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Shop Beers Volume 1: Mechanical Failures Anoymous · Pushin' the Cushion

• Slim Pushins: Hey everybody, welcome to a special edition of Pushing the Cushion, Shot Beers. As always, my co-host, guy that sleeps in his fire suit every night, Corby Sherb. Corby Scherb: It's the last thing I'll ever do. Jim Gardner: you Slim Pushins: And as always, the guy that keeps us in line, Uncle Jim Gardner. Corby Scherb: I jump gym. Jim Gardner: happening. Slim Pushins: So what is shot beers, Corby? What's the point of this? Corby Scherb: First off, I want to apologize publicly to everyone who's been on the show. It seems like there's some bad Juju following people that have been on here. I don't want to say that it's the show, but it's been tough. Rigors is running good, had some issues. Riders been upside down, broke power steering line. Poor Jeb couldn't figure out. Thought they had a mag problem. Turns out it was something deeper than that. Slim Pushins: Anything. Corby Scherb: So, sorry if we did that. We'll bless the show with some holy water or something. Yeah, Jimmy, same. Yeah. Jim Gardner: I didn't have breaks and crashed and D D bricks crashed into me. They they're big supporters. ⁓ I haven't looked up wilds results, but he probably crashed and broke, ⁓ Corby Scherb: There you know, he didn't do good, for sure. We'll get some holy water and like sprinkle it on it or something. Slim Pushins: Just so everybody, just so everybody knows, this is the latest concoction that Corby's come up with. Corby tries to cut, he tries to quit the podcast twice a week, every single week for outlandish ideas that it cuts into his workout time or his full body shave time. ⁓ So here we are. That's the elephant in the room that Jim Gardner: Yeah. Corby Scherb: I believe in that stuff. If I went up to Roderick LaPlante and said something to him and he went out there and crashed, I would never say that same thing ever again. Ever. If I did that, it's the same concept with Carson Bolden or John or anyone that I know. If I said anything, I don't even care if I'm cussing you out, I would never say that to you ever again. Slim Pushins: Well, it's not. Well. Well, but this one directly impacts the podcast. He's trying to quit this thing and now he thinks he's found an angle. Jim Gardner: There has been a common denominator. Everybody's been... Yeah. Corby Scherb: This is it. This is it. So if anything else happens, I'm out of there. Slim Pushins: I don't know. I think that's BS. I think. Corby Scherb: It's tough man, you don't want to do these on Tuesday nights and I have a little... It's super tough. Slim Pushins: Tuesday real tough. When would you? What would be a better time for for what would Corby's time be? Get ready Jim grab a pen. Corby Scherb: Let's see, let's break down the week. ⁓ Monday, work, work out, Brooklyn has practice. Tuesday, work, work out, shit shower, shave. Wednesday, Slim Pushins: There you go. Corby Scherb: It's tough because ⁓ some Wednesdays, every other Wednesday I have Brooklyn. Thursdays, ⁓ Brooklyn, I have Brooklyn HTS practice. Fridays are tough because sometimes we're at the races or whatever. Saturdays are tough. It's hard, yeah, it's hard to get someone on on Saturdays. Sundays are really tough. know, Sundays are a very important day of the week. Gotta get laundry done. Slim Pushins: Well, not this weekend we weren't, but. Jim Gardner: Yeah. You got golf in the morning with your new friends. Slim Pushins: Golf with his golf buddies. Corby Scherb: Gotta get groceries done. Jim Gardner: And it takes you extra long because of the 20 extra shots you have to take. Slim Pushins: You know, Jim, what he fails to realize is that ⁓ for six, five, six years for me, a little bit longer for you, we had all of those same things going on during the week, but because he was racing all of a sudden, all of a sudden, four nights a week in the shop and Saturday night at the track Sunday washing. Yeah. Jim Gardner: found time yeah yeah I remember that made sense night so let's talk about mornings you know how many times he called me at 10 o'clock hey man I gotta put it I gotta put a different engine in this thing in the morning can you be here I guess Slim Pushins: This thing won't start. Corby Scherb: We did it off of Wesley's whatever he had the crane on the trailer. Jim Gardner: I had to revolve around the Wesley's pump service schedule to see when he was going to be in Wise County. Slim Pushins: Ha Corby Scherb: My dad, he was so proud of the floor. We couldn't bring the cherry picker into the new shop. Once we built that, it was almost better to go to the old shop and just deal with it. was saying, I'll be a silver spoon kid right now. Working in the old shop, man, it was brutal midsummer. It was. Jim Gardner: Yeah It was hot. It was hot. And when I first started going over there, was, you know, four cars in a shop built for two and, ⁓ moving stuff in and out. Corby Scherb: Yeah. Plus all the fence work and the gates were being built. Half the time, one car sat in the trailer that sat in front of the shop the whole time. It was brutal. It made you want it. Jim Gardner: Yeah, they tested our patience. ⁓ you know, but we had a, we had a great 11th place run the night before, you know, so we're. Slim Pushins: Well, back to the point of the story is. Corby Scherb: Yeah Slim Pushins: We're taking an hour and half out of Corby's entire seven day week and he's ready to quit the podcast. Corby Scherb: It's hard man, I'm just a very scheduled person. Just a really scheduled person, I can't help that. Slim Pushins: I don't understand, we've been doing this six weeks now. Why is Tuesday nights? Corby Scherb: just hasn't fallen into the schedule yet. It's just not there. It's not home yet. Slim Pushins: What has to happen? Jim Gardner: Alright. Corby Scherb: I'm not sure. I'm not sure. Slim Pushins: Is there a committee meeting? Is there like an HOA that we need to meet with? Corby Scherb: I can talk to Brooklyn, see what Brooklyn says. Slim Pushins: No, because if it doesn't if it does involve, you know sour candy or ice cream ⁓ Yeah, well, you know when we recorded that first ⁓ episode here she was she was here in the official Rutherford team studio and She was so good Bored got bored but good Corby Scherb: or just her being here, period. Jim Gardner: you Corby Scherb: See you again. She actually, supposedly she's watched every episode. She waits for it to come out. ⁓ yeah. Slim Pushins: Really? I'm sure she... She's... So she's one of the ten? My parents are two, Brooklyn's three, there's four. So we've got about five random people. Okay, so now we're up to get... We're getting close to ten. Jim Gardner: We appreciate the support, Brooklyn. Thank you. Corby Scherb: Yeah, thanks sister. Yeah, one of the ten. Jim Gardner: Yeah, my wife. Ha My parents, ⁓ don't wa don't watch. Like my mom's like, hell, how's that little thing you're doing with Kerbo and Corby? And I was like, you haven't been watching and she's, she's no, she's got, she's got Fox news to watch. Yeah. Slim Pushins: How's that new things you've been doing with your little friends? Corby Scherb: Man, these are the times, and honestly, this is the first time I've said it in air, my mom passed away November 22, and I promise you, my mom would be, she would stay up to see if Jim posted it at midnight, just so she could be the first person to watch it. Jim Gardner: Probably. Yeah. Well, I, I in passing with my mom, I was just like, yeah, we're trying to do some different stuff, you know, um, you know, so we can get more engagement because, know, engagement is a snowball. And so now if you notice, like, she's the first to comment on everything that we put up. So she's, she's locked in, actually listening and caring about what we say. No, but, uh, Corby Scherb: She was a trip. Slim Pushins: ⁓ yeah. Corby Scherb: It's way too long, way too much, way too much information. Jim Gardner: Anyway. Slim Pushins: Brother-in-law is dying to be on the podcast. wants to do, ⁓ he somehow wants to turn this into a ⁓ racing, no, a racing movie top, he wants to do a ranking. But when he, well, when he came at gym with number two on his ranking being the Pixar movie Cars, I was out on that deal. Jim Gardner: Thank Corby Scherb: a bachelor recap, that'd be the bachelor party. We probably could. Jim Gardner: Matt? No, no, that's not what I had an issue with. ⁓ I think it was maybe Talladega Nights being up above some good classics and that Rush wasn't on the list of 10, which is, just nullified his opinion of anything. I don't care if he studied film in college or not. Rush is in the top 10. Slim Pushins: Casablanca. Well, then The Fast and the Furious is not a racing movie, so... Corby Scherb: See ya! Y'all can talk crap while you want. was a movie that came out. was ⁓ on a Sunday. had to be late 70s, late 70s of a motorcycle racin'. In this movie, if you raced flat track motorcycles, you knew every line of this movie. You watched everything about it. And it was soup. No. So they, like they wore, it's On Any Sunday. They made one, two, and three. And revised. On Any Sunday, that's what it was called, yeah. No, On Any Sunday. Slim Pushins: Great. Thank Jim Gardner: but you can't even come up with a title. Slim Pushins: Yeah, great story. Jim Gardner: I you were saying like it was on AMC every Sunday. Slim Pushins: ⁓ that's the name of it? like Bravo any Sunday. Corby Scherb: They had like helmet camps these people wore they said they'd have to wear like a neck brace after it was over because the helmet the helmet camera was so So big that was cool. That was like the greatest movie there ever was I to this day can probably turn it on and watch the whole thing Jim Gardner: Yeah, it's like Steve McQueen's movie Grand Prix where they just had this huge, you know, TV monitor looking camera or guys actually riding like the engine compartment of the car holding the camera to get some of those shots back in the day. They were they were manlier men than we are. Corby Scherb: So. Steve McQueen was in on it on Sunday. Slim Pushins: