The Dale Jr. Download - 172 - Dale Jr., Jimmie Johnson Talk About Their Richmond Run-In

Episode Date: May 2, 2017

Dale Earnhardt Jr. invites Jimmie Johnson on to the show to discuss their incident at Richmond. Earnhardt also talks about the reaction he received to his retirement news, whether or not Kyle Larson is the last true racer, shares memories from his Talladega victories and answers fan questions during the weekly Ask Jr. segment. 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.

This is Dale Jr. And you're listening to Dirty Moe Radio. Hey, everybody. It's Dale Jr. Back again for another episode of the download. And we are in the Dirty Moe Radio studio. Exaltes Studio. By Exaltz.

Yeah. Presented by Exhafter. However you want to say it. It's the Exaltza studio. All right. A junior mayor sports. Okay. I like it.

And I'm Tyler Overs Street. He is Tyler Overs Street. We got a nice group of fans that came out today. We have a, we have, we have, You know, obviously the studio is here at Junior Motorsports in the corner of the gift shop. So if you guys want to come out here and watch us record, please do. We got a special treat for everybody later in the show. Should we tell them now?

We can tell them now. Okay. We got Jimmy Johnson. We're going to call him up. Call him up. And we're going to talk to Jimmy about... We need answers. A few things.

All right, so let's talk about the Richmond race. I sat on the periscope after the race, the post-race pariscope that I do on my Twitter. handled Dale Jr. We weren't going to talk about this. For very long. That was in parentheses. Okay. Well, we finished 30th?

Yeah. That's terrible. I'm sick of it. I think of any dumb thing could happen this year. It's happened. Yeah. And we're only nine races in. Yep.

We got our third speeding penalty of the season. I didn't know we had that many. That's a lot. Yeah. I know for a whole season. Atlanta, Martinsville, and then Richmond. We should have probably, instead of calling Jimmy, have called Travis Peterson, who sets up my dash for me and ask him...

Oh, yeah, the engineer. Yeah, ask him about this rash of speeding penalties we've had this season. Yeah, because during that caution, you said, I guess the lights aren't right today, losing a lot of fate in this. All right, so this is how it works. We don't have a speedometer. We really don't have a tachometer anymore. I have lights on the dash, and they start with...

They start green, then they turn yellow. there's basically like four green lights, two yellow lights, two orange lights, and then red lights. And they all kind of light up just like a RPM bar would. So you kind of, you know, you're going down pit road. If you're in, if you've got just green lights, you're going too slow. If you have two yellow lights, you're going the speed limit, all right? Or just under breaking the speed limit. So two yellow lights should be safe.

When we have a pit road that has a bend in it, you run two, orange lights. And that should be safe. Anytime you see any red lights, you're speeding. That's how that's it. That's as simple as it is. So from inside the car, I have a simple job. And you go out there and you do that job and you get called for speeding.

And it was the last section. So it was in a bend. Yeah, it was in a bend. You know, it's just, we're pushing it, being aggressive on the lights. And maybe we need to be a little more conservative until we can put together some solid finishes. Yeah, because at that point you were running like eighth or night. Yeah, I mean, one mile an hour on pit road in the last segment is not making or breaking our race.

We need to be a little more conservative, I think. And I don't want to have to do that inside the car. If they're asking me to run two yellow lights down pit road, I don't want to run just one. You want to maximize it. Yeah, I want to just run two yellow lights. We should probably just be a little more conservative. We'll see how that works out. I'm going over to HMS today.

something we'll probably definitely talk about in our team meeting. But we need to stop doing that. We had contact with Jimmy Johnson. Jimmy and I will talk about that later in the race, so we won't really get into this too much. Obviously, we had a conversation outside of the car once we got to pit road, and he didn't see us. Didn't know we were there.

But prior to that, I think we've said on this show, like we've got to be aggressive with the pit calls and whatnot. And y'all were, like, staying out there. You were one of two cars that had stayed out for a long, long time, So you're being aggressive on the pit crawl, hoping for a caution, and then ended up being involved in the caution. Yeah, I was fine with the strategy to stay out there. It wasn't really hurting us.

We had moved to the top. That was actually a really good run for us. We had made a change right before that particular run that I loved, and the car was pretty competitive. Everybody was coming to pit road, and the guys that had all pitted pretty much the whole field had pitted, except for a few of us. They had all began to slow down.

And, you know, their cars were, you know, falling off like they typically do. And we, and, you know, the speed we were running compared to them wasn't that bad. So it was going to work out for us to stay out on the racetrack. And, you know, had that, you know, had we continued to run, I believe we had got the caution we were looking for, that would have given us opportunity to come down pit road in the top five, hopefully leaving pit road in the top five and, you know, getting an opportunity at a great to finish. So Richmond was the first race since your announcement last week. That's right.

Obviously, we recorded our podcast before the announcement before people knew. So what was the reaction, like the people that came to you? Everybody just said congratulations, which I think is a – a lot of people don't know whether to say congratulations or that they're sad or, you know, it's – Even some of the drivers and people that are working in the industry are like, I'm not sure exactly what to say to you. But most people say congratulations, which is something that you don't expect to hear. I don't know. I mean, everybody's been real positive.

