---

NASCAR WCUP: McReynolds to Step Down at Season's End

11 August 2000

Posted By Terry Callahan
Motorsports Editor, The Auto Channel

WELCOME, N.C. -- Larry McReynolds will step down as crew chief of the No. 31 Lowe's Home Improvement Warehouse Racing team at the conclusion of the 2000 NASCAR Winston Cup Series season to become an expert analyst for FOX Sports' NASCAR television broadcasts.

"We hate to see Larry go but I've always said that I would never get in the way of anybody at RCR who felt they had a great opportunity somewhere else," said Richard Childress, president of Richard Childress Racing Enterprises, Inc. "Larry's done a great job at RCR, with both the 3 and the 31 teams, since he arrived here in 1997. I know the depth of knowledge he'll take to his next career stop will only help the sport."

McReynolds will remain as the Team Lowe's Racing crew chief for the balance of the season, transitioning the role of crew chief to current assistant crew chief Royce McGee. RCR and McReynolds then plan to maintain a relationship on a consulting basis.

McReynolds, 41, has been with RCR since 1997 and has been a NASCAR Winston Cup crew chief since 1985. His initial stint with RCR was with the No. 3 GM Goodwrench Service Plus team, highlighted by driver Dale Earnhardt's victory in the 1998 Daytona 500. An internal crew chief swap with Kevin Hamlin in the middle of the 1998 season saw McReynolds move to the Lowe's team and driver Mike Skinner. In their 74 points races together, they have earned three poles, 10 top-five and 30 top-10 finishes. They also won the 1998 Coca-Cola 500 exhibition race at Twin Ring Motegi in Japan.

"I've gained a wealth of knowledge in the four seasons I've been at RCR," said McReynolds. "The one moment I will treasure no matter where I go or what I do is winning the Daytona 500 in 1998 with Dale Earnhardt. I appreciate the opportunity to work with Dale Earnhardt and Richard Childress and, hopefully, when we close the book on this 2000 season, there will be a summary of the races we won with Mike Skinner. To be a part of the win in the final event in 1998 in Motegi is also something I will always treasure. I will treasure all the associations I've made over the past four years with the people and the sponsors involved, including GM Goodwrench and certainly Lowe's Home Improvement Warehouse and Kobalt Tools. They're relationships that, just because I'm leaving here at the end of the year, don't have to end."

McReynolds' new career will be an expansion of the part-time work he's done the past six years as a TV pit reporter with TNN, TBS and CBS. As an analyst for FOX Sports broadcasts of NASCAR Winston Cup events, he will share the booth with co-analyst Darrell Waltrip and an as-yet unnamed third person.

"This was by far the toughest decision I have ever had to make," McReynolds continued. "The decision to leave Kenny Bernstein and go to Robert Yates in 1991 was tough. The decision to leave Robert Yates at the end of the 1996 season and come to Richard Childress Racing was tough. But those two combined and multiplied times four can't hold a light to this one.

"My goal will be no different than my goal over the past 15 years as a NASCAR Winston Cup crew chief and past 20 years as a crew member. I will work as hard as I can at it so that, at the end of the day, I will be one of the best TV analysts there is. I feel I'll be working with one of the best in Darrell and I feel like we'll really complement each other.

"I've always tried to take a step back and say, 'Okay, this may be good for me but how many lives is it going to affect?' I mainly looked at (wife) Linda's, and (children) Brooke's, Brandon's and Kendall's lives. It's going to be a change for them but, as I've explained to them, it will only change as much as we allow it to change. Dad's going to be wearing a different outfit at the race track but we're still part of the NASCAR family and we still have our friends.

"With the blessing from FOX, Richard Childress and I are working on keeping an affiliation with RCR. It's a Catch-22. I feel that if I'm going to be a good broadcaster and present the facts, I've got to stay close to the sport. I can't just walk up on the weekend in a coat and tie and start talking about things just to be talking about them. I want to understand what's going on so I need to keep my foot in the garage area.

"On the flip-side of the coin, I want Todd Parrott, Ray Evernham, Kevin Hamlin, Robbie Loomis, Jimmy Makar, Robin Pemberton, Jimmy Fennig, and the list goes on, to feel good about me talking to them and not hold their guard up thinking I'm still with RCR. So it's going to be a fine line we'll have to sort through.

"I may be doing a Lou Holtz or Bill Parcells by doing this for two or four years and then decide to come back to assume a crew chief position. It would be a little harder to do in Winston Cup racing than in football because the rules, for the most part, don't change in football. The rules and what goes on in our sport change every week. That's another reason I need to keep my foot in the garage. But I'm going to FOX with every intention of being there a long time, to help them create a new era of NASCAR broadcasting and give the fans another viewpoint of what our sport's about."

Richard Childress Racing Enterprises, Inc., has set the standard for modern-era stock car racing teams. Based just south of Winston-Salem in Welcome, N.C., RCR has nearly 200 employees and fields the NASCAR Winston Cup teams of seven-time champion and 1998 Daytona 500 winner Dale Earnhardt and 1997 Rookie-of-the-Year and 1995 Truck Series champion Mike Skinner, as well as NASCAR Busch Series teams with drivers Mike Dillon and Kevin Harvick.

Text provided by David Hart

Editors Note: To view hundreds of hot racing photos and art, visit The Racing Photo Museum and the Visions of Speed Art Gallery.