The Dale Jr. Download - 436 - The Business of Motorsports - Part II

Episode Date: April 11, 2023

It’s time once again to talk dollars and cents (and sense..) as Kelley Earnhardt Miller is back in the Bojangles Studio for the second edition of the Business of Motorsports. On this episode, she is joined by co-host Mike Davis and the President/CEO of Speedways Motorsports Inc., Marcus Smith. While Marcus has been a recurring guest on the Dale Jr. Download, this interview dives more into the nuts and bolts of how speedways operate and his business philosophy.Marcus discussed his path up the ladder at SMI and imparted advice he received from his father Bruton and former President of Charlotte Motor Speedway Humpy Wheeler. He also chats about the research that goes into keeping racing fans happy, the process of making the NASCAR schedule, track reconfigurations, and the speedways’ perspective in the ongoing negotiations surrounding the next NASCAR broadcasting deal. Listeners can expect to hear some updates on the NASCAR All-Star weekend at North Wilkesboro and what the future may hold for the legendary track. 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.

The following is a production of Dirty Mo Media. Welcome to the Dell Jr. Download. It is yours truly, Kelly Earnhardt Miller. This is actually a little bit different segment. The business of Vodersports. This is something that I've wanted to do with you for a long time. Do business-related podcasts. Do business-related episodes.

Open chats, right? Open chats about the business concerns of our industry, which there are many. I hope this series opens people up to the broader, bigger picture. All right, welcome to the Dell Jr. download coming to you from the Bojangles studio. This is the second part of a new series called The Business of Motorsports. I'm your host, Kelly Earnhardt Miller, CEO of Dell Jr.'s companies. And with me today is the awesome Mike Davis president of DirtyMove Media.

How are you doing, Kelly? I'm good. How are you today? I'm excited that we're doing the second installment of this series. We got a great reception of this thing. time, right? We sure did. You know, these conversations that we're having about the business of motorsports and, you know, our first guest, Steve Luleta talking about just kind of the track, I mean, the team operations and the business of NASCAR and how it relates to the team and the startup of

2311, right? So yeah. We learn a lot. Like, listen, we do this to educate ourselves. And then hopefully race fans can, and people that listen to DirtyEmon Media can educate themselves as well. But like we're having conversations with with business influencers that I don't know we're comparing notes taking notes just what's in their minds man like how do they approach this stuff it's a it's a hard business model that you you p you racing life lifers have decided to dedicate your entire livelihoods to so how do y'all make it work and so we're bringing in people that you know can give us some ideas i love it i've i received so many um pieces of feedback you know i shared with you some of those through email and obviously on social media and just reading all the comments of how people

loved it. And, you know, one of the things that that was being said is that it's in layman's terms, right? For, you know, you don't need to be a business exec to, or a motorsports business exec to think about what we've got going on and the questions we're asking. And the things that we're just really trying to, like you said, uncover, educate ourselves, learn more about, teach more about, educate people so that when we are all taken in and consuming this sport that we all love, that we have this bigger picture of how it all works and how each piece works. And I'm excited about our guest today, Marcus Smith, president and CEO of Speedway Motorsports. Wow.

You know, we're going to learn a lot about tracks today and, you know, what makes a great race track, you know, some of the decision-making process of great racetracks, that fan experience. I'm really excited to get into some of the nuts and bolts of that. I really kind of want to ask him. I hope I have the nerve to ask him some very pointed questions. Like, listen, the RTA certainly has been very public about this whole negotiation and how the pie is sliced in terms of revenue from the media rights deal. Well, those negotiations are happening.

We have a guy on our platform, Denny Hamlin, that is very vocal about it from the team side. I just don't get to hear much from the track side. Well, Marcus Smith, I'd like to know, give us the track side advantage of that. And I'm not saying sides in terms of, you know, you guys are competing against each other. I'm just saying, give me the perspective from the tracks. You guys get a big chunk of that rights, those media revenues. And so, you know, why is it necessary? What do you do with it, right?

Marcus is the only one that I know that can really explain because he operates. God, how many does SMI operate? Exactly. So, you know, our guest segment brought to you. you by Ally today. That's right. Well done. Well done.

Ally is the only reason Marcus is here. Yeah, and he is one of our allies. So, you know, we get to talk with Marcus and SMI. they own Atlanta, Bristol, let's count, Charlotte, Dover, Kentucky, Vegas, Nashville, New Hampshire, North Woodsboro, Sonoma, Texas. I don't even have enough fingers. How many was that? That's 11.

I ran out. Not only that, they also own and operate performance racing network. The Radio Network. Proud out to Doug Rice. That's right. The Legend Cars Program. U.S. Legend Cars International. His son is operating and running that, right?

Like Marcus's son. So that would be a fun thing to ask him about. And SMI properties, which is the licensed goods piece of the business. So, you know, they operate and sell their own souvenirs and all their venues and tracks and so on and so forth. So they do screen printing, all that kind of stuff. Listen, there's also this little racetrack called Wilkesboro that's going to be coming up. And I don't know if, you know, anybody that listens to the Dell Jr. download might know that there was some influence on this show that I think contributed

directly to the fact that we've got an all-star race that's going to be in mid-May, and they are doing some robust preparations, big time spending. We get to ask Marcus about that. We also, hey, if we're on the Dell Jr. Download, let's ask him about Nashville Fairgrounds while we're at it. He's doing a lot of time, spending a lot of a time, going talking to city councils and mayors and everything. I think we need to go ahead and get an update from him on that.

So, like, I can't wait. This is going to be a fun conversation. Yeah, it's going to be super fun. I'm super, super excited. So I think we should get to it. Let's get to it before we do. I want to just say one thing. This is some programming notes for us, if you will.

This will be the only download episode this week because Dale is off. And by the time people hear this, I will probably be in the Grand Canyon. Awesome. So we're taking the week off. But that's okay because Dirty Mo Media has you covered. We will have actions detrimental and door bumper clear recapping the Bristol Dirt Weekend. We'll have Speed Street looking forward to this weekend's Grand Prix of Long Beach, the IndyCar race.

Dirty Mo Doe will preview Sunday's NASCAR race at Martinsville. Obviously, Dirty Moe libel, react to any breaking news. So Dirty Mo Media has you covered. One Dale Junior download episode this week, that's this right now. And Marcus Smith is in the building. We should get him in to the Bojangl Studio. What do you think? We certainly should.

Let's do it. So let's welcome our ally, Marcus Smith, to the Bojangle studio. He is the longest tenured guest on the Dell Junior Download history. I mean, this has got to be four, five, six appearances. I love it. It means we love you. But it'll be the most important one because you got Kelly here. I know.

Not Dell. This will be a first. What a great day. Yeah, I love it. So what do you got to be talking about? Well, we were just kind of setting up our day. You know, we just started this business and motorsports podcast. Yeah.

A series on the Dell Junior download. And so this is our second episode with you. We talked to Steve Loletta from 2311 a few weeks ago. And, you know, really just. kind of diving in in a layman's term on the business side of our motor sports industry, the one that we love so much, you know, talking to, it was fun to talk about the race operations and owning a team and, you know, obviously going to talk to you today about track ownership and just decision making and, you know, just really trying to give people a big picture look,

you know, because we love this sport so much, right? And it's easy to say X was bad because of what, but maybe there's all these things that line up behind it to make sense of something that somebody can say, oh, well, that wasn't too bad. I realize what goes into this decision-making process, right? Yes, yeah. Yeah, I listened to the last one you guys had on with Steve. I thought it was really good. And I think I heard Dale say something about like diving into the licensing and merchandising world of NASCAR.

He wants to do that. Wow, what a path that would be. Are you coming back for that one? Are you coming back? I, you know, we could. On that one, expensive education. Yeah. On that one, I think we, we better sit down and do a lot of pre-planning.

Yeah. Yeah, that one is, why is that such a robust topic in this sport? Why is the merchandising licensing such a thing? Why is Del even asking for it? Because it's such a, it's an amazing story. I mean, the merchandise world of, of the sport. I mean, you know, it goes back to just selling t-shirts. Then you got to be big money. And then, you know, who gets what portion of the money? All this doggass. Yeah. All that stuff.

Yeah. It's really fascinating. It's really fascinating. I think it's a big part of the sport. I mean, like the docast. We love them, right? You love the history to kind of commemorate your collection and everything and old t-shirts and hats. I mean, when I was little, every race I'd go to, I'd want to get a pin and, you know, put it on my hat. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, get a new hat. Hat pins. Absolutely. Absolutely. Yeah, those are big. I got a lot of those. I got a lot of Earnhardt ones of those. Yeah. I would hope so. Yeah, good stuff. Yeah, it's fun to collect that stuff. It is fun. It is fun. Well, let's just jump in. So I'm ready to. Let's jump in. Yeah. Jump in. So, you know, I want to start with just kind of learning a little bit about your background, you know, just for the listeners. I know you fairly well and know all the great things that you've been doing.

But want to talk about, you know, just starting in your dad's company, the growth that you went through, the different positions and really talk about how you got to the position that you're in today. Sure, sure. It's like my first job. Yeah, just kind of, yeah, you know, and it doesn't have to be like detail. But my curiosity about it is we're both raising 20-some-year-olds, right, both of your children. my children. And in this world of immediate gratification, my curiosity about it is just looking back, same path for me, looking back through the 25, 30 years of the roles that you worked in and the things you learned. So kind of that standpoint. I love that because I've been thinking a lot about it

lately and having kids that are out of college or coming out of college and it's been hitting me. like I feel like I just got here not that long ago. And I know y'all do too. And that kind of goes into this amazing, I feel like just an amazing blessing, an amazing gift that we get to work with people for so long. I mean, we've worked around each other. And so many people that I work with every day at the Speedway business,

we've worked around each other for like 20 years, some 30 years. And what a huge unusual thing. I mean, that doesn't happen, I don't think. So I think that's just such a cool thing. You know, for me, I started, when I started working in the summers, I didn't think that I was going to be in the racing business. I just thought, you know, I'm weed eating. I'm, you know, painting walls.

