New Dale Jr. merchandise flying off shelves

When Dale Earnhardt Jr. cracked the tab on that first AMP Energy drink Wednesday in Dallas, traditional retail stores such as Wal-Mart and K-Mart gobbled up 160,000 t-shirts.

Gold mine.

"Right off the gun," said Joe Mattes, JR Motorsports VP of licensing. "That's a lot for this sport."

And Mattes would know. He used to run Dale Earnhardt's merchandising empire.

In all, 200,000 Dale Jr. No. 88 t-shirts have been ordered for sale.

"It makes sense," Mattes said. "There's two sponsors — it's a double-hit. It's not like a [typical] guy coming out with a new sponsor. It's Dale Jr. with two sponsors. His fans have to have one of each.

"They're shipped and ready to go. We hit it right. Everyone kept quiet about it. By end of weekend, all said and done, there's a couple hundred thousand t-shirts sold. A lot of them are pre-booked. NASCAR.com and dalejr.com are close to record days. There's so much pent-up demand, [fans] are hitting it hard." More at ESPN.com