Dale Earnhardt Jr. Says He Doesn’t Need Family On Team To Succeed

One of the ongoing theories floated by fans is Dale Earnhardt Jr.‘s lack of success has to do with his environment at Hendrick Motorsports.

When Earnhardt Jr. was winning races, he was at Dale Earnhardt Inc. on a team made up of family (like uncle Tony Eury Sr. and cousin Tony Eury Jr.) and close friends. The majority of Earnhardt Jr.‘s No. 8 team had been with the driver since his days in the Nationwide Series.

When I asked Earnhardt Jr. about this theory on Thursday afternoon, he responded that he didn’t believe the close-knit group at DEI had a different impact on his racing than the group he has – or has had – at Hendrick.

Here’s his full response:

”I don’t want to believe that (being surrounded by family/longtime friends) has an affect on it. I think that me and Steve are going to get along really good.

”It’s important to me to have a friendship and a trust built up, because you need to be able to lean on people and trust what you’re hearing from them, trust what they’re doing. That’s more important than the professional working relationship.

”I was able to build a great friendship with Lance in the short time we were together. I’ve never really had a problem doing that. And I had a real good friendship with a lot of guys on the team. We were a team, you know? I felt part of that group. I felt like I fit in there and felt like we had a good package.

”So I don’t want to believe that needs to happen for me to be successful. (The DEI No. 8 team) was a unique group, and we all kind of did work together from the Nationwide Series up – and if they came in, I trusted them immediately because it was Pops (Eury Sr.) bringing them in. I never questioned him.

“But I don’t want to believe that has to be the occasion for me to have success.”