Have a FaceBook, Twitter, or other social networking account?

Link them to your fanatic account!

Add An Account

TAKE ME TO...
NASCAR Sprint-Cup Series
CUP: Junior Tries To Rebound From Debacle
Dale Earnhardt Jr. is looking for some good luck at Dover this weekend...
Tom Jensen  |  Posted September 21, 2009   Charlotte, NC
Dale Earnhardt Junior looked as though he would have a top-five for much of the Sylvania 300 Sunday until a tap from David Reutimann 19 laps from the end of the race sent the No. 88 Chevy into the wall. (Photo: LAT Photographic)

Dale Earnhardt Jr. will be more than ready for this weekend’s AAA 400 at Dover International Speedway. Anything has to be better than the frustration he experienced at New Hampshire Motor Speedway on Sunday.

Earnhardt was solidly in the top-five for much of the Sylvania 300, when David Reutimann slid into him 19 laps from the end of the race, sending the No. 88 Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet Impala SS hard into the wall. Instead of a legitimate shot at winning his first race in more than a year, Earnhardt ended up 35th, with a badly torn-up race car. And royally ticked off at Reutimann.

“He run down into the side of me and spun me out late in the race,” said a visibly irate Earnhardt. “I mean we're all running real hard but you've got to know how much race car you've got and you've got to know how much talent you've got before you go down in the corner. He never knows. It's disappointing. We had a good car. We run hard and worked hard all day long and we had the best car at certain times in the race. I felt like we had a top-three car.”

For better or worse, though, the busy NASCAR Sprint Cup schedule doesn’t allow time to dwell on what happened, only what lies ahead.

And for Earnhardt and the rest of the Cup regulars, what lies ahead this week is the “Monster Mile,” a wicked-fast, high-banked one-mile oval that some drivers have referred to in the past as “Bristol on steroids.”

Earnhardt’s last race here, on May 31, was also his first with new crew chief Lance McGrew. The end result was a decent 12th-place run. Now that might not seem especially great, but given that in 13 of 27 races this year, Earnhardt has finished 25th or worse, a 12th isn’t all bad.

When you factor in how Earnhardt ran at New Hampshire, and the fact that he was third at Michigan and ninth at Bristol a few weeks ago, Earnhardt could be primed for a decent run at Dover. His one prior victory here came Sept. 23, 2001, in the first NASCAR Sprint Cup race run after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.

“Dover has basically one groove, and it's right on the bottom,” said Earnhardt. “So trying to get around the bottom of the racetrack and trying to keep the nose down and keep the front of the car turning and gripping is really the most important thing. There's really not a second or third groove that works all day long. The guy that runs around the bottom and can do it the quickest is the best.”

McGrew, who has lived through the slings and arrows of this challenging season, is seeing light at the end of the tunnel. “I think it's going good,” said McGrew. “It's definitely been challenging because of the way he describes things and the way I am used to things being described is different. So that's been an adjustment. But I think as a whole, at the racetrack we are performing better. We still aren't getting the finishes I feel like we deserve, but I'm definitely seeing progress.”

Tom Jensen is the Editor in Chief for SPEEDtv.com, the former Executive Editor of NASCAR Scene and a contributing Editor for TruckSeries.com. He is the author of ?Cheating: The Bad Things Good NASCAR Nextel Cup Racers Do In Pursuit of SPEED,? and has appeared on television and radio shows to discuss NASCAR racing. Jensen is the past President of the National Motorsports Press Association. Jensen is the 1997 National Motorsports Press Association Writer of the Year and has won numerous national and state awards for news reporting, columns and feature writing. The Answer Man is back at SPEEDtv.com. Tom Jensen answers your questions during every race week and looks forward to hearing from you - please e-mail it to



tom_jensen's avatar

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Tom Jensen

MORE BY THIS AUTHOR
Advertising | Jobs | Feedback | FAQ | Terms of Use | NEW Privacy Policy | Ad Choices | Site Map
Fox Sports | FUEL TV | FX Network | National Geographic | IGN | AskMen
The Motor Sports Authority, SPEED and associated logos are registered trademarks of Speed Channel Inc.
All Rights Reserved © Speed Channel, Inc. 2012

All external links will open in a new browser window. SPEED.com does not endorse external sites.