Earnhardt Jr.

As Dale Earnhardt Jr. went backwards through last weekend's Brickyard 400 field from first to 20th and continued to drop, his crew chief was hit with the same thought as Junior.

"What do you do?" Tony Eury Sr., said. "We tried everything."

This year, Earnhardt Jr., said he expected to run for the championship. He had every reason to believe he could, too, coming off a seventh-place finish in the standings last season, believing he and his team had matured and feeling as though the No. 8 crew was closer to finding the right setups for certain tracks he had struggled at in the past.

But while at this point last year he was seventh in the standings, Earnhardt is now 17th and scratching his head. Eleven times this year Earnhardt has failed to finish in the top-20, seven of those finishes being 30th or worse. But of the other 10 races this year, he's notched six top-fives (eight top-10s).

The hit-or-miss deal has confounded the team, which worked feverishly last weekend at Indianapolis Motor Speedway trying everything it could to figure out how to make Earnhardt's car go faster.

"I don't know what to say. The car wouldn't turn," Earnhardt said after the race. "I think I was hollerin' that the car was really, really tight from the first lap. That's about it -- no grip -- and really, really, really tight. It was like it was on three wheels or something. I just couldn't get on the gas.

"We tried everything. Nothing worked. I don't know what was wrong with it."

The closest answer? Depreciation.

"I don't know why -- because (during practice) our car drove like a million bucks," Earnhardt said.

On Sunday, it was worth $125,280 for a 22nd-place finish.

Though the team has been doomed for different reasons this year, the ending has woefully been the same. A handful of times he's been caught up in wrecks that ruined his chances, and once he had to pull out of a race with engine problems. Other times, it's been setups that just haven't agreed with racing conditions.

	Earnhardt Jr.'s season got off to a rough start at Daytona in February.

The only consistency has been superspeedway racing, where he has his only victory of the year.

"We didn't expect this," Eury said. "But we're going to keep at it. We'll find it, sooner or later."

Earnhardt is hoping sooner -- like now. He's even willing to make an attitude adjustment if he can break his three-race streak of sub-20 finishes and get back to running well this weekend, when the series visits the second, and final, road course on the schedule at Watkins Glen, N.Y.

"I've been known to be less-than-thrilled when it comes to the road course events, but I've learned that I have a lot more fun if I just go out there and drive my butt off on every lap instead of worrying about the track," he said. "We did a test this summer at (Virginia International Raceway) and I think it helped with my frame of mind and helped the team learn about setups for the road courses."

If the setups work out this time, it'll only be one-third of the battle. He'll have to avoid the wrecks and mechanical problems that have helped this year fall short of his expectations.

But confidence is high. This road course allows Earnhardt a second chance at showing the competition he's proficient at both left- and right-hand turns. He believed he would be able to prove it at Sonoma, Calif., but was caught up in a wreck.

He wouldn't mind doing it at Watkins Glen, where he won once before while racing in the Busch series.

"We were pretty good at Sears Point until the crash, so I feel better about the way the car should drive this weekend," he said. "I've always said Watkins Glen is a less 'technical' track because you can really haul down the long straights and then set up for some of the turns like an oval.

"Who knows -- maybe we'll surprise some people like we did (in Busch) in '99."

Earnhardt also happened to win the Busch title in '99 -- so it's safe to say he'd like to turn back the clock in more ways than one.

Rupen Fofaria is a beat writer for the Raleigh News & Observer.