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ANDY PAPATHANASSIOU
NASCAR VISIONARY
Though NASCAR has been around since the late 1940s, teams didn’t realize the benefit of an athletic, fit pit crew until the early ‘90s. Once upon a time, teams focused their limited resources on improving their cars rather than pit stop times—until Andy Papathanassiou, (PAPA-THANA-SEE-YOU) a former offensive lineman at Stanford, who graduated with a degree in economics and a master’s in organizational behavior, snuck into a track and started looking for work around the garage in 1991. After making some contacts, he gave his notice with his northern California employer and moved to Charlotte, NC in order to try and break into the industry.
Andy designed, built up and currently heads the Hendrick Motorsports Pit Department which has resources similar to any college or professional sports organization. HMS races championship drivers, Jeff Gordon and Jimmie Johnson. In addition he is the Executive Director of the North Carolina Motorsports Association and speaks on behalf of the state’s annual 5.9 billion dollar motorsports industry which supports 26,000 jobs. “In the beginning, because I didn’t have a lot of racing experience, the area I identified with most at a race were the pit stops,” he says. “It looked like a football play to me. When I asked about getting involved with practices and the team, I was told they didn’t really practice much, if at all. That’s when the light bulb went off.”
In 1992 Papathanassiou joined Hendrick Motorsports for the formation of Jeff Gordon’s new race team. Under his guidance, Jeff Gordon’s pit crew started practicing and working out. When Gordon won the Cup championship in 1995, the garage took notice of how he consistently beat everyone off pit road. By the late ‘90s, almost every team had adopted the Papathanassiou method, and pit times dropped.
Now teams, armed with athletes pulled from the college and professional sports ranks, are performing pit stops in 13 seconds compared with 18 or 19 seconds in the early ‘90s. When up to speed, cars travel almost a football field a second.
In his speeches Papathanassiou, whose nickname is “Papa” blends humor, racing stories and his Stanford education to get his message about teamwork across. He uses the acronym “PIT CREW.”
Papa, who remarkably finds time during the busy 10-month racing season to do a limited number of speaking engagements, explained the meaning behind PIT CREW, as follows:
P – Plan
I – Innovate
T – Teach
C – Can’t do it alone
R – Reality
E – Emotion
W – Work through adversity
Here are some more details about Andy’s message:
- Plan: The plan doesn’t have to be elaborate to produce spectacular results. To illustrate his point, Papa cited an old Nike television commercial starring Jackie Joyner-Kersee. In the commercial, according to Papa, when Joyner-Kersee was asked what went through her mind while competing in the hurdles, she responded, “One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, 10, jump! One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, 10, jump! One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, 10, jump!”
- Reality: Papa said that all pit crew members are required to work out for at least an hour a day to remain in top physical condition, but they don’t always have the time to spare. Therefore, they deal with the reality of the situation by doing a 10-minute, non-stop pit stop and a five-minute compressed workout that collectively act as a bridge to when they do have the time to devote to the complete routines.
- Can’t Do it Alone: This strategy may not hold truer for any sport more than car racing. Seven crewmembers have to jump over the wall in a pit stop, and they can’t do their jobs without the seven guys behind the wall. All of them can’t do it without a coach. Believe it or not, Hendrick Motorsports consists of 500 full-time employees and additional pit support including doctors, rehab therapists, chiropractors, nutritionists, massage therapists and sports psychologists.
- Work through Adversity: As a divorced dad of two children, Papa said that he handles adversity by using it as motivation to get going with something positive such as his speaking. Also, not dealing with the negative effects of stress, will cloud all of the positives. To deal with stress, you need a physical release such as walking, running, biking, etc.
“You know this stuff,” Papa says. “What you’ve got to do is put in the time, effort and energy to implement these strategies.
“In the South, there is an expression: “Get ‘er done!”
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