Earnhardt Jr. expressive in 7th

BROOKLYN, Mich. – The way Dale Earnhardt Jr. expressed his thoughts on Sunday’s race at Michigan International Speedway can’t be told here.

Needless to say, it was something good.

Earnhardt finished seventh in the Heluva Good! 400, his fourth top-10 finish of the season and first since he was eighth April 19 at Texas Motor Speedway. He jumped two spots to 14th in the series standings, 81 points behind 12th-place Mark Martin.

“Hopefully, my fans enjoyed it,” Earnhardt said at the back of his No. 88 Hendrick Motorsports hauler. “I hope I can bring more of them to them, man.

“You have to have a good car, but with the way these races go at the end you have to have a ton of good luck, too. You have to make the right calls about the car at the end.”

Earnhardt was flirting around the top 10 most of the race and during the final caution on Lap 182, he was one of a group of teams that elected to pit for four fresh tires.

He restarted 11th, second among the teams that pitted. He outdueled Jeff Burton for seventh on the final lap.

“When the caution came out I told the guys y’all had a good car no matter what happens, they knew we were here because usually it’s been a bad deal,” he said.

“I worked the bottom (groove) all day trying to discipline myself and figure out what my car needed to run down there. We can run fast up top, but we get beat at the end of the race running up there.

“I figured I would try the bottom. The car worked well down there.”

Earnhardt’s last Cup win came at Michigan two years ago and even though his winless streak has now stretched to 72 races, he's keeping a positive outlook.

“We’re not a team that’s challenging for victories just yet, so top 10s for us are the direction we need to go,” he said.