Dale Earnhardt Jr. explains his hopes for NASCAR short track package

Dale Earnhardt Jr. is passionate about short-track racing, and that’s part of why he wants to help NASCAR find the correct balance for their Cup Series package.

It’s been hit or miss when the Cup Series has raced at tracks like Bristol, Martinsville and other short-tracks over the last couple of seasons. Ahead of a trip to Iowa Speedway, Earnhardt Jr. explained why he has high hopes for the future of NASCAR’s short-track package, and why he believes we’re trending in the right direction at the moment.

“I think we’re learning a lot,” Earnhardt Jr. said, during an interview with Bob Pockrass of FOX Sports. “I’ve been very critical of the short track package on my own content, Dirty Mo’ Media, The Dale Jr. Download. And fans have been critical, and everybody wants NASCAR to get it right and everybody’s got a different opinion, myself included — it’s the car, it’s this, it’s that and the other. But I think where we’ve kind of landed, at least it seems at the moment, is that we can certainly learn a lot by messing with a tire and Goodyear seems to be willing to be a bit aggressive with the tire.

“We didn’t get the desired result that we were looking for [with the softer tire] at the all-star race at North Wilkesboro. We didn’t get that desired result with the different tire combinations. But they did learn from it. And I think the drivers are open-minded and have given a lot of great input and feedback on what they’re feeling with the tires as they start to change the compound. And so I’m hoping that Goodyear can continue race by race to push the envelope on a softer compound and a tire that will give us the racing that we want.”

While the reaction was mixed regarding the 2024 All-Star Race at North Wilkesboro, Earnhardt Jr. believes it provided NASCAR with some valuable insight, and any complaints about it being too hard to pass were drastically overblown.

“Honestly, man, I really thought that the all-star race was a really great step in the right direction. We saw a brand new repave that was multi-groove. We’ve never seen that before and as many years as I can remember, a repaved racetrack that put on such great racing. I know it’s hard to pass, but it’s supposed to be hard to pass. It’s never not going to be hard to pass, I can promise you that,” Earnhardt Jr. added. “The only time it’s not hard to pass is when you’re at the superspeedways and you can get a draft and get around somebody. But everywhere else, it should be hard to pass. And so we’re always going to be arguing over how much of hard-to-pass can we put up with. Any time you have multi-grooves like we had at Wilkesboro, that’s a great thing.

“Hopefully, we continue to see that develop as we go further along the schedule and racing at these short tracks throughout the rest of the year [and] Goodyear continuing to push the tire and get more aggressive with the tire. Because I don’t think the tracks are broken. And I don’t really necessarily believe the car is broken. They’ve tried everything with this car. They’ve stripped the downforce away. They’ve done all the things they can do at the test. The drivers feel nothing when they’re making these changes. So I’m not 100 percent sold that the car is the problem.”

Alas, Dale Earnhardt Jr. believes NASCAR’s short-track package can be salvaged, and it’s not simply the fact that the NextGen car is the problem. We’ll see what else NASCAR looks to change, but it’s evident Earnhardt Jr. believes we’re moving forward in the right direction at the moment.