Dale Earnhardt Jr. is racing the iconic red #8 Budweiser Chevrolet for the second time. Ahead of the race at Anderson Motor Speedway, the NASCAR Hall of Famer shared the story of how he convinced Budweiser to join him back at the track.Earnhardt Jr., who famously carried Budweiser colors during his early NASCAR days with Dale Earnhardt, Inc. (DEI), saw an opportunity to reunite with the brand after securing the #8 license back from his stepmother, Teresa Earnhardt. He initially asked for a one-off race, but the company gave him more, including this weekend’s race at Anderson Motor Speedway.This time, the former Hendrick Motorsports driver is sporting a Budweiser “baseball” throwback livery, a nod to the scheme he drove to victory in the memorable 2001 Daytona summer race. He spoke about how the deal came to be with FloRacing on X, saying [0:24]:“This deal with Budweiser was really interesting, the story behind it coming together. We reached out to Bud, I said to Kelley (Earnhardt-Miller, sister) and everybody at JR Motorsports, just like, ‘Man, I like to run that red car one time.’” “We got the #8 licensing back, and that just made sense. So we called Bud, and they weren't sure what we were talking about doing. They didn't really understand the kind of ask we had,” he added.After Dale Earnhardt Jr. explained the CARS Tour to Budweiser and clarified that all he wanted was their name/decals on his car, he recalled [1:22]:“They were like,M‘Man, let's do one race this year... another race the next year, which is this race here in Anderson,’” the Kannapolis native said. The Anderson Motor Speedway event marks the CARS Tour’s first return to the 0.375-mile South Carolina oval since 2017, with a 125-lap Late Model Stock feature. This follows Dale Earnhardt Jr.’s first Budweiser-backed race at Florence Motor Speedway in November 2024, where he charged from the back after a poor qualifying run to second place. His night ended early, however, when the #8 Chevy suffered a fuel pump failure.The 50-year-old is also a co-owner of the CARS Tour, along with Kevin Harvick, Jeff Burton, and Justin Marks. In NASCAR, he co-owns JR Motorsports with his sister, Kelley Earnhardt-Miller, and HMS boss Rick Hendrick.Dale Earnhardt Jr. explains struggles with adding hip-hop songs to NASCAR 25Aside from co-owning two racing series, Dale Earnhardt Jr. continues to champion NASCAR through video games, serving as executive producer of NASCAR 25. But the process hasn’t been all smooth sailing. He admitted facing challenges with clearing samples from hip-hop tracks, which prevented him from including some of his personal picks, such as an unnamed Lil Wayne song.In an X post, Dale Earnhardt Jr. wrote:“Clearing hip hop music was really tough. I had a Lil Wayne song I wanted on there as well as others. To clear a song what has sampled music, you have to get the rights to not only the current artist and publisher but also the rights of the sample. Getting in contact and a response with all those people is one challenge.”“Working with a budget also made that a real challenge,” he added.NASCAR 25 has 28 soundtracks from various genres, including country, rock, and hip-hop. Some of the hip-hop tracks include Big Dawgs by Hanumankind ft. Kalmi and 7000 Miles (Remix) by Ruby Ibarra.