People say, you know, people are saying some pretty incredible things about what you may have did or how you've impacted their career. That's always incredible to hear. you don't really take stock or inventory of maybe all the folks in this industry that you've had contact with or influence of. And so when you hear about what, like Elliot, Sattler, you know, him making mention of what the impact of our relationship has had on him, it's incredible to hear that. Because you don't really have those opportunities or take the time, I guess, to share that information with each other. So to hear those things is incredible. the fans have been real supportive obviously a lot of them would love us to keep racing

you know my heart you know would love to keep racing for till you know till the end of time racing's a lot of fun probably the funest thing that I'll ever have the experience of you know the pleasure you're doing and but it's been great the reaction's been good we were talking about this also on the periscope this is something that really was interesting to me Kyle Larson the last true racer is that got got to to be the name of his movie when they make a movie about Carl Larson? Maybe. The last true racer.

That would be a good, like, a documentary name? Yeah, it would be a good movie. So Kyle, Super Guy. Yeah. All right. And very talented, obviously, showing his... In everything he drives. Pretty much, yeah.

So this is, quote, there are other drivers in the cup level that go on their off weekends and run other types of racing and stuff. They don't race nearly as much as I do outside of NASCAR. and I would race a lot more if I was allowed to. That's why I feel like I'm the last true racer. I like that you emphasize the last true racer. Well, it reminds me of the movie that they made about Junior Johnson called The Last American Hero. Oh.

So I just like saying it. Maybe it'll be a sequel. Yeah. So he says he would race more if he was allowed to. And what he means by that is that Gannasi puts a cap on how much he can race. That's understandable. There's sprint cars that he likes to race. Yeah, they're concerned about his potential to get injured.

or what have you. He means a lot and it's worth a lot to that team, so they have to kind of... If you're at Kyle Busch who races all kinds of NASCAR and kind of gets ridiculed about, oh, I race X amount of X-Finity races, X amount of truck races, he'll go run late models, super late models, and he kind of gets ridiculed for it. But he's a racer. He just doesn't race on dirt. Yeah.

So I would think Kyle Busch is a true. racer. I mean, you're a true racer. You show up 38 weekends. I think what he means is, okay, we got another quote here that may spell it out for you. I would love to race any type of vehicle, whether it's in a circle or a straight line or a road course, I don't care. I just feel like I think like Andretti and Foy and Tony Stewart. I feel like I'm in the same category as them. They would race anything every day of the week. Like I said, there's a couple that will race here and there, but I would race every day of the week if I could. That's why I feel like I'm the last true racer.

So the diversity of what he races. I think that's what he's getting at is he says, you know, a driver sprint car, he'd race N.5.00. He would race a Pikes Peak, he'll climb. He would race a soapbox derby. Apparently he would raise a dragster. He would race dragsters if he could. That'd be fun.

So, like you compared him to Kyle Bush, and Kyle Busch runs mostly, you know, strictly stock cars, you know, like trucks and... A similar discipline. Yeah. You know, he mentioned Andretti, speaking probably of Mario. Yep. AJ Foight ran a lot of stock car races, won some stock car races. Mario and Reddy won a Daytona 500.

Tony Stewart ran in all types of vehicles as well. There's been a handful of drivers that have been able to do that. I kind of have to agree with Kyle Larson that he may be, he is a true racer. Is he the last? I don't know. Hopefully he's not the last. I don't think, I hope he's not the last. Yeah. I think there'll be guys like him down the pipe.

Christopher Bell seems like he'll run some sprint cars and all kinds of stuff. A lot of things that, you know, Kyle Larson races is able to race all these different types of cars because of his, he has the leverage to and the means, the sponsorship means or the financial means to do it. Yeah, like he has his own sprint car. A guy like, I mean, look, you know, Casey Kane has a sprint car team, runs a racer too, but he's even more limited to running outside of his cup car than Kyle Larson. Like Rick, I know Rick does not want Casey Kane running his sprint car. I think if I was a car owner, I probably wouldn't want the driver to run a sprint car.

Those things are pretty scary. Yeah. I think Kyle Larson, I think there's more true racers out there than Kyle may think. I'd like to say. You named Christopher Bell. Yep. Like if Christopher Rebell, he doesn't have the leverage of the financial means to be able to go do whatever he wants to do. But if he becomes very, if he gets lucrative opportunity financially in the Cup Series,

then he gets that leverage and he might be able to go ahead and take control of that. Yeah. You know, be able to run type of all kinds of stuff? You think Kyle Larson will ever run the Indy 500? Sure. I believe he will. I bet he run it within the next three or four years. I do too.

Plus the fact that he's with Gannasi. You know, Nassie has the... That's one of the top two teams. The only thing about, you know, I think another roadblock for these guys is, and I'm not real sure about, you know, how true this is, but sometimes, like, I'm not sure about Gnassi. What is Gnassi's IndyCar teams? Are this Chevrolet?

No, Honda. Right. So that in itself presents a roadblock for Kyle. manufacturer yeah yeah the manufacturer when I was racing for National Guard Ray Hall yep was also racing with National Guard and he was like hey man come drive my car but I couldn't because they weren't the same model same make so Chevy wouldn't want me going and driving which is understandable yeah so the in the 70s and 80s guys would you know you could do that manufacturers didn't have that much control over what

the drivers could do we didn't have personal social service agreements with all the manufacturers to lock us into these kind of deals and put these roadblocks up. So, you know, there's a lot more to it than just having the desire. Yeah. There's a lot of obstacles to overcome. A lot of legalities. Yes.

