The Dale Jr. Download - 296 - Steve Phelps: First Sport to Come Back

Episode Date: May 5, 2020

As NASCAR returns from the pause of the pandemic, Dale Earnhardt Jr. sits down with NASCAR President Steve Phelps for a behind the curtain viewpoint of running one of America's biggest sports. Phelps talks about the initial shut down due to COVID-19, opens up about tough decisions, shares insight into the sports' return and the opportunity they have to seize new fans in an uncertain sports climate. He also shares insight into schedule changes, looking closely at mid-week shows and double headers and how they are looking ahead to 2021. Dale Jr. and co-host Mike Davis share news about bringing back North Wilkesboro in a unique way. Speaking of Wilkesboro, Odd History tells a story of day the King spread a fan's ashes. The crew learns the community gossip about poo and how Dale gets tricked into telling fat-jokes. 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 a production of Dirtymo Media. Dirty Mo Media. Hey, everybody, it's Dale Jr. Here again for another episode of the Dale Jr. download. We got a great show today. We got Ask Junior presented by Exfinity. We got news on North Wilkesboro. I hadn't had news on that racetrack in a long time.

Our guest, Steve Phelps, is here. Let's start to bring him right in. Start with your interest. President of Natsdam. Phil Fiscese. All right, everybody. Let's welcome in Steve. Phelps, Steve, thanks for showing up today. How you doing? Pleasure. Great to be here.

Where are you? I'm in Daytona Beach. Really? Let's see this. Are you at the office? Oh my goodness. He's right across the C.A. He's in the office. Look at this. You know, I'm about the only one in this building, so, because we are technically closed. That's pretty awesome, though, to be able to look out of the office window and see Daytona International Speedway. I mean, no matter how bad of news that might come through an email or a phone call, you can just be completely do a 180 by just looking out the window and looking at that racetrack and put a smile on your face. I totally agree. Every time I sit down in my desk, I look out the Speedway, it's fantastic. It's got to put things into perspective. It does put

things in perspective. Pretty awesome. All right, buddy. Well, we've got some great news from you guys here recently that we're going back racing. And this has been a long process for everybody. One month feels like a year, all that. Everybody's pretty much ready for life to get back to normal. We want to talk about that. But first off, I guess, let's go back to when all this came about. When you got teams headed to Atlanta, some are at Atlanta Motor Speedway.

Can you even sort of help us understand how chaotic that might have been as an industry and you guys making the major decisions to shut down not only, you know, to shut down racing for that weekend. I know that we were, we had intentions of trying to, you know, we had no idea we were going to be sitting here idle for this long. But here you are having to really pull the plug on a race wing. That's unprecedented. How difficult was that for NASCAR?

Yeah, that was a tough week. You know, the guys in Atlanta, to your point, a bunch of folks were already there, competition people. you know, race teams, other people already at the facility. I would say the guys at Atlanta Motor Speedway, all of them were fantastic. And it moved pretty quickly to your point. So I think that, you know, we ramped up and looked like we are going to try to race,

at least initially, you know, at one point without fans. and in fact we were it just the whole thing was it was just moving so swiftly and then by Friday morning it looked like we are going to be we are still trying to transition to create something that would work and then ultimately we just had to pull the plug which was unfortunate very difficult I would say is that again the race teams the NASCAR racing operations folks everyone really just banded together Landem Motor Speedway and tried to create something that was going to work for this industry which was unprecedented. And so it looked like we were going to race with fans

and then it looked like we're going to race without fans. And then we had the Fox guys on board. And it was, you know, within 48 hours, it kind of went from one direction to them being completely shut down, which, you know, in hindsight was the right decision. But it was really difficult. and, you know, as Eric Shank said for Fox, he said NASCAR was the last sport to close down, and NASCAR will be the first sport to come back. So as a, you know, just I get information from my phone, from the news. I'm, you know, I'm not making the decisions that you guys are having to make.

Y'all obviously need better information than I could ever receive from the outlets that I have and everyone else up and the street has. So where are you guys getting the information you need to make these decisions? Who are you trusting not only back then to make the correct choices, but now going forward, who are the people you guys allow them? Yeah, that's a good question. You know, we've got a lot of folks that we're dealing with. Early on, we got kind of hooked up with an infectious disease doctor,

