CONCORD, N.C. -- Justin Raybourn was driving through Winston-Salem with his wife and listening to the race on his radio when Jimmie Johnson and Jeff Gordon banged to a one-two finish two weeks ago at Martinsville Speedway.
"Mark Connolly was following the Nextel Cup event on his computer, switching between the intense conversations on the in-car radios of both Hendrick Motorsports drivers over the final laps.
Robert Deering arrived at home just in time to catch the final fender-to-door finish on television.
None really cared who won.
Each was thinking the same thing.
"What's it going to be like when they get here Monday morning?" Connolly said as he sat next to his two co-workers in the cafeteria at HMS. "What's the feeling going to be for everybody that comes back from the track?
"I felt like everybody in the shop would be like I was, just excited we won and had a great finish. I didn't know what the road teams were going to be like. That was the question on my mind. I wasn't sure."
The No. 48 and 24 cars of Johnson and Gordon have been built in the same building since 2001. With the exception of crew chiefs Chad Knaus (Johnson) and Steve Letarte (Gordon), almost everybody works on both cars during the week.
Every nut, bolt and idea that comes out of this multimillion-dollar complex in the rolling hills near Lowe's Motor Speedway is shared.
The process of keeping everything equal goes all the way from the photographs on the wall -- not once are there consecutive pictures of one car or driver -- to the logos of both teams on employee shirts.
Even the bonuses from both teams are shared.
Jason Smith/Getty Images for NASCAR
Crew members who work on the cars of Jimmie Johnson, left, and Jeff Gordon knew they would have some body panels to straighten out. They were anxiously awaiting to see whether some relationships needed mending after the finish.
But there never had been a situation quite like Martinsville, where Gordon stopped just shy of taking his teammate out and then publicly expressed displeasure with the way Johnson blocked him to win over the final laps.
"There was a little bit of a tentative, uncertain feeling about how things would be when we got back to the shop," said Deering, the shop supervisor. "It's a territory we generally haven't had to experience.
"A lot of it was how Stevie and Chad were going to deal with it. Once they showed the team they were going to deal with it in a positive way, everybody was cool. Within a few hours we were a hundred percent getting ready for the next race."
That's the way owner Rick Hendrick intended it to be when he came up with this concept that is shared by the No. 5 team of Kyle Busch and No. 25 of Casey Mears in an adjacent building.
It's evident the moment you walk in the lobby and see the cars of Gordon and Johnson side by side, not an inch separating their noses, on a round platform highlighted by the inscription, "Teamwork is the fuel that allows common people to produce uncommon results."
"When we started rebuilding back in 2000, we told everybody we're going to win together and we're going to lose together, but we're going to be together," Hendrick once said.
"And every crew chief and every driver that's come into the organization since then … we've had the goal of working together, sharing information and making it work."
That was the case at Martinsville. After Johnson had the slowest car in Saturday's first practice, Knaus went to Letarte for help.
Letarte handed over every detail of the setup that put Gordon third in the starting lineup.
"Stevie, it might have burned him a little bit [to finish second]," said Raybourn, the lead engineer for both teams. "Jeff led a lot of laps and had the faster car. I told him he needs to take a lot of pride in what happened. If it wasn't for his help the 48 wouldn't have been able to do what they did.
"He was, 'Yeah, yeah, right.'"
Deering laughed.
"The 24 gave the 48 their setup, so they should win, right?" he said. "But it doesn't always work that way in the racing game.
"Yeah, Stevie was a little bit down, only because he wants to win. After Steve realized in the bigger scheme of things what happened, he looked at it differently. Once you let it sink all in, everybody realized it was a good thing."
Gordon, by finishing second instead of wrecking one or both cars, stretched his lead in the points to 28 over Jeff Burton heading into Sunday's race at Texas Motor Speedway.
Johnson moved to third, 60 behind his teammate.
"It's hard for some people to understand," Deering said. "They want to make things out like, 'OK, the two teams are at each other.' But five minutes from now I'll be working on the 48 car trying to resolve issues there.