But I do believe Kyle Larson will run ND500 before he hangs up his helmet. Looking at it this weekend, we're going to Talladega, which is considered Earnhardt Country. Six wins in the Cup series. one win as a driver in Xfinity. I know JRM is won two, so you've got two as an owner in Xfinity. I have more than that as an owner. Yeah, Chance 2 won three in a row or four in a row.

You forget that I own Chance 2. I know. Well, I looked it up yesterday, and it said Dailer & Hart Incorporated, so I didn't know which one was considered which. You're trying to weasel me out of some successes. Tarnish your owner record. but so Taladega is a awesome track

do you have any specific memories that you'd like to talk about uh four in a row yeah that was pretty cool you know it was almost five in a row and this really still ticks me off um we were coming around turn three and four and i was side drafting jeff Gordon and i was literally like another hundred yards from being in the lead we were side drafting him and the 25 spun out and they froze the field as soon as the 25's car went sideways

that was their you know that was the way they did it back then as the wreck was starting to happen that's when they froze the field and so Jeff got the win remember throwing all the water bottles and beer cans at him yeah he was driving like a Star Wars car or something he was in the Pepsi car Pepsi car maybe maybe but I do remember that would have been freaking five in a row and then he won the next race which would have made it six in a row How about that shit? That's the word that got you in trouble when you won that fifth race. Oh, was it?

Yeah. Whenever you said shit in Victory Lane. Well, it's frowned upon. That's also another good memory. I thought... Was that a good memory? Yeah, because... Okay, so Janet Jackson started this, you know, big mess with the FCC and with Justin Timberlake and the halftime show for the Super Bowl.

So anytime anything even remotely out of bounds happened on TV, people were getting fined left and right, right? So you're blaming Janet Jackson? This is a story I'm telling you. So that's what started it all. So that's why NASCAR makes the need-jerk reaction to penalize me. But before that, Johnny Sauter said the word shit on. in an interview after getting wrecked in a truck race,

maybe a week or so before the Talladegh race. But his was in a negative manner. You're going to tell a story for me. So that's exactly what my point. So he's out of the car, angry, mad, and he says that, and he gets penalized. And then I said it in like a moment of celebration, and that was my argument with Helton. I was like, man, I didn't say it as a, you know, derogatory mean in a mean way.

I was like celebrating. I can't believe you guys are going to penalize me for, you know, being excited. But you can say shit now in an interview and not get penalized. What is, you know, and nothing really has changed. I mean, it's not like, it's just public perception. It's funny to me how the thing with Janet Jackson had everybody on edge and NASCAR included was watching their ass. So when we said those, you know, we said that in Victor Lane, we get penalized. but now it's okay.

How did that negotiation process with Elton go? He called me and I was on vacation. He called me and said, I'm going to penalize you and I was having, I was on vacation so I didn't care. I was like, all right. Time, yeah. I mean, I wasn't going to let nothing like that go and ruin my vacation, man. Yeah, that's true.

Yeah. The one cool memory that I have from Talladego was last fall, obviously you weren't in the race, but we rode in that big truck. Oh, yeah. So that's maybe going to be a little weird this weekend, like standing on Pitt Road, watching it go by. You want to ride in it again? No.

Okay. I've done that. I didn't really have a seat in that because I was trying to video it for our social media. It seemed very unsafe, but it was a cool experience. Yep, it was pretty fun. Well, we'll do it again. Next year. Next year?

Yeah, let's do it. Maybe you could drive it next year. Are you capable of driving something like that? Yeah. Okay. You think things are way too difficult. That guy was shifting gears and stuff. I don't know that you've drove a.

big truck like that. Shifting gears. I shift gears all the time. They're not the same. They're the same. No, they're not. Yes, they are. Gears are gears.

So you're going to drive, you could drive the 88 hauler? Sure. I'm going to negotiate that for you. This is going to be very anti-climactic when I can drive, when I drive it up and down the road and back. Yeah. You're going to be like, okay. You're going to drive it, no, down the interstate around other cars.

Fine. It won't be. It's not going to be as exciting and daring as you think. Okay. All right, so we went on a cycling ride in Richmond. This is the first time that I rode with Matt Kenseth and Jamie McMurray, big-time cyclers. Is Matt? Matt's huge in cycling.

All right, so I ride with Jimmy every Friday pretty much in between practice and qualifying. Jimmy's real cool about, you know, understanding that I'm a novice, definitely not as strong as he is and fast up the heels and stuff. So when we ride, we kind of all stay together pretty easy going. Now, Mackenzie is not as accommodating. It just goes. Yeah. So a couple times I got chunked off the back of the group, and I'd have to catch them at the next stoplight.

Is it like in NASCAR when you lose the draft? Yes, it's hard. So when you're in draft, you really feel like you're working only half is hard because, you know, you just kind of tuck in behind the guy that's in front of you and you really don't have to pedal that hard. You can feel it in your legs immediately as soon as you get in behind somebody that your legs are burning like crazy.

Even going uphill? No, well, not really. Uphill is going to be a load. Okay, I figured. But when you lose a draft, you're screwed. It was me, Chase, Casey Kane, McMurray, Kenseth, and Jimmy Johnson and my pilot, Jeff Melton.

