NASCAR team chief issues statement on shock Cup Series exit

Spire Motosports co-owner Jeff Dickerson has explained the reason for Rodney Childers' shock exit from the NASCAR Cup Series team.

Earlier this week, it was revealed that Spire and the championship-winning crew chief would be parting ways despite having worked together for just nine races.

Childers was Kevin Harvick's crew chief when he won the 2014 NASCAR Cup Series championship, and had been hired to be crew chief of Justin Haley's #7 Chevrolet from the start of this season.

"NASCAR is an ever-evolving sport and the path to improvement isn't always comfortable," an official statement from Spire Motorsports read.

"The break in the Cup Series schedule gave us a chance to evaluate where we are as a program. We took the opportunity to discuss the best paths forward for everyone involved and the team and Rodney agreed that it would be best for us to part ways."

Why did Rodney Childers leave Spire?

Now, Dickerson has gone into Childers' exit in more detail in an interview following his exit.

In the discussion, the Spire co-owner claims that Childers' dismissal was not about results, suggesting it was more about the 'energy' and 'communication' in the relationship.

“We know from the outside, it looks like we are just pulling this out of our a** here,” Dickerson told The Athletic. “I understand why people would think that.

"An organization like ours, nine races in, moving a guy who has got 40 Cup wins and a championship? Something really huge had to happen, right? There had to be something that happened.”

Dickerson continued: "In this sport, you don’t get to date before you get married and move into the house together, and this is just one of those examples where things look good on paper but maybe don’t translate.”

“This wasn’t about results. This wasn’t about speed. You notice the energy is off, the communication is off.

"It just got to a point where it was like, ‘I’ll just deal with the consequences of this because it’s best for all parties involved.'"

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