Dale Earnhardt Jr. goes from shy driver to the broadcast booth

Dale Earnhardt Junior was ready for retirement, but he’d still be racing today if it weren’t for injuries.

Dale Earnhardt Jr. is all over television working for NBC at the Indy 500, Kentucky Derby, Olympics and NASCAR booth calling various races. This is quite the transformation for the racer who was once afraid of the camera.

“I hated being shy and nervous and an introvert because I was in this world where I was always around crowds doing this incredibly nerve wracking job,” Earnhardt told the On the Mark Podcast. “It [anxiety] kept me in motion, kept me moving and it kept me busy. It [racing] felt like what I was suppose to be doing it. I was suppose to be apart if it, and born into it. I just kept going.”

Until he couldn’t any longer. Concussions had taken their toll on Earnhardt Jr.’s career and forced him into retirement.

“Coming to terms with my retirement was probably more difficult for my family and fans and everybody else than it ever was for me,” Earnhardt Jr reflected. “I was ready to be done to get off that ride. To finally get off that train I was ready. It had been a lot of ups and downs. The ups were really great, and the downs were really low. So to finally get off that train, I had been on it a long time, I was ready.”

Some drivers who have suffered concussions may not be as willing to retire as Earnhardt Jr. was, but he believes they’re more aware of the dangers of racing injured.

“I hope that the culture is always changing, it has to,” Earnhardt Jr. said. “Drivers read articles, drivers are curious. You have to assume that drivers are becoming more and more educated by the minute. We have a neurosurgeon at every race, it didn’t used to be that way. NASCAR has changed a lot of things to protect the drivers from themselves.”

Dale Earnhardt, who was once addicted to smoking, is working with Nicorette. “It [tobacco] becomes this thing that controls you. I want to be able to help someone to break that cycle.”

PODCAST- Episode 6 of On The Mark:

(00:00 – 10:15) On this episode of On the Mark, Ashley Young (@young_ashleye) shares a startling, perhaps inaccurate statistic about Memorial Day, Mark reminisces on patriotic memories at a Red Robin and gets screwed over by a buddy via bike exchange.

(10:15 – 45:00) Mark sits down with “America’s Voice of Victory”: speaker, singer and storyteller Wayne Messmer (@WayneMessmer). Messmer tells the incredible story of how he was shot in the neck and eventually returned to singing.

(45:00 – 57:15) Dale Earnhardt Jr. (@DaleJr) joins the podcast ahead of the Indy 500. The self-described “shy” racer opens up about the emotional realm of the sport and anxiety, life after NASCAR and quitting smoking.

(57:15- 1:11:25) Musician Griffin House (@GriffinHouse) talks to Mark about channeling fear as a guide, what success means to him and plays new song “Rising Star.”

(1:11:25 – 1:25:50) Seth Marks joins the show to reflect on legendary sports broadcaster het Coppock, who recently died in a car accident.

Subscribe to On the Mark and follow Mark Carman on Twitter @theCarm.