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Dale Earnhardt Jr. Gets Deep On Racing & Life · Kenny Wallace Media

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  Hello everyone and welcome back to Kenny Conversation brought to
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  you by Jags, the leader in high performance aftermarket car
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  parts. Remember to go to jags.com for
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  everything you need for your vehicle.
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  Well, I think it was still Rolling Stones.
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  Please allow me to introduce my friend.
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  He's a man of wealth and fame. Dale Dale Earnhardt, Junior,
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  Junior. How you doing buddy?
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  I'm doing good, Kenny. It's good to see you.
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  Not as good as being there in person to hang out, but don't
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  get to talk to you as much as I'd like to.
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  So I've been looking forward to this.
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  Well, we definitely have a long distance relationship and I
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  guess our friendship started years ago, but I specifically
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  remember being your friend at Dave Mader's slot car track in,
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  what was that Mooresville? Yeah, that was, yeah.
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  We had Dave Mader, the third raced in the Cup Series and but
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  he also was a very successful short track racer and when his
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  Cup career kind of ended he took over this little store on Main
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  Street in Mooresville. And put a slot car track in
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  there and man, if you were always there, boy, I was always
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  there. And you know, you'd see a lot of
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  other people in the industry. Dave was always really good.
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  And you know, you I still have. So you bought those wooden
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  boxes, right, that you you kept your slot cars in.
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  I still have mine. I got mine too.
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  My tires are dry rotted. Yeah, and.
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  The simpler time, man. We were.
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  I don't remember. I must have been in my, you
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  know, 1819 years old and you were, you were right in the
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  middle of your career. And yeah, it was fun to go over
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  there and and try to figure out how to be competitive and
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  messing with those cars and trying to buy the coolest and
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  latest and greatest and and then, you know, then Dave.
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  Moved out one day this slot car track went away and and we got
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  into RC cars, You know bigger stuff can't scale, Quarter scale
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  stuff kept on getting bigger and bigger.
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  But I still got that wooden box with all of my cars in it, just
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  like I walked out of that building the last time I was in
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  it. You know what I'm going to do?
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  I'm going to I'm going to go up. It's in my my garage.
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  I'm going to take a picture of it and I'm going to post it
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  later this week. You know it always, it always
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  come down to trying to be better.
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  And you know when we would win like heats or a mains he he
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  would pay like $8 and he'd give you credit and you could take
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  that $8 and go buy tires and. Track rental time?
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  Yeah, stuff like that. Well, you know, as old Larry, MC
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  Reynolds say, Junior, I'm loaded up on my notes.
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  We're going to have a good time. So I always remind everybody,
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  Kenny, conversation is just that we go every which way.
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  Everything doesn't have to be in order.
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  So I've had this up in my race shop for a long time and I'm
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  going to show it to you and I want to talk about this.
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  So this is a Piston, OK? You got a good idea what this
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  is. Yeah, come out of your race car,
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  your qualifying engine. You wanted to pull the
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  Rockingham, so I want to go a little bit deeper into it.
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  So I'm going to turn this over. So if you look at it, it's looks
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  like they were made it says DEI. And then there's, you know,
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  looks like the number 2 cylinder.
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  I drove that pencil car for DEI. You and I were teammates.
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  We set QuickTime and run second in that race.
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  But it wasn't till weeks later I go to DEI and I believe it was
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  Richie at that time. He was the motor man and he gave
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  that to me, but the reason I want to bring you in into this
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  is he's he said. Dale Earnhardt Junior started
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  this. Do you know the story behind
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  those Pistons? Because that piston came out of
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  that motor right when we had qualifying motors.
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  Yeah. So they obviously when we could
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  change engines we would rerun a practice motor then you put in.
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  A qualifying engine and then you'd put in a race motor and
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  run a few laps on on that motor. In the final practice.
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  There was a huge difference from behind the steering wheel.
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  You could feel how much faster that qualifying motor was and it
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  was built to really only do one thing and that's go fast for a
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  couple laps and it would not. No.
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  Under any circumstance, at least in in my rookie year in 2002,
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  2003, under any circumstance would that motor ever be put in
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  for the race. It just wasn't going to make.
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  It wasn't built for that. You run lightweight oils and all
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  those things and all the coatings and everything was
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  purposely made just to be able to make it a couple laps and and
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  so you knew that that motor would come back and.
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  And more often than not, a lot of the parts in that motor might
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  not get used again. They would end up taking the
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  Pistons out and different things like that.
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  So when the motors, you know, got the pole, we started taking
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  those Pistons, and I've got a handful of them myself still at
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  my house. But I don't remember.
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  I don't remember bringing that idea to Richie.
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  I appreciate him giving me the credit for it because it's a
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  pretty cool idea. But you know, it's neat to have,
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  you know that the piston, knowing what it was doing inside
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  that engine during that short period of time, it's kind of,
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  you know, comparable to having something off of a rocket or you
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  know, knowing where that rocket went and all it had to do to
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  lift off the ground and and go through the air, you know, it's
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  it's an impressive piece of machinery.
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  And then to know that you were behind the wheel and and you
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  succeeded on being the fastest pole.
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  You know, when I when I look back on my career, and even
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  today when I raced in the Xfinity Series, I was never more
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  nervous behind the wheel of the car than right before
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  qualifying. Oh, me too, 100%.
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  You know he's terrified because the funny.
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  Thing about it is like people, just people are like how are you
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  not more nervous for the race? The race is is a long process
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  and you are in control of your pace and you get to pick and
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  choose when you're going to push, when you're going to take
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  it easy, when you're going to take care of the car, how hard
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  you need to run at certain points in the race.
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  And it's it's you're never, you know.
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  You don't run a race at 110% every second, every foot of the
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  track. In qualifying you do.
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  And qualifying, your job is to go out there and overachieve.
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  And the other thing too was everybody was watching.
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  The whole field is lined up on pit Rd. watching every car run,
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  every crew chief, every car owner.
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  Everybody's paying attention. So when you get it right, that's
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  great. When you screw it up, that's not
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  so great because everybody saw it and when you were so, so or
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  average or forgettable. And you were forgettable or
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  average for multiple weeks in a row.
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  You know it would. It hurts your ego, you know, You
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  felt like it was an indictment on your reputation as a driver.
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  And I remember having some of my most emotional, challenging
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  times as a driver when I was having this sort of stretch.
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  Of. Qualifying in the, you know, low
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  20s, I I remember one of the last couple years I raced full
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  time. I felt like I qualified 23rd
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  every week. And it broke me like I I I was I
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  had had all I could stand of qualifying 23rd and you know the
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  racing, the racing was hard. Emotionally it was you know
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  difficult to finish below your your expectations.
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  But you always were going to come back and try again the next
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  week. And even now, like when I was I
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  was saying when I get in that car to qualify the Xfinity car,
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  I. Had to go to.
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  Homestead just a couple weeks ago and I think I went out first
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  and I don't have a guaranteed spot in the field and don't I'm
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  not I'm not getting to watch where other people are racing on
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  the track or going to. You know, you can watch other
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  people qualify and go OK, he he run a good line.
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  I'm going to run that line. I didn't have any of that, And
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  so qualifying happens 5 minutes after the end of practice when
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  my practice session ended. I got out of the car like we
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  always do. The crew came over and said you
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  need to get back in, you're getting ready to go qualify in 5
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  minutes. And so I buckle in and I'm still
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  putting my gloves on. Then the guy's telling me to
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  crank the motor to pull off and I'm like, this is crazy and I
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  ain't got my head on straight, You know, I don't know what I'm
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  about to do. I ain't even thought I ain't
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  even had a chance to think about what I'm going to do.
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  And I called. I mean, I was so nervous.
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  A week leading up to the Xfinity races at Bristol and at
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  Homestead, because at Bristol I think I had to go out third.
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  Maybe it was first, but anyways, I called Timmy Hill.
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  I didn't call the champion or the last week's race winner.
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  I called Timmy Hill because Timmy's had a lot of experience.
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  Going out first, going out third, going out second.
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  He knew how that track was going to be.
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  He knew the pressure and he knew.
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  You know, I needed to know what his thoughts were on what I
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  should be expecting and what to safeguard against.
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  And so it's intimidating, man, even after all these years, I
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  really appreciate you sharing that with me because I'm going
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  to go somewhere with that. You know, I really listen to
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  what you you have to say. I think once I start talking
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  about it you're going to remember so being your friend
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  Sonoma, you're on the you're you're leaning on the back of
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  your Budweiser car at that time at at the road course and you
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  didn't qualify real good. And I walked up to you and I
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  said in you know our friendship way.
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  I said what's wrong man. And you were.
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  You were heartbroke. And here today you're admitting
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  that qualifying will will break a person because it was such a
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  show back then, all eyes. Do you remember saying that to
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  me? It's Sonoma, you said.
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  I feel like I I've let everybody down, is what what you said to
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  me. No, I don't remember it, but I I
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  That's how it felt. You know, I I remember.
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  I'll share this. I've never shared this one with
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  anybody, but I'll give you this one.
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  Thank you. It was me and Amy were me and
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  Amy were not married yet. We might have been, I can't
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  remember. This was like 2015, sixteen or
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  seventeen. It was one of those years, last
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  couple of years in my career. We're at Richmond and I I feel
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  like I've qualified 23rd for eight weeks in a row.
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  I mean, it just, it wasn't, I really didn't qualify 23rd, 8
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  weeks in a row. But gosh, it felt like I just, I
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  had this sort of writer's block I just could not get past.
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  That, that, you know, that sort of mediocre, even less than
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  mediocre performance in qualifying and it was bugging
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  the hell out of me and I I didn't know why we couldn't do
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  better and we're at Richmond and it was wearing on me.
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  I'd take it home and think about it and and you know, probably
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  the race performances probably weren't a whole lot better to be
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  honest with you, but. I qualified 22nd or 23rd and
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  went back to the bus and walked into the bus and walked back
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  into the bathroom and shut the door and cried.
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  And I I mean, I didn't know what else.
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  I didn't know what else to do. And Amy come back here and she
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  don't know. You know, why am I upset about
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  this? It's qualified.
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  And I'm like, you know, you doing this all your life.
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  You know in your heart you believe you're good at it.
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  You want to believe you're one of the best at it.
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  And no matter what you're doing or no matter how you try to
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  approach it, you keep getting the same result, you know?
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  And you know, I never, I never really cried over results.
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  Like I'm physically cried over results in my life.
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  But that'll tell you right there that one day in Richmond.
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  That qualifying effort was all I could take it.
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  Been building and building weeks in, week, week in and week out.
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  I don't know why. I mean, I've, I've had some race
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  results that hurt, you know? Hurt your heart.
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  But never, never did I get out of the car and cry or go home
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  and cry over it, you know? But for whatever reason, that
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  day I was just at my wit's end. And and and the only.
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  Only qualifying could do that to you.
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  I don't know why qualifying mattered that much, right?
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  Yeah, well, let me. I almost want to call an
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  audible, and I'm going to, I'm going to go to the very end of
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  my notes. You and I share something in
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  common now. You've had way more success than
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  me and I, and we're going to rattle off your stats later on
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  because I like to remind people, but you and I share something in
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  common. Your dad was the man.
