Dale Earnhardt Jr

Dale Earnhardt Jr., NASCAR’s most popular driver for the past nine years, returned to the Chase in 2011 for the first time since 2008. It was his fourth Chase appearance.

With 18 career victories, he also entered 2011 trying to win a race for the first time since 2008.

Few NASCAR debuts have been more highly anticipated than the arrival of the son of the seven-time champion and one of the most popular drivers in the history of the sport.

After winning back-to-back Nationwide Series titles in 1998-99, Earnhardt Jr. made his Cup debut at Charlotte Motor Speedway in 1999. He ran five races that year with a best finish of 10th at Richmond.

Driving for his father’s Dale Earnhardt Inc. team, Earnhardt Jr. won two points races in 2000 and became the first rookie driver to win the Sprint All-Star race. He finished 16th in points and finished second in the rookie-of-the-year race.

Earnhardt Jr. suffered the most tumultuous year of his career in 2001 when his father was killed on the final lap of the Daytona 500, a race in which Earnhardt Jr. finished second to teammate Michael Waltrip. Earnhardt Jr. finished eighth in points that year and scored two of the most dramatic and emotional victories of his career. He won the July Pepsi 400 at Daytona in the return visit to the track where his father was killed. Two months later, he won the first NASCAR race after the 9/11 terrorists attacks, winning at Dover.

Earnhardt Jr. finished a career-high third in points in 2003 and then won a career-high six races in 2004, including the Daytona 500.

He won just one race in both 2005 and 2006 and shocked the NASCAR world in 2007 when he announced that he would leave DEI, which was being run by his stepmother Teresa, for Hendrick Motorsports after the season.

After going winless for the first time in his career in 2007, Earnhardt Jr. won at Michigan in June in 2008 and made the Chase in his first season with Hendrick.

With expectations an all-time high, Earnhardt Jr. struggled in 2009-2010, missing the Chase and finishing 25th and 21st, respectively, in points and going through two crew chief changes.