Dale Jarrett's Top Five
by Michael Daly-Staff Writer
03/20/2008

Dale Arnold Jarrett has officially ended his Winston Cup career other than an appearence in NASCAR's all-star race in latter May. With his final points race he closed the book on a career that was a mixture of rockiness and success, highlighted by the 1999 championship. The rocky final years of his career, when he was going through multiple crew chiefs, multiple laps down, and eventually multiple DNQs, obscured the success he'd shown as late as the first few years of this present decade when he and teammate Ricky Rudd put Robert Yates' Fords up front and challenged for 2001's title.

It certainly didn't start like that. Jarrett was something of a late starter in racing, racing local tracks and later the Busch Sportsman circuit in cars he co-owned with Andy Petree. His Winston Cup debut illustrates how long he's been at this, for it came at the 1984 Virginia 500, driving a car owned by Emanual Zervakis. Jarrett drove twice for Zervakis that season, while in the 1984 Firecracker 400 he made his superspeedway debut in Jimmy Means' Pontiac.

His first real crack at the Winston Cup level came in 1987 when he replaced Tommy Ellis in Eric Freelander's #18 Chevrolet. Ellis had survived a huge melee at Daytona where he flipped into the wall and got nailed by another car, then crashed twice more before quitting - both the race and the team - at Darlington's demolition derby of a Rebel 500. Jarrett drove 24 races in 1987 for Freelander before the team disbanded.

But it got him notice, and when Cale Yarborough wanted a driver to drive his Oldsmobile in races he wanted to skip - as Cale was debuting his self-owned team onto the full schedule after a part-time go in 1987 - Jarrett fit the bill; to make those races Cale would drive the #29, Jarrett was hired by Hoss Ellington's Buick team.

Jarrett ran the full 1989 season in Cale's cars, but the effort dried up and Jarrett was back to the Busch Series in his own car, before fate moved its proverbial hand at - ironically - another demolition derby of a Rebel 500 at Darlington. Neil Bonnett, driving Glen and Leonard Wood's #21 Ford, was injured in a massive melee keyed by Ernie Irvan, and Jarrett was tabbed to sub for Bonnett as he was sidelined with amnesia. Jarrett's first run in the Wood Brothers Ford was Bristol. and he turned it into the best run for the #21 in years, leading and staying in contention before spins washed out any victory hope.

The "temporary" assignment turned into a two-season run where Jarrett stayed out on a late caution at the 1991 Yankee 400 at Michigan, and turned that fortuitous non-stop into a photo-finish win over Davey Allison. Suddenly Jarrett had changed from a pretty consistent finisher into a victory threat. When a newcomer to NASCAR's wars wanted a driver for 1992, Jarrett was hired along with his brother-in-law, crew chief Jimmy Makar. The newcomer was coach of the Washington Redskins and few took Joe Gibbs Racing seriously.

But JGR made people eat words of ridicule with the first of what would be the five best races of Dale Jarrett's career -

1993 DAYTONA 500 - Kyle Petty and Jarrett took the front row for the 500 but Dale Earnhardt was the heavy favorite. Jarrett led early but fell into the bottom portion of the top-15, but he never let the top ten get away and raced hard to get back into the first ten amid a huge battle for the lead that swelled into chaos following crashes by Rick Wilson and Ernie Irvan. Indycar star Al Unser Jr. got hooked into traffic by Earnhardt and the melee wiped out Unser, Bobby Hillin Jr. and Petty, before an even more ferocious struggle ensued up front, in which Jarrett stormed headlong into the fight and ahead of a gigantic tumble by Rusty Wallace. Jarrett battled Earnhardt, then fell to third, before noticing Earnhardt's Chevrolet slipping in the turns. He stormed into second, then pounced under Earnhardt coming to the white flag. Jarrett stayed nose to nose with Earnhardt, then Geoff Bodine and Hut Stricklin pushed him into the lead, tried for it themselves, but could not dislodge Jarrett from a spectacular win.

