Preparation, Anticipation Key to Chase
It’s a time-honored adage in motorsports that most races are won or lost long before the first green flag ever flies. It’s the team that best prepares its car and best plans for any mid-race setback that most often wins races and championships.
The fact that Chad Knaus and the No. 48 Lowe’s crew rarely fall victim to a lack of preparation is no accident. They have checks and cross checks before the car ever leaves the shop, and the race-day preparation is just as intense.
For the crew, a typical race day begins in what some might describe as military style – “Hurry up and wait.”
Long before the gates to the garage area are opened, the best teams gather outside, so no crucial time is lost once NASCAR allows teams to begin preparing cars.
“Standing outside the gate is always fun. We usually get there way too early and have to wait a long time,” said car chief Ron Malec, who is charged with ensuring that the No. 48 Lowe’s Chevy is made race ready and presented to NASCAR inspectors in a timely fashion.
Once the crew is allowed to go to work, various parts and pieces are inspected, other wear parts like brake pads and rotors are replaced and a final chassis set-up is done on the car.
Making the job stressful for the crew is the fact that there’s no opportunity to test their work. The first time the car is driven off into a corner is on the opening lap, at full speed with 42 other cars also trying out new pieces.
For that reason, Malec and his crew try to swap no more major parts on race day than absolutely necessary.
“Failures usually happen with brand-new parts, so we try to keep it to a minimum,” he said.
The crew also tries to keep their work on schedule, so they won’t be late presenting the car for inspection.
“NASCAR has a cutoff, and if you don’t meet that, you lose practice the next weekend,” Malec said.
NASCAR also is involved in the race day preparation by shock specialist Pete Michel. He must do his tuning of the rear shocks, including the setting of gas pressures, under the watchful eye of NASCAR inspectors. He also uses a shock dynamometer to double-check all four shocks before he puts them on the car.
Michel says it’s usually 25 laps into a race before he can relax, knowing his work was mistake-free. For Malec, that moment comes later.
“Usually I give myself 50 laps before I relax,” he said. “If the car makes it 50 laps, it’s okay mechanically.”
The race-day look of the pit area can vary according to the type of track. At the short tracks like Martinsville and Bristol, the layout is cramped due to the inherent lack of space. And the equipment and parts brought to pit road also vary from track to track.
At longer tracks, where aerodynamics are a big factor, a whole new front end is standing by ready to be bolted onto the car. At short tracks, it’s more common to see tools required to simply remove damaged panels and send the car back onto the track without them.
And if it’s a Chase race, there’s more preparation for possible repairs.
“In the Chase, we are more prepared, Malec said. “We try to fix anything.”
Ironically, one key member of the team chooses to bypass planning and preparation and simply reacts to situations as they present themselves.
That team member is the driver – Jimmie Johnson.
“For me the only strategy may come late in the race,” he said. “If it does come early, it’s ‘Should I fight that hard for this position right now? I may see this guy later in the race, and am I frustrating him to where he won’t work with me later?’ Small things like that I consider.”
But when it comes down to the end of the race, it’s all take and no give.
“From the last pit stop or two, you don’t give anybody a break,” he said. “You just can’t. Every inch on pit road and on that race track matters. I just try to drive each lap as hard as I can and give good feedback and try to stay out of trouble. The strategizing takes place on pit road. I’m more reacting to circumstances out on the track.”
When it comes to trackside strategizing, there are few better than Johnson’s crew chief Chad Knaus. While he usually isn’t directly involved in the race-day prep of the car or the pit equipment, he does do his share of planning and strategizing. He uses records gathered over the years to help him make winning decisions in the heat of battle.
“What we do is we make sure we pay attention to all scenarios,” Knaus said. “We try to prepare for everything. We look back at history, and see what the trends have been over last 10 races. We pay attention to that and introduce our own scenarios. It’s ever-changing throughout the course of an event.”
But sometimes situations occur that even the most diligent strategist would never envision. That’s where Knaus and crew tend to shine.
Last year in the Allstate 400 at Indianapolis Motor Speedway, tire failures had teams making pit stops every 10 laps or so. Johnson and Knaus won that race, by the way, even though Knaus’ data bank didn’t contain anything like the scenario that played out that day.
“You can’t prepare for that,” Knaus said. “You have to adjust on the fly and shoot from the hip.”
Whether shooting from the hip or sticking to a plan, the Lowe’s team has a history of scoring bull’s eyes, as evidenced by 43 wins and counting, plus three championships in the past three seasons and no points finishes worse than fifth since they began campaigning full time in 2002.