Actions Detrimental with Denny Hamlin - Extending an Olive Branch to Kyle Larson

Episode Date: July 31, 2023

Denny talks about partying with Dale Jr in his younger days. Xfinity has a new contract with The CW. SVG intends to join NASCAR full-time. Sam Mayer gets his first win. Fans boo Denny at his home track. Denny disagrees with Dale Jr on how to fix Richmond. What happened at the end with the re-start. Kyle Larson gives Denny a love tap. Will Chase Elliott point his way into the playoffs. Plus, #DearDenny Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

It's his birthday today, by the way. Who's? Kyle's. Happy birthday, Kyle. I got him something. Delivered it to him before media. It was more of an olive branch. The following is a production of Dirty Mo Media.

Hey guys, welcome to Action's Detrimental, Richmond Edition, hometown edition, my favorite fans edition. I'm Denny Hamlin, drive the number 11, Mavis, Tires, and Breaks, Toyota for this past weekend. and my co-host is Jared Allen, Purple Vest Guy 560. Jared D. Allen. Jared D. Allen. If you're looking them up on social. Yeah, you couldn't find me this weekend. No, I found you.

You were outside of my bus signing autographs on your hero cards. You couldn't find me on the internet. Can you explain that to me? Ronnie, your good buddy, high school buddy, Ronnie. He needed a hero card for his Dennyham. He said, hey, man, come on. Can you sign me a couple of them cards right there? He sent me a picture here.

I'll show you. Live on the air. Ronnie Hickson. Who did he have? You were writing a letter to someone on these things. Okay. First, here's Ronnie's. Wow, what a shrine.

You've seen this, right? Give me this thing. Give it to me. Now here, here, just to your camera, they'll do the best they can to zoom in. No, you got to zoom way in. And bring your camera out. Look at the camera.

Right here. Right here's your camera. Okay. This is my buddy, Ronnie. You can't see it. Now your hands are in the way. It's just a, it's just a, help me on this.

Travis is going to help us out. Get a little zoom in here. Ronnie is, uh, was my best friend in high school. Well, you could put it on the, I'll send you the picture.

That was terrible. It was, I saw it was blurred. It was, we'll add it in. I'll send him back. But Ronnie was a high school friend. He's still a great friend of mine.

He's my best friend of high school. Man, the guy loves hunting. It's not really a fishing guy. But he, uh, he loves to knock down. down some buck and had dough every now and then i give him shit about that um but yeah and uh and drinking

beer i think it's funny the the correct me from wrong the story when you moved to charlotte you moved to charlotte with austin and scotty yeah and ronnie couldn't ronnie couldn't make it right ronnie's like i can't leave chesterfield he couldn't do it no and i think at the time i'm trying to think about the timing. I think that's right around when his girlfriend at the time got pregnant with twins. Okay. So it wasn't just I don't want the city life. I like Chesterfield too much. Well, he's, you know him. Right. He ain't moving down to the city. Exactly. So, yeah. So, yeah, I was down here for a couple years and then, you know, I had a breakup. And then at the time, Austin and Scotty were living in

in Chesville, Virginia and I said, hey, y'all come on down and move down with me. And then we ended up having parties every Tuesday night at the house. So it was crazy times in my life between 2000, I don't know, probably 2007 or 8 to 2012. Late nights, late nights.

Because before I started doing that, I used to go over Dale Jr.'s house. you know it's people know about the western town that the late nights we used to have there and you know back then i mean martin trex would be an all-nighter guy i mean he goes till the sun comes up people uh you didn't realize the the wild side that martin treuix had sounds like it it was fun it was fun i mean i was just coming down here so i was kind of starstruck with all the you know guys you know race car drivers that would hang out at dale juniors for so many nights and then it's like i don't want to start my own thing up here

instead of traveling 40 miles up to nowhere, Mooresville. How the times changed from those days to now you win your 50th race and you play pickleball until 3 a.m. It's just so different from what it used to be. And a lot of it is because the hangovers are just so much worse than what they used to be. I mean, I don't have time to be out for a day where it used to be. I can just get myself to my body to 12 o'clock and then boom, I was ready to move on to the next day. So things have changed.

Getting old sucks. I used to hear people say it all the time. I didn't believe them. But it's true. Xfinney series has a new home on the CW exclusive deal coming in 2025. We'll run until 2031, getting $115 million per year. Like I said, exclusive rights to the CW. Yeah.

You know, immediately when we saw it, us car owners, cup car owners are like, all right, let's start doing math. Let's try to figure out what's in this deal, what's not in this deal. How does it relate to the current deal? And, you know, from the information I gathered from the sources I have is like it's, it's, what it was was 75 million, um, is. And then you go from 115. What's not included, though, in that 115 is NASCAR is going to produce, um, the Xfinity series. So likely, uh, they'll be producing it out of Charlotte, wherever the race is, right? So they won't be traveling a whole lot of people. And NASCAR will then charge back whatever the production costs is to them to produce this to CW. So, you know, NASCAR built, you know, a $30 million production facility right there next to the R&D Center in Concord for these reasons. You know, you have this.

You have a potential Amazon coming on. And Amazon doesn't, well, I guess they do produce some things, but they'll likely lean on NASCAR to produce that. series. So, you know, they're setting themselves up to be the kind of all-inclusive, hey, you want to bid on our sport. We can help produce it for you. You don't have to put that cost in. So I guess the only thing to discuss really is, well, what is that production cost? What does NASCAR then charge back for that production costs? And that's really what your gain will be as far as the financial benefit for the Xfinity series. So, you know, a spoke to Dale Jr. a little bit about it, and he definitely sees the positives in it for sure.

I mean, you're going to have one home for the Xfinity series. I do think that's a good thing. I do. You do lose some efficiencies on the TV side, simply because, as you notice, a lot of, you know, when NBC or Fox has one of the races, they also do the Xfinity series. So because the announcers are already there, the production team's already there. and with NASCAR doing it, if you have your incumbents, Fox and NBC return in 2025, they'll just be doing Xenity series, or they'll be just be doing Cups Series. So I guess I'm thinking out a lot here,

some questions that I might have would be, man, we've just lost a lot of content that we, you know, the Xfinity series gets about $340, 50,000 people watching qualifying. That's more than most sticking ball sports get for a game. That's pretty good. And then they get, you know, the million or so for the race. So I know that TV partners want more content, more content, more content.

So if you peel off the Xfinity series and saying, all right, it's going to CW. Now what you've just taken away a lot of content that's in that package that we're selling. Right. A deal with NBC or Fox in the past has included the Cup Series and the X-Finney Series. Yes. So, you know, if you're looking for a raise from those guys, you've just lost some content. But I don't know. We don't know because, I mean, listen, I wish we knew.

