The Dale Jr. Download - 300 – Bubba Wallace: We’ve Got to Change Our Ways

Episode Date: June 3, 2020

On the 300th episode of The Dale Jr. Download, Bubba Wallace joins Dale Earnhardt Jr. to discuss the ongoing racial tensions playing out across the United States and his recent strong performances on the track. Wallace gets personal and tells stories about his experience with racial discrimination, a family tragedy and his interaction with law enforcement. Earnhardt Jr., Wallace and co-host Mike Davis have an open and honest conversation about what we can do as humans to help make the world a better place. Wallace shares the message he sent to all drivers and NASCAR’s executives, how he deals with negative comments thrown his way, and the intense scrutiny he faces as the only black driver at NASCAR’s top level. Later in the show, Chase Elliott joins Earnhardt Jr., Wallace, and Davis after the dramatic finish to his day at Bristol. Elliott banters with close friend Wallace about not being invited on the plane ride to the track and dishes his opinion about limited practice time and its impact on the racing. Monday night’s Xfinity Series race featured two JR Motorsports drivers roughing each other up racing for the win and the bossman describes his feelings watching one of his cars wreck and the other win. The milestone show concludes with great questions from fans during the Ask Jr. segment presented by Xfinity. 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.

Hey, everybody, it's Dale Jr. back again for another episode of the Dale Jr. Download. This is another episode, but this is the 300th episode of the Dale Jr. Download. Thank you guys for being so supportive of this show that we can continue to bring it to you. We really enjoy it. We've got a pack edition today. Bubba Wallace is going to come in here and talk to us about today's current events going on in the world. Chase Elliott's going to drop in. We're also going to talk about the Xfinity race. at Bristol, being a car owner, watching your two cars crashing each other, that was kind of tough.

So we'll see if we can't unpack that a little bit. Should be a great show. Let's get started. All right, everybody, just as promised, Bubba Wallace has dropped into the show. Good to see you, Bubba. You too, man. How has it been going? Oh, God, busy.

My phone has been blowing up nonstop the last couple, yeah, a couple days. I can imagine. Just recently talked to Jimmy Johnson, had a good conversation with him. Talk to my mom, talk to PR people from the race team, settling down, barely had some time to eat. So we're ready to roll. What are you and Jimmy Johnson? Why does Jimmy Johnson call it? Why is he blowing you up?

I don't know. I thought he was mad at me. I think I ran over him a couple of times just past weekend. But it wasn't that. It wasn't that. It was what's going on in the world today. Okay. So you kind of, that's that, you know, I got a lot of things I've wanted to ask you.

And that really brings one of my questions right to the surface here. You know, you're the only black driver in the Cup series. And in a situation like this, you're the guy that everybody looks to. On social media, you know, everybody's waiting on what Bubba's going to say, how Bubba's going to respond. We've had a couple instances over the last several weeks where you've sort of been the guy that everybody looks at. How does that make you feel? Honestly, is that a stressful burden? Is it something you are getting more comfortable with?

How does that make you feel when everybody puts that on you? Yeah, it's definitely tough. I think the one thing you can't learn being a part of, I guess, any sport, any sanctioning body, whatever it is, is the pressure that comes with it off the racetrack. It's how you carry yourself and matters like this. It's how you portray your image, your brand. And that's where the pressure comes from just because I can say the same thing as Joe Schmo from around the block, word for word, but mine is picked out because I am somebody that has a profession in a national spotlight. And there's no practice for that. You were thrown into the wolves and you have to learn as you go. Have I stepped over the line and said some things I shouldn't have? Absolutely. We're all human.

We don't make the sense. So the instances that we've dealt with in the last month or so, starting with Larson, that was tough just because, you know, through all of the chaos that has gone on in the world, all of the African Americans, the unarmed black men and women being killed, I've been silent all. I've read all of them,

and I've been silent. It's just, I just felt like it wasn't my place. And that was a huge mistake. I don't wish I could go back and start over, but what I'm trying to say is that I've got to be careful because this is the part where this is where the pressure comes from. It's like, okay, how is he going to word this?

You know, who am I going to piss off with the way I did? And that's Jimmy Johnson and I had that conversation earlier. And when I told him, I was worried about how I said something. He was like, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, you're scared of saying something? As a black man, you're scared? And I'm like, yeah, I was because you got to be careful how it comes out. And he was like, that just opened my eyes way more than ever, just by saying that I was afraid to say something that I had just said.

And so starting all with the Larson stuff, you know, it felt that one hit home because it was inside of our sport. And that one directly, didn't directly target me, but indirectly pulled me in. I'm right there. I'm like, oh, boy, here we go. As soon as I read it, I'm like, I am involved. I didn't even do anything.

Right. I already rage quit, I race, and I'm done with it. I'm not even part of it. I've raged quit. So it brought me right back in to where I thought it was time to see. say something. And I said my thoughts and I had wrote up that message, typed it all out, and got it proofread, and made some tweaks and put some more thought into it than I posted it. And we went on about it. And I encouraged NASCAR to do a lot to really, you know, that moment

set us back. And, you know, we're not sitting here bashing Larson again. That moment set our sport back a lot. And he knows that, sport knows that, the bands know that, and the ones that are targeting us, they, they, that's kind of what they want. It's like, yep, they're right back to where to start it. And I'm encouraging people, our drivers, are the sanctioning body to help us get past this. So fast forward to, what two, three weeks ago, the Ahmaud Arbery video. I don't know if you guys seen that, the jogger. Yeah. That one, I was sitting right here in this chair playing Call of Duty. This was the same setting I was in, maybe a different t-shirt and no hat. And it was about midnight when I seen that video, Dale, and my heart had, I've lost a race.

I've given up a race, you know, and lost last lap, whatever. And I thought my heart was broken there. My heart was broken and my stomach was ripped out of my body when I seen that video. And even thinking about it, and I'm getting emotional now thinking about that video and just seeing how an unarmed black man was, you know, I don't know all the details on this. So, but to jogging down the street being hunted by two armed civilians and shot and killed him in broad daylight with the other guy videoing sounded like he loaded his gun and was ready to do the same thing. So that's my take on that. And I'm just like, what kind of world do we live in where we hunt people and take their life away because we assume something.

We assume that this is a black guy that's terrorizing our neighborhood. So we're going to go kill him. what in the hell man like i i don't see how people can can wake up and think like that like okay yeah we have them in our sights cops can come and take care of the business but that's where it all started and kind of shifted my mindset on how vocal i need to be and i remember waking up that next morning and Amanda was here working and i walked out and i kind of just gave her a blank stare i don't even know if I said good morning to her. And, um, damn, this is, this is bad, man. It's, it's terrible, you know, um, and she said, is everything okay? And I said, no, I've seen a video where, and she,

she knew what I was talking about. She was like, yeah, I've seen it too. And we sat there and talked about it and it was, I was still mind, mind blown over it. And so obviously we grieved through that and got through that. And then you see George Floyd incident and you're just like, man, when's it going to change? When is it going to stop? That's why I sent out my initial tweet. It's getting old. And I don't know what's going to change, how it's going to change.

But I've accepted the, I guess, the new role, the role that I should have before of being, you know, outspoken about and being vocal. but it's just I don't know you know what to do I feel helpless because you know I've been discriminated against and I share those stories with Ty Dillon last night and I'll share them again in a little bit

but it's just it's just a sad place we live in to where I won't get accepted because of my skin color that's it it just I don't get it so yeah it's been it's been tough

I've been pissed the last week or so. I raced with a lot of anger on Sunday, just because everything that's going on in the world. Yeah, you could tell that you raced with some aggression, and it's incredible to even imagine you having to carry those emotions into what you're going to do in that race car. How has speaking out, you just explained to us how you've changed your approach to that, and how has speaking out made you feel?

How has that changed things for you personally, putting your message out there? Yeah, I think no matter what, you're always going to have the people to pick it apart and come at you, come after you. That's part of it. You know, I got into a little Twitter battle there after the race on Sunday with a guy, and I ended up sending him a private message, and we had a peaceful conversation. It was peaceful to start with, but it was just like, let's take it privately, and we talked. And, you know, that was positive. We just hearing each other's thoughts.

And that's what we don't do. We don't listen to each other enough. The society doesn't listen to our neighbors, our brothers, our sisters. We don't listen. All we do is, I'm guilty of it, too. We'll judge a book by its cover. We'll judge somebody before you even meet them and come up with an assumption. And it takes me back to racing legend cars, and it wasn't a discriminating thing.

I had a kid come up to me and say, man, you're not bad to race at all. And I was like, no, I try not to be. I race you, how you race me. Yeah, everybody says that you. You were a jerk to race around and whatnot. We've raced around for years now, and I finally realized, like, that was a lie. And I was like, yeah, all right. Well, I kicked your ass today, but yeah, thanks, you know, whatever.

