After an 18-year run together, Tony Stewart and Donny Schatz have parted ways, ending one of the most successful owner-driver pairings in the world of Sprint Car Racing. Schatz and Tony Stewart Racing own eight World of Outlaws titles and nine Knoxville Nationals wins together. Needless to say, it was indeed a shock to the fans when the news surfaced.Stewart, a former NASCAR Cup Series champion and the owner of Tony Stewart Racing, went on Dale Earnhardt Jr.’s NASCAR podcast and revealed why he let Schatz go. Per reports, TSR has hired Kerry Madsen as the replacement for Schatz for the remainder of the 2025 season.“My goal was to ultimately...at the end of the day, I wanted Donny Schatz to retire as a sprint car driver driving a TSR car,” Tony Stewart explained. “Really, in the sport of sprint car racing, we probably have the longest relationship of any full-time team right now...but it just comes to a point where things cycle through and decisions are made along the way, and the variables in the equation change, and finally it just got down a path that we couldn't recover from.”“You have to make that tough decision. I all honesty, I probably should have done it two years ago for the sake of our people,” he added.Schatz’s final race with Tony Stewart Racing was Saturday’s Knoxville Nationals. He started from 20th and finished the race in P11. Between Friday's Hard Knox Night and Saturday's B-main, the 234-time World of Outlaws winner earned 17 spots to qualify for his 27th straight Knoxville Nationals A-main (since 1998).While Schatz hasn’t revealed his next endeavor yet, Kerry Madsen’s first race with Tony Stewart Racing is scheduled for this coming Friday, September 19, at Ogilvie Raceway in Minnesota, as a part of the 2025 World of Outlaws tour.“Kerry’s been in our car before and is a proven winner, so bringing him back feels natural,” Stewart said in another release. “He knows our team, we know his capabilities, and I’m confident he’ll give us everything he’s got as we close out the season.”Madsen made 37 starts with the No. 14 car for TSR back in 2021, bringing home six dominant wins for the team. Three of them were with the World of Outlaws. As he is currently racing for the track title at Knoxville Raceway for VerMeer Madisen Racing, TSR will hire an interim driver for the WoO events on August 22-23 in North Dakota.Tony Stewart joins forces with Rico Abreu for the 2026 Sprint Car seasonRico Abreu, the 2014 USAC National Midget Series champion, is expected to merge his No. 24 family-owned team with Tony Stewart’s organization after the ongoing season ends. Although TSR has only used the numbers 14, 15, and 20 until now, reports suggest that Stewart’s new driver wants to continue driving his iconic No. 24.Besides Abreu, also joining the team is former TSR crew chief Ricky Warner. Notably, it was Warner who guided Donny Schatz to 264 wins, 10 World of Outlaws Sprint Car Series titles, and 10 Knoxville Nationals crowns.“I see it as tying myself to a top-tier establishment. Like, I don't know if you find anything bigger or better than Tony Stewart Racing in our industry,” Abreu told FloRacing. “If you really break it all down, resource-wise, when it comes to data and dissecting Sprint Cars on the mechanical side and infrastructure internally, like, I can't provide my team with what he has built over 25 years.”As per the latest news, Stewart will not drive for his team full-time in the NHRA Top Fuel division next year. His wife, Leah Pruett, will return to the driver’s seat, which she left vacant for quite some time due to her duties as a new mother.