The Dale Jr. Download - 207 - Korea Goes Jr. Nation for the Olympics

Episode Date: February 27, 2018

From Bobsleds to eating eel, Dale Earnhardt Jr and Mike Davis download all the fun experiences, stories, bumps and bruises from their Olympic trip to Pyeongchang, South Korea. 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.

Let's make sure we're recording. We're recording. We're recording. Bidip-bidip-pip. Hello. Morghumong in Korea today, this time is two of whom today. Two people's name is Dale and Hart Jr. and Mike Davis.

Now this time is Dale Jr. Download. Enjoy one of the Dale Jr. download starts now. Hey, everybody, it's Dale Jr. for another episode of the Dell Jr. download. With me as always is Mike Davis. I'm hurting. We are in South Korea still, but this is our final day and we're coming home.

So excited to come home. We've got a lot to talk about. You ready, Mike? I'm ready. If you don't mind us podcasting a little bit hobbled. We went skiing yesterday. You did much better than I did. There will be videos of this.

I'm afraid, but I got to take it like a man. You, my friend, are a step below Lindsey Vaugh. Oh, whatever. No, you are. You are. Let's be serious. I mean, you went down, can we just say, at the top of the show, the slope you went down? The diamond? Double diamond.

What do you call it? Double diamond. I mean, double black diamond. What the heck? Well, I had to try it. I was impressed, man. I hadn't. I went down, but I didn't go down to double like diamond.

I went down on my ass. All that and more on this episode of the Dale Jr. Download. All right, Mike, so you were talking about your, uh, Awesome experience, snow skiing. Yeah, you know what, though, this trip to me, I don't know how you feel. To me, it's been so awesome that even that did not make it bad. I mean, like, this trip has been phenomenal. We're ready to go home.

We've been here, what, six or seven days? It feels like? I don't know. But we're ready to go home, but, man, I had nothing bad to say about this whole experience. It's been a once in a lifetime. What do you think? Yeah, I've just really enjoyed it. I keep, I don't have any other way to explain.

it other than saying it's like a once in a lifetime trip and I know that's so cliche but we are in South Korea and you just almost have to pinch yourself every day to realize that that's true that you're on the other side of the globe what we've seen this week you know there's a lot of great events happening at the Olympics we got to see the women win the gold in hockey we let's see we went to the big air snowboard women's which was awesome incredible short track speed skating we got to see the mass start speed skating which was in the Olympics for the first time this year. That event itself is still sort of evolving, so it's fun to see a new event.

Explain what that is. Well, because you need to explain it to me. Go ahead. So the short track speed skating is exactly that. It's kind of like Martinsville or Bristol, and there's only about four to five skaters, and they have a 500 meter, 1,000 meter, and 1,000 meter, and 1,000 meter, and they're really quick, action-pack races, and there's a lot of gamesmanship and pacing, and everybody sort of saves their energy for that last.

few laps. There's also a lot of pushing and shoving in the short track. Now, on the mass start, it's on a much, much bigger track. And there's anywhere from 15 to 20 skaters in each race. And they give points out during the race. They do. Much like stage racing in NASCAR. Exactly. So there's these sprint laps that happen throughout each event. There's 16 lap races and there's like two or three sprint laps in there, they'll ring a bell, and that means there's a sprint lap. And if you can finish in the top three in that lap, you get points, five points for the winner and three for second

and one point for third. And those go toward your total points at the end of the race that can advance you into the next round. So it's not really where you finish at the end that impacts who advances. It's trying to accumulate those sprint lap points. If you do finish in the top three at the end, you get a lot of points and those top three are advancing no matter what.

But those guys that got the sprint points, you know, that won or finished well in the sprint laps are the guys that also advance. And rarely does anyone advance just on finishing position alone. If you don't get any sprint points, it's going to be hard for you to advance into the next round. It's really, really interesting. It's the first time it's been in the Olympics and they're long races. There's a lot of strategy involved. You know, it really reminded me of a NASCAR race.

because of the stage, you know, the stage points and so forth. Very fun. I'm a big fan of it. I'm going to, you know, try to follow it throughout the next several years to try to stay on top of who is doing really well in that particular sport so that if I get a chance to come back for the Winter Olympics four years from now, maybe I can have a bigger role as an analyst in that particular event. It's a lot of fun to watch.

On that note, though, you know, you're talking about following it. Something happened after that race. that I thought was, I've sort of given you a hard time about it. The American that was in the finals, you sent a tweet out, you know, hey man, congratulations on this. And he tweeted you right back. And the next thing you know, I mean, it wasn't a half hour after this race ended, this gold medal race.

