By Jared Turner Dale Earnhardt Jr. said on Friday at Pocono that he and first-year crew chief Greg Ives still don’t have the close, personal friendship that the driver enjoyed with Steve Letarte, his crew chief of the past four seasons. Calling Ives, an engineer, “super, super-serious,” Junior admitted that the new guy atop the No. 88 pit box this season doesn’t joke around much and that there’s not a lot of small talk that goes on between the driver and crew chief. While it’s certainly commendable that Ives doesn’t take his responsibilities lightly, perhaps it wouldn’t hurt for the rookie crew…

By Jared Turner As the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series continues headlong into its busy summer stretch, up next is the Axalta We Paint Winners 400 at Pocono Raceway – a track commonly known as the “Tricky Triangle.” Rest assured, the nickname is not a misnomer. With three straightaways and three distinct corners, all featuring various degrees of banking, Pocono is one of the hardest tracks to master on the schedule from both a driver and setup standpoint. Getting a car to handle reasonably well in all three corners usually means a bit of compromise on at least one end of the track.…