Win or Lose, Earnhardt Always Makes it Interesting
(nascar.com)
LAS VEGAS -- Even in the midst of a disheartening start to the season, the true believers continue to believe. In the long line of cars snaking toward Las Vegas Motor Speedway on Sunday, Dale Earnhardt Jr. was everywhere -- in 88s scrawled across rear windshields or pickup tailgates, in those familiar red and green colors on car flags or cap bills protruding from rolled-down windows, in the T-shirt worn by a guy standing up through the sunroof of a limousine, just like the Tom Hanks character in Big. The NASCAR driver was nowhere to be seen, of course, but he was everywhere at the same time.
This was Junior Nation, marshaling as it does every week, through race victories and long winless streaks and crashes and pit-road mistakes and controversy. Their man was in trouble, and they knew it -- a spate of misfortune in the season-opening Daytona 500, combined with engine failure last week in Southern California, had relegated NASCAR's most popular driver to a precarious 35th in points as the Sprint Cup Series rolled into town. His support system was out in force, its members honking car horns and trading fist pumps as the quagmire of traffic inched its way ever closer to the big speedway splashed across the stark desert landscape.
That kind of fan following is just one of the things unique to Earnhardt, at once the most popular, polarizing and criticized figure in NASCAR. People love him. People hate him because so many people love him. People embrace him because of his last name and who his father was, while others are repelled for the same reasons. Some don't think he's done enough to justify all the attention he receives; to others, he's been hamstrung by change and circumstance. It's hard to believe that such a relatively quiet, often unassuming, occasionally taciturn 34-year-old can inspire such a disparate array of passions. But Earnhardt does, every time he slides behind the wheel.
It's all part of what makes him so fascinating. Anything Earnhardt does creates substantial ripples, like a large rock dropped into a pond. His triumphs and struggles are magnified by the brightness of the spotlight that's always focused on him, made larger than life because of the reactions they provoke. Any other driver misses his pit board in the Daytona 500, and it's a non-story; Junior does it, and it's a crisis. Any other driver crashes with Brian Vickers trying to get a lap back, and it's a controversy; Junior does it, and it provokes debates over the most overrated athlete in history. Likewise, just the sight of that No. 88 car taking the lead elicits a chorus of cheers that can be heard even above engine noise. Missing the Chase, ending a 76-race winless streak, changing teams -- his career is a roller coaster, and we're all along for the ride.Just take the Shelby 427, for instance. Las Vegas is the place where Earnhardt recorded a second-place finish to truly jump-start his first season with Hendrick Motorsports, a result he surely could have used again Sunday. Of course, it didn't help that he qualified closer to the back of the field than the front. And then came an early pass-through penalty for speeding entering pit road, and suddenly for the second time in three weeks he was a lap down again, and all those folks wearing 88 caps were having flashbacks to Daytona -- where Earnhardt first missed his pit box, and then overran it, and all the trouble started.
We know that we need to put together about six or seven good weeks to give ourselves a shot at getting back in the battle for the Chase. We've got some good tracks in a row here where we can do that.
"I just keep giving everybody ammunition," he said after the race with sly grin. Actually he'd been rather cognizant of Las Vegas' tricky pit-road entrance, even thinking during the Nationwide event about where he'd have to stop in the Sprint Cup race a day later. Still, going from 180 mph to 45 isn't easy, as the nine drivers busted for speeding Sunday can attest.
"I lifted a little bit earlier, and when I got toward pit road I really got on the brakes hard and it wheel-hopped," Earnhardt explained in the garage area as his crew loaded up his car. "It was just my fault. When you're wheel-hopping, you can't read the [tachometer] and I knew it didn't matter if I could read it, it was going to be too fast. But just trying, man, tryin' hard."
On the race track, he was clearly beating himself up over the misjudgment. "I thought I slowed down way early," he told crew chief Tony Eury Jr. over the radio. "This thing isn't stopping like I thought it was. I'll do a better job next time."
He got back on the lead lap when David Stremme spun to bring out a caution, even inched into the top 10 with 89 laps to go. "There you go, man," spotter T.J. Majors encouraged him. "You're doing awesome. Keep digging." But track position didn't come easy, and then the sun started to set behind the vast grandstand, and the temperature dropped and the car got tight. Suddenly Earnhardt was back at the end of the lead lap again, struggling to make headway. Then strange things began to happen -- Denny Hamlin plowed into the wall, Gordon struggled to slow down entering pit road and shredded a tire, Carl Edwards blew an engine and Jimmie Johnson went spinning. Earnhardt drove through it all, keeping the car pointed straight while so many others went sideways, making up spot after spot after spot.
And when it was over, Earnhardt was 10th. It wasn't pretty, it wasn't textbook, but it was the top-10 finish that he desperately needed, one that boosted him six spots to 29th in points. Crisis averted, for now. Junior Nation can breathe again. Junior haters can go find someone else to grouse about.
"We really, really needed it," Earnhardt said afterward. "We know that we need to put together about six or seven good weeks to give ourselves a shot at getting back in the battle for the Chase. We've got some good tracks in a row here where we can do that. We've just got to keep our heads on straight. The problem with speeding on pit road is just trying too hard, and that can hurt you as bad as not trying enough."
From the top deck of the Neon Garage, the faithful hooted and hollered their approval. Then it was back to all those cars bedecked with all those flags and bumper stickers, and another slow crawl in the opposite direction. The dizzying amusement park attraction that is Dale Earnhardt Jr. chugs on. Next stop: Atlanta Motor Speedway.
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