Once Earnhardt fans, always Earnhardt fans

Commentary

By Mark Newman, Turner Sports Interactive

DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. -- I took the accompanying photo just before the start of Sunday's Daytona 500 because Dale Earnhardt had That Look. It was the intense gameface that I'd heard about, and there was none like it in all of professional sports.

This was my first NASCAR race, and this was a vision that I knew I was going to remember. Walking amongst the 43 cars lined up on pit road, no other driver had that same look of intensity at that moment, at least not yet.

More than four hours later, I had a horrific feeling about that same helmeted man in the cockpit. We waited in the media center for the word that most of us already knew was about to come. It was delivered with these four heartbreaking words from NASCAR President Mike Helton:

"We've lost Dale Earnhardt."

My first NASCAR race. Earnhardt's last.

You immediately sensed the full extent of the legend when you walked around the Speedweeks of Daytona. You knew it when the black No. 3 car passed any other car on the speedway. There was a roar. They are the same minions who had made Earnhardt a nonpareil figure in the collectibles business, and the same ones who had seen him break through here in 1998 with his first Daytona 500 victory.

Long live the king.

I hadn't needed to see proof of this legend, but it was there on the shirts of the fans here. And it was in the tears of the people around me as I stood by Earnhardt's transporter following the fatal crash…waiting with his crew members for the word that no one wanted to hear.

This was a brilliant and crisp Florida afternoon in the "birthplace of speed." Through 175 laps, the race was remarkably clean. More to the point, the entire Speedweeks package had been remarkably clean. You wondered if it could last. And then came the crash that involved more than 19 cars. It was violent. Earnhardt survived that one. Tony Stewart somehow survived it. I watched the twisted metal roll off, one by one, back into the garage area, while Earnhardt resumed action back on the track.

Why do drivers seem to survive the most gruesome-looking crashes while we seem to lose our heroes in seemingly milder incidents? I thought that at the time of the Stewart crash on lap 175. Everyone asks that question. I thought that when I saw that Michael Waltrip took this checkered flag.

Earlier in the week, I had been in Talladega and visited the International Motorsports Hall of Fame for the first time. There I had seen the separated remains of the Kool-Aid car Waltrip drove at Bristol a decade ago. There are photos of the crash that split his car in two, showing Waltrip exposed in his open seat over the hard track. The sign over the display read: "Worst Crash In Racing History."

Waltrip walked away from it cleanly. Amazing. Yet on this day, he crossed the finish line as his team owner hit the wall a turn behind him, a less-than-spectacular collision as crashes go. How many crashes must Earnhardt have been through? Dozens, from big to small. One tough cookie, they were saying this week, as a way of trumpeting the Oreo model that he rolled onto Daytona.

Consider:

In July 1996, Earnhardt broke a collarbone and sternum in a crash at Talladega. Two weeks later, he won the pole at Watkins Glen with a track record.

In the fall of 1979, Earnhardt began a streak of consecutive starts that reached an amazing 649 with his fatal Daytona run. In April, he would have been due to surpass Terry Labonte's NASCAR Winston Cup Series record of 655 consecutive starts. It was a milestone that would have made Earnhardt fans proud.

Dale Earnhardt awaits the command to fire his engine prior to the 43rd Daytona 500.

Dale never got there. At 5:16 p.m. Sunday, he was pronounced dead at Halifax Medical Center in Daytona Beach. Back at the track, fans were scattered in the brightly lit Turn 4 stands where I had watched part of the race. They couldn't leave the scene of their hero's final turn.

In the infield, the first flag hung at half-staff. They undoubtedly will look that way throughout the South, on into the next NASCAR stop at Rockingham. The transporters slowly and sadly exited the garage area, one by one.

The red No. 8 Budweiser transporter pulled away, ready to now carry the torch for the Earnhardt racing family. Then went the black No. 3 transporter, carrying two cars on top, one extra and the one that hit the wall. I thought of all the team personnel who were devoted to sending Earnhardt toward Victory Lanes.

What happens to Chocolate Myers, the big teddy bear of a gasman on the No. 3 crew? What happens to Kevin Hamlin, the crew chief? Do they now go hire a driver? It's incomprehensible. No way can they ever run a No. 3 car again on the Winston Cup circuit. Maybe they'll roll out a No. 03 and carry on. Who's gonna fill those shoes? Maybe no one.

Life will go on in NASCAR, I am sure. It always does after the tragic loss of a driver. It does in all walks of life. I am not sure fans of Dale Earnhardt know how to do that right now, though. You can walk up to your first Daytona and see right away that it is all about devotion to your favorite driver. I grew up the son of Bill Elliott fans who take an RV to many of the races. You don't flip-flop. You NASCAR fans seem to hold onto your loyalties like no other fans. They may jump to a different car or a different sponsor, but the driver remains the same. I wonder about the Earnhardt fans out there. It's hard to think ahead right now, but if you're that fan, I wonder where you go from here.

I never got to know Earnhardt, but I miss him already. I'll miss That Look inside the cockpit.

(Mark Newman is Vice President of Content Development for Turner Sports Interactive, which produces NASCAR.com.)

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