Michael Waltrip Addresses MWR News

On FOX Sports 1's NASCAR Camping World Truck Series practice telecast Wednesday morning, Michael Waltrip Racing (MWR) co-owner Michael Waltrip addressed the morning's news that MWR and #15-Clint Bowyer have mutually agreed to separate at the conclusion of the 2015 NASCAR SPRINT CUP SERIES season and that the organization no longer will field full-time cars in 2016. Waltrip, on the air Wednesday in his role as a FOX NASCAR analyst, shared his thoughts with play-by-play announcer Adam Alexander and analyst Phil Parsons. Below is a transcript from the exchange:

Alexander: What more can you tell us as this news is just breaking this morning?

Waltrip: "Well, it's a sad day for MWR obviously. I love the culture we've built there. Our sponsors – they're not sponsors; they're partners. And our employees are our teammates. We just have the perfect workplace, and unfortunately in 2016, we're not going to be racing there. My hope is somebody wants to have a really nice shop full of really cool people that work together well and want to have a race team and we can provide that for them. Rob is going to be a part of Chip Ganassi Racing going forward. Rob and I are best buddies. He's done an amazing job of stabilizing MWR in the beginning and then we raced for a championship — finished second in 2012. So, my heart goes out to all the employees, all the people that worked at MWR. Hopefully, somebody wants to have a team and they can have it right there at our place."

Parsons: A lot of people may say MWR started in 2007. MWR really started behind your house in the garage back in the '90s. How hard is that for you after being in this as an owner for around 20 years now?

Waltrip: "Our first race was here (Bristol Motor Speedway) in 1994 with Jeff Green. We towed in here with Rodney Silver, a flatbed trailer, unloaded our car and ran third that day. And won Nationwide/XFINITY races behind our house and competed in the Cup Series. We made the Daytona 500 with Kenny Wallace in a car we built in Sherrills Ford (N.C.) behind my house. That grew to Michael Waltrip Racing and we raced for a championship, like I said, Chase berths, race wins. I'm thankful. I'm happy. It's a great run that we've had. We'll just see what's next." FOX