As a crew chief he claimed eight championships, one more than even his far more famous second cousin, Richard Petty.

He has in recent years been through so much -- the deaths of many close to him, a battle with prostate cancer. But through it all Dale Inman remains not only arguably the greatest crew chief to ever pick up a wrench, but also one of the finest storytellers in NASCAR's garage.

Q: Talk a little bit about what you're doing these days?

Inman's Legacy

• Crew chief in eight championship seasons: seven with Richard Petty, one with Terry Labonte.

• Crew chief for 198 of Petty's record 200 race victories.

• Petty's second cousin; they used to race each other on a track they made through the woods behind their homes in Randleman, N.C. -- on bicycles.

• Noting how times have changed, he recently spotted a picture of himself and Richard and Richard's brother Maurice in a magazine after eating breakfast at Cracker Barrel. They were working as the pit crew for Petty's father, Lee, in an early race. None were wearing shirts.

• Now spends much of his off-track time attending the various sporting events of his grandchildren.

Inman: I actually retired in 1998. And really I did retire. Richard was kind enough to keep me on the payroll for my insurance and everything going, for me and wife, which I really appreciated.

I lived right next door to my mother, and I had a sister who was mentally handicapped. And mother had taken care of her all her life. She never was able to take care of herself one day in her whole life. A year later, my mother passed away, and left me and my brother to care for our sister. We took care of her for probably four or five months, and my wife worked real hard to try to find her a good nursing home that was convenient for us. She found a good rest home in Asheboro and I went to see her every day, sometimes three or four times a day. I went every day of my life after I retired, so that kept me busy for a couple years.

Q: What was your sister's name?

Inman: Shirley Ann Inman. She was born [with a mental disability]. Her left side just never did develop. She could walk at one time, but she never could take care of herself. And it finally got to be that she couldn't walk as she got older. She passed away in 2002.

Q: What did you get into after that?

Inman: So I knew Hugh Hawthorne was starting the Victory Junction Camp. He was a good friend of ours. So I went over there one day and I said, 'Sure, I'll help you for a couple of weeks.' That wound up to be more like two years.

He had bulldozers and all that stuff. He had borrowed them from a John Deere Company. Heck, we must have saved Victory Junction the first million and a half [dollars] maybe. He would get volunteer helpers and have the equipment there. I had never been on a bulldozer or nothing in my life.

Q: So you were actually driving those things?

Inman: Oh, heck yeah. He had bulldozers and backhoes and the big end-up trucks. I mean, it was the time of my life. I enjoyed it. You'd get on a big bulldozer and go knock a tree down. Hell, that was fun. Then it would be so muddy you could hardly get around and it would be so dusty you couldn't see the ground because of the trucks and stuff like that.

They also kidded me. When they finally started getting some buildings up over there, they said they had to take the bulldozer away from me. They were afraid I'd go knockin' down something they had just built.

Q: That takes us up to roughly 2004. What happened with you next?

Inman: When I got through with that, Richard asked me to come back and see if I would kindly be a consultant, to see if I could help. That's sort of where it's been for me since then. I've been to about every race since. I went through a prostate cancer deal, but I think I only missed one race with it.

I had the 25 radiation treatments, then they went two weeks and put the seed [treatment] in the prostate. I missed Pocono, probably two and a half years ago, and that was about it.

Q: Is everything OK now?

Inman: Yeah, the numbers are real good. In fact, I got back [soon] to get checked. But they said they checked my whole body and it hadn't got outside the prostate. But as I talk, a lot of people have had that, you know?

They found it in my blood. But, in fact, going through all the tests, right up to the biopsy, they were just sure I was OK. Then the doctor told me, 'I've got good news and bad news. The bad news is you've got cancer; the good news is I'm gonna take care of you.' He took good care of me. He was Richard's doctor, too, and so far it's been good. ... They keep getting more advanced with it.

Q: You look great and seem to always be in good spirits?

Inman: I'm not tryin' to be macho or nothin', but I didn't let it bother me, you know? I just kept going to the races. I scheduled my appointments where I could keep going to the races.

Q: Well, that's what you love doing, right?

Inman: It's a bad disease, racin' is. It gets in your system, and it's bad.

Q: Could you quickly tell us one of your favorite stories from the early days?

Inman: I tell the boys about coming to Martinsville when the place was dirt, and they had that little bit of grandstand right there on the frontstretch. And on the backstretch, they had a dirt bank where people would sit and watch the race. And from the bank down to the racetrack there was no fence there.

One time a couple of men got in a fight on that bank, and ended up falling out on the racetrack. This was way before Richard was even driving. It was when Lee [Petty] was still driving. I was going to the races eight years before Richard ever started driving.

