April 20, 2009
By Kim Roberson
Kim Roberson
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Teams and car numbers come and go, but who would have thought that we would be at a NASCAR Cup Series race and not have the #8 car on the track?
We know that NASCAR is having tough times just like the rest of us, as we all make it through this recession together; however there are just some teams that you think will always be on the track. Powerhouse numbers like the Hendrick Motorsports #24 and #48, the Rousch-Fenway #6, Penske’s #2. The Wood Brothers #21 has managed to be at the track for the better part of the season, despite sponsor issues.
This year has seen the shuttering of classic numbers such as the Yates #28 and #38 teams, and the DEI #15 and Ganassi #41 vanished when the two teams merged over the off season.
However, it almost seems like the end of the final chapter of the team that Dale Earnhardt Senior built with the #8 team being forced to close up because no sponsor could be found to get the team to the track in Phoenix…and beyond.
When Senior created DEI in 1996, he dabbled with various teams and drivers for a few races a year before introducing the #1 car with Pennzoil and Steve Park as a full-time team in 1988. A year later, when Dale Jr. was ready to make the step up from Busch to Winston Cup, he added the #8 Budweiser car…a number his own father had driven “back in the day”. When Senior brought on one of his best friends to round out the team in 2001, he created the #15 NAPA team for Michael Waltrip.
For a time, those three cars were a powerhouse on the track. Junior and Park combined for three wins in 2000, and the #15 won that fateful Daytona 500 in its first outing in 2001. The next week, the #1 car won to honor their fallen boss. On the return to Daytona in July 2001, the #8 car took the checkered flag, and later won at Dover and Talladega.
In the fall of 2001, after 12 top-10 finishes and the one win, Park was critically injured in an accident at Darlington. He worked hard to recover, and was able to return to the #1 car six months later; however he was released in 2003, and the team that had been the first full-time team at DEI closed its doors.
For four years, the #8 and #15 teams battled on, and were almost always seen bumper-to-bumper at Talladega and Daytona fighting for the win. For two of those years, 2003 and 2004, it seemed like they were virtually unstoppable, winning 11 races between the two cars, and finishing in the top-5 21 times in 2003 and 18 in 2004.
The first inclination that the wheels might be falling off the DEI machine happened in 2005. Discord in the #8 team led to the decision to have the #15 and #8 teams swap everything but the numbers on the doors. At the end of the year, the two teams only had 10 top-5’s, and Junior went through three crew chiefs while Waltrip decided to depart the company to start up his own team.
In 2006, the #1 came back into existence when Martin Truex, Junior moved up from Busch to Nextel Cup. With back to back championships in the Busch Series, it seemed that we would have a chance to go back to the powerhouse days of the #1, #8 and #15 showing the world just what DEI had for the rest of the NASCAR world. Paul Menard took over the #15 car part time in ’06, and moved to full time in 2007, but seeing that neon yellow car just wasn’t the same as the blue NAPA #15, and even with Waltrip’s less than stellar history on anything but the plate tracks, the #15 was never able to achieve the partnership with the #8 car that had once been enough to make other teams worry when they saw the red and blue cars coming up behind them in their mirrors.
The high hopes for Truex also never seemed to materialize. He has shown glimpses of great hope, but Park still has more wins in the #1 car than Truex. In 7 years, Park had 2 wins and 12 top-5’s. Since Truex began driving for DEI 6 years ago, he also has 12 top-5’s…and only one win.
DEI was never as powerful as they were in those first four years after Senior’s death when they had the Park-Waltrip-Junior grouping. Those three were tutored by Senior, and worked to get the set ups under them with the combination of Senior’s knowledge and the teams ability to build awesome equipment. Between removing Richie Gilmore from the engine shop and the internal strife between the two Juniors, the decline of the powerhouse that Dale Senior built started four years ago…and appears to have come to a head now.
We could play all kinds of woulda-coulda-shoulda games with what would have happened had Senior not died that day. But it all seems a moot point now, as the 1 team is the last vestige of the old DEI, and even that team has a questionable future. To date, Truex has two top-10’s in 2009, including a 7th Saturday night in Phoenix. Rumors have been swirling that Truex and his sponsor, Bass Pro Shops, may be leaving at the end of the year, if not before. Before the #8 car shut down, it was 36th in owner points with no top-10’s, despite the fact that just last year Mark Martin stated that team was a “great team” with winning potential.
Officially, the company that Dale Senior created ceased to exist over the off season with the merger with Chip Ganassi Racing; however fans could still look at the #8 and #1 teams and think of them as “DEI” cars. Now, the last car that had continuously raced from when Dale Senior was alive has shut down, and it seems with that, the ties to the founding father have officially been severed.
Since Robby Gordon drove the first race for DEI in 1996, the company has 24 wins, 127 top-5’s and 247 top-10’s. All but one of those wins was from the Park-Waltrip-Earnhardt Jr. era of drivers, and 21 of the wins happened between 2000 and 2004.
Maybe we can look back to what appears to be the pivotal year of 2005 and see that we shouldn’t be all that surprised as to where the house that Senior built has ended up at today…but that doesn’t make it any less sad. DEI was the first company that I became a fan of when I became a fan of Michael Waltrip in 2004. For many, it was a link back to the Intimidator, and his dreams for the future.
And now, just 8 years after the Man in Black’s death, his brainchild is in danger of vanishing forever.
Taking a quick look back at the weekend in Phoenix, I am shaking my head over two incidents that have to leave you asking “what were they thinking?”
First, to Carl Edwards on Friday night. If there is proof that Karma exists, it happened during the Nationwide Series race when Edwards ran over the #99 car for no apparent reason other than he was standing between Edwards and the front of the pack…and then ended his night in the garage with engine issues finishing just a few spots ahead of Mikey and the #99 car. Even Edwards appeared to recognize that the fates was paying him back during an interview after his engine forced him behind the wall, saying “I guess this is Karma for running into Michael Waltrip.”
Second, to the aforementioned Dale Jr. on Saturday night. Yes, it had to be frustrating to have a car that was able to lead so soundly go south and turn out to be more than a handful by the end of the night. However, intentionally spinning Casey Mears after the checkered flag flew because he helped an already squirrely car spin, and not necessarily doing it intentionally, was just a stupid move. Not only did Junior’s bad night leave the team down in points from where they started the night, but I am pretty sure that the #88 team is looking at a minimum 100 points and $100k fine tomorrow, which by my math puts the them not in 19th place in the standings, but could potentially drop the #88 all the way back to 28th in standings.
Yes, we like spirit from our drivers…but there is a line between spirit and stupidity…and I think both Carl and Junior crossed that line this weekend. Hopefully they will both learn from those lessons the next time and take a millisecond to think better about making those kinds of decisions the next time they present themselves.
And finally, switching gears, a quick note of congratulations to the man who drove the #8 car in 2008. Mark Martin proved Saturday night that 50 is just a number when you put your heart and mind into accomplishing your dreams. I don’t know of anyone who was upset with the winner of the race in Phoenix…and it goes to show if you have a mind to do it, and the right equipment beneath you, you can win no matter how old you are.
The thoughts and ideas expressed by this writer or any other writer on Insider Racing News, are not necessarily the views of the staff and/or management of IRN.
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