And then moved on. But it shows he had that notion of me being an ass and a jerk on the racetrack just because of somebody else's opinion. And instead of finding out for himself, which he did later, it's just that kind of just, it's like you don't know somebody. You don't know what people are going through. don't know, like, we have to be patient. We talk about being patient in a race car, being patient at Darn.

Being patient at Bristol. We had to take that and apply it to life. And we have to be patient with one another. We rush into things. We're very impatient. It's opened my eyes to, I turn on the news for the first time, Saturday morning, I think, Friday morning for Bristol. I never turn on the news.

I never watch unless Amanda leaves it on and turns the, turns the TV off, then I'll turn it on and it's on. I went from whatever channel I was watching and typed in Channel 18, found whatever news it was, and was sitting there listening and watching. And I was like, something's changed to me because I would avoid the news like the Black Plague. And I just didn't want to be a part of it. And now I'm taking an effort to understand where all the hate, where all the anger,

the pain, the suffering it's coming from. And I'm proud of that. I'm doing my research. I'm learning about things. So I feel better about speaking out about it. I'm not shy. You all know me. I'm not shy about speaking my mind.

But are people's affirmation is important to you? How important is people's affirmation? When you go step out and deliver your message, Dale asked you if it was, you know, what does that make you feel like? It seems to me like it's helping you internally. But are you also going out and seeing what people's responses to you? your messages are?

Absolutely. We are, Jimmy and I talked about this as well. We are trained to look at the negative. Over a thousand comments that are 999

all positive. You sit there and read that one that's negative over and over and over and over again. Yeah. You know? I wish I could not do that, but we are trained

to feed off the negative hate and energy. And that's just one thing that I am trying to do better as a person. and I have been wearing out the block button on Twitter and Instagram. I remember years ago, Dale's talking about it, it's sunshine and rainbows and whatever it is on his timeline.

He doesn't see anything because they're all blocked. Not anymore. No. Well, I've blocked a ton of people, and I feel good about it. I don't need the negative energy anymore. I already put enough pressure on myself. And when I mess up, I own up to it, and I am beating myself up until seven days later when I gets climbing the race car again and go do it again.

Now with all this stuff going on the world, it opens up a new avenue. It opens up for people that aren't even a part of the sport to give their opinion. And that's a whole other learning curve. Yeah, that's an interesting thing for me. And we were talking a little bit earlier this week and you were giving me a little bit of an insight into some of your experiences on social media just over the years. And I mean, I have a hard time not turning my back on just let's say Twitter, for example, let's just take that platform. I have a hard time just with what I deal with, not turning my back on Twitter because it's just so frustrating the misunderstanding.

When you could say one sentence and people will read it a thousand different ways depending on who they are, what mood they're in, what's going on in their lives. I obviously don't see the type of hate and difficulties that you deal with on Twitter, and I don't understand how you're so strong to be able to continue to sort of weather that storm to be able to stay involved in the platform and use your voice. So how do you do that? That's a good question. You know, for me, it was always like that kind of boring answer.

I just put it on the helmet and go drive and put it all behind me, but that is what I do. I mean, at the end of the day, I know I still have a job to do and to sit here and to read all that and let it beat me up. It's just, man, I know what I am capable of and I believe in myself and my abilities 100% each and every time. And we're going to have a good days. We're going to have bad days. And I feed off the competitive edge that gets me over that home to, you know, that's why we do it. We're competitive. We love competing.

and I think that helps with dealing with all that stuff. It's like I get a chance to, I get another chance to prove you wrong here. It might not happen, but I get another chance, you know. And one day they'll all go away. That's how it was when I was younger. It was, you know, I always had to people rooting against you, giving you the finger when you won.

You show up and win again. They're just sitting there with their arms crossed this time. Like, bam, he's pretty good, I guess. We got to let him slide. That's all you can do. You just keep showing. up. And eventually they'll either shut up or they'll leave. That's it. So that's kind of how I've always dealt with it. You know, let me just go out and continue living my life and you have enough time on

your hands to worry about my life. That's not my problem. You need to find something to do and get your mind off me. I appreciate support, but you know, you're just adding fuel to the fire to me to go out and do better things. Bubba, I want to ask you this. And I don't even know the right way to ask it. But I'm curious, I want to learn about this. Like, did you watch the last dance? With Michael Jordan. Love it. Wasn't it amazing? Yes.

One of the things that I thought, and it made me really try to understand, is the confliction that one must be in when there are multiple entities of people and corporate sponsors and this is pulling you in multiple directions with expectations on each side that never really match up, right? And one of the things about the last dance was that Michael, when it came to some big social issue or, you know, similar actually to the situation we find ourselves in now when the country is sort of in this divisive, like, turmoil, and they look to their, to their person, to their star, to their, you know, their leader to tell us where to go. And Michael, he tapped out. He's like,

you know, he didn't, he didn't throw his vote in the ring, you know, that was a very deliberate thing. And people sort of admonished him for that, maybe, or, you know, some people did. And maybe even the African-American community would in some cases, right? It made me think, we have no idea the confliction one must feel. And you're talking about pressure. Where the pressure must come from. Well, it's coming at you both different directions, right? Am I wrong in that?

No, you're right. And then that's not even accounting the pressure you put on yourself. And I know you, and you put on just as much pressure as anybody. So can you help me further understand the terms of the terms of, normal that the conflict and the expectations come, and is that really the source of the pressure that you're speaking of? Yeah, for sure. I think for me, look, I've gone from ups and downs or being at the top, kind of work my way down, and just kind of riding the roller coaster out. And where I'm at today, we're a very small team, and I say that, I might be beating a dead horse on that,

but it's the truth. We're a small team, but I'd be damn if we haven't turned up and not. this year and been running great. We've shown a lot of speed and it's showing the pressure comes from the ones that know nothing. Right. And they are making assumptions. That's where I let the pressure get to me is because, for example, we had our second hub failure at Charlotte back to back and I smacked the wall because of it. People are like, he wrecked the car. He's terrible. Kick him out. He needs to be done. He's tarned the 43 name and it'll never recover with him driving. And It's like, did you not hear that we broke a hub, man? Right.

When that happens, it could have been a lot worse, you know? Like, and that's where that pressure comes in because it's like, all right, you son of a gun, I want you, I want to invite you out to the next one. I want you to invite you to the shop and come hang out with us all week. And then let's go to the racetrack. And let's let's give you a front-hand look, first-hand look at what we go through. And then versus other teams and show you how hard we are busting our ass. to compete with big teams.

That's where that, I feed off that. And I want to prove every person wrong. And then on top of the sponsors coming in, and you want to run good for that, and you have a one-time sponsor come in, and it's like, okay, this is a big race, his favorite race, and something goes south.

And then it's like, I don't know if I would ever get that opportunity again. And for me, I feel like I always have more eyes on me. Let's go to Bristol and I race. I got wrecked twice and 18 laps on a video game. And I quit. I didn't even cuss when I quit. I did.

I said, my bad. And I got off, it wasn't even a rage quit, to be honest with you. It wasn't even rage quit. And I get dropped from a sponsor. Yeah.

And part of me thinks like, what? Part of me thinks that that was somebody else would that have happened. Hmm. You know, and I think that. I believe in that. Like,

if it was some other driver, would that have happened? Or would have been like, man, we don't appreciate that. I get that. But the way it was blown up, magnified, that gave me more fuel with fire to get back in a race car in real life and go out and do good things. So it just for me, it's, I let so much negative pressure get to me, but I let that build up to me to go out and compete well.

I don't let it, I used to let it, like, wear me down and not be able to sleep, want to go out and win practices. I remember KVM, 2013 in the truck, I had probably five bad races in a row, wrecked out. Just because I was like, I'm not winning practice. I'll never get a sponsor if I don't win practice. I missed the poll. And 15th, I'm starting 15th. Kyle was on the pole about three seconds.

I'm terrible. And then I was just like, take it back, take it back a notch. Coming into 2014, had a great year, beat Kyle some times. And started realizing that. Went to Roush and went down that same path. It's like, okay, I got to make a name. for myself. I got to go out and I feel like I was a badass in the trucks. We're going to turn this program around. We're going to go out and win races. That is the thing that haunts me to the

day that I am winless in the Xfinity series. Pisses me off every day. I think about it. Hey, you can fix that. I know. I know. Dale's got a ride. Call me when I want it's available. But I just let, I let so much negative stuff gets me in it. But like I said, it builds me up to be competitive. Yeah. I think you're using this fuel. I am, I am. And it's like it's a, it's a thin line to walk. Yeah. Because it can get too much to where it's, it's taking you away from what you need to be focused on.

