Blk3GM's NASCAR Winston Cup News - Dollars no driving force for engineer

Dollars not driving force for engineer
August 2, 1999 - USA Today

Before leaving Hendrick Motorsports' No. 25 team in May to become chief engineer for Dale Earnhardt Inc., Dave Charpentier says he had a couple of offers from smaller teams to become their crew chief -- and for more money than his DEI deal.

Charpentier declined.

He knows what it's like to be crew chief for a single-car team, having spent nearly two years with Butch Mock's outfit.

"You look at a Dale Earnhardt Inc., at the facilities and the investments he's made, and you look at the Roush organization, Robert Yates, Joe Gibbs, and Rick Hendrick," Charpentier says, "and you realize, 'I would have to compete against these guys with a significantly smaller budget, (fewer) people and less-experienced people. Some of these smaller teams, you're always feeding off the bigger teams, and technology-wise, you're always behind," Charpentier says.

"When I was with (Mock), we had eight hours of wind-tunnel time the entire year. Since I've been with (DEI), we've had 32 hours just in the last three months. "You literally can't compete against that, so you come to the racetrack every week and you copy (other teams). But you don't always understand what you're copying, so you don't always get it right."

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