Dale Earnhardt Jr. explains what happened when his car caught fire

For most of last Friday’s NASCAR Xfinity Series race at Bristol, Dale Earnhardt Jr. enjoyed a pretty good run. But his night under the lights turned hectic when smoke started filling his car near the end of the race.

Earnhardt drove down pit road with 30 laps remaining, ending his night prematurely because of the smoke. Following the race, the veteran driver — who now only races part-time — explained what happened.

“So it started smoking, and I thought — Well, I started smelling something first. I though, ‘Man, maybe that’s the car in front of me, hopefully it’s the car in front of me. Then I started seeing a lot of smoke around the dash and above the dash,” Earnhardt said.

“I thought we just had some rubber build-up on the pipes. I was telling the team about it so maybe they could see through the wheels, maybe they could see a fire in there. … And then it was getting worse. The smoke was getting worse. I had them boys racing for the lead right in front of me, and I looked down at the leg brace and it was on fire. And I felt this sting in my leg. I thought, ‘Well, I can’t keep going.’

“If I would have kept going, it would’ve burnt me pretty bad. I don’t know if it would’ve went out, but I wasn’t willing to take that risk.”

Dale Earnhardt Jr. explains what he felt in the car when it caught fire and what caused the fire. He said he does not have any burns on his leg (his firesuit has a hole in the leg). pic.twitter.com/Zl7FdPxm2V

— Bob Pockrass (@bobpockrass) September 16, 2023

Earnhardt closed out by saying he was especially disappointed because of the success he and his team had on the track. He thought he was going to finish in the top four prior to the incident.

NASCAR VP of Competition explains Dale Earnhardt Jr. fire

Elton Sawyer, NASCAR’s vice president of competition, also explained what he thinks occurred in Earnhardt’s car on Friday night.

“To the incident, I believe it was an electrical fire, as we kind of dove into it,” Sawyer explained, via NASCAR’s YouTube channel. “Our safety folks have asked Dale to provide us with his fire suit. We’ll take a deeper dive into that. Just to make sure everything worked as it should have, and if there’s any learnings from the fiber, the device certification, any of that type of stuff as we move forward.

“But fortunately, he got out of the car and to my knowledge, just some burns to the fire suit, and I don’t believe it got to his actual skin on that one.”