Dale Jr. is buddies with this guy who was competing in it, Joey Mantia. Right. And I was sort of giving you a hard time about it. But the fact of the matter is this happened a couple times. during the week. You have befriended some of these Olympians. There was a guy that won the bronze medal in the... Pair skating. Yeah, team pair figure skating. Obviously, you had known via Twitter, Nick Cunningham on the bobsled team, but we got to know him and also the other pilots on the bobsled team, and that was kind of cool, and we kind of hung out with them a little bit. So talk about,

you know, getting to know these athletes, and what do you take away? Oh, yeah, what is his, How do you pronounce his last thing? This is the figure skater that you met up with. Yeah. Chris. Keneerum. We're probably butchering it. But his name is Chris.

We know that. Yeah. He and his wife, Alexa, they're pair skaters, and they won bronze this year at this Olympics, and this is Chris's first Olympics. Chris actually owns an automotive business back home with a friend of his that they just started. Apparently, Chris and his wife, Alexa, are very good. They're two times pairs national champions, two times silver medalists.

Yeah. You know, and then Nick Cunningham on the bobsled team, he does drive race cars, you know, sparingly in his off time and any chance he can get. So I found that there was a lot of, I don't know, crossover and a lot of interest in our industry, in our world of auto racing from these Olympians themselves. And that was sort of refreshing to me because I think, you know, like you came, a lot of people ask us, you know, when you come over here to South Korea, you know, what's it like to people recognize you? Well, the fact is they did, and a lot of them, it was all in a respectful kind of way because a lot of them are really fascinated with our sport. Yeah, I enjoyed getting to meet some of the athletes. I didn't know whether we'd have the chance to actually speak to many of the athletes and knowing that they're here competing. How much time to socialize do they really have?

So we sort of stood on the sidelines and literally reached out and communicated with Chris through social media in our Twitter DM. to set up an opportunity to meet him. We talked to Chris and hung out a little bit after the mass start speed skating. It's been a lot of fun and so much fun to support all the athletes and be here, supporting and watching the U.S. compete. It's so different than, you know, being at home watching on the TV or trying to follow from far away. All right? It's so fun to be here while it's happening and be in and around the Olympic Village

and the huge facilities that have. all these events. It sort of has a big footprint, you know, as far as the bobsled tracks over here, you got the, you know, the big ski jump monstrosity that they built. Huge, enormous, beautiful, that Alpensia ski center. I mean, that place, that thing is just, it sticks out. You can see it from miles away. It's just, it's just a beautiful structure. You can't appreciate it until you really see it in person. It's 100%. One of the things that I want to always take away, I hope I never forget the feeling and the sound is how the South Koreans, especially at speed skating, the South Korean people

just go bananas when one of their own make a pass. And this isn't even for the lead. I have not heard a sound and a rumble and I just haven't heard that. And it's so loud how South Koreans just rise up. And it made you cheer for the South Koreans too, because it was just, it was amazing. We also since that in the bobsled yesterday. When the Korean bobsled team comes like, I think they were the second to last to go, and we knew the Germans were pretty much locked up, but the silver medal was still out there to be won.

And they just come roaring down this thing. South Koreans, man, love these sports. And they have been a fantastic host. They have been super friendly people. I have just gained such a big respect for this country, for the people of this country. I've asked people that live here that are from America. Is this how they are all the time?

Or is this just because it's the Olympics and everyone's on their best behavior? And he said, no, this is how they are all the time. And so that's one of the big takeaways I want to leave here with is just that sense of pride and that sense of support and that friendliness that the South Korean people have shown. What about you? Yeah, I've been enjoying just how hospitable everybody's been from South Korea to NBC to everybody that we've met.

It's just been a great experience. Everybody's so happy to be here. Everybody's so excited about what's going on and what's taking place. So it's been a great trip. There's been so many things. I've had a lot of fun sort of putting everything on social media and sharing with everybody on Instagram. Boy, have you ever.

I mean, my gosh, I was trying to explain to my wife our day, and I said, you know what, go watch Dale Jr.'s Instagram stories and then call me back and then I can answer any questions you might have. Yeah. You wore that Instagram amount. In fact, you used through your data plan one day. It shut it down. Did it not?

Well, you only get a certain amount of international data plans. And I'm putting so much videos and stuff in my story that I think I broke it a couple times. But I just was a little bit of that's me missing home. A little bit of it's me wanting Amy and everybody all my friends to see what's going on. I obviously want to share with everybody else. Everybody's like, everybody on Twitter is like, hey, what are y'all doing? Where are y'all at? When are you going to be on TV?

what's happening, you know, what's going on with you? So trying to share as much as we could through the Insta story, I think sticking with one platform, you know, instead of trying to spread it across everything, I just put it in one place. Everybody knew where to go to get it, see what we were doing. We had a lot of fun sharing. We'll share, you know, we'll share like that the rest of years.

