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Dale Earnhardt, Harry Gant, & The Rise Of Roush Racing | Mark Martin Archive · Kenny Wallace Media

• 0:00
  What do you think made Dale Earnhardt resonate so much with
• 0:05
  the fan base and really just America in general?
• 0:08
  I mean, he, it's like, you know, all you guys would joke about in
• 0:12
  the garage area, like he made-up like 90% of the merchandise
• 0:15
  sales. Like, you know, all you guys are
• 0:17
  just everybody else. I mean, he was like the poster
• 0:20
  guy for NASCAR. What?
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  What do you think it is that made him resonate?
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  So much he identified with the blue collar 'cause he certainly
• 0:28
  was totally unapologetic, ruthless racer, you know, all
• 0:35
  those things and he won a lot and he ruffled lots of feathers.
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  And that that made him, you know, that that made his
• 0:45
  detractors or haters, you know, more vocal and louder, which
• 0:50
  made the ones that were for him more vocal and louder and wanted
• 0:56
  to support his merch. And he, his merch thing was way
• 1:05
  over 10 times, you know what my merch was.
• 1:08
  And my merch was top five, you know, in, in the 90s, certainly
• 1:13
  top five. But I mean, he was way over 10
• 1:16
  times my numbers. He was, he really resonated with
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  the regular guy. They were able to identify with
• 1:27
  Dale, and Dale was their hero because he was out there doing
• 1:30
  it like they would if they could, you know?
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  Yeah, he always kind of remind me like Stone Cold Steve Austin,
• 1:38
  you know, like Dale was a NASCAR version of Stone Cold Steve
• 1:42
  Austin. I mean, the reason why I always
• 1:44
  thought Stone Cold was so popular, you know, in that in
• 1:47
  his area, the Attitude area of, you know, the WWF is like, he
• 1:51
  was the heroic version of the fan base, you know, And it's
• 1:55
  like, I love, you know, I love that guy.
• 1:57
  And it's like Dale was kind of like the racing version of that.
• 2:02
  Absolutely, yeah, he was. You know, his fans loved him and
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  they didn't like anybody that threatened, threatened him in
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  any way or his dominance on the racetrack or whatever.
• 2:18
  I was so good for the sport, Dale, You know, I think Dale did
• 2:25
  even more. I mean, Richard Petty did tons
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  for NASCAR's growth, but Dale even more because Richard was a
• 2:36
  big winner and a big fan favorite.
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  But he wasn't nearly as controversial as as as Dale.
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  So Dale was able to inspire an awful lot of blood pressure in
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  the in the fans realm. What do you think made Dale such
• 2:57
  an incredible race car driver? I mean, you know, he just,
• 3:02
  there's a couple guys throughout NASCAR history, you know, that
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  they just seem like they stand head and shoulders, you know,
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  way above everybody else. And obviously he's certainly one
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  of. Them man, I I said, you know
• 3:17
  that people that didn't know Dale Earnhardt, you know, just
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  saw him on the racetrack thought he was aggressive driver.
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  But I said, and I still believe it's a fairly accurate
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  statement, Dale would throw his mother in the river to win a
• 3:34
  race. Then after the race he'd go back
• 3:38
  and pull her out because he was a good dude, had a good heart.
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  But man, he showed none of that. He was merciful.
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  Merciful. I mean, on the race track he had
• 3:55
  a lot of skill, but he had just amazing determination.
• 4:02
  The guy would never give up. He would never just say my car's
• 4:06
  not any good. I can't tell you how many times
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  he beat me with a slower car just out of sheer will.
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  Yes, he always, you know, all the footage you've ever seen of
• 4:19
  him, whenever you're going to pass him, he always looked like
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  such a difficult guy to pass, even when he wasn't having a
• 4:25
  good day. You know, it just really seemed
• 4:27
  like he could get the most out of, you know, his car, you know,
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  almost more sure than anybody else could.
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  Yeah, and he was, you know, he, he wasn't big on getting past,
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  even if he was, even if his car, even if he knew he wasn't any
• 4:41
  good. I was in a Bush race at
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  Darlington and I think it was 88 or 80 and I think it was 1989.
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  And I was ridiculous fast, but I had had a bad pit stop or
• 4:56
  whatever. And I come up to catch him and
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  he, you know, I mean, I'm like ridiculously fast.
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  And so I pass him in what is now one and two and coming off of
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  two. He hung on my right rear.
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  Back then nobody did that. Well, I kind of just squished
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  him off, you know, I, I acted like he gave me room and he
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  really didn't. And you know, it almost got him
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  in the wall and I was able to keep going.
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  Well, this thing went green for a long time and before the next
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  green flag pit stop, I come all the way around and lapping,
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  that's how much faster I am. And when I go by, he hangs out
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  the middle finger #1 you know, as I'm lapping him because he,
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  you know, so he lets me know that he certainly didn't
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  appreciate me squeezing him off. But you know, that's how hard he
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  raced with how slow of a car. I mean, it had to be, you know,
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  6060 laps. I made a whole lap on him and
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  come back around, you know. So it was, it was, it was, it
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  was tough racing with him, but he always raced me.
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  You know, we had a couple of scuff UPS, but he always raced
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  me. I watched him race other people
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  and I will say everyone else I watched close because I always
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  wanted to race someone how they raced me.
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  Well, he raced me differently. I mean, we did have a couple of
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  dust UPS, but you're going to have that in racing.
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  He he didn't, he was always, he wasn't nearly as.
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  Rough on me. As he was a lot of the guys.
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  Yeah, that's, you know, what I wanted to bring up while we were
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  talking about him. You know, I've watched so much
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  footage from back, back then of you guys racing together.
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  And, you know, everybody's got this thing about Dale.
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  He he bumped and run people. He'd move people out of the way,
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  he'd wreck people and everything.
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  And maybe that's true for for other guys, but I have not ever
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  found like one clip of him moving you, wrecking you.
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  Now, you guys made a lot of contact.
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  You probably, you know, banged doors with him more than anybody
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  else in your career. But I mean, he he would race you
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  fair. And I think, you know, of course
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  you did. You treated him the same way.
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  So that was kind of my question, which I guess you you partly
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  answer that Dale must have raced you a little bit differently
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  now. Did you race him a little bit
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  differently than you did everybody else?
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  No, I gave Dale, you know, I, I gave him respect before I was
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  running good and, and, and and when I started running good, you
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  know, I expected kind of the same respect and, and he gave
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  it. So I was able to now, you know,
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  we, we raced really, really hard.
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  Some other drivers might concede when you had them where Dale
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  wouldn't so it would get ferocious.
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  But it never got dirty or wrong, you know, or questionable.
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  It had to be done with respect and it I'll tell you if you even
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  thought about disrespecting Dale, he would eat you a lot.
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  That's why I was lucky. I was dreading.
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  I saw him at, at, at, at Darlington.
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  I was coming up to lap him and I was like, Oh no, I'm going to
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  have to pass him after I squeezed him off, you know, But
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  he just gave me the finger and, and let it go at that.
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  But I was, I was expecting to get, you know, eat some, some
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  concrete or something. So I felt like it was my duty to
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  make damn sure that I always raced with proper etiquette with
• 9:07
  him. And if I did that, you know, I,
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  I felt like he would, he would give it back.
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  I never expected anything out of out of line from Dale when I was
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  coming up to pass him or racing him to pass him or he was racing
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  to pass me. I I learned early that I could
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  expect, you know, proper etiquette.
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  Hard racing, hard as it could get, but but fair.
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  Well, you know, we've heard you and and Rusty and so many other
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  guys talk about, you know, what he was like, you know, in the
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  race car on the racetrack. You know, one thing that always
• 9:51
  has stood out to me, you know, running Marmart and Archive and
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  all the stuff that I've been doing to prepare for your book
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  is just how many video clips and photos that I've found of you
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  and Dale just, you know, hanging out together in in the garage
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  area, you know, and usually you guys are are laughing, you know,
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  what was he like outside of the race car?
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  You know, that's what I feel like a lot of fans don't hear
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  enough about, you know, they hear about, you know, he, he was
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  the intimidator on the racetrack, but he was really a
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  little bit different of a person when he was outside the race
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  car. He really liked to cut up and,
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  and I think he liked to cut up with people.
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  He liked, you know, he loved, loved Neil Bonnet, you know, and
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  of course I did too, you know, and, and the people that we were
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  around. I mean, he was, he liked to have
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  fun. He liked to cut up.
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  I just saw a video that I had completely forgot from 1990.
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  You know, when we're battling, it's right down to the
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  championship, you know, I don't know, just a few races from the
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  end of the season. I'm still leading the points and
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  it's at the drivers intros and somehow or another Arlene, maybe
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  I had to go do a, a interview or something.
