CONCORD, N.C. – Every NASCAR Sprint Cup Series season, Hendrick Motorsports general manager Doug Duchardt said Tuesday, is a marathon.
This year’s race is rapidly approaching its conclusion, and Jimmie Johnson has a chance to send the organization across the finish line in first.
Johnson’s four wins have powered Hendrick Motorsports all season long, and propelled him into the Championship 4 with a shot at a seventh career Sprint Cup championship this weekend at Homestead-Miami Speedway.
“Internally, I think the focus is just on getting to Homestead and performing the best that we can,” Duchardt said. “We've been fortunate to have a couple of weeks as a company to rally behind the (No.) 48 to prepare for this. So, we're looking forward to getting down there and racing for (Johnson’s) seventh championship.”
The general manager noted that Hendrick Motorsports got the season off to a “fairly strong” start before the summer months saw results dip. Coupled with Dale Earnhardt Jr. being sidelined due to a concussion, the organization had to rally and recover down the stretch.
That’s exactly what it did.
“I think there are cycles when you feel like your cars have speed and when you're just off a little bit, and it doesn't take much in this sport to be off a little bit. It's very competitive,” Duchardt said. “I feel like all of us have rallied together to get better, and I think that the results of those efforts started to show as the Chase started.”
To that point, in just nine Chase races to this point, the organization’s two wins matched its total from the first 26 races. In those same nine races, the teammates’ combined 870 laps led, average start of 12.8 and average finish of 12.5 are all better than the numbers from the first 26 events.
"Jimmie is just the kid from El Cajon that's California cool. I never see him flustered in these situations."
Doug Duchardt
Along the way, Johnson won in both the Round of 12 and Round of 8 in the Chase for the NASCAR Sprint Cup to advance to the finale.
“We were fortunate that we worked in every area, and I think that all that work paid off,” Duchardt said. “I think it's just part of the ebbs and flows of how tough this sport is, and I'm proud of the work that everyone did to get us back to where we're competing for a championship at Homestead.”
Now that the season has come down to one final race with a championship on the line, Duchardt said a major key will be to make sure simple mistakes don’t derail all that work.
“I think the first thing is the team that has the fewest mistakes is going to set themselves up to be successful,” he said. “As competitive as these races are, a speeding penalty or a bad restart or a cut tire, anything of that nature can be difficult to overcome -- not that it's impossible.”
In addition to avoiding mistakes, Duchardt said that bringing a fast car to the racetrack and optimizing it throughout the race will be crucial cogs in the quest to find Victory Lane.
One facet he is not worried about, however, is the mindset of his driver.
“One of the aspects of Jimmie that's underestimated is how strong his mental toughness is,” Duchardt said. “He savors these opportunities. He looks forward to challenging himself and being prepared for this. Jimmie is just the kid from El Cajon that's California cool. I never see him flustered in these situations. He embraces it.”
“I know that he's looking forward to strapping in at Homestead and getting after it.”