Labonte joins Petty for 2006

The 2000 Champion announced four days ago that he will part ways with Joe Gibbs Racing at the end of this season, after eleven years.

The 41 year-old will take the place of Jeff Green in Petty, and he will team up with Jeff Gordon's Championship winning crew chief Robbie Loomis who will become vice president of Petty Enterprises.

Six-time champion Petty made the number 43 car famous in the seventies, and Labonte said he is excited to fill "the King's" shoes.

"It's an exciting day. I'm very thrilled about this," Labonte said. "I just feel very fortunate that I was picked by Kyle and Robbie to drive their race car.

"To have the opportunity to drive Richard Petty's No. 43 car is something I could not have imagined growing up.

"The biggest thing that I want to do is communicate really well with Kyle and Robbie and get our off season program together as far as getting ready for the season. The communication is the big part.

"I think that being able to be part of the race team is going to be huge for me and I want to be able to give everything I can back to that as far as the communication goes with the race cars."

Labonte has had a poor season this year with Joe Gibbs, with a best result of second at the Coca Cola 600, when he lost out to Jimmie Johnson on the final corner. He will be teammate to Richard's son Kyle, in the number 45 Dodge.

"I'm excited to have Bobby as a teammate, that's our whole deal," Petty said. "I'm really excited to work with Bobby Labonte personally. Bobby brings a huge amount of talent and a huge amount of experience to that seat, which will hopefully also bring the No. 45 team up."