Latest / Kenny Wallace Media / How To Kill Your Local Short Track

Transcript

How To Kill Your Local Short Track · Kenny Wallace Media

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Hello everyone and welcome back to Kenny.
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Conversation brought to you by Jags, the leader in high
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Well, you are looking at a dear friend of mine, family friend
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Gordy Gundaker. Gordy, how you doing?
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I'm great, Herman. I'm glad to be here.
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You know, just enjoy, try to enjoy the weather we got now,
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you know, finally we got some good weather, I guess today.
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But yeah, no, I'm doing good. Just staying busy.
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Well, Gordy's well here. First of all, here's my
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disclaimer. I use this a lot over the last
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couple years. The disclaimer is this.
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Gordy's mom and dad or Kevin and Tammy Gundaker and they own
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Tri-City Speedway in Granite City, IL Kevin Gundaker, his dad
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is basically family to the Wallace, you know, the whole
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Wallace family. His dad, Kevin actually worked
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on his race car in our shop years ago before he married
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Gordy's Mama, Tammy. So the Gundaker family is very
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close to the Wallace family. And before we get talking about
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something so controversial, I needed to make sure that
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everybody understood that. Gordy, I want to talk about you
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just for a little bit. You are a smart person.
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You're a college graduate. Where did you go to college?
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I went to Quincy University right there in Quincy, IL I went
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up there and played college baseball and got my business
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marketing degree while I was there.
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So I think I was focused a little more on the baseball.
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But I did do, did do good in school.
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You know, I, I enjoyed it and yeah, it was a great, great
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university. I loved everything about going
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to Quincy and I wouldn't wouldn't change it for the
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world. You're a really good baseball
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player, a great catcher. You and I love our Cardinals.
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I watch you on X, you know, give your two cents about the
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Cardinals. I admire you because, you know,
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listen, sometimes it's so, so redneck dirt racers.
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We can get labeled as not being very smart, but I just wanted to
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start to show out and tell everybody, you went to college,
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you're smart, you're a great athlete.
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You've got a lot of friends up in that area.
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Yeah, I've got a ton, you know, playing sports growing up, you
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obviously your teammates with a lot of guys.
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And, you know, when you go to a university like Quincy, you
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know, we had 50-60 guys on our roster, you know, each year.
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So, you know, you had guys leaving, guys coming back.
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So I would say between that time, you know, we had between
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probably 120 guys that I, you know, had relationships with
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that were friends and teammates of mine.
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And, you know, fortunate enough, a lot of them I became super
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close with. They're still great friends
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today. You know, guys that I've, you
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know, obviously been to their weddings or been in their
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weddings and, you know, now everybody's having kids, you
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know, I've met their kids and see everybody grow up, you know,
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so it's, it was, it's a really, it was a really cool time,
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honestly. And, and I just enjoyed playing
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ball up there. You know, it was a completely
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different relationship, I guess you'd say in camaraderie than it
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is in the racing world. Cause those guys you're with
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everyday, you know, you're in a constant grind of working out
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and going to practice and, and doing those things, but you
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become like brothers with a lot of them.
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And that's really what happened, you know, and, and so they kind
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of got to see the life I live because they didn't know what
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racing was, you know, so then I got to kind of teach them kind
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of what I did outside of baseball growing up.
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And you just learn about a lot of different aspects everybody's
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life. So it was, it was a really cool
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time and and yeah, I've got a ton of friends.
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I think that's one thing I don't lack by any means.
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I've got, you know, I've probably been in like 3 or four
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different walks of life. So I got friends in in all
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different places and from different areas.
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You're a very good race car driver.
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When I think about our time together, I think about the time
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that I believe you. You won the the race the the
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hell towards summer National race big race at Farmer City.
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Maybe on the last couple laps you took the lead from Shannon
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Babb on the inside. Maybe not Shannon, but then you
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also won the Herald review 102 times.
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Yeah, yeah, I want, I want it back-to-back.
