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Carl Edwards Gave The Greatest Speech in NASCAR History · Kenny Wallace Media

• 0:02
  Happy Saturday morning, everybody.
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  This is the best weather in the history of Daytona Speed weeks
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  ever, ever. I'm down here at Brother Rusty's
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  home and I am so thankful to him.
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  And Patty, I'm, I'm spoiled rotten and, and Rusty and Patty
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  and my brother Mike, they love me.
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  I got it going on, man. I'll tell you, I'm I'm so
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  thankful to brother Rusty and Patty for letting me stay at
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  this house. Listen, I've been gone 21 days
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  and I miss my wife. And this beautiful home has made
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  it nice on me. Staying in those old hotels.
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  Boy, they get depressing. So thank you to Rusty and Patty
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  for letting me stay at this beautiful home, just not too far
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  from the Volusia Speedway. But this weather, I've never
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  seen any. Listen, I'm 61 years old.
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  I'll be 62 August 23rd. I've been coming to Daytona
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  Speed weeks since the 70s. I remember when Benny Parson and
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  Richard Petty and Kale Yarborough and I have never ever
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  seen weather like this. It it's, it's 8586° every day.
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  This is the first time I've come to Daytona Beach, FL Volusia,
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  you know the whole deal. And it's just there.
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  There's no forecast of rain, and it is beautiful.
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  I'm thankful. All right, let's sit down,
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  everybody. Oh, man, I don't even need
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  Rusty's Dixon shirt on the day. It's so hot.
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  Actually, I started to come out here.
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  I started to come out here with the Dixon shirt on and I took it
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  off. It's so darn hot.
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  All right, listen, I got up late today.
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  I don't know why. I just maybe I'm tired.
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  I I think, I think my sleep goes with my brain.
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  It's like if my brain's working hard, I get tired, OK?
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  It's all about Carl Edwards. I read something a fan said, a
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  fan said. I I didn't want to pay attention
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  to Carl Edwards Hall of Fame speech, but I couldn't turn
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  away. Same here.
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  But I did want to listen to it because Carl and myself are
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  friends. But that is how good Carl
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  Edwards speech was. And once again I would break my
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  arm patting my back that I was right.
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  OK, I'm going to tell you what this speech was about.
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  I'm going to debolt a little bit.
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  There's another story like this for a lot of you that pay
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  attention to coffee with Kenny. I tell the story about the great
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  tennis player Bjorn Borg. Now we know all the negativity
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  about Bjorn Borg. That's not the story.
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  OK, so we want to pay attention to the real story about Bjorn
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  Borg. Bjorn Borg, he was a great what
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  from Germany and he he played Jimmy Connors and you kids don't
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  know about this, but what happened is he was great.
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  Bjorn Borg was one of the greatest tennis players of all
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  time, but his whole career he was bitter, just bitter.
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  And when his career was over, he got rid of all his trophies even
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  though he was the greatest. This is a strange phenomenon in
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  sports compared to someone like, let's say, Jimmy Johnson.
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  Jimmy Johnson, seven time champion, thankful, you know,
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  but Jimmy had to go out and move to different countries and, you
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  know, live in Colorado. So everybody deals with their
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  demons. No matter how good you are, even
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  when you're the greatest of all time, you feel like you paid
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  this price and you hate it now. And then all of a sudden, after
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  Bjorn Borg's career was over and time went by, he made peace with
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  himself. He he forgave himself and you
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  know what Bjorn Borg did? He paid millions of dollars to
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  find the trophies that he gave away in haste.
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  What that means is Bjorn gave all this stuff away 'cause he
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  hated tennis so bad. Because to be the greatest it
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  you got to be self-centered and you're the person you don't want
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  to be. You are a total Dick.
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  And I got to tell you, I love my brother more than anybody in the
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  world. Nobody loves.
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  And I love my brothers Rusty and Mike, but Rusty was not, is was
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  not the easiest to get along with, but I understood it.