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  And then I, I come back up. Well, he's got Arlene sitting on
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  his lap, you know, and he's smiling because he thinks he's,
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  you know, he thinks he's cool. He's going to take no take, no
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  woman, you know. And you know, he's cutting up,
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  you know, like, like he was, he was trying, but it was in a fun
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  way, you know, And I told him, well, you know, that'd be OK as
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  long as I got the championship, which I never heard back from
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  Arlene about that. But we were all cutting up, you
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  know. And so, I mean, he was there
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  were times when we had some good fun and felt some warmth.
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  You know, there were sometimes when we had some rubs.
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  Gosh, you, I don't I can't imagine not having that,
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  especially with, you know, I mean, they all had to have a a
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  monster ego from you know, I mean, he was the man, but yet he
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  he really, you know, acted, you know, outside the race car.
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  He acted like a clown sometimes and like to joke around and have
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  fun and you know, he he was he was just a lot of fun.
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  I had a lot of fun with him. I had some sometimes when it
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  wasn't so fun. He was pretty strategic with, I
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  mean, golly, he was friends with, I mean Ricky Rudd, even
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  though they were what I would consider pretty arch enemies.
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  Now, I don't know if he ever went out to dinner with, because
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  he did with Ricky after they had had lots of dust ups, you know,
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  and then he went right back to being, you know, an adversary of
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  Ricky's. But I don't know if he did that
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  with Bow down. Now I'm telling you, there was
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  no love lost between those two because I was a witness to it.
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  What's so funny about that? That 89 North Wilkesboro race
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  when you know him and Ricky Rudd tangled was just man, that was
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  just salt and wound. That Jeff Bodine won that race.
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  I mean, that's gosh, man. Yeah, I didn't think about that,
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  but yeah, that had to make him even triple mad about that.
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  Yeah. Didn't you say because you
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  finished second, I think, didn't you say you saw that?
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  You saw, you saw it happen. Oh, I was, I was running, you
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  know, or was I running 4th or 5th right there?
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  I mean, you know, I'm, I'm past the start finish line when
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  they're turning into the corner and they're making that arc and
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  I, I got my eyes right on it. I'm that's what I'm looking at.
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  And so that goes, they go around and of course I get all over the
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  brakes, you know, trying to get through and, you know, I get
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  through. And then once I get through, I
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  was like, Dang, man, I might have could have won the race if
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  I hadn't slowed down, you know, 'cause they both spun up the
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  hill And I was like kept, you know, kicking myself thinking,
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  you know, your response was to slow down because there's a
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  wreck in front of you. But, you know, and it was a
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  mess. But, you know, I thought I may
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  have missed an opportunity to get that win, you know, by by
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  not throwing caution to the winds.
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  So yeah, yeah, I ran. SI was the second one to get
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  through it. Of course, Bow Down was the
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  first one. It's.
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  Crazy. That reminds me, it's a little
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  random but I wonder if that was the race it could have been the
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  year before where you disguise yourself as a day Earnhardt fan
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  to get out of the track. Is 1 in North Wilkesboro.
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  No, that was Martinsville. Yeah, 'cause there's not a ton.
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  Yeah, yeah. But I needed, I needed to do it
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  at Wilkesboro because Wilkesboro got really crazy the last few
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  years because it was, it was the same way as Martinsville.
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  There was only one gate to go out of.
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  And you know, the fans just got to where they lined up, you
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  know, because you pretty much the drivers were able to park
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  inside, but it would be a traffic jam driving out.
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  So you would be parked with Fans Rd., you know, down the road on
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  both sides trying to get out. So it was a it was a pretty wild
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  time there, too. So would you wear a Dale
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  Earnhardt shirt you got in the back seat of the rental car?
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  And you had my sister Rachel drive out.
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  And didn't you say that people looked in the car and saw you in
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  your Dale Earnhardt gear? And so there's Mark Martin.
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  Yeah, they figured it out. Yeah, Yeah.
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  But that got to be. And then after, after I did
• 16:00
  that, it got to be more drivers tried that stunt.
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  It was really, really in the 90s, it was hard to get out of
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  Martinsville. I mean, because you had that one
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  gate and that row up to the highway, you most drivers had to
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  park out by the highway to ever get out of there because there's
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  so many people. So we would Parkway up by the
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  highway. So we'd have to walk with the
• 16:25
  fans for a mile to get to her car.
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  And so it was, it was pretty well a wild mob up through
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  there. So a lot of us tried to get
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  disguised to to try to get out there.
• 16:40
  If I recall correctly, didn't you say that Dale at least one
• 16:44
  time I dressed up as a Terry Labonte fan?
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  He did. That's pretty funny when you
• 16:49
  think about the 2 Bristol races later.
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  Yeah, you know, and that's the thing about Dale and Terry.
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  Terry was mild mannered, you know, and such a clean good
• 17:03
  dude. You know, they even though those
• 17:06
  those things happened at Bristol, there was never any
• 17:10
  serious animosity. I mean, obviously Terry didn't
• 17:15
  like it, but it was, it never became a feud like, you know,
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  like like Bodine, you know, and I'm talking Jeff Bodine, of
• 17:24
  course, like Jeff Bodine or Ricky Rudd.
• 17:28
  Those two were those were flat out feuds.
• 17:34
  So we kind of touched on this a little bit already, but you're
• 17:38
  driving style and Dale's driving style are really cited by fans a
• 17:43
  lot of the times as the two, two polar opposite styles.
• 17:48
  Now, if you really pay close attention to all the footage out
• 17:52
  there of you guys racing together, you know, you never
• 17:56
  backed down from him at all. And in fact, that's why you guys
• 17:59
  made so much contact over your your time racing together.
• 18:04
  But, you know, at the same time, he never wrecked you.
• 18:07
  And Dale's supposed to be this, you know, dirty, rough driver.
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  So what do you think it was? Why didn't he wreck you?
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  You know what? Why didn't he drive you the way
• 18:19
  he did? Jeff Bodine.
• 18:21
  I didn't ask. For it.
• 18:23
  You know, and I didn't try to assert myself as the, the
• 18:29
  biggest dog, you know, I didn't try to be the big dog.
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  All I was trying to be is there. You know, I was trying to be
• 18:37
  there and, and I was racing for my spot and I was racing for
• 18:42
  every spot I could. And, and they'll, he, he
• 18:48
  respected that and appreciated that.
• 18:51
  And my driving style was different.
• 18:54
  His was hard charger from get go.
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  Mine was not from the get go. Mine was all about the finish.
• 19:03
  And part of that was cultivated from being racing on my own with
• 19:09
  no sponsorship money, totally off the purse on a national
• 19:14
  stage at 20 years old. You know, I paid my bills.
• 19:19
  I paid my, I had two employees and I raced my car.
• 19:23
  I got all free parts except for motors.
• 19:26
  So otherwise I couldn't have done it.
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  But I so all that mattered was the finish position didn't
• 19:34
  matter to be showy, didn't matter to lead the race.
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  None of that mattered. And so and then I went right
• 19:42
  into NASCAR with my own team in the same thing.
• 19:46
  It was all about that purse money 100% The first year I ran
• 19:51
  full time in in in NASCAR, I had no sponsor 0, but did it all off
• 19:59
  of the money I could beg borrow and, and and purse money.
• 20:05
  And so that developed my style, which it just wasn't worth
• 20:14
  tussling. Over a spot you could pass back
• 20:18
  then. So it wasn't worth tussling over
• 20:22
  a spot halfway through a race or a fourth of the way through the
• 20:26
  race when half the time that guy that wanted to tussle for it, if
• 20:34
  I let him go, he would wind up on the hook wrecked or his motor
• 20:39
  blown up or he broke to, you know, whatever, man.
• 20:42
  I had to nurse my equipment. I had to spend my whole race
• 20:46
  concentrating on how am I going to drop the hammer this last run
• 20:52
  after the last pit stop? How am I going to get the best
• 20:56
  result I can get? And so that was that wound up
• 21:00
  being ingrained in my style, and I've been criticized for it a
• 21:04
  lot. But that's how I got my results.
• 21:08
  And, you know, yeah, I mean, Dale and I raced tooth and nail,
• 21:15
  but he respected, you know, how I did it.
• 21:20
  And I never tried. I was never trying to be as big
• 21:25
  as Dale earned her. I was just trying to win me some
• 21:28
  races and that's all. I was just a little guy with
• 21:33
  dirty hands trying to win some races.
• 21:36
  And he, I think he respected that.
• 21:39
  He respected my approach. And you know, and we miss, you
• 21:45
  know, we just never really, we had a couple of dust UPS, don't
• 21:48
  get me wrong, but that was Dale testing me to see if I would
• 21:53
  revert to the Jeff Bodine. You know, he didn't like Jeff
• 21:57
  Bodine cause Jeff Bodine complained and I did something
• 22:02
  about it. I didn't say nothing, you know,
• 22:05
  I would be the one to, you know, be like a rattlesnake, you know,
• 22:11
  if you're going to do that, there's going to be
• 22:13
  consequences. And it ain't going to be my
• 22:15
  voice, you know, I mean, and, and we had zero.
