Dale Jr. will win and make this year’s Chase

That’s because he has a new crew chief, Lance McGrew.

McGrew’s first race atop Junior’s pit box will be next week after Brian Whitesell fills in this weekend. McGrew is unavailable because he is working with the NASCAR Nationwide team and driver Brad Keselowski this week in Dover, Del.

It’s not that Earnhardt’s cousin, Tony Eury Jr., isn’t a good crew chief. I don’t know enough to make that judgment. But family members — especially those two who are like brothers — can’t always communicate the way a driver and crew chief should.

I give Rick Hendrick credit for respecting Junior’s desire to bring Eury with him to join Hendrick Motorsports. Hendrick also has been more than patient before switching to McGrew — and he is keeping Eury in the organization.

When Junior joined Hendrick I was hoping his crew chief would be Alan Gustafson. Gustafson was crew chief for Kyle Busch when Busch won four Cup races for Hendrick, and he has taken Mark Martin to two victories this year.

Junior’s mistake was family loyalty, but it’s hard to be too critical of that.

However, loyal race fan and Review-Journal reader Dave Clark does not agree with me. The following is an e-mail he sent to me this morning:

I am a fan of Rick Hendrick and what he has done for NASCAR but I said from the very start that bringing both Earnhardt Jr. AND Tony Eury Jr. in together was a bad move.

Putting them together with the other 3 Hendrick teams had about as much chance of survival as mixing oil and water.

Eury is too set in his ways to ask for or accept help and ideas from ANYONE else but he has had Earnhardt to cover for him and play the big star/spoiled brat role by saying I want my cousin or I won’t play!

Eury is not a dumb man but he is not a good crew chief.

Earnhardt has proven he is just an average driver (not even an average driver misses his pit box) and has made more mistakes driving than even most rookies would be allowed to make before being given their walking papers.

Here’s my prediction: if Earnhardt’s record doesn’t improve dramatically over the next couple of months he will be out at Hendrick.

Maybe he and old DW (Darrell Waltrip) can form a team and we can all laugh.

Kenny Bernstein’s back

That’s not “back” as in comeback. It’s “back” as in spine.

Kenny Bernstein — the six-time NHRA series champion and first to reach 300 mph — had back surgery on Tuesday (May 26) and will miss this weekend’s NHRA event in Topeka, Kan., and probably the next two while he recuperates.

He had been diagnosed with a narrowing of the spinal cord after experiencing pain in his lower back and numbness in his legs, according to NHRA.com.

“It seems that the years of driving race cars have taken a bit of a toll on my back,” Bernstein told NHRA. “This isn’t unusual as many drivers suffer from back ailments after years of absorbing vibration from these 8,000-horsepower engines.” It must have been the g-forces because the entrepreneur hasn’t been known to do much heavy lifting.

NHRA’s apparent money pleas

The NHRA Full Throttle Drag Racing Series has been hit hard by rain this year. It started with the season-opening Winternationals in Pomona, Calif., and also affected turnout for the Las Vegas race two months later.

An indication that NHRA is trying get some cash in the bank came last week when it began soliciting deposits for tickets to the 2010 Winternationals, which will be the event’s 50th anniversary.

That was surprising considering this year’s season ends at Pomona and tickets still need to be sold for that event. But who am I to question the wizards at NHRA headquarters.