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Rusty Wallace Once Drove 242 MPH at Talladega & Started Hydroplaning! | Kenny Wallace Classics · Kenny Wallace Media

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  In the mid 90s a phone company gets a hold of you because they
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  want to see if their GPS works. Tell the story about when you
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  went to Talladega. That's pretty correct what you
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  just said, but but Winston went away.
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  OK. And Nextel was the new sponsor
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  for NASCAR. Phone the phone guys.
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  Nextel. OK, That was a new sponsor.
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  So I get a phone call about six months into the new contract
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  that we're racing about six months into the year now with
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  the Nextel Cup series. OK.
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  And they said we want to start broadcasting the drivers
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  communications to a tower. Then from the tower down to the
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  the all the fans of the grandstands, we want you to
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  drive around the racetrack above 200 mph to prove that the
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  signals can transfer back and forth quick enough to do that
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  correctly. And I said, OK.
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  And back then, you got to remember the cars were running
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  like 192 miles an hour. That's all.
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  They had to run it with a restrictor plate.
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  OK, so that's OK. Well, they asked me if I would
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  do it. I said, yeah, we'll do it.
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  So they asked Team Penske if they would.
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  So at that time, I don't want to belabor the point, but when big
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  companies like that or NASCAR or automotive tests, you know, the
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  Ford test, what what make were you running at that time do?
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  You remember? Does that mean it was a?
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  It was a. Ford, OK, so whether it's Chevy
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  White Sport, you got to feel full of pride.
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  Ford big sponsor coming in, they want you to do it.
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  You didn't. You didn't shy away from it.
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  Well, I don't know if that's full of pride or not.
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  It was just a question they came across.
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  I mean, all the drivers were getting requests from everybody
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  to do different things. I just happened to get a request
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  from Team Penske. Got a request?
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  I guess what it means you didn't say no, I don't want to do that.
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  Oh, no, I mean, I wanted to do it.
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  I said, OK, it's it, it, it was a simple test, too.
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  Yeah, 'cause you know, I took the truck driver myself and Earl
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  Barben. That's it.
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  Three of. You three of us, Team Penske
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  prepared the car to put her on the truck and blew us down
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  there. Being Earl jumped on my
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  airplane, we flew down there, we fired that thing up, warmed it
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  up. Earl Barbin, Jenny Johnson.
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  Spider is from Saint Louis, So Earl.
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  Earl, Yeah. Well Earl Barbin, Earl was my
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  sponsor my whole career and then when I retired at the end of
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  2005, he went for went to work for Jimmy Johnson and went on to
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  be his sponsor for his 7 championships.
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  OK. OK, so you 3 go down there.
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  Oh, yeah. I mean, me and Earl were tight.
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  A real thing. We still are, Yeah.
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  And so those guys said, OK, go on down there and do it.
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  And so we send the truck driver down there with the car.
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  We get, we fly the plane down, we get out.
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  We ended helping the truck, we unload the car.
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  We fired up and warmed up and plugged the oil in and get it
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  all done. It's garbage.
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  I mean, to drive around Talladaga in 190 mile an hour is
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  pretty easy, OK? It really is.
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  But because we have restricted place, all they wanted us to do
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  is run four or five laps above 200 mile an hour.
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  Yeah, 2 right at 200 or above. So we fire the thing up.
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  I go out there and run up. I run.
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  Know what I run? I run 194 miles an hour.
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  You come in and put a different restrict plate on.
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  Car runs 199.8. So OK.
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  And so we got to go faster. We got to go over 200.
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  Is it OK? Put another restrict non nastars
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  there and Buster Auten and a couple other guys there.
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  So they come do me some men. You're not going to believe
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  this. That's what's wrong.
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  We screwed up and left the Dong lawn restrictor plates back in
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  Hickory, NC. We don't have a bigger
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  restrictor plate, so the only restrictor plate they had to
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  carbon run 199 eight. This is what This is why we're
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  doing this, because yeah, we're trying to figure out the next
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  thing you're going to say, don't restrictor plates.
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  So it was redneck as it was. That's what happened.
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  We just forgot the rest. Restrictor plates and make it go
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  a little faster maybe over me two O one or two O 2.
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  So as we don't have it as we'll just take the damn thing off
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  take the restrictor plate clear off and it went all rusty.
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  We don't hope we can do that. I say come on look you're it's
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  there's nobody around. We're not testing, we're not
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  competing. Let's just get this test done
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  for these guys, OK yeah. They took out restrictor plate
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  off. I went out there and I thought I
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  was in second gear leaving the pits instead of being in 3rd
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  gear. So I downshifted a car as a this
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  thing's in 3rd gear and it's screaming.
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  It's turning. I mean, it's wound up.
