Dale Earnhardt Jr. can't overcome early spin, outside lane

MARTINSVILLE, Va. — Dale Earnhardt Jr. got stuck on the outside lane of Martinsville Speedway’s one-groove track, costing him a top-10 finish after he had pitted for tires prior to the final restart in Sunday’s STP 500.

Earnhardt, who came back from a lap-4 spin to contend for a solid result, had to settle for 14th place instead.

Afterward, he told Paste BN Sports about what a disadvantage the top lane was.

“You don’t want to be up there at all, but you can’t help it when there’s a car on your inside,” he said.

And with the track not taking much rubber in the last couple years, there didn't seem to be an obvious solution for the future. But then a thought crossed his mind.

“I’ll tell you what they oughta do to this place if they really want to make it awesome,” he said. “Remember when they ground the bottom groove and everybody had to run the second groove? That was fun as hell. You could work the top and pass and (stuff). It was fun as hell then.”

We don’t recall, Dale. Refresh our memory?

“I can’t remember why they did that one year,” he said. “But we had a blast. … Then that big chunk (of concrete) came out (during a 2004 race) and they had to repave the place.”

Either way, Earnhardt said Sunday was one of those days where the No. 88 team just had to take what it could get. Crew chief Greg Ives later told him he was running top-five speeds all day, but Earnhardt spent it fighting back from the early spin.

It’s a long season, he said, and being ninth in the point standings could end up being important.

“We’ll stick these points in our pocket in case we need ‘em, in case we don’t win any races this year,” he said.

Follow Gluck on Twitter @jeff_gluck

PHOTOS: Behind the wheel with Dale Earnhardt Jr.