I'm doing this labor and maybe, you know, I'll go into finance or I'll go into medicine and I had all sorts of ideas. But when I got into racing, it's really kind of this time when I fell in love with just the smiles that fans have when they come to our events. And, you know, that happens when you spend time in front of NASCAR fans and, you know, monster truck fans and our dirt track fans and see, you know, that this sport, the, the business that we have is as much theirs as it is ours. And it's because it's a point of passion and what a privilege that is. And I think, you know, we have this, you know, duty to be

good stewards of the sport. So, but of course, I didn't think a lot about that stuff early on. I just thought, you know, everything was bigger than life. When I was coming out of college, I thought, you know, Dale Earnhardt was intimidating. And I thought that, you know, people like Daryl Waltrip and, you know, Kyle Petty and the King, I mean, all these amazing superstars were all bigger than life. And, you know, these events were amazing. And I just got to, you know, sort of hold on and see what happens. But I remind myself that I didn't have all the experience I had then that I have today. And so, you know, the way that, you know, 25-year-old, 26-year-old makes decisions today is just with that much experience. And we're, we have

all this benefit of hindsight. So it's important for us to remember like, what was it like again when I was first starting, you know, and how can I help plant some seeds, give some guidance to the younger generation that's now coming behind us and, you know, make sure we properly pass the torch, you know, over time and give them as much insight as we can. What was your first job, not officially like painting walls or mowing grass? What was your first job in the business? that actually where you were now deciding that this is what you were going to be doing with your life. Finance and medicine or anything is now.

So I came out of college and I started to work at Charlotte Motor Speedway in the sales and marketing department. And I was just kind of a first year sales associate selling souvenir programs, selling contingency programs for, you know, back then. all the little stickers on the side of the cars, kind of half of them were NASCAR oriented and about half were track oriented. So I went around and, you know, it called the different companies, usually in the, like, engine world, anything mechanical. And, you know, if you give us a sticker and you buy a souvenir program ad and then

you put up some money, like $2,000, $4,000, that can go to the win. and the second place car. And then I would go to the garage and I'd get my list of teams that I needed to go visit, my list of stickers, package. And right then, you know, I would sign people up. Do you want to run this, you know, Cleveite sticker? Do you want to run this, not Unicow because that was NASCAR, but all the different ones that we would sign up?

And, you know, you talk to the right person at every team. and get them a sticker or sometimes they'd say, no, we can't do that one because we've got a conflict. So that was my first job just selling sponsorships and I was pretty good at it. And, you know, I liked it, liked working with all the people that I got to work with and kept doing that. I'm curious, talk about your relationship with your dad in that time period, growing up under, you know, and I know you lost your dad.

And I know that my dad and your dad, probably two peas at a pot if I'm going to have to guess. Yeah. But I've got my experience being introduced to the business world underneath my dad, where he wanted me to work, where he didn't want me to work, what he wanted me and Bob then. And just sort of then that kind of school of hard knocks stuff. So talk about that a little bit with your dad. I'm real curious to hear how that worked. Yeah. He wasn't really instructive as a boss or a dad.

just sort of led by example. So I worked around, you know, Humpy Wheeler a lot. I was working at the Speedway. My dad's office was in Charlotte, second floor at Town and Country Ford. So, yeah, yeah. I didn't see my dad a ton. I saw Humpy Moore and I saw a lady by the name of Jane Allen, who was just phenomenally impactful to me, Jim Duncan,

and a lot of other, you know, names that you know that I got to see on a regular basis and learned by just I was soaking it up and just just love to learn from all these people around me and you know but my dad had a great way of influencing by his actions and probably one of the coolest things I can tell you like for me that made a huge impact on me as I was I was young newly married probably like a year out of out of college. And my, you know, my rent check was bigger than my, uh, biweekly paycheck. I got out of balance and it's a problem. It was a problem. It was a problem. A 20 year old mindset. Yeah. I mean, it's a problem, but it's not unlike any other examples. Right. Right. Yeah.

Well, and actually it was, so it was a mortgage payment that I had and I lived up here. My wife and I married early and this this mortgage check was due and you know everything was tight and I um every every month it was it was just catching up on me and and I thought I can't believe they loan me this much money you know like who qualified me for this is crazy and and then so I eventually got up the courage to ask my dad for a raise and he said son you can have a raise anytime you want, you just need to sell more. Isn't that great? I love it.

That's the perfect answer. It really was. It was such a great answer, and I got to tell you, even though it didn't make it easy, it took a load off of my shoulders that, you know, I don't know why. It just made me feel really good that my dad was saying, go make it happen. You're in control. Maybe that's it. Like, hey, listen, you're in control of that.

you can actually get a raise. You can make more money. It's up to you. It's a responsibility. And I probably would have felt like a real loser if he had said, sure, you know, how much do you need? Yeah. And like, because that would have just sort of solidified me as, you know, the boss's son gets, you know, what he wants. And that's the typical thing that you would expect.

Yeah. Yeah. And it was so it was really great that he said. go sell more. And that was such a great kind of realization for me, made a huge impact on me. I never asked him for a raise after that. And it, you know, it was really cool to have that. So, yeah. That leads me to want to ask him this question. I've wanted to ask this a long time, and it's very simple, Marcus. What is your business philosophy? We're getting to know you right now. What is your business philosophy? Boy, I mean, it's hard to,

encapsulate it into one thing, but what comes to mind when you say that is, you know, my dad always said, do the right thing. He taught us to inspect what we expect. Oh, I love that. Isn't that great? Say it again. Inspect what you expect. That's solid. Do the right thing. Exceed expectations. Take care of teammates. Sell to sell again. Those are those are things that, You know, we, it's kind of pumps through our blood in the business. And we always want to exceed expectations. And it doesn't matter who that is.

You know, it's a customer. It's a colleague. It's, you know, a vendor. We want to, you know, make a positive impression. And the other thing I think about a lot is that when it comes to my teammates that I work with, you know, I want them to go home and have positive stories to tell about from work. Because, you know, you spend so much time around your coworkers. I mean, in most of your life, if you're working, most of your life, most of your week is spent around your job.

So I really want all my coworkers to feel positive about their job and be able to tell stories around the kitchen table about, you know, good things at work. I feel a burden and responsibility that that should be the way it is. And for our fans, they entrust us with time and money. And you could go lots of other places, but our fans, the ones that come and watch your cars are on the track, the ones that take time on television, the ones that come and buy a ticket and enjoy camping, tailgating, watching events, they give us their very precious time. and money, and it's our responsibility to deliver. You know, and I mean, there's not, you don't get many vacations.

I know, I don't get many vacations. And, you know, I want it to be a good one. And, you know, I'm going to take my family or I'm going to spend time with my friends. I want it to be good. And that's our, our charge as the host of the party to make sure that we're delivering on all those details. Yeah. So speaking of the host of the party, owner of we counted 11 speedways.

And we have so much to unpack. Mike and I are so excited about this. I just want to unpack a lot of different things just in terms of, you know, managing tracks and being that host of the party and talking about the fan experience. So, you know, one of the things, and this is just kind of me as a business owner in my curiosity is, you know, how do you do what you just said? you get those positive experiences for employees, managing these relationships, managing your people, managing thousands of employees across 11 different locations and then the other few businesses

that you run as well. Yeah, yeah. I think that, you know, you always hear like it's all about the people and it really is. I think a great manager is also a great coach. I love studying, you know, great business stories, great business leaders, great coaches, you know, the ones that in college coaching, you know, people like Nick Saban create dynasties not by, you know, luck or happenstance. It takes, you know, coaching skill. And I think, you know, it's up to us as managers to cultivate great leaders in the company, taking care of people. you know, spending time. Time is such a huge element. I heard James Dobson as somebody I've listened to a lot over the years. He has a, he started focus on the family. And he always says kids spell love T IME. And I think it's all of us, not just kids. It's humans. We all, you know, really have this, this connection by the time that we spend with, other humans. And, you know, if we spend time with each other, we're going to build more trust.

We're going to, you know, get a better connection. And I think, you know, for a team, that time is so key and, you know, respect those sorts of things to just build that team and it goes, you know, from the top to the bottom and all around. All right, though. How many employees does SMI have? So we have about a thousand. Okay, about a thousand. You get that right. All right. All right. I'll even take, let's take junior motorsports for a second.

How many employees do we have here, but a hundred? 125. Okay. Whether it's 125 employees or 1,000, how do you spend time with them? That's true. It's true. So what I do, and we, we swell up to, we've got about 10,000 event time staff. So, you know, you think, and that's our biggest challenge is how do we deliver the experience with a lot of temperament.

you know event time people and so it starts with our core leadership group and then our core call it thousand people that come to work every day and you know for me I'll I go out to the different properties when it's not race time we have what we started a few years ago called listening tours and so we spend time with our managers and with team and just just hear hear from people, ask questions, see what's going on, giving everybody a chance to voice concerns and really encourage them to give us feedback. And we really want feedback. Let us know.

And we've been hearing some great feedback over the years we've been doing this. So that's been fun. I've also enjoyed at times I do sort of a secret shopper deal where I go undercover and And just, you do that as well? She does all kinds of fun ideas. She does. I mean, she'll hide things in the shop. She'll, you know, it's a big scavenger hunt some days.

Oh, fun. I'm telling you. That she comes up. All right, so you're doing secret shopper. You're dressing up? Yeah, yeah. A few. So we haven't done it in a couple of years, I've got to admit, but it's so much fun.