buzzing Corby Scherb: Oh yeah, for sure. Yeah, they talked about like Baja 1000 in that movie. It was a cool movie. It was informational, but... Jim Gardner: Okay, we'll check it out. It's good offseason content. Everybody's in this in this video 10 minutes in like what the hell are these guys talking about? Slim Pushins: I'm not, I'm not checking it out. I'm not interested. Alright, so, collectively there was zero push in the cushion representation at KSP or any other racetrack for that matter this weekend. ⁓ Corby Scherb: For sure. Jim Gardner: Guilty. I was working on cars at least. Slim Pushins: ⁓ Speaking of that, Jim, how's your thumb? Jim Gardner: It hurts. really hurts. I sliced it open, cutting some push lock fittings off some old hoses, trying to plumb baits his car here and, uh, stick, caught, uh, no, band-aids ever. Um, no, you, so I, have a, like a little band-aid first aid kit in my toolbox that I take because I'm a responsible father and husband and friend. Slim Pushins: and that you went with Band-Aid brand. Corby Scherb: I'll just let it go. Slim Pushins: No, it didn't let it go, it gets better. Jim Gardner: But I don't use Band-Aids. just they're not I don't I don't do Band-Aids. I don't do umbrellas. And I and it's starting to show, but I don't do diet anything. ⁓ It just doesn't make it. It's starting to show a little bit, but, I just I don't you know, if you're walking around with a diet coke like look. Slim Pushins: Yeah, I quit that back in the 70s. Jim Gardner: Coke's bad for you. Diet Coke's also bad for you. Don't act like you're being healthy and having it. so. Corby Scherb: I won't even, I won't even, I won't even chime in on that stuff. I'll just... Slim Pushins: Well, one of them's gonna give you diabetes, the other one's gonna give you cancer, so pick your poison. Jim Gardner: Yeah, exactly. You know, and so this all kind of started when I was teaching back in Cincinnati. You know, I was 22 years old teaching high schoolers, physics and math, and I had like this homeroom of 15 year old kids. Like every, I don't know, month, six weeks or so we had like this homeroom, you know, time for 20 minutes on a Friday. And so I started teaching the kids like how to be a man and. ⁓ you know, no band-aids and, know, I would teach him, like we went out to my crappy Ford Ranger out in the parking lot and I made them like learn how to change a tire. ⁓ how to tie a tie. Yeah, it was homeroom stuff. So we were just around like hanging out for 20 minutes. There was nothing, there was no structure. And so, you know, I was, you know, I have 15 to 18 year old boys who, you know, Need to have some life skills. So was like, look, come on, we're to go change a tire. Slim Pushins: You fit that into the curriculum? Corby Scherb: Probably the most knowledge, yeah. Jim Gardner: Here's how you read a tape measure, how to tie a tie, how to pack a cooler properly, which paid off in my college years and ⁓ how to jumpstart a car, how to break up a fight. ⁓ There's definitely, there's a procedure for breaking up a fight, Kerbo. You have to have a plan. Everybody knows this. Slim Pushins: What? Corby Scherb: That's interesting. Yeah, hold on before we even get any deeper into this, I'm gonna say this. I am really concerned on how often I was taught how to put out a fire that was on my body and I haven't been on fire yet. Not yet. Slim Pushins: Yeah, just, just let him. Jim Gardner: This is like being a little kid and be really concerned about quicksand and thinking I'm gonna be involved in quicksand all the time. Yeah I've yet to see it Slim Pushins: You just feel like that was just wasted. Corby Scherb: Yeah, for sure. Slim Pushins: Quicksand. I'm 47 years old. I've never seen Quicksand in my life and I cannot wait to the day. Corby Scherb: Now I probably the Jim Gardner: Exactly. I have spent all that time worrying about my taxes. Slim Pushins: Man, I hadn't thought about quicksand in 30 years. Corby Scherb: Yeah. Now about the only, I'm glad that you said you did something like that, about the only thing that I've learned in high school that I still use to this day was Mr. Elmore and teaching me how to weld, the welding class. Jim Gardner: So the school I taught at was a little private college prep school. They didn't have shop class or anything actually useful. It was all like how to get into Yale and teaching them calculus. there was just very little, there was no body shop, welding shop. know, they had like an art department for the play and all that sort of stuff. But so I took my 15 kids and I was like, Hey, let's. Slim Pushins: You Corby Scherb: Yeah. Jim Gardner: Let's teach some life skills here. And, uh, anyway, well, yeah, no band-aids. So you can't, I can't practice what I preach. Like some kid needed a band, you know, had a little cut on his arm. He's like, I need to go to the nurse and get a band-aid. I was like, no, don't don't use band-aids. Band-aids suck. Slim Pushins: So. So. Jim sent me a picture of his homemade band-aid and if he doesn't post it on the Pushin' the Cushion Facebook page within three hours of posting the podcast, I'm gonna post it. But it needs to be seen. Jim Gardner: Yeah, mandate. Corby's seen it. It's it's a blue shop rag wrapped in electrical tape a mandate you have to stop the bleeding. I'm not Slim Pushins: ⁓ we've all seen it. Corby Scherb: Yeah, that's it. And electrical tape is the, well electrical tape's the move because it's gonna stretch and still be flexible. Duct tape's kinda tough because duct tape's like, it's kinda rigid, so. Jim Gardner: Correct. And it's going to leave a lot of residue. It's too sticky. Yeah. We were at the devil's bowl. Who crashed at devil's bowl in like a heat race or a bee or something. And we swapped one around and I cut the ever living out of my finger. Corby one night. It was Lucas. Was it Lucas got run over down there and turned one and two. Corby Scherb: Yeah, you gotta know the difference. Slim Pushins: Well... Corby Scherb: I think it was me. ⁓ it was. Yes, it was. Yes, yes, absolutely, Modo. You're right. Yes. Yep. Slim Pushins: Ha ha ha. Jim Gardner: Yeah, in a B main or something like that. And then he ended up getting through and we had to thrash around wings and stuff. And I split my finger open just terribly. Blue duct tape. Slim Pushins: Corby, I just texted you the picture ⁓ of his thumb. Corby Scherb: I've probably seen him in real life though. Slim Pushins: It's yellow. Like everything else Jim does in life, it can't be normal. Corby Scherb: No, that's Jim's, tire... Jim Gardner: No, no, it's not. It's not my wheel tape. It's, it's the six pack of electrical tape from Harbor freight, but I get those because like, uh, I use the green to wrap my fuel jug for diesel. Um, because I got that heater for my shop that takes diesel and I don't need to have my dad put it in the lawnmower or in my, in my four wheeler, the, you know, the rhino, the rhino has got enough issues. It barely runs to begin with. Corby Scherb: Gotcha. Slim Pushins: What do you put diesel in? Corby Scherb: See, there's logic behind it. Slim Pushins: ⁓ Jim Gardner: I need diesel in there so I wrapped all the handle everything's green you'd have to pick it up and be like why is everything green anyway but yeah there's like a ⁓ six pack of colored electrical tape at Harbor Freight so that's that I it stopped bleeding so ⁓ but I got a I got a pretty good digger it's right at the top but anyway Slim Pushins: Green, like. Wow. Corby Scherb: See look, I did, I still have a little bit of mark on my thumb. I didn't band-aid anything there, Slim Pushins: Well... Jim Gardner: I was also, I was also buffing pucks off of a master cylinder and it slipped and about burnt my finger off. So it was a, it was an okay. Yeah. I was working hard, just not at the track. Slim Pushins: I ⁓ Corby Scherb: Just let you know it was still there. Slim Pushins: Well, you had a rough weekend. Well, I did not go out to Kennedale and Jeb Sessions called me out on it, called me a fair weather fan. I didn't know how to take that. That was early in the night before he couldn't get out on the... He said he ran a lap and a half before he started, before the gremlins showed up, the push and the cushion gremlins showed up. Jim Gardner: This is before he had engine issues, I guess. Instead of wind stickers we should have ⁓ push in the cushion. Slim Pushins: Gremlins, little gremlins. Corby Scherb: Yeah. Yeah. Slim Pushins: No, I thought it was going to get rained out. I played the odds and I lost that bet, but it was a good race. I took my nieces, Carson and Adeline, to a great little place called Pennstack and I spent about a quarter million dollars on various games so that they could win $12 squishies. Jim Gardner: Yeah, it's right up your alley. Corby Scherb: ⁓ yeah. Slim Pushins: but we had a good time. I'm 100 % addicted to those coin pusher games. Those things are... I want to buy one for the house. Corby Scherb: ⁓ yeah, Logan will go ballistic with those things. Yes. You lose Logan at a gas station, just look for the corn machine. Slim Pushins: Those things are so fun and it's the simplest of games. Uh-huh. Corby Scherb: But yeah, we'll talk about the whole racing and the gremlins and stuff, rider blowing up power steering line, Jeb having issues, Brotherford, Kevin Brotherford actually had issues, the first Kennedale. It's the craziest thing in the world and I'll say that, I mean, I've watched our Sprint cars break in the trailer on the way to the racetrack. We started them up, we set up the shop, they ran, they built heat, everything was good, put it in the trailer to get there, bull run. Most unbelievable thing you've ever seen. Jim Gardner: ⁓ Remember that race at, at rocket LaPlante's left rear bird cage broke in the trailer. Remember we showed up in the bird cage and had like split the casing or the bolts broke or something. It was the craziest thing I'd ever seen. Slim Pushins: It's... Corby Scherb: Yes. Yep, yep. It's the wildest stuff you've ever seen, Slim Pushins: Remember, Corby, remember the hole that we put in the floor of the trailer? Corby Scherb: Coming up