It's been fun. Yeah, we'll keep sharing. And by the way, we've had a video series that we've been putting out, sort of documenting our trip. And I know that by the time this podcast comes out of it would have been yesterday was the third installment of that. roll out a couple more videos of our day because we really wanted to just document everything and turn it into content and allow you guys to kind of see what we saw and you know yesterday in the

bobsled I mean like being up against that racetrack there's no there's no way to describe it and I don't even know that it fully is you know encapsulated through our videos and through our cameras but still being right next to that ice when it comes by that bobslet comes by was a feeling I'd never ever could have imagined so we've had fun document many stuff. I hope everybody's enjoyed it. You can go to Dirty Moe Media's social media channels. You've been retweeting it, Dale, on your channels. I have been doing the same thing. It's on Dale Jr.'s Facebook page. You guys check that stuff out. Let's talk about food, Dale. I am impressed. You went right into it. You

drove into the deep end. You ordered eel for lunch one day. I never got that bowl, but we had a dinner where we didn't actually know what was your strategy and where did you pan out with this food stuff. was hit and miss for me i mean there's dishes that had a little bit of western influence and those were fine the eel actually to me had a lot of western influence i ate the eel several times they had it downstairs in the hotel uh we ate the buffet at the hotel a couple times for dinner and it's they had it there so um and before you hate on that i just want you know this is the best hotel i've ever been in yeah and uh there is no shame why would they hate on that i mean because people that think that you're in

korea and you just stayed and you ate in a hotel in your hotel yeah no no that's not how this one is okay you just can take our word for it. It's there's a restaurant downstairs. Yeah, this isn't going next door to the Golden Corral or anything. No, so I wouldn't have thought that, but. People do. Okay. There was a couple restaurants that we went to that was pure, authentic, and it was just too much for me.

I just, I couldn't, I couldn't dive in there. You were pretty aggressive and really enjoyed that meal. I did, yeah. I myself, yeah, I just, it was, it was, it was, I tried hard to eat as much of the, uh, the cuisine from South Korea as I could, and I think I got a good understanding of really what their cuisine's like. I think if you come all this way, you've got to get in and try it. I did not eat any octopus.

I did either. I've heard that that is common here, and some people talked about having that for dinner or for a meal, but we did not try that. I mean, they have a, for anyone who's curious, though, I mean, they pretty much have, you know, if you want a hot dog, fried chicken, or a cheeseburger, they have that. You don't have to go far to find it. But if you want raw fish and real authentic

Korean cuisine, they have that right next door. So you can get as aggressive as you want. I thought the food was good. I didn't go all the way and get the octopus and stuff. But my strategy on that was don't ask questions. Like literally just eat and go off of whether I thought it tasted good or not. And that way I wouldn't go in with any preconceived notions like, you know, This is the head of a fish. Yeah. Well, if I can't recognize it, if I recognized it was a head of a fish, I didn't eat it. So it is Monday morning here, and we woke up this morning and watched the, or maybe we couldn't watch the race,

but I know the race was still going on in Atlanta. Were you able to follow that along at all? I was not. I couldn't get any of my viewer. I was trying to log into some maps that would allow me to watch live TV that work all the time back home, but couldn't get any of them. to work here. We know Harvick won.

Yeah, Harvick seemed to dominate, which he's been great there for the last several trips. He's led a lot of laps over the last several races. But interestingly enough, I think a lot of people would have gotten this trivia question wrong. He only has that one win in Atlanta that he got back in 2001 when he replaced Dad in the three car. Oh, I would have got that wrong. Right. See, I assumed as many races as he's led and much as he's done there that he would, that he had more wins as recently as the last five years.

I just assumed that he had won there because he's dominated that racetrack. Whatever he has there, no one else has. It's either just his style of driving or he himself has something that he's discovered in the setup of the car that only they have, air pressure or shocks or something that stands out. But he knows how to get around that place for sure. So it looks like Brackazowski finished second, Boyer, third, Denny Hamlin, fourth, Truex Fifth.

It looks like Joey Lugano is now your points leader with Blaney and second, Denny Hamlin third, Harvard, fourth, Clinton Boyer Fifth. One of the things that I thought was interesting, Jimmy Johnson is in 35th, two races that, I don't know what happened to Jimmy today, but I'm assuming there was an incident, or I doubt that he finished that far back. But I don't know, do you have any thoughts to that?