Like I could be sitting on Twitter all up until five minutes for climbing in the car, being like, all right, that's a negative comment. Or I can just kind of see it and be like, okay, this is the job I got to go and do. We'll go out and compete. That's how my mind works. Anybody else, I would say, don't read negative comments. You seem to be the exception to the, rule only because you use it as fuel, but there's also another thing that I've noticed,

and you said it back, and this is something that Dale and I have noticed about you, and that is you are also very unique in that you do still try to listen. I remember listen to people who have a disagreement with you or have taken it. I remember when, what was it, several years ago, there's somebody stepping at you on Twitter and you're inviting them to a race. Like, look, come, let me invite you. Hot pass is on me, this kind of thing. You've always been that guy.

Listen, we could all take a lot of lessons from that approach. And listening and understanding, you know, Dale Jr., it finally ate at him this week because he's been stewing on this whole situation in our country all week. And I think the instinctual reaction for guys in both of your shoes is don't cause more attention to myself than necessary, right? I don't need the headache. I don't need that. But eventually it festeres in you and you got to do something. something because sitting on the sideline's not an option anymore.

And they'll reach that point. And you know what? I told him, don't look at the comments. I looked at him. Don't look at the comments because it will absolutely disappoint you on where we are as a society. Nobody is willing to listen and understand before they already have their mind made up, however ignorant it is. And that is where we are.

How do you fix that? Where do you go from that? if nobody's willing to listen to each other. People, it's either, if I see one more driver post about this, I'm done watching NASCAR. Yeah. Instead of trying to understand the problem of why we're talking about. Right.

Why can't you be impacted too? Because you're a race car driver. This doesn't affect you. I mean, it broke you down into tears. It didn't want to watch that that has even an ounce of compassion, but understand that it's unacceptable. And yet. People are so tired.

of hearing about Black Lives Matter. We're tired of hearing about that. Well, damn it, but make a change. You know, step up and be a part of the change. And one day we'll stop hearing about that, hopefully. That's exactly what my PIN tweet is about. My PIN tweet is from 2017, and I still get comments to this day talking about, this guy is only chasing race.

He just throws, he's a race baiter. He just throws race in every conversation. Look at his PIN tweet. I did an interview about debuting in the 43, I believe. It was around that time. I forgot who it was with. I'll have to look back on that. And 50 comments come through once it's posted.

But the article reads, African-American driver to make his debut along those lines. Starts off with black driver, African-American driver. And the comments were going off. He's just a driver. He's just a driver. We've got to keep throwing black at him. He's just a driver.

All positive. stuff. And I went to Twitter and I said, guys, I understand your pain, but you're not going to stop hearing about the black driver for a long time. Media has to get their message across. That's the only way they're going to get views is if they put something that's going to grab your attention. And they won. It grabbed your attention. You were clicking on the link. You see the headline. They already got clickbait. They sucked you in. I said, you have to accept it that they're going to do it. Accept it, embrace it, and enjoy our journey together as we try to get through this. This isn't me saying, hey, I'm here.

I'm the black driver, watch out. This is me saying, no matter what I do, slip and fall in the bathroom at a racetrack. Black driver slips and falls at the racetrack. That's just how it is. That's the world we live in. Accept it. That's what my message is about. It's amazing that you are the one that have to explain that to people, too, though.

Like this is like, hey, guys, this is, this is my life. This is what you can expect moving forward. Anytime something happens, this is going to be the headline just so you know. Get used to it, right? Absolutely. Get used to it. So it's a part of my name. Unfortunately, that's how it is.

So I'm not sweating it. I want you guys to join me and not sweat. Amen to that. Yeah, absolutely. You know, the, I think the opportunity for me in this particular instance was to learn. And I don't know that I did enough listening in the past. And I feel for you, Bubba, because you carry the burden to be the black driver in our sport that we look to, that we all look to you for guidance and for assistance.

And now it's our responsibility to educate ourselves, right? It's my responsibility. It's not yours to tell, to teach me. But as I'm trying to educate myself, I do, it does pose questions. I do have questions. Bring them on. You've been incredible. and I appreciate you being that guy.

So I have to imagine, it struck me in a great way to see you and Ty have such a personal conversation in front of the world pretty much on Instagram Live. You just talked about talking to Jimmy and having a conversation with him. I know that you probably had more conversations this week with drivers and industry folk than you can count. Are those good experiences for you? Are you coming away from those conversations in a better place?

Do you feel like that the people that are in those conversations with you leave those conversations in a better place? That's a great question. And to be honest with you, I have felt as pissed off as I am internally. Every conversation I've had, I have felt better about the direction our sport is heading. I'm sure you got a long way to go. Yeah. You know, I fired off. I sent out my message about the George Floyd incident, and you had other drivers chime in.

Ty Dillon, Tyler Reddick, Jimmy. I seen they ask questions after the race, and I was like, wow, all right, that's stepping up. I think Clint had mentioned something there. And so I was so mad after the race just because there wasn't more of that from our peers, our competitors.

And Ty and I had talked, and Ty and I have been, we've been close. We've raced against each other's three of kids. And obviously being in an alliance there, the RCR, definitely we're around each other a lot. but on a more personal level, we haven't. And so the conversations that we had really fired me up in a positive way to get my message across. So I had sent a message to the drivers and high ups in NASCAR.

Dale, you've been a part of that text chain. All the high ups that you would need to get my message across. And I said, this group has all the drivers. I mean, I can go back and read it. I might need a proofread it. so I don't get myself in trouble. Wouldn't that be something? If all this stuff, you didn't prove free to text message,

you read it on the digital download. That's not the one's this to happen. I said a few drivers, very few have given their opinion on a day's matter, and I appreciate that. But the silence from the top drivers in our sport is beyond frustrating. Ooh. All of our drivers, our sport has always had somewhat of a racist label to it. NASCAR, everybody thinks redneck, better flag, racist.

and I hate that. And I hate that because I know it's NASCAR so much more. I said, do y'all not care about what's going on in the world? That's not the right way to go about it. I said, our voice carries so much more weight than Joe Schmoe from down the street. I mentioned, I said, we have got to do better. We've got to step up. I urge everybody to say, you know, what they feel.

And I get, I get it. I said, this is way more important. At the end of that, it's way more important than any reason. race win, any championship that you've ever accomplished. This is something that can change on a global impact. So imagine, imagine that. Imagine I wouldn't want to be the guy that went out and won a championship in a horrible year, but never made a comment on the issues that we are dealing within our society

and maybe being that only guy. And I wouldn't want to carry that burden because I'm looked at as championship caliber driver, whatever it may be. You've got to deal in all aspects. And I get, we have it, we got it tough. We got to worry about sponsors. We got to worry about teams and all that stuff. But that has shifted for me.

This is, this is, and maybe I'm wrong for thinking about this, but I don't give a damn what anybody says, I'm going to get my mess across and how I feel and what I think should be, you know, how things should be changed in this world to make it better for everybody to be included. Inclusion is so important. And I'm not worried about what sponsors think. I'm not worried about what the team thinks for once. And that's where maybe some people are like, it's just tough subject to common. I get that. I get that. You're white. It's tough. You don't understand it. But still, I told Chase Elliott this. I told him, you know, him and him and Ryan are probably were obviously the closest to. I texted him last night. I said, say, hey man, you're the biggest name

in our sport right now, bud. like it or not you're the biggest name and your voice carries over much more than mine in our sport i said don't be silent on this please don't be don't let it go into wraps and he was he was like i know it's tough to comment on i've been trying to come up with something fun and he said you know what's what's really going to change i said chase i don't know but think about this i said imagine a follower two followers that you have and how to your i don't know how many followers you got is a person that's going to go hate somebody, go kill somebody today. And the other one is somebody that's getting discriminated against.

Imagine you saying something, and both of those people look at that and they're like, wow, that changed who I am today. I'm not going to hate on anybody anymore. And I'm not going to allow to be discriminated against anymore. I'm going to stand up for what's right. Imagine your words changing somebody else's life. Being silent on that, they could have just been, I was waiting for somebody to tell me something. We have that platform and that voice to tell people we have got to stop and change our ways. That's just how I think about it. I mean, my words could have helped people. Pissed off people

for sure, but it could have helped that one person that needed it, that didn't know it. Wow, Bubba Wallace just said that. He's my favorite driver. You know what? I'm going to change my life today because of that. That makes me feel good. Yeah. Well, what do both y'all think? Would you agree or disagree that what we're lacking in first and foremost. I mean, we're talking about listening and a lack of listening, but maybe it goes more to the lack of empathy, you know? I mean, I don't know where we, I don't know how we got to such a place of where we're so selfish. I mean, it's like if it doesn't affect me, then I'm not going to worry about it. I don't know. I just don't see a whole lot of compassion being thrown around. I don't see a whole lot of empathy being thrown around. And it's like,

you know, looking out for each other, your brothers and your sisters, man. I mean, your neighbors. That's what I feel. I mean, we're having a great conversation with Bubba Wallace here, but let's take a quick break. Dale, we've got a value partner to tell them about. My most public interaction is on social media. And I hate to take social media at face value, but when I first joined Twitter, it was a better place. And it's much more toxic than it used to be. It's much more challenging and frustrating to be there in that space at times, especially

times like this, it's almost impossible. And that to me has been a big shift. And I think that that is a micro example of what happening in our society. There's less compassion. There's less patience like you were talking about, Bubba. And we are dealing with unprecedented times with unemployment. People are frustrated. They're mad.

