Rudd to call it a career at the end of the '07 season (cont'd)

"To run the schedule week-in and week-out, it's more demanding than it used to be," Rudd said. "And it's really become a young guys' sport: a single guy or a guy that's married and no kids, which means guys in their 20s and early 30s, just because there are so many demands on your schedule. I guess I'm not willing to make those sacrifices for that full-time schedule anymore."

Rudd said the decision didn't come overnight. However, he wanted to make sure he came to a verdict before RYR needed to set up its marketing plans for 2008.

"I've been thinking about it for a while," Rudd said. "I wasn't 100 percent sure whether I wanted to retire or not. By having the chance to enjoy some time off and then coming back and running a full schedule again, the decision for me now is pretty clear.

"I know it's the right thing. It's a great sport, it's been good to me and we've still got 13, 14 races left. The grind of the schedule, I guess, as you get older just sort of wears you down."

If you never saw Ricky Rudd in his prime, you missed something special. Rudd was tougher than an overcooked steak, a driver who once taped his eyelids open with duct tape in order to race in the Daytona 500 after a horrific crash the week before.

It's a moment that Rudd looks back on with pride, especially since he won the following race.

"That was a low and a high in one week, the 1984 Bud Shootout," Rudd said. "I had won one race in 1983 and got to drive for Bud Moore in 1984. We got wrecked in the Bud Shootout and it was close to being one of those career-ending accidents.

"I was very fortunate to be able to come back the next weekend at win at Richmond. That one there was neat, because I had some dizziness and equilibrium problems and to be able to come back and win was one of those extremes on the emotion spectrum."

Rudd's first Cup victory also brought back some special memories.

"In 1983, I won at Riverside and that was my first win," Rudd said. "It was Richard Childress' first win as a car owner. Times have changed. In those days, they didn't have TV cables long enough to reach Victory Lane so our Victory Lane was out on pit road somewhere."

Rudd never missed a start between 1981 and 2006 -- a span of 788 consecutive races. He was NASCAR's Iron Man. He didn't win a lot, only 23 times, but he had a stretch of 16 seasons where he won at least one race. If anything, Rudd misses the thrill that comes from running with a win on the line.

"The sport has always been a tough sport but the enjoyment has always come from winning a race or running up front, top-fives or top-10s," Rudd said. "Those are sort of rewards that are the benefit you receive for the demands on your time. We haven't had that many rewards this year to offset some of that."

Ricky, how do you want to be remembered?

"Just [as] a guy who gave 120 percent and came close to a Cup championship once or twice, and won a few marquee races along the way," Rudd said. "I came into this sport with really nothing. I had a tremendous fan following, obviously not as large as [Dale Earnhardt] Junior's but people that have supported me all these years, and I don't want to forget that."

Most roosters crow at daybreak, but this Rooster would like one last chance to strut at the twilight of his career.

"I guess I want to be a little bit lazy for awhile," Rudd said.

Enjoy your retirement, Ricky. You earned every bit of it.