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  My brother was the man. Rusty could never understand why
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  I was not him. And I would read, you know,
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  years past, 20 years ago, why people like Dale Junior is not
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  his dad. And I'm thinking to myself,
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  well, I never wanted to be my brother.
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  I just wanted to do what Rusty did.
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  I wanted to do what my dad did. So you telling me that story and
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  we've all been there. You're no different than
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  anybody. But do you, do you feel like you
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  know, coming to your wit's end and qualifying that is just
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  because of who you are? Or do you think it was just
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  because you had enough? I just wanted to do good.
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  I was. I always felt like that I was.
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  Fallen short of expectations. Even if no one ever said
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  anything to me, my expectation was my father, his success,
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  right? It wasn't that people were
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  coming up to me and saying, man, you're not winning enough,
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  you're not doing this enough. I mean, I heard the.
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  Talk out there, he's never going to be his daddy.
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  He's riding his coattails, all of those things, but none of
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  that really that bothered me that bad.
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  To be honest with you, all of the talk, all the noise outside
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  that might be negative, never, never really bothered me.
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  I expected to be a champion. I expected to be a winner.
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  I wanted badly, badly to to win. And so when you know when I go
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  out there. And I want, you know, I look,
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  I'd go out, run laps in practice, look at the.
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  Sheet. All right.
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  That's not good enough or OK, we're fast today.
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  Go and qualify. That was great.
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  Nope, not good enough. God, I'm disappointed in that.
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  And and that, you know, that bothered me badly.
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  We go to race in the race on Sunday or Saturday.
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  You walk away with the result you expect maybe a little
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  better. Maybe you're surprised by the
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  result or you're super disappointed in it.
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  And I just lived it every single day and when I finished poorly,
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  I would not feel OK about that until I could get back in the
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  car and fix it. And so if I ran bad on Sunday, I
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  was a miserable person until the next Sunday and.
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  You know, it just I, you know, I, I, I people might think that
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  I felt a lot of pressure from the outside about you know, my
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  last name and my dad and his fans or my fans and just the and
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  the the nest, you know, the NASCAR fandom in general.
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  Just having these certain you know, high expectations of me.
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  I had even higher expectations. Of myself, you know, and.
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  Later in my career I felt like you know, I, you know I I had
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  gotten with Steve Letarte we had sort of developed this process
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  of improving which I can go into detail about but when my career
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  was over in 2000 and. 1112, right.
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  I was sitting there thinking, man, I don't know how in the
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  hell this is ever going to get turned around.
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  I don't know who could turn it around.
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  I don't know if it's possible. I'm no longer in the, you know,
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  under the wing of my father's company.
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  I'm out. Outside of that security, in
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  that safety net, I'm at HMS. There's nowhere to hide.
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  If you can't run good in that car, there's no excuse.
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  And so I was sitting there around 2011.
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  And 12 thinking that my, you know, I might wake up one day
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  and and and my career could be over, whether I want it to end
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  or not. Rick, to his credit, assured me
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  we're going to keep working. We're going to keep trying.
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  We're going to keep trying. I never felt from Rick Hendrick
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  or anybody at Hindrick Motorsports that I was on thin
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  ice. But damn, I I knew the results.
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  I knew the success that my team mates might be having.
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  Anyways, I get put with Steve Letarte.
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  Steve said, man, you're, you know, finishing 20th in points
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  or worse, you're running like that every week.
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  We're going to set a goal of 15th.
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  And I was like, OK, I was like, you know, we'll just, he just
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  expected 15th. He didn't expect us to go run
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  third. We started running 15th when
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  that started happening every single week.
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  He said, all right, we're moving it to 10th, buddy.
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  It's time to start finishing 10th or better.
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  We started doing, you know, we it took a little time, but we
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  got to where we were a top ten car every week.
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  And then he said, hey, guess what?
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  I want you to go to the track and we're going to expect to run
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  5th. And I was like.
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  OK. And then we would go to the
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  racetrack and we would run in the top five every week.
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  We had top five speed and we'd run there.
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  We were battling with Greg Biffle leading the points
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  throughout the, you know, end of the summer stretch having a
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  great. Couple of years but Steve like
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  put this progress in place that made sense and it actually you
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  know if you would if you're standing at the bottom of that
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  hill in 2013 and he said hey look up that hill one day we're
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  going to be running third you'd go down that how's that possible
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  that's going to be hard to do well over time it it we got
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  there we achieved it and then we were winning races Daytona 500
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  and. He he walked in or I I forget
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  how I heard this, but I was at Charlotte Motor Speedway in 2014
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  and somebody said, hey man, I got word that the tarp might be
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  going to work for NBC next year. And when I heard, so when I
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  heard that NBC was thinking about coming into NASCAR and
• 21:31
  becoming a partner, I called one of the, I called somebody that
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  was sort of helping put all that together and I said, you know
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  who they need to put in the booth at NBC is Dale Jarrett.
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  Dale Jarrett hadn't been in the booth full time.
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  In quite a while. I think he'd been there before
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  with ESPN and a few other people, but couldn't really
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  remember. But I was like, man, you know, I
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  was, I was opinionated about what our broadcast booths
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  needed. And I was like, here's a shot
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  for me to put in my 2 cents. I think the booth needs Dale
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  Jarrett. And they went and they went and
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  hired my crew chief that I was running good with.
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  Yeah. And anyways.
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  That might have been around 2013, but it broke my heart and
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  you know, and so then I go into those final few years with Greg
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  Ives and and me and Greg became great friends.
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  I had some problems physically with concussions and things like
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  that that were definitely derailing our momentum and our
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  ability to, you know, build as a team and and the results.
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  Were hard to come by for me in in that final year.
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  And so even then though, man, I'd go to the racetrack thinking
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  I'm good enough and I'm with a good enough organization to run
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  top five. And when that didn't happen, you
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  know, you just would be just as disappointed as if it were ten
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  years ago. I didn't.
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  I didn't go into that last year thinking, man, I'm just going to
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  have good time and this is going to be my swan song and right off
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  into the sunset. You know, I wanted to win a
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  race, I wanted to win races, I wanted to run great and still
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  felt like I could. But those final few years it was
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  it was hard to reconcile with the reality the the results just
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  didn't come as easy as you wanted.
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  OK, this this is excruciating for me because I love you as a
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  friend and we've gone down this road before.
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  I think you're awesome. I think you're entirely you're
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  highly intelligent. Let me just let me just Wow,
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  that's very heavy for me. I want to read you your stats
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  and we're going to go back around.
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  We're going to have some fun. But I want you to listen
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  intently, OK? Dale Earnhardt junior, 49 years
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  old, right now, 776 NASCAR starts.
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  You're in the NASCAR Hall of Fame.
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  That is not to be taken lightly. That's unbelievable.
• 24:19
  You got 26 Cup wins, 24 Xfinity wins.
• 24:24
  You are the 15 time NASCAR Cup most popular driver and that's
• 24:31
  from 2003 to 2017. That's that's 15 years straight.
• 24:37
  You're the 19981999 Xfinity champion.
• 24:43
  You've won 2 Daytona 5 hundreds. And as we always say you're
• 24:48
  you're a two time Daytona 500 Champion 2004 2014.
• 24:55
  This one here blows my mind. Budweiser Shootout winner O3 O
• 25:01
  408-1516 and this one's even bigger.
• 25:07
  You won Talladega 4. Straight years in a row and and
• 25:12
  junior. There's way more but I thought
• 25:15
  OK it would be ridiculous. Just keep going.
• 25:17
  So buddy you know I think your story is what I call.
• 25:24
  It's a cautionary tale where as great as we are right away you
• 25:29
  went to the negative. So let let's ease it up.
• 25:33
  I just read you your stats. You're great, you are great and
• 25:38
  that's. That's not I'm not sure of code
• 25:40
  name. What do you think when I tell
• 25:42
  you all that? Yeah.
• 25:44
  So that's why I watch. I watch a lot of the races from
• 25:49
  my past. I love watching old races, no
• 25:51
  matter whether I was in them or not.
• 25:53
  But I do watch races that I was in.
• 25:56
  I watch a lot of the old Xfinity stuff from 9899.
• 25:59
  Yeah, because, well, we got to remember because we we we
• 26:04
  forget. You're right.
• 26:05
  You know, you get down the road and you're like.
• 26:08
  Yeah, you know, I I really only remember or you know really on I
• 26:14
  left with this, you know imprint or emotional imprint from those
• 26:19
  final few years. The tough times destroys.
• 26:22
  Us. They do.
• 26:23
  I I, you know, I was with, you know, I was around Jimmy Johnson
• 26:27
  a lot in in his final few years and you know, it blew my mind
• 26:33
  I'd go to the racetrack with. And and and here's a seven time
• 26:37
  champion like he has done he he won a championship.
• 26:42
  The time's over right? It's like God almighty, how
• 26:45
  could you ever be disappointed with a run or a qualifying run
• 26:50
  or race weekend when you got 7 championships.
• 26:53
  You know, you're like, that guy never gets sad about nothing but
• 26:56
  dude, Jimmie Johnson, one one of the greatest drivers that ever
• 27:01
  was. Would.
• 27:04
  Get out of a car in the last couple of years of his career
• 27:08
  and be just as frustrated and, you know, looking for answers
• 27:15
  and distraught over a run as anybody you know as as this as a
• 27:21
  25 year old rookie still looking for his first win.
• 27:25
  And it blew my mind. I was like, damn, this guy's
• 27:30
  human, you know, he's a human being and he's got.
• 27:33
  Even all of that success hasn't weathered or leathered his
• 27:38
  emotions to where dude, he still he feels the hurt and the pain
• 27:44
  and the disappointment of of a of a loss or a or just a
• 27:47
  frustrating run or just lack of speed.
• 27:50
  He feels that as real and as authentic as any other driver in
• 27:54
  the field. And so you know that that was
• 27:59
  interesting to me, but I. Yeah, I do go back and look at
• 28:06
  the old Bud days and and you know kind of remind myself that
• 28:10
  man, we had a good, we had some good stretches where you know,
• 28:15
  we won a handful of Xfinity February races, the 300 in
• 28:22
  February, we won a handful of those in a row and.
• 28:26
  I could have kept going, you know, we just.
• 28:29
  Have to permit, you know, that we were at Martinsville.
• 28:33
  You love Martinsville. You always ran so good there.
• 28:35
  We were at Martinsville just a couple weeks ago and somebody
• 28:40
  was like, you know you had a, you had a stretch of like 5 top
• 28:43
  five finishes in a row or something like that back in the
• 28:46
  bud days. And I remember, I'll tell you
• 28:50
  this, we we went, I went to Martinsville for my first race
• 28:58
  and. Ran into everything.
• 29:01
  I ran into the wall. I ran into the tow truck behind
• 29:04
  the wall. I ran.
• 29:05
  Ran into. Everything right.
• 29:07
  You hit everything except the tow truck.
• 29:09
  Go out there and hit everything and the tow truck.
