"You held strong": Billionaire Rick Hendrick credits Kelley Earnhardt for one lesson in 'leadership'

Rick Hendrick recently discussed how JR Motorsports co-owner Kelley Earnhardt taught him a negotiation skill. The 75-year-old Hendrick is notably famous for owning the famed NASCAR Cup team, Hendrick Motorsports. The American businessman has an estimated net worth of $1 billion, as per Celebrity Net Worth.

In a recent episode of Business of Motorsports, a segment in the Dirty Mo Media Productions, Kelley, sister of Dale Earnhardt Jr., invited the NASCAR Hall of Famer Hendrick and asked the Warrenton, North Carolina, native if he has ever acquired a lesson on leadership from his employees or drivers. To which the 75-year-old shared his thoughts and even included Kelly in his answer.

"You know, Kelley, you learned something from everyone," Hendrick said. You taught me something in negotiations when we were sitting down."

The owner of the winningest NASCAR organization then shared a story about Kelley Earnhardt's meeting with Dale Jr.'s sponsors, back when Junior was competing for HMS. He added:

"We were negotiating. We were in a meeting. We had a National Guard and Pepsi fighting over the car and we split it. We're sitting there with the Pepsi people and Kelly said, 'Well, there's a couple things. We want to design the car. And number two, you're not going to share in the royalties.' And they sat back and said, 'Well, we can't do that because we need the royalties to help support the deal.' And Kelly just closed her book and said, well, that's not going to happen.'"

"I thought, oh, my goodness, let's take a break. And I went out and said, Kelly, we need to negotiate a little bit. And as it worked out, you were right. You held strong. And so I learned a lot about your negotiating skills back in that day," Hendrick concluded.

For context, Hall of Famer Dale Jr. moved from Dale Earnhardt Inc.(DEI) at the end of 2007 to HMS, where drove the #88 Chevy. Moreover, Kelley, who served as the manager for Junior, was the catalyst for this move and in bagging the sponsorship of National Guard and Mountain Dew.

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"I took my brother's career and charged forward with it"- Kelley Earnhardt opened up about Dale Earnhardt Jr.'s switch to Hendrick Motorsports

Earlier this year, Kelley Earnhardt Miller had a conversation with former NASCAR driver Kenny Wallace and discussed the time Dale Earnhardt Jr. transitioned to Hendrick Motorsports from their late father, Dale Earnhardt's team.

On an episode of the Kenny Conversation, Kelley said:

"I think that whole time and then going out and talking and negotiating with Gibbs and Richard and Mr. Hendrick and netting out where we netted. And, you know, all the hoopla on the sponsorship that we were able to achieve with Mountain Dew and National Guard at the time in 2008 and just really set the path, you know. I took my brother's career at that time and charged forward with it." [11:32]

Dale Earnhardt Jr. then went on to compete for Rick Hendrick until his full-time retirement in 2017. He now co-owns JR Motorsports, an Xfinity team, with his sister, and will resume his broadcasting role from the 2025 NASCAR season.