I mean, literally, it's so hard to keep track over here in South Korea. There's, I mean, unless you have Mike Davidson, you've got this nice laptop. But I was talking about Jimmy Johnson's in 35th. two races that kind of went south we've had that happen to us before you know yeah i mean honestly i don't take too much stock in the points uh at this point of the season two races in uh if one thing that you pay attention to really is that if we get five races in and there's not and you know jimmy hasn't rebounded somewhat there's that's some cause for some serious concern

that any driver that's down outside of the top 20 or even you know even around around 18th, from 18th on back or so, if they're still in that area after five races, they've got a good possibility of being one of the drivers that's battling for those final few spots in the playoffs unless they're able to get a win at some point in the season to push them further up into the playoff situation and conversation. Jimmy could go out and run in the top three next week and cure this issue right away. But if we get five races into the season and they still. haven't really laid down a couple decent finishes to stop the bleeding here, they'll have a tougher

time, you know, climbing their way through the ranks. As all the drivers in front of them are still finishing well and improving their points, it's making a steeper climb or steeper, it's a steeper hill to get up. That'd be the thing that I'd be concerned about. I wouldn't worry about it right now and just kind of get to the next race track. You got the West Coast swing coming up. Jimmy's great at California, and we'll see how it goes. I'm not too concerned about it two races in. It's definitely something that people are going to talk about because it's an unusual situation for Jimmy

and any driver back there. But it's early. It's easy to get out of that hole. It's as easy as it was to get in it right now. I got in a hole yesterday. That's what I heard, man. We went skiing. This is something that me and Mike just recently learned how to do

over the last couple of months. I learned over the New Year's holiday and I told Mike, I said, we're going to South Korea. I'm, I want to ski, he said, well, I need to learn how to skis, right? That's exactly what happened. You FaceTime me over the holiday. And you were so excited about skiing. And I'm like, I've never done it. But if we were really planning on going in South Korea, I would like to learn over here. And so I took

like a one hour lesson. It was a big group. And it was some little ski resort in North Carolina and felt like I had done enough to get, to get acclimated enough to get to South Korea. But then we didn't plan on skiing when we got over here. when we left South Korea, I'm sorry, when we left the States, we were like, yeah, we're not going to have time to ski. But then somehow, I don't even remember, how did we end up getting a plan, getting a ski trip planned? I don't remember where that happened during our trip this week.

Really? So Jack, one of the producers, he actually produced the piece that me and Rutley did for the Super Bowl where we were scrooring and broomballing. Jack heard that we wanted to ski. He said, I'll take you skiing. So that's kind of how that came out. Okay. Yeah, I mean, it was really in just conversation.

somebody said, hey, y'all want to ski? Yeah, we'll go skiing. We didn't think we was going to get a chance. So we went yesterday, and I had a blast. You had a good time, but you crashed real hard at the end. I did. At the end, I crashed. And it wasn't the only crash, but I crashed hard at the end. And, man, I was like, that's it. Like, I might have done some damage. Yeah. And you have a knee that's had some surgical. Because of our basketball league. Yeah. Which is really kind of like all I focus on. It's not my place to say what's, happen to your knee so don't you explain like what what's going on you took a hard foul at me in the db yeah i wasn't even on the court that's right i was sitting on the bench did you help me out

the court i don't remember i probably not i probably did um so yeah that that was years ago like it seems like it was it was six or seven years ago really yeah well how long the dmbL's not been around that how long has the dmbo been around your knee injury because it was a second year it was a second year D.MBL. And we've had, I think, seven seasons. Yeah, you're right. I guess, I mean, it doesn't seem like it's been that long ago. It seems like maybe four years ago, you, you tore your ACL. Is that all? Yeah. Okay, so you tore your ACL. You were out for a year and you came back. That's not funny. Well, not, like, you were out. It's funny because it's like saying, because our basketball season is like, while we, while we're here. Like, I'm talking about a

professional athlete here. You were down for a season. Right. Then you made you come back into the It was a lot of rehab and a lot of prayers, but I made it back. But you've been into DMBL playing aggressively and playing well for the past couple years. So anyway, I was a little worried for you, but not really. You fell, you've maybe sprained your ACL. Something. I don't know. But let's just say this.

I would have hoped this big old ski slope. And Dale and I were not skiing together. He went off and we actually had people skiing with us, great people at NBC. And so you and Matt from NBC kind of went off your own way. I was with Jenny, who is a super person, and we were skiing on some other slopes, because you have a little bit more experience than I have, and you certainly had better training. That's all. I wasn't ready to go jump into these big steep hills.

