How to … Deal with the pressure that comes with being the son of a legend

From the Sporting News NASCAR Wire Service

(August 4, 2010)

Sporting News has developed a feature called “How to …” in which NASCAR personalities explain certain aspects of their life in stock car racing. In today’s “How to …” former Sprint Cup Series driver Kyle Petty explains how he has dealt with the pressure that comes with being the son of a legend.

By Kyle Petty

You handle it by just being yourself and not trying to imitate and not trying to duplicate the things your father did. You’ve just got to go and say, “I do the best I can. I look in the mirror in the morning, and that’s good enough for me.”

People always say, “Tell me the pluses, and tell me the minuses.” I could never think of a minus of being Richard Petty’s son. It was all pluses—getting to be around racing, getting to be around racing people, getting to go to the racetrack. There were never any negatives.

I think Dale Earnhardt Jr. kind of looks at that the same way. I think there’s a lot more pressure on him because the media and the time was different when he came along from when I came along. But you just have to put that to the side. You really don’t pay any attention to it.

— As told to Reid Spencer