Pearn up to speed with Daly at Indy 500
INDIANAPOLIS – There is not much the owner of a backcountry skiing and hiking vacation company in Canada can do with a lifetime of racing knowledge after he has walked away from a championship-winning career.
Cole Pearn abruptly retired at the end of last year’s NASCAR season after helping build one of the best teams in stock car racing. His life on the road cost him too much time with his young family and relocating from Colorado to North Carolina had limited their access to outdoor adventures.
They returned to his native Canada to operate Golden Alpine Holidays in British Columbia, a venture that has been disrupted by the coronavirus pandemic. Racing has also been scrambled, and when the Indianapolis 500 was moved from May to Aug. 23, one of the Ed Carpenter Racing engineers had a conflict.
It created an opening for an engineer at Carpenter for Conor Daly’s car. One of Carpenter’s crew members had worked with Pearn before and the connection was made: Pearn, the crew chief of Martin Truex Jr.’s 2017 NASCAR championship season, would work the Indianapolis 500.
“They asked. It was like, ‘Yeah, why not?’” said Pearn, who called the Indy 500 a bucket list event. “It’s hard when you race your whole life and just completely turn it all off. So it’s kind of nice to scratch that itch at the same time.”
Daly, in his first day working with Pearn, was ninth fastest around Indianapolis Motor Speedway. The Chevrolet was even faster Thursday, when Daly briefly sat atop the speed chart before Takuma Sato bumped him down a spot.
Daly, making his seventh Indy 500 start, finished a career-best 10th in his hometown race last season while running for Andretti Autosport. A scrapper who has pieced together a full Indycar season swapping between Carpenter for oval races and Carlin Racing for street and road course events, The 28year-old Daly is trying to stabilize his career.
Daly will try to parlay a strong 500 into full-time work while relying on a part-time engineer in the 37-year-old Pearn.
“I’ve learned to just try to get along with everyone,” Daly said. “I’m a very trusting individual. Obviously, Cole has an incredible amount of experience in the racing world. Was a driver himself, as well. He knows what’s going on.”
Pearn’s most noted success is in stock cars and a five-year stint as Truex’s crew chief that produced 24 Cup Series victories. The team raced for the title three consecutive years, finishing second in back-to-back seasons after the 2017 championship.
Things began to change when Furniture Row Racing closed at the end of the 2018 season and Pearn and Truex were pulled into Joe Gibbs Racing. They won seven races and were runner-up to teammate Kyle Busch in the title race when Pearn decided he’d had enough.
He has since watched NASCAR on television and provides both insightful and comedic commentary on social media. Pearn recognized he missed racing.
“For sure missed the competition side,” Pearn said.