Elledge out, Pattie in (temporarily) as JPM's crew chief?

Question

i just heard on Nascar Now that target chip ganassi racing has released jimmy elledge as the crew chief of the #42 dodge, driven by juan pablo himself. the new interim crew chief named is brian pattie, a crew chief from a ganassi nationwide team.

jpm seemed to be doing pretty good, up in the top 12 a couple weeks ago, and currently 16th.

does this surprise anybody? any talk around about who will be named the new permanent crew chief? do you think this will have any effect? i'm not a big JPM follower, so i honestly don't know... (yes, it happens ;-)

color me curious...

Answer 1

I dont think it matters as long as JPM is the driver.  Last year when he was running the companion Busch events you could see progress and could tell he was re-learning how to drive a heavy ill-handeling racecar.   I dont know if it was just ego or what but mid-way last year he cut back to hardly none and I have not seen him in many this year.  I really think he thought he didnt need any help after his pit strategy win at a road course last year.  He has not been very immpresive but he is just one of a long list of recent open wheel drivers that thought they could just show up and win in NASCAR.

Answer 2

I have seen 2 articles on the subject. They only say that he will be crew chief for this week's race. I was trying to dream up some juicy details to spice it up a bit but came up empty. I must be getting old. I'm sure you can relate to that eh #1? I'm not a big JPM fan but I liked what he said about how surprised he is at the way we fans support all the charities and you don't see any thing like that in F1. Give yourselves a pat on the back fellow fans. You deserve it. I understand that the F1 fans did take up a collection for Max. Seems he wore some holes in the knees of his n**i uniform and can't afford a new one. I can't believe he's saying that if he gets fired it will put F1 in a state of disarray. And they say we're stupid? The worst we have is a guy shooting up then driving a truck in circles at 180 mph. Ya gotta love these nitwits.

Answer 3

I thought Jimmy was the crew chief for that kid.   What's his name?  Did they make a move?  I guess I am out of touch.  You can see I am not a JPM follower at all.

Answer 4

Ganassi never ceases to amaze me.  I bet JPM got the swap from Wingo to Elledge because he's too much ego for anyone to handle.  

Ganassi has their diva driver and they do whatever to keep him happy, even if he's a total di*k.

But, no, I'm not suprised at all.

Answer 5

Jimmy Elledge was the crew chief for Reed Sorenson.  A few weeks ago, Chip Ganassi swapped Jimmy and Donnie Wingo.  I felt bad for both Reed and Jimmy, as I am not fans of Juan Pablo or Donnie.

Now, Jimmy has been let go.  It's probably a good thing for him.  He is a good CC and could do better with another team.

Now, here is my theory:  Jimmy will be JUUUSSSTTT fine, especially if brother-in-law does move to Cup racing and puts Tony Stewart in the seat, as is rumored.  They will need a CC and won't have to go far to find one, since Jimmy is just next door.  Or possibly taking over the CC duties for Keselowski if that team moves to Cup.

Answer 6

I won't get too specific but I follow JPM.  In a nutshell Chip gave several people on the team an ultimatum several weeks ago.  Elledge made c**p call after c**p call the last three weeks and he was let go.  Its pretty simple.  Not saying either him or Donnie are bad chiefs but they simply haven't been getting the job done.  Juan has been pretty much moving the car forward minus positive changes.  His Testing times are great as well as his practice times but the changes on the wall have been aweful with a lot of second guessing.