There have been plenty of tales in NASCAR of a couple of pals who conquered it all. But perhaps none is more legendary than the duo of Richard Childress and Dale Earnhardt Sr., because it wasn’t only that they were dominating NASCAR as professionals and as a driver-team owner duo, there was something beyond that too, something deeper.
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This was what Childress opened up on during a 2022 appearance on Cars and Culture with Jason Stein. “Both of us had a similar background. We’d lost our fathers, I lost mine a little earlier and we just built a bond between us, the trust, the bond, we trusted each other so much,” Childress said of him and Earnhardt.
He recalled how back in 1985, they blew around 11 engines, which disheartened Childress so much that he asked Earnhardt to find another team considering RCR wasn’t “good enough” for a driver of his caliber. But instead of paying any attention to this prospect, the Intimidator did what only the truest of friends do, as Childress described, “I never will forget, we were sitting on an old brick wall and he looked at me and said, ‘No, we started this together, we’re gonna end it together.'”
“That’s the kind of man Dale Earnhardt was.”
The legendary team owner added that while Earnhardt had “plenty of opportunities” to drive for other teams, he wanted to stay true to his friend. Of course, they didn’t get to end it the way they would have wanted to considering what happened in 2001.
But as Childress said, “Life is what it is.”
Richard Childress never doubted Dale Earnhardt Sr. behind the wheel
By all accounts, Dale Earnhardt Sr. is arguably the greatest driver NASCAR has ever seen. But even someone as great as he took a while to win the greatest race there is the Daytona 500, a peak he eventually conquered in 1998. However, his boss never doubted him, no matter the track or the occasion.
“Man, we finished second a bunch of times. Still, it never crossed my mind that we’d never win the 500. When Dale Earnhardt crawled into your car at Daytona, you just knew you were going to win,” Childress said as per Autoweek.
He added that while there were times when the circumstances beat them, there wasn’t an instance when he put Dale Earnhardt in a racecar at any racetrack and didn’t think he would win.
