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DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. — It was hard to tell who was happiest after Dale Earnhardt Jr.’s No. 88 Chevrolet was atop the scoring pylon following Friday’s final qualifying round for the Coke Zero 400 (7:30 p.m. ET, NBC, MRN, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio). It might have been Junior, or it might have been anyone else at Daytona International Speedway.
Fans high-fived and screamed loudly enough to hear over the sound of Junior’s car making its way back around the track for a cool-down lap.
“Dale Yeah! D-a-l-e yeah,” yelled an especially enthusiastic Earnhardt fan, jumping into the air on pit road and holding his Earnhardt-autographed hat up high off his head like a trophy.
Other race teams, still standing on pit road, smiled knowingly and walked away realizing they had better prepare for some big-time “Little E” competition.
For NASCAR’s reigning 14-time Most Popular Driver, it marks the first pole position he’s earned in four years and positions him for the fondest of farewells in his final full-time Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series season at the one venue most associated with his legendary racing name.
“I just heard him on the radio say he might come back for the Clash,” his teammate, and fellow front-row qualifier Chase Elliott said with a laugh about the annual Daytona Speedweeks exhibition race featuring the previous year’s pole winners. “Did you all hear him? I’m just going to start that rumor right now!”
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The two will line up next to each other in an event Earnhardt has won twice and is considered a favorite for Saturday.
“I think I will look at it as just a great opportunity to go out there and get a win,” Earnhardt, 42, said. “There are a lot of things that you have to do before you see the checkered flag. But I don’t know if I am feeling any more pressure than we typically feel when we come do Daytona.
“We always seem to be in the conversation when we show up and one of the guys that is the favorite or a contender, and that has always been the case when we come here. So we have always had a little bit of that to deal with, so I don’t think it makes me feel any different about it this weekend.”
Earnhardt had spoken to the media earlier Friday to discuss his final Daytona start. He was heartfelt and open. And coming into the media center again late Friday afternoon after winning the pole position, he was energetic and reflective. He didn’t answer questions as much as share stories.
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And what a story Daytona has been for him. He has 19 top-10 finishes in 35 starts, 13 top fives and four victories that includes the 2004 and 2014 Daytona 500.
One Earnhardt “fan family” came to Daytona Beach from Hot Springs, Arkansas, just to see him perform here. It was 9-year-old Andrew Grisham’s first plane ride — all just to see his favorite driver’s potential final Daytona Monster Energy Series start.
Dressed in an Earnhardt T-shirt, wearing an Earnhardt hat and sipping water out of an Earnhardt cup, he and his uncle, Matt Milks, 30, stood outside Earnhardt’s garage window in Daytona’s “Fan Zone” for six hours waiting for a chance to interact with the two-time Daytona 500 champion.
They left with autographed dollar bills, hats, jackets, drink koozies, even their tickets for Saturday’s race.
“I love my mom and dad and Dale Jr.,” Grisham said with a huge smile. His grandmother leaned in and explained with another grin, “This has been passed down through generations.”
And Earnhardt gets that and appreciates it. He hears the crowd’s cheers. He feels the crowd surround him wherever he walks.
Sure, it happens everywhere, but there is a special “feel” here where his legendary father Dale Earnhardt also collected 34 top 10s before being killed in the 2001 Daytona 500.
Earnhardt Jr. has 17 race wins here, including XFINITY Series and non-points events, and knows this is a logical — and emotional — place to score his first Cup win of 2017.
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“We haven’t had a lot to be happy about on the race track this year, we haven’t had a whole lot to celebrate,” Earnhardt acknowledged. “As a driver and I think as a team, you feel responsible to deliver. The fans have expectations. You have expectations of yourself and what you should be able to accomplish on the race track and you feel that responsibility to deliver.
“They come to the race track to see you lead. And when you don’t, you can feel the frustration coming through Twitter and social media after the races where you’re not a factor. They want it. They want you to be up there.
“It’s a responsibility. I’m supposed to get up there and do it. They think I can do it. I think I can do it. It feels good to give ’em something to cheer about. Hopefully that gets them excited for (Saturday) and hopefully … we’re a part of the celebration at the end and part of the excitement at the finish.”
Asked repeatedly about his expectations at Daytona this weekend, Earnhardt insisted his fate depends as much on the car as his great talent behind the wheel. Even if his fans would beg to differ.
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“We have had some really, really good cars here,” Earnhardt said of his success at Daytona. “When I get the car that I need or when I’ve had the cars that I have had that were so good here, you could just do whatever you wanted with them.”
Pressed about whether it was the cars or his own talent behind the wheel, Earnhardt paused.
“I think I know what I’m doing out there,” he said, carefully considering his answer. “But I don’t know how you rate one guy versus the next because we are all in kind of different cars every time we come back here.
“Sometimes Denny’s [Hamlin] car gets the job done and he whoops us; sometimes we get the job done and sometimes it is somebody else. I watched Dad. I didn’t know what I was seeing when I was watching him. But once I got out on the track and I started doing things with my car, I realized what I was seeing all of those years, and why things were happening the way they were. I started to understand why.
“How does a side draft feel if you have never been out there? Why do they do that? Why do they side draft and sling away? Why is it happening? You don’t know that until you get out there in the car.”
So far, Earnhardt’s time in the car at Daytona couldn’t be more encouraging. Even he had to smile sizing up his chances.
“If I’m behind the No. 88 I’m probably going to let him win; hell yeah,” he said laughing. “I’m a little different than the other drivers. I won’t pass him.”