The Dale Jr. Download - 438 - Hut Stricklin - Helmet in Hand, Always Ready

Episode Date: April 19, 2023

It was a reunion of the “8’s” this week as Dale Earnhardt Jr. and co-host Mike Davis sat down with longtime NASCAR Cup racer Hut Stricklin. After rising through the ranks of the NASCAR Dash Series, Stricklin went on to race for legendary car owners like Rod Osterlund, Bobby Allison, and Junior Johnson before arriving in the famed Stavola Brothers number-8. He would occupy the ride until 1998, and shortly after the team would dissolve, with the number 8 being sold off to Dale Earnhardt Inc. to prepare for Dale Jr.’s 1999 Cup debut. Hut explains how he cut his teeth in the Alabama short-track racing scene, following in his father’s footsteps. They discuss how a chance encounter while driving around in Panama City would lead to Hut meeting his longtime wife Pam, daughter of racing legend Donnie Allison. Hut also fills listeners in on some of his favorite rides in Cup, how he became Tom Cruise's driving coach for the movie Days of Thunder, the story behind his career-best run at the 1996 Southern 500, and why he decided to walk away from the sport after the 2002 Bristol night race.  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.

Calling is a production of Dirty Mo Media. There he is. Come on in here, buddy. Have a seat. Hey, everybody. Glad you tuned in. It's time for another episode of the Dale Jr. Download.

Mike Davis, Delenhardt Jr. The Mojangles Studio. You've got a great guest today. Well, how you doing, Rhiz? I'm doing fine right now. This is every week, okay, though? buckle in. You died on that hill.

Your career died on that hill and you were hardheaded. You were a bigger idiot. I didn't even think about it. You thought about it and didn't ask it. That makes me the bigger idiot. I think so. Hey, everybody, it's Dale Jr. And back again for another episode of the Dale Jr.

Download here on Wednesday. It's April 19th. And we got a great guest coming in here, Mike Davis. It's going to be a lot of fun. Hutz Strickland. Hutt Strickland. Yep. Hutzrickland's coming in to talk about his career, and when I look through the notes,

the guy drove for everybody, did everything. Seems super resourceful. Yeah. Going everywhere, just carrying his helmet around, jumping in anything that was available. Pat Helmet, we'll race. Right. And so we're excited about that. Let's get him in the Bojangles studio.

He's a great ally. Works right up the road from us. Did you know that? I didn't know that. Yeah, he's a manager at Stock Car Steele, I believe. Yeah. I didn't know he was local. Yeah.

Let me make sure. Sure. He is. No, no, you're right. He is. But I didn't know that until we just started researching for this show. And so the fact is, I thought he was always in Alabama. Dude's been around.

So he's right under our noses here. Yeah, so. And so I don't know why. Shame on us. Shame on us for not having him in here sooner. Thank you, Ally, for everything you do to help us bring this guest segment to our fans and our listeners every single week. Ally. Thank you also, man, for sending me to that soccer game with Ila.

Yeah. Ally's been a great friend. And they're also bringing great friends to the show, Hutz Strickland, on the Dale Jr. Download. Hey! Well, be 62 in June. I hope I looked that good at 62. Oh, you there.

Man, I got it for 13 years. Really? Yeah. Wow. Time flies. It does. So there you go. You got shirt on, stock car.

Stock car steel? You've been working over there for how long? Well, I'd work there almost six years. Yeah. I've been going from there about a year and a half. Okay. Where are you being? We moved to Orange Beach, Alabama.

We bought a place. Pam and I bought a place down there about five or six years ago. And kind of finally made it full time. Well, semi. I mean, we ain't quite there yet. Okay. Been building a house and all that good stuff and got it all done. And now ready to go back and get back in it.

Doing something. I'm always going to keep doing something. You are? Yep. Yep. So keep moving. Yep. So where do you get rid of everything you had here?

Well, I stored most of our stuff when we sold our house here. Yeah. And Taylor's shop. And, of course, he's been trying to. Taylor, you know, my son, yeah. He's a race shop. What's he do? He's got a race shop.

Well, he was racing. His real job, he pour seats for BSCI. Okay. And then he does a rental program. He's doing late models. pro-lates and superlates. How's that going? Going good.

Yeah, he just started it actually this year. You know, and they've been doing pretty good with it. I think I poured a seat with him here recently. Yeah, I think so. Yep. Actually, he told me he did. Yeah, it was good. Yep.

Good kid. He is. Yep. So he told me that y'all were kind of back and forth and getting ready to go to Alabama full time. So that's the goal, right? Yep. Are you going to miss it up here? I am.

I mean, I miss them, but, you know, we got, we got. got, you know, of course, my son and I got a daughter here, too. You know, she has a hair salon here in Moresville, too. And, but, you know, we got their own thing going. And, you know, of course, whenever we lived here, we didn't really see a whole lot of them. So everybody was so busy and what have you. So at least now it'll be, you know, really, you know, special times when we do show up and, or they come see us. It'll be, you know, kind of neat. What's the place like in Alabama? I'll show you some pictures of it when we get done. Where did you say it was? It's in Orange Beach, Alabama.

What's Orange Beach like? What's it comparable to? The water there and the sand is a whole lot different than it is on the East Coast. It's a lot cleaner. You know, white sand. Water's blue, blue or green. Y'all right on the beach? We're on a canal.