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Yeah, I sure did. Yeah, 18 and 19.
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Yeah, so I I hope everybody understands the picture that I'm
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painting right now. Gordy's super smart.
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He's a good race car driver. His grandpa, the great Gordon
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Gundaker in the day was one of the largest Realtors, one of the
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most successful Realtors in the city or in the surrounding areas
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of Saint Louis, a Gundaker, a Gundaker Realtors, then later on
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Gundaker Better Homes and Gardens.
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Your Grandpa Gordon, a smart man.
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Yeah, You know, he kind of paved the way for our entire family,
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in all honesty. You know, I've got, we've got a
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huge family and they're all located here in Saint Louis.
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You know, I've got my dad's got four sisters.
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So, you know, I have 4 aunts, 4 uncles.
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We've got, I think total up now, I want to say our family, you
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know, between cousins and everything and grandkids is like
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38 or 40 somewhere now and in this area.
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And you know, grandpa truly laid the foundation for all of us.
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You know, he kind of laid it out there of what hard work looks
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like, you know what, you know, persevering through tough times
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and, and how to keep grinding through every every day.
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You know, you see that in him. I mean, he's 9090 years old and
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he still goes to work, which is unbelievable.
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You know, he just can't stop And, and it's great because I
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think, you know, like I said, you don't see that very much
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anymore. But in our family, hard work is
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just something that just comes natural because we've seen it
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our entire lives and, and everything that he has achieved
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and everything that he has, you know, become successful.
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And it's literally just because of how hard he works and what a
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smart person he is. And he'll be the first one to
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tell you that if he doesn't know what it is, he's not afraid to
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ask and listen and learn and and keep learning, you know, even to
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this day. So he does a Yeah.
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He's just an unbelievable man, you know, just super thankful to
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have a a grandfather like that. OK, let's get right to it.
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Now we're going to take just a little bit to talk about this
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yesterday. You're look at him right there.
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Gordy Gondaker made national news in the dirt racing world.
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So we have baseball world, football world, NASCAR world,
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dirt racing world. So in the dirt racing world,
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Gordy Gundaker made national news yesterday.
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He is smart and he eloquently wrote a long letter, punctuated,
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perfect, the dots in the right place, the commas, no
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misspelling, easy to read. And it was long.
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So Gordy, 20 years ago, your mom and dad created, rebuilt the
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Tri-City Speedway in Granite City, IL.
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It's a dirt track. They rebuilt it.
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It was a big half mile. You all rebuilt it.
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You made it a little bit smaller.
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You upgraded it. Millions of dollars in new
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concession stands. You know, the walls that go
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around the racetrack. So you know, millions of dollars
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spent in upgrading the old Tri-City Speedway in Granite
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City, IL You and your brother Trevor were born.
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You were born into a racing family, but yet Gundaker
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Realtors, so it it's safe to say y'all are pretty smart.
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You come from a a heritage of you know, land barons.
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You know, knowing how to your your aunt sold one of my
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properties. So tell me Charlie's going to
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put this letter up. The letter is going right now as
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we talk. Tell me the whole story and how
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you got to this letter yesterday.
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Well, I mean, kind of honestly, it started back really a few
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months ago. You know, this year for for us
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at Tri-City has been probably our worst year ever as far as
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getting races in here. We are sitting June 27th and
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we've had two races over at Tri-City, which is just
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unfathomable really to think about.
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But you know, you know why obviously at the beginning of
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the year I was looking at promoting my own race, had it
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all scheduled. I scheduled this race back in
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November, yadda, yadda, yadda. And, and I saw I had a lot of
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doubters. I felt like from the beginning,
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you know, on there just talking about how this was never going
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to work and we couldn't do these things, blah, blah, blah.
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And then you know what, we've gotten rained out now.
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Like I said, I think I don't even know how many times 8. 9
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every time. Yeah, it's been ridiculous and
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it's been ridiculous, you know, and as a when you're a promoter
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and racetrack owner, you know, it's a business.
