"You smell terrible": When Amy Earnhardt interviewed husband Dale Earnhardt Jr. after Bristol "fire"

Last year, in 2023, during his first NASCAR Xfinity season start at Bristol Motor Speedway, Dale Earnhardt Jr. encountered an incident as his car caught fire. As he prepares for his return to the same track this year, Xfinity Racing reflected on the previous year's ordeal, hopeful for a safer race this time around.

In September 2023, Dale Earnhardt Jr. was competing in his first race at Bristol since 2017. After leading 47 laps and appearing poised for a top finish, disaster struck. His car unexpectedly burst into flames, filling the cockpit with smoke and a "big fireball," which left a burn hole in the bottom left of his racing suit.

Following the race, his wife Amy Earnhardt questioned him about the harrowing experience during a post-race interview:

"You smell terrible by the way. You smell like a fire. What happened?"

Junior replied:

"Yeah! I have got a hole in my pants. The shifter tunnel column was on fire. I saw some smoke in the car, and I felt that I was like, ‘Hopefully that's not me,’ but it was. That last lap, I saw a big fireball down in the tunnel of the car and I felt it."

"Obviously, my uniform was burning up. I was like, ‘I can't keep going. I got to stop.’ And usually when you stop the fire gets bigger. So I pulled over by the pit stall and some of the guys were pretty alert, and they helped me out."

John Hunter Nemechek's crew was quick to respond during Dale Earnhardt Jr.'s fiery incident last year, coming to his aid by pulling him from the driver's side of the burning car. Reflecting on this, the official X handle of the Xfinity Series revisited the event with a post-race interview, playfully captioning it:

"Here's hoping @DaleJr doesn't get a hole in his pants in his 2024 #XfinitySeries shot at @ItsBristolBaby ."

Ultimately, Dale Jr. concluded the race in P30, with the official cause of his DNF listed as "ignition."

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Is Food City 300 Dale Earnhardt Jr.'s final appearance in the Xfinity Series?

In a recent episode of his podcast, Dale Earnhardt Jr. shared some reflections on his racing career, hinting that the upcoming Bristol Motor Speedway race might mark his last stint in the Xfinity Series, even though he plans to continue participating in Late Model Racing. He expressed his thoughts, saying:

"“Probably… but I’ll keep running my late model for a little while” @DaleJr addresses whether or not his upcoming @NASCAR_Xfinity Series race from @ItsBristolBaby will be his final career start. [...] So everybody's like, is this really your last race? I'm like, probably."

He indicated that his increasing focus on late-model races over Xfinity ones might be a sign that it's time to turn the page on this chapter of his racing career.