Kevin Harvick's Happy Hour presented by NASCAR on FOX - Las Vegas Playoff Recap: Denny Hamlin Advances to Championship 4, Byron and Blaney Struggle, NASCAR 750 HP News

Episode Date: October 14, 2025

It was a monumental weekend in Las Vegas! Kevin Harvick, Kaitlyn Vincie, and Mamba Smith recap Denny Hamlin’s emotional victory, which not only secured his spot in the Championship 4, but also marked his 60th career Cup win, tying him with Harvick on the all-time list. The crew breaks down what this win means for Joe Gibbs Racing, and how it shakes up the Round of 8. Then, the team reacts to NASCAR’s massive horsepower announcement, increasing output to 750 horsepower on select tracks next season. Harvick and Kaitlyn share why they’ve been pushing for this change — but explain why they’re skeptical it will make a huge difference right away. Plus, Mamba brings the week’s best social media moments in Social Sips, and in Last Call, the crew grades Hamlin’s burnout and makes their Talladega predictions. LINK TO SUBMIT PICKS FOR TALLADEGA: https://forms.gle/Jw4H6P12RD4Qcjgd9 0:00 - Intro 5:36 - Las Vegas Recap 28:17 - Talladega Preview 35:46 - NASCAR To Boost Horsepower In 2026 43:06 - Mamba’s Social Sips 55:47 - Last Call! 1:00:06 - Submit Picks For Talladega GAMBLING PROBLEM? CALL 1-800-GAMBLER, [phone] or visit gamblinghelplinema.org (MA). Call 877-8-HOPENY/text HOPENY (467369) (NY). Please Gamble Responsibly. 888-789-7777/visit ccpg.org (CT), or visit www.mdgamblinghelp.org (MD). 21+ and present in most states. (18+ DC/KY/NH/WY). Void in ONT. Eligibility restrictions apply. Terms: draftkings.com/sportsbook. On behalf of Boot Hill Casino & Resort (KS). Sponsored by DK. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The thing I love about Denny Hamlin is his willingness to keep learning. Driver of the 11 is very determined right now. Those are the brakes in sports. Sometimes it just isn't meant to be, and that's one of those situations. He said, Kevin Harvick came out to me and said, in your position, you should be the most hated person. Kudos to them for giving the cars more horsepower. I don't think anybody will notice. Welcome to Kevin Harvick's Happy Hour, presented by NASCAR on Fox.

I'm Kevin Harvick. She's Caitlin Vincy. And our one and only mama Smith. Hey, one and only. Welcome back. Already dressed for Phoenix, I see. Listen, got to get there. I had a fan this weekend at the racetrack.

You need to tell Slappy to bring it. You're now being referred to as Slapstick. Slapstick. Slapstick, whatever you want to refer to him as. Yeah, I mean, some of the fans do it in an endearing way, and some of them in other places, not so endearing. So do you get Slappy or Slapstick? Somebody on Twitter called me Slapstick,

and I said, I appreciate you closer, because that means you watch. The only way that you call me. The only way you know is if you listen. So at least it's not slap dick. Yeah, it could be slap dick. That'd be way worse. That would be bad. Baby face slapstick today.

Look at that. Clean shaving. Oh, he's so cute. You can go from looking 42 to 22. Because he was in Mexico. Get up the mamacitas. Was it hot down there? It was.

Or rainy. No, it didn't rain. Really? Did not hit us at all. It didn't rain. No kidding. He got back from a bachelor party in case people aren't falling on. I was at a bachelor party.

That's fun. It's 25 of us. Wow. Did you guys all fly on the same? No, we all got it at different times, but those 25 of us had a great time. I've never been a part of a party like that. So you're in the wedding? No.

No. You were just there for fun. They called me because they know. You're the chief. I'm the chief high officer, so you know you got to call the guy. Okay. It was fun. I had a good time.

Did you drink any beer? Yeah, I did because the way that they pour the liquor there is not great at the, because we had an all-inclusive resort. Okay. So, like, I'm pretty sure they cut the liquor. Did you get the whistle and the head shake and the tequila shot? We went to Cocoa Bongo. It's like this club slash like Vegas type show.

And they're with the whistles and so. A whistle. Dude, I got, they like hit me in the face, throw a shot in my mouth, shake my head and bang it off this girl's chest. And I was like, what is happening? Very aggressive. That's a little much. Yeah, it's a lot.

Yeah. And you didn't want the shot, did you? I didn't want the shot. And it burned the whole way down. I got the shot and it hurt. So did you eat the worm? No, there was no warm in that. Oh.

I wouldn't eat the worm. I got you. Did you ever eat the scorpion? No. Heck no. I love how different our lives are because I was at a pumpkin patch with my kids. Yeah. Kevin was in Vegas, but he was competing.

That's right. He finally beat Keelan. He did. I did. Yeah, Keelan wrecked. Yeah. Yeah, it was a wet, rainy Friday night and Thursday night. It's weird.

Yeah, it was a monsoon, and luckily we got it in about 1.130 in the morning. Really? Oh, wow. It ended. Yeah, it was late. So, killed the crowd. But it was a great event. It had good turnout of cars, and Arka race was good.

So we had good races. But I raced for the lead, and I passed the leader twice. I moved him the first time, first time he got high, got under him, caution came out. The second time I moved him, got by him, caution came out. and third time I didn't get to him. He was a little bit, he won the race, but he was a little bit better than I was. And I knew that I had to get to his back bumper

before he got through turns one and two. Third time I didn't get there. He knew the move. Top five, though. Top five to finish. Should have finished second, but it got a little dicey at the end and wound up third.

That place is cool. And you have quite a bit of racing coming up. I do. Yeah, this weekend we're racing the Cars Tour finale at North Wilkesboro, so we're going to, Keelan and I are going to run the Pro Late Model this weekend. And so that's the last race of the Cars Tour season

out here on the East Coast. And then we go to run the Super Late Model next week at Kern Raceway in Bakersfield, California. And then the finale for the West Pro Late Models is next month, I think it's the 15th, 14th, whatever that weekend is in the Pro Late Model. So three more. Would you ever, would you like to bring the cars tour west to Phoenix?

Because I know when you race late models out there, that was a thing. Yeah. I think the track's a little bit too big for those cars. I just think that the way that it's evolved with the straight frame rails, they used to be perimeter cars. I felt like they could crash a little bit harder. But I just don't think that you want to take them to a track that big. No, the straight rails kind of fold up pretty hard.

Yeah. There's just nothing over there on that right side. Speaking of straight rails, got to give a shout at a time. Ty Majeski, he won the Winchester 400. He did. Yeah. I like when, he's one of those guys that whenever he can, especially with the truck schedule, you have more time.

Flexibility. More flexibility. And I like that he goes and does that. Yeah. Yeah. Good for Ty. Yeah. He's ready for Talladega.

