Dale Earnhardt Jr was ‘so embarrassed’ by NASCAR – Sports News
Dale Earnhardt Jr. has recalled being “embarrassed” about a 2001 crash at Rockingham that was eerily much like that of his late father’s deadly incident on the Daytona 500 a week earlier.
The NASCAR world misplaced one of its best-ever drivers on the final lap of the 2001 Daytona 500, with Dale Sr. succumbing to his accidents sustained within the sport’s most well-known race. The seven-time NASCAR Cup Series champion’s son, Dale Jr., completed the Daytona 500 in second behind Mike Skinner, earlier than studying of his father’s passing. Dale Sr. had died immediately from a basilar cranium fracture.
Despite the shock and devastation of his father’s passing, Dale Jr. and the Dale Earnhardt Inc. group continued racing for the rest of the 2001 season, beginning the next week on the Rockingham monitor. Dale Jr. knew all eyes can be on him and the group following his father’s death.
A poor qualifying adopted by a crash ended Earnhardt Jr.’s weekend early, and the Dale Inc. group instantly packed up. They departed for home, with your entire group nonetheless in mourning. Dale Jr. admitted that the crash left him feeling “embarrassed” because of how related it was to his dad’s deadly incident the week earlier than.
“We went to Rockingham, uh, you know, I don’t know that any of us knew where we were supposed to be, but we didn’t want to be at home. Yeah. You know what I mean? We didn’t want to not, we didn’t want to go sit at home. You know, we had to race,” Dale Jr. mentioned on his Dirty Mo Media podcast alongside longtime buddy and crew member Kevin “Two Beers” Pennell.
“We probably didn’t want to go to Rockingham. We could have chose other racetracks, but, um, we went to Rockingham and we qualified pretty bad. Got ran into, into turn three,” he continued.
“There’s a lot of checking up guys trying to get to the bottom into three. And, uh, we got, we got turned into the wall.
“I simply form of overcorrected after I bought turned sideways, however, um, I was so embarrassed that that crash, how related that crash regarded to dads.
“I was so embarrassed, um, that I, I mean, it’s lap one. I knew everybody was kind of wondering watching. And then for that to happen, I was like, golly, um, it would have really done me some good to run 500 miles or just run half of that or something.
“That’s simply to get, simply to be, only for it to be off my thoughts for a couple of minutes, you recognize, trigger driving a race car, it could possibly get, you’ll be able to, you’ll be able to’t take into consideration nothing else. It can actually clear your thoughts. Um, and I simply, uh, that sucked.”
Dale Jr. went on to win three races within the 2001 season. The first being the Pepsi 400 back at Daytona in July, back on the scene of his father’s death. He then gained at Talladega and Dover, earlier than ending eighth total within the Cup standings.
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