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Sprint Cup
Hall Of Fame Profile: Dale Earnhardt, Part 2 Of 5
In 1979, Dale Earnhardt won the Sprint Cup rookie of the year title and then went on to win the championship the very next season...
Dale Earnhardt kneels beside car before the Dixie 500 race on November 4, 1979 at the Atlanta Motor Speedway in Hampton, Ga. (Photo: ISC Archives/Getty Images)
The NASCAR Hall of Fame will induct the five members of its inaugural class May 23. Leading up to the hall’s induction ceremony, SPEEDtv.com is profiling the first five racing legends chosen for this unique honor.
In 1979, Dale Earnhardt ran for the Sprint Cup rookie of the year title and won it, then backed up that performance by winning the championship the next season.
He was on his way.
During his rookie season, Earnhardt crossed into victory lane for the first time, winning in April at Bristol, showing the short-track smarts that he would demonstrate over and over again across a career of a quarter-century. It was only his 16th Cup start.
“This is a bigger thrill than my first-ever racing victory,” Earnhardt said. “This was a win in the big leagues, against the top-caliber drivers. It wasn’t some dirt track back at home.”
The next season, Earnhardt won five races, including his first superspeedway victory (at Atlanta) and his first championship, and a new era in racing had begun.
Even in the early years, Earnhardt was perfecting the combative, two-fisted style of racing that made him one of the most successful racers of the 1980s and ’90s. He raced hard, he ruffled feathers, he took chances, he bashed fenders.
“It was the type of racing you might not see again,” NASCAR historian Buz McKim said. “You see little flashes of it from time to time with Kyle Busch. Back then, those guys drove over and above what was expected.”
Team owner Rod Osterlund suddenly decided to leave racing in 1981, the year after he and Earnhardt won the championship, and the team was sold to businessman J.D. Stacy. The move stunned Earnhardt, and, by the summer of that season, he had quit the team. Wrangler, a devoted Earnhardt sponsor, worked out a deal to move Earnhardt to Richard Childress’ team for the rest of the season.
Childress, who was racing his own cars, didn’t have the team foundation to support a quality driver like Earnhardt long term, and Earnhardt and Wrangler moved on to Bud Moore’s Spartanburg, S.C.-based Ford team for the 1982 season.
Moore worked with Earnhardt’s still-evolving talent for two seasons. He wasn’t able to totally control the fierce and feisty Earnhardt, but he saw his promise – and his fire.
“One year at Darlington, he was about a half-lap out front in our car,” Moore said. “I got on the radio and told him, ‘Dale, just take it easy and loaf some. You’re a half-lap ahead. Take care of that motor.’ He said, ‘Aw, I ain’t running it hard.’ I said, ‘Well, you’re running it about half a second faster than everybody else.’
“The more he backed off, the faster he got. We won the race [the 1982 Rebel 500].”
Moore had good reasons for urging Earnhardt to baby his engine. Ford engines were notorious for having endurance issues during those years, and it was that problem, in part, that eventually chased Earnhardt to greener pastures.
“If he had driven another year for us, I think he would have stayed a while,” Moore said. “We only had about a 300-mile engine. The valve springs wouldn’t last but 300 miles. I stayed on him all the time, trying to hold him back. I said, ‘Look, you’ve got to loaf. It’s not going to last if you run it hard.’ But when he got in front and you told him to slow down, he just kept on getting it.”
There is little doubt, however, that Earnhardt did learn some things from Moore, a veteran of the NASCAR wars who had been there since the sport’s beginnings.
“He was the world’s greatest,” Moore said. “He was the type driver, like Junior Johnson, who was there to win the race. When he first started driving for me, I told him, ‘Now, Dale what you need to do is think about this track, this car and what’s going on. Don’t be thinking about some gal or something else. You keep your eye on that track and learn how to run it. Learn different grooves and the feel of the car.
Study your competition.’
“Then I told him to pass that guy on the high side or on the low side or run over him.’ And that’s what he did.”
WEDNESDAY: Solid Gold With Childress
Mike Hembree is NASCAR Editor for SPEEDtv.com and has been covering motorsports for 28 years. He has written several books on NASCAR, including "NASCAR: The Definitive History of America's Sport" and "Then Tony Said To Junior: The Best NASCAR Stories Ever Told". He is a six-time winner of the National Motorsports Press Association Writer of the Year Award.
