Daytona 500 Reaffirmed Dale Jr.'s Desire to Own NASCAR Cup Team

Dale Earnhardt Jr. (left) is open to bringing his JR Motorsports team to the NASCAR Cup Series full-time, but there are still some obstacles before he could make that happen. | Taylor Kitchen | Racing America

What a NASCAR Cup Series debut it was for JR Motorsports in the Daytona 500 as Justin Allgaier not only made the field in the team's No. 40 Traveller Whiskey Chevrolet "Open" entry but as the checkered flag flew on a chaotic last lap in The Great American Race, Allgaier was credited with a ninth-place finish.

While every driver and team heads to Daytona International Speedway hoping to end the night hoisting the Harley J. Earl Trophy, Earnhardt says new NASCAR Cup Series teams, such as his, try to come into the race with realistic expectations, and the end result that they achieved was better than anything he could have imagined leading into the week.

"When we showed up with our first race to run in the most elite form of Stock Car racing, what kind of expectations can you have in terms of being really competitive in the race," Earnhardt questioned following Sunday's race. "I would say that we'll be very happy with the top 10. We'll be really happy we got to duke it out with them all out there tonight and I guess if you told me I was going to finish 10th two months ago, I would have really been thrilled with that top 10. So happy, happy with the result. Everything about the experience was was good. Even the challenges that we faced."

Earnhardt continued by praising his team for their execution, and said, "I'm happy. We'll see what comes next."

What comes next for JR Motorsports is the question on everyone's minds. Over the last few years, Earnhardt and his sister Kelley Earnhardt Miller have not shied away from admitting that they'd love to bring JR Motorsports, their team that has competed at a high level in the NASCAR Xfinity Series for years, to the NASCAR Cup Series full-time. Sunday's race further cemented that desire for Earnhardt.

"It really was good for me, I think, to come here and experience this, to see if it was truly something I felt like I wanted," Earnhardt explained. "And because sometimes you wonder, because of growing up in the sport and [what] your last name is, are you making yourself do this because it's what you think you're supposed to do? Do you really want to do it, right? I think this helped me understand that I do want to be here, personally. I do feel like that it's what I should be striving for."

While Earnhardt says he loves the NASCAR Xfinity Series and the business his race team has built competing at that level, but he feels it's time to ramp up efforts to make a move to the NASCAR Cup Series happen for JR Motorsports, but if the 2025 Daytona 500 is where his journey as a NASCAR Cup Series team owner ends, he is at peace with it all.

"...[moving to Cup] would be a big challenge, but something I think that Kelley and I could put a lot of effort in for the next several years, so we'll see. We've been sitting in this position for a long time and I know people get tired of hearing it from me, but I was so thankful for this opportunity. If this is it, this is it," Earnhardt said.

Over the last several years, Earnhardt has indicated he would like to expand his organization into the NASCAR Cup Series, but that he wasn't a fan of how the economics of the NASCAR Cup Series at the time were designed from a team owner's perspective. Earnhardt says those concerns were alleviated by the new NASCAR Team Charter Agreement signed heading into the 2025 season.

"I think that with the new Charter model, it's more economical to be here and so I feel like with our ability to draw interest in terms of sponsorship and support, it's a [favorable] economical model for us with the new Charter agreement. And I feel like that the charters will continue to increase in value," Earnhardt said.

Even with the economical side of things now tuned to make sense, there are still major stumbling blocks between Earnhardt and full-time NASCAR Cup Series team ownership. With Team Charters having a price tag between $15 million and $30 million over the last few years, Earnhardt will not make that kind of financial commitment on his own. He is open to investors, and has had some talks with a few, but nothing has panned out just yet.

"The overall hurdle is the initial investment in the Charter," Earnhardt admitted. "And I can put some money in, but I cannot, I will not, even if I had it, I would not buy the entire thing myself. I can't risk my kids' inheritance and future on some idea of my own. That's a selfish thing. But I would certainly want to be an investor in any Charter that we would be involved in. The Charters, though, I think are at the value now to where you almost have to have partners to get in if you're somebody like myself. But we'll see."

Earnhardt is hopeful that with JR Motorsports making last Sunday's Daytona 500 field as an "Open" entry, and finding a way to collect a top-10 finish in the race will possibly spark some new interest from investors looking to be involved in the ownership group of a NASCAR Cup Series team.

"I told Kelley that this could create some new conversations with people we haven't had conversations with, yet," Earnhardt said. "We've been on the phone and at the table with other people who are interested in investing in the Charters that didn't work out, but we could have some brand-new conversations. So, you just wait and see. If it's meant to be, it'll happen."

As of now, Earnhardt says JR Motorsports doesn't have any other planned NASCAR Cup Series starts scheduled for the 2025 season, but if Traveller Whiskey, Chris Stapleton's signature whiskey that partnered with the team at Daytona, or any other brand has interest to have their colors on the JR Motorsports NASCAR Cup Series car on track this season, they're ready to run it back.

"I think we hit it out of the park in terms of our activation with Traveller [Whiskey]. I think JR Motorsports did what they always do and that's engagement, and marketing better than anybody in the sport or as good as anybody. So, we'll see if that is exciting for them if they want to continue doing this or do it again sometime this year, or maybe somebody else [will call] us on Monday that has some other ideas, but we're always ready and have been for years," Earnhardt said.