• 29:12
  I I had a rough day so Tony Junior and Tony Senior we take
• 29:17
  our car up there to go test and when we didn't run good Tony
• 29:20
  Senior and Tony Junior they took you to work and so we go up
• 29:23
  there to test. Tony Junior and you This is this
• 29:27
  was neat to me back in the day but.
• 29:30
  More than likely most everybody had it.
• 29:32
  Tony Junior took a piece of tungsten and shaped it like the
• 29:39
  the perch, the spring perch on the trailing arm and so the left
• 29:43
  rear trailing arm. Spring perch was made out of
• 29:46
  tungsten and so it was like it's unsprung weight that would plant
• 29:50
  the left rear tire on the ground at all times.
• 29:53
  Amazing. Yeah.
• 29:54
  And so we were, you know, we wait.
• 29:56
  We put tungsten in lower A frames for the left front,
• 29:59
  trying to figure out how to make this car work.
• 30:01
  And we ended up learning that putting that tungsten on the
• 30:05
  trailing arm somewhere back there at the rear axle was the
• 30:08
  way to go. We just had to disguise it to
• 30:11
  look like part of the car so that we didn't get in trouble
• 30:14
  because it was illegal. And man, we went there and ran
• 30:18
  in the top five like 6-7 races in a row.
• 30:21
  It was awesome. And every time I went, when I
• 30:25
  went over to Hendrick, they're like, you know, they're great at
• 30:29
  Martinsville. They win a lot of races and we'd
• 30:31
  go there and I'm practicing in the top five and I'm like, man,
• 30:34
  this thing's good. I just wonder if we can get a
• 30:36
  little better. Y'all ever put any tungsten.
• 30:40
  And they're looking at me like, what?
• 30:44
  We don't need that, you know. I don't know but.
• 30:48
  We're down South, that's what we do.
• 30:51
  I didn't mind doing a little cheating.
• 30:53
  I always wanted some advantage, yes, over the competition and
• 30:57
  that was the easiest way to get it.
• 30:59
  So that leads me to this, you know, I wouldn't say back in the
• 31:05
  day I I think that's a little brutal, but we got this next
• 31:09
  Gen. car which is a whole another conversation but.
• 31:14
  In our day, Tony, Tony, Yuri, Tony Senior, they could craft a
• 31:19
  race car and make that car better than everybody else's.
• 31:25
  Do you think we're better off nowadays or I mean, I kind of
• 31:29
  liked it where a team could craft cars because when you look
• 31:32
  at Formula One, you know it's Mercedes versus.
• 31:36
  You know all the other makers, you know, pours, Ferrari,
• 31:39
  whatever it is. What's your thought of back
• 31:42
  then? We could craft a car.
• 31:44
  I loved it. I, you know I it's it's there's
• 31:54
  pros and cons to both right. There's there's part of me, so
• 32:03
  you know there's. There's part of me that loves
• 32:05
  the creativity and I do miss being able to create a van an
• 32:15
  advantage in the shop. You know I but it it's
• 32:23
  expensive. You know you got a, you got, you
• 32:26
  get a great fabricator that knows how to build a quarter
• 32:28
  panel better than anybody else and he's going to get.
• 32:31
  Offers from other teams and you're going to be at battle all
• 32:34
  the time trying to keep those people in your building and
• 32:39
  secrets don't last long. You know you you the garage is
• 32:44
  so tight literally working on top of each other in some of
• 32:48
  these garages up down the you know the the in the series that
• 32:53
  you know people see everything. You're not going to hide nothing
• 32:56
  and so. I miss it, You know, I miss
• 33:03
  being able to sort of have an advantage in the shop over other
• 33:08
  companies being able to hire better people just, you know,
• 33:11
  flat out, you know, out spending them.
• 33:15
  But also, I love the Peace of Mind that the new Next Gen. car
• 33:23
  brings where man, if you if you know how to set the thing up,
• 33:28
  you can, you can beat some of these guys.
• 33:30
  You know, and it's not it's it's not.
• 33:36
  The parody that it brought was pretty evident in the first
• 33:39
  season. Now as we go through the next
• 33:41
  sand full of years, maybe, you know those, you know, those high
• 33:44
  buck teams distance themselves from everybody else just like
• 33:48
  the old car. But yeah, I don't know.
• 33:52
  I mean. It costs a lot of money is what
• 33:54
  you're saying too. Outrun back in the day it does
• 33:58
  but it. Also sounds like it cost a lot
• 33:59
  of money this these days too. Yeah, yeah.
• 34:03
  There's no balance. Says they're out there racing
• 34:06
  Lamborghinis, right? Yeah.
• 34:08
  You know, so $350,000 race car. So I, you know, I think that,
• 34:16
  you know, the Xfinity Series, it's kind of a nice balance, if
• 34:21
  I could be honest. When I look at the trucks,
• 34:23
  right, they still. Do a lot of work on the bodies.
• 34:27
  They look twisted up. It's it's very aggressive.
• 34:30
  I never loved that. You know?
• 34:32
  We'd go to the racetrack around 2003, 2004.
• 34:35
  I remember pulling out on Pit Rd. one time behind Ricky Craven
• 34:39
  in the 32 tied car, right? And I said to Tony Junior was
• 34:42
  getting ready to go out on the racetrack to practice that.
• 34:44
  Damn, I said damn it, Tony Junior.
• 34:46
  I think Ricky Craven's already backed his car in the damn wall.
• 34:49
  The left rear quarter panels pushed all the way over, the
• 34:52
  right rear quarter panels hanging out.
• 34:54
  And he's like that's the way they're building them these
• 34:56
  days. I said, well, I hope my looks
• 34:58
  like that we got to go to work slide that rear tail over and
• 35:01
  get that quarter panel on the right side flat.
• 35:04
  And it got, it was cool, but then it got too much, you know,
• 35:09
  the cars became almost unrecognizable.
• 35:12
  And when you look at the trucks today, they, you know, they got
• 35:16
  that big board on the right side and the and the right rear tail
• 35:20
  pieces slid way over. And I like the car to be
• 35:23
  symmetrical. You know and and even our cup
• 35:26
  cars just a couple years ago, you know had the flat right
• 35:29
  side, the left rear quarter panel would be bent in toward
• 35:33
  the center of the car and the car, the tail piece ain't on the
• 35:36
  car straight, it's moved over couple inches.
• 35:39
  What the hell? Like just make them set, set the
• 35:42
  tail piece on their centered up, put the roof on centered up to
• 35:44
  the roll cage, tail piece center, nose piece center and
• 35:47
  then put the body on it. And you know, that's kind of
• 35:52
  where we are with the. With the Xfinity cars, you know
• 35:56
  where our our bodies are, you know, plastic.
• 36:00
  And there's areas where NASCAR's like, do not touch this.
• 36:05
  If you touch this, you're in big damn trouble.
• 36:07
  And we don't touch it. You know, we don't give, we
• 36:09
  don't get cute. And so I kind of like where the
• 36:12
  Xfinity Series is. It's kind of a good blend
• 36:15
  between how crazy things used to be in the Cup garage 15 years
• 36:20
  ago and the and the new. Kit car that they're racing in
• 36:24
  the Cup series now, the rules and the way the bodies are with
• 36:28
  the composite bodies, that kind of keeps us pretty honest.
• 36:31
  I don't have to go crazy with my payroll trying to hire some
• 36:36
  insanely expensive fabricator. You know you're good fabricator.
• 36:40
  You can come in here and hang the body on an Xfinity car
• 36:42
  pretty easily and I'll be happy with the job you do. 2 Two weeks
• 36:47
  ago. Not exactly on that subject, but
• 36:52
  we were at Martinsville. Somebody asked Ryan Newman who
• 36:57
  was the hardest guy he ever raced on short track.
• 37:00
  And Ryan Newman said the toughest short track racer he
• 37:03
  ever raced against was you, Dale Junior.
• 37:08
  I can remember you getting tired of, you know.
• 37:13
  What do you call him? Cue ball headed?
• 37:15
  Yeah, you would move people. You moved Todd Bodine at South
• 37:20
  Boston getting into three. You moved people in short track
• 37:25
  racing. Were you surprised that Ryan
• 37:27
  Newman remembered that about you?
• 37:29
  I thought he misspoke and he's trying to say dad, but.
• 37:33
  So. No, I thought he met you.
• 37:36
  I know I I've watched that clip and I was really taken aback
• 37:40
  that he would mention me out of every driver that he's ever
• 37:43
  raced. But me and Ryan did have some
• 37:48
  some hard races and I mean Ryan Newman's had a hard race with
• 37:51
  everybody, but you know, I, I, me and Ryan had a couple instant
• 38:02
  incidents on. And and they weren't on short
• 38:05
  tracks they were in Atlanta back-to-back races.
• 38:08
  So we're running the I'm running the top I've got the top figured
• 38:12
  out this is like 2004, 2003. Ain't many people got it got up
• 38:18
  to the top of the racetrack yet at that point in time and and
• 38:21
  and I'm up there flying and I run and and when you come off
• 38:27
  the top of Turn 2 at Atlanta in 2003 and the guys around the
• 38:30
  bottom you're going to be about 10 mile an hour faster.
• 38:34
  And Ryan, the way he races, which is fine.
• 38:38
  We love the way Ryan races. Ryan would come up off the
• 38:42
  bottom and pull right up in front of you and you got to stop
• 38:46
  and you're going 10 mile an hour faster and you got this
• 38:48
  incredible run off the top of the racetrack and you just got
• 38:51
  to stop or go to the inside. And I'm like, I don't like that
• 38:55
  Ryan. So I ran in the back of him and
• 38:57
  spun him out and he wrecked. His motor coach was right next
• 39:01
  to mine. I thought he's going to whoop my
• 39:02
  ass when I saw him at the driver's motor coach slot after
• 39:05
  the race. But it would come.
• 39:07
  He'd come up to me and I said, man, I got to run off the top.
• 39:10
  Why in the hell would you pull in front of me?
• 39:11
  Just leave me the outside lane? And he said, well, why don't you
• 39:15
  go to the inside? And I said, well, I'm running
• 39:17
  the top, I want the top and you pulled up in front of my ass.
• 39:20
  I'm going too fast. I can't stop.
• 39:22
  And we had this little conversation about it.
• 39:24
  We get back there to the very next race in Atlanta.
• 39:28
  And he does the same damn thing. I mean, it was a carbon copy and
• 39:31
  I jacked him up and spun around again and and so we, you know, I
• 39:38
  think and we had some other you know, good races in our career.
• 39:43
  And so I think those two moments may have imprinted on him that I
• 39:48
  was aggressive in nature, but I I felt like I kind of was.
• 39:53
  I certainly wasn't as as rough as Dad was, but.
• 39:57
  When I I remember racing in my first Xfinity race at Michigan,
• 40:04
  I'm running 7th in this number 31 blue car.
• 40:09
  I'm only running like 5-6 races that year and just trying to,
• 40:13
  you know, I'm trying to prove that I belong in there.
• 40:16
  And I'm racing with Dale Jarrett.
• 40:17
  He's in the number 32 Band-Aid car, big old Ford and I I catch
• 40:23
  him off of two and I bump him in the left rear.
