Hendrick, Earnhardt Jr. sticking with McGrew as crew chief
Dale Earnhardt Jr.’s season has been filled with problems. His cars haven’t been good enough. When they are, he fades during the race and doesn’t get the finish he expected. And his confidence has sunk with every lost spot in the standings.
Those are significant issues, and Hendrick Motorsports owner Rick Hendrick is giving Lance McGrew more than five months to fix them.
McGrew spent five months as “interim” crew chief for Earnhardt Jr., but the 41-year-old veteran had the “interim” tag removed Oct. 30.
“Lance has been part of the solution, not the problem,” Earnhardt Jr. said.
With his three teammates all making the Chase and having won a race, Earnhardt Jr. says his equipment should be strong enough for him to thrive. But since moving to Hendrick after the 2007 season, he has won only one race. He made the Chase in 2008, but missed it this season.
He was 19th in the standings when McGrew replaced Earnhardt Jr.’s cousin, Tony Eury Jr., as crew chief. By the time McGrew earned the full-time job, Earnhardt Jr. had slipped to 24th.
“He tells me sincerely that he believes in my talent as a driver and with the right situation, we can have a lot of success,” Earnhardt Jr. said. “Being a crew chief is a very, very tough job and very thankless and Lance understands that as well as anyone. I feel confident that he can handle the pressures of the job, and I feel confident with him on the box. I feel like he is going to make the right calls.”
The announcement of McGrew’s promotion to full-time crew chief was a slight surprise considering Earnhardt Jr. said two weeks earlier that he was “at the end of his rope” with his struggles on the track.
“I can’t speak for everybody on the team, but my confidence was pretty down earlier,” Earnhardt Jr. said. “It’s gotten better. It’s still nowhere near where I want it to be. But every week we seem to improve on that.
“I’m really impatient about it. It’s just a matter of time. If we can string one or two solid, serious runs together before the end of the season, I think it would do a world of good for us. One top-five for this team – there’s no telling how much that could do for us confidence-wise.”
Hendrick believes McGrew can handle the job.
“I’m excited about it,” Hendrick said. “We’ve been kind of idling along in neutral waiting for … some good results, but if you can be committed to each other after the kind of [year] we’ve been through, it’s real easy to be positive when you’re going through good times.
“But if the chemistry can work and you can see that you’re getting better and everybody is focused on it, I think it was definitely the right thing to do.”
