"I gotta qualify better" - Dale Earnhardt Jr. sums up hard-fought P8 finish during South Carolina 400 at Florence Motor Speedway

NASCAR Hall of Famer Dale Earnhardt Jr. rallied through a stacked field in the South Carolina 400 at Florence Motor Speedway to take an eighth-place finish, having started 26th on the grid.

Earnhardt Jr. had plenty of fun overtaking his rivals at the short track but was dejected for not qualifying well for the race. After displaying a solid race pace, the 49-year-old rued a missed opportunity for fighting at the front.

Speaking to Flo Racing after the 250-lap race, Dale Earnhardt Jr. was harsh on himself for lacking speed in qualifying, despite bringing changes based on his previous attempt.

"I gotta qualify better, I came here during the Darlington week and we ended up qualifying really good, we raced ok. I thought we need to be tighter in the race. So we came here with a little different balance," he said.

"We knew weren't gonna qualify good, I gotta figure out how to get a little more speed out of the car in the qualifying so I don't have to work hard in the race. But great race car, you could put us anywhere in the top 10 and we could have finished there... running good lap times in the end," he added.

It was his third start at Florence Motor Speedway this year, as he was coming off a 16th-place finish in the Icebreaker in February and a sixth-place finish in Locked In 150 a couple of months ago.

Dale Earnhardt Jr. was satisfied with the eighth-place result and was happy with the progress the team made despite starting the weekend on the wrong foot.

"But happy to just be competitive, we struggled in practice yesterday. We struggled all day today trying to figure out where we needed to be. We really weren't confident in everything we were doing and what we had for the race tonight. And it turned out to be really good, had a lot of fun racing all the competitors," he said.

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Dale Earnhardt Jr. yearns for a late-model win

The two-time Busch Series champion is missing the victory lane as he yearns for a late-model dub. He reckoned he could win more races if made more starts in the future:

"Wish I could get up and challenge for a win one of these days but I think I need to run more races to be able to do that."

However, Dale Earnhardt Jr. enjoyed his time at the track as he caught up with many of his old friends.

"It's so fun, it's so much fun. 250 laps is a lot, but it's a good distance... lot of great energy all weekend long, saw a lot of old friends, just a good deal pretty happy," he said.