The Dale Jr. Download - 1 - Sprint Unlimited

Episode Date: February 18, 2013

On the debut of The Download, we recap the Sprint Unlimited and pay tribute to Dale Earnhardt with stories from the people who knew him most -- his family. Check out Dirty Mo Media on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@DirtyMoMedia  Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Have you tried Dale Jr.'s new potato chips? Go to Del Jr. Foods.com to see where you can find the chips in your area or place an order online. It's that easy. This is Dale Jr., and you're listening to Dirty Moe Radio. And then can you imagine meeting Dale Earnhardt? If you're the boyfriend. No, I don't want to imagine that. The Dell Jr. download starts now.

With Mike Davis, I'm Taylor-Zarzer, and it's our very first podcast on the Dale Jr. download. What do you want to do on this thing, Mike? I want to make it big, man. I want to make it bigger than Seinfeld. Are you fired up? I am fired up. I don't know if I can promise that, though. I am very fired up. I can tell you that I'm prepared. I mean, I drank seven diet dues this weekend, which is why I'm shaking right now. I had an amp energy this morning. I tried to join the National Guard a few days ago. I ate a couple of bags of Dale Jr. Potato chips. Yeah, you're ready. Yeah, I'm ready.

And we may not make it to this show. I might have to take you to the hospital. just to get to checked out. I am kind of freaking out and shaking a little bit, but I'm trying to get my mind around everything that is Dale Jr. And speaking of that, I know he finished 8th in the Bud shootout, the Sprint Unlimited, excuse me, on Saturday night. And I got to be honest with you, man, that race left a lot to be desired.

I really thought that, you know, when you watch the shootout or the unlimited now, it's going to take me forever to get used to that, you're thinking, all right, man, NASCAR's back, plate racing, three and four wide, beating and banging, wrecking. Now we saw some wrecking at the beginning, but after that everybody said, no, sir, we're not going to see any more of that. You think that was just because it's the first time

they've been in this new car? I do. I mean, if you were looking for the shootout at the OK corral, you left disappointed, and certainly that's understandable. But if you look at it from, you know, if you're a student of the game, so to speak, and you're looking at car attitudes as they're driving them for the first time, and you're listening to driver chatter,

which we often do, and everybody has access to that now. It was really interesting to me listening to how the drivers were handling the cars for the first time. Yeah, it was. And you could tell after that wreck early on where Tony Stewart thought he could clear

and get down towards the bottom and he wrecked half the field, you could tell after that, everybody was like, you know what, we're not tearing up any more cars. Let's try to feel this sucker out for a few more times before we get ready for the Great American Race. I think you're going to see more of that

in the duels on Thursday and Friday. As for qualifying, And on Sunday, Danica Patrick is the huge story. First time ever a female driver has taken the pole in a cup race. That's very significant. Obviously, a lot of people around here know her well and very excited for her, but not just her. Not just her. Yeah, that entire 10 team.

That's Dale Jr's old crew right there. A lot of them, I'll put it that way. That's the old number eight bud crew. We went to war with those guys and we're still great friends with them. So it was really cool to see them get that pole because I know how hard they work. and I know how good they are at restrictor plates. She's got the best in the business when it comes to that. How about Dale Jr. qualifying 11th?

Let's not put much stock in that. I mean, hey, you get into this race, you set your position by the Gatorade duels, and that's what we can expect. I'm sure that Stevie probably wish he had qualified a little higher up there, Stevie being Stevie, not Stevie wishing Dale had qualified up there. But I think that car is going to be stout. All right, well, let's ask Stevie.

Let's do it. Let's speed dial. Speed dial. All right. Steve LaTart, crew chief for Dale Jr. And number 88 National Guard, Chevrolet, joins us from Daytona. Mr. LaTart.

That had to be a very interesting race for you as a crew chief when you trot out a brand new car like the Gen 6, and you have no earthly idea what's going to happen because it's the first time they've ever raced it. I mean, what was that like for you out there during the Unlimited on Saturday night? Hey, Steve, Jr. communicated during the second segment that he was having a hard time. getting runs, like from the tail end of the draft, and he was wondering, is there something

wrong with the car? You know, I'm not really sure. It was definitely a feeling that he had never felt before. What was the eventual verdict on that? Well, I think that's exactly. You need to do the winning Daytona is you have to be able to complete passes. And what that means is when you get to leave that list to me, so we have to stop to work on for the second half of speed league.