I think we should know. I think that obviously we've said for a long time that the teams probably should be in some of these meetings because we control the content and we can provide more access and rights that NASCAR doesn't own. but it's um they haven't seem as interested in in collecting those rights and normally they'll just go to a deal and then hand it to us and say well here's the deal so that's what we've kind of been you know fighting over for the last couple years or a year or so with this is like you know how can we get more involved in it to understand it and so um i don't know you never know what nasker's cooking up and you know what they've got playing long term i think that they're still

very optimistic about where they stand on the media rights deal for the Cup series and obviously helping change the business model for the Cup teams because that is an absolute necessary thing. With the Xfinia series currently on NBC and then Fox early in the year, how many of those viewers, the 300,000 you said watch practice, the million you get for the race, how many of those viewers do you think are accidentally stumbling upon the Xfini series? Because what I think is good about this, at least in my perspective, every Friday night I know where I'm going to be able to find the truck race. I can go on my computer, Fox Sports Go, truck race is going to be streaming online, don't need a TV, I pull it up. Saturday and Sunday, not necessarily the case. I'm wondering where is the

cup race, what channels cup race on this weekend, where's Xfinney race? Now you know Xfinney race is on CW Saturday every week, practice qualifying. There's value to it. There's no question. There's value to it. The only difference, right, is that the folks that watch cup qualifying, what leads, what happens right after cup qualifying? You've got the Xfinity race. Now you've got to tune out of that to go to CW. So and will NBC be or Fox, depending on what season we're in with the Cup series, will they be promoting that the Xfinity race is on another network? Good question. Don't know. You would think so. I mean, the more NASCAR or motorsports fans that you can gather,

I mean, I see them cross-promoting a lot, actually, even different major network. So I think that it is an important thing to help the overall sport grow. And if the overall sport grows, then each incumbent will get more advertising revenue because more people are tuning in. So, yeah, still a lot of details that need to come. out of it for us to really kind of understand

what this means for us as cup owners but I think that the certainly the Xfinity series needed some help as well. I think you can talk to Dale Jr. and those guys

like if you look at the Xfinity series it's tough. I mean go walk around the garage. There's like you know 10 kind of good funded car and then there's everyone else. And everyone else is, you know,

teams struggling to get to the racetrack and struggling to put together a formidable car to run. So it's very, very tough on these guys and hopefully they, you know, get to see some of this benefit going forward. Would you say this is a good number, money-wise, for the Xenny series?

I see a lot of people trying to compare it to, like, well, this is about, what they get for F1. F1 has half the races, so it's very, very different. I'm sure there's going to be someone that breaks it down based off of per race. I saw a couple of guys online trying to break it down how much it is per race. What's the actual bump in revenue for the Xfinity series? But again, we don't know the details of how much NASCAR is going to charge for the production

of it. That could eat into whatever that gap between 75 million and 150 million. 15 million is. How much of that it eats into, we don't know. Got it. Well, next year in, or I guess this is 2025. In 2024, we could have another star coming to the next Finney Series and Shane Van Ginsberg announcing that he will be moving to NASCAR next season. Yeah, I mean, the rumor's been swirling about this quite a bit. I'm excited because I think that he's a great talent. Man, I don't, has he ever, I guess my question,

has he ever run an oval? Do we know? Has he ever run an oval? Travis, he's quickly grabbed his phone to check it, to see. I feel like that would be something that be noted in a bullet point on all these articles announcing that he's coming to race, and it has not been. It's exciting because he went out, he won his very first race. and like it's like holy cow this is amazing right i guess i i need to know more about i need to find

out more about them for sure like what makes him a great race car driver in those supercars he's obviously a great race car driver period because he came over here and won in nascar in his first start but it's like i know everyone as a race car driver has their identity right for a long time it was ditty but short tracks and then it kind of moved to super speedways and you know Everyone just kind of has somewhat of an identity of what they're really specialized at or what they're, you know, AJ Elm Digger. He's a road course guy, right? What about Shane is great? Is he a exceptional street racer?

He has some dirt racing, Oval's experience. Spring cars. Oh, awesome. I mean, I'm guessing he's won quite a bit. He's going to be proponent for Bristol dirt to stay then, I guess. no doubt don't do that NASCAR please don't do it um but okay so he's got some oval asphalt oval dirt ovals very very different but i guess maybe a team what they say is that man if he can go out and he can win he can get us in the playoffs this is my ticket to the

playoffs is to go hire this guy um i think we'll know more after the indie road course race because, you know, I think that we've all got experience at that road course race now. As Chicago, it's really hard for me to explain, but he was so much faster than the field in the tight street area. Right there kind of on, is that Michigan that we were on? That Michigan Avenue, he was so fast in that section. He was very good everywhere else, but he was exceptional. in the what you'll call it yeah over the bridge yeah the half circle yes yeah there and then just kind of in that slow section and uh turn 11 he was very very fast but that's what the supercars they're

so used to on racing on a street having these walls right next to us you know we're in cup we're we can't see and whatnot and it's just we're not used to it so i think we'll know a lot more about what is this guy's ceiling when we get to the Indy Roadcourse? Because you're going then to attract where all the cup drivers, we've got some experience. We're not going to be as far off. We're going to be more comfortable with what we've got. And so does he have that advantage over the field at Indy Roadcourse?

I don't think so. I don't think so. That doesn't mean he won't contend for a win and be up front. It just won't be as easy as what it was. certainly at Chicago. Yeah, he'll also be introduced to the bumper car aspect of racing. Oh, man. Yeah.

Yeah, welcome to turn one on a restart at Indy. It's going to be different for sure. But, I mean, the guy drove on the wrong side of the car in one side. I just, I keep going back to that. That is an accomplishment. I just, I can't fathom. What does your phone say about what he's going? at.

Let me get back to you. While you're looking that up. But I'm on chat, GPT. And I'm going to AI, what makes Shane van Gisnenberg, Gensenberg, a great race car driver. Because usually it'll pop up, you know, it searches all this stuff. It's going to tell. Gisbergen.

Gisbergen. It's going to tell us what the, internet thinks why is he great at what he does what is his specialty so let me get back to you on that where are you going to say Travis uh he has won one one of the sprint car races his first time he finished 14th so it seems like it's limited um and he even admitted that half the races that he does over there are the street courses to the denny's point about race in chicago okay so i'm in perfect time for him to get into the cup series if more street courses are on the horizon Okay.

So AI says he is a highly talented race car driver known for several qualities that contribute to his greatness. He possesses exceptional driving skills, a deep understanding of racecraft, and the ability to adapt quickly to different track conditions. Additionally, his determination, focus, and consistent performance on the racetrack have earned him numerous victories and accolades. However, for the most up-to-date information, Check again, new sort of, both of a lot. Man, that sounds like a resume. Yeah. Well, does the ability to adapt to different track conditions include track shape?