• 22:21
  I knew, man not to push his buttons because I knew there'd
• 22:25
  be consequences. But I think Dale learned that
• 22:28
  over time that I was a very respectful guy.
• 22:31
  I was serious about my racing, my style was different and I
• 22:36
  didn't. I didn't want to be him and I
• 22:38
  didn't want to take his his spot in the sport, but I wanted to
• 22:41
  win every what every race that I could.
• 22:47
  Well, you know, as we close out here, you know, thinking about
• 22:51
  Dale, you know, what are the races that that come to mind
• 22:56
  when you think about Dale Earnhardt?
• 22:57
  I mean, what, what are some of the most epic battles that you
• 23:00
  ever had with him that it could be Cup series, Bush series, I
• 23:05
  rock. I mean, just give us a couple
• 23:07
  moments that you think of when you think of Dale Earnhardt.
• 23:13
  Dover, both races in 1989 I was super fast and we were super
• 23:23
  green. Roush Racing, we're super green.
• 23:26
  I haven't won yet, but we're blistering fast.
• 23:32
  And your cool suit. Failed.
• 23:34
  Oh yeah, that too. So that's that's blistering as
• 23:36
  well. Yeah, explain that too.
• 23:40
  As you you know, tell the IT gives context to this word.
• 23:45
  There were some cool suits around back then and what they
• 23:48
  were were a rubber vest and and little hat for your head and an
• 23:56
  ice chest over on the right hand side of the car.
• 23:59
  That pump circulated ice water through this vest, through the
• 24:05
  veins in the vest and through your head, pretty thick leather
• 24:11
  rubber. And so when they failed, when
• 24:18
  they stopped pumping the water, they would be way hotter than
• 24:22
  nothing because you'd be you'd have a rubber suit on.
• 24:27
  And they were not always super. That's why a lot of guys didn't
• 24:32
  use them is because they weren't always super reliable.
• 24:37
  And so, you know, 500 laps at Dover back then, when you run
• 24:43
  the car sideways through the corner and smoke the tires.
• 24:47
  In the summer. In the summer is a good time to
• 24:51
  have this thing put where this thing.
• 24:53
  So, so I, I put it on thing fails early in the race and so
• 25:00
  it's brutal. You know, one of the one of the
• 25:03
  comments is, you know, you know, later on it's like, don't worry
• 25:08
  about it. I'm gonna be, I'm gonna, I'm
• 25:09
  gonna, I'm gonna finish this race.
• 25:10
  I'm gonna be, but just have an ambulance ready, you know,
• 25:14
  'cause I'll be dead when I, when, when I cross the start
• 25:17
  finish line, I'm gonna need an ambulance.
• 25:20
  So anyway, yeah, we had a Daryl Dale and his team were probably
• 25:28
  beating us off a pit Rd. probably had, you know, might
• 25:31
  have had, you know, a slight advantage at times there or he
• 25:39
  was better on restarts, whatever.
• 25:41
  He kept getting in front of me. And so I was having to pass him.
• 25:45
  And it was the, the one part that I really remember was after
• 25:49
  the last pit stop is, is time to go and there's lap after lap
• 25:56
  after lap that I and he gives me the inside so I can't hit him.
• 26:02
  I mean, how are you going to move a guy when he gives you the
• 26:04
  whole inside lane? I mean, that's why he didn't
• 26:08
  ever wreck me because I wouldn't, you know, my, my
• 26:12
  constitution says you can't do that.
• 26:14
  So you can't drive and chase somebody into the corner and
• 26:17
  wreck them when they gave you a spot, gave you the room to race.
• 26:21
  He gave it to me. I smoke in the tires, smoke in
• 26:24
  the right front tire, balling off the tire, smoke in the right
• 26:27
  rear tire, get beside him over and over and over again.
• 26:31
  And I can never quite clear him. And he knew how bad I needed to
• 26:35
  win and wanted to win. And the fact I think this is
• 26:39
  1989. So this is early on in our
• 26:43
  relationship as far as me being able to take a win away from
• 26:48
  him. I think he always remembered and
• 26:51
  respected that because he knew how bad I needed and wanted to
• 26:55
  win. And he beat me.
• 26:57
  I could get up beside him and maybe break a nose ahead of him,
• 27:03
  but then he'd run that outside and he he, I had plenty of room
• 27:08
  on the bottom but I just couldn't pull it off.
• 27:11
  And there again my car was a lot faster than his.
• 27:14
  So I really remember that race as as being a wheel to wheel
• 27:18
  with him. And then I also remember that
• 27:20
  same year, 1989 at Darlington had two races.
• 27:24
  I always ran really good at Darlington and I ran second to
• 27:27
  him in both races. So he was first and I was second
• 27:30
  in both races. They had at Darlington the
• 27:33
  spring and the fall race, so I remember that as well.
• 27:38
  Those two. That was not a wheel to wheel
• 27:40
  battle, but it was a frustrating thing because we handily beat
• 27:45
  everyone else but couldn't beat him.
• 27:48
  But he beat me with a slower car at at Dover, mostly because he
• 27:52
  was ahead. If I could have come out of a
• 27:54
  last pit stop ahead of him, I would have drove off into the
• 27:57
  sunset. But you know, I just couldn't
• 28:00
  manage the to complete the pass. Well, one race that I definitely
• 28:07
  think of when I think of you guys battling as the 93 Southern
• 28:11
  500 where you guys seem like you just kept passing each other
• 28:16
  every other corner, you know, for half the race.
• 28:19
  And then then finally you got around him and then then LED
• 28:22
  pretty much the the rest of the race.
• 28:24
  And and 1 you know, y'all, you guys had some epic battles at
• 28:30
  Darlington in the early 90s and that was certainly one of them.
• 28:34
  Well, it was and Dale was hard head, you know, and and so I had
• 28:39
  to race him hard headed so in in a way.
• 28:44
  So the thing was is that I was faster than Dale, obviously.
• 28:50
  And in today's one and two, the one and two, today's one and two
• 28:53
  there, you know, the crossover is very common.
• 28:59
  So if Dale would have been faster than me, I wouldn't have
• 29:03
  crossed him over down there, but he crossed me over.
• 29:09
  So I'm like. OK, dog.
• 29:11
  So every time we go into one and two, you know, one would be we,
• 29:17
  you know, we, we'd be passing each other coming down the front
• 29:20
  stretch and whoever went into one first would crossover.
• 29:24
  So I'd cross him back. Next lap, he crossed me back.
• 29:28
  Next lap, I'd cross him back. You know, we just can't do it
• 29:31
  because I was, I was not going to lose that.
• 29:35
  You know, that battle, you know, that was, and that's me.
• 29:39
  I, I never gave up. I would have given up if he
• 29:42
  would have been faster because we were wasting time.
• 29:46
  You see, the leader was driving away while we were doing that.
• 29:50
  So with anyone else, I would have quit wasting time.
• 29:54
  But with Dale, I couldn't do that because if I did that, he
• 29:59
  might see that as weakness. So I couldn't, I couldn't do
• 30:04
  that. So we just wasted more time and
• 30:06
  time and time. But you know.
• 30:08
  Yeah. So we just race.
• 30:09
  Yeah, BB, Ned and and Bob Jenkins, they started laughing
• 30:14
  because you guys kept doing that so much.
• 30:16
  Yeah, it was. Yeah, it was just two hard heads
• 30:20
  racing. Neither 1 going to give up and
• 30:23
  and you know, it was clean racing, but it was hard man.
• 30:26
  We were on the edge of control about to about to lose control
• 30:31
  every inch of the way. But we were we were fighting
• 30:33
  hard. Fans love that stuff, man.
• 30:37
  Yeah, it's, I'm really excited because Nigel Kinrade, he has a
• 30:40
  really great photo of you and Dale.
• 30:42
  It's actually from the first Darlington race for 93, but
• 30:48
  where he he won and and you ran second, but you guys there again
• 30:51
  had the same type of battle. But there's a really phenomenal
• 30:55
  photo he took of you guys in the corner side by side and that's
• 30:59
  definitely going to go in the book.
• 31:00
  So I can't wait for people to see that.
• 31:02
  I think Nigel's actually posted that before, but it's one of the
• 31:06
  best pictures of you guys I think ever on the racetrack
• 31:09
  together. And I think I think Dale
• 31:13
  Earnhardt fans are going to love Never Lift our book.
• 31:19
  I think they're going to love it.
• 31:20
  I really do. I think Rusty Wallace fans will
• 31:23
  too. They're both large in in our
• 31:26
  book. You know, they, they, they both
• 31:28
  have a lot of presence there. They were very important in, in
• 31:32
  my journey. And I think I think those fans
• 31:36
  especially are going to love it. I think so too.
• 31:39
  And you know, what's so wild about that is, you know, while
• 31:42
  we were putting the book together, I mean, we didn't even
• 31:44
  try to make it that way. I mean Dale's in it, you know,
• 31:48
  obviously a lot. But really, I mean, Rusty is in
• 31:52
  it all the way through pretty much.
