DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. (AP) — Dale Earnhardt Jr. blinked back tears as the moment hit him at Daytona International Speedway — a track bursting with triumph and tragedy for his family — that he was, with a country star and a NASCAR champ in tow, back in the Daytona 500.
“I can’t believe that we get to race on Sunday,” Earnhardt said. “I just can’t believe it.”
Believe it, Junior.
Long NASCAR's most popular driver as he built a Hall of Fame racing career in the intimidating shadow of his father, Earnhardt and his JR Motorsports team celebrated Thursday night at the track where he both won two Daytona 500s and suffered the loss of his father on the last lap in the 2001 race.
“Daddy loved Daytona,” Earnhardt said. “Loved winning here. Just loved to win any race here. He loved to add to that number whatever it was (34 total). Gosh, I loved coming here as a kid. Just a lot of great memories. So when he passed away, I had to make a decision, I had a career in front of me and I was coming back multiple times. I had to figure out a way to be OK with it."
Earnhardt knew only joy and gratitude at the track as JR Motorsports and reigning Xfinity Series champion Justin Allgaier qualified for the season-opening “Great American Race” and secured their Cup Series debut with their performance in a 150-mile qualifying race at Daytona.
Earnhardt bearhugged and head-locked all his crewmembers, friends and family — that includes his race team partner, sister Kelley Earnhardt-Miller — as he climbed down the pit box and snaked his way to pit road. His lips quivering, hands shaking before the race, Earnhardt clutched Allgaier in pure bliss as the dream of moving up to the elite Cup Series level became a reality under the lights at Daytona.
“Man, we have kind of tried to downplay how badly we want to race in the Cup Series,” Earnhardt said. “At least I have. It's one of those things where you're like, if it's meant to be, it's meant to be.”
Outside of two full seasons a decade ago, the 38-year-old Allgaier never made a serious run at a Cup career but found new life in NASCAR's second-tier series. He has 25 career wins and won his first Xfinity title last season. He finished second in 2020 and 2023 and blossomed into one of the most popular drivers during his 14 seasons on the Xfinity series.
None of those accomplishments right now hit quite like racing in the Daytona 500 with Junior.
“This one means more than I could ever imagine,” Allgaier said. “It’s going to be really fun.”
Added Earnhardt-Miller: "In our DNA is to earn it, and that’s how we were brought up with Dad. I think everything that we do, you put that hard work in, and it feels better to earn your success.”
Normally a beer drinker (Budweiser Select 55 is his favorite), Earnhardt might have to do cheers to his good fortune with some "Tennessee Whiskey."
JR Motorsports made a run at Daytona in large part because of a partnership with Grammy Award-winning artist Chris Stapleton. Allgaier, who has two previous Daytona 500 starts, and his No. 40 Chevrolet are sponsored by Stapleton's whiskey label, and the singer was expected to attend the Daytona 500. There's more star power inside the car, with the Chevy powered by a Hendrick Motorsports engine.
Earnhardt was crushed after the race team — one of nine open teams trying to fill the final four spots in the Daytona field — failed to lock in a spot the previous night in qualifying.
“I didn't really know exactly how badly I wanted to do this or wanted to be a part of something like this until we started going through it,” he said. “Yesterday was just so tough to understand, something as simple as being eight-thousandths too slow was really hard to understand. It's hard to accept. I've just been sitting here all day thinking about how badly I wanted this for all of us.”
Earnhardt won two Daytona 500s, in 2004 and 2014, and 26 races overall. But he never won a Cup championship or came close to matching the achievements of his late Hall of Fame father, Dale, who won seven titles and was known as “The Intimidator.”
It might have been easy for Earnhardt's professional successes through the decades at Daytona to get swallowed by the grief following his father's death
“I probably need a psychiatrist to describe it,” he said to laughter.
Candid as ever, the 50-year-old Earnhardt insisted he's learned to accept his dad's death as part of the long arc of life rather than grounds to forever blame and hate the famed track.
“I knew that it wasn't the track that took him. I knew that wherever he was, he still felt the same about Daytona," Earnhardt said. "So, I've embraced it. Him losing his life in this property brought this property closer to me. That doesn't work the same with other people and tragedy, but for me, knowing I had to keep coming here, I made some peace with it, embraced the track and loved it.”
Earnhardt loves Daytona, too.
As the tears flowed, it was conceivable to think Earnhardt might not have ever loved it more.
“We get to push a car on the grid Sunday for the first time ever,” Earnhardt said. “In the biggest, most important race that I’ve ever known. And I can’t wait.”
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AP auto racing: https://apnews.com/hub/auto-racing
Dan Gelston, The Associated Press
