Tony Eury Jr to Crew Chief the No. 30 Toyota!

In a bit of good news for Dale Jr. family fans, it looks like Tony Eury Jr. lands on his feet and gets a new job.  Check out the good news...

via press release

Swan Racing Hires Tony Eury Jr

Eury to be Crew Chief for No. 30 Toyota

Tony Eury Jr. will be the crew chief for Swan Racing's No. 30 Toyota driven by David Stremme for the 2013 season.  The move comes just days after the new team, owned by Brandon Davis, was formally announced. 

"We have a long-term vision for Swan Racing and the addition of Tony Jr. is another step in that process. Tony brings a world of experience to Swan Racing and will be part of our long-term success," said Davis. 

"I am really impressed with the team Swan Racing is building and I am proud to be part of it," said Eury.  "I am looking forward to working with David Stremme behind the wheel and with competition director Steve Hmiel." 

Eury began his NASCAR career in 1991 when he was hired to work for Dale Earnhardt, Inc.  He has been a part of 19 NASCAR Sprint Cup Series victories with Michael Waltrip and Dale Earnhardt Jr. including twice winning the Budweiser Shootout in 2003 and 2008.   In 2006, Earnhardt qualified for the Chase for the NASCAR Sprint Cup and finished 5th in points with Eury making the calls on race day.   Most recently, Eury was Danica Patrick's crew chief/co-owner JR Motorsports in the NASCAR Nationwide Series.  The team won the Coors Light Pole in Daytona for the 2012 Drive 4COPD 300. 

"Tony Jr. has pretty much done it all from tire changer to crew chief.  His experience and knowledge will be pivotal to the success of Swan Racing," said competition director Steve Hmiel. 

Driver of the No. 30 Toyota, David Stremme said, "The team has transformed itself virtually overnight. It's hard to believe just how different this team is in such a short period of time.  This is how you build success from the ground up; you hire quality people, put their experience to work and execute on race day.  Lets go racing." 

Swan Racing is located in Mooresville, N.C., and will get its horsepower from Triad Racing Technologies, a top engine builder. 

For more information about Swan Racing go to www.SwanRacingCo.com, become a fan on Facebook at www.facebook.com/SwanRacingCompany and follow on Twitter at https://twitter.com/SwanRacingCo.

JR Motorsports and Tony Eury Jr. - Surprising Parting of Ways

Yesterday it was announced that Tony Eury Jr. parted ways with Dale Earnhardt Jr.'s JR Motorsports.

To many this seemed like a shocking development, because if you follow NASCAR, you know that Dale Jr. has stuck by family through thick and thin over the years.

But as the business side of things gets tighter, and Danica Patrick's crew chief (Eury Jr.) was not getting the car contending for wins, something (else) had to break.  And it was letting go of family that lost out.

It's anticipated that Eury Jr. will be replaced by Ryan Pemberton, who was hired last week by the team.

Dale Earnhardt Jr. had this to say about the parting of ways:

"Unfortunately, Tony Jr. is no longer with the company.  I had hoped he would be here for a long time, but as we've discussed the direction of JR Motorsports moving forward, it was clear our differences in ideas were too vast to overcome. I love him like a brother, and you'll never hear me say a bad thing about him. I know he'll have much success in anything he does going forward. As for our No. 7 team, no decision has been made on who will crew chief that team this weekend at Kentucky Speedway. We will discuss our options and make a decision very soon."

Right now Danica Patrick is 11th in points in the Nationwide Series, and that would seem to be not what was anticipated for her.  Next year she's moving to Cup to race for Tony Stewart, though last weekend's Cup event saw her finish a few laps down in 25th.

There are no plans noted yet if she's going to continue to compete in the NASCAR Nationwide Series next year.  Though judging from performances in both series, I would think it can't hurt.

10 days ago Eury Sr. was also let go from JRM in this end-of-year staff house cleaning.

[NASCAR]

Let The Juniors Joke

Guest Column By Cathy Elliott

Just five races into the 2009 NASCAR Sprint Cup Series season and we're already discussing the interpersonal skills of the two juniors, Dale Earnhardt and his crew chief, Tony Eury.