Dr. Celine Gounder, who's, you know, one of the best in the country. And so she was getting the information that we needed probably well in advance of where some other folks were, frankly. And since that time, you know, we still have been consulting with her. But the medical community, the CDC, all kinds of different inputs that come that allow us to make informed decisions about when you can go back, when it's safe to go back because we don't want to go back and, you know, heaven forbid, have something happen and then have to stop again. And once we go back, we need to continue down this road and make sure that, again, everyone is safe, the competitors, the safety workers, everyone involved. So it's our folks, Steve O'Donnell, John Bobo, Tom Bryant, a bunch of folks that are kind of but behind the scenes that are making sure, and then obviously dealing with all the stakeholders in the sport, making sure everyone is aligned on what direction that. we're going. So it's not the decisions aren't made in a vacuum. The decision aren't made, our decisions aren't being made because of kind of sentiment. You know, one of the most important

things that we have had to do is to try to make sure that each of the governors and the states where we want to race initially without things that they needed to be on board. The first governor who did that, frankly, was Governor DeSantis here in Florida. And the governor was great, called up and said, hey, we really want you to get back to racing, you know, in our state. And so, you know, whatever you need to do, you'll have our support. Now, with that, with every governor and every decision we have, you also need to make sure you've got, you know, kind of the local communities and the counties on board. And then all these various, depending on states, the health boards and health and human services or county medical people. I mean, it's just,

and every state's different. So Florida came online and then it was really trying to important. The plan was to really look at going to places where we wouldn't have to travel. Right. So the bulk of the industry is in Charlotte. So we wanted to make sure that they're a day trip. So if I'm a crew guy, I wake up in my bed, I eat breakfast, I jump in my car, I drive to Charlotte Motor Speedway, I drive to Darlington, I drive to Bristol, I drive to Martin's, all day trips, right? You go on your work, you get your race in, you jump in your car, and you go home and sleep in your own bed. And that's what we really wanted to do because we wanted to limit the risk and make it as simple as possible. And so we've talked about, you know, the essential personnel being there.

You know, I do find it funny. I had a sales guy reach out to me last week and said he was, he was pretty sure he was was essential personnel. And I said, there's no one to sell anything to in the racetrack. Right. I appreciate your efforts. But it was tough. And each of the governors has been unique and different. I think the process has worked pretty well. So we're cleared to go in a number of different states in the southeast. Those were the ones that we were most wanting to get right. Obviously, we've only announced the schedule in South Carolina in Charlotte. And North Carolina was important, and Governor Cooper was great.

Governor McMaster in South Carolina was great. But we've had discussions with the governors of Georgia and Texas and Tennessee and Virginia. And we're looking to open things back up because we want to get back racing. So you guys, I think the surprise for me and one of the surprises of the many that this whole situation is presented was the back-to-back races, racing at Darlington twice, Charlotte twice. What was those conversations like? What was the reservations and what boxes did that check for you guys to go ahead with that plan? Well, I think initially it was really about trying to make sure that we got it right.

And so, for example, in Darlington for the Sunday's Sunday-Wednesday race, you have the opportunity to make sure all your procedures are right, make any changes to them, make sure the Fox equipment, you know, frankly is set up and ready to go and actually have two races instead of one. There's an ease to it that just we wanted to make sure we're being very, cautious about what we're doing. And we want to try to get those races on the books. I think it's pretty cool to look at a Wednesday race. I know it's something that we've been looking to do for a while and, you know, test out. Now we have the opportunity to test it out and see how it's going to go.

It is different, right, to be going to a racetrack for a cup race, two races in a row. but I think that everyone is starved for, you know, to get back to racing. And, you know, you look at the success of the eye racing and the number of eyeballs that it has put out there. You know, we think this is going to be a really good test for us and a real opportunity for us to not just have our, you know, our core fans consume the sport like they never have because it's, we haven't been racing for so long. but also an opportunity for other people to see our sport, sample our sport, and I think we're going to have millions of fans that will tune in who otherwise wouldn't that are going to see how great our sport is. And so I think we'll have a potential lifetime fans that will come out of this really difficult situation

that we're experiencing. Steve, you know, you just hit on something, and I want to ask you this. you know, usually when changes happen or big decisions come down, we are prone to ask, how does that affect me, right? I mean, that is 99% of the people, but you're the president. You don't have that benefit. You've got a lot of people that you've got to consider. So I wonder if you can just give us the scope of your considerations when you have to make even, I mean, just any decision. I mean, off the top, you just, you've mentioned Fox. and you know you talk to governors.

So like let's be selfless for a second and try to understand all the people that have to be considered in every decision that is made in this type of situation. Yeah, I think for us, I think if you go back, Mikey, you look at what we're trying to achieve. The most important thing for us

was to make sure we got all the races in, and that continues to be kind of job one for us. So get all the races in. We would love to be racing in front of things, but we can't do that right now. And so we think it's more important to get the races in, particularly right now because we don't have a lot of competition out there in the sports world. Frankly, anything else. I mean, how many Netflix series can you watch?

Enough. How many movies that you've already seen 20 times? Right. So, you know, for us, we had a real opportunity here. So getting the races on. And then we've tried to do a good job of plugging into the industry to understand kind of what the pulse of the industry is. So, for example, early on, we had to get back with, you know, get to the race teams and figure out, well, how quickly can you guys get back on the racetrack once you get back in your shops? And part of it had to do with, okay, well, what tracks are you going to go to?