"And then a minute later I'll be on the 24 car. It's kind of an odd concept for people to pick up, but it's just one team fielding two race cars."
The concept must be working. Since 2001, HMS has won 54 races, with Johnson and Gordon teaming for 49 wins and two championships, Johnson in 2006 and Gordon in 2001.
HMS has won four of the six races this season, with Johnson claiming three and Busch one.
"It starts at the top," Deering said. "Mr. Hendrick is a great leader [who] says this is how we're going to operate, and he advocates that everybody that works for him works in that mind-set.
"So you don't necessarily see that in-house battling at all. The people that want to work here, they know when they step in the door that's how they have to operate."
Connolly referred to a series of photos in the Hendrick Museum in which members of all four HMS teams are working to get Gordon's backup car prepared after a first-lap crash in the 2000 All-Star race.
"Those photos say a lot about what this organization is about," said Connolly, the lead fabricator for both teams. "There wasn't just one uniform on that car. There was every uniform from this complex.
"Mr. Hendrick always said they can't bring us down from the outside. It's always going to happen from the inside. That's why we do like Robert said after Martinsville. We catch our breath and go about our business."
Few if any other multi-car organization work quite like this. Most have different crews for each team.
"I believe everybody out there believes they're all plain cars until they're loaded on the truck," Connolly said as he looked toward the HMS shop. "I don't believe anybody really sees numbers on them."
Unlike a lot of garages, where you'll find all of one car on one side of the shop and all of another on the other, 24s and 48s are intermingled among cars that are painted gray with no number.
Kyle Busch got a little help from teammate Jeff Gordon to win at Bristol.
The only rivalry is between the pit crews that work predominantly on one car.
"But it's healthy," Deering said. "The pit crews are part of the competitive environment we're in. To get better and better there's always that little bit of 'I can do it better than you' mentality.
"It's more of a healthy thing. That's what keeps us driven to get better."
Deering never considered the pit crews would go after each other at Martinsville as sometimes happens during a heated finish. His biggest concern was the same one he has every week.
"My biggest thing is, 'Don't wreck. Just don't wreck,'" Deering said with a laugh. "Our inventory is not the greatest with our [Car of Tomorrow] Impalas."
They didn't wreck, but Connolly knew his crew had a lot of work to do long before the finish.
"They were already wrinkled up enough for us to have to repair body panels," he said. "My concern was they were going to wreck each other and one of them was going to have to finish under the green-white-checkered and Kyle Busch was going to beat us again."
If there's a rivalry at HMS, it's between the Johnson-Gordon shop and Busch-Mears shop.
That got pretty interesting three weeks ago at Bristol, where Hendrick radioed Gordon not to wreck Busch as they were running one-two with a few laps remaining.
Busch went on to win and Gordon finished third.
"They're certainly part of the company, but they are on the other side of the parking lot," Connolly said. "There's no question Kyle is strong and Casey is going to be. We have to beat them like we have to beat anybody else. It would be fair to say there might be a little bit of rivalry."
Connolly doesn't believe Busch would have thought twice about taking Johnson out had he been in Gordon's position at Martinsville.
"His history and driving style, his impatience and maybe inexperience would have taken over," he said. "I just think after three laps of beating on somebody when you have the faster car Kyle would have gone for it and he would have won.
"Some of the things he says in his interviews after the race shows he certainly wouldn't hesitate to take somebody out to win. I don't mean any disrespect with that. I think everybody agrees with that."
Deering interrupted.
"Even after Bristol you would say that?" he asked. "Jeff took care of him pretty well at Bristol. Hopefully, he keeps that in his memory bank."
Connolly simply shook his head.
"I just don't think he would have [backed off]," he said
This is as close to in-house squabbling as you'll see here. One thing they all agree on is that there are more interesting times like Martinsville ahead.
"I don't think that's the last time you'll see that," Connolly said. "Both cars are real strong. Both are headed in the right direction. Both drivers are pretty excited about their season and where they're at.