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And that's the way that this all works is that we're we're who
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were there to to put on a show for fans and give people a place
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to race. But at the end of the day, it is
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still a business, you know, and and it's dollars and cents no
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matter what. And, you know, during some of
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these rain outs, every time you get on social media, it is just
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a constant bashing about. I can't believe they cancelled.
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Why would they cancel? They don't care anymore.
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They don't even want to have races.
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They they should just sell the racetrack, get new promoters in
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here. The Gundakers are terrible.
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And, you know, and I'm not one to get on social media and give
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two shits really at the end of the day about what people have
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to say because I know there's so many people out there just
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that's all they do. They live a negative lifestyle.
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So it doesn't bother me. And I always tell my mom, you
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know, she takes a lot of that more to heart than I do.
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She she'll get on there and read every comment on, on everything
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that she posts. And I always tell her just stay
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off of there because you're not going to read anything good.
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And, you know, after we, when I canceled my race, you know, it
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was a big two day deal. I took a lot of backlash about
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why I canceled early. You know, I canceled on Thursday
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when teams were getting ready to start traveling in from 1314
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hours away. And, you know, I'm staring at
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80% chance of rain. And I as a racer myself, I know
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better than to, you know, drive halfway across the country when
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it looks like rain. And, and, you know, as a
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promoter in that sense, what, well, you know, what kind of
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person and promoter would I be knowing that I'm staring at
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rain? And if we get it in, it's either
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going to be half a night or one night and I'm canceling this is
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it rain. So, you know, I, I see both
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sides of the fence where a lot of people don't.
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And, you know, then mom and dad cancel Thursday night or Tuesday
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night. I'm sorry for this week, for the
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summer Nationals. You know, we had gone over on
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Monday and watered the racetrack until the racetrack back up and
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did all the things we do to get prepped and we were getting
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ready to go back over there Tuesday night because it was
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98°. I think it was 108 heat next
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year Tuesday afternoon. Hottest day of the year?
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Yeah. And so we were going to go over
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there about 6:00 to go over there and and water and get the
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racetrack ready and grade in preparation for Wednesday.
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And dad was already over there and then and he calls me and
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says, hey, don't even bother coming over here.
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It is downpouring, you know, which obviously is just not what
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you want to hear. The rain.
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Came in early, it was supposed to be like a four hour rain and
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it shocked the whole community and it rained forever.
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Yep. And so I mean it just down
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poured. I mean I mean it to a torrential
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downpour. And it rained and rained and
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rained and, and by the end of Tuesday night, about 11:00, we
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were actually sitting on the couch watching the summer
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National Springfield race. You know, Sam had texted mom
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and, and said, Hey, you know, what are, what are you thinking
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here? And she said, listen, I just
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don't think it's possible with the amount of rain we got and
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what's coming. She said, I think it's probably
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best if we just cancel it now. So they put a press release out
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there at, I don't know, 10/30, 11:00 on, on Tuesday night about
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us canceling. And you know, you just get on
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there. Of course you get on.
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You see the post, you see the comments rack up in a hurry.
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And you know, the first couple comments I read about, you know,
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on their says, you know, typical gunned acres, you know, they
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should just sell the place because they don't care.
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And you know, why would you cancel this early?
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I think the one person said something like didn't even try
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to get the event and they could have at least waited to try to
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get the race in. Well, you know, so like I said,
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I don't really normally get on there and care too much, but I
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just honestly had enough of it. This this struck a nerve.
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So part of Kenny conversation is me asking questions.
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Why did this strike a nerve with you 'cause you know, you're,
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you're kind of, you know, you're like me, you're like Nick
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Hoffman. We don't care.
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We're tough guys, screw everybody.
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But why did this get your goat this time?
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You know, honestly, I just, I've just seen my parents kill
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themselves, you know, for 20 years over there.
