Yahoo Sport 
Richard Petty Motorsports replaces competition director
Richard Petty Motorsports is changing personnel in the hopes of a performance boost.
The team, which has struggled mightily in 2016, said Wednesday morning that competition director Sammy Johns would be replaced on a temporary basis by Philippe Lopez and Scott McDougall.
“The past several years, we have made significant investments in our organization with the goal of winning races and to compete at a high level on a weekly basis,” RPM CEO Brian Moffitt said in a statement. “We now have direction over our own chassis and bodies and work closely with Ford Performance on technology and engineering. With these investments, unfortunately, we have not seen the on-track results that we expected this season.
“As we look ahead to 2017, we are taking steps forward to improve our on-track product to better serve our partners and fans. This means analyzing every part of our organization and making adjustments where needed. Sammy Johns has been a big part of our organization; he helped us succeed in many different ways and helped us become a winning race team. We wish him nothing but the best going forward.”
Aric Almirola, who made the Chase in 2014 and finished 17th in the standings in 2015, is currently 25th in the standings. Teammate Brian Scott is 33rd in the points standings. Neither driver has gotten a top-10 finish in the first 24 races of the season.
Almirola had six top-10 finishes in 2015 while Sam Hornish Jr., the driver Scott replaced in the now-No. 44 car, had three top-10 finishes and was 26th in the points standings a year ago. Scott replaced Hornish – at least partially – because of his ability to bring in a sponsor. Scott’s family founded the Albertson’s grocery store and his father is the owner of the Shore Lodge resort in Idaho.
RPM made the move to build its own chassis in 2016 after hanging the bodies on its own cars in 2015 in a move to make it more independent from Roush Fenway Racing, who it still shares technical information with.
– – – – – – –
Nick Bromberg is the editor of From The Marbles on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at nickbromberg@yahoo.com or follow him on Twitter!
