Dale Earnhardt Jr. may not be racing stock cars as often as he once was, but he still gets his fill of action behind the wheel in the late model world.
How much longer does Earnhardt Jr. envision himself able to race in the late model medium? During an interview with Bob Pockrass of FOX Sports, the NASCAR Hall of Famer pulled back the curtain, and put a timeline on the endeavor moving forward.
“I want to run my late model for a really long time. I imagine when I get to around 60, I’ll be probably considering that that’s probably too old to be out there battling with some of these younger guys,” Earnhardt Jr. revealed. “So I’ve got about a 10-year runway to do everything I want to do with my late model.”
That seems like plenty of time, as Earnhardt Jr. is giving it a decade, but who knows what’ll happen between now and then. Regardless, fans will want to savor any time Earnhardt Jr. has behind the wheel moving forward.
As for his races in the Xfinity Series, Earnhardt Jr. provided some color on that subject as well. Evidently, the NASCAR veteran recognizes that is’ a “big commitment” every time he gets behind the wheel, and it always feels like whichever races he chooses to run could be his last.
“The Xfinity car? Every year, I say that — personally but I don’t really share this publicly — but every year, I pretty much feel like it could be my last,” Earnhardt Jr. explained. “I’m going into this race at Bristol this year knowing that it might be the last one I run. There’s nothing that really makes that decision. It’s just last year was a lot of fun, led some laps. But it is a big commitment. I just logged in the calendar the sim that I’m going to be doing to try to prepare for that. And we do a lot of promotion around the partnership with Hellmann’s around that race. And so it’s not just show up and race and, ‘Oh man, that was great. We’ll do it again next year.’ There’s a lot of work that goes into it months ahead of time.
“But as long as we’re running good like we did — we ran so much better than I thought we would at Bristol last year — and as long as that’s happening, I think I’ll always want to keep coming back. When you go out there and you know the car is good and you just aren’t able to produce the result, then it’s probably time to let somebody else try it.”
As long as Dale Earnhardt Jr. wants to race in some capacity, fans, sponsors and media members alike will welcome it. It’s up to the NASCAR veteran when he wants to truly be done behind the wheel, and only he knows when that day will come.
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