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This Advice Saved My Life · Kenny Wallace Media

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  I want to say something that I remember you teaching me and I
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  want you to comment on it and you might not remember this but
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  it it helped me. It changed my life and you did
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  you don't know this but you saved my life as you know I was.
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  No, I mean this. I'm very serious when I say this
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  as you know I can't help it but I was born hyper the whole deal.
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  So I I'm at Dover and you and I are sitting on pit wall
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  1989199091 somewhere in there and you looked at me and you
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  said, do you plan on racing for a long time?
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  And I said yes. And you said Kenny, you got you
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  got to calm down. Now, you might not remember
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  that, but I remember it like yesterday and I was probably
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  venting to you that my car wasn't doing this.
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  Yeah, when I look back on that time, I look, first of all, I
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  look up to you because I think you're awesome and you're you're
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  you're a calm natured athlete. Where does that come from?
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  And when you told me that as you're thinking right now in
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  your head, where did you come? Where did you come from?
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  I mean, how did you grow up? Calm and I.
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  You know what I mean? My dad built Natural Bridge
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  Speedway in 67 your. Dad built that racetrack.
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  You did. They opened it in 67.
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  Whoa, whoa, whoa. This is a big story here now.
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  OK, keep going. And I would witness as a little
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  boy during the week, the phone ringing off the wall at the
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  house and people calling and just lambasted my dad, cussing
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  and raising them. My dad didn't, he didn't hardly
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  have a pot piss in either of those days, but he was able to
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  make things work. But I would listen to people
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  just lambasted all week long from you competitors, and it
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  still goes on today. Same deal.
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  And I would go to the racetrack as a little boy.
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  I'd watch guys down there. I mean, get in fights.
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  I mean, not playing, you know, not Mickey Mouse and I mean
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  fights. I'd watch all this stuff and
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  then when I started racing, I had to deal with that.
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  I had to deal with that same stuff myself.
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  And in the early days, it's kind of like Schrader told me one
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  time, he said he told the guy that was mad at him, let's sit
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  down and have a beer and drink, talk about it instead of fight.
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  You know, it's my fighter. Well, I, I, I came to that
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  conclusion a lot earlier in life because some stuff I went
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  through here locally early, you know, with with with
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  roughhousing or fighting and stuff that you learned.
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  You know what it really meant to get in a fight.
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  You know, you got in a fight. It was like you see now, it
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  wasn't that a fight then was a fight.
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  I mean, you're going to be. Punching you in the face.
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  And you're going to somebody's going to end up standing and
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  some guys not, right. And I witnessed that and a lot
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  and went through a little bit of it and, you know, over a period
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  of time. And I'll tell you something else
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  that happened, Kenny, in 1980, whatever we were at
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  Martinsville, I didn't have for the big double hitter.
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  You know, the modified. I didn't have radios, right.
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  I had wiring hardest, but I didn't have radios.
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  I just couldn't afford them. I went up to Richie Evans, the
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  great Richie Evans, the Dale Earnhardt Richard Petty of
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  Northeast Racing greatest it ever was.
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  I guess modified. I just went up to him introduce
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  myself. I said, Rich, you don't know me.
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  I said, but I'll drive it 22. Car was like in the Bush series
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  or whatever. It was like by.
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  I guess your Bush did. I don't have radios.
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  Would you rent me your radios after the race Sunday?
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  And we talked for a little bit. I think it took me back.
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  Anyhow, we end up making a deal, right?
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  So the race, his race is run. First it was over.
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  I go, we grab the radios, his crew guys radio out of his car.
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  I even use his helmet because the earpiece is made in the
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  helmet. I put his sweaty asshole helmet
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  on and run my. Oh gosh.
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  Yes, true story, true story. And the race is over.
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  We run the race. I take my stuff back to Richie.
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  I said. Richie here.
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  I appreciate it. I work, you know, so thankful
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  how much to owe you. And he looked at me, said Rick.
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  I don't know. I've never rented radios before.
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  I don't know what it's worth. I said, well, I'm not sure
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  either. I mean, I you just tell me and
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  I'll pay you because I finished that day so I had money, right?
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  And and we sit there and he, he didn't know what to do.
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  He finally said, you going to be here for the next race in the
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  spring or the fall, whatever it was.
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  I said, yeah, He said meet me at the Dutch in on Saturday night.
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  Buy me a beer. Let's call it even, right?
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  I'm like, it's like being to me. It felt like being anointed by
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  the Pope, you know? Yeah.
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  This is Richie Evans. Yeah, we go back for the next
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  race and I'm standing on Pit Rd. Then it modifies the proxy and
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  we're on the back stretch. And I'm just watching them
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  because we've been on the track yet.