Okay. We're actually on an island. Okay. And we come out of an island. We live on a canal out into the intercoastal. and then when you hit the intercoastal you hang a left and you look and you see the ocean yeah do you worry about the do you worry about the weather uh not a lot y'all been down there a while so you kind of must we do we we we uh our house we built i was telling the girls up front here and showing them some pictures

uh you know when we got ready to build we had a friend of mine that owns a concrete place down there that that uh i'd done a lot of stuff for back in the 70s the stuff built race cars for them and things like that and told me, he said, if I can ever do anything to help you, you know, pay, repay the favor. So I said, okay, great. You know, so I kind of kept that in old memory bank. And we got ready to build a house there. We built what they call an ICF wall house, which basically is a poured concrete house. And it's supposed to withstand a Cat 5 hurricane.

And, you know, it's one of the limited number of them down there. But at the time, wood was as high or higher in concrete. So, you know, was able to do that and build a really nice strong house with rebar and concrete. So hopefully we shouldn't have anything to worry about. Awesome. Yeah. So anyways, man, you were born in Alabama. And what was growing up like for you back then?

Where did you live? What was going on around you? Well, I was born in Birmingham. I grew up in Kalira, which was right in the center of the state of Alabama, which was a great place to grow up. You know, we had, you know, racetracks, you know, B.I.R. Birmingham International Raceway. One of my favorite racetracks of all time, you know, was probably 25 miles away from us.

We had a Montgomery, which is about an hour away. Are you a racing family? Do what? Are y'all racing family? We are. Yep. My dad used to race. Dad raced back in the 60s and 70s.

So you had race cars in the garage? So that was around. from the moment you're using diapers. Yep. Well, when mom and dad first got married, as most young people do, you know, they're pretty poor family, what have you, and anyway, I come along a few years later, and they had been struggling with gas stations and what have you, and anyway, they, mom had talked to my dad about buying an automobile salvage yard

that was going out of business. Junkyard. Yeah, big jump yard. And anyway, they end up buying one of those in the middle 60s. and I grew up working with them on that. So the junkyard is going out of business and y'all bought it. Why does a junkyard go out of business? Well, that one there, I think a lot of it was poor management.

And it was just, you had to hustle it. It was one of those businesses. As long as you hustle it every day. And mom and dad and myself, of course, I was small then, but I was with them every step of the way through it. And we just hustled it. What is your, what is the, when a junkyard's functioning properly going well, what kind of businesses and services do y'all provide?

Well, basically at that time all we did was, what was sold car parts, sold parts off cars. We had, you know, was lucky enough, we got hooked up with several dealers, new car dealers. We sold them engines, transmissions, rear ends, you know, front ends of cars, back ends of cars, quarter panels. You name it. If it's on a car, we sold it. You know, I grew up working in that, pulling those parts.

That's a tough work. Hard job. Climbing back in underneath them things and the snakes and the grass. Hotest place in the summer and coldest place in the winter. Yeah, miserable. I had a junkyard sponsorship for my street stock, and so, man, I bet I was, we bent every damn ball joint every week and bent all the uppers and lowers on that old car.

and we was in that juck yard every Monday or Tuesday pulling something. Yep. Springs and whatever. And I couldn't imagine that, you know, that type of work every day. Yep. Because you didn't know what somebody was going to come in there and need. No, no, you didn't. And some of the stuff, you know, dad, I think dad, you know, I get so mad at him because, like, you know,

people come in there and they'd want to buy a used heater core, you know. Well, anybody who's ever worked on cars and pulled out a heater core, especially out of a car, an older car in the 70s or 60s. Hardest thing to get out of. Hardest thing in the world get out of. And the most money you're going to get out is going to be about $10 or $15. Really?

You know, and sometimes you'd pull one and, you know, work your tail off and get it out and it'd be good. Other times it'd be bad. But those things like that is what made his business thrive. You know, he would sell them anything, you know, and he might lose on one piece,

but he'd, you know, double up on the next one. And, you know, they were just, you know, his and moms both had become real success. doing that. What happened at the junkyard? In, I guess it lasted until like, I think it was about 95, 96. They both had reached a point. Age-wise, they just was ready to get out of it.

The land had become so valuable there in Pelham, Alabama, where it was, and it just one of them things that, you know, it was a good time. They sold it and got out of it, and then mom ended up a year later or so, selling herds in Kalira. Yeah, a couple. Yep, mom had one and dad had more. Is it developed now? Is that, because I'm very familiar with Birmingham and Pelham and everything.

So, yeah, there's probably some sort of strip mall or something on it. What is it? Actually, Moms is like a strip mall. Is it? Where Moms was. Dad's is, it's got like multiple things. It had like a steakhouse on it. Then it had a one.

root beer joint, you know, like a drive-in something. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Like one of those A-W. A-W. A-W. A-W. A-W. A-N-Bere joint beer joint.

Yeah. So your dad started racing. When? Dad started racing in the 60s. What year were you born? Sixty-one. So you're, do you remember any of that? Oh, yeah.

I remember it all. Okay. Yep, sure do. You know, dad, he was, like I said, it was probably mid-60s, shortly after he got his salvage yard going. Did he build him a car out of the yard? He did. Yeah.

About built a 56 Ford, Spectator Division, what they called it. It was first night out. He takes it out to midfield Speedway and does an end over-end flip. My gosh. He comes back, gets everything beat out, and comes back and runs a feature. I don't remember where he finished, but it was pretty amazing to him. They would get it running You're doing an end over the end.

Same night. Yeah, same night. Okay. Yeah. But I guess a couple years later he moved up to the late mile division and, you know, with the 64 civilians and running stuff like that.

Won a lot of races. And he was more or less a what I call a quarter mile king. Loved the quarter mile racetracks. Mainly because he could get, he didn't have, you know, the funding that it really took to build the, you know, the engine with the good rods in it and stuff like that.