• 31:54
  And I mean, it's actually crazy how much he's brought up in in
• 31:59
  the story. I mean it it just and we didn't
• 32:03
  even, you know, try to make it that way.
• 32:06
  You know, it just he's so part of your story that I mean, you
• 32:12
  guys raced, you know, from the time you were kids up to the
• 32:15
  time he he retired and it was a 2005.
• 32:18
  So it's it's wild. Yeah, it is.
• 32:23
  I, I, I really love, look forward to sharing, especially
• 32:27
  that stuff with the fans about Rusty because, you know, he and
• 32:31
  I were shoulder to shoulder. And I say, he'll say we're
• 32:36
  friends. I'll say we were friends because
• 32:40
  we would call each other from time to time and whatever.
• 32:42
  We didn't necessarily hang out together and go to dinner
• 32:46
  together, but we raced together, we worked together, we worked on
• 32:51
  cars. The story of me being his crew
• 32:53
  chief was one of the highlights of and one of the highlights
• 32:58
  stories in the book. I loved it.
• 33:01
  You know, he's like, hey, man, I'm going to go to Jackson to
• 33:05
  the race. Jackson, Ms. And I wasn't going
• 33:08
  to race down there, but my cousins and aunt and uncle live
• 33:11
  in Jackson. I'm like, you need a crew chief.
• 33:13
  He says. Hey, yeah, man.
• 33:15
  And so, you know, we went down there and I'm telling you we
• 33:18
  were going to win the race. We and and the whole stories in
• 33:21
  the book, but we were going to win the race.
• 33:24
  Poor old motor blew up. But but we were going to win the
• 33:28
  race. We had the right strategy, the
• 33:29
  right tires. He, he let me, you know, choose
• 33:32
  the tires. We we put the hard fire stones
• 33:35
  on and we were still fast even on the hard fire stones and we
• 33:39
  were going. We won't win that race.
• 33:41
  That's awesome. I think that's a a good way to
• 33:44
  to close out. I think this was a a good
• 33:47
  conversation. Harry Gant in my opinion is one
• 33:52
  of the coolest guys that's ever driven a NASCAR and he also
• 33:56
  drove one of the coolest cars ever, that Skull Bandit 33
• 34:00
  Oldsmobile. So Harry is an 18 time Cup
• 34:04
  series winner. He won 2 Southern 5 hundreds and
• 34:09
  the 1991 Winston 500, which I know there's some people out
• 34:12
  there that will argue that the Winston 500 is not a crown
• 34:16
  jewel, but I'm throwing it in there.
• 34:18
  Harry is 1 of the 8 drivers in the modern era to win 4
• 34:23
  consecutive Cup races. And think about this.
• 34:27
  In 1979, his rookie season, he was 39 years old, like about
• 34:35
  that. So he is the oldest driver to
• 34:38
  win a Cup race and he won eight of his eighteen wins in his 50s.
• 34:45
  That's a pretty wild stat. So my first question is whoever
• 34:51
  said a green car was bad luck? I don't know who said that.
• 34:56
  Yeah, I mean, that's what I always heard in racing that, you
• 34:58
  know, green race car is bad luck, so.
• 35:01
  And that's what Harry drove his whole time.
• 35:04
  Yeah, well, you know, at least with the Skull Bandit in the Cup
• 35:07
  Series. So.
• 35:09
  But Dad, what is your earliest memory of Harry?
• 35:13
  Is there anything particular in your early career, your early
• 35:17
  stint in NASCAR in 19811982, that stands out about him?
• 35:22
  So I didn't really have a lot of interaction with Harry in 828182
• 35:31
  when I was dipping my toe in, in 83 and in the limited time that
• 35:38
  I ran with him, I don't, I didn't talk to him a whole lot.
• 35:42
  But when I came back to NASCAR in 88 with Jack, that's when,
• 35:51
  you know, I had been running the Bush Series the year before full
• 35:55
  time. And Harry ran quite often in the
• 35:59
  Bush Series back then. And so we were starting to cross
• 36:04
  paths and speak and talk a lot. And so really the first memory
• 36:11
  that's etched into my brain is 1989.
• 36:16
  We were so incredibly fast everywhere, every race.
• 36:24
  It was incredible. But we couldn't win a race.
• 36:28
  It's every time we ran awesome, somebody else ran better.
• 36:32
  And the next race after the Pocono race, we're standing that
• 36:39
  usually I talk to Harry at the driver's intros when we were
• 36:43
  waiting to get introduced. And Harry, he looks at me and
• 36:47
  you know, Harry's, he's short sentences.
• 36:51
  He never talked a lot and his sentences were short.
• 36:54
  And he was, he was, he spoke kind of what I'd say country a
• 37:01
  little bit. Taylorsville.
• 37:02
  Yeah. Taylorsville.
• 37:03
  He he spoke Taylorsville. And so we're standing there and
• 37:10
  he looks at me, we make eye contact.
• 37:12
  He goes, I've seen you up here spinning your wheels like a
• 37:14
  rookie. And yeah, I just thought.
• 37:20
  You know I. Guess I wasn't.
• 37:22
  You know, Harry was a master at, you know, saving his equipment
• 37:26
  and saving his tires. And he was right.
• 37:30
  Yeah, I was up there at poker, you know.
• 37:32
  You just trying real hard. I was trying real hard and yeah,
• 37:37
  yeah, he was. I was up there in front of him.
• 37:39
  Of course I was sliding the hell out of my race car trying to get
• 37:43
  get something. And of course, he eased up there
• 37:47
  and passed me a little bit like Bob Seneker did, an ASA.
• 37:51
  So that's probably that. My first really etched in
• 37:55
  memory. I seen you up there spinning
• 37:57
  your wheels like a. Rookie.
• 37:58
  Now that that kind of leads me into my next question.
• 38:01
  What was it? Because y'all ran the Bush
• 38:03
  Series A lot together and he he won quite a bit as well in the
• 38:07
  Bush series 21 times I think. What would he say to you after
• 38:15
  he had won a Bush race on Saturday but before the when you
• 38:19
  saw him before the Cup race on Sunday, when you would go up to
• 38:22
  him and compliment him on his win?
• 38:24
  What would he say to you? It was always drivers intros.
• 38:27
  That's where we cross paths and that's where we talk, you know?
• 38:31
  And I'd say, you know, good run yesterday, oh, clutch was
• 38:37
  slipping, you know? Or.
• 38:41
  Dang Harry, good run yesterday. Things on 7 cylinders, you know.
• 38:47
  That's why. He'd always have an IT.
• 38:48
  Always said, you know, yeah. Oh, no, no, he'd say that thing
• 38:54
  was skipping. You know it's skipping.
• 38:56
  Yeah. Yeah, even though he won't beat.
• 38:58
  Everybody beat everybody. Wrong with the.
• 39:00
  Car some always something wrong with the car.
• 39:02
  He drove that in Ed Whitaker's car, which was, you know, rocket
• 39:07
  ship. And I think that Chris was the
• 39:13
  crew chief and everything Chris ever worked on was was really
• 39:16
  fast. And Harry go over there and
• 39:18
  drive that thing and whoop us. And then the next day he'd tell
• 39:21
  us what the car was, you know, old clutch was slipping or
• 39:25
  something. So what was Is there any driver
• 39:29
  that you could compare Harry to as far as his driving style?
• 39:32
  What was Harry's driving style like?
• 39:35
  Well, I think Harry was, you know, the first guy I think of
• 39:42
  which was the total extreme of this was, was Bob Seneker.
• 39:48
  You know, Harry was smooth, he was smart, he was calculated and
• 39:55
  he focused on, you know, my driving style, you know, wound
• 40:00
  up being a lot similar to his. He focused on that last after
• 40:05
  the last pit stop. That's when he really.
• 40:09
  Drop the hammer. That's what I noticed a lot in
• 40:12
  preparing for this show is that all of his wins seem like either
• 40:17
  he just totally dominated the race or he he saved his
• 40:22
  equipment and then he stayed in striking distance and then he
• 40:25
  pounced at the end and took the lead.
• 40:28
  And that that's the way I remember him was, was that way.
• 40:31
  And I'm sure he had had dominant races as well.
• 40:35
  I just, you know, probably wasn't, you know, I wasn't
• 40:38
  admiring that as much as, you know, being a Bob Sinacre type
• 40:45
  where, you know, it just put every the whole race all
• 40:50
  afternoon was all, you know, headed toward that last, that
• 40:55
  last run after the last pit stop.
• 40:59
  So in September of 1991, at 51 years old, Harry won four times
• 41:06
  in a row. What do you remember?
• 41:11
  Anything at all about that September?
• 41:16
  Well. The biggest thing that I
• 41:18
  remember about that was that he was on his way to five in a row.
• 41:24
  Yeah, well, you know, he totally dominated that fifth race, you
• 41:29
  know it, North Wilkesboro. And I think he he wins if his
• 41:34
  brakes doesn't go, you know, didn't go out.