Yeah. Just in a few days. Okay. Welcome in, everybody, to episode 72 here on Happy Hour. Plenty to talk about leaving Las Vegas on the Cup Series side. Talladega is next. We have some good sips. Yeah.

A special guest on the sip. Oh, we got a guest. Yeah. We got a guest. Really. Kind of cool. Yeah. All right.

guys. So this race, the ending had some intrigue with differing strategies, two tires versus four, a lot of aggression out of a certain driver at the end to try and make something happen. And it was Denny Hamlin, win number 66 on the year. What impressed you most about what you saw out of Denny? Well, we asked the question several weeks ago when he had the run in with Ty Gibbs, was that going to be the downfall of Denny Hamlin's championship run? And that is not the case. It has just steamrolled right on. And we saw in qualifying the Gibbs cars were super fast again. And we got to the race. Kind of started and you're like, I don't know.

Chase Briscoe was fast. And by the end of the race, though, and Denny Hamlin, you see the pass for the lead right here on Chase Briscoe, who was on two tires. He got it in the wall a little bit earlier. The 19 did and lost a little bit of pace in his car, but they rolled the dice and wound up with a decent finish for the 19 car. but that 11 was on rails at the end. And driver of the 11 is very determined right now to do all the things that he's doing. A lot of emotion after the race with everything going on in Denny's life. And you saw how important it was to get that 60th win.

His dad's been ill. Got the lawsuit going on. You got all the pressure of the championship. And you could just see all of it just hit him all at once. But those guys are on a mission right now. for sure. He tied you. He did.

He did. And I want to give credit, too, to his crew chief, Chris Gale, because he made a comment after the race saying how he got the car exactly how he needed. And people probably forgot. Like, this came together in December last year. I don't think Denny or Gale knew they were going to be together. It was kind of last minute decision. And Chris Gale has never even advanced out of the first round of the playoffs.

Now he's going to the championship four. Yeah, I mean, Chris Gale has had usually young drivers. Correct. He talked about that a lot at the beginning of the year. And now he's able to flex the muscle and all the knowledge that he's learned with somebody who knows exactly what they need and what they want in their car and maybe are a step even in front. And then Chris can work on something else. Well, Denny's working on this part, right? That combination obviously is working.

Six wins is a huge total. It is. They should be very proud of what they've accomplished this year. Denny hasn't been to the final four in a while. So having a shot at a championship is huge for that group. And I mean, we've said it before. We said it last year. He's a walking Hall of Famer.

Yep. Like, he's going in. The driver that he is is absolutely incredible what he can do with a race car on track and putting people in compromising situations. And even when he was racing with Larson, you can kind of see, like, Kyle was doing a little bit of the same moods, but maybe not as close and still gave him a lane and he took the top. And then once he ran down the 19, it was like, Chase was a sick dog. It was like, okay, just go ahead, bro.

The thing I love about Denny Hamlin at this point in his career is his willingness to keep learning. And you hear him talk about that. And you hear his crew chief talk about that. And when Denny talks about, I'm always learning something. There's nothing more true. And I think that if you're open and willing to be critiqued and learn and listen and take the things and apply the things that work for you, that evolution. I used to always, you guys have heard me say it before, evolve or die, right? And if you don't evolve with the situation, our sport is, it evolves constantly as to what's good,

what's bad, what works, what doesn't work. They change the tires. They change the horsepower. Whatever it is, you have to constantly change what you're doing as to what works and what doesn't work. And I think that his commitment to the simulator and the sim and his team, I think that, you know, Chris Gales had a lot of young guys, but I don't think he's had the experience and the guidance and the leadership that you get from a Denny Hamlin type.

You know, I look at Denny Hamlin and Joey Legano is maybe the only two guys that can do it at the level that they are able to guide their team with what they need in the car and the commitment that it takes. You know, I think Blaney's, you know, committed. I think William Byron is committed. But they haven't seen as much. And you can't make up for that time in the seat with a team, with different teams, different people as to as to the way that things work. So experience and commitment and just being a badass driver is hard to overcome that. And especially right now when those Gibbs cars are as fast as they are. It's definitely a testament to his dedication.

I think they said he spent seven hours in the Sim and had a list of 20 questions for Chris Gale going in about this race in particular. So it paid off. How advantageous too for the team. They're locked in. They have the next couple of weeks to prepare for Phoenix. Well, you look at everything that they did for this race. I can't imagine how much time that they will put in for Phoenix. I don't think that they have the strength in the cars that the Fords and things do for Talladega. I think that's almost a survival race for those guys. I think that the Chevroletes and Fords have better, faster cars for Talladega than what the Toyotas have. But I think when you look at Martinsville, you know, Blaney's going to be good. I think that Denny Hamlin is always really good at Martinsville, and it just seems like that they have more pace at all the places except for Talladega. So it'll be,

it'll be interesting. You know, I think if Bell can get himself into that championship four, you know, I think that those cars have the most speed right now. But the five and the 24 showed up this weekend with speed that we, that we haven't seen out of those cars in a while. Kyle Larson, a bunch of laps, putting himself in contention to win the race there at the end. William Byron obviously had the mistake, but he had speed all day. So I don't know if those guys, it seems like since St. Louis, those guys have found a little something to put themselves back into that speed conversation. I mean, I'll be interested to see how Denny decides to try to control the playoffs now, right?

because he's in the situation to where he can. And like, if there's one guy that you don't want to be able to have all the control, other than Joey Ligon on the 22, is probably the 11. And because he's fast and he knows how to put you in compromising situations. He knows how to help somebody without being a detriment to himself. So how he decides to make moves over the next two weeks will be interesting. I'm really, I'm very happy for him from the standpoint of his dad. Because, you know, like my, he talked about in his,

and post race in the conference room there. He's talking about how his dad sacrificed so much. Oh, yeah. And that's how he was able to get there. And when I think about my parents and what it meant for my dad to be at just one arc of race, let alone having your dad able to watch you go off and be a NASCAR Hall of Famer, like,

it just means a lot. So I'm really happy for that. Because I think people forget, because Denny's been such a huge star in the sport for years of his humble beginnings. And I remember interviewing him at Langley where he started a lot of his career saying how his data to take out all these extra lines

of credit and mortgage and all these different things to help him race. And I'm sure you can relate to what it's like to come up the hard way and really earn it the tough way. I mean, you just, you have so much respect for the achievements that you have. And I think that, you know, there's a lot of things that lined up for the emotion

of what we saw at a Denny Hamlin this week. But I think the passion that he has for the sport, you see it. you know, whether it's the respect that his dad gave and the things that he gave for that situation, or it's the respect for always trying to make the sport better. Sure, he does it in his own unique way. But I think after the race, you really saw all that emotion thanking the fans, not trying to instigate the fans. I mean, there was just a number of things that were very different when we saw, and cheers.

