Stewart-Haas crew chief swap doesn’t pay off for Danica Patrick

New Crew Chief cannot make Danica faster

This weekend's race at Texas Motor Speedway marked the first event for the new driver-crew chief combinations announced two weeks ago by Stewart-Haas Racing.

Long-time veteran crew chief Tony Gibson moved over to work with former Sprint Cup Series champion Kurt Busch, while rookie crew chief Daniel Knost moved to the No. 10 team to help get Danica Patrick up to speed. The change was not just to the crew chiefs, but also pertained to the mechanics, engineers and road crews for each car.

Looking at the results from this weekend, it looks like the Gibson-Busch relationship took off flying, while the Knost-Patrick partnership stumbled out of the gate and never really recovered.

While Busch and Gibson got off to a slow start in the opening practice (30th-quick), they were able to steadily gain speed throughout the weekend, leading to a fourth-place qualifying effort.

Throughout the race, Busch was a factor in the top 10 for much of the day, while overcoming struggles on pit road. As the final stages of the race approached, Gibson gambled to regain track position and stayed out when most of the leaders hit pit road under the eighth caution of the day with just over 30 laps to go in the race.

Unlike many others, Busch was able to make the gamble pay off and remain in front of the field on older tires, but in clean air to lead a total of 15 laps before fading on older tires. Busch brought the No. 41 Stewart-Haas Racing Chevrolet to pit road with just four laps to go when the caution flew for Clint Bowyer, setting up a green-white-checkered finish.

Despite starting the first green-white-checkered in the 26th spot, Busch brought his car home in the eighth spot – only his third top – 10 finish of the Chase races.

"It was great to have a shot at the win," said Busch. "Tony Gibson and the engineers did a great job reading my balance, and I was trying to pick up on their changes. So, it was nice to go out there and execute. We just lost too many spots on pit road, and that put us behind a few times. The strategy was to stay out at the end, and we didn't need all those yellow flags."

For the solid day Busch had, Patrick's outing at Texas Motor Speedway was a bit of a disaster.

In their first outing together, Patrick and Knost could only get the car to 27th on the speed charts throughout the weekend's three practice sessions. Patrick qualified the No. 10 Stewart-Haas Racing Chevrolet in the 27th spot, but was forced to the rear of the field after changing a transmission after qualifying.

Although she was able to climb to the edge of the top 30 after starting in the back, a flat right front tire on Lap 39 put the team in a much deeper hole and multiple laps down to the race leader. The team's problems were not over, however, as she cut another tire on Lap 250 and fell even further behind the race leaders.

When Jimmie Johnson took the checkered flag at the end of the night, Patrick was 36th on the field, nine laps down.

While this may only be the first weekend working together, it seems the Gibson-Busch connection is working better than that of Knost-Patrick.
Gibson is a seasoned veteran atop the pit box, now partnered with a veteran driver behind the wheel. Both have an old-school feel to them, and have hit the ground running.

On the other hand, Knost is a first-year crew chief now working with a still-developing driver behind the wheel. Knost is more of an engineer, something Patrick car relate to from her IndyCar days. However, the relationship is not off to a great start.

When Stewart-Haas Racing announced the changes, Gibson's role was a permanent one, while Knost was deemed the 'interim' crew chief for Patrick.

The team has two more races to work the kinks out before the end of the year, but already it appears Busch may have gotten the better side of the deal. FOX Sports