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  Pull that baby back in high gear.
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  I come ripping down the back straightaway.
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  I come down the front straightaway.
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  I come down the front straightaway. 221 miles an hour.
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  Were you up scared? Getting up to speed?
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  No, I knew I was really flying. I come back around, that damn
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  thing come off at turn 3, it goes down the front straightaway
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  at the start finish line it goes into complete hydroplane mode.
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  I got the front wheels turn and the friends got lift in it and
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  it slid from the bottom of the track all the way up to the wall
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  and nothing crossed the damn spark figure sign at 242 miles
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  an hour. Oh.
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  My gosh, I come in, I come in. I said Oh my God I can't drive
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  this thing. So Earl, I put 2 spring rubbers
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  in the back of the rear springs. A jacked ass on her car up.
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  Then we took the front fenders. We pulled the fenders out like
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  3/4 of an inch on each side to get some downforce back to the
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  front end. We bolted 4 tires on that thing.
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  I went back out, blew around here one more lap at run 234
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  then it run 241 and I felt the vibration and I throttle back at
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  241 mile and come down and in two laps it ripped all the
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  rubber off the right front tire. It was going that damn fast that
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  it ripped the rubber off the tires.
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  So this is what everybody wants to know.
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  And, and OK, that's an unbelievable story.
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  I cannot add to that. But we always heard of of, you
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  know, Dale Senior, you know, the man of black.
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  Take your restrictor plates off, drop the rag.
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  You just explained why that was impossible.
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  Yeah, the cars are aerodynamically unstable to run
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  that speed. Let's put it this way.
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  That era of car. That era of car.
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  Yeah. Would you?
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  No way you could do that. Yeah, that car, 200 mile per
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  hour was his Max to be aerodynamically stay
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  aerodynamically stable. I proved that.
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  Yeah. I mean, I couldn't even turn the
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  wheel. Those goes so damn fast.
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  It was lifting. The front end and in two laps
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  that you're saying the tires. Were gone.
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  Ripped the tires off. It ripped the rubber off the
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  tires. Yeah, and Goodyear probably
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  couldn't make a tire, and if they did, it have to be built
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  like a truck. There'd be a lot, and there's no
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  reason. OK, let's change the subject a
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  little bit. If we're putting on a show at
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  200 mile an hour, why do we need to go 240 or 220?
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  Well, you. The fan really can't tell that.
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  Yeah, I mean, yeah, you're right.
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  You don't need to go that speed, you know.
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  To put her on a. Good race.
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  I absolutely proved to myself that day I came in off the
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  track. I my first got the windows are
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  all look at Earl. So you know what?
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  Now you know and now I know why you can't race these things over
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  200 miles an hour because it's a stock car.
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  It's not designed to be around 40 other cars swap, swarping all
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  over the place. I realized that we couldn't run
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  that speed, but we did it. So we proved it.
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  And I think I, well, I, I know we were probably one of the
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  fastest stock cars in the planet still to this day.
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  Yeah, so there's a lot of documentaries out there, people
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  voicing over, giving their opinion, but now we know the
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  details. 3 of you Penske Racing just says go on down or do what
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  they need. You get down there, it's three
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  of you now. You, you don't have a restrictor
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  plate. Now this story just keeps
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  building and building. And before you know it, you you
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  realize that at what point let's end it like this?
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  Was it a day later was an hour later?
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  When did you realize that this story has become, I mean, today
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  the story still lives on. Did you realize it was as big as
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  a story as it? Was well, that that day when we
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  left, I really felt like we did something that was miraculous
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  that it did. We accidentally backed into,
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  yeah, we didn't know we're going to do that.
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  And it happened, You know, I remember Earl going back going,
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  Oh, my God. And me going back going, Oh, my
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  God. Yeah.
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  And like, wow, we just can't just.
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  And Team Penske and Don Miller and the guys just set us down to
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  the skeleton crew, you know, and you do that.
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  We knocked that out and we loaded up and come home, You
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  know, I said, dude, you're not gonna believe there's something.
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  Right? 242 mile an hour.
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  Yeah. And back then, those cars were
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  making about 750 horsepower. Yeah.
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  Man, at the end of 05, before they wanted all these new rules
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  stuff, our NASCAR motors were making about 950.
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  Wow. I mean, my.
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  Well, a lot of power. My qualifying motive for the
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  Coke 600 was 950 horsepower ice cream and turn to think 10,300
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  RPM. That's another story, the inside
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  of that motor, and that will be down the road.
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  That's way down the road. That's way down the road.
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  But now as we end this, we realize how many great stories
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  are these. These are Rusty Wallace stories,
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  but these are also moments in the sport that changed the
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  sport.