Motorsports

Quiet start to a noisy future

By BRANT JAMES
Published October 30, 2007

Though he has three more weeks as a member of the team his father founded, Dale Earnhardt Jr. gets ready to take the No. 5 for a test, his first official drive for Hendrick Motorsports.
	[Getty Images]

HAMPTON, Ga. - The new era began understatedly at 9:16 a.m. That didn't make it any less momentous for the principals.

Dale Earnhardt Jr., replete in a white and red Adidas firesuit and still smarting from a jarring crash in the Nextel Cup race on Sunday, shook hands with Hendrick Motorsports engineers huddled around his new race cars in the garage at Atlanta Motor Speedway.

This Car of Tomorrow test would be Earnhardt's first official on-track duty for NASCAR's most successful organization, which he'll join at season-end in three weeks, leaving behind the team his late father founded. Monday was about learning to mesh NASCAR's most popular driver with a system that could make him one of its most competitive. He said the physical act of driving new cars, though they were in subtle ways different and better than his DEI machines, was the easy part of the transition.

"It's like going to a new school, making new friends," he said. "It's hard to make friends. It's hard to build relationships. I had such a great rapport and great relationship with all the guys on my team I'm currently with, and to have to go through the challenge of that and building that respect and trust with a whole new group's going to be tough."

Even the one familiar face was different. His cousin and crew chief, Tony Eury Jr., who left DEI three weeks ago to begin the transition, had completed the appearance aspect of his Hendrick makeover. Gone were the red shirts of sponsor Budweiser and camouflaged No. 8 baseball caps. His short-cropped hair was tidy. He seemed assimilated in an olive team button-down shirt and black jacket. A grin set off the ensemble. A metal clip board probably held all sorts of new secrets, the kind that helped Hendrick to six championships at NASCAR's highest level.

"I've been looking forward to this day," he said.

After tucking his sunglasses on a shelf, Earnhardt Jr. strode to a No. 5 Chevrolet swathed in a paint scheme reminiscent of the one Hendrick Motorsports (then called All-Star Racing) first used in 1984. He'd requested the look as way of commemorating the moment.

Driver Clint Bowyer stood behind a cinderblock half wall in the garage bay with hands on hips, taking in a spectacle that has intrigued drivers as much as fans.

"It's kind of weird seeing him over there," Bowyer said. "I was surprised. I figured he'd be in the 88 car. The 5, I didn't know what was going on."

Though Earnhardt Jr. will drive the No. 88, he tested a No. 5 built for Kyle Busch and another especially for himself. Earnhardt Jr. has a connection to that number, also, one that has given this all a storybook quality. His maternal grandfather, the late Robert Gee, was a fabricator at Hendrick's shop who helped the fellow Palmer Springs, Va., native enter the sport and co-owned the car that won Hendrick's first NASCAR Busch Series race in 1983. It was driven by Earnhardt Sr.

"I was talking to (Earnhardt Jr.) last night," Hendrick said. We called to make sure he was okay after the wreck and I said, 'I'm coming tomorrow.' He said, 'You're coming to the test?' I said, 'Yeah, I want to be there and get a picture beside that car.'"

Like most owners, Hendrick only attends test at ... "Daytona, Speedweeks," he smiled, nostalgic, "... and when Junior shows up for this deal. It's a special day for us and I felt like I wanted to be here."

Normalcy had seemingly returned as Earnhardt Jr. readied himself to drive, wetting and inserting his earplugs. Everything could be from rote now.

"My name's Jim," said mechanic Jim Jenkins, extending a hand for shaking and a black helmet. This could take a while.

 CHASE FOR THE CHAMPIONSHIP: ATLANTA

WINNERS

1.Jimmie Johnson: Series-best eighth victory trims the gulf to leader Jeff Gordon from 53 points to just nine, which equates to the difference between finishing fifth or seventh in a race. The defending series champion has made this chase a virtual dead heat.

2. Jeff Gordon: The leader is still the leader. Johnson fell a record eight points short of the championship in 2004, so he knows every point matters.

3. Clint Bowyer: Still drafting off the breakaway Hendrick drivers. Johnson and Gordon are cognizant of how the second-year driver has stayed within pouncing range.

LOSERS

1. Martin Truex Jr.: Contending for the title was a foregone conclusion weeks ago, but a No. 1 Chevrolet that led a race-high 135 laps was ruined after being rear-ended on a bizarre restart where leader Denny Hamlin stalled, bunching up the leaders.

WHAT WE LEARNED

Or maybe it was re-learned: Johnson, now a winner of consecutive races and four of the last nine, is the master of blistering late-season runs.

THE BIG PICTURE

Neither Gordon nor Johnson has won at Texas Motor Speedway, site of Sunday's third-to-last race, and both had disheartening spring runs there. Gordon won the pole and led a race-high 174 laps before brushing the wall with 23 orbits remaining and finished fourth. Johnson crashed 260 laps in. Johnson has six top-10s in eight starts at the 1.5-mile track.

[Last modified October 30, 2007, 11:14:27]