In the Fast Lane

Talk about split-second decisions. Ray Evernham’s career as a crew chief soared one day in 1994 when he shaved seconds off Jeff Gordon’s pit stop time enabling him to overtake Rusty Wallace and win their first major race, the Coca-Cola 600 at the Charlotte Motor Speedway.

“I calculated how long it would take to do two tires,” he said, referring to his decision to change only two of the tires on Gordon’s car. Wallace’s crew had spent 17 seconds changing all four tires so when Gordon pulled in, Evernham ordered his crew to change two tires, which took only nine seconds. The eight seconds made the difference. Gordon won the race by two and one-half seconds.

“We won on pit strategy,” Evernham reflects. A former driver and race car builder, he is now the award-winning crew chief for Jeff Gordon, the top driver on the NASCAR circuit. The team, which drives a Chevrolet Monte Carlo sponsored by DuPont, competes in the Winston Cup, a series of 32 races a year that culminates in an award banquet in New York. The top driver receives $2 million in prize money. Gordon won the prize in 1995 and, as of this writing, is in the lead for the 1997 prize.

A little more than a decade ago, Evernham was struggling on the Jersey shore, building cars that he raced in the Northeast Modified Series, a group of small races about as far from the big time as you can get. But winning some of those races with cars he built for himself gave Evernham personal satisfaction and spurred him on to greater things. When he began building cars for other drivers, his fame began to spread. “I was very aware of the aerodynamics of race cars,” he says. “Drivers wanted my trade secrets.”

One of racing’s high rollers finally came knocking at Evernham’s door. Roger Penske, of Penske Auto Care fame, hired Evernham in 1984 as team manager/crew chief for an all-star race in which the world’s top 12 drivers drove identical cars built by Evernham. “It was my big break,” he says.

While Evernham got his start as a crew chief with Penske, he continued to drive. In 1991, however, he sustained a head injury from an accident at the Flemington Speedway in New Jersey. “It put me out for 12 weeks,” he says, and put an end to his racing career. He came back after the injury to win one final race, because “I didn’t want to quit driving or winning because of an injury,” he says. “But I knew my time was running out.”

Evernham realized his place was in the pit where he could help other drivers win. He worked with Alan Kulwicki in 1992, but “we fought like cats and dogs, we were too strong-willed to work together,” he says. On the eve of the Daytona 500 Evernham quit. He was headed back to the Jersey shore when fate pulled up beside him. “I was walking out of the gate with no job and I bumped into the man Jeff Gordon was driving for and he said, ‘Don’t leave.’ He hired me the next day and we’ve been together ever since.”

Now in his sixth season with Gordon, the two have combined for a number of big wins, including the Coca-Cola 600, the inaugural Brickyard 400 at Indianapolis and the Busch Classic at Daytona. In 1994, Gordon won $1.6 million, more prize money than any other NASCAR driver, with fourteen top-ten finishes and seven top-fives. The team won $600,000 in seven days at the Winston Cup championship in 1995 with an experimental car built especially for the race. This year, the team had won eight races by the end of July.

As crew chief, Evernham oversees a crew of 20 with a variety of jobs. There are mechanics for the nuts and bolts of the car, a fabrication team that builds the metal parts of the car, a body shop crew that makes the car shine and an engineering staff that makes sure the car handles well. During the races, a crew of seven services the car, changing tires and adding fuel at pit stops.

“I’m in two-way radio communication with the driver at all times,” Evernham says of his race strategy. He continually inquires about the condition of the car. The driver may say it’s oversteering or understeering, prompting Evernham to determine what kind of repairs must be made at pit stops. He might call for the adjustment of weight bolts on the tires, for instance.

As the race proceeds, “I call the plays,” Evernham says, deciding when to make pit stops, how many tires will be changed and how much gas will be pumped. His strategy here is to “make the competition make the first move.” By witnessing how the other drivers conduct their pit stops, Evernham plans his, always trying to save a little time. “If it works, we can continue to stay a step ahead,” he asserts.

Crew chiefs used to be chief mechanics, but their role has changed. “Now you have to be a very good coach,” Evernham says. “You have to get the most out of the players and call the right plays. You have to know how to build a car and engineer a race plan suited to the driver. And you have to coach the pit crew, and get 15 to 20 people to work many hours and get along with lots of egos involved.”

As a successful crew chief, Evernham is living his dream. “As a child I wanted to be involved in racing,” he says. “I never wanted to be a fireman, doctor or baseball player. It’s the only thing I wanted to do and the only thing I’ve done.”

Since he’s doing what he’s always wanted to do, he maintains a strong desire to succeed. “I’m just relentless. I want to be the best, the best team, the best everything,” he says. “Our motto is ‘Refuse to lose.’ “