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Evernham Cutting Back

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By TONY FABRIZIO, The Tampa Tribune

Published: January 23, 2008

Updated: 01/23/2008 12:17 am

CONCORD, N.C. - Workaholic Ray Evernham attended the BCS Championship Game in New Orleans. He went to the Barrett-Jackson car auction in Scottsdale, Ariz., and bought a 1955 Chevy.

He enjoyed himself, and he plans to do more of that.

After winning three championships as a crew chief for Jeff Gordon, spearheading Dodge's return to NASCAR's top level in 2001 and running Evernham Motorsports for the past seven years, Evernham, 50, is cutting back.

He's still a co-owner of the company he sold majority interest in to Montreal Canadiens owner George Gillette and his family, but Evernham has surrendered the reins of the team that fields Dodges for Kasey Kahne, Elliott Sadler and newcomer Patrick Carpentier.

"I still got a strong passion for what I do; it's just time to do it a little differently," Evenrham said Tuesday. "I think everybody reaches that stage in their life where they know they have to change something to get better.

"I didn't have to do this; it was something I wanted to do. I felt like that hamster in the cage, we just weren't getting anywhere. So I needed to really look at what's happening and in order to do that you have to slow down sometimes.

Since buying his team from Bill Elliott, Evernham has functioned as managing owner, CEO and director of competition. He has relinquished all of those titles, although he vows to remain involved on the mechanical and engineering side of the race team and in recruiting talent. Last week, Gillette-Evernham promoted Mark McArdle, formerly the director of the company's engine shop, to vice president and director of competition. McArdle spent 10 years building engines in CART with organizations such as Penske Racing and Mercedes-Benz and went to Victory Lane at the Indianapolis 500 three times.

The company expects to name a CEO before the Daytona 500.

McArdle, who already has announced a significant shuffling of personnel, said Tuesday it will take six to eight people to replace Evernham.

"Really no one appreciates the fact he was doing the job of owner as well as director of competition, and that's just an insane work load," he said. "Even for Ray Evernham, there comes a point in time here that gets to be too much, and I think he's had to fragment his job responsibilities into several new roles."

Evernham's team won six races with Kahne in 2006 but was winless and did not place a driver in the Chase last year. During the 2006 season, he was blasted in the media by one of his drivers, Jeremy Mayfield, for not spending enough time at the track.

Evernham said Tuesday that wanting to step out of the media spotlight factored into his decision to cut back.

But he isn't leaving.

"Two things I never got to do as an owner was win the Daytona 500 and win the championship," he said. "I'd rather be a part of a team that can do those things than the complete owner of a team that never does."

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