“Hadn’t Slept in 3 Days”- Dale Earnhardt Sr’s Death Led to a Huge Crisis At RCR, As Once Revealed by Kevin Harvick, Who Replaced the Intimidator

Right after that one gloomy day at Daytona, when the legendary Dale Earnhardt Sr got in his car for the last time, the tragic loss of the sports “Intimidator” left a deep wound amongst everyone in NASCAR. However, just in the next race, a young Kevin Harvick was thrust in to replace the dearly departed driver of the number 3. Back in 2016, Harvick finally revealed how it felt during that time to have been asked to drive Earnhardt’s car.

Harvick said, “There was a lot of things that happened in a really short amount of time. You know when Dale died, the company, nobody really knew where to go. So I think it was a Wednesday night of the next week. I got a call from Richard as I was laying in bed and he asked me to come to the office and it was Richard Childress and Kevin Hamlin, who was the crew chief at the time, Bobby Hutchins, who was the team manager at the time.”

“And I’ll never forget walking in, I’ve been in Richard’s office a few times, but that night was different. Richard was sitting behind his desk looking like he hadn’t slept in three days, you know, which he probably hadn’t. Kevin Hamlin had a bottle of Jack Daniels in a cup and just sitting there. And he obviously had plenty of cups of Jack Daniels.”

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“They were just trying to figure out what they wanted to do and they asked and they asked me to drive the car. At that point it was just trying to keep the company afloat and survive and not have the emotions of the whole situation shut the company down… That Wednesday night I told them that I’d drive the car and went through the next couple of days and everybody is just kinda, not really knowing what to do.”

Kevin Harvick explains how it felt in the press room

Following his first race in Earnhardt’s car, right after he had passed away, Harvick recalls what went down in the press room and how had the reactions been after seeing him replace Earnhardt.

Harvick called it to be the most “overwhelming situation” that he had walked into because of how the situation was and his being thrust into that stage.

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However, just with his third start, Harvick brought back the lost smile on his team’s faces after he was able to win his first-ever race in the top flight of NASCAR.