Talking to the media on Thursday morning, Matt DiBenedetto was asked if this weekend’s race at Bristol could impact his contact with Wood Brothers Racing to return to the #21 next season:
HOW DO YOU THINK THIS RACE WILL AFFECT WHAT HAPPENS TO YOU IN 2021 CONTRACT-WISE?
DiBenedetto: “I sure hope it doesn’t come down to just one race as far as my contract stuff for next year. I’ve said it before, I came over here and there was a lot of people involved. It’s a dream come true driving for the Wood Brothers. They’re not the only ones involved. We have a strong alliance with Team Penske, a big relationship with Ford, so there are a lot of folks involved in this and in the decision-making, but they heavily expressed they wanted this to a multi-year opportunity as far as my contract. They heavily expressed they wanted this to be a long-term relationship, something that we build for a long time to come. All those things, so that was very encouraging when I came over here. I do not want to go anywhere. I love driving for the Wood Brothers. It’s a dream come true. They are family and as far as my contract stuff, it has options for I think 2021, ’22 and ’23, if I’m not mistaken, so it’s a multi-year deal opportunity, but the team has to pick it up each year and the deadline for that is at the end of this month, so I guess I should know pretty soon. I wish I knew now because I don’t want to go anywhere and it would put me in a pretty bad situation if something were to change, but I don’t expect any changes. I’m just waiting to hear.. Hopefully, it works out. Hopefully, I’m not going anywhere. I love being the driver for our team.”
