BY TEAM FORD RACING CORRESPONDENT

Hampton, Ga. — They still have four races this year—Kansas City on Oct. 4, Charlotte on Oct. 17, Texas on Nov. 8 and Homestead on Nov. 22—but the Wood brothers already are considering their 2010 plans.

“We’d love to maintain our relationship with Bill Elliott and our sponsors, and run about the same number of races we’ve run this year,” team co-owner Eddie Wood said Sunday at Atlanta Motor Speedway. “We’d consider it, but it would take a ton of sponsorship money before we tried to run the full schedule again. We’re really content with the way things have gone this year.”

Because of sponsorship issues, the long-time Ford loyalists trimmed their schedule from 36 to 13 races this year. Elliott ran the first eight and David Gilliland was in the No. 21 Fusion this weekend. Elliott took himself from the car after breaking three ribs in a Wednesday afternoon dirt-bike accident.