And pretty much everybody in that group's a serious rider, except for chasing me. And I hung in there. It was tough. but when Matt Kansas leads, I'm in trouble because he don't care if I fall off the back. He just keeps going and don't look back. Is he like a seasoned pro like Jimmy,

like been riding for years? Yeah, he's been riding for a while and he does a lot of mountain biking, which is actually pretty tough. And I think that's where he gets most of his strength. McMurray uses the peloton bike. He has one of those indoor peloton bikes. Amy has one too.

So Jamie rides that all winter long When's Amy going to join the group? I got her a bike that I borrowed, and I'm trying. I'm going to try to get her to the bike shop this week to get geared up, and maybe see if we can't tool around the neighborhood a little bit and see what she thinks. She's interesting. Oh, interesting. There you go.

She's intrigued. She says that she's worried that if, you know, she's like, man, you're not, you know, you're going to leave me or you're going to, I'm not going to be as fast as you and you're going to run off. I'm like, I'm going to run off and leave you. Like, I'll just dial it back a little bit. But Matt Kenseth, he would leave her. Yeah. Man, Matt. It's terrible when he takes the lead of the peloton, it's bad.

So whose call is that? Like, all right, going to the front? Matt's really impatient, so he just gets in the front all the time. He's like, we're going too slow. I'm leading. Damn. Then everybody's out of breath. Even Jimmy?

Even Jimmy. Damn. Yep. So anyways, we're going to talk about that a little bit more with Jimmy on the call-in. Ten minutes with Jimmy coming up after a while. Yep. That should be a new segment. Ten minutes with Jimmy.

We're going to do ten minutes. That's what we're going to call all of our interviews. Ten minutes with whoever. All right, so we got Jimmy Johnson on the line. He is in Colorado. Jimmy, you go to Colorado all the time. Yeah, we've got a place out here. We're back to North Carolina and get back into the regular grind.

But I've always wanted to be a ski bomb. And we spent the winter out here. with the kids in school and we're near at the end of our stay and head of Charlotte. So what time is it out there? 5.54. And what are you doing right now? I was on my trainer on Zwift, getting a right in before the day started and had to get the kids to school. someday you'll be done recently.

So in order to stay fit, there are some days I've just got to get up. I was on the bike when you texted and glad to be on your podcast. Yeah, man, I appreciate you. This is our, you're actually our first interview, right? Ever, ever. Yeah. So we've had, how many shows? This is the 12th show.

12th show and you're our first interview. Obviously, we had a pretty inventful race on Sunday. And it was, you know, is what it is. Is your mom okay with me? Yeah, she just, she's a tremendous. Mom's good. I have to, I love it. She texts me after every race, and usually they're pretty funny.

She doesn't mean to be funny. but she just new to social media. She's not on Twitter or anything like that. And she's new to texting, to be honest with you. So as you can tell by her shorthand. But it's funny to share with folks what she says sometimes because, I don't know, she's kind of, yeah, she's old school and been around racing a long time. So it's pretty funny. But, yeah, she's fine.

And we're all good. Fans like think that whenever we have a run in that we're going to get mad at each other. but teammates don't get mad at the time though were you man no um you know you know as wild as it was i knew it wasn't a must i knew it wasn't like he just wasn't giving me room um i knew how hard we hit i was like he didn't even know i was there so it wasn't like me and jeff uh ran into each other at bristler i ran into jeff really and cut his left retire now that he was mad yeah ev was his crew chief and so that's understandable understandable, but I knew when we hit that Jimmy had no clue that I was even there.

I think we were both pretty shocked. I was, yes, and you were too. I was completely shocked. You didn't know anymore than I did. I was on my green flag stop. They gave me a water bottle, and we have that little pouch on the side for our hat and our glasses. The water bottle is I hit the brakes going into turn one. It's trying to come out of that pouch and go under my pedals.

So for five or seven last wherever I was out there, I've got one hand on braking holding a water bottle. And I think that's where I didn't hear my spotter telling me that there was a car on the outside as I was going into the corner. And then I didn't see anything off the turn, just assuming that I knew that you were there and you were going to. And I clearly came out to the wall with all intentions to have the entire racetrack to myself. Yeah.

Well, it's pretty funny. reading some of the fans comments on Twitter. I don't really see everything, and I'm sure you don't either. There's so much information flying at me. Well, half of them just fell my name wrong, so I think the old football coach ends up getting haze to death when something like this happens.

How many championships do you think you've got to win before they learn how to spell your name? I know, right? It's terrible. It is. It's funny. I did it one time. I never even thought about it.

And me and Jimmy and our other teammates were doing this, we were doing some media for HMS, and we're sitting down, filming some video, and we had to write, we had to write each driver's name on a piece of paper, and it was, we got posed to question about maybe who's the best plate racer or something like that, and I wrote Jimmy's name on my piece of paper, but I spelled it with a Y, and right in front of him, so, and he grabs a piece of paper and spells it properly for me. That was pretty embarrassing. But, and so never, you have an easy name. I know, never again, will I make that mistake?

So Jimmy... I've been called far worse, son. Yeah. A lot of folks have really been picking up on our fitness program. We've been doing a lot of cycling and a lot of cool technology and posting all kinds of stuff on social media. It's been a blast. And I've been trying to tell people kind of how all that started

and who was spearheading this, and that was you in the all season. So talk to us a little bit about fitness and, and why you think that's so critical to not just yourself personally, but your career and decisions you make inside the race car. Yeah, for me, I mean, years ago, I knew that I needed to do more, you know, from an athletic standpoint. And I've got this great, you know, kind of honor and privilege to drive a race car for a living. And just in my heart, I knew I wasn't doing everything that I should.

