_{*Quick Summary: The author waxes nostalgic about the personalities he’s worked with through the years in racing.*}

I have been fortunate to work with seven current NASCAR Hall of Fame members through the years at Hendrick Motorsports. Certainly there will be several more in the next few years as well. Beyond those stars, I was also fortunate enough to grow up around, and later work with, some lesser known legendary characters. While Hall of Fame credentials are always an indication of greatness, the behind-the-scenes folks have had more of an impact on me personally. I’ve thought a lot about growing up in racing as I’ve transitioned into a life away from it. The people stand out to me more than anything else. To have been able to experience motorsports at the highest level from the time I was a child, and know the people I’ve known was a true blessing. The impact the day-to-day interactions I had with so many great people had lasting effects on me. Effects I can never be thankful enough for, but effects I hope to repay to the next generation.

When we left the legendary “shop on the hill” of Harry Hyde in 2009, it was an emotional time for all of us. This was the first building in Hendrick Motorsports history, the place that started it all. Due to its age and condition, it was due to be repurposed. I was so moved by it I went in the night before we were to leave and wrote a few words from my heart on the wall behind Papa Joe Hendrick‘s photo. I instructed my guys to leave that picture for last. When they removed it, they were able to read what I’d written the night before. I knew the walls were going to be repainted as the building was being converted to a storage area, so what I wrote wasn’t supposed to last. It was meant for the stellar group of people I was working with at the time. They were the last group Papa Joe Hendrick ever had working for him, and in the five years after his death until that moment, my first group. I wanted to tell them how much they meant to me, and how great their impact was. I hoped to impart them with a sense of their value to the history of the company as a whole, and remind them they helped accomplish greatness. I hope it had that effect, especially as some of those people were there from the beginning, and were those exact legends I wrote about. I was lucky to have that time. So lucky.

Written on that wall are these words –

Here stands the finest building on the complex. For in no other building have so many characters been created, stories told, or fun times experienced. Nor can any building here claim the accomplishments this old tin has seen. Nowhere else has produced so many historic times and people. No other place laid the foundation of the success you see around you today. While no team fielded here ever won a championship, the contribution of those who worked here built the legend the championships were crafted upon. This old, run down shell will forever be the originator and birthplace of the finest racing team the world has known. This building will forever contain the spirit of those that worked here and we will always be – “The Boys On The Hill”.