Each of our general managers will, you know, go undercover, put on some glasses, wear, you know, regular, you know, clothes, no credential. book a ticket, book a camping site, you know, do the, do the whole thing, just like we're a regular customer, and go and experience what it's like to be a fan at one of our other tracks. So that is such an enlightening thing. And one of the common thing that all of our managers have come back and said is, this is fun. Like, no wonder. Yeah, isn't that great?

That's great. I mean, we learn some things, you know, obviously that we can improve. But overall, the message has been, this is really cool. You know, I'm glad that we are kind of re-engaging as fans, and we realize that what we're doing is really fun. That kind of leads me into the whole fan experience, because, I mean, what you're describing already tells me part of your process about going through, you know, in today's world and the changing landscape of how we want to consume things, how we want to experience things as consumers. you know, talk a little bit about that in terms of how you create that experience, what you're looking for, how you define what a good experience is, you know, how you keep up with those, you know, that demand from a consumer and experiencing that at the track.

I think it's super important to get on our own two feet and go and, you know, eat our own pizza, if you will. You've got to experience the property on your own two feet. You can't just be in a car or a golf cart. You got to get out there and check it out. And the other thing that's super important is going to a lot of other events. And I go to a lot of other events. Our management team does. And we want to go and see what's happening out in the marketplace and just take it in.

So who does it right? Who does customer experience well, whether it's even in sports entertainment or even beyond sports entertainment? Well, one of the coolest events that I go to personally is the Kentucky Derby. Oh, yes. I think they do a great job, you know, props to Churchill Downs for what they deliver. It's a phenomenal experience that, you know, is better than I expected it to be, different than I expected it to be. You know, you always hear about Millionaire's Row. Well, there's like Millionaires Ten Rows.

And then, you know, people. the ladies dress up with the dresses and the heels and the big hats, but that's even happening in the grandstand. Oh, yeah. Which is 100%. Amazing. Yeah. Yeah.

So there's a little bit of everything there, and it's just really fun. And I've had a great time, the times I've been, would love to go back. I think that's really cool. Yeah. Do you have an example? I have one that I think just when I went there, I'm like I was taken aback by the customer experience that the efforts that they, go to. You talk about yours and I'll think about it. Disney. Like when I go to, like when I'm taking my

kids to Disney, listen, Disney can be a long exhausting day. We all can agree on that, right? But they go out of their way, whether it's in the hotels, whether it's in the theme parks, whether it's in the restaurants, in the lines. Like one of the things that, you know, I went to Disney as a kid, you know, once or twice maybe. Then when I go back, I can see so much efforts and improvements in the customer experience, for instance, if you have a ride that's in a long line, they created playgrounds and things for your kids who are the most impatient people. And the ones that are going to dictate if you actually are having a fun time or not. So while you're in line, they're entertaining.

They're entertaining and it doesn't feel like a line, whether it's you're watching stuff on a monitor, whether there's things to just distract. Like I can even see, I'm like, oh, that's funny. They're playing Jedi mind tricks on me. I'm distracted and I'm not even wanting to sit there and focus on the fact that all my feet hurt. Yes. Yes. I thought that that's just like a remarkable thing.

And I'm like, man, there's so many notes that we could take out of this and apply just at a NASCAR venue. Yeah. So what are some of the experiences that fans can expect this year? I mean, we're just in the throes of the beginning of the year. Let me mention something about what Mike said. So I've been to Disney as well and it is amazing. And, you know, so we have to look at Disney for ideas and inspiration, but it's a very different business model than what Speedways do. Oh, of course.

Because, you know, you're open every day. You get tomorrow to make up for something, right? If you're, you and your family are at Disney, even if you had planned on, like, checking out tomorrow, like, you can, they could add a night to your stay. No problem. They can, you know, give you free food for the next meal, things like that that you can still take with you as value for that stay. We don't get tomorrow. So that's a big, big difference. But I'll tell you another one that I love that's in the Disney world, but it's Pigeon Forge.

And going to Dollywood, Dollywood is, have you guys been there? Yes. Isn't it awesome? Yes. I mean, I love what they. do. I think it's so cool. To me, it was like easier to enjoy than Disney because it's just not quite as big. Our family's had a great time going there many times. And they just always exceed expectations. I'm really, really impressed with what they do. They also don't have like the

kind of the juggernaut of Disney behind them to help get that stuff done. They just kind of do it with really good thinking. And I've always been impressed with that. I'm so glad. I'm so glad. I'm so glad you said this in a follow-up thought because that's not to suggest that Disney or any of these others are immune to critiques or bad experiences, even mistakes, all those things. But the opportunities to make up for them, they get way more of those. They get way more Mulligans than NASCAR tracks do or NASCAR teams for that matter. Well, it's a nice, it's just sort of this option that you have and how to handle things. They do a lot of great things. I mean, it's impressive. But I always tell our team like, hey, keep in mind, we don't

get tomorrow. Everybody's gone. So it's got to be right this time. And that's, I know it's pressure, but it just is, it is the way it is. It is. Yeah, that's right. You can't explain anything differently. Nope. Nope. It's got to be great. Yeah. So this year, you know, the coolest, biggest, most different thing we have going on is North Wilkesboro. And we have been taking all sorts of care to keep the character and the history of the venue while delivering on, you know, all the necessities, the core elements of, you know, plumbing and electricity and all those important things. Let's go ahead and dive into Wilkesville. Yeah, no, we were going to kind of save it, but let's do it. No, no, we need to because that, I think it's it's like, because Kelly and I are both curious.

There's this guy named Dale Earnhardt Jr. That actually brings up Wilts for a good bit. And so we might as well educate ourselves on the progress and all that is going into the May events. And I'm saying events. I don't want to just say All-Star Race. Oh, it's everything. It's the whole week. It's going to be exciting.

You're not going to tell me how much you're spending on it. But give me an idea of how much investment, whether it's in time, money, whatever, that is going into that week. Oh, goodness. I mean, it's tens of millions and we will, oh my gosh, you know, we're spending a lot to make the traffic better. And I got to say, here's a big thing, for all the fans out there and for everybody who works and is going to Wilkesboro, buddy up. You don't have to be, you know, one or two people a car. You know, most cars have at least four seats, it will make a huge difference. And the reason I'm saying that is because the average car that comes to one of our events has two people in it. So if we just get four people,

we'll cut traffic in half. Carpool, man. Please. Please. We've got shuttle bus opportunities, all those sorts of things. So it's going to be a big challenge, but we've brought in people from all over the country, you know, traffic experts, the people, this guy named David Stetzer heads up our traffic management out of Las Vegas, and we handle 165,000 people a night there for this music festival we have called the Electric Daisy Carnival. David is the point person on that. Does a phenomenal job. You know, we can only fit 25,000 or so people at North Wilkesboro Speedway, so but it's no less challenge because you know there's there's not a compact footprint yeah it's very compact yeah yeah we have less than 100 acres to work with so i've been um you know on facebook just

following along um obviously terry parsons benny's yes uh wife um benny parsons wife and just i've I've just been seeing all these different things pop up on Facebook. And so about parking. And you have some great people in the area that are team North Willitsboro to bring this back to the economy. Oh, yeah. To the people of North Wiltspur. And, you know, talking about the parking, what you just said, I read a whole thing on it. And he may have been a council member of something that he was kind of explaining because people were talking about, you know, it's got to be expensive to this.

It's going to be expensive to that. And talking about the shuttle bus. and just, and I'm, you know, I went there last year. I loved the feeling that I got when I drove up to Northwoodsboro. I cried. I cried tears last year because I spent my time as a kid in that infield, you know, hanging on the wall, sitting in the back of a pickup truck. And, you know, just being there was very emotional for me.

And so I want people to have that experience and then not b-b about parking their car, right? And because, you know, you're creating such an opportunity and experience there for people. So my point is that there's so much to take in to put that together, right? And the people that you have to work with and the people that you are working with. And, I mean, I've seen campground stuff pop up and new businesses are popping up even as a result of the economy and the people that are going to be coming in and things like that. You know, Terry shares everything. I mean, she's so pro North Luxford, you know. Follow of Terry Parsons.

Yeah, right? I mean, because it's great. Yeah, but keeping that balance of that nostalgic, we're coming back to. Yeah, absolutely. We, so that's what we're really focused on, keeping the history, keeping the nostalgia, you know, respecting the past and having that, that resto mod of a speedway. You know, I love resto mods. So it's, what's that mean? That means, an old car.

I've got an old Bron. It's got a new engine, new transmission, but it still looks old. And so I love that I get to like, you know, keep the nostalgia. But so, but at North Wilkesboro Speedway, we, we want you to have that same feeling. And, you know, the feelings are important, right? I mean, it's the, it's this joy that people in the community, people that love racing are going to have and seeing it reopened and having cup racing there. we're going to extensive links to try to make a big positive impact on the traffic in and out. And nobody's ever spent this much time or money on traffic management for North Wilkesboro before.

It's just because we want to make an improvement, you know, from what it was previously and what it was just this past summer for the revival. I just feel like we've got, you know, we wouldn't be doing it the way. we do it if we didn't make an improvement. So we've rented parking lots. We've brought in tons of shuttle buses and drivers. And, you know, so hopefully that's a big positive. Huge encouragement to people to come in early because we're going to have full days of experience, you know, Tuesday through Sunday, you know, camp finds campsites. I think we might have a couple extra campsites. I think I saw something yesterday. I just came on for sale. But I'm sure there people around that are still selling campsites. So I highly recommend that if you can do it.

