Entering the cutoff race at Bristol Motor Speedway, Alex Bowman sits a distant 35 points below the cutline, and likely faces a must-win situation to avoid a first-round elimination.
While Bowman has struggled on track over the first two races of the playoffs, the No. 48 has also been hindered by issues on pit road. In the Southern 500 at Darlington Raceway, they fell two laps down after a messy 40-second pit stop. There suffered another slow stop at Gateway when the car fell off the jack.
Now, Hendrick Motorsports (HMS) have chosen to replace the following pit crew positions, effective immediately Front tire changer, rear tire changer, jackman, tire carrier.
They will do this via a swap with the No. 77 Spire Motorsports Chevrolet of Carson Hocevar. Daniek Bach (front tire changer), Rod Cox (rear tire changer), Cody French (jackman), and Jarius Morehead (tire carrier) will immediately move from the No. 77 to the No. 48 for Bristol.
Spire has a strong technical alliance with HMS, and they have moved pit crew members between the two organizations before. Earlier this year, the rear tire changer from Justin Haley‘s No. 7 car was shifted over to the No. 9 of Chase Elliott.
According to Motorsport.com contributor Bozi Tatarevic, Hocevar’s pit crew was ranked third-best at Gateway, while Bowman’s crew was down in 28th.
This isn’t the first playoff team to take such action, as Trackhouse recently took Daniel Suarez’s jackman (Josh Appleby) and moved him over to the No. 1 car of Ross Chastain.
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