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I watched them day in and day out for 20 years, do everything
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possible, you know, to give, to give guys a place to race and
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fans that go sit in the grandstands without nickel and
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diamond on them and overcharging and doing these things.
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And I mean, they absolutely kill themselves.
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You know, you know, most of the people that have seen my dad
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lately obviously saw that he got hip surgery.
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You know, a lot of people know that he was in a motorcycle
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wreck, you know, back in 2002 and, and he can't hardly get
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around. But I, I promise you right now,
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that man works harder than 99.9% of people in the country and
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will do anything he can to watch that racetrack succeed.
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And, and I've watched him days on end, no sleep.
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And, you know, I've watched mom do the same thing and I watch
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how distraught they get when they read some of this stuff,
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you know, and, and I try to stay out of the middle of it, but
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honestly, I just, I'd had enough, you know, you, you read
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some of this stuff and you watch people just kick your family
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down over and over again. And you finally, just, you, you
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get enough of it, You know, you don't want to deal with it
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anymore. And, and sometimes it's time for
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a reality check to these people. You know, I, I don't think, I
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don't even know if it's their fault, You know, that, that,
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that they don't understand the negative energy they're pushing
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towards people on social media. I, I think they're dumb.
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I'm, I'm aggressive with my verbiage.
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I think people are dumb. I don't think they got proper
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schooling. I, I think they've always worked
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for people. I've always, I've always, you
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know, I, I'm controversial because I just say it, you know,
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you know, there, there's a, there's a word called ignorant
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in, in the word ignorant sounds horrible, but but some smart
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people use the word they say real nice.
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You're ignorant. Oh my God, that's horrible.
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But ignorant means you don't have a clue in the smart ass
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world. These people are ignorant.
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They're dumb and but they're piercing with their verbiage.
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Their their spelling is usually off.
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They can't spell and they're horrible.
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They're horrible humans. Well, and that's I think the
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part that, you know, you try to stay away from getting on there
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to arguing with these people or, or even giving them their 5
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minutes of fame and, and letting them get at you.
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But you know, it's a when it's a constant every week.
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It's something you know, and, and you're exactly right.
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You know, I talked to a friend of mine yesterday and he his
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exact words that he says that was these people are uneducated.
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You know, they don't, they're in exactly your words.
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They're dumb, you know, and that's why even on my post I
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talked about calling these people idiots because at the end
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of the day, that's what they are.
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Because it's like you don't know what you have till it's gone,
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right? You know, these people sit here
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and bash you and bash you and bash you.
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And then the minute you sell the racetrack or the minute you say,
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hey, we're done, we're closing the doors and we sell it to a
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concrete plant and it's no longer a racetrack.
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Well, now you're the bad person for selling the racetrack and
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you didn't care all along when you're really it was those
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people that ran you out. So, yeah, just, yeah, I, I just,
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I've had enough of it, you know, and and these people need to
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kind of understand that that what they say carries a little
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bit of weight. It doesn't make me lose any
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sleep at night. I slept great last night.
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So that didn't happen, you know, But at the same time, it just,
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you know, these, I wish that they could come put themselves
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in our shoes for a week, a month, a year.
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You know, I mean, when you sit here and lose races like this
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over and over again, I just got, I guess people don't understand,
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you know, this is what my parents do for a living.
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You know, this is a business. And when the racetrack doesn't
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race, we're not making, you know, there's no money being
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made there, you know, So I've watched them pour every dollar
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they've ever had into this place, right?
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You know, we upgraded the racetrack, the concession
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stands, the pit area, the lighting, you know, I mean, I, I
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can't tell you how much it has been put in there.
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I mean, let alone the fact that we bought the bowling alley to
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put a quarter minute track on that land to let the younger
17:16
kids race out there. And, and there's plenty of
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appreciative people out there though, right?
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But it's not the paths on the backs that that you really
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remember. It's the people that are sour at
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you constantly, right? That's what really gets to you.