• 41:38
  I think there's no way that he doesn't win that race.
• 41:40
  That's how all all of us felt, you know, that's how we felt at
• 41:44
  the racetrack was he had a a mechanical problem that that
• 41:48
  that took that away. But the other thing that I
• 41:52
  remember is right front Fender all curled up, that thing at
• 41:57
  Martinsville, but he was just on a roll.
• 42:01
  I mean, and sometimes you would see that, but it was cool.
• 42:05
  Harry was such a cool dude. He was short with his words or
• 42:10
  he always was with me. He never.
• 42:13
  Very. Almost like dry humor.
• 42:15
  Oh yeah, he was definitely humorous, but it was dry.
• 42:20
  But most of the things he'd say, a lot of things he'd say would
• 42:22
  be funny. And he was just a, he was a
• 42:26
  man's man, you know, not interested in the spotlight, not
• 42:31
  interest. He was interested in winning
• 42:32
  races and going home and working with his hands.
• 42:36
  I mean, he was, he was a man's man.
• 42:38
  Well, what's so interesting about that too, is he does, he
• 42:41
  has that kind of, you know, blue collar, you know, country type
• 42:47
  persona. But at the same time he drew for
• 42:50
  Hal Needham and he's been in more, you know, movies than any
• 42:54
  other NASCAR driver. I mean, it's pretty wild to
• 42:58
  think about. Yeah, it is.
• 43:00
  And you know, I don't know if he was in in in real life, but in
• 43:06
  racing he seemed to be an introvert.
• 43:08
  So here he is in all these movies and and he's really an
• 43:11
  introvert. So.
• 43:13
  But you know, it's just a really fun guy to talk to.
• 43:17
  Great competitor and you know, like someone that I, that I
• 43:23
  tried to pattern my racing after, you know, as as a young
• 43:29
  guy, especially in the late 80s. Today we're going to talk about
• 43:33
  what I call the rise of Roush Racing in 1996 to 2004.
• 43:39
  A couple things that happened was number 1, you got to hang
• 43:43
  out with Jack Roush at Barrett Jackson, which I bet that was
• 43:47
  cool. Was it cool catching up with him
• 43:49
  some? Oh man, we had the best time.
• 43:52
  We got together 2 days. So we we've spent a lot of time
• 43:56
  together, told a lot of great stories.
• 43:59
  Even Craig Jackson set in and and was amazed by some of the
• 44:03
  old stories that we were were telling.
• 44:05
  It was such a good time. That's so cool you guys got to
• 44:09
  catch up because I know it had been a while.
• 44:12
  Yeah, yeah. Well, another thing that
• 44:15
  happened was Kenny had Jeff Burton on for a Kenny
• 44:19
  conversation. And the other thing was at Kurt
• 44:22
  Busch's Hall of Fame induction, he was interviewed and he
• 44:28
  mentioned in his interview that there was no place like, you
• 44:34
  know, early 2000s Roush Racing. And so just all those things,
• 44:39
  you know, happening together near the same time, you know,
• 44:42
  gave me the idea for this episode.
• 44:44
  So I wanted to kind of before we dive into 1996 and the important
• 44:50
  things that that happened that year, I wanted to kind of give
• 44:53
  the the back story in the background of Ralph Racing as an
• 44:57
  organization. So in NASCAR that is.
• 45:00
  So in 1988, that's the first full season of Ralph Racing in
• 45:08
  It was a single car team from 88 to 1991 and then they added the
• 45:16
  16 team in 1992. But from 1988 to 1995, you Dad,
• 45:24
  you earned 18 Cup wins and then 13 Bush wins when Ralph shown it
• 45:30
  starting in 1993 on to 1995 S In other words, you captured every
• 45:38
  single Ralph Racing win at that time.
• 45:42
  But you know, with that said, obviously you, Steve Mill and
• 45:48
  all the guys there in Liberty, you guys had put together a
• 45:52
  winning formula. What do you think Jack wanted to
• 45:58
  do? What?
• 45:59
  What was his intention on starting the third team, the 99
• 46:02
  team, and basing it at Mooresville?
• 46:05
  What was his goal, do you think? So Exide came to him after the
• 46:13
  Dover race and told him that they wanted, wanted him to put a
• 46:19
  car out there, sponsor a car for next, for the next season.
• 46:25
  And he could, he could pick the driver and, and you know, and
• 46:32
  the whole thing. So, you know, it was just a, it
• 46:34
  was a great opportunity for the organization to expand with
• 46:38
  backing with, with top notch backing from Exide.
• 46:43
  And he had, he kind of told this story while we're at Barrett
• 46:47
  Jackson, which was pretty interesting, But the motivation
• 46:51
  was to expand. You know he had done 2 car teams
• 46:57
  or multi car teams all the way back into his drag racing days.
• 47:02
  You know all this road racing stuff was a minimum of two cars.
• 47:06
  And so he understood how you know if you could get double the
• 47:12
  sponsorship you could you know you could do a lot more with the
• 47:16
  backing and you know it it just have a bigger, stronger deeper
• 47:22
  organization. So as you know, I guess he asked
• 47:28
  Ward to drive it and Ward was had just signed with Bill Davis
• 47:36
  or re signed with Bill Davis or something or other.
• 47:38
  And he, you know, he told Jeff, he said, you know, when Jeff
• 47:45
  said, well, I'll call him. So it was really, it was really
• 47:50
  a great deal. Jeff, you know, I'd known both
• 47:54
  Ward and Jeff from the the Bush series and I'd actually even
• 48:00
  help Jeff with it. He was driving the a car the
• 48:03
  year before Cup car and for their Stavola brothers.
• 48:07
  And I actually got his car at Rockingham and drove it and gave
• 48:09
  him some feedback on it. So, you know, we go way back
• 48:13
  before even we became teammates. Right.
• 48:17
  Well, I think this, you know, other than hiring you, I think
• 48:21
  this is the best decision Jack ever made is in NASCAR as far as
• 48:26
  starting this third team as I think what we talked about today
• 48:30
  will show. But, you know, all this is
• 48:34
  happening in 1995, all these events.
• 48:36
  And I wanted to ask you because Jeff Burton tells a funny story.
• 48:41
  Do you remember, you know, initially they're being tensions
• 48:46
  between, you know, the 2 Liberty teams, the sixth team and the 16
• 48:51
  team and the 99 team, you know, because Jeff tells that funny
• 48:56
  story about going to the Christmas party.
• 48:59
  You're flying the airplane and he's in the back with Steve Mill
• 49:04
  and then Comstock, who's the crew chief of the 16 team.
• 49:09
  And they just, they tell him that they're not helping him and
• 49:13
  it's not about him. It's just like this is because
• 49:15
  Jack's trying to piss us off. Yes, there was.
• 49:19
  I remember vividly do. You remember.
• 49:22
  That, well, I do, I remember it real well.
• 49:26
  So part of the reasoning for the shop to be in Liberty instead of
• 49:34
  Charlotte was to be able to keep our secrets in in in house
• 49:40
  better. In other words, the guys that
• 49:42
  work there couldn't just close their toolbox up and push it
• 49:47
  down the street 1/2 a block to another team and, you know, and,
• 49:51
  and all your secrets get out. So we were, you know, with that
• 49:57
  team being in Mooresville, my team, our teams, it felt like
• 50:03
  that, you know, everything that we were doing that somebody else
• 50:07
  didn't know about was going to get out.
• 50:09
  So that was that was part of the reasoning, you know, and that
• 50:14
  that dissipated over time. But yeah, initially it wasn't
• 50:18
  met with the open arms, just like the 16 wasn't met with open
• 50:22
  arms. I did not like the idea, you
• 50:26
  know, of, of adding a second team, especially after just
• 50:31
  winning one race in 1991. It just didn't feel like we were
• 50:35
  ready. Yes.
• 50:37
  So going into 1996, all three of the teams had had some good runs
• 50:45
  that season, but there were no wins across all three teams.
• 50:51
  You know, do you what do you think happened there?
• 50:55
  I mean, why do you think you guys struggled to get, you know,
• 50:59
  into Victory Lane that year? And you know, like I said, you
• 51:03
  guys had some good runs. I mean, Jeff Burton even for
• 51:05
  briefly he led the points for after.
• 51:09
  I forgot it was early in the season, but it was one race.
• 51:11
  But then he missed. I think it was North Wilkesboro.
• 51:15
  I think he missed Atlanta, Atlanta, Atlanta.
• 51:18
  So it was early in the season and he wasn't in the points yet.
• 51:23
  You know, they didn't work counting 96 points until after
• 51:27
  like rock, I don't know, after Atlanta something.
• 51:30
  So he missed, he missed the ride.
• 51:33
  He had me come over and drive his car because it wasn't fast,
• 51:36
  you know enough. And I drove it and couldn't help
• 51:38
  him any with it really. And he missed the race.
• 51:42
  And Jack comes up and, you know, says, I'm so sorry, I'll take
• 51:48
  all the heat. I'll handle the sponsor.
