{"id":323866,"date":"2025-10-22T12:58:12","date_gmt":"2025-10-22T12:58:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/323866\/"},"modified":"2025-10-22T12:58:12","modified_gmt":"2025-10-22T12:58:12","slug":"dale-earnhardt-jr-on-criticism-and-change-in-nascar-his-racing-future-and-more-12-questions","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/323866\/","title":{"rendered":"Dale Earnhardt Jr. on criticism and change in NASCAR, his racing future and more: 12 Questions"},"content":{"rendered":"

Each week, The Athletic asks the same 12 questions to a different race car driver. This year\u2019s series concludes with NASCAR Hall of Famer Dale Earnhardt Jr., who is now a broadcaster for Prime and TNT, also co-owns the JR Motorsports Xfinity Series team and hosts the \u201cDale Jr. Download\u201d podcast. This interview has been edited and condensed, but the full version is available on the 12 Questions Podcast<\/a>.<\/p>\n

1. What was one of the first autographs you got as a kid, and what do you remember about that moment?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Autographs didn\u2019t really get cool to me \u2019til later in life. I have become someone who definitely appreciates autographs, but one of the very first autographs I asked for was from Richard Petty. When I was young, Richard Petty had a comic book, and it was really large in size. And in this comic book, it was the story of him and Maurice (Petty) and Dale (Inman) growing up as kids and racing these homemade box cars down a hill and then growing up and racing with their dad, Lee.<\/p>\n

I found four of them online and bought them and took them to Richard. I loved this thing when I used to read it as a kid and I found some in very good shape, and I took them to Richard and had him sign them. I still have them.<\/p>\n

2. What is the most miserable you\u2019ve ever been inside of a race car?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I was racing in my first (Xfinity Series) race at Myrtle Beach in 1996. I\u2019m guessing it was about 95 degrees, middle of the afternoon, and before the race, I had a 100-lap Late Model stock race. I was running at Myrtle Beach every week in my Late Model car, so running a 100-lap feature in the middle of the afternoon wasn\u2019t a big deal.<\/p>\n

But I wasn\u2019t very aware of my health or hydration or anything like that. None of that had been scienced out at that point in my life. With about 20 or 30 laps to go (in his Xfinity debut), I was driving around the racetrack, and I had this insane, very apparent, super self-aware realization that I was bone dry. I had been sweating all day long and my suit was soaking wet and then all of a sudden, all my skin felt extremely dry inside this suit. It was really weird. It grabbed my attention, and immediately I started getting really dizzy and started having a hard time staying awake and getting through the final laps.<\/p>\n

I\u2019d basically just gotten so dehydrated that I was delirious and it was really scary.<\/p>\n

3.\u00a0Outside of racing, what is your most recent memory of something you got way too competitive about?<\/strong><\/p>\n

There\u2019s a bunch of us in this NCAA College Football Xbox\/PlayStation dynasty (league). I\u2019m not a good loser. I don\u2019t just hop up from the console after a loss and put it behind me. It bothers me.<\/p>\n

We used to be in a Madden league back in around 2012 and I won the Super Bowl three years in a row, so I was pretty good, but playing Madden with your friends brings the absolute worst out of you. Nothing else is like this. And I had to stop and tell myself: \u201cThis isn\u2019t healthy if I can\u2019t control my emotions around winning and losing.\u201d Brad Keselowski was in this league and he would talk about breaking remotes every other week, throwing them across the room. I don\u2019t know what it is about console games and your friends, especially sports games.<\/p>\n

\"Dale<\/p>\n

\n Dale Earnhardt Jr. on set for Prime during their broadcast of NASCAR\u2019s Mexico City race in June. Earnhardt is also a commentator for TNT Sports. (James Gilbert \/ Getty Images)<\/p>\n

4. What do people get wrong about you?<\/strong><\/p>\n

When I went to race at Hendrick Motorsports, Jeff Gordon was like, \u201cMan, I didn\u2019t know you were as funny or as big of a smarta\u2014 as you were.\u201d That\u2019s something I got from my mom. And this is a compliment \u2014 my mom was an unbelievable smarta\u2014, and I loved it about her. She was going to pick on you, she was going to jab, but it was all in fun, and it was hilarious, and nobody was safe. If you slipped up around her, you might get called out. And she was just so damn funny.<\/p>\n

5. What kind of Uber passenger are you, and how much do you care about your Uber rating?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I care about it. I\u2019m a great passenger. I don\u2019t make a fuss. I\u2019m not loud, obnoxious. If I\u2019ve had some drinks and you\u2019re picking me from the bar, I\u2019m going to be calm and quiet. I\u2019m not going to be hollering and having loud conversations in the back with my friends. I\u2019m not that kind of person. I\u2019m worried about what this person who\u2019s driving this car thinks about me. I don\u2019t want to create a problem, much less get a bad rating.<\/p>\n