They're angry. They're fearful. Yeah. They're fearful. I mean, I'm fearful. I feel like Mike was talking about I've been stewing over this. And, you know, we throw around so many quotes during times like these. And in my opinion, they're great because usually there are quotes from great men

and historical figures in our lives that we all need to continue to draw from. And there was a quote. Matthew Dillner posted something on his social media from. from Martin Luther King that talks about we must learn to live together as brothers or we will perish together as fools. I've seen that. I like that. And I had a similar quote that a friend sent me

many, many years ago. And it's a quote from Abraham Lincoln. A buddy of mine sent me this over 10 years ago. And I've saved this and I've had this and I've read it over and over and many points in my life. And I truly feel this to be true. But basically he was speaking and said, At what point then is the approach of danger to be expected?

I answer, if it ever reach us, it must spring up amongst us. It cannot come from abroad. If destruction be our lot, we must ourselves be its author. As a nation of free men, we must live through all time or die by suicide. And basically he's saying that if we fail as a nation, it will be us that fails it. Our future and our success is determined by us. Nobody's going to come across the ocean. and destroy us.

Nope. You know, so I drew from, I think that Martin Luther King's quote is along the same lines. Like we've got to figure this out. We've got to come together to make this, make the change. And I also feel that it starts in our own homes. You know, my responsibility to change is my own in my own heart. And my responsibility beyond that is to my children, the children that I raise, that they're changed, that they're better.

Yep. You know, so I get a little frustrated with how much more challenging the world is today and how harder it is to communicate. It gets more and more difficult to have just common decent conversation. Yep. Over certain topics like this. People just have no patience for it. It's just like, that's one of the roots of the problem.

It's like, I have ideas that I want to talk about. and then the person gets fed up I'm done hearing about it. It's like you're part of the problem, you know? Yeah. It's tough. And you're right about, sorry to cut you off, you're right about starting at home because I say hate is taught. You're brought into this

world. You don't know a damn thing. You ain't even how to talk and how to walk. Hate is taught. So you're right, it does start at home. You know, that's something as a parent, Dale, you know, I've got myself really kind of pondering this. You know, I've talked to, I've talked to Tony Mayhoff a lot

about this and his wife, frankly. And it's like, I've got two little girls. Dale, you're about to have two. What is my responsibility as a parent to teach them about the past transgressions of our country? Should I tell them about that? Is it my responsibility to teach them about slavery? You know, am I inviting something that will have not the positive effect that I think it will? You know, what am I doing?

And man, I sit here and, scrutinize these things. That's scrutinized because as a parent, you know, you got one shot, right? You got one shot. They're going to grow up. They're either going to be tears to society or they're going to be, you know, contributors to society. And what is it going to be? And I think I sort of net out. It's like they're going to have to live their own life and learn it for themselves. I can tell them a lot. I can teach them a lot. But ultimately, when they leave my house, they're going to have to learn it for the sales. And that scares me because look at the world around us.

That's what's going to teach my kids. That's going to, is it our world right now that's going to be the deciding factor of what they become? Maybe they see it and they go, oh, I've got to do something about it or I can do something. But this is a hope now at that point. So like, you know, as a parent, what do you do? How do you teach them? Do you even show them what's on the television right now? I think, well, for me speaking, I'm nowhere near kids right now.

And you bring up a lot of good points. I've talked to a lot of people about that, that have kids and they're afraid to, you know, show them the world, the outside world. But I think you go back to history class, and I've seen a couple posts, you know, will these events be in the next generation's history books? Right. Who knows? but I think for you guys

I think it'd be important to be up front and honest if your kids come up to you and we learn about slavery today Right Then it's like well let's let's Let's go eat some dinner and then we're going to skip bedtime We're going to talk about it and lay it on a line And be upfront and truthful about it

And open their eyes It's all about exposure It's how you expose them If it's like oh yeah that's great And then let it blow over Then they'll never truly understand. That's true, because they're going to emulate you. If it doesn't matter to you, then it's not, then they're going to, they're going to emulate a lot of that. The other thing,

it doesn't affect me at all. There is a simple principle that I know that we can teach and I try to teach my kids. And that is treat everyone the same. Treat everyone the same. I mean, it's a simple principle. So much so it's, it's almost cliche. Just treat others the way you would be expected. It doesn't mean anything to anybody until you've been treated wrong. Right. To be clear. Like I'll tell them that treat people how you wouldn't be treated until they dealt with being mistreated to, you know, to a level that affects your inner being, then it's hard to process that. But you hope that they'll remember it whenever that happens, you know? Remember how that felt? Remember how that felt? This is what I've been trying to

teach you. Don't be that person. Yeah, don't be that person. And right now we're, kids are so influenced by their friends, right? And they always want to do, well, Jimmy Joe has this thing and Sally has this thing. Like, I need to have it. Like, we always got to be, you know, right there keeping up with the Joneses. And whether that's in a group and you're picking on somebody, that's where it starts. It's like, we should not allow, start bullying. It's a problem that I dealt with in school.

It's a worldwide problem in our school system now. days that we seem to can't cannot get a hold on and it starts there it's it's like you're right we treat everybody with respect until they're around their friends and they try to act cool because they think it's a cool thing to do and so it's like how do we get kids to understand that you know what's right what's wrong right so it's tricky man i'm gonna come back to y'all on that when i have kids but i got to yeah that brings up a great uh to twitter's credit i did draw a a question from a follower of yours in mind, Bubba, Tim's question, which I thought was a great one, in all seriousness, can you guys offer some advice to people on how to start these difficult

conversations? A lot of folks just don't know how to start them conversations. And I think that we just, not only talking about conversations about race between the black and the white communities, but also to our children, how do you start those conversations? I think just being up front and honest and sharing with your children your own values and what you would hope that they would choose to do in any situation is a way to go there. But let's go back to Tim's question of how do you start that difficult conversation about racism? How do I start that conversation? How does someone else that wants to reach out to you, Bubber, wants to talk to you about that, start that conversation? Well, I think it's simply as, hey, man, what are your thoughts on what's going on in the world?

and they offer their advice and I think that's where it kind of snowballs from there or not advice their opinion. Yeah. If I'm tired of hearing about I don't want to talk about it, then that's your,

the door just opened up for you to be like, why not? Why not? Why don't you want to talk about it? Are you tired of it? Why are you tired of it? Or if they're all, you know,

for it, then it's like, okay, well, let's come together and start this gospel of how we can, get more people involved to help the narrative along. But it's all about you have to be the man in charge of being like, hey man, I just want to

sit here and talk about today's world and society and how it's going. What is your thoughts? And you get that direction right there. You have two ways to go. You have a way to educate them or a way to both y'all listen to each other and it continue to grow together. Oh, that's so interesting. You know, and about Tim's question, Dale, is one thing, how do we start the conversation?

It's another thing to have it publicly. The conversation publicly is a completely different conversation. And so we're having a public conversation of sorts. It's just distant here. Speaking about it publicly and that's what's fascinating about you and Ty Dillon. Yeah, that was, that was, I literally had just pulled up to RCR. We were running some Sim stuff. and he texts me.

He said, we were talking about the silence in the group chat. And I were very vocal about that. And he was like, what do you think about going on Instagram live? And I sat there and I thought about it. And I was like, yeah, sure. You know, I mean, I said the race is going on, though. I might not get a lot of views, but that's a fact. And I was like, yeah, sure.

You know, let me get home and get some dinner in and let's do it. that was off the wall, off the cusp, non-scripted, just he asked what my stories were, and I laid it on the line like I always do. I am 100% raw and real every time. And, you know, that's the way it went. And I thought it was powerful. Now, I'm not a guy that is very by the book and by the Bible. and when he brought out the prayer at the end,

that was like, that was the most amazing thing ever. I thought that was incredible. And the way he was just sitting there and wanting to learn, he wanted to know how to be a better person. Yeah. You know, maybe he had had troubles in his time. Who knows? Ty's always been a great guy.

