The Bless Your ‘Hardt podcast offers interesting insights into the lives of Dale Earnhardt Jr. and Amy Earnhardt. In a recent episode, Amy recalled how Junior had taken her on a ride-along in his stock car when they first started dating in 2009.
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Junior and Amy were at Charlotte, along with Rick Hendrick and some of his friends. After entertaining the team owner’s friends in ride-arounds, Junior turned to his then-girlfriend. He took her on a few laps around the track before hitting upon a wild idea.
Dale Jr. wanted her to drive the car. But he did not want to accompany her in the passenger seat. Amy was understandably terrified.
Fortunately, the lady received help from Mr. Hendrick. He jumped into the passenger seat and began guiding her on how to navigate the track with the car.
“I am snapped into the HANS device. I can’t move my head. I can’t see anything. You can’t move your eyeballs when you’re in that thing,” said Amy, recalling the incident.
“And I’m like mega out of my place. Out of my element. I have no business doing what I’m doing. I know how to shift a car, but that’s as far as that goes. I don’t even know how to start this damn car,” she added.
Amy recalled how jumpy it got when she slowed down at a corner and downshifted as one would do with a streetcar. The move nearly blew the car.
Needless to say, she was seething in fury at Junior when they got back around.
Junior admits that Rick Hendrick saved his marriage
But Amy suppressed her rage, at least on the face. “I couldn’t show it because Rick’s friends were there and we’d just started dating. But I’m like, ‘I can’t believe he did that to me and put me in a situation that could have been really bad’,” she said.
Junior picked up the story with what seemed like a sheepish smile on his face. He said that Mr. Hendrick saved his to-be marriage that day.
This isn’t the only experience that Amy has had inside a stock car. The second time Junior took her on a ride-along was at Bristol.
On that occasion, Dale Jr. perhaps raced a bit too hard in an attempt to either impress or scare her. Shockingly, the PJ1 resin that the track’s bottom was treated with ended up turning against him. His car got loose as he entered Turn 4 and slipped into the wall hard.
Amy remembered how scared she was and wanted to get out of the car immediately. It is rather fortunate that neither of them was injured. The bright side: She did get the most realistic NASCAR experience anyone who is not a professional driver can get.