A lot of cheers. A lot of cheers after the race. So, you know, I think that that balance of podcast controversy lawsuits and then you have the other side of the performance on the racetrack. I mean, you can't deny what he does in the race car. And so, you know, I think that was, you know, pretty awesome moment for Denny to get that 60th win to put himself in the playoffs. And, you know, right now he's the guy to beat when you get to Phoenix. Yes, he is. So things came together for Denny. William Byron, I want to go to him next.

Because it was interesting at Kansas, they kind of limped through that race, mile and a half race. But they came to play when it came to Las Vegas. Very good car. Bizarre incident happened to him, though, with Ty Dillon, who was coming to Pit Road, but no one seemed to know this. There was no wave. There was no communication.

How frustrating is this for a driver? See, this is why the one race to the championship thing sucks? Because what if this was Phoenix and you're leading something like this happens to prevent you from having a good result? Well, there's a number of things that could have gone. done a lot better here. You know, when they go back, you know, the 10 car of Ty Dillon never put his hand out the window. Like when I was coming to the pit road, I always would kind of weave my car, put my hand out the window to make sure that the guy behind me knew I was coming. Now, the 10

spotters says that he told the 24 spotter and the 24 driver says the spotter never told him. So there were a number of things that could have gone better right here in this situation. But You know, the line was locked down to the bottom of the racetrack for the most part. And I think from William Byron's standpoint, he looked and saw the 10 car, two car links off the white line, which was pretty normal for pit entrance this weekend. I don't know about a car that's multiple laps down. He was out of the pit cycle of everybody else by 15 or so laps when he was pitting. So I don't think William, William didn't know he was pitting. And he said that.

And he didn't think he was pitting because of where they were at from the cycle thinking it was done. And then all of a sudden, you know, all that just compiled into a bad situation right there in a massive, massive wreck. Yeah, no, that was, that's probably the worst way to lose a race. Yeah. You know what I mean? And like, people are like, well, William could have, why didn't he just move right? Well, like, let me tell you, when the car's all loaded up and you're fully in the throttle, if you go right, there's no bringing it back left before you hit the wall. So, like, there was nothing he could really do.

far into the situation to abort. Yeah, to abort that. I absolutely, I hate that. And, you know, those are the brakes in sports. That's, you can do everything right, and he did, they did everything right, they brought a fast car, they executed well. He was doing what he was supposed to do, good stops.

And sometimes it just isn't meant to be, and that's one of those situations. But because of the situation, they have two more races to make sure they lock in. They're only 15 points out. So they legitimately can point their way in or when they're way in, and they could win either one of this. And I think for me, the thing that really caught my attention when he was

doing his post-race interview or at the medical center was just, I mean, it knocked him to his knees. He was devastated. Yeah, he was devastated. Said it, right? Yeah, he did say it. And it's just that time a year when the implications of something like that happening. And I think he feels like whether he knew or didn't know, it was his responsibility to not hit that car. Yeah. Yeah. And, you know, that's a, That's a tough one to swallow there as you get into that scenario. So they'll rebound and be able to be ready for Talladega. And I think they'll be strong at Talladega. Those are the situations that set someone up to go a minor step back.

And then it really locked somebody in because you're like, I feel like that was taken from us. Yeah. So go take one back. And you heard him talk about it as well in his post-race interview. But, you know, he had just made a mistake, got loose, and lost the lead. So he lost control of the race. So it was two. Back to back.

Two heirs, however you want to categorize them and who to blame them on, I don't know. But two back-to-back errors that he felt like were in his control. So William Byron is 15 points below the cut line. Further down from him is another playoff contender, obviously Ryan Blaney, who had an early exit in the first stage after a left for your tire blue. And your pick? Those are both our picks, right? Byron.

Didn't you pick Byron? No, no. Oh, you were brisk. That's right. I knew it was a B. Okay. So how much panic mode do you think Ryan Blaney needs to be in, does he? Well, I mean, I think both of those Penske cars are in a hole points-wise.

And there's only one winner next week. We expect the Fords to be the fastest cars when it comes to speed at Talladega and being able to push in the Penske lineup. So, yeah, it definitely, the good news for Blaney, I feel like he can win at Talladega, I feel like he could win it at Martinsville. So they have the capability to go out and win. It's going to be difficult to make up all those points.

Yeah. At this point. Yeah. I mean, there was a time not too long ago. It was death taxes and Ryan Blaney winning at Talladega fall race. So they're going to have to reach back into that bag of tricks. The back's been gone for a couple years. It's been gone for a couple years.

But it's not like they haven't, to your point, Kevin. It's not like they haven't been running up front. Like a lot of times when Ryan wrecks out at a super speedway, they're running up front and running well. And it's like a mid, it's honestly like mid race or like before the end. So I think for them, it kind of, it kind of makes the path very clear, right? Yeah. Go win.

Sometimes it makes it easier. It makes it easier. Mentally it makes it easier because of the fact that you only have one thing to worry about. One option. Yeah. Typically with the way that they qualify and the speed that they have, they're going to score some stage points. And there's going to be a couple of these guys that probably don't score points in the

playoffs in those stages. So I look for them to probably go after the points like they normally do in those first two stages, which you might be able to cut 10, 12, 15 points off of some of those guys. If it at least gives you a better option for the end of the race first, but at least gives you some sort of better option as you go to Martinsville. If you can cut that point gap from 31... Deficity up to like 15?

Yeah. If you can go to Martinsville with 15, points down. You have options. Because you know you should run good at both of those racetracks. And as good as they were at Loudoun, you would expect them to go and run well at Martin's field. I think if it was me, I would go into this week and be like, because it's really, it's up to the driver

and the spotter at Talladega, right? Like, it's those two guys that have to really get it done. So I'd be like, boys, be aggressive, go get it done. Like, go get it done. Which they always are. Right. The Fords are always very organized. They're good pushers.

We know they will be strong. And like you mentioned, I'm sure Ryan feels the same way Byron does. Like, one got taken from him. And the hardest part, the hardest part about, the hardest part about Talladega is just the fact that there's so many different agendas.

So many agendas. And everybody, and everyone, like, feels like they can win, right? And they can. And they can. And you got like a Brad Kizowski. If I'm Brad, like, I'm, I feel like I should have won Atlanta. And if it's between me winning Talladega

or pushing a forward to advancing the playoffs, I don't know if I'm not just going to win. win for me. You know what I mean? I think I'm going to win for me. They need to win. Because they need one. And really, I think this is the only opportunity that the six car will happen. Yeah. That remains, yeah. But there's a whole bunch of those guys in that category. This is the only race at the end of the year here that you have a chance left to win. The rest of them, the other two, are going to be, or two more, are going to be won by one of these playoff guys. Yeah. Kevin may be given a little precursor on his pick there.

Dropped a subtle hint, perhaps. You never know. You never know. So let's talk about Chase Elliott for a moment because this team just basic errors, unfortunately for them throughout the day. Well, first he went too far on his pit box, which kind of threw off the choreography of the stop. Easy there, though.

