Dale

The hyper-masculine nature of NASCAR seems weird when you consider that there’s nothing especially masculine about driving a car. The questionable language that many people use to downplay women’s sports simply does not apply here. You don’t need any additional height or weight on your body, you just need to turn the wheel in front of you. Yet NASCAR often targets a very specific group of people: white men with lower income in the Southern U.S, a group including those who often cling to traditional definitions of masculinity and sport the most. This seemingly makes no sense whatsoever, but there’s an underlying reasoning on both sides of the coin. Why do these men love NASCAR? For the rednecks, an anger lies within NASCAR: destructive road rage multiplied by some magnitude of ten. Oftentimes, the default negative emotion within men is anger. When you’re raised with the ideology that you alone should provide for your family, and then, for whatever reason, you can’t, your existence is shrouded by permanent, self-diagnosed failure. For a man, this means being angry, and it’s much easier to swallow being angry at the driver who cut your guy off than being angry with yourself. Now, why does NASCAR target these men? Well, I think when you have a product that’s as bad as NASCAR, you sell to whoever’s buying.

The most common complaint I’ve heard in respect to NASCAR is what I call “the oval complaint”. While racing sports like F1 often feature tracks with harrowing twists and turns, NASCAR tracks are largely just ovals or almost ovals. However, there’s so much more that makes NASCAR unwatchable to many. It’s also really long. The quintessential NASCAR race, the Daytona 500, comprises 200 identical laps which add up to 500 miles. It’s like watching an extended roadtrip to nowhere. Ideally, the incredible speed of the sport solves this problem. It doesn’t matter if the cars are going in a million circles as long as they’re going a gazillion miles per hour. Well, the cars do go fast, but not as fast as they could. In the 80’s, cars began hitting laps that were faster than 210 MPH. Speed became the name of the game. However, speed could also be dangerous, and thus NASCAR manually handicapped themselves with restrictor plates. These plates dropped the top speed of cars to around 195 MPH.

Restrictor plates were a controversial change. Drivers were pissed. Fans were pissed. However, someone has to benefit from this change. If all of the top drivers are falling due to game plans entirely based around speed, then hypothetically someone has to pass them. This someone does exist. He is also pissed about the rule. Meet Dale.

Dale Earnhardt Sr. is very possibly the greatest NASCAR driver of all time. It would be nearly impossible to list all of his accolades. Simply put, he won NASCAR’s championship 7 times, a record tied for the most of all time. Dale did not speak like a man who won NASCAR’s championship 7 times, but this wasn’t because he was humble. 

He often spoke about his father, Ralph, who was a successful car racer as well. Dale got soft when he talked about Ralph. During many an interview, no matter the question, Ralph wormed his way into Dale’s answers. When someone lingers on your mind like that, it’s tough to keep them out of your mouth. Ralph never wanted Dale to race cars. He didn’t go easy on Dale when he made NASCAR his career, criticizing him at every turn. Then, Ralph suddenly died of a heart attack at 45 in 1973. Dale won his first Winston Cup 7 years later in 1980, and as Dale became the most decorated driver in NASCAR history, he often publicly doubted if his father would approve of him. Dale was perhaps the best ever at what he did, and this still wasn’t good enough. He would never prove himself to his father. He was chasing a ghost. Dale was a man from the South who felt like a failure. So he drove angry.

They called Dale “the Intimidator”. He was a bully on the track, precisely and scientifically nudging racers off course and taking calculated risks. If anyone else pulled the moves Dale did, they’d have been considered a menace and banned from the sport, but Dale had such an intimate knowledge of everything racing that it allowed him to mostly avoid the carnage that should’ve resulted from his techniques. When NASCAR capped speeds, Dale became essentially unstoppable. His car, painted an iconic black, heralded destruction. I don’t think he drove this way because he hated others. I think he drove this way because part of him hated himself.

Dale Earnhardt Jr. was born in 1974. He started racing cars in 1991. Dale Sr. was an asshole to his kid, just like his father was to him. Dale constantly put down Junior for having interest in anything other than racing. Junior has gone on record saying he only really started racing so that his dad would talk to him. Junior still idolized Dale in the same way Dale idolized Ralph. However, Junior harbored his feelings of failure in a much quieter fashion than Dale. Junior raced like a normal human being, and many NASCAR fans liked Junior, something Dale never really achieved. Dale was a unique kind of miserable. As the years rolled on, it became clear that he would race until the wheels fell off. This was his boulder to roll. This was what he did.

Michael Waltrip was the brother of largely successful driver Darrell Waltrip. When Michael was 12, he decided he wanted nothing more than to be a driver like his older brother Darrell. The next time the two spoke, Darrell told him to quit it and stay in school. As Michael continued to make steps towards becoming a professional NASCAR driver, Darrell continued to offer little to no support. Where Michael did find support was with Dale. Dale undoubtedly saw shades of himself in Michael, and took Michael under his wing. For a man who was emotionally absent in most of his children’s lives, Dale became surprisingly attached to Michael. During this time, Dale also began to reconcile with Junior, and the three formed a triumvirate of sorts. By 2001, Dale was past his prime, but Junior and Michael were just beginning to emerge into theirs. This trio by no means dominated the sport, but the growing bonds between the 3 seemed to help each of them with their respective internal struggles.

The Daytona 500 makes for NASCAR’s Super Bowl. It’s the biggest race. In 2001, Dale, Junior, and Michael all lined up at the starting line to compete. Even in the prime of his career, the Daytona 500 eluded Dale, with him notching only one win during his decade of dominance. This is a difficult race, one that would be the crowning achievement of most drivers’ careers.

For the first 200 laps of the race the lead shifts frequently from car to car. Dale does Dale stuff. Someone makes contact with him, so he takes his hand off the wheel at 185 MPH to flip them the bird. However, with 300 laps left, a clear top three emerges. Michael in first, Junior in second, Dale in third.

Rounding into the last lap, the top three remain unchanged. The commentator on the broadcast points something out.

“The best thing Mikey’s got going for him is those two cars behind him,” he remarks.

Junior isn’t trying to pass Michael. Dale isn’t trying to pass Michael. In fact, Dale’s doing more than that.

“Woah! Look at Earnhardt!” His voice is electric in the booth. Dale’s cutting 4th and 5th off. He’s swerving back and forth, making sure they don’t get close to his two sons.

As the cars approach the second to last turn, the commentator begins to yell. “C’mon, Mikey, you got him, man. You got him.” His voice quakes. “You got him. Come on, man.” Darrell Waltrip, commentator for the 2001 Daytona 500, starts to cry. 

“Oh! Big trouble,” another voice in the booth booms. 

The cars sail past the finish line. Michael crosses in first. 

“Mikey!” Waltrip wails.

Michael Waltrip wins the 2001 Daytona 500, and Dale Earnhardt Jr. comes in a close second. As Darrell begins to quell his tears, he mumbles a shaky afterthought.

“I just hope Dale’s okay. I guess he’s alright, isn’t he?”

Dale had continued to cut off competitors and keep them away from the lead. As Micheal sailed past the finish line, the black number 3 car careened into the concrete walls of the Daytona drack. He died instantly on a warm, sunny, Florida day. 

Dale took an unwatchable sport, and made it poetry. Dale was a man ruled by toxic masculinity, perceived toughness, and hate, and yet his last action was one of love. He lived and drove as an angry and broken man. He could not be anything else. And so when he loved, he loved as a wrecking ball. This beautiful mess is his bouquet. He is a cat bringing his owner a dead bird. This is his apology and his thesis. This was Dale.