Remember the 2024 regular season finale at Darlington Raceway? Although Chase Briscoe dominated the NASCAR Cup Series storyline, another driver’s disastrous run shocked fans. Tyler Reddick was fighting with Kyle Larson for the regular-season title, and while doing so, he fell sick. A lingering stomach bug made him pukish, and Reddick threw up at the end of stage 1. He went on to beat Larson, demonstrating how hardy drivers can be. And Dale Jr.’s hardiness extended beyond the racetrack.

The 15-time Most Popular Driver retired back in 2017, but his endless treasure trove of stories keeps fans hooked. These tales range from the most dazzling race victories to the most embarrassing failures. However, some of those also entail some super disastrous moments off the racetrack – one of which involved Teresa Earnhardt’s daughter.

Dale Jr. was sprayed by something unexpected

Usually, drivers spray champagne on their team members on Victory Lane. However, Dale Jr.’s sister sprayed something else on him years ago. Although Kelley Earnhardt Miller is well-known as his elder sister, who runs JR Motorsports, Dale Jr. also has a younger sister. Taylor Earnhardt is Dale Sr.’s youngest daughter, shared with Teresa Earnhardt. She is the only Earnhardt sibling to stray from the family heritage of racing 200 MPH stock cars, as she took up horse riding. But before deciding her career path, she could not help but face a moment of disaster with her brother. “This is like 19 f—ing 87, 94, or something, way back,” Dale Jr. recalled.

Waiting in the field while their father raced on the track, Dale Jr. and his sister were having fun. But that fun did not last long, as the 26-time Cup race winner said. Taylor ended up spraying her brother with vomit. Dale Jr. said, “It was me, Teresa, and Taylor. It was in the morning, like a Saturday morning on the race weekend at Charlotte. I was playing with Taylor. And I didn’t know nothing about how you’re not supposed to…I guess I was shaking her or something. We were playing. I was on my back on the couch, and I was holding her above me, like doing an airplane. She threw up all over me. All over my face. Oh my god. It happened, and I was like, I cannot believe it.”

Dale Jr. has two daughters of his own now, Isla Rose and Nicole Lorraine. He must have experienced repetitions of the incident with Taylor multiple times now. What is more, his Dale Jr Download co-host, T.J. Majors, shared a similar incident with his own daughter, Madelynn. “I ate sweet potatoes. I was holding her above my head.” Then, Ryan Blaney, who won the latest Magic Mile race, made a hearty comment. He said, “At the end of the day, I always try to tell myself. You get pissed on, you get thrown up on – it’s just you…It’s not random, it’s not like me throwing up on you. That is your blood and flesh. So it’s not bad.”

Dale Jr. learned a lesson all those years ago of not having too much fun with his baby sister. He learned a lesson from another family member recently.

Getting called out for his vocabulary

As we all know, Dale Jr. is a man of the racetrack. He is a racing legend who has spent his life knowing split-second strategies and technical details on cars. Despite his meticulous planning on the racetrack, he missed out on an intricate vocabulary mistake. On a recent episode of ‘Bless Your Hardt’, Dale Jr. recalled a memory from his childhood: fishing alongside Captain Malcolm, a family friend who was also a state patrol officer in North Carolina. Junior was trying to wrangle a tough garfish with a lot of zest. His efforts received notable attention in a local publication, which featured the headline: “Dale Jr. lassoed gar fish.”

But then Dale Jr. made the blunder in front of his wife, Amy Earnhardt. He told Amy that for years, he thought of it as one of those “old wise tales.” Then Amy corrected him, and Dale Jr. could not help but feel hopeless. He said, “For 50 years, I thought it was a ‘wise’ tale. I was today years old when I figured out it was a ‘wives’ tale.” The term “old wives’ tale” has been around for centuries and may have first appeared in English translations of the Bible as early as 1382. Since then, the saying has evolved into modern use by the 16th and 17th centuries.

Hence, Dale Jr. had lots to learn from his family. With more such stories unfolding on his podcasts, the NASCAR veteran never fails to keep his fans hooked.