So I started with a weights program, and then it led into, triathlon and not being outdoors. And once I got to the outdoor side and started riding and running and got in the pool, you know, the discipline that it took to figure those things out, instantly I saw it cross over to my day job. And I started making better decisions with how I used my day, what I did, started feeling better. And I honestly felt that I started being more alert and aware in the car and just better all around.

So, you know, typically when I get into something, I fall, you know, fall in health. head first that I have and I've been there for quite a while and it's been cool to have you know the support from Hendrik Motorsports to kind of start a program and try to get everybody up and going and we've been obviously able to get Jamie on into work with with all the drivers and I've worked with him for a lot of years so he understands the schedule and routine and then I just have to commend you and Chase and Casey for for being so open-minded to it our crew chiefs as well they're involved on a lot of these things. And I think everybody can see the benefits once you experience it firsthand. I'm sure it makes you stronger, makes you better in the car. But I think there's a mental side to it from a discipline

side when you're suffering on the bike. It's like suffering in the car. And then obviously being outside and you've lived this for so many years, you know, on a Saturday in Richmond, what would you normally do? Yeah, you just sit around the bus and hang out all day. And we went out and saw, you know, all kinds of cool stuff. So it's good for the brain in a lot of ways. Yeah, I appreciate you pushing us as hard as you had. You loan me a bike about 10 months ago. It finally, it took me about eight months to convince myself to get on it. But I really, I think it was two years and eight months. Or a year and eight months. Right. I really enjoyed it, man. I really have, you know, we don't all spend enough time together outside of, you know, when we see each other to race track.

and obviously in the meetings and stuff. So it's awesome to be able to do things recreationally with your teammates and the people that you work with. We get to really talk about things outside of racing. I love the social aspect of the cycling, which I had no idea with such a social activity. Yeah. And all the technology, too, you know, the relive app that you showed me the other day

where you basically can post on social media and show everyone exactly where you're riding. Really cool. The community on Strava is incredibly supportive. Everybody's really, it's an accountability aspect or there's a part of accountability and encouragement that goes on in the fitness community that's really special. As a matter of fact, today we, you'll be calling in, you're in Colorado, but today me and Chase and Jamie Yon, our coach, we're going to go. run after lunch. Awesome.

I have a question for you, since I'm new to the fitness. I'm going to eat lunch. How do I not throw up my lunch if I go run right after lunch? You just don't eat much. Don't eat much. Be careful. All right. No.

Now snack further out and then just eat lightly or, you know, keep hydrating. But yeah, running is probably the most brutal. You can eat and ride. Eating and swimming really doesn't go too well. Right. But running and eating just, yeah, you'll, you'll, you'll visit that food again. That's been a struggle for me as far as how to position the food when I'm supposed to eat

and then when I'm supposed to work out because typically they kind of go hand in hand. You're going to eat dinner and go work out. But a lot of times, like you say, you revisit that food. Yeah, just sit on a sports drink too. That's what those things are designed for. Honestly, Gatorade's four of carbohydrates and some calories. And that's a great way. Your stomach does better on fluids than solids for whatever reason.

So, except on some of that and it'll be good. All right, bud, well, that's 10 minutes with Jimmy Johnson. I appreciate you letting us give you a call today in Colorado. I hope you have a good week. We'll see you in Talladega, buddy. Thanks, brother. See you soon. Later.

If you love Dale Jr., then Exaltor Racing is your go-to social media account on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter. It brings you Insiders info all weekend long on the 88 team. It's at Exaltor Racing, a must follow for any Dale Jr. fan. All right, guys, we're going to get to our Ask Junior questions. These are questions that we received on Twitter using the hashtag Ask Junior. Mike Davis has joined us here in the Exalta Studios. We're going to get right to it. All right, fellas, you ready?

Yes. So I want to lead off with the first question that we did receive on Twitter. Have you thought, Dale, ever – have you ever thought about asking Tony Stewart to go on one of your bike rides? No. Why wouldn't you? Because he probably doesn't cycle, and he's probably imposterous. to convince. It doesn't hurt to ask.

Yeah. I know my, I know my limitations on being able to sell something like that to him, and it's probably impossible. So why waste your time? You know, though, it would be good content. In fact, if you do this 10-minute interviews, your 10 minutes could be 10 minutes of trying to convince Tony to do bike riding. Yeah.

Really? Yeah. Yeah. Are you periscoping the periscope? I'm periscoping the periscope. Well, that seems redundant. Yeah. Yeah, why would they watch the Dirty Moe Periscope if they're going to watch yours?

That's a great question, and the answer is they wouldn't. We're competing. They wouldn't watch it. Look on Mike's face. That's a good question there, Tyler. All right, let's go to the next question for the tens of you that are watching this now. Pitman Harley asked, will you please continue podcasting after you retire? Yeah.

We've got that question from a lot of people. I'm going to retire from life? Yeah. They missed that quote last week when we talked about not retiring from life. Like, are you going to podcast? Are you still going to be on social media? Yeah. That's good news.

All right. Helen J.50 asks, you get the trophy in the check for winning a race. What does your spotter and crew get? Hmm. I really don't know what their deal is. They probably don't know my deal either. So it's, we've been meaning to ask them what they get all these years. We should.

