Dale Earnhardt Jr. kept his partnership with Nationwide Insurance intact even after stepping away from NASCAR competition in 2017, continuing to promote the company’s products and services related to financial protection and planning. Yet maintaining a sponsorship tie was not the only reason he remained aligned with the brand.
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He joined forces with Nationwide Insurance and a local safety organization called BRAKES (Be Responsible and Keep Everyone Safe) to help teenage drivers, or future teenage drivers, including his daughters Isla and Nicole, become more alert behind the wheel and better prepared to handle difficult scenarios before they escalate into crashes.
The initiative specifically targets the reduction of phone-related distractions among teen drivers, an issue that has become one of the biggest concerns for parents. The BRAKES curriculum spans three hours and is designed for teenagers who already hold a driver’s license or permit.
Dale Jr.’s daughters are only five and seven, but he stated that he will ensure that they definitely enroll in the program when the time comes. “Oh, but they’re definitely going to BRAKES when they’re old enough. I’m a worrier by nature,” he said.
The reason why he is so concerned about teenage driving is that Dale Jr. has personally experienced the setback himself. As a teenager, Dale Jr. wrecked his own truck. He described how on one Christmas morning, he sat inside his Chevy S-10 pickup, a truck he treasured. Reminiscing, he recalled how his sister Kelley had given him an adapter that allowed him to play CDs through the truck’s cassette player, and the update felt revolutionary.
Eager to try it, Junior took the truck for a drive. While glancing down to check his music, he got distracted. While fooling with the device, he drifted off the road and flipped the vehicle. And eventually, his father, Dale Earnhardt Sr., came to pick him up.
Dale Jr. recalled how fortunate he was to walk away unhurt and how careless he had been as a young driver, noting that it happened three decades ago, before cellphones added another layer of distraction to the roads.
But he understands now that if a mere CD player can be that big of a distraction, cellphones are now in everyone’s hands all the time. And it’s crucial to focus on the road while driving, rather than checking social media or messages. That experience explains why he is personally invested in teaching teenagers to stay focused.
He has taken an active role in promoting BRAKES’ “Focused Driving Rewards,” a program that incentivizes teens to reduce phone usage, monitor their driving habits, and earn rewards through the Nationwide app. Even the central message of the program mirrors Dale Jr.’s own: put the phone down.
