Dale Earnhardt suggests radical changes to The Clash amid proposed shift to Daytona

Talk of a major change to The Clash has been going on for months now, but NASCAR still hasn’t officially made the switch to Daytona. And, according to Dale Earnhardt Jr., the sport still has some trepidation about moving it there.

Earnhardt revealed the latest from CEO Steve O’Donnell on an episode of the Dale Jr. Download. There’s concern about what putting The Clash ahead of the Daytona 500 could mean for the sport’s signature event.

“This is it, this is the deal,” Earnhardt explained. “I just got done talking to Steve O’Donnell, right? And he’s like, ‘Man, you know, if we take The Clash to Daytona and it’s bad, it’s like a bad commercial for the 500.’ And I’m like, ‘Well, you know, you just make the racing good and it’ll be a good commercial for the 500.'”

Earnhardt then got pretty worked up. Why? Because he has some strong opinions on what would make The Clash even better.

A no-frills type event with the best of the best just might do the trick. Right now, that’s not what fans are treated to.

“The problem is we’re trying to do too much,” Earnhardt said. “We’re trying to do too much with the All-Star Race, we’re trying to do too much with The Clash. I don’t understand why people don’t agree with this, but The Clash is an appetizer. It is the table-setter.”

Earnhardt then offered an interesting proposal for The Clash. A way to make it the best of the best competing for a short while, giving fans a glimpse of the intrigue to come in the season ahead.

“How many guys have won poles this year? Is there a pole award for the most poles?” Earnhardt asked. “Like, there used to be a Coors Light pole award at the end of the year if you won like six or five. Let’s just see who’s got the most poles. Eight drivers have poles. Well, let’s get to the end of the year, maybe that’s 12, right? All right.

“I want to see those f*cking 12 guys run a 20-lap race, no caution, no pit stop, no bullsh*t. Drop the f*cking green flag, give me 12 f*ckers out there going as hard as they can for 20 laps. It’ll be over before you know it, but it’s going to be freaking awesome. That’s what it was. That’s all it needs to be. It doesn’t need to be more than that.”

Scarcity and brevity can be their own form of juice, Earnhardt seemed to indicate. Give fans just a taste and they’ll come back wanting even more.

“I don’t want to hear nobody that says 20 laps is too f*cking short,” he said. “You weren’t around when this race was 20 laps. It was bad*ss. And even if there are only 12 guys out there, them 12 guys is going to make it a show.”

Earnhardt summed up his final plan for The Clash and the timing it could take. He’s all in on the idea.

“Let that happen the same day you’re going to qualify, do it on a Saturday or something like that the week before the 500, get everybody out there, have your little ARCA race, have your little Clash and then qualify,” Earnhardt said. “Hey, it’s a full day, all kinds of activity. You’ve got cars on the track, fans can enjoy it. And then the drivers, they can go home for a couple days, come back on Tuesday or Wednesday, we’ll start doing some media, we’ll boil up this Daytona 500 excitement. That’s how they need to do it.”