Dale Earnhardt Jr. has revealed a valuable lesson taught by NASCAR legend and father, Dale Earnhardt Sr..
The older Earnhardt died back in 2001 in a tragic incident at the Daytona 500, but his son went on to achieve great things in the sport, claiming 26 Cup Series winz between 1999-2017.
Now, Earnhardt Jr. has revealed that his achievements in the sport were made possible by a hugely valuable lesson that was taught to him by his late father.
In the new Amazon Prime documentary titled Earnhardt, the 50-year-old recalled a time when he and his friends were sat in the team trailer following a bitter blow for Earnhardt Jr.
“All of a sudden, the door flies open on this trailer I lived in, ‘BOOM’, I know immediately those are Dad’s footsteps,” he said. “He looks over at my buddies, they’re sitting over there, and he goes ‘get the f*** off my property’.
“They ran out the house and jumped in their cars and they drove out to drive away, their shoes are still sitting on the floor and he said: ‘Come here.’ We walked out, I thought he was gonna whoop my ass and he goes ‘man, what are you doing?’
“I was like ‘I thought my racing career was over’, and he said ‘no, they’re gonna fix that car, that’s where you should be, you should be wanting to fix your car. Where’s that inside of you? What’s missing in you that you thought to come over here and sit on your ass and feel sorry for yourself?'”
Earnhardt Jr grateful for father’s interruption
From there, Earnhardt Jr. went on to have a fine racing career himself, and has also become a very successful team owner and broadcaster.
The latest documentary shines a light on the pair’s relationship, and reveals what drove Earnhardt Sr to achieve so much success in the NASCAR Cup Series.
“That was the one father-son talk that we had that sunk in,” Earnhardt Jr revealed, in an emotional clip from the new Amazon Prime documentary.
