DALE EARNHARDT JR., NO. 88 DIET MOUNTAIN DEW/NATIONAL GUARD CHEVROLET met with media and discussed his first NASCAR Sprint Cup career win 12 years ago at Texas, being very close to winning, his suggestion for improving Bristol Motor Speedway, the upcoming race at Kansas, and more.

YOU’VE SOME ON LIKE A HOUSE OF FIRE IN THE LAST FEW WEEKS. YOU’RE SECOND IN POINTS. YOU GOT YOUR FIRST CAREER NASCAR SPRINT CUP WIN HERE AT TEXAS IN 2000. TALK ABOUT COMING TO A PLACE THAT HAS FOND MEMORIES AND ABOUT RUNNING WELL SO FAR THIS YEAR
“Yeah, we’ve had a good season. Everything has been going pretty good and I do enjoy racing at Texas. It’s a mile and a half, like a lot of tracks we run on in the series, but this track’s got some oddities to it and things about it that make it a lot different than most of the other 1.5-miles. The exits, to Turn 2 especially, is a real challenge. And the bumps and stuff are pretty challenging on the bottom of both corners. The entry to (Turn) 1 is really, really loose in the race; or the entry to (Turn) 3, I mean. The entry to (Turn) 1 is always a lot of fun, really fast and just trying to get the car through the middle is a challenge there. But it’s a unique place and what makes it even better I think, is the energy the fans bring here. The fan base here has always been pretty solid, right from the start. And that’s kind of, in my opinion, rare. The further west we go, we really sort of don’t have that gain in the energy of the fan base. But they really enjoy this race track and really enjoy us coming here and it seems to have a lot of NASCAR fans in this area. So, that makes it even funner to be here when you know that there’s a lot of people that are going to come out and support the track. Eddie (Gossage) does an interesting job; kind of out of the box a lot of time with all the things he does. A lot of credit has got to be given to him and his staff for what the track is today and how well the track does.”
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