NASCAR: Full-time team decides not to compete at Atlanta

MBM Motorsports have opted not to compete in this coming Saturday night’s NASCAR Xfinity Series race at Atlanta Motor Speedway.

Despite having competed full-time in the NASCAR Xfinity Series since 2015, MBM Motorsports have made the decision to withdraw from this Saturday night’s Alsco Uniforms 250 at Atlanta Motor Speedway, citing multiple reasons.

The key reasons for the decision are the lack of simulator time and the lack of practice, making it more unlikely that Chad Finchum would be able to qualify and lock his No. 66 Toyota into the 163-lap race around the four-turn, 1.54-mile (2.478-kilometer) Hampton, Georgia oval.

While Carl Long’s team have run full-time since 2015, they have missed a number of races over the last nine seasons due to being unable to qualify. This weekend simply marks their first race without a car and driver on the entry list since 2014.

Their plans for the immediate future include rolling Finchum’s entry over to new weekend’s race at New Hampshire Motor Speedway, but beyond the Ambetter Health 200, they have only committed to three additional race weekends at Daytona International Speedway, Bristol Motor Speedway, and the Charlotte Motor Speedway Roval.

The team’s general goal includes competing part-time in both the NASCAR Xfinity Series and the Cup Series.

While MBM Motorsports have been a full-time Xfinity Series team since 2015, they have only ever run full-time in the Cup Series once since making their debut in 2017. They ran the full 2020 schedule with Timmy Hill and set out to do the same in 2021 before needing to scale back.

In 2022, their two cars were the two cars which failed to qualify for the season-opening Daytona 500 at Daytona International Speedway, and they ended up making just two more appearances later in the season.

Boris Said drove the No. 66 Ford at Circuit of the Americas in March 2022, and J.J. Yeley drove the No. 55 Ford at Talladega Superspeedway in April 2022.

Tune in to USA Network this Saturday, July 8 at 8:00 p.m. ET for the live broadcast of the Alsco Uniforms 250 from Atlanta Motor Speedway. If you haven’t yet begun a free trial of FuboTV, do so now!