NASCAR will not allow YouTube star Garrett Mitchell, AKA “Cleetus McFarland,” to run the NASCAR O’Reilly Series race at Talladega on April 25. Apparently, McFarland’s performance in his O’Reilly Auto Parts Series debut this past Saturday at Rockingham wasn’t good enough to allow him onto a superspeedway.
“We’re all huge Cleetus fans. We all watch his videos and are certainly very appreciative of everything he’s done in our sport and will continue to do in our sport,” John Probst, NASCAR executive vice president and chief racing development officer, said in a statement.
“He is approved right now for O’Reilly Series short tracks, which means he’s good for all of ARCA, all of (NASCAR’s third-tier Truck Series), and then O’Reilly up through the short tracks. We’d like to see more out of Cleetus in the short tracks.
“So we’re not saying no, but there is more that we would like to see out of Cleetus before we would approve him for Talladega.”
The Rockingham race was just the second national NASCAR event in which McFarland had competed. He finished 32nd, six laps behind the winner. His first, a Truck Series race at Daytona International Speedway in February, saw him after completing just five laps.
Cleetus McFarland addresses NASCAR’s rejection
“Ladies and gentlemen, I want you to hear from me first that I have been denied by NASCAR to run Talladega in my O’Reilly’s car,” Mitchell said in a video. “(I) made my O’Reilly’s debut last Saturday with hopes of getting approval for Talladega, but they did not see enough.
“Granted, it was a pretty hectic race. I tried to pass someone three-wide on the third lap, spun out, spun out a few more times. Didn’t crash or crash anybody, but still, it was pretty hectic.
“Nonetheless, NASCAR has said, we’re gonna need to see you run more ARCA and more trucks. I’m fully approved for trucks — which I have some of those on my schedule coming up — but in the O’Reilly’s, I am still limited to short tracks.”
Cleetus McFarland added, “I’ve only been racing NASCAR for one year, so it was never my mission to go out and climb in an O’Reilly’s car and get to the top as fast as I can. But we figured we’d try, and we didn’t get approved. So it is what it is.”
Former NASCAR drivers agree that McFarland needs more experience
Several former NASCAR drivers will be glad to hear that officials won’t allow Cleetus McFarland to race in the O’Reilly Auto Parts Series race at Talladega.
One of them, Dale Earnhardt Jr., said on his podcast this week, “I saw enough to not approve him for Daytona or Talladega in the O’Reilly Series, to be quite honest with you.”
Former NASCAR star Mark Martin said on the Door Bumper Clear podcast, “Everyone traditionally feels like he should have had more time, should have had more time in ARCA because that’s an easy place to learn where it’s not a hornets’ nest. Dude, to run 25th in an O’Reilly race, it’s worse than running in the top-10. It’s hard.”
Tommy Baldwin echoed the others’ sentiments when he added, “It’s not Cleetus, this is not about him. It’s about the process, it’s about the learning curve. It’s like being in seventh grade and deciding you’re going to go to college. It’s the same type of thing, right? … You got to go through the process, and it’s not hate on Cleetus at all. You have to go through the process to learn. … You gotta do it in ARCA, understand car control, you gotta drive a Late Model, you gotta do these things.”