is not settled. The team and Keselowski, the release said, "intend to collaboratively and mutually work through the appropriate next steps regarding his existing ownership interest in the organization." The release gives no reason for the split.
He is not retiring. "I'm nowhere near ready to be done as a driver," Keselowski said in the release. "I still have a lot more I want to accomplish in this sport." Neither his statement nor the team's says where he will race next.
Here's the thing, folks. He came into Roush Fenway Racing as a co-owner in 2021. The team added his name ahead of 2022, and he started driving for it that same year. The release credits him with "modernizing its efforts with an ambitious commitment to process and technology." The other owners are Roush Enterprises, Jack Roush's company, and John Henry's Fenway Sports Group, and the release says both "remain firmly committed" to the team.
The numbers from the driver's seat: from 2010 through 2021, the 12 seasons before he started driving for RFK, Keselowski won 34 Cup races. In five seasons driving for RFK he has won once, at Darlington in May 2024. This year he is 18th in points with no wins, two top-fives and six top-10s through 30 races, and he did not make the Chase, NASCAR's 16-driver playoff. He came closest at Darlington in the spring, when he won both scored segments of the race, called stages, and finished second.
Team president Chip Bowers said Keselowski "was not simply driving the No. 6 car but investing himself in the future of the team and helping us think differently about what RFK Racing could become." Bowers added: "Brad has been clear about his desire to continue competing for years to come."
The release names no driver for the No. 6 in 2027; plans for that team will come "at the appropriate time." It says RFK will stay a three-car Cup team and "continue its active pursuit of a third charter." Charters are the 36 guaranteed entries into every points-paying Cup race, and they carry a share of race purses and revenue. The search for a new head of competition, the release says, "will begin immediately."
Keselowski stays in the No. 6 for the last six races, starting Sunday at Las Vegas. One of them is Talladega on Oct. 25, where his six Cup wins are the most of any active driver.
His name is still on the team. After Homestead on Nov. 8, he won't be in its car.