• 51:50
  Don't worry about anything. It's all good.
• 51:52
  And and he said, I didn't give you what you need.
• 51:58
  And Jeff said you gave me everything I asked for.
• 52:01
  He said, yeah, but I didn't give you what you need.
• 52:06
  That's my that's my Jack Roush right there.
• 52:09
  So that was pretty cool. But yeah.
• 52:10
  So as far as the six goes, we were fast enough to win a lot of
• 52:15
  races that were very frustrating year.
• 52:18
  You know, it seemed like every race that we would be really
• 52:22
  good at someone was just better. And it just it was one of those
• 52:28
  years where they just we weren't consistently fast enough, you
• 52:33
  know, to to win a race and on on a good day.
• 52:36
  We didn't get lucky. Well, you know, even though you
• 52:39
  guys, you know, all three teams kind of had a a tough year that
• 52:43
  that season, the next season in 97, I mean, you guys really came
• 52:47
  out swinging. I mean, you won four races.
• 52:50
  You were in contention for the championship all year, all year
• 52:54
  long. And Jeff Burton won his first
• 52:57
  three Cup races and he became the second driver to win a a Cup
• 53:05
  race for for Jack. What do you remember about
• 53:09
  Jeff's first win? Do you have any remembrance from
• 53:12
  that? Yeah, I do.
• 53:13
  I do. It was Texas and I was leading
• 53:20
  the race and on the restart he was a lap down and he was
• 53:25
  starting on the inside of me. And on the restart, you know,
• 53:29
  because back then they lined up the lap cars on the inside row.
• 53:33
  He was in front. So we took off and he got ahead
• 53:36
  of me and we ran a few laps there and my motor blew up.
• 53:42
  So I headed for the for the airport and flew from Texas to
• 53:50
  Daytona. And I got out of the got out of
• 53:53
  the plane and Arlene said Jeff Burton won the race.
• 53:57
  And so that's that's my memory of it.
• 54:00
  So I wasn't at the track, but obviously really happy for him.
• 54:05
  He he brought so much to to me and to the six car and to the
• 54:11
  team and their organization. It was, it turned out to be a
• 54:15
  genius move by Jack to, to do it differently than we were doing,
• 54:21
  you know, things in, in Liberty. And it really made the whole
• 54:24
  organization a lot stronger. Did it dawn on you at the time
• 54:29
  that he was, you know, the second driver now to win a Cup
• 54:33
  race for Ralph Racing? I mean, did you think about that
• 54:35
  at the time or? No, I, I it didn't even occur to
• 54:40
  me. I kind of had blinders on.
• 54:43
  Well, you know, you talk about Jeff really bringing a lot to
• 54:48
  the six car and that kind of segues into the next season.
• 54:53
  And my next question is in 1998 you guys move the six team moves
• 55:00
  to Mooreville into the shop with a 99 car and then you have your
• 55:05
  best season ever. You win 7 races and have over
• 55:09
  1700 laps LED in 1998. My question is, is how much did
• 55:16
  that move influence the success of that season?
• 55:21
  I mean, did did the 99 team really bring a lot to the six
• 55:27
  car and allow you guys to have such a successful season?
• 55:32
  They had, you know, that their organization was in in shop was
• 55:36
  all established there in Mooresville and Bobby Hudson was
• 55:45
  in charge of the the surface plate, the body hanging, which
• 55:48
  was real important to Jeff and I both, you know, because we
• 55:52
  thought we could pretty much handle the chassis stuff, but we
• 55:55
  had to have, you know, really, really good people doing bodies
• 55:59
  and and at the time wind tunneling and stuff like that.
• 56:03
  So the cars. So it was all new car builds for
• 56:06
  me, you know, like Liberty and and Troy Martin and those guys
• 56:12
  that always done the cars since the beginning.
• 56:15
  And now it was Bobby Hudson's Surface Plate and a whole new
• 56:19
  group that were furnishing cars to Jimmy Finnig and I.
• 56:24
  And they were built just like Jeff's.
• 56:29
  Ours were built together. If I had suggestions that that
• 56:33
  might be better, they were incorporated into Jeff's cars.
• 56:37
  And if Jeff, you know, had suggestions or they had
• 56:40
  anything, those things were incorporated in ours.
• 56:43
  So we had pretty much 6th sister cars.
• 56:48
  We're in the same shop. We had really good cooperation,
• 56:56
  you know, between the six and the 99 car and and you know, we
• 57:00
  were, you know, elbow to elbows there in that shop.
• 57:04
  So it was a it was a really, really good year.
• 57:07
  Good year for Jeff, great year for us.
• 57:13
  Everything just hit magic. That was the first year for the
• 57:16
  Taurus body and we really hit, we hit a home run on the on the
• 57:23
  downforce side of things and we're able to really have a
• 57:27
  dominant year. Was there anything that you
• 57:30
  recall that they did like drastically different there in
• 57:35
  that shop compared to how y'all were doing things in Liberty?
• 57:39
  No, no, not really, you know. The.
• 57:45
  Cars, I mean, if you want to say the difference between 97 and
• 57:50
  98, you know, cars coming out of different shop, there's there
• 57:55
  was no difference. It was the best stuff that we
• 57:57
  knew how to build. And, you know, it's very psych.
• 58:04
  You know, you cycle from not winning in 96 to be in a
• 58:09
  championship contender in 97, to have the best season of my
• 58:14
  career in 98. You know, those were just a lot
• 58:18
  of that is when the stars line up.
• 58:20
  You have to run good all the time to get those wins.
• 58:24
  And we didn't. We ran good a lot of the time in
• 58:27
  96, but not all the time. And so the stars never lined up.
• 58:33
  But you know, there was a there was a lot of enthusiasm in that
• 58:37
  Mooresville shop with the six and 99.
• 58:40
  The six was basically 100% new team.
• 58:43
  I don't think maybe Dennis was still with us, the truck driver,
• 58:50
  but it was Jimmy and 100% new people on the six car.
• 58:55
  So I don't, I don't recall any anyone coming, you know, from
• 59:00
  Liberty, you know, and, and being on the team, I know that,
• 59:05
  you know, it was just a bunch of young guys that were excited and
• 59:09
  they were damn good too. Sean.
• 59:11
  Parker yeah, Sean, you know, and, and so, so many of of those
• 59:16
  guys, you know, somewhere along the way, you know, Jeff Paxton,
• 59:23
  you know, as well, I mean, just every guy that was on that car
• 59:27
  in 98 seemed to be young, fresh, new to me and and and ready to
• 59:34
  have a lot of success, you know, that hadn't hadn't had the
• 59:38
  opportunity to work on a car that was that fast and that,
• 59:43
  that solid. You said before that that team
• 59:46
  that you had there in 98 and 99 was one of the best you ever had
• 59:51
  in your entire NASCAR career, right?
• 59:54
  Yes, they were just all so good and they and you know, the magic
• 1:00:01
  is in the attitude and they were so excited.
• 1:00:06
  You know, it was it was similar to 2009 with with those guys
• 1:00:10
  that that that was an amazing super quality.
• 1:00:15
  All people who had been there and done that before.
• 1:00:18
  But that enthusiasm makes a lot of difference.
• 1:00:22
  People don't believe that, but you know, you hear chemistry
• 1:00:25
  talked about sometimes. It does somehow translate into
• 1:00:31
  performance, just the attitude of the team.
• 1:00:34
  And I'll I'll give you an example and I've told you this
• 1:00:37
  many times. There's a lot of times in the
• 1:00:39
  80s when 2 great drivers weren't winning races and you saw team
• 1:00:45
  swap and both was win races. That's so crazy.
• 1:00:50
  It just they just needed something to change and new, you
• 1:00:54
  know, attitude, new enthusiasm and boy 98 and O nine were were
• 1:01:00
  two of the the top years for enthusiasm level.
• 1:01:05
  So you had your, you know, career year in 98, and then the
• 1:01:10
  next season Jeff Burton has his career year.
• 1:01:14
  So in 99, he won six races and he led over 1000 laps.
• 1:01:20
  And so my question is to you again, I mean, do you think the
• 1:01:24
  success that you guys had on the six car translated some over to
• 1:01:30
  their success the following season?
• 1:01:34
  You know, I think that what I mean.
• 1:01:36
  He knew everything that we were doing and of course we do
• 1:01:39
  everything that they were doing, but part of it is just how the
• 1:01:42
  stars line up. I I've heard Jeff say that we
• 1:01:46
  kicked his ass and in 98, you know, moved in and kicked his
• 1:01:49
  ass. Well, it's fun to talk like
• 1:01:51
  that, but honestly, you know, it's not really the case.
• 1:01:55
  And they, they just, you know, they did the same to us the next
• 1:01:58
  year 99 for no, you know, expectable reason.
• 1:02:02
  It's just it was, there was a lot of Jack always he hated it
• 1:02:07
  too, because Jack's such an engineer.
