Rumor Mill: Are These the Top Candidates For Legacy Motor Club’s Expansion?
What’s Happening? The NASCAR rumor mill is heating up as a new rumor suggests that a former series champion and an…
Sources tell the Daily Downforce that Dawson Cram will be announced today as a full-time driver with JD Motorsports and owner Johnny Davis for the 2024 season. Davis was impressed with the 22-year-old Cram’s late-season runs in the Xfinity Series last year. Here is everything you need to know about JD Motorsports’ newest driver.
Contrary to what many say about him, Cram says he was born in Ballantyne, North Carolina. However, his racing career started in San Diego, California thanks to a job opportunity for his father, Kevin, a former NASCAR crew chief.
[My dad] got a job opportunity on a K&N West [now ARCA Menards Series West] car that he thought would be a better balance of family and racing.
Dawson Cram
When Dawson was 5 years old, his parents bought him a mini-dwarf go-kart. From there, he says he began racing in Southern California before moving back to North Carolina during the 2008 recession. He then moved to Bandoleros and eventually legend cars and dirt cars.
However, racing is an expensive business, and Cram’s family began to realize that when they got into legends cars. To fund his racing career, Dawson’s father started renting out extra, identical cars to Dawson’s, to other drivers.
I think we had like 12 customers at one point running under our umbrella, and as I went through legend cars, that paid for my racing.
Dawson Cram
Racing became a family affair, and Dawson said that every family member had a job at the race track. His family became the only family to win the prestigious Tom VanWingerdin Award at Summer Shootout. Dawson continued to race in multiple other series throughout the 2010s.
He won Bandolero Championships at Concord Speedway, Summer Shootout, Winter Heat, and Midweek Mayhem. He also won the Young Lion Championship at Concord Speedway in Legends Cars in 2015. In the late 2010s, he started making his turn to NASCAR.
In 2017 the Cram family acquired a Truck to race at Martinsville, but Dawson had to withdraw from the race. He came back to run four Truck Series races between 2018 and 2019 with a best finish of 13th at Martinsville in the fall of 2019.
However, Cram was willing to do whatever it took to get into NASCAR more consistently. A promise from his dad convinced Cram to graduate high school early.
I graduated early from high school on a promise to my dad that I would graduate early if he could get me into the next step, if he could find me another opportunity, so, I graduated high school adn immediately went to Daytona to test an ARCA car.
Dawson Cram
With his family unable to afford the test, Cram got creative. During a “Road to Daytona” program run by Andy Hillenburg, Cram made a deal with other drivers that they could race in his seat if he could run a few laps. He got to test that day.
Cram fully dove into NASCAR in 2020 and 2021. He ran 26 races those years in the Truck Series driving for his family’s team, Josh Reaume, and Boyd Long. While racing for his family, Cram developed a relationship with Marcus Lemonis of Camping World, who helped fund his car partially in 2021.
However, moving up to the Truck Series was a big transition for Cram. He kept his focus on keeping his car on track.
About the time I was 18, I figured out that I’m on my own path and we’re gonna run the way that we’re gonna run, and I don’t need to go tearing up equipment trying to be better than the car is.
Dawson Cram
In 2023, Cram committed to trying to be at the race track every week in some capacity. He even started spotting for other drivers and developing relationships that way.
In 2023, he raced 9 times with 3 races for Bobby Dotter and SS Greenlight and 6 times for Mike Harmon. Cram closed out his 2023 Xfinity Series season with his best career finish, a 19th-place finish at Phoenix Raceway.
It felt great to finish [2023] on a high note…We made great adjustments as the sun went down, and we started running down that next pack. I started to realize that, hey, a top-20 is probably going to happen if I play my cards right here, so, it was very rewarding.
Dawson Cram
The Cram family has been connected to the Earnhardt family since before Dawson was born. While Cram admits that he does not have much memory of his early years, that connection still impacted Cram’s upbringing.
Dawson says the first time he drove an asphalt car was at Dale Earnhardt Jr.’s house. This is how he met Brad Keselowski, who became Dawson’s favorite driver. Brad’s brother, Brian, actually spent some time as Dawson’s crew chief in 2021.
Brad Keselowski was living there because he was running [Dale Jr.’s] Nationwide car, and ended up just walking out and hanging out with us. From that point on, Brad Keselowski is my favorite driver which is pretty funny.
Dawson Cram
Dawson also worked for a while with the JRM late-model team, and his mother also has a close relationship with Kelley Earnhardt. It is interesting to see all of the connections that Cram has.
What do you expect from Dawson Cram in 2024? He will get a big opportunity for JD Motorsports.
With the NASCAR team Legacy Motor Club set to expand, there are many names in the rumor mill as to who will drive the team’s third car in 2027, but one new name entering the rumor mill could be the biggest surprise yet.
What’s Happening? The NASCAR rumor mill is heating up as a new rumor suggests that a former series champion and an…
During the 2025 season, Legacy Motor Club, which missed the opening to buy one of Stewart-Haas Racing’s three Charters for sale at the end of the 2024 season, was aggressively pursuing a third charter for its NASCAR Cup Series team.
This mission took the team to court, where it battled Rick Ware Racing over a Charter sale gone awry, with hopes of getting this charter ahead of the 2026 season.
While this goal never came to fruition, per a settlement between the two parties, LMC will have a third Charter for 2027, as RWR will sell the charter currently leased to RFK for their No. 60 at year’s end.
Now that all the excitement has leveled off, it’s decision time for LMC, as they search for a driver to fill this new seat ahead of the 2027 season.
The rumor mill concerning this third seat is heating up, as two names floated through the NASCAR community earlier this week, when a post from a well-known rumor mill account listed Riley Herbst and Jesse Love as potential candidates to drive for LMC in 2026.
