JOLIET, Ill. -- In an effort to build his race team into a contender, Bobby Ginn hired 75 new employees after taking ownership of the entity formerly known as MB2 Motorsports. The move seemed to pay off in his very first race, when Mark Martin nearly won the Daytona 500.

But the growth came too quickly. As the season has worn on and sponsorship for the three-car team has failed to materialize, Ginn Racing has been forced to make difficult decisions. The organization has shut down its Busch program and laid off some employees as part of an ongoing restructuring that it hopes will make it stronger in the future.

"Unfortunately we did what we did a couple of weeks ago, and basically that was a derivative of, we grew so fast, and we just had to reevaluate where we were at people-wise," team CEO Jay Frye said Sunday at Chicagoland Speedway. "Again, even at that point, we didn't know what we were going to do. Did we have enough, not enough? We didn't know where we were at. It became apparent we had too many [people]."

Ginn, a Florida developer who purchased controlling interest in the team late last year, has poured resources into the organization. Besides hiring new employees, he also unveiled plans to expand the race shop, bought two jet airplanes to facilitate travel, and purchased a seven-post shaker rig, a $2 million piece of equipment that simulates setups. Mid-tier teams like Ginn typically can't afford them, and have to rent time on those owned by larger organizations.

But a lack of sponsorship has taken its toll. Only one of Ginn's Nextel Cup cars, the one split by Martin and Regan Smith, has backing for the full season. The plans for next year are for three cars: Martin and a yet-to-be announced driver in the No. 01, Smith in the No. 14, and Joe Nemechek in the No. 13. But only one of those vehicles -- Martin's U.S. Army car -- has sponsorship in place for 2008.

"The core group here is still here and will continue to be here," Martin said. "The 01 is sponsored for '08 and the driver lineup is set for '08 and the crew chief is set for '08 and I know the team members are the same ones who have been involved at that place for a long time. Don't forget this is the little team that could, and I expect it to get back to that. Trying to go through explosive expansion is a really tough thing to do, and for various reasons, [Ginn isn't] being as successful at expanding as quickly as they had hoped. Getting back to that core group and getting stronger, it's exciting for me in that respect."

With the Busch team shut down -- right now, there are no plans to revive it -- Smith is losing out on valuable seat time. Frye said the team wants to get Smith in more Cup races, other than those he's splitting with Martin in the No. 01 car. How? "We're working through that, too," said Frye, also a minority owner of the team. "He's got to race every week, too."

The odd man out appears to be Marlin, who turned 50 earlier this year. The former Daytona 500 champion would like to run a partial schedule next season like the one Martin is running now, but the prospects of doing that at Ginn seems dim.

"Sometimes things happen for a reason, and you've got to step back and reevaluate where you're at, and it will make you better for a long time. I think that's where we're at," Frye said. "We're backing up, we're evaluating where we're at, and that's going to help us better next year this time. Joe and Sterling's contracts are both up at the end of the year. If we continue like we are, what effect does that have? What do we do? What are we doing? Is that part of our future? Joe certainly could be. Sterling, probably not. If we have a part-time opportunity for him and we can put it together, great. Right now, I can't guarantee that's going to happen."

Uncertain future

Whether or not it's at Ginn Racing, venerable veteran Sterling Marlin would like to follow teammate Mark Martin's lead and race a part-time schedule next season.

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The Ginn team hopes to have a clearer picture of its plans for 2008 by the event at Indianapolis in two weeks. Martin, the team's cornerstone, said he never spoke with Ginn before taking the part-time ride in the No. 01. But he knew Frye and the bunch that had been with MB2, an organization that has won twice at the Nextel Cup level, most recently with Nemechek in 2004.

"I don't talk to Bobby very much," Martin said. "I told him months ago that this was going to be a problem for us, and it's being addressed. Jay really runs the company. My deal was made with Jay. I never spoke with Bobby prior to the deal getting done. I know Jay Frye, I know this team and I know this group. And I know this group has over-performed for years under very stressful conditions, and this is not anything new for them. I think that the program will be much stronger if they go through this reevaluation, and take a step back in size, and strengthen the program and then only look at expanding when all the timing is right -- when everything is in line, when the funding is in line."

Walking the business tightrope is nothing new for Ginn, whose company has 40,000 acres currently under development. His career nearly ended three decades ago, when the aspiring developer paid $80 million for a collection of properties on the resort island of Hilton Head in his native South Carolina, and everything went wrong. Cash-flow problems mounted, debt piled up, and bumper stickers reading "Honk if Bobby owes you" began to appear.

Ginn was prepared to file bankruptcy when a sympathetic judge, hoping to protect Hilton Head's upcoming golf and tennis tournaments, convinced him to sell out to other investors. Princeton development professor Michael Danielson chronicled the saga in a 1995 book about the island, and he pulled no punches. "Ginn left a trail of broken promises, angry property owners, and dashed hopes," he wrote, adding that the developer was "long on dreams and short on action."

But Ginn rebounded to build a company that did $2.5 billion worth of business in 2005. His development arm operates resort properties throughout the U.S. and Caribbean, and his sports wing oversees LPGA and Champions Tour golf tournaments in addition to his NASCAR effort. There have been hiccups -- the housing market has been sluggish, and a Bahamas newspaper reported that Ginn's company is the target of a class-action lawsuit filed in Michigan by plaintiffs who claim they were defrauded.

But Frye said those issues don't affect the race team, which he said is a separate business entity. Sponsorship would solve a lot of problems, but it's proven hard to find. Every week, Frye watches his three cars -- all inside the top 35 in owner points -- make the race. And he watches other teams with big sponsors and better funding go home.

"We couldn't be more frustrated because of that," Frye said. "The sponsors that we have, they've been with us a long time. There's a reason. We provide a good value to them. It's a partnership. We're not just taking their money, not that other teams are. We're a good place to be, we think. You continue and continue, and it's like the twilight zone. Every week is the same thing. We do what we do, and others don't. I'm not knocking those teams, but it is what it is. How do we show that value to somebody? We're trying. Every day, we're trying."