Entering the garage as the defending Daytona 500 champion, there’s certainly people who will remind you of the win by questions and comments they share. However, Dale Earnhardt Jr. says beyond that, this year doesn’t feel any different as being last year’s winner “doesn’t really help you out there in the heat of the battle”.
Earnhardt Jr. is looking to become the fourth driver to win back-to-back Daytona 500s and feels that he has a great car to do it.
“We need to do everything right,” he commented. “We need to get that car all the way through the week and on to the starting grid on Sunday. We don’t need to have any problems to where we have to pull any race cars out of the trailer.”
Earnhardt Jr. was put in that position a couple years ago as he wrecked in practice after sitting on the pole. Going through that, he says it’s “just was a difficult week after losing that primary car because that was so much better than the next thing we’ve got” so he doesn’t want to go through that again.
“So you definitely want to race hard and do everything you can and learn everything you can during the week, but you want to be able to put that car on the starting grid in one piece,” he added. “I think we’ve got one of the best cars down here. We only practiced one day so far. But looking at the speeds of my car compared to others, I was real happy with that. So, we’ve got a long week. Guys can find speed.”
He had started his weekend off on the right foot, posting a time that would have him start fifth in his Budweiser Duel on Thursday. However, he was disqualified in post-qualifying technical inspection, resulting in having to start at the back.
“I think the goal is to win the race,” he said of the Duel. “I’ve have that sort of discussion going on in my head every since we got through qualifying. You don’t want to tear the car up but the goal is to go out there and win the race. It just feels wrong to worry more about keeping the car in one piece than winning an event. You’re in that event to compete and to win.”
Earnhardt added that he could take the conservative approach and not race hard to make sure that he doesn’t wreck, but says that feels unnatural to worry about that.
“I think you get yourself in trouble mentally when you’re out there not making the right choices to try to be competitive and move toward the front,” he continued. “I think if you want to do well in the race and not find yourself in trouble, you do what your instincts tell you: to try to win. If you’re worried about tearing your car up, it’s like the law of attraction. You end up tearing your car up somehow. Trying to stay out of trouble, you find yourself in trouble most of the time.”
One of the big challenges that stands in his way though is the fact that he will be working with a new crew chief. With Steve LeTarte moving to a broadcast role with NBC Sports, Greg Ives takes the pit box. Ives led Chase Elliott to an XFINITY Series Championship last season, and Earnhardt feels that Ives is the right man to handles the pressure of the job in working with Earnhardt and Hendrick Motorsports.
“It takes a unique individual to work there and it takes a certain mindset and culture to be successful there,” Earnhardt shared. “He’s well aware of that with his past history working there, which I think it going to make this a lot easier for him. So, he knows what the expectations are. And he’s prepared for that. I think he far exceeds them as far as his ability to go in there and lead the team and do his job, he’s overqualified, so I think he’s going to do just fine.”
So far, communication has been going well between the pair as Ives seems a real-easy going guy, per Earnhardt. The good communication has shown up through their track time so far, as well as the group text messages that are shared between Earnhardt, Ives and the whole No. 88 Nationwide team.
“We did that with Steve, just so everybody stays in tough with everybody and knows what’s going on,” Earnhardt commented. “We had a little trouble in qualifying and he was a little disappointed in himself. So we had a little rah-rah text session for about 30 minutes with all the guys pitching in and getting everybody fired-up and he’s good at that.
“He’s very vocal and believes in the team and speaks his mind. So, he has a little bit of cheerleading qualities in him. That’s going to be good and positive. You’ve got to rally the guys and he knows he is part of the leadership of this team and knows he has to be vocal and let those guys know where he’s at. So I think that’s important that he knows that and that’ll help us a lot.”
