Dale Earnhardt Jr. has a largely throwback All Star Race idea

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Dale Earnhardt Jr. largely enjoyed the All Star Race on Sunday afternoon at Dover Motor Speedway but largely as a standard race and not as part of the lineage it represented.

To that end, the Hall of Famer and winner of the 2000 running of ‘The Winston’ has his own ideas with what to do with the event.

“We’re doing too much,” Earnhardt said on his Dale Jr. Download podcast on Tuesday. “The (1987) race is legendary. The (1992) One Hot Night was a legendary race. All those were simple formats — 50 laps, 25 laps, 10.

“You have your Open and a support system, O’Reilly’s and Trucks, whatever. … That’s all it needs to be.”

So, Earnhardt wants to run the All-Star Race on the Wednesday night before the Coca-Cola 600, giving the industry an off-weekend in the process. He would give Dover back its points race. His format would only include 20-ish cars, winners from 2026 and maybe the back half of 2025.

“You could can even do the last 20 winners, 20 car field, that’s it,” Earnhardt said.

He thinks it’s important to have an Open for the rest of the field to race their way in, but no fan vote.

“We’ll take the winner,” Earnhardt said. “Not fucking second or third — the guy who won the Open gets in. So there’s 19 locked in and the winner of The Open to go race for a million bucks. That’s all you need to do on a Wednesday night.

“You don’t need the whole damn field out there. You don’t need to wear everyone out and beat everyone’s shit up. You have a couple of guys in The Open to go out there and put on a good race.”

Earnhardt says this is an appetizer for the Coca-Cola 600.

“But most importantly, I don’t want them to get rid of the All-Star Race,” Earnhardt said. “And you know why? For everyone who won it, it’s a kick in the balls man. It’s like getting rid of the Daytona 500. Why would you get rid of the Daytona 500? You wouldn’t. It’s a legendary race. If you get rid of it, all the history that goes with it becomes worthless.”