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NASCAR Sprint-Cup Series
CUP: Addington Takes On SHR Crew Chief Job
Steve Addington comfortable as Tony Stewart's crew chief, calls Kurt Busch a friend...
Bob Pockrass  | http://www.scenedaily.com  |  Posted January 01, 2012   Charlotte, NC
Steve Addington will crew chief the SHR team of Tony Stewart in the 2012 NASCAR Sprint Cup Series season. (Photo: Getty Images)
Steve Addington insists he wasn’t looking to leave Penske Racing, but when Tony Stewart came calling in October, he had to listen.

Addington eventually took the job as crew chief for the 2011 Sprint Cup champion after Stewart released crew chief Darian Grubb.

So Addington, who has won 16 races the last four years with the Busch brothers, now has the job of trying to help Stewart repeat as champion.

Addington had wanted to go work after his release from Joe Gibbs Racing in 2009 but a third SHR team didn’t pan out at the time.

“It wasn’t like I went out looking for Darian’s job. I was approached; they were going to make a change and if I was interested in coming over there. … It wasn’t like I had enough of Kurt Busch,” Addington said in a phone interview. “It was an opportunity for me to go to a race team that I tried to go work for before, just knowing the people [at SHR].”

Over the last two years, Addington had won four races and finished 11th in the standings each season with Kurt Busch as his driver. Two weeks after Addington left, Busch was released, the result of several emotional outbursts while a driver at Penske.

Addington said he and Busch still get along.

“I’ve got a lot of respect for Roger Penske,” Addington said. “I loved working for Roger. And Kurt is an awesome person. We had our radio tiffs that everybody has records of but as far as having a friend in Kurt Busch, I’ll always have a friend in Kurt Busch.

“It was made more of a bigger deal out of than what I made out of it. There are no hard feelings and there’s no burned bridges between me and Kurt or me and Penske Racing.”

The transition to Stewart’s team should be easier than normal as Addington has worked with about 80 percent of the SHR employees, he said.

Addington was crew chief for Kyle Busch at Joe Gibbs Racing before being released with a handful of races left in the 2009 season. At the time, he talked with Stewart about possibly coming to SHR.

“They tried to put something together and it just didn’t pan out at a time,” Addington said. “[They] were trying to work a deal to try to start a third team back then and were trying to get me over there then. … I know the type of people that are at Stewarrt-Haas Racing and I know how Tony is – Tony likes to drive anything.

“That’s the kind of person you want to work for, that’s a racer and understands I’m kind of old school.”

Addington obviously is quite familiar with Stewart, who drove for 10 years at JGR, and new SHR competition director Greg Zipadelli, whom Addington worked side by side with at JGR.

“[Stewart and I] have always talked at the race track, and he’s always come up to me and talked to me and stopped me and talked to me about stuff,” Addington said. “It’s been pretty neat.

“With Zippy over there, it’s going to bridge that gap between mine and Tony’s relationship just because Zippy can say, ‘This is what he really means,' and it’s going to really help me get acclimated to what Tony wants in his race cars.”

Addington said his goal will be much as it has been with past jobs – use what the engineers tell him should work but rely heavily on the driver’s feedback before making a decision.

He believes that everybody is “pulling on the rope the same direction” at SHR, giving him the support he needs to win races.
Steve Addington (Right) and Kurt Busch (Left) parted company after the 2011 NASCAR Sprint Cup Series Season. (Photo: LAT Photographic)

He also said that having a competition director for the first time since June will allow Stewart to focus even more on racing.

“If I just go out and do my job, I’ve got confidence in myself and the organization to go out and win races and compete for a championship,” Addington said. “I’m not going to be the big difference. It's going to be the people in the organization. … Tony Stewart is a hell of a race-car driver and he is going to go out and win races if we give him a car that is capable of being competitive.”

Stewart and Addington will work together at the track over the next month in the Daytona test as well as a Goodyear tire test at Texas.

“There are going to be some growing pains,” Addington said. “If we go out and we don’t win a race in the first couple of races, that doesn’t mean that our year is shot.

“We’ve got to have a little time to get to know each other and things like that as far as what he wants in a race car. But I feel like we have the parts and pieces there, the people are in place. They went out and won a championship. That was everybody on that race team stepping up to the plate and doing their job. I have confidence in that group of people.”

SceneDaily.com • Greg Biffle honored with NMPA quarterly Spirit award
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Bob Pockrass

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