You could run an old Chevrolet pink rods and, you know, and it would live. Yeah. But you start getting on a 5-8 mile, half-mile, like the Montgomery's and Birminghams. You know, the long straightaways with RPMs, it just wouldn't live. Yeah. Well, you had pink rods in that street stock. Oh, yeah. I'd never even heard of that until Daddy started talking about it.

But we blew the motor up the first week, the stock motor in it, and then he built one for us with pink rods in it. But what are your earliest memories of you getting behind the wheel? Probably my first race. You know, I had, they had a place called Searie Speedway. Dixie Speedway is now called a quarter mile race track. They were starting a... These are dirt tracks?

Asphalt? It was a quarter mile asphalt. Okay. Barely. It wore out now pretty good, I think. But it was in, either. But anyway, they ended up starting a what they call a limited sportsman division. And it was a dad had an old car in the back of the shop there that 064 Chevelle with a 57 Chevrolet frame under it.

And anyway, I said, Dad, that car really fits some rules. I said, would you mind if I put it all together and stuff? And he got an old engine over here. And he said, well, I tell you what, if you can put it all together, you can go. you know, have at it. So anyway, I proceeded to work on it and what have you and put it all together. I was very smart, knowledgeable-wise, racing-wise. You know, I grew up, my dad had a helper on his car named Paul Robinson, one of the sharpest guys had I'd ever been around. Just real, we called him Mr. Clean. He wore a white suit all the time, white pants, white,

almost like a painter. But the guy was never got dirty. You know, he was one of the guys taught me everything for the most part. You know, dad was always in the junkyard making money where me and Mr. Clean was out there working on the car. Yeah. And, but anyway, he, you know, we put the car together and, you know, went to take it to say really the first time, what heavy, and we unloaded, we had to take dad's car was on a drive-on carrier.

What year is this? This was 77. 77. Oh. Yep. And so we, we, we, my car was on the trailer, so we had, unload my car off and push it off the side because my dad's car it was the number one car we had to you know he was running for points what have so we had to get him going anyway so we got him all set up

and he's going out there and practicing doing his thing and all that well my car still haven't you know come time to go race and my car still hadn't or the car hasn't even been on the racetrack so anyway we go out there in the heat race and start dead last and my might you know first time ever in a car you know but i felt like i knew just from standing on top of the truck watching cars race. I knew like where the groove was. I knew, you know, I'd watched so many races, where they pass, how they passed, things like that.

And I knew that part of it, you know. But anyway, I went out there in the heat race and the car was really loose, what have you, couldn't, you know, couldn't drive it, come in and parked it after the heat race. And I had a little young kid, I'd say young kid. He's probably 10 or 11 years old. You know, he was my only pit crew.

And he said, what are we going to do, Hut? And I said, well, I'm going to jack his thing up. pull a left rear spring out of it. I'm going to put a stronger leaf in it where the thing would get a bite off the corner because I can't, I can't drive it. It's so loose. He said, you know I'd do that? I said, yes, sir, I sure do. So he went and got to jack, started jacking. I got jack stands, got under it and put a left rear spring and it added a left rear spring to the leaf springs. And anyway, went out in the feature, got all together, barely in time to go start the feature. I started at the back. It was about 15 cars. And I started.

at the back and they dropped the green flag and man I come off the corner that thing took a bike and it was like this is not going to be good for anybody else tonight so so anyway make a long story short end up winning my first race damn all the way from the back to the front uh I meet I beat the guy this guy was a dominant uh driver there had been winning a lot I beat him by about a foot coming to the start finish line and uh needless to say that that set me on fire for racing you know that, you know, without a doubt, that's what I wanted to do the rest of my life. How old did you say your pick crew member was? He was probably 10 or 11 years old.

You had a 10 or 11 year old pick? Anybody else, or is that it? No, that was it. Dugie Hauser on the pit crew here. And you win the race? Yep, sure did. Where did this, where did you find this kid? Well, he was actually a friend of mine's kid. Okay.

He wasn't even there. Just a kid could go. What the hell? So, I mean, he beat anything, you know, he beat nothing, you know, basically. And it was a thrill, you know, I mean, having him, somebody out young, of course, I was young. I mean, I, you know, I think I wasn't about 15 or so. You win the next week.

I win the next week, yep. By 79, though, this is 77. By 79, you're up in a late model stock car, or late model? Sorry. I know that I was still, we didn't really have the funding to really do much more than a limited thing. We had built a... How old's your dad around 79? 78.

He was born in 40, so that would have been whatever. Yeah, 40. Yeah, it would be 39, 40. Yeah. So how long did he race? When did he stop? Dad stopped in 78 or 79. That's the time I started.

Real good. Why did he quit? He enjoyed watching me race a whole lot more than he got, you know, than with him, one and another the obviously the funding and what have he just wasn't there and he just put you know everything everything he could into into my car and so when he stops does he and mr. clean start focusing on your cars they do yep yep and so now you're racing you're the e-car yep yep you know and in 79 and 80 we had a

banner year in the limited division won the state championships and you know just Really couldn't be beat. Who are you racing against? Are there, I mean, are there any... Davy Allison was starting out then in 78. What kind of driver was he like back then? Davy. Davy was a good racer.

I mean, we know what he would become. Yep. But like you starting out, was he, you know, did he have a good success right away? He didn't win right away, I don't think. I think he, you know, I think he, like when he went to Montgomery and stuff, the that wasn't as many cars down there for the most part,

not taking anything away from him. Yeah. That and the racetrack was a lot easier to race on. It was a symmetrical corners, you know, relatively a newcomer could go good there. Yeah. And, you know, it took him, you know, a little bit longer to win at BIR,

but not that long. Yeah. He'd come on. So you race Davy and who else would we recognize? There was a lot of the short track guys that was coming up there. I'm trying to remember. I know Jackie McGuire was a bigger name down at that time. His dad used to race, and he raced.

