"You're gambling really": Dale Earnhardt Jr. sheds light on the reality of NASCAR teams budgeting 

Dale Earnhardt Jr. gave his take on NASCAR revising rules for Cup drivers' participation in lower series. On the latest episode of the Dale Jr. Download, Earnhardt Jr. addressed this from the perspective of fans and teams.

Junior claimed that fans would want to see Cup drivers in Xfinity or Truck races. He said that there were 'a lot of people' who want to see their favorite drivers race other than on Sunday as well.

From a car owner's perspective, Dale Earnhardt Jr. claimed that there needed to be a perfect balance so that a Cup driver can go and win some lower-tier races. He said that a team owner in the Xfinity or Truck Series, if they don't have Cup resources or Cup drivers, their chances of winning or even running in the top 10 get harder.

Earnhardt Jr. said that teams' budget in the series was based on 'strictly performance.' He claimed that teams don't have a $5 million check from a sponsor as their budget. Instead, it's based on a prediction of how they were going to finish in races.

"So you're gambling really starting the year to say, 'Man, I'm gonna run all year and we need to average an 18th, 15th, 12th place finish. I'm going to make this much and I'll spend this much and we should at the end of the day come out ahead or at least flat.'

"So you're predicting this sort of result. And so now the team that was maybe going to run eighth to 10th on average throughout the year may run 12th-14th. Now they're making less money. Now they're not able to spend as much. It gets things tighter," Dale Earnhardt Jr. claimed.

Dale Earnhardt Jr. recalls the state of affairs with Cup drivers racing in lower NASCAR tiers

Further sharing his thoughts on the subject, Dale Earnhardt Jr. looked back on his early days as a racecar driver. It's worth mentioning that before his superstardom in the Cup Series, he was a successful driver in the Busch Series in the late 90s, winning two championships before being promoted to Cup.

Later in his career, Earnhardt Jr. co-founded his own team, JR Motorsports, which is one of the most successful teams in the latter era. Speaking about the state of affairs in the lower-tier series with regard to Cup drivers' participation, Dale Earnhardt Jr. recalled, via the aforementioned source:

"I don't know how the teams made it work when we had we go to Charlotte in the 2000s. Man, you'd have 14-20 Cup drivers in the race. You might not have a regular in the top 10. I'm serious. I wasn't really a full-time team then.

"But when we became full-time and we had one car and we had a regular driving it man you were lucky if you could mingle in the top 10 with some of the Cup guys that were competing and you thought you sitting there running sixth behind five cup guys."

Earnhardt Jr. claimed that things have changed now because back in his day, running in the top 10 behind Cup drivers amounted to 'a great day.'