So if you're going to intermediate track, since we had some of those cars already in the process of being built or built, that would be an easier racetrack to go back for us than to go to, you know, Daytona International Speedway, right? Right. Which would take much longer. So, so there are, there's so many different stakeholders. You know, we did need to make sure the Fox guys were, you know, on board with what we're doing. You know, the Fox and NBC scheduling people to make sure we had the windows available. they've been both groups have been fantastic, you know, on the Fox procedure, safety, production, all of them working with our folks to make sure everyone understood what was happening.

So, but we have to think about this, the stakeholder group is, you know, overall. So, you know, our partnership people have been speaking to the partnership people, the broadcast folks, the tracks themselves to make sure all the tracks understand what it is we're doing. with each of the governor calls, we needed to make sure that whatever track was in that, you know, in that state that they were up and running. And in some cases, they were helping us in other cases. You know, we're working in concert with them. It's just, it's been a, it's been a process, just a lot of people. But, you know, and we're trying to be as, you know, communicate as best we can, which is, you know, it's hard because you're moving, you're moving really fast. And in some

cases, the usual kind of checks and balances and confidentiality. We understand how this industry works, and unfortunately, if something is put out there, it gets in the media pretty quickly. And, you know, we just don't have, we don't have time to wait and, you know, kind of check all those boxes. It's just, all right, we're moving forward. And if the information gets out, so be it. We just need to make sure that we are doing whatever we can do to get back as quickly and as safely as possible. So, Mike, you mentioned it, Steve. You want to get all the races in. Why was that so important that we have the number of races, the same number of events?

Why is that so critical? Yeah, well, I think it's really two things. One, I think that was the expectation of all the folks in the industry, including the fans. frankly. But then it's also, you know, if we ran, you know, 30 races versus, you know, 36 points paying races, then if I'm a sponsor and I don't have six of those races, well, then I'm going to want my money back. And for race, race teams, you know, need that revenue coming in. We need to make sure we do that. You know, same thing from a television perspective, frankly. You know, if we raise six be a racist. If I'm Fox or NBC, I'd probably be like, okay, well, just take a pro rata deduction

on what I was supposed to pay you. And that, you know, that pays a lot of, obviously a lot of bills, right? So we needed to make sure that we try to get that in. And then lastly, or firstly, we think there's a tremendous interest from our fan base to want to make sure that we get all the races in. And, you know, the championship that people are running for is meaningful. You know, right now you've got other sports that are trying to determine can we get back? If we get back, do we run playoffs? Do we, you know, end our regular season as of yesterday? And then you're just moving forward with whatever your playoffs.

Like they're all over the map. And for us, if we didn't have to do that, you're able to get the races in, you know, we're four races in. So which means we've got 22 regular season events to go plus the All-Star. That's something we're interested in doing. Okay, let's take a quick break from this conversation and have Dale Jr. tell us who's back with the Dale Jr. download. Forgive me if this information's out there,

it's so hard to stay on top of what's real and what's not. But for some of the tracks, you know, is the schedule still fluid beyond the first couple of weeks? Is the door closed on any race tracks for this particular race season? How does that all remain? Yeah, so I would say the schedule is 99% of the way done. We would like to announce a full schedule. The reasons why we can't do that, part of it has to do with we don't know if we can get into that particular state or not.

So we know we're good in the states of South Carolina. We know it's good in the states of North Carolina or in the state of North Carolina. So that's kind of where we stopped just to put a kind of put a flag in the ground and say, to move forward, you know, with these first four races. What we're determining right now is, you know, obviously the number of events in Darlington for this year when the season started, we had one. Now we have three. So we had to figure out where those races are coming from. So we have some idea, but we're trying to figure out what that looks like. because if you have two additional Darlingtons and one additional Charlotte Motor Speedway,

they have to come from some racetrack. And so is that coming from a racetrack with two events that will now have one? Those are the things that we're trying to work through right now. Well, I was curious, you know, I think we pride ourselves on trying to be prepared for everything, right? You know, in our plans and our contingencies. this would have been hard to prepare for because you're talking about having to deal with governors and different governors, maybe different personalities. I can't even imagine what that's like delegating through all that.

But is there even anything remotely close to a precedent that you could have pulled from to say, okay, this is how we would, or maybe another sport has, or maybe the TV partners were able to have a precedent that they refer to as as far as helping deal? Or did you guys start from square one in preparing for this? Yeah, I think it was a that was a square one kind of thing, Mike. It reminds me of, you know, a conversation two weeks ago with Governor Cooper. And he said, you know, in the playbook, when this whole thing started and I became the governor, became the governor of North Carolina. It didn't say anything about a pandemic. Right. So I think it's for everybody, it's, it's all new.