We had my mind's blank right now. What about Henry Brooke? Henry Brooke, yep. Related to him. You are? Okay, okay. Raced against Henry in the Lake models. Yeah, right.

Henry was a dominant force there. So you were running a limited steel in 79? Yep. And you, but you went to the derby, Snowball Derby. Yep. I took one of Dad's last... Oh, one of his sportsmen's.

Yep. And got it all together and went down there and... That's a big step. Sure was. That's only a couple of years removed from Dad running there. My dad ran his own car there. That's right. That's tough to do.

He took his old Nova and just got destroyed, you know, by some of the... I mean, I think Jack Ingram took his sportsman. car ran pretty good. But most of the guys that ran good at the snowball were like, you know, Mark Martin and trickling those guys with those tricked out Camaros. So, but you took, your car was more akin, I think, to like what Jack Ingraham and Sam Arden and them were running around the time or? Yes and no.

From the front clip forward, yes. The back of the cars, I don't know if you ever heard of them, but we were running Halfleaf Springs. what that was the alicems had come up with that years probably in the 60s they were leaf springs that had been cut in half turned backwards you had the eye on the spring at the at the hanger of the rear end and then the leaps bolted to the frame on the front and really would get a bite off the corner I mean like nothing else in this world have you ever heard of that I never heard of it yeah they were actually the proper name they were called I think it was quarterlyptic springs Yeah, they were, they were, how did they not outlaw something like that being so unique? You'd think that they would have.

You would have thought that. I don't know why. At that time, they were pretty much letting everything run. I mean, you know, the how cars like you were talking about earlier, they could run whatever. Yeah, that's pretty unique. Is that on both sides or just the left rear? Both sides. Yeah.

How was the top of the rear end? How did it not pivot off the? Okay, the top, the top, it had a top. So it was like a three link. Like a three link. Yeah. Had the top length and you, same deal. You could pick it up or move it down.

But it was a hymn bar stop, stood, right? That's right. Interesting. Yep. And the leaf springs, the way they mounted, they were, you didn't have a panard bar. You just, they were running there at the angle like an old chavelle, like a, like a, like a 68, 72 chavelle. how the arms run the lower trailing arms run

and the angle that's the way the springs mounted was just like that yeah he used the same mound on the rear end as like the old Chevelle did and I's you know bobby and Donnie and then he'd come up with that that's crazy years ago and they'd built several cars and sold them

you know Jerry Lolly like that do you know at this time like in 79 when you're when you're doing this do you know the Allison's well uh new of them new of them about all because you would get interwoven into that family down the road.

But that happens later. So in 1980, your dad finishes his racing career, how does it go to a derby in 79 with your dad's car? Ran good. I think we blew up or something in the race. We didn't have a good finish. It wasn't anything. Was that the only time you went to the derby?

We went there and I went there a couple more times. I think I went there in 80. I think it did We went there with a car That was the You know We done a lot of stuff Arrow wise on it and stuff

Tricked up And then by that time They'd become More strict on the rules What have you trying to get everybody Kind of tuned in Doing the same thing All the cars doing the same thing

80 and 81 And I'd run there I'd probably run Three or four derbies But never I never had a good finish there It was a hard race for me to finish. Yeah.

The Derby is a fascinating race. It is. Even today. Yeah, sure is. It's a really fascinating event. It's one of them things like everybody tells me you've got to go once. You got to go down there and see it, right? I want to go.

Oh, you haven't been? I've never been. Yeah, we live about 30 minutes away from it now, so. Oh, I'm going to go down. You'll be going down to the coast. Yeah, I am. You're not far from it. No, and it's a, actually, I went to a race there, these,

I hear a couple months ago, or months ago. Yeah, they run over there often. So you used to go around to racetracks, carrying your equipment, your helmet, and your suit, and jump in anything. And that would, you know, that would really explain or be the story of your career and your whole life. Pretty much.

It's like, man, you would, climb in anything and everything. So when you started, so are you calling people up saying, hey, man, I like to drive your car? Are you just going to the racetrack and just walking around in the pits? What's the approach back then? Well, pretty much it was just showing up at the racetrack. And there would be people sitting there going, oh, hey, Hutt, would you like to drive this car? Yeah, pretty much.

Who's driving it? What happens to him? Different things. Yeah. They fired him or got sick or his wife was having a baby. It didn't happen on it. It obviously didn't happen every time you went to the racetrack, but that would happen quite often. I can't.

I said it's so far and today because I don't think anybody does that now, right? Everybody shows up the racetrack. Has a driver in hand. Nobody walking around. I might, I will be surprised. I'm going to go to Hickrere this weekend to watch the car store. Maybe I should take my helmet. Take a helmet, a helmet, a fire suit.

could get asked to drive a ride. That's right. That's right. So, like, when did those, did that ever, or when did it materialize into something somewhat steady? For my career, probably didn't. It never did? But you had, you had rides. I mean, like, at some point, like, when's the, when did you get more than one or two in a row with the same team? You mean, like, on short track stuff?

Yeah, any of it. Yeah. Well, every time you would get in somebody's car, you'd build a relationship. Right. And, you know, that's a great point. And it, you know, it just went, everything, it just went, people see me doing that. Yeah. You know, they'd call me up, hey, you know, I'm outlawed this week.

