Dale
Jarrett
1999
Championship seasons require consistency
and luck. In 1999, Dale Jarrett had the most of both and won his
first ever Winston Cup Championship.
Nothing really changed for Dale Jarrett
from the previous season, which is not necessarily a bad thing.
While most drivers would be thrilled with a 3rd place finish in
the Winston Cup standings, Dale was thinking about more. Quietly,
he started putting together a great season in the #88 Quality Care
Ford owned by Robert Yates. With his first win in a long time at
the Pontiac Excitement 500 in Richmond and at that point Jarrett
assumed the points lead in the Winston Cup standings and never
really looked back. Despite only winning 4 races, Jarrett put
together an incredible run of races. During a 20 week run, Jarrett
had 4 wins, 17 top 5s and 20 top 10s. He had all this success
despite having extremely inconsistent qualifying efforts. One can
only wonder what would happen if he nailed this down. He did
manage to back up the quals with incredible success. Only 8 times
did he finish in a worse place than where he qualified. Jarrett's
season was so remarkable, that it was being compared to Jeff
Gordon's 1998 season, where Gordon was completely dominant from
start to finish. It would not be hard to say that if he even comes
close to duplicating his effort, he would become the latest
two-time champion.
1998
After the 1997 season, Dale Jarrett must
have be thinking that the Winston Cup Championship is extremely
close. Few changes needed to be made. The season did not start so
well for Jarrett as he posted his first DNF in the first race of
the season. (He only had one in all of last season). He seemed to
quickly figured out what was going wrong. From the Primestar 500
to the Pocono 500, Jarrett has had a win and 10 top 5s in 13
races. Qualifying picked up for him during this stint as well. He
had 7 top-10 starts in this 10 race period. Down the stretch,
though, he lost any hope of winning his first championship of his
career, somewhat because of his inconsistancy down the stretch,
but mostly because of Jeff Gordon's dominance in the second half
of the season. In the Busch Series, he ran the #32 White Rain Ford
in a limited schedule with limited success. His son, Jason
Jarrett, filled in for much of the rest of the races.
1997
The #88 Quality Care Ford team performed
up to standards set in the 1996 season. With a win at the
PrimeStar 500, Jarrett was first in the standings. The team was
not just finishing well, but also setting themselves up for a
great run with great starting positions. He qualified third at the
Daytona 500, second at the GM Goodwrench 400 and third at the
Pontiac Excitement 400. He finished the season in second place in
the Winston Cup standings. Jarrett also ran in the Busch Series
this season with the #32 White Rain team. His best finish was at
the GM Goodwrench 200 where he posted a second place finish.
1996
The 1996 season was the best year of Dale
Jarrett's career. With wins at Daytona, Indianapolis, The
Goodwrench Service 400 and the Coca-Cola 600, and seconds at The
Goodwrench 400, The Winston Select 500, The Jiffy Lube 300, The
DieHard 500, The AC-Delco 400, The NAPA 500 and The Pontiac
Excitement 400, Jarrett finished the year in third place in the
Winston Cup Points race. He also won the 1996 Busch Clash at
Daytona. All of this in his first season in the Robert Yates owned
Ford Quality Care #88 Thunderbird. He just missed winning the
Winston Million, which is awarded for winning 3 of 4 selected
races.
Driver Record
All Winston Cup Races
Year Races Won Top 5 Top 10 Money Won
1999 34 4 24 29 $3,608,829
1998 32 3 18 21 $2,268,335
1997 32 7 20 23 $2,522,385
1996 31 4 17 21 $2,985,418
1995 31 1 9 14 $1,363,158
1994 30 1 4 9 $ 881,754
1993 30 1 13 18 $1,242,394
1992 29 0 2 8 $ 418,648
1991 29 1 3 8 $ 444,256
1990 24 0 1 7 $ 214,495
1989 29 0 2 5 $ 232,317
1988 29 0 0 1 $ 118,640
1987 24 0 0 2 $ 143,400
1986 1 0 0 0 $ 990
1984 3 0 0 0 $ 7,345
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