He’s @DaleJr
Dale Earnhardt Jr. got on the Twitter bandwagon after winning his second Daytona 500 in February. He had an account set up years ago but activated @DaleJr on Twitter after that huge victory.
But he has not become addicted to social media, like many others in the sport. Earnhardt pops in and out, now and then, here and there. Earnhardt did say he took a peek after his fiery wreck at Texas Motor Speedway a few weeks back.
“I guess Twitter can be a help in a situation like that,” Earnhardt said. “My fans certainly have my back and tell you to ‘brush it off, don’t worry about it.’ I’m sure there are some people on there saying the opposite, but I didn’t see many of those or any of those.”
Earnhardt, who is introspective and pragmatic, said Twitter, like most anything in life, has a “positive and a negative” to it.
“I didn’t really spend a lot of time on Twitter (after Texas) because we were working at Michigan,” Earnhardt said. “We had some things to do. Twitter is a bit of a playground, and I don’t want to horse around if we are not doing good.
“I don’t want to be on there goofing off and making light of the situation because it was a frustrating mistake. It was something I don’t take very lightly. Just being able to get back in the car and test at Michigan was a big help for me to get past it and to get focused on the next race.”
So the Twitter takeaway is this: If Earnhardt is racing well, you might see him tweet a bit. If he’s having a bad weekend, NASCAR’s Most Popular Driver is likely off the grid.
MUSTANG STORY
Ford asked several of its drivers to recall their favorite memory in a Mustang, which is celebrating its 50th anniversary of production this year. Most of the responses were politically correct, with this one wonderful exception from Aric Almirola, who drives the No. 43 Richard Petty Motorsports Ford. “I had a friend in high school that had a Cobra Mustang,” Almirola said. “I had an old, ratty pickup truck, and he let me drive that Mustang. He let me drive his Cobra and we put black marks around the street of our high school everywhere. I mean everywhere. That was a lot of fun.”
YOU ARE RIGHT
If you think Cup racing is better this year than 2013, you are statistically right. Here are some quick comparisons. Leaders per race: An average of 12 compared with 8.6 last season. Lead changes per race: 25.6 this year, 17.4 in 2013. Total greenflag passes: 29,541 in 2014, just 23,178 in 2013. Green-flag passes for the lead: 346 this year compared with 181 last season.