I was comfortable on a certain hill, so we got our separate race. But just so happens that I take this fall in an exact place where your ski lift is going over, and you just happen to see me laying in the same. the snow is that not right i um i kept so we got separated and i would go when i was on the lift you were skiing down the mountain and every time i was on the lift i would see you fall in the same spot that spot the very same i mean this is fine yeah i mean literally within 20 york 20 feet of the same position you i'm like they're he's right he's down there again the same place it's like do you think he'd learn well the second the last time you got up real slow

and I was a little worried because I know about your knee and I know how skiing, it's easy to get your knee twisted when you fall. I mean, it's, you know, the skis and everything is so cumbersome. So someone with an ACL restructured ACL, you know, would have to have, you know, be very careful. So I was a little concern for you, but you got up eventually and as I'm riding the lift by you, I see you make a couple turns. I'm like, okay, okay, maybe he's, if you hurt your knee, you'd be like carry me off.

But I literally, I told Jenny, I'm not sure how it's going to feel when I get up on these skis. I'm going to get up on them. But it's just, it's so funny because I had every chance to avoid that one troublesome spot. Jenny even kept saying, you know, you don't have to ski down that one part. You could go around. I'm like, nope, I got it. I got it this time. Boom, crash, crash, crew, boom.

And I'm like, no, no, no, I'm going to get this one next time. And she's just like, okay. And finally it was like, the last one, I was like, no, I'm done. This is done. This is stupid. Well, we'd been skiing for several hours, and just as soon as we quit, they turned off the chair lifts and closed it down for night skiing later, which I imagine would be a lot of fun.

When I learned to ski in Aspen, I got to ski on the blues, which is sort of middle ground, right? Yeah. And in South Korea, there's not really greens, blues, and... I think there is. Well, there's sort of a mix. Like, when we were going down that one slope, there were some real steep parts, then some flat parts.

There's a bit of a mix. They're kind of mixed. The greens and blues are kind of mixed together. I just thought that was normal, but... I don't think it really is. Okay. Good to know. That makes me actually feel a little better because it was a steep part that I kept falling on.

There's particularly a couple of steep parts, you know, the intermediate slope. Okay. But I ended up going down a black and then a double black right at the end. That's so impressive. I mean, I was literally proud for you because I saw how steep that hill is. Well, the thing is, if I, if I, I, If somebody said, you want to go down that when we got there? No, what?

No chance in hell. We ski for three hours. Everything went great. I only fall when I'm standing still. I don't fall when I'm skiing. I only fall waiting on the lift. Really? That's right.

I fell twice and it was literally just standing still. I wish that was the case for me. Yeah. So you get your courage up and it's probably good that the hill, you know, we quit when we did because I was probably going to be crashing trying that double black again. But it scares the hell out of you going down that double black diamond. Oh, man, I guess. It's just straight down.

It's crazy. I don't even know. I don't even, I didn't even really enjoy it. Like, ooh, this is great. I'd rather go slow and just take my time and have fun. Is that what you did? You just try to, I mean, you can't go slow, can you? Down the double black, it's so steep.

You just got to bite the bullet and just turn the skis down and haul butt. I don't know how to, you know, hop down there. How long did it take you to get down? Like 20 seconds. I mean, like it was that fast. Yeah. Yeah. If I was a better skier, I could make it laugh.

I could make it, you know, I could definitely get able to enjoy it. But I just enjoy skiing for how you can take your own time, take, you know, just pace yourself. And people tell me, everybody that I've talked to about skiing says it's a great family activity, like with your kids and stuff, which I hope to find that out to be true one day. That was the worst part about my fall, by the way, is I was late. there in the snow and she had to have been four years old five maybe this little Korean girl just goes whizzing by me yeah and I Jenny caught the moment I caught the moment the humor in that moment as as you know the dumb fat American that is laying there face down in the snow can't even get up on his skis and sitting there going my knees hurt my knees hurt and this little Korean girl I mean

she was a tiny little thing she goes by like Lindsey Vaughn yeah might even dust it up a little snow in my But anyways, if I weren't in pain, I would have laughed. I had the same sort of revelation when I was in Aspen learning to ski and watching Jimmy Johnson's daughter ski. She's really young, but such an expert, so smooth. And I'm like, wow, I just can't imagine. And now, you know, when I went to the slopes, there's so many kids like that out there. I mean, they're just, you know, three and a half foot tall whizzing by you.

And it makes you want to learn, you know, makes you want to try to figure. it out but I've enjoyed skiing certainly can't wait to go again Mike I hope that you go get your knee scoped and MRI or whatever you want to do there and get some confidence to go back again oh I didn't lose confidence I did not lose confidence I promise you that no we'll be good and I'm sure I'm going to feel it on this flight back but anyways let's do some ask junior questions sounds good yeah it's time for ask junior I got a question you have a question for me hit us up on Twitter using the hashtag ask junior All right, Ask Jr., first question from Kerry R.

