Ryan: Team must help Earnhardt,
Lagging in Chase, Earnhardt needs his team to step it up
CHARLOTTE Sitting in a rocking chair beneath a Sunoco sign and just adjacent to a replica of his late father’s black No. 3 Chevrolet, Dale Earnhardt Jr. faced the nation Tuesday. Junior Nation. Though the sample size for the event at the NASCAR Hall of Fame was limited to roughly 50 die-hards, their fervency for gleaning information from their hero was relentless.
What’s your favorite commercial? (“That one with the gorilla charging through a window that showed I could be ready for anything. One of my other ideas was to run into Kenny G playing a saxophone.”)
My brother-in-law in Georgia wants to know if he can go hunting with you? (“If I get a chance. I like bow hunting.”)
Is that Danica Patrick’s real cellphone number in that commercial, and if not, what is it? (“That’s pretty funny. Danica’s a pretty cool person.”)
Earnhardt’s fans seemed to want answers to everything but the most obviously pressing question: Was his Chase for the Sprint Cup bid on the ropes after opening with consecutive disappointments?
NASCAR’s nine-time most popular driver finally took charge to assuage the faithful sea of green in their No. 88 hats and T-shirts.
“I appreciate you guys coming out here,” he said. “And I hope we can turn it on these next eight races and give a good challenge to these guys to try to win this championship.”
It was an assertive statement by an admittedly introverted driver — and it might be the kind of bold leadership he needs to impart to his team after a lost weekend at New Hampshire Motor Speedway.
Earnhardt fell 26 points out of the lead with a 13th-place finish that mostly was the result of one lackluster pit stop Sunday, but the die actually was cast in practice Friday. The team struggled with the handling and spent so much time on race setup, it turned the session into a “cluster” that affected qualifying, Earnhardt said, and “bled into Saturday, and . . . I really didn’t feel we were in a good position. It was inevitable to me the car was not going to be where we needed.”
Crew chief Steve Letarte said Monday on Sirius Satellite Radio that the team “had tossed the ball all around the race team, but no one has grabbed and run with it. Someone has to take the ball and go.”
With typical candor Tuesday, Earnhardt explained why that’s difficult. “I want to, but I’m afraid to come across as a bit of a ( jerk),” he told news reporters after the fan Q&A. “I don’t want to piss somebody off or step on anybody’s toes. There’s times in the car that I want to step up and go, ‘Hey man, this is really a problem, this is something we really need to fix.’ Steve’s going to take that as, ‘Of course I’m trying to fix it, man, we’re talking about that right now. Give us a moment to figure it out.’
“That is something me and Steve have yet to learn with each other.”
But feelings often can be overrated in a title hunt. Jimmie Johnson and Chad Knaus were known to bicker like decades-long spouses throughout their reign of five championships.
In their second year together, Earnhardt and Letarte remain in a honeymoon phase of enjoying each other’s company and positive influence. While running outside the top 15 for much of Sunday, Earnhardt stayed calm instead of past instances when he’d key his mic for “a meltdown that would have been quite popular.”
There are times, though, when barking at the crew might bring a necessary spark, and Earnhardt acknowledged he planned to be more forthright this weekend at Dover International Speedway.
It’s perhaps the difference in whether he can salvage what he has described as his best shot at a championship. Though his Chase start could have been worse (he rallied from the rear for an eighth at Chicagoland Speedway after an engine change), it’s teetering on the precipice of top-fiveor-bust at Dover.
“It ain’t coming to us,” Earnhardt said. “I’m not going to sit here and paint it like it’s roses when it’s not. We have to start the weekend with good practices and utilize every minute that they give us. If we can do that, I can go into Sunday confident we can give ourselves a shot.”
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