Dale Jr.'s guest recalls the fateful day he announced Dale Earnhardt Sr.'s tragic demise on the broadcast

On February 18, 2001, Dale Earnhardt Jr. lost his father, Dale Earnhardt Sr., to a last-lap crash during that year’s Daytona 500. While others were still processing the accident, NASCAR’s then-president, Mike Helton, was given a harder job: announcing the demise of the seven-time NASCAR Cup Series champion.

However, Helton wasn’t sure what to say at first. Recalling the moment on Dale Jr.’s podcast, Helton, who currently serves as the vice chairman for NASCAR, said,

“I’m not sure how I did it but the sequence of events got us to the point where a lot of folks had already assumed what had happened. But we had to authenticate it by making an announcement.”

Neither Bill France Jr. nor long-time NASCAR executive Paul Brooks was ready to make the announcement. So France Jr. pointed at Helton, asking him to do it.

“What do I say? We just lost the greatest driver we’ve ever had. What am I supposed to say?” Helton continued. “I think it was Brian or Paul Brooks both at the same time stepped in and said, ‘Just say that. Just say we lost him.’ I still think that the realness of all that hadn’t sunk in.”

“I still thought that there was a part of me that thought well, I’m gonna wake up here before I have to go do this and I never got a chance to wake up. I just had to go do it,” he added.

Often known as “The Intimidator”, Dale Earnhardt was only 49 at the time of his death. Official records state that the NASCAR veteran had succumbed to a basilar skull fracture sustained in that last-lap wreck.

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When Dale Earnhardt Jr.’s sister shared a personal moment with their father

2025 marked the 24th death anniversary of Dale Earnhardt Sr. On that note, Kelley Earnhardt Miller, the daughter of Dale Sr. and Dale Earnhardt Jr.’s sister, took to Instagram and shared a very personal moment with her father.

Kelley and her daughter, Karsyn Elledge, who was a couple months old at the time, were also present in the photo, which was taken just weeks before Earnhardt’s death. Captioning the photo, Kelley wrote,

“Two months after this picture... he was gone. Life was messy back then, and we weren't living on the best terms seeing Earnhardt to Earnhardt. Stubbornness is a trait of ours. I don't always post about his death. But life is still messy. Everyone's is. Life is just that way.”

Kelley is the CEO of JR Motorsports, which she co-owns alongside her brother and NASCAR Hall of Famer, Dale Earnhardt Jr. She is the one who brought Danica Patrick to the team’s Nationwide Series roster on a part-time schedule back in 2010.