Okay. So let's talk though. Let's get specific here. That sounds like a long-term investment that you're making. Like it doesn't sound like you're just, you wouldn't go spend tens of millions of dollars for one week. Is that fair to say? That's fair to say. So what is, I guess, what is the future for Wilkesboro? And I ask that also with a follow-up. How do you have, once the honeymoon is over after this big event in May, how do you sustain? How do you sustain the lifespan of Wilkesboro and it doesn't end up suffering the same fate that it did before. Sure. Yeah. Great question. Well, I got to say a huge thanks to all the fans and drivers and all the people associated who have been so positive, right? I mean, we've had nothing but positive

reviews so far. That's amazing. That never happens. You know, last summer, the traffic was very congested and people were so forgiving and so gracious and how amazing is that. I think there is an expectation that we'll improve it, so we're going after that to make it even better. And then the follow on, I think, you know, I've said all along, Dale and I've talked about, you know, this should be a place that hosts other events. Yeah. It's, you know, other racing. I mean, I think the cars tour ought to go there, you know, on a regular basis. And, you know, And I don't know exactly what that looks like, but I think it's probably something that could be done. I think other racing can happen there, but car shows and Christmas light shows and all sorts of special events.

In fact, we're fielding calls, and we have been for months about events that people want to host there when we're done with the All-Star Race in May. So it's exciting. And we have to continue to keep after it. You know, we'll have a manager there on a regular basis that's managing the property, managing the schedule, and, you know, just working to make it as regular of a show place as it can be. That's the answer. That's the answer is find other uses, not just races, but other uses to where it has purpose all year round. And that's what we do at our other speedways.

That's what you've been doing. That's what I was going to say. Talk about some of those opportunities. I mean, obviously I'm familiar with here at Charlotte. but yeah, talk about some of the things that you... Yeah, I think, I mean, it would be a great place to go for a music event. Having a music festival of some sort, having the Christmas light shows, maybe, you know, we've got some experience of that at several of our speedways.

I love, you know, car shows and other forms of racing, and we can do a lot there, I think. Yeah. Hey, do you sense that... I don't even know if this is the right question. But like it just occurred. Like, does this feel like a bit of an audition this May event? Does it feel like a bit of an audition to see if NASCAR will commit coming back routinely? Great question.

I haven't thought about it that way. I haven't thought about it that way. But, you know. Wouldn't that ultimately be what we're, wouldn't that be the ultimate response or the, the ultimate outcome is that NASCAR is like, this is where we would want to put an event every year, whether it's the All-Star race or an actual points race, whatever. I mean, like, sure. Why not?

I mean, if it's successful, I think you would follow that. I'm not saying that's what's going to happen because we haven't worked on the schedule for next year. But why not? You know, it's – I never thought we'd be here, frankly, saying we're going back to North Carolina. Isn't it amazing that we're even having this conversation? Right. I was talking with – At least you've gotten rid of all the socials –

media comments and when you got to clean up North Wales, right, right, look how bad it looks. Props to all those people for continuing to push. Yeah, I guess so. When we were at Wilkesboro and we came back and talked about in here, we talked about a little bit or maybe it was that day and I remember you Mike saying, well, I see now, like I know why you say it's not coming back because it looked like it was dead and gone. Like it wasn't coming back.

Well, I didn't, when we went and weeded it to get it laser scanned for iraicing, that felt like a win. That felt like that's how the Wilkesboro story will continue. Right. And whoever knew that that was ever going to be possible. Like, that's an amazing thing. And ir racing was going to make that possible. All they needed was a little bit of cleanup.

And so we go clean it up. But then when we're there, I saw a garage that was collapsed or half of it was collapsed. I saw, you know, the suites or the press box areas that one of them was down already. Like I said, yeah, now I see that this is the only way it can survive. Right. I should have qualified, though. Of course it could survive if the right amount of investment is put into it. But at that time, I didn't think it was possible without just completely tearing everything apart

and then starting up and just building a new facility. Yeah. But you have managed to find the. investment to do it and preserve it to where it is still the racetrack, just upgraded. Well, it's really phenomenal, and it's a huge testament to, I got to say a big thanks to the local officials and to the governor for their investment, support with us to help make it happen. You know, without that, we would not be able to make this happen. and then a huge thanks to our team led by Steve Swift that when construction people,

when my team says we can do it, I have full confidence knowing that they can do it. And that's such a cool thing for me. Kelly, you know, Kelly and I were talking, and I'm just going to say, you know, when we were saying, I wonder if Marcus Smith ever turns off, right? Like I wonder if he's ever not selling. Even in his compliments, he's still selling, right? Yeah. Here I am.

Like, aren't you glad? You don't have to listen to those people. And you're like, thank God for those people. Yeah, I don't mean selling in that you've got a bill of goods and you're trying to get people to actually invest. I'm just saying. Looking at the good. Yeah, the better way of saying is that you're always on, even if you're just selling satisfaction or time, selling yourself for your time or committing something. But like I always find intention and purpose.

And I think it's natural, by the way. I don't want to insinuate that you are making an effort. effort to do this when otherwise you wouldn't be. I just think that one of the key ingredients that you have in the business world is that you're always on. Listen, Steve LaTartre was in my office this morning. He was about to do our show and he goes, here, I know what you should ask, Marcus. How does he manage his schedule? And I'm like, that's a great question. How does Marcus find the time to not just be where he needs to be, but always be on? Yeah. Wow. You don't have have a bad day. You don't ever look out of sorts. You don't ever have a bad hair day, Marcus. What's the

deal? I don't know. I guess I'll take those days off, maybe. I don't know. I want to play more golf. You know, I like to play more golf. I played 15 rounds last year. My goal is to play 20 rounds this year. You know, try to, I definitely need to be purposeful about some more balance. But, you know, when I get a weekend off, like this weekend is not one of our events. So, you know, my wife and I will do something fun and we'll, you know, be able to have some hangout time. Yeah, it'll be unplugged. And I'll be wearing, you know, T-shirts and jeans and just enjoying life. I mean, you're working every day in the office at the Speedway.

Well, you know, I have a great job. I just, I love my job and I love the people I work with. And so the stuff I do is fun. Yeah. and but I do, you know, gosh, Cassie and I, we've been watching Dallas lately. And she's way ahead of me. She's left me in the dust on watching all the, all the shoes. She's not wait around.

She's not because it's addictive, you know, but it's fun. And because you can watch episode after episode after episode in one sitting. But she, you know, so we'll watch some Dallas together. We watch the voice. Yeah, that's always fun to watch. So we do that kind of stuff and we go out to dinner. But I try to have balance. That's really important.

And I try to, but I love my job naturally. So that's probably part of my secret. Yeah, at the racetrack at Millbridge, I was asked by some people that I see every week there. And they said, you know, we want to come by and get one of your books. How often are you there at the shop? And I'm like, I'm there every day. Yeah. Every day, Monday through Friday, 830 to 5, you can pretty much find me here.

I mean, I may be in a meeting or I may be off-site doing something or there's sometimes that I'm traveling, but, you know, it's a misconception that, you know, that we're not invested in here every single day. Talking about the, talking about Northwestboro and your question in terms of NASCAR and, you know, is this a try out, you know, to see what things might look like in the future. I want to understand for myself a little bit and for our listeners, you know, kind of that process with NASCAR, track selection, moving events, you know, because that seems to be, you know, that can be a big topic, right? Right. And change is not easy for people. So talk about that process and what it looks like and what are the things that you're looking for when you have those discussions and you move a race from one track to another, etc.

Yeah. You know, over the last few years where we've seen more moving. movement lately, it's intentional. And, you know, like the idea to go to Cota was one of those things that it took a few years to finally get it done. But we're thinking about the markets and the possible changes and sometimes change. Somebody said one time, and I love this quote, that nobody likes change, but nobody likes things to stay the same either. and so and my dad used to say don't worry we're going to change so much you're bound to like something that was that's always a good one but I think that you know when when we're looking along

with NASCAR at the schedule and the market opportunities you know new things don't always present themselves but you always have to be looking you always have to be considering and huge props to NASCAR for the clash going to the LA Coliseum. What a cool idea. I was really excited about that when they first brought it up to us, and I think it was such a unique way to start the season off. So that out-of-the-box thinking, sort of putting the pressure on ourselves to do something that's not normal, not conventional.

And the other thing that's kind of cool is that it's sort of, of going back to the way NASCAR used to run. The first time my dad ever promoted a race, he was 17 years old, and he did a deal with the local fair board chairman who leased him the Charlotte Fairgrounds to host a race. And that's kind of like what's happening at the Coliseum in L.A. or what happened at Cota, you don't have to necessarily build a track. So the Chicago Street course, I mean, that's a big push. It takes a lot of effort.

It's a big risk. But it's a pretty cool thing from a kind of a market differentiator, and it delivers something new that, you know, for us as fans, in my 30-plus years of being in the business, new markets tend to be a good thing for the sport, you know. And that's part of the growth of the sport and kind of injecting. some new excitement into things because we don't know what's going to happen and we want to see. Yeah. How much are you looking forward to Chicago then?

Just to see what happens, the Chicago Street course. Yeah, I'm on the edge of my seat. I want to see what's going to happen. I don't know. I mean, people talk about what they think's going to happen, but I don't know. Yeah. It's going to be interesting. But when you think about the challenges, does it even seem to?

Yeah. Does it seem even overwhelming to you? Yeah. And you've had some big challenges. It's a big challenge. other challenges that I would rather, you know, go down. But I think this one is, um, is a big challenge. It's a, but it's a world renowned city. I mean, the Chicago market is, I mean, Chicago is known throughout the world. So I think that's pretty interesting. I think it's just like

Formula One wants to go to Las Vegas because Las Vegas is known throughout the world. It's a world destination. So it will be interesting to see how, how it comes off. you know, that area where the track is set up is where, you know, big events happen in that city. So it should be really cool. I'm anticipating some excitement and controversy and, you know, good guys and bad guys and somebody's going to win. Yeah. I'm just sitting here thinking about my perspective as a fan and you're talking about the Coliseum because I personally, like, fine idea, great idea, cool factor, the fan engagement and the ages and all the things that I've not been to the event, so I'm only seeing this from TV.

