Earnhardt Jr. blames himself for wreck
HAMPTON, Ga. - Dale Earnhardt Jr. admitted Monday he made a mistake by not pitting to fix a problem with the left-rear wheel in Sunday's Pep Boys Auto 500 at Atlanta Motor Speedway. The wheel worked itself loose, and Earnhardt Jr. slammed the wall soon after a restart for the green-white-checker finish.
Earnhardt Jr. was running third at the time of the crash and ended up finishing 25th.
"I was a little disappointed in me for being ignorant enough to think [the wheel] would stay," Earnhardt Jr. said during a break in NASCAR's test of the car of tomorrow at Atlanta. "They tell you when you're a rookie when you come into this sport, if you have a vibration, have a problem, come into pits immediately, never try to drive through it, never try to fake it or hold together, save everybody trouble.
"I should have done that. I was bullheaded. I was frustrated. We hadn't got our finishes this year. [I] thought we could steal a third place there, [but it] cost me a good spot, good finish. I was just disappointed that I didn't do a better job, not only [for] my own safety, but everybody else's."
Earnhardt Jr. said that during the middle of the race, the wheel had worked its way loose from the hub, damaging either the threads on the wheel studs or the hub. The wheel would work its way loose every 30 or 40 laps, he said.
"That's why I stayed out there," Earnhardt Jr. said. "I thought, 'You know, it's been loose all day long. It's not come off yet, not really gotten bad.' And it wasn't."
Earnhardt Jr. said he felt fine after the grinding crash, though he was surprised his neck did not hurt.
"I thought my neck was going to hurt like hell," Earnhardt Jr. said. "But my leg smashed into the clutch pedal. I had the brake pedal mashed. When we hit the driver's side, my pedal flew ... caught the top of my foot up pretty good. Just shocked some of the muscles in there, so it cramped up all day long.
"But that's about it. I mean, I had a headache a little bit, but no concussion. I was pretty glad about that. When I laid on my back I didn't get dizzy or anything. Just a real hard hit."