Herbst, for one, is facing the loss of his ride at 23XI Racing with the rumored (and all but confirmed) promotion of top prospect and NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series Champion Corey Heim to full-time status in 2027.
Love, on the other hand, seems destined for a Cup Series ride as the reigning NASCAR Xfinity Series Champion, alongside this rumored spot at LMC, could see a spot open up at his current home, Richard Childress Racing, depending on how Kyle Busch’s 2026 season shapes out.
But, not even three races into the 2026 season, the rumor mill is still spitting out potential candidates for this third car.
What’s Happening? NASCAR Hall of Famer and Seven-Time Champion Jimmie Johnson’s Legacy Motor Club is suing Rick Ware Racing over a…
This time, the online rumor mill is heating up for a potential return to the Cup Series, with rumors pointing to former Wood Brothers Racing driver Harrison Burton as another potential candidate to join LMC in 2026.
Burton, the son of former Cup Series standout turned NBC Sports analyst Jeff Burton, most recently raced full-time with WBR in the Cup Series in 2024 before losing his ride at year’s end, moving to AM Racing for the 2025 NASCAR Xfinity Series season, and eventually jumping to Sam Hunt Racing (and Toyota) for the 2026 NASCAR OAP Series season.
While Burton’s return to NASCAR’s second-highest division has not produced any wins, the 25-year-old still maintained a solid effort in 2025, granting AM Racing its first-ever run in the playoffs on points alone.
Much like Herbst, Burton has a winning resume in the OAP Series, and, most important of all, loyal sponsorship, with brands like Dex Imaging sticking with him throughout most of his development, time in the Cup Series, and his return to the OAP Series.
Burton is the type of driver that fits the LMC mold, as, if he were to return to Cup, he would have taken a similar path back to the top that fellow second-generation driver and LMC Cup Series talent John Hunter Nemechek took before landing with LMC in 2024.
A potential return to the Cup Series would also mark an ironic turn in Burton’s career, as he was once a top prospect for Toyota, even making a Cup Series start with the manufacturer before jumping ship to Ford in 2022.
Of course, many fans would say that, given a choice, they would pick Love over Burton, but, then again, LMC may not have a choice, and a driver as experienced as Burton could be a safe bet to get this third team off the ground at the very least.
As always, these are just rumors, and it’s important to note that neither party has expressed plans for the still very, very far away 2027 season. Furthermore, as most NASCAR fans know, even rumors that may seem like a done deal can change at the very last second.
What do you think about this? Let us know your opinion on Discord or X. Don’t forget that you can also follow us on Instagram, Facebook, and YouTube.
An email sent by former Joe Gibbs Racing Competition Director Chris Gabehart claims that resentment towards him from members of the Gibbs family made him feel that the future of JGR was a “no-win situation.”
Last week, Joe Gibbs Racing filed a lawsuit against former Crew Chief and Competition Director Chris Gabehart, claiming that the former Daytona 500 Champion had schemed to steal vital information from the team in the lead-up to his departure from JGR for Spire Motorsports.
Not even ten days since JGR filed this lawsuit, the two have continued to trade barbs and accusations back and forth through the court system.
In a filing earlier this week, Gabehart accused the team of misleading him in his duties as competition director in 2025, and specifically calling out JGR’s No. 54 team, driven by Joe Gibbs’ grandson Ty, alleging that the team received “differential treatment.”
Friday, an email sent to JGR CFO Tim Carmichael by Gabehart in November 2025 (released as part of this lawsuit) showed just how uncomfortable he had grown working at JGR during his tenure as Competition Director, with the industry veteran stating that Ty Gibbs and his mother, Heather, held “resentment” towards Gabehart.
The now former Competition Director went on to say in this email that, as the two were the future bosses of JGR, “I’m afraid that leaves me in a no-win situation.”
These exchanges, including the claims made by Gibbs in his filing earlier this week, have swept fans into a whirlwind of sorts, with the two sides even meeting in court today for the lawsuit’s first official hearing.
Of course, Gabehart’s claims about the state of operations at JGR pale in comparison to the accusations made by the Gibbs team in their initial lawsuit.
On Tuesday, the team even added Spire Motorsports, Gabehart’s current employer, as a co-defendant, and requested the court force Gabehart to sit out at least the 18 months since his termination before doing any work in NASCAR similar to his role at JGR.
The team is also asking that any information procured by Spire from Gabehart be returned, though the CEO of TWG Motorsports, which owns Spire, Dan Towriss, told Bob Pockrass of FOX Sports Friday that “Spire doesn’t want data from Joe Gibbs Racing. It doesn’t have data from Joe Gibbs Racing. No point in time has it had data from Joe Gibbs Racing.”
Alongside Spire, Gabehart adamantly denied any wrongdoing in a post to social media last week, saying, “I feel compelled to speak out today and forcefully and emphatically deny these frivolous and retaliatory claims.”
What’s Happening? Former Joe Gibbs Racing Crew Chief and Competition Director Chris Gabehart has filed a new response slamming JGR as…
What do you think about this? Let us know your opinion on Discord or X. Don’t forget that you can also follow us on Instagram, Facebook, and YouTube.
A few years ago, I looked at the racetracks preserved on iRacing that no longer exist in real life. After digging deeper, I expected to find one common reason they all shut down. Instead, each one tells a completely different story — from booming cities and land value spikes to ownership changes, broken promises, and even mysteries that still don’t have clear answers.
Some tracks were pushed out by urban development. Some lost the one person fighting to keep them alive. Others faded due to declining support — or were never meant to last forever in the first place. No two closures are the same, and that’s what makes this deep dive so fascinating.
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