You know, from my standpoint, not my cup of tea, right? Like, not the experience I would want to have. But what's wrong with it being an experience that someone wants to have? Yeah. And providing that opportunity, right? because, you know, that's where I think sometimes we see the backlash or the negativeness on this change that we're talking about, you know. But what's wrong with having a schedule that provides the opportunity for someone to enjoy NASCAR at some point during the year in their life, right? Whether it's whatever kinds of tracks you won't, right?

Well, tens of thousands of people are out there. Yeah, that's what I'm saying. What a different way to think about it. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Like, I don't have to love it. That's kind of the...

There's 10 other places I love to go and watch races. Absolutely. Right? That's kind of the way I felt about it. I was not a big fan of it before it actually happened. I thought, oh my gosh, you know, it's too short. What a big difference. I mean, I was...

Internally, I was thinking negatively about it. Then I got there and the light went off. And I saw all these fans that are, you know, in the region. got to come live to their own hometown NASCAR event. And that's the way it is in Austin with Circuit of the Americas, bringing NASCAR to that area. It's a big deal. And I think that, you know, once I saw, in the case of the clash, once I saw it unveiled and kind of come to life, it was very exciting. So I went back this year, too, had another great time.

And Austin, you know, I think is another great market. And we'll see that happen. And I think, like I said before, I'm on the edge of my seat for Chicago, see what happens. All right, I got a hypothetical for you. Yeah. Kelly Earnhardt Miller gives you a call. She says, Marcus, Dale Jr. says he wants to buy a racetrack. I'm not talking about, you know, SMI-level, you know, Charlotte Motor Speedway Race Track.

I'm talking about local, quarter-mile dirt track, maybe even. But Kelly says, we bought it. And I just need three pieces. there's a lot of things that are going to factor into whether it's success or not. But I need your top three suggestions on what Kelly and Dale can do to make sure that track has the best chance to succeed. What is your top three advice for Kelly? Oh, my goodness. Wow.

Loaded questions. Loaded questions. What are the three years that they got to focus on? Yeah. Yeah. I mean, you have to have events. You have to have the, you know, so you'd want to, in y'all's case, you'd want to have the cars tour there. You want to have events that people want to come to.

It's, but it's tough, you know, and I think, you know, you have to just have events that people want to come to. And it's, and of course, you've got to watch your expenses. It's important. What's the process for, because I'm thinking about one of the answers is like people. Like, I mean, you've got to be able. So what's the process of, obviously, there's lots of ways to talk to NASCAR fans, but what do you guys do specifically through Speedway Motorsports to, for the new fan, for someone to come that's never came to a racetrack to experience?

Well, so. How do you sell them on it? Sell people. Yeah, you know, yeah. Well, attract them. So the Hopi always used to say that the three T's of Speedway, operating the three T's, tickets, traffic, and toilets. Boom.

How true is that? Yeah. So these are like the core, it's kind of things you take for granted, but you got to make sure that the toilets work. You can sell the tickets and you handle the traffic. So imagine you're having a party in your backyard. Yeah. Same things I think about.

Where they're going to the toilet. Yeah. What's the traffic on my carpet going to look like? Where they park. Where they're parking. Right. How do you get the food there and all that stuff? So putting on a race, putting on a big event is just like having a really big event in your backyard.

It's just a lot bigger. And you've got to have people that care. You want to, you know, if you have a speedway or any kind of venue, you want to operate it as much as possible. But you have to have time to plan the event, have the event, and clean up after the event. So those are some limiting factor. How much time to plan the event do you need? Bigger the event, the more time you need. But like people say, like, how long does it take to plan a wedding?

I hear that takes like six, eight, eight months maybe. Think about a big NASCAR event. I mean, the Olympics, a golf tournament. Those things take, I mean, from anywhere from a year to three years. Yeah. And I think when you have the benefit of hosting a business, big event year after year at the same place, you do have the benefit of, you know, a common number of people that, uh, that will come and help you and on a temporary basis. You've got some core

sponsors. You've got some, some knowledge of the, of the, um, the venue itself. But when you go into a new place like NASCAR is doing with Chicago and you're setting up there for the first time and, uh, you know, nobody around there has done it before. you really have to pull from all sorts of different sources. You know, the local law enforcement, they sort of have done law enforcement, but now they're going to have to do it with this new barrier system and traffic management and the EMS and communications, all this stuff that really throws a system, you know, for a loop

when you bring so many people to one spot. What should Kelly and Dale look for, look for in a general manager? What's the quality of a general manager that's going to be the best? I think, you know, somebody who's great with details, somebody who likes to meet and greet people, you know, someone who's great with local officials. Well, that rules LW out. He can't be the general manager.

He's no good with the officials. Yeah, yeah. You might have to do it, Mike. You have to have a third job. Well, that's good. That tells us a lot about your mentality on how you manage racetracks, you see. I mean, I think that that's why I ask. I think it's fascinating.

You do rely on people, but if you get more granular, I'm curious on what kind of people you gravitate towards, that you entrust to run major operations, major events. We've got the greatest management team. I'm so thankful for them and proud of them for what they do. you know, dealing with our vendors, dealing with, you know, governors and mayors and city and county councils and, you know, helping to promote and put on events. It is a huge job that it takes special people. So I really, really have the most amazing team and they do is just such a phenomenal job.

Yes, absolutely. I've, you know, I've been able to. to witness Jessica who is overseeing the North Wiltsburgh project, right? And I don't know her official title these days, but she's a chief experience officer for Speedway Motorsports, and then she's also the director

of the NASCAR All-Sall race at Wiltsboro. So I've seen that growth and that progress like you're talking about with your people. You know, I've witnessed that firsthand just in terms of that investment in all that they. have. What is Jessica's last name? Fickinger. Yeah. I wasn't going to try to say it. Yes. You said Fickenscher? Jessica Fickensure. Jessica. I just call her Jessica Fick. That's her. Yeah. That's who started as an

intern. Exactly. Oh, wow. Is that right? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I remember the days of calling her up and like scheduling help to get to Marcus or whatever it was. Schedule meeting. Like, yeah. Schedule meetings. Yeah. That's an amazing story. She's one of those people that is like done everything. Yeah. And we'll put herself in position to do anything. Maybe Jessica Fick is who we get later on down in the Business of Motorsports. You should. After Wilkesboro, it would be fantastic to talk to her. She's got great stories.

Oh, my goodness. She's the queen of Wilkes County. I mean, she and Terry are just a dynamic duo. And, you know, Jessica is doing that all. I really, really appreciate her. So with, on our discussion with Steve, we talked about a lot about the change. landscape of NASCAR and you know the new the charter system and you know spend some time on the charter system and thinking through that and this new there's going to be a new re-up of the

charter agreement with NASCAR and the teams this new TV contract which you know completely affects you guys and so I'm just curious kind of your take on the changing landscape you know what what do you foresee the relationship between tracks teams, NASCAR, you know, the fans, because it takes us all in that collaboration of taking it all. Right. Yeah. Yeah, I think the biggest thing is that we have this kind of interwoven relationship with teams and drivers and Speedways and NASCAR. And then, you know, you keep expanding it. It's the manufacturers and our sponsors and our broadcast partners. Very symbiotic relationship with the the sport. And so, you know, when you look at just the teams and the speedways and NASCAR,

you know, there have been sort of ups and downs over the years. I think we're, I feel like we're in a really great place and a growing position in the sport. We have been for the last few years, which is really good. And, you know, we don't have the big skirmishes around merchandise, like we used to. I would like to get back to that, frankly, because it means things are growing even more. Healthy, right. But, you know, I think this year it's been, it has been, I think, a good year of growth. I think more time spent with the various parties is really important and something that I would love to see, you know, more of. Just building trust, having FaceTime, helping

to answer questions. Because we're all, we literally all are in it together. And, you know. Literally, one can't exist without the other. Yeah. Literally. I think that's really the secret of how NASCAR did it better than all the other professional sports leagues for COVID.

You know, we all have this great balance of how things work. And we knew that we couldn't have a business if we didn't race. So, you know, when the world took a break in the middle of the market, in the middle of March in 2020, it didn't take us long to get up and start the virtual racing and then having, you know, races with no fans there. I mean, we figured out pretty quick how to get back on television, how to get back in front of the fans and make that happen so that the wheels of this, of this race car of a sport could start rolling again.

Yeah, kept spinning, right? Yeah. So, okay, you bring up Kelly. you say, you know, we can't do this without each other. Boy, there's never been a more true statement. But a lot of times I hear, you know, just fun debates and arguments, especially if they come from the driver's side saying, well, they can't do it without the stars of the show. Agree.