And there are parts of it that are unique to what this pandemic is. And part of it's just, you know, reacting and being a leader, right, and doing it in the way you think it's best. And so for me, that's what I'm trying to do. I've got phenomenal, as you guys know, I've got phenomenal kind of lieutenants here. So Steve O'Donnell, Jill Gregory, Darry, Daryl Wool. Craig Neeb, Ed Bennett, Gehrat, karate, and then the support of Jim, France, and Lisa Kennedy, you know, our teams are unbelievable. I think it's the best group in all of sports, and I think they've really proven that during this, you know, during the past six weeks. They have been fast and,

you know, kind of reacting and adopting and creating a plan and then starting to execute against that plan with excellence. And, you know, the beneficiaries are going to be, You know, anyone who loves this sport and anyone who works in this sport, frankly. And there have been tough decisions that we've needed to make. Some personnel stuff, which, you know, I just hate. But we got to get through this. And when we get through it, we're going to be stronger. It's just difficult getting there.

Is that when the toughest decision, the personnel? For me personally, I mean, for other people, maybe it's not for me. I just, you know, our whole, our whole organization, the industry as a whole, is really about people. Right. And that's what we do. We're about racing and we're about people. And, you know, we've got intellectual property that we have, but it's the people that make it go. And so, yeah, we've had some tough things.

I can't imagine. We'll get through it. And when we get through it, you know, those folks that are partners, you know, of the team moving forward will be part of a you know a stronger better organization that can help hopefully lead this sport to to new heights well i was just going to go back to the schedule for a second when if we do get through this our hope is that we get back as close to as normal as possible i don't think any of this will ever expect to be you know how you know ever expect things to be like they were pre-pendemic i think that we all are going to have to approach our lives differently and

going forward, but there is a new schedule for next year. How much, and there's a lot of new things on the horizon, the new car that's been delayed, unfortunately, but how much of that stuff are you guys able to put any focus on? And also, does this schedule this season present opportunities for you guys to learn the potential of what that schedule could be going forward in 2021? midweek races, stuff like that. Will you take some notes from what you learn here to devise that new schedule? Yeah, I think it's a couple different things. The answer, sure answer is yes. So we are actually

had a conversation last week with O'Donnell and Ben Kennedy around the 2021 schedule because we got to we got to get going. And so there are there are things that, um, we're having discussions on right now, which seems odd because we're still trying to figure out the 2020 schedule. All these things are, you know, kind of wrapped up and moving forward. So we've started those things. And then as it relates to learnings that we have, yeah, I think there are learnings that we can have on a lot of different fronts, not just on things like, you know, potentially double headers

because we're supposed to have one double header and it was at Pocono this year. Right. But can you do one standard rates? Does it work? Can you load in quickly, you know, kind of load in, load out, you know, slightly shorter race potentially? I think the answer is yes, not just from the schedule standpoint, but, you know, do you need to, I don't know the answer to this. You know, do you need to practice three times and then and have qualifying. Do you do it over a period of three days or do you shorten all of that as well because you can't?

those are things that we'll study and we'll look at it as you know industry-wide we're you know what things are just not necessary moving forward and and I think that's what we need to try to get at and so I think there will be a lot of learnings that we'll have you know you also have to look at it and make sure that you're not looking at it you know that first Wednesday night race that we have at Darlington you know it's probably to do a real big television number right because people are bored and it's cool to, hey, we're a really cool idea to race, you know, on a Wednesday night. You know, that may not look the same, you know, next year on a Wednesday night, right?

Because you've got other sports and other opportunities. Just have to be cautious about how we're looking at it. But I think there are some really interesting and unique ideas that people are trying to develop that make this thing work. That's interesting, too. So if everything goes as planned and we're into, August, September, November, every sport in the world, every sport that's going to go, you know, from start to finish from February to December is going to cram into the fall. What challenges does that present for NASCAR to have to sort of, you know,

stake their claim to a little bit of that territory when every sport that we know is going to be happening all at once? Yeah, I think the good thing for us is because we were first, I believe we got to NBC and Fox sooner than any of their other sports. And so we're able to secure windows as quickly as, you know, more quickly than anyone else. So, yes, there'll be increased competition, most likely as the fall gets just crammed with sports. But the first and most important thing for us to make sure that we had those television windows that were secured. And then, you know, from there, I do think that,

We're going to take a lot of these fans with us. So once they learn about our racing, they see how competitive it is and how cool it is and the storylines and our drivers, athletes, our crews, all of it that makes us who we are, we're going to keep people into the fall. We're going to keep people into next year.

We're going to keep people, you know, going into the Daytona 500 next year that wouldn't have even considered us the Daytona 500, you know, this past, you know, earlier this year. when you consider, you know, a million and a half new people watch ir racing that had never watched a NASCAR event. That's insane. A million and a half. And a lot of them were younger.

