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NASCAR: Dale Earnhardt Jr. discusses how much longer he’ll drive in Xfinity races

By Asher Fair

DARLINGTON, SOUTH CAROLINA - AUGUST 31: Dale Earnhardt Jr., driver of the #8 Hellmann's Chevrolet, stands next to his car after the NASCAR Xfinity Series Sport Clips Haircuts VFW 200 at Darlington Raceway on August 31, 2019 in Darlington, South Carolina. (Photo by Sean Gardner/Getty Images)
DARLINGTON, SOUTH CAROLINA - AUGUST 31: Dale Earnhardt Jr., driver of the #8 Hellmann's Chevrolet, stands next to his car after the NASCAR Xfinity Series Sport Clips Haircuts VFW 200 at Darlington Raceway on August 31, 2019 in Darlington, South Carolina. (Photo by Sean Gardner/Getty Images) /
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In an interview with FanSided’s Mark Carman, Dale Earnhardt Jr. discussed how long he would like to continue competing in NASCAR Xfinity Series races.

Dale Earnhardt Jr. hasn’t been completely done with NASCAR competition after retiring from the sport following his 18-year career as a full-time Cup Series driver, a career during which he won 26 races, including two Daytona 500s.

The 44-year-old Kannapolis, North Carolina native has competed in two Xfinity Series races since last making a Cup Series start in the 2017 season finale at Homestead-Miami Speedway.

In September of 2018, the 15-time Most Popular Driver Award winner drove for JR Motorsports, the team he co-owns, in the Xfinity Series race at Richmond Raceway.

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He drove the #88 Chevrolet to a fourth place finish after starting in second and leading a race-high 96 laps of the 250-lap race around the four-turn, 0.75-mile (1.207-kilometer) Richmond Raceway oval in Richmond, Virginia.

The at the end of last month, he drove the #8 JR Motorsports Chevrolet in the race at the four-turn, 1.366-mile (2.198-kilometer) Darlington Raceway oval in Darlington, South Carolina and ended up in fifth place just over two weeks after he was involved in a horrifying plane crash that fortunately did not result in any major injuries.

According to Earnhardt in a recent interview with FanSided’s Mark Carman in Carman’s On the Mark podcast, he has no plans of ending his competition in the Xfinity Series anytime soon and will continue driving for as long as he is able to.

He plans to continue doing what he has done in the last two seasons by competing in one race each year, and he also plans to continue switching up the tracks at which he competes.

DARLINGTON, SOUTH CAROLINA – AUGUST 30: Dale Earnhardt Jr. drives the #8 Hellmann’s Chevrolet at Darlington Raceway (Photo by Brian Lawdermilk/Getty Images)
DARLINGTON, SOUTH CAROLINA – AUGUST 30: Dale Earnhardt Jr. drives the #8 Hellmann’s Chevrolet at Darlington Raceway (Photo by Brian Lawdermilk/Getty Images) /

“I’m going to run one race a year for as long as I can,” Earnhardt stated. “I enjoy doing that one event.”

He added that for the 2020 season, he plans to compete in the race at Homestead-Miami Speedway, which is scheduled to be contested in March after being moved up roughly eighth months from its date as the season finale in mid-November.

“I kind of like to move around, try a different track. Next year, I hope I get to go to Homestead. Got to work that out with our sponsors and the race team and everybody, but that’d be the race I’d like to go run. Maybe Martinsville the year after that and just keep on doing that.”

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Will Dale Earnhardt Jr. return to NASCAR Xfinity Series competition in next year’s race at Homestead-Miami Speedway like he is aiming to? This race is scheduled to take place on Saturday, March 21.

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