Well, but the stars of the show also can't do it unless they got a place to show their talents, right? And nobody can do it without income. And that's where the, none of us could. Maybe the better question is, can you do it and have the same lifestyle that you want? Yeah. You know? Well, the thought process that went through my head is, I was saying that is that, yeah, we can exist without each other. And the argument would be made,

well, we'll just go take, you know, one part of it to somewhere else. Well, you take one part of it to somewhere else. You still need those other things, you know. If you're the driver and you're like, okay, I'm going to go do my own thing. Well, you need a track. You need a race car. You need a team. You need a same body or whatever it is, right? Right, right. Yeah, you can break them all apart and they can exist by themselves. But they don't exist the same way with the same luxuries and everything else that we that we experience. Exactly. I think that's why I say, you know, the time spent in front of each other is such a

valuable thing and an important thing because, you know, we all sort of, it's easy to point a finger. And particularly when you don't have a relationship, you don't have familiarity and trust, you can point a finger, you can complain, you know, and you can easily say, like, man, there's a problem, right? And just point out the problem, but you don't have a solution or you think you know a solution. It looks a lot easier than it really is. Nothing is as easy as you think it is. Nothing. Right? And so I'm, I've been around long enough to know what happens when,

when you start with, you know, a friendly fire situation. And we, you all remember when IndyCar decided to kind of turn on themselves, IndyCar was the preeminent. form of motorsports in the United States. And it was, it was huge. That's where Mario Andretti was. That's where Emerson Fittipaldi was. That's where, you know, all the A.J. Foyt, I mean, it was the form of motorsports in America.

And everybody knew about IndyCar. But when I first started selling, what I mentioned earlier, I had to explain to people what NASCAR was in the 90s. Like in the, in the early 90s, I had to tell people, well, here's what NASCAR is. We're kind of like IndyCar, but we have full-size, full-bodied cars. I mean, that's where we were in the 90s. Indy-car was at the top, top, top of the heap. And then they kind of turned on themselves because, you know, everybody thought that they had the better plan,

that somebody wasn't treating them right, and you had this lack of trust and arguments. I know Chip was in here. I mean, he knows all the stories. He was involved and knows it all too well. But that doesn't work well, and they're still recovering. They haven't recovered. They haven't ascended back to where they were. They never did recover.

Not even close. Not even close. So all those things happen. It's very destructive, and it's very difficult to rebuild. So really the great thing to do is learn from other people's mistakes, you know, kind of have conversation, build trust, you know, figure out a way forward. And what can tracks do for drivers and race teams that can be improved? And then what can drivers and race teams do for tracks that can honestly all reach towards this same goal of not just avoiding a very public divorce like the champ car, IndyCar cart situation.

But thrive and make this sport absolutely healthy. I mean, the number one thing we can do is grow the popularity of the sport, right? I mean, that's to have more engagement with fans, more fan avidity, you know, growing the sports so that more people want to be close to the sport. More people want to take in, you know, media and information and merchandise. Yeah, they want to consume it in so many different ways. Absolutely. And so that really comes back to just the full fan avidity and engagement, you know, more,

more face time with fans. I think that there's an opportunity. Like a lot of people I've heard kind of feel like, well, we're never going to get back to where we were. Why is that? Why do we ever get to where we were? Yeah, why shouldn't we strive? Yeah, absolutely.

Why could we not get back to where we were? Why not? We can. And so what were they doing back when the times were the best, when we hit our prime, what were they doing that contributed to that? Well, that's a great question. I love to think about, you know, what were the best of times and what are the characteristics of the best of times?

Right. And a lot of that is building the connection between the driver and the fans. And it's that connection that creates what I saw was a bigger than life persona from the drivers to the fans. And just that that's how we got. to be known as the most accessible, you know, sport in the world, built the most fan loyalty in the world. And, you know, those are things you can never, ever take for granted. You can't stop building any of that stuff. You can never stop building a business. You can never stop building anything because, you know, life doesn't stop. Yeah. You got to enjoy the climb because

it never ends. You just got to keep pushing. and keep working on the sport, which is part of the business, and the fan connection. So when you look way back, I mean, there's everything from the glory days of when the king, Richard Petty would sign autographs for hours and hours. You know, Jeff Gordon and Dale Earnhardt and Daryl Waltrip and Rusty Wallace, they're all out there, engaging with fans, sponsors. You know, those are important things. I remember, you know, every week, drivers would go and go to dealerships that were around a track and sign autographs.

And that's how you got your cars for the driver and team to drive around, right? Yep. I mean, Chevy didn't just send cars to every track around the country, the local dealers. When I worked for an agency, yes, I did that. got their getting around cars for the weekend. So when I worked for an agency, got to work for it. Yep.

I called the dealerships to set up those cars in the areas, and that's how you did it. There you go. Wow, why did they get away from that? That was so, that's such a brilliant idea. Time, probably for a lot of people, right? You got to go to the dealership to get your get-around car for the weekend. I would love to see us get back to the,

also the race day stage, you know, that Fox Sports used to have, speed stage. Yeah. At Bristol, we did it. We got Kenny Wallace out there, John Roberts, and the fan connection. I mean, I've been trying to bring this back ever since it went away because we used to have Friday night, Saturday night, and Sunday morning live on TV, driver connection, fan connection, that really just builds this great relationship between our drivers and the fans and the events. It's something that we need more of. And I would love to see that happen at every race. Yeah. Another Millbridge story, fresh on my mind.

This one particular night, I was stopped by three different sets of race fans that were coming to experience the dirt race for the first time that night because they were in town visiting. And so they had came to our shop, they came to RCR, whatnot. And, you know, they're always nervous to stop, you. And, you know, you're in, I'm in my element watching my son race and whatnot, you know, and that's the first thing they say, you know, are you Kelly, you know, I'm so nervous to talk to you, but I just want to tell you, you know, how much I appreciate you, how much I appreciate

your family or the shop. We had an amazing experience. You cannot take those connections for granted. I could easily walk by, not make contact with people. I walk by every single person. I say hello. I don't care who you are. I don't care where I am. You know, people think I'm crazy. This half of them don't talk back. But you cannot not make those connections. And they'll say to me, I can't believe you're standing here talking to me. I can't believe I got this opportunity to talk to you. And I'm thinking to myself, why wouldn't I make myself available for that?

You are the reason that we are all here. You know, the reason that we exist is you keep talking about connections that just is resonating with me. I'm thinking about the things in my life of where that's so impactful. Well, and think about how many people are those people telling. Yeah. You know, it's not a one-time impact. So I tell people that, you know, you've got impressions, right? In advertising, you get an impression if you see a logo.

Well, when a fan can see your eyeballs, that's like a platinum-level impression, and it gets passed along a thousand times. So that one impact, they're going to tell a thousand other people. Yeah, multiplies. That's the opportunity, I think, that, you know, every time you or Dale or Mike or drivers will make that connection, you know, take a selfie, sign an autograph, it gets passed along at least a thousand times. Yeah. And that's the impression that people always say, boy, I got to meet Kelly. She's such a nice person.

Yeah. I mean, that's what a great thing that is. Yeah. Yeah. Well, let's just address the elephant in the room then because you have a dilemma with this. And that is you're trying to operate three major factions, all of which need each other, tracks race teams and drivers, which I consider one, and then NASCAR, the entity. You're trying to all operate together with one unified goal.

But then when, listen, we open up a sports business journal. and all we always see is that there's, you know, negotiations over TV media rights deals and the teams want more of a slice. And by the way, Marcus, not sure if you noticed, they start going right at the racetracks about what your cut is, right? And oh, by the way, I hate to say it, NASCAR, but I know you only get 10% on paper, but we also know you own 12 racetracks. So like there's a lot of things. And so it's like, how, I do want your opinion. I don't get a whole lot of opportunities to ask track presidents or track. operators to advocate for yourselves in that discussion. I have Denny Hamlin on a podcast. I get to hear

the race team and race owner's side of it all the time. And I appreciate that perspective from listen, race teams are going to need more money because the business model is a difficult business model. I don't think anybody would dispute that. It's not it's not easy to chase this passion of racing, right, and make it your your business and your life. What is the track perspective on the TV revenue, which is being negotiated now, which would take effect in 2025? So the current TV deal, media rights deal, expires after next year. So these negotiations are going on now. We know the RTA needs more, says they need more out of that slice, needs more of that revenue.

The tracks get, what I've seen, 65%, advocate. for yourself. Why do you need 65%? Yeah. Well, I think you have a great point that you haven't heard. I don't think NASCAR or us speedway owners and operators advocate for ourselves in the media like the teams have. And so I would I would love to have discussions with team owners and get specific. on those things. I think what I would say is that it's not always what it seems. And I'll tell you a little bit about the track ownership business. In fact, I think I was talking to you, Mike.

I know I was talking to Dale about the cars tour and how a Speedway makes money. And if you take out the television, the way that an event is operated, you have revenue from tickets, You have revenue from concessions. And sometimes, not usually, sometimes you might charge for parking, but typically, you know, that's admissions and a little bit on souvenirs and then concessions

and then backgate, meaning, you know, people that come in the back gate. And those are the competitors and friends of the competitors, your pit passes. Okay. And then you put TV on top of that. You put sponsorship on top of that. Well, the venue needs to be able to pay the bills with the business operating that happens there. And NASCAR, over the years, it used to be a portion of the purse was paid into by the track from tickets. and a portion was paid for sanction fees.

And then we added the television on top of that. There are all those elements that kind of don't get spelled out or broken out. And so it's not really 65, 25, 10. And I don't want to get into the details because I'd rather do that. Yeah, face-to-face with the people that matter. Yeah, and in a good business. discussion. But I think the short of it is, it's not, it's not that we're so far apart. I think we've got challenges, we've got opportunities, tremendous opportunities. And, you know, the sport has worked.

It's not that it's always been easy, but it's worked for a long time with a business model that has proven to be, you know, very sustainable over the years. And you guys know, think about all the people that have come into the sport as team owners and they're not here anymore. Some are still here, some aren't. People would always say the best way to make a million dollars, you know, with a race team is to start with 10 million. Now they might say the best way to make, you know, a million to start with $100 million. I don't know. But it's a, there's a, it's never, it has never been easy. And, um, but I think, you know, the opportunity is there. We got to work together to grow it to build value, build sponsorship value that build sponsorship revenue. Um, grow the, the gate,

grow the fan base. That's good for all of us. And, um, you know, the more, the more fans we, we grow in this sport, the better it is for everybody. I think the more fun it is for our fans as well. From what you know, how optimistic are you? I will keep it broad like that on that this thing is going to get sorted out and everybody's going to be working on the same beat. Yeah, I'm 100% optimistic. You know, I'm an optimistic person. I think we have smart people in the sport, smart stakeholders and longtime friends. We'll get it worked out. I think we, you know, It's really something we just need to get together and be purposeful and have those good discussions to get things worked out. Yeah.

