"After Richmond when we didn’t perform (well), she told me I needed to give Dale better race cars because he can’t win with one like that," Ives said. "She’s pretty tough on me for an 8-year-old, but that’s good, that’s what we need. We need self-assurance that we’re doing the right thing, but at times we also need a kick in the butt."
 
Earnhardt finished 14th at Richmond and dropped to eighth in points. Sunday, he led 67 laps and all but punched his ticket into this year’s Chase for the NASCAR Sprint Cup with his 24th career win.
 
"She was being a kid," Ives said of his daughter’s accident. "She was … having fun, playing with friends. She fell out of a swing set, just landed awkwardly. She didn’t really recall everything. I haven’t really got to talk to her about it. I just know she broke it.
 
"She didn’t cry one bit. … I thought she would start bawling. She didn’t. She said it hurt but she wasn’t going to cry about it."
 
The long grind and constant travel required by the job can be difficult, especially when family emergencies arise. But Ives said he has a unique way of dealing with the time away from his family, which includes another daughter and son in addition to Payton.
 
"Every time I feel like I’m helpless being on the road or away from my family, I think of all those military folks, men, women and children, all those families that are affected by the things that are out of our control," he said. "Those military families who sacrifice their time, whether it’s a month, six months, or years away from their families so we can do something like this. That helplessness only makes me show more appreciation for what we get to do every weekend as a great nation, how appreciative we need to be for them."
 
Earnhardt said he wasn’t sure if Ives was comfortable staying in Talladega or if he should return home. But he knew that if Ives departed, the team would be left in capable hands.
 
"This race is a little less challenging to call than other events," Earnhardt said. "We’re going to take two tires pretty much every time. We’re going to get as much gas as we need but never fill it up. It’s pretty self-explanatory."
 
Engineer Kevin Meendering "could have called the race just as easy and just as well," he said. "Kevin is a real, real talent just waiting to bust out and get an opportunity to crew chief.
 
"So I felt like if there was ever a weekend that Greg could comfortably go home without any guilt, he could have done it last night without a problem. We’d have fueled up the plane and sent him."
 
But, Earnhardt noted, "(Greg) said she’s tough as nails."
 
Ives won the 2014 now-XFINITY Series title with driver Chase Elliott at JR Motorsports before making the move to oversee the No. 88 team. Before those two jobs, he was race engineer for fellow Hendrick driver Jimmie Johnson and the No. 48 team during Johnson’s run of five consecutive Sprint Cup titles.
 
He replaced Steve Letarte as crew chief for Earnhardt and stepped into the crosshairs of the NASCAR’s most vocal, devoted fan base.
 
Sunday, he helped give them a reason to cheer.
 
"When you have 43 race cars going by, you still hear the crowd cheering, you can see them jumping up in the stands, that puts a chill around you," Ives said. "As far as being emotional, yeah, of course, it’s my first win as a Cup crew chief, first win thinking about things that are more than just race cars, whether it’s my daughter, whether it’s my mom, all those sorts of things. That’s going to weigh on you.
 
"You work hard to get to a point to be in Victory Lane no matter where it is, what it is. That all gathers up in one lap or one race, you’re going to have that.
 
"I’m excited. I’m happy. I feel great about where this race team’s going. Obviously I haven’t cried yet, so that’s good. But I definitely was emotional about it, happy about it. Like I said, just thinking about my daughter with a broken arm, her being tough enough to not want her daddy — that’s pretty cool."