I can't drive my car. Would you want to drive my car? Yeah, I wrecked a guy last week. I won't let me go very. Right. It was always something different, you know, on the local level. Yeah. at some, you know, Birmingham, Montgomery.

Plus, if you get in, now, not to interrupt you, but if you get in somebody's car that run 10th every week and you run fifth, everybody goes, damn. And I need a guy, I'm going to call him. That pretty much happened a lot of times. Yeah. It really did. And, you know, it,

bad for them, good for me. But you're still running your own car too. You know, you won track championships at Birmingham in 81. The weekly racing series starts. in 1982. Yeah. Okay. Winston puts a bunch of money

into the short track grassroots program. NASCAR sanctions a bunch of race tracks. They mail them a bunch of them white and red paint. You know, for the walls? Yeah. The whole short. Red and white helmets.

Yeah. The whole, they did. And I mean, they were, I guess, you know, looking back, they were doing this a little bit before them. But really, that, you know, when Winston came in and infused a bunch of money into the short track ranks and the local tracks,

you were right in the middle of it back then. That was a really big deal. It was. And so when you're hearing about the Winston Racing Series, what are you thinking? Is that pretty, is everybody getting all fired up? It's been a national championship, right? Most definitely. Was there a national champion?

There was a national champion. Recognized before that? I don't, I think there was. I don't think that, I don't think the popularity. Right. I know they were, they were track, obviously, track champion. state champions. I know they were celebrated state champions,

but I wasn't sure if they was as organized as it became once racing, Winston Racing Series started. Yep. And there was guys, I mean, you know, that, you know, what was cool about that thing when they did that is like, there was guys like what I was doing that was competing for a national championship against, you know, Richie Evans in the modifies. Right.

Never, never raced against each other. Right. Never would. would, that's right. But, I mean... But y'all had a shot. That's right. That's right.

Damn. I remember in the 90s when I was running our late model cars, now we never factored into any of that, but watching that play out, right? And just like you say, you would have, and it would become, so we were in the Mid Atlantic, Atlantic seaboard, you know, we were in the region, right? Right. And it was all our late model stock guys that ran Hickering, Tri-County and South Boston and Myrtle Beach and all that.

Max Prestwood and these guys. And even though I was at racing and I wasn't good enough to beat Max Presswood or Barry Beggardly for our Mid-Atlantic region, I was pulling for them to beat the guys over in, you know, Washington State or up in New York or whatever, you know, racing completely different race cars. Sometimes even on dirt and ass, you know, dirt and asphalt.

So that was, that didn't happen until the Winston Racing series started. Yep. That's when all that began. That's right. Yeah, that's pretty incredible. Yeah. So because now you've got newsletters coming, you know, everybody's subscribing to the newsletters every week and you're reading where you are and the points and who's the guy,

who's the big favorite and you're learning about all these other people that are racing all across the country and all kinds of different shit. So, I mean, that had to be pretty fascinating. It was. I mean, the notarot that all the, you know, the dirt guys got, the guys running like we got, you know, from all across the United States, it was just phenomenal. Everybody seemed like they, you know, just, it was amazing what happened at that time. Yeah.

That, you know, Winston could do that and bring that together like that. I wonder what happened because, you know, there is a national champion celebrated today. Advance Auto supports the series, you know, that is and used to be the Winston Racing Series. but it's a foregone conclusion that it's going to be a late-mall-stock guy, like, you know, that races from around here. It's not the, you know, it's not, it's not this patchwork of, of, you know, different types of racing all over the country that come together and converge to compete for this national title anymore.

But I remember, it was like that even in the 90s, mid-90s when I was kind of doing it. And so, you know, you talk about the, you would, you know, you talk about that notoriety, how long, How long did you get mixed up into that before you started trying to go beyond the Winston Racing Series? It starts in 82, so. Well, my problem that I had, my biggest problem I had was always money. You didn't have the proper funding that they need to do to go, you know, to do all over the country. And I could go race Birmingham, Montgomery, because it was right there at home, you know, that type of thing. but I think like the year Mike Alexander won it along that time he was racing

you know Birmingham Montgomery Nashville you know wherever else he could go Mobile Pensacola you know all those NASCAR tracks and you know he was he was basing everything he was doing was off like Richie Evans you know he had to chasing him chasing him chasing his point you had to race as many times as Richie is and that's right and you're keeping track with his schedule that's exactly right and in the car count, I think, coming to play a little bit. You know, go somewhere where you had the car count. You know, that was better.

You know, everything coming to play there. And, you know, it was a, you know, just an extremely good deal. I mean, you know, I'd give anything to see that get back to like that. I agree. And you both.

You end up going into the DASH series. Why the DASH series? A couple of reasons. I had a friend in Haleyville, Alabama, Billy Knight, give me an opportunity to go run a dash car, Daytona, Dalton, you know, places like that. You're like, hell yeah.

Yeah. So. Not BIR. Right. So I go to Daytona, we blow up. So hold up. Biggest track you've ran since up to this point is probably five flags. Birmingham, probably.

Birmingham. Okay. Five eighths, what it was. All right. So five inch flat. You're going to go to Daytona. Did y'all go test? Test.

What's that? Yeah. So you show up. They probably had you on the back straightaway outside the racetrack going through tech. You probably weren't even inside the track when you got there. No. I don't know. So you get, when you go in, when you walk into the track, what's your thoughts?

Well, I'd seen it. You've been there before. I've been there before. Watching a Daytona 500 as a spectator? Yeah. Helping? Yep. Helping?

No, not helping. No, just watching. Just being a fan? Yeah, big fan. But when I go there, my biggest surprise was when I hit, when I got, go out on the racetrack in a four-cylinder car like that. I'm like, holy crap, you know, going down on the bottom and it's like the banking, he's like, you're looking up that wall, you know, it was so high.