I'm writing down to connection. It's my big word from this and education. I mean, you know, those discussions, educating people, not just in this situation, I'm just saying in general, right? There's so much lack of knowledge of knowing how things work and why decisions are made. I'm just, I wrote down the cars tour. I'm learning a lot. right now about how it works and how our series goes into the racetracks and how we share revenue and what things look like and I'm learning so much from Jack on that I haven't ever had to

think about it and I've never wanted to think about it right I never so it's just that education and all the moving parts you know and I'm learning the lingo back gate and front gate I'm like I could tell that you weren't sure where that was going I wasn't sure but he didn't explain it. It's like, I'm like, yeah, of course that makes sense. Yeah. And so yeah, you know, I think, you know, asking questions and educating ourselves on, you know, each part of the puzzle, no matter what we're looking at, you know, it's just so important. Yeah, yeah. I learned a big lesson when I was watching my son Graham drive Bandoleros a few years back. I learned, so at summer shootout at Charlotte Motor Speedway, where, you know, that's a great place to learn

about promoting and operating in events. We run 10 Tuesday nights, Monday night practice, Tuesday night racing. And there's a big focus on the schedule on things like bus races and mascot races and the pizza and the Coke and the fireworks. But you've got to have a cadence and you've got to be on the clock. That's from a promoter's perspective. When I was dad watching my little boy drive the bandelero. I didn't care about any of that stuff. I didn't care what time it was. All I needed to know was, you know, when is his next heat?

Where's he need to be? You know, and how's he running? That was a total, like, tunnel vision for me. And I had this awakening, you know, that, wow, I kind of understand why if you're a associated with a race car, you don't get out and see any of this stuff. Like, you don't, yeah. You don't understand the weight for the bus. And you don't need to.

Yeah, right. Yeah. Your job is, you know, like you're there to win a race. Yeah, yeah. And, you know, it's a lot more fun when you're winning. Yeah. But, yeah, it's interesting. And we were done with shootout night.

We go to, you know, cook out and get a burger and drive home. We'd smell like gas and oil and tires. And that was a great night. I'm in the throes of that right now. Yeah. Yeah. In the summertime, I'm so much. much happier smelling like gasoline and oil than I am smelling like chlorine. I'm glad my kids

didn't swim. And your son actually runs the... Yes, Legend Cars. Yeah, Legends Car. So he's that right? Yeah, he's working over there in business development. Graham. Yeah, Graham. Sales and you're kind of working on the business with the guys over there. And we, it's so cool to see what's happening in the Legends car business. we ship 45% of all of our cars around the world. So out of the U.S. People love legends and bandaleros, and we just need to, you know,

we're trying to get caught up on all the parts delay from, you know, just the supply chain shortage. And I think we're close, but we're still working on it. Before we move on past all this, because I think that I'm really, kind of like informed by all of the Dale Jr. opinions that happen on the download every week. You know,

and one of the ones that always comes up, Marcus, you know this, is Dale Jr. is an expert on track repaves. He is. He knows when they're supposed to repave, when they're not repaved. Anything about repavements, you ask Dale Jr., he'll tell you about repaved.

And the thing he loves about Wilkesboro is that it was not repaved. It was going to be repaved or is going to, I think at one point, like it was his idea. Right. Yeah. But then when that late model race happened,

happened last year and I think the decision was like, hey, this track being worn out and old is actually the best racing product. Okay. I love it. So I got to ask you this question. You're here. How much does it cost to repave a track? And what are the signs? There's an obvious answer to what are the signs of if it starts to crack. But come on, there's got to be a more a lifespan approach. Like what is the lifespan of a repave and what are the implications of all these things? And what are you looking for because this, according to Dale, is a very important thing on the racing product? It is. It's really fascinating. So years ago, the interest in a repaving of a track or just paving the track, the goal was to get it to last for as long as possible because it's expensive.

It's millions of dollars. So we paved Charlotte Motor Speedway with this synthetic based asphalt, I think it was called Ross Vault. And it was the first track to be paved with this synthetic binder. And, you know, it turned out to be like a great investment if you want your track to be there as long as possible. Because previously, the regular asphalt, you know, the sun shines down and Charlotte shines on turns three and four. And it actually starts to move down the hill. And And that might produce character in the track, but then it also starts to degrade, and we know that's going to cost us more because we've got to repave again. So, but fast forward to today, the way that we started thinking about repaves is really more

focused on the quality of the racing because I felt like we don't have time. We don't have five or six races to wait for the racing to be good. good again because it's infamous how how terrible the racing is at a racetrack after you know the first pavement yeah the first four or five races it's always really challenging for a fall the leader kind of a race so we we re looked at how we pave and we we totally threw out the book on you know all asphalt paving concrete paving because all that technology is going towards streets and parking lots and we're paying a racetrack so we need to think about You know, what does it look like to pave a racetrack so that it can be more racy, more,

um, uh, act more like an old track? And, and that's where we started to use different, um, different recipes for, for what goes into the track itself. Um, how do you know it needs to be, um, repaved? Well, after Atlanta, what we learned is we can use glue, basically, it's sealer and go in there and just literally go in. every crack in crevice and and glue it and get it back together and, you know, let it sit for a while and it will hold up for another race longer than you think it would, longer than anybody would ever go

and try that. But because it produces more interesting racing, more competitive racing, that's what we chose to do. So, you know, at some point, Wilkesboro would need to be repaved. If it gets, you know, some big chunks come out or, you know, the under the top surface becomes less stable, things like that, then you really got to go in. And the cost comes in with how much dirt work, how much work in the base do you, are you going to have? And some people will just go in and do a top dressing. That's cheapest.

It's also the least lasting. Some people will go in and take it all out, reprofile it, repurpose it, repypile it, repyce. You want to put in a lot of pipe and drain to get the water out. Weepers. Weepers happen when you don't have enough drainage. Yeah. So in order to really repave a track properly, you got to take it all out, get down of the dirt, make sure you get all the pipes in there, all the drains, and then, you know,

your base layer rocks and all the details that... That's a lot of smart people. It is. It is. And you have to get the right equipment, you know, because you can't pave on a bank with just any equipment. So it's a specialized practice. Wow. Yeah. See, you're going to have to think about that.

You're going to think about this when you own your track. You might. Yeah. I tell people that when you, like if you have a golf course, you can add a par three without a lot of incremental cost because you already have all the equipment, the knowledge, and the people. But if you, and if you own a race track, you can add, we're working on a second track at one of our properties and we can add another

track and have that done pretty good because we have a lot of expertise and a lot of equipment. But when you start with one track and you've got to care for it and take care of it, it's a, they take a lot of money. Yeah. Speaking of adding tracks. Yeah. Did he leave news just now? Did he break news?

No, no, no. I think you mean like maybe something at one of your speedways. Yeah, testing. Testing. Okay. You know how Charlotte has the dirt track and the little track out back, the little, yeah. You know, Marcus and their tour. For you're dropping a Marcus bomb, as we call it on this show.

Yeah, so when I was talking to L Dub about being on here together, he's like, he needs to build a dirt track for all these competitors that are showing up at Millbridge to race. The quarter of midgets? No, for our micros and our, yeah, our micros and our outlaw carts and everything. Because, I mean, last few weeks ago, 44 non-wing micros at one of the events. Wow. And then 18 wing class.

So you're talking about 60-some cars just right there. How often would you all race if we built a dirt track for you? So it's something we need to talk about. Well, they race 20 times. Gosh, oh, they probably race, I'm going to say 35 times a year. Really? Because we run every other week during the week, and then we run Saturday events. And how big of a track is that?

I think we're at eighth mile. Eighth mile. Is it eighth bigger than a fifth? No. Okay. Eighth. Eighth is bigger than a fifth. Yeah. No.

No. No. It's smaller. It's eighth. It's eighth then. I always want to say a fifth or an eighth, but it's a eighth. But no, seriously, like, it's something to think about. Like, you know, a lot of NASCAR competitors out there, a lot of racing people, period.

Modified racers have their kids out there. Jonathan Davenport's kids been running out there. Like, there's just Lance Deweese's kids been running out there. Like, there's a lot of opportunities. And it's all dirt. All dirt. All dirt. All dirt.

We need to look into that. You can put a little thing in the middle of the big dirt track. Listen, I know this is going to be an ignorant question, but somebody out there is going to be wanting to know it. And so I'm asking it, is it like, why would the dirt track, is that just too big? That it's too big of a dirt track that Marcus already has? For the types of cars. The types of cars you're talking about? Yeah, yeah, yeah.

But may or may not. I don't know. I mean, some of the places that I've seen the legend cars run in, you know, they're running some bigger, big places, right? So, yeah, may not. I don't know. Yeah. No, I think there's something we could look into there.

It's food for thought for sure. I'll look into it. I've actually had many people mention that to me, and I do think that it would be really interesting, and we love being a... Charlottom Motor Speedway is a special place because it's right in the middle. Thick of everything, yeah, yeah, right, yeah.

You don't got to go down into Charlotte. You're still... Yeah. I want to revive our carting track, too. Yeah. Now, which one do you mean? Because there's a bunch of tracks, actually, when I think about Charlotte Motor Speedway. Because you've got the one in the infield there, but you've also got the row.

