One accident Dale Earnhardt Jr. could rally back from, but a second proved too much and ended his bid for a storybook win of the Coke Zero 400 Saturday night at Daytona International Speedway.
Dale Earnhardt Jr. falls short of win in final Cup Series race at Daytona
Dale Earnhardt Jr. made a go of it, but ultimately a crash ended his race early Saturday night.
Earnhardt was running directly behind Kevin Harvick on Lap 107 when Harvick lost control of his No. 4 Ford and spun on the backstretch, leaving Earnhardt and others with no avenue to avoid a pileup. In the aftermath, Earnhardt struck the outside wall, then back into traffic with his No. 88 Chevrolet suffering considerable damage.
Earnhardt drove the car to pit road where his team attempted to make repairs, but the damage couldn’t be fixed within NASCAR’s five-minute clock that teams have to make repairs. NASCAR’s 14-time most popular driver then drove the car to the garage and retired from the Coke Zero 400. He finished 32nd.
”As soon as we got our lap back, I knew anything was possible,” Earnhardt said. “We were just kind of drafting right back up there and I think the No. 4 got a flat. I had nowhere to go, but it was fun. We had a pretty strong car.”
Earnhardt was making his likely final Cup Series start at Daytona, having announced in April he would retire from full-time competition at the end of the current season. The restrictor-plate track that is NASCAR’s signature venue has played host to several indelible moments for himself and his father, but also where Dale Earnhardt Sr. was killed when he crashed on the final lap of the 2001 Daytona 500.
In the buildup to Saturday night’s race, Earnhardt Jr. downplayed the emotion, preferring to focus instead on securing a win that he needed to qualify for the playoffs. And for much of the night a victory appeared possible, as he started on the pole and commanded a position at or near the front for
Earnhardt’s race began turning south on Lap 52 when what he thought was a flat right rear caused him to de-accelerate entering Turn 1. But as Earnhardt slowed Paul Menard clipped his rear bumper sending the No. 88 skidding into the outside wall.
”I was trying to lift, but there was really nothing I could do because there were so many guys behind me,” Earnhardt said. “We got into (Turn) 1 and hit the wall.”
After several pit stops, Earnhardt would return to the race two laps down. He would get those laps back with a little more than 60 laps remaining, and rallied to a spot inside the top 10 when Harvick’s car jumped sideways.
”I just didn’t expect all that attention all week,” Earnhardt said. “The attention and the reaction from the fans makes me feel great. Hopefully we are able to turn that around and back on them for the rest of the season and thank them for all they had done.
”I wish we had had a good finish tonight if not a win. We were working up in there and having a good time and being aggressive and wearing out the sides of that race car. It just wasn’t to be.”
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