This is just one of those places where the pit boxes are super slick and slid all the way through that pit stall and kind of got everything out of sync right there on this pit stop. So it's, we saw a few mistakes on pit road, but I think that the last one that, that the nine had on pit road with the tire getting away from them and putting them a lap down and putting them behind.

And he never really recovered. Never recovered for that. So it's just something so small can take you out of contention. But they had speed as well. They had speed in like middle of the race. I'm like, dang, Chase and Allen in that group, they have really turned a corner. Qualified good again.

Qualifying, good, running mid-race. I'm like, y'all might have a little something here. If you can get to Phoenix, but now they get into Phoenix is kind of... Yeah. Well, and another guy that's going to be, I would say that he'll be a contender this week. I would think you want to control the race? Do you think if you're a guy that needs to, if you're a team that needs to win, I would think you want to be up front trying to control the race rather than waiting.

And a lot of that's going to start in qualifying, though. And then it's going to come down to, you know, how the stages break up from a fuel mileage standpoint. And, you know, but, you know, I think that those, the Elliot's, the Blanis, the Liganos, you got to take the stage points and then see where all that falls before you worry about the rest of it. You know, you got to take the points and then figure out how to get back to the front. Yes, Chase Elliott currently 23 points below the cut line heading to Talladega. We should talk about his pick finally, Chase Briscoe.

James Small, crew chief made a gutsy call with the two tires there at the end. What did you think about the race the 19 put together? put together, I mean, he let a bunch of laps early, put together a good race. He got into the wall there and they felt like it knocked the toe out, whether it was front or back, I don't know. But the car lost a little bit of speed. They fell back six or seven there on that run. And so it was a great call. It wound up gaining them some finishing spots. They already had capitalized on the stages beforehand. And there were several opportunities there where the 11 and the five could have wiped each other out. It was a game of

inches. And I think that they gave themselves a chance with a car that wasn't the fastest car at the end by getting that track position. And James Small said that. He said, look, this, we might work. Might work might not. But that's what happens when you're in a position where you've had a good first two stages and you're in this playoff position with a car that's not capable of winning at that point. You might steal one. We saw Joey Legano do it last year. And Ligano stole some spots at the end of that race with the exact same call of two tires. He just didn't capitalize on it in the first two stages like Briscoe did. But those are the days that you got to have when it's not all going right and you don't

have a car capable of winning. Sometimes you can steal one. I like that, though. And James Small, I feel like is really starting to come into his own. Also, this pairing, we talked about Chris Gal and Denny, but these two seem to be the right match as well. They definitely have a, they definitely, that team has a different type of energy around it. Yeah, they're a different type of energy.

energy around it. And when you have somebody that comes in new, that injects that and, like, wants to, you know, again, we don't even talk about it too much, but Martin was on his retirement, and, like, he was ending his career, so the energy is different. This is very true. Right? You're doing, you're looking at things different. You want to win

and all the things, but it's just different with how you're going about it. How Chase is trying to go about it is, he's also on a show me, prove it deal. Yeah. He's also, so he's in the mud trying to work on everything that he can. And obviously the speed and qualifying has been there all year. Lightning fast.

They've starting to figure out how to put races together. Been lightning fast. When the playoffs started, I said they are the most dangerous team in the playoffs because they have been just so quick, raw speed. And they've made, I think, up until like this part of the playoffs, I think they have like the top, one of the top three most points gained. So they've been strolling through this thing. And that two-tire move, when I was like, man, there's too many.

laps left. Like, it's not going to work, but it wasn't a work to win, really. It was a work to be better than they were. And the way it worked out, they crashed right off the bat. So they burned, you know, they burned six or seven more laps of maybe more laps than that on the lap count to get to the end. So you never know. I mean, I've been there before and seen a couple crashes at the end and then it winds up being three or four laps is all you got to run. If the five and the 11, like, if the guys behind them could have caught them and made it more of a battle because he got passed with like eight to go. Yeah.

So it wasn't that much more that he needed and it almost worked out completely to where they stole the wind. So what dice worked out? Mentioned the big crash at the end. I did want to give some props to Mr. SVG. I know he had a handle in that last big incident there. But we've talked about his improvements on the ovals. And Justin Marks was saying he feels like he's made a ton of gains.

And SVG, when I interviewed him when you couldn't last week, he's like, my main focus the rest of the year is the driver is improving. He had a good run until that happened. Yeah, he ran in the top 10. I qualified his teammates. All day. And, you know, I think that that's definite improvement. And, you know, I think that that comfort level.

But that's another guy that's like Denny Hamlin and Joey Lagano that we haven't seen a lot because he hasn't raced here. But he has a work ethic and an ability to look at the data and study and watch and learn and apply it. You know, and I think right here, he just, he wasn't clear when they were four wide, kind of turned across the 20's nose right there and ultimately caused this wreck. But I don't know that you can blame that on anybody.

It's just one of those late race restarts there where everybody's going for it. Yeah, racing deal. Race and deal. Yeah, just a racing deal there. But not only SVG, I think you've got to give credit to the 48 car. They were super fast all day. Had a good run.

Ty Gibbs had a great run all day and ultimately got caught up in this wreck. the end. So Tyler Reddick. Yes. He was pushing. They ran well this weekend for being out of the playoffs, but a few of those guys that weren't in the playoffs looking for that late season win, we're in contention there to have a chance. Better late than never.

That's right. They say, yes. Okay, so Las Vegas definitely gave us plenty to talk about. Now we're moving on, guys, as we mentioned, to Talladega, the Super Speedway. Do races remaining in this round. Martinsville will be after that. So, well, we've touched on it a bit, this racetrack, unpredictability, what it presents for drivers as far as the challenges go. Yeah.

I like, you know, for me, the riding around strategy is gone. You can't ride around anymore. You've got to be able to race as hard as you can to put yourself as far forward as possible. The wrecks usually start at the front lately with you push, push, push, push, and you just have to keep. escalating that that risk level until it's either too far or it works out in a positive way for you. So I just think that you have to just go for it. No matter what your points position is, you have to put yourself in a position to score stage points. You've got to be a good pusher. You've got to control your spacing. See a lot of guys that get themselves. They'll catch them at

the end of the straightaway and they get the timing of the corner off. There's some guys that are really good at it. Brad Kozlowski is really good at it. Joey Lagano is really good at it. And the Ford's push better. But you've got to be able to push and shove and have a car that's stable enough to drive. That's the problem that the Toyotas and the Chevys have. They don't push well because of the way that their nose is shaped. The Toyotas aren't as fast as the other two brands. I don't think the Chevy's quite as fast, not as big a deficit as the Toyotas have to the Fords. But I feel like once it gets mixed up and you have that wreck that wipes out two or three of the Fords that are in that mix, it's going to happen. I mean, it's inevitable. There's too many different agendas at Talladega.

