On what would have been Dale Earnhardt’s 65th birthday, fans are being invited to Dale Earnhardt Inc. today in Mooresville, North Carolina, to celebrate the annual Dale Earnhardt Day.
“It’s crazy to think what he’d been like at 65 years old,’' Dale Earnhardt Jr. said Friday at Talladega Superspeedway. “You kind of had an idea that he wouldn’t have changed a whole lot had he lived a little bit longer. What he would have been like at 80? All those things would be hard to imagine. It’s great that people still talk about him, the sport, his fans, the media that everybody still acknowledges who he was and what he meant.’'
Items from Earnhardt’s past and that of DEI will be on display, and the Grand Showroom also will be open to the public in honor of the seven-time NASCAR champion who died on the last lap of the 2001 Daytona 500. This year’s celebration includes the first public viewing of a life-sized statue of Dale Earnhardt by artist Jason Fizer of Roanoke, Virginia.
The Dale Earnhardt Foundation will be accepting good used or new books to benefit the Salvation Army’s Center of Hope in Charlotte, North Carolina.
On Earnhardt’s birthday, here are some memorable moments to recall in Hall of Famer’s driving career:
Earnhardt’s 76th and final Cup win came in the 2000 fall race at Talladega Superspeedway. He went from 18th to first in the last five laps to win:
Here is Earnhardt’s interview after winning the 1998 Daytona 500:
Earnhardt collected his record-tying seventh series championship by winning the title at North Carolina Speedway in Rockingham, North Carolina, in 1994.
Here is the dramatic finish in the 1999 Bristol night race where Earnhardt made contact with Terry Labonte on the final lap, meaning only to “rattle his cage.”