I think everyone listening feels pretty comfortable with you doing your job right now. Stevie, I want to ask you about jumping out of line and thinking you can, clear. I mean, you saw what happened with Matt Kinseth in practice thinking he can clear. You saw what happened with smoke thinking he could clear early on in the unlimited. Is it harder to clear with this new Gen 6 car? Is it just a subconscious deal where you think you're in the old, you know, COT and you think, oh yeah, I've got it cleared? What was the reason for that? You know, I think that's the problem. It's no different when you're passing someone in the interstate. When you go buy somebody at a rate of speed susceptible to the side drive, the guy next to you can kill your

momentum by kind of moving up towards you. And I think that's what's catching these drivers off guard. They think they've rolled on going to be the key to speed weeks, and I don't think we've seen the end of that. Dale Jr. is one of the best restrictor plate racers ever. That being the case, nobody really ever gets bent out of shape with where he qualifies. He qualified 11th on Sunday. What was your reaction to that?

Obviously, you've got the duels coming up later in the week, and that'll decide where you start. Well, I guess I'm a little bit of the field, but... Well, that sounds good. So you get back to the track on Wednesday with two practices. What's the strategy? We're liquid right now, Mike. You know, we got to be careful.

You don't want to tear up a call. We did that a couple years ago, and we kind of put us... So we're going to have to take some risk. With a new car, there's too many questions on some speed, but at some point. That's good. Now, more importantly, what's your strategy for the next two days since you don't have to be at the track? Well, it's a mix of work and pleasure, you know? There's a lot to do with the shop.

So there's a lot of emails, but we're off to the night. That's a smart dad. smart that's a smart husband right there well hey last thing before we let you go is a little birdie told me that you have gotten a man that used to you know party not worry about what he ate uh to drink carrot juice for a couple of weeks in preparation for the season i'm talking about dale earnhard junior is there something specifically you have this man eating or drinking this week well dale and i um he kind of used to look at me funny when i would not eat the great great pizza he's over there with gross he he's definitely um He's committed with 13th started off. The real season to start comes Sunday and the 500. One more reason why we love Steve LaTart. Go say hello to Mickey for us.

We appreciate you. All right, guys. Thank you. Okay, next up is Mike Hogue, road manager for Dale Jr. J.R. Motorsports. Hey, Hogue. Now, it was a busy week for you guys. Now, did you make junior work the entire time down in Daytona,

or did you give him some downtime? No, the only time we had to work was to Media Day. That was really, we had a pretty, Me, Dale, the dog they have Jumba. I remember as fast as he can. So we got the funny idea why we're sitting in a C microphone. Imagine three guys sitting in a Tahoe outside. And they hear the yelping.

And Amy texts Dale from the car. She's like, oh, my gosh, what are you guys doing out there? And she said she can hear the dog playing his day. And then the movie was walking out. And they see me sitting right in the Pomeranian. And he's just yelping as loud as he can. And everybody in the store is peeking out. and Dale was the funniest thing you had to be there to see it or witness it.

But other than that, I mean, that was the most entertaining all weekend, other than just on track. Well, I think that our audience would appreciate since we weren't there if you would do an imitation of the dog, so we kind of could get a sense of what it sounded. I was starting. You can imagine a little pound and a half Pomeranian just yapping it aloud as he can, and then on a microphone times 10.

No, I can't. I'm sorry, Hogue. I'm going to need you to give us an interview. You try your best. It's too early in the morning. I'm still on the Daytona hangover, and we've got four more days ago. What time of day was this, Hogue? Three or four in the afternoon.

And there were a lot of people there? Oh, there was just random people coming into a drug story and doing with, you know, a small business. And I had never seen it. Dale was laughing pretty good. And the funny part was, Amy, was texting saying, I can hear you laughing almost. That's good stuff, man. Insighted. You can't get anywhere else.

