MOORESVILLE, N.C. -- Talk about a culture clash.

The folks at JR Motorsports worked late into the night recently, trying to get the seat set just right for driver Danica Patrick in her ARCA car before she headed off to give it a test run. First they had to retrieve the special seat from Hendrick Motorsports in Concord, N.C., and then get it back to the JR Motorsports shop in Mooresville and attempt to install it.

Before they knew it, the day was pretty much gone. It was pushing 8 p.m. and no one had eaten dinner.

Tony Eury Jr., Patrick's new crew chief for her limited Nationwide Series schedule, got with some of his colleagues and decided to order out for pizza. When it arrived, Eury waved it in front of Patrick and asked if she wanted some.

"No, no," she replied, waving him off.

No problem, thought Eury. He quickly ordered out for "salad and some other healthy stuff."

Patrick's husband, Paul Hospenthal, stood nearby shaking his head.

"She won't eat that, either," he told Eury.

“

I was really sitting down and thinking about some other offers when this deal came up. I talked to Pops several times about it and he said, 'Just make sure this is what you want to do -- because if you leave that Cup garage, you might not ever want to go back.

”

- TONY EURY JR.

By this time, Eury was thoroughly confused. He asked Patrick's husband what the diminutive driver actually would consider consuming -- and was appalled to discover that Patrick not only would not eat a donut, but admitted she had never even tasted one of the Krispy Kreme variety.

"What's the deal with that? You're missing one of the best things in life," Eury told her.

"Well, I can't eat one right now. I've got a swimsuit shoot coming up," Patrick replied.

My, how times have changed at JR Motorsports. But in his new role as not only Patrick's part-time crew chief but as part-owner of the operation along with his cousins -- founder Dale Earnhardt Jr. and Kelley Earnhardt -- Eury knew just what executive decision to make.

"When is the photo shoot?" he asked.

Told by Patrick it was scheduled for the following Tuesday, Eury added: "After that photo shoot is over, I'm going to send you a dozen of 'em."

This time, Patrick bit. Or at least said she would be willing to bite when the time was right.

"If you do that," she told Eury, "I'll send you a picture of me eating one."

A different challenge

Eury gleefully told the media this story in great detail recently at the JR Motorsports shop. Just shy of seven months removed from his removal as the high-profile Sprint Cup crew chief of his famous cousin, Earnhardt Jr., Eury has never seemed happier.

Earnhardt came to him with the offer of ownership and other expanded duties within the day-to-day operations of the JR Motorsports shop after first talking it over with Rick Hendrick, owner of Hendrick Motorsports. The two operations are closely connected, and Earnhardt drives for Hendrick in the Cup Series.

Earnhardt said the motivation was part selfish and part personal. He thought Eury Jr. had much to offer his racing company. But he also wanted to see his cousin -- who emerged from years of close scrutiny working in the Cup garage feeling more than a little worn down and beaten up emotionally -- happy working again.

In agreeing to come on board at JR Motorsports, Eury Jr. was reunited with his father, Tony Eury Sr., more affectionately known as Pops. That was by Earnhardt's hopeful design as well.

"Our company needed him. We've got the [Nationwide Series version of] the COT to build and develop," Earnhardt said. "But there were a lot of other things that went into it, too. ... I thought it would be great for him and Pops to be able to work together again and build their relationship -- which always has been a great relationship, but it's great working with your dad. Plus I love working with him.

"So it was his for the taking. He didn't have to do it. It wouldn't have made any difference [personally] meant being crew chief for someone else, for another Cup car, that would have been fine, too."

So they had a heart-to-heart conversation about it.

"I've got this idea," Earnhardt told Eury Jr. "Kelley has kind of earned this position [as part-owner]. I want to bring you in also, and give you that opportunity to grow, to take on a little different challenge."

Don't worry, be happy

Eury Jr. didn't accept his cousin's offer immediately, or before doing some serious soul-searching. He talked it over with his father first and often, of course, and then spent a month thinking it all out from every angle he could conceive.

Although there are those who felt some sort of reconnection with Earnhardt was inevitable because the two are so close -- and because Earnhardt said he intended to "make it up to" Eury Jr. when they split at Hendrick -- both parties denied it necessarily was so.

"We didn't have this in mind. I was just enjoying my time, being with my wife and being at home. We had some other offers," Eury Jr. said.

But then the other Junior came knocking with the deal he ultimately could not refuse.