1995 SUMMER 500, POCONO - Once again a serious driver injury put Jarrett into the seat of a powerful racecar, as Ernie Irvan, recovering from a near-fatal hit in August 1994, was sidelined from Robert Yates' #28. Jarrett was slotted into the Yates Ford for 1995, with the plan being that he would run out the season before Irvan would take it over, then Jarrett would be off on his own.

Jarrett had struggled all season, posting some good finishes but also struggling to run up front. At Pocono in latter July of 1995 the racing became as hot as the weather as the lead began changing back and forth, and as the afternoon wore on it was changing in all three corners of a single lap. Jarrett soon found himself in the thick of the fight with Rusty Wallace and Jeff Gordon and outlasted both for the win, his third career win.

1996 DAYTONA 500 - The plan for Jarrett to be let go from RYR changed when the team formed a second team for Ernie Irvan to run a few late 1995 races in. Seeing that multicar teams were now becoming the key to strength, Yates got full-season sponsorship of the second car, numbered 88, and decided to keep Jarrett. Some thought of it as a demotion, as Irvan was supposedly set to get the focus of the organization. That all changed in Speedweeks as Jarrett won the Busch Clash. Irvan then won his 125, and when the 500 started it quickly became as ferocious a race as any. It also appeared Jarrett and Irvan could be battling each other for the win amid a pack of strong Chevrolets. Irvan hammered the wall after 28 laps, and Jarrett was thus left on his own, but he stayed in the top ten and rocketed to the lead as the race's second half proceeded. It soon became clear Jarrett's Ford had more muscle on the straights than Dale Earnhardt's Chevrolet, and with the strongest Chevys of Sterling Marlin and Terry Labonte out with engine failures, the expected Chevy romp had instead become a Ford fleet, and Jarrett led the final 24 laps of the 500, leading a stunning Ford sweep of nine of the top 11 finishers.

1996 BRICKYARD 400 - The role of top dog in RYR was not what everyone expected, and the third annual NASCAR event at Indianapolis proved that point. Once again strong GM products bit the dust - two of the race's leaders, Kyle Petty's Pontiac and Marlin's Chevy, were eliminated following a four-lap fight for the lead when Petty's right front blew him into the wall off Four and into the path of a surprised Marlin - and the Yates Fords were 1-2 in the final laps. Many expected race leader Irvan, fresh from his comeback win at New Hampshire, to get a friendly push by teammate Jarrett to the win, but instead Jarrett pounced when Irvan slid out of the groove and the race was his.

2005 AUTUMN 500, TALLADEGA - Jarrett won four times in 1996, seven times in 1997, then finally won the title with four wins in 1999. But the collapse of Jarrett's career began when Elliott Sadler joined the team in 2003 and Jarrett's crew chief changed. Todd Parrott had been Jarrett's crew chief for years but had gone elsewhere in the organization, but late in 2005 he returned to Jarrett's car and Jarrett timed the best he'd qualified in a long time. He led early then took a back seat to Tony Stewart and others, but bad crashes ensued that included a nasty tumble by Scott Riggs in the trioval - a crash eerily reminiscent of Dale Earnhardt and Bill Elliott tumbles in that same spot years earlier - and this thinned out the field to the point that the top Chevrolets were almost all eliminated and after over 40 lead changes Stewart held sway before the fight ramped up again in the final 20 laps. A two-lap shootout came following a late yellow, and Stewart stormed from mid-pack into the lead, but Jarrett stormed up high for a three-abreast fight that prematurely ended when Kyle Petty crashed off Two; NASCAR's new rule freezing the field stopped Stewart from retaking the lead from Jarrett to the stripe, and Jarrett thus had as brazen a theft of a win as any ever seen.

It would be the final win of Jarrett's career, as a revolving door of crew chiefs, both with Yates and with Jarrett's ill-advised tenure with the woebegone Michael Waltrip team, ensued that illustrated a loss of control of his racing on Jarrett's part. That his retirement was tardy is true enough; that his career was nonetheless superb is also true, and the five races illustrated above help display how good Jarrett really was.

Questions? Comments? Contact Michael Daly at stp43fan@hotmail.com

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