Tony Eury Sr. says son is beaten down over reassignment
Former Dale Earnhardt Jr. crew chief Tony Eury Jr. was reassigned within Hendrick Motorsports on Wednesday.Daytona 500 practice
// Jim Fluharty, NASCAR Scene
DOVER, Del. – Tony Eury Sr. said his son is “beat down pretty bad” after being replaced as crew chief for Dale Earnhardt Jr. and the Hendrick Motorsports No. 88 Sprint Cup Series team.
Team owner Rick Hendrick announced he was replacing Tony Eury Jr., Earnhardt Jr.’s cousin, May 28, three days after the team finished a woeful 40th in the Coca-Cola 600 at Lowe’s Motor Speedway. Eury Jr. will move to the Hendrick research and development department.
“I don’t know what’s going to happen,” Eury Sr. said after his driver, Brad Keselowski, won Saturday’s Nationwide Series race at Dover
International Speedway. “I brought [Tony Jr.] along ... I had a fire in me when he came along. He saw that fire and I worked him like a dog. That’s no lie. He was my engineer guy, because we didn’t have an engineer [at Dale Earnhardt Inc.].”
Eury Jr. served as car chief for Earnhardt Jr. in the Nationwide Series as well as when the team made the move to Cup in 2000. Eury Sr. was the crew chief for Earnhardt Jr. during the time Eury Jr. was the car chief.
“Probably nobody in that garage works harder than him,” Eury Sr. said. “He has worked so hard ... he’s worn slap out. My advice to him when this happened was to go to the R&D deal, get a breath of air and decide what you want to do at the end of the year. [Decide] if you want to stay at Hendrick Motorsports.”
Eury Jr. had served as Earnhardt’s crew chief since the final 10 races of the 2005 season. During that time, Earnhardt Jr. scored just two of his 18 career Cup wins. He has made the Chase twice during that time, finishing fifth in 2006 and 12th in 2008, and fans of the sport’s most popular driver – known as the Junior Nation – have been calling for Eury Jr.’s removal in online chat rooms and message boards.
Lance McGrew has been named interim crew chief and will begin those duties following the Dover race. Brian Whitesell is overseeing the operation for the Dover race weekend only. Eury Jr. will replace McGrew, who runs Hendrick’s R&D team with Keselowski competing in a handful of Cup events.
Heading into Sunday’s Autism Speaks 400, Earnhardt Jr. had managed only three top-10 finishes in 12 starts and was 19th in the point standings.
“He’s beat himself to death,” Eury Sr. said of his son. “You know, he stood up there for awhile. Took it pretty good. I thought he was doing good, he was taking it for a long time but then it started getting to him. And when it started getting to him, it really went bad then. It was getting to Dale Jr.
“I love both of them like a son. I’ve got two sons there, Tony and Dale Jr. I’m kind of in the middle of it. Honestly, I told them both they’d be better off apart.
“Family is hard to work with in this business. It’s a cutthroat business. If you don’t perform, you’re gone. And the crew chief is always
the first one gone.”
Still, he said, Eury Jr. will “bounce back.”
“He’s a strong guy, a smart guy,” he said. “Somebody in this garage needs him, whether it’s Hendrick Motorsports or whoever.
“He’ll be back, he’ll be strong and he’ll win races.”