nationals. Oh, what about what about building a brand new car and then letting the top wing fall off and scratch the horizontal tubes? Going to have a link you remember that I just rolled the door down and I just turned around Jim Gardner: know. The only time I ever forgot to put the top wing pins in was your dad at Boyd and that never happened ever again. Corby Scherb: No, we didn't know so ⁓ in our trailer you could put it was for two cars But you took the front cars topping off and you said the little tray like up on top and we just had this we had a bungee cord that was probably the first bungee cord ever sent to the state of Texas this thing was blown out, but it worked so good it was like the perfect length and I'm not gonna call names, but it wasn't anyone sitting in here actually didn't pull it across there Slim Pushins: ever. It was... it was... Jim Gardner: Hehehehehe Corby Scherb: I still love you, Wes. And we got to... Jim Gardner: There was a, ⁓ you know, back in the height of the Sherbrooke racing days, there was a hierarchy of ⁓ trailer pit stall selection. ⁓ You know, who got to leave their wing on on that trailer and who didn't. And it was a big to do ⁓ every time. You're the lead horse in the stable. Corby Scherb: ⁓ yeah. ⁓ yeah. ⁓ yeah. That big one. That was good. You were running good if you got to your wing on. Slim Pushins: Well, never, Corby and I never got, Corby and never got to leave the wing on, so I don't know what that says about Corby's, Corby's race operations. Jim Gardner: Yeah. Corby Scherb: I was even racing alone and I still didn't get to leave it on. Slim Pushins: Yeah, ⁓ I talked to Ryder a little bit after the race. He had hell of a showing. He was plus nine. Started I think dead last and he was so mad at himself and you know, I get it I like that. I love the drive that that y'all have If you don't win, you know if you're not first your last type of deal, but I told him I was like listen like you broke in your heat started dead last and and were plus nine with some of the best in the nation so What else could you ask for? Corby Scherb: Consistency is hard. It's a hard thing to understand too. It's not just points chasing all year. It's just, man, you have to finish all the races. I don't care if you run 12th. You have to finish all these races and it's gremlins that do it. It's being tangled up in something. It's rolling into turn one on a restart and spinning yourself out. Can do that to you. There, Jim. You're not even gonna pay attention, you know. Slim Pushins: Hmm. Jim Gardner: Yeah, I'm paying attention. Yeah, no, I know. I remember. I dorked it up. Corby Scherb: There's just so many things that go into it and that's when it just becomes, it's not exhausting. It's so much fun to race. I love everything about it. It becomes grueling. It becomes so mental at those points where you just, you know you should have done better. You had a better car than where you finished. I come in and all the time I would. Jim Gardner: It's the best. Corby Scherb: tell you two guys that you know, we suck, this sucks, I don't know what I'm doing, you know, I messed up, I made a mistake here, I did this wrong, did that wrong, but if you're still finished, it's still better than the guy who ended up upside down. Jim Gardner: Yeah. Yeah. And those guys, I mean, we talked about on the weekly report about, ⁓ gravel having a, you know, getting back out after his big crash at Peevely. And, ⁓ you know, the, the badge of honor and the pride that the crew guys have going up and down the road to make sure their cars see the checkered flag because you know, over 60 or 80 races or whatever they run, those three spots might matter. is Corby Scherb: Yeah. For sure. Jim Gardner: it matter to your livelihood, you know, whether or not your contract gets picked up, whether or not you get a big bonus, ⁓ and you have to be prepared for it. And, the points chase is there's points racing is such an iceberg because there's so much more going on, ⁓ under the surface and behind the scenes just to make that program get to every race and Corby Scherb: Mm-hmm. Yeah. Jim Gardner: And be able to finish and be able to run up front and having motor cycle in and out and having rear end cycle in and out and steering boxes and wings and, um, you know, uh, especially the three 16 to four 10 stuff. I mean, you just have to swap out. We're seeing a lot of rear ends break, um, which is kind of a little bit of an epidemic here with maybe their new rules. I don't know. There's some good information, Danny Dietrich and flea music and a bunch of guys going back and forth about, um, Corby Scherb: Right? Jim Gardner: The axle tube's breaking. ⁓ but you know, when I was growing up, ⁓ I lived close enough to the Hoffman's that they sold me a lot of their used parts, you you joints, they run 12 races, they take it out and sell it because they're not going to have one break and ruin their point situation. ⁓ you know, you just have to cycle that part out. And luckily the 305 stuff that we run here, ⁓ we don't see, you know, we saw parts wear out, but not nearly as Corby Scherb: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Slim Pushins: the heat and the torque. Jim Gardner: Not nearly as aggressively as the, as the four 10 and three 60 stuff. So you just got to be on top of that. And it's a, it's a full-time game. And, um, you know, Kevin LaPlante running all that is just. Uh, he's yeah, he's, he's rowdy. Um, but yeah. Corby Scherb: For sure. Dude's my hero. Slim Pushins: Super Trucker. Corby Scherb: Supertrekker, man. Slim Pushins: anybody that saw our post earlier about the potential ⁓ gremlin ⁓ pushing the cushion gremlins ⁓ kevin laplante posted a picture of rider's car upside down and on fire ⁓ i'm glad he Jim Gardner: I hear it. Corby Scherb: I'm surprised that Amy hasn't called me now that we've settled in. Jim Gardner: Yeah. Slim Pushins: I'm glad he can have a sense of humor about it at this point, but it was scary for a lot of people in the moment. Jim Gardner: Right. Corby Scherb: It's tough, know, and that's the big thing is crashes happen and situations happen no matter what's going on, whether it's just parts breaking or... getting ballparked or something, know, rider says that he thinks he saw something, you know, shiny coming off turn four. And I, it's hard sometimes to, be a driver and to try to remember if something happened, if something broke, you know, we watched, ⁓ Jimmy was there. don't remember if you were there, Kerbo Lucas drove into the wall at Wichita falls and you know, and that's all he said. He came in and he goes, it just wouldn't turn. goes, everything I did, the car would not turn. Jim Gardner: Boo. Corby Scherb: And to know that and then we watch something like that happen just at TMS, we as drivers too have to be able to replay that back to y'all to see then if y'all saw something during the race, if y'all watched me run something over if I didn't see something, if someone was pushing me from the pack. ⁓ There's things that happen in racing and this is why not everyone does it. We talked about it last week, Anthony Macri. Like there's just certain things that happen and this is why the strongest will survive and it's gonna happen. I hate that that happened to Ryder and super scary deal, but if you never have those moments, you don't know what it takes to be there. Slim Pushins: You take it for granted. Yeah. Jim Gardner: Yeah, I agree 100 % on that. I think one of the reasons I love this game so much is that there are no shortcuts. There are no cheap, easy victories. ⁓ You have to scrap and claw your way for absolutely everything. ⁓ Slim Pushins: I was just about to say there's nobody, ⁓ there's nobody that I know that is more thorough about nut bolting a car than Jim and lost his brakes. Like, you know, it is what it is. Things come up. I pulled up behind Jim in that, that, ⁓ during that red flag and Jim Gardner: Yeah. ⁓ This is, this is two races ago. So it was the Kennedale opener and you know, have all, all winter to get the car ready. And, ⁓ I fought like hell to bleed my brakes, ⁓ for like three straight nights, ⁓ dad and I couldn't figure it out and back and forth. And so, you know, even after hot laps or the heat race, I told the told you boys like the brakes kind of suck, like they're not good. And we considered just changing front axles just to. Slim Pushins: Yeah. Corby Scherb: Mm-hmm. Jim Gardner: do something and you know, I don't have a quick disconnect or anything on it. So it was going to be the same caliper and everything, but I just wanted to kind of change something. just then the heat race went really well. We're like, I think we'll be all right. You know, I can manage this, you know, and the thing that I hated the most about that ⁓ was pride for one. My cars don't fall apart. know, ⁓ I don't, you know, and Slim Pushins: I didn't help that either when I pulled up behind you. Jim Gardner: Go ahead, Curvo. ⁓ Slim Pushins: there was a red flag about what four laps before you totally lost your brakes. And I thought to you, looked at, I didn't know. thought that was fixed, but I got behind you and I was like, Hey, ⁓ you're going the wrong way. You started like eighth and you're in 18th and I, and I just hear him sigh. And then he goes, I don't have any brakes, my brakes, something's wrong with my brakes. And I was like, ⁓ all right, well. Jim Gardner: The parachutes out, was two seconds off the pace. With some extra extra adjectives there. I was pretty fired up and I was so like again, I was so furious to waste your all's time and you know my folks time and my wife's time to go out there and I have too much pride to just pull it in because something's not right and I can't figure this out, you know. And actually I still kind of scratching my head, you know, back here putting this pile back together and it broke the frame in a couple spots and we got some work to do. Slim Pushins: Hang in there, pal. Jim Gardner: But there's a lot of rash on the ⁓ left front caliper. think what happened is when we put the left front tire on it, back some of the studs off and the studs