Michael Worrell, owner of the Rockwall Honda race team, had big plans for 2009. He wanted to promote his new Yamaha dealership by fielding high-profile riders on 2009-model YZF-R1s in the new American Superbike class, but shortly after he signed a new title sponsor the deal collapsed, leaving Worrell devastated and looking for other ways to go racing this season. “I’ve let my team down,” Worrell told Roadracingworld.com. “Now they don’t have jobs. I’m paying them. I’ve been paying them this whole time waiting for this sponsorship to kick in. I didn’t know what else to do, because I love racing. This is my life. I’d rather cut a finger off than not go racing.” The sponsor that would have funded the effort was German Technology Services, a German-based corporation that deals in radio frequency identification (RFID) technology. Worrell spent tens of thousands of dollars and months trying to get the owner of the company, a motorcycle racing enthusiast, according to Worrell, to commit his support. Late last week, Worrell thought he finalized the sponsorship deal and made plans to announce it January 24 on “The Liberty Motorsports Hour,” a weekly motorsports radio show based in Houston, Texas. “I had a contract signed and everything went green that day,” said Worrell. “But this guy overnight said, ‘I don’t want to race in America. It’s a bad investment.’ I said, ‘What do you mean it’s a bad investment? I’ve got all these people online. They’ve already passed on other jobs. I’ve got riders like [Jamie] Hacking and [Steve] Rapp wanting to do business with us. This was going to be the best year ever.’ He either, A, doesn’t have the money; B, is a liar; or C, he got a better deal.” Now, Worrell is hoping to put together a deal with young riders, possibly some of the riders left out in the cold by KTM’s pullout of the Red Bull AMA U.S. Rookies Cup, to run in the new youth-orientated AMA SuperSport class. “The only other plan I can think of and that I really love, because my son [Lloyd Worrell] is already at that level, take some kids from the Red Bull Rookie program and put something together for them in the 600cc SuperSport class. I’ve got bikes. I’ve got crew. I’ve got everything in place.” Those riders, however, would have to bring a significant amount of cash with them. “I don’t know 100%, but I think with $100,000 we can break even,” said Worrell. “And I think that’s cheap for a first-class program. It costs $60,000 to $75,000 just to drive my semi to all of the races. “I really, really hope that we can find the right person to participate with me, and we can run this Plan B. If not, I’m just going to build my business up so big this year that I can pay for next year myself.” Worrell said riders interested in working with him in 2009 should email him at [email protected].