MBM Motorsports revealed in 2023 that they would no longer be competing full-time in the NASCAR Xfinity Series, just two years after making a similar move in the Cup Series. It marked the first time they had missed a race at the sport's second highest level since 2014.
The team missed the 2023 Cup Series team entirely after running only two races in 2022, and in 2024, they competed part-time in both the Xfinity Series and the Cup Series.
They planned to attempt to qualify for the 2025 Daytona 500, a race they haven't competed in since 2020, with Mike Wallace behind the wheel of the No. 66 Ford, but NASCAR ruled against Wallace's entry, leaving the team needing to find a new driver. They did replace Wallace with Chandler Smith, but he failed to qualify.
It marked the team's fifth consecutive Daytona 500 DNQ, as both of their cars failed to qualify in both 2021 and 2022.
Suffice it to say that the latest development is one of several less-than-ideal developments surrounding Carl Long's team, which has since been rebranded to Garage 66 at the Cup level.
After the Wallace decision, we promised that we would revisit an interview we did with Long in the spring of 2021, if for no other reason than to highlight this small and relatively underfunded team's continued commitment to this sport and to doing everything they can to punch above their weight.
Long was never able to acquire a charter for his No. 66 MBM Motorsports entry in the Cup Series, but it certainly wasn't due to a lack of effort – and that effort came over a span of several years.
There are just 36 charters in the Cup Series, though transactions involving charters are more common than you might expect; several changed hands between the 2020 and 2021 seasons, for instance, resulting in the creation of three new teams (23XI Racing, Trackhouse Racing, and Live Fast Motorsports).
Even more were moved around ahead of the introduction of the Next Gen car in 2022, when demand was arguably higher than it has ever been.
Charters were already becoming increasingly hard to obtain, and ahead of the debut of the Next Gen car, Long expected that trend to continue, with more and more team owners looking to bring their organizations to the sport's top level in a full-time capacity and more and more team owners looking to expand.
That is exactly what has happened.
Long ran the No. 66 car full-time in 2020, even without a charter, and he discussed the fact that he had been trying to get a charter for several years beforehand. But before the team ended up needing to scale back in 2021, he just wasn't able to get it done.
With it becoming tougher and tougher – in addition to more and more expensive – to acquire a charter, it's looking like that window is all but shut. When charters become available these days, MBM Motorsports are no longer even mentioned as a potential suitor.
"I’ve been trying to buy a charter for the last three years [since 2019], and nobody will sell me one," Long told Beyond the Flag, back in 2021.
"I went to them last year with a blank check and said, 'Just tell me how much to fill it out and I’ll get you the money.' And I got turned down, all three charters that went out. So I don’t know what the situation is that I can’t buy a charter, and right now I understand the charter prices have gone stupid."
Just how ridiculous are the market prices for a charter?
"Last year [2020], the charters that we were looking at were about $2.5 million," he said. "Then they started getting them priced up to about $4 million. I’ve heard that they’ve already been up to $15 million on offering some, and people not getting them at $15 million."
The latest reports place charter value at between $20 and $25 million, and that's with supply actually exceeding demand for the first time in several years, specifically due to Stewart-Haas Racing's shutdown after the 2024 season and the four charters that became available as a result of that.
One stayed with Gene Haas to run Haas Factory Team while one each went to Front Row Motorsports, 23XI Racing, and Trackhouse Racing, even amid the decisions of Front Row Motorsports and 23XI Racing not to sign the new charter agreement, plus their ongoing lawsuit against NASCAR.
After the 2023 season, Live Fast Motorsports were reported to have sold their charter to Spire Motorsports for upwards of $40 million, and that remains the most expensive charter transaction. But even before that move went down, we were still talking about charters being valued at $30 million.
Needless to say, the charter value increase has certainly outpaced inflation. Even if you factor in the recent drop, you get an increase of roughly 1000% over five years.
It's not hard to see why even somebody such as Dale Earnhardt Jr. doesn't want to fork over that kind of money to move JR Motorsports up to the Cup Series full-time. It's also not hard to see why MBM Motorsports are pretty much out of the running, and why they have been for a number of years now.
MBM Motorsports/Garage 66 are set to make their first official start of the 2025 Cup Series season at Martinsville Speedway in this coming Sunday afternoon's Cook Out 400. Casey Mears is set to drive the No. 66 Ford for his first start in more than six years. Start a free trial of FuboTV and don't miss any of the action!