I'm glad you brought this guy on board with J.R. Motorsports, Mike Davis. Hey, man. He's bringing us this stuff. insightful at all for what we're doing, but hey, it's funny that happened. All right. It was 12 years ago today that we lost the great Dale Earnhardt, and ever since then, February 18th has become a day of great significance for anyone associated with the sport that's a fan or involved in the sport or just sports in general. Certainly it's a very big day, especially for those that cheered for the number three, Mike.

That's right, Taylor. And, you know, two years ago, I remember Kelly Earnhardt did something really special for the 10th anniversary. She went into her family photo album. We got some never-before-seen photos that I had never seen. A lot of people never seen these things and shared them in a video that we posted on Dale Jr.com and it's actually still on there today if fans want to check it out. But, you know, ever since then, the family has really like embraced this day as one that we can smile and remember the character the big he was.

Yeah, today we're extremely honored to have in studio with us, Martha Earnhardt. Dale's mother, his sister, Kathy Earnhardt, Watkins. And on the phone in Pennsylvania is Kelly Earnhardt Miller to talk about the great intimidator, Dale Earnhardt. Kelly, let's start with you. Let's start with daughter. Dale Earnhardt as a father, I know that every day, I'm sure you think about him, but especially on days like today. Yeah, that's right to take the time to really celebrate his life. And you mentioned the word intimidator, and I think, you know, as a father, he was intimidating.

as well. And, you know, you always wanted to do right by him. He kept this in line for sure. And he was a tough father, but a loving father. But we definitely knew what the rules were and not to break them. So I was just thinking back on a funny story as the daughter of Dellerinhardt, and we could take all day to share a lot of those kind of stories. In my teenage years, he always said, well, you can't date unless I meet them. well, you know, everybody knows that the weekend is when they race, and the weekend is when you go on a date, right? So that was kind of hard.

So guess what? I never went on date. My goodness. That's understandable. Now. And then can you imagine meeting Dale Earnhardt? Like, you know, that would be. If you're the boyfriend.

Right. No, I don't want to imagine that. Chances are he would have worn, he would have still worn the glasses and worn black. So, yeah, that could have been incredibly intimidating. That's right. Do you actually have a story of when you brought a boyfriend home to meet your dad? Well, I really don't have one about when I brought one home because I didn't get that opportunity very often, but I do have one about me being somewhere I went with my dad and I were on the farm, and I had told him a project for school. And it was, I don't know, it was about 7, 7.30 at night and liked. We weren't boyfriend and girlfriend or anything, but I liked him.

And I was sitting at his kitchen table with his family, and his mom goes, she comes in and she said, your dad's at the door and he'd like to see you. Well, I mean, can you imagine the way I felt? It just so happened. He took this out of the way road home. It would not have been his door up to the front door. He knocked on the door. And I had to go out and get my car, and I was grounded for probably at least a month.

You're still grounded. Now, we're here with Martha. Yeah, that was quite funny. We're here with Martha, and I just, I have to call you. all because that's what everybody called you. That's fine. Now, Kelly's talking about how he was the intimidator even as a dad. Was he the intimidator as a son or were you the intimidator?

Well, Kathy's pointing to you. But he was in the neighborhood. He was in charge of the other kids. Oh, okay. I mean, they followed his lead, whatever, you know, whatever they were doing, riding tricycles, bicycles, or whatever. But I remember talking about Kelly, I was staying with them. weekend when Dale's gone to the race and I let a boy come over to see Kelly and of course

we never, his dad, her dad never knew about that but I, you remember that, you remember that? Mama, you were the bad influence in Kelly's life. Well, I was sitting right there with him the whole time. Oh, okay. I didn't let them get out of my sight. No funny business, nothing like that. Do you remember that, Kelly? I do remember that.