The NASCAR Hall of Fame Grand Opening is set for May 11, 2010. Outdoor Opening Ceremonies are May 11th from 9 to 10 am ET free of charge, open to the public. Outdoor festivities including driver appearances and concerts May 11th from 10 am until 8 pm ET open to the public, free of charge. Tickets to enter the NASCAR Hall of Fame are on sale now at www.NASCARHall.com or by calling 877-231-2010. The countdown to the NASCAR Hall of Fame is on! Visit www.NASCARHall.com/50days for daily updates about the NASCAR Hall of Fame.
In 1979, Dale Earnhardt ran for the Sprint Cup rookie of the year title and won it, then backed up that performance by winning the championship the next season.
He was on his way.
During his rookie season, Earnhardt crossed into victory lane for the first time, winning in April at Bristol, showing the short-track smarts that he would demonstrate over and over again across a career of a quarter-century. It was only his 16th Cup start.
“This is a bigger thrill than my first-ever racing victory,” Earnhardt said. “This was a win in the big leagues, against the top-caliber drivers. It wasn’t some dirt track back at home.”
The next season, Earnhardt won five races, including his first superspeedway victory (at Atlanta) and his first championship, and a new era in racing had begun.
Even in the early years, Earnhardt was perfecting the combative, two-fisted style of racing that made him one of the most successful racers of the 1980s and ’90s. He raced hard, he ruffled feathers, he took chances, he bashed fenders.
“It was the type of racing you might not see again,” NASCAR historian Buz McKim said. “You see little flashes of it from time to time with Kyle Busch. Back then, those guys drove over and above what was expected.”
Team owner Rod Osterlund suddenly decided to leave racing in 1981, the year after he and Earnhardt won the championship, and the team was sold to businessman J.D. Stacy. The move stunned Earnhardt, and, by the summer of that season, he had quit the team. Wrangler, a devoted Earnhardt sponsor, worked out a deal to move Earnhardt to Richard Childress’ team for the rest of the season.
Childress, who was racing his own cars, didn’t have the team foundation to support a quality driver like Earnhardt long term, and Earnhardt and Wrangler moved on to Bud Moore’s Spartanburg, S.C.-based Ford team for the 1982 season.
Moore worked with Earnhardt’s still-evolving talent for two seasons. He wasn’t able to totally control the fierce and feisty Earnhardt, but he saw his promise – and his fire.
“One year at Darlington, he was about a half-lap out front in our car,” Moore said. “I got on the radio and told him, ‘Dale, just take it easy and loaf some. You’re a half-lap ahead. Take care of that motor.’ He said, ‘Aw, I ain’t running it hard.’ I said, ‘Well, you’re running it about half a second faster than everybody else.’
“The more he backed off, the faster he got. We won the race [the 1982 Rebel 500].”
Moore had good reasons for urging Earnhardt to baby his engine. Ford engines were notorious for having endurance issues during those years, and it was that problem, in part, that eventually chased Earnhardt to greener pastures.
“If he had driven another year for us, I think he would have stayed a while,” Moore said. “We only had about a 300-mile engine. The valve springs wouldn’t last but 300 miles. I stayed on him all the time, trying to hold him back. I said, ‘Look, you’ve got to loaf. It’s not going to last if you run it hard.’ But when he got in front and you told him to slow down, he just kept on getting it.”
There is little doubt, however, that Earnhardt did learn some things from Moore, a veteran of the NASCAR wars who had been there since the sport’s beginnings.
“He was the world’s greatest,” Moore said. “He was the type driver, like Junior Johnson, who was there to win the race. When he first started driving for me, I told him, ‘Now, Dale what you need to do is think about this track, this car and what’s going on. Don’t be thinking about some gal or something else. You keep your eye on that track and learn how to run it. Learn different grooves and the feel of the car.
Study your competition.’
“Then I told him to pass that guy on the high side or on the low side or run over him.’ And that’s what he did.”
WEDNESDAY: Solid Gold With Childress
Mike Hembree is NASCAR Editor for SPEEDtv.com and has been covering motorsports for 28 years. He has written several books on NASCAR, including "NASCAR: The Definitive History of America's Sport" and "Then Tony Said To Junior: The Best NASCAR Stories Ever Told". He is a six-time winner of the National Motorsports Press Association Writer of the Year Award.
The NASCAR Hall of Fame Grand Opening is set for May 11, 2010. Outdoor Opening Ceremonies are May 11th from 9 to 10 am ET free of charge, open to the public. Outdoor festivities including driver appearances and concerts May 11th from 10 am until 8 pm ET open to the public, free of charge. Tickets to enter the NASCAR Hall of Fame are on sale now at www.NASCARHall.com or by calling 877-231-2010. The countdown to the NASCAR Hall of Fame is on! Visit www.NASCARHall.com/50days for daily updates about the NASCAR Hall of Fame.
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