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So, you know, I just wanted to kind of lay it out there for a
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lot of people that don't get it. They just flat out don't get it
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kind of what what their their words kind of carry.
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And at the end of the day, we will still drive on no matter
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what. My mom and dad will never just
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quit because somebody says something that I think if if you
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know my parents, that's the way they are and that's they've
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instilled that and me and Trevor and it's the same thing.
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We're never going to quit working.
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But at the same time, you just don't want to keep hearing it
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over and over again because there's too many race tracks
18:01
being lost, too many promoters getting out of it because they
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just don't want to deal with the bullshit anymore.
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Just flat out they just don't. Because every week it's
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something else. It's, it's, you know, you just,
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you can never win with, with a lot of these people, you know,
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and, and like I said, 95% of the, the racing community is not
18:20
that group, but that 5% surely tries to ruin it for everybody
18:24
else. So we're going to get to the the
18:29
phenomenon of the social media. But before we do that, the last
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thing I want to ask you is do you see yourself, your dad, the
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great Kevin Gundaker, dirt late model Hall of Famer Kevin
18:46
Gundaker down there in Florence, KY.
18:49
He's a great racer. Your dad's got to be 70 now.
18:53
He'll be, Yeah, he'll be 70 next year.
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He's 69 right now. Do you see yourself taking over
19:00
Tri-City Speedway or, or what do you think?
19:03
You know, it's, it's funny because if you would ask me this
19:06
last year, I would have said no, just flat out.
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And, you know, after, after last year, you know, obviously I had
19:14
my little girl and, and we kind of moved back home in a sense of
19:18
not racing the Outlaws and, and changed up our schedule a little
19:22
bit. You know, I got to be able to
19:24
spend some more time with mom and dad here at the racetrack
19:27
and obviously was promoting my own event.
19:29
And that was the topic of conversation here probably two
19:32
or three months ago kind of about what the plans for next
19:36
year. Look, and, and I, I pretty much
19:38
told mom and dad, I said, I, I really think I'd want to be a
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part of this, you know, and, and kind of, you know, maybe not so
19:45
much take over, but be a, play a big role in, in working together
19:51
with them. You know, my mom does a great
19:53
job up front running the business, taking care of the
19:56
concession stands, all those things.
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So I don't think I could ever do without her.
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But I do think that, you know, I, I do think that I would love
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to, to promote, you know, I've, I've been very fortunate to
20:06
travel to a lot of race tracks across the country and meet a
20:09
lot of. Great promoters like the
20:10
Kasiski's and, and Matt Curl, everybody up there at Eldora and
20:15
Larry Booze and, and guys that just do a great job, you know,
20:20
across the board. And, and to me, I think it's
20:24
going to take someone like me in my shoes that's got a real
20:28
passion and love for the sport to to make it grow and, and
20:32
continue on a path that we want it to be on and not let it just
20:36
trickle down. Just like I think Kyle and Brad
20:39
are doing there with high limit. You know, it it they took two
20:42
racers to put it put that together, you know, and there's
20:45
a lot of drama around that. Was it good?
20:47
Was it bad? I don't know, but it was packed
20:49
at Lake Ozark Speedway last night.
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So they're not doing anything too bad.
20:52
So I think I would love to, you know, and I've, I've had real
20:56
conversations with mom about it. And, you know, I think moving
21:00
forward, that's that's kind of a plan.
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You know, it's kind of see where it goes and to keep promoting
21:06
some and, you know, Trevor wants to be a part of helping out over
21:09
there. So I've been fortunate as I've
21:12
done this. I've had some people kind of
21:14
reach out and say they're willing to help, you know, and
21:16
Aaron Draghi, who has helped me do the racetrack over there
21:20
since April, has pretty much said he was willing to help me
21:23
anytime I needed his help. And, and he's been over there
21:26
every day. We're working on the racetrack
21:28
and I, you know, can't be more thankful for a guy like that.
