Dale Jr.: 'In position to win' at Charlotte

"I think for sure we had everybody I saw out there whupped that was out there winning those races," Earnhardt Jr. said on the "Dale Jr. Download" released on Tuesday. "I think we can go to Charlotte and do the same thing -- put ourselves in position to win.

"If we get the win, we get the win. We get to move on so we're going to go there with that attitude, and hopefully that will produce a positive finish and a good result."

In recent weeks, the Hendrick Motorsports driver was frustrated that his car hadn't been competitive in practice, but the No. 88 team had turned a corner at Kansas, according to its pilot.

"We had good speed in the last practice," Earnhardt Jr. said. "I've been stressing that we need to be able to run competitive times in practice to really get a good idea how we can adjust the car and improve it for the race and we were able to do that."

In the race, Jamie McMurray and others took the high line toward the front while Earnhardt Jr. said he "wanted to run where there was rubber on the race track to help save on any kind of tire wear or tire abuse."

Only two years ago at Kansas, Earnhardt Jr. was involved in a crash during a test, so rubber was on his mind on Sunday.

"That's the race track where I blew the right front tire and got a very, very bad concussion in 2012," Earnhardt Jr. said. "So (I was) very aware of how touch-and-go and how critical the tires can be at that track, and thought we were doing the right thing by sort of taking it easy."

The concussion kept him out of that season's fall Charlotte and Kansas races.

"But we were running really fast while we were taking it easy. We were sort of letting Jamie and those guys run where they wanted to. We made some adjustments actually, improved on the handling of the car and got by everybody on one of them restarts and took the lead and just had a rocket. (Our) car was just driving away from everybody."

After leading 45 laps, Earnhardt Jr. had a tire failure that wrecked the car that swept Pocono Raceway this year. On Tuesday's podcast, he reassured fans that the car wasn't the only potential winner in their garage.

"We know how to make another one like it, so don't worry," Earnhardt Jr. said.

Sitting 25 points away from eighth place and the final spot in the Eliminator Round in two races, Earnhardt Jr. also noted his team's positive attitude at Kansas along with the bad luck experienced by Brad Keselowski and Hendrick teammate Jimmie Johnson will serve him well at Charlotte and Talladega.

"…the 2 and the 48 had some trouble," Earnhardt Jr. said. "I don't want to wish bad luck on anybody, but at least we weren't the only one that had trouble (at Kansas).

"There's two races left, and anything can happen, so we've got to keep working hard and stay positive, keep our heads up. We went into (Kansas) with a great attitude, and it almost netted us a top-five finish, if not a win."

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