Meet Team AmeriVet, the unconventional NASCAR team aiding veterans

Team AmeriVet is not your conventional NASCAR team.

It's not owned by a legendary former NFL coach (Joe Gibbs of Joe Gibbs Racing) or an automobile sales magnate (Rick Hendrick of Hendrick Motorsports). It's owned instead by a first-grade teacher and her husband, a former construction equipment salesman. They are based in Highland, New York, roughly a two-hour drive north of Manhattan, and far from NASCAR's hub in central North Carolina.

These unconventional qualities make for a unique race team that is leading NASCAR into the future on and off the racetrack.

According to team co-owner Becky Auchmoody, she and her husband, William, are "fan owners" who "wanted to try a new opportunity."

"My husband started racing in 1996," Auchmoody said. "Every weekend we were either racing somewhere or watching the (NASCAR) race on Sunday. It's just been something that we've always followed."

That passion soon turned into an opportunity most fans could only dream of: owning a NASCAR Cup Series team.

"My husband had a mutual friend that said, 'I think I know someone who might be into this.' We started working with [boxer] Floyd Mayweather and got the marketing agreement with him, and then COVID hit. It was just before COVID hit that we decided that I was going to keep teaching and that we were going to try (racing) full time."

According to Auchmoody, the global pandemic presented the new team with a host of new opportunities to "talk to people we wouldn't have gotten to talk to before" due to travel logistics. Those conversations — many held over Zoom meetings — culminated in the team making its first Daytona 500 in 2022, with Kaz Grala behind the wheel. Despite the wheels literally falling off Grala's Chevrolet, he brought home a 26th-place finish in the organization's NASCAR debut.

After racing intermittently in the Cup Series in 2022 and 2023 — including another Daytona 500 start with Conor Daly in 2023 — Auchmoody said the team "needed a change" for 2024 and beyond.

"In April, we started wondering what we could do for other people," she said. "We wanted something on a larger scale."

That vision turned into a fresh start for the rebranded team AmeriVet —known as The Money Team while connected to Mayweather — that began with Ty Dillon driving for the team in the 2024 Coca-Cola 600, as well as in the team's "50 Vets A Week" program. According to the team's website , its aim is to help 50 U.S. military veterans per week throughout the 2025 NASCAR Cup Series season by paying off "targeted debt."

Erik Antico, the chief revenue officer at ForgiveCO, is partnering with the team to help the program come to life.

"There are so many veterans who are NASCAR fans," Antico said. "This was a match made in heaven. We said, 'If we can match the number of the car (No. 50) to the relief of who we're going to be helping for the whole season, that could be something special.'"

As for the team's on-track future, Auchmoody said 2025 will be its busiest season yet, as it plans on "running anywhere from 15-17 races."

"In order to really get this program off the ground, we need to partner up with some sponsors and get to the track," she said. "The more we're on the track, the more we can do for the veterans. There are drivers we're talking to, but they want to hold out for a full-time ride before committing to a part-time opportunity."

Every lap turned by Team AmeriVet's No. 50 car during the 2025 season will mean that much more.

All quotations obtained firsthand unless otherwise noted.