New crew chiefs can enter an intimidating situation (cont'd)

McGrew's situation is somewhat unique, given that car owner Rick Hendrick has also dedicated a general manager and a chassis engineer to help him reverse the fortunes of the No. 88 team. But he's still the crew chief, and he'll be the one to receive the accolades or the blame depending on how Earnhardt runs the rest of the year. It's still his name on the line. Gordon saw Letarte go through a similar process four years ago, and knows just how intense it can be.

"From the outside, there is certainly a lot more attention from the media and the fans and pressure from that sense. A lot of times you've got to block that out, because the pressure within is already intense enough," he said. "And from that standpoint, it's no different no matter what your name is or what you've accomplished on the track or how popular or not popular you are. When you're trying to make changes and you know you're with a top organization and your teammates are running good, and I have been there, those pressures and that intensity and those decisions are as high for anybody in that situation. But when you throw in the outside criticism under the microscope then yes, that does intensify it."

“

The biggest thing was, man, we had no fear to be honest. So after a race, it was very easy for him to say, 'When you asked me this or asked me that, if you were to have worded it this way or that way, that really would have helped me out.'

”

STEVE LETARTE

Every situation is different. When Letarte succeeded Loomis after Gordon missed the 2005 Chase, he had 10 races to prepare for the next season. He had an intern record radio transmissions in each of those events, and he would watch a replay of the race, read the transcriptions, and familiarize himself with the language Gordon used to describe how his car was handling and what it needed. The process helped Gordon and Letarte reach a comfort level in their communication relatively quickly.

"The biggest thing was, man, we had no fear to be honest," Letarte said. "So after a race, it was very easy for him to say, 'When you asked me this or asked me that, if you were to have worded it this way or that way, that really would have helped me out.' I would take our transcript after the race and say, 'You were describing the car here, and I was just confused. I didn't know what you meant. If it had been more this direction or this direction, it would have made more sense.' We were real honest with one another critiquing our performance."

By the time they reached Daytona to open the following season, they were ready. Gordon won twice that year and finished sixth in final points. "To try to go to Daytona and make it happen first thing in 2006 would have definitely been much more stressful," Letarte said. "I learned a lot in those first 10 weeks. I had 10 weekends of practice."

Erwin had no such luxury when he joined Biffle's team a third of the way through the 2007 season. Before officially succeeding Pat Tryson, Erwin attended the Coca-Cola 600 just to observe. He saw Biffle blow a tire, hit the wall, and finish last. "I walked in and they said, 'Here's a radio, here's a stopwatch, here's Greg Biffle. Have at it.' It was hard," he said. "Just the overall size of the organization, the number of drivers involved, the number of crew chiefs and engineers, getting your hands wrapped around a completely new group of guys. I really didn't know anyone. It wasn't intimidating, but it was a tall order."

It was also something of a reclamation project, given that the team needed more organization, the pit crew needed fine-tuning, and the Roush organization as a whole was slow to adapt to the new Sprint Cup car. The kind of communication Biffle wanted was completely opposite from what Erwin had been used to with his previous driver. And because he took over midseason, he was expected to try to get the No. 16 team into the Chase, just as McGrew is tasked with doing with Earnhardt today. To do that, Erwin not only needed to set up two kinds of cars to his driver's specifications -- NASCAR was phasing in the new chassis at the time -- but he also had to learn what Biffle wanted during a race. (Continued)