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Inside Motor Sports
Posted: Tuesday November 16, 1999 01:13 PM At age 42, Dale Jarrett finally locked up his first Winston Cup title By Ed Hinton
"I'll be 43 in a few weeks, and if [being that old] is what it takes, that's fine," said Jarrett. "All you can do is work hard and try to put yourself in the best situation you can at the proper time." Jarrett's timing looked awful when he joined tragedy-riddled Robert Yates Racing in November 1994, replacing Ernie Irvan, who had nearly died three months earlier from injuries suffered in a crash in Brooklyn, Mich. Irvan had replaced Davey Allison, who had died in a helicopter crash in July 1993. Jarrett won only one race in his first year driving for Yates and was heavily criticized by media and fans, who considered him an inadequate replacement. "There were people who said, essentially, that I couldn't drive a lick," says Jarrett. After Jarrett clinched the championship on Sunday, Yates broke into tears remembering how he and Davey Allison had started the team, but the car owner composed himself and beamed as he hugged Jarrett. "To all the people who were second-guessing our [hiring] move," Yates said, addressing the media, "after all the things he's had to shoulder and after the way he shouldered them all -- suck it up, guys! He can get the job done." The same can be said of the 28-year-old Stewart. On Nov. 7 in Phoenix he became the first rookie since Davey Allison in '87 to win two races in a season. On Sunday he became the first rookie to win back-to-back events since Nelson Stacy in '62. Not since Dale Earnhardt in '80 has a rookie of the year gone on to win the Winston Cup as a sophomore, but Stewart's thunderous start makes him appear capable of keeping Jarrett's reign short. Issue date: November 22, 1999
For more Inside Motor Sports, see this week's issue of Sports Illustrated, on newsstands Wednesday, November 17. Click here to subscribe to SI.
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