FANTASY NASCAR Racin

a professional American race car driver and team owner who drives the No. 88 Nationwide Chevrolet Monte Carlo in the NASCAR Cup Series for Hendrick Motorsports. In 1996 Earnhardt would make his first start in the NASCAR Xfinity Seres. He drove the #31 Mom 'n' Pop's Chevy from a seventh place start to a 14th place finish at Myrtle Beach Speedway. This would be his only start in this year. 1997 would see Dale Jr make just eight starts and would post a best finish of seventh at Michigan in a car owned by Dale Earnhardt Inc (DEI). In 1998 Dale Jr would run the full Xfinity series schedule and the rookie would post an incredible seven wins and win the Series Championship by a scant 48 points over Matt Kenseth. 1999 saw Earnhardt again win the Xfinity Series Championship 1999 on the strength of six wins including a stretch of three in a row in the middle of the season. He wheeled the #3 Ac Delco Chevy to the Championship by a whopping 280 points over runner up Jeff Green. 1999 also saw Earnhardt Jr make his first Cup start in the #8 Budweiser Chevy. Earnhardt would move up to race the Cup level in 2000 full time. The rookie would win twice in his DEI Chevy; Earnhardt Jr. competed for the Raybestos NASCAR Rookie of the Year Award in 2000. His primary competitor for the award was Matt Kenseth. Kenseth ultimately scored a 42-point victory in the rookie race. Earnhardt's #8 rookie car is shown here racing next to his Dad in

the #3. Earnhardt Jr. came into the 2001 season hoping to avoid a sophomore slump, but the year proved to be one of the most tumultuous and memorable seasons the young driver would experience. The major event of the season occurred on February 18, 2001 in the final corner of the final lap of the 2001 Daytona 500. As Earnhardt Jr. finished second, to his teammate Michael Waltrip, his father had crashed in turn four. Dale Earnhardt Sr. did not survive the wreck. He was pronounced dead at 5:15 p.m. that Sunday. Junior raced at Rockingham the following weekend, but finished in 43rd-place after a wreck that looked eerily similar to his father's wreck just one week earlier. Dale Jt would return to race at Daytona in July and

pull off an emotional win beating his DEI team mate Michael Waltrip to the checkered flag; the first Daytona race since his father's death there. In 2002 and 2003 Dale Jr would win twice each season. Like his father before him it seemed Dale Jr had a sense of how to 'sniff' the air and work his car in the draft. He won four races in a row at Talladega. 2003 would see Earnhardt post his best career finish in the points to that time ending up third. In 2004 while at the controls of the #8 Budweiser Chevy, Dale Earnhardt, Jr. won the Daytona 500, six years to the date after his father won his only title in the "Great American Race". Teresa Earnhardt had inherited DEI upon Dale Sr's. death; Immediately trouble started brewing as she inherited ownership of DEI. Problems brewed for several years. Dale Jr had asked Teresa to release the #8 he had driven all his Cup career so he could take it with him as he left to go drive for Hendrick Motorsports. Ralph Earnhardt

(Dale Jr's grandfather) and also Dale Sr has raced using the #8 in the Cup series and he wanted to keep using the family number. Teresa even filed laws suits tring to deny Dale Jr the rights to his own name.... She refused and make rediculous request demanding revenue from the licensing and such things. Teresa wanted complete control over Dale Jr and the team. Being Dale Sr's son; Dale Jr wanted a majority ownership of DEI; and being a racer himself felt he knew how a race team should be ran. All Teresa had ever done was be married to a race driver and she knew nothing about the racing business; but she wanted complete control over everything simply because of the mass amount of financial income DEI produced. People on the inside complained about Teresa's "absentee ownership". She never attended the races; and would spend weeks four to five weeks at a time on her yacht with no contact. With help from his fellow drivers and his sister Kelley; Dale Jr was shown that "he" was the face of DEI and that he controlled what DEI was worth. Several