are getting into the left front caliper, which is nuts. And essentially the studs, ⁓ rounded butt head bolts had rubbed into the caliper so much it had bent the caliper and the bracket and the rotor. ⁓ Is the only thing I can think of is why that happened. Corby Scherb: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Jim Gardner: ⁓ it never locked up or Corby you had a rotor lock up on you at Wichita falls once. ⁓ and it never locked up, but I, every time I went to the breaks, got worse and worse and worse. And I think you were on the front row. If I remember correctly, cause you only break when you run good. And that's why I hate breaking. You never break when you're running 16th, you know, and it, the pride, yeah, the pride, the pride is, know, Corby Scherb: Yup. Yup. It was actually before the green even was dropped that time. I was Slim Pushins: Hahaha Corby Scherb: Yeah, talking about breaks, you can be prideful if you want, ⁓ breaks are so important, I think. ⁓ In a sprint car especially a 305 a lot of the tracks we run around here Probably our war is probably about the only local track that you could survive just fine without having any brakes It just it helps and like not to get super deep in it It helps keep it load on the left side of the car. It helps keeping the car rotated down the racetrack It's yeah, yeah, absolutely Oh Absolutely Jim Gardner: It helps up here. It helps up here when the track, when the track gets on the fence that you have breaks and can check up if you need to. And I, and that's what was murdering me at Kennedale. there was three cautions in front of that race. And I was sitting there thinking, can probably survive and run 11th here, you know, instead of pulling off now and finishing 18th. And, ⁓ it was just bad. So again, to the D bricks, my bad. I shouldn't have been out there. Corby Scherb: There it was. Slim Pushins: All right, that's enough. That's enough about that. Let's talk about, let's talk about this weekend's races. KSP ⁓ Abilene's first race of the year. What, how many Abilene, how many races did Abilene have last year? Sprint car races? A couple. Jim Gardner: It was pretty talentless. Corby Scherb: think two. I think. Jim Gardner: Like two last year, they got three this year. They run, uh, hang on, I can pull that up. I got it queued up here. Corby Scherb: Yeah. West Cranfield, great, great track owners too. They absolutely love sprint cars and they know they try to like space it out because they know that it can be a tire heater on some occasions. And in 2024, we went there and ⁓ it was actually around the top. Absolutely 100 % around the top and the coyote candle guys always try to show up there and they brought in this dude named Ethan Barrow from from up north I think he's from actually Indiana and ⁓ Me I started well, I think we broke a heat ⁓ a rear-ended heat race or something like that and I started driving to the front and me and Ryder ran with him, but it was One of the coolest races I've ever been a part of because Ethan was doing what most Texans would have done in that moment was just cruising around on the bottom like going slow to go fast and me and Ryder Jim Gardner: Mm-hmm. Corby Scherb: or ripping the top ⁓ Abilene has I will say this and Jimmy might even agree with me I liked Abilene better when I had the fifth turn in when it was like super aggressive coming off turn two it was cool super unique yeah Jim Gardner: Yeah. I liked turn five and it helped it. You know, was, it was, you could get on, on and off. No, I did. Slim Pushins: Hehehe. Don't they still have that written on the wall? Corby Scherb: They actually pulled some of the arm code back. It used to be like you truly came off turn two, you would straighten up and then you turned right. Jim Gardner: Yeah. Cause it was kind of like the, end of the front straightaway at Kennedale, you know, where there was room to race if you got up there. So, you know, you would kind of come off a two, the first half of the fence would end and you had a lane, maybe two, you know, especially when you got late and slick where you're hanging a right. and it, but it was more, it was more coming off two than it was going into three, ⁓ like Kennedale is. ⁓ so like it, you kind of just enough. Corby Scherb: Yes. Yeah. ⁓ yeah. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Jim Gardner: ⁓ and it was just, it just made it kind of dynamic and different to run other than all the other core and all the tracks are different. I'm not going to sit here and say that, but it just kind of made it, ⁓ you know, I don't know. I missed it. And then they kind of, they kind of rounded it off and sealed it off. And, ⁓ you know, it's fine. I don't own the track and they got all the makeshift sweets on the backstretch. They still have those. Corby Scherb: It was cool, I liked it. I-I-I-I- Yeah. ⁓ yeah. ⁓ yeah. Slim Pushins: That's a cool concept. They sell backstretch or rent lease backstretch space along the backstretch fence and people put containers on stilts and air condition them. Yeah. That's a cool concept. Jim Gardner: Yeah, or just built like a deck. Yeah, it's cool. Yeah. Corby Scherb: Pink porta plots too. I'll always remember Adelaide with the pink porta plots. Slim Pushins: Or we get his porta potties. Free frequent all of them. Jim Gardner: I Corby Scherb: Now Aveline, Aveline's super cool. I don't like that ⁓ they seem to struggle to have cars. We're gonna go ahead and say this, TSS always had a good car count and it was people chasing championships, people points running. ⁓ Slim Pushins: It's a stretch. Jim Gardner: Yeah. Yeah. And the, the, the list, you know, if you wanted to run Boyd the following Friday night, you probably had to make sure you ran and they did a good job of protecting, ⁓ you know, the series and the interests and stuff. And TSS did a lot of good stuff. You know, they did some stuff that gave us gray hairs too. And not, you know, but that's because they have a different perspective and a different agenda and us just trying to go win races. ⁓ but. You know, back in the day when it was full fields. Corby Scherb: I agree. Yeah. Jim Gardner: ⁓ it was a dogfight at Abilene. They put on some really good races down there. I hope they get, you know, are they going to get 20 cars? Probably not. I hope they get enough for a pretty good field. ⁓ is my, is my goal for that. Yeah. So hopefully I don't know what's going on out West. ⁓ if they can pull any of those cars, I don't even know if the car is out in El Paso and Corby Scherb: For sure. I'm going 14. I'm going to say 14. Let's give him 14. Slim Pushins: I think they'd be happy with 14. Jim Gardner: And Amarillo and Lubbock are running up the same rules. ⁓ remember they, they were on wing sliders and tie breaks and stuff for a lot of years. I don't know if they've changed that, but. Corby Scherb: Yeah, I know I know that, what's his name, Carney, not John Carney, gosh dang it, what's his name, Jett Carney. Jett came and ran with us a couple times there. He's a really good racer from out there. He actually builds his own chassis, sells them, good stuff. And then I don't know, like Braxton and them, they're from out that way. So I don't know if any of those guys would go there over RPM. mean, RPM's gonna get, a lot of the local guys I would imagine. Jim Gardner: Jet. Yeah. Slim Pushins: Shit. Corby Scherb: ⁓ It's the same, know, and like let's just shoot from the hip here. RPM's super cool too. It's very unique. It's probably that and Grayson are the only like true short tracks that we have. ⁓ And RPM's really good about putting it on the fence. And that always helps any Sprint Car guy. Yeah. Jim Gardner: Yeah. I'm excited just for, I'm excited for Kevin to be running it. ⁓ we had him on it, but hopefully he doesn't have any bad luck, ⁓ with the Yeah, maybe that was it. But, you know, I, I, I think everybody has really high hopes for, for Kevin, ⁓ as a promoter. I know, ⁓ Tom Lawrence at Smiley's has invested a lot of hope. Corby Scherb: They got it in even with a rain delay last weekend, so that was good. Slim Pushins: Well, if he would let me in that motor grader, I'd put y'all on the fence. Corby Scherb: ⁓ yeah, for sure. Mm-hmm. Jim Gardner: place is beautiful. They've changed kind of their pricing structure and payout stuff. It's a little bit more even keel, a little friendlier at the front gate and the pit gate and stuff. So I hope the economics work out. They're paying a pretty good purse too. They posted it. It got posted somewhere. It's 800 to win and 200 to start or something, which is really good money. Corby Scherb: Yeah. Right. Jim Gardner: You for, for good local 305 racing. I'm hoping they get a lot of support. I'm hoping, I think the weather's going to hold off. ⁓ weather was looking real bad, but I think it's going to be good. Yeah. So, ⁓ you know, and then, you know, with 105 running, is it going to keep, you know, the Harris's down there probably. Corby Scherb: This is Texas, this is Texas in the spring man. Slim Pushins: It's always bad. Jim Gardner: You know, those local guys are just going to run their show, which is fine, but you're just going to lose some cars there. And then, you know, we know of Bolden going to, to, ⁓ OCRS in Oklahoma, but, ⁓ and maybe they're drawing more guys just for money and to run something different. I don't know. ⁓ I don't think Lotton's running wing cars. think they only got non-wing cars. So maybe the Lotton guys will go to OCRS or maybe you'll get a couple of them to tow to Abilene. You know, don't really know, but, ⁓ you know, it's. Corby Scherb: Right. Right. Jim Gardner: It's great to have four sprint car races within a three hour drive. ⁓ you know, of the Metroplex of which one you want to go to, but it's also bad because they're all competing for cars. ⁓ you know, it's the nature of the beast. ⁓ if we're going to have a healthy, a healthy industry here, it's going to happen. ⁓ you just hope it just kind of manages, you know, manages. Okay. So we'll see how it goes. ⁓ Hoping for good shows from all of them though. Slim Pushins: Let's talk about favorite stories of those