Everyone in this big blue marble knows that nature can sometimes call at the most inconvenient of times. One of the times it called for Dale Earnhardt Jr. was the evening of May 6, 2000. He had just won the Pontiac Excitement 400 (now the Toyota Owners 400) at Richmond Raceway, which was a pretty big deal considering it was the second Cup Series win of his career and also made him the first repeat winner that season. Even sweeter, he got to pass his dad, the legendary Dale Earnhardt Sr., on the way to his monumental win.
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When he pulled into Victory Lane, Dale Jr. had every reason to celebrate big time. However, he just had one order of business to take care of first. Junior may have been driving the No. 8 Chevy that day in Richmond, but as he recalled in a video from his JR Nation Appreci88ion Tour back in 2017, he really, really had to go No. 2 after finishing No. 1.
All of our wins at @RichmondRaceway are special, but my first Cup win there was memorable for a little different reason. #Appreci88ion pic.twitter.com/3ElkCDw1nz
— Dale Earnhardt Jr. (@DaleJr) September 6, 2017
"We got by Dad pretty quickly and just ended up beating everybody to the finish line over a few handful of laps," Earnhardt said.
"I didn't know it until I pulled into Victory Lane, and I had to go to the bathroom really, really bad — No. 2. The tradition in Victory Lane is you pull in, they tell you to get out of the car when they're ready for you, when TV's ready to come back from commercial. And you get out and you have this real yet semi-mock celebration 'cause you've had to wait for it, wait for the OK from TV."
"Well I got to Victory Lane and said, 'I'm getting out. I gotta use the bathroom. Y'all just sit tight. I gotta do this now.' Ten minutes later, everybody's in Victory Lane kind of standing there like, 'Where'd the driver go?' And I come back to Victory Lane, and I'm like, 'All right, I'm ready to celebrate! Let's do this!'"
Every now and then the question comes up: what do NASCAR drivers do if they need to use the bathroom during a race? Junior himself has admitted that he used to go in his race suit once or twice a season. That was just number one, of course. When a driver has to drop a deuce, it's just a matter of holding it until the race is over. I like to imagine that's why most races go down in the afternoon or night. Can you imagine having to sit in a car for hours after just having drank your morning coffee? Forget about it.