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  And I watched Richie come out of Turn 2.
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  I watched him go in Turn three. I see he's left front wheel kick
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  out right, he locks up, he goes right into the wall.
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  Oh no, I know where you're. I know where you're going with
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  this. I'm so sorry.
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  And we lost Richie. The one part of that story I
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  forgot to tell you when we were sitting there that morning
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  before the race, I'm trying to joke with Richie a little bit.
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  I say, Richie, I said normally I'd bet on you to win this race
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  day because you always win every time I come down here, I said.
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  But my guy said they seen you being dragged out of the Dutch
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  Inn this morning, at 4:30 in the morning, right.
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  Richie was a partier, right? Richie loved to party.
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  My guys, of course they were up too.
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  They said. And I said I don't know if you
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  get drug out of the you were drug out of the.
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  That's in at 4:30 this morning. You would have mean from
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  partying. I don't think I'll bet on you
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  today. And he said something and I gave
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  him a little more. I think it irritated me.
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  Fine. Looked at me.
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  Let me tell you something, boy. He said.
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  You only hear a blink of an eye. He says work hard, treat people
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  right and be happy, right. I'm like, OK.
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  When he hit that wall, Kenny, I was sitting there and looking at
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  it and then when the rescue went there and I remember Andy Hall
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  come by me, said we lost Richie, right.
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  And I remember thinking work hard, treat people right and be
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  happy, right. And I I kind of, I kind of
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  accepted that monitor you might say.
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  And I it it changed how I started looking at things and
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  doing things right. It made me, I guess it made me
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  realize, you know there's a little bit bigger picture than
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  this lap. This last lap we just ran and
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  what the car is doing, which leads into your deal, right?
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  You know, you get so wrapped up in that moment of what you're
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  doing. You know, you're just like, I
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  mean, you know the deal, Kenny and NASCAR trying to get up
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  through where any any of this race would really down.
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  But yeah, I mean, you're like trying to put out the Hells of
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  fire, the fire of Hells with a squirt gun, you know what I
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  mean? And sometimes you need divine
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  adventure to help you. When you came to me with that,
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  right that day you were, you were.
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  And you brought this up to me before years ago.
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  Then that may remember back to it.
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  And then that's like that's how I'm still able to remember.
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  If you hadn't brought that up a few years ago, I probably forgot
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  about. But the deal was, Kenny, I was I
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  would help anybody do anything. But if, if, if there's somebody
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  I didn't really care for, you know, I didn't do, I didn't do
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  anything. Right.
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  You know, I'd be cordial dice. But you were one of those guys.
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  I mean, I watched you when you came in.
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  Oh, hell. Here's here's Rusty Wallace's
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  brother, right? Hell, he'll be like the rest of
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  these guys they had to fight with, right?
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  And it become apparent very soon that Rusty was making Kenny
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  Wallace earning this on his own. You know what I mean?
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  You. Can hear.
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  Myself Lame can help you get there little bit, but when
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  you're there, you better do your own deal, man, and your ass will
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  get kicked out. And I watched you and I was
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  around you and I was around Raquel Kim and I I you know
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  you're one of those guys that. And I'm better at this than I
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  used to be. I used to be pretty good at.
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  But I'm better now. I could I could.
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  I feel like I'm a good person. Good at judging people's heart.
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  I I go off of people's heart, right.
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  I don't give a damn what you say, what you do.
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  I want to see what your inner being is, right.
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  And you, you always come across me as one of those guys.
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  It's just good hearted son of a bitch, right?
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  And I see so many guys in your position.
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  I was in that position. I know exactly what you were
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  feeling and what you were going through.
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  And but I I I wanted you to succeed, right?
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  And in that moment when you were where you were at and you're so
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  encapsulated in that moment that you couldn't, you know, release
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  it enough to be able to make rational decisions and that
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  screws you up and racing man. If you don't, if you get that
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  I've seen guys ruin careers ruining, I can say names and you
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  don't too, of of getting in that mindset that it completely
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  screws them up and they can't think about the bigger picture
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  because all they're worried about is the last two races and
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  the cars doing this and I can't fix it, right.
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  Well, you got to get out of that a little bit, you know what I
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  mean? And that's where you were at
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  that point. And I was just trying to you
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  know, just make you see a light. It's it's different.
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  And you're not the only person that ever said that to something
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  like that. Do you?
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  But maybe not. But anyhow, that's the reason I
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  did that. So if I.
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  Didn't do it. I love you and I haven't told
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  anybody I love him yet on the 32 episodes that we've done, and
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  you saved my life that day.