• 1:02:10
  He's all that black magic, you know?
• 1:02:13
  Yeah. He never went for all that.
• 1:02:15
  It always pissed him off. But I'm telling you, there's
• 1:02:18
  something about just enthusiasm and momentum and the stars
• 1:02:24
  lining up that that makes it all happen.
• 1:02:27
  We still ran good in 99 but. Yeah.
• 1:02:30
  Jeff had a career year. Well, The thing is, is, I mean,
• 1:02:33
  to your point, I mean, if you watch the races from 98, I mean,
• 1:02:37
  yes, you won seven races. But if you watch a lot of them,
• 1:02:41
  Jeff's run right up there with you, you know, and it's just a
• 1:02:44
  couple things are different. I mean, he might win more races,
• 1:02:47
  you know, and the same is true with you in 1999.
• 1:02:50
  I mean, you know, he won six races, but you're up at the
• 1:02:53
  front, you know, most of the time and you know, it doesn't
• 1:02:56
  take much and then you win more races than you did.
• 1:02:59
  So there's a lot of truth to that, that plaque magic.
• 1:03:03
  So so going into 2000, that's Matt Kansas first full time
• 1:03:11
  season in the 17 car. You guys had hired him earlier,
• 1:03:17
  but that's his his first full season and cup.
• 1:03:20
  So he scores his first win at the Coke 600 that year and
• 1:03:25
  becomes the third driver to win a Cup race for Ralph Racing.
• 1:03:31
  Now you played a role in making all that happen.
• 1:03:33
  I mean, can you tell us, you know, about the process of
• 1:03:37
  discovering Matt and then, you know, talking to Jack about
• 1:03:40
  hiring them? Well, I think everybody knows
• 1:03:43
  that my foundation for my Cup career was built in Wisconsin,
• 1:03:49
  and the Wisconsin racers had a lot to do with shaping, you
• 1:03:53
  know, the racer that I was. And so I'm down there in NASCAR
• 1:03:57
  racing and I'm I'm reading about this.
• 1:03:59
  Matt Kenseth winning here, winning there.
• 1:04:04
  I'm looking at the cars. They're not the same car.
• 1:04:07
  They're owned by different people or whatever.
• 1:04:09
  And I'm like, this kid knows his stuff and remind me of myself.
• 1:04:16
  You know, he knows. He in other words, he doesn't
• 1:04:19
  rely on the on Howie Leto, who was the greatest crew chief up
• 1:04:23
  there ever to make his cars go fast.
• 1:04:26
  He knew how to do it. He knew how to make his cars go
• 1:04:29
  fast. And I was attracted to that
• 1:04:31
  always. So he and Robbie Riser come for
• 1:04:35
  the Bush race at Salladega and I meet him for the first time.
• 1:04:41
  And so after the drivers at at I met met him at the drivers
• 1:04:45
  meeting. And so after the drivers
• 1:04:47
  meeting, we sit there on the bleachers and talk for about
• 1:04:51
  2020 thirty minutes. And I just really liked him.
• 1:04:55
  And I could tell, you know, a 100% this is a dude that reminds
• 1:05:00
  me of a career, you know, that I've had.
• 1:05:04
  He's a good dude, smart guy. He was.
• 1:05:08
  It was just the right thing. So I went straight to the hauler
• 1:05:11
  to get dressed for the race, the Bush race.
• 1:05:15
  And Jack was there and I said, Jack, I know you don't have a
• 1:05:20
  place for him, but you have to sign this guy.
• 1:05:23
  You've got to sign it. You've got to sign it.
• 1:05:25
  You have to. And you know, Jack never, I'm
• 1:05:31
  not going to say that that didn't always listen to what I
• 1:05:34
  said. And that's a that was a big bold
• 1:05:37
  move to sign him to a contract when he didn't have room, you
• 1:05:42
  know, for him in the. Stable so, but they he did.
• 1:05:47
  And you know, Matt Kenseth never, ever, ever let me down.
• 1:05:52
  He was everything that I thought he was and a great teammate and
• 1:05:58
  a great friend to me. So the interesting thing to me
• 1:06:03
  too is, you know, Matt, you and Jeff, you know, one of the
• 1:06:09
  things you guys all have in common is y'all are car guys and
• 1:06:12
  y'all are also the, the first three that saw success there at,
• 1:06:16
  at Roush. You know, I think that certainly
• 1:06:21
  Jack giving you guys the ability to determine more how your cars
• 1:06:26
  are set up and, and how they are, you know, I, I think that
• 1:06:31
  definitely helped you guys, you know, achieve success there.
• 1:06:34
  I mean, would you agree with that?
• 1:06:35
  I mean, I just, it's hard to me believe it to believe at least
• 1:06:39
  in the earlier years that you could have put somebody that was
• 1:06:42
  just, you know, like a Tim Richmond or somebody like that
• 1:06:45
  that's a really good driver but doesn't know much about cars.
• 1:06:50
  To me it seemed like the early route drivers, they had to be
• 1:06:53
  good drivers but they also know it had to know how to set up
• 1:06:56
  their car. Yes, that's absolutely true.
• 1:07:00
  In in it, it's really because, you know, Jack, let us determine
• 1:07:12
  our own fate. Robbie Reiser and Matt Kansas,
• 1:07:16
  you know, they were the architect of their cars.
• 1:07:20
  Jeff Burton, I've said over and over again, was a absolute
• 1:07:24
  master architect of his cars and team.
• 1:07:29
  And I had always had my finger on the pulse as well.
• 1:07:33
  I think some of the lack of super great performance from
• 1:07:41
  Johnny Benson or or or Chad Little or Ted Musgrave Le Page
• 1:07:49
  and especially while dollingback was that they didn't have that.
• 1:07:54
  They couldn't come in and say put this, this, this, this in
• 1:07:58
  that car and then go drive it and then come in and say, you
• 1:08:02
  know, make this change to it. Nothing against their, they were
• 1:08:07
  all incredible drivers. Yeah, they just needed to Ray
• 1:08:10
  Everham or something. They, yes, they, they needed
• 1:08:13
  someone, you know, that could really listen to them and and
• 1:08:19
  make magic and we weren't able to give those guys that.
• 1:08:25
  And where Robbie Riser was able, Robbie and Matt were able to do
• 1:08:30
  that and Jack let them, you know, I think it helped when
• 1:08:35
  Jeff really broke the ice because, you know, Jeff was
• 1:08:41
  successful. And so OK, then what we've done
• 1:08:45
  with Mark is successful. What we were doing with Jeff is
• 1:08:47
  successful. We're going to let Matt and
• 1:08:51
  Robbie determine their, you know, destiny here.
• 1:08:54
  And so that really worked. And then, you know, of course,
• 1:08:59
  then you know, we come along with some incredible drivers.
• 1:09:02
  Like when you put Kurt Busch in, you know, even a decent race
• 1:09:07
  car, he's going to win. And, and the same thing with
• 1:09:11
  Biffle, you know, I mean, he was so incredibly talented as well.
• 1:09:16
  So those guys were able to do more because of the amazing
• 1:09:24
  talent. Of course then Kurt winds up
• 1:09:26
  with Jimmy Fennig and which was perfect combination so.
• 1:09:31
  I'm glad you mentioned Kurt cuz that we're getting into 2001.
• 1:09:35
  So 2001 is Kurt's rookie season in the 97 car.
• 1:09:40
  He captures one pole, but other than that he doesn't, you know,
• 1:09:44
  run that good the rest of the season.
• 1:09:46
  And also you and Matt Kenseth go winless and don't do that well
• 1:09:51
  either. It's kind of almost a repeat of
• 1:09:54
  1996. When I was doing the notes for
• 1:09:57
  the show, I realized that. With that said, though, Jeff
• 1:10:00
  Burton, even though he didn't get off to a good start, he did
• 1:10:03
  win 2 races. He won the Coke 600 in Phoenix.
• 1:10:08
  But do you recall like any particular reason why all the
• 1:10:12
  Roush team seemed to struggle that year?
• 1:10:14
  Because all you guys did. Somehow or another we got behind
• 1:10:18
  somewhere. You know, it it I don't know
• 1:10:22
  where we got behind, but or it was probably more than one area.
• 1:10:27
  We got a little bit behind probably arrow wise, maybe
• 1:10:31
  possibly power wise, I don't know for sure.
• 1:10:34
  I don't remember exactly at that that time, but and we had to
• 1:10:40
  have been off a little bit on our chassis stuff.
• 1:10:42
  You know, we just, we just as a group weren't making the speed
• 1:10:47
  that that we needed to. Well then this is another repeat
• 1:10:52
  of 97. Then in 2002, you guys, you
• 1:10:55
  know, come out swinging again. So you and Kurt switched teams
• 1:11:00
  in the offseason. So in 2002, you go in with
• 1:11:03
  Kurt's team and Kurt goes in with your team and he wins his
• 1:11:08
  first four Cup races with your old crew chief Jimmy Fennig.
• 1:11:13
  And my old. Cars.
