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Haas, Stewart show it’s easy to build a winning team
By Kenny Bruce - Assistant Managing Editor
Thursday, June 18, 2009
So you want to become a car owner in NASCAR’s Sprint Cup Series, but you don’t know the best way to get started, huh? You don’t want to be just any owner. You want to be the owner of a contending team, a winning team, a team that gets to spray champagne in victory lane and attend postrace news conferences and receive congratulatory phone calls afterward.
No problem. It’s easy. And here’s all you need to do: Commit this list to memory, then rip this page out, tear it into tiny strips and burn them. Because we don’t want everyone knowing just how simple it is to go from zero to hero.
Step No. 1: Hire at least a dozen different drivers, of varying levels of talent and desire, to drive your cars. This might take some time. Maybe as many as seven years.
No sweat, though. Seven years will go by in a flash when your guys are working 24/7 just to keep their heads above water.
Step No. 2: Accomplish practically no noteworthy results in an effort to keep attention off your team. Treat top-five finishes like they’re the plague. It’s OK to post the occasional top-10, but don’t get carried away. One or two a season should suffice.
And don’t worry if your driver occasionally falls out of races early. That’s not always a bad thing. Think of it this way: Now your crew can get back to the shop and get an early start on the following week’s event.
Just to play it safe and make certain that folks know you’re still around, it’s OK to occasionally have your car or cars confiscated by NASCAR. After all, any publicity is good publicity, right?
Step No. 3: Once you’ve proven beyond a shadow of a doubt that you have one of the most overlooked teams in the sport, announce that you’ve given half of your organization to a talented driver who has never owned a Cup team in his life.
That’s right. GIVE it to him.
Then sit back and enjoy the ride.
Maybe that’s not the best way to go about it, but that’s how team owner Gene Haas saw his Haas CNC Racing become Stewart-Haas Racing and Stewart-Haas Racing became the surprise story of 2009.
OK, but how did new co-owner Tony Stewart do it? That’s the question, in some form or fashion, that has been asked of Stewart time and again this year.
How has Stewart, a two-time Cup champion, been able to transform an organization of also-rans into an honest-to-goodness contender?
And let’s be honest here, Haas-CNC Racing, before Stewart’s arrival late last year as co-owner/driver, had also-ran written all over it. The team, which debuted in 2002, saw a dozen different drivers slide behind the steering wheel. They made a combined 284 starts in NASCAR’s Cup series. And recorded a not-so-impressive list of 14 top-10 finishes and one single top-five. It wasn’t low-buck, by any means. Just low results.
But after just 14 races, Stewart already had one victory (Pocono), was atop the point standings (for the second consecutive week) and teammate Ryan Newman was fifth in points.
Stewart will tell you that it’s all about people. Hire the right people to do the right jobs, and everything else will take care of itself. But it has got to be more than that. After all, there are several teams in the series that have incredibly intelligent employees on staff.
Some will say it’s the team’s association with Hendrick Motorsports. After all, a Hendrick driver (Jimmie Johnson) has won the last three Sprint Cup championships, teammate Jeff Gordon, a four-time champ himself, had led the points for most of the season, and Mark Martin, long given up for the retirement home, is back to winning races and contending for a spot in the Chase For The Sprint Cup.
But if the reason’s that simple, why hasn’t Hendrick driver Dale Earnhardt Jr. been contending for wins and enjoying life in the top 12?
Stewart probably doesn’t know the real reason. He’s been smart enough to hire the right people, and the association with Hendrick certainly hasn’t hurt. But even he had no idea if all the parts and pieces and personnel would result in a contending team or an organization with plenty of ideas but no direction.
Until now.
Which leaves only one question unanswered. Just how good can these guys be?
2009 Sprint Cup Race for the Chase Standings
Driver Standings after the Checker O'Reilly Auto Parts 500
| 1 | Jimmie Johnson | 6492 |
| 2 | Mark Martin | -108 |
| 3 | Jeff Gordon | -169 |
| 4 | Kurt Busch | -211 |
| 5 | Tony Stewart | -285 |
| 6 | Juan Pablo Montoya | -289 |
| 7 | Greg Biffle | -321 |
| 8 | Denny Hamlin | -352 |
| 9 | Ryan Newman | -411 |
| 10 | Kasey Kahne | -476 |
| 11 | Carl Edwards | -520 |
| 12 | Brian Vickers | -666 |
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