I don't know about you guys, but I just see a pattern here......
Dale Jr. won't be at DEI for the long haul
Larry McReynolds / CREWCHIEFCLUB.COM
Posted: 36 minutes ago
Duane from Frankfort, Ky.: Why is Dale Earnhardt Jr. using Richard Childress Racing engines in the No. 88 Navy Busch car instead of Dale Earnhardt Inc. engines?
Larry McReynolds: I don't know the whole story, but I was told was that Earnhardt attempted to try to do a program with DEI for JR Motorsports. They kept hemming and hawing and wouldn't really give them an answer. Finally, the sands in the hourglass were running, and Earnhardt was trying to run the final race of 2005 at Homestead. He finally had to do something. In a very short time, like hours, he put a program together with Childress.
If I had started a late model team for my son Brandon while I was working for Childress or Robert Yates, I feel like I had the kind of relationship where I could have walked into their office and put together an engine program within a matter of minutes. Dale Earnhardt Jr. is not only the driver of the No. 8 car and pretty much the franchise for that organization. He's an Earnhardt, and he couldn't put together a program in a short amount of time for his Busch team. That doesn't say a whole lot about their relationship.
In my opinion, it's a perfect example that Dale Earnhardt Jr.'s time at DEI is short. There's such a separation between him and the management/ownership structure, and you can't have success when you've got that separation. As Darrell Waltrip has taught me, there's always more to the story. But the handwriting is on the wall that Earnhardt will not be there for his entire career.
http://msn.foxsports.com/nascar/story/5280190
[and if true, Sr is fuming in heaven about all of this and more - I hear thunder now]
I think that some day Mikey will have something to add to the DEI story.
Jr's struggle last year was too acute to rest on his teams shoulders alone...
It might be a couple days late, but I finally put together my answer to Ray Dunlap. I should have my season preview shortly after the Super Bowl.