DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. -- Richie Gilmore was smiling Wednesday morning at Daytona International Speedway when the three primary cars carrying ECRT engines were in the top 10 on the Preseason Thunder drafting speed chart. (test speeds)

But that was nothing compared to the exhilaration Gilmore felt on Monday morning when the new season's first test opened, as it marked the first time he'd been to a racetrack in more than three months.

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Gilmore, who last season was Dale Earnhardt Inc.'s vice president of motorsports, suffered an aneurysm on the opening day of practice at Talladega Superspeedway, and had to be airlifted to a hospital on Oct. 5.

He recovered well but had not received clearance to fly by the season closing weekend at Homestead-Miami Speedway, so Daytona was his first time back at the track.

"It's good to be back, and it's good to see everybody," Gilmore said on Monday.

And it was a total throwback effort for Gilmore, as he was overseeing the engines in the seven cars from four teams being fielded at the test by DEI and Richard Childress Racing.

"I'm happy to be back working with the engines," Gilmore said. "What I did [as vice president of motorsports] was good experience and I enjoyed it, but I really am enjoying every day going to work and having my hands back in the engine side of it -- that's where my passion is."

Gilmore worked eight years in Hendrick Motorsports' engine department before being hired in 1998 by the late Dale Earnhardt at DEI to be his head engine builder.

Last season Gilmore was an integral part of the engine department collaboration between DEI and RCR whose result is ECRT.

"My official title is COO of ECRT, which is Earnhardt Childress Racing Technologies," Gilmore said. "We have a facility up at RCR, which does all the Cup engines; and at Earnhardt's we do all the Truck and [Nationwide] engines.

"So at the old RCR facility we do all of the development work and all of the Cup programs. Right now we have seven [full-time] programs, and we have nine coming down here for Daytona, with two lease programs -- one for Kirk Shelmerdine and one for Stanton Barrett."

RCR's three teams are again the No. 07 for Clint Bowyer, the No. 29 for Kevin Harvick and the No. 31 for Jeff Burton; while DEI's teams include Paul Menard's No. 15, Martin Truex Jr.'s No. 1, Regan Smith's No. 01 and the No. 8 to be split by Mark Martin and Aric Almirola. (Continued)