INDIANAPOLIS – Dale Earnhardt Jr. doesn’t care about Sunday’s chance to become one of the few drivers to win the Daytona 500 and Brickyard 400 in the same year.
All Junior wants is to get that Brickyard 400 trophy for the first time in his career, something that has eluded him for nearly 15 years now.
“I’d love to win here,” Earnhardt said Saturday at Indianapolis Motor Speedway. “This is such a historic racetrack regardless of whether we won Daytona or not. I really wouldn’t pair the two together as an accomplishment. But I wouldn’t think about it, I guess, like that.
“Just winning here alone would be tremendous. … This place just has so much history. The story of how this track came about and how it almost ended up being history in itself during the war. It’s just amazing what’s gone on here. I would love to win here and hope to be able to accomplish that at some point in my career.”
Much has been said about how this is Earnhardt’s final season with crew chief Steve Letarte, who will leave Hendrick Motorsports at season’s end to become a NASCAR on NBC TV analyst in 2015.
Winning the Daytona 500 was a great kickoff to their final season together, and adding the first Brickyard 400 title would only further enhance how special of a season this has been thus far – and one Earnhardt hopes become even more special during the Chase for the Sprint Cup.
“Yeah, I mean, any race I win with Steve this year is very special because of his last year,” Earnhardt said. “So yeah, we’ll take anywhere, we’ll take a win anywhere.
“He’s one of the guys that’s one of the best on the box when it comes to strategy, and this style of race and the way the tires are going to play into that. This is right in his wheelhouse. I think he’s going to give us a great opportunity.”
But Earnhardt is also realistic. Not only does he have a mediocre past record at Indianapolis (14 starts, just one top-5 and three other top-10 finishes), he also had a disappointing qualifying effort Saturday (will start 23rd).
When asked if he thinks could be his best chance to win at Indianapolis, Earnhardt was honestly blunt.
“No, not really,” he said. “I think I’ve had some pretty good cars here in the past. I’ve had chances to win in the past and didn’t even know it.
“… I guess my point is we’ve had good cars in the past and just didn’t do the strategy just right. Somebody did it better than us or somebody made it on fuel and won the race or what have you, but we’ve had some good cars here.”
While Earnhardt would love to check a Brickyard 400 win off his bucket list, don’t look for him to follow Kurt Busch’s lead and attempt the “double” of racing in the Indianapolis 500 and NASCAR’s Coca-Cola 600 in the same day.
“I don’t think I would,” Earnhardt said. “I know it’s a lot of preparation, and I think that it takes a certain mentality, a certain style of person. I think that Kurt has that mentality, has that ability to really get down and want to take on something like that.
“He’s sort of in a situation in his career where he can sort of juggle all those things. We’ve got so much going on, and I really never aspired to drive open wheel cars. I do follow the series and have some drivers I pull for, but I was always a stock car guy and just always wanted to race short tracks and bang on fenders.
“But I do have a lot of respect for what he did, and it was a great joy to cheer him on and support him. We all, everyone in the garage, wanted him to do well and to see him do well and accomplish what he did was a great thing I think for both series. So definitely it drew a lot of attention to both series.
“I enjoyed that, and I like seeing drivers do that, but I’m going to turn 40 next year, or this year actually, so I think I’ve got so much going on that I’d rather not pile that on to my plate.”
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