three tracks. Abilene, Kennedale, and 105. Corby? Corby Scherb: Yep. Jim Gardner: Well, you only have one story at 105, so go ahead and tell that one. Slim Pushins: Well, we've been a couple of times. We've been a couple of times. Yeah, the first time we went down there, we got a hard lesson about the rules. Jim Gardner: Have you? Corby Scherb: Yeah, we went there, ⁓ Yeah, really hard lesson about the ropes. ⁓ yeah, so actually I drove the 68 car. ⁓ My dad was like huge on that once you're like in like this championship battle or you're going to national or something like that, like you can't touch your car. So I drove his car down there and the car was ran great. ⁓ Didn't have the best heat rays, just kind of got bottled up in my heat rays. Jim Gardner: Tell that story, I don't even know about that. I mean, I'm sure I've been told. Corby Scherb: And then in the feature they do single file restarts period the end no matter what first caution single file And ⁓ Okay, and so I got up to I don't know I wasn't running that good probably like eighth ninth something like that And this car just kept jumping me every restart every single I mean Yes every time Okay, and so like I'd have to work Jim Gardner: I'm in for that. you Slim Pushins: Soon as the green flag dropped, we would lose three spots. Jim Gardner: Oh, so it's a single file until the green came out and then it was a free for all. Yeah. There was no cone. Corby Scherb: Yeah, okay, and I didn't know that. so like it would happen and ⁓ Trent Dixon, he's actually a super good race car driver. I was just furious, furious. And then after the race, in my mind, what I thought I saw going on the back straight over was he put his hands out, like he threw his hands up at me. And I'm like, bro, I didn't do, you held me up every single restart. And so I got out of the car. Slim Pushins: Corby was so pissed off. Corby. Corby stomped as soon as he got out of the car. He stomped, helmet still on. Corby Scherb: went over there, I feel bad too. And so I went over there and I was like, dude, why'd you throw your hands up at me? And he was like, oh, I was talking to my dad. And I'm like, dude, you clearly threw your hands up at me. And he was like, no, man, I was talking to my dad. And he's a young kid. So like, you know, I'm respectful. I'll always be that way. And I went to walk off and I said, dude, you held me up every single restart. Why would you do that? And his dad lit into me and told me that you go when the green goes. And he went off like this whole story about that's what the rules are. You know, if you was at the driver's meeting, you would have heard all this stuff. And me being the racer that I am, I was like, dude, my bad. Had no idea. I said, I promise you, whatever I just said, means nothing. And right on dude, good race. Because I apparently didn't listen in the driver's meeting that you could go with the green drops. And every single start, he jumped. Slim Pushins: You only have to tell me once. So for four hours, Jim, on the way home, all Corby spoke was, you watch. You watch. We're coming down here again. You watch. Corby Scherb: I was mad. I understand that role of going with the green goes. I'm not taking that for granted, but there's times that it can just be like blatant. ⁓ I'm not saying that Trent did that to me. Me and Trent are cool. ⁓ He's a great racer, but I just felt like it was, I don't know. And then we went back down to 105 later and we had a pretty good showing. Slim Pushins: and Doug. Jim Gardner: I forgot about that first night. I did. Did I run that car at Waco the night before to shake it down? Yeah. I remember that. Corby Scherb: Pretty good show. Yeah, yeah And the car ran great. It was it was perfect. It worked just fine. We wasn't tight enough I'm not gonna give away all the secrets now because when we showed back up to 105 we were tight But and it was the same Jim Gardner: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Now that you mentioned it, I forgot about that. The grand points chase of 2024 where you had to go hit every race in sight through September. Corby Scherb: ⁓ yeah. ⁓ Slim Pushins: Nobody told me about the mind games and the blatant lying. Friends, friends of ours, where are you racing this weekend? I don't think we're gonna race. We found ourselves in a points battle with the Boldens. And we all play the game. And they're like, we're not gonna race this weekend. And then we show up at 105 pitted next to each other. Jim Gardner: You Corby Scherb: No, they said they wasn't gonna race. No, should, yeah, they went to Emeril the weekend before and I was like, whatever dude. Because we had like a pretty big points lead in the Texas series. then I think that he went up by like two points or something like that for Texas. And we went there and he actually got tangled up in a crash and went upside down. I it was the first time he went upside down in a big sprint. But we got Texas back. We had pretty. Jim Gardner: And then they were in, they were in Amarillo or something. Corby Scherb: Comfortably throughout, but which part? Slim Pushins: Go ahead and tell the The 105 story. Jim Gardner: you were you're digging one by nine seconds and Kerbo had him panicked the whole time. Corby Scherb: when we... Yeah, so we went there and... See, I never even told y'all this. So, you know, I told Kerbo, I was like, dude, like, if we ever show back up, man, like, I'm gonna do it. So the first start of the heat race, I pushed... What's his name, like, Randy Waller? The three car, the blue three car? I pushed him all the way down the front straightaway. Slim Pushins: It was a BEATING! Jim Gardner: You Yeah, he's Corby Scherb: Okay, I was gonna go before the green flag ever went. I pushed him all the way down and I actually, I got in front of Jacob Harris on the first start and then, ⁓ what's the dude's name? He's from Louisiana, comes and races there, the red car. But then he flipped and so we had a restart and I was like, damn it, now Jacob knows what I'm gonna do. And so on the next restart, Jacob did the same thing, basically like we took off together and he ended up getting me and I ran third. And actually when we showed back up, I told Carson, said, you watch dude, this is gonna be a draw redraw and I promise you I'm gonna draw on the back. Because they line up off of points, but it was the last points night and guess what? Draw redraw. And I redrew 12th. Unbelievable. Slim Pushins: ⁓ believable, because that's... You never drew anything under any circumstances. Corby Scherb: We took off on the first one and then there was a little bit of a tangled up and Jacob Harris got into it and the car felt really good. I had called Jimmy and I had called Wesley and we went like, I was texting them in the group text and they told me to go with the aggressive stagger. We came up, so we restarted 10th that time and got a good jump, went through one and two and I'm like, man, the car feels really good. Went through three and four, I drove like a different line than everyone else was driving. I'm like, dude, like we have the car. And drove up to like fourth or something like that, another caution and we restarted third. And then like within a lap and a half, I took the lead. And I was like, there is no one here who has anything for us. We took the lead and we led, I don't know, like three or four laps. And a red flag came out. And so I was stopped on the back straight away. Kerbo comes up there and he was like, keep doing what you're doing, dude. You're doing great. Everything's good. Just keep digging. And I was like, right on. And so we restarted, we ran like two or three laps and another caution came out. And I looked down at Kerbo, because everyone knows now I like to see signs. I looked down at Kerbo and Kerbo's giving me the shovel sign. And I'm like, bro. Slim Pushins: Nobody's got anything for you. Corby Scherb: And so then, like I said, have 105, they have like a ticker of like, tell you who's in what place. And I saw 12, I'm like, Trey Smith's like, this dude has raced here all his life. Like this dude's wicked fast. And I'm looking at Kerbo saying, keep digging. So we took off and I just like kept laughing people. And like we was in the lap cars, like lap two of the restart. And I just kept laughing people and laughing people and laughing people. And then another caution came out and I looked down and Kerbo tells me to keep digging. And I'm like, dude, what do I gotta do? There's no way. Slim Pushins: He owned that place. You Corby Scherb: There's no way. So they told us that we had, think it was like nine laps to go and I'm like, all right, Corby, it's just a heat race. Like no one showed you a nose yet. Keep doing what you're doing. And the same thing, I looked down there and all I can see in my head is Kerbo saying, keep digging. I'm like, dude, Tray's all over me. There's no way. I'm talking like absolutely slicing through lap traffic, like pushing people off the racetrack. Slim Pushins: best advice I've ever given him. I mean, it was a clinic. He was putting on an absolute clinic. Corby Scherb: Go across the line and I was about to lap someone so we had to finish an extra lap and so like I went by the front straightaway and I was giving Kerbo a thumbs up and everything was good. We got to the skills and I stood up in the car and turned around and I was like, dude, we just can won that race. And Kerbo was like, yeah, I know. Jim Gardner: You Slim Pushins: I was, you weren't looking where you were going. ⁓ We're like eight, 10 miles an hour and you're looking backwards standing up in the seat. I just wanted to, I didn't want anything. Corby Scherb: Dude, I thought it was a hell of a race, but apparently the only race was just me carving through lap traffic. Slim Pushins: Corby called me at 7 a.m. the next morning and he was like, you've got to be shitting me. And I was like, dude, it a hell of a night, wasn't it? Like, I've never seen you drive like that. He was like, Kerbo, I won by like 14 seconds. And I was like, yeah, yeah, yeah we did. Jim Gardner: That's awesome. Corby Scherb: Because I was big on that, I don't