Q&A: Richard Childress

FORT WORTH, Texas -- For more than 35 years, from his time as an independent owner/driver to his status as one of the pre-eminent conglomerate team owners in NASCAR, Richard Childress has always been good for an opinion or a tale.

	Richard Childress

During a break in the action at Texas Motor Speedway, the president of Richard Childress Racing sat down with NASCAR.com's Dave Rodman to discuss the status of his Winston Cup teams, reorganization after Dale Earnhardt's death and the impact that engineers have had on the sport.

What is your opinion of the state of your three Winston Cup teams?

We're not where we wanted to be, for sure. We had hoped to be a little better. I think RCR got a little behind the curve on the downforce on our cars. The box that NASCAR has built for us this year -- it's a lot tighter than any of us expected, but then there is a little room to work. We're working toward making our cars a little better. That's a big key for us, is try to keep working on making our cars better.

The bright side of things (is) Kevin (Harvick) won the (Bristol) Busch race; all of our cars ran good at Daytona, despite what Rusty (Wallace) said; and we signed GM Goodwrench for another three years and re-signed Kevin Harvick.

We've got PayDay for three years and also AC Delco with Ron Hornaday for three years (in the Busch Series), so there are a lot of bright things going on at RCR and we just keep moving and going.

Can you comment on the confiscation of Joe Gibbs Racing's No. 20 car when it didn't fit the body measurements Friday in inspection?

	Kevin Harvick

It was NASCAR's call. Everybody is doing everything they can to get more rear downforce on these cars. Last year we were real short on the front. This year we've got too much front and are a little short on the rear.

Last year there were questions about how tight they were going to be on that rule. They made it very clear to us if we went over that boundary that they would take action and they showed what they were going to do.

I think they're just buckling down more and letting everyone know how serious they are about making a level playing field for everyone. It's tougher (and) more expensive on the car owners to try to stay in these boxes and control everything. But, I think -- as you see this year -- it's made racing a little better, a little more competitive.

What contributed to a team as good as yours getting behind?

We were behind last year. I think we started out behind. I don't believe in excuses -- I don't accept them and I try not to give them. I don't give them. I think one of the reasons that got us behind was adding an extra team (Jeff Green's No. 30 AOL Chevrolet). There was more to it than what we realized.

	Richard Childress shares a conversation with NASCAR president Mike Helton during pre-season testing. Credit: Don Bok/ISC

I think now that we've gotten through building that we're where we need to be. Building our new buildings, putting all the teams together -- we've got so much of it working so good, like our engine shop, our fab shop, the things that are really working -- we've refined several times in our race shops and we'll keep doing it until we get it where I think the three-car team works.

My goal was to have all three of them the same and I accomplished my goal. They're just all three maybe 25th, 26th, 27th -- which isn't good.

Are people taking advantage of your situation to "raid" your team and get personnel to leave?

Yes, and it happens it sports. When you're down, they kick you. They like to make situations a lot worse than it is. But, I think we've recovered and we're recovering. We're stronger than ever. We're building a program. We started a five-year program.

Each year I have a five-year plan. Through 2000 we were ahead of where we wanted to be from '95 to 2000 and that was with race teams, equipment, building and where we wanted to be.

How did Dale Earnhardt's death in 2001 affect your planning?

	Jeff Green

We had a 2005 plan and Dale and I talked about it -- adding three teams and doing things that we knew we could work together on. Well, that plan was changed in 2001, so we've had to go back and re-structure a whole new plan.

Today I feel stronger than ever about where RCR is, where RCR is going. I feel good about everything we're doing at RCR and the future. I wouldn't be building these buildings (if I wasn't).

How much is your team depending on engineers these days?

At RCR, we're still in the middle of rebuilding our whole organization. We put together a building where we put our engineering equipment (and) we've got nine engineers and got two more slots to fill.

We'll have 11 engineers, a seven-post operator and a mechanic working in there. By the end of the day we're going to end up with 13 or 14 people in one building that do nothing but our engineering. You'll see more and more engineers at the race tracks.

Do you ever see any type of revenue sharing entering the sport to contain the high cost of competing?

If you would see that and I could see it happening way down the road possibly through some licensing agreements that are out there today -- I could see where they could do some revenue sharing. As far as controlling what each team spends -- each team is an independent contractor.

We're responsible for the income and our expenses, so I don't think that we'll ever do that. But, if they did, they would probably do it through some type of licensing conglomerate, kind of like the NFL does.

With Talladega coming up this week, was the confiscation of the 20 car any kind of warning?

That's a good one. I hadn't thought about that. I'd better talk to my guys about that. It could be. They were really tight. It's the toughest Daytona we had ever been through on inspection. We went there for the test and our cars were pretty well -- we thought -- in the box. But, they were out of the box.

	Robby Gordon

We had to go back home and rebuild all six of our Winston Cup cars that we went down there and tested with. When we down there (for the race), it was a tough inspection. But, we were one of the few that got through the first day."

How long can you wait on the teams of Robby Gordon and Jeff Green before you look at making changes?

I'd say we'll get through Charlotte and see where we're at. We were shooting for Charlotte. The thing that we're seeing is that crew chiefs have got so much more responsibility today than they had three years ago or four years ago. When we ran Dale (Earnhardt), Bobby Hutchens was the team manager-engineer, then we had a crew chief and then I was kind of the next guy up there.

Today we're probably going to end up with a team manager, an engineer and a crew chief for each car at the race track -- I can see it going there. It's not the direction I want to see, but I think to stay competitive and do what we're going to have to do, you'll probably see more and more of that.