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Posted on 09/18/2007 5:20:52 PM PDT by NYTexan
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DALLAS – So we now have a pretty good idea of how this whole Dale Earnhardt Jr. deal with Hendrick Motorsports and his new car number and sponsors went down.
Based on the conversations and interviews done at Wednesday’s news conference at the Dallas Convention Center, the leading number in the clubhouse was, for quite a while, the 81.
Somewhere along the way, though, as trademarks and things like that were being researched, it was discovered that there’s an apparel company called Company 81 that sells a lot of the same kind of shirts and things you’d sell to race fans with a car number on it.
Hendrick Motorsports could have trademarked a particular design of an 81, but there’s nothing that could have been done to stop that company from putting out its own shirts with that number on it. That would have caused a type of confusion in the marketplace nobody wants any part of.
(There also was the fact that “81” is a number sometimes associated with the Hell’s Angels motorcycle group. Supposedly, members of that group sometimes have that number tattooed on them because the “H” is the eighth letter of the alphabet and the “A” is the first, so “81” also can stand for “HA.” Team owner Rick Hendrick, though, said that wasn’t a factor in the decision to move away from the 81.)
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But it took a woman to get the 88 thanks Kelley!! :)
http://turn-lane.blogspot.com/2007/09/how-dale-jr-got-no-88.html
Then I'd better put this pic up instead.
I talked to this Marine for about a half hour, he had been in Afganistan and had just got back a couple of days before the Vegas race...
facinating tales he told...
Yo, gotchyer drivers picketed?
Unnngh? Drop your keys?
Awesome. Gunny lookin sharp!
Would you be so kind as to quickly ask Bo how he wants his Rib Eyes grilled :(
That’s a great pic. Thnaks :)
Now for the nutty news and I mean it must be the M&M with the nut inside.......
Mars Inc., which has sponsored both Nextel Cup teams at Robert Yates Racing this season, is finalizing a deal to become the sponsor of driver Kyle Busch at Joe Gibbs Racing next season, The Charlotte Observer and ThatsRacin.com have learned.
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Must be the M&M with the nuts inside.
He’s on a health kick these days, probably slimming down for the holidays. He likes fuji apples.
Life is good! I’m watching qualifying while my First Wife is washing my pickup...
Speaking of Q, it's a good day so far for Mikey's team - with 30 cars gone so far, the Big Brown Truck's 9th and locked in, and the NAPA machine is 21st. Meanwhile, your polesitter as the continue qualifying is JPMoveover.
I wonder if Gibbs is giving Mikey some technical advice; all 3 of his cars are in.
Mikey's officially in the show now. Is this the first race all three MWR cars have made a race?
Your pole-sitter; JJ, and the bastard did a second lap faster than JPMoveover’s without putting it in the wall.
What gives me hope is Robot qualifying 10th in Black Beauty.
I haven’t seen Matt’s car yet.
I’m not sure if MWR has had all three in a race yet or not. I thinking not. I just hope they can be competitive rather than be in the way like Mikey was a few weeks ago several laps down blocking people.
Updated: September 21, 2007, 6:10 PM ET
DOVER, Del. — Tony Eury Jr. often felt like the lone wolf at Dale Earnhardt Inc.
If things didn’t go well with Dale Earnhardt Jr.’s famous No. 8 machine, he felt there was nowhere to turn for advice, nobody to help him figure out how to get better, nobody to make sure what was a problem one week wouldn’t be a problem the next.
That’s one reason he can’t wait to get to Hendrick Motorsports, where he’ll officially move the Monday after the Oct. 7 race at Talladega Superspeedway.
“It’s going to be better over there because when something happens, it’s going to be addressed,” Earnhardt’s crew chief said on Friday at Dover International Speedway. “It’s some credibility. Somebody is going to take some responsibility.
“There’s none of that over there [at DEI]. If we blow up, everybody goes, ‘OK, this happened. Let’s go to the next one.’ Over there, they’re going to take care of the problem to make sure it doesn’t happen again.”
Eury began thinking about an early exit to HMS in June shortly after Earnhardt announced he was going there so he could get a head start on how things work at NASCAR’s strongest organization.
The decision became easier after Earnhardt blew his fifth engine of the season three weeks ago at Richmond. That was the third blown engine in eight races, taking NASCAR’s most popular driver from a Chase contender to a spectator.
“At Watkins Glen, we over-revved the motor [in practice],” Eury said. “We talked about changing the motor. They said, ‘We’ll check it out.’ We changed two valve springs. Sometimes you’re asking for trouble, and we got it.”
There are enough checks and balances to keep that from happening five times at HMS, where Jeff Gordon and Jimmie Johnson are tied for the points lead.
There’s been only one blown engine — Casey Mears at Darlington — this season between four HMS drivers.
“Like that power steering going out at Chicago,” Eury said. “There’s going to be a guy there going, ‘Hey, we need to do away with this pump bearing after two races.’ They’ve got nothing like that over [at DEI].”
The size of the staff alone at HMS will be a step up from DEI.
“We’ve got a lot of great people at DEI, but their staff is probably doubled,” Eury said of Hendrick. “So you’ve got a lot more people you can put more responsibility on to come up with ideas. The more ideas that are out there, the better you can make the cars run.
“You’re not making a decision on your own. You’ve got three people just as good as you that can help you make those decisions so you don’t feel like a lone wolf.”
While DEI has spent the past few months reorganizing and growing — the merger with Ginn Racing took it from a three-car to four-car organization — Eury said the company may be four years from being as strong as it was with Earnhardt and him.
He’s concerned that the No. 1 team of Martin Truex Jr., which is in the Chase, will feel the pressure he has for much of the past eight seasons.
“With Dale Jr. and me leaving, they’re losing a lot,” he said. “It’s a lot more than what they think. A few guys on this team are going to go with me and a few are going other places.
“When you’ve got two teams running as good as these are and break one down, then you’re putting the load back on one again.”
Eury plans to take four members of the No. 8 crew with him to Hendrick, and he expects others to go elsewhere once the season ends. He said one has already committed to JR Motorsports, the Busch Series team run by Earnhardt and HMS.
“They’re taking a little setback with this deal,” Eury said of DEI.
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