Because if that's the case, he sounds like he's a slam dunk. Slam dunk. Again, we're going to know more after Indy Brok Horse. Sorry, so tune back in for that. But I think it's awesome to have someone who is at the highest level in Australia in the supercars wanting to come to NASCAR. He obviously had a great experience. he liked what we're doing he likes to projectile that the projectile though what am i looking at

the uh projection or whatever trajectory trajectory that's what i'm looking for of our series and so he's willing to leave what he's comfortable with to come over here and challenge himself that's awesome while your phone is open can you search your name see what it says about you sure dag on it Um, what else? Oh, so let's talk about the, the lower series and Xfinity series and truck series, right? So look that up and then save it and then we'll get to it in a second when we move on to the couple of us. All right. Xfinity series really, I mean, they were in Rhode America this weekend, um, but really I feel like the, the key point we need to talk about is the final app of this race because my goodness. If you haven't seen it, go look it up on YouTube. Just fantastic. The epitome of an Xfinity series finish. It was. It was. It was, it was entertaining. I loved it. They, they, they, they weren't green a lot. There was a lot of cautions late. And man, there was, there was one time I thought that, I remember, I came in after qualifying and I'm like, I'm going to wait till the end of this stage to shower and take my suit off and get situated.

and it had to be an hour and a half late. There was like three laps to go in the stage. And there had to be an hour and a half later before the next stage started. So it was just like so long. It was so long. But it all didn't matter because we had a fantastic finish

with Justin Algeyer, Sam Mayer, and Sage Karam. And I was watching, and the whole time I'm watching Sage because I'm like, man, he is just, I've heard how aggressive, of he is from competitors that race against him whatnot but i'm like i kept watching them thinking all right he's going to make a bonehead move i know it that it's coming and he never did he just he just

drove so well in that same hunt car the sam hunt cars were really good what why do you give me the well he said he never made a bonehead move but i'm watching him mow the grass here on the last lap i'm saying he didn't take anyone out he didn't take anyone out no right than himself i i i get it but I mean, it's easy to get excited in those moments. People, you don't know, like, when you have your chance to win your very first race and it's on a road court, this isn't an oval. Like, you know, the line isn't really defined that well.

So it's easy to get excited, and it appeared, whoever was leading that race was very excited into whatever corner they were driving into because they overshot it every time. And, but yeah, it was just an Algeyer, unfortunately for him. he dominated the race and then just slipped up and made a mistake. And then here comes mayor and sage. And he just then overdrove, I don't know, one of those corners.

One of the last ones. Yeah. But in the end, we had Sam Mayer, who had this on their bingo card, not many people winning his very first race in Rhode America on a road course. So I think he did a phenomenal job. I'm liking what I'm seeing from Sam. as far as his trajectory, he's trending well.

He is. I mean, at the very beginning, it would have been very easy to write Sam off saying, he just wrecks too much, and he's, you know, he doesn't have the speed of his teammates, and it's just whatever.

You could make that argument, but sometimes I think we forget how young these guys are. I mean, they're really, really young. And so now we're starting to see him turn the corner, and come into his own, and it's not just about to win this weekend. He's steadily gotten better throughout his career at junior motor sports.

So I think that he's someone that probably, as long as he doesn't leave, I think in two years he could be a championship favorite in the Xfinity Series. So I like it. I like where he's at. He's doing a good job. and I think the composure he showed at the end of that race while Sage and Justin were running off the track and everything, he was doing a really good job. Yeah, for what it's worth, he passed Parker Klingerman coming to the white in that last corner. I don't know what number that is at Road America.

Yeah, we saw Parker, I thought he was in control because I was in the bus. I was kind of shouting through this whole last sequence and whatnot, and I'm like, I'm rooting for Parker. I'm a big Parker fan. and so I'm rooting for him and I see that coming in the last corner he missed it but there was you see rooster tails of

stay dry coming out of the back of his car and it's like man I guess he just hit the stay dry it's just wrong and he lost it but yeah it was it was exciting you had a lot of first time winners potentially and that and Justin Algae are all in that final

couple laps of a battle it was awesome to see it was really fun as a fan to watch that. Yeah. To Sam Mous credit, what I was getting to is he had to drive a perfect final lap to win his first race. So as you said, guys get excited in that situation. He didn't overshoot anything and he won the race.

Yeah. Definitely want to talk about the truck race as well. Ty Majeski, you know, so in my bus, I've got the TV, I got my couch TV, and I got a large scoring monitor that helps me watch lap times as I'm watching the race to understand, hey, if I see someone running a certain line, I'll look over and see, oh, they're making some speed there. So I'm watching him, and it's been a very long time since I've seen a vehicle that dominant over the field.

It's been, I can't remember the last time that one was four tenths, maybe a half a second faster than the field in the long run faster but even in traffic he was dramatically faster than the field and so it was they he tried to throw it away with a speeding penalty you know what i would say to tie majesky is what in the world are you doing speeding you could come out fifth you're still going to win the race like don't you have to be situational aware of what what you got what's going to keep me from winning on this day. And so he tried to give it away with the speeding penalty. And then he comes back through the field and I'm watching the time from like,

this is just cake. He is going to come through this field so quickly and he starts catching. Then they have the sequence for green flag pit stops. I guess my question would be to the team, what are you doing? I guess I know that you're counting. on what he's so good in the long run, so we're going to go long, or not pit,

but he's so much faster than the field. He's only a couple seconds behind Carson Hosevar when they start these sequences as a race team. How can we lose it? We can lose it on strategy. We can lose it by making mistakes. They did both and they lost.

And so that's a hard one to swallow. I know it is for that team, especially you just don't. don't come across races like that where you're that dominant. But man, they had to just stay on sequence with the 42 because they were light years faster than them. It didn't matter that they were going to come out a couple of seconds behind.

He would have caught that in five laps. So they just mismanaged that race. I know it's easy to say on Monday because he lost, but when you have a, you only, you have to just think about what will take us out and they managed to do the two things that would take them out of winning the race, which was a bummer for Ty.

I'm very high on Ty Majesky. I think that he knows about his car. He kind of wrote, I don't know Ryan Newman a ton, but they said he was very in tune with his race car, what it needed. I know Ty works at the race shop, building shocks for all the trucks at Thorosport, and he's a really good race car driver. He's an awesome short track racer. as good, if not better than Josh Berry.

I think that those two put themselves in a very upper echelon of short track racers. But ties, man, he's really good. I'd love to see him get a shot at the next level in the Xfinity series. Speaking of him and Carson Hosephar, how do you view the up-and-coming talent in the Xfinney series in the truck series? Is it equal? Is one series have more the other? Trucks are better.

I mean, the competition level is better in trucks. There's no question. There's more, there's more better trucks in the truck series. Xfinity, I don't know. It's, I don't know if it's the model or what,

but it, you know, if you look at the starting grid from 12 years ago, you had 25 really good cars and you had eight, nine cup drivers in it, and it was a battle.

It was something to be seen. I mean, there might be eight cars that can win in Xfinity series. maybe there's eight cars, eight cars and or drivers that can win. I just think the truck series has more good trucks with more young, up-and-coming talent in it.