Q: No one ran over those men, I hope?

Inman: No, no, no. I don't remember what year it was, but they came out of it OK.

Q: Do you have one or two other memories that stand out from over the years?

Inman: There have been so many of them, so many highs and so many lows. Losing Kyle's son, Adam, of course. I wasn't there, but Lord, that was so tough. And then, of course, we lost Lynda's brother at Talladega [Lynda Petty is Richard's wife] in the pits on a freak accident. Losing those two hurt as much as losing my mother and my sister, or maybe more. I mean, losing my mother hurt terribly, don't get me wrong. But she was 89 years old. Losing those two young men was just devastating.

But I always tell people who ask me what my greatest moment or my biggest high was, and I tell them about 1999. My son-in-law was going to spot for John Andretti the year after I retired. But he went down to Daytona and got pneumonia, so they brought me down to spot for him. I guess about an hour before the Busch race, they ended up asking me to spot for Adam. He ended up finishing sixth, I think, but that was a thrill, you know what I mean? Then we lost Adam after that.

But that was big. And I think maybe I helped him some. He was wild as a buck. They talked one time during the race, and they were under a caution. He had seen a wreck and he came in and they said, 'You flat-placed all four of your tires.' And I came on and said, 'Yeah, you flat-placed them the second time through the wreck!' But he was a fun kid. Boy, you just wanted to break his neck sometimes -- and then all of a sudden he changed. When he got the racin' bug, he was a fine young man. But golly, did he give us a hard time when he was a kid. Nothing bad, just mischievous stuff. I used to think he was just out to worry me. But when he got serious about his racing, buddy, he really got serious. It's just a shame that talent was lost.

Q: Adam was so enthusiastic, with that infectious grin, wasn't he?

Inman: My son-in-law was his crew chief at the time that it happened. He tells the story where they got into some racetrack late. I think they flew in and it was already dark. But Adam wanted to see the place because he had never been there. They went to the racetrack and climbed up onto the fence where they could look in and try to see the track, and Adam said, 'Boy, I'm going to like this place!' And you couldn't see nothin', it was so dark. But he just knew he was going to love it anyway.

Q: What's your son-in-law's name, and what's he up to now?

Inman: Chris Hussey. He works for Childress now. He's one of their engineers.

Q: What exactly happened to Lynda Petty's brother?

Inman: We were at Talladega, and we burned a left-front wheel bearing out. And Richard came in and got out of the car. We had a water tank that wasn't as safe as it should have been. He was putting air into it to get pressure. He squirted some water into it and it blew up. It was a freak thing. It was really sad. He left small kids [behind]. That was Lynda's brother Randy.

Q: It's a great sport, but what has been said about it is that it can bring you to the highest of highs and lowest of lows, right?

Inman: Oh yeah, it's like that. The races themselves can be like that. There have been two different times in Richard's career -- one time at Bristol and one time at Dover. Two different times where he coasted by, leading when he got the white flag, and he couldn't coast by one more lap to get the win. That's disheartening. You work so hard for 500 laps or 500 miles and think you have it won, and then something like that happens. You are so close and then you miss out.

Q: What was your reaction to Kyle Petty recently failing to qualify for the race at Martinsville in the No. 45 Dodge of Petty Enterprises?

Inman: Kyle missing that race, god-durn it that hurt. We missed races with Richard, too, and those hurt. It's not like a death and I've never been involved with a home burning, so I can't say it's as bad as something like that. But it's close.

Q: On the more positive side, you've got other things going on in your life right now, too, like grandkids to watch playing ball. How is that?

Inman: Yeah, we went to a ballgame the other night. My granddaughter is pitching now. She's a freshman, pitching for the varsity [softball] team [at Randleman High School]. ... But she's doing great. And the [grandson], according to my daughter, Tuesday at 4:15 I've got to be at his game in Randleman, too. He's in the seventh grade and he starts [on his middle school baseball team]. That part of my life is great.

Q: You still are spotted at the Petty shop once or twice a week, even after it was moved from Level Cross, N.C., near your home, to Mooresville nearly 90 minutes away. How is all that working out for you?

Inman: I don't have to be around the shop all the time. I go do some spotting for Bobby during practice. I go up there with the spotters and watch the race. And they make it as easy as they can for me with the travel. Whenever Richard isn't doing something special, I can travel with him on his plane. That makes it as easy as it possibly can be, but it's still rough.

But I enjoy being at the racetrack. I really do. It's in my system and I can't get it out. I'll be 72 in August and it's like everything else. But if I didn't stay active, I don't know what would happen to me. But I don't hurt myself working, either, trust me.