Dale Blaney may tower above his brother, Winston Cup regular and former World of Outlaws champion Dave, but temperamentally they're identical. Quiet, down to earth, determined beyond belief and born to race, the brothers are apples that fell directly under the tree of their father, Ohio and Western Pennsylvania sprint car and DIRT Modified legend Lou Blaney.
But the 2002 season will find the 37-year-old Dale, a 12-year veteran of the sprint car wars, wheeling a grader around Sharon Speedway in Hartford, Ohio, rather than buckling in for 100 World of Outlaw shows.
While never a big winner with the Outlaws, where he collected but three feature trophies, Blaney has won two of the sport's premier events-the 1998 Historical Big One, and the 2000 King's Royal.
Getting off the road will not be easy. It's hard to leave knowing you should, and could, have done better.
"2001 was a real disappointment," Blaney says. "We had the same car and the same motors we had the year before. Gene Jenkins left the crew to go with Jack Elden, but I still had D.J. Lindsey, who's real sharp. I can't pinpoint what happened, but it seemed like the whole year, we'd have a good run going and then something would break or a tire would go flat.
"That was the worst year I've had. In '98, my first full year with the Outlaws, we were ninth in points, which I thought was respectable. Halfway through '99 I was 'relieved of my duties,' but we came back in 2000 and ran seventh in points with a really solid year, a lot of Top 5s and almost all Top 10.
"It's hard to beat Steve (Kinser), Sammy (Swindell), Mark (Kinser) and Danny (Lasoski), whether you're talking feature wins or points. They seldom fall out and they're always up front at the end. If you run up front, they're right behind you, and when you have a bad night and finish 20th, they're still third or fourth."
Did Blaney have visions of becoming the next Steve Kinser or Sammy Swindell when he first started?
"Not really," he says after pondering the issue for a moment. "When I started racing, I just wanted to be the best driver I could be. Then when I got to the Outlaws, my goal was to be the best driver in the country. That didn't happen, but a few hundred other guys tried and didn't succeed either. I don't have any bad feelings about what I accomplished. I raced with a bunch of extremely talented drivers and held my own.
"I don't regret my time with the World of Outlaws at all. Ted Johnson has created an opportunity for a lot of guys to race for a living and make good money doing what they really want to do. They go into a small town and put on big-time racing for the fans. People will come out of the stands after the race and tell you how much they enjoyed watching you, even if you ran 20th. It's a big deal for the fans and a lot of fun to be a part of."
The down side to running in the World of Outlaws is the hectic schedule, putting teams on the road competing in a lot of different venues in a short amount of time. In fact, time spent on the road is the sport's biggest negative, according to Blaney. Drivers with young kids, in particular, face a lifestyle change when those children reach school age. He says an ideal situation would be one where drivers could homeschool their children and take their families with them.
"I've got a lot of respect for what Steve and Sammy have done," Blaney says. "Racing full-time for 25 years is really tough. They live and die racing. That's the bottom line. Like some people and cigarettes, they can't live without it."
Blaney admits to being unsure whether he can handle the agony of withdrawal, but a number of factors have come together to allow him to test his resolve.