So I think it's harder to win in trucks than it is in Xfinity. So do those guys? Do those guys then run in truck and then look for a riding cup or are you still think you have to go through it? No, I think you still go through the process. I don't know that Xfinity series now benefits you a ton in cup because they do drive so differently. uh more than likely uh the trucks drive more similar to the next gen than what exfinity does so

but it's you know i don't think i don't think any cup owner is going to trust just someone running in the truck series i just i just don't so i mean carson hosovar i think he's he's getting better trajectory is good on him as well um great win for him he's he's he's he's he's he's he's he's he's you know, obviously went through a real rough patch there. I know he's a guest on DBC, if you all want to tune in after you listen to us. If you know anything about DBC, you know how those guys feel about Carson O'SVar.

Is this the first time he's on it? I would think so. It is. Yeah. So that'll be exciting to hear that because I know Brett, you know, he gave Carson so much shit for so long. So it's cool that, you know, Carson's going to go there and hopefully stick out for himself

and, you know, pop the old trophy. you right there in front of those guys and say, what's up now. He's got two now. Yeah, I mean, he's doing well. Even when he ran in the cup car, I mean, you could argue he outran Corey in his own, you know, when Corey ran the nine car. So

he was doing a really good job and I think that he's another guy that you know, we're probably going to see in the Xfinity series soon. There is. There's just a lot of young talent in the truck series that I like that there really is. So Corey Heim, man,

he's, these kids are young. They are young. They're half my age. It's so sad to say they're half my age. So they've got so much learning to do, yet has got so much talent for their age that, you know,

I think the future is bright as far as what's going to be coming in in the Cup series over the next five to ten years. Unlock your phone. What did chat GPT have to say about you? Okay. The answer is quite a bit longer. Danny Hamlin is an unliked race. It gave five.

points. There's five points here. It says number one, consistency. I'm not, I can't, I can't say this about myself. All right,

then throw your front of here. Number two, racing intelligence. There'd be some fans that would argue that. Natural talent is number three. Number four is experience. Number five,

teamwork. He's also formed partnerships with his team and crew creating positive, efficient working environment. Yeah, I like that. Please note, it says at the very bottom, that racing is a dynamic sport

and the new developments might have occurred beyond our last update. Yeah, they don't have my last few minutes. This is as of September 2021. A lot has changed since then. Like what? You're getting booed at your home track now.

Buddy, as you can see, my care level is so low on that. Just keep making noise. Please. When they call my name, don't just sit there. Don't clap. I either want a loud shout.

Yes. Yay. Or give me all you got in the booze. Like, I want noise. I want volume. I want to know, because you obviously know, know that's coming, right? Whether it's

a, like you said, a cheer or a boo. When you're in the tunnel, like this past weekend at Richmond, like you came out on your... It's the only... I gave him the model wave. Yeah, that's the only intro that was tweeted out on...

Well, NBC. Yeah. I love NBC, but man, they feed drama. They're, like, that's their... They feed into the drama way more than Fox does. They play into the rivalries way more than Fox does, which, I mean, they're trying to get, you know, people interested, right?

Right. But you also had the president of Richmond saying, you know, in our driver's meeting that, like, last week was great. Like our phones, as soon as it happened, ticket sales instantly went up. Yes, you want drama. But I want to know is when you're in the tunnel, are you thinking about what you're going to do when you go out there? Like, are you thinking about a plan on how you're going to react? to play it up a little more. Not really.

I mean, I just, I mean, you don't want to come out of the tunnel with your head hung high. You know, you don't want to give the 11s to the people. You just want to smile and wave.

Smile and wave. Let them know. I hear you. But here I am, and there you are. I don't know. What else do you do? I don't know.

You can do whatever you want. I'm just wondering if you're thinking about that before. You're formulating a plan in your mind. Let me just say this, though. I was very pleasantly surprised. You were around me all weekend. We typically hear, you know, people chirp once I go past them or when my backs to them. It's less in my face.

Right. But I thought this weekend the fans were pretty good and pretty respectful. And I saw a ton of 11 gear out there. I mean, I still am confident we have more fans than we've ever. had. But it's people passionate about racing. And I get it. I understand.

And I think that typically the further away from you that they are, the more disrespectful that they become. It's just, I mean, that's why Twitter is such a tough place because they're so far distance from you that, you know, they think that, you know, you're the only one that sees what they what they say yeah i personally got a i get a kick out of it regardless um because i think like you said any noise is is good noise um but right before the anthem you're standing at your car and there's fans on the other side of the wall obviously and right before the anthem everything gets quiet and this guy's been shouting danny danny he wants to get my attention right and as soon as

it goes quiet he goes danny i know you can fucking hear me i could and i could and i i We didn't acknowledge him. I saw him earlier. Sorry, Molly's sitting in the corner. Sorry, Molly. I didn't see him, but I saw him earlier. So I knew who the person, I didn't know him. Yeah.

Right. He wanted me to see him giving me the 11s. Yeah. Right. And it took every power in my being not to turn around and act like I was going to give them the 11s and then give him the old, the old crying face. Yeah. Like, I wanted to so bad.

But I'm like, don't do it. Don't do it. Just don't, just ignore. You don't have any nice things to say. So I just ignored him. But yes, fella who was screaming, we did hear you. Even got a kick out of Chase L.A. He's in front of me in the driver on the grid.

And you saw him and his team when this guy's yelling, like, checking it up. I was trying to position myself. I was hoping you were going to turn and do something. I was trying to position myself. Okay, I'm going to get him in the camera and this guy in the camera at the same time because that would be my post race. Did you see him? Yeah.

Okay. Did you get any photos of him? I don't think so. And by the way, we don't encourage because I will not engage with that unless you're like, you're fucking awesome. Which is why I played rock paper scissors with that one guy. You saw me on the, you know. There was some guy, a fan, you know, I don't know if it was just me or he was doing it with all the drivers, but he had his handout and he had this. And as we go by, he'd do this. And I'm like, okay, yeah, it's on. So I'll go, you know, one, two, three, and he busts the scissors on my paper and cut me up.

I saw a Twitter comment, which was perfect. He said, ah, would you put paper or you put scissors? I put paper. You're scissors. Yeah. Okay. So he said, oh, obviously Denny went paper. He left rocking Pocono. I'm surprised you didn't see that. You should go back and look for it. Oh, that's good. That's good. I love it.

All right, how about we talk racing in the Cup series? What do you think? Richmond. Okay. Go for it. What are your thoughts? Oh, my thoughts is, dang, what a bummer. Second.

I was very content with second with 15 to go, but I wasn't with three. to go. I thought that the overall weekend was really successful. The 2311 cars were rocket fast. I thought that they made dramatic gains at their prowess at Richmond. They did a really good job of working on their craft and getting better. The RFK's cars were phenomenal.

You cannot give them enough credit for what they accomplish. and both the 6 and the 17 were well in control of that race, but it's so hard in this sport because, you know, you got to have it all put together. And the 17 had no mistakes all day. And really everyone around them, I guess, accept us. We didn't have any mistakes. We just, you know, lost a little track position here and there.

