"Those brand new rights just drove around the corners
so much better than those other guys with old tires out
there," Earnhardt said. "I wasn't worried. They make the
calls in the pits and I just drive the car."
Dale Earnhardt Jr would beat Harvick to the finish
line by 2 car length.
"I knew they were coming," said Harvick, "There
wasn't anybody else in the field that was going to get
by me. They can just do it when they want to at this
place."
The win would vault Dale Jr back to the lead in the
Nextel Cup championship standings by 13 points over Kurt
Busch. A lead that would last only 2 days.
During a post race TV interview in victory lane Dale
Jr was asked what it meant to win his 5th race at
Talladega.
"It don't mean shit right now. Daddy's won here 10
times," a euphoric Earnhardt exclaimed, proudly honoring
his father.
Dale Earnhardt Jr hadn't meant to let the word slip,
and he didn't mean to offend anyone. He was merely
celebrating his win. But NASCAR didn't care what the
reason was. On Tuesday NASCAR fined Junior $10,000, and
docked him 25 championship points - costing him the lead
in the point standings.
Fans of Driver 8 were irate, but the precedent had
already been set. Johnny Sauter had received a $10,000
fine, and was docked 25 points, for a similar slip
earlier in the year at a Busch race in Las Vegas.
"If anybody was offended by that, I can't imagine why
they'd tune in to a race in the first place," Earnhardt
said.
When NASCAR issued the penalty Jim Hunter, their VP
of Communication, explained it this way:
"It was really a no-brainer,'' Hunter said. "Are we
getting angry e-mails from fans? Of course. But when we
announced the Chase for the Championship, everyone asked
us how we were going to police it. The answer was 'The
same way we police everything else.' ""