But he wanted to be even better than what he was. And there's so much respect into that. Because when you think, it doesn't bother me, it doesn't affect me at all, but I want to learn about it so I can be better and educate other people. That shows a lot of power, you know, the time dealing, and I appreciate that. I didn't know how long we're going to talk,

what we're going to talk about. He just simply said, I want to hear your stories what you've gone through. And I was like, all right, sit back, you know, because it hasn't been all good. And like I told you, Dale, my instance there, of being told to get out of my car and have it searched. and it's funny on that instance,

and I forgot to mention last night, I just got my car clean, and I had, I think, a race winning check just cashed, and I had all that money in my car, but we had cleaned it and we had taken it out. So imagine if the money was in there. Oh, man. So, you know, and it's like, man, those instances,

and there's another incident, the reason I talked to my mom today is I wanted to bring it up. I lost my cousin. I was eight years old. This was a year before I started racing. I think I was eight. You're at my sister's basketball tournament. Can't remember where.

I was running around the gym with all the other brothers and sisters there. And all of a sudden I hear a scream. Like, like the worst scream that you want to hear. Not like somebody scared your screen. Like something bad had just happened. And I look over and I see my mom running out the door. And we had just found. I found out my cousin was shot and killed by the police officer.

On the arm. And so it was, I was young. I didn't understand it. I just, we lost a family member. But now seeing everything come full circle, I totally get it now. They had just left, she just told me, it just left somewhere, football game or something. He was 18. they all went to a gas station here in Knoxville, Tennessee.

And playing loud music. There was a whole crowd. Hangout spot. After football games, we would go to the McDonald's right here down the street and all hang out. Blast me. I had the system in my car, so I was blasting the music, but never thought about that I was bothering somebody. A brother, store clerk who happened to be white, felt threatened that there was more

African-Americans, that something bad was going to happen. So she called the cops. and the police officer had ordered my cousin Sean to put his hands up and he did and then that officer walked away and he went to grab his phone to call his mom because he was scared and was shot and killed from the other police officer so and it's like all because people were having a good time not bothering somebody but it somehow people are afraid how are you afraid of black people? That's just the thing I don't understand. Like, mine in our own business, we're having a good time, and somebody's life was taken, and it happened to my family member,

and I've never shared that story. I remember in fourth grade, I was crying. I got letting out of class for it. But now, truly understanding it, it definitely hurts a lot more now that I can decipher what really went on into it, said he was reaching for a gun, and it wasn't. So, you know, that's tough.

And, you know, I've dealt with that. That's indirectly, but it's family. And I've dealt with my struggles, you know, directly of getting pulled up at stoplight. Like I talked about last night and having guns drawn, not pointed at me, but they're out of their holster ready to do something. And that moment, you know, being pulled out in front of and turn on your hazards is a sign that you're slow and I need to go around you. But when it's undercover cops, you can't do that. And when it's tinted windows, they don't know what to expect. So they're ready for anything.

So one wrong move, I wouldn't be here talking to you today. And then the comments after, and this is where we can help so many people, it's the comments that they made towards me that pissed me off the most. Can you afford this car? This is a nice car. Oh, my goodness. And I said, yes, sir, I can. And what I wanted to say is, yeah, I'll have you one.

here Monday. I have your mama here one on Tuesday. I'll have the rest of your family here on Wednesday because that's how much money I made. But I didn't. I let it, I let it go because one wrong move because I'm black could have me on the pavement saying I can't breathe. So, you know, that's a, that's, that's the point that I've, I've sort of learned is that, you know, there's a lot of people that would respond to what you just said as, you know, bad things happen to everybody in the course of a lifetime. You know, everybody's going to be mistreated. is going to do that. And there's truth to that for sure. There is truth to that. We all have been mistreated at one time or another. But we haven't feared for our lives. Like there's there are things

that happen that you shouldn't have to wonder about getting shot. And there's the difference, right? I get pulled over. It's happened a bunch. Not once did it even enter my mind, the things that have to enter your mind and other people's minds that have to deal with this. That's their reality. Your reality and my reality are not the same realities. You know, for better or worse, it's not the same. And so that's where we have to be like empathy. But there's a big distinction in being mistreated and fearing for your life.

And I think that, you know, a lot of the expression that we see going on around our country right now, it gets to that point when you fear for your life. Don't you agree? Yep, I agree 100%. You said it right. There's a big gap in between being mistreated and fear for your life. I think we're seeing fears for life. And fortunately, you're seeing a lot of other people joining that.

People that don't necessarily fear for their lives. People that are privileged, people that do, they're realizing the problem with that. It's just a problem. We shouldn't be this fearful. And if you are, let's not nivis. pick why you are, let's listen and say, okay, how can we fix the fear, the cause of the fear, you know?

It goes back to listening. It goes back to listening. Boy, end that a good lesson. Yep, going back to listening. Brother, I kept you on here a lot longer than I told you I would. Hey, man, it's all good. I can go on for days, brother. We can keep going.

Yeah, we got a part. Look out. Look at. Look at. Look at you just dropped in. He's rolled in. Who jumped in? Chase.

Look at this. Go ahead, caller. Who's on this? What are we doing? Hey, old boy. How about you? What's going on? We've been talking to Bubba forever.

It's been a good conversation. Good. Yeah. Yeah. What are you doing today, Chase? You know, I've been doing media for the past hour and a half. Have you? Yeah.

And I get to end it on a high note with y'all. Now, that's the biggest load of BS I've ever heard because he's just like, now I'm ending in it with more media. No, I've been waiting on this one all day, so I appreciate it. Oh, no. Hey, Chase, you're so full. Hey, Chase, are these fellows like Bubba, are they inviting you to more things? Are they still just leaving you off the invite list like they used to?

Are we live right now? We're always live, buddy. Don't feel like the world works now. Yeah. You know, I feel like I've got a couple invites here lately to some things. So I appreciate that. You know, it's the thought that counts. Hey, Chase, who flew with you to Bristol?

Who did fly with me to Bristol? My dad, dad flew with me to Bristol. Oh, is that right? I thought Ryan flew with you, too. He might have been in there. I think he was hanging out of the pool. Yeah, I'd rather than in there, too. How did you get to Bristol?

I rode my motorcycle, which is a lot more peaceful, but we're talking about invites. I would love to be at Chase Elliott's house after a big win. You know, I'd love to be kicking it back, throwing back to Colvin, but no, I'll just ride my motorcycle, whatever. Right, right, right. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. Well, we got you, while we got both y'all here, let's talk a little bit of racing. Bubba, I didn't want to let you go without giving you some props on a great finish at Bristol.

Yeah, we should. Yeah, you mentioned it earlier in a conversation, how the cars has been fast this year. And you were really aggressive. One particular situation with Eric Amarola down in the term one. Man, all right. I'm stopping right there. What happened? Did you not see? They literally said, oh, Bubba, oh, wait, Brad gets, Brad's pushing.

Bubba, and then they just go back to Bubba just wrecked Amarola. Brad was pushing me the whole time. It worked out really good for you. It did. Truex got bottled up. So he gave me a ride back to the bus on the golf cart. And Tris was like, dude, what happens? Just get in there and get into Amarola?

I said, no, dude, I was getting pushed. So I said, whoever moved you or whatever happened, he's like, I just got sideways. I said, okay, Eric filled the hole. And then he checked up. And I got to run underneath him. And while Freddie's saying, block bottom, block bottom, I look over, and here comes the two of Brad coming in there. Now, like the Jimmy and Stenhouse deal, Jimmy can't see what's in front of Stenhouse at that moment.

I can't see what the 19's doing. So I'm just like, oh, I'm trying to hold a pretty wheel. I'm getting shoved in there. You literally feel front bumper back bumper, front bumper, front bumper, and then caution's out. It's like, okay, that was just an accordion effect. I don't know who was pushing Brad, whatever. but as clear as day on the replay that I'm getting pushed by the two car, still my fault.

I thought it was awesome. I thought it was awesome. I would take full credit for what happened right there if I were you. Hey, I'm fine with it. I finished 10th. Where did they finish? Maybe you both can chime in because you both kind of been involved in some things this year, but why do y'all think guys are being a little more aggressive?

I love it. I think we need more aggression in our sport and more beating and banging and carrying on. And, you know, obviously more short tracks if we could get them. But why do you think the intensity is higher? Or is it, it does it not seem higher to you guys? You tell me. I feel it's higher. I've always been the person to race hard from lap 1 to lap 500 in Bristol.