But apparently, I wasn\u2019t doing something I was supposed to be doing in the first week I had Uber, and I got a really low rating. It was like a 4.4, which I thought was really good. Fast forward a couple months and we\u2019re somewhere else using Uber, and I\u2019m getting ready to call the Uber and my friend goes, \u201cMan, you might not get picked up with that rating.\u201d \u2026<\/p>\n

Since then, I\u2019ve been steadily over-tipping, being overly nice, trying to get my rating back up. It\u2019s a 4.83 now. I like to use it. But if I\u2019m with somebody who is kind of rowdy and loud or maybe a little bit too intoxicated, we\u2019re gonna use yours, not mine.<\/p>\n

6. I\u2019m asking each person a wild-card type question. Brad Keselowski said recently: \u201cThe sport is really interesting with how it perceives itself. It\u2019s one of the sports that has the most noticeable negative feedback loop. That said, it\u2019s also a squeaky-wheel-gets-the-grease sport, where if somebody\u2019s not squeaking, things don\u2019t ever change.\u201d You have arguably the biggest platform and loudest voice in the sport. How do you balance the times when you feel it\u2019s necessary to push for change versus worrying about potentially hurting the sport by feeding into that negativity?<\/strong><\/p>\n

When I saw that comment, that certainly makes you reflect inward. And I hear from NASCAR, and their concern is genuine and it\u2019s real. When they say, \u201cMan, all people hear about is what we\u2019re doing wrong. You\u2019re telling everyone these things are bad, and they\u2019re not going to want to come see it if you\u2019re telling them not to watch it.\u201d \u2026<\/p>\n

I absolutely understand where they\u2019re coming from. Since I bought the CARS Tour, I\u2019ve gotten a really unique perspective on NASCAR\u2019s position. \u2026 I worry about that. I do. And there are absolutely some things I\u2019ve said in the past that I shouldn\u2019t have said that have turned somebody away or have convinced somebody not to appreciate NASCAR or not to enjoy it.<\/p>\n

And I hate that, because honestly, it\u2019s the most important thing outside of my family. It\u2019s the most important thing in my life, and it means the world to me. If NASCAR failed, or if NASCAR was to diminish, all the things that I ever accomplished \u2014 or more importantly, that my dad accomplished \u2014 are less valuable, less important. I want NASCAR to succeed and be the greatest thing ever. We\u2019ve all got our own version of NASCAR, and what we think NASCAR could be and should be. I believe in its success. But it\u2019s hard sometimes to keep your mouth shut.<\/p>\n

The podcast has been helpful with this: I\u2019ve gotten better at understanding how to phrase something and how to get my point across without dragging the sport down. Like, I can tell you with all honesty, no B.S., the champion this year is a deserving champion. I would celebrate them, drink a beer with them, and be as envious and as jealous of them as any champion we\u2019ve ever had. But I have a format that I love better than the one we use today. So I can tell you both things, and they both can be true.<\/p>\n

Sometimes I wake up one morning and think I need to be less of a talking head, because a lot of the things I want or think are better are not going to happen. And so I\u2019m spewing all this criticism and critique into the middle distance that\u2019s benefiting nothing. But then there\u2019s days you get up and you\u2019re like, \u201cI want this to be better. I want more of this. I want more for this.\u201d And you want to fight for something, or you get confident or passionate about a particular viewpoint in the sport or about the car itself.<\/p>\n

\"Dale<\/p>\n

\n Dale Earnhardt Jr. celebrates with driver Connor Zilisch after Zilisch\u2019s win at Indianapolis in July, the 100th Xfinity Series victory for Earnhardt\u2019s JR Motorsports team. (James Gilbert \/ Getty Images)<\/p>\n

7. This is my 16th year of doing the 12 Questions interviews, so I\u2019m going back to an older one and re-asking a question to see how your answers compare. In 2010, I asked you: How much longer would you like to keep driving? You said: \u201cUntil I\u2019m 50 or 55, that\u2019d be awesome. I don\u2019t think you can get to where you can quit. You can\u2019t just stop and go sit at the house.\u201d You\u2019re 51 now and your NASCAR career has wound down. Do you see an endpoint where you stop running Late Models as well, or will you keep digging well into your 60s?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I don\u2019t know the answer to that. I\u2019m definitely going to run next year, and it\u2019s really a year-to-year kind of thing. I used to own a helicopter. I bought my helicopter from Tony Stewart, and I had that helicopter for a couple years. It was great. But I woke up one day, out of nowhere \u2014 nothing happened, I didn\u2019t see anything, read anything \u2014 I just woke up one day and went, \u201cI don\u2019t want to get in a helicopter anymore.\u201d And I sold it.<\/p>\n

