Darrell Wallace Jr will drive Richard Petty’s iconic No43 full-time in the Nascar Cup Series next year.
The team did not immediately disclose a car manufacturer or sponsor in Wednesday’s announcement, though Sports Business Journal reported that team president Brian Moffitt said the US Air Force and STP will be the sponsors on the car.
The 24-year-old Wallace, more commonly referred to by his nickname Bubba, became the first black driver to race at Nascar’s top level since 2006 when he replaced an injured Aric Almirola earlier this year. He will become the first full-time African-American driver in the Cup Series since Wendell Scott ran 37 races in the 1971 season.
Wallace is only the fourth black driver in one of Nascar’s top national series. Scott raced from 1961 through 1973, Willy T Ribbs did three Cup races in 1986 and Bill Lester raced sporadically from 1999 until 2007 at all three national levels.
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Welcome to the team, @BubbaWallace. #NASCAR #R43KIE pic.twitter.com/99RngthsL8
“Much like [Hall of Fame baseball player Hank Aaron], who is also from Mobile, Alabama, Bubba has the potential to be a transformational athlete and to break barriers,” Andrew Murstein, majority owner of Richard Petty Motorsports, said in a statement. “Bubba will bring a tremendous amount of youth, talent and excitement to the sport.”
Wallace won the Truck Series race at Martinsville in 2013 to become the first black driver to win at a national Nascar series event since Scott did it in 1963.
The move comes one month after Petty, a seven-time champion whose team has struggled to match his record as a driver, thrust himself into the national debate over the protests of racial injustice that have swept through the sporting world, saying he would fire any driver who protested the national anthem.
“Anybody that don’t stand up for the anthem ought to be out of the country, period,” Petty told reporters in September. “What got ’em where they’re at? The United States.”
On a Wednesday conference call announcing the move, Petty said Wallace’s background had nothing to do with the decision.
“That was the least of my considerations,” Petty said. “We looked at the talent. We looked at how we thought he handled the fans, how he handled the press, how he handled sponsor deals – all this kind of stuff. I didn’t care what color he was or where he came from.
“If you look back at the Petty history, we’ve had a driver from Brazil that drove for us for a while. I’ve had one from Mexico that drove a truck race for us. It’s not anything different that what we’ve done before.”