know how many other people are, I'm huge on just studying. I try to always watch the race back, see what I did right, what I did wrong, what someone else was doing. There's only so much that I can see during the race. And I think it helps, ⁓ I know that Kevin Rutherford has started to do that and I've tried to explain things in a different manner to him, the same as, you know, Jimmy and... his little mishap there, know, like you can always go back to the race and watch it from the outside perspective. Slim Pushins: mishap. Jim Gardner: Problem is I can't go watch mine, I was way too far in the back. Going too slow. Slim Pushins: It does help. It does help when you go back and watch the broadcast. Yeah. Jim Gardner: You just hope the leaders are catching me so I can see myself. Corby Scherb: Yeah, but you know, and then it goes back to same thing. Like we'll talk about breaks, you know, my break pedal went to the floor going to turn three at Kennedale and we had a... Some people run like residual valves and stuff to like keep the pedal better. And ⁓ it was, it was one lap. It was actually the Harris brothers were at Kennedale and ⁓ I bounced real bad coming off turn two. And I guess it just like pushed the pucks away just enough. And I went to turn three and I am super reliant on just stabbing right as I roll off the throttle and the pedal went to the floor. And I don't know. We talked about the Kennedale fence. have no idea how it didn't get sucked into it. Somehow like bounced off it, kept my foot in it, drove back off. Jim Gardner: Mm-hmm. Corby Scherb: but I live and die off of breaks. Jim Gardner: Yeah, giving away a lot of what we do, like you got to have them. Corby Scherb: I just... Jim Gardner: You got to, we are programmed to be like, all right, here's the fix. Land on the brakes, you know? So, just being, go ahead. Slim Pushins: ⁓ yeah. Yeah. Corby Scherb: Yeah, for sure. Slim Pushins: All right, what about about, ⁓ Kennedy? I think I know the answer to this, but I'm going to ask it. Kennedy favorite moment. Yeah. Jim Gardner: ⁓ Corby Scherb: My favorite moment? I mean, I got two of them that run hand in hand. Actually, I got my first feature win there, and it was Jimmy Gardner. And I actually have a really cool picture of ⁓ Jimmy. He had on Alpine Star gloves. It was wickedly cold that night. It took rubber around the bottom. Yeah. Jim Gardner: I was there. It was cold. Yeah, I had some dry hard like old driver gloves on. It was cold. Corby Scherb: Took rubber around the bottom. This is like my first year in a sprint car and I didn't have a clue what I was doing I just kept telling myself like just keep doing what you're doing. Don't miss the bottom Just no not digging just keep doing what you're Yeah, well it was the same same thing like I said Trey was behind me they called off the In our race fever. They called off who was behind me. They said Chad Wilson and I'm like, oh my god, dude Like this can't be happening. There's no way I'll let half this race For sure Slim Pushins: Keep digging. Jim Gardner: If I'd have known this was the sign, I would have given it to him. Slim Pushins: Yeah. Jim Gardner: chat is Chad Wilson. Yeah, Chad was, Chad was the man around that time too. Him, Marcus and Kyle Jones and, and, and Jeb just had wars every night and somehow we were, we were up there and the yellow come out with three, four to go. You know, we had a pretty good lead or something. I was sitting there up in the stands, like getting ready to puke. I do remember that vividly. It was awesome. Corby Scherb: ⁓ yeah. Yep. Slim Pushins: crying. Corby Scherb: We didn't get it. Yeah, it was a cool moment. That one and then, I mean, of course the championship is super cool, we had a little tangle up in Abilene with our brother the weekend before and this was 23, mom passed away in 22. And I said in my head that I was gonna win a race and I was gonna win it for her. Slim Pushins: So that was. Corby Scherb: We had that little tangle up and out, I was so focused. ⁓ we showed up. Ryder LePlan was actually supposed to start front row outside of me, he ⁓ had bird cages seasoned up in his heat race, so he didn't get to start the feature. We didn't get a rear end change quick enough. So Logan actually started to the outside of me. And I'll never forget this. Ryder walked up to me and leaned down in the car, and he said, he knows you, he knows everything about you, do something different. He goes, it's gonna be on the top. And I said, okay. I started the race as we entered turn three. And it goes back the same thing, man. Like if you can gap them in the beginning, it just like put something in their head. And we did and we caught lap traffic and I was trying to get around Atlanta, Venezuela. Actually, I think this was his first year in sprint cars. And I tried a slider, didn't work. I tried to run low. Logan actually got around me and Logan sent a bomb into turn three. Jim Gardner: Ha Slim Pushins: I was about to say, that when you had all the patients in the world with the 22 and then Logan lost patients? Corby Scherb: And yeah, Logan did that first lap. Because I'm sure Logan in his head, he knew that me and Chad were behind him. I led the whole race, like I was going to do something dumb too. So the costume came out, we reverted back a lap. And then we had eight laps to go, and I counted every single lap. And it was cool. It was a really cool win. ⁓ Brooklyn was there. There's actually a picture of Brooklyn laying on me, because I laid down on the ground. And I made a dirt angel for my mom, and I wrote GG in the dirt angel. That was a cool one that Brooklyn got to spin it with me. We got to do the wing dance together. That one will always be really true. I know Jimmy, the first win was huge, but that one was cool. Slim Pushins: That was a big win. That's what one of the downfalls of having a multi-car team is when one of your cars, I just figured Landon was just gonna hate all of us forever after Logan dumped him more or less. Corby Scherb: We can tell the whole story right now. Okay, like we'll go ahead and get all this out. So actually, actually at Abilene, I started like fourth or fifth, something like that. Logan started up front and I found the rubber and I ran him down. Slim Pushins: This is not rehearsed and I have no idea what he's about to bring up. Jim Gardner: you Corby Scherb: And I knew, I knew that I was gonna catch him off surprise. He was just running the bottom. He was just going slow to go fast. And I knew I needed two more laps and I had caught him and I was gonna drive right by him and he never would have known it was gonna happen. And Landon brought out a caution. I don't even know if y'all know this whole story. Landon brought out a caution. And I was like, damn it. I like, it's okay. And I got pulled up next to Logan, going down the back straighter, I gave a thumbs up and I'm like, yeah dude, we're gonna run one two tonight. And Ryder was right behind me. It was gonna be a great night. Jim Gardner: You Slim Pushins: This is what we've moved on to Abilene now Corby Scherb: Well, this is like build up to that. ⁓ so we restarted and TSS always has had a rule that anything inside of Five Laps to Go is not gonna be a double Delaware. They were big on the double Delaware. So sure enough, they called for a double Delaware. And I'm waving my hands. I'm like, there's no way that we're gonna do this. Jim Gardner: So we've been on Avaline Carbo, where you been? Keep up. Good rule. Any rule that eliminates Delaware double file restarts is a good rule. Corby Scherb: And it was, so actually it was Jeff Emerson running third at the time. So I picked the bottom of course, Logan was out front, me, Emerson, Ryder was right behind me and then Jeff Sessoms. And I had missed a race at Boyd. So I was out of the TSS points championship. Logan was the one doing it. He was battling Emerson and Jeb. And like, I'm a brother, you know, first off, like it's not that I'm gonna block for you, but I'll help you if I can. And I don't know if there was... And I don't know if... Jim Gardner: That's not twisted. Nobody ran the sherbs harder than the sherbs. Slim Pushins: That's a fact. Corby Scherb: if he intentionally did it, if there was any, you know, there was no like ill intentions by Logan, but he took off at an absolute snail's pace. And in my mind, in that moment, Logan knew my car wouldn't take off that slow. Jim Gardner: You Yeah. ⁓ Corby Scherb: I don't know, I never ran a stumble valve, I never believed in that stuff, Logan always ran a stumble valve, and my car stumbled and Ryder got in the back of me and then me, Jeb, and Emerson all got tangled up and ended up going second to fourth. I was furious. Furious, couldn't believe that just happened. From the double Delaware to the caution, I mean, I didn't speak on the way home, that's the worst part about racing with your brothers is we had to. Jim Gardner: Ha ha ha ha ha. Slim Pushins: That's an understatement. and an Abilene. Corby Scherb: It was so long. I think I'd drink a 12 pack. I think I'd drink a 12 pack. Slim Pushins: it was it was the single worst ride to or from a track i mean i it was the tension the tension in that car Jim Gardner: You Slim Pushins: Because Logan isn't gonna, Logan's not, he wasn't gonna bring anything up. It probably wasn't the right moment. And I mean, two and a half hours into the ride, nothing had been said from any of three of us. Corby Scherb: All you heard from me was just, whoosh. Slim Pushins: Yo, yes. So two and a half hours into the ride, Logan just kind of quietly goes, I think we're going to have to stop for fuel. And Corby goes, I don't really give a shit what you do. Corby Scherb: It was bad, man. It was a bad moment. It's happened in reverse, but we got home and me and him had a little tiff in the shop and everything was cool. But I had told myself that week, absolutely not will Logan beat me. No way. And then sure enough, we lined up at Kennedale, both on the front row. And he was the first person to come to me and give me a hug after that race at Kennedale. So that one will always be special to me. To