Dale Earnhardt Jr. ‘nervous’ after confirming – Sports News
Dale Earnhardt Jr. conceded that he’s already feeling the nerves forward of JR Motorsports’ highly-anticipated return to the Daytona 500.
This 12 months, Earnhardt and co. loved a near-perfect debut within the NASCAR Cup Series, as JR Motorsports’ Justin Allgaier steered the No. 40 Chevrolet to an inconceivable ninth-place end in ‘The Great American Race.’
Last Friday, JR Motorsports introduced that they intend to as soon as again area a Traveller Whiskey’s sponsored car piloted by Allgaier within the 2026 Daytona 500. Despite working it back with the identical driver and crew, Earnhardt expressed concern that Chevrolet’s new superspeedway physique may affect the crew’s efficiency.
On Monday’s version of ‘Dale Jr. Download,’ Earnhardt famous that even the minutest of modifications may result in short-term inconsistency as drivers grow more accustomed to how the physique behaves in site visitors and soiled air. “I’m nervous because we’re going to have a new body,” he stated.
“Anytime a manufacturer gets a new body, they don’t go to Daytona and perform better. You’re figuring out kind of what makes that body perform at a track like that. I don’t know details, I just shoot it straight. Every time a manufacturer changes the body, they’re trying their best in every way, when a new body is coming in, to make their cars more competitive at the tracks that we race the most.
“They’re always trying to put a character line in there or fudge the quarter panel, or whatever the nose in such a way they’re working with the teams to go, ‘Hey man, this is what we need, this would make us better. Well, let’s see if we can get it passed through. Will NASCAR accept it?’ NASCAR will run it through some tests and aero and stuff like that to make sure it’s not like this massive advantage comparable to the other manufacturers.”
Given the collection of changes to the Chevrolet Camaro physique — together with a bigger hood dome, more sculpted rocker panels and a redefined entrance grille — Earnhardt admitted that he might be tempering expectations at Daytona International Speedway in February 2026.
“You got to rein all the expectations back in to man, we just got to get in the show. Let’s get in the show. We’re not locked in,” Earnhardt stated. “New body, don’t know how the car will qualify.
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“We thought we were gonna do alright last year and we didn’t in qualifying. I’ll be apprehensive about our opportunity in just pure speed on qualifying. We may have to go back and race our way in.
“You just want to get there and roll the car out for Sunday morning and put it on the grid. That’s a proud moment, pushing a car out on to the grid and standing there watching your driver. That’s a proud moment. … Hopefully we can go back. It’ll be hard to recreate the experience and the success we had last year. So, everybody will have to be realistic.”
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