Stewart-Grubb pairing full of potential
RICHMOND, Va. – Tony Stewart confirmed Friday that Hendrick Motorsports team engineer Darian Grubb will be his NASCAR Sprint Cup crew chief at Stewart-Haas Racing in 2009, and Grubb says he's excited to have a chance to help build what he expects to be a championship effort from the ground up.
In making the announcement Friday at Richmond International Raceway, Stewart said that Grubb was someone he already feels comfortable with. He's bringing in an engineer with experience working with the Hendrick chassis and engines, which the Stewart-Haas team will use in the series next season. And he's joining ranks with someone he already believes in.
Stewart spent 10 years working with crew chief Greg Zipadelli at Joe Gibbs Racing, winning 32 races and two Cup titles together. He's never regularly worked with anyone else in NASCAR.
That changes next season - and Stewart seems comfortable with that. He also says that he has encouraged his future crew chief to talk to his current one to learn more about the driver himself.
"It's about relationships," Stewart said Friday. "You build a chemistry, and that's something that Zippy and I, we had to do a good bit."
Stewart says that he and Grubb had a lengthy dinner in California last week, and he actually suggested that his future crew chief speak with his current one to learn the nuances of what Stewart means when he suggests changes to the car during the race. He says that will help the team both prepare for races and be better together in them.
Grubb says that he considers Zipadelli a good friend and that he's completely comfortable picking up the phone to call him.
Grubb has experience calling a race from atop the pit box, having won races with Jimmie Johnson in 2006 as he filled in when Chad Knaus was serving a six-race suspension. He was tabbed to be Casey Mears' 2007 crew chief but opted to return to his engineering role. But now, after six years within the Hendrick fold, he's ready to take on the leadership role again.
Grubb says that during his tenure at Hendrick, he's had chances to go to other teams but wasn't tempted before this offer.
"I've never wanted to step outside the Hendrick Motorsports operation until this opportunity came up," he said. "I'm just extremely excited about being able to continue my Hendrick knowledge and being able to use those chassis and engines and everything else going forward and just keep building this organization's strength outside of Hendrick Motorsports. This opportunity is a great chance for me to be able to step out and be able to almost take off on my own and try to help build up the organization and surround myself with good people that are capable of going to win championships."
Now, these two men from championship organizations will attempt to craft their own effort and build their own title-contending group. They've obviously been actively involved in racing for years, but they've also seen teams being built. They've watched some of the best in the business and plan to use the knowledge they've gained observing owners Rick Hendrick and Joe Gibbs as they build their own group next season.
But they also want to build something unique - something that is solely their creation and an operation that can contend for titles.
Grubb says he just couldn't pass up "the opportunity here to go forward with Tony and Stewart-Haas Racing and the chance to build a
championship-contending team and go out and just fight from the ground up and build something with all these people and get it built around my past history with Hendrick Motorsports."
Now Stewart and Grubb are preparing to find out just how well they will work together. Stewart will adjust to the change from a crew chief who learned by working on the cars and one with an engineering background. He thinks it will be an easy adjustment.
"It's hard to know exactly how it's going to work," Stewart said. "But you just look at Darian's past and you look at what he accomplished with the 25 car [with Mears] and in the times when he had to go over and work with the 48 cars [of Johnson]. The results are what we look at. It's not necessarily how you get to the end of the road to get to your goal; it's just the fact that he can get to the goal, that we have that confidence in him.
"I think with this car it's a more engineering-type background that it seems like you have to have anyway."
Only time will tell, though, what will work.
"It's hard to know how it's going to work, right now, between us and how his style is going to be different to Greg's," Stewart said. "At the end of the day, we've already got the major ingredient there, and that's that we both have the same passion and desire to be successful and win races and win championships. That part is something you don't have to fix. How we get to that end goal is yet to be determined, but at least we're focused in the same direction right now."
Meanwhile, Grubb's presence will be missed with his old teams. He's worked closely with the team of Dale Earnhardt Jr. and crew chief Tony Eury Jr., and the driver says he will be missed.
"It will be difficult to replace Darian. It will be difficult to get what we've gotten out of him," Earnhardt Jr. said. "He was a good balancing
act for me and Tony Jr. if we got off track or something. He was perfect for the role, really. He'll be definitely very difficult to replace."