Like, that's how I was brought up, man. The whole letting go and faster than you, you're fashioning me. You'll figure out a way to get around me. You know? And nobody lets nobody let's nobody go anymore. Good. Everybody races everybody for position. Like when I was in 2000, just picking a year, like 2010,

everybody let everybody pass. What happened? Y'all are the reason we got to where we are. I was going to get you guys out and let people get back to racing. Chase? It was this old farts. Is it back in there riding around all day? Jason and I and Ryan,

we race each other the hardest because I think it's like a bragging rights competition. Like, I'm going to race them hard, knowing in two laps are going to blow my doors off. So it's like, I'm going to put up a good fight now. Is that true, Chase? Chase, does Bubba race you harder than other people? Oh, I mean, yeah, absolutely. I mean, he talks.

You had to look out the window to get it. Yeah. But, you know, it's all good. No, come on now. Come on. You got to tell him, because you're not going to invite them on your airplane. So you're going to have to tell them now. Amen.

Unless you want to ride a bitch on the motorcycle, because this is your chance to tell him. Hey, maybe I do want to ride a shot going on. Give me a side car. I love to ride with you. This side car. That's awesome. Speaking of that, I got a picture of him and Ryan.

No, no, you don't. No. Come on, did that happen? Did that be? Oh, I got one. Didn't that happen on y'all's trip? No, no, no. This was at Ryan's place right next door to you, Dale.

And they were just sitting in the motors. They were just sitting in the drive. I was going to say. Yeah, they weren't riding anywhere. It was funny. Let's not share this. Why don't we? No, let's just get this one out.

This is the content we're here for, boys. Look at this. Hold on. Get it in front of the camera. Yes. All right. Appreciate y'all's time. Some things,

some things are never just going to come out sometimes. I love it. You just got to be ready. It's a perfect time. Hey, Dale's point, I want to tell you both something. Chase, man, I'm going to tell you. So when you guys were preparing to go back to Darlington, you know, we're sitting here and getting all excited because, look, you know,

we're just fans, we're spectators. And I said on this show, me and Dale were talking, and I said, man, you know, I hope, gosh, I hope these drivers are just not, you know, I hear them all saying, man, we're just ready to get back in the car. But, like, there's an opportunity here with no other sports going on to, to really rise up. And if you're going to, if you got aggression and you show your aggression.

And if you got personality, show your personality. And if you got things, holy, I didn't even think Chase, you took that to a whole other level, dude. I mean,

like, we're seeing, this is the chase we came for right here, dude. And you're winning. I just got to applaud you both. And I know those Chevroletes are driving good. I know.

I got it. But, man, the way the races have been so entertaining for us, you know and it's it's this is what this might be the jolt we needed you know while all these other guys are sideline looking seeing if we're going to mess this up by coming back too early you guys have come up here you took the stage you took the spotlight and you're running with it man i just that's not a question i just want to say thanks to both of you for it and chase yeah my god man you you you don't come out uh you know on a tear and i love it dude this is this is i hope it just

continues with i hope so it's been fun you know know, I think that, you know, one thing too, I think NASCAR deserves some credit, you know, and I'll be the first one to say they're typically not the ones to be trendsetters. I feel like we're a lot of times following suit of, you know, other playoff formats or this or that. And I feel like in the past we've tried too hard to be like other sports. But I do think they deserve a little bit of credit and coming back first. I don't think it's coincidence that you're now seeing F1 come out with their schedule and all of a sudden they're racing at two tracks in a row.

and all these things that they've been trendsetters and that. So I think it's been fun. I think it's been a good time for our sport under bad circumstances, but I think we've made the most of it as an industry. Well, it's been a lot of fun to watch you guys. And I think I asked Chase this the other day. I was talking to him, and I'll let you chime him, Bubba. The no practice, no qualifying, do you think that that is better?

And do you think that it also adds to what we're seeing in the race? as far as the more exciting sort of wild, wild race when we're seeing it. I believe so. I'm a fan of it. I think I said who I was talking to. I think it was an Air Force meeting greet. I think 10-minute hot lap session right before the race. Let's just roll out, get her travels right?

Make final adjustments right there and then roll. Other than that, I'm good with it. I like showing up getting in and getting out. I think it adds for a lot more excitement. The unknowns of your car are kind of still there. and you don't know what to expect. So for us, it's definitely helped. We've brought some really good cars.

We'd like to attribute it to the hard work back of the shop, for sure. We've done a good job. But how much of that has played in? Just no practice and allowing other teams not to, you know, allow it to miss it that week. So we're capitalizing on that. What about you, Chase? I think it's great. You know, there's a few things I've thought about in this is, you know, number one, we're asphalt racing, right?

and that asphalt changes a heck of a lot less than a dirt track does. And those guys practice for 10 minutes every Friday night before they go race, number one. And then the second thing I think about is we're supposed to be professionals at the top level of stock car racing. And every short track in America that races on Friday night, those guys show up on Friday afternoon, practice for 45 minutes and then go race that night. So why is it that we're supposed to be the best, but we practice for two days before we get to race on. that you got to practice for 45 minutes. I don't get. Yes.

Love it. This is the Chase Elliott I have been waiting on right here, boys. I'm telling us. Love it. We're supposed to be the best. That's right. I mean, that's what everybody talks about all the time. I'm not saying we are, but we're supposed to be.

We should at least, you know, try to act like it, I guess, a little bit. Yeah, you got to believe you are, man. That's right. You're the best of my eyes, Chase. You're the best of everyone. Love you, buddy. Love you. Oh, man.

Chase, speaking of, you know, being aggressive this past weekend at Bristol, you sent it down into the corner last couple laps trying to get your car out front. It didn't work out. But I know that you might not be able to see it because you were on the wrong end of it. But man, was it fun to watch. And I hadn't seen, that was old Bristol. That to me is 80s, 90s Bristol. And I thought, okay, maybe that. That's just a one-off.

Maybe old Bristol isn't back. Maybe old beating and banging racing at short tracks isn't back. But then my own driver, Noah Gragson, goes out there last night. And almost has the exact same move. He's even driving the same numbered car and drives down in the corner and cleans out his teammate, Justin Algar. And it's been a tough day for me. He did sell it on in there, didn't he?

He did. So, and I think when it was all over, I was, after that race was over with, I was sitting there thinking, well, you know, maybe Bristol is back. Maybe, maybe, you know, the style racing that we'd come to love at that place decades ago is kind of made it back with the PJ1. I was almost kind of losing, falling out of favor with that PJ1. But what y'all's opinion on it now? After Bristol, I know that that race didn't work out like you wanted to chase, but after that race, what's your opinion? opinion on PJ1 and what would you do different to try to make that pass work? Yeah, those are good questions.

I mean, I think that PJ1 stuff is a good thing. You know, I think that kind of going back, I guess, to the dirt racing thing. And one thing I felt like that makes dirt racing really entertaining is their racetracks dynamic throughout an event. Asphalt racing is a little bit, you know, guys working the groove up to find fresh racetrack. But I just think that stuff being on the surface at some point in time, we're going to wear out. So that's going to make you have to go somewhere else. And I think that change is good.

I think the racetrack changing over the course of an event is going to make for a better race, in my opinion. And then as far as, you know, what I would do different, you know, I mean, ultimately, you know, just be better to be able to go better on the short run, number one, to not let him buy, to not give him the opportunity. I thought the restart went really good. And, you know, Ultimately, I should have just been fast enough to where he never had a shot at me. But looking back, I felt like he had more pace than me at the time. I didn't want him to get to my outside. I thought for sure if he got to my outside, it was over.

So I ran the top and looking back, I don't know that I should have run all the way up to the wall. Maybe he should have run the middle there for a few more laps and played better defense. But once he got by me and then I got back to his inside, I felt like. like I had to try to slide back up in front of him there into three. And ultimately, just didn't have enough momentum to do that. And then he was anticipating it and shortcut the corner too. So just all those things put together, it didn't work out. But, you know, you look back and it's like, man, do you be more patient?

Do you fall back in line? You know, I don't know that you fall back in line. There's enough time to get another run at him. I mean, you're coming to two to go. There are three to go or whatever it is. and it takes a couple laps to set up a pass a lot of times. So I just felt like the shot to try to get back in front of them was there. And if I didn't do it right then, I thought it was over for me.

And it's way too important to win these races to not try to win. In forward, buddy. Well, hey, I appreciate your time today. I know you've been real busy. Thanks for giving us a few minutes. Bubba, thanks for coming on. And we hung on to you longer and I told you we would. All good, bud.

I appreciate you being a leader in this score. Yeah, man. And we're leaning on you big time right now, and I appreciate that. Yeah. I appreciate how you handling and all this. Yeah. Well, reach out if y'all got anything to ask me, so I won't hesitate. You got it, buddy.

All right. Thank you. Thank you, guys. I'll take it out. All right, Mike. So pretty wild racing action this weekend at Bristol open segment. I want to keep this short. You know, there's so much going on in the world.