And so as these storylines have developed with some of these, you know, drivers, you know, that are, them will be on the racetrack or the booth. It's like, oh, cool. I know that guy from eye racing. And well, this is a lot cooler than. an eye racing because, oh, they're actually in real cars. And there's obviously a danger element, too. And all of that, that makes kind of the sights and sounds of who we are as a sport. Would you agree that NASCAR of all the other sports, and I think timing might have played a

big part in it as well, because, you know, the other sports that aren't even in season. But it feels like NASCAR has been the most opportunistic, given the bad situation. and eye racing is one such way, but also you getting back and us being able to get back in, I mean, and what you're talking about, I mean, would you agree that the sport that you preside over has been able to rise up and make the most of an opportunity when otherwise it would be just really bad?

Yeah, I think that's a good question. You look at the eye racing and all the other sports when we started the eye racing piece, And I think this, you know, all the top e-sports on television are now ours. So every race we run, we are then the number one, two, three, four, five, you know, e-sports in the country. And we will be again from this past weekend at Dover. So that part's really cool.

Do we have a competitive advantage? Yeah, we had a competitive advantage that they had this great, you know, platform out there. And the irasing guys have done phenomenal job and how lifeless. like it, it is at Dover and it was at Talladega and just, just incredible. And so NASCAR gets, you know, applauded for being geniuses. It's like that was done 10 years ago, right? We're just fortunate to be able to take advantage of it today and give the fans and new fans and, you know, kind of avid fans alike an opportunity to see some racing, right, to see some cars on the racetrack, even if they're virtual. And then you look at kind of our, you know, kind of traveling

circus and the, and the fact that, you know, most of the people who are working at the racetrack already have protective equipment on. And so it's really, unlike the MBA, I had a conversation with the deputy commissioner a couple of years, a couple of weeks ago, Mark Tietam, and he said, we got a bunch of guys, you know, banging in each other, you know, exchange and bodily fluid. and it's tough, right? For us, our guys are, everyone already has a helmet on, right? Or, you know, protective clothing and those that don't will. And so for us, we have another competitive advantage.

There are other times that we don't have a competitive advantage, right? So if you're major league baseball and you've got, you know, 81 home games and you're trying to have a bunch of content out there of live games, typically that's a great thing for them at a competitive advantage that they have. Now, trying to get all those games scheduled now, maybe not. That makes it a lot more difficult, right? So we all come to one place and we're there, we race, and then we leave, right? You don't have, you know, to go to another city to another town and play that team and potentially infect them.

And it's just, you know, we have a more controlled environment. A lot of people. work in the events, but a controlled environment. Well, Steve, we really appreciate you giving us some time today, and we know you've got a lot of things to get back to. We appreciate the hard work that you put into running our sport and trying to make all the best decisions that you can for us. I think that as a team owner, our employees, everybody really appreciates it

because I know that you make a lot of decisions on our behalf. and we think you're doing an amazing job. We can't wait to get back at the racetrack and see you, buddy. Thanks, bud. I appreciate it. And thanks for your time, guys. Yes, sir. It's nice to be on with you guys again.

Hopefully we'll be back racing soon and appreciate all you guys do to make sure that, you know, I know a lot of people watch this and are entertaining their star for something that, you know, is unique and different. You guys always put on, you know, a great show and look forward to getting, seeing you guys back at the race track, at least, you know, hopefully soon anyway. Absolutely. Yes, sir. Take care, bud. Take care. See you.

All right, guys. So we're bringing back North Willsboro. That's right. All right. That's the news on North Willsboro. This is a bit of a touchy sort of subject. Man, people are super, you know, anytime anybody talks about resurrecting a racetrack, North Willsborough is the track that everybody wants NASCAR to go back to.

They hadn't raced there since 1996. The way that things sort of fell apart for that race, track was really difficult for people to understand. It involved Marcus Smith and Bruton and his group acquiring the racetrack and the dates to that racetrack and sending those dates out to other places like New Hampshire and Texas. And so that was hard for people to deal with. But anyhow, the place is pretty much sat, you know, dormant and there's been very minimal use of the race track and it's it's quickly or soon to be beyond any real consideration for being renovated. It is probably beyond that point already,

but I went out there with Mike Davis, a bunch of other people, ir racing. Marcus Smith went with us. Basically, Marcus has opened the door up for us to be able to go and scan the racetrack and scan it, I mean, put it in irasing and sort of bring it back to life. When we went out there, we found some very interesting stuff. And we are going to share that all with you on my Twitch channel, which I have. And Thursday, I think at 9 p.m., we're going to live stream on Twitch a short film by Dirtymo Media on how we went about this project.

