There's no denying that Ron Hornaday, winner of six Camping World Truck Series races in 2009 -- including a record five in a row, is a unique talent inside the cockpit. But his veteran crew chief, Rick Ren, is the brains behind the operation with an impressive resume all his own.

Ren made history at Nashville, becoming the series' all-time winningest crew chief with 27 victories among five different drivers -- Hornaday (16), Johnny Benson (5), Andy Houston (3), Travis Kvapil (2) and Rick Carelli (1).

“

I build race cars and, having been a driver, when a guy is explaining to me what the thing is doing, I can react.

”

-- RICK REN

Despite Kyle Busch breaking Hornaday's streak at Bristol, Ren is shooting for the seventh victory this season for the No. 33 Kevin Harvick Inc. Chevrolet on Friday at Chicago.

But unlike most championship crew chiefs, Ren can't thank his father or uncle for handing him his first wrench and showing him the finer points of using it. In fact, prior to his senior year in high school, Ren's mechanical abilities were limited to dismantling a bicycle, a skill he learned on his own.

"My dad was the guy who could barely change the oil and put gas in," Ren recalled. "We never had old cars or worked on cars. My extent [with cars] growing up was tearing a bicycle apart. When I got old enough to buy a car, I started with a '55 Chevrolet and started tinkering with it. As soon as I got old enough to drive, one of my buddies took me to the races and I've been doing it ever since. I'm pretty much self-taught."

Ren also trained himself to race and accumulated 130 wins in Late Model dirt cars in the 14 years following high school. He credits his time behind the wheel with his adaptability to a variety of drivers and their idiosyncrasies.

"It [27 wins with five different drivers] just shows you can adapt," said Ren, who led Hornaday to the 2007 Truck Series championship. "You might have guys that are 'A'-personalities and 'B', 'C' and 'Ds', and I adapt to them. I build race cars and, having been a driver, when a guy is explaining to me what the thing is doing, I can react. It doesn't matter that those five guys don't drive the same."

"He used to race cars years ago, so he understands what you're talking about," reigning series champion Johnny Benson, whom Ren guided to five wins and a runner-up points finish in 2006. "If you have that communication and say one thing, and he knows the direction you want to go, it's a lot easier. Rick could probably be successful with many different types of personalities and I think that's what makes him good."

Ren's 34 years of racing experience have allowed him to build quite a database, one that Hornaday teases him about, but which also plays an integral role in the team's unprecedented success.

"He looked like a professor," Hornaday joked. "We went down and tested Daytona for the first time and we wanted to try something and he couldn't figure out how to do it. I said, 'Where's Rick? We've got to go back out.' I walked in the hauler and there's papers scattered everywhere from the floor to the top. He's got seven years' worth of notes trying to find this one little thing he tried that would pick the thing up a half of a tenth."

"I think he is very set in his ways on his approach," Harvick said. "He's got a lot of Truck experience and 100 years' worth of notes. I've never seen a crew chief with so many notes. But there's something to be said for that much detail and I think it definitely shows on the track."

While Ren, in NASCAR since 1990, is currently charged with leading the Truck Series' most successful driver to a fourth championship, he also has helped groom young talent along the way.

"He did a great job of kind of introducing me to NASCAR racing and the Truck Series, and he was a veteran crew chief that had success in the past," said Travis Kvapil, whom Ren led to two wins and the 2001 rookie of the year honors. "He was a guy that I really looked up to help me figure out how to race in the Truck Series."

Even Hornaday, at the top of his game with three championships and 45 career Truck Series wins, admires and trusts his pit boss.

"Rick sometimes comes up with crazy ideas and experiments which I question, but it usually works out in the end," Hornaday said. "He has a way of bringing the guys together, teaching them when they make mistakes, and working with them to make them better workers and people.

"He has worked with lots of drivers and has a way of being able to give me what I need in a truck," Hornaday continued. "Now, he and I have disagreements, but I told him when he started working at KHI in 2007, I would drive the truck and he could make the calls. It has worked out pretty good for us."

Sure, it's worked out pretty well for the KHI bunch, but would the No. 33 team be disappointed with anything short of the 2009 Truck Series championship?

"Yeah, I think we really would be," confessed Ren, at KHI since early 2007. "It was pretty rough last year not winning it. We sat back over the winter and talked about what we needed to do differently. I've seen a difference in the way Hornaday is driving. I've seen a difference in the way my guys attack their work and I work really hard on my pit calls.

"So, I think the whole team has taken it upon ourselves to not let happen again what happened last year. We can always have flat tires and mechanical failures but we don't need to shoot ourselves in the foot with things that are in our control."

Win or lose the final 10 races or the championship, Ren always will have a special place in NASCAR history.

"It's been a really good run and was kind of cool to do something that hasn't been done in 38 years," he said. "It may never happen again. It may happen before this year is over -- someone else may win six in a row. The season's not over but at least it's cool to be a part of NASCAR history in one form or another."