We're going to get 10 minutes with Adam Jordan. Yeah. Adam, what do you get when we win? You know, TJ would tell you. Oh, oh, oh, oh, if he'll tell you what you're being wrong. No, no, no, no, that's it. They get a bonus anytime anybody in any, either car in the shot wins. So even when Jimmy wins, our team gets a bonus.

The 4888 shot. Yeah. Right. Okay. So if I win, you know, 48 guys also. The whole shop, sort of. You remember when Lowe's was doing that gift card? Gift cards.

Man, a lot of people did some home improvement projects over the years on that team. Plate Race 88 asks, are you hunting turkey with a bow or shotgun on your upcoming trip? I only hunt with a bow. All right. But I'm probably going to do shotgun this time since you ask. Changing it up. Oh, gosh. Plate Race 88 has a lot of influence in your life.

Ray Hosten asked. Would you and Amy ever consider a reality show focused on retired life and all good things you do off the track? Man, I don't know. There probably isn't enough money to make me do a reality show. Really? I'm just seen those destroy so many lives. That's true. Name me one family or marriage or anything that survived a reality show.

I want to really take this seriously. I mean, I'm not asking two reality show aficionados, but... No. All right. Hulk Hogan didn't last. Nope. John Forrest and his wife, that was my all-time favorite reality show. They were sort of...

What did he say? They liked each other. They didn't love each other. They're still married. I don't know. The show probably created some struggles. Yeah. Who else?

You know, it didn't do well for... Jessica Simpson. Nope. The Osbournes didn't... You're right. Don't do it. I think we just don't do it. I think we just have to answer the question.

There's not an amount of money that we would do that. It seems like that the reality TV show, you're going to have to make some sacrifices. And one of them might be your sanity. That's right. All right, let's move on here. You know what? I'm going to tease this. While it's not a reality show, Dale Jr. will be announcing soon a television project, a television series project.

You're going to hear first? No, no. I said I'm going to tease it. That's all I'm going to say. Well, I know, but you're going to hear the tease first here? Yeah. Sure. I guess you did.

There will be a television project that's going to be announced soon, possibly even today, but it'll probably be next week. And that'll be so. Just all you got to say is this, Dale. Are you excited about it? I am. All right. That's all we're going to tell them. Hey, we're doing a TV show.

That's it, for now. It's called a tease for a reason. That is called a tease. Yeah. All right. Let's see here. Copeland, Zach, ask, what do you attribute to having such continued success at restrictor plate tracks? What?

What do you attribute your restrictor plate track success? I can see the air. What does it look like? Sometimes it's clean, sometimes it's dirty. Hey. Is it the same air you see when you're cycling? Yes. It is.

Yes. I'm learning quite a bit about drafting and cycling. do you think that you're going to take anything you've learned from cycling to Tau Legga this week? I knew somebody would ask that. I just didn't think it would be you. I am. Oh, really? What is that?

Well, I don't want to tell everybody my secrets. So if Matt Kenseth gets ahead of and we're screwed. See you. He's like, Matt don't slow down for nothing. All right. I don't know really what, I think that, you know, I don't know why we seem to have some of success other than these things. obviously I need the car to do certain I need the car to be a certain way

so the car's got to be great and when you don't you know when your car isn't able to do the things you want it to do you're not going to be able to you know look as good so the car's a key component it has to have certain

attributes attributes and abilities and I know what I'm looking for so I can communicate to the crew chief whether it's doing those things or not. So maybe some guys don't know exactly what they're looking for in their car or what they need their car to do. So there's that.

Obviously going in there with a lot of confidence. If you feel confident about making moves, you're going to make them. If you don't have confidence in making a move, a lot of times you think twice about it and someone else makes that move before you and takes that opportunity away from you. So maybe having the confidence,

confidence to be able to make moves on instinct and trust it is a big deal. You see that plate racing seems to, you seem to have the same guys up front. Like I list a couple guys that I think always seem to show up at the front of the races. One of them is like people, sometimes it's guys that you don't think of as some of the, the best in the business overall. But like Jamie McMurray always runs up front in the cup races. He always finds

his way to the front. Kurt Busch always seems to find his way towards the front of the pack. One of Daytona 500 this year. There's a handful of guys, Denny Hamlin, he's one of the best plate racers out there. Joe Lugano always seems to find his way to the front

at the plate races. Those races and that style of racing seem to fit certain personalities. Certain people seem to always do well there. So I think it also has something to do with your, you know, the personality you have.

Your approach. If you go in, hate it. Like Mark Martin always said he hated it. Yeah. He never liked restricted. Right, right. And he didn't win Marybony anymore. Yeah.

All right. Let's see. Precon 40 asks, what is the most heart-touching present that a fan has ever given you during your career. Oh, yeah, this is a good one. I was, a fan gave me one of my dad's driving suits.

So it was from his I-Rock days. And I guess, so if you have a Dillenhardt driver suit in your closet, is your first instinct to give it to me? Probably not. It's probably, wow, I got this badass driver suit. I'm going to hang it up in my house or put it in my man cave or maybe I walk around in the house with it on. so I was floored that this fan was going to give up this incredible suit and let me have it.

