Ralph Dale Earnhardt Jr. (born October 10, 1974) is an American stock car racing driver. He competes
occasionally in the NASCAR Xfinity Series, driving the No. 88 Chevrolet Camaro for his team JR
Motorsports. A third generation driver, he is the son of 7-time NASCAR Cup Series champion Dale
Earnhardt and relative to many former and current drivers in the NASCAR ranks.
After driving the No. 8 Chevrolet for Dale Earnhardt, Inc. (DEI), his father's team in the NASCAR Cup
Series, for much of his early Cup career, he moved to Hendrick Motorsports to drive the No. 88 in 2008.
He remained with Hendrick until his last season as a full-time driver in 2017. Earnhardt has 26 wins in
the Cup Series, a total that ranks him tied for 32nd in NASCAR history (with Fred Lorenzen) as of March
2023. He is a two-time champion of the Xfinity Series, winning in 1998 and 1999.[3] Since his last season
in Cup, Earnhardt has worked as a broadcaster for NASCAR on NBC.
Earnhardt's success at Daytona International Speedway throughout his career earned him the nickname
"Pied Piper" of Daytona.[4] He is a two-time Daytona 500 winner (2004 and 2014), and has won the
Most Popular Driver Award fifteen consecutive times from 2003 to 2017.[5]
Racing career
Early life and career
Dale Earnhardt Jr. was born and raised in Kannapolis, North Carolina, the son of Brenda Lorraine
Jackson[6] and Dale Earnhardt[7] His maternal grandfather, Robert Gee Sr., was a NASCAR car builder. He
has an elder sister, Kelley; an elder half-brother, Kerry, from his father's first marriage; and a younger
half-sister, Taylor Earnhardt-Putnam, from his father's third marriage. He is of part German ancestry.[7]
His parents divorced shortly after he was born, and he and Kelley lived with Brenda Earnhardt until their
house was destroyed in a fire when he was six years old. As Brenda had no financial support after the
fire, she gave up custody of the two children to Earnhardt Sr. prior to his marriage to Teresa Houston.
During Dale Earnhardt Jr.'s childhood, Kelley took care of him while their father and stepmother were
busy with the race seasons. At the age of 12, he was sent to Oak Ridge Military Academy;[8] three weeks
later, Kelley quit high school to join him.[9][10] He considered remaining at Oak Ridge for his senior year,
but instead decided to attend Mooresville High School, from which he graduated in 1992.[8][11]
Earnhardt Jr. attended the high performance driving school run by Andy Hillenburg[12] and began his
racing career at the late age of 17 with his father, competing in the Street Stock division at Concord,
North Carolina's Motorsport Park. His first race car was a 1979 Monte Carlo that he co-owned with Kerry.
By age 19, after two seasons of driving Street Stock Division, Earnhardt Jr. had honed his driving abilities
to the point of joining the Late Model Stock Car Division. He competed on the North and South Carolina
short tracks driving a No. 3 Buick. While he did run various tracks during this time, Earnhardt Jr. primarily
focused his efforts at the Myrtle Beach Speedway in South Carolina and the East Carolina Motor
Speedway in Robersonville, North Carolina, where he captured the pole for the Greenville Merchants
300 on October 28, 1994. There, he developed an in-depth knowledge of chassis setup and car
preparation, while racing against his siblings. He worked at his father's dealership as a mechanic while he
went to Mitchell Community College to earn an associate degree in automotive technology.[13]
Earnhardt Jr. ran nine Busch Series races between 1996 and 1997 for Dale Earnhardt, Inc., and Ed
Whitaker, respectively, before driving for his father's team in the Busch Series full-time in 1998, in which
he started the season with an amazing blow over after contact with Dick Trickle and Buckshot Jones at
Daytona, on the same weekend that his father had his first and only Daytona 500 win. Earnhardt won
consecutive NASCAR Busch Series Championships in 1998 and 1999 barely edging Matt Kenseth. In 1998,
he made his first start in the Winston Cup Series, at the exhibition race held at the Twin Ring Motegi in
Japan. Also in 1999, he drove in five Winston Cup races in the No. 8 Budweiser-sponsored Chevrolet for
DEI in preparation for a full-time Cup Series ride in 2000, with his best finish being a tenth-place finish at
Richmond in the fall race.[14]