Lance McGrew ready for battle as Dale Earnhardt Jr.'s next crew chief
Hendrick Motorsports' Lance McGrew (left) and Brian Whitesell talk to the media Friday morning at Dover International Speedway. // David Griffin, NASCAR Scene
DOVER, Del. – Lance McGrew knows that being Dale Earnhardt Jr.’s crew chief won’t be easy.
McGrew, who has served as a crew chief mostly in the Nationwide Series as well as for a year with Brian Vickers in the Sprint Cup Series, takes over as Earnhardt Jr.’s crew chief beginning next week at Pocono Raceway. Tony Eury Jr., Earnhardt Jr.’s cousin and former crew chief, is taking McGrew’s spot in the research and development department at Hendrick Motorsports.
McGrew brings substantial experience to the challenge, having worked with Brian Vickers, Kyle Busch, Mark Martin and Tony Stewart in addition to Earnhardt Jr. at various times.
“i don’t know if any crew chief would sit here and tell you it’s not a little daunting to have the most popular driver in your stable,” McGrew said Friday morning at Dover International Speedway. “I have been very fortunate to work with a lot of different drivers, seen a lot of different personalities. It’s going to be extremely challenging, and it’s going to require a lot of work – not as much from an equipment side but just on a personal side because I feel like you have to have a relationship with your driver, and I feel like you have to have a relationship with your team to be successful.
“For me, I’m not the most outgoing person in the whole world, and the media blitz is not what I’d prefer to be doing right now. But it’s part of the job, and it’s something I’ll have to work on as well.”
Earnhardt Jr. worked with McGrew for a couple of races in the Nationwide Series series but doesn’t have the rapport he had with Eury, who worked with Earnhardt Jr. as a car chief for five years and as crew chief for 120 races at both Dale Earnhardt Inc. and Hendrick Motorsports.
But with the driver having one of his worst seasons, sitting 19th in the standings and 203 points out of 12th, the cutoff for NASCAR’s postseason Chase For The Sprint Cup, team owner Rick Hendrick announced the crew-chief change Thursday.
McGrew and Earnhardt Jr. talked for the first time Thursday night since the decision.
“I will ask different questions [than Eury],” McGrew said. “Obviously there is a lot of pressure here because it is Dale Jr. and because it is such a big deal. Constantly being under the microscope, having millions of people listening to you what you say on the radio, obviously you have to be aware of that. As we grow together, I believe that the communication will come.”
McGrew has spent the last three seasons working as a fill-in crew chief for those suspended or when Hendrick would run an additional Cup or Nationwide car as well as working with the Hendrick test team. Does he want the job full time?
“Ultimately, when you’re presented an opportunity like this, you dive in and go,” McGrew said.
Team owner Rick Hendrick said McGrew will be allowed to win the job permanently, but he would like the team to make the Chase or at least show significant improvement.
“It would be landmark for [making the Chase] to happen, as history shows where they are in points at this particular time,” McGrew said. “But nobody has come from as far back as Mark Martin [from early in the season] to make the Chase, and he has performed extremely well. We’re going to do a really good job of leaning on our teammates and getting good advice from the right people, and we’ll see how it goes from there.
“Obviously the performance on the track is the bottom line, and that’s what we’re shooting to improve on.”
Brian Whitesell, team manager for the Earnhardt Jr. and Mark Martin teams, will guide the team this weekend as McGrew works with Brad Keselowski. Whitesell said Earnhardt Jr. has all the resources he needs to be successful.
“Tony Jr. and the entire team is very talented,” Whitesell said. “That part of it was under control. What wasn’t working is we just weren’t getting the results. The equipment is there. Everything that we needed is in place. There’s no substantial differences in how the 88 is being run versus the other teams.
“Personalities and the fact of them being family may have been a factor. But it was just time to do something different, and now was the time to do it.”
Whitesell said he wasn’t sure exactly would work, but he knows what needs to happen on race day.
“We need to give him a feel that he is looking for,” Whitesell said. “That’s part of the communication, that’s part of the personality, that’s a big part of what we’re trying to make better. As far as him getting better, I feel like his talent is exactly where it needs to be. We just need to respond to that with the people and how we’re doing things so he can do his job without worrying if everything else being taken care of.”
