Rick Hendrick has confidence in Dale Earnhardt Jr., Tony Eury Jr. combination
Hendrick Motorsports owner Rick Hendrick (left) talks with his driver, Dale Earnhardt Jr. at Daytona International Speedway earlier this year. // David Griffin, NASCAR Scene
CONCORD, N.C. – Team owner Rick Hendrick says he doesn’t think Dale Earnhardt Jr.’s problems on the race track are the result of his pairing with crew chief (and cousin) Tony Eury Jr.
And, Hendrick said during qualifying Friday at Lowe’s Motor Speedway, he doesn’t anticipate a shakeup in personnel within the No. 88 team despite fan sentiment that suggests such a move would improve the performance of the sport’s most popular driver.
“If I’m going to do something [I know] in my heart that’s not going to make it any better, just to make a lot of people happy, then I’m screwing the whole deal up,” Hendrick, owner of Hendrick Motorsports, said.
“I don’t have a better answer than what we have. That’s the simplest thing I can tell you. With the guys I’ve got working on it, I don’t have a better answer right now. If we need to do something different, we will, and I won’t be the only one making that decision.”
Earnhardt Jr., the sport’s most popular figure, has three top-10 finishes this season, his second with Hendrick Motorsports, but has six finishes of 20th or worse. As a result, he’s 18th in points heading into Sunday’s Coca-Cola 600 at LMS.
Hendrick teammates Jeff Gordon, Jimmie Johnson and Mark Martin all have at least one win this season, and are first, fourth and 11th in points, respectively.
“If Tony Jr. was the only guy on that [pit] box making decisions, if Tony Jr. was the only guy in that shop talking to Dale, I say ‘Yeah, maybe,’” Hendrick said. “But that’s not the case. ... What you don’t see is all these engineers picking this thing apart, showing it to Dale and Dale going to Chicago [to test] with some engineers from the 5 car [of teammate Mark Martin] and just hitting right on the combination. And Tony was the guy doing it.
“Tony was the guy a year ago when that was the best car in my shop. Until the guys, the guys are smart over there and I’m not one of them, all say, ‘Hey, it’s time for us to do something different,’ then we’ll do it. But we’re working hard and I feel it.
“... I never know what the best combination is. We’ve been successful at putting together combinations that work and I believe that we’re not ready to make a change right now.”
Hendrick admitted that it’s too easy to stick with what has previously worked for a team when things begin to go awry. And the fact that NASCAR has curtailed testing this season has meant that the No. 88 team has had to try and make gains on the fly.
“We’re having to ... convert and test at a race track [on race weekends],” he said. “You’re trying to qualify, practice. Your mind is telling you to go back to what you know, what has worked [in the past], but you know deep down that that’s a half a second slower. So it’s not going to work any more.
“Every driver I’ve ever had in every situation goes through that period. Jimmie did, they started testing after Las Vegas last year, worked their ass off and turned it around. Jeff, the same thing. He didn’t like the feel, didn’t like the car. We changed some people, too, but we had a plan, we followed that plan and we implemented those things.”
Gordon, a four-time Cup champion, was winless in 2008, ending a 14-year run of winning one or more races. Hendrick noted that despite that setback, “we didn’t rip the team up, we just worked on it and fixed it.
“I know the fans are impatient and they want [Earnhardt Jr.] to run good, the sport needs him to run good, we need him to run good and our sponsors need him to run good,” Hendrick said. “He wants to run good. And the harder we work sometimes it looks like the further behind we get. But I really feel like we’ve turned the corner and I look for a good race here Sunday.
“Just to say, ‘OK let’s get this guy and put him over here, put this guy over here,’ you can hurt more than you can help. At a point where you have tried everything you know and you can’t get it, it’s time to do something.
“But that time’s not here.”