So (with racing) I think one day I\u2019ll just wake up and go, \u201cYou know what? I think that was it. I think that was the last one.\u201d I really feel it\u2019ll be that way. It\u2019s been like a faucet I\u2019ve been slowly turning off as I went and ran those Xfinity Series races once a year, and now the Late Model races. I\u2019m just kind of slowly turning that faucet off until I feel like I\u2019m ready to shut it off entirely.<\/p>\n

8. Other than a JR Motorsports driver, name a driver you\u2019d be one of the first to congratulate in victory lane if they won a race and you were there at the track.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Josh Berry, Ryan Blaney, (Carson) Hocevar. Hocevar and I text all the time. He\u2019s something else.<\/p>\n

There\u2019s a handful of guys. Probably Connor Hall, Landen Lewis, Kaden Honeycutt \u2014 anybody that\u2019s been through the CARS Tour would be somebody I\u2019d probably go over and congratulate.<\/p>\n

9. How much do you use AI technology? Are you a ChatGPT guy at all?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Yeah! I ask it all kinds of dumb stuff. Just earlier today, I\u2019ve got this really big playlist of music on my phone, and every song was skipping at about the 10-second mark. And I was like, \u201cHey ChatGPT, what\u2019s the deal with this skipping every song on my phone?\u201d And we had a conversation around it.<\/p>\n

I\u2019ll ask it all kinds of questions about weather and different things, but I don\u2019t ask it anything important. I use it for fun and just to see what it\u2019s going to say and I try to think of stuff to talk about to it, but I don\u2019t ask it anything that I really might not want to know the answer to. (Laughs.)<\/p>\n

\"Dale<\/p>\n

\n Dale Earnhardt Jr. steps into his Late Model car before a 2023 race. \u201cI\u2019m just kind of slowly turning that faucet off until I feel like I\u2019m ready to shut it off entirely,\u201d he says of racing. (Jared C. Tilton \/ Getty Images)<\/p>\n

10. What is a time in your life you felt was really challenging, but you are proud of the way that you responded to it?<\/strong><\/p>\n

My dad\u2019s passing (Dale Earnhardt Sr. was killed on the last lap of the 2001 Daytona 500). That\u2019d definitely be the main thing. And that was a process of 20 years or even all the way up \u2019til today.<\/p>\n

Also, getting my s\u2014 together and asking (now wife) Amy to marry me, how important of a move that was and how I put that together. \u2026<\/p>\n

Parenthood, I would not put on this list. (Laughs.) I have not handled that well. I\u2019ve not played that game very well.<\/p>\n

11. I know you\u2019ve spoken about this topic frequently on your podcast, but what needs to happen in NASCAR to take the sport to the next level of popularity?<\/strong><\/p>\n

We need some rock stars. It\u2019s all about having some driver come in here and captivate the hell out of us and make people who aren\u2019t watching go, \u201cWho the hell is that?\u201d That\u2019s what it\u2019s going to take. We\u2019ve got very cool people racing; there\u2019s a lot of people in there who I like, cool guys who are fun to hang out with, but I don\u2019t know how we get them to become mainstream stars.<\/p>\n

12. Each week, I ask a driver to give me a question for the next person. The last one was A.J. Allmendinger<\/a>, and he wants to know: Why\u2019d you always flip him off when you were racing against him?<\/strong><\/p>\n

(Laughs.) I don\u2019t know. Probably because the way he drove, he was aggravating. And I mean that in the nicest way. He wasn\u2019t a blocker like (Ryan) Newman, but he was antsy out on the track. He\u2019s high-energy, and I\u2019m the complete opposite on the racetrack. I\u2019m trying to stay calm.<\/p>\n

But I think he\u2019s joking. I don\u2019t remember flipping him off a ton. I just always found his energy and mine to be polar opposites.<\/p>\n

This is the end of this year\u2019s version of the 12 Questions interviews. Earnhardt will submit a question for the 2026 edition prior to the Daytona 500. Next week will feature a compilation of the best answers from this season\u2019s Championship 4 drivers during their 12 Questions interviews this season.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Each week, The Athletic asks the same 12 questions to a different race car driver. This year\u2019s series…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":323867,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[46],"tags":[1833,1406,62,67,132,68],"class_list":{"0":"post-323866","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-nascar","8":"tag-motorsports","9":"tag-nascar","10":"tag-sports","11":"tag-united-states","12":"tag-unitedstates","13":"tag-us"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/323866","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=323866"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/323866\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/323867"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=323866"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=323866"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=323866"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}