Michael Waltrip Racing swaps crew chiefs for Bowyer, Ragan

Michael Waltrip Racing announced Tuesday morning that Clint Bowyer crew chief Brian Pattie will become the crew chief for the No. 55 MWR Toyota driven by David Ragan, while Ragan crew chief Billy Scott has been named crew chief for Bowyer's No. 15 MWR team.

The swap, made in an effort to improve the performance of both teams, is effective immediately.
 
Pattie has been the crew chief for the No. 15 with Bowyer since the team was established in 2012. Bowyer has three wins and finished second in the 2012 Chase for the Sprint Cup and seventh in 2013 under Pattie's guidance.

After 14 races this season, Bowyer is 17th in the standings with three top-10 finishes and no top fives.
 
Scott has been the crew chief on the No. 55 since August 2013, and previously worked under Rodney Childers as the team's lead engineer.

In four races since taking over the No. 55 car driven earlier this year by Brian Vickers and Brett Moffitt, Ragan has finished no better than 13th.

Additional changes announced Tuesday for MWR include a reorganization of lead, secondary and support engineers for each team. Car chiefs, road mechanics and pit crews will remain with their originally assigned teams.
 
"Our goal is to best position the 15 and 55 teams for a berth in the Chase for the Sprint Cup," said MWR co-owner Rob Kauffman. "MWR has an enormous amount of bright, motivated and quality people working to solve the endless challenges inherent to racing. We have won poles and races, we have made the Chase and competed for a championship with this core group of personnel.

"We just felt it was time to shake things up a bit to try and spark fresh ideas and more consistent results. There are 12 races left before the 2015 Chase field is set, and we plan to be a part of it."