And we just weren't fast enough when we needed to be. We lost it a little bit in the middle stages of the race. But about the time we got it back, it was too late in the day, and then, you know, the race was pretty much over. So they did a phenomenal job. Chris did a great job driving the car, and RFK just was phenomenal. So I just can't give them enough credit. I know what it takes to, you know, build a team.

And, you know, yes, that team has been established for a while, but, you know, to take it from the struggling years that they had to, you know, making a race-winning organization now a couple years in a row is phenomenal. Steve Newmark, the RFK group, the Fenway group, Brad, everyone who's a part of it is, you know, certainly put a lot of work in to get it to this point. In a year where, you know, their performance has dramatically taken a step forward when you would argue the manufacturer or the car, the people that drive for that manufacturer has taken a step back. So they're exceeding expectations and outkicking their coverage certainly at this point.

As an owner, I'm curious, what does it say about RFK that it seems like they are the most in sync team on the grid? Like wherever one runs the other. Yeah. When the six is good, the 17 is good. When the 17 is good, the 6 is good. You don't necessarily see that with other teams. Yeah, it's the more cars you have, the harder it is to lump them all together. I mean, on the flip side, you had Hendrick last, you know, yesterday who was, they were, I think

Cliff Daniels even said on the radio, it was like, yeah, we're all the same, we're all equally sucky. Like, you know, we're all just, you know, sometimes you see that, and then sometimes you see one break away from the other. I think the Gibbs cars, eh, they didn't show what I thought they would yesterday. Now, Turex was on a completely different strategy than everyone else, all the other Gibbs cars yesterday. But, I mean, I never saw C. Bell.

Did he have any issues? Not that we can... Not really, right? And Ty, I mean, Ty was, you know, hanging around at the back end of the top 10. So he's running where he should, for sure. But I just, usually that's like a Gibbs or Hendrick track. And it, it wasn't. It was really a 2311 and RFK track yesterday.

C-Bell did have a speeding penalty. Ah, that'll do it. That'll do it. You just cannot speed under green. The penalties are just too huge to do it. It's too hard to pass. Not speeding, but your driver, Tyler Redick, missed the commitment cone under green. Hand-in-face emoji.

I just, geez, just they really struggle to finish, you know, kind of like what they're capable of. Now, again, they did it at Pocono, but the mistakes, man. The mistakes is just killing the 23 and 45. And I saw the 23 had a long pit stop. I mean, you can overcome that. It was under Green as well. But he lost a few positions, but then just kind of started bleeding some spots late in the day.

But it looked like they maybe lost the handle of their car as well, which we did in the middle. But then towards the end, we got our handle back where it needed to be. So it's hard. Bell started at the rear at the final stage. Okay, so it was under caution. Yeah. Why was he two laps down? Just ran bad?

I don't know. You go laps down when you're... I know they struggled in practice, but yeah, I mean, very uncharacteristic, I think, of the Gibbs cars in general. Of, you know, it wasn't a Gibbs and Hendrick Day, for sure. So I think that, I mean, RFK and 24. Point 311 showed the way for the most part of the race, and I think the fastest car won. I mean, that's just, it's hard to dispute it.

What change between spring and now? Because like you said, not only were the Gibbs and Hendrik cars not the class of the field today, like they were in the spring. Hendrik Carr won the race in the spring. But also looking at Jeff Gluck's was a good race pole, this race is hovering around 50-50, whereas the spring race was 80-20. I don't know. Like what changes other than the weather?

Yeah, nothing. Nothing really changed. I think it's just the flow of the race. Do we have cautions? And how does the finish? I mean, you know, the race could have gone completely green and then, you know, maybe it's 45% or something. But I think it's just sometimes it's the flow of the race.

And sometimes in that type of racing, you're going to have cars that hit the setup. up and I'll say this too. Here's what I think about it is that in the second race, the field gets closer together. I think in the first race of the season, at any given track, the field is more spread. There's got to be some sort of scientific proof on this, that in the second race, when people make adjustments, the fast guys don't get faster the second time around. They typically maintain maybe get a scosh better.

but the tail end of the field, who is way off and left field the first time around, gets better. They learn. And then when they come back, they go like this. They tighten it up. Well, what happens when the field tightens up? There ain't much passing because everyone starts to run equal. So I think that that probably played a factor.

I would argue to say probably that there was less green flag passes. Mike Ford, NASCAR. Let's give us some stats on that. There had to be less green flag. flight passes than what we've had in the spring. But it's because everyone's the same. I mean, it was so hard to pass lap cars. Cars that you started with, and they were three quarters of a mile behind you,

you now get behind them, and all of a sudden you lose two, three-tenths of speed. Like, it was so hard to pass. And there's just not a whole lot of explanation of why. I think we know why, but who knows, right? I mean, they're working on this new short track package. I'll stay optimistic until it proves otherwise, but we got some work to do. I think that, you know, it's hard to put this one on good year. The tire fall off was around a second and a half by the end of the race.

So it's tough. It's just these cars don't have much downforce, and when you put it behind another car, it just, it loses so much grip. With what you just said about teams getting better and more equal on the second time around to a track, makes me think that it would be a good experiment next year or whatever year to go to one race at tracks like Richmond, where you're not seeing a great fan turnout, where you're not seeing great racing time after time. It seems like that's worked at some tracks.

Mm-hmm. Yeah, I mean, there's data to be had. Where's Jeff Gluck's poll on races, you know, on number two races? Now, some of them, rich, you know, like Martinsville 2 usually is far and above. Yeah, because of the circumstances. Because of the circumstances. The stakes and people are more aggressive for whatever reason. Daytona 2, Daytona 500, people are riding in a line for most of the day.

Daytona 2. You've got 20 guys that this is their last shot, right? It's way different. It's way different. So maybe you can't use the data to, you have to individualize it. But it's certainly tracks like this, the field gets closer together because it's just, that's just the way it works. So last year, Richmond 1 was 63%. Richmond 2 was 70.

Martinsville 1 was 18. That was bad. Martinsville 2 was 78. Darlington 2 was a 93. You know, the wall ride. And Darlington 1 was 86. The thing is, though, all those tracks you just mentioned, other than Richmond, are good tracks. Racing at Darlington is consistently good.

The second race at Martinsville is consistently good for obvious reasons. I don't know. Certainly I'm, I'll die on the post that the field gets tighter, passing gets more difficult. So it's just, I mean, there was many times that I, because of the strategy the 11 car had of us staying out a little bit longer, I would gain two, three-tenths on the cars in front of me. But as soon as I get to them, it's like a roadblock. I just, you can't get around them.