All right, so I don't want to open up any more cans of worms or give you any more information about it. I want you to wait around until Thursday, 9 p.m. on my Twitch channel. It's Dale Earnhardt Jr. 88. Just go to Twitch. Type in Dale Earnhardt Jr. 88, all one word. And that's my Twitch channel. And you can see that with us on Thursday. And it's a great little film.

And I'm excited to be able to share with everybody. Yeah, how we brought North Wilsonboro back to life. So it's going to be a great experience. And we're literally only a month or so away before that's coming, probably just about a month before that's going to be available to the irasing customers, which is going to be an exciting day for me. I'm going to really be having my eyes on the community to see the reaction and see how much they enjoy this sort of version of the racetrack.

And there's a lot of bells and whistles that they don't know about that'll be included in that release as well. It'll be exciting too. So pretty cool. Mike, you were a big part of all this and especially helping Matthew and Leah even as well. Everybody's sort of pulling together to not only helping us get the racetrack ready and to scan it, but also to put this content together if you guys want to comment. Well, first of all, there was a lot of weeds.

I mean, I think you were being a little too kind about it's almost in disrepair. I think it's actually there. We saw that garage coming down. I mean, let's put it this way. You can spend billions of dollars if you want. I mean, everything's repairable if you got enough money and want to spend enough money. But let's just be honest.

I think to build it up, you have to tear it all the way down. So I just, that's gone. That's an aforementioned thing. And people, look, I'm not saying that you're wrong or people can be,

you know, can be emotionally tied to it. But it's just life. I mean, the thing is beyond repair. But because of eye racing, we get to live with North Wilkesboro as it was back in the 80s and 70s. I mean, like, it's really fascinating.

And I've been learning the process as we've been going along because when you, I got to admit, when you started saying, we need to get out there and we'd eat this track so they can scan it. I got to be honest with you. I wasn't exactly sure of what we were doing. I wasn't exactly sure the process in which how can these guys literally bring every nook and cranny of this track back to reality. And now this video that we're going to premiere on Thursday,

and it'll be on our YouTube channel Friday, it explains it all. And it shows a little behind-the-scenes perspective of what that day in December was like for us. Because if you guys remember, it was quite rainy, it was quite cold. Super cold, yeah. And yet, I got to hand it to Marcus. Marcus was out there right there with us, boy. I mean, we got dirty.

We got dirty and wet and cold and man, Marcus was out there plowing with us. And there was a lot of work to be done. It was a lot of fun. That being said, I'm really, I can't wait to watch this race Saturday as well. I mean, you know, we get to watch a,

we get to watch a Wilkesboro race this weekend, all right? I mean, I'm pretty geeked out about it. Yeah, I'm looking forward to that as well. I really haven't watched any of the broadcast. I've just been in the races myself, but this is one that I might actually go back and watch, only because you're going to see basically, similar camera angles and you're going to see the cars coming up the back straight

away up the hill and going down the hill on the front straightaway and it's really going to bring back a lot of memories to see to see those visuals you know and to be able to sort of watch some of the older footage of that racetrack and and then now the the new image the new footage from i racing it's going to show you i guess how how well i racing did in rebuilding this racetrack and and recreating it it's really cool look forward to that video and being able to stream that on Twitch Thursday for everybody to see it. It's not a very long experience. It's not a very long, long, drawn out process of the video.

It's very nice and compact and easy to see. It's what we do. We do 15 to 20 minute videos. That's what we do. You'll love it. So looking forward to that. I'll get on there and probably do five minutes of conversation, maybe not even that. Get the video going.

We'll watch that. And then after that, maybe about 10 to 30 minutes of 10. Q and A, if you guys got any further questions. So it'll be fun. Look forward to that. All right. Here we go. Three, two, one.

Hey, everybody. It's Dale Jr. with the Dale Jr. download here. This is the Ask Junior portion on our YouTube social handle. This is all presented to you by Xfinity. Leah is here with me to sort of go through the questions. And Mike Davis is here. I don't know if he's going to do anything or not. But he's here.

Probably not. Are you not going to be anything? Okay. So I hope you guys got some good questions. Hope you had a good weekend. Let's get started. First question comes from John Duncan. He wants to know,

says it sounds like the first hot lap at Darlington will be the green flag. Have you ever had a race like that? And if so, what were you thinking going into turn one? I don't know if we've ever had a race like that. But I'll tell you this. All right,

when I hear about this, it reminds me of only one thing, and that's Mark Martin. And if you go to Mark Martin's social men, the social media handle, Twitter, you'll see him comment about this. When I was racing in 98 and 99 in the Xfinity series, Mark Martin was running all the races and winning all of them. And when we would get up in the morning and go to the racetrack on either a Friday,

