Hendrick would have signed Kyle Larson to lifetime deal if he could

The last time Hendrick Motorsports had a tandem like Kyle Larson and Cliff Daniels, the driver (Jeff Gordon) was signed to a lifetime contract and the crew chief (Ray Evernham) left to form a factory team for Dodge.

Rick Hendrick was very adamant, with the two-time champions both on a contract year, to not lose his latest dynasty to any sort of free agency or market shift.

“Well, it was expensive,” Hendrick said with a laugh. But no, I wanted these guys in place and I didn’t want to race against them, and they are part of the family and the fabric of Hendrick Automotive and Hendrick Motorsports.

“And when you are that involved, and I look at Jeff Gordon standing over here, or Jimmie Johnson. I remember Jeff and I had a lifetime deal, and I know what he meant to our company, and I know what he still means to our company as Vice Chairman.”

Hendrick said that he would gone longer with Larson ‘if he wanted to’ and that he wants Larson and Daniels to ‘retire with me.’ Hendrick wanted to lock them down as long as he could. They have 25 wins and two championships in five years together.

“So, for the next five or six years, we could put that in a drawer,” Hendrick said. “We are going to race to win championships and win races.”

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So, all of this begs an obvious question, over why Larson wouldn’t go longer with Hendrick or even contemplate a similar lifetime agreement with ‘Mr. H.’

“For me, I don’t need the contract to know that I will hopefully be there for the rest of my life,” Larson said. “I don’t ever foresee a reason for me to want to entertain being a part of another group. I know what I have at Hendrick Motorsports and I know what I have with a great leader with Rick, J.B. (Brown), Cliff and everybody else – the Jeffs, Chad, you could go on and on.

“So, maybe a lifetime contract will be the next one. But I am not too worried about it. I am pretty confident in where I am at and don’t have any plans to think about going anywhere else.”

It’s also worth asking because Larson frequently has said he intends to race Sprint Cars full-time around 40 years old. It’s been awhile since he has said that so definitively but this contract extension takes him through his age 39 season. He’s also now the co-owner of a series alongside brother-in-law Brad Sweet and broadcaster FloSports.

“I don’t get too wrapped up in the duration or all of that, I really just….its nice to know that I will be here for at least five years and hopefully more,” Larson said. “And that is kind of it. I just get to work on trying to win more races and win more championships in the time that I am there. So, yeah, grateful and I feel like it’s a very long-term contract compared to what you see these days. So, I am very happy with all of that and yeah, I think that gets me close to 40 and then we will see after that.”

In equal parts importance to Larson is Daniels, who is very much the Evernham and Chad Knaus of his era. But he’s done it in a completely different way. He’s an intellectual. He has his crew members reading self-improvement books.

Daniels believes that championships are won with the mind and body.

“I want to say one thing about Cliff too,” Hendrick said. “He had his guys reading books and we have Hendrick University. And we have management by strengths and how we evaluate how you work with each other. He took his whole organization, and I think most everybody in motorsports has gone that way now.

“But the integration of the two and the leadership that Cliff has shown in standing up in front of 100 dealers, and actually teaching, is impressive. I have never seen a crew chief with that talent, drive and enthusiasm.”

And no, Daniels says he feels similar to Larson regarding his long-term place at Hendrick Motorsports.

“Very grateful for Mr. Hendrick, J.B. and everybody that helped put this together,” Daniels said. “And then we have Jeff Gordon, Jeff Andrews, Chad, and a whole leadership staff at Hendrick Motorsports. We are trying to be excellent on the racetrack now, but we are also looking into the future of people, talent, and resources of what its going to take.

“It’s really exciting to be a part of and to have a small piece of being able to build that in ways that they have included me in the conversation and looking ahead to the future for all the reasons that I just mentioned. Its inspiring and I am certainly happy to be a part of it and hope to be a big part of it for a long time.”