Yeah. I do. See, Mamma, I'll try to keep a little sense of normal things to us. I hear you. So you guys like to go to Mamma's house probably a little more. Well, I was actually staying at their house. Okay. Yes, you used to come to our house and stay on the lake with us quite a bit when Dad,

dream we're gone. Kathy Watkins, again, Dale's sister is here, and Kathy, mom here was saying that the intimidator ran the neighborhood, huh? Well, honestly, Dale ran things from the day he was born. My favorite story is. My favorite story is, you know, mom and dad, mother got pregnant the first time, and dad wanted a blonde-haired, blue-eyed girl, and he got Kay. Well, then, of course, the second baby, he wanted a boy and got me.

So I've always said when Dale was born, that Dale had my life, because I always wanted to be the boy, and so I tagged along, Dell and I were very close. And from the day he was born, it was like he was in charge. If we got a tricycle at Christmas, he took the wheels off of it and worked on. And if we got a wagon, he renovated it or souped it up and could aggravate you to death just to prove he could outrun you. From the day he was born, he wanted to be first and show you how he was always the fastest, he was always the best. And even as we got older and got boyfriends, he would aggravate him to death saying silly things just so the boys would chase him so he could prove he could outrun him. But he was in charge.

I was going to say this boyfriend topic here would apply to you as well because you would bring you know you have boyfriends growing up and what is the brother, is he the protective brother or is he, it sounds like he was the aggravating brother. He was actually running them off what he was. Goodness gracious. Well, to see the funny thing, there's only 14, 16 months between me and Dale. So we sort of grew up together with the same kind of things going on in our lives. And I will have to say we were very, very, very close.

until, of course, marriage and children, and then his life as a notorious race car driver sort of got in that way. So over the years, you lost that being able to have that personal contact with Dale, but you always knew it was there. He had the ability to tell you what to do and how to do it, but make a personal contact with you by looking you in the eye, even if there's thousands of people around. He was just that kind of person. And she always told him that she was supposed to be in the first boy, and he got her right.

So he loved to aggravate people, and the stories are unbelievable about that. I mean, everybody that knows him knows those stories, and he always had that grin on his face. Where did he get that grin from, Mamaw? From you or from Ralph? And it wasn't me. He did have his dad's green. Yeah, he did sort of a little sideways grin. Del Jr. does it sometimes.

I noticed Kelly does it. I've watched it in all of Dale's kids. See that same thing. His oldest child looks so much like it. Right, Carrie. Yeah, he sure does. Kelly, you pull tricks on people, too? I like to play around, but I think dad was the, he was definitely the prankster.

He was the leader, wasn't he? The driver, yeah, he was the leader. He taught us well, I guess. Ma'amah, what was a normal morning like when they were kids, like, from the time they woke up eating breakfast, getting them off to school, what was a normal morning like in the Earnhardt house? I don't think of a normal one. I get that's normal But it was fun

I was young I was young and so you know I didn't know no better They just sort of helped raise me too I don't think there was anything about that's life That was really normal because If people ask me that question all the time too Is you know

What was it like being his You know the daughter and You know we didn't have 9 to 5 jobs And family dinners at 530 and that kind of stuff It was you know With them being gone and having the career he did, it was just really different than the typical household. It was always something going on, and he never knew what to expect.

But growing up, at our table, they all had to be at our table at supper time or dinner time. They didn't get anything to eat. They had to be at the table. They had to be at the supper table, but nobody usually was sitting with us. What was his favorite food? We had to clean our plate, too. he loved vegetable soup and

I don't know Kelly what was his favorite food he always made a big deal I just remember going to little kitchen all the time for a little cheese dressing yeah blue cheese dressing these personal stories are wonderful but being his family

I'd also I think our audience would love to hear your favorite professional memory from from Dale Kathy let's start with you is there a favorite achievement that he had sort of a personal and professional I was lucky enough to be at the Daytona 500 when he won and as I said earlier as Dale's life blossomed you never got a long time you never got personal time even when he was there for

holidays there's 35 of us in the house and so you always felt like you sort of lost that personal connection well I I was lucky enough to go into Victory Lane for when he won the 500. And for a split second, I walked through that gate, and of all those hundreds of people in that victory lane, Del made out contact with me and said, there's my sister Kathy, and hug me and told me he loved me, and I felt like we were the only two people there. That is wonderful. That is wonderful. Kelly, how about you? For me, probably just, you know, being at the races and being, we went in a conversion and flip and until the race started you know we didn't even really just kids running around we

played track and just being kids mamma you could go way back I bet yeah I didn't get to be there when Dale won the Daytona race but he called me from the race track he was there for the first win at Bristol I'm talking about Daytona yeah but anyway he called me from the track and told and said mama finally won I said yeah I know I was watching but it. He won his first race at Bristol. They tried to get me to go on into the winter circle. I said, no. You didn't go?