• 40:26
  And he come over the radio and said are y'all sure that's
• 40:29
  Junior in that car, not his daddy, ran over me like his
• 40:33
  daddy would. And I, you know, when I first
• 40:37
  started in my career, you know when you called a guy, you ran
• 40:42
  into him a little bit, right? You you you'd use that headlight
• 40:45
  and yeah, use that little right front headlight and kind of
• 40:49
  slide them on up the racetrack a little bit.
• 40:52
  Just get them up off the bottom and go buy them.
• 40:55
  And, you know, then I started racing in the Cup Series all the
• 41:02
  time and Mark Martin, bless him, changed the entire culture on
• 41:08
  the racetrack. One guy taught the entire field
• 41:13
  how to race. And you know, when you ran a guy
• 41:18
  down, you didn't race the crap out of him.
• 41:21
  You let him go. He's faster.
• 41:23
  You know it's fit. It's halfway in the race.
• 41:26
  Why you want to hold him up and slow both of you down.
• 41:28
  Eventually he's going to get by you anyways, but you damn hold
• 41:31
  him up and you cost both of you straight away.
• 41:34
  Martin Martin taught us that man.
• 41:35
  You just let him go and then later in the race you running
• 41:37
  back down 50 laps or 100 laps later he he lets you go and if
• 41:41
  you don't then you then you can hit him right?
• 41:44
  And so you know Mark, Mark taught us all how to race and.
• 41:48
  I cleaned my ACT up a little bit and certainly wasn't quite as
• 41:53
  rough as I as I might have might have been earlier in my career.
• 41:58
  You just took us through two cultures, you know, racing here.
• 42:03
  I'm. I caught you.
• 42:05
  You you haven't pulled over. So now I'm going to knock the
• 42:08
  hell out of you. And then to to Mark Martin and
• 42:11
  I, you know, Junior, we were racing 500 miles.
• 42:15
  And you know, I've had that talk given to me before.
• 42:19
  Hey, boy. Harry, Gant, we're not racing
• 42:21
  each other. We're racing the leader.
• 42:24
  You know, and we're losing time battling side by side.
• 42:27
  So yeah, I I like that. Take two different takes.
• 42:31
  But OK, let's let's lighten the load up here.
• 42:34
  Let's have a little fun. And I'm not saying a rapid fire,
• 42:38
  but so I did a show on Monday and I gave you a trophy.
• 42:45
  I've. I've given you this.
• 42:46
  This is the Rick, Claire. OK.
• 42:50
  So the reason you get this trophy?
• 42:53
  Is this OK? How in the hell did you know
• 42:58
  that Ryan Blaney was going to win the championship this year?
• 43:03
  Famous, you called it. So here's your trophy.
• 43:07
  I'm giving it through you. I'll send it to you.
• 43:09
  But what was your deal with? I know you love him, but what
• 43:13
  did you see early in the year? Well, I'll be honest, I picked
• 43:18
  Ryan Blaney to win the championship because I think
• 43:21
  Ryan Blaney as a champion and successful in NASCAR is good for
• 43:26
  NASCAR. I didn't pick Ryan because I saw
• 43:29
  something on you know, in his performance.
• 43:31
  I just knew that a a Ryan Blaney championship would be positive
• 43:35
  for us and be and he's so there's a there's a lot here.
• 43:40
  I will. I'll tell you this.
• 43:43
  So I Remember Me and Dave Blaney came in together in the Xfinity
• 43:48
  Series. He had this really bad ass paint
• 43:51
  scheme, the 93 Amoco car. It was, I remember it.
• 43:55
  He was, yeah, he was fast, kick ass little race car and really
• 44:01
  quiet, nice, mild mannered guy. He was a father.
• 44:05
  He was a be a family man. I wasn't right.
• 44:07
  So we didn't become friends because we just weren't on the
• 44:09
  same page. But I thought the world of him
• 44:12
  respected him immensely. And then I'm standing on the
• 44:20
  grid at Kansas for Ryan's first Cup start.
• 44:25
  We had all watched Ryan sort of piece together these little
• 44:29
  opportunities in the Xfinity Series and eventually get a deal
• 44:32
  with Penske as a developmental driver and get opportunities
• 44:36
  driving this 22 car. And so we were all a witness to
• 44:41
  that and and kind of pulling for him, mainly pulling for him
• 44:45
  because of his daddy. Right.
• 44:46
  You knew who his daddy was and you're like, I liked his daddy.
• 44:48
  So I'm going to pull for the kid.
• 44:51
  And then you get to know Ryan and it turns out, man, I mean
• 44:54
  he's just salt to the earth. He's just as cool and as easy
• 44:58
  and as low you know, level as his dad.
• 45:01
  And so I sit there and talk to him on the start finish line or
• 45:05
  on the grid for his first start. We qualified side by side.
• 45:08
  I probably qualified 23rd and and so.
• 45:13
  Marie hey, that's Michael Jordan.
• 45:16
  And so I was like, hey man, you know, nobody cares where you
• 45:19
  finish. Don't worry about that.
• 45:21
  Go out there and run all the laps, learn If you wreck early,
• 45:25
  you're not learning. I was like, nobody expects
• 45:29
  anything out of you performance wise, all right?
• 45:32
  So you don't have to feel like you've got to measure up to a
• 45:34
  certain thing. Just go run the laps and have
• 45:37
  fun. This is going to be neat.
• 45:38
  It's going to be surprising. And and interesting to you and
• 45:43
  just make sure you get everything you can out of it.
• 45:45
  And so I see him, you know, I see him renting a house
• 45:54
  connected to my property. I used to own this piece of
• 45:56
  property and I sold it to Brad Keselowski.
• 45:58
  Well, he rents this house from Brad to live in it.
• 46:01
  And he's neighbors like earshot from my mother who actually
• 46:05
  lived down the hill for me. So we're all neighbors, so him
• 46:09
  and his buddies Bubba Wallace and they're they're all running
• 46:12
  around on my property on 4 Wheelers and stuff.
• 46:14
  And these young kids being goofy, Yeah.
• 46:17
  And. And and we became friends, you
• 46:21
  know, after the race, I'd call him up and he might come over
• 46:24
  and sit in the basement bar and talk about the race weekend or
• 46:27
  whatever. And we just got to know each
• 46:30
  other really well. He wins his first race in the 21
• 46:34
  car. Pocono and I called him and I
• 46:36
  said, I'm bringing all the beer. Don't you worry about it.
• 46:38
  He said my crew's coming over. I said I'll handle all the beer,
• 46:41
  don't worry about it. We'll be there and can't wait
• 46:43
  for you to get home. And so we ended up, I got a
• 46:48
  picture that I sent today, just the other day.
• 46:50
  We took on the back porch that night of the whole team, his
• 46:53
  whole crew and all of us, right. And all his friends Bubba, Ricky
• 46:57
  Stenhouse and bunch of other people.
• 47:00
  And so Long story short, I've just really always thought a lot
• 47:06
  of Blaney. The other thing that people may
• 47:10
  not entirely realize is that everything that anyone has ever
• 47:16
  asked Ryan to do that would promote the sport.
• 47:20
  He said yes to going out to the West Coast to do sitcoms, any
• 47:26
  interview. He started his You know the
• 47:30
  Glassholes podcast. You know, all of those things
• 47:36
  were just. You know, he didn't make a lot
• 47:38
  of money. It wasn't like somebody said,
• 47:40
  here's a briefcase full of money, do this.
• 47:42
  It was just, hey, man, I'm getting, you know, I want to
• 47:45
  promote myself. I want to help promote the
• 47:47
  sport. He's always really been active,
• 47:50
  which I admire a lot I didn't have.
• 47:54
  I didn't have a whole, I mean, I was doing a lot of things in my
• 47:57
  young career to promote the sport, but they weren't my
• 48:01
  ideas, they were, you know, Budweiser and all these other
• 48:04
  people were pushing me in this direction.
• 48:06
  He has more foresight, vision to understand how valuable that
• 48:15
  that work is outside of the race car.
• 48:17
  And so I've always liked that. And so I thought, man, you know,
• 48:21
  I want him to win a championship.
• 48:23
  I want him to be a champion. I want him to be a successful
• 48:27
  winner year in, year out, on on our, on our, on our, on our
• 48:32
  tour. I want that for him personally,
• 48:35
  but I also want it for our sport because it would be great for
• 48:38
  our sport to continue to develop superstars.
• 48:42
  He's a well known name in our industry, but I want him to be
• 48:46
  well known in the mainstream and so that's just why I picked him.
• 48:51
  I said man, I want him to win it.
• 48:52
  I hope he wins it. And there was part of me that
• 48:55
  saw a very similar sort of season that Joey had the year
• 49:00
  before. Joey wasn't lighting the world
• 49:02
  on fire. When we went to Phoenix and
• 49:04
  we're interviewing the final four drivers, the championship 4
• 49:08
  in Phoenix, everybody was thinking that Joey wasn't in the
• 49:11
  mix, right? He wasn't really a threat to win
• 49:13
  that championship. But when they, you know, when
• 49:16
  they got done, he he was the champion and won the race.
• 49:19
  And I thought to myself, man, if Blaney can get to Phoenix, why
• 49:23
  can't he win it? He could probably win it.
• 49:25
  Phoenix is a good track for him. It's great for Penske.
• 49:28
  But getting there was going to be the hard part.
• 49:30
  And there were some very, very close calls where he almost
• 49:34
  didn't get it, get through. But you know, once he's once he
• 49:38
  made it to Phoenix, man, the rest of the industry was like,
• 49:42
  oh, Blaney, he's a favorite. Blaney's a favorite.
• 49:44
  Look at Martinsville, look at this, Look at his stats at
• 49:46
  Phoenix. Blaney's the favorite.
• 49:48
  And he went out there, had the best car in practice and then
• 49:51
  then the race got the job done. So I made a big stink a week, A
• 49:56
  week or two ago I said that I love NASCAR.
• 50:00
  It's my life. I wanted to do good, but they
• 50:03
  got to do a better job at getting these drivers face in
• 50:08
  the mainstream. We once asked, well, somebody
• 50:11
  asked Kyle Larson, hey, when you won the championship, what
• 50:14
  happened? And I was shocked.
• 50:17
  He said nothing. He said I won the championship.
• 50:19
  Didn't even matter so. About two weeks ago, I did the
• 50:23
  Kenny Wallace Show. This is the Kenny conversation.
• 50:26
  This is more serious. I said NASCAR and everybody's
• 50:33
  got to start promoting these drivers and Steve O'Donnell
• 50:37
  liked that on my Instagram And I said, oh boy.
• 50:41
  So I want to know from you. We have 4 drivers that finished
• 50:47
  in the top fourth. Blaney is 25 years old all the
• 50:51
  way up to Larson 31 Junior. Do we have the drivers?
• 50:55
  And with NASCAR building this new center, you know there by
• 51:00
  the Concord Regional Airport, can they get these drivers to
• 51:04
  where people know them? Do we have the right drivers?
• 51:09
  Absolutely. We, our drivers, are great
• 51:15
  personalities. They're entertaining people.