"They'll be there again."
David Newton covers NASCAR for ESPN.com. He can be reached at [email protected].
"Mark Connolly was following the Nextel Cup event on his computer, switching between the intense conversations on the in-car radios of both Hendrick Motorsports drivers over the final laps.
Robert Deering arrived at home just in time to catch the final fender-to-door finish on television.
None really cared who won.
Each was thinking the same thing.
"What's it going to be like when they get here Monday morning?" Connolly said as he sat next to his two co-workers in the cafeteria at HMS. "What's the feeling going to be for everybody that comes back from the track?
"I felt like everybody in the shop would be like I was, just excited we won and had a great finish. I didn't know what the road teams were going to be like. That was the question on my mind. I wasn't sure."
The No. 48 and 24 cars of Johnson and Gordon have been built in the same building since 2001. With the exception of crew chiefs Chad Knaus (Johnson) and Steve Letarte (Gordon), almost everybody works on both cars during the week.
Every nut, bolt and idea that comes out of this multimillion-dollar complex in the rolling hills near Lowe's Motor Speedway is shared.
The process of keeping everything equal goes all the way from the photographs on the wall -- not once are there consecutive pictures of one car or driver -- to the logos of both teams on employee shirts.
Even the bonuses from both teams are shared.
Jason Smith/Getty Images for NASCAR
Crew members who work on the cars of Jimmie Johnson, left, and Jeff Gordon knew they would have some body panels to straighten out. They were anxiously awaiting to see whether some relationships needed mending after the finish.
But there never had been a situation quite like Martinsville, where Gordon stopped just shy of taking his teammate out and then publicly expressed displeasure with the way Johnson blocked him to win over the final laps.
"There was a little bit of a tentative, uncertain feeling about how things would be when we got back to the shop," said Deering, the shop supervisor. "It's a territory we generally haven't had to experience.
"A lot of it was how Stevie and Chad were going to deal with it. Once they showed the team they were going to deal with it in a positive way, everybody was cool. Within a few hours we were a hundred percent getting ready for the next race."
That's the way owner Rick Hendrick intended it to be when he came up with this concept that is shared by the No. 5 team of Kyle Busch and No. 25 of Casey Mears in an adjacent building.
It's evident the moment you walk in the lobby and see the cars of Gordon and Johnson side by side, not an inch separating their noses, on a round platform highlighted by the inscription, "Teamwork is the fuel that allows common people to produce uncommon results."
"When we started rebuilding back in 2000, we told everybody we're going to win together and we're going to lose together, but we're going to be together," Hendrick once said.
"And every crew chief and every driver that's come into the organization since then … we've had the goal of working together, sharing information and making it work."
That was the case at Martinsville. After Johnson had the slowest car in Saturday's first practice, Knaus went to Letarte for help.
Letarte handed over every detail of the setup that put Gordon third in the starting lineup.
"Stevie, it might have burned him a little bit [to finish second]," said Raybourn, the lead engineer for both teams. "Jeff led a lot of laps and had the faster car. I told him he needs to take a lot of pride in what happened. If it wasn't for his help the 48 wouldn't have been able to do what they did.
"He was, 'Yeah, yeah, right.'"
Deering laughed.
"The 24 gave the 48 their setup, so they should win, right?" he said. "But it doesn't always work that way in the racing game.
"Yeah, Stevie was a little bit down, only because he wants to win. After Steve realized in the bigger scheme of things what happened, he looked at it differently. Once you let it sink all in, everybody realized it was a good thing."
Gordon, by finishing second instead of wrecking one or both cars, stretched his lead in the points to 28 over Jeff Burton heading into Sunday's race at Texas Motor Speedway.
Johnson moved to third, 60 behind his teammate.
"It's hard for some people to understand," Deering said. "They want to make things out like, 'OK, the two teams are at each other.' But five minutes from now I'll be working on the 48 car trying to resolve issues there.
"And then a minute later I'll be on the 24 car. It's kind of an odd concept for people to pick up, but it's just one team fielding two race cars."