21:30
But you know, just, you know, I, I think as I've grown a little
21:35
bit over the last few years, I think this is something I've,
21:37
I've really grown a passion for and, and definitely want to kind
21:42
of go for here in the near future.
21:44
OK, excellent. I think we've kind of laid the
21:48
ground work out. We've talked about your
21:50
education, where you come from the racetrack.
21:56
What I want to move into now is I talked to what I think is one
22:00
of the greatest promoters of all time, Bob Sargent.
22:04
I told Bob, I said, Bob, you're not a flashy promoter.
22:08
You don't pay very well, but you're consistent.
22:11
You, you saved Terre Haute, you saved Milwaukee.
22:15
Bob Sargent is known for stadium race tracks, but he's also known
22:21
for making money and keeping race tracks going.
22:26
One thing Bob said when I talked to him on Kenny Conversation was
22:31
that social media, now this is specific right here, social
22:37
media is killing local short tracks.
22:42
Now hold on, social media is not killing the race at Eldora.
22:47
It's not killing the world finals, but social media is
22:52
killing the local Saturday night short track because it becomes
22:58
like Peyton Place. You know, if you're outside of a
23:01
restaurant long enough, don't go on there.
23:03
The food's bad or you know. So with that being said, we are
23:10
in a new phenomenon now. We are in a new era where I, I
23:15
don't, I don't believe God had us Born This Way, but the
23:20
phenomenon of the, the feel good of the, the negativity.
23:24
I hate them. I'm going to sit home tonight
23:27
watching on TV and talk shit about that race track.
23:31
It makes them feel so good. It's a, it's a, it's a euphoria.
23:37
So here we are now. It's the way it is.
23:41
We can't change it. But because of what you went
23:45
through yesterday, I thought, you know what?
23:46
I just wonder if I ought to put a headline on all my social
23:50
media. You cuss me, you're gone.
23:54
I don't mind debating, I don't mind being wrong but the way
23:59
they MF you and your track and talk so degradable to you.
24:05
My question is where are we at in the era of local short track
24:09
negativity and social media bashing?
24:12
Bashing for the local short tracks.
24:16
It said an all time high, you know, people will be sitting in
24:19
your grandstands bashing you, you know, and I think the
24:23
problem with social media, right, is that you can hide
24:27
behind a computer screen. You can hide behind your what
24:31
you're typing out here on on social media and do all those
24:35
things without having to face what is reality, right?
24:37
Like if, like me and you, right, if we had something to say to
24:41
somebody, we'll just flat out say it.
24:43
But somebody like that, they don't have to.
24:45
They can get on social media and hide behind a page or whatever
24:48
they want to do. They can make a fake account,
24:50
they can make a fake name. They can do literally whatever
24:52
they want. And the problem with that is at
24:55
the end of the day is that people read all those things,
24:58
right? So if you get on there and just
25:00
constantly bash somebody on their posts and say what a
25:04
terrible place this is, or they did this or they did that,
25:08
you're running people off. And that's the reason why in the
25:10
Saint Louis area, we don't have local racing anymore, right?
25:13
That's why we don't have it at Tri-City Speedway.
25:16
Stop right there. OK, I wanted to point this out.
25:20
All short tracks are closing it. It's a whore, you know.
25:24
Listen, everybody says El Doral World Finals.
25:27
All this is all good. But nobody, nobody debates what
25:32
we're going to say right now. We've lost Lake Hill, Speedway,
25:35
Valley Park, MO. We've lost Saint Charles.
25:38
We've lost Godfrey. We've lost Belleville, we've
25:42
lost four race tracks in our era.
25:44
Your race track has gone to, you know, specials only.
25:49
Brownstown is specials only. Lincoln, IL is specials only,
25:54
Jacksonville specials only. There's a few here and there.
25:58
I hear that it now straighten me out and respond right here,
26:01
everybody. I hear Montpelier IN Gas City.