And anyway, I think I run about three-quarter of a lap. The engine blew up. Damn, geez. And needless to say, that was the only engine. They couldn't get another one, so that year was done. Okay. So we come back, the next race, we go race Nashville. What a blast.

What a blast The whole fairgrounds Yep Yep And I don't remember What happened there Run good I think I don't remember

Where we finished We race We race We run The dash here was touring So we race Birmingham Montgomery And we won Montgomery

We finished We was leading Birmingham And tore rear in it Oh And so Anyway that Did you go to Darlington?

Did go to Darlington What did you think About hitting that place For the first time? That was pretty often Damn, that was actually my first super speedway race. No, I take it back. My first, yeah, actually that was my first super speedway race that I'd ever run.

I can't imagine. I mean, those cars probably ran 150 around Daytona. Yep. Right. So at Darlington, I mean, you were probably in the throttle pretty hard through what was three and four back then. Yeah. I don't know about one or two, but damn, I just can't even imagine running that car down into the corner like that. It was pretty awesome.

I'm going to tell you. I mean, especially for a guy, a short track guy starting out. You know, Darlington was, well, you know, Darlington, it just, it was a heck of a place to start. You'd have some great runs there later on in your career. In 1986, you got linked up with one of the best in the business, Richard Mash. That's who Kerry drove for eventually. When he got into the dash series, and by that time, you know, Richard was a legend in,

in that type of car and that discipline, just a great engine builder and a really unique guy. How did you get teamed up with Richard? I was planning on going to Daytona with my other team that I'd mentioned there in 86. And I guess in December, December or January of the... 1985, 19-8. Yeah.

Charlie Ogle, when Richard, he was driving for Richard, Dr. Ogle. Oh. Got killed in Daytona at a test. Damn. Driving a dash car? Driving a dash car? Damn. They were running at that time about 178, 79 mile per hour in a tire bay.

And so anyway, Richard called me and said, you know, of course, every time I'd went to the racetrack, Richard and I would always, you know, we'd see each other and we'd go meet, you know, and talk and, you know, and Richard, I'm like, man. I'd like to have you driving for me, you know, someday. Well, anyway, he called me up and said, you know, I don't know what I'm doing right now, you know, about Daytona, but I'm just, what if if we end up taking our car out of our pocket and go to Daytona, would you be interested in driving? I said, sure I would.

Was his car one of the best cars? It was, yeah. It was, yeah, he was top-notch. And I knew his stuff was, you know, from, I'd seen it run with Michael Walter, you know, to, you know, everybody who had been in it to run good. And when we went to, we ended up going to Dayton at the last minute and finishing second down there in the race. And we just took, you know, basically the whole year we put the money right back in the car, didn't have proper sponsorship. We picked up a little bit of sponsorship from Rooster Bush, Ponyak dealership there, Illinois.

And when all this is going on, what race cars are back at the, back at the Strickland home base? Do you get rid of all your stuff or have you still got some of it? I've got some, had some. Not a lot. Yeah. We had, are you peddling on the side? Because the dash races, what, they were 12, 14 races a year? Probably so.

Right. So not that many. So you got a lot of weekends off. What are you doing? I was trying to race anytime I could race, not just dash cars, you know, just anything I could do. And it was just, you know, when we wasn't racing with Richard stuff, we'd go test somewhere or what heavy. Didn't, you know, basically just doing whatever it took. You know, I would run some other people's cars, you know, different places, anywhere I could.

all over. So in 1986, you dominated the DASH season. You won the championship easily. Nine out of 17 races. At that point, is that, like, that's probably the most success that you've ever had? I mean, you won track championships back home. Yeah. But this is, the DASH series had a bit of a national stage, you know.

And we had some pretty good competition, you know, I mean, Rob Maroso was there. There you go. You know, we had, you know, Billy Standridge. You know, there was, you know, Mickey York was there. I mean, there's a lot of guys that had won a lot of races. Didn't Billy on the junkyard? He did. Yeah.

Yep. That's right. Yep. I race against him, I think, in the Xfinity series in 98. I can't. Yep. Yeah. He was pretty cool.

He was good guy. He had some good old cars he put together there at the back end of his career when he came to, he'd run Dayton and Ta-Dadega once a year or something like that. Yep. He had a couple of fast cars. Yep. So you would meet and marry Pam. When did y'all meet?

We met in the summer of 1980. 80? 1980. So you met Pam Allison. This is Donnie's daughter. Yep. In 1980. Yep.

Y'all dated all that time or just kind of? Yes. We dated for almost seven years before we actually tied a knot in 86. Dagum, what took so long? Donnie Allison would have been his father-in-law. That's why. No. No, we, you know, I don't know.

I just wanting things, you want to make sure everything was right. Make sure. He's busy. I mean, we was. I mean, you know, she was supporting what I was doing and going with me everywhere. And her daddy, what's going on with her daddy? Her daddy was, Donnie was still racing a little bit in 80, obviously, but he would get injured pretty severely. That would actually, that would actually be the reason he would have, you know, retire.

That's correct. So you were experiencing, you were going through that with her, I guess, at that point in time. I know there was a real nasty wreck for him at Charlotte in 81 or 82. It was. That put him out for a while. I never kind of really recover from that. Was that difficult? I mean, I imagine it was, but I mean, do you recall much about that time?

I do. You know, it was very difficult on her, you know, being her dad, obviously. You know, and she, I noticed a lot of times, like with me and, you know, she would get in a wreck or anything like that, you know, it kind of shake her up a little bit. Shake her up a little bit. But for the most part, you know, she got over it. Did you spend much time around Kenny or Ronald or Donald? Yeah. Kenny and Ronald and Donald are Donny's sons.