• 51:18
  Listen, I mean, Jimmie Johnson is one of the most interesting,
• 51:25
  coolest guys that I've ever met. I mean, this guy has a he has a
• 51:33
  fun sense of humor, likes to goof off, gets wild every once
• 51:38
  in a while. And he, you know, he was, he was
• 51:44
  with Lowe's and he was with Hendrick and a lot of things
• 51:48
  sort of quelled that sort of personality from really ever
• 51:51
  coming out. He wasn't all that eager to
• 51:55
  showcase that side of him to the rest of the world, you know, for
• 52:00
  whatever reason, that person that I knew never really became
• 52:06
  that well known to to the rest of the world.
• 52:10
  They only knew him as Jimmy, the same time champion that drives
• 52:13
  for Hendrick Motorsports sponsored by Lowe's, and I knew
• 52:17
  him as these is this really kick ass fun guy that I love to hang
• 52:21
  out and drink beer with. Falling off the roof of Go Karts
• 52:24
  and right and so our all our drivers are are fun badass
• 52:31
  people and I feel like that it is somewhat NASCAR's
• 52:38
  responsibility to take advantage of their avenues and their their
• 52:42
  the things that they're connected to and the access that
• 52:45
  they have they they certainly do work to get the drivers into
• 52:49
  certain places right outside of our bubble.
• 52:54
  The one of the things that I we talked about this on my podcast
• 52:58
  a little bit a couple weeks ago. One of the things that, if we
• 53:01
  think back to it, Kenny, so if we look at my career, I had
• 53:07
  Budweiser and Budweiser probably had more access and ability to
• 53:19
  shoot us into the stratosphere more than any other brand.
• 53:22
  And they did. They took advantage of all of
• 53:25
  that. Sending me to boxing matches,
• 53:28
  getting me into the Rolling Stone, getting me.
• 53:33
  And all of we did. We did all types of articles in
• 53:36
  publications that weren't asking or calling for NASCAR drivers,
• 53:40
  right. We did MTV Cribs multiple times.
• 53:44
  Damn, I must have Cribs. I did Cribs three or four times.
• 53:47
  It was awesome. You know, we we were, we did.
• 53:51
  I went to MTV and introduced during the MTV Music Awards,
• 53:55
  Lincoln Park. That stuff was, you know, it was
• 54:01
  was. It wasn't uncommon to see a
• 54:02
  NASCAR driver, to see Mt Awards. But at the MTV Music Awards, you
• 54:06
  weren't seeing NASCAR guys there.
• 54:09
  That wasn't the power of the Earnhardt last name.
• 54:12
  That was Bud, man. That was Budweiser.
• 54:15
  And wore your hat backwards. That was good.
• 54:19
  So the the the corporate sponsors are really the ones
• 54:25
  that have the most leverage to be able to get a driver into a
• 54:30
  certain space that they can't get to and they had the most to
• 54:33
  gain from it, the most to benefit from it.
• 54:36
  And so we kind of got to we we kind of got to get our partners
• 54:40
  to really use their leverage to to get these drivers out there
• 54:46
  and put them in places where you know we're not getting access
• 54:51
  to. You know, the other thing that
• 54:57
  was different about my time was, and I don't want to get in any
• 55:02
  trouble for saying this, maybe I don't.
• 55:04
  But the PR people that a per APR person's job in NASCAR is to
• 55:13
  secure their driver interviews and speaking opportunities,
• 55:18
  whether it's in print or video, whatever they, their job is to
• 55:23
  get their driver in front of cameras and in front of
• 55:26
  microphones as often as possible and is and and and try to make
• 55:30
  as big a splash on a weekly, daily basis, right.
• 55:34
  Their job is to promote this driver, get this driver in front
• 55:38
  of the camera. Well, right now all of the PR
• 55:43
  people are usually employed by the race teams.
• 55:48
  In 2004 man, or when me and you were racing, the PR people were
• 55:53
  spot, were hired by the the sponsor.
• 55:57
  And so when when you're APR person that is employed by
• 56:01
  Budweiser, there's a lot of pressure.
• 56:04
  You better perform. They don't want to, you know,
• 56:07
  they don't want to see you getting, you know, getting an
• 56:11
  art, getting an article or or or a piece written in the local
• 56:15
  paper. That ain't going to do it.
• 56:17
  They want to see you on the front page of the USA TODAY.
• 56:20
  They want to see you on the front page of the Rolling Stone,
• 56:23
  or that's a song. Yeah, US Week, Us Weekly,
• 56:27
  whatever, right. They want that driver to be on
• 56:31
  the. Cover of the Rolling Stone Yeah.
• 56:35
  So it it was. I wonder now, you know since
• 56:41
  that shifted, the PR people are now really more employed by the
• 56:44
  the race teams that the motivation and the real true
• 56:49
  role of the PR person has evolved.
• 56:54
  And maybe there's a, you know, the the the corporate, the
• 56:58
  corporate sponsor didn't want to manage that cost right, of that
• 57:02
  salary for the PR person. Now the teams had to take it on
• 57:06
  so that the driver had APR person.
• 57:08
  If they, you know, if they don't have one, they they they're
• 57:10
  rolling around aimlessly, right? Without really getting any kind
• 57:12
  of opportunities to be able to be speaking in the media and
• 57:16
  working in the media and promote themselves and their sponsors.
• 57:19
  So maybe if we can figure out a way to get that shift back to
• 57:22
  where these corporate sponsors are investing in people, that
• 57:28
  will help push this driver and get him promoted right?
• 57:31
  I think I. Love.
• 57:32
  I love what you're saying. Yeah.
• 57:33
  So to go back to, to your point, like NASCAR's carry some
• 57:38
  responsibility, but I think they do what they do.
• 57:40
  They do. They're doing everything they've
• 57:42
  always done. They're doing.
• 57:44
  They're doing all they can. I don't see them doing less than
• 57:47
  what they were doing when I was driving.
• 57:49
  I think they do a lot. What we're missing I believe on
• 57:52
  on on the promotion of the drivers is corporate American,
• 57:55
  how they used to push drivers out into the world.
• 58:00
  And so you know, and that that's AI don't know.
• 58:05
  That's not the whole answer. There's a lot of little things
• 58:08
  right? But.
• 58:08
  You, you and I are on the same page.
• 58:11
  I don't mean to interrupt you, but I'm, I'm the bad boy.
• 58:15
  I believe that we are in a new America.
• 58:19
  Everybody is scared to death to make a mistake.
• 58:22
  And therefore I said if you don't say nothing, you don't
• 58:27
  sell nothing. We're boring and we are both on
• 58:33
  the same page, except I say it a little more aggressively with
• 58:38
  that being said. This is down my list here and
• 58:42
  allow me to say this without any repercussions.
• 58:47
  You you are extremely popular. You are one of the most famous
• 58:51
  athletes in in America. I've sat there and watched you
• 58:56
  and Jim Frantz talk. Your friends, people admire you.
• 59:01
  The industry looks up to you. How do you deal with that?
• 59:06
  I mean, I know that you know that you.
• 59:09
  You hold the key. How do you deal with that?
• 59:13
  It is it? Is it a burden or do you like
• 59:15
  it? I don't feel it.
• 59:18
  I really, Yeah, I don't feel that way.
• 59:21
  I feel like that every day. I got to get up and earn
• 59:27
  respect. Every day I got to get up and
• 59:29
  earn my place in the sport. And I, you know, I don't take it
• 59:38
  for granted. I don't.
• 59:39
  I don't just assume that I'm going to always have a spot at
• 59:47
  the table, you know. And so I, you know, I love
• 59:54
  broadcasting. I love doing that.
• 59:57
  I hope to be doing it for a long time and but I don't.
• 1:00:01
  I don't. I don't just assume, man, I'm
• 1:00:03
  going to be a broadcaster as long as I want.
• 1:00:08
  I. You know I I think you know some
• 1:00:13
  I I have a pretty great relationship with NASCAR.
• 1:00:18
  I think sometimes you'd be surprised at at how how much I
• 1:00:24
  get myself into trouble on my own podcast.
• 1:00:28
  Maybe running my mouth a little bit too much.
• 1:00:32
  You know, I get this happens, this has happened.
• 1:00:37
  This is exactly how it goes. Every single time something
• 1:00:41
  happens in NASCAR, I get mad about it.
• 1:00:45
  I go on my podcast or over to a buddy or whatever, right, And
• 1:00:50
  go, that's BS. Why'd they do that?
• 1:00:53
  That shouldn't have done that. Why that?
• 1:00:54
  I don't know why they did it that way.
• 1:00:56
  That had never done it this way. And then if I take a minute and
• 1:01:01
  go talk to Mike Hilton or Steve O'Donnell, they'll go.
• 1:01:07
  Let me explain to you why we did it that way.
• 1:01:10
  And then by the end of conversation, you're going, oh,
• 1:01:13
  man, that makes total sense. Like, I get it.
• 1:01:16
  And so a lot of times I don't really, you know, a lot of times
• 1:01:22
  I get myself in a little bit of trouble.
• 1:01:24
  And so that makes me feel like I've always got to be earning
• 1:01:28
  back, you know, my space, my place, my role, my job, whatever
• 1:01:32
  it is in this whole thing. And I always want to be involved
• 1:01:39
  in the sport one way or another. I want to matter.
• 1:01:41
  I want to be an asset to it. I want it, you know, I want to
• 1:01:46
  make a difference. I want to add to it and raise it
• 1:01:50
  up. And but sometimes my actions
• 1:01:56
  would say different, right? Sometimes my actions would tell
• 1:01:59
  you that I'm pushing back against it and it's a it's
• 1:02:04
  something I got to personally work on.
• 1:02:05
  You know, you get. I I truly believe, man, that
• 1:02:10
  like my role in life outside of, you know, being a being a dad
• 1:02:17
  and a husband and all those things and running, running
• 1:02:19
  junior Motorsports. I'm sitting in Kelly's office
• 1:02:21
  right now doing this interview. My outside of just the things
• 1:02:25
  that you see, my role is to make NASCAR better every day.
• 1:02:32
  Absolutely. Now, do I live that way?
• 1:02:36
  No, not every day. I get it wrong every once in a
• 1:02:39
  while. But that's truly what I want to
• 1:02:42
  do. Like where my heart is right and
• 1:02:45
  but sometimes I get it, I get it wrong.
• 1:02:48
  And you know but trying to wake up every day and and wanting to
• 1:02:53
  be an asset to something. I don't ever think you wake up
• 1:02:58
  feeling like I'm the center of this universe or I'm you.
• 1:03:02
  You don't wake up like understanding your importance.
• 1:03:07
  You just wake up every day going, man I want a matter.
• 1:03:09
  I got to do something today to make a difference.
• 1:03:11
  I got to do something today that you know what Mike Hilton or
• 1:03:16
  Steven On will go, man. That's I'm glad he's on our
• 1:03:19
  side, you know. Or I'm glad he's in this
• 1:03:23
  business. He's helped us today you know.
• 1:03:26
  And it's it's it's hard to move that.