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  I understood it. There is a sense of misery
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  required to be great. That doesn't mean you got to be
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  a Dick to be good because there's plenty of race car
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  drivers that win everything and they're not mean.
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  However, they got a toll edge to them.
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  Carl Edwards speech last night was a speech of forgiveness.
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  Carl Edwards was one of the greatest race car drivers of our
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  time. And everything Carl Edwards
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  talked about, he and he said it. This is a speech of
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  gratefulness. He was grateful to everybody.
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  And you know why? Because at the end of this
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  speech, he says, you know, Dale Junior made it famous.
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  And he said, I didn't want to hit my head one more time.
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  So he left NASCAR bitter and he went and traveled the world.
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  And he looked back And at the end of his speech, he said, I
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  realized that this is my life and I and NASCAR is me.
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  Think about that. He left NASCAR 'cause he was
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  hurt mentally and physically, and he felt like if he hit his
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  head one more time that he wouldn't be able to spend time
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  with his wife and his kids. So finally, finally, Carl
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  Edwards tells the truth why he leaves NASCAR.
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  And I'd have to say that it is important for me to understand
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  this because all competitors deal with this, even the local
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  race car drivers out here, they're out here Volusia and
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  this is their Daytona 500. It it, it defines them.
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  And you know, in a lot of us go this racing don't define me.
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  I'm my wife Kim and my children. And they are they're everything
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  to me. So when Carl Edwards on that
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  last restart and he did not win that championship for Joe Gibbs
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  and he hit that wall, like I said yesterday and here today,
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  I'm telling you that I was right.
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  I'll be darned. You know, when I was telling you
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  Carl left NASCAR with a broken heart, I thought it was 90%
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  right. But here today I was 100% right.
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  So he lost that championship, hit his head and his wife is a
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  doctor. Carl Edwards wife is a doctor.
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  She looks like she's not somebody to be screwed with.
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  Have you noticed Carl Edwards wife?
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  She never did that NASCAR thing. It's because she's a very strong
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  lady with a career. So looks to me like Carl Edwards
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  wife is a bad ass not to be screwed with.
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  She's not prancing up and down pit Rd. with the diamond ring on
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  and the hair did. She has her own career.
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  And I think that grounded Carl. So he was very thankful to
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  everybody now. And basically it was, it was an
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  apology speech. He said I was the worst
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  teammate. And he sent, he took this speech
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  to make a wrong a right. So congratulations to Carl
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  Edwards for finally finding peace in your life.
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  And the camera went to my brother Rusty 2 times.
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  And I've never seen Rusty. He was like this because all of
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  us are complete Dicks our whole racing career 'cause it it takes
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  that laser focus. You got to be self-centered.
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  And it was Carl just apologizing everybody.
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  He, it was an incredible speech. But in the end, Carl Edwards
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  left NASCAR with a broken heart, a hurt head, and he felt like if
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  he had his head one more time, he wouldn't know his children.
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  And he said that he didn't say that, but watch the speech.
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  All right, everybody, it's sad to say, but Father John, who
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  married Kim and myself, you know, I went to pre Cana class
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  and Father John said to me, what do you say?
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  You all? You all know, I tell you all the
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  time. Father John said to me, Kenny
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  Wallace, what are you going to be?
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  I said I'm going to be a race car driver and Father John
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  looked at me right in the eye and he said be careful young
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  man, competition will kill you. It almost tried to kill Carl
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  Edwards. So his speech was incredible and
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  I could totally relate to it. So congratulations, Carl
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  Edwards. He gave the best speech in
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  NASCAR Hall of Fame history and everybody, Etzel Ford, the most
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  powerful men, Mike Hilton, Joe Gibbs, they were glued to the
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  speech and Carl was matter of fact when he said it all,
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  meaning he was saying it and there was no it was he didn't
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  miss a verbiage. He was a matter of fact.
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  Congratulations, Carl Edwards, you're at peace now.
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  Time to have fun, buddy.