NASCAR Hall of Fame inductee Tony Stewart‘s Superstar Racing Experience now has another member of the Hall to race against. On Thursday, the series announced 1988 NASCAR Cup Series champion Bill Elliott as the eighth confirmed driver.
A member of the Hall of Fame’s Class of 2015, Elliott was one of NASCAR’s biggest names during his nearly four-decade career at the top level. He is a sixteen-time winner of the Cup Series Most Popular Driver Award (more than any other driver), a two-time Daytona 500 winner, and a forty-four-time Cup race winner. Since ending his driving career, he has supported his son Chase Elliott‘s rise through the NASCAR ladder; Chase’s #9 is the same number used by his father for much of his time in NASCAR.
Elliott’s last Cup start was in 2012, though he returned to the driver’s seat six years later when he ran the NASCAR Xfinity Series event at Road America. In his first start in the series since 2005, he piloted the GMS Racing (an affiliate of Chase’s team Hendrick Motorsports) #23 car to a twentieth-place finish. The SRX announcement came at a rather apt timing as Road America was added to the 2021 Cup schedule on Wednesday.
“Welcome to one of the best ever and a guy I have a great history with. Bill Elliott. So cool that we can work together again,” series co-founder Ray Evernham tweeted. “@SRXracing is truly going to be a Super Star Experience”.
“Awesome Bill from Dawsonville” and Stewart are not the only NASCAR stars set to race in SRX. Bobby Labonte, the 2000 champion and 2020 Hall of Fame inductee, will also join the ranks. Other confirmed names include Hélio Castroneves, Paul Tracy, and Tony Kanaan from IndyCar, Willy T. Ribbs from sports cars, and Mark Webber of Formula One fame.
With eight drivers confirmed, four more are needed to fill out the expected twelve-man grid. The series will begin racing in summer 2021.