You got the Ricky Stenhouses and guys that are in position, Brad Kozlowski, that are in position to know that this is the one race that they have left to win. And this could make or break their season, you know, to put their team in victory lane. So, but everybody in the field thinks that. Everybody has got the same. Those guys have done it. And, you know, I think are capable of, of those two guys are capable of doing that. But so is Michael McDowell, guys, Todd Gillen, Ryan Priest. I mean, they're all, everybody's got a shot.

So it's a matter of how you position yourself and who misses the reps. Do you think, do you guys think that we'll see a race more like we saw at fall Daytona? I hope so. Because when the green flag dropped at Daytona under the lights, Everyone was shitting and getting. Yeah, but the unique part about Daytona is it's 100 miles less

and the way that those stages split up are a little bit different. Yeah. I still think you're going to have to save some fuel at certain points during this race, but, you know, it depends on what those guys are doing that want to push the pace to keep themselves in position to score those stage points, right? I think you've got to race the first two stages and then figure the rest of it out if you're those guys. But there are going to be some guys that save fuel and get to that last run that all of a sudden pop up and be in position to win the race that don't really care about stage points.

Why would Kislauski care about stage points? Right. Right. You know, but the thing that we can't forget, there are guys that are still racing for points. All 16 of those guys can still finish fifth in the points. The money, the money change from 16. Yeah. What does for your charter average and how you get paid is a big difference from fifth to 16.

So when we're talking about all year long, because we don't ever talk about it, So this is probably the first time it's really brought up. All year long, everyone's like, well, it doesn't matter if you don't, you know, if you don't make it a Phoenix. No, it definitely matters. It definitely matters. Because you're still racing for money and you're still racing for points position. You're still racing for your charter slot.

And all that stuff matters because there's an average that you get and it puts you in a different tier and all these things. It's a three-year average of where you finish into points over the last three seasons as to what your charter's worth, basically. That's how they get, that's how they pay out. And so, you know, anytime that we would get knocked out of the playoffs, the focus immediately became, okay, we got to get fifth to points because, A, I want to make more money. And B, the team's going to make more money.

And so, you know, you can instantly motivate yourself with the difference of fifth and 16th when you look at the payout. It's not hard. It matters a lot. It matters a lot. Plus, I don't want to be 16th. Who wants to be 16th? Yeah.

Who wants to be 16? Nobody does. This race, though, it's like you can have every plan in the world, right? And it just all go out in the window. Usually once the green flag drops, the plan is more of us. Yeah. I've always found it interesting, though, how the Ford's just seemed to always have a little bit better of a plan in place for some reason.

It's easier to push with a Ford. It's easier to get pushed by a Ford. Okay. Now, when you get pushed by a Chevy or a Toyota, it's not the same as being pushed by a Ford. It's squirlier. Cars move around more with the way that their cars are shaped. It's very difficult to push a Toyota because of the way that their cars

handle in the way that their tail is shaped. It's super easy to spin them out. It kind of has a bubble. Yeah, it's super easy to spin a Toyota out. And, you know, from a Ford guy's standpoint, when you're pushing another Ford, you can be really aggressive in how you push that car compared to when you're pushing a Toyota, you've got to think about what you're doing. I wrecked Tyler Reddick one year at Daytona or Talladega.

And not even, I mean, just breathing on the back bumper spun him out. And that's typically the case with a lot of the Toyotas and not as bad with the Chevrolet's, but much harder for any brand to push those two brands. And any of the other two brands pushing a Ford is even not as effective because you just can't be as aggressive. I'm really going to be looking at how, to your point, the extra 100 miles. Because if that is a big change in how they race, then I think that we should look at adjusting whatever it is, either the mileage or the stage breaks. Because I want what we got in Daytona,

because that was exactly what we want. Yeah. So if that is a major factor, then we need to look at just adjusting that a little bit. And maybe we can get close to that. And you can tell when they're going and not going. Yeah, you know. When it's two lanes, they're going.

Mm-hmm. When it's four lanes, they're not going. Mm-hmm. Yeah. There's somebody that's saving gas and stirring things up to slow things down. So, you know, it's very, you can, I mean, at the end when they're all,

dicing all over the place, you're going to see them three and four wide briefly. But the bottom two lanes are still going to be the dominant lanes when they're all lined up pushing 100%. I think it takes like eight guys. Eight cars need to feel like they want to go and be trying to dice it up because that drags the rest of the people along with them.

If there's only like four guys, they're just kind of mixing up between themselves and it's not as effective. If there's like eight cars that are trying to lead and be in the front and in position, I think that'll. And it's the same thing. Control what you can control.

Don't beat yourself. Don't beat yourself. Don't speed on pit road. Don't have a pit road penalty. All those, don't go below the yellow line. Whatever it is, just don't beat yourself. Cannot speed on pit road here, especially under green flag. Because you are, that is it.

Like, you might as well just pack up and get ready for Martin's Row. Yep. Okay. We'll have to see how it all transpires out there in Talladega. You mentioned adjustments. there's been an adjustment made. NASCAR competition officials announced that the target horsepower for Cup Series events

at road courses and oval tracks less than a 1.5 and length will increase to 750 in the 2026 season. Which I thought Kyle Larson's comments about this were interesting because he said, don't over-promote it. It's likely not going to fix everything. He said he did a test, and no one told him that he had higher horsepower and he didn't even realize it. Yeah.

So what do you think about all this? Well, I think that I'm happy that they did it. Yeah, there you go. I think that they, it's at least a step in the right direction. I think that listening to the feedback from the drivers, they don't notice the difference in the power, which, you know, it's 80 horsepower on paper, right? So 80 horsepower. And I think that says a lot about the amount of increase that it actually needs. Now, there's some, there's a, there's a counter argument to the how much it would cost for everybody to go more, horsepower than this. So my hope is they're looking to go more horsepower down the road as

they look at how things evolve. But I don't think we'll, I don't think we'll, I'm happy that they did it. Kudos to them for giving the cars more horsepower. I don't want to knock it. But I don't think anybody will notice. Okay. That's kind of like Larsson was saying. Yeah. It's not a huge noticeable difference. No. And like when I talked to Richard Childress about this homestead early on in the year when this was a really big topic. he was like, brother, let me tell you that it is expensive. Like the money to do it is a lot. It's millions of dollars in R&D.

And that's what the man said. So I'm not going to say that. I'm not going to discredit that. So if that's where we're at where it's like how much horsepower to how much money, then it's we, then the industry needs to decide when. When are we going to get more? Like how are we doing?

And Steve O'Donnell was on with Dale Jr. And they kind of got into this a little bit where it's like, and you could kind of read the tea leaves a little bit. I felt like he was saying, well, you know, we got a new brand coming in with Dodge is looking at coming in at the couple of it. It sounded like he was saying. He also made mention of Honda. So he was basically like, well, if we'd make this huge jump now and then it changes.

