The NASCAR Cup Series will take a breather this weekend while the Xfinity Series and the Craftsman Truck Series head to the Rockingham Speedway for a double-header weekend. The one-mile oval track is returning to the sport after a long absence and is set to be celebrated lavishly. On Dale Jr. Download, Dale Earnhardt Jr. spoke about his experiences on it as a driver.
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Back in the day, when he was an Xfinity Series driver, Junior started five races at Rockingham. He never broke into the top 10. He narrated, “I hated that place until the very last race … I went there in the Xfinity Series in 1997. Drove the Wrangler car. My track bar was dropping on the right side as we ran the race. I ended up running 14th or something and struggled, but not too bad.”
“Went back in 1998 and 1999. I don’t think anything great happened. I remember Harvick missing the show there in his Xfinity Series debut. It just made me have a hard time appreciating the track because of how brutal it could be.” In 2000, he ran a Cup Series race on the track for the first time. The misfortune continued.
For the first eight of the nine races that he ran there, he finished outside the top 10. It was only in his final appearance, in 2004, that he secured a fifth-place finish. But then, it was too late. The track was removed from the calendar post that season, and he was left with a strong yearning to taste more victory at Rockingham.
He added, “I just had a lot of rough days there, and then the last race, I ran fifth. I had a good car, and I felt like I’d figured it out. I was like, ‘Man, that was pretty fun.’ Then we quit going.” So, will he take up an opportunity to race at the track once again? Probably not. Junior is not a fan of the new asphalt that the track has been repaved with.
He believes that it is the tracks with the old asphalt that have a lot of character. Unfortunately, the young drivers in JR Motorsports and the rest of the Xfinity Series field will not get to make this choice. They are in for a tough challenge at one of the few tracks that even an iconic driver such as Junior couldn’t figure his way around.
Hopefully, he will be able to impart bits and pieces of the wisdom he gained to the drivers who will navigate “The Rock” for him this Saturday.
