David Ragan was considered to be one of the hot free agents in the garage ahead of the 2015 season. Rumors were running rampant that he would be the one to replace Marcos Ambrose as the driver of the No. 9 Ford for Richard Petty Motorsports until RPM signed Sam Hornish, Jr. last week.
Ragan said despite the Petty rumors there was never any genuine interest between him and Petty for that ride – just preliminary conversations.
“I had my contract coming up at the end of the year and we haven’t talked a whole lot about the 2015 season,” Ragan told Popular Speed. “My goal was to get myself in a real good competitive situation and I didn’t have a contract and I showed them some interest, but that’s it.”
Ragan said RPM had plans for the No. 9 moving ahead and he wasn’t apart of those plans. Despite the Petty talks, Ragan expressed his pride in his relationship with Front Row Motorsports and believes a deal will be done prior to 2015.
“I haven’t finalized anything with the team yet but we’re working on it,” Ragan said. “We’ve got to get the sponsors lined up. The owners have to get their budgets sorted and the drivers are usually the last things to come together.
“Hopefully, over the next few weeks, we’ll get that sorted. I would definitely love to be back.”
Ragan has two Sprint Cup Series wins, his most recent at Talladega in the spring of last year.