The 2001 EA Sports 500 was a NASCAR Winston Cup Series race that took place on October 21, 2001, at Talladega Superspeedway in Talladega, Alabama.

Coming out of the tri-oval to the white flag, Dale Earnhardt Jr. attempted to pull to the inside of race leader Bobby Labonte.

Instead of going with his Joe Gibbs Racing teammate, Tony Stewart moved down and got behind Dale Jr. and Earnhardt took the lead in turn 1.

Bobby Hamilton got a run after a push from Ricky Craven and attempted to pass Labonte but Labonte blocked Hamilton.

This would cause the big one on the backstretch collecting as many as 15 cars.