Earnhardt Jr. finished third in the Daytona 500 last month. Credit: Jonathan Ferrey/Getty Images

Junior facing crucial race Sunday at Las Vegas

Earnhardt Jr. 14th in points going to track he struggled on last year

It's only the third week of the NASCAR Nextel Cup season and Dale Earnhardt Jr. already is facing a crucial test heading into Las Vegas Motor Speedway.

After a solid third-place finish in the season-opening Daytona 500, fan favorite Earnhardt had a terrible day two weeks ago at California Speedway, blowing three tires and hanging on for a 32nd-place finish.

	Tough luck Dale Earnhardt Jr.'s record at Las Vegas Motor Speedway Year Start Finish 2000 3 10 2001 32 23 2002 35 16 2003 4 2 2004 26 35 Avg. 20 17.2

That dropped Junior to 14th in the standings, 103 points behind series leader and reigning Cup champion Kurt Busch. Not so bad with 34 races to go, but the 1.5-mile Las Vegas oval was one of Earnhardt's worst venues last year. He started 26th and fought an ill-handling car all the way to a 35th-place finish.

Earnhardt, working well with new crew chief Pete Rondeau, said he is not feeling any extra pressure heading into Sunday's UAW-DaimlerChrysler 400.

"It wasn't much fun driving around with tires blowing out all day (at California), but that's what happened and it's behind us," Earnhardt said. "Nobody said it was going to be a cakewalk, but we're going to get better because of what happened.

"I was real happy the way Pete and all the guys handled the situation. Pete had me calm and chilled out at a time when I probably would've lost focus and been all over the place. I like that about him."

Earnhardt, who finished fifth in the points last year after being in contention for the title until the final race, started 2005 with a big question mark after he and Dale Earnhardt Inc. teammate Michael Waltrip swapped teams.

Earnhardt got the unproven Rondeau, the rest of Waltrip's No. 15 crew from last year and all of his teammate's cars, while Waltrip got Junior's cousin and former car chief Tony Eury Jr. as his crew chief, the rest of Earnhardt's crew from last year and what had been the No. 8 Chevrolets.

Earnhardt and Eury grew up together and are great friends, but they often clashed during races when things were not going well.

	Earnhardt Jr. said the Auto Club 500 at Fontana turned into little more than a test session. Credit: Jonathan Ferrey/Getty Images
	Earnhardt Jr. cuts a tire on two occasions Sign up for TrackPass now BUY YOUR NEXTEL DRIVER PHONE

So far, Earnhardt and Rondeau, who took over as Waltrip's crew chief late last season after veteran Slugger Labbe left the team, have melded nicely.

But, looking to bounce back after California, the tough Vegas track will be a big test for them and the entire No. 8 team.

"I'm actually looking forward to it," Earnhardt said. "We tested at Las Vegas (in January) and we learned a lot of stuff in the last half of the California race that should help us there.

"Once we blew those tires, we turned the rest of the race into a test session. We're taking the same car we used at California."

Earnhardt said that bringing the same car with which he struggled at California is not as strange as it sounds.

"It was a good car when the tires stayed on it," he said. "Once we fixed that problem, it was pretty fast. But nobody noticed because we were more than 10 laps down.

"We tried a lot of things, the car got better and we learned a lot about the car that should be good for us at Vegas. The car was never a hassle to drive at any point during the race and it was by far one of the better cars I've driven at the big, flat tracks."