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EVENTS
CNNSI.com GROUP
COMMERCE
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Awesome again Invigorated Elliott eyes return to Victory Lane
By Mike Fish, CNNSI.com DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. -- Bill Elliott has a bit more bounce in his giddy-up these days -- and it has little to do with his sitting on the pole for the Daytona 500. It has loads to do with selling his race-team operation at the end of last season to former champion crew chief Ray Evernham. Now, instead of wearing all the hats, Elliott is simply lead driver for Evernham’s Dodge factory team. "Well, it’s more like a universe instead of a load off my shoulders," said Elliott, one of Winston Cup racing’s elder statesmen. "Oh Lord of mercy, I feel wholly relieved. As fast as NASCAR is changing, I just couldn't keep up with being an owner/driver. "If I could have just found the right group of people around me, maybe it would have been OK. But I just had problems either finding them or keeping them. Or keeping my thumb on top of things. Instead of me thinking about the race car, I was thinking 'Well, did this guy get a credential [for the race]? Did this guy quit today?'
It couldn't have worked out much sweeter for Elliott, a 35-year-old Dawsonville, Ga., native who's being paid a substantial undisclosed sum over three years by Evernham for the keys to his business. The overall deal is enough for him to end his longtime relationship with Ford and take up with Dodge in its return to the sport. His brother, Ernie, was also able to stay in the sport, landing a job with Chip Ganassi’s Dodge race team. Another brother, Dan, got a job with the soon-to-open Thunder Road racing museum back home in north Georgia. If he didn't sell his shop in Statesville, N.C., Elliott says it would have been a matter of time before he'd have been forced to close. "It depended on if we got sponsorship, but eventually we would have folded up," said Elliott, who left Junior Johnson’s team six years ago to start his own organization with Georgia businessman Charles Hardy. "I just didn't feel there'd be enough of a future. So we pursued sponsorship as long as we could. Then, when Ray came to me I didn't want to continue to drag it out, get down to the last minute and try and do a bargain sponsorship deal with somebody. "See, the problem with the way the sport is growing is the owner-driver team is labeled a non-viable deal. When you get that in the sponsor marketplace, then it’s hard to sell owner-driver anymore. They just don't think the teams are capable of doing what they need to do. So we were kind of in catch-22, anyway." Indeed, in a lot of ways. Elliott found himself often overwhelmed by the sponsor demands. Then again, as sponsorship fees continue to climb in the sport, corporations are demanding more of owners and drivers to justify their hefty financial outlay. It’s true, money in the sport is nothing before, but that’s also a product of a longer, grueling race season. And it’s easier for the well-financed, multi-car teams to adjust to the grind. As Elliott discovered, the small teams often end up burning out their people during a season. "It’s also harder to respond to a NASCAR rule change when you're a small organization because you don't have the mass building you do with a multi-car team," Elliott said. OK, with all that said, can an invigorated Elliott win again? He can count on Dodge’s money, Evernham’s disciplined leadership and his own driving resume -- 40 victories, 50 poles and more than $23 million in winnings -- but fact is the man hasn't won a race in six years. No one has ever questioned his ability to handle a Winston Cup car. It’s also fair to say few careers have needed a rebound quite so much. And not many athletes revisit the glory years after their 45th birthday. Elliott gets to give it a shot starting on the pole at Daytona, where he began to forge his reputation with a victory in the 1985 race that kicked off an 11-win season. "Experience sometimes can make up for losing a little bit of sharpness or whatever," said Elliott, 21st in last year’s Winton Cup points standings. "As long as I feel good and feel I can still turn a wheel, I want to be here. If I've lost too much of that edge to continue on, then I need to go find something else. "That hasn't happened, not yet. But age is a part of what we got to do. We got to deal with it one way or the other. Either you're growing older or you're not here."
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