Days before celebrating his 2018 NASCAR Camping World Truck Series championship with his Hattori Racing Enterprises team in uptown Charlotte, Brett Moffitt told Autoweek that he was informed he will not return to the organization for the 2019 season.
Moffitt, a native of Grimes, Iowa won six of the 23 races this season – but the team often faced struggles trying to make it to the races because of lack of sponsorship.
“We always wanted to stay together,” Moffitt told Autoweek. “The crew guys and I certainly wanted to stay together. I found out on Monday and I was at the shop on Tuesday to get my stuff. I met with (team owner) Shige (Hattori) and he told me the direction.
Soon after Autoweek’s feature published, Hattori Racing Enterprises issued a statement Wednesday afternoon – but did not address their new driver for 2019.
“We are extremely proud of what we achieved with Brett and winning the championship together. Our organization’s relationship with (Moffitt) dates back to 2012 and we’re thankful for what he has meant to our team and the effort he put forth. This past season was full of adversity and we faced numerous challenges in getting to the racetrack each week.
“Our entire team is working hard to put the best possible program together for next year and we’re excited to compete in 2019. We’re looking forward to celebrating our championship on Saturday night with Brett at the NASCAR Camping World Truck Series awards banquet and hope our results together benefit all of us in the future.”
Sources tell CATCHFENCE.com the new driver, a winner in K&N Pro Series competition will be announced in January for the rebranded NASCAR Gander Outdoors Truck Series in 2019.
Moffitt’s status, however, is not all that surprising. Before the green flag flew at Homestead-Miami (Fla.) Speedway in November, Moffitt told several publications that he was “not guaranteed a job next year.”
Moffitt’s clouded future was presented to NASCAR president Steve Phelps just two days after Moffitt won the season-finale and his first Truck title. Phelps was questioned how NASCAR can make sure successful drivers have a footing in the sport – even without corporate backing.
“Brett Moffitt is obviously a very talented race car driver who has won more this year obviously than he’s ever won,” Phelps said on Nov. 18. “He has a bright future. What that future looks like, I don’t know. What I do know is that we work with race teams from a revenue standpoint as much as we can. We also work with drivers to try to bridge driver opportunities.
“Are we always successful in getting a driver who wants to be driving in whatever series they want to drive in? No. But there are a lot of historical things that we have done to try to make sure that if a driver is interested in continuing that that driver has that opportunity.”
Hattori told CATCHFENCE.com in November that he would like to compete in the NASCAR Xfinity Series in 2019 — running Toyota’s new Supra model in a limited schedule. Hattori said he would like Moffitt to drive those events. However, with Wednesday’s announcements, it’s unclear if Moffitt would get the nod.
“Yes, obviously the Supra is a huge over in Japan and a huge market over in Japan,” Hattori said on Nov. 2. “We cannot do (a) full season for Supra in Xfinity, but I really want to do four or five races back in Xfinity. I’m really looking forward to see what we can do.”
In 36 career Truck Series starts, the 25-year-old has seven wins, 16 top-five and 19 top-10 finishes. He has led 292 laps in four years of competition and carries an average finish of 10th.
Follow Chris Knight on Twitter @Knighter01.
