Rodney Childers is amongst the first to clock in every morning at JR Motorsports and amongst the last to clock out several months into the next chapter of a no-doubt NASCAR Hall of Fame career.<\/p>\n
That\u2019s how you know this is working out for the 2014 NASCAR Cup Series champion crew chief now tasked with leading a No. 1 car split between Carson Kvapil and Connor Zilisch. After spending most of last season on the outside looking in following his departure from Spire Motorsports, Childers wasn\u2019t sure he would find this kind of passion and motivation again. \u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cThe biggest thing about being at JRM is the way it operates,\u201d Childers told Motorsport.com on Friday. \u201cI feel at home and I wake up every morning excited. I\u2019m still about the first one there and the last one to leave and have a lot of ideas and thoughts about how to make things better.<\/p>\n
\u201cI don\u2019t know what anyone else would say, but I do feel like I have made the whole place better, and that\u2019s important to me. That\u2019s what my main goal was, not to just make the No. 1 car run good, but to make the whole organization better with a lot of small details that some people don\u2019t think matter.<\/p>\n
\u201cBut to have five wins in a row, and to see the smiles on Dale and Kelley\u2019s face every week, and everyone in the building, that\u2019s really important to me.\u201d<\/p>\n
So Childers will be pleased to learn that others in that building indeed do feel as though the addition has been significant. For example, Justin Allgaier is leading the championship with three wins paired with Andrew Overstreet but was quick to praise the entire group, including the 40-time winner at the highest level.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think anytime you\u2019re on the Cup side, and you understand the Cup process and details, I think there are a lot of things on the O\u2019Reilly Series side that we don\u2019t have access to,\u201d Allgaier said. \u201cWhether it\u2019s details, personnel, data or manufacturer stuff, Rodney has seen it all and been ultra-successful at the highest level for a long time, you don\u2019t see it a lot, that guy coming back down and bringing all that knowledge with him.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s the same as when you see Cup drivers come down and race here. Yes, they are ultra-talented, no question, but they also can gather way more information and a lot higher sampling rate.\u201d<\/p>\n
He\u2019s speaking from experience right now because he\u2019s now that guy doubling his seat time and download bandwidth now that\u2019s he driving the No. 48 for Hendrick Motorsports until Alex Bowman can return. \u00a0weekend that I’m running the Cub car here, just last few weeks, I’m doubling or tripling the amount of laps that I’m running on that race service every weekend, right?<\/p>\n
\u201cSo, a guy like Rodney, who has done it all and seen it all, he brings a competitiveness and a willingness to say good enough is never good enough, right,\u201d Allgaier added.<\/p>\n
He said the same can be said Overstreet, Mardy Lindley and Phillip Bell too, that everyone in the building is pushing each other and that Childers has simply elevated the bar within the company ever so higher. \u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m super proud of that,\u201d Allgaier said. \u201cThat\u2019s what you\u2019re looking for and as a company, when you have that, we better make the most of that opportunity. Andrew has done a good job of that.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019ve always had good people and good tools around us that we\u2019re able to build from, and I do think Rodney has been great, but it\u2019s just elevated the whole company and each of us are reaping the benefits of that.\u201d<\/p>\n
To wit, Kvapil is still seeking his first career victory but has been right there in the mix with Allgaier for wins and arguably should have outdueled the No. 7 at Phoenix but didn\u2019t nail the last restart.<\/p>\n
So on one hand, the pressure is mounting but there\u2019s also confidence at the two-time CARS Tour champion could win on any given Saturday when he\u2019s driving the No. 1.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think Rodney coming on board has been huge for me,\u201d Kvapil said. \u201cNot just in the aspect that the cars are fast but he\u2019s just a good leader for the whole team. Everyone loves him. I don\u2019t think I have met one person so far that dislikes Rodney Childers.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen people feel that way about you, they give you 100 percent. If I make a mistake, I feel bad because what it makes Rodney feel, if that makes sense. He\u2019s just a good leader and everyone on this 1 team, drivers, road crew, we all want to do our best for him.<\/p>\n
\u201cSo our cars are really fast and we\u2019re running in the top-5, but top-5s aren\u2019t great days for us. We should be top-three.\u201d<\/p>\n
Childers says part of his role with Kvapil, especially as he nears his first win at this level, is not over-coaching him. The 49-year-old says he motivates through conviction and not heavy-handedness.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe biggest thing to me, in talking to him over the winter, was that Carson was overthinking everything,\u201d Childers said. \u201cHe had like information overload. I think they were throwing too much at him, telling him how to drive every lap.<\/p>\n
\u201cI told him I\u2019m not going to tell him how to drive of SMT that isn\u2019t always very good. He got here because he knows how to drive. It\u2019s up to us to give him the car he wants to drive. I say it all the time, it goes back to what Kevin (Harvick) always said about how you can\u2019t drive a slow car fast. He hasn\u2019t had slow cars but it\u2019s my job to make the car faster. We\u2019re going to win because we gave him the fast car and it\u2019s going to come together on the day he has that and everyone executes.\u201d<\/p>\n
Again, all told, Childers feels at home at JR Motorsports.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s not exactly home like Stewart-Haas Racing was or even last year in Late Model Stock Cars with Kevin Harvick Inc. but this new home has a little bit of everything he was doing before.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt’s different,\u201d he said. \u201cThere are some weeks this feels like old Cup racing and there\u2019s some weeks we feel like we\u2019re ARCA Racing in the sense that it\u2019s second fiddle and you feel like people aren\u2019t paying as much attention. But there are weeks where it feels like Cup racing back in the day and that\u2019s so much fun.<\/p>\n
\u201cI just have really enjoyed being around Carson and I love his personality and the way he grew up, the way he thinks, and he reminds me of me. He fits our team really well. We\u2019ve ended up with a great race team \u2026 and we have speed. We\u2019ve qualified on the front row three of the first six races or something like that.<\/p>\n
\u201cEveryone is doing a great job and hopefully we can get one here before long.\u201d<\/p>\n
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