Wins don’t tell his story

Hendrick Motorsports’ next Nextel Cup race win will be its 150th, which might be about 100 more than NASCAR’s most powerful team would have without Terry Labonte.

Officially, taciturn “Texas Terry,” who will drive his last NASCAR race today, has only a dozen of Hendrick’s 149 wins.

But owner Rick Hendrick will tell you that Labonte was the catalyst for many, many more.

“He’s a very, very important part, as important as anybody who’s been there,” Hendrick said of the team that has sent Jeff Gordon to 75 victories and four championships, and Jimmie Johnson to 23 wins and bids for the title in each of his five Cup seasons, including this one.

HMS, as it’s now known, had only 33 wins, a tempestuous history and plenty of internal conflicts when Labonte arrived in 1994 to replace a discontented Ricky Rudd as senior driver, and tutor the then-winless second-year prodigy Gordon.

“He brought a lot of stability and harmony,” Hendrick recalled going into today’s Dickies 500 at what Labonte calls his home track, Texas Motor Speedway. “He is without a doubt the most unselfish guy to be in a competitive position that I have ever met ... probably to his detriment.”

Without Labonte, would HMS have been able to make a smooth transition to the launch of Gordon and then Johnson?

“Absolutely not,” Hendrick said. “That [question] is right dead on the money. When you have an uproar on the team, or you’ve got a crew chief and driver who are fighting, it filters through the whole organization.”

Hendrick said things were becoming somewhat unraveled with the team, but Labonte “stepped in, and he brought harmony and experience.”

Labonte had 10 wins and one championship (1984) under his belt when he arrived at Hendrick, but he accepted his background teaching role with Gordon as the marquee driver.

“Jeff will tell you he wrecked a lot of cars [early in his career], and he won a championship [in 1995] before Terry did [his second, in 1996], but he learned how to race and mature.”

Gordon learned not from lectures but from Labonte’s demeanor and driving style.

“He’s been that quiet guy, yet he’s been a solid class act,” Gordon said. “He’s probably one of the most patient race car drivers I’ve ever been around.” Labonte will start last today, on a former champion’s provisional. He will drive a car numbered 44, the same as in his first full Cup season, 1979. And his soft-spoken, wry humor will ride with him one more time.

“I think if I need a caution I’m going to throw some roll bar rubber out,” he deadpanned, alluding to the penalties assessed against Robby Gordon for doing that at Atlanta last week. “I figure what the heck, they can’t suspend me. If they fine me, I’m not coming back anyway, so I don’t have to pay that.”

And how would he like to be remembered in NASCAR? His little laugh and his reply were quintessential Terry Labonte: “I don’t really care.”

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Ed Hinton covers auto racing for Tribune newspapers.