Did a lot of people recognize you in South Korea? Just a couple of the American athletes and some of the, obviously, everybody from NBC. It's a couple people in USA Gear. Yeah. You know, people that have flown here. I was surprised at how many people, like fans, you know, just people, just normal citizens from every country flew here. Like Canada? There's a lot of Canadian people here all the way over in South Korea.

How about the fans that we met in the Korean market that said that they go to every Olympics? Well, there you go. You're right. Yeah, we did go to the Korean food market, and there were some fans where you happened to be on this one aisle and ran into about six or so. But they travel together. They're all from different countries. There was a couple from Australia, a couple from Canada, a couple of Americans. They meet at the Olympics. And they stay. And this was like their ninth Olympics. Yeah. How awesome is that?

Yeah. There's people that are fans of just, you know, fans of the Olympics and they center their, you know, their travel around it and so forth. and don't miss games. I can't imagine it. I mean, talking like we talked about Jack earlier, the producer for NBC, this is 10th Olympics. It's crazy.

It's crazy. I can't imagine doing 10 straight Olympics. Yeah. I mean, this was a great experience, but it's such an effort behind it, to get here and go, you know, to travel and credentials and, you know, checking in and getting everything,

you know, getting everywhere you need to go, just in town trying to get from event to event or place to place. It's an extraordinary production. from every walk of this thing. I mean, it's like the IBC is the International Broadcast Center. They build that. NBC builds their three blocks of the IBC

in the basement of their sports headquarters in Stanford, Connecticut. And then they tear it down and ship it over in a boat and rebuild it in the structure where the IBC is located. I mean, think about that. Think of the engineering that has to go in on that. I mean, it's amazing. So I was blown away by that, too.

But the fans were great, and you did get recognized. a few times and that was cool so s parsons says who would you want on your bobsled team you know i thought about that and been asked that question a couple times while i've been here jimmy's one of the most athletic drivers and keeps himself in the best shape and he's one of my great friends and i'd love to you know we we do a we get he gets me into snow skiing and cycling and so forth so we probably end up in the bobsled as teammates i think another uh driver or past driver that It's probably in great shape that would be great for Bob sledding and super focused on it if he were to get involved is Carl Edwards.

Oh, man, yeah. Yeah. I mean, Carl, you know, worked out real hard and kept himself in shape. And I think if he was to, you know, get involved, he'd be super focused about it and be obsessive about winning. So what would you have him driving? Let's think about the foreman. You got the driver, you got the two pushers, and then you got the brakes. Well, I would want to drive it, but.

Okay, let's say you drive it. Who do you want put, let's think of the three best pushers. What the turn, I mean, like, what? Who's, like, who's really, like, I think Carl Edwards would be a great one. Yeah, Carl's in shape. Jimmy's in shape. All right, who's our last big meat guy? These guys were huge.

Think about it. I mean, we don't have a driver like that in a circuit. You really put me on the spot to come up with something where there's nothing. I would take like a pit coach, maybe. Well, I don't get a pick coach. You don't? I got to say another driver. You got to say drivers?

Who would you want of your bobsled team was the question. All right. Well, I don't know any pick coaches personally. All right. All right. Do you know a pit coach personally? Yeah, I know a bunch. Who? There's so many I can't even give their names. Listen, I think the pit coach is the way to go. All right. All right, I got a guy. Oh, who you got? Jeff Clark.

All right, Jeff Clark used to be on my pit crew. Now we're talking. He was a jackman and gas at some point. Giant guy, we call him a universal soldier. He's just huge. He is. So he'd be perfect. That's a great idea out there. All right. Simon-Admich says, the best two foods and the worst two foods you had in Korea.

He sort of talked about this, but see what you can do. The best anything fried. Boy, they fry a lot of stuff over here. Don't be fooled. Fried and dip it in some sweet sauce, I'm good with that. So that's going to be the best stuff. All right, no, check that. The pancakes...

I knew it. The pancakes, ice cream, chocolate syrup combination was the best thing I ate here, but that felt like McDonald's, you know. That felt like a Carmel Sunday at McDonald's to me. I mean, it was amazing, which I always loved those Carmel Sundays when I was a kid. The worst thing, I'll say this. So the worst thing about eating in South Korea is a lot of the places have metal chopsticks.

Oh, you hated this. I didn't like that. I don't know what it is. I don't know why I can't get past that because we eat with a fork and a spoon and a knife that's metal. But for some reason, I didn't enjoy. The metal chopsticks was kind of like fingers on a chalkboard for me. It was very hard to eat with them. It wasn't that it was hard to do.

I thought it was. Well, not, I didn't like it because it was hard to do. I like using chopsticks, and wooden ones are great. I just didn't like putting metal chopsticks in my mouth. It was like fingernails on chalkboard, like, ugh. Make your skin crawl. I didn't even think about that. Gross.

