MARTINSVILLE, Va. — Brad Keselowski has provided an update about his future in NASCAR after weeks of questions and speculation.
Videos by FanBuzz
He is finally free to aggressively pursue one of the multiple opportunities in front of him after securing his upcoming release from RKF Racing, something that both sides worked out a mere hour before he sat down in the Martinsville Speedway media center.
"This is me signaling to the industry the three action steps that I have, and seeing what the industry says back to me," Keselowski told media members on Saturday.
"And I don't know 100% how the industry is going to respond — hopefully, positively — but it's a very fluid sport and things can change very quickly."
Prior to the Saturday morning press conference, RFK Racing issued a statement and provided some details about the plans moving forward. The team said that it had reached a mutual agreement with Keselowski that would allow him to continue driving with any other team or manufacturer, existing or new to the Cup Series.
"Moving forward, Brad will be a passive investor of RFK Racing, thus concluding his role in governance, competition oversight, and board participation," the statement added.
The 2012 Cup Series champion acknowledges that opportunities appear limited this late in the season; teams have largely made their announcements about their lineups for the 2027 season.
But he also says that he is open to any opportunity and that he has received "a number of outreaches" regarding multiple opportunities for the future. He just could not take any steps while working through the negotiations with RFK Racing.
"There's really three pivotal next steps for me that we're working through very hard," Keselowski said. "And the first one for me is to, now that I've been granted the release, I can meaningfully engage in opportunities that exist. I was more or less taking phone calls and unable to do much with them until granted that release here just recently. Now I can engage them in a meaningful way.
"I can also go about the process of finding the right media and marketing partners to take on that challenge. As you guys know, this sport relies on marketing and partner and sponsorship relations. It's hard to achieve that when you don't have any clarity on what your rights are. So now that those are are certain, I can go do that.
"And last but not least, I will begin the process of selling my 20% RFK equity, so I will have a full release for the rest of my career to do what I want. That's what's in front of me right now."
Keselowski will not have any existing partners joining him as he seeks his next opportunity in the sport. He and RFK Racing have a deal in place where any partners that joined the team after he became co-owner will remain after he departs.
The lack of sponsors is a hurdle in the immediate future. It's not necessarily daunting as Keselowski continues to examine his future. He sees major interest from outside parties, especially after 23XI Racing, Front Row Motorsports, and NASCAR reached a settlement in their antitrust lawsuit and made charters permanent.
"There's a lot of interest in this sport right now, tremendous interest in this sport on the ownership front and it's never been hotter," he said.
"We didn't necessarily get there as an industry the way I think we'd liked to have gotten there with the different lawsuits and all those things, but the closing of the lawsuit here in the last 12 months has dramatically affected the perception of the sport, in particular in New York City and where a lot of these big investment firms are.
"This sport is now viewed as an ownership asset that has certainty and it has a level of stability and the valuations have dramatically increased along with the interest."
Make no mistake, the pieces are in place for Keselowski to move forward in this sport; he just needs to put them all together in a limited amount of time.
This is far from a guarantee, and the veteran driver says that it would be "devastating" if he didn't race in 2027. But Keselowski feels more confident now than he did the past few months while working through this uncoupling.
"I feel like I control my own destiny and there's a lot of power in that - for good or bad," Keselowski said. "Being able to control your own destiny, you hear it in other sports - 'Give me the ball, coach.'
"That's where I am at a professional level right now. I now have the ball and if I fumble it, it's on me and if I score with it, it's on me, but I have the ball."
