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Eury Jr. eager to get fresh start at Hendrick Motorsports
By David Newton ESPN.com

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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