You can't buzz through them like you used to. So it's just so different. And, you know, I don't necessarily know what the exact answer is. I mean, if you look at the platform of the race cars, we got our noses up because we've got to feed the back of the diffuser to make down for us, which that makes them plow in traffic. I don't know. I want to read Brad Kazowski's post-race comments real quick

because I thought they were interesting. I want to get your take on them. He said, from the driver perspective, when we dropped the green at the start stage two, I was just digging. I'm in the background going, oh, God, don't let this go long green flag run because I knew I burnt the rear tires off the car. by nature, a couple paragraphs down now,

by nature, that means just have races with long runs because everyone will sell out for the short runs, then the racing gets dramatically worse. When everybody in the field can sell out for short runs,

you never see any passing, comers and goers, start the air pressures high, do all these different things, have the cars sideways loose. To me, that is the worst racing you're ever going to see. So he's actually saying

these long green flag runs yesterday, from a driver's perspective, was good for racing. Yeah. And I said in my media after the race that like if you're racing purist, you like this type of racing because there's strategy. And this Richmond is the closest to an F1 race you'll possibly find.

Just because strategy is such a big part of it. Now, our racing is way more competitive than F1, even when it is strung out. But it's that type of race where you're going to have to really enjoy the strategy to enjoy the race. if you're looking for side by side, beating and bang, it's just, that's not the track. It just isn't because,

you know, we are fighting different things that you don't see inside the race car. So I think NBC does a really good job of kind of, they painted the picture of the strategy, what's going on,

who's going long, who's going short, this person should come to this. They could probably do some more projections of here's where we think this person will come out because they went long

or because they went, sell the strategy. Yeah, you pretty much got to really sell it. But it's super difficult to do. I get it. And I also agree, Brad said too, that, you know, you got to have tracks like this on our schedule because this is a different type of technique.

Sometimes you need to be good on road courses. Sometimes you need to be good on super speedways. But this type of racing is a different discipline. And if you want to truly crown your champion or show who the best drivers, stock car drivers in the world are, you've got to put them on different type of disciplines. And sometimes this type of racing,

you'll see drivers that are super fast, you know, not excel at this type of racing because it's a different type of discipline for sure. Not to go down this rabbit hole, but you did respond to Dale Jr. on Twitter. He said the top groove looks like it needs some resin. Oh, God. You said, isn't that just a Band-Aid?

It is, and now, you know, what happened was we would all be running in a train up against the wall and nobody would see us all day. Like, that's, it's not it. I know what we're, what he's trying to say, and we're trying to replicate the days of the sealer, but we don't have the same cars as what we had when sealer was around. And what I'm trying to say is that when they paved Richmond, Man, this was before my day. This was early 2000s, or maybe it was late 90s. They then put sealer on it afterwards.

And so there was a lot of grip in the sealer. So as the cars ran one line, they wore the sealer off. Then they kept moving up the racetrack to chase more sealer. It was almost like resin. But again, the cars are different. The drivers are smarter. There's no refuting that. more data. We're not smarter naturally because we were born that way. We're smarter because

we have more information and data that help us be faster and smarter. So what will we do if you put up one lane to resin around the racetrack? We're going to run in that one lane around in a train. And it's just, it wouldn't, it would not, I just don't think it would work. Again, I think you're going to have to appreciate this type of racing to really appreciate it. or you're going to just say this is ridiculous and I hate it, which I understand both arguments, but in my opinion, I agree with Brad. You've got to,

if you want to challenge us in many disciplines, this is just a different discipline you've got to be better at. Let's take a look at the final restart. You start on the outside of Chris Bisher. Do you think you had a shot at it? I did. I thought I had a great shot at it, but then I spun my tires.

TV didn't show it really great, but the top lane is so hard to restart, and typically on low group racetracks too you have the the outside guy is trying to react to the first car like I can't go before him I can't roll up on him you know at a higher speed so don't spin him

so I have to react to him and I'm trying to look at him to see any kind of lunge that I can to go but again he knows how much throttle he's going to carry on that restart me I'm guessing so when I start to see him go my immediate reaction is, okay, I've got to go. And what do you do is you spin them because you don't want to get left behind.

Well, then I buzzed them, and then Kyle kind of straightened me out on the restart and was pushing me down the front straightway. I'm like, oh, this is what I need. And I start two lengths behind Busher entering turn one. And I got such a great run through one and two that I almost got to his outside. And then in three and four, I start and I start to get to his outside. and I'm like, oh, he's running me up. Let me just try to go higher yet off of turn four.

I should have just cut it low because at the time, I didn't realize he was only going up the racetrack because his car wasn't turning very good at all. So when I rewatch it, I'm like, dang it. If I had to do it all over again, I would have just entering turn three, I would have cut low on him because my car was turning great on that restart. His wasn't.

And so I would have cut low on him there got positioned on the inside of one or two he would have held me super low and we likely would have had contact but again i'm on the bottom his car's tight he really can't control it in the middle of the corner like he needs to i would have gone low but i didn't i'm only using the information that i've got at hand and that is get to his outside get to his outside because then i have the ability to hold him down and keep him from getting through the center of the corner how do you feel about the comments of don't let denny get inside of you he'll do the same thing he did to our time last week well i mean i got ran up i got ran up so what were we talking about here i

it's listen i again i would have done the best i could have and absolutely on a short track if i would have got on the inside of him sure coming off the last corner i probably would have ran them up a little bit he he would do that to me and there's no question he tried to to get us up in the middle of three and four. So I don't, that's short track racing and you just got to accept it and it's, and it's all good for the win. I don't have any issues with how he, how he executed those final restarts. I did a terrible job.

He did a great job and won the race. Kyle coming through you there, midway through the race also short track racing. I got no issue with it whatsoever. Everyone just needs to move on. And if he does nothing, his team probably gives him a bunch of, right? It was the one opportunity where he was faster than us that day because he had on new tires. And so I kind of, they told me that the five's on new tires, he's 10 back, five back. And at that time, I'm trying to battle the 41 for second.

I think it was second. And so when I'm side by side with him or real close to him, maybe it was 41, maybe it was someone else. But I'm side by side. And Kyle's not going to let me hold him up. So he's like, here, get you out of the way real quick. It's just, it's convenient. It's a convenient way to, like, show your displeasure, but keep going about your day.

It's his birthday today, by the way. Who's? Kyle's. Happy birthday, Kyle. How old is he? 31. What did you get him? Jared?

What did you get your best friend for his birthday? I'm going to give him the other half of that t-shirt, I think. I got him something. No, I don't know. I got him something. I got him a pair of shoes for. from the Grove from this past week. And I got him the new Grove Jordan Ballmarker.

And I delivered it to him before media this week. Yep. That was very nice. I didn't realize it was a birthday present. It was more of an olive branch of sorry and, you know, here you go. And because usually when I go to the Grove, you know, which is, you know, those who don't know, that's Jordan's golf course. scenes in Florida.

Like there's exclusive apparel there that you can't get anywhere else. It might be shoes, golf shoes, might be shirts, whatever. And usually I get a request from the buddies to pick up a few things from there. So I didn't take, they didn't ask for me to get them something, but I just thought I'd be a very kind of you. Be a friend and get them some stuff. Very kind to help out your buddies like that. Thanks.