Well, you also got the one on the back stretch, right? Is that the one you're talking about just now? No. The carting track. Well, so the carting track is in the infield. Okay. Okay. It's, we've recently renovated it back to its original form, and it's really phenomenal.

It's a world-class carting course. Okay. So I think, you know, I've had a lot of people say, boy, I wish you could open that up for people to drive on more, which would be fun. But I've, and I've had a lot of people to ask about, you know, something for the micros and quarter midgets. So, yeah. Yeah, I'll look into that.

What is that track considered on the backstretch that's outside the tunnel? We always call that our fifth mile, just because it's a fifth mile, but it's got some challenges. It's on, it's on landfill property. Oh. And so it keeps moving. Yeah. Yeah.

And that's a problem why, yeah. Yeah. Seems like just something for the drivers to have to continue with. It used to be my favorite track for a legend's car because it had just the right amount of banking. It's really fun. But, you know, turns one and two or now like 10 feet below where they ought to be. It's kind of a pain. You know, I was kicked out of that track. Nobody knows this except my wife.

When I first moved to Charlotte, I was going to, this was 2002. Okay, are you sure you want to tell the story? You said nobody knows this but your wife. Well, listen, if you're going to tell it, tell it with Marcus here. It's just fun. I'd never been in racing. I'd never been on a airplane. I'd never done anything.

I get moved to Charlotte and I'm off to Daytona the next day, which I've never been there. Speedweeks has already started. I have one night. My apartment that I just moved into is just down the road from the Speedway. I am now in NASCAR heaven, right? I'm now in the sport, right? And I go over and I'm driving by Charlotte Motor Speedway, which I had been there as a fan. Just the year before at the All-Star race,

the one where they dropped the green flag and it started raining and they all went into the turn and they started wrecking. Oh, man. And then they allowed them to come out the backup cars. So I was there as a fan. I was just graduated college. Right. Yeah. So now, just a few months later, I'm about to start my career in the sport.

And I said, there's no gate that's keeping me out of that little track back there. I'm going to take my little Nissan. Oh, my gosh. And I'm going to go lay down a quick lap. I didn't know that there was a security guard in that gate in that little hut. They came out fast. But I'd like to think like I...

So did you get a half lap or what'd you get? I got a couple laps and I'd like to feel like I still own the pole there. I need somebody that's have an official thing. Oh my gosh. In a past four car sedan, I have to have the quickest. I bet you do. The track record. We need to put a plaque up for you.

I mean, I don't know. Naming rights to the track at some point. you need. That's awesome. I've heard so many stories about people doing stupid. That's not the dumbest thing. So I'm not even going to put that in stupid category. But there are some really, you know, stupid stories that people have done when they snuck into a track. And I mean, so it's, I'm always really careful. Even when I, when I pull off, I don't even get on pit road without looking four or five times because you just never know if somebody's going to be flying down pit road. Right. And it could be, you know, in the painting van.

It could be somebody giving pace car rides. I mean, who knows? So I always check. And it's just because there are, you know, people go full speed run into the racetrack. Yeah. That was pretty dumb. I shouldn't have done that.

It wasn't that bad. You didn't get caught. It was at night. Yeah, that's not that bad. They didn't throw you in jail? Yeah. No, I don't know. Do you have a Charlotte Motor Speedway jail that we don't know about?

We do. We do. We also have the tubes underneath the track that move all the money. Yeah. Well, that's where you should have sent me. That's right. Send me to the jail so I can kind of break through like Shawshank Redemption and find the safe. Yes.

All right, we derailed there. We need to get back on track here. What else do we have with Marcus we want to ask about? Well, I mean, you know, I was just really thinking about you. We've talked about North Woodsboro. Got such great stuff happening there. Your Bristol event over Easter weekend. You've got the trucks on dirt, cup on dirt.

Got some great concerts happening for North Woodsboro, too, if I'm not. mistaken. We do. The rest of the year, what's, what's, you know, what else is there to look forward to? Let's see. Coke 600. I'll predict. Always an amazing. Oh, always an amazing.

I'm predicting a sellout. We're, thankfully, thank you to all the fans out there that are coming to the Coke 600 again. It's going to be awesome. Can't wait. So if you don't have tickets yet, please. Get them. Please get them. You know, they're going to be out very soon.

based on all of our numbers. And I would say, like, to all the fans out there, bring friends to the track. You know, I think it's way more fun when you bring friends, bring a new friend, bring a new fan to the track. I think that's just really, you know, part of being a NASCAR fan. You know, we want to pass it on. There's no experience like the in-person experience.

There really isn't. Yeah, there really isn't. I've got, you know, hockey friends that have taken me to hockey matches. matches. Same. Yeah, it's like I never would have thought it would be fun. I never have been to a hockey game until maybe within the year of COVID, whenever they got started back and I went to, is it the hurricanes in Raleigh? Yeah. Had a ball. And I never cared about hockey. Yeah, never cared about it. Yeah. It was so fun. Yep. So, you know, the rest of the year ahead, I think we've got great things to look forward to. I'm really looking forward to seeing how the championship

plays out. I can't believe we're, I mean, I feel like we're almost to the halfway point, even though like we just started, but I feel like it's right down the street. But we'll be working on next year's schedule. We've got to look forward to, you know, the Chicago Street race. I think there's a lot going on that we've got to work on. And we'll be, I'm sure we'll have a lot to talk about between now and then, but a lot of good stuff. Awesome stuff. Good, good stuff. Give our best to Cassie, the grand, the whole family. All right.

What about butter bean? A little doggies. Oh, yeah. Well, that, yeah, that was understood. Three little do you? Yeah, right, three? Butterbean, peaches in June. Yes.

We have three dogs and our daughter has a dog. And, yeah, it's a great, it's a great furry family. We have non-shedders, which I love. I mean, it's great. Oh, too. That's game-fetched right there. retriever the number one shedder I think.

However, the best behaved dog in the history of dogs. Find me another dog that does better than Zeus. What's your golden's name? Zeus. Zeus. All right.

I had one named Buddy growing up. So Zeus and Buddy were brothers and lived in the same home and we rescued Zeus because they ended up needing to just have one dog. Oh, wow. Buddy was his brother. Yeah. Okay, so leave us with this.

What's the craziest thing that Cassie's had you do recently. Oh, my goodness. I love this. What a great question. Oh, man. You know, she'll ask me to, I mean, you take pictures, you know, and you can follow her on Twitter, Instagram, see pictures.

Usually she'll want me to, like, come into one of her videos, and I stop fighting it. Yeah, you have to. You have to. Yeah, yeah. I can't think. of a crazy thing lately, but, but she, she, I honestly haven't seen her as much, like, you know, with the microphones and the singing, which I knew, I knew that, you know, she was, she's, she was recovering from something, the roller skates, you know, lately she's been on roller skates.

She has, okay. I haven't, I don't know that I've seen them, you know, and the way that our algorithms do on social, I could just be missing them, right? Well, I tell you this. She is just amazing. You know, Marcus cracked me up the other day because Dale Jr. came into the, you know, the podcast and he sort of unloaded all his frustrations about his dealings with Ilo that morning. Yeah, yeah. She was throwing a tantrum. Marcus is texting both of us. Just loving it. Oh, yeah. I love it. Isn't it funny? And you tell them, too. I mean, both you all, you're like, yeah, that's parenting. I mean, it's great. It's great. You got to own those flawed moments, man. You got to own them, right? Everybody's dealing with it. What I love about it from my perspective is because we didn't have kids at the same time.

you know, I've raised mine, witness, been there, done that. He was the one standing over there going, I can't believe you didn't spank them. I can't believe you didn't do this. I can't believe you didn't do that. And now I get to watch, you know, and listen. And he's like, I'm sorry, I said all those things. And I just get to see, like, I think if we would have had kids at the same time,

we'd have both been learning and not knowing what to say, do, or think, right? So it's so fun to watch from my perspective now. It is fun. It is fun. I mean, you got to admit, like, I think I kind of, forgot what it's like to have little kids. So I'm trying to remind myself that, you know, yeah, my goodness, I mean, there's some years where you're just treading water. Yeah. You know, and like, I used to always go to the fast food restaurants to get chicken nuggets and now I never do.

But, I mean, we used to like plan the day. You got to go get lunch or go get dinner and all that stuff. Everything revolved around your kids doing planning all day long logistics. Yeah. Listen, Dale Jr. and Bill Lester were in my office just yesterday, and I said, guys, I got to go. I got a soccer game that I've got to be at. And I'm the team dad. And I got to get fed unless I bring the sandwiches. It is like, I got to go. Bye. Yes. Those are good times. It is good stuff. Yeah, good times. Very good stuff. Well, fun. Thank you, Marcus. Appreciate y'all having me.

Absolutely. I appreciate you being here. Enjoy talking with y'all. It was fun. Yep. Thank you so much. Close us down. however you want to do it How did I close us down? You want me to close us down? Yeah, you close us down today. Well, thank you everybody.

Again, this is the only Dale Jr. Download episode this week. So, Marcus, we're relying on you, buddy. All of our analytics, everything is on you. Everything rests right here. And then maybe afterwards we'll have a listening tour. All right, that'd be great. That'd be great.

And all the fans out there, we love you, appreciate you, and look forward to seeing you at a race some time soon. Absolutely. Thanks so much. Man, I'm really excited to have Ally help us bring the guest segment every week. It's one of my favorite parts of the download. We get to talk to so many different people in racing, outside of racing. But everybody that comes in here, I want them to have had a good time.

I want them to want to come back. I want them to feel like an ally to Dirty Mo Media. Thank you, Ally, for your continued support of the download and the entire Dirty Mo Media team. Check out Dirty Mo Media. Twitter, Facebook, TikTok, and Instagram.