• 1:11:15
  Yeah, and your old cars. And so he becomes the 4th driver
• 1:11:19
  to win a Cup race for Roush Racing.
• 1:11:21
  And then Matt Kenseth, he wins 5 races and then you win the Coke
• 1:11:26
  600 and you're in contention for the championship that year.
• 1:11:31
  Oh and by the way, with your Coke 600 win that Roush Racing
• 1:11:36
  has now won four consecutive Coca-Cola 6 hundreds.
• 1:11:40
  So although your career is starting to wane some, Ralph
• 1:11:46
  Racing is becoming a powerhouse. It's obvious at this point.
• 1:11:51
  Do you recall what the energy was like at the organization
• 1:11:55
  around this time? Well, the energy, I recall our
• 1:12:02
  group, the energy was really good in 2002 because I had, you
• 1:12:07
  know, all these young guys. This is when you know, we're,
• 1:12:11
  we're we're now at 5 teams and there's a lot of pressure to
• 1:12:17
  have all the cars built the same.
• 1:12:20
  And Matt Kenseth likes the opposite in Arrow than than I
• 1:12:24
  do. And we go through, we go through
• 1:12:28
  a struggle there because I, I don't like the arrow that Matt
• 1:12:33
  likes and he he doesn't like mine and he's having success
• 1:12:37
  with his and I try his and I don't like it.
• 1:12:39
  I want mine. And, and so we struggle through
• 1:12:43
  that for, you know, a year or two there where we're just, you
• 1:12:49
  know, we're just not the inner energy was good and we ran good
• 1:12:53
  and we really should have won the championship that year.
• 1:12:57
  We just wait. We broke one too many times.
• 1:13:03
  I mean, we were in position to win it.
• 1:13:05
  And I, you know, I thought it was, we just couldn't fall out
• 1:13:10
  and and, you know, from here on. And sure enough, we fell out and
• 1:13:14
  that cost us. But yeah, wait, I mean, you
• 1:13:18
  know, we just then, I don't know, I don't remember O3.
• 1:13:23
  I don't remember a whole lot about that.
• 1:13:26
  Well, 2003 was Greg Biffle's rookie season in the 16 car and
• 1:13:31
  he picked up his first career win at the Pepsi 400 at Daytona.
• 1:13:38
  And so that made him the 5th driver to win a race for Ralph
• 1:13:40
  Racing. So he'd go on to have a ton of
• 1:13:44
  success in that 16 car. You know, my question is, you
• 1:13:49
  know, that car had been around since 1992.
• 1:13:53
  What did Greg bring to that car that turned it into a a winning
• 1:13:58
  car? You know, is just him.
• 1:14:04
  Just him. Yeah.
• 1:14:05
  What? He sat in the seat.
• 1:14:07
  He was, he was, he was on the level of Kurt Busch, you know,
• 1:14:11
  He he and and Doug Rickard, you know, had a championship all the
• 1:14:18
  way back in whatever it was 1979 or, or or 80, whatever it was
• 1:14:23
  with, with Dale Earnhardt. Yeah. 8080, yeah.
• 1:14:28
  But after that, not such great success.
• 1:14:32
  Doug was absolutely spectacular at getting Greg what Greg
• 1:14:38
  needed, what he wanted in his car.
• 1:14:41
  I watched it first hand, you know, in amazement, trying to
• 1:14:45
  gather any, any speed out of it that I could.
• 1:14:48
  But Doug was just Absolutely Fabulous at getting Greg what he
• 1:14:53
  needed. And they just, I mean, they just
• 1:14:59
  won them a bunch of races and especially intermediates where I
• 1:15:04
  think Greg's driving talent could really shine.
• 1:15:08
  And Doug getting that left front, you know, they were
• 1:15:10
  always preaching. Got to get that left front down.
• 1:15:12
  You know, I'm over, I'm over here trying, but I'm not getting
• 1:15:16
  it like that. You know, they were, they were,
• 1:15:19
  they were stout. So an O3 and O 4 Ralph Racing
• 1:15:23
  wins Back to backup series championships with Matt Kenseth
• 1:15:27
  and Kurt Busch. So obviously, you know, this was
• 1:15:31
  the peak of Ralph Racing as an organization.
• 1:15:36
  Do you have any like particular memories from these two years?
• 1:15:40
  I mean, the, the team had come a long way from, you know, just a
• 1:15:43
  handful of employees and a single car team in 1998 or
• 1:15:49
  excuse me, 1988 in Liberty, You know, and now I mean, it's on
• 1:15:55
  top of the NASCAR world. Yeah, by this point, you know,
• 1:16:00
  I'm not young by any man and so, you know, I'm starting to to
• 1:16:07
  face the the challenge of not being, you know, the fastest
• 1:16:12
  wheel man, you know, in the shop.
• 1:16:17
  And so with Matt winning that championship, when I, you know,
• 1:16:22
  I Co owned that car, I got ownership in it when Jack set it
• 1:16:26
  up. So I had a lot of pride because
• 1:16:32
  I felt like I had a hand by bringing Matt to it and bringing
• 1:16:36
  a Cup championship to that that organization.
• 1:16:40
  I know you can see it all over Jack's face and I felt it a lot
• 1:16:45
  that he was, he was sad that it wasn't me that brought him the
• 1:16:49
  first one. But.
• 1:16:51
  Dude, we got it. You know, I wanted it for Matt,
• 1:16:54
  I wanted it for Jack, I wanted it for the organization and I
• 1:16:58
  was happy. You know, I, I didn't run good
• 1:17:01
  enough to to win it and you know, and, and didn't from there
• 1:17:07
  on going forward in the sixth car, you know, I didn't run good
• 1:17:10
  enough to be a contender for one.
• 1:17:13
  We tried hard. Jack tried everything he had to
• 1:17:18
  get me, you know, whatever he could to put me in a position to
• 1:17:23
  do it. But I just, I mean, we could run
• 1:17:24
  good. But, you know, we, we have
• 1:17:27
  somebody's, I mean, it's, it's hard to win those championships
• 1:17:30
  when you've got, you know, 36 races and every single race,
• 1:17:36
  every single position, every single point matters.
• 1:17:40
  Yeah. Well, I would say to, you know,
• 1:17:42
  to add on to that, I mean, particularly when you're now
• 1:17:45
  into your 40s and you're really starting to get past your prime
• 1:17:51
  level as a driver. And you know, it's kind of
• 1:17:54
  frustrating because Ralph racing, you know, like your
• 1:17:57
  peaks were at two different times your peak, they first
• 1:18:00
  hired you, but at the, you know, at that time, they had so many
• 1:18:05
  mechanical failures and, and all these different issues that they
• 1:18:09
  all these bugs that they had to get worked out.
• 1:18:12
  And then once they did, you're, you know, past your prime, you
• 1:18:17
  know, and so it's kind of a frustrating deal, but you know,
• 1:18:23
  how was it seeing, you know, Kurt Busch win his championship
• 1:18:26
  in O 4 and, you know, Jimmy Fennig getting his championship?
• 1:18:31
  Well, my, you know, my relationship with, with Jimmy
• 1:18:36
  Fennig is extremely warm that, you know, we, we work.
• 1:18:40
  He was my crew chief in ASA in 85 and 86.
• 1:18:45
  We were. Side by side, you know, every
• 1:18:49
  day and every night. I worked in the shop with him
• 1:18:53
  and his brother Jeffrey every day and went racing, you know,
• 1:18:59
  every, every night and so. I had a good.
• 1:19:03
  Relationship with him he had the opportunity at the end of 86 to
• 1:19:08
  Bobby Allison wanted him to come and crew chief the Cup car and I
• 1:19:11
  was thrilled for him and I was leaving, you know, ASA as well
• 1:19:17
  to go Bush racing with the Lawmaster and and David
• 1:19:21
  Levomdos. So so I was happy for for Jimmy
• 1:19:26
  and I was also happy that when we made the the swap, you know,
• 1:19:32
  Kurt starts winning races good on Jimmy.
• 1:19:36
  You know, it makes it look like it was a good move.
• 1:19:40
  And by the way, we won the 600 with our new little group, but
• 1:19:46
  to see Jimmy get that championship means more than I
• 1:19:49
  can describe. I love Jimmy, man.
• 1:19:54
  We spent a lot of lot of long days and a lot of long nights
• 1:19:58
  and a few cases of of Miller. We've been in the trenches
• 1:20:05
  together when he came in 97. We had a revival at the six car
• 1:20:11
  when he came crew chief that I think about 1/3 of my Cup wins
• 1:20:18
  him at the helm on top of the box, which is actually amazing.
• 1:20:23
  So for him to get for him to get that championship was huge.
• 1:20:27
  Then to get a Daytona 500, I mean this guy, well, he got
• 1:20:31
  Daytona 500 with Bobby. So he's got, I don't know how
• 1:20:34
  many Daytona 500 wins. He's got his crew chief, so get
• 1:20:39
  on him.