Keselowski credits Earnhardt Junior for helping decide Penske move

Penske Racing announced Tuesday that Brad Keselowski, one will compete for the team full-time, beginning with the 2010 NASCAR season.

A third-generation driver, Keselowski has won at every level in which he has competed. He is currently ranked third in the Nationwide Series standings with three wins to his credit in 2009, including a dramatic victory in August at his home track at Michigan International Speedway. Keselowski also scored his first Cup Series win earlier this year at Talladega Superspeedway and he has produced three top-10 finishes in just eight Cup Series starts this season.

In a conference call Tuesday afternoon, the 25 year old said he has one goal with Penske.

"I want to be the guy that comes to Penske Racing and gives them their first NASCAR championship,'' Keselowski said. "I'm going to put a full effort into being that guy that gets it done.”

Keselowski has been rumored for months to be making the move to the Cup level, especially after his first Cup win at Talladega. Many however felt the move might come with Hendrick Motorsports, a team closely aligned with Dale Earnhardt Jr. owned JR Motorsports. According to Keselowski however, a Hendrick deal wasn’t able to come together.

"Over the last month before this, just the opportunities started to not come to fruition and I think we both could see it,'' Keselowski said. "We talked about it and Mr. Hendrick said he would keep working on different scenarios and he did. He worked as hard as he could. He told me something that I thought was pretty interesting that he worked much harder on my deal than he ever had to work on Jimmie’s or Jeff's or any of them to try to find a way to keep me in camp. It became obvious that it was just not in the cards. There were too many things going against us."

So instead of joining Hendrick Motorsports, Keselowski will compete against them starting in 2010.

“There are very few teams at this level that have the resources to compete with Hendrick Motorsports and this is one of them,” Keselowski said. “In the decision-making process that I went through, it became fairly evident that no matter what route I went down, I was going to have to build a team. Building a team is more than building cars and buying transporters or war wagons or pit boxes, it's about people and it's about putting the right people together. This seemed like the best place to do that.”

In the end Keselowski credited his current team owner Dale Earnhardt with helping him to make his final decision.

"He was actually one of the people that pushed me fairly hard to take this deal, as surprising as that might be to some people or some of the fans or media,'' Keselowski said. "He brought up one of the good points that stuck with me when I made this decision, which like I said earlier, was the hardest decision I've ever had to make in my life, and that was when you have the opportunity to grow and to take on new challenges and you're capable of conquering those challenges, you need to take. You need to grow when you have the opportunity to grow not only in your career but as a person and this is a great opportunity for me to grow.''

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