That's correct. And I know them really well. I went to work for them a little bit when I was really young. incredible incredible group of guys most definitely yeah so very smart yeah yeah yeah so what

but what were they like back in they were kids back then right they were kids well Ronald and Donald were kids yeah Kenny and I was Kenny was a few years behind me not a lot but they were all sharp kids what were they doing they could build anything

were they just peddling with their dad stuff building donnie was they were going donnie was had a short track car. They were going with him some. Did they ever go with you? Occasionally they did. They did.

But Kenny and Donald had moved to Fort Myers, Florida, with Bill Collins. Dang. Running Donnie's Bush Grand Ashtal car team for Bill Collins. Okay. And they was building all the cars down there at that time. Who's Bill Collins? Was he driving? Bill Collins.

Bill Collins on the big Toyota dealership. He owned the car? Fort Myers, Florida, yep. Was that red and yellow, red and white Miller car? 23? It was red and white, 23 jerseys. Yeah, jerseys. Yeah, that's right.

Yep. So, like, Donnie drove it a couple times. I think Davey might have drove it a couple times. I'm not sure. Bobby, maybe? Yep. Because it would run like five or six races a year, right? That's right.

Yeah. Charlotte and big places. Yep, the big races. Yep. Damn, that's cool. Yep. And then I guess, I guess. I guess I'm not sure what year probably had to be 80, I'm guessing 88, 87, 88.

They moved. Kenny ended up buying, or Bill ended up shutting his team down. And I guess Kenny ended up, and the twins ended up buying all that stuff and moved it to Carolinas. And then they started building their car building business there. Yeah. They're right close by where I live or that building is. I think they're still on that property over there off of 70.

Wow. And, yeah. I didn't know that. They're very close. Yeah. And I used to, I got a speeding ticket one time. And dad said, well, I guess you need to go get a job to pay for your lawyer to pay for your ticket. And so I went and acquired a job at Kenney's.

And Kenny put me to work for summer working on Legends cars. We had a lot of fun. Yeah. Yeah, they are a fun group. Were you tight with the Alessons when you met Pam? I'm assuming you were, right? That's how you met him? Met her?

No, what happened? We was in Panama City, Florida. Davy Allison, myself, Jimmy Kitchens, and another guy who needs to spot for it. Sammy San Filippo. It's so funny how we're all kind of somewhat connected in funny ways. But the four of us was riding up and down the strip, hollering to all the girls.

Oh, hell. And we had the Bobby Allison van. man, we were hot-ticket. The Allison van. It's probably right. Mike Miller bands. Yeah, you know it is. People thought there was beer in Zad.

Oh, yeah, yeah. But we were going down the strip there in Panama City, and like I said, it was bumper-to-bomper, traffic creeping along. And anyway, Davy says, well, hey, there's Pam and Lisa. You know, I said, who's Pam and Lisa? He said, Pam, Pam is Donnie's daughter. I never met her, you know. And all I'd heard with Donnie had a good-looking daughter, but that's really all I knew, you know. And so anyway, and Lisa's her friend.

Okay, so let's go over and turn in and see what they're doing. So we turn in there. And Davey rolls down his window. He's driving. I'm in the passenger seat. And he rolls down the window. And Pam, Lisa walked up to his side and said, hey, what are y'all doing? David said, oh, we're just riding around, you know, hollering all the girls and all that stuff.

And so Pam said, well, who you got in here? And he said, well, I have, you know, Sammy in the back and Jimmy and. and uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, that was what,

you know, that was my racing name. That was my real name, you know, it was a few years later, you know, before I actually went by hood, you know,

my, Amy's grandfather's name is Wayman. Yep. Yeah. My wife. Really? It's the unique name. Yeah.

We, uh, anyway, Dave, uh, Pam says, what are you doing in there? Points of me?

And I'm like, so she walks around the front of the van. And I, uh, roll down the window and she said she comes around and she's pointing her finger she says i hate your guts and she says you beat davy every week and i don't you know i don't like that you know and so i just rolled the wind up huh you know i was hated you know oh damn i was really hated because i won a lot you know and you know and it just won things and so anyway i was like okay whatever you know

so i'd roll the wind up and so i told davy let's go so we we go and we leave them so the next day Davy says, Davey says, we meet Davey somewhere and Dave's, man, I can't believe Pam how much she really hates you, you know. So I don't know why she hates me. She don't even know me, you know. And so, so anyway, make a long story short, we, about, I was end of June, something like that.

Fourth July, I got a postcard from her, says, I'm in Daytona with my dad at, at Firecraft. a race and we'll be back, you know, from home such, such day, you know, here's my phone number to give me a call, you know. Dang. So, what? They didn't hate you that much. It doesn't hate me that much.

So anyway, so make a long story short, first night you got back, we called, was talked, you know, three quarters of the night. Yeah. Been together basically ever since. That's pretty cool. Yep. So that's 1986. After your massive year in the dash series, you know, you're, you know, you.

you knew you were ready to go. Move up the next, what's the next, I mean, the next opportunity, is it Cup, really? Well, I mean, for people these. I didn't think so. For people these days, you know, there's like, you know, everybody thinks there's this ladder of K&N truck, Xfinity Cup, right? But back then, they really wasn't this sort of, you know, there wasn't any rules, right? Michael Walter comes right out of the Dash series into the Cup series. Right.