I just couldn't believe it. And he didn't want anything other than just a picture with me. It wasn't, you know, some people will reach out to us and say, hey, man, I got this truck. Dale Earnhardt used to own. His name's on the title. How much Dale want to pay for it? And we don't ever buy anything, right? So we're like, yeah, if you're wanting to sell it, you might as well just hang on to it.

or sell it to someone else because I'm not into buying the stuff. So I was blown away this guy was going to give it to me. I just couldn't believe it. I almost brought me to tears. This happened to Indy last year. It was walking through the garage. A guy walked up. He was almost in tears.

Handed it to me. And then I was almost in tears. It's a really good moment. I was there. Yeah. How was there? Were you almost in tears? No, I was actually in shock.

Yeah. I was like, holy crap. Where did you get it? And it's legit. I was looking at it pretty legit so that kind of stuff like that is really cool Kevin Harvick had an autographed die cast that my dad had signed for him and Harvick gave that to me thought that was pretty thoughtful I remember that that was very thoughtful and it meant a lot to Harvard to give it to me yep yeah I remember that yep very cool um how questions coming in all

over the place so don't answer this somebody's uh asked well what's the what's the crap you thing somebody's ever given you. So I don't know that that's a good answer. So we'll just move on. What's the crappiest thing? Are you asking me? I don't know. I don't know what the, I mean.

Probably a cold. Let's see here. How do you find, oh, here we go. How do you find your next driver for either your late model or Xfinity series team? Oh, man. Well, sometimes these kids come to us and they have some. financial support and we'll look at their resume and decide you know whether we think that they they would be someone we'd like to spend some time with and

obviously you know we don't we don't want to take somebody to the racetrack year week after week after week that we don't feel like can be competitive it certainly helps that they have their own financial support or sponsorship backing them but we obviously try to partner with somebody we feel like can can help us win races and we can have you know our guys that are working on the car can have a lot of fun with uh that's part of it that's that'll be one of that you know we have two cars typically that's what one that's what takes up one car the other car uh we had a sponsorship with and we've struggled to find a replacement since they've left uh but that's car josh barry drives and i you know

i believe in josh i believe in his talent and we're going to try to keep working with him until we hopefully get an opportunity to get him in a truck or an Xfinity car for multiple race deal. And you just work on that and keep on working and keep on hoping that something's going to come together. Eventually, you know, if it doesn't come together, and this has happened in the past, Josh has to make a decision whether he's going to continue trying to put together deals to drive cars or maybe he wants to become a mechanic or an engineer or something like that.

We worked with a guy as a driver for a really long time, and he is now a crew chief in the Xfinity series. His name is Richard Boswell. Richard used to run my late models and then our K&N car and Hooters Pro Cup. And eventually, you know, time ran out. You know, you just kind of know when you got to make a decision to do what's right for your family. And Boswell became a full-time engineer here at Junior Murder Sports. got out of the driver's seat and now he's a crew chief over at Haas

for their affinity team. So that's kind of, it's either going to work out for Josh or he's going to have to eventually make that choice. That's tough, tough crossroads to come to but hopefully we'll get him an opportunity. We've got a few more years to push and push and try to make something happen.

All right, we've had a couple questions here about what you're going to plan on doing after retirement. Would you consider being a Redskin season ticket holder? I don't know. I mean, probably not because I still want to work. So I'm not, you know, hopefully I'm at the racetrack on the weekends working. There you go. Here's an interesting question.

I just, whoever asked it, it went away too quickly, but it's a good question. Do you wish that NASCAR had a dollar cap to make it more affordable for race teams? That'd be hard to monitor. I mean, it would. It would be. But let's just think hypothetically. I mean, if there was some sort of way to figure that out. I think that would be cool.

you mean what they can spend financially on research and engineering or is it like a driver salary or i think all-encompassing yeah i'm getting a headache it'd be difficult it'd be so hard to monitor though yeah it would be it is um impossible b t nelson 325 asks when are you going to ride shotgun with trucker squiggs again our truck driver on 88 we just talked about that Oh, did you? Yep. I think I'm going to go with him again to Daytona in July. I like that trip.

So that's the plan. We won last time that you did that. Driving a nationwide patriotic scheme, the black one with the American flag on the bottom. That was a good one. Good looking car. What are you most looking forward to with retirement? Honeydew list, free time, family time? Very vague.

Yeah. What am I most looking forward to in retirement? I think that, yeah, I'm most looking forward to the next opportunity. You know, what's going to be career number two and, you know, how can I, you know, how can I be good at it? How can I be successful? There's a lot of things that are exciting. Obviously, you know, being a little more involved in junior motorsports, continuing our podcast and growing this business with you, Mike. Oh, man.

That means a lot. exciting. Other opportunities outside of racing. We'll have the opportunity, just like you said, we've got TV show coming up we're going to announce. Things like that are going to be fun as they present themselves, and we kind of bet through what things we can do, want to do. A lot of cool stuff, a lot of cool opportunities.

I think people are going to be interested. I'm asking the question. I don't care. What do you order when you go to Taco Bell? Two chicken soft tacos, two beef soft tacos. There you go. Lots of mild sauce. Gross.

What do you get? Is that gross? I just don't go to Taco Bell. I haven't ate Taco Bell in like five years. Amy got it yesterday. I would go there because that's the only place you can get that. I know it. I thought you knew.

That's why I thought you asked the question because you knew we ate Taco Bell yesterday. It actually came up. Did you guys tweet about it or something? No. Amy might have. She posted on Instagram. She did. Okay.

