DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. -- February 2010: The Sprint Cup champion leans back on the black leather couch in the lounge of his team transporter, a long day of practice behind him, a long night of promotion ahead. There's the photo shoot for Time, the appearance on Nightline, and live morning-show interviews with the BBC, Italia 1, and another overseas station he can't remember.

"What's the name of that network again?" Dale Earnhardt Jr. asks his team owner.

"Eurosport, I think," Joe Gibbs replies.

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Junior just smiles and shakes his head, as if he's still trying to comprehend it all. From almost the first day he entered NASCAR's premier series, he's been the sport's most popular and most recognizable figure. Television spots and magazine covers are nothing new. But after the events of the past few years -- the split with Dale Earnhardt Inc., the championship, the global marketing blitz -- he's emerged as more than just a sports figure.

He's become a worldwide sports ambassador, one of those few athletes capable of influencing public policy or furthering social causes, and known from Atlanta to Australia by just a single name. It's an elite little club. There's Ali. Jordan. Tiger. Pele.

And now, Junior.

"Remember, you're going to speak to the House subcommittee next week about that clean water bill," his public relations rep says. "You promised Rep. Hayes that you'd be there."

Junior nods. This all started back in the early days of 2007, when the dispute with his stepmother Teresa over control of DEI widened from a rift into a chasm. There was the dramatic moment the week before the Daytona 500, when Junior launched a public campaign for majority ownership in his late father's team. His relationship with Teresa had deteriorated to the point where he was relegated to negotiating through the press.

Some took Earnhardt to task for what they saw as a double standard: He wanted to run the team his father founded, but also said he "didn't want the headaches of being a Cup owner" -- exactly what he'd become with a 51 percent stake in DEI -- when asked about taking his JR Motorsports Busch team up to NASCAR's premier level. But no one could argue that DEI's entire stature in the sport was embodied by one man in a red driving suit.

Give Junior what he wants, they clamored. Granted, majority ownership seemed a little much for a driver whose ownership experience was limited to one promising but unproven Busch team. But the general consensus in grandstands and media centers across the circuit was that he deserved some stake in his dad's company. That maybe one day he ought to be running the thing. That regardless of popularity or souvenir sales or commercial viability, eventually handing DEI down from father to son was just the right thing to do.

Everybody believed that -- except the powers at DEI. It was almost like the movie The Queen, where the British royal family saw Princess Diana only as a troublesome daughter-in-law, and not as the global figure she was beyond the walls of Buckingham Palace. Teresa treated Dale Jr. as her stepson, not as the face of NASCAR, not as the immensely popular and influential person he was to the outside world, not as the one person she could never afford to lose.

She just never got it. And as a result, Junior moved on.

The deal was struck, oddly enough, over bologna sandwiches with Tony Stewart and Denny Hamlin in the motorhome lot outside Martinsville Speedway. J.J. Yeley was struggling mightily in Joe Gibbs Racing's third Nextel Cup car. Interstate Batteries had a long history as a primary sponsor, but wasn't able to match the dollar amounts being spent by bigger companies in the sport. Earnhardt enjoyed a close friendship with Hamlin and Stewart, and had been a fan and admirer of Gibbs since his first stint coaching the Redskins.

It just made too much sense. As 2007 wore on and Junior competed without a contract extension and without the ownership stake he wanted, animosity festered. Performance suffered. Just like he had in 2004 and 2006, he made the Chase but was never a serious threat to win the championship. Something always seemed to be missing. Those golden days of 2003, when the No. 8 team finished third in final points and brimmed with so much potential, were long gone.

It happened quickly. Gibbs, always the savvy businessman, structured a deal similar to the one between Valvoline and Evernham Motorsports, where he would field the entry but Earnhardt would hold a majority ownership in the car. Earnhardt thought about jumping to his father's old team at Richard Childress Racing, but he also wanted to win, and over the past decade only Rick Hendrick and Jack Roush had done that more than the Coach. Driver, sponsor, and Junior Nation all made a seamless transition into a gleaming red and white No. 03 Chevy.

The result was a supernova explosion of star power unlike any NASCAR had ever seen. Earnhardt won seven races that first season with Gibbs, leading Stewart across the line in three of the four restrictor-plate events. His long-awaited championship last year transformed him into a global phenomenon, complete with product endorsements from Portugal to Hong Kong. His title also emboldened him to pursue off-track causes, like preserving wildlife in his native North Carolina and strong-arming NASCAR into forming an elderly driver care fund.

Looking back on it now, the dispute with Teresa in 2007 seemed silly. How was she unable to see Dale Jr. for what he was, the most powerful commercial force in NASCAR? Why was she unable to appreciate that no one in the sport was capable of influencing more change than her stepson? Sure, his demand for majority ownership seemed a little unrealistic. But how did DEI let it get to that point? Why did they give every impression that they were taking the greatest commodity in NASCAR for granted?

All that's in the past now. There was only one winner in the split between Dale Jr. and DEI, and it was the younger Earnhardt, now more popular and more successful than ever before. His new team treats him with the respect he's always deserved, and puts him in the kind of equipment he's always wanted. This week, he's a heavy favorite to win a third Daytona 500.

Of course, DEI also has high hopes for this Speedweeks. With Greg Sacks behind the wheel of the No. 8 Family Dollar Chevy, they feel like they have a pretty good shot to make the race.