Dale Earnhardt Jr. gets No. 88, Mountain Dew for 2008.

Dale Earnhardt Jr.'s new look is official: his Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet will carry No. 88 next season, as well as sponsorship from Mountain Dew, Amp Energy drink and the National Guard. Earnhardt will say goodbye to his famous No. 8, which will remain the property of Dale Earnhardt Inc. when Junior switches teams. Aric Almirola and Mark Martin will share duty in the No. 8 Chevy for DEI next year. Meanwhile, long-time Earnhardt sponsor Budweiser will sponsor Evernham Motorsports' Kasey Kahne in 2008.

"I never thought a car number would create this much excitement," said Rick Hendrick. "Trying to do it and keep it quiet from the rest of the world until you have it all together, it was probably the toughest thing I've ever done in motorsports."

Attempts to pry No. 8--which Junior has used since entering Cup in 2000--away from DEI owner Teresa Earnhardt were unsuccessful; instead, Robert Yates Racing asked NASCAR to transfer its retired 88 to Hendrick for NASCAR's most popular driver.

Hendrick not worried about adding Earnhardt Jr. to fold

With Dale Earnhardt Jr. set to come on board at Hendrick Motorsports in 2008, he'll join an already incredibly successful program in which Jeff Gordon and Jimmie Johnson have combined to win five Cup championships and 108 races going into Sunday's event at Dover. Can it work? Will there simply be too many roosters in the hen house?

Hendrick has a long history of mixing strong personalities. The outspoken Northerner Geoffrey Bodine was already a fixture at Hendrick Motorsports in the late 1980s when not one, but two outspoken characters joined the organization. Tim Richmond dominated the sport in 1986, a year before Darrell Waltrip entered the picture.