The concept must be working. Since 2001, HMS has won 54 races, with Johnson and Gordon teaming for 49 wins and two championships, Johnson in 2006 and Gordon in 2001.
HMS has won four of the six races this season, with Johnson claiming three and Busch one.
"It starts at the top," Deering said. "Mr. Hendrick is a great leader [who] says this is how we're going to operate, and he advocates that everybody that works for him works in that mind-set.
"So you don't necessarily see that in-house battling at all. The people that want to work here, they know when they step in the door that's how they have to operate."
Connolly referred to a series of photos in the Hendrick Museum in which members of all four HMS teams are working to get Gordon's backup car prepared after a first-lap crash in the 2000 All-Star race.
"Those photos say a lot about what this organization is about," said Connolly, the lead fabricator for both teams. "There wasn't just one uniform on that car. There was every uniform from this complex.
"Mr. Hendrick always said they can't bring us down from the outside. It's always going to happen from the inside. That's why we do like Robert said after Martinsville. We catch our breath and go about our business."
Few if any other multi-car organization work quite like this. Most have different crews for each team.
"I believe everybody out there believes they're all plain cars until they're loaded on the truck," Connolly said as he looked toward the HMS shop. "I don't believe anybody really sees numbers on them."
Unlike a lot of garages, where you'll find all of one car on one side of the shop and all of another on the other, 24s and 48s are intermingled among cars that are painted gray with no number.
Kyle Busch got a little help from teammate Jeff Gordon to win at Bristol.
The only rivalry is between the pit crews that work predominantly on one car.
"But it's healthy," Deering said. "The pit crews are part of the competitive environment we're in. To get better and better there's always that little bit of 'I can do it better than you' mentality.
"It's more of a healthy thing. That's what keeps us driven to get better."
Deering never considered the pit crews would go after each other at Martinsville as sometimes happens during a heated finish. His biggest concern was the same one he has every week.
"My biggest thing is, 'Don't wreck. Just don't wreck,'" Deering said with a laugh. "Our inventory is not the greatest with our [Car of Tomorrow] Impalas."
They didn't wreck, but Connolly knew his crew had a lot of work to do long before the finish.
"They were already wrinkled up enough for us to have to repair body panels," he said. "My concern was they were going to wreck each other and one of them was going to have to finish under the green-white-checkered and Kyle Busch was going to beat us again."
If there's a rivalry at HMS, it's between the Johnson-Gordon shop and Busch-Mears shop.
That got pretty interesting three weeks ago at Bristol, where Hendrick radioed Gordon not to wreck Busch as they were running one-two with a few laps remaining.
Busch went on to win and Gordon finished third.
"They're certainly part of the company, but they are on the other side of the parking lot," Connolly said. "There's no question Kyle is strong and Casey is going to be. We have to beat them like we have to beat anybody else. It would be fair to say there might be a little bit of rivalry."
Connolly doesn't believe Busch would have thought twice about taking Johnson out had he been in Gordon's position at Martinsville.
"His history and driving style, his impatience and maybe inexperience would have taken over," he said. "I just think after three laps of beating on somebody when you have the faster car Kyle would have gone for it and he would have won.
"Some of the things he says in his interviews after the race shows he certainly wouldn't hesitate to take somebody out to win. I don't mean any disrespect with that. I think everybody agrees with that."
Deering interrupted.
"Even after Bristol you would say that?" he asked. "Jeff took care of him pretty well at Bristol. Hopefully, he keeps that in his memory bank."
Connolly simply shook his head.
"I just don't think he would have [backed off]," he said
This is as close to in-house squabbling as you'll see here. One thing they all agree on is that there are more interesting times like Martinsville ahead.
"I don't think that's the last time you'll see that," Connolly said. "Both cars are real strong. Both are headed in the right direction. Both drivers are pretty excited about their season and where they're at.
"They'll be there again."
David Newton covers NASCAR for ESPN.com. He can be reached at [email protected].