Hendrick remains calming voice in gut-churning sport

This week brings us a pretty interesting dichotomy, as the Sprint Cup Series heads into its second off weekend of the season, while the Nationwide Series goes south of the border, to Mexico City.

It's a made-up tale of a hungry man: NASCAR team owner and businessman Rick Hendrick.

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Whatever you could you say about the trials and tribulations of each of his NASCAR seasons, you can say this. His stomach certainly seems to be calm, despite his hunger for NASCAR victories.

Hendrick is a guy, who in the face of whatever turmoil an absolutely tumultuous business and sporting life can throw him, always seems to be a pillar of calming strength -- which we know, comes from faith and family.

Now, I know someone once did a movie on people getting shrunk in size and navigating their way through a human's innards; but if it was up to me, I'd steal the idea and shrink me down a nice little sub and do some cruising through the guts of Hendrick.

The neat thing is, at least externally, Hendrick holds that sense of great calm. On the other hand, you'd like to cruise through his guts and see how they're really dealing with team leader Jeff Gordon's up and down fortunes this season.

Gordon's currently out of the 12-man Chase for the Sprint Cup field, though not by much. But conversely, a year ago he was leading the standings at this point in the season and it was he who had won at Phoenix.

In 2008, it took Hendrick's four Sprint Cup teams eight races to win in a league in which they won half of last year's 36 events. Jimmie Johnson, Hendrick's two-time defending champion, has been "off" this season -- but that's only in the estimation of what he's accomplished the last two years.

Johnson is fourth in the standings after his victory last weekend in Phoenix and while nothing is ever a given, seems ready to march to his seventh consecutive top-10 points finish in Cup racing.

Gut checks aside, the aftermath of Johnson's win shows how Hendrick the owner so strongly influences everything about his race teams.

"It feels good, and I think it's a sign of things to come, but we know there's still work to do," Hendrick said earlier this week. "I'm just proud of the way the entire organization has stepped up and made a collective commitment. When you feel like you're a little behind, it's real easy to get down on yourself, but no one had that attitude.

"Everyone approached it in the right way and pushed forward. We've been working hard; testing and doing all the things we need to be doing. One win doesn't change that. The big focus is making the Chase and competing for the championship.

"We want to be in position to make a push in those last 10 races."

NASCAR's new car might have an inordinately high center of gravity that makes an acceptable handling package a dearly-sought and to this point, not often found commodity.

By the looks of things, though -- that Hendrick gut sub has its CG right where it needs to be to keep the craft upright and full steam ahead.

One of Hendrick's best characteristics is the humble, appreciative way in which he accepts the success that his organization has worked so hard to achieve.

Even at the end of last season, when he was asked how the addition of Dale Earnhardt Jr. -- of whom it was predicted four to six wins this season -- would affect HMS's win total and the team's balance; Hendrick's response was measured, and reserved.

The rough start to 2008 -- one win in eight starts, and 10 top-fives and 14 top-10s; when at the same point last season the organization had five wins, 13 top-fives and 18 top-10s -- doesn't faze Hendrick in the least.

And it shouldn't, considering those numbers aren't too far off, especially considering how badly Gordon and Johnson have run in a couple races. The comparison -- and questions if his organization is "back" after Johnson's win -- is about the only thing that raises any type of gray cloud on Hendrick's horizon.

"Well, I don't think we went anywhere," he said. "But it's difficult to come off a season like we had last year and live up to all the hype and expectations. It's not like we finished up 2007 and said, 'OK, we won 18 races this year, so now we've got to win 19 [in 2008].'

"You can't set goals that way. We know that we won some races last season we shouldn't have won, and we knew coming into this year that it would be near impossible to continue that pace. We had a horseshoe and held onto it as long as we could.

"But I look at the [2008] stats and feel really good about the season we've had and the direction we're headed. I think we'll win our share [of races]."

Johnson winning is a given, with his and crew chief Chad Knaus' latest fuel-scrimping gem an exclamation of that. That Gordon and Earnhardt Jr. will win is also expected to happen sooner rather than later; and Casey Mears, the team's junior member in experience, has shown some fire lately.

But the way his teams are working together, in light of the significant addition of Earnhardt and his cousin and crew chief Tony Eury Jr., and their chemical balance is the thing that's got Hendrick's boat floating the lightest.

"I think [the chemistry is] better than ever -- everyone is really clicking," Hendrick said. "The crew chiefs are working together extremely well, the drivers are communicating and the information is flowing. I knew it would be pretty good, but it's actually surprised me to see how fast everyone has come together.

"That doesn't just happen. It takes commitment and effort from everyone. It's been fun to watch it develop."

There are no guarantees, even with some Hendrick gold mines from the past like Talladega, Richmond and Darlington coming up -- not to mention Johnson's recent "home away from home address" -- Lowe's Motor Speedway.

Hendrick's last and most solid bit of ballast came when he described those upcoming events.

"We definitely have some tracks where we've been successful, but that's in the past," Hendrick said. "We can't sit back and rely on [past performances] to carry us through. We have more testing to do and more gains to make with this new car, but we'll be ready."

The opinions expressed are solely those of the writer