Surpasses the Xfinity series, which was sportsman back in the day. But so you're having this great success in the DASH series. You can stay there, I imagine. But what are you looking at for opportunities? Wanting to get in the what, being the Bush Grand National Series. You know, wanted to do that. Went and talked to several sponsors, what have you, couldn't ever put anything together.

Who's car were you going to drive? Well, didn't know. Do you ever talk to any of the owners? I talked to Chuck Ryder a lot. At that time, he was the All-Pro Auto Parts. I talked to him, I talked to Carrie Bodenheimer,

a time or two on the phone. Carrie Boultenheimer built us our first couple of late model stock cars for Carrie and Kelly. Yep. I'm trying to remember some of the other ones I talked to, but we just couldn't ever seem to put anything together for it. What did you end up doing? For 87.

Okay, 87. I was still trying to beat the bushes and what happened. I had a guy that wanted to start a cup team out of Richard Mast shop. I think it was in 87 or 88, 87. It was in 87, yeah. It's that orange car. Yeah, number 76. What color was it?

Yellow. Was it orange or yellow? Well, yellow orange. That car was built in Richard. I was at that race. Yep. I remember being at Wilkesboro when he ran his first race. Yep.

So I remember thinking, damn, Hutt Strickland's a cool name. I don't know where you came. I mean, this is 1987, so I'm 13. But I don't remember where, I don't know where you came from. I knew you were friends with the Allison's, and your car was cool. Like a pretty race car. So y'all had a little trouble in that race. We did.

We run good, qualified, top 20, I think. and which was unheard of, especially for a dash driver. Brand new car, brand new team. Yep. And we ended up running was running top ten, and the guy that Steve Christman, I think his name was. Number 62 or 68? Champion Spark Club.

Yeah, AC Spark Club. Okay. One of them, yeah, I think it was. I'm in a red and white car. Yep. Blew an engine going in turn one at Wilkesboro. And you busted your ass in that. Yes, I did.

That's what happened. Right front tire into the wall. Man, it knocked the whole snout off. What happened? What did you do with the car? We carried it back to the shop, stripped it down, took it back to Hutchson Pagan, got a new front clip put on it, come back and went to, I think we went to Rockingham after that. Don't remember what happened at Rockingham.

Must not have been anything spectacular. Yeah. We made the race. struggled, what have you. Then went to Atlanta. The last race, qualified really good at Atlanta. I don't remember where we finished. 16th.

16th, yep. Not a bad finish for, you know, first cup race there and stuff. That was the end of that deal. That was end of that deal. Who is this guy? Who is this, how you can say that name? Skip Janie. Janie.

Janey. Damn. How you pronounce it. I recognize that. Yeah. So who was he? Where did he come from? He owned, he worked for a company called Prudential Bach or Bates or however you pronounce it in Florida, South Florida.

They were a investment company. And he had made a fair amount of money and invest in other people's money and all that stuff. Not in the race cars, but decided to spend it all. Yeah, he had a dream, he wanted to build a cup team. And he had probably a million bucks, which he thought that was good enough. Spent it all in three races. Yep. So that deal's done, and now you're sitting there in all season with, I don't know,

do you got any opportunities? Anybody calling you? No, not really. My only opportunity I had there, I had a Bush Grand National car that I had when I'd won, the 86 championship. My only money I made of the whole year was Richard that said, you know, you take all the championship

money because you didn't take any money. So I took that money and built my own Bush Grand National car. Did you buy a brand new chassis? I bought a brand new Laughlin chassis. And built your own car. Built my own car. What is this car? What's the body on it?

It was an automobile cutlass. Okay. At that time. What are you going to do with this? I'm going to race it up in the Carolina somewhere, wherever. Didn't know where. It ended up getting it going, getting it built.

I come up here and raced. Where? And Hickory, I raced. You had a short track car? Is it a short track car? And you're running the Bush Grand National races with this car. Yep. And so you had a couple starts?

Yep. I had Hickory. I had South Boston. And I went to Orange County. That's like beating your head against the wall. Oh, yeah. You got no money. You got one car and you're going to take it to all the tracks where it can get destroyed.

Yep. For the most part, Yeah. Beat to hell. But I was thinking, you know, my way of thinking was, maybe I can go there and impress somebody. Right. You know.

Yeah. And so how'd it go? Well, what I did, let me back up a little bit first. I'll tell you a little bit more. Every time I come up to Carolinas, I'd heard it in the 88 season that Rod Austerlund was starting a team. He's coming back. He's coming back.

So Rod Australon was dad's owner in 1980, won the championship, won the rookie of the year in Saturday, sold the team to J.D. Stacey in the middle of the 81 season. And he's from the West Coast, a real estate guy, I believe, and decided that there was some things not going well in the market. And so he decided to – he was very smart, very short. So I got to get out of this. Yep.

And then he's coming back. Yep. I spent a lot of time trying to promote myself. You know, I would go hang out and got to know Roland Wallatica over the Austerlans. Yep. And I kept telling him, hey, you know, Roland, I'm racing Hickory. night. I'm racing South Austin. Come see me race, you know. And he did.

And he did. And Roland, it's interesting to me, Hutt, that Roland is there. Yep. Because he was the general manager for the team in 1980, in 79 and 80. So when Rod goes away, I don't even know what Roland does for the next

seven years, but when Rod comes back, Roland's back in there running that team. Same thing. We're helping him start it. And when did you first start getting in Roland's ear? That's 88? 88. Right of right?

Yeah, 88. Who tipped you off that they were starting a team? Well, I just, through the media. Yeah. I had just heard, you know, and I come to Morrisville, you know, tow my car and trailer, and, you know, I asked, stop at 7-Eleven or whatever, and, you know, heard, you know, austral and starting a team, do you