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Racing & Life Will Go On With Or Without You | Coffee With Kenny · Kenny Wallace Media

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  Happy Friday morning, everybody. Just like clockwork, it's
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  raining on this Friday in St. Louis, MO.
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  I'm telling you, it's like a conveyor belt.
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  It won't stop. It's sunny on Monday, Tuesday,
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  Wednesday, sometimes Thursday. Then it rains Friday, Saturday,
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  Sunday, and then it's sunny on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday,
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  Thursday, and then it rains on Friday, Saturdays.
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  So it's raining today and our races, the summer national races
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  tonight, 30 minutes from my house at Tri-City Speedway in
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  Granite City, IL. We are canceled tonight.
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  Canceled because it's raining and we're running on dirt.
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  That that's the bitch about dirt racing.
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  It's raw dirt. And when it rains, it's it's a
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  muddy mess. It might as well be porky to
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  pick. You get to the racetrack and
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  it's like, Oh my God, get me some boots.
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  Let's lay some hay around here. I had a buddy.
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  I had a buddy. Clyde.
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  Dave Powers. We call him Clyde.
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  I haven't seen, I haven't seen Clyde in a while.
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  But anyway, he went to a dirt race with me for his first time
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  ever because he's one of my old asphalt ASA buddies.
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  And we went to it was Clarksville, TN.
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  He went to Clarksville with me and you know, Clarksville's got
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  that real red dirt and he shows up, goes into pit area and, you
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  know, some of Clarksville's got some rock or grass.
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  But this particular time at Clarksville years ago, there's
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  dirt everywhere. And of course, we're asphalt
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  guys, and this is in my early dirt days.
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  He goes, Oh my God, you want me to go down and get some hay and
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  put around here? It was so damn funny because
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  it's true. If you're a dirt racer, it's all
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  normal to you. But when you're asphalt, you
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  know the asphalt tracks, you know, you're used to having
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  decent work areas, asphalt or something like that.
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  But when you go to these damn dirt tracks, you just curb plunk
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  your ass right on grass or dirt, you know, like a kid out, like a
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  kid out in the yard playing. But we got used to it and, and I
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  do have to give Clyde an Atta boy because nowadays when all
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  the big, big dirt teams, when they unload, the first thing you
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  do is they lay down this real nice tarp and all the big dirt
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  guys, now they operate on that big tarp.
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  So it is nice to see everybody control their workspace at these
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  dirt tracks. But never forget, Clyde, should
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  we put some hay down here? So it's not fun to race when
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  there's been rain. It it it becomes a cluster.
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  And I mean, it destroys. Hell, I remember it's rained and
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  you don't even race and it just wipes the truck and trailer out
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  because everybody's stomping through the mud and you spend
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  the next day washing everything and you haven't even raced.
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  So rain and dirt racing do not match.
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  OK, today's subject. They are going to race and life
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  is going to go on with or without you.
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  So I know you heard it, but let me let me kind of say it again
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  this way. Eddie Balkovic.
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  Eddie just texted me. He says no coffee with Kenny.
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  You know what Eddie? I slept really good.
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  I feel rested today. I went to bed about 10:30 last
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  night and woke up about 8:00 today.
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  So a good eight hours. Sleeper slows.
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  I'll see what already has to say.
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  All right, I'm going to say it one more time because I I want
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  to hear myself too. Life will go on and they will
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  race with or without you. Had a friend of mine called me
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  yesterday. I'm not going to say his name
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  because I like him. And when we got off the phone, I
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  thought that'd be a good coffee with Kenny.
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  He said, well, we blew a motor. Looks like we're going to be out
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  for two weeks. And and although I really care
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  about him and I really like him, something overcome me and, and I
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  said nobody will miss you. And we both kind of laughed.
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  I, I, I know I'm going to repeat myself again.
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  Don't get mad at me, but I want to hear myself again one more
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  time. And then I will not repeat
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  myself again. He said to me, we blew a motor,
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  looks like we're going to be out a couple weeks.
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  I said nobody will miss you. And then we laughed about it.
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  We talked about it. I said, let me explain.
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  Competition will kill you, said. For example, I said I was going
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  to Cabo a week or so ago in my competition.
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  They were happy, they smiled, even though I might not win.
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  They got to battle me. So I'm I'm going to be in the
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  battleground. Competition's funny, especially
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  dirt racers, because usually around home here, you know,
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  there's a couple races that you can run on a Saturday.
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  You can run pevely or you can run highland.
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  So these dirt racers, if there was a true meaning of cherry
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  picking, you really can't cherry pick.
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  Well, since I was in Kabul, hell, they was happy to get rid
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  of my ass. Dirt racing is like that.
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  If you don't show up, they don't care.
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  Hell, they'd rather win. If there was only 10 cars there,
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  I won and we laughed about it. It's so true.
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  Now my face is going to get very serious at this time.
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  Another example, we lost Dale Senior.
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  Now this is a more serious one. And this one shocked me too.
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  This was a life lesson for me. Dale Senior lost his life on a
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  Sunday in the Daytona 500 on a Sunday.
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  And then we went Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday.
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  Four days went by and on that Friday we were on the track that
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  morning at Rockingham. So I learned a big lesson when
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  Dale Senior died. You know, you, you would think
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  that's the day the music would stop.
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  But no life goes on with or without you.
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  And they're going to race with or without you.
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  Now in the truck and trailer that night, going home, somebody
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  might go, what happened to so and so?
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  And they're like, oh, I don't know.
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  But in their heart of all hearts, they're happy to get rid
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  of your ass. I'll leave you with this,
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  everybody. And I will tell you the name of
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  this one, David Ift, my original crew chief back in 1989.
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  David's a legend. He's a he's a gold wrench crew
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  chief for Kel Yarborough. And I've told you his name a
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  couple times. But David, if David, if he's a,
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  he's a gangster and he taught me, he taught me a valuable
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  lesson when I was about 2223 years old, maybe 25, I think 25
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  about 1989 in 1989. David, if said race is a merry
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  go round, it will throw you off. You got to hang on.
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  So take a deep breath everybody. You aren't all what you think
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  you are and neither am I. Just when you think, well, I
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  hell, I'm not going well, guess what?
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  They don't care. They don't care.
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  I, I never think I'm anybody now I have fun.
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  I have fun, act a little silly times, but just because you're
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  not going to go, they don't care.
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  The sport is not going to stop, life is not going to stop.
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  Everything's going to go on with or without you.
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  So choose your decisions wisely. They don't care and that's life.
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  Have a great Friday, everybody.