I just wasn't really feeling compelled to be conversational about what was happening at the racetrack this weekend. I haven't been on my SIM rig or really done anything, but just kind of been studying what's happening and trying to learn why it's happening and what I need to do about that. So I was sitting there last night, and I thought, you know, I'm just going to wait until we get the podcast going today

to talk about, you know, what happens when your cars crash into each other? Noah and Justin Algar, racing for the win at Bristol. And Justin had been doing really well all race along leading a lot of laps. 150 laps. And Noah had been doing equally as well as far as his speed and so forth, passed a lot of cars.

And both of them are sitting there with a shot to win at the end. Now, Justin has the lead. They get a restart. Justin goes down in the corner. He missed the bottom and opened up the opportunity for Noah to get to his inside. And Justin has admitted that's his first mistake that he wished he would have never made. He allowed Noah, if he doesn't allow Noah to get there, I think Justin wins the race. But he slipped up out of the sticky stuff, out of the traction compound, and Noah was able

to fill that hole, and now they're side by side. They ran a corner or two, however many it doesn't really matter. They ran a lap almost before contact. I was, my initial reaction, as soon as it's happening, was anger, frustration with the fact that Noah got loose and got into Justin and now Justin's not only going to not win the race, but he's going to finish terribly, right? He's crashing. And so that's the right as it's happening. That's like the first flash in your mind is, damn it, Noah, now we're screwed, right? Now Justin's screwed and then a switch will flip immediately in seconds. And your mind goes to, Noah, you better win this race. right no you if you lose this race now you've opened up the opportunity for all of us to set you down

and say what in the hell are you thinking the only way that he can and it's not really that winning's going to make this right but the only way can come out of this with any kind of argument is to win and he goes and wins okay and so he's sitting there winning and standing on his car and doing what he's doing and and i'm sitting there thinking in my mind man, how do I feel about this? How do I feel about this? So Noah just won Bristol. I can't take that away from him. I don't want to take that away from him. I'm trying to put myself in Noah's shoes. I don't want to take away the joy or the happiness that Noah's feeling, that his team is feeling. I don't want to minimize it. I don't want Noah to think that he has made this cardinal sin or, you know, if you have race cars on the race, track and multiple cars on the racetrack. At times they are going to race each other. And sometimes when they race each other, they do crash into each other. It's inevitable. It's impossible to avoid. You don't want it to happen. You never want it to happen, but it's going to happen. And there's

nothing that I could say. In fact, I've tried to figure out what to say to Justin, and I just can't come up with anything that would make a difference or help him feel better. There's nothing I could say to Justin in that moment or beyond that, that will fix it. He has to go to the next race and try to redeem himself. I mean, if I'm a race car driver and I feel like that I've been wrong or I made a mistake or I didn't get the finish that I deserved, I need to get to the next race immediately and fix it, fix it, get that result. And so while, yeah, while Noah's sitting there doing his celebration and all. I'm just, you know, and even hours and on beyond that. I mean, I reached out to know and I said, hey, celebrate this win, be proud of it. Next time you're in

that situation, try not to crash your teammate. Try to do it clean. That's all I can ask him to do. Now, if, you know, if this is something that continues, if he disregards my advice, it will, it will change from being advice to, you know, demand, you know, and then we're going to have a real problem. But, you know, until it becomes a problem at this particular point, it's just hard racing that might have crossed a few lines. And sometimes in racing, particularly at short tracks like Bristol, those are crossed all night long. We watched guys beating and banging in that race, and it was a great race to watch. We saw the cup guys are getting aggressive with each other as well. So it wasn't sort of out of ordinary.

It's just unfortunate. That's the toughest part of being an owner in my mind is when your two cars are racing for the lead. Right, right. Bristol, no bless. I mean, God, but, you know. We've had years where we've been down, not even competitive. Those are not fun, but I think the hardest thing to stomach is that one of your guys is going to be disappointed while the other is celebrating. So you are literally torn in half as to how to how to feel. This happened also at Homestead a couple times. We're sitting there racing for the championship. For example, William Biden, Elliot Sadler.

Elliot Sadler. Here I am thinking, man, Elliot Sadler is finally going to be able to put, you know, put the period at the end of the sentence in his career with a championship. Something that he's, he just needs this so badly. And it was,

you know, it wasn't to be. William Byron wins the championship. That's equally as amazing for me. But half of me is in the dumps because of Elliot, not able to secure something that was elusive and that he really wanted. And time was running out for him to acquire. and then the other half of me is elated for William because I've been part of his journey.

He came and raised late models with us, went to race trucks for Kyle, and then he was going to move on from us and go race for Rick Hendrick. And we were helping in that process. So that's going to happen in race. I mean, I guess it's a good problem to have. It's not really a good problem to have. But there's a lot worse things going on, as Justin Allgaar said. And Justin took that opportunity to reflect and compose himself.

and move on to the next event. As he always does. I mean, such a professional. He is. He's a professional. And I knew, that is probably the maddest that I think I've ever seen him. And, you know, like he always does, he pulled himself together. I'm sure he had a lot of thoughts and comments and emotions to direct toward Noah,

which he made. And I told Noah, I said, look, you're going to have to work really, really hard to repair that relationship with Justin if he chooses to do that. So that's the other thing I think a lot of people. maybe don't know well enough is that although there are teammates and although you do want them to work really well together they haven't known each other for very long you know they haven't been fast friends for years and racing each other up through the ranks and you're going to get teammates not that noah and justin are like this you're going to get teammates that don't see eye to eye

don't get along right but hopefully they can work it out i'll tell you though if if if they want to continue to get aggressive and they're racing up front and having great years. I don't know how much involvement I'll have in trying to micromanage their decisions on the racetrack. So there's been some times we've had to step in with NOAA this year where he's made some mistakes. And, you know, for example, at Vegas, spinning Mide on the straightaway and all that. And we'll continue to do that with NOAA and try to help him become a better race car driver.

You know, when they're racing like that, I don't know that I can step in there and say, don't, you need to change this and you need to change that. I would just challenge Noah to do it cleanly next time and not to make that mistake. How do you feel? I feel as conflicted as you do. I also wonder about the crew chiefs and the dynamics down that hallway because we got two awesome crew chiefs, Dave Ellen and Jason Burdett that work well for each other. I like the complexities that go into that, you know, team frictions you worry about because,

you know, those old team guys now. They get competitive. And so there's a lot of ramifications that can come into something like that, especially when you both have a chance to win. And everybody, you know, wins are two. There's a premium on a man. You got to win. And so, yeah, it ain't easy is, I guess my point,

which is just reaffirming what you're saying. I find it interesting that you were feeling a need to console Algeyer and coming up empty because what do you say to a guy like that? What do you say, get them next time? I mean, that doesn't do it. And then you're going to say, sorry, because it ain't your fault. I can't look at, I can't look at Justin, I can't look Justin in the face and tell him that I'm unhappy how we won.

Right, right. I can't look at Justin in the face and lie to him and say, you know, I'm not disappointed in Noah for winning that race. I mean, if that's anybody else on the racetrack, I'm like, good job, Noah. Who cares who got put in the fence, you know? But it goes our car. So, you know, I'm splitting half about it. This is the ass junior portion of the podcast where I'll answer the question.

questions you sent in. It's all brought to you by Xfinity, premier partner of NASCAR and our podcast, and your partner for fast internet. Hey everybody, it's Dale Jr. This is the Ask Junior portion of his show from our Dirty Mo Media YouTube channel. Thanks for everybody for tuning in, sending in questions for us to be able to get this segment going. Thanks to Xfinity for being a sponsor of the Ask Junior segment in our and supporting our podcast. Great company. Been supportive of NASCAR for years. We're glad to have them. Leah, you got the questions ready. let's get started. I do. We're going to stay on theme on track her fluffles as our friend Higgie says. He wants to know if you were a fan of immediate discussion after the race like Jason Logano or letting

the dust settle and discussing it later or does it depend on the situation. You know, it depends on the situation where the other drivers at, whether you can get to him, whether he can get to you, you know, just what's happening around in the moment. I think you just kind of work off instinct at that time how you want to handle that situation. If you're angry and you want to get something done about it right then, and you feel like that that's the only way you're going to be able to release that energy, go handle it. If you feel like, man, this might be a mistake.