Yeah, tacos are freaking. And awesome. Do you remember this? You and I, this is years ago. There's no way you remember this. But we went to the Taco Bell drive-thru, and then we ordered a good bit, and then we realized neither one of us actually have any money to pay for it. Did you remember that?

Yeah. Yeah. I walked in here today without my wallet. Yeah, exactly. Tyler had to let me in. I don't go. Is it? The brokest rich guy I've ever known in my life.

I don't walk around with the wallet or any money in my pocket, ever. Let me ask you a question. if you get pulled over for speeding and you don't have your license, is that, is that, you get in trouble for that? Jail. Go? What? Yeah. You're not going to, no, if you have a license, but you left it at home.

Why don't, why would I believe you? That's what all criminals say. They can type it into their, they can type it in the laptop. You get in trouble for that kind of thing. They can type into a laptop on the console and see you have driver's license. Driving without a license is a, is a thing. I don't think that driving without a, I think driving without a license means driving without actually having a real license period.

Not I left it at home. Shouldn't you have clarified this before you started driving without a license? It's a ticket. People are saying serious trouble. No, I'm a police officer. You wouldn't get in trouble. You go to jail for irresponsibility. Big trouble, you get a warning.

These people are all over the place. So if I left my license at home, I'm going to go over to HMS today with nothing in my pocket. right? Will I get in trouble if I get pulled over? Yes. If he pulls me over and says, I'm going to give you a speeding ticket and I don't have my license, but I got my registration, is he going to give me an additional ticket for leaving, like, license at home? Everybody outside is shaking their head.

Yes. I'm more nervous now. You ought to be. It's going to be touch and go today. I'm nervous for you. Do I go ahead and write the press release? But I do this every day. I don't speed demon.

Dale and Hart Jr. I didn't think you had to have it. I'm like, what purpose did you think there was? Where did you get that? Of course you've got to have a driver's license. I know you have to have one. But nobody would carry their driver's license if it wasn't important to have it. Like, who would carry it?

That makes sense, too. Shit. I'm going to have to. Shot the dark here. Do you carry your registration? Yes, it's in the glove box. Okay. But put your driver's license in the glove box.

No, don't do that. You need one for every car. If you only have one car, then he... Yeah. These are Dale Junior problems, but not really real-world problems. All right. Do we want to end on that, or do we want to do one more here? Let's do one more.

All right. I'll ask Michael Condellie's question, what determines yours or any other driver's weekly paint scheme schedule? Huh? Okay, so this is how the paint schemes are sorted out for our team. our team. Nationwide gets first choice. And I think that it's kind of like a draft. And I believe nationwide, you might know this. Do they pick, do they alternate? Like nationwide picks a race, Exalted picks a race, or does Nationwide pick all their races and Exalted takes what's left?

No. Nationwide picks one. Exalted picks two. I'm not sure who, like, who gets like three, four, five. I don't think it necessarily alternates just because Nationwide has more. Yeah. But Nationwide gets first pick, and obviously they take the 500. Exaltes' first pick is always Homestead. Gotcha. The last race. Yeah. And I think usually Mountain Dew's first race that they choose is the fall Talladega.

They always activate around that one. So there you go. That answers that. We got a couple. We might have a, gosh, I'm going to throw it out there. We might have a special paint scheme for Homestead. Maybe. Maybe.

Oh, boy. And if it happens, I'm really excited. You're scared me. I'm excited. You're driving without a license right now. You're scared to me, man. All right, that's all I got. Tyler's not scared.

I'm also not riding with you today, so. This is Tyler is, this is Tyler, frightened. Looking ahead, there's not much to look ahead for. I know it's a light week. Yeah, pretty light week. I got there, today, pretty much today off. I'll go over to HMS and do our meetings, try not to get pulled over. And nothing wins.

in Thursday, so I'm going to try to get Amy to the bike store and get her set up, so she'll go riding with me one time. Friday, we got two practices, and we'll be in race trim for both of those. We'll probably go out and draft. There's an opportunity where everybody's ready to draft at the start of both of those practices, and then once you come off the track, the pack sort of dissipates, and we'll do single car runs probably the rest of those practices. That is exhilarating to watch.

freaking boring. Saturday, we had the Xfinity race at 1 p.m. on Fox, the big Fox. And then qualifying is a 4 p.m. Notice I put in the notes, W-T-F. Yeah. Why is it after the race? That's interesting.

Yeah. I don't know. Maybe they think more people will watch putting it behind the race. Maybe. So, yeah, qualifies at 4 p.m. after the Xfinity race on Saturday. Sunday, the race starts at 2 p.m. on Fox. 2 p.m. starts.

Boy, they're getting them every week. Well, I mean, this is 2 p.m. Eastern. It'll be 1 p.m. in the central time zone where the race is, but still. Interesting. All right. Well, that's it. Hope you guys enjoy the show.

The Dell Jr. download and all Dirty Moe Radio podcast are made possible by Exalta. You can subscribe to all eight podcasts on iTunes, Stitcher, SoundCloud, and all major podcasting outlets. As always, you can listen to Dirty Mo Radio podcast on Dell Jr.com. Follow us on Twitter at Dell Jr., at Overstreet Tyler, and at Dirty Mo Radio. Also check out the Dirty Mo Radio Facebook page. Thanks to Tyler, as always, for co-hosting and producing the show. Today's theme song, Sins, is by the Dangerous Summer, courtesy of Hopeless Records.

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