26:05
I'm hearing all these tracks. I see a post yesterday from
26:09
Kankakee Gordon. We are.
26:13
Do you think local short tracks are all but gone?
26:16
They're just Bob, Sargent says. They're nose diving in a hurry.
26:20
Oh, they are. I mean, it's, it's obvious.
26:22
You know, it's a it sucks because that's really why doing
26:27
your own. That's why our sport thrives,
26:29
right? When our sport was was killing
26:32
it in the 90s, in the 2000s, it's because every night you
26:36
went on, every Friday and Saturday, when you went to
26:38
Pevely, you went to Godfrey, you went to Tri-City.
26:41
The grandstands were full, right?
26:43
People were dying to get to the racetrack.
26:46
Now that is not the case, you know, and the era of social
26:51
media has has caused that, you know, and I don't know, I don't
26:56
know if there's ever a way to save it.
26:57
Right, right. I wish, I wish we could go back
27:00
maybe 10 years and we could probably save it.
27:02
I don't think saving it now is, is a real possibility.
27:05
The only way it's going to get saved, I guess in a sense is
27:08
that every other race track is going to close down.
27:10
You're going to have two, right? That, that could probably be
27:13
about the only reason that you could get local racing back
27:16
because you'd have nowhere else to go.
27:18
But by then, I think everybody's going to be run off from the
27:21
sport anyways because you're you're running out of promoters
27:24
who are willing to deal with the constant day-to-day bullshit and
27:27
having to pay out all this stuff when they they're not getting
27:30
support from the fans who are in the stands.
27:32
Right. So I don't think it's the
27:34
racers. I think racers do bitch and they
27:37
they moan and and that's part of what comes with it.
27:40
But the racers still show up. You know, we might complain one
27:43
week about how it was rubbered and we burn up all these tires
27:46
and then we're still just dumb enough that we go back the next
27:49
week anyway, so it doesn't really matter, right?
27:50
The racers aren't going anywhere.
27:53
I want to say this, the fan watching right now is going to
27:57
say, yeah, but you deserve the ass chewing because of this.
28:00
Because of that. I want to explain to all the
28:02
fans that's not what we're talking about.
28:04
What we're talking about race fans, is the race tracks are
28:07
closing. They're already shut down.
28:10
So you lose on that debate with me and Gordy.
28:14
They're already shut down. So see what I mean?
28:18
Yeah, I mean, you know, do you, do you see Tri-City just
28:22
specials from now on the will you ever go back to local racing
28:26
or try it? I you know, I'm not so sure that
28:29
I wouldn't say we wouldn't try it because it's something and I
28:31
would, if there was a way to visit it and make it work that I
28:35
would absolutely love to because that's that's where the racers
28:38
are right? Every you know, you listen to
28:41
all the great adages. Where do racers come from?
28:43
They come from the street stocks and in the the modified ranks,
28:47
and that's where they start. Well, when you don't have local
28:50
racing to go do that at well, where are they going to come
28:52
from? Right?
28:53
We're going to, they're going to come from asphalt and go karts
28:56
and that's going to be about it and they're going to run legends
28:59
cars and that's right. That's that's not what we want,
29:02
right? You're it's tough to it's tough
29:06
to grow those guys when they don't have places to race.
29:09
So I'm not saying we won't ever go back to that, but there's
29:14
going to have to be AI guess a test run or a trial and error
29:18
type deal on how do we get people back in the grandstands
29:21
on a constant basis. And you know it.
29:25
I think I would love nothing more than to have a Friday night
29:29
that's got five classes of four cylinders and St. stocks and
29:33
sportsman's and B mods and a mods and late right, right,
29:37
where you where everybody shows up and and those things and and
29:41
there's a whole another topic that we can get into on that
29:43
side that, you know, that changes some of that.
