'Nerve-wracking' pit strategy helps Earnhardt find Victory Lane

RIDGEWAY, Va. – The race was all but won.

Dale Earnhardt Jr. had built a cushion ahead of the second-place driver, Hendrick Motorsports teammate Jeff Gordon, and the laps at Martinsville Speedway were ticking by quickly.

Then the last thing Earnhardt wanted to happen, happened – an accident in Turn 3 brought the second red flag of the day.

So there he sat in his No. 88 National Guard Chevrolet SS with a decision to make – head to pit road and give up the lead? Or stay out and make a run on old tires?

“It wasn't hard to make, but it was nerve-wracking to watch,” crew chief Steve Letarte said of the decision. “Basically it came down to if you pit and no one else does, you lose. If you stay out and everyone else pits, you lose. So how would you feel better losing? We felt we would feel better losing with tires.”

So when pit road opened, Earnhardt made his way in for four tires – a strategy that was duplicated by Gordon.

“Staying out on old tires, we were going to lose for sure,” Earnhardt said. “Taking two tires, if nobody else took two tires, so we got all these guys behind us on four tires, we were probably going to be beat. It was the right call to come get four. I knew it was.”

Thanks to a quick pit stop by the No. 88 crew, the call dropped Earnhardt just four spots – from first to fifth.

“Steve and the guys did a real good job all day,” Earnhardt said.

But the strategy wouldn’t matter if Earnhardt didn’t get the right circumstances for the final restart with five laps to go.

“Dale has to go out and do what he did,” Letarte said. “That makes the pit call look good, which I appreciate him doing.”

Lined up on the inside with Gordon just behind him in seventh, Earnhardt quickly moved up the pack and retook the lead, holding on for his first-ever win at Martinsville.

With a new grandfather clock finally in his possession, he no longer had to worry about daydreaming too much about the famed Martinsville trophy.

“You get to running really good, about Lap 200, you start daydreaming about what it might be like to win,” Earnhardt admitted. “I refused to let myself do that in this particular race. I don't know if that had anything to do with how we ended up winning.”

“My team, we all came together and made it happen. I couldn’t be prouder.”