Hard work, determination finally pays off for Jenkins (cont'd)

But there's already no mistake about something else: Jenkins has already earned a ton of respect, and so have his guys.

"It's amazing," Andretti said. "After the race at Texas, I got a text from Mark [Martin] saying 'good job today.' Here's a guy running for a championship -- what's he doing texting me? But it makes you feel good that they know, and they can see that we overachieve in a lot of ways, because we're a good group."

“

Every weekend you want to be the best that you can be, and I think that we are because we push really hard to be that way.

”

-- JOHN ANDRETTI

"We just want to be in the position where we're competitive," Jenkins said. "Maybe not to win races yet, but to consistently be improving and offering a solid program. And we've achieved that. This season we've not lost one [crew] person who said 'I've got a better job down the street and I'm leaving.'

"I kind of credit that to an attitude that we're like a bunch of 12-year-old boys working on our bikes in the neighborhood. That's what these guys do, without the pressure of sponsors or a big team. I have one engineer on this team, for everything, and it's his clear canvas to paint, same as it is with the crew chiefs, who are running their own programs."

Andretti said it's Jenkins' personal involvement that's the difference.

"It says a lot for the guys, and it's all about competition, because every weekend you want to be the best that you can be, and I think that we are because we push really hard to be that way," Andretti said. "And Bob, he's involved with the people on the team, he knows everyone's names, and about their families and you don't get that with a big team."

Respecting their achievement, which was attained with a group that numbers fewer than 40 people from administrative help to the race teams that field two Cup cars and another full-time effort in the Nationwide Series for driver Tony Raines, who finished 20th in that series' owners' standings, has to be a given.

Jenkins knows all about NASCAR's infamous "top 35 rule," the guideline that grants the top 35 teams in the car owners' standings an automatic starting position in each successive week's race. It's even more critical at season's end because 2009's owners' standings guarantee 35 teams starting positions in 2010's first five races.

"With my two cars, to be honest with you, we live out of those purses," Jenkins said. "So it's just critical to be in every race, to get points and continue on to next week's race."

Jenkins' Front Row Motorsports made it stick with its No. 34 Chevrolet, which was driven in 34 races by John Andretti. Andretti skipped two races in May to compete in the Indianapolis 500. When he returned from Indy, the situation wasn't overly promising with the car only about 40 points ahead of 36th.

But Andretti, a versatile, capable driver who's won in Cup cars, Indy cars, IMSA sports cars and NHRA top fuel dragsters among other classes, teaming with crew chief Steven Lane, a veteran mechanic who came to Front Row through its initial alliance this season with Earnhardt Ganassi Racing, got the job done.

"I've been with some big teams and I've seen what kind of resources and man-hours are out there," Lane said. "We've tried to concentrate on five races at a time and to do what we needed to do to stay in the top 35. Honestly, if you would have asked me at the beginning of the year if we'd be there 10 races in, I'd have said that'd be tough.

"So it's been a big achievement, and we've done it without a lot of money, and that's the thing. I know what kind of budget Red Bull [which finished behind them in the owners' standings] has, so it's a big thing."

And now they get the reward, which is stability and, Jenkins hopes, something solid to offer potential partners.

"It certainly helps, because those first five races are some of the biggest races of the year," Jenkins said of Daytona, Fontana, Las Vegas and Atlanta, a corporate business center. "It's critical."

And for Andretti, for whom family means a huge amount, it's time to get with his friend and team owner to decide if they'll continue the battle next season. Jenkins said the next two weeks he'd hope to know what direction he was going, but he didn't see "any wholesale changes taking place."

"This race team needs to be sponsored, but I don't want having sponsorship be the deciding factor in whether or not we can race," Jenkins said. "We've tried to build a nucleus that can survive in a down economy, that's consistent and solid, so that when good times do come around, we become a logical choice for somebody."

For team owners Kevin Buckler, Joe Nemechek, Tommy Baldwin and Phil Parsons, the current economic downturn created an opportunity, both in equipment and personnel that enabled them to experience a dream in 2009, of establishing themselves in the Cup garage.

Jenkins' Front Row team has been here, and to hear Andretti tell it -- now they're truly established. And for Jenkins, it doesn't get much better than that.

"Our attitude, from day one since we started this team, is that we realized that you just can't walk into this sport and say 'here I am,' and that sponsors would just line up to sponsor us," Jenkins said. "Our position has always been that you have to make your own place at the table -- nobody's gonna give it to you.

"It's been ugly over the years and it's hurt at times, but establishing the consistency we have and to be locked into the top 35 at an attractive price will help us to attract a sponsor for the next couple years. For us it's kind of been racing in its purest form, maybe without a big budget, but guys working on cars and enjoying the fruits of their labors.

"For these guys, they set out at the beginning of the year to accomplish this and it's a big deal for them. They feel like they had a plan, they've come together and they did it."

The opinions expressed are solely those of the writer.