I need to go take a break. I need to go talk to somebody who can clear my head. You go do that. You know, I've kind of handled things differently many different times. And sometimes you don't even get that choice. You kind of end up in front of the media before you ever get to make any choice one way or another. And that conversation with the media can dictate which way you go. Because maybe you say something in the media, you blow off some steam, you say something

angry and there's your point. You know, you've made your point that way and then you walk away. It just depends on what's really happening in the environment. Our next question coming from Jake Wilson, how do you think the racing will be at Atlanta given the surface and the heat drivers will be racing in as opposed to racing there in March when it's cooler? Yeah, the one thing that I think is important to remember with Atlanta is the track being so abrasive. It's going to eat up that its first set of tires, probably that second set of tires as well. NASCAR is probably going to have maybe certainly one controlled caution, possibly two competition yellows in that first 40 to 50 to 60 laps to make sure that nobody has any tire issues, because I'm

promising, man, as green and abrasive as that racetrack is, there's no way good year could make a tire strong enough for anybody for that matter to be able to take those cars going around there for more than 20 or 30 laps before they're going to have to come to pit road and get more tires. And so it's a real safe play for NASCAR to do that competition yellow. We don't have any track time. There's no rubber down. They have to do this. There's no question.

So that's going to be the thing that I pay attention pretty much in most of these races. Even at some of the other tracks that's not quite as abrasive, that first set of tires is just going to get destroyed. And no place does that more than Atlanta, Darlington. Atlanta's going to be pretty wild. They'll be hanging on. They're going to be sliding all over the place. Around lap 10, lap 15, they probably won't work harder at any point in the race than they will.

right then in that moment. So if you're a fan like me watching the race, tune in to what you're seeing. Really pay attention to the drivers and how they're steering the car, what they're doing with the car, the choices they're making at lap 15 to 20 because that's when they're really going to be earned their paychecks. M writes in and she asks, is there anything in your life that you're hesitant to do at first but ended up enjoying? About everything, probably. Ain't that the truth? Yeah, Mike knows me pretty well. I'm super shableness. I don't like to get out in front of anybody.

I don't like to do things in front of crowds. Probably, you know, I've had some real cool opportunities to be a part of some of the award shows, go on some late-night shows, you know, meet a lot of celebrities and mingle in those circles, go to football games, boxing matches, things like that. And I really honestly have to push myself into those environments. I just don't feel comfortable doing it.

I'd rather sit at home and watch it from afar. I don't like being the center, attention in those situations. I feel like a fish out of water like I don't belong. And I feel like that I just never saw myself having so much celebrity or fame. And also I was in a sport that was so regional to me when I was young. And to be invited to these areas sort of outside of that bubble, that NASCAR bubble just seemed so strange to me. I just had never seen NASCAR in some of these spaces working and living in some of these spaces of entertainment. And I didn't want to be the first guy. You know, it's like, you know, walking into a room or walking into a party, you want your buddy to go

in first. So, you know, I've lived my whole life sort of that way. And yeah, I still have that in me. You know, even today, you know, we get a lot of, we get some requests that are just really intimidating. And I have to have a, I have to literally have, I call Mike or I go sit down with Mike, Tony, you Leah, and we all talk about why it's going to be a good experience, why I need to do this, why I should do this. And so a lot of times I'll go into those experiences. And let's take, for example, maybe introducing a band at the MTV Music Awards decades ago. You know, I go into those terrified, terrified, and I come out of them exhilarated. Thrilled is the greatest experience. I've never came out of a experience like that and got what I expected, which is a good

thing. I always walked away, really blown away, and glad I did it, you know, glad I pushed, glad I was talked into doing it, glad I pushed myself to listen. Next question from Justin Williford. Do you have a favorite non-sports video game? Well, I don't know if I have a favorite, but here lately I've been playing some Red Dead Red Dead Redemption 2 on PC, a little bit of Call of Duty, little bit of day Z. I like first person shooters. I like to, I've always played Tom Clancy, Rainbow Six, things like that years ago. Some of my favorite games, original Rainbow Six. So, you know, I still get into that stuff from time to time. You know, it's a nice little change of pace from irasing all the time. I race all the time. So it's nice to do something a little

little different at once while. I had my Wii in a box from, you know, years and years ago. and when we went into quarantine, I busted it back out. So we've been bowling and golfing and tennis, all that stuff. So that's been fun. Me and Amy bought an old original Nintendo with a lot of games about a couple years ago. And we were so psyched. She got on there and could play Mario Brother like she'd never put it down. She just started and just went right through the first stage like she'd just been playing it, right?

I was amazed. I was like, wow, you remember everything you had to do. And it's all, you know, it's all time. You know, there's all, but I, and I was excited about double dribble and excite bike. Those are my two favorites from the original Nintendo and Days of Thunder. And they looked a lot worse than I imagined. That's right. So surprised about how bad the graphics were.

We are so spoiled by today's technology standards. There's one game, there's one Nintendo game that didn't let me down years after. And that was still, it was Mike Tyson's punch out. It still was good. But all the other ones, like, you know, Ivan, Ironman, Stewart's off-road racing. Yeah. Instead of wear that game out. And it's just like, really?

It only has like... I can't believe I really spent this much time on this. Yeah, right. Oh, dude. Double dribble was awesome. You know? Rivel. Remember blades of steel?

Blades of steel. Excite bike. Remember building tracks and excite bike making your own jumps? Kung-foo. Kung-foo? I remember Duck Hunt. That was my favorite. Yeah, that's my favorite.

Came with this console. Yeah. All right, guys, that's it for today. Wait, I got a question. I got to ask you the question. Kyle Busch and Kurt Busch at the booth. Oh. Awesome.

Ain't that the truth? Yep. You know, my opinion as to why I enjoyed them was because that was probably the most genuine that I had ever seen them both. I've been around them both. I've been around them when they've been genuine. We had both of them on our show.

they do incredible jobs in those scenarios. But them together, you could really see the human brotherly sort of, yeah, this vibe was happening. The dynamic was there. It's like, you know, where else are you going to be able to see somebody poke on Kyle and him not blow up? Because he can't blow up at Kurt. Because half the thing's saying probably more than half, Kurt's right.

Blow up on Kurt in the booth. I mean, like, yeah. I'm just saying. It was the perfect scenario. Kurt keeps Kyle honest. And Kyle keeps Kurt honest. And I really enjoyed that about it. Yeah.

And honestly, both of them were really good. It were. Just great, good commentary. Kurt is a good speaker. I never would have given him credit for that. But, you know, when he came on our show, he was a good communicator. And he brought that into the booth as well. And him and Kai, I agree.

The dynamic was entertaining himself. You know, it was incredible. I love seeing the cup guys in the Xfinity booth. I really do because we want so much to see their personalities. And in the booth, they can't really control the whole narrative where, you know, with their social media and so forth, they get to choose really what we get to see their lives. And we take everything we can get. But in the booth, you know, they're kind of thrown into a life situation.

and it's fun to watch them think on their feet. And we tend to really get to see them get comfortable and the real individual really comes to the surface. Good stuff. All right, Leah, I have no further questions. Good, good questions, Mike. All right, everybody. Thanks for tuning in for Asch Jr.

Thanks to Xfinity for sponsoring the Ask Junior segment of our show and supporting the Dale Jr. download. Xfinity's been a great partner for us. It's been an amazing partner for NASCAR. We'll hope you check them out. Thanks for tuning in. I hope you guys enjoy the show. You've got to be fast in our sport, and Exfinity knows a thing or two about that.

With Exfinity, get blazing fast Wi-Fi without any pit stops. X-Fi delivers the speed, coverage security, and control you need to stay connected to NASCAR and Dirty Mo Media all season long. This is beyond Wi-Fi. This is X-Fi. Keep your questions rolling in to at Xfinity Racing and at DirtyModemo Media on Twitter using hashtag Ask Junior for a chance to have your questions answered by El Jr. himself. We're proud to partner with Xfinity, keeping us connected to the sport all

season long. Shout out to Xfinity, premier partner of NASCAR. All right, everybody, that's a great show. You know, we kept Bubba on here a little bit longer than we, I told him we'd probably get about 45 minutes if we could and ended up running a lot longer than that. And it's just because he's so gracious and given us an opportunity to really talk to him means a lot to me and it should mean a lot to everybody else that's able to listen to the show. He's really stepped up in a big way and became a leader in our sport. We really need him at times like these. And thanks for Chase, too, for jumping in. I didn't know that he had such a long day of media. And I called him on the phone or texting yesterday, and he said, no problem. Just a great

ambassador for our sport, really becoming an ambassador right in front of our eyes. And so it's fun to watch as he becomes more and more prominent and showing his real personality. great questions with Ask Junior and just a fun show and I don't know that I really was able to help articulate what it's like to be an owner when your cars crash but I try my best.

I hope everybody's staying safe out there. These are some crazy times and I hope you're taking care of yourself and your family. So appreciate you guys tuning in and supporting our show and we can't wait to talk to you next week. Thank you. Check out Dirty Mo Media on YouTube, Twitter, Facebook and Instagram.

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