May 24, 2007
By Rebecca Gladden

Rebecca Gladden

In the aftermath of NASCAR superstar Dale Earnhardt Jr.'s decision to leave his father's company, Dale Earnhardt, Inc., I was amazed to hear that many fans cannot conceive of another driver in the 8 car, which Junior has piloted full time in the Cup series since the year 2000.

Perhaps this is not surprising, since so many of today's fans have come to the sport during roughly that same period of time.

But students of NASCAR's almost 60-year history know that many drivers raced the 8 car before Dale Jr., just as many will do so after him.

The number 8 has been used on the equivalent of a Cup car since the earliest days of the sport in 1949. Of the 1253 Cup races that have been run by a number 8 car, nearly 80% featured a driver other than Dale Earnhardt Jr.

The first appearance of the 8 car was in NASCAR's second-ever "Strictly Stock" race held on July 10, 1949, at Daytona Beach. The event was 166 miles - 40 laps on a 4.150 mile road course - and featured an average speed of 80.883 miles per hour.

The 8 car that day was a 1947 Ford driven by Billy Carden, who would race in the Strictly Stock and Grand National series for the next 10 years. Carden finished the race 15th of 28 cars and earned $50 cash. The race, attended by approximately 500 fans, was won by Red Byron and also featured several women drivers including Ethel Mobley, Sara Christian and Louise Smith.

The 8 was featured on the side of a number of different stock car makes in the late '40s and early '50s, including Ford, Oldsmobile, Kaiser, Pontiac, Mercury, Cadillac, Lincoln and Hudson, and was piloted by several different drivers of the early NASCAR era along with Carden - Dick Linder, Jack Holloway, Gene Comstock and Bud Harless among others.

The first pole for the 8 car came in September 1951 at Charlotte with Carden at the wheel. He led 58 of 200 laps and eventually finished seventh, marking the first time the 8 car, an Oldsmobile that day, led a Grand National race.

1961 was a breakthrough year for both the 8 car and driver Joe Weatherly. He won nine races that season - eight of them in the 8 car - a Pontiac owned by Bud Moore. The very first win for the 8 came in a 40-lap Daytona 500 qualifier. Other well-known drivers in the race included Buddy Baker, Lee Petty, David Pearson and Bobby Allison. Weatherly started 24 races in the 8 car in '61 and scored four poles. Along with the aforementioned Daytona victory, he had two wins at Charlotte and one each at Myrtle Beach, Richmond, Martinsville, Bristol and Hillsboro, finishing the season fourth in points despite only running a fraction of the total races.

Weatherly remained in the 8 car until the mid 1960s, along with brief stints by Larry Manning and Dick Dickson. Ed Negre became owner and driver of the 8 car, now a Ford, midway through the 1967 season and spent most of the next 10 years behind its wheel, switching briefly to Plymouth in 1969 and then to Dodge in 1972, but never scoring a pole or a win during that time.

Bobby Hillin Jr. was the next driver to spend significant time in the 8 seat, driving his first race at North Wilkesboro in April 1982. Hillin remained in the car through the end of 1990, beating out Tim Richmond for the win in the Talladega 500 in July 1986 for his only victory in the ride.

Rick Wilson had a short one-year stint in the 8 in 1991, followed by the illustrious Dick Trickle, who assumed the ride for a year after the 1992 Daytona 500. Neither had any wins in the car. Two drivers known to today's NASCAR fans were in the car next - Sterling Marlin in '93 and Jeff Burton in '94-'95, both in Fords. Hut Stricklin took the wheel from 1996 through Martinsville in April 1998. He had switched to Chevrolet in early '98, launching a Chevy stretch for the 8 that continues to this day. The 8 car ran only nine Cup races in 1998 - six with Stricklin, one with Buckshot Jones and two with Morgan Shepherd.

It was in the Coca-Cola 600 at Charlotte in May of 1999 that the 8 car, now owned by Dale Earnhardt, was first driven by Dale Earnhardt Jr. Junior was still driving full-time in the Busch series, having won the '98 Busch championship, and was on his way to a second Busch title that year. He made five Cup starts in '99, leading his first lap in the 8 at Atlanta in November. Earnhardt Jr. assumed the ride full-time in 2000 and the rest, as they say, is history.

A few other well-known names pop up in the history of the 8 car, perhaps for just a race or two, including Tiny Lund, David Pearson, Wendell Scott, and even Dale Earnhardt, who drove the car in the 1975 World 600 for car owner Ed Negre. It was Earnhardt Sr.'s first ever Cup race.

It is notable that Dale Earnhardt Jr. accounts for roughly 45% of the 8 car's total Cup-equivalent wins, though he has been the driver in only 21% of the car's total races. No doubt this success, coupled with his popularity, have created a powerful fan association with Junior and the number 8.

On the other hand, the car number had an interesting history years before Junior came to NASCAR, and if he lands in a different ride next year, the 8 will simply start a new page in NASCAR's colorful history book.

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.