That's where Evernham's slide began. Resting on the laurels and successes of the past, Evernham realized early in the 2007 season that his teams were not where they needed to be.

In 2007, through 29 races, Evernham's three teams have not performed as they did in the past. Riggs has failed to qualify for six races and is mired deep in the owner's points for the season. Kasey Kahne, who had performed so well in 2006, is 22nd in the Nextel Cup standings and Elliott Sadler is 25th.

All of this season, it has left Evernham wondering how he was going to steer the ship away from shallow waters.

"It's killing me, it's been the worst racing year that I've had in my life, but you've got two choices. You can crawl under the covers and bitch and moan or work hard and fix it," said Evernham. "We're working hard to fix it but that doesn't mean that it's not eating your stomach. It's embarrassing. I've said that before, it's the worst year that I've ever had in (Nextel) Cup.

"We think we're understanding a lot of the reasons for it," Evernham continued. "We've had some distractions with growth and partnerships and personal issues and now we've got that all behind us. We're going forward but it's going to take some rebuilding. This is a competitive, competitive sport. It's certainly been tough on me personally, but if you want to be in charge, you have to be a big boy and shoulder that responsibility. We're going to get it fixed."

The challenge for Evernham is knowing where he stands right now. He wasn't sure if he had a car that could win at Talladega on Sunday. Kasey Kahne has finished worse than 20th in 19 of the 29 races this year with no victories. Elliott Sadler's stats are nearly identical, also with 19 of 29 finishes of 20th or worse, no wins.

None of Evernham's teams made the Chase for the Championship this year. So it's not the drivers, it's the cars. Evernham has just flat dropped the ball.

"The biggest thing is -- we under-estimated where we were against the competition," said Evernham. "I think our resources got spread a little thin where we thought we were doing enough. When you're doing all you can and you're pretty sure it's enough and then you find out you're not even close, it's an eye opening experience. And then you can get behind. We have to take responsibility and say we didn't know how much we didn't know. We over estimated where we were at performance wise and we under estimated what some of the competition was stepping up and doing.

"When you go to the first three or four races that you've won before, and you're running 25th to 30th, that tells you pretty quick that something has changed."

So the struggles continue for Evernham, but it's a bet that he'll turn his teams into winning teams again. Evernham is a car guy and the recent merger with George Gillett Jr., will allow him more time to set things right.

The car guy and the pride in Ray Evernham demands it.

Evernham's favorite saying is by the famous football coach, Vince Lombardi.

"I firmly believe that any man's finest hour - his greatest fulfillment to all he holds dear - is that moment when he has worked his heart out in a good cause and he's exhausted on the field of battle - victorious."


Some stats courtesy Wikipedia