Shootout win proves Junior can handle the pressure

It is, as so often is said in sports and in life, one of those good problems to have.

But in the wake of his stunning victory in last Saturday's Bud Shootout at Daytona International Speedway, one has to wonder: did Dale Earnhardt Jr. just alleviate much of the pressure to win that accompanied him when he jumped from Dale Earnhardt Inc. to Hendrick Motorsports? Or did Junior just ratchet up the pressure a notch to win a race that really counts?

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Winning the Shootout in his first outing in the No. 88 Chevy powered by Hendrick was impressive and no doubt beats any alternative. But it was a non-points event and it was only 70 laps. Heck, he might have won five or six races for DEI last year if some of the points races had been of similar length, given DEI's penchant for providing Junior with engines that allowed him to run up front much of the day before blowing up sometime during the latter third of several events.

By now everyone who follows NASCAR knows that it has been 62 races -- the Crown Royal 400 at Richmond on May 6, 2006, to be exact -- since Earnhardt has driven to Victory Lane in a Cup points event. Everyone also knows how Junior ditched the company his father built (for many good reasons) in favor of the most powerful organization in NASCAR today in Hendrick, with the idea that Earnhardt would be able to step in and begin winning again immediately.

That is precisely what Earnhardt did last Saturday night, out-dueling Tony Stewart down the stretch at Daytona with a little help from behind from one of his new teammates and presumably his newest best friend, two-time defending points champion Jimmie Johnson (watch video).

Afterward, Earnhardt's new boss, team owner Rick Hendrick, told reporters that it felt good "to answer the question of can we win." He went on to add that Junior is "as hungry and as committed as anybody who has ever sat down in one of my racecars."

Stewart praised Earnhardt and made the curious remark that Junior might even be a better restrictor-plate racer than his late father, who won a record 34 races at Daytona. Although it may have been a heat-of-the-moment observation, it was high praise indeed.

Take that, Teresa Earnhardt. It seems Junior has decided to be more of a racecar driver than a celebrity, after all.

Thanks, guys

Earnhardt thanked everyone under the Florida sun who had anything at all, however remotely, with helping him win. He thanked Johnson and also Hendrick teammate Jeff Gordon for helping push him to the front. He thanked crew chief and long-time friend Tony Eury Jr., and all the guys who work on his car. He thanked Mr. Hendrick, of course.

And he kept right on going.

"I've got to thank a lot of people for the preparation we had coming into this season -- not just Tony Jr. and the team, but there were a lot of people throughout the sponsor ranks and the PR side of it, the personal side of it, and family and friends," Earnhardt said. "There are so many people who helped prepare this deal and [we're] hoping to get it right to where we could come in here and be able to work under this microscope, you know?"

But perhaps most of all, Earnhardt thanked Stewart and Kurt Busch for getting into it on the track during a Friday practice and, allegedly, in the NASCAR hauler afterward (watch video). It shifted the sun's reflection from through Earnhardt's microscope, where it might have become white hot, to Stewart and Busch on the very eve of Junior's first foray in a Hendrick car. It could not have been more appreciated. (Continued)