RCR Crew Swap? UPDATE 2 Yes and Chocolate too: hearing rumors that the #29 and #31 Richard Childress Racing teams could swap crews in order to try to turn around their season.(5-22-2002) UPDATE: Richard Childress Racing (RCR) crew chief Kevin Hamlin and many current members of the #29 Goodwrench Service NASCAR Winston Cup team will swap places with fellow RCR crew chief Gil Martin and many current members of the #31 Cingular Wireless team starting at next weekend’s Pocono 500 at Pocono Raceway. In essence, Hamlin and his group will become the Cingular Wireless crew for driver Robby Gordon while Martin and his group will become the GM Goodwrench Service crew for driver Kevin Harvick. “We’re making this move to help the GM Goodwrench Service and Cingular Wireless teams and all of RCR,” said Richard Childress, President and CEO of Richard Childress Racing Enterprises, Inc. “The results of our performances this season have not been up to expectations. Jeff Green and the America Online team have had the best results so far and are showing a lot of promise for the second half of the year so we’re not going to change what they have been building on. But the 29 and 31 teams are down enough in the points right now that it makes the most sense to make some changes between the two. Kevin (Hamlin), Gil and all of the guys in the shop haven’t forgotten how to build and prepare race cars and Kevin (Harvick) and Robby still know how to win races so it’s just a matter of getting the right people in the right places. We’ve made changes like this before and it’s worked out and we’re confident that it will again.” Hamlin is actually moving back to where he began at RCR. He was the #31 team’s crew chief during its inaugural NASCAR Winston Cup season in 1997 until midway through the 1998 season when he swapped places with former RCR crew chief Larry McReynolds.(RCR Racing Site)(5-29-2002) UPDATE 2: Danny “Chocolate” Myers, the well-known gasman during all six of the late Dale Earnhardt’ Winston Cup championships with Richard Childress Racing, will fuel the #29 Chevrolet for the final time this weekend at Dover before moving to RCR’ #31 team. RCR announced on Wednesday the crew chiefs and crews would swap between the No. 29 and 31 teams beginning next weekend at Pocono. “Richard (Childress) let me have the choice of staying with the 29 team and I would love to but, on the other hand, Ive worked with that group of guys moving to the 31 team for so long and so well that I dont want to break up that deal,” Myers said. “Ive been at Richard Childress Racing for nearly 20 years and I feel like there are a lot of younger guys coming in that look up to me because Ive been doing this for so long. By making this change and not having a problem with it, it should give the other guys reason to be able to do the same thing.”(ThatsRacin.com)(5-30-2002)
