{"id":22111,"date":"2019-09-10T11:22:12","date_gmt":"2019-09-10T15:22:12","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/tireball.com\/nascar\/?p=22111"},"modified":"2019-09-10T11:27:27","modified_gmt":"2019-09-10T15:27:27","slug":"paul-menard-retiring-matt-dibenedetto-taking-over-no-21-seat","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/tireball.com\/nascar\/2019\/09\/10\/paul-menard-retiring-matt-dibenedetto-taking-over-no-21-seat\/","title":{"rendered":"Paul Menard retiring, Matt DiBenedetto taking over No. 21 seat"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/tireball.com\/nascar\/files\/2019\/09\/img_5481-1.jpg\" class=\"size-full wp-image-22115\" width=\"640\" height=\"425\" srcset=\"http:\/\/tireball.com\/nascar\/files\/2019\/09\/img_5481-1.jpg 640w, http:\/\/tireball.com\/nascar\/files\/2019\/09\/img_5481-1-594x394.jpg 594w, http:\/\/tireball.com\/nascar\/files\/2019\/09\/img_5481-1-300x199.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 640px) 100vw, 640px\" \/><\/p>\n<p>Paul Menard will retire at the conclusion of the 2019 season paving the way for Matt DiBenedetto to take over the seat of the famed No. 21 Ford of Wood Brothers Racing.<\/p>\n<p>Menard has made over 460 starts at the Cup level and joined the Wood Brothers for the 2018 season. He claimed a win in the 2011 race at Indianapolis Motor Speedway.<\/p>\n<p><span style=\"caret-color: rgb(10, 10, 10); color: rgb(10, 10, 10); font-family: Stainless-Regular, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 18px; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: auto; text-align: start; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-tap-highlight-color: rgba(26, 26, 26, 0.301961); -webkit-text-size-adjust: 100%; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); text-decoration: none; display: inline !important; float: none\">\u201cI\u2019ve enjoyed every moment of my career racing in the NASCAR Cup Series, and I\u2019m so thankful for all the great memories and friendships I\u2019ve made through this sport. But I\u2019m looking forward to spending more time at home with my wife, Jennifer, and our two young children while moving forward with the next chapter of my life,\u201d Menard said. \u201d \u2026 I\u2019m excited for what the future holds and I\u2019m looking forward to sharing the plans for 2020 and beyond in the coming weeks.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p>DiBenedetto was appreciative of Menard on Tuesday thanking him on Twitter.<\/p>\n<blockquote><p><span style=\"caret-color: rgb(28, 32, 34); color: rgb(28, 32, 34); font-family: Helvetica, Roboto,\" segoe ui calibri sans-serif font-size: font-style: normal font-variant-caps: font-weight: letter-spacing: orphans: auto text-align: left text-indent: text-transform: none white-space: pre-wrap widows: word-spacing: rgba background-color: rgb text-decoration: display: inline float:>I don\u2019t even have the words to describe how thankful I am!! Paul is such a great guy and I\u2019m lucky to call him a friend and I wish him the best! So excited to take over and drive for one of the most legendary teams in NASCAR next year! I have so many people to thank!!!! <\/span><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p><span style=\"caret-color: rgb(28, 32, 34); color: rgb(28, 32, 34); font-family: Helvetica, Roboto,\" segoe ui calibri sans-serif font-size: font-style: normal font-variant-caps: font-weight: letter-spacing: orphans: auto text-align: left text-indent: text-transform: none white-space: pre-wrap widows: word-spacing: rgba background-color: rgb text-decoration: display: inline float:><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Paul Menard will retire at the conclusion of the 2019 season paving the way for Matt DiBenedetto to take over the seat of the famed No. 21 Ford of Wood Brothers Racing. Menard has made over 460 starts at the Cup level and joined the Wood Brothers for the 2018 season. He claimed a win [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[20,786,788],"tags":[789,946,708,503],"coauthors":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-22111","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-cup-series","7":"category-nascar-topstory","8":"category-news","9":"tag-front","10":"tag-matt-dibenedetto","11":"tag-nascar","12":"tag-paul-menard"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/tireball.com\/nascar\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22111","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/tireball.com\/nascar\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/tireball.com\/nascar\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/tireball.com\/nascar\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/tireball.com\/nascar\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=22111"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/tireball.com\/nascar\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22111\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/tireball.com\/nascar\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=22111"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/tireball.com\/nascar\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=22111"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/tireball.com\/nascar\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=22111"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/tireball.com\/nascar\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=22111"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}