Above all else, Mike Wallace says he doesn’t want to come across as bitter or mad about NASCAR denying his intent to race in the Daytona 500 for MBM’s Garage 66.
But he is confused.
“I’m confused over how the process took place, how it was supposed to take place,” Wallace told Sportsnaut on Monday night. “I didn’t know there was a process. Again, I don’t want people to think I’m pissed off and angry. I’m just a good guy that wanted to race, had a good cause, and wanted to help a small team.”
At this point, Wallace has made his case in the public, that he sought approval from NASCAR president Steve Phelps and that he and other senior leaders did not anticipate there being any issues — only for the competition department to ultimately deny him.
John Probst, NASCAR’s senior vice president of racing development, and Elton Sawyer, the senior vice president of competition, was asked about Wallace on Monday during a competition and rules briefing for broadcasters and the core media members.
Sawyer said Wallace announcing that he had entered the Daytona 500 was a ‘cart before the horse situation,’ and when asked who approved the 65-year-old, said twice that he had ‘never been approved.’
Probst said that Wallace has also been given ‘a road map on how to race next year’s Daytona 500 and we’d love to see him there.’
Again, Wallace points to informing NASCAR of his ambitions on December 23, seeking guidance’ and being told on January 1 that ‘I don’t anticipate any issues and will present to the group on Jan. 7’ before denying his entry on January 13.
The reason NASCAR gave at the time was ‘inactivity,’ as Wallace had only made four Xfinity Series road course starts for JD Motorsports in 2020 since his last Cup Series start in the 2015 Daytona 500.
Wallace doesn’t dispute that he wasn’t formally approved but he doesn’t understand why ‘no one stepped up to provide me the proper guidance’ when he asked for it, while also indicating there would be no issues.
He spent that time finalizing his sponsorship package. He successfully passed the same physical every other Cup driver underwent this offseason. Everything was a done deal, except on NASCAR’s part.
“I’m just very confused,” Wallace said. “I’m not hung up on it anymore. I thought I was going to race at Daytona, at a track where I’ve won numerous times, but it was a wrong assumption. Just disappointed.”
Wallace was first told on January 15 that NASCAR wouldn’t approve him for any national touring license. Now he’s been told that to run the Daytona 500 next year, he would need to run a intermediate track Xfinity Series race, then an Xfinity Series superspeedway race and then a short track or road course Cup Series race to get acclimated to the NextGen car. After that, he would then need to run a Cup Series speedway race … all in 2025.
He says it’s not worth it on several fronts.
One, the timeline to get everything lined up to run one of each of those races makes lining up deals all the more complicated. He also says he feels compelled to find a more competitive car because if he didn’t put up a respectable result, he would be worried that NASCAR wouldn’t approve him for the next step — even if he were held back by the limitations of an underfunded program.
That then becomes expensive in addition to the expedited timeline needed to do all this by February 2026.
Wallace put this intended start together to honor the memory of his wife Carla, who passed away on January 22 of last year. He paid MBM team owner Carl Long up front for the ride and then put together his own sponsorship package.
He says the point wasn’t entirely to race in The Great American Race. That would have been a bonus. Instead, the goal was to have a respectable attempt in time trials and his qualifying race while celebrating his wife with their family in Daytona Beach next month.
The ARCA Menard’s Series race at Daytona is on over-the-air FOX this year. This is a race he won for Ken Schrader back in 1994. Could that have been a viable place to race and accomplish his goals?
“Could it have been viable,” he repeated. “Hell yes. I still to this day say winning that race with Schrader was one of the most meaningful days of my life and career. It’s a win at Daytona and any of those are special.
“But as it turns out, NASCAR waited until the day after the test to tell me they weren’t approving me for the Daytona 500.”
Wallace says that he certainly would have raced in the ARCA race but now that the preseason test has passed, it’s harder to go there and do it the right way, and find the right people to enter it with.
Now, Wallace feels like he probably isn’t going to race at a national touring level ever again, and he’s at peace with that. He says he has received several offers to go race on dirt, including one with longtime friend, engine builder and track owner Vic Hill, with some pavement Late Model starts on the side.
As for the NASCAR process gone wrong …
“Maybe I just took it to the wrong table,” Wallace said. “I may have made a wrong assumption. There’s senior leadership and there’s the competition department. It just hurts that I feel like they took away this chance for me to honor my wife and like I said, that’s just disappointing.
“I feel like we had a good storyline for NASCAR and the Daytona 500. There have been some good stories, like Dale Jr’s team entering the race and Helio Castroneves, but I feel like we gave them another good story and you can’t have too many of those these days.”