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NASCAR - Junior in search of that a-ha moment
By Jay Hart
February 10, 2010
DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. — The professional life of Dale Earnhardt Jr. is beginning to mirror an episode of “House.” Someone has an ailment no one can diagnose. To the rescue comes a team of trained specialists – the best, mind you – who throw out idea after idea, run test after test, prescribe med after med, only to see the patient get sicker and sicker, that is until the brilliant Dr. House has his “a-ha” moment.
Under Rick Hendrick’s roof, Earnhardt has gotten the best care NASCAR has to offer, only his on-track performance isn’t getting better. Despite all of Hendrick’s efforts – from transferring Junior out of a second-tier facility in Dale Earnhardt Inc. to assigning him a new crew chief midway through 2009 – Earnhardt’s Cup career remains in critical condition.
His chart reads as follows: one win in his last 134 starts; one Chase appearance in the last three seasons; a 25th-place finish in the standings in 2009; zero championships.
These are desperate times for Earnhardt. At 35, time is running out on him to change the course of his Cup career.
But if there’s one man who can help, it’s Hendrick, the brilliant manager who has won nine championships with three different drivers and most recently resurrected the career of Mark Martin, the quinquagenarian who came out of retirement and nearly dethroned the seemingly unbeatable Jimmie Johnson.
Recognizing the severity of Earnhardt’s situation, Hendrick has called for all hands on deck of Junior’s No. 88. He’s reassigned engineers, brought in members of his research and development team to focus specifically on Earnhardt’s car, and over the offseason he ordered the merger of the 5 (Martin) and the 88 (Earnhardt) garages, a structure that’s worked well for Hendrick’s other two teams – Johnson and Jeff Gordon.
While not an act of desperation, the merger almost has to be Hendrick’s a-ha moment if things are to turn around for Earnhardt.
A year ago, the 5 and 88 teams were not working in tandem. Their numbers totaled 85 people, but on one side of the garage 43 were working on one thing, while just across the room 42 others were working on the exact same thing. From the vantage point of Martin’s crew chief Alan Gustafson, it was counterproductive.
“You’ll go over the same things that the other guys went over and you won’t get as far,” Gustafson explained. “We needed to improve. We needed to be more efficient. We needed to play off each other more. We needed to make that shop operate as one.”
Getting the people in the shop to work together, however, is only part of the equation.
Earnhardt has to buy in, too. And according to Johnson, Earnhardt has been “on his own little island” since arriving at Hendrick Motorsports in 2008.
“If he really embraces the teammate standpoint and is right there alongside with Mark day in and day out, they’ll get it figured out,” Johnson said. “It may take changes in driving style, a lot of things that aren’t familiar to him, but he’s gonna have every opportunity.”
And so the pressure mounts.
When Earnhardt decided to leave DEI following the 2007 season, the buzz was he would have no more excuses, not driving in Hendrick’s equipment. Then, when his performance started to slip, the blame shifted to his former crew chief Tony Eury Jr., who was finally replaced last May. Now, with Junior and new crew chief Lance McGrew having most of a season under their belts together, and with Hendrick stepping in to address the communication issues, there are no more outs for Junior.
From here forward, it’s on him.
“I’m used to [the pressure],” he said. “There’s days and moments where you feel a lot of pressure. For the most part, I get through the day without a lot of problems.
“I’ve had a pretty good rough patch,” he continued. “Haven’t won hardly any races in the last two to three years. But, you know, I’m 35 years old. If I wanted to, I could probably race another 15 years. I’ve probably got a pretty good chance of putting together another season like I had in 2004 [when he won six races and finished third in the standings] sometime in that 15 year span.”
And if he doesn’t, he says he’s fine with it, not because he doesn’t want to win, but because he likes to think his popularity – the Rolling Stone feature, the spot on MTV Cribs, you know, the kind of things his detractors criticize him for – will have helped introduce the sport to the mainstream. And if that’s his legacy, he’s OK with it.
In other words, he doesn’t need his racing career to be saved.
“I would like to think that I put the sport in front of a lot of people that never would have seen it before,” he explained. “So maybe, you know, like I said, I’m in it to win races and I want – when I’m done, you know, I want everybody to appreciate what I did on the racetrack. But hopefully I can do even bigger things aside from that.”
NASCAR 2010 SEASON PREVIEW
No. 20 Martin Truex Jr.
No. 19 Brian Vickers
No. 18 Kasey Kahne
No. 17 Clint Bowyer
No. 16 David Reutimann
No. 15 Kevin Harvick
No. 14 Ryan Newman
No. 13 Greg Biffle
No. 12 Dale Earnhardt Jr.
No. 11 Jeff Burton
No. 10 Matt Kenseth
No. 9 Juan Pablo Montoya
No. 8 Kurt Busch
No. 7 Mark Martin
No. 6 Carl Edwards
No. 5 Kyle Busch
No. 4 Tony Stewart
No. 3 Jeff Gordon
No. 2 Denny Hamlin
No. 1 Jimmie Johnson
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Pair Of Crashes Mar Daytona Practice
Associated Press
February 10 , 2010
DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. — Jimmie Johnson's quest for a fifth straight NASCAR championship will begin in a backup car.
Johnson was involved in the latest wreck at Daytona International Speedway on Wednesday, doing enough damage that crew chief Chad Knaus decided to scrap the primary car for Sunday's season-opening race.
"I was just riding along and thought everything was fine, and the next thing you know, I was in the middle of it," Johnson said.
Joey Logano and Kyle Busch also got caught up in the accident during the second practice at Daytona International Speedway. Mike Bliss triggered it when he lost control of his car coming out of a turn. Bliss turned sideways, seemingly got tapped by 1990 Daytona 500 champion Derrick Cope, then shot across the track and rammed into Logano.
Logano also was forced into a backup car. Busch's car sustained minor damage, and he was back on the track a few minutes later.
The two practice sessions had several other harrowing moments.
Clint Bowyer started a three-car accident in the first session when he cut a tire, hit the wall and collected David Reutimann and Cope. Bowyer and Reutimann went to backup cars.
Two-time Daytona 500 winner Michael Waltrip and fan favorite Dale Earnhardt Jr. narrowly avoided wrecks in the second session. Waltrip spun and drove through the infield grass, but managed to not hit anything. Earnhardt got a little sideways after getting bumped from behind by Denny Hamlin, but Junior got the car straightened out at 190 mph.
Earnhardt said over his radio that Hamlin "doesn't know how to bump draft."
"I think he made an aggressive move with [Jamie McMurray] and I followed him," Hamlin said. "I think I was pushing him and he was steering all over the racetrack and it just may have lifted his car up at that point. But a relatively good save."
A few minutes later, when asked about his bump-drafting technique, Hamlin joked that, "Dale Jr. said I [stink] at it."
Last month, NASCAR relaxed its rules on bump-drafting and gave drivers permission to be more aggressive. The changes have been evident at Daytona.
Hamlin and Daytona 500 pole-sitter Mark Martin started a seven-car accident last week during the first practice for the exhibition Budweiser Shootout. Logano, Busch, Bowyer, Greg Biffle and McMurray also were part of that one. The accident prompted Biffle to say, "Trust me, we're not finished."
He was right.
The Shootout ended under caution after Jeff Gordon hit Biffle and started an eight-car accident behind eventual winner Kevin Harvick. Throw in the latest practice sessions, and Thursday's 150-mile qualifying races could provide drivers with chaotic rides.
"I think it will be relatively wide," Hamlin said. "You'll see it's very, very wild, but it's going to be mid-pack around those guys that are fighting to get in."
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