The OEMs won a different engine package in three years. then we just cost everybody a dumb amount of money for no reason. I'm like, okay, if you're telling me that we have a path, like that was, that interview I felt like it was one of the more transparent and path leading out once, because now we're not guessing. At least like you told us and we feel like, okay, we see where you're going, and then we'll see what kind of how we get that. I wish they would be more open like that consistently.

Yeah, and he said that on that too. And I thought Steve O'Donnell did a good job on Dale Jr.'s podcast. It's a good listen. If you haven't listened to it, you should go listen to the conversation between he and Dale because it was very informative. But I think that

if they want to be like this, they need to be like this all the time. Lock it in. It needs to be, sometimes it's, I know this is a situation where it would cost the teams a lot of money, but sometimes you just got to say, screw it, you're going to do it.

This is what we're going to do because it's right for the sport. It can't always be about money. What point do we get back on track to say, okay, here's a path to, where we want to be, what is that? But I think if we had a Dana White, that was just, you know, don't care.

Don't care about this, don't care about that. Yep, let's do this. That was great. Good job, bad job, you suck. Whatever it is. Why did you put it in me? Because you're in laughs. Because you're in the voice.

You can't say I suck. I'm walking him down right now. You know, I think that being in front of things and just being open about it and not trying to be so secretive and all the things that it seems like they've done in the past. that openness and honesty, you don't have to think about what you said

or what you did, just say, oh, that was good, that was bad, whatever it is. Be more open like that. People love it. And people like it. They are informed. Tell us where we're going. What are we doing?

How are we fixing it? You know, I think that the horsepower is great, but it's not going to fix it. No, we've got to keep, it's not going to fix it all the way. No, you got to keep making moves, and there's narrow stuff that you've got to work on. The tire thing, we just barely,

feel like we're starting to understand. So when you make these adjustments with horsepower and arrow, how is that going to affect the tire? Like this week time, right? Like, Kansas was a fantastic race, you know, and this was the upgraded construction change with this tire. It wasn't like Kansas.

It was a great ending. Right. And, you know, the race was great at the end, and it was exciting, which is what we want. So I just think that different tracks, they've taken. the tire codes and made less of them to try to make them work at a lot of different tracks. I feel like the reason that we got to so many different tire codes in the past was because all the tracks are

different. They have a lot of characteristics that the other one like Kansas and Vegas, they don't mirror each other. Right. Like it's just there, there's some differences there that might require some change. They're basically wide open and qualifying through one and two. Had to lift a little bit in three and four this weekend. So they're still, they're still too slow. You get a hard winner of some of these places

that changed that phrase. There's a lot when you get there. No one solution fits all. But they are making what? No, did you hear what OD said about Kevin? No, about the show? No, no, no. No, he said, he said, Kevin Harvick one time came out to me and said,

look, man, if you should be in your position, you should be the most hated person in the industry. Yeah. And he said, that's a hard thing. He said, that's a hard thing. That's a hard thing as a human being. but he like gave credit to like, yeah, because you're making all the hard decisions. Yeah.

Somebody's got to make them. And when you're publicly open about those hard decisions like he was in this particular instance about all the things that he addressed, what are people going to say? And people respect that. Yeah. I mean, don't hide. And don't hide. And Steve's been around the sport long enough that he can talk knowledgeably about it. He has a lot of conversations, has been around the sport a long.

long time. It's just sometimes, you know, you go back to the Brian France piece of it and all those things where, you know, he would get up there and talk about some of the stuff and you're like, what in the hell is he saying? I have no idea what you're talking about. That is the dumbest thing I've ever heard. And I think that Steve O'Donnell has that credibility. And even Phelps kind of struggled with that credibility from the racers. From the competition side as far as what was what was going on, what was not going on because he wasn't in the middle of it all the time like O'Donnell has been. So I just feel like, you know, that was a good, the horsepower thing is a good step. I don't think it should be the end of it.

I don't think it's going to, you know, I don't think it's going to fix it all. It's definitely not going to hurt. But I love the way that they approached all of the topics that they were, that he was handed. Yes. Dale threw it at him. Things are changing. Yeah. He didn't back down.

Yeah. Very good. Okay. So that's all the serious stuff. Time now for the non-serious. This is when my partner takes over. Oh. Hello, world.

Clapy Sips. Welcome to Mamba's social Sips, your favorite part of the program. What, Kevin? Well, I just had this old guy flashback. I just, and I don't know where the world is at with this person, but I had this Arsenial Hall moment right there where, I don't know. I just looked over and I'm like, oh, man, hello world. Hello, world.

Good. Hello, world. I'm glad I could do that for you. Listen, friends, family, closers from Australia, New Zealand. What about Mexico? Mexico. New friends in Mexico? New fans over there?

I thought you did. Yeah, I made new friends in Mexico City. And then again in Cancrued. We got friends all over place. Listen, welcome to my segment, Mom of Social Sips. And to start it off, guys, we have a video game that is dropping. NASCAR 25 is coming out. I think it's out right now, actually.

And our great people at Fox Sports are doing a little article about your top, your favorite. What are the best racing games ever made? Yeah. Okay. Kevin, did you ever play a game? Do you ever play much of the racing games? I spent so much money on racing games. Because when I was a kid, they were not as cool as they are now with NASCAR 25 and high racing

and all the things that are the premier racing games in today's world are not like Super Sprint. and Ivan Stewart's off-road. I grew up with an Intellivision. Most of you listening probably don't even know what that is. Have you ever heard of that? Have you heard of an Intellivision game system? No. It was like in the TV? No.

Okay. No. He said Intellivision, right? In the TV. I mean, the TV took five minutes to warm up. So what is it? Explain what that is. Well, an Intellivision is like an Atari or an Nintendo. Oh, yeah.

Okay, okay, okay. So it had like this little round pad on it. And then it had like numbers, like a telephone on it. Oh, I saw that before. Yeah. It's like an antique now. Yeah. So my game growing up when I first started playing video games on the Intellivision was Astro Smash.

Astro Smash. Oh, no, I do remember that game. You don't. You're not even thinking of the right one. Isn't that the one with the, you're shooting it? You're shooting the rocks. Yeah, but it's a different name, the one you're thinking of. But probably not on the television.

Okay. That's close. You know, so I played a lot of video games when I was a kid. Mario Kart, we would miss school. We'd skip school. Our parents would go to work and we'd act like we were going to school and then we just bail out of school and we'd sit and play Mario card all day. That's awesome.

Yeah. Yeah. He's been a senior trip and his skipping school for video games. Kevin went to Mexico for his senior games. I've had a lot of video games. I had in my KHA shop, we had Ivan Stewart's off-road. We had four Daytona USA machines. Yep, that was a great game.

Super Sprint. I spent a lot of money on Super Sprint. And to this day, I still have a super sprint machine. So, RC Pro Am, that was a good one on Nintendo. Okay. And Excite Bike. You ever heard of Excite Bike? Is that the one you had at your house at Keel and Wumped My Assight Bike?

