By Thomas Pope
Motor sports editor

Bobby Labonte has earned his place in NASCAR’s record books, winning championships in both the Nextel Cup and Busch series. He’s got 21 Cup wins, including the Brickyard 400 at Indianapolis Motor Speedway in 2000, and an IROC title.

All of that was accomplished on paved tracks. His immediate future as a race team owner, however, will have driver Earl Pearson Jr. tackling dirt tracks from Florida through the Dakotas.

Labonte’s the latest in a long line of NASCAR stars to be bitten by the dirt stock car bug. Last month, he purchased the Dunn-Benson Ford Motorsports team from Carlton and Kemp Lamm — a team which was still celebrating its third consecutive national championship with Pearson behind the wheel. The sale ended a six-year collaboration for the Lamms and Pearsons, one which saw them make more than 30 trips to victory lane in the past four years.

It’s a venture for which Labonte seems genuinely more excited than piloting his famed No. 43 Dodge in the Nextel Cup Series for Petty Enterprises.

“Some people think I’m crazy for buying a dirt team, but I look at some of these other guys I race with in Nextel Cup and I’m no different than they are,” Labonte said. “The Nextel Cup thing is so pressured, you need some way to turn it off, and this is how I choose to do it.

“I’m not Tony Stewart or Kenny Schrader or Bill Elliott — I’m not going to be flying off here and there to drive a dirt car. If I get to race one time a year, I’m fine with it. I just wanted to be involved in it.”

Labonte drove one of Pearson’s cars at Eldora in 2005 against Stewart, Elliott and others, and he closely followed the team’s performance via the Internet and regular phone calls to Pearson.

Last year’s success included three wins in an eight-day stretch: a Carolina Clash event at Fayetteville Motor Speedway; the Hillbilly 100 in Middlebourne, W.Va.; and the sport’s most-prestigious race, the World 100 at Eldora Speedway in Rossburg, Ohio. Those three paydays totaled $69,000.

Labonte inquired about buying the team at just the right time, Carlton Lamm said.

“The only way I would have ever been interested in selling is to sell everything,” Lamm, 65, said. “With Bobby’s offer, I was in a position to do that. ... It was the right time to get out after 35 years.”

Labonte and Pearson first met about three years ago when in Talladega, Ala. Labonte was entered in a Cup race at Talladega Superspeedway, and he ventured across Speedway Boulevard to watch a race at Talladega Short Track, a 1/3rd-mile, high-banked dirt oval. He was impressed with Pearson’s smoothness in the hornet’s nest action of short-track racing, but equally as impressed by Pearson on a personal level.

“I’ve just always been intrigued with him,” Labonte said. “I think he’s a great guy and I thought a relationship with him was worthwhile whether he raced for me or not. He’s the kind of person I like to be associated with.

“I wouldn’t be doing this without Earl, and this will hopefully lead to some bigger things for him. We don’t have any plays for anything other than driving this dirt car, but as we all know, I’m in a position where — just being in the right place at the right time — maybe something could happen that would lead to the next step.”

That would be fine with Pearson, who quit a job in construction in Jacksonville, Fla., two years ago to concentrate on racing full-time.

“To get with Carlton for the last six years and climb the ladder like we did together, it’s just been a big dream come true,” Pearson said. “Now to have this deal is another big step for me.

“Bobby can open doors for me and steer me in the right direction. Hopefully it will lead to bigger and better things.”

Labonte offered to buy the team lock, stock and barrel, and he hired Pearson and both of his full-time crew members. The team has relocated from Dunn to a large shop Labonte has in the Randolph County town of Archdale. Labonte has signed LifeLong Locks as Pearson’s major sponsor.

Labonte said it’s all a part of the friendship he’s made with Pearson and wanting to help him reach his potential.

“Money’s not what all this is about,” Labonte said. “That’s not why I’m in this. In the end, what life is about is your relationships.”