To wrap up this Richmond conversation. We might not have too much moving on the track, but we did have some movement in the standings. Bubba on the playoff cut line now plus 54 after yesterday. Michael McDow plus 18. He's in 16th. Ty Gibbs in 17th minus 18, followed by AJ Almondinger minus 22,

Suarez minus 34, and Chase Elliott now minus 40. Okay. Let me update this. My Swarez picked to make the final, the playoffs, that's dead. it's a dead bet

I just that they're heading in the wrong direction I haven't really seen the speed out of the track house cars that we saw earlier in the year but breaking news Chase Elliott is going to make it and he's going to make it on points stop shaking your head

he's going to make it on points you want to know how I know yes please okay enlighten us someone tell me where Bubba Wallace was four weeks ago how many races we got left He was around the cut line. You're not listening to me. How many races are left?

Four. Four. Okay. Show me the points from four weeks ago. Bubba Wallace was like zero to the cut line. Now he's plus 54. And where has his finish has been? Low teens during that four week stretch.

Now he's gotten some stage points. But the low teens. Low teens as in around the top time. So he went from about the cut line, zero. and just call it zero. I think he was plus minus three, whatever, to now plus 54. Chase L.A. is minus 40,

minus 40 with four races ago. You're telling me he can't make up 40 points and four races? He's racing that guy that you're talking about who's had a couple of good weeks. He's racing that guy and Michael McDowell for that cut line, though.

He's not racing... Two of them are in. Not one. I understand, but Chase has to... The 17, 18 and 19 guy does not really matter for Chase. He's racing the cut line, right? So he's racing McDowell and Bubba.

So you're saying that Chase Elliott can't make up 40 points on McDowell in the next four races. I'm not saying he can't. But McDow's three strongest tracks, or you know, two road courses and a super speedway are coming up in this final race. Breaking news, Chase Elliott's good on fucking road courses. What are you talking

about? He's going to point them and he's going to get in on points. pending, pending, there's not a crazy new winner at Daytona. You're adding asterisk in here. I think we need a friendly wager between you two. Roll the tape and I guarantee over previous episodes that says he's going to point in

as long as we don't have a new winner. I could be wrong, but I don't think so. He's going to get in. Bobba Wallace, Chase Elliott are your two final guys. Look, I hope for content sake he does Because I think it would be hilarious How much should he make up on the cut line this week? 15.

Yeah, roughly. And where to finish? Not that great. Like, he's going to finish better at road courses. I know Michael McDowell will too. I get it. But results show that Chase Elliott should run better than McDowell at road courses

because he has. Now, maybe not over there. Yeah, he is. His results are great there. He's going to get more stage points. By the way, we don't have to do these strategies anymore to avoid stage points because we don't have cautions. The whole kink would have been if road course races had yellows at stages, then you start to see madness. Because some people like Chase Elliott, or I don't know, maybe it might be Gibbs or Almondinger or whatever, they might say, all right,

screw it. I'm not going to make it on points. I'm going for the race when. They're going to put themselves in front to try to win the race. Now again, this is the cause and effect of changing how we do things. We have no stage breaks at the end of stage. We're just going to award points

based off of how you're running. Chase Elliott will be ahead of McDow just he should be. Now Gibbs is making up ground and he continues to make up ground. I just think that the nine team finds something these last. I mean, listen, all the

hinder cars are right next to each other this week, but the, but the best one was the nine car. I think that they are going to shift their focus to the 48 and the nine, and the nine gets in. He's getting in on points. And you're going to be wrong, and I'm going to be right, because I'm always right. Look, in a way, I hope you are right for content sick because I think it would be hilarious to go out here and go get a siren somewhere and get a video of you ringing a siren when Chase makes the playoffs. If Chase makes the playoffs, you get me a siren. I will wind the siren out of that thing. Done deal. Okay?

100%. You had to hook it up to a car battery, though. Whatever you want. All right. I'll do whatever. Also looking at this cutoff line, he's clearly not in your playoff picture. so I guess it really doesn't matter, but AJ Almondinger skip practice and qualifying at Richmond

to go run the ex-fini race on Road America. I don't get it. It doesn't make sense to me. There's got to be other factors that it doesn't make sense. And there's no, to me, and this is my opinion, because I have a podcast and it's my job to analyze this, it makes no fucking sense to me why you would give up practice and qualifying

at Richmond to go run a meaningless Xfinity race. And there's no excuse in my mind why that Xfinity series means anything to you over what a cup playoff birth means to your company. I don't get it unless there's sponsor reasons, whatever. I can't get behind it because I guess I tried to before, you know, I knew I was going to have to comment on this. so I tried to get as much information from comments made by AJ and the team or whatever and AJ said last week that you know again he's he's saying it in the moment he's getting

interviewed but hey we haven't really been that good at Richmond anyway I'm like well you got a practice session you got a chance to get better why aren't you there for that and I don't think this this is not an AJ decision this is management's decision I can't It doesn't make any sense to me Cup is what we're all here for It's the highest Motorsports in America

And you're willing to start in the back And not get practice When you're five races away from a cut Doesn't make sense It doesn't make sense And you're giving up potential stage points You never know let's just say he qualifies

21st, 25th. You then give yourself an opportunity to do a different type of strategy such as a true X and get stage points. Starting in the back, you got no shot at that because you're so far back, you won't give yourself a chance to get stage points.

And every point for AJ Omdinger is going to mean something. I just, I can't make sense of it in my head, head and we can talk about we want to go trophy hunting who gives a about Xfinity trophy I mean I guess they do but it's just it's really tough and it's hard to really come down and say you know who am I because I'm not running their race team and I don't know all the factors involved and I think that the most likely scenario is there's other factors that is not being talked about that made sense within their company and not sense

to the rest of us. I think the important question now is to ask you is what does it mean to make the Cup Series playoffs? Because you said earlier in the show that Shane Van Gensenberg, I think, is going to have all these offers because he's good at road courses and he can put a team into the playoffs.

So, I mean, what does it mean to make the Cup Series playoffs? Financially, it means a lot. You know, the charters get paid based off of where you are on a three-year running average of your points position. So, like the 11th team, like they are, I think we're the number one ranked charter, maybe the 19, we're really, really close.

Either than the 19 or the 11 or the, been the number one ranked charter for years now because of the three-year running average. I mean, the years we keep making the final four over and over and over, like it's just, and that ranks you, and then basically NASCAR pays your charters based off of where you are and where's your average point position over the last three years.

They weigh their current year 70% or the previous year 70% or then it's like 20 and 10 or something like that. But it all matters. So I don't know where that 16 team charter is ranked, but it, you need to dig, we need to dig into that. But I would say if you can get yourself in the playoffs, you know you're not going to be worse than 16th in points as an owner that year. So is there a major financial difference between 16 and 17?