No. Excite Bike was like on the original Nintendo. It was like a motorcycle game. Yeah. And you could make your own tracks. Oh, that's cool. That's actually kind of cool. So the games that are on the list are Mario Card 8, Cruising 8.

There's a lot of Mario Kart. This is like the list of their games. Yeah. The list of greatest racing games that they think. That they have. Yeah, that they have. So mine didn't make the list because they weren't born. Well, yeah.

Cruising USA, Need for Speed, Grand Tourismo, F0, Outrun, Daytona, USA, pole position, Ivan, Iron Man, Stewart's Super Off Road, and R4 Ridge Racer Type 4. I think that two, that Caitlin that need to be in there is Dirt to Daytona. and Chase for the Cup, 2005, that our guy. Then that, look that smile. I got a couple covers, right? Yeah, yeah, two? What year?

05 and NASCAR Heat 4. Yeah. I think the first one was EA Sports. Yeah, it was the EA Sports cover jinx. Yeah, oh, yeah, 05. That was a tough, yeah. I will say, though, that game, so much fun. The story mode was great.

I think they used Kevin because you guys at Kate. and you guys were like one of those groups that were like going from driver to owner and you had like modified you could run you know who's getting you know who's on that show game Matthew Martin Mark Martin's really Matt Martin was in that yeah it was a good game so anyway go so what's your what I mean what do you think the best game is oh man my and is this NASCAR 25 is probably going to blow him out of the water NASCAR 25 I was I saw the beta like I played it a little bit the AI, the experience is, it's pretty cool. Crazy part. So it's evolved into eye racing. Yes. So when all this first started, Sierra was the name of the gaming company, I believe.

And they would send us all these disks for the computers to put them in and you'd play them on your PC with this little mini steering wheel from your game. And so we used to always get the updated games. But think about that was in the late 90s when all that started. When we first started getting the video games, late 90s, early 2000s, right in there, whatever that time period was. But where it was compared to where it is is pretty unbelievable. Insane. Insane how it's progressed. I think my favorite is that 05 game.

The total team control aspect and the storyline of building up from nothing and owning teams, I always thought that that was really cool. Do you still play video games? Yeah. I haven't played a racing game for real in a while. When Forsa brought NASCAR back into their fold, I started playing that again. But I play a lot of NCAA. I mean, like, year 2000 and like 39.

So you're not up to, you're not, you don't play any of the new video games, like the Fortnite or anything like that? No, no, I don't play Fortnite. I got you. No, I'm an old school. I'm a traditional guy. Traditional. So make sure you go check out Fox Sports.com, and you can check out that article. And they got the breakdown, and you guys can decide if they're right.

What's the game for you? I hadn't heard of half of those games. Out of that list, I remember, like, the Daytona USA one was always really fun. Yeah. But like the Ridgeline and the, what did you say, F0? F0. I think that sounds like an F1 game. Okay.

They have, like, the P-ZO. The F-1 games were always pretty good on. They were pretty good. I need to start playing games. That's what I've learned from this entire conversation. Yeah, take your kids to Chuck Echee cheese and go play some arcade games. Chuckie Cheese, yeah, you can fill them full of journey. Okay, Dave and Busters. Go to Dave and Busters.

Actually, David Busser's way better. That one and the Ivan, the off-road racing. I remember using that one. The only reason I got rid of my Ivan Stewart off-road games is because you couldn't get parts for them anymore. I had full-size arcade machines. Oh, wow. But I do have all the original Nintendos.

Now they come in a little make-believe Nintendo with a chip inside of it that has all the games. So you can play all the original Nintendo. games. So if you ever want to come over and play games. That sounds like a good time. You just invited you up right. Yeah. Contrary to popular belief, Kevin loves me.

Okay? Kevin loves me. All right. Come on, slapping. Moving along. We got a guest, guys. Oh, really? That I'd like to bring in to the show right now. Let's roll it with our new guest here.

Yo, Mamba Smith. I heard we're teammates at Fox Sports. And you're the chief vice. vibes officer for NASCAR. What's this I hear about a games with names Daytona car wrap? Let's make this happen, Bubbs. I love that he called you, Bub.

What's he talking about? So this year, this year I didn't know. Who was that first off? That was Julian Edelman. Okay. Patriots Hall of Famer. Okay. Super Bowl MVP,

multi-time Super Bowl champ and my guy. And obviously one of our teammates at Foxx. You know, Fox analyst on the NFL. So he, I invited a friend to Phoenix, and he wanted to bring a couple of his friends. A couple of his friends happened to work on the games with names podcast with Julian. And I showed them a rap design that I had made a while ago, like in 2015 or 16, that I was trying to run at Loudoun. And it was a Patriots and American Cancer Society combination.

And it just kind of fell through. But I showed it to him because out of the 11 on it, I'm like, hey, if you guys would ever want to, like, like do something at the racetrack and be on a car, like, let me know. I didn't race this past year. And that really bothers me. And so I've been wanting to run Daytona in the Arka car for a while. Okay. So I pitched Julian on running the Archer Race of Daytona.

We are looking for some partners. Oh, so you're going to actually try to do this. I'm going to, yeah, no, no, no. We're going to go run. So we're going to see that pain scheme. We're going to, not that scheme. It'll probably be something different if I had to guess. But who knows.

But yeah. Games with names. I mean, I've seen a few of them I've seen a few of them give it a whirl. I think you'd be okay. Hey, thanks. I appreciate that. You could be in the mix.

Listen, it can't be harder than IRP in the middle of the summer. I think your biggest issue would probably just be getting tired. Probably. Yeah. But I'm not going to get more tired than I did. Not tired from driving, just hot. Then you get tired. No, no.

We got the cool suits now, though. I use my first cool suit at Daytona and the road course race when I drove this Miata. That was game changer. Oh, yeah. I was like a brand new person all over again. This sounds like something that will need to be a whole feature. Because now you're tying into the Fox NFL side. That arc of race is usually on Big Fox.

It's on Big Fox. We could have a whole thing with the two of you on this. So, and you know, we had a little call. Kevin out there coaching you. I think that'd be awesome. We had a little call and they don't want me to spot. They have another, they have another podcast called, it's like called Dudes, dude or something.

It's him and Grunk. Grunk has been to the racetrack a bunch. He's a monster. He's a monster. Yeah, yeah. He's a monster energy athlete. He was in Victory Land when Kurt won the 500. Look at him just making things happen.

Hey. I like that for you. Kevin said he was going to support it. There you go. Did he say that? Driver coach. Driver coach. Yeah.

And Bush lights after the race. Yeah. Does that mean that we're going to work on your physical fitness routine leading up to the race? Yeah. I'm down. You know, help me out? Yeah.