• 1:03:28
  It's hard to make that difference sometimes, and
• 1:03:31
  sometimes you get it wrong and sometimes you sometimes you
• 1:03:37
  hopefully get it right. I I find this amazing how humble
• 1:03:42
  you are. You know, a year ago I commented
• 1:03:47
  on why Carl Edwards left, and a little birdie told me you might
• 1:03:55
  have. That one was a little rough.
• 1:03:59
  It was. It was my take.
• 1:04:02
  I didn't mean anything mean by it, but I can.
• 1:04:05
  I just want to let you know, I relate, you know that that was
• 1:04:10
  on the Kenny Wallace show. It's exactly that kind of thing.
• 1:04:12
  You know you'll you'll, you know, we do these shows.
• 1:04:16
  We work to provide content for people and give people
• 1:04:20
  entertainment or a unique point of view.
• 1:04:22
  And sometimes you know you say things without thinking about
• 1:04:27
  how it might affect the other person, right, or the other
• 1:04:30
  side. And so sometimes I'll get
• 1:04:32
  critical NASCAR and I think well they ought to be used to that,
• 1:04:36
  right. They ought to be used to people
• 1:04:38
  being critical about them. And they, you know, I, I look
• 1:04:41
  you know it content is content. It's all good, right?
• 1:04:46
  We're all talking about the sport whether we're talking or
• 1:04:49
  really like something that happened or don't like something
• 1:04:51
  that happened. But sometimes, sometimes.
• 1:04:55
  But you can take it a little too far.
• 1:04:58
  Answer that. Let's see who it is.
• 1:04:59
  No, it's Kelly's. But not.
• 1:05:01
  Yeah, but we don't think too. Far, yeah.
• 1:05:07
  OK, so dirty MO, yeah. I'm I am your biggest fan.
• 1:05:15
  This is must watch podcast. I absolutely am addicted to it.
• 1:05:21
  Your team. Does the most fantastic job.
• 1:05:24
  They figured it out. The shorts that you put on
• 1:05:27
  Twitter or podcast. I have our local dirt racers.
• 1:05:31
  They dirt racers who hate NASCAR because they're jealous of it.
• 1:05:37
  They listen to you. I listen to you.
• 1:05:40
  So what I want to know is I find you sometimes to be a little
• 1:05:46
  shy. Where did this Dirty MO media?
• 1:05:52
  And I never saw this coming. How did this start?
• 1:05:57
  Mike Davis is. Mike Davis was my PR guy that
• 1:06:04
  Bud had hired to to manage. You know, my role is the
• 1:06:10
  Budweiser race car driver in the Cup Series and so.
• 1:06:13
  But you know, Mike Davis and I were at the racetrack together
• 1:06:18
  every day and then I hired him to be kind of a brand manager
• 1:06:24
  for me. I really didn't even know what a
• 1:06:25
  brand meant, right? But he, he come on board to sort
• 1:06:31
  of manage my brand, which meant basically everything under the
• 1:06:35
  umbrella that I had connections to.
• 1:06:39
  He was going to manage those partnerships and try to keep
• 1:06:42
  building our brand, growing our recognition and and and value.
• 1:06:47
  And so he came to me one day and he said, man, we need to get
• 1:06:49
  into podcasting. And I was like, I've never
• 1:06:51
  listened to a podcast in my life, right?
• 1:06:54
  I don't plan on it. I don't.
• 1:06:55
  I'm not going to be a podcaster, I'm not going to listen to
• 1:06:57
  podcast. I listen.
• 1:06:58
  You're busy racing, baby. Yeah, I listen to the radio and
• 1:07:01
  I listen to music and I watch TV, Yeah, you know, So he's
• 1:07:06
  like, trust me, podcasts are going to get popular.
• 1:07:09
  You're going to want to be in this space.
• 1:07:11
  And he told me how it was going to work.
• 1:07:13
  And all I really had to do was record into my phone, just sort
• 1:07:17
  of a brief some synopsis of my race day every Sunday.
• 1:07:20
  And then I'd mail it to him. Him and another couple people
• 1:07:24
  hosted the show forever. And it grew and grew.
• 1:07:28
  You know, it was very popular with our core hardcore fan,
• 1:07:31
  right? And it was this great, neat
• 1:07:34
  piece of content that only they, you know, could get in this one
• 1:07:37
  space. And the other thing that I loved
• 1:07:39
  about it is, you know you would you get out of a race car and
• 1:07:43
  run your mouth or or you get to the racetrack on Friday and go
• 1:07:48
  in the Media Center and run your mouth and be all smart assy
• 1:07:52
  because race car drivers have massive egos and we're all real
• 1:07:55
  smart, assy people. People know everything we do.
• 1:07:59
  We get into, we go in the Media Center and we tell, I'm going to
• 1:08:01
  tell y'all, what's up, This is what's going on.
• 1:08:03
  This is what I think, this is what this is what's right.
• 1:08:07
  And then they write the story, right.
• 1:08:08
  And then you read the story and you go, damn blew that out of
• 1:08:12
  proportion, you know? And so the podcast is great
• 1:08:16
  because you control the narrative, right?
• 1:08:18
  Your message is your message and you are in control of it.
• 1:08:22
  And whatever you want to put out there, you put in that show,
• 1:08:25
  that podcast. And I started, you know, maybe
• 1:08:28
  dialing it back a little bit on my interviews outside of the
• 1:08:33
  podcast being a little more reserved.
• 1:08:36
  And then when I wanted to say something important that I
• 1:08:39
  thought mattered, I'd I'd go on my show and do it.
• 1:08:41
  And then eventually I went to Mike and I said I think it's
• 1:08:44
  time for me to host or Co host. So we've been doing that a
• 1:08:48
  while. I never thought it would become
• 1:08:51
  what it has become. I never took the interview side
• 1:08:55
  of it that seriously until I became a broadcaster and then I
• 1:08:58
  was starting to use the interviews as practice.
• 1:09:02
  I'd always been interviewed my whole life.
• 1:09:04
  I admired people that gave interviews.
• 1:09:07
  Dan Patrick to me is probably the best that does it and then I
• 1:09:11
  started asking myself why I thought that and why do I think
• 1:09:14
  Dan's so good and what's his technique And then I started
• 1:09:17
  trying to incorporate it. It's not a mistake that our that
• 1:09:21
  our podcast studio kind of looks similar to the man cave at
• 1:09:25
  Dave's place and so or at Dan's place.
• 1:09:29
  So I I've just admired Dan for a long time and and tried to mold
• 1:09:36
  my style of interview a bit like his you're never going to be
• 1:09:39
  that good but he asked short questions and that enforce that
• 1:09:44
  forces the subject to expand, right.
• 1:09:48
  If you put all of the answers in your question, you're going to
• 1:09:51
  get a real short answer. And so you know he just can do
• 1:09:55
  so he can just ask 3 little. He just say 3 words of a
• 1:09:59
  question question for him and get this really great answer.
• 1:10:03
  And so I I don't know why I tried to use the podcast in the
• 1:10:08
  interview as an opportunity to become a better broadcaster and
• 1:10:13
  it's better storyteller and and it's really been fun.
• 1:10:18
  We just announced that Mike stepping away.
• 1:10:21
  The Dirty MO Media business has gotten so big and we got so many
• 1:10:27
  things we want to do that it's taking more and more his time
• 1:10:32
  and he can't put what he needs into the Dale Junior download to
• 1:10:36
  be great as a Co host and he has kind of been wanting to step
• 1:10:40
  away for a while now. And then finally we announced
• 1:10:43
  that on our final show of this season.
• 1:10:45
  So the Dale Junior download will be somewhat similar to what it
• 1:10:48
  is now, but it will be a couple new faces in the room.
• 1:10:53
  When you had me on. You were like my therapist.
• 1:10:59
  You you you were absolutely incredible.
• 1:11:01
  I was shocked how well prepared you were.
• 1:11:05
  You pulled out of me things that I forgot.
• 1:11:08
  You went step by step. I just wanted to comment.
• 1:11:14
  You are there. You are incredibly good.
• 1:11:16
  Well, we got a we got a good team around us.
• 1:11:19
  That helps me with the research, to be honest with you, yeah.
• 1:11:23
  So we all need help. Yeah.
• 1:11:25
  So I've got some good help there.
• 1:11:26
  And the one thing that I will tell you that I was my boss at
• 1:11:31
  NBC, Sam Flood told me. He said you're curious and just
• 1:11:35
  lean into that, lean into being curious and everything you do.
• 1:11:39
  And so when they send me to do the Kentucky Derby, I'm scared
• 1:11:42
  to death I'm gonna do live TV at the Kentucky Derby.
• 1:11:46
  I don't know shit about horse racing.
• 1:11:48
  I don't. I love it.
• 1:11:50
  You know and and so for you know, for a month, you've got to
• 1:11:54
  dive in and become an expert. They don't expect you to get it
• 1:11:57
  perfectly right. And so when you don't know
• 1:11:59
  something, don't be scared of it.
• 1:12:02
  Don't be scared for the audience to find out that you are
• 1:12:06
  clueless. Like lean into it and ask
• 1:12:09
  questions and be curious. Because I'll promise you that
• 1:12:12
  more often than not, the viewer at home or the person that's
• 1:12:15
  listening is also wanting to ask that same question, you know?
• 1:12:20
  And they're also curious, but they're scared to raise their
• 1:12:23
  hand and go, hey, why is they, why do they do it this way?
• 1:12:26
  You know and. How many people don't raise
• 1:12:29
  their hand? No.
• 1:12:30
  And so, you know, lean into it that you don't.
• 1:12:35
  They be honest. You don't know everything.
• 1:12:37
  And we're going to find out what we don't know.
• 1:12:39
  You know, I really enjoy doing that kind of work.
• 1:12:42
  When I go to the racetrack and I'm working on Sunday, though,
• 1:12:45
  I'm supposed to know shit, so I can't lean into my curiosity as
• 1:12:49
  much there. But when I'm doing the podcast,
• 1:12:52
  I'm sitting down with you. I just want to know what your
• 1:12:56
  story is and and so I'm just going to keep digging until I
• 1:13:01
  learned all I want to know and heard all I want to hear.
• 1:13:04
  So dirty MO Media. Has a door bumper clear which is
• 1:13:09
  very popular but I feel like you deserve another trophy somebody
• 1:13:15
  at Dirty MO media and this is what I want to know who who
• 1:13:18
  created actions detrimental. Who chose Denny Hamlin because
• 1:13:24
  it is must listen it it you know for all the the right reasons.
• 1:13:30
  Tell me about actions detrimental specifically, that's
• 1:13:33
  another Mike Davis idea. I'll.
• 1:13:35
  Be down. Yeah.
• 1:13:36
  So Mike's the leader of the whole thing now I you know.
• 1:13:42
  So I come to Mike a couple years ago and we had there was there
• 1:13:55
  was a player at the Panthers for Carolina Panthers football
• 1:13:59
  player that we had worked with a little bit and I was like Mike
• 1:14:04
  we we this guy is pretty sharp we should probably we ought to
• 1:14:09
  do a podcast and he could be the host and we'll have a football
• 1:14:13
  podcast. Dirty MO media can be more than
• 1:14:16
  just racing And so that conversation has sparked you
• 1:14:23
  know this sort of intention going forward to like grow
• 1:14:27
  beyond just my show and door bumper clear we it's been
• 1:14:32
  difficult for us to get outside of our NASCAR world but Mike
• 1:14:37
  wants to have like an SEC college sort of podcast.
