Freshrubber Blog

The much-scrutinized era of Dale Earnhardt Jr. and Tony Eury Jr. is over.

Hendrick Motorsports announced on Thursday that NASCAR’s most popular driver would have a new crew chief beginning with this weekend’s Sprint Cup race at Dover.

Eury Jr., who has been the car chief or crew chief for his cousin for all but part of one season since Earnhardt began the Sprint Cup series in 1999, will be replaced by Lance McGrew on an interim basis beginning with the June 7 race at Pocono.

Team manager Brian Whitesell will serve as the crew chief at Dover. Whitesell and Rex Stump, Hendrick’s lead chassis engineer, will support McGrew on a fulltime basis in hopes of turning around a team that is 19th in points.

“Our performance hasn’t been where it should be,” team owner Rick Hendrick said in a release. “It’s impossible to pin that on any one factor, but a change is the right decision at this point. We have a plan in place, and we’re going to move forward with it.” ESPN

Robby Gordon was docked 50 points by NASCAR on Wednesday for failing inspection after his best finish in almost four years.

Crew chief Kirk Almquist was also fined $50,000 and placed on probation until the end of the season for the infraction discovered Monday at Lowe’s Motor Speedway.

Gordon used strategy in the rain-shortened Coca-Cola to finish third, his best finish in a Sprint Cup Series race since he was second at Watkins Glen in 2005. Knowing the race could be called at any time, David Reutimann, Ryan Newman and Gordon did not pit with the leaders during a caution for rain. The three moved to the top of the leaderboard and ran five laps under caution before the race was stopped. Fox Sports