No. 88 driver takes blame, maintains he 'had one of the best cars' at Daytona
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DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. -- You win some, you lose some.
For Dale Earnhardt Jr., the "some" in question just happen to be Daytona 500s.
The 2014 defending winner of The Great American Race finished third in the 57th annual running at Daytona International Speedway on Sunday, leading 32 of the event's 200 laps with what he deemed earlier in the week as the fastest car in the field.
Unfortunately for the driver of the No. 88 Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet, Earnhardt made the wrong decision on a restart with 19 laps remaining that in the end proved too costly to overcome.
"Jimmie (Johnson) was on the quarter panel; he was in a great spot on the guy in front of me," Earnhardt said. "I thought if I could get in behind him, he was going to shoot past to the lead, I could tuck on the quarter panel a little bit as soon as I got on that right rear quarter panel.
"You know, just one of them moves. You made some good ones, you make some bad ones. I made a bad one too late. … Just got too cute there. ... Should have won the race."
While Earnhardt was particularly hard on himself for the restart snafu, the No. 88 was still in a strong position on the final green-white-checkered sequence. The 12-time NMPA Most Popular Driver winner was in eighth when the final green flag dropped, but "the outside line got going really good" and he was able to advance, though there were "not enough laps to form anything" to send the 88 to Daytona's Victory Lane for the second consecutive February.
If there had been enough laps, however -- or, who knows, if the yellow flag hadn't frozen the field on the final lap -- Earnhardt's car was clearly fast enough to almost move up through the field at will.
It makes the third-place finish all that more bittersweet.
"You don't get cars that good too often" Earnhardt said. "I had one of the best cars out there and that gave me a ton of confidence to keep digging. We were able to get back up to third place. It’s really disappointing because the Nationwide team gave me the best car and we should have won the race. I’m just really disappointed that I didn’t do everything I needed to do.
"Good cars like that don’t come every week and you like to take advantage of those and when you're put in a car like that you've got to deliver and we fell a little short today."
While Earnhardt won't be able to carry the momentum that comes along with being the Daytona 500 champion that clearly propelled his best season in a decade a year ago -- not to mention the peace of mind that comes with locking a Chase for the NASCAR Sprint Cup berth after the first of 26 races -- Sunday's race was still about as good as the 88 team could've hoped for, given the changes it has undergone.
With a new crew chief in Greg Ives sitting atop the pit box, along with some new over-the-wall pit crew members, engineers and car chief -- the speed and near-flawlessness that Earnhardt exhibited during Speedweeks was extremely encouraging.
The driver addressed the first race with these new faces on Twitter after he left the Daytona media center.
They'll get another go in a week from now at Atlanta Motor Speedway in the Folds of Honor QuikTrips 500 (March 1, 1 p.m., FOX)
"We are ready to go to Atlanta," Earnhardt said. "It’s going to be a fun year.”
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