I don't know why, but because a fork doesn't bother me. Yeah, yeah. Kenneth Hudson, have you picked up, oh, what, did you have more to add to that? No, I'm just saying I'm weird. Oh, Kenneth Hudson, have you picked up on the Korean language yet? If so, what have you learned? Not a word. Me neither.

Have you? No. I mean, it wasn't for lack of trying. I didn't even try. Well, a couple times people were, you know, we were talking a couple people about how to say thank you or you're welcome or hello. But it's such a challenge. So it didn't do too well there. And the Koreans really go out of their way to make it easy on you.

I mean, and I took advantage of that. That's probably wrong on me. If I was here longer, I would have done. Definitely make an attempt. Of course. It just should come naturally over time, I guess. John Burchett, Korean barbecue or Lexington Barbecue? You know, to be honest with you, I'm not a big fan of either one of them.

Oh, look at there. Well, Lexington, people, you know, people assume because I'm from North Carolina that I'm going to like North Carolina barbecue the most. And I really don't. I think that, you know, Kansas, Midwest, that's my stuff. Korean barbecue, people have that, it's not the same. It's not even, it's not, the barbecue, the Korean barbecue, me. It's more like the barbecue defined as grilling out or like the way you cook your food. It's not, you know, barbecue.

We were doing barbecue. We went to a Korean barbecue, which all that meant was that we were cooking beef and pork on a flame. And it was kind of built into our table. That was the Korean barbecue. Yeah. I mean, you cook the meat. It already comes to you sliced and you just throw it on there. And, you know, in two minutes you've got your eating.

So it's completely different. I mean, it's good. And the high quality food, high quality meat, right? I thought that was incredible. I thought it was so, I loved that whole experience. We had dinner with, you know. I would just like, I would just have liked some flavor, like options, like sauces or something. Yeah, and you are that guy.

You love the sauce. I mean, I'd put A1 on the best steak money could buy. Right. And the chef will be insulted until the end of the time, but that is the way they'll eat steak. he has to have sauces. I like sauces as well. And I get it, you know, if it's there, I'd definitely use it. But in this case, it didn't really detract from the experience.

And also, I thought it was fabulous. I mean, we were grilling all kinds of stuff on that thing. And they had wooden chopsticks, which is great. They did. They did. They had the option for wooden chopsticks. Last question. Pam P.J. Johnson, how hard is it honestly spending so much time with Mike Davis?

Well, that's a question, huh? All right. Well, Pam P.J. Johnson, you comedian. How hard was it to spend with me this week? You know, this trip, this trip was extraordinary, but just like any trip, it's always better with company, good company. And Amy couldn't make the trip, and I was trying to think of somebody that's been a big part of my life that would really appreciate something like this,

and that was an easy answer to bring Mike. So, you know, me and Mike are sort of on this new mission to make this transition from the race car driver to a broadcaster and Mike's going to play a huge role in that, and I think that he needed to be here as much as it would be fun for him to experience it. So I was lucky and thankful that he could come, and his schedule, his personal schedule allowed it. And it was exactly what I anticipated it being.

You had fun, I had fun, we enjoyed a lot of things together. We, you know, we had a good time, and we're lucky and thankful and ready to go home now. So take that, PJ. Yeah, there you go. Listen, this has been, I was truly grateful to be able to come on this trip. And we did have a great time. I like also creating content.

And I looked at this as an opportunity to do that. We've done two podcasts. This will be our second podcast that we've done on the road. We did the other one last week in the Atlanta airport. This one is from South Korea. So that was fun. We made videos. We documented.

Insta-Storied. I mean, like, that was fun for me, but also really becoming part. part of this NBC fabric was a huge benefit for us both. That would be a good thing to, that'll be a good thing for me personally to learn if everybody who's listening is to, did you enjoy the Instagram stories? Would you have rather found the content or had access to the content some other way? For me, doing the stories was simple, and I like to keep it all in one place so that everybody knew where to go.

I didn't want to spread it across several platforms. So a little feedback there for the future, keep it going in the story. Great with that or would you like me to switch it up or put it somewhere else? Where would you like to access that content as we go forward? If we end up at another sporting event because there's so many things that NBC has their hands in, we could be at other places before we start broadcasting for NASCAR in July at Chicago. So let us know exactly how you liked the content and where it was. Where do you consume it?

I mean, like where people prefer to consume content? That is something we're always trying to check out. For me putting it in the story, Instagram story, It was real easy and convenient. But would you like it another way? Let us know. I want you guys to be able to see what we're up to. You ready for a big flight?