maybe Thursday morning, whatever it was, to run first practice, typically the Xfinity cars were the first cars on the track. And Mark would go out there and he would enter, for example, at Charlotte Motor Speedway, Turn 1, we would go out of the racetrack, and I'd try to follow him because I want to learn. And he would arc entering turn 1 bigger than he probably

was ever going to do in the race. And with entirely 100% commitment on entry speed, on what he expected the grip to be, everything, he went in there with no questions, no doubts,

and no insecurities, right? and this type of situation is tailor-made for a guy like Mark Martin. So that's what I think about when I hear about this. There'll be some guys that are going to be loving this idea. There's going to be some guys that are not going to like it, not going to be excited about it, going to be extremely nervous. And the ones that like it are going to love that,

you know, that they feel like they've got an advantage psychologically over some of these guys. So, in Darlington, you know, one of the toughest racetracks that you can race at. I don't care if you're out there by yourself. It's one of the hardest, most difficult ovals in the country. And, yeah, I think it's really going to separate some of the braver, more talented guys from some of the less experienced, timid sort of drivers. But it'll be fun to watch.

Can't wait. But that Mark Martin arcing off in the term one, in the Xfinity Series in that Wind Dixie car in 1998 on a cold Friday morning, you know, really was the most impressive thing that I'd ever seen in racing at that time. And it's exactly what it reminds me of. Guys like that, they're going to kill it. Staying on the theme of going back to racing, Jim Foster wants to know, what are teams doing to prepare for this upcoming stretch of back-to-back races that we may not know about?

I don't, yeah, I don't, this is all uncharted territory for all of us. So everybody's going to approach it differently. I don't think there's a right or a wrong way. I'll tell you one thing. So if I'm a driver and I've been in my house, right, haven't had a lot of opportunity to go communicate. Obviously, we can zoom and do all the things, but there's nothing as good as the communication you could have

being in the same room, getting the temperature of people's opinions and the tone of their voice and inflection and all those things, you really can learn so much about what your crew chief expects from you or what your engineers are thinking about all being in that same room. Well, we haven't been able to really do that a lot for some of these teams. So if I'm a driver and we're coming up on this weird schedule where we're going to run at Charlotte twice in the same week

or have back-to-back races and seven races in a very short period of time, I need to be in the room of those guys. They are the ones that can look at this and find the advantages. The engineers, the crew chiefs are going to sit at home or huddle and find ways to manipulate this and take advantage of opportunities that it presents. And so I want to be close to those guys. I want to be in the same room with them.

I want to be talking to them on the phone with them, calling them, texting them in sync with what their mindset is and what they expect to try to accomplish when we go to the racetrack. and that's really going to give me the most confidence. Everybody's different. Everybody feeds off of, you know, I feed off the affirmation, cheerleading. People react well to different things. But I want to be around my guys and just sort of knowing that, man, they got it under control

and they see some opportunities here and some ways to take advantage of this situation. Think about it. All right, let's be real. We're going to the racetrack, and we've got a very limited amount of people that are going there. All right? it's going to be a very quick show there's not going to be all the bells and whistles and the whole layout the intricacies of tech and practice and qualifying and all those things throughout and they're going to cram all this in one day all right there's going to be opportunity to to get a few things through right in tech

let's be honest like so so you can you might want to be a more aggressive right do i do i want to know everything my crew chief and my engineers are thinking about maybe not everything i don't want to be privy to all that information, but I definitely want to know how their approach is, whether they're going to be aggressive, all right, whether there's things that I need to take care of in the race car to try to take advantage of those opportunities. And so that's what I'm thinking about. If I'm a driver, every driver and crew chief and engineer, when they get the rule book, they don't read it and build their race car to the specs. They read it for holes. They read it for finding ways to circumvent the wordage and try to twist it to take advantage of it.

Unipulate it, right? That's what you're going to do to this race weekend. It's a different race weekend. It's not going to be like we used to have it. It's going to be very short and there's going to be limited things happening and individuals around to be observant and in control. Will the tech be as strict? I don't know, right?

but let's go there with opportunity to try to take advantage of some gaps, right, in that process. So that's how I would be approaching these weekends. I would be doing everything I could to try to take advantage of getting a win, creating more speed for myself, creating an advantage that other teams don't have. And I would be in the ear or on the phone or in the middle of the conversations with my crew chief and engineer all the time, every minute of the day. Um, next question coming from Tim Pendergrass. What would your, uh, first five picks be for the underappreciated paint scheme hall of fame? This one might be tough for you. What? What was all that?