I mean, you think you can run more than two minutes? Yeah. We're going to, we need to film like a rocky episode leading up to this. Yeah. Okay. This is taken on a whole life of its time. I know. You never know where this is going to go.

All right. Moving right along. You guys know that popular driver votes coming on? Yes. Most popular driver. Right? Most popular driver for all this series. Connor Zillich, Jesse Love,

homies. They are so funny together. They have this little back and forth going on. So essentially, I think Jesse asked Connor if he was going to vote for him. And he said, absolutely not, like he wasn't going to, like, help support him. And then Jesse made this little AI skit of Connor.

Oh, I thought he used a filter or something. Yeah, AI filter, whatever it was. Okay. And it's kind of, it kind of freaks me out a little bit. Did you see the one that the guy did with Taylor Swift the other day? No. Oh, yeah. He's talking in the background and he's showing what, I mean, he's making all the motions and everything.

And it looks just like her with all of his motions. Watch this thing. Watch this video of Connor that Jesse made. Hey, guys. Vote for Jesse Love in Most Popular Driver Award. Hey, guys, vote for Jesse Love in Most Popular Driver Award. Sounds like Lee Diffy. It's so creepy.

But, you know, I guess Connor says vote for Jesse Love. There you go. So there you go. I actually won that one year. How? The most popular driver. What series? In the Bush series.

Oh, okay. 2001. I know it wasn't Cup. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, it was Bill Elliott, Dale Jr., Chase Elliott. That is it.

That's pretty much it. That's the list. Yeah. All right, guys, leave a voice mail 8.05, 3174175. If you want a mailback question, Harvard Caparrow 4 at gmail.com. We appreciate you. Welcome to Bombat Social Sips. Welcome.

It's ending now. All right. We're moving on to last call. Gambling problem. Call 1-800 gambler. In New York, call 8778. Hope N. N.Y.

or text Hope N. 67-369. In Connecticut, help is available. for problem gambling. Call 888-78-9-77 or visit ccpg.org. Please play responsibly. On behalf of Boot Hill Casino and Resort Kansas, 21 plus age and eligibility varies by jurisdiction. Void in Ontario, new customers only. Bonus bets expire 168 hours after issuance. For additional terms and responsible gambling resources, see dkng.c.com. NASCAR is not responsible for this promotion and used under license. So, Kevin, before we get into our picks for this week, let's take a look at the

best bet of the weekend. Yeah. Pretty good one this week. Plus 450 with Denny Hamlin. So, I mean, for a guy that's strolling like he's strolling right now, that was a pretty good, pretty good pick. So if you bet on Denny Hamlin, you won some money. Take the checker flag with draft king's sportsbook. Download the draft king's sportsbook app and use code Harvick. That's code Harvick for new customers to get $300 in bonus bets when you bet just five bucks and win your first bet. Only on draft kings, the crown is yours. There you go.

Oh. Oh. Oh. Oh. Your crown today. Oh, wow. Sorry, guys. Ticket.

There you go. Okay. Very nice. From the other week. Yeah. All right. You blow that up yourself? You're full of hot air.

Full of hot air. Speaking of that, let's grade the burnout, guys, for Denny Hamlin in Las Vegas. Because he did two of them, technically. Oh, I think this is a top three burnout. Really? It's got to be. I think that I have never seen this before somebody doing a burnout in their pit stall. Yeah, I thought that was really cool.

That, to me. That, to me. my friends is what you need for creativity. Yes. Creativity is as much a part of the burnout, but the burnout was really good as well. I don't think it's quite... SVG.

I don't think it's quite Bowman Gray or SVG, but... It was... The creativity was high. Yeah. And I love that the guys got to be right a part of it. It added to the emotion. And then this part... There was three phases to it.

Yeah, there was a lot going on. And then when he did it into Victory Lane, um, okay, this... This is, my only thing about this, I know my ear drums would have been... I've been there. I was there when Riley Herps won in the Xfinity race and went

to Victory Lane and just the revving of the engines inside of there, I feel like I can't hear as well to this day. It is so loud in that little area where Victory Lane is in Las Vegas with all the fan zone right there. It is so loud when you do that.

But looks cool. Looks cool. High marks for Denny Hamelin. We know he's probably paying attention to the show and listening. What's the great? I don't know. Where are you putting him? Top three, you said. I think it's third.

Okay. I think that one's third. Okay. Just because of the, the burnout was really good. We've seen a lot of good burnouts, but I think in the pit box, I've never seen anybody that did that before. Yeah. I don't know that NASCAR would love that, but if that continues.

You only could do it like right there. Okay. So he's third. It was different. It was different. Third? And I am third, apparently, in the standings. We got Kevin at 48.

Your last. Mamba 43 and I'm 27. Zero points for me picking Blaney. He picked Briscoe. Kevin picked Bell. So picking up more points for the two of them. Now it's time to make our selections for Talladega. Your last, you go first.

I go first. Okay. I want to go with a Ford and I just want to pick Blaney again because I'm hoping he has some sort of redemption for himself. Yeah. And I think he's a solid choice there. But I thought that last week too, we saw what happens. He's finished in the 30s the last two times. But go ahead.

No, wait, wait, wait. I had the best finish. Last week. You're second in the points. Okay, fine. You each picked up six. So, go ahead. Yeah.

So, um, Ryan Priest. I like it. There you go. Congratulations to him on the baby, by the way. I'm going to go with William Byron. Hmm. Very good. Okay.

See, he didn't pick a on for that guy. Yeah, I tried to misguide you guys. He took the bait. You took the bait. It wasn't. It wasn't bait. It wasn't bait. Because, you know, Ryan's been really close.

and I think that their group is really locked into the Super Speedway and winning, I think a Kazlowski-Rashkar is going to win, I think. There you go. That'd be awesome. 14% of fans picked Danny Hamlin this week. We encourage the fans to keep joining us with their picks. Scan the QR code on the screen or go to link in the description of the podcast. So we'll see what happens in Talladega.

So you mentioned ARCA earlier. You have special guests. I do. This is going to be fun. I have Bill and Billy Venturini. Love that. They recently sold their 40-some-year team to Nitro Motorsports and Nick Tucker and his group. But, you know, they ran the West Race last weekend, and that was their last race.

And I just thought it would be fun to hear their stories and just how it all feels now that they're done after this is all they've done for so long. Yeah. I mean, it's your livelihood. So I'm looking forward to that conversation. I'm stoked. I got to drive for that team at Toledo a couple years ago. It was top because, you know, if you wanted a race, you want to be good, you had to go through Vennerini's at some point.

Everyone did it. And to be able to drive their stuff was cool. And real quick, shout out to my parents. It's their 46th anniversary. Nice. So love you, Mom and Dad. Very nice. All right, guys.

That does it for this episode of Happy Hour. Make sure you subscribe on YouTube, wherever you get your podcast, leave a review, send some mail to Mamba. We'll see everybody. after Talladega.