drivers even stepping in to make public comments on behalf of Dale Jr. "He deserves the respect of being a grown man and not being treated like he's 15 and somebody's stepson," said Kevin Harvick, who called Teresa Earnhardt "a deadbeat owner." So after much speculation Dale Earnhardt, Jr. announced on May 10, 2007, that he would leave Dale Earnhardt Inc., the company founded by his father, to drive for another team in 2008. He went to Rick Hendrick Motorsports. Earnhardt expressed that his decision was based entirely on his desires to achieve his career goal of a Cup Championship, and his apparent belief that he would not be able to attain that objective while driving for DEI. Earnhardt started the

season by winning the 2008 Budweiser Shootout (a non-points paying exhibition race). It was his first race for Hendrick. He led for a total of 47 of 70 laps, a Budweiser Shootout record. He followed that up five days later with a win in the Gatorade Duel. Earnhardt finished 9th in the Daytona 500. He later won a points paying race at Michigan. From 2008-2011 was a dry spell for Earnhardt. He didn't post a win, and only posted 19 top 5 finishes. Steve LeTarte was made Earnhardt's crew chief at the beginning of 2011, moving LeTarte from being Jeff Gordons crew chief in a move to see if his performance and results can be improved. Ten top five finishes was a step in the right direction, and in 2012 the pair broke through again to win at Michigan and snap the four year win streak in the #88 Dark Knight ride; 2013 saw another win-less season;

but in 2014 the duo went to victory lane four times, and started off the season winning the Daytona 500. The pair won an additional three times in 2015 but LeTart announced he would retire from racing at the end of the 2015; and Greg Ives was brought in to be Earnhardt's new crew chief for 2016. Ives had just led Chase Elliott to the Xfinity Championship the season before. After a fairly successful 2015 season, Earnhardt was geared up for a competitive 2016 season; but had a couple early season crashes. He began having headache and dizzy spells and pulled himself out of the car. The doctors diagnosed him with concussion symptoms and advised he not race and put him into a program to rehabilitate himself. After

discussion with his doctors, Earnhardt decided to sit out the remainder of the 2016 season and the seat was filled by Alex Bowman and Jeff Gordon. Earnhardt was only able to race in 18 of the races before he sat out the rest of the season. Before moving up to full time in the Cup series. Earnhardt Jr did win the Nationwide Series championship in 1998 and 1999. Much like his father before him; Dale Jr has interest in being a NASCAR car owner. He started JR Motorsports in 2005 and the team ran just some events the first several years. In 2008 Earnhardt teamed up with car owner Rick Hendrick and created a two car team. Up-and-comer Brad Keselowski was tabbed to drive one of the cars full time and wound up third in the points that season.

Keselowski again drove full time in 2009 and again finished third in points. 2010 and 2011 saw the rides shared among many drivers including Kasey Kahne, Jimmie Johnson, Jamie McMurray Dale Jr, and a young gal named Danica Patrick. In 2012 the team expanded to three teams with Patrick racing full time. 2013 saw JR Motorsports become a force in the Xfinity series. Driver Regan Smith finished third in the points championship while 2014 saw Chase Elliott win the Xfinity Championship and Smith finish second. 2015 again saw Elliott and Smith finish in the top four in points as Elliott finished second. In 2016 Elliott Sadler would finish second in the Xfinity points Chase with Justin Allgaier third. On New Years Eve of 2017 Earnhardt

got married to his long time girlfriend Amy Reimann. They got married at Richard Childress' Vineyard in Lexington NC. At the end of the 2017 season it was announced that Dale and Amy would be expecting a baby in 2018. As 2017 kicked off Dale Jr once again took on the Cup competition with Greg Ives as his crew chief. There was lots of anticipation early in the season. Many expected Earnhardt to renew his contract with Hendrick Motor Sports for additional years. Part way into the season; to people's surprise; he announced that 2017 would be his final year of Cup competition. He started the year qualifying second for the Daytona 500, but was wrecked while leading mid-race, and finished 37th. He would finish fifth a few weeks later at Texas; and sadly it would be his only Top 5 finish of the year. He only managed to lead a lap in eight races; and posted eight Top 10 finishes. But Earnhardt seemed to step back and enjoy the moment all throughout the year; and requested people not make a big fuss over his retirement. If anyone insisted on doing anything; he

