Dover, Del. ? For a driver who turned 47 on Saturday, Kyle Petty was set to celebrate with the perfect birthday gift: time off.

It’s not a quite a vacation for Petty, who still will visit NASCAR tracks every weekend. He’s leaving the No. 45 Dodge for a spin in the broadcast booth.

Not even his best finish in a decade could make him waver in his decision to temporarily dump his ride to work as a NASCAR race analyst for TNT.

“I don’t have 10 years left of driving,” Petty said Saturday. “I’ve got to start looking for something else to do. I can’t write, but I can run my mouth.”

And he showed in last week’s Coca-Cola 600 that he still can drive.

Petty stunned the rest of the field when he finished third at Lowe’s Motor Speedway – his first top five in 10 years. Petty could take some added momentum with him after today’s race at Dover International Speedway, where he won in 1995 and finished eighth in the fall race on the mile concrete track in 2005.

If Petty does end up with another strong run, he still wouldn’t regret the transition to TV.

“If I was 21, I’d be excited for Kyle Petty,” he said. “But I’m 47. I’m at a different place in my career.”

Petty wasn’t a contender in the Chase, anyway, with only two other top-20 finishes in his first 11 races.