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Sprint Cup
JENSEN: Hendrick Legacy Is All About People
Rick Hendrick has always surrounded himself with a fascinating and eclectic collection of highly talented individuals...
Hendrick Motorsports drivers Jimmie Johnson (Left), Jeff Gordon (Center Right) and Dale Earnhardt Jr. (Far Right) share a moment with team owner Rick Hendrick (Center Left). (Photo: LAT Photographic)
With all the success Hendrick Motorsports has enjoyed, at some point it became inevitable that the team would hit the 200-victory milestone. The only questions were when and where, never if. Jimmie Johnson answered those questions convincingly Saturday night at Darlington Raceway, with a dominant victory in the Bojangles’ Southern 500.
But if you know anything about Rick Hendrick, his race team, good as it unquestionably is, isn’t defined by its many victories and championships. For Hendrick, whatever the team is able to achieve — and it has achieved more than any other NASCAR Sprint Cup team in the last two decades — begins and ends with people.
From the very start, Hendrick has surrounded himself with a fascinating and eclectic collection of highly talented people. Early on, there was the irascible Harry Hyde, the superb craftsman Robert Gee and the wild and crazy Tim Richmond. Drivers Jeff Gordon, Terry Labonte and Jimmie Johnson and their respective crews delivered 10 Sprint Cup championships. Current and past crew chiefs Chad Knaus and Ray Evernham are among the best the sport has ever seen.
Over the years, Hendrick has even been able to maintain strong relationships with people no longer with the organization. Kyle Busch, who was allowed to leave the team at the end of 2007 to make room for Dale Earnhardt Jr., was one of many in victory lane last night, giving Hendrick a bear hug and shaking hands with his former teammates. Brian Vickers, another ex-Hendrick driver, turned to Hendrick when he had his life-threatening battle with blood clots two years ago.
Hendrick is that kind of guy.
Listen to the team’s current drivers talk, and to a man, they all said that they wanted to be the guy to win the 200th race for Hendrick, as a gift and a show of appreciation to the boss man. In a people business, no one in this business is better with people than the man his 500 or so employees at Hendrick Motorsports all call “Mr. H.”
The path to 200 victories for Hendrick has been riddled with tragedy, from the death of Richmond in 1989 from AIDS, to the Martinsville plane crash in 2004 that took Hendrick’s only son and brother, along with eight other family members, colleagues and friends.
Hendrick battled his own demons, too, most notably chronic myelogenous leukemia, which was diagnosed in late 1996. Told by his oncologist that 95 percent of the people his age and his condition died within two years of diagnosis, Hendrick reacted quickly. “The first thing I thought, is ‘Why can’t I be one of the five percent?’” Hendrick told me after the screening of the team’s excellent documentary film, “Together: The Hendrick Motorsports Story.”
Which brings us full circle to Darlington.
Hendrick was late getting to the Bojangles’ Southern 500, not arriving until after the race started.
The reason? He was at the wedding of McKenna McGarry and Dr. Steven Limentani, the oncologist who successfully treated Hendrick’s cancer.
People. The real story behind the story of Hendrick Motorsports. Yes, there was a race waiting to be won, but first there were friends to take care of.
“Probably the neatest thing when I look back at NASCAR in my almost 30 years here are the friends that I've got, that I have to race against every week, Richard Childress, Joe Gibbs, Roger Penske, all those guys,” Hendrick said after Johnson’s landmark victory. “Great friends. This is a special — I don't care what anybody says — family. The NASCAR family is a special family. I'm honored to be able to sit here with these guys tonight.”
And I can only imagine many of Hendrick’s friends feel the same way.
Tom Jensen is the Editor in Chief of SPEED.com, Senior NASCAR Editor at RACER and a contributing Editor for TruckSeries.com. You can follow him online at twitter.com/tomjensen100.
The opinions reflected herein are solely those of the above commentator and are not necessarily those of SPEED.com, FOX, NewsCorp, or SPEED
But if you know anything about Rick Hendrick, his race team, good as it unquestionably is, isn’t defined by its many victories and championships. For Hendrick, whatever the team is able to achieve — and it has achieved more than any other NASCAR Sprint Cup team in the last two decades — begins and ends with people.
From the very start, Hendrick has surrounded himself with a fascinating and eclectic collection of highly talented people. Early on, there was the irascible Harry Hyde, the superb craftsman Robert Gee and the wild and crazy Tim Richmond. Drivers Jeff Gordon, Terry Labonte and Jimmie Johnson and their respective crews delivered 10 Sprint Cup championships. Current and past crew chiefs Chad Knaus and Ray Evernham are among the best the sport has ever seen.
Over the years, Hendrick has even been able to maintain strong relationships with people no longer with the organization. Kyle Busch, who was allowed to leave the team at the end of 2007 to make room for Dale Earnhardt Jr., was one of many in victory lane last night, giving Hendrick a bear hug and shaking hands with his former teammates. Brian Vickers, another ex-Hendrick driver, turned to Hendrick when he had his life-threatening battle with blood clots two years ago.
Hendrick is that kind of guy.
Listen to the team’s current drivers talk, and to a man, they all said that they wanted to be the guy to win the 200th race for Hendrick, as a gift and a show of appreciation to the boss man. In a people business, no one in this business is better with people than the man his 500 or so employees at Hendrick Motorsports all call “Mr. H.”
The path to 200 victories for Hendrick has been riddled with tragedy, from the death of Richmond in 1989 from AIDS, to the Martinsville plane crash in 2004 that took Hendrick’s only son and brother, along with eight other family members, colleagues and friends.
Hendrick battled his own demons, too, most notably chronic myelogenous leukemia, which was diagnosed in late 1996. Told by his oncologist that 95 percent of the people his age and his condition died within two years of diagnosis, Hendrick reacted quickly. “The first thing I thought, is ‘Why can’t I be one of the five percent?’” Hendrick told me after the screening of the team’s excellent documentary film, “Together: The Hendrick Motorsports Story.”
Which brings us full circle to Darlington.
Hendrick was late getting to the Bojangles’ Southern 500, not arriving until after the race started.
The reason? He was at the wedding of McKenna McGarry and Dr. Steven Limentani, the oncologist who successfully treated Hendrick’s cancer.
People. The real story behind the story of Hendrick Motorsports. Yes, there was a race waiting to be won, but first there were friends to take care of.
“Probably the neatest thing when I look back at NASCAR in my almost 30 years here are the friends that I've got, that I have to race against every week, Richard Childress, Joe Gibbs, Roger Penske, all those guys,” Hendrick said after Johnson’s landmark victory. “Great friends. This is a special — I don't care what anybody says — family. The NASCAR family is a special family. I'm honored to be able to sit here with these guys tonight.”
And I can only imagine many of Hendrick’s friends feel the same way.
Tom Jensen is the Editor in Chief of SPEED.com, Senior NASCAR Editor at RACER and a contributing Editor for TruckSeries.com. You can follow him online at twitter.com/tomjensen100.
The opinions reflected herein are solely those of the above commentator and are not necessarily those of SPEED.com, FOX, NewsCorp, or SPEED
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