Gibbs team hopes changes avert another Chase crash (cont'd)

Much of what happened to the Gibbs drivers last year -- tire problems and crashes, most notably -- wasn't necessarily anyone's fault. But then there were the equipment problems. And a few pit-road speeding penalties. And other issues that rapidly turned the Chase into a morass that swallowed the team's championship hopes.

"Some of that is beyond your control. That's life," team president J.D. Gibbs said. "Some of it is, how do you do a better job being prepared? We had a few issues during the year, and the fact that they all hit at the end was discouraging. Part of that was just chance, and part of that was I think that we just weren't prepared properly. You go back, and I think we did as good a job as anybody preparing our cars and our guys for the race. but there are a few things you can learn. I think we learned a few things -- hey, cross your t's and dot your i's a little better next time."

The meetings to address the root of Gibbs' Chase crash began shortly after last year's awards banquet, and those who were there say they weren't for the meek. "I think it was a lot of people who had to swallow their pride, you could say," Hamlin said. The disappointment was heightened by the knowledge that Busch had been the class of the field for two-thirds of the season, only to wind up 10th through no real fault of his own. Many opinions were voiced. Busch provided insight as to how some things were done at Hendrick Motorsports, his employer the previous season and winner of the past three championships. There clearly was an urgency, Makar said, to get things figured out.

"We all want to be better," said crew chief Greg Zipadelli, who worked with Stewart last year and now oversees Logano's program. "Whether you're willing to make the effort, speak your mind, maybe put yourself out there by yourself because other people may not agree with you or whatever, that's the important part. I think us as crew chiefs did that, I think our engineering group did that, I think our owners kind of held us accountable for how we ran in the Chase and wanted to know what we needed to do differently to be better. If we are in that situation again, we want to be able to capitalize on it, or at last feel we had more of a shot at it. We just didn't do a good job."

Team owner Joe Gibbs said five specific areas were addressed. Although he wouldn't name the areas, reliability was clearly at the top of the list. Nothing hampered the 2008 Gibbs Chase effort more than parts failures, specifically the three consecutive weeks of mechanical trouble that turned Busch from championship favorite into also-ran.

"Our No. 1 focus this year is more reliability than it is speed," Hamlin said. "If we were to be just average, we'd have been better off. This past year was the worst average finish I've had in my career. But yet, we ran the best during the [Chase] races. That's backward. Just backward. We've got to get back to the reliability we had two years ago." (Continued)