The day that followed was tough. I admit, I let it affect me more than I probably should have. But I didn’t know what else to do. I had just started working in the world of motorsports media about two months prior to the accident and I didn’t know how else to react. I didn’t want to do anything and the last thing I wanted to do was think about racing.
But something that was said by a driver, and to this day I can’t remember which one exactly, following Dale Earnhardt’s death in 2001 struck me late that next night.
“They would have wanted us to race on, because if the shoe were on the other foot, they would have raced on for us.”
That was the moment when I realized that yes, it’s okay to hurt, because these are our friends, and our colleagues — but they would want us to keep the sport they loved alive because it’s part of their legacy and if they were still here, they would want to be enjoying it as well.
We have indeed raced on in the five years since the crash. We’ve made the sport safer. We’ve watched one of Dan’s closest friends, Tony Kanaan, win the great race that Dan had the privilege of winning twice.
And we’ve all, in our own small way, carried on a portion of his legacy by helping to make the sport he loved and cherished so much a better, more competitive and closer family.
Dan’s nickname, “Lionheart”, is one that has stuck with me ever since the crash — I had the decal on my car until it faded so badly that it wasn’t readable and I saw it every time I got in or got out when I’d go down the road.
It’s also a quality I’ve tried to embrace.
Dan was never one to follow the crowd, he was strong, he was loyal, and he did it his way — from his 2005 IndyCar championship to his second Indy 500 victory with Bryan Herta — and even to that final race, where he started 34th for a shot at $5 million, all because it was going to be part of the pageantry of what was supposed to be IndyCar’s most memorable weekend.
And that weekend was indeed memorable, but unfortunately for all the wrong reasons.
Dan would never have wanted us to look at it that way, though. He would have wanted us to put a smile on our faces, remember the good times we had with him and carry the sport on in his honor — because if it had been someone else, he would have done the same thing for them.
He also would have wanted us to smile, much in the same way that he always carried that megawatt smile that lit up the space around him for miles on end.
So on this day, eight years later, I look back on that Las Vegas race, and yes — it still hurts that Dan isn’t here — but I’m not truly sad anymore.
Instead, I’m smiling thinking about all the fun that Dan is surely having right now watching how we advanced the sport with a car named after him (the DW12) and seen his competitors and friends carry on and succeed in the race and the series he loved so much.
So friends, on this day, smile like he would have wanted us to.
And maybe click on that replay of the 2011 Indianapolis 500 and take in his smile one more time.
We miss you Dan.
Godspeed Lionheart.