• 1:14:42
  He's a massive Alabama fan and we would probably you know learn
• 1:14:49
  a ton doing something sort of outside of our familiar space of
• 1:14:53
  racing. But we have always we've we've
• 1:14:57
  had big conversations with Kabush and other drivers about
• 1:15:03
  doing a podcast with us here at Dirty MO Media.
• 1:15:06
  I talked to Blaney a couple years ago about his podcast and
• 1:15:11
  if he's going to continue to do it, if he would ever move it to
• 1:15:14
  Dirty MO Media. So we've had this interest in
• 1:15:18
  having more drivers doing shows in our building.
• 1:15:22
  We talked to Denny. I did not think Denny was going
• 1:15:25
  to be interested. We went and met with him and his
• 1:15:28
  team. We spelled it out in front of
• 1:15:30
  him and it's like, look, man, this is, you know, this is not a
• 1:15:33
  lucrative thing. You're not going to walk away.
• 1:15:36
  You know, you're rich off of doing podcasts.
• 1:15:40
  That's not what this is about. You do podcasts to control the
• 1:15:45
  narrative, share your message. Anything in the world that you
• 1:15:48
  want to tell people about, you save it for your show and they
• 1:15:51
  get it exclusively right there from you.
• 1:15:54
  And you know you have a race team and all of these assets
• 1:15:59
  that you need to be telling people about and that you want
• 1:16:01
  people to know about. This is a great way for you to
• 1:16:05
  promote what you're doing and what you're involved in, but
• 1:16:07
  it's also a great way for your partners to gain content.
• 1:16:11
  And so if you've got a sponsor on, you know, Tyler Reddick's
• 1:16:15
  car, well now you can sell them not only sponsorship on the side
• 1:16:20
  of that car and and on the side of the holler, but on the
• 1:16:23
  podcast, right. This action is detrimentals.
• 1:16:26
  You know, thousands of people tuning in exactly.
• 1:16:30
  You know they're going to be thousands of people watching
• 1:16:32
  this. And I can, I can, you know, you
• 1:16:34
  can brand my show. We have the Bojangles Studio and
• 1:16:38
  you know Ally and Xfinity and all these brands are now really
• 1:16:42
  involved in Dirty MO Media because they're getting good
• 1:16:45
  return. And so it's it's a business and
• 1:16:51
  we all know that Denny, it's very sharp and so more than
• 1:16:57
  likely you know he takes his actions detrimental and maybe
• 1:17:02
  creates his own sort of podcast media company one day.
• 1:17:07
  But we told him we're like start with us, we've got we've got all
• 1:17:11
  the listeners ready for you. We'll put you right into our
• 1:17:14
  server and right in front of all of our fans that we already have
• 1:17:18
  And then you can learn from this experience and and then take it
• 1:17:21
  and do what you want with it. But it's been a lot of fun and
• 1:17:26
  got a little bit of trouble early on when he admitted
• 1:17:28
  breaking Chastain. I didn't know if we were done
• 1:17:30
  podcasting at that point with Denny Hamlin, but he kept
• 1:17:33
  digging. Best thing that ever happened.
• 1:17:35
  Well, you know, I was, I'll say this man, I was surprised in a
• 1:17:41
  good way that he stuck to it. He stuck to podcasting and
• 1:17:44
  continuing to do his show. And I I'm curious.
• 1:17:49
  He wants to sit down with me down in my studio and go over
• 1:17:53
  what that experience has been like for him.
• 1:17:56
  You know podcasting is you're very vulnerable you you admit to
• 1:18:00
  your own flaws and mistakes and you can't be bullshitting people
• 1:18:04
  on a podcast. You you know, you you know you
• 1:18:06
  know people going to see right through that.
• 1:18:09
  So when you turn that mic on and that camera, you got to tell the
• 1:18:12
  truth and that's been interesting experience for Denny
• 1:18:16
  to have to be that vulnerable and that transparent.
• 1:18:19
  So I'm eager to sit down with him and sometime in the
• 1:18:22
  offseason and and sort of interview him about that first
• 1:18:28
  year experience of his hosting his own show.
• 1:18:31
  Yeah, I, you know, I I admire what you all are doing.
• 1:18:36
  That's why I had to. I agree with you.
• 1:18:39
  I just wanted to say my experiences are the same.
• 1:18:42
  Kenny Wallace show is where I run my mouth and I got to gauge
• 1:18:46
  when I get in trouble or not. Kenny conversation This one
• 1:18:49
  right here. Is where I shut up and listen
• 1:18:52
  coffee with Kenny grew on its own.
• 1:18:56
  I really appreciate you telling me this because there's no doubt
• 1:19:02
  in my mind and I mean there's the great Joe Rogan but buddy in
• 1:19:05
  my mind you know I mean obviously I don't think you're
• 1:19:08
  you're you're far behind. I I like what you're saying
• 1:19:11
  about Mike Davis going as Felix Sabada says.
• 1:19:15
  Sounds to me like Mike Davis is getting ready to make you
• 1:19:18
  worldly. Sounds like you're going to go
• 1:19:21
  into stratosphere and you deserve it.
• 1:19:22
  Junior, you're very good at what you do.
• 1:19:26
  All right, let's turn the corner.
• 1:19:28
  Coming to this is kind of this is rapid fire right here.
• 1:19:35
  Best time in your career, Worst time in your career, Best time
• 1:19:40
  in my career is probably the 2004 season.
• 1:19:44
  We won the Daytona 506 races. It was disappointing because we
• 1:19:50
  didn't. I didn't know what kind of.
• 1:19:55
  I didn't realize that we could have won the championship that
• 1:19:58
  year. You know, no point in that
• 1:20:00
  season did I wake up and go, damn, I got a shot at this and I
• 1:20:04
  regret that. I wish I had seen it because I
• 1:20:07
  remember my dad telling me and I remember reading in an article
• 1:20:12
  or seeing, seeing in a video where he says, Man, there was a
• 1:20:15
  point in that 1980 season where I thought, damn.
• 1:20:18
  I might could win the championship this year.
• 1:20:21
  You know, he's up there leading, leading the points.
• 1:20:23
  And it just dawned on him one day he's like, shit, I could be,
• 1:20:27
  I could actually win this championship.
• 1:20:29
  We might could do this, you know, He thought at some point,
• 1:20:32
  you know, the Allison's and the Petty's and the Walters were
• 1:20:34
  going to just start rattling off finishes and put him in the
• 1:20:37
  distance. But that never really occurred
• 1:20:40
  to me in 2004. So regretfully, I think that was
• 1:20:44
  probably my best shot at the title.
• 1:20:46
  That never happened. The worst times for me were
• 1:20:50
  probably 09 to 2011 or 09 In 2010, Tony Junior and I had a
• 1:20:58
  really good start. In 2008 we both moved to
• 1:21:00
  Hendrick together. I told I talked Tony Junior into
• 1:21:03
  making the move. I said this is going to be great
• 1:21:06
  for both of us. We're going to be well taken
• 1:21:07
  care of here at Hendrick. Rick loves us both.
• 1:21:11
  We got I don't know how far into the 2009 season and things
• 1:21:21
  unraveled. The timeline's a little murky,
• 1:21:24
  but we started off great. We went to our first Test in
• 1:21:28
  Vegas and shocked Jeff Gordon about how on how fast we were
• 1:21:33
  and how well we work together and how just like, man, they're
• 1:21:37
  going to make us better. This is awesome.
• 1:21:39
  We were running really well in the points.
• 1:21:42
  We finally won a race. We had great speed and then it
• 1:21:47
  just stopped. We just stopped performing.
• 1:21:49
  We couldn't get it right. Me and Tony Junior, me and Tony
• 1:21:52
  Junior would argue on the radio like brothers, and that was
• 1:21:55
  normal for us. Kind of like a little bit like
• 1:22:01
  Truex and and Jane and Small, James Small, his crew chief,
• 1:22:05
  they they catch a lot of hell for arguing over the radio, but
• 1:22:08
  they get out and they're like, it ain't no big deal.
• 1:22:09
  But me and Tony Junior, we were brothers.
• 1:22:12
  Yeah, family, yeah, we fall like hell on the radio.
• 1:22:16
  And our team was embarrassed, you know.
• 1:22:19
  Oh my gosh, you hear what they said to each other?
• 1:22:22
  And you did that with the Budweiser car.
• 1:22:24
  Oh yeah. But at Hendrick it was
• 1:22:27
  different. They didn't.
• 1:22:28
  They didn't. They didn't think that was
• 1:22:30
  great, you know, They didn't think it was not good.
• 1:22:33
  It just was a bad look. But me and Tony Junior didn't
• 1:22:36
  realize that we needed to keep her mouth shut.
• 1:22:39
  But anyways, they met, we all sit down and talked and talked
• 1:22:45
  ourselves into making a change and so Tony Junior ends up going
• 1:22:50
  to Junior Motorsports and and then I got teamed up with Mcgrew
• 1:22:58
  and you know, things. We just could never really
• 1:23:02
  figure it out. I struggled pretty badly during
• 1:23:04
  the next couple of years and man, I just was.
• 1:23:06
  I mean, I was as miserable down bottom of the barrel as I could
• 1:23:13
  be. It was very, very, very
• 1:23:16
  challenging. Thank you for telling me that.
• 1:23:19
  So NASCAR today, sorry, I was supposed to be rapid.
• 1:23:25
  No. Rapid fire, that was.
• 1:23:26
  No. Nothing about that was rapid.
• 1:23:28
  It it is rapid fire. I guess what I mean is, you know
• 1:23:32
  that we're coming to the end here.
• 1:23:34
  So no, I love it because everybody wants to know.
• 1:23:38
  Because you know. Everybody feels like Dale Junior
• 1:23:41
  has a charmed life. Everything's perfect.
• 1:23:43
  You need and and this is a, you know, Junior sometimes it's OK
• 1:23:48
  to make people feel that they're normal and this whole Kenny
• 1:23:52
  conversation you have done just that.
• 1:23:55
  You know you have made everybody feel normal and I and I
• 1:23:58
  appreciate that. So you go as long as you want.
• 1:24:01
  So NASCAR today, what do you think about it?
• 1:24:07
  I think NASCAR today is moving in the right direction.
• 1:24:13
  You know, there's some things that I can't explain away that
• 1:24:18
  aren't great. You know, our our TV numbers are
• 1:24:21
  question. You know, the TV numbers confuse
• 1:24:24
  the hell out of me because I had AI had AI was very entertained
• 1:24:28
  in the playoffs. I thought that the championship
• 1:24:30
  race itself was very entertaining, but I don't know
• 1:24:34
  where the numbers are. I don't know why our numbers
• 1:24:37
  aren't better, but all of the big changes, the next Gen. car,
• 1:24:47
  all of the other things that we've done, the racing at the
• 1:24:50
  mile and a halfs is phenomenal. There's there was a very big
• 1:24:58
  concern over the short track package will cause the short
• 1:25:03
  track and road course package because it kind of effects both,
• 1:25:07
  but there's already some sort of light at the end of the tunnel
• 1:25:10
  with that, which I really wasn't expecting at this point in the
• 1:25:14
  year. I thought that the, you know,
• 1:25:15
  any kind of advances or progress made to make the short track
• 1:25:19
  racing better was going to be another 12 months down the road.