me, there was a lot of pride involved in winning that one. Especially Logan and on the top. Let's be honest, I'm not necessarily known for running the top. I'm more of a bottom feeder, but it was around the top. Slim Pushins: All right, Jim, ⁓ we're almost in an hour. You want to go with Uncle Jim's power rankings this week? Or do you want to go with, okay, there we go. Plan A. Jim Gardner: Yeah. ⁓ so I've been working on, we'll just go over this briefly. we're not going to release them because it's a really small sample size, with only four races and most people have only run one or two. ⁓ but I'm taking a kind of a big look into a spreadsheet, ⁓ and, ⁓ to, to time to, ⁓ to try to Slim Pushins: spreadsheet involved. Jim Gardner: compare and look at some power rankings that are a hundred percent math based because Kerbo is all worried about pissing somebody off doing power rankings and ranking. Slim Pushins: Well, Corby's already brought up evidently, whoever we have on the podcast is going to have just the shittiest of luck for the foreseeable future. So yeah, I'm not, I'm not really about opinion based power rankings. We would still like to have guests. Jim Gardner: Hahaha! Hahaha. Corby Scherb: Well, someone's gotta prove us wrong. Jim Gardner: So. I, ⁓ I'm a stack guy. ⁓ I'm a data guy, stack guy. ⁓ and so I built this kind of interactive spreadsheet that, that gives everybody a starting ranking. ⁓ and then. Built a race and then you can enter each guy into a race and then score the race essentially, ⁓ you know, where you start, where you finish, ⁓ tiers for passing. So it's got, you know, hard chargers, ⁓ and then hard chargers towards the front. ⁓ weigh a little bit more. So where you start, where you finish, but the cool part about it is because I'm able to put each competitor into the race, the race is weighted based on the strength of the field. like, ⁓ that first race at Waco only had eight cars. It doesn't count as much as the 35 car race at Kennedale or the 25 car race at Kennedale. so, math and spreadsheets and stuff is never going to be perfect, but I want to. make sure that we're highlighting people who might not be getting the wins, but are having really good runs and are consistently upfront and just kind of seeing ⁓ things from a bigger picture. we'll probably release it. Yeah, like DJ Estes is the number one, you know, he right now would be leading the power rankings. We're not going to post these probably until next week. Yeah, you win nothing, by the way. ⁓ Slim Pushins: like DJ. Congrats, DJ. Jim Gardner: ⁓ so like right now Slim Pushins: while he's, while he's looking this up, just for everybody at home, we told the story, uh, a couple of episodes ago about, uh, us betting on, uh, the chili bowl every night, uh, every night's feature. This is the, uh, this is what Jim put into that same scenario. can't just bet Jim has formulas in the spreadsheets and Jim Gardner: you You Slim Pushins: until Jim updates it you have no idea how it is that you were how you've done. Corby Scherb: I promise you Lucas hates your ⁓ breakdown of the chili bowl because he went in there leading it. I think he came out like sixth or something like that after the last day. Jim Gardner: You ⁓ you should have picked better. Slim Pushins: Rutherford, Kevin Rutherford was in 9th place and ended up winning the whole thing! Jim Gardner: Yeah. Well, you want it to be interesting. The, the, the, the reason we're not, I'm not releasing this right now is that this, I'm still kind of fine tuning it. Like I look at what the numbers give me and I go, I don't really like that. Let's go change the metrics. Just so you can fudge the numbers in anything you do, any calculation, any. Okay. First of all, to that point, all right, just to clear the air on this, I think. Corby Scherb: No. Slim Pushins: He's fun. Jim's fine tuning it until it shows him as the number one power. Jim Gardner: I've got 51 drivers registered in this thing. And right now, Jim Gardner, 51. I am 42nd of 51. And I'm, I got no problem saying it because I sucked at the one race I ran. Okay. 42nd. This is not skewed to help me. This is a way to try to take four. Slim Pushins: Congratulations, Jim's number one on the power rankings. You win a t-shirt. Jim Gardner: I was trying to like figure out an idea. You know, we have a really big race at Kennedy coming up. How do we like, can we make some sort of fantasy game? Can we get some fans involved? Can we do some cool stuff to give some juice to it and do it kind of smartly? ⁓ but mostly just like with the podcast, we want to highlight guys who are overperforming, ⁓ you know, kind of laying low in the radar, you know, underperform. Well, we're not going to highlight under performance. ⁓ Slim Pushins: If this is a good idea. underperforming. Jim Gardner: Trust me, that three hour drive I had home from Kennedale after I had no breaks and crash and I was dog cussing myself and grumbling under my breath. You know, my dad's over there looking at me, wondering what was wrong with me. ⁓ the sports hard enough. We're not going to pick on. Yeah. We're not going to pick on the, the, you know, we're not going to post the rankings to see who's last. Like that's not the point of this. The point is to highlight the people who are, who are in the top five, in the top 10. And we want to recognize. Slim Pushins: Well, I guarantee you ate well. I know you ate well on the way home. Jim Gardner: ⁓ guys who might not be winning, ⁓ but are putting on a show consistently, you know, upfront or making big charges, you know, so DJ. His power ranking right now is a 38 and a half, which is just an arbitrary number. ⁓ you know, he's been in the top five, three times he's gotten. Yeah. But you know, DJ's got an average finish of third right now in three races. Corby Scherb: No one even knows what that word means. Slim Pushins: what that word means. You got Corby's to jumble up he can't speak English. Corby Scherb: No one knows. Jim Gardner: ⁓ you know, Colby Stubblefield's got an average finish of three and a half, he's been, ⁓ starting in the back. He's got an average charge of nine, you know, in the two races he ran. So. Corby Scherb: I think it's cool too, just to say this, it has nothing to do with the series that you're running, it just has to do with that driver and how much he moves forward, no matter who they are. ⁓ Jim Gardner: Right. And, you know, so every driver's got a score and that score changes and that score actually kind of affects previous scores on which races you're in and what, how the races are kind of weighted. And obviously like the Ramey's haven't raced yet. Some guys haven't been out yet. Some guys have only been out once. Right. So the data will only get better as we get more in that involved. But, ⁓ you know, this is how we're kind of keeping an ⁓ eye on Lane and Valens Whalow. Corby Scherb: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Jim Gardner: Sorry for butchering his name. You know, he's eighth in the power rankings right now. You know, ⁓ Bolden's ninth and Bolden's, know, I think would say he's off to a slow start in his mind, but he's had really good races. He's, know, moving up five spots, a race and finishing in the top 10. ⁓ so as the data gets better, we'll probably, you know, kind of try to highlight the top five. Just to give some people to talk about and give some people to keep their eye on who, who might not be. Slim Pushins: Zoolander Jim Gardner: you know, upfront and winning the races, but are upfront and contending. Corby Scherb: Like I said, a lot of people never remember winners of races and a lot of times throughout the year it's just about being consistent and showing up and doing, running the best that you can inside those moments. Like I said, I think Colby's so filled, thing, dude, he's just, he's drew real bad and had to fight tooth and nail for every race that he's had. Jim Gardner: Yeah. Yeah. And, and the numbers don't tell the whole story. mean, Ricketts blows up running second last week and gets dinged for it. And so the math is never going to tell the whole story. Your eyes tell the whole story. But you know, when most of our demographic and listeners are involved with a car, you care about how your car ran. You don't really see necessarily the hard charge or the people struggling or you don't, you don't see the big picture over time unless you go look for it. And so this is just me kind of looking for it. Corby Scherb: Right. Jim Gardner: And if I build the spreadsheet correctly, all I have to do is enter results. And then it kind of does all the thinking for me. Um, and it's just something that, you know, once a month we're going to pop in and say, Hey, you know, who's been running good? This guy, hopefully it's me better than 42nd out of 51, but, Slim Pushins: Well, it gives... Corby Scherb: Great, one more thing that AI gets to take away from us. Jim Gardner: Yeah, AI has done a lot, but it's pretty easy with it. Slim Pushins: It gives us something to talk about. Are we going to report this at some point on the recap? Jim Gardner: ⁓ we can, we can. I mean, it's just a tool to have. Slim Pushins: Are you gonna post it or what? Corby Scherb: Can we have power ranges of how many times Kervos lost during an episode? Jim Gardner: Uh, yeah, we could. Um, yeah, I think like, I think I'm going to, I think we'll post it like right before that. Kennedale big race. Um, just to give everybody like an idea of who's who, who we think is going to contend, you know, if we do a show preview in that race of, guys to watch and stuff like that, but, um, just kind something to keep an eye on and it helps. Slim Pushins: You think you could do a spreadsheet on that? Mathematics. Jim Gardner: You helps tracks the races down in Houston. Some, ⁓ you know, you don't have to be at the race to kind of understand what happened or who's running up front and stuff like that. You know, we have speed week coming up, ⁓ next month, ⁓ that will hopefully draw a bunch of cars. We'll get a bunch of good data from, but, ⁓ that's Kerbos power rankings. ⁓ so right now top five, ⁓ DJS is Colby