‘Closure’ opens other doors

By Dave Rodman, Turner Sports Interactive
August 19, 2001
12:46 PM EDT (1646 GMT)

COMMENTARY

The important thing about the accident investigation report that NASCAR and its independent committee will deliver on Tuesday in Atlanta is not its results. Dale Earnhardt is dead. No report will change that.

Dave Rodman

That door is closed. The critical element -- whether it occurs Tuesday, a week from Tuesday or in a year of Tuesdays -- is the steps that NASCAR takes moving ahead from here.

The most positive point might be that NASCAR simply made the decision to conduct an in-depth investigation following the death of its seven-time Winston Cup champion on the final lap of the Daytona 500 on Feb. 18. In a truly alarming year, Earnhardt’s was the fourth death in NASCAR’s three top series and came in concert with a couple more fatalities in equipment from lower divisions.

The decision to go “outside the fold” and ask for help in itself -- at least in the public eye -- is unprecedented in NASCAR’s 53-year history. NASCAR has not typically made it a point to publicly ask for help, or acknowledge it needed any.

There is hope in garage areas from Winston Cup down to Buddy’s backyard in who-knows-where. Given Earnhardt’s stature, more than just the eyes of the racing community will be on Atlanta on Tuesday.

“We’d like to have some answers as to what’s gonna make our sport safer and better,” 1999 Winston Cup champion Dale Jarrett said Saturday, taking the role of unofficial spokesman for the entire Cup garage. “What’s gonna give the drivers better chances if we should have a crash?

Dale Earnhardt

“I have no idea what we’re really gonna find out from this. I know there’s been a lot of very talented people working on this for quite a while and I feel sure that we’ll have some answers. Will the answers be something that we can put in place? Hopefully they will be and I feel quite certain they will have worked hard enough to try to incorporate something that we can use in this.

“That’s kind of my wish and everybody’s.”

Even as they hope doors open to a new era in safety technology and concern, a lot of people hope that a door will open back to the sport, for so many Earnhardt fans who have said they just cannot watch any more.

Don’t turn away from the sport -- which is not what The Man would have wanted. Everyone retires -- everyone passes on. There is no escaping that fate, and for those who know and accept their salvation in The Lord, there is joy in that fact.

Dale Earnhardt knew that and even though he was no more eager to shuffle off this mortal coil on that bright and sunny day than you or I, he was ready.

Carry his memory forward -- keep it alive.

For me, I have to work hard to kindle up images of a wildly spinning Geoffrey Bodine, or an irate Bill Elliott -- both often “the Intimidator’s” victims -- or even a maniacally grinning Tim Richmond wagging a playful and remonstrative finger in Big E’s direction.

The everlasting memory I have of Dale Earnhardt came on a sunny day in the spring, not unlike Feb. 18, 2001. I can’t remember the circumstances: Be it testing, business or a trip south on the boat.

Dale and wife Teresa and daughter Taylor Nicole, all of six months old, stopped by our original Daytona International Speedway office building. Now, for those of you who know the lay of the speedway land, that was the one-story building right outside the tunnel entrance, which used to house 85 percent of ALL the speedway departments.

Dale stuck his head in the door, then strolled in with the family and sat down to just shoot the breeze with us in the PR Department: Larry Balewski, ISC’s Victory Lane emcee extraordinaire; Donna Freismuth from the credential department; and anyone else who happened to be kicking around.

I barely knew The Man, or I guess I figured, ‘how could he know someone in as simple a role as I held?’ But as I am today with four grandkids, I had a passion then for children -- and Taylor was an easy and willing target for some cradling.

I have a thing for testing myself and everyone around me. By example, trying to raise them to a higher level. Little Taylor was less than a peanut, but surely, I thought, she could walk with a little prodding, a little support.

From one side of the office, I propped her up under her armpits -- just to see what she could do.

Hah! I had to question the Earnhardt resolve? This 20-inch-tall pixie charged across the room as steadily as her little legs would carry her, to a man who was so commanding yet so gentle; who caused many a strong man to shiver yet who was just bursting with indefinable love for his family.

And now, it’s hardly possible to spend a day without considering how many of you take minutes out of yours to remember him with an equally passionate affection.

Hold that memory. Carry it on. Keep it alive. Shed a tear.

No, they are not tears, as Dale Earnhardt Jr. said, of pathetic self-pity; but tears of passionate joy, and loss, and hope.

Remember the day.

NOTE: Dave Rodman is a staff writer for NASCAR.com. The opinions listed here are those solely of the writer. To provide feedback to Dave, email him at dave.rodman@turner.com.