Team owner Hendrick holds top three spots in Chase, yet laments Earnhardt Jr. being left out
Rick Hendrick admitted before Jimmie Johnson’s victory at Lowe’s Motor Speedway that he’s having some trouble enjoying Johnson’s success, and that of teammates Mark Martin and Jeff Gordon.
Guess having three solid cars isn’t good enough for Hendrick. And it’s especially not good enough if Dale Earnhardt Jr. is struggling. Since he hired Earnhardt Jr. more than two years ago, Hendrick could feel a knot in his stomach that gets bigger each week Earnhardt Jr. doesn’t have a good result.
Earnhardt Jr. is the son of one of the sport’s biggest icons and the pressure is on Hendrick to lift the pressure off Earnhardt Jr. and get him back in sync.
If Hendrick doesn’t get Earnhardt Jr. back in victory lane and contending for titles, will he be remembered for that failure as much as the nine championships?
OK, he only has eight championships, but it’s pretty much a foregone conclusion that if Johnson doesn’t win his record-setting fourth straight title this year, either Martin or Gordon will bring home the trophy for Hendrick. Johnson, Martin and Gordon were ranked 1-3 in the Sprint Cup standings after the Charlotte race.
Hendrick says all the right things about Earnhardt Jr., talking about how he doesn’t just want to get that ship straightened, but emphatically vowing that he will get it back on course.
Hendrick spent almost 10 minutes talking about Earnhardt Jr. instead of the two Hendrick Motorsports drivers starting on the front row and leading the points – Johnson and Martin – prior to the race. He understands that until Earnhardt Jr. is running near the front, his entire organization can’t avoid the question.
“I hate not to see one of our teams reach their potential, because everybody in the engine shop, the chassis shop touches that car, and I have to face the sponsors and I have to look the crew people in their eyes, and it’s a really hard thing to do to celebrate when you know in the back of your mind there are things that you’ve got to work on,” Hendrick says.
“But that’s just – you’re going to have that. Until four people can cross that finish line tied and you’ve got a photo finish and declare they’re all equal, then it’s going to be that way, and you’ve got to learn to live with it.”
Earnhardt Jr.’s season gnaws at Hendrick because it’s more than just Junior, son of seven-time champion Dale Earnhardt, driving that No. 88 car. It’s also the grandson of Robert Gee, who helped Hendrick get into the sport as a partner and an employee.
There’s a personal interest for Hendrick, and it would be thrilling for him to not only be the one to win a championship with Earnhardt Jr. but also be the one who engineered the revitalization of the sport’s most popular driver.
That won’t happen this year. So Hendrick needs to just enjoy this one. Enjoy the 2009 championship with a guy named Johnson (and if not him, then Gordon or Martin). And then keep working to spark the comeback of Earnhardt Jr.
It might be hard to envision Earnhardt Jr. winning a Cup championship in the future. Who really thinks that Junior can go from struggling to finish in the top 20 to winning a Sprint Cup title?
Hendrick thinks he can. And for good reason. Hendrick’s got a kid who grew up in California racing motorcycles and then off-road events on the brink of winning his fourth consecutive Cup title. And that off-road racer is doing it for a tobacco farmer’s son who grew up in tiny Palmer Springs, Va., who 25 years ago no one would have predicted would become one of the most successful owners in all of sports.