stubble field, ⁓ Justin five field, Kyle Jones and John Ricketts is who I have. Slim Pushins: Do you, ⁓ No. And two of those guys have only raced once. Jim Gardner: Right. Yeah. And so the num- yeah, and rightfully so they should be in the top five, know, five field one. Rick, it's one, one of two, and he was running well in the other one. And then Kyle Jones was second in the deepest field we had. So it's not shocking that he's up there, you know, but eventually it's going to account for number of races run kind of in this and it'll kind of weed out some of these one-off good runs, but you're only as good as the data it'll produce. So. ⁓ anyway, just something kind of interesting to look at. that's some cool stuff we got going on. We're to try to do some contests, ⁓ some pick them contests, ⁓ to try to give away some hats and t-shirts, just try to give some people some juice, give some fans some juice and some guys to root for. Slim Pushins: hats and t-shirts from stompandsteer.com well yeah Jimmy sent, Jimmy sent ⁓ Corby and I about a hundred screenshots of this of this whole power ranking and ⁓ we still don't have swag up on the website Jim Gardner: Maybe I've been too busy building spreadsheets to actually do that. So one thing at a time. Slim Pushins: But you can go get hats. You can go get this hat that Corby won't wear because it's not flat bill. Corby Scherb: It's not a flat bill. It's not a flat bill. Jim Gardner: Anyway, what else we got? got anything else? Slim Pushins: real quick yeah let's ⁓ speed weeks speed weeks i'm looking forward to i don't know if i'm gonna be able to make all five ⁓ because some of us have to work for a living Corby Scherb: What about you, Jim Gardner? You running Speed Week? Jim Gardner: Uh, no, I'm, I'm on a race to race basis and I don't, I signed up for the big show at Kennedale and now I don't know. We'll, we'll see. Um, I probably, I know Justin Bates wants to run it, so, um, we'll probably run his car and my car will be a backup in case we run into some trouble. Uh, Corby Scherb: you need me to wash my fire suit, just let me know. Slim Pushins: There's no reason your fire chutes should be dirty. Well, other than you sleep in it every night, but other than that, it doesn't have any dirt on it. Jim Gardner: I'm gonna Corby Scherb: I refuse to wear my fire suit anywhere other than inside the car. No, that wasn't me. It someone else. Slim Pushins: You were at Tabuccy's one night when we... Jim Gardner: There's, ⁓ yeah. So I plan on going to all of them. mean, Texarkana, I think if we're running well, it's the last night Sunday. ⁓ that's a long journey out there. If we've been struggling, it's a long week. might not make it. we're hauling ass, then we'll probably will. It's just as what it is. So, but it's a cool event. I hope a lot of people make a commitment to go. know Zimmerman, ⁓ posted about it. He was wanting to be involved. ⁓ Slim Pushins: What night is Texarkana? Son- Corby Scherb: Sunday, Sunday this year. Jim Gardner: But it's a long week for maintenance and part failures and crashes and late nights. yeah, it's that too. So, ⁓ hopefully it's a good turnout again. Last year it was one of them, one of my more fun, ⁓ fun times racing last year. It was a good time. Slim Pushins: A lot of miles at $5.50 a mile. We had a blast. ⁓ Jim and I got a hotel room at the casino in Brokenbone. That was a lot of fun. But that's what an event like this ⁓ lends itself to is, know, you pretty much, depending on where you live in the area, ⁓ you're almost bound to a hotel room at least one of those nights because there's a lot of mileage. Jim Gardner: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, the way they got it set up, there's a lot of crisscrossing kind of around the Metroplex, but I think it'll let a lot of people go home every night, you know, with the exception of maybe Texarkana, you know. Corby Scherb: Right. Slim Pushins: It might. So, night number one is... I've got it right here. Rocket in Paris. Night number two is in Ennis. Yeah. And then, let's see, where did it go? I got it right here. Jim Gardner: ⁓ rocket, right? So that's probably furthest away for most people. Yeah. ⁓ back to Greenville, Greenville on Friday night and then Terrell on Saturday and then Texarkana on Sunday. So Crandall, Tex, ⁓ Terrell same place. So, ⁓ you know, yeah. Corby Scherb: Yeah. Slim Pushins: Crandall. Crandall. Well, one of them you lose tailgates and the other one you can race in. Corby Scherb: Yeah, know, ride with a plant, won it last year, it'd be cool. That was one of the first nights that he ever, had, he had motory shoes at RPM and he had to tough it out and ride it out. It sucks running for points and he wanted to pull off unlike Jimmy did, but he stuck it out and made it. And that was the difference. That was the difference. I think he was running like second or third or something like that and he fell back to eighth or ninth. But that's all that it takes is just that one night that you just pure grit of just hiding your face and just dealing with it. That's the cool thing about Speed Week is, ⁓ I mean, it's tough to finish five races Slim Pushins: Yeah, he did. Corby Scherb: in a row, let alone five days in a row, not to mention just everything that can happen, including to just your trailer on the way to the next one. ⁓ It's a big deal. should be known as a big deal. I mean, I remember one day during the championship chase at 24, called Kerr really next morning and said, hey man, did we have a blowout? Slim Pushins: I forgot about that. I was almost to the shop and he was like, Hey, when did we have a blowout? And I was like, like what, what week, like what race we were headed to. And he was like, no, last night. Corby Scherb: The tire is gone. Jim Gardner: glad you guys were paying attention to the truck. That's frightening. Slim Pushins: You knew that was coming, Corby. Corby Scherb: ⁓ yeah. But yeah, Speed Week is super cool and it'll separate people to see who... Slim Pushins: It's a marathon, like you just said. And that trophy that Ryder LaPlante won was, he's a tall kid and it was as tall or taller than him. Corby Scherb: It is. We'll go back and say this again, these people who don't work out or want to eat and drink and can survive in these cars is just beyond me. Slim Pushins: That was a dig at somebody. Jim Gardner: It's pure grit and determination is what that is. You wouldn't know anything about it. You worry about your own diet program. Corby Scherb: Is that what it is? Slim Pushins: Well, normally about this time of the show, normally about this time of the show, we'd be asking somebody if we landed on the moon, but Corby, didn't you have a hot take on whether or not Artemis went to the dark side? So you tell me this, did I see something that I know the moon is nowhere the size of earth, but did I see that they were only on the dark side of the moon for like 20 something hours like Artemis? Jim Gardner: Or you crash out two laps in, you can't even be tired. That's me. Corby Scherb: That's that. Who was? When? They made it that far? Slim Pushins: last week. Jim Gardner: last week. It went all the way around. Slim Pushins: We were told that they made it that far Jim. What do you think? Jim Gardner: But they definitely went around and then came back. Now, the dark side of the moon could be in reference to where the moon is with the sun and how it's moving, because there's three objects moving around the sun. And so there's going to be there's going to be a cadence of timing for all that. Let those guys handle that. We just. Corby Scherb: Yeah, they made it right at the firmament. No big deal. Slim Pushins: you get that, Corby? Corby Scherb: there. Slim Pushins: Hahaha Corby Scherb: So we came back in to the earth's surface, bucketed, 25 thou. They had this cool little heat shield that just like deflects all the heat from it falling so fast. They didn't have jets the whole time as they was being pushed away from the earth, but to fall back into the earth, it's like a suction, like a tractor beam, the whole deal. Gotcha. Slim Pushins: You Jim Gardner: Mm-hmm. Slim Pushins: The thing. Jim Gardner: Yeah, it's called gravity. Jump, jump up, see where you land. Corby Scherb: And then as the earth is spinning at 3000 miles per hour, magically they landed exactly where they said they was going to. Jim Gardner: Yeah. It's a bunch of guys, a lot smarter than the three of us on this podcast figured it out. It's math. Slim Pushins: A more data than the power rankings. Jim Gardner: That's right. Corby Scherb: So from a fundamental standpoint, no way. Jim Gardner: You You guys are exhausting. Wrap this up, Kerbo. I can't handle more of this. Slim Pushins: There's your hot, there's your hot jibs over it. All right, well, thank you guys for joining me. Thank everybody listening at home. All, all 10 of you. Corby Scherb: It's just you or? Jim Gardner: Back to regular schedule programming next week. We'll, we'll get on the horn. We'll see how the races go this weekend. We'll try to get somebody on for next week, but, ⁓ this is a good kind of, break up every five, every five, six weeks, just to kind of talk about nonsense for, for however long we want to about some more overarching stuff. So, ⁓ I think this will work out, but, ⁓ next week we'll get a guest on. Slim Pushins: Well, I was talking to you two. Shop beers. Meh. Corby Scherb: Cool man, that's the cool thing about racing and I think that hopefully we can bring some of that light back to it's such an experience just every single weekend and you talk about stuff like Speed Week or Nationals or the Chili Bowl or the shootout. Racing's cool, racing's really, really cool and I want a lot of people to understand where we come from and why we do what we are even if you don't do it anymore. I mean, I've been involved in racing for 34 years of my life. Jim Gardner: Yeah, yeah, it's. Yeah, all right, boys, I appreciate it. Slim Pushins: And now he's quitting a podcast twice a week, Corby Scherb: Bingo. Slim Pushins: All right, well, thanks everybody for listening. Corby Scherb: Yep. Slim Pushins: There you-