29:45
And it even comes back to the racers a little bit right of
29:48
everything now, even on the late model side has turned into such
29:52
a a business, right, and it and it's you know, you used what
29:55
used to happen. I remember when I was 5678 years
29:59
old and we would race at Peeveley on Saturday night with
30:01
dad and at 3:00 in the morning you would look in the pit area
30:05
and the pit area was full. There was haulers, not haulers,
30:09
there wasn't haulers. There was open trailers and a 28
30:13
foot enclosed trailers and everybody would park together.
30:16
You know, we might be parked down at the end with our rig
30:19
next to Ed Dixon and a couple other guys and guys would pull
30:23
their trailers down to park next to us after the night was over
30:26
to hang out and, and guys would be drinking and, and bullshit
30:30
and then carrying on till 3-4 in the morning.
30:32
You know, I don't know how many times we left that place when
30:34
the sun was up. And those are the days I
30:37
remember, right? And, and I know the times have
30:39
changed and things are very different, but at the same time,
30:43
that's when local racing was at its best.
30:46
How do we get back to that? I don't know.
30:48
There's there's got to be some solution and I would love to get
30:53
back to it. I would think that we can get
30:55
back to it. You know, the B modified class
30:58
is is doing is doing fine. You know, they've got plenty of
31:01
racers. So but there has to be some kind
31:05
of, you know, give and take at some point to get that back.
31:09
And I would think that we'll probably visit that at some
31:13
point because this rate, we're just going to keep losing race
31:16
tracks if we don't bring them back, right?
31:18
Because those are the racers that keep the race tracks alive,
31:21
you know, without the big races. So man, I, I hope so because I
31:25
don't want this sport to go anywhere and I don't want to see
31:28
it die out. I don't want to see any more
31:29
race tracks die out. But, you know, unfortunately,
31:33
the way that everything is trending, that's going to keep
31:36
happening until something changes, whether it be on social
31:40
media or, you know, whether it be with the race tracks and the
31:43
fans that go to the races. So there's, there's got to be a
31:47
common ground. We just got to find it.
31:50
All right, everybody, you heard it.
31:51
Let let's let's wrap this up. The local short tracks are
31:55
dying. Soon you won't be able to go to
31:57
your local short track. We could have six races a year.
32:01
There's a small percentage of you out there that had destroyed
32:05
it through social media, you know, beating people down to
32:09
where they're like, you know, it's not worth it anymore.
32:11
As far as the argument, well, they got to be strong.
32:13
They got to take the ass chewin. It ain't worth it.
32:16
They can, they can go sell homes for that.
32:19
The only reason people on these local short tracks is because
32:23
for the love of the sport, same as you don't have to go to the
32:26
racetrack. So it's a sad time right now.
32:28
Everybody respond right here. Explain why all the tracks in
32:34
America, all of them, explain why they're all shutting down.
32:38
And by the way, respond right here on what track has shut
32:42
down? It's in the hundreds now.
32:44
We lost Chattanooga, we lost Boyd Speedway down there in
32:47
Chattanooga. All the big ones are shutting
32:49
down. Local short track racing is dead
32:52
and gone. It's official.
32:54
They might run every other week here and there.
32:56
But Gordy, listen, thank you so much for being on the show.
33:01
I'll, I appreciate you having me, Herman.
33:03
I really do. I love you to death and I, I was
33:06
pumped whenever you called and and asked me to do this.
33:09
You know, there's no more that I love than than sitting here and
33:12
and talking with you. Like we said before, we could do
33:14
this for full on hours no issue. Well, my strategy at the end
33:18
there was to tell, you know, be very indignant.
33:21
And my strategy just now was everything's closed,
33:24
everything's horrible. So let's see how the fans
33:26
respond now and all. Like I said, all your tracks are
33:30
shutting down and you might have a couple open now.
33:32
So that's a smart ass statement right there, but it's true.
33:36
And listen everybody, we are in podcast form.
33:40
You can listen to Gordy Gundaker on the way to work and you can
33:45
listen to him on the way back home until the next Kenny
33:48
conversation. We'll see you next time.