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After
losing 143 straight races, Dale Earnhardt Jr. finally won again. This
time at Michigan;
the same track he last won at.
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Nascar...
Jr. gets monkey
off his back
Having gone four years without a victory, you’d have expected Dale
Earnhardt Jr. to go a little nuts when he crossed the finish line first
Sunday at Michigan International Speedway.
He didn’t.
Instead, Junior calmly said over his radio, “I don’t know what to say,”
then asked his crew chief Steve Letarte if, in fact, he’d really won.
Letarte confirmed he had and, well, Junior was relieved.
Oh, there will celebrations across Junior Nation now that their
driver’s 143-race losing streak is over – “National holiday tomorrow,”
Tony Stewart said as Junior took the checkered flag – but just as he’s
done throughout these four long years, Junior won’t get caught up in
it. When he hopped out of his car, he immediately thanked his fans –
“They stuck behind me for all these years. I appreciate their loyalty,”
he said – but going crazy over one victory isn’t in his blood, not when
his daddy won so many races and a championship is still the ultimate
goal.
So as he celebrated in victory lane, Junior did so as if he’d been
there the day before, and the day before that and the day before that,
even if he hadn’t been there since June 15, 2008.
“Winning races is all you ever want,” Earnhardt said. “You work real
hard to get there. I have got to thank [team owner] Rick Hendrick and
the whole organization really for sticking with me. They could have
taken another route, but they stuck with me, and we are back to victory
lane.”
This season has been a revival of sorts for NASCAR’s most popular (and
therefore most scrutinized) driver. He’s been near the top of the
standings all year, has finished every single lap of every single race,
has 12 top-10 finishes in 15 tries and now this, a victory to end
what’s become the sport’s most eternal question: When will Dale Jr. win
again?
Ironically, this win came on the same track (Michigan) as his last one,
which came in his first season with powerhouse Hendrick Motorsports. At
that time, Junior was on a role and it appeared things would only be
looking up for him and his decision to join NASCAR’s premier
organization. Only it didn’t turn out that way.
The win in 2008 would be the high point of his season, as he slipped
into the shadow of his more formative teammates, namely Jimmie Johnson.
Junior had always battled with the critics who complained that his
popularity didn’t match his talent, and that was only emphasized with
him sharing garage space with a guy who was in the midst of the
greatest winning streak the sport has ever seen.
Johnson winning five straight championships may have been great for the
organization, but it served as fuel to the fire for Junior haters,
whose “overrated” screams became louder as Earnhardt’s winless streak
mounted.
The truth is Junior isn’t nor has ever been overrated. If anything, the
critics’ complaints that he is a crappy driver is misdirected anger
aimed not at Earnhardt, but rather at preserving his father’s legend.
Junior will be the first to acknowledge that he isn’t his father and
that he owes his popularity almost entirely to his dad. Sure, he has
more fans than he otherwise would, but he was still an 18-time winner
throughout the entire losing streak, a number that puts him in the Hall
of Fame conversation.
Win No. 19 came in absolutely dominating fashion, which it had to in
order for the critics not to scream foul, something they do with
regularity. Junior started 17th, fell way back early, but after an
adjustment on the first pit stop it was clear he and his car were the
class of the field. By Lap 70 he was at the front, a lead he would only
relinquish briefly over the rest of the 130 laps.
He wound up leading 95 laps, more than twice as many as anyone else,
and cruised to a more than 5-second victory over Tony Stewart, who
could only watch the 88 drive away.
“I don’t know what it means for him personally to get that win but I
know that even if he acts like it’s not, it’s probably a burden having
all your fans talking about you and writing stuff about you not
winning,” said Matt Kenseth, who wound up third. “But this year, you
could see it was going to be a matter of time. Really they have been
the guys all year.”
Now the talk can shift from when will Junior finally win a race to can
he win a championship. The victory moved him to within four points of
Kenseth, the current points leader.
Shake one monkey off your back and another quickly climbs on. So is
life when you’re Dale Earnhardt Sr.’s son.
Read this and other articles at Nascar
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