• 1:25:22
  Goodyear had a tire at Martinsville that I think helped
• 1:25:27
  us understand a direction to get better.
• 1:25:30
  There's a big test in Phoenix that NASCAR and the drivers are
• 1:25:33
  fired up about. We had one already at Richmond
• 1:25:36
  that did not bear any fruit, but we're going to Phoenix in the
• 1:25:42
  winter to continue to work on the short track package and
• 1:25:48
  there's some real excitement around what NASCAR wants to try.
• 1:25:52
  And for the first time I think they've said that everything is
• 1:25:55
  on the table, even horsepower if I read the quotes correctly from
• 1:25:59
  from O'Donnell. So you know there's a there's a
• 1:26:03
  lot to be excited about and I, you know I feel I feel pretty
• 1:26:12
  good about it. You know there was there's some
• 1:26:14
  stretches and some moments over the last decade or so that I
• 1:26:17
  wasn't so sure about and had big concerns about.
• 1:26:21
  But the the next Gen. cars been been better and I'm happier with
• 1:26:29
  it personally than I thought I would be.
• 1:26:32
  And yeah, I mean I I think the Xfinity Series is great.
• 1:26:40
  There is a big debate internally about what the identity of the
• 1:26:45
  Xfinity Series will be. Where is this series five years
• 1:26:49
  or 10 years from now? Obviously I care deeply about
• 1:26:52
  that because I'm, I'm an owner in the series.
• 1:26:55
  You know what does NASCAR, what did the new TV deals look like?
• 1:26:59
  Who's in the who's involved in those TV deals?
• 1:27:02
  How will that affect our popularity and who can see our
• 1:27:06
  sport? All of those things are, you
• 1:27:10
  know, have everybody a bit on edge over the next probably 20-4
• 1:27:14
  months. But once all of that's in the
• 1:27:17
  rearview mirror, we can sort of focus back on competition and
• 1:27:20
  trying to put on amazing races. The Next Gen.
• 1:27:25
  Car Your opinion on the next Gen. car?
• 1:27:29
  What is it? Well, I like it at the mile and
• 1:27:32
  a half. It's awesome.
• 1:27:33
  I know the drivers complain about dirty air, and dirty air
• 1:27:37
  has been around since the second race car got built.
• 1:27:41
  I I don't know that you can ever fix it entirely.
• 1:27:45
  Sure, it's been worse at times throughout different packages in
• 1:27:49
  NASCAR's history, but when you watch a mile and a half race, I
• 1:27:55
  mean, look at Charlotte. Let's look at the World 600.
• 1:27:58
  Nobody, I mean the the the last decade at Charlotte on the Oval,
• 1:28:05
  it's been a bit of a hard sell, so much so that we built the
• 1:28:09
  Rovel and took away one of the Oval dates.
• 1:28:14
  Good point now in Jeff Glucks, was it a good race pole?
• 1:28:20
  The World 600 was second this year in the last several Oval
• 1:28:24
  races at Charlotte had been probably some of the most
• 1:28:27
  entertaining races of the year, and so the mile and a half
• 1:28:32
  stuff's great. I know the drivers don't love
• 1:28:35
  the new Atlanta because it's just kind of wild and tough, but
• 1:28:39
  I loved that race. I.
• 1:28:40
  Had the show it was I was I don't believe I've I've that's
• 1:28:45
  the most entertained I've been by watching a race in a long
• 1:28:52
  damn time. I was blown away by and how
• 1:28:56
  thrilling all of the action was and that race ended as in a
• 1:29:00
  rain, you know, rain short an event.
• 1:29:04
  But I still thought to me that was the most entertaining
• 1:29:07
  handful of laps I'd ever seen. Yeah, to to your point, to your
• 1:29:14
  point, they're going back at the Brickyard, They're going away
• 1:29:17
  from the road course now, right? It's to your point.
• 1:29:21
  I want to, I do want to say I mentioned it, you know, the
• 1:29:23
  short track package has to get better.
• 1:29:26
  But NASCAR, Goodyear, everybody's at the table.
• 1:29:28
  Everybody wants to make it better and they they're going to
• 1:29:32
  try their hardest and I think they're going to, they're, you
• 1:29:35
  know, they're not going to take the shortcut to try to get
• 1:29:39
  there. They're going to go through this
• 1:29:40
  methodically and try everything to try to get some answers.
• 1:29:45
  And now when they get those answers, we may have to be
• 1:29:49
  patient before all of the teams can get access to this new parts
• 1:29:54
  and pieces, whatever it is that they think they need.
• 1:29:57
  But I'm really happy with what I'm seeing in NASCAR in terms of
• 1:30:02
  how they're trying to move to figure this out, because I want
• 1:30:06
  the short tracks to be just as exciting as the mile and a half
• 1:30:10
  stuff, and that's important to me.
• 1:30:14
  Short track racing is our roots, it's our history.
• 1:30:17
  It's where we came from. It's where all of us learn to
• 1:30:19
  race. Yeah, it's a discipline that we
• 1:30:22
  absolutely have to have. Last but not least, your opinion
• 1:30:27
  on the fines, tech inspection, how we're going about governing
• 1:30:31
  the sport right now. I'm pretty good with it.
• 1:30:34
  I always said that I want NASCAR to be strict and I want
• 1:30:41
  penalties to be severe. You know, right up your alley,
• 1:30:45
  Yeah. Look, when I get caught or
• 1:30:49
  busted or in trouble, man, it sucks.
• 1:30:52
  And I and I don't love, I don't love that experience.
• 1:30:56
  But in my mind, I think that in racing, whether it's a a cheated
• 1:31:05
  up part on a race car or a behavioral issue in the pits or
• 1:31:09
  or a driver behind the wheel with a behavioral issue, you got
• 1:31:13
  to nip it in the bud. Let's not, we're not going to
• 1:31:16
  tiptoe up onto this. I want a deterrent right then
• 1:31:19
  and there that that driver will never want to experience again.
• 1:31:23
  Right. And so, you know, I, I think
• 1:31:27
  that NASCAR's, you know, made a, you know, they made a stand on
• 1:31:32
  messing with this car. They're not going to you know
• 1:31:37
  it's not going to be fun if you get busted fooling around with
• 1:31:39
  these parts. They made that clear and I'm I'm
• 1:31:43
  I think that you know for the most part we won't have much to
• 1:31:46
  worry about in terms of teams trying to cheat or do something
• 1:31:50
  with these these race cars. The behavioral issues is you
• 1:31:55
  know like the intentional wrecking and so forth.
• 1:32:01
  It's a it's a judgement call it's not as it's not as clear
• 1:32:07
  right or wrong right. NASCAR has to decide was their
• 1:32:10
  intent. Do they want to assume or guess?
• 1:32:14
  You know they won't. They won't Black Flag a driver
• 1:32:16
  for shell spinning unless he admits it.
• 1:32:20
  Even though you know you're watching that and you're like
• 1:32:22
  that dude did that on purpose, you know they're not going to go
• 1:32:25
  there and make an assumption unless they've got hard facts
• 1:32:28
  and evidence, right? Yes.
• 1:32:29
  Denny Hamlin admits it. Right.
• 1:32:31
  So that's that's where it gets tough for me because I'll see
• 1:32:36
  something that I know was intentional and NASCAR sometimes
• 1:32:40
  doesn't act without real evidence And so it gets a little
• 1:32:44
  frustrating sometimes. But you know other times, you
• 1:32:48
  know they don't always have to have that admission of guilt but
• 1:32:54
  you know that that the the behavioral issues.
• 1:32:57
  Sometimes I feel like you know certain drivers would have been
• 1:33:03
  able to learn quicker what not to do if NASCAR were a little
• 1:33:08
  more harsh in some of those decisions.
• 1:33:12
  There's sometimes when a driver's wrecked another driver
• 1:33:14
  on purpose and nothing got nothing was nothing was done
• 1:33:18
  right. It was just kind of it looked a
• 1:33:21
  little suspect. We're not sure if it was on
• 1:33:23
  purpose. And so they they don't do
• 1:33:25
  anything. That driver really just gets
• 1:33:27
  away with it and thinks that he can do that again next time he
• 1:33:30
  wants to. Yeah, well, Dale Junior, you are
• 1:33:34
  by far the biggest voice. Most respected voice in our
• 1:33:38
  sport. I want to thank you so much for
• 1:33:41
  coming on Kenny conversation. And remember everyone, we are in
• 1:33:44
  podcast form. You can listen to Dale Junior on
• 1:33:48
  your way to work on the way back home, iTunes and Spotify and
• 1:33:52
  Dale Junior, I owe you. I got to give you this, you
• 1:33:56
  know, I got to give you the Ric Flair trophy for picking Blaney
• 1:33:58
  to win the championship. And thank you so much.
• 1:34:02
  Well, there's a couple things. I love you to death.
• 1:34:06
  I appreciate your friendship. We've been friends for a long
• 1:34:09
  time and I it means the world to me.
• 1:34:13
  And you're one of my favorite people.
• 1:34:17
  I love what you do. I love what you're doing with
• 1:34:20
  all of your content that you're creating.
• 1:34:24
  You, you know, you you put yourself out there and it's fun
• 1:34:28
  to watch People care about you. People want to know what you
• 1:34:31
  think. And lastly, I'm tired of, I'm
• 1:34:38
  tired of looking at that race shop that you're in all the
• 1:34:40
  time. I I want to go and be there.
• 1:34:42
  I want to come sit down with you and drink some beer.
• 1:34:45
  It's been a long time since you and me sat down and had a cold
• 1:34:48
  beer in a can and I I think every time I see you in that
• 1:34:53
  shop shooting on them videos, I wish I was there.
• 1:34:58
  Please come. You're welcome anytime.
• 1:35:00
  I know I am, but damn, we got to make it happen and stop dragging
• 1:35:04
  our feet. OK, so here's my dream, by the
• 1:35:07
  way. The show is supposed to be over.
• 1:35:09
  Here's my, here's my dream. You, you come in, we don't
• 1:35:13
  really disguise you, but you, you ride shotgun in my pickup
• 1:35:17
  truck. And we, we run Saturday night at
• 1:35:20
  I-55, people. And then we come back home and
• 1:35:23
  it's hot. We got the swimming pool, the
• 1:35:25
  hot tub. You know, bring Amy to whatever
• 1:35:28
  and and we have a good time. I'm doing it.
• 1:35:30
  We're going to make it happen this year.
• 1:35:32
  We're not going to. We're done fooling around and
• 1:35:34
  talking about it. We're going to do it.
• 1:35:35
  Kenny Schrader and Ray Mahler will love that.
• 1:35:38
  I I love you too. And thank you so much, Junior.
• 1:35:40
  All right, buddy.