by Darrell Waltrip

Around the track

Follow the action:

• Michigan schedule
• Michigan practices

Watch:

• Video Central

Picture perfect:

• Action at Watkins Glen

Read all about it:

• Dale Jr: Changes needed in NASCAR
• Vickers edges Martin for Cup pole

Analysis:

• White: Chasers feel the heat
• Spencer: Drivers to watch at Michigan

Jake sure knew how to work on a race car. He wouldn't fit the model of a crew chief today, but trust me, back in the day when I was getting started he was the absolute master of setting up a race car. Elder, Robert Gee, Dale Inman and Harry Hyde were those hands-on type of crew chiefs who knew everything there was to know about building and setting cars up to race.

Those guys back then were pure mechanics. They weren't like the guys today. I call the guys today R&R mechanics — remove and replace. That's pretty much how they do things nowadays, you remove something and replace it with something new. Guys back in the day, like Jake, knew how to fix things and make them work. They did it by experience and common knowledge. They were so smart and they made this sport what it is today by building our platform.

When you hear all this talk about the NASCAR Hall of Fame and who should or shouldn't be inducted, the crew chief category is one that I think definitely needs to be considered and Jake needs to be at the top of the list. Jake Elder made me, Dale Earnhardt Sr, Terry Labonte and others who we are. The thing that Jake could do for all of us young inexperienced drivers was give us a car that drove and handled right. Once you show a young driver how something is supposed to work and feel, he will never forget it. That's what Jake always told me. Once you educate a driver on the right way of things, then he will always keep searching for it and not be happy until he finds it. He taught all of us what to look for and that education was priceless.

Jake always had a theory: It was "we might get out-run, but we aren't going to get out-worked." A lot of the things I still apply today to different areas of my life, I learned from Jake. He was and is a great guy.

The irony is that Jake was with me when I won my first NASCAR Cup race and Jake was with me when I won my last NASCAR Cup race. My first Cup win was during Mothers Day weekend at Nashville in 1975 and Jake was there. He was with me when I won my last race, the Southern 500 in Darlington in 1992.

Jake moved around a lot. He wasn't with me throughout my entire career. That's how he got the nickname "Suitcase Jake." He would work for me some and then maybe he'd go work for Earnhardt and then he would move on to work for someone else.

The other great thing about Jake was he was loyal. He was always there when you needed him. All you had to do was call and tell him you needed his help and he would be on your doorstep the next morning with his toolbox. Jake is, what a friend of mine used to say, one to a box. There will never be another Jake Elder.

Jake was a loner. He liked to do everything himself. He would work himself to death working on the car by himself. He didn't really trust anybody else to do it right. He knew if he did it then it was done right. Unfortunately, Jake had a hard time training people how to work with him. Jake would just as soon run someone off as opposed to taking the time to show them how to do something.

The thing that Jake was most proud of, and he would constantly remind me, I never had anything fall off my race car. I never got knocked out of a race because something broke or fell off the car. That was due to Jake and he took great pride in that.

I just wanted to take a moment to reflect on Jake. He is in a nursing home in Mooresville. Sadly, Alzheimer's has robbed Jake most of the great memories he has. His sister looks after him. Thank goodness for sisters — and trust me, I speak from experience. Jake doesn't have a lot of family. Sadly his son Randy, who worked for me when I had my own team in the early '90's, died suddenly from a heart attack last year.

I honestly never thought Jake would end up in a nursing home. Jeff Hammond, Larry McReynolds and I went to visit him last year. Alzheimer's is a disgusting disease. It has hit my relatives and families of my friends and employees. It's especially sad when it hits someone like Jake. He never was one for keeping notes. He just never was big on writing things down. He did everything from memory and kept things in his head. To be robbed of your memory as Jake has is so sad. He accomplished so many great things in his life. But the one sweet thing he does have is pictures. His friends and family have brought pictures and put up on the walls in his room. Jeff, Larry and I dug out some of our favorites with Jake and put them up in his room too.

So when you get a spare moment, pray for Jake Elder. Pray that he is well taken care of. He was a great crew chief. I couldn't have accomplished probably half the things I did if I hadn't had him working on my race cars.