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Crew Chiefs Complement Each Other

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By TONY FABRIZIO, The Tampa Tribune

Published: November 11, 2007

Updated: 11/10/2007 11:33 pm

AVONDALE, Ariz. - One is the Type A workaholic who demands precision, agonizes over mistakes, and is so consumed by his profession he jokes about renting a family.

The other balances his job with outside interests and a family, doesn't move well early in the morning and relies on people skills more than technical prowess.

Chad Knaus and Steve Letarte, the crew chiefs for NASCAR championship combatants Jimmie Johnson and Jeff Gordon, are friends who have worked together at Hendrick Motorsports for much of the past decade. They're also men whose strengths, styles and personalities differ greatly.

"Chad really thinks more like an engineer," says Johnson, who takes a 30-point lead over Gordon into today's penultimate Chase race, the Checker Auto Parts 500 at Phoenix International Raceway. "He's more into looking at the squiggly lines from the data ... the nuts and bolts and advancement of the car.

"Stevie is aware of that stuff but is probably stronger with people. So you have Chad kind of cracking the whip and pushing the guys and driving technology, and Stevie coming to the shop and loving on everybody and smoothing things over for all the extra hours and hard work."

Knaus, 36, and Letarte, 28, oversee what's known as the 24/48 shop on the Hendrick Motorsports complex in Concord, N.C. The 80 some-odd employees in the shop wear both Gordon's' No. 24 and Johnson's No. 48 on their shirts and work on both cars. Only on race days do the Nos. 24 and 48 teams compete against each other.

During the week, Knaus arrives for work at 6:45 a.m. focused and alert. He expects the shop employees to be punctual, clean shaven, have their shirts tucked in and be ready to work. Letarte, who describes himself as more "colorful and loud," is more apt "to be telling stories around a cup of coffee until 8:15 a.m."

In substance and style, they complement each other.

"Chad is by far the better car guy," Letarte says. "He can make a car go faster than I think anyone in this garage, and I lean on them a lot. I can't run Jimmie's setups, and Jeff doesn't like some of Jimmie's setups, but that doesn't mean he doesn't understand the car. So I'll show him 'A' and 'B' and ask him which is better, and he'll give me his feedback.

"But he leans on me a lot as well. It might be, 'How is this guy? What do you think about his personality, and would he match up with this other guy?' I think I have a better read on people, but he's by far more talented when it comes to a race car than I'll ever be."

Friendship Through Commonalities

The dynamic has worked. Since Letarte stepped up from car chief to replace Robbie Loomis as Gordon's crew chief in September 2005, Gordon and Johnson have combined to win 25 races. Johnson won the 2006 championship, and either he or Gordon almost certainly will win this year's title next Sunday at Homestead.

Even the loser will be a winner because of the one-team concept at the 24/48 shop.

"Absolutely," Knaus says. "Am I going to get as big a bonus if they win? No. Am I going to be pouting for a week afterwards? Probably. But I'm going to be just as happy for those guys as I would be for us in the long run, because we would have achieved our ultimate goal, and that's to have both of these teams running for championships."

The friendship Knaus, an Illinois native, and Letarte, a New Englander, share was born more from their commonalities than differences.

Both had a father who raced. Letarte's dad was a "no-nonsense guy" who still works in the sport as a chassis specialist at Chip Ganassi Racing. Knaus' father raced against the likes of Mark Martin, Rusty Wallace and Dick Trickle in the Midwest. As a 14-year-old crew chief for his father's late model team, Knaus "got used to the mentality that you have to get things done."

Both started at the bottom at Hendrick Motorsports. Letarte began as a "parts kid," then became a tire specialist, a mechanic, a car chief and eventually a crew chief. Knaus was 20 when he joined the company after a brief 9-to-5 stint at an Ohio company that designed drainage systems. He started as a body shop assistant on Gordon's team and worked his way up under Ray Evernham, who guided Gordon to three championships.

Because Knaus was mentored by Evernham and shares his intense personality and pension for creativity that at times has run afoul of the rulebook, he is often referred to as an Evernham protege.

"I'm flattered," says Evernham. "The guy is doing a great job ... It's like when people at one time compared me to Smokey Yunick - I was always flattered. But Chad's his own person, and it takes a tremendous amount of sacrifice and commitment to do it at the pace he has."
Knaus Surpassed Expectations
Knaus and Letarte were members of Gordon's first championship teams in 1995 and 1997. Knaus notes that he was with Letarte for many of his first experiences - his first race, his first championship, his "first drink."

"He's a very good friend of mine, one of my best," he says.

It was after spending a few years away from Hendrick Motorsports at Dale Earnhardt Inc. and with Evernham's startup Dodge program that Knaus returned in 2002 as the crew chief for Johnson's rookie season.

Gordon, who co-owns Johnson's team with Rick Hendrick, admits he had reservations.

"He was a pit crew member and a fabricator, and when somebody said to me that Chad Knaus could be a good fit for this new team we were starting up, I laughed," Gordon says. "I said, 'You mean Chad, the guy who used to work in the shop? No way.' I have to admit, I was wrong on that one. Brian Whitsell former team manager gets the call for that one. Chad has surpassed everything that any of us expected."

Letarte has a wife and two children and sounds a little like Manny Ramirez when he says racing isn't as important as the other things in his life. Knaus has a girlfriend of four years, Brazilian-born Bruna Oliveira, but his sense of purpose resolves around Johnson's No. 48 Chevrolet. He isn't sure about children or marriage, hence the joke about renting a family.

"For whatever reason, Knaus' personality and Jimmie's personality, while they are opposite at times, seem to get the results," Gordon says. "I've said many times that Chad wouldn't work as my crew chief. As a co-owner over there, I'm extremely glad it's worked for them."

Reporter Tony Fabrizio can be reached at (813) 259-7994 or afabrizio@tampatrib.com.

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