The King is ready to move past football

   Richard "The King" Petty is ready for some racing.

   After all the problems the Richard Petty Motorsports organization went through at the end of the 2010 season, you might think Petty would like some time off. Not so, with a more streamlined RPM run by new ownership, Petty is ready to return to the track.

   “For the last three or four months it’s been football, football, football, so now that football is almost over, we’ve got you all out here to carry the ball forward into next season. I think everybody here and everybody I’ve talked to is really looking forward to a new season," Petty said.

   "It’s been a couple of months since we’ve raced and racers want to race all the time, so with your help to get the spectators and the fans and help us please those people, all of our sponsors that have helped us all this time, you do your job and we’ll try to do our job and work together and make all of this a lot bigger operation."

   Petty said the financial problems were a great distraction at the end of 2010 but he looks forward to a fresh start.

   "You’ve got to give our crew a lot of credit the last five or six races because they didn’t know if they were gonna have a job when they came in the next week or not, but they stepped it up – the drivers stepped it up and the whole crew stepped it up and we ended up with a pretty good season," he said.

   "Our sponsors stayed with us all the way through the winter and came back this spring and we’re getting ready for the new season. It was really good to have all of those people say, ‘OK, guys. Stay in there and keep digging and we’re gonna be ready for the next year.’ "