LOUDON, N.H. – Biddeford’s Richard “Slugger” Labbe always enjoys racing at New Hampshire International Speedway.

That’s because, for all intents and purposes, it’s home.

The crew chief for Sterling Marlin’s No. 14 Ginn Racing Chevrolet even got an opportunity to go home and spend some time with his grandmothers on Saturday afternoon.

“Things are going fine. I’ve got some buddies up from Maine. I’m hanging out with them. So that’s cool,” said Labbe.

The 50-year-old Marlin was 28th in points entering the LENOX Industrial Tools 300 and finished 24th in the race. His best finish had been a 13th at Darlington. He had five top-20s in 16 races. He had two top-10 starts.

Labbe took over as the crew chief for Marlin over the last 11 races of 2006 and has remained with him.

“Sterling is fun. We’re trying to figure out if he’s going to run full time next year. He’s a real easy going type of guy. He lets you do your deal. He just wants to drive it and run hard. He lets you do your work and gives you the input. He reminds me of Michael Waltrip and that kind of fits my style. So we get along really good.”

The feeling is mutual.

“He’s great to work with,” said Marlin.

Marlin started 41st Sunday and Labbe said, “We didn’t give him a very good car.”

But he expects better things next Saturday night at the Pepsi 400 at Daytona.

“We’re going to make a big splash. I think we’re going to run really good there. We really think we can win that race. We’ve got a great engine from Hendrick Motorsports and we’ve done a lot of work on our car. We’re going down there to win that race. Hopefully, we’ll send him out a winner if he decides to retire after this year.”

Labbe said whatever Marlin decides to do, “we’re behind him 100 percent.”

Labbe said the team’s biggest problem this season has been their inability to “finish” races strong.

“Like last week in Sonoma. We qualified well [20th] and we practiced well but we blew an engine during the race,” said Labbe.

Marlin finished last.

“Mr. [Bobby] Ginn has given us a lot of resources and a lot of tools to work with,” said Labbe. “We’re getting there. The 01 [car] runs good every week when Mark Martin is driving. Mark has adapted really well. And Joe [Nemechek] has run well [in the No. 13 car]. They’ve got the same stuff we have so we’ve got to find what is needed to be done so Sterling can run like Mark has.”

Martin is 15th in points with seven top-10s and four top-fives in just 12 of the 16 races. He is running a part-time schedule.

Crew chiefs put in endless hours during the week and on race weekends and Labbe said he plans to retire after five more years to spend more time with his family.

He pointed out that he has seen his son, Chase, play just two Little League games this season.

“He’s on an all-star team in Charlotte. He’s a pitcher and a real good hitter. I keep getting text messages from my wife [telling me how he’s doing],” said Labbe. “We test a lot and work a lot.”

Labbe has been a crew chief since 2001 and has four career wins, three with Michael Waltrip and one with Jeremy Mayfield, who earned a spot in the first-ever Chase in 2005. Mayfield finished ninth that year. He has also been a crew chief for Dale Jarrett.

He quipped that you can expect all the current crew chiefs to look for “team manager jobs or competition director jobs. We bust our butts. We work all the time. We’ve got 280 people in our shop and you’re constantly talking to them to make sure things are going good for them.”

Crew chiefs have the added duty of dealing with the Car of Tomorrow this season, a safer car that will also create more parity in the sport. There are 16 races this year with the COTs and the entire 2008 schedule will be run with the COTs.

“It’s OK. I’m learning more and more every day about it. But it’s like our hands and feet are tied,” said Labbe, who sympathized with suspended crew chiefs Steve Letarte (Jeff Gordon), Chad Knaus (Jimmie Johnson) and Tony Eury Jr. (Dale Earnhardt Jr.), who have all received six-race suspensions and $100,000 fines for making illegal adjustments to their cars. All three teams were docked 100 points as well.

“[NASCAR] is sending a message not to mess with the cars,” said Labbe. “But if we don’t mess with them, we’ll be on the outside looking in. It’s our job to make them competitive. It’s like telling a reporter you have 10 minutes to write a story but you can’t use a computer or a tape recorder.”

Labbe has been fined and suspended before but he said the fines and suspensions are getting heavier and longer. There used to be much more leniency, he said.

“You have to keep your nose clean and do the best you can. You have to ask yourself if the risk is worth the reward. Is it worth possibly getting suspended or questioned?,” said Labbe. “You might hit on something during a test [to improve the car] but you’ve got to tell your engineer and your boss what you’re doing if you think it might be over the edge a little bit. You’ve got to give them a heads up. They’ve taken our tools away and put us in a box. It comes down to pit strategy and how much time you spend on pit road. Everything we do is critiqued. It’s a tough gig.”