requested that a donation be made in his name to a charity. History will show that in his final race Earnhardt finished 25th two laps down. But at the end when the checkers waved; Earnhardt parked on pit road and the crowd gave him a rousing ovation. It was also revealed that Earnhardt and his car owner Rick Hendrick had made an agreement that when the race was over; he would give Rick his helmet and a keep sake and Hendrick would give Earnhardt the race car to had to his collection. At the 2017 NASCAR Banquet Earnhardt was once again award the Most Popular driver award - His 15th such award; second only to Bill Elliott who won the award 16 times. Bill's

son Chase Elliott was yet another of the drivers that have graduated from the Xfinity series into the CUP series having driven for JR Motorsports (along with Keselowski, Patrick and Aric Almirola). 2018 will see another JR Motorsports Xfinity Series Champion, (driver William Byron) move from the Xfinity Series full time into the Cup Series. Alex Bowman will return to Hendrick Motorsports to wheel the #88 in 2018. Although Earnhardt has had success with his Xfinity teams; he almost had a tragedy on August 15, 2019. A Cessna Citation Latitude private jet was carrying Earnhardt, his wife Amy, daughter Isla Rose, and dog Gus to the race at Bristol. The plane had a hard bounced landing at Elizabethton Municipal Airport in Elizabethton, Tennessee and caught fire. None of the passengers were seriously injured and everyone including the pilots escaped before the plane caught fire and burned up. He had planned to race at Darling in the Xfinity race and announced that even though he had a badly bruised back and swelling he planned on doing so. Earnhardt finished fifth in the Darlington race after having sufficiently recovered to be taking part in the event, confirming before the race he was feeling great and had been assured there was no risk for him in taking part. For his career Earnhardt ran in 631 Cup races over 19 season. He won 26 times and posted 149 Top 5 finishes. He has raced 143 races over 25 seasons in the Xfinity Series and posted 24 wins. He ran only two season full time in the Xfinity Series; and won the Championships both years. At Richmond on September 22, 2018 Earnhardt competed in the Xfinity race; many thought it was perhaps his last time behind the

wheel. He signed with NBC Sports and teamed with past crew chief, State LeTarte on NBC to broadcast Xfinity and Cup races starting in 2018. He has taken to running one Xfinity race per year. In 2019 it was at Darlington; 2020 was Homestead; and he had Hellmann’s as the sponsor. Both races he ran well and finished fifth. In 2021, as he had done the previous two seasons, Dale Earnhardt Jr ran just one race in the Xfinity series. This time the start came at Richmond. This was a great race; but Earnhardt’s car just wasn’t set up to race at the front. When you looked; you’d usually find him about 15th. In 2022 he raced at Martinsville, had a good run and finished 11th. As he had done for the last five or six year; Earnhardt would run a

race in the Xfinity series just because he still enjoyed racing. This year he would make two starts. The first came in his self-owner JRM equipment at Bristol. He qualified 15th but drove the car through the field and was in the Top 10 at the end of stage one. He continued to climb through the field and was fourth at the end of stage two. He took the lead on lap 174 as he drove by Justin Allgaier to claim the point; and went on to lead almost 50 laps. With about 30 laps to go; Earnhardt suddenly pitted, and pulled into a pit motioning franticly. It seems a fire had developed, was coming up around the shifter boot and had caught the pants leg of his fire suit on fire. He ended

Fantasy NASCAR Racing

RALPH DALE EARNHARDT SR - 10/10/1974