If there, if there, if there was an underappreciated paint scheme hall of fame, what would your first five picks be to go into it? Five picks. I mean, I couldn't even probably give you one. Let me see. Underappreciated paints. Yep. You know, I, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, I've, said this before. The Keystone, I think it was Keystone. Wally Dolembach drove that car for Rouse, number 16. Kind of had this orange, white corner sort of fade thing going on. I always like that car. Anything with orange and a fade. One of our cars, I think we, so I had this red, this red sort of, who was, it wasn't Oreo, it was a cracker. Ritz? Ritz. Yeah, so the red Ritz Bush car that I ran in Daytona in February one year had this sort of yellow stripe around the bottom.

I recreated that car intentionally for the exalted race car for one of my years, one of the last few years I raced. I didn't tell anyone else that, but some people picked up on it when they saw it. But I like that sort of red to orange to yellow, any kind of fade thing. And I use that. But most good schemes are appreciated. There's not really any good schemes that aren't appreciated. But I would say that Keystone car, plus it was a beer car.

I always liked all the beer cars. But most of the beer cars, you know, there's a lot of people that like the Miller. Let's talk about paint schemes that people liked that I didn't think was that good. Like all the, like that. Yeah. Talking about beer cars, I go to the Miller cars, right? look I like Miller I'll drink it

nothing wrong with it but people I thought a lot of people really liked a lot of the Miller cars and I really didn't think I really didn't I really didn't think I read great you know I really didn't there's a couple that Brad Kislawski um throwbacks that he did for Rusty right

and people were like oh I love that car I remember that one that was a good one you know maybe the black one with the red and blue squirrely through the door or whatever it was yeah I remember that as a badass car none of Rusty's car is ever really stood out to me as like, damn, that's a good looking scheme, you know. So there's probably more of those, I think, where people are wowed by a scheme. And I thought, another one might be

the Bell South car, the 42 Bell South car, I think green and the, yeah, Kenny Irwin, Kenney Irwin drove it, Nimichick might have drove it. I think that they should do that car as a throwback. I do because I think it would be cool to, because I'll be honest, aside from Kyle Petty's melly yellow car. The last couple of 42 throwbacks have been overwhelming. But that Bell South Car thing would be a cool throwback. So maybe that's one that's underappreciated that I thought was cool. There you go. All right guys, that's it for today. That's it. That's it. Thanks to Xfinity for sponsoring our Ask Junior portion of the Dale Jr. Download. Great

questions. You know what's been cool to see, Dale? Companies come together to help everyone during this crazy time. You had the special Feeding America scheme for the pro-invitational series of Talladega a few weeks ago and our friends at Xfinity have been helping donate and distribute masks, face shields, gowns, and other supplies to our frontline workers. It's been incredible to see all that support because we do need to work together to help as many people as possible. All right. Check out Xfinity.com slash prepare to see all of their COVID-19 efforts and that some of their policies have been extended to June 30th. Good news, Mike. We're going to have good enough internet to record these at least through June.

That is great news. Yo, it's Brett Griffin, and we're going back to the racetrack soon. You need to make sure you listen to our podcast, Door Bumper Clear, to get ready for the racing return. What's up, Freddie Craft here, and today we discussed racing without practice or qualifying, debate NASCAR's waiver system, and talk about tracks we wish we could have spotted that. I'm T.J. Majors, and you don't want to miss us this week and every week.

Listen and subscribe the Door Bumper Clear on all major podcast platform. Odd history. A little North Wiltsboro odd history for you today. Enoch Staley. You hear his name mentioned a lot when you talk about early NASCAR racing.

He helped run a few tracks. The Big Kind Man was best known for owning North Wilkesboro Speedway. The entire Staley family throughout the history of North Wiltsboro ran the place well and really took care of the fans, even when they had the most unusual request.

The fan connection to North Wiltsboro Burroughsboro was strong, so much so that a fan once requested that if he passed away, his ashes be spread on the track. So, before the October 1994 event at North Wiltsboro, Richard Petty drove a lap around the track with the man's ashes. Then the king helped spread them on the track before the green flag of the Tyson-Hawley Farms 400. Mike Staley, the son of the former Trashions. track owner later said, if you think about it, all that dust flying up there, people eating hot dogs, everybody got a little piece of that guy.

Everybody got a little piece of, that's grotesque. That's pretty odd. Okay, a note for all of you who are stuck in their homes during this pandemic, and some for you who are starting to go out and about. You need to look good. How? Well, you can get you some gear at dirtymomedia.com. Use the discount code DJD10 to get 10% off.

Here's your final reminder. Bringing back Wilkesboro. It premieres Thursday, May 7th at 9 p.m. Eastern on my Twitch channel. That's at twitch.tv slash Dale Earnhardt, Jr. 88. All right, everybody's a great show. appreciate everybody tuning in. Can't wait to see most of you Thursday on the Twitch channel. And I hope you enjoyed our little conversation with Phelps and the rest of the show.

Y'all take it easy and we'll see you next week. This bit of badassery was badassery. It was made by Badassery. Dirty Mo Media. Dirty Mo!