Word: dale
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...NASCAR nation, Dale Earnhardt has been front-page news every Sunday of every race season, and some Sundays in between. For the rest of Americans, he was a name they knew, the emblem of a sport they'd seen here and there but probably didn't know too much about...
...Earnhardt, the doctors say, died instantly when he careened into the wall between the third and fourth turn of the final lap of the first race of the 2001 Winston Cup season, making one last push for victory lane. Michael Waltrip won, in one of Dale's cars, and Dale Jr. finished second, and the peculiarities of the moment allowed the pair to savor some unalloyed Daytona glory before the news caught up to them that The Intimidator's tame-looking crash had been his last...
...hero led every newscast Sunday night and fronted every newspaper in America on Monday morning. Throughout the week, cable news channels brought us the daily press conferences, tearful interviews with mourning fans, and a memorial service befitting a folk hero. Sunday's race in Rockingham, N.C., not far from Dale Sr.'s hometown, will be a wailing wall. But Dale Jr. will be out there, in one of his father's cars, because Dale Sr. would have wanted it that way. The race will...
...counting on its Dale Earnhardts to help bridge a tricky divide. The purebred artistries of the NBA's Bird, Magic and Michael made that sport's gaudinesses easy to forgive; these days those criticisms are stickier. Any sport of individuals - and in this era, aren't they all? - needs the reflected light of its heroes to keep eyes off its pockmarks. In joining the big-money world of pro football, baseball, and basketball, NASCAR will now have to watch out harder than ever for its soul...
...NASCAR will certainly wish it had him and his hirsute grin to do commercials on its new network home, and keep the old school alive. It will mourn Dale Earnhardt, and miss him. But he did the promo of a lifetime Sunday when he hit that wall between the third and fourth turn...