“I don’t think it’s gonna be a huge adjustment,” Kenseth said of Blickensderfer’s move. “Honestly, in today’s world, it’s almost all engineer-driven anyway. We get sheets of paper every week that give you recommendations of what to put in the car and what we should run and these cars with all the rules there is very little we can do to the cars. Our bodies are almost identical. All of our car builds within our company are the same, so you’ve got a lot of stuff to look at and you’ve got a lot of teams to draw information from and to work with and talk with, so I’m not really worried about that part.”

In fact, said Kenseth, the change isn’t too complicated at all. “Really, Chip (Bolin) last year did the first three-quarters of the year with no engineer,” he said. “He did the engineering and crew chief duties, so I almost feel like we added a person. Chip gets to work on the car all the time and he’s got Drew to help him out with the car, and Drew is gonna be calling races and doing all the crew chief stuff that maybe took away from Chip working on the car, and seeing what other teams were doing and keeping track of all that stuff.”

Of the three non-race winners, Harvick had the best 2008, finishing fourth in points. But after narrowly defeating Mark Martin to win the 2007 Daytona 500, Harvick suffered a bad start to his season, placing his Richard Childress Racing Chevrolet Impala SS 14th at Daytona.

“Last year was a downer just because our car ran so good all week and
then it just ran like crap in the race,” Harvick said. “As we came home and figured things out, that helped us to ease the pain. We honestly felt as we were going into the race last year that the car could win the race and so that always stinks when you have something and it doesn't turn out like you think it should.”

So how will things turn out for Gordon, Kenseth and Harvick in 2009? No one knows for sure, but it would be a shock if another season passed without all three visiting victory lane.

Monday: What will Stewart-Haas Racing do in its first year in the Sprint Cup Series?

NASCAR 39/10: Reviewing the 60th Season A unique and comprehensive look at a historic season in the annals of stock car racing. For the first time ever, NASCAR fans will be able to relive the entire 2008 Sprint Cup Season, over the course of a 30-hour anthology. From Preseason Testing in Daytona, to the Postseason Banquet in New York, viewers will relive NASCAR’s 60th season, and one of the most important years in the sport’s history.