Pettys make first step on way back to prominence (cont'd)

"Our goals for the race team are to bring the 43 and 45 cars back to Victory Lane, and adding a third car as soon as possible," Davis said. "It is our plan to invest significant dollars in people, technology and equipment to make this happen.

"We are not that arrogant to think that this will happen overnight. We totally recognize that there is fierce competition out there ... but it is our goal to bring Petty Enterprises back to its former glory."

Labonte stays

Bobby Labonte decided Petty Enterprises was where he wanted to stay as he signed a four-year extension with the organization.

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• NASCAR 24/7: Labonte returns
• NASCAR Today: Petty deal

They began this process by signing driver Bobby Labonte to basically what amounts to a lifetime contract. He said it locks him in for at least four more years of driving, after which he will have the option to continue driving or to assume a different role in "the partnership."

That was a good first move, a strong move. Labonte is a class act who, at age 44, still appears to have several good driving years ahead of him.

What's next?

Things will be different now at the Petty shop, which relocated to Mooresville, N.C., just last January after 59 years in Level Cross, N.C., where it was located next to the home Richard Petty grew up in.

David Zucker will be the new CEO, but he and Davis stressed that the day-to-day operations will still be handled by the likes of Richard Petty and Robbie Loomis, the former crew chief who is the head of Petty Enterprises racing operations. There will be a board, which will include Richard and other princes the King will have a hand in appointing, to make money decisions on a quicker basis than in the past -- when Loomis said final verdicts on the acquisition of basic but expensive equipment, or people, could take far too long.

In other words, the place known for being a family operation will begin to operate more like a big-time corporation -- with the deep pockets to go along with it.

"Everything has changed so much from when we first started. We've been there; we've seen it all. But as time progressed, it really got away from us from the family standpoint," Richard Petty said. "We had so many other investors or other people coming in, making NASCAR's growth come from outside in. We did it from inside out, and we just got behind -- because we still tried to do it from the automotive side inside out.

"Eventually we sat down and talked about it, and said, 'OK, guys, if we're going to play this game, we've got to get in the game.' And the only way we could see to get in the game is to get new monies coming into Petty Enterprises."

Richard Petty is not going away anytime soon, he emphatically added.

"Most people we talked to wanted to come in and buy the team and run the thing, and all that stuff," Petty said. "That's where Boston Ventures came in. They said, 'Y'all are runnin' the show. We're gonna put our money in and help you take care of the money, but grow the business.' We really like that approach more so than saying, 'OK, here are the keys; I'm outta here.'

"I'm going to be involved in the day-to-day business. I'm not going away. I'm still going to be out there, aggravating people and doing my thing. So from the outside, you're not going to see any difference other than hopefully seeing the race teams do better."

Loomis added: "I look at it like this: family businesses are great for starting up, but it reaches a point where the business takes over. It's like NASCAR when they went to the TV package, it changed. I'm not saying it changed necessarily for the better or for the worse, but it changed. I think NASCAR had to give up some control. I think TV took on some things, but it has become more of a partnership as it has moved forward.

"I think for us, it's going to be the same way."

And finally ...

Loomis said it is too soon to speculate on where the new money will be directed first. But he and Zucker, as well as Davis, kept stressing that what they need most are quality people. And lots of 'em.

In the beginning, Petty Enterprises was where the best of the best strived to get -- in terms of crew members, fabricators, mechanics, drivers, the whole ball of wax.

In the last 15 to 20 years, that changed. Petty became the place for many to get their start in the business, and then they would head elsewhere to work for organizations that could pay more. Engineers fled to other operations; drivers, at least those not named Petty, came and went; same for crew chiefs and workers occupying just about every other position in the shop over the years.

That was when it all got away from the Pettys running Petty Enterprises, and they stopped winning races.

The move to Mooresville was the first step in helping to retain some of the talent Loomis said the organization is now hoping to procure for the long haul. Partnering up with Boston Ventures is the second, and far more important, step in the process that he admitted will take some time. (Continued)