Not until he got the checkered flag. I got you. I got you. I wasn't about to go in there. He got that checkered flag. But that had to be an unbelievable feeling because you experienced a lot of success with your husband and then also with your son. That had to be an unbelievable feeling.

Well, see, when my husband started driving, our oldest child, which was Kay's Kathy's older sister, she was about six months old when Ralph started driving a race car. And I was 18 years old. And I'm 82 down, so that's how long I've been in racing. My goodness. Hey, you know more about racing than any of us would put together. I tried it one time, but it didn't work out too. I love that story.

You want to tell it? I asked her for J.M. 360 last year. She was wearing a fire suit for a commercial that we were shooting with Carrie Dale Earnhardt, and I said, you know, this fire shoot, have you actually ever driven the car? and she said one time, and I could tell by her face that it wasn't a great experience. Tell us the story. Well, it was at Hickory Speedway, and Ralph put me in the race car. The car he was going to drive in the main event and put me in the race car and told me what to do.

He didn't let me practice or anything. Well, I was doing pretty good until I come off the turn, fourth turn, and the little car got up beside him and got me sort of squirrel, you know, when I run into the bank right in front of the grandstand where everybody could say. How much damage? Well, they had to fix it for him to drive. And him and another guy, Bud Alman, they had some cars together. And his wife, Bud's wife, was driving the other car.

Well, she wrecked it. So they had to take both cars and make him one to drive. The funny part, Mom's always said, Dad come checked out the car first and then stuck in there in the wind. in the wind and after was she okay? I was set right in. That's exactly what he did. He checked, looked at the car, see how bad it was hurting.

And he stuck ahead and went and said, well, are you okay? Priorities. Well, y'all are awful kind to be here today. And Martha and Kathy, we can't thank you enough for coming and sharing these stories. And Kelly, I really salute you for getting all of us together. And like you said, to celebrate Dale's incredible life because there are so many wonderful stories we could tell. Yeah, it is. And that's the great thing about his legacy is that the stories will go on and on,

and we have a shoot, a 24-7, 365 day a week show about it, for sure. Well, maybe that's the next show on Dirty-Modradio. All right, guys. We'll talk to y'all later. Thank you, Kelly. Kathy Watkins, Dale's sister, and Martha, aka Mamma Earnhardt, Dale's mom, we're so grateful you were here today. Thank you so much.

Thank you for having us. But we do need to finish with the white flag. All right, Taylor, Daytona practices resume Wednesday, and Dale Jr. will be there in the number 88 National Guard Chevrolet. Now, Wednesday night, Dale will be at the Performance Racing Network's annual Q&A appearance at Volusia Mall at 6.45 p.m. Eastern Time. It will also be on Motor Racing Network's NASCAR Live with Eli Gold at 7.20 p.m.

So check your local listings for that. You've got the Gatorade Dual 150s on Thursday. Junior's in the first race at 2 p.m. on Speed Channel. On Friday, you have Nationwide Series Qualifying, Taylor. Saturday you've got drive for C-OPD 300 nationwide series race at 1 p.m. Juniors in the number 88 tax slayer.com. Sheverleigh. Hey, this tax season, don't forget.

And Sunday, the Great American Race, the 55th running of the Daytona 500. Dale Jr. will start his day with a live Q&A at the team Chevy stage at 10 a.m. And that is open to the public. Finally, Taylor, this week is my wife's birthday, and I need present ideas. Maybe I'll get ma'am ought to give you something. You can't ever go wrong with a spa package. For Mike Davis, I'm Taylor Zarser. This has been the Dale Jr. Download.

Thanks for listening to Dirty Mo Radio.