TULSA, Okla. Pete Willoughby took one more look at his teams fleet of race cars, slipped across the aisle and fell into a waiting chair. Who could blame him?

This corner of the expansive pit area is always a high traffic area and Christopher Bell was roaming through the Keith Kunz Motorsports-Curb Agajanian compound. There was potential for chaos.

There was a time when Willoughby was focused on his own budding career. It is a fun fact to note that on April 7, 1984, Willoughby captured the late model feature at Indianas Brownstown Speedway becoming the first winner of a UMP-sanctioned event. He once headed his own midget team with drivers such as Jay Drake and Jason Leffler in the fold and now has been one of the key players at Keith Kunz Motorsports for years.

It is doubtful that over 40 summers ago Willoughby could have imagined a single race team bringing 16 cars to the track. It is a situation that has caused some blowback in social media circles which in turn provoked a strong response from Kunz. He has, as he rightfully points out, worked hard to get to this point in his career.

When Emerson Axsom took the checkered flag on Wednesday night it marked the 37th time that Kunz has had a winning car at the Chili Bowl Nationals.

Nonetheless, there were 16 cars and drivers that needed attention, which prompted the most basic question. How?

Well, we had 15 last year so one more did not seem like a big deal and we carry a lot more equipment down the road than most people realize, Willoughby said. Last year in California there were 17 cars out there. The issue is that after Turkey Night you have basically five weeks to get ready for the Chili Bowl, and 10 days of that you are shut down because of holidays.

The biggest hurdle the team had to cross may come as a surprise.

Its the wraps, Willoughby said. The guys doing the mechanical work will be ahead of the wrap.

When you have sponsors to satisfy, this isnt an inconsequential matter. There was a time when the team would request a wrap for a car and it might take a week to get a response and only one version was offered for consideration. However, a new supplier and designer moved the process along.

We found a guy who would send us five versions of our JBL car that you could choose from within eight hours, he said. Then we could send that to the sponsor. They were thrilled because they had choices.

From that point on it all falls in the lap of Hall of Famer Jay Drake who wraps all the cars.

Jay had the skills and didnt tell us, Willoughby said with a laugh. He kept that hidden from us. When the graphics are done, they send it to Jay and he babysits it.

Nonetheless, there are still 16 cars that need mechanical attention and care.

There are really two groups and they manage everything internally, Willoughby explained. Keith and Beau (Binder) are crew chiefs, and they have their own guys that help them do their thing. We also have four crew guys who float. It just seems like everybody knows what their job is, and they do it. If somebody needs support, they jump across and help out.

Beyond logistics and technical challenges there are always personnel concerns. Ask any racer willing to be honest and they will tell you having one teammate is difficult. There can be jealousy, feelings of favoritism, and fights over equipment. Imagine 16 motivated and competitive individuals under one tent.

Within this team, managing the rough spots has often fallen to Willougby.

I am the one who usually hears it, he said. But the drivers have really stopped coming to us with that problem. Take last night. We had two cars that didnt make the show, but one of our cars won. So really, what can they say? Everybody is getting what they need. It is the newer, younger and more inexperienced drivers who come and say Im too loose, Im too tight, the car is doing this and that.

To some degree the message to them is just learn to drive the race car, Willoughby added. Our guys can make the car do, for the most part, what you want it to do but that isnt necessarily going to make it fast. If you want to run in the middle in the slick, we cant help you.

There is a reason no one is in your lane and people are going by you on both sides. You almost have to jump them and tell them to find the race track, because if you cant find the race track we cant help you. Years ago, I heard Keith tell a driver I only know one way to set up a race car, and thats fast. The rest is up to you.

While the first two night of the Chili Bowl went reasonably well, it wasnt quite up to standard. Were used to winning. Willoughby said. So winning last night (Wednesday) put a little pep back into our step.

The team has evolved along with the sport. Given their track record and ability to develop drivers, in Willoughbys words we used to be seen as a pipeline to Charlotte, but that pipeline has really clogged up. Now our goal is to help these young drivers find a way to race for a living it that is what they choose to do.