September 8, 2009
By Allen Madding
With the Pep Boys 500 at Atlanta Motor Speedway near Hampton, Georgia -- being moved to Labor Day Weekend this year, the fall race at Atlanta has taken a significant role in the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series Chase for the Cup.
For the teams in the Chase or almost in the Chase, the race is the next to last opportunity to garner a position in the Chase and to acquire points.
For those without a bid for the Chase, the race signifies an opportunity to begin figuring out what went wrong in the 2009 NASCAR Sprint Cup Series season and an opportunity to begin making changes to try to better things for 2010.
It has been no secret that Richard Childress Racing has not had a banner year this season. Coming into Atlanta, Clint Bowyer was 15th in the standings. Burton was 18th, Casey Mears 20th and Kevin Harvick 24th. This past week, the Childress organization announced that it had begun making internal changes to try to address their competiveness.
Will Lind, long time team member dating back to the career of the late Dale Earnhardt, will become the business director for competition, Scott Miller was named the new director of competition, and a new crew chief will be named at a later date to replace Miller atop Burton’s pit box for 2010.
The Childress changes did not stop there. During the Pep Boys 500, it became obvious to those on pit road that changes were afoot. The jack man on Bowyer’s No. 33 BB&T Chevrolet was wearing a Shell Oil fire suit – the telltale sign that he was a Harvick crewmember. But, it did not stop there. The rear tire carrier and rear tire changer servicing Kevin Harvick’s No. 29 Shell Chevrolet was wearing BB&T fire suits. To watch the crew work was a thing of art. The two BB&T crewmembers would change tires on Harvick’s car, disconnect the pit gun, and take off running to Bowyer’s pit to change tires on the No. 33.
Harvick’s pit stops told the tale of a struggling organization as the night wore on as he several times pitted in the lead and would rejoin the field in third or fifth place. But, it is obvious that Childress is willing to make the changes necessary to correct the deficiencies in the organization for 2010.
The big question of the night was why so many teams were struggling with loose race cars. Hornish spun coming off Turn 4 while several cars were seen coming off the turns sideways and having close calls with spinning out.
The answer was Goodyear. As noted by Kenny Wallace, Goodyear brought a different tire than what they had tested with earlier in the year leaving the teams guessing on the fix.
Even during qualifying teams were surprised by how greasy the track felt with these tires. Kyle Busch screamed on the radio during qualifying that he wanted the name of the “Goodyear Guy” because the tires were inconsistent.
During the race, Busch’s crew tried to encouraging him by saying. “You got to hit it perfect 248 more times”, referring to the line into the turns. Busch replied, “I can’t even do it once.”
Busch’s night was an accordion experience of being extremely fast on new tires and then struggling with a terribly loose car. On lap 157, he told the crew, “The car is driving me at this point”, and “It’s horrible. I can’t drive it” on lap 159. On lap 165, he commented, “Oh look. The 17 that is 2 laps down has got me now.”
Dale Earnhardt, Jr. also struggled with getting the No. 88 National Guard Chevrolet to get bite into the track. On lap 203, he commented, “I’m ready to go to bed…slick #%$ track…124 laps my $%@”. On lap 282, he posed the question, “What the hell was Goodyear thinking?”
Jamie McMurray struggled with the track and tire as well. On lap 241, he reported, “The harder I drive, the slower I go.”
Jeff Gordon spent time at the back and front of the field and noted, “It is like an accordion – back and forth all night except for the 29. They’ve got something figured out.”
Harvick, Montoya and Kasey Kahne’s teams seemed to have the setup figured out, but even with their cars, it was apparent that every time the crews bolted on a set of Goodyear tires that the car’s handling would change significantly.
The final yellow flew when Bowyer went sliding through the infield while teammate Kevin Harvick was leading. The subsequent double file restart provided just what Kasey Kahne needed to wrestle the lead away from Harvick. Despite losing the win with 12 laps to go, Harvick’s run at Atlanta showed promise for the Childress organization for the not too distant future.
The thoughts and ideas expressed by this writer or any other writer on Insider Racing News, are not necessarily the views of the staff and/or management of IRN.
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