My all-time favorite Dale Earnhardt story.
Many racing fans know his story, and Dale was born in the small town of Kannapolis, North Carolina into a racing family. His dad was one of the best short-track drivers in the state, and was a driving force (pun not intended, but I like it) in what made him want to be a race car driver in the first place.
And his son Dale Earnhardt Jr.. told a great story on his podcast the Dale Jr. Download a couple years ago, involving Dale Sr. and a trespasser hunting deer on his property, that’s truly one of the best about his dad I’ve ever heard.
It all started with a guy fixing a tractor on Dale Sr.’s land back in 1993:
“So, a guy was working on a tractor during the day on dad’s property, fixing a big tractor. And he saw some deer, went to a bar later that afternoon, happy hour drinkin’ with a buddy of his tellin’ his buddy about the deer. The more they drank, the braver they got. They decided they were gonna come back to dad’s property at dark, around dark, jump the fence and shoot one of the deer, right?”
I’ll admit that I know next to nothing about hunting, but I know a hell of a lot about Dale Earnhardt so I’m already thinking this guy’s an idiot. I guess they don’t call it liquid courage for nothing…
Dale Jr. continued:
“Dad and his farm manager guy are walking the power line, and they’re in the tree line walkin’ this power line. Just happened to be there that day. And they heard the gun shot and they saw the deer run down the power line and fall down. And so they hid in the tree line and waited for those guys to come up to the deer.”
And if you think Dale Sr. is about to let this guy off easy, think again:
“And when they got to the deer, dad just ran after the one with the gun and he tackled the guy and broke his hand on his face. And the only reason why he stopped punching the guy was cuz the guy, he recognized the guys voice, and his face I guess, once he started saying ‘Hey man, stop’.”
Broke his hand? Punching the guy’s FACE.
“So dad held him there until the cops got there. But he ended up getting his cast on his arm and he went to the banquet with that cast and his tux [with] his black and white cast. And he told everybody a lie, he told everybody a lie about how it happened.”
Now, knowing how men are, I would think he’d be happy to tell everyone the true story about how he broke his hand. But, I guess he didn’t want to have to break it again in case anyone got any ideas about wanting to set up shop somewhere on his land and get their own deer.
Though if you know anything about Dale Sr., I don’t see how anyone would even dream about trespassing on his land. I mean, I would think just knowing this story in and of itself would be enough to deter someone from doing that…
“He didn’t want people to know about his deer, he didn’t want more people showin’ up, trying to sneak into his property cuz he had some really big bucks on that property. He wasn’t hunting it, he was just wanting them to be there cuz he liked watching ’em. And so he told a different story.”
He’s as real as they come. He was even told by his boss that he couldn’t race at the Daytona 500 with the cast on, so what did he do? Well, what do you think he did? He cut it off right there in the office. It’s my favorite part of the whole story, actually:
“I told him he couldn’t run Daytona with it, so he got a pair of scissors, cut it off, and tossed it to me as he left.”
Jr. shared proof of it on his X feed a while back, where you can even see a picture of his cast:
In fact, this happened right before the 1990 NASCAR Awards Banquet, where he was giving a speech as the Winston Cup Series champion, so he painted his cast black to match his tux.
You can see the cast very prominently during his speech, and he messes with it some, but makes no mention of how it got there, which only adds to the mystique of this legendary story:
Dale Earnhardt accepts his gold replica car from Goodyear at the 1990 Awards Banquet
He has a cast on his hand because he whipped a guy’s ass for hunting deer on his property pic.twitter.com/feMfKsIKCG
— nascarman (@nascarman_rr) December 2, 2022
But apparently, it’s a story Dale Jr.’s wife, Amy, didn’t remember, and during a recent episode of their Bless Your Hardt podcast, Jr. recounted some more details of how it all happened:
“The last time he had a guy come out there to work on his bulldozer, the guy ended up seeing some deer and came back later that night and tried to shoot one. And then he broke his hand on his face.”
Amy was stunned to hear that, saying what many fans know about the racing legend in that “his life was bonkers”:
“What? That’s the turn of events that he was probably thinking through with the bulldozer? This man’s life was bonkers. It’s just always surprising to me, the things that he did.”
Jr. says his dad had 300 acres of high fenced property, and this bulldozer tech guy and his buddy jumped it to get back on the property:
“Yes… everybody knows that story, but I’ll tell it for you. Some guy had come over to work on something, a technician or something, and this man saw some of daddy‘s there. We had a lot of deer on the property, it was 300 acres, and high fenced, all of it.
And that guy and his buddy went and drank some beer at a bar, and got talking, and thought it’d be a good idea to go back out there to try to shoot one. So I don’t know, it’s probably not the same day, but it’s later now, in the evening hours.”
They manage to shoot a deer, and it just so happened that Dale Sr. and his property foreman were out on the land doing whatever, and they heard it. Dale Sr. just so happened to be in the perfect spot to see the deer run by, and so him and his foreman decide to hide in the grass nearby until the two dumba** guys come to get the deer.
Just as soon as they get over there, Sr. jumps on the guy with the gun and starts punching him the face, and as we all know now, broke his hand in the process:
“This guy and his buddy jumped the fence, they shoot a deer. Well it just so happens that Dad and his property foreman, he had a guy that would do everything daddy told him to do for the property.
They’re out there on the property, and daddy hears a shotgun. And dad’s standing, I mean, it’s just pure coincidence, he’s standing in this power line, so it’s cleared power line. The deer comes running by them, and falls over. So daddy and this guy get over there by where the deer is and wait. They get down and wait, and here come them dudes trying to get that to get to that deer.
And as soon as they get to it, daddy takes off running and tackled the one with the gun and started punching him in the face. And broke his hand.”
Amy put it best, though:
“That’s like some actual cowboy s***. Can you imagine how terrified those dudes where when he came out of the grass, full speed?”
I would pay GOOD money to hear the other side of this story from the perspective of the guy who got punched. Jr. also confirmed that Sr. had the cast on at the banquet, but didn’t really tell anyone how he’d broken his hand:
“And he held them there and called the police, and had the police come out here and get them for trespassing. He went to he went to the banquet weeks later with cast, a black cast. He didn’t tell many people what he did. Broke this bone, the long bone in his pinky knuckle to his wrist, broke that bone punching that dude.”
It’s just such an iconic story, and Amy’s reaction to it is just priceless:
