Rodney Childers on Spire Motorsports split: ‘It just kind of started falling apart’

Spire Motorsports used the off week to evaluate where they were as a race team. And ahead of Sunday’s Jack Link’s 500 at Talladega Superspeedway, Spire made the decision to part ways with No. 7 team crew chief Rodney Childers.

Childers explained the sudden split during a Monday appearance on SiriusXM NASCAR Radio. Just a few races into their nine-race stint, Childers knew something was off.

“Everything was going fine,” Childers said. “You could kind of tell after we got racing a little bit that maybe it wasn’t going the way that we all wanted. You know, and a lot of times, that’s performance-based or that can be how things are going at the shop or how things are going at the racetrack, and what’s the communication like? And just the chemistry of all of it. It’s not one person, it’s not two people, you know it’s 200 people. Just figuring that out as we went.”

The chemistry did not improve as the season wore on. Eventually, it reached a point where both sides knew it was time for a breakup, Childers said.

“It finally [came to] a point where they could kind of tell I wasn’t happy, and I could kind of tell that maybe they weren’t happy. And it just started falling apart a little bit,” Childers said. “And I could sense it a little bit. Maybe a couple of weeks before [parting ways], it had kind of [gotten] quiet around. And anytime it gets quiet, you kind of start wondering, you know?”

Rodney Childers reveals future plans for NASCAR career

Childers, 48, was seen as a big coup for Spire when it signed him to a multi-year deal this past June. Childers joined Spire after Stewart-Haas Racing announced it would be closing its doors after the 2024 season. In September, Justin Haley and Corey LaJoie traded places.

Haley, who at the time was overperforming at Rick Ware Racing, was now driver of the No. 7 car. That meant that 2025 would be the first year of the Childers/Haley pairing. Haley sat 23rd in the points standings through nine races alongside Childers, with one top 10 finish. He finished 25th at Talladega, his first race with Ryan Sparks back atop the pit box.

For Childers, he’s a crew chief with 40 career victories. He won the 2014 Cup Series Championship with Kevin Harvick. He still wants to continue his career as a crew chief, hopefully finding his way back to Victory Lane in the future.

“I think in my statement, it was not really clear what I wanted, and I want to be clear in that I want to be a crew chief in the Cup Series like I’ve been,” Childers said. “I want to get past that 700 races [milestone]. Want to get to that 50-win mark. I want to be with a good team, a good driver that can win races. And I want that to be clear. I’m looking forward to figuring that out over the next six months and hopefully get back in Victory Lane.”