Dale Earnhardt Jr. returned to the driver's seat of the iconic Budweiser No. 8 car Saturday evening during the South Carolina 400 at Florence Motor Speedway. The NASCAR Hall of Famer turned in an impressive showing before a mechanical issue forced him to retire from the race and relegated him to a 28th-place finish. 

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With a sellout crowd packing the grandstands at the Timmonsville, South Carolina track, Earnhardt Jr. began his night with a disappointing qualifying effort that saw him finish 53rd out of the 56 cars attempting to qualify. 

As a results of his qualifying effort, he was forced to start in one of the two qualifying races. He finished 16th in the first qualifying race, which was not good enough to qualify into the 250-lap main event. However, Earnhardt Jr. was granted a provisional by track officials and started the race in the 37th position. 

From there, it was game on for the Budweiser No. 8 machine. Earnhardt Jr. made steady progress through the field during the early stages of the event. He cracked the top 25 near the lap 40 mark of the race. He continued marching forward until passing Josh Berry for the second position prior to the halfway break of the event. 

Throughout the second half of the race, he maintained the second position behind race leader and eventual race winner Treyten Lapcevich. That was until lap 219 when Earnhardt Jr. brought his car to pit road under caution while reporting to his crew that "something is wrong with the car." 

The JR Motorsports crew went under the hood to diagnose the issue and reported a fuel pump issue as the culprit that forced him to retire from the race. 

Lapcevich won the race over Doug Barnes Jr., Sam Yarbrough, Jacob Heafner and Carson Lotin. Full results can be viewed below. 

South Carolina 400 at Florence Motor Speedway Results