- Gordon maintains Hendrick Motorsports is still in a “searching” phase of 2026.
- HMS organisation has led a combined 274 laps, a sharp contrast to Hamlin.
- Crew chief & VP of competition emphasise that team is forced to “stack pennies”.
For the NASCAR Cup Series’ winningest team, success isn’t often measured by just checkered flags; even a win amid a slump can come with a quiet sense of unfinished business. That’s the paradox currently surrounding Hendrick Motorsports.
On paper, the organization heads into the Easter break with momentum, thanks to a timely victory at Martinsville Speedway. But behind the scenes, the mood is far more measured than celebratory.
Even in victory, Jeff Gordon isn’t one to gloss over the bigger picture. The vice chairman knows one result doesn’t suddenly solve underlying issues. Hendrick has shown speed this season, but not always the consistency to match.
And while Chase Elliott’s breakthrough gave the Chevrolet camp some respite, it hasn’t changed the reality inside the garage; the team is still learning its new Chevrolet package and still searching for the level it expects.
Inside Hendrick Motorsports’ Martinsville win: Jeff Gordon offers reality check
For a team that claimed last season’s owner’s title with Kyle Larson delivering his second Cup championship, HMS has endured a surprisingly turbulent start to 2026. Across its four entries, the organization has managed just one win, along with 12 top-10s, six top-5s, and a combined 274 laps led through the opening seven races.
The contrast becomes even sharper when compared to Joe Gibbs Racing, where veteran Denny Hamlin, in his No. 11 Toyota Camry, has led 444 laps alone. 2026 also marks the first time since 2019 that Hendrick failed to win one of the season’s first six races. Meanwhile, Toyota teams like 23XI Racing and JGR have set the early pace.
But the Cook Out 400 at Martinsville Speedway gave HMS fans a breather, as the No. 9 team finally broke through and gave the team a much-needed reset. Yet, despite the valiant breakthrough and momentum back on its side, Gordon remains adamant, making it clear that the job is far from over.
“We know that this new body, whatever the upgrades, they show a lot of potential,” Gordon said after the race. “But that doesn’t always mean it’s just automatic on how you extract it. It’s definitely a little bit of a balance change, so we’re working through that.”
That “balance change” has been a recurring theme early in the season. The new Chevrolet body hasn’t just added speed; it’s changed how the car behaves, forcing teams to rethink setups and approach weekends a little differently.
The three-time Cup champion pointed to a simple but telling pattern. Where his team had strong notes from last year, they’ve looked competitive. Where they didn’t, they’ve had to play catch-up.
“If you look at the places we’ve run good this year, we had good notes and ran solid at those places last year. Places that we didn’t, we haven’t,” he explained.
At the same time, the rest of the field hasn’t stood still. JGR and 23XI have been consistently strong, racking up five wins in total, while Team Penske (Ford) has taken steps forward at tracks where it already had an edge. “You have to give credit to them where credit’s due,” Gordon said. “All that does is make us work harder, come together stronger.”
Bringing it all together, the 54-year-old concluded, “It’s a long season. We got a lot of fighting to do. Today just feels good. It feels good to pull this off in the way that the 9 team pulled it off, taking some risks, executing, Chase getting after it when he needed to.”
“It’s always nice to reassure yourself of days like today that you can get it done, even as we’re searching a little bit in some of the other areas.”
Learning the car while racing: Hendrick’s ongoing challenge
For HMS, the biggest hurdle right now isn’t effort; it’s time. Testing in modern NASCAR is limited, so most learning happens on race weekends. That’s something the 2025 Daytona winning crew chief, Rudy Fugle, has been open about as he works with William Byron.
“We are learning this new car, 100 percent,” Fugle said. “We feel it has more potential. It’s a car we want to race and expect it to be faster, but we just have to learn it.”
The No. 24 crew chief also added, “It’s got some new characteristics that we knew we wanted to include, but we have to encounter it in race conditions. The only way to do that without testing is to race it.”
That said, there have also been encouraging signs. For instance, the Goodyear tire test at Las Vegas Motor Speedway provided the team with useful data, and at similar tracks, the team has shown it can run with the front of the field when everything lines up. But consistency is still the missing piece.
“We have to execute on race day to a level we usually can overcome on speed,” Fugle noted. “We’re stacking pennies with this car… just stacking good days and not jumping the gun until we’ve extracted the most potential out of it.”
That idea of stacking small gains pretty much sums up where the team stands right now. They’re close, but not quite at the level they expect. Even Chad Knaus, HMS’s VP of Competition, admitted there’s still work to be done.
“We’re definitely trying to learn the car and get ourselves in the right positions to extract the full potential,” he said. “We’re always trying to learn and get better.”
In short, the Martinsville win mattered, but it didn’t suddenly change everything. It showed the team can still deliver under pressure, with Elliott and crew chief Alan Gustafson getting the call right when it counted.
Inside the HMS camp, though, there’s no sense of having arrived. As Cliff Daniels of the No. 5 pointed out, the team is in a good place, but not quite where it expects to be.
