Earnhardt Won't Drive No. 8 in 2008

Aug. 20, 2007 — -- To the citizens of Red Nation:

My dear brothers and sisters, do not fret over the fact that your beloved slanted 8 will not be joining your beloved Dale Earnhardt Jr. at Hendrick Motorsports next season.

Yes, it stings. Yes, we all thought the Budweiser ad about having to alter your tattoos and yard ornaments was merely a joke. But, yes, we shall survive this. As will Junior, Teresa, Hendrick and, yes, even the digit located between 7 and 9.

Truth is, the No. 8 was in the NASCAR business long before Driver No. 8. In fact, and this might hurt a bit, Earnhardt isn't even the most successful driver to have the numeral slapped on the side of his car. Not even close.

In all, 82 men have run the 8, beginning with Billy Carden. The man from Mableton, Ga., started third and finished 15th in NASCAR's second-ever Strictly Stock (now Nextel Cup) race, run on the grueling 4.15-mile beach and road course in Daytona. They ran only eight races that season, and the No. 8 was used in four races by three different drivers, common practice in those early "hired gun" days.

Including Carden's inaugural start, the 8 has run a total of 1,264 Cup races, steered by two Jacks, three Joes, six Dicks, and guys named Possum, Pop, Tiny, Skip, Banjo, Elmo, Bud, L.D., J.D., E.J. and D.K. Earnhardt is the third Junior to drive the car and isn't even the first Dale Earnhardt. Senior made one start at Charlotte in '75.

For his 15th-place finish, Carden received a tidy $50, the first bucks of a pile that has topped $41 million. Dale Jr. may be responsible for nearly all of that coinage, but he's not the racer responsible for the majority of the 8's visits to Victory Lane.

That distinction belongs to Little Joe Weatherly, considered by some to be the most talented driver ever to own a NASCAR license and by most to be among the greatest partyers in American history.

Weatherly slipped into the No. 8 in 1961, having already won four races with other teams and numbers as he bounced from team to team. But it was in car owner Bud Moore's Pontiac that Weatherly became a legend. From 1961 to '63, he started 109 races in the 8, earning 20 wins, 16 poles, and back-to-back championships in '62 and '63. For those of you scoring at home, that means Little Joe tops Little E in wins, poles, championships --