Is it major? No, I don't think it's major, but it's significant. It's significant. Is there significant sponsor? You're in the playoffs. It gives you a chance. It gives you a chance. Somehow you win that race, then you move on.

I'm not disagree. Guess what? There's road courses in the playoffs. So he could get an opportunity to, bam, go to. next round. AJ could have got lucky with qualifying this week and got the good group and maybe you know, somehow got into. That's a good point too. That's a good point too. There's just a lot of factors. And again, unless there's more information, that's that's where you got to keep going. Unless there's more information we don't know about, this didn't make any sense to me. Spot off. And others.

Spot off. It's not just me. Others said, you know, same thing. But again, there's not there's more others. I hear you. We've got some questions that we want to ask. Dear Denny. We need answers and we need them fast. We tried to ask Junior, but his answers were lame. And with DBC, it was more of the same. Now we're caught on you because you're our own hope.

This ain't the race track, so maybe you won't choke. Dear Denny. Dear Denny, which generation cup car did you enjoy the most? That's a tough Can you list them first of all? Four, five, six, seven next day. I'm just curious which ones you've... Yes.

Yes. I can't list them, no. How many generations have I driven? Didn't you start with four? Might have been four. Five. Five was car tomorrow? Six and then seven.

Okay, yep. I started with four. Generation 4 was a really good car. It wasn't as safe as the car tomorrow. I understand the changes in why they made the changes to the car tomorrow that they did. My favorite car to drive, though, would probably be Gen 6. I think Gen 6 encapsulate, it really had a lot of good things going, and we didn't know how good we had it. We thought we were talking about Arrow back then.

Now is way harder to pass than what it used to be. Now, the mile and a halfs have gained, but I would argue the Gen 6 550 package on mile and a half was as good a racing as you will ever see in NASCAR. The finishes were fantastic. The restarts were fantastic. We had 750 horsepower on short tracks. You had to really wheel it on short tracks. Yeah, I would definitely say that Gen 6 was really good. Now, yeah, Gen 6 was really good.

That's all I really got to say about that. What are the physical demands in a car at 135 degrees, and is there anything you could compare it to for us everyday people? I can't, other than maybe sitting in a sauna. I mean, you could sit in a sauna, but how long are you going to be able to stay in 135 degrees in asana? Well, I think you're missing a key point, right? You're 135 degrees and pissed off in a sauna.

right it's not just chilling in a sauna yeah that's true i don't know i think a lot of it is you just adapt your body adapts to it uh i you know i don't get bothered as much by heat as as some do but i think it's because after 20 years i just have gotten so used to it uh but but yeah i think um it certainly is a factor especially when you have long green flag runs like we had I expected to see more drivers falling out of the seat. And there's a lot that goes into falling out of seat. You make more mistakes. You get dehydrated.

So much of your body is made up of water that you dehydrate yourself just a little bit. Your brain doesn't function quite as good. Your muscles aren't working quite as good. So there's a lot of factors other than just heat that we have to fight week and week out. And I didn't get bothered by it by too much. It was 134 in the car. Trust me, you really feel it during cautions more than anything. Under the green, our adrenaline is pumping so much.

We don't really. I don't let it bother me one bit. I don't run cool shirts that often. I did this weekend because the temperature was over 90. That's kind of our rule of thumb on the 11. If it's over 90, we'll run it, but otherwise we won't. Do you think you can catch Truex for the regular season championship? Boy, I sure wish I had my 25 points fast.

that NASCAR took earlier in the year? How far are we back? 39. 39. God dang it. Yes, is a short answer. We can catch them,

but I sure rather be 14 points behind. Well, you are in the understandings. This was part of my inside conversation to NASCAR when I'm arguing with them behind the scenes about this penalty. I'm like, you know, these points don't matter until they do. Like, I get it. It's just 25 points. to you now.

But like, seriously, this is, don't, don't do this and it end up being the difference in, you know, five extra playoff points because that might matter as well. You don't, you don't need the points until you do. And so, um, we're battling back. Truex went on a big run there and, and gaped us quite a bit. We're 39. Byron's four minus 43. He certainly wishes he had his, was it 60, 60 back.

but what was 100 before. Bell 91, he ain't getting there. Bush, 96, no, Harvick 110, no. So it's probably a three-horse race between Truex, myself and Byron for the regular season. There's road courses coming up. I think Truex is probably a little better road course racer than what I am, although I'm working on it.

I think I can maintain. and then Michigan, I'd give us maybe an upper hand there, and then Daytona. I feel like I need to be within 20 when we get to Daytona to give him a run for it. Yeah, that would be something if you somehow finish like 10 behind him and miss the Recon Csons Championship. Come on, man.

Don't do that to me. Don't do it. It won't be me. It'll be Twitter. Okay. As you said, Michigan next week, It's the only final thing on this rundown. Yeah, you know, I'm excited for Michigan.

Chris Gabehart has been telling me for weeks. Like, I'm going to finally get a Michigan win with you. Like, we've been the fastest car or one of the most dominant cars over the last handful of years, really since I've had Chris Gabehart as my crew chief. Here you go, Danny. The last 11 races, you've had eight top tens and four top fives. Yeah, we've been better than that, though.

And you won. Zoom in on the last five. Well, last year. you won second stage second and stage one first and stage two and you finished third so you're right there the entire race bad pit stop I remember

bad pit stop lost track position game over yeah yeah so we were very strong last year so I like our chances we typically anytime we are good we can tweak a little bit and make it a little better but the competition

you know coming back with the next gen car they're the back of the field's going to get closer. So I think that we better be on our game, but I like our chances. It historically has been a really good track for me and Chris. That's it. That's all I got. All right. Well, let's get out of this heat, man. It's been so hot in the U.S. Southeast. It's been miserable. We're going to go up to the Irish hills and hopefully cool off this weekend. We had a fan leave, a new fan leave a review this week. New one. Awesome. You got that on here, Travis. I looked right over it. And this is a good one.

too. This is from 5 o'clock somewhere and they say Denny wasn't my favorite driver before but he is now. I love hearing the thought from a driver week to week Jared does a good job too. It kind of encapsulates our podcast

right? Yeah. And Jared with Jared. Yeah, I appreciate the review. We definitely, we do read your reviews because they read them to me But also, I did check. I have a little portal where I kind of keep track of where our podcast is at and how it's doing.

It's doing very well. So thank all of you for tuning in each and every week. And, you know, any other questions you want us to answer? Just, you know, give us a review and let us know what you think, how we can improve. You have to leave a five-star review if they want us to answer any questions. Yeah, leave a five-star, but then you can leave constructive criticism after that? Yeah. You good with that, Travis?

Yep. Or they can leave a dear to any question in the five-star review, anything. Okay, perfect. We'll do that and we'll continue reading your reviews and reading your Dear Denny questions. And we'll try to get those answers for you. So appreciate y'all tuning in. We'll see you next week. Check out Dirty Mo Media on Twitter, Facebook, TikTok, and Instagram.