I think we got a big flight coming up. We got actually a drive and then a big flight. This is funny this is funny this morning. So this might make no sense at all. But this morning, just before we record this podcast, it's probably 9 o'clock in the morning here. And we're going to get on the plane this afternoon or later this afternoon around late evening around 6 o'clock on a Monday. Yeah. And we're going to land at 9 o'clock on a Monday at home.

That's right. Well, I'm getting a text from my sister this morning on Monday, and she's like, when do you get home? And I'm like, so I said, I'll get home at 9 and 9 o'clock. And she said, 9 in the morning. I'm like, no, 9 p.m. tomorrow. So, but it's not tomorrow for me, right? Right.

Today. So I'm telling her, I'm like, it's real confusing because she was super confused. And I'm like, today is Monday. And I'll be home later tonight, but it's actually Sunday where she's at. So Kelly knows that this is, I mean, we've been 14 hours ahead all week. So we've been communicating with her all week. I don't know that we really wouldn't spell it out. I don't think that I'm throwing her under the bus here.

Yeah, I don't want to do that either. It's just an interesting conversation to have with somebody coming back. Oh, sure. When are you coming home? Right. I'll be home tomorrow. Oh, yeah. My girls have loved every morning, which is my morning, their evening,

or when they're morning, my evening, they always love to go, okay, what time is it there? Oh, yeah. Are you going to bed? And I'm like, yeah, it's going to bed. She goes, we're waking up. And I'm like, well, you need to get back to bed because it's time to go to bed. No, we got to go to school. Yeah.

They thought that was cool. Oh, yeah. I thought it was great. It was like clockwork. As soon as I would climb in the bed, Amy would text me that she's waking up. I mean, every night. And vice versa, when I'd get up in the morning, she's going to bed. So we had this great, you know, moment or time to communicate or FaceTime.

when both of us weren't busy. Yeah. You know, both of us weren't busy with the middle of the day. So it's been nice. Missed everybody back home. Mike, you missed your family. Yeah, totally. I'm ready to get back.

So what's the first thing you're going to do when you get home? Aside from hug your daughters in case you walk. Oh, I think I've got a list of honeydews that are waiting on me, by the way. What's the first thing you're going to eat? You know, first thing I'm going to eat. Man, this is going to be the dumbest answer. It's like, I'm probably going to go to Canapolis and go to the varsity. Is it opening that late?

Again, I don't know. Oh, you're saying when we, is when we land? Well, am I taking you home? No. I'm not. I think I'll get somebody to meet me at your house. Pick me up. Is that what you want to do?

Sure. Okay. Well, I can take you home. That's way out of your way. So we could, yeah, but my point is we could stop it. Stop somewhere in you. We can do that on the way to your house. Do you know that they fed us so much on that dagam airplane, though?

Like when I got here to Korea coming here, I don't know what it'll be like going back, but I felt like I'd gained 10 pounds just on that flight. Because I kept eating everything they put in front of me. I'm going to try to pack some not-so-healthy food in my bag at the airport in Seoul, Korea, and then skip a couple of meals on the plane. I didn't really enjoy the airplane food that much. Well, you slept through some of the good ones. Yeah, and I don't know how, see, I stayed up all night before we went to get on the plane coming here.

Yeah, what's the strategy? The strategy now is I have no clue how this flight's going to work out because I didn't stay up all night. But I like to eat junk on the airplane because I imagine that the airplane food is not much better for you. So I go ahead and eat the, I go ahead and that's a great opportunity to get them chips out and start eating. So do you still have a lot of the junk food? No, I've got to restock at the airport. Hey, you cleaned the IVC out yesterday. They're cookies.

Do you get any left of those? Oh, my God. I had three before we went to bed last night and three for breakfast. All right. Well, all right. Well, look, this has been the Dale Jr. Download. We appreciate everyone for listening. Don't forget to follow us, rate us, review us, do all the things to us that you do.

We appreciate Exalta for their support on this show. Any closing thoughts? Yeah, man. Kenan Thompson, I know you were the Grand Marshal for the race this weekend. Hopefully you'll come back to another bit so I can see you. Congratulations, Kevin Harvick, and Brett Moffitt. Brett Moffat on the truck race. Congratulations to Brett Moffat in the truck race.

And Johnny Sauter, who was the driver that he called that? Bo La Mastus. Bo La Mastus. My new favorite. Is it La Mastis or Labastus? No, not La Mastis. Lolaastis. Bo Labastus sounds like a downhill skier.

Downhill skier? Yeah. Well, my name ain't Bo Lomastus in it because that is one thing I'm not. All right, everybody. Have a good one. We'll see you back home. Bye. Bye?

Why do I say bye? It's a phone conversation. Bye, y'all. See you.