Donny Schatz’s present world is ever-changing. This time last week, he was still employed at Tony Stewart Racing. Since then, he’s been released from TSR and has raced for two different teams in as many races while scrambling to find rides — or one fuller-time ride — the rest of the season.

On Monday evening, the 48-year-old told FloRacing there's another pivot — that he’ll now be racing with Lunstra Motorsports through the end of August rather than for Big Game Motorsports. The initial plan was for the Tod Quiring-owned Big Game team to field Schatz as a teammate to David Gravel, but that’s fallen by the wayside following Friday’s crash at Ogilvie (Minn.) Speedway.

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The Big Game team only had one car ready for Schatz, so when it was evident the chassis couldn’t be repaired anytime soon, Sioux Falls, S.D., car owner Dave Lunstra stepped up and fielded Schatz’s entry Saturday at Jackson (Minn.) Motorplex.

Schatz will still receive support from Quiring and his team, including sponsorship from ShopHusets.com, just he’ll be driving Lunstra’s car instead of a second Big Game entry.

“That wasn’t what we originally planned, but Tod Quiring's still helping out, all them guys are helping us keep going,” Schatz said in a phone interview Monday. "Tod and I, we've been friends a long time. And I told him it was a bad idea to begin with because if anything happens, it puts his guys in a bad spot if they try to keep going. And that's exactly what happened. It's just the way it works.

"It's not their responsibility to come to my rescue and with this going on, but they've been super incredible and so has Dave Lunstra,” added Schatz, who’s raced in 1,601 straight World of Outlaws events dating back to 2003. "We were using Dave's truck and trailer anyway.”

It’s a short turnaround for Schatz and co. with the WoO racing Tuesday at Mississippi Thunder Speedway in Fountain City, Wis., before Schatz returns to his homeland in North Dakota on Aug. 22 at River Cities Speedway in Grand Forks and Aug. 23 at Red River Valley Speedway in West Fargo.

As of Monday, Schatz's final shows with the Lunstra team is Aug. 30-31 at the Quiring-owned Huset’s Speedway in the L.G. Everist Huset’s Shootout. 

Schatz’s race-day crew still consists of former TSR employee Brad Alexander and Stephen Hamm-Reilly "who used to work for the Big Game guys and organized those two guys," Alexander and Jacobs, "to come out and try to get everything rolling.”

"And they did. They've done a tremendous job and obviously got shifted over to the Lunstra car when we ran Saturday night after crashing Friday night,” Schatz said. “They’re still there (the Big Game team) and obviously going to help me through this whole stretch, and see what happens after that. Both of them have been awesome to upend their lives to make sure I have the best opportunity I can have.”

Despite finishing 10th on Saturday at Jackson, something that he doesn’t want to overlook, Schatz felt he should’ve finished in the top-six if not for a chaotic final restart.

"I want to be ready for anything, but you can't say you'll be ultimately prepared going through anything like this. It's like the other night, I ran 10th, but I felt like I won the race because everybody busted their balls,” Schatz said. “It took 20 people to get, like I said, what two should be able to do. And we qualified good. We made it into the dash, which I haven't done very much this year.

“We should have ran six, but we ran 10th because I got put in a bad spot on that final restart. It was either end up wearing another race car out or being the sane uncle. So a top-10 is not bad for where we were and everybody was happy with that. And we can just improve on that.”

Schatz said his situation is so fluid right now that he’s had to borrow Tim Kaeding’s seat while he awaits to regain possession of his own seat. In a way, the Lunstra car might be a better fit for Schatz because the Lunstra ride is built more for Schatz’s stature.

"Every car is made for a different seat, and what I had before was made for my seat,” Schatz said. “I couldn't even use my own seat here. I didn't use my own seat the other night. I used TK's. Thank God that TK and I are about the same size. We fought that battle at Big Game because I'm a little bit bigger than all those guys.

“So, you know, you got to make sure you get things halfway close and we've done that, but it's been super challenging.”

As far as the job hunt for a potential longer-term ride, Schatz emphasized "I'm working on it. I'm absolutely working on it, but, you know, it's not quite as simple as a person thinks from all aspects.”

“I mean, all these years I've had people trying to get me to go do other things, and now I'm in that position,” Schatz said. “Am I closer? No, I'm no closer than I was. Obviously, you got to get started. I mean, it's been, what, five or six days since this happened? I mean, it is what it is. That's just such a short period of time that you can't move mountains. Rome wasn't built in the day. I'm trying.”

With Lunstra fielding his entry through August and Quiring backing the efforts, Schatz should now have flexibility to put something together for Sept. 5-20’s West Coast swing on the World of Outlaws, a stretch that starts Sept. 5-6 at Vado (N.M.) Speedway Park and continues Sept. 12 at Bakersfield (Calif.) Speedway, Sept. 13 at Perris (Calif.) Auto Speedway and rounds out Sept. 19-20 at Thunderbowl Raceway in Tulare, Calif.

But even then, Schatz says there are no guarantees he’ll make the trip west.

"At this point, I want to get to the West Coast, but I'm kind of crippled just trying to get through what I'm doing here,” Schatz said. “My focus, as I said, are these first seven races. I mean, I'm borrowing seats and trying to make everything work to do this without doing something that gets me hurt in the process. I'm going to be in good equipment, but I'm so used to being in what I'm supposed to be in, it's kind of a challenge.”

As much as Schatz would like to find one ride to close out 2025 and secure for 2026, he may have to start putting together one-off or part-time deals until that happens. The outpouring of support, opportunities and ride offers presented to him have been overwhelmingly. Even then, he’s still in a bind figuring out who and what to commit to.

"No, look, I've had numerous people call. Ultimately I was trying to put something together to finish out the rest of the year,” Schatz said. “So, you know, obviously I'm going to have to start saying, 'Hey, this doesn't work, this works, this doesn't work, this works.' And, it's crazy. If I was to put on a list of paper all the people have reached out and made offers, you wouldn't even believe it, honestly, and it's probably better that I don't. I mean, it's absolutely insane.

"It makes me feel good, but yet it makes me feel like an asshole that there's many people out trying to help and wanting to do something and I have to tell almost a majority of them no, you know?"

Another difficulty Schatz navigates right now is his merchandise, another hurdle that comes with the uncertainty of free agency.

"The thing that people don't understand is with some of this stuff is the way I've always operated my merchandise stuff with fans and all that, you know, hero cards and all these things,” Schatz said. “You know, the other night at the races, I had kids coming up (asking), 'You have hero cards?' And I got to tell them, 'No, I don't.' And they don't understand that yesterday we were driving one car and today you're driving another car, and you can't magically make these things appear to make everything 100 percent whole, you know?

"And it's no different with merchandise. You can't sell it if you don't have it. And my mom's always been on top of that. We're coming to North Dakota, which is always the most fans I'm going to see throughout the year for myself and supportive of us.

"So it's from all fronts, it's kind of just a different scenario. We're trying to navigate it the best from all fronts.”