Osborne's Impact

I have been observing for the first six races of the season on how Trevor Bayne has worked with new crew chief Bob Osborne compared to his past two crew chief's Donnie Wingo and Chad Norris.  Osborne is a very different guy, all together he is very technical and he lets the driver give some input before deciding on the final change with the race car.

Bayne and Osborne talk in the garage at Atlanta

So after these first six races I took down some key things that were very different.  Osborne isn't negative towards Bayne on the radio, he and spotter Freddie Kraft have keep the radio waves positive with Bayne compared to Norris and past spotter Jason Hedlesky.  That in itself is a very good thing in my opinion, because a driver does not need to hear the crew chief and spotter blabbering on the radio about everything he could do better.

Osborne won 19 races as a crew chief with Carl Edwards and he knows his way around NASCAR.  The Penn State graduate went away for a few seasons after some health issues, but with his return he told Clare B Lang during an interview earlier this season that he was looking forward to working with another young, up and coming star.  Bayne had never worked with someone like Osborne before, considering that Osborne is an engineer turned crew chief, he likes to do things a little bit different than most crew chiefs.

Osborne and Bayne worked together on Saturday night to get the handling fixed on the No. 6 Advocare Ford Fusion and in the end they found a result of 18th.  No this isn't the results that Roush has expected but it was a building block with a new chassis that they say is the future of the organization.  I've always taken notice to something with Osborne, his cars rarely start up front but the longer the race goes, he seems to find a way to make the race cars better.  The feedback that Bayne gives him will pay off as the season goes on.  A driver can't win without a good crew chief impacting his results on the track.

In a way a crew chief is like a coach and cheerleader all in one.  He has to keep everyone on the team under control and make sure to keep the driver going in the right direction.  I've seen a lot more of that from Osborne this season so far that with Bayne's past two guys on top of the box.  Chemistry between the crew chief and driver make a world of a difference, and if it isn't there; there is going to be a lot of negative commotion going on.

From what I have heard on the heard I have seen a very big impact that Bob Osborne has played in keeping Trevor Bayne on the track and the last two races they've found a way to maintain lead lap contention, even if it meant getting two lucky dogs last weekend.  The two have worked it out well to find the fixes during the race to make the car get better.  Every race this season, the team has finished higher than the position they started in.

Bayne was asked on Saturday if he felt his team was on the right track after the race.

 “Yeah, you have to get that little momentum every now and then. Momentum isn’t gonna make faster race cars, but it just gives the guys that have been working their butts off for the last two years a little bit of hope. We need that, so it’s really good for us. AdvoCare was here this weekend, so they got to hang out with us and we had a decent run, so we’ll take it and work with it. Obviously, 18th isn’t where we want to be at this point in the season, but for where we’ve been it’s an improvement and we’ll keep getting better.”

The next two races are on short tracks in Bristol and Richmond.