I suppose the most recent springboard for this topic came at Atlanta, when Junior commented to Eury on the radio that if his wheel came off as the result of a mistake earlier in the race, he was going to take a hammer to the head of every member of his pit crew. It was one of those funny comments, like "Point that finger at me one more time and I'll bite it off," that in some societies are known as ... jokes.

This in turn set off the inevitable flurry of remarks from the millions of armchair and barstool NASCAR experts out there, who really want to believe that all that's holding Junior back from regular visits to Victory Lane is the seemingly contentious relationship between the driver and his crew chief. If Eury doesn't have the ability to settle his driver down during a race, they ask, how can he possibly guide Junior to a win?

This seems ridiculous to me. I'm far from a mechanical expert -- I just learned how to spell carburetor last year -- but if memory serves, Junior made the Chase for the NASCAR Sprint Cup in 2008 and won one race more than four-time champion Jeff Gordon did. Are we really so ready to throw in the towel because his season has gotten off to somewhat of a bumpy beginning? Is finger-pointing ever the answer to anything?

And perhaps most importantly, when did we lose our collective sense of humor?

In the excellent but mostly depressing movie "Gran Torino," there's a memorable scene where Clint Eastwood's character, along with a friend from the neighborhood barbershop, attempts to teach a young boy "how men talk to each other."

I can't go into too much detail, because the movie is rated R and this column is not. But when I tell you the scene included a few hand gestures that could be described as "suggestive" and more than a few words that could be described as "profane," you probably get the picture. And the soundtrack.

In essence, this scene was a more adult version of the name-calling contests most of us engaged in with our siblings as kids. Strangely, verbal missiles like "scab eater" and "cheese breath," which merited a good stern talking-to from Mom back in the 1970s, don't seem to pack the same punch they had back then.

But no matter. The point is that we interact differently with our friends and family members than we do with casual acquaintances or strangers. Little girls might hug one another on the playground, while their male counterparts are more likely to playfully shove one another around. This isn't intended as a gender-biased observation. It's just that in my own personal experience, these are often the patterns we follow when we communicate.

So if I told my brother I was going to whack him upside the head with a hammer, it would be an expression of affection. But if I said the same thing to the guy who owns the insurance agency around the corner, it would constitute a threat, and likely would involve the cops. It's all about the context.

When you think about it, NASCAR gives fans a wonderful and largely unprecedented gift by allowing us the ability to monitor our drivers' radio frequencies during races. Do we really want our teams to resort to communicating by way of some type of encrypted signals that we are unable to access?

All that would accomplish is to turn NASCAR crew chiefs into some version of football coaches, hiding their faces behind those silly clipboards. That's a bleak prospect, indeed.

Perhaps instead of using what we hear as the basis for trying to get guys fired based on our opinions of their communication skills, we should adopt a policy of keeping our own mouths shut about what comes out of theirs. Sanctioned eavesdropping isn't all that common, you know. One man's belligerence may well be another man's banter. "Sweetheart" and "scab eater" could be interchangeable, according to the speaker and the circumstances.

We need to take off the headsets if we can't take a joke.

source: nascar press

Tony Eury Jr to be Dale Earnhardt Jr.'s Crew Chief in 2008

Casey Mears will drive the No. 5 Kellogg's/CARQUEST Chevrolets for Hendrick Motorsports in the 2008 NASCAR Sprint Cup Series

TONY EURY JR. WILL JOIN HENDRICK MOTORSPORTS FOR 2008;
When driver Dale Earnhardt Jr. joins Hendrick Motorsports for the 2008 Sprint Cup Series season, Tony Eury Jr. will be his crew chief.

Hendrick Motorsports is evaluating alternative numbers for the Earnhardt team, which currently uses the No. 25 on its Chevrolet race cars. A timetable for that announcement has not been set. (Aw, come 'on! Give us the number!! It's killing my readers!)

hendrickmotorsports.com

A Reminder: Eury Jr is Back

Starting with this weekends Daytona race, Tony eury Jr is back on the war wagon for Jr.