"I was really sitting down and thinking about some other offers when this deal came up," Eury Jr. said. "I talked to Pops several times about it and he said, 'Just make sure this is what you want to do -- because if you leave that Cup garage, you might not ever want to go back. And if there is something else you want to do over there, stay over there and do it.' But the biggest thing he said was, 'Do whatever it is that makes you happy.' "

Don't worry, be happy.

That has become the mantra of Eury Jr. He could not stop thinking about the advice his father gave him, which obviously was endorsed by Earnhardt as well.

"I took about four weeks, putting people off, and just thought about what it was that I really wanted to do. How was I going to be happy?" Eury Jr. said. "I done that stuff for 16 years straight [on the Cup side]. To get off the road, I was wondering what it would be like that first weekend, and then how it would be the second weekend. I wanted to make sure I stayed off the road for at least six straight weeks -- because then you're thinking, 'OK, now it's like a winter-time break, and how much would I miss it?'

“

I'm 10 times happier now. Everything about this makes me happier.

”

- TONY EURY JR.

"And I'll be honest with you: there were some weekends when I didn't even turn the race on. That was kind of like a sign to me where I said to myself, 'Well, OK, you're pretty much done with that. Go to where it will make you the most happy.' And that's what's going on here. I'm happy and I'm having a blast."

Earnhardt was right on the money about reuniting Tony Jr. with his father in the JR Motorsports shop.

"It's great that they offered this ownership to me, but the biggest thing is I've kind of noticed that I missed being with Pops and a lot of the people who are here that I had been with before," Eury Jr. said. "Being able to work with those guys -- I mean, I've been back there for the last three or four weeks, welding fenders -- it's been like the old days. ... I'm doing all of the things I used to love, instead of just sitting in front of my computer."

He also said he is enjoying his working relationship with Patrick. To outsiders, it looked as if Eury Jr. was jumping from the frying pan of being Earnhardt's closely scrutinized crew chief to the fire of being Patrick's -- but neither Eury Jr. nor Earnhardt think that way.

"I don't know if it's really throwing him back into the fire," Earnhardt said. "It depends on how you look at it. In [the media's] shoes, I can see how people might think it's going to be a challenging experience for him with her over the next several months.

"But I only plan to run two [Nationwide] races. Me and him will work together in those two races. Otherwise, he'll handle the Danica stuff -- which is not a lot. It's a minimal schedule. I hope that it works out for him. I hope that he enjoys it."

Earnhardt said Eury Jr. already is having a positive impact on day-to-day operations at the shop. He said he's hoping perhaps it even has the indirect but not totally unintended ripple-down effect that helps Earnhardt improve his own sagging Cup fortunes by allowing him to focus almost solely on that.

"He's already made a great impact around here," Earnhardt said. "He's getting to work with his dad and his uncles, and his friends, all the people he knows well. It's just a great opportunity for him to change direction and maybe find a job that he enjoys. I'm happy that he's here. I feel really comfortable with the ownership side of it. There is no majority owner in the company, and everybody has a say. It's great to have Tony Junior's opinion involved on the ownership side. He has a lot to offer. And Kelley's taken to it, because she was born to it and she's already been doing it for pretty much the last seven or eight years.

"It takes a lot of pressure off me. There is a lot less for me to worry about. I can relax and not have even the slightest worry -- and focus on my Cup stuff, because Lord knows I need to be focusing on that as much as I can."

Merry Christmas, times 10

Meanwhile, Eury Jr. is having fun getting to know Patrick better -- and pulling pranks on her. He didn't send her just one dozen Krispy Kreme donuts after her recent swimsuit shoot; he sent her eight dozen.

Again, how times have changed. A reporter joked with Eury Jr. that his former driver not only never would have been asked to do a swimsuit shoot, but he also never would have turned down Krispy Kremes in the first place.

Tony Jr. laughed heartily. Then he related what Patrick told him after he exerted his bad influence on her otherwise strict dietary habits. And yes, she sent the picture of her doing her part.

"That's the craziest thing I've ever eaten. There must be drugs in 'em or something, as good as they are," Patrick jokingly told Eury Jr.

How many, exactly, did Patrick devour?

"She said they were so good, she forgot to count," Eury said.

Again, he could not stop laughing as he related the story. Then he turned serious for a moment when he was asked how much merrier he is heading into this Christmas as opposed to last Christmas, when there was enormous pressure on him and Earnhardt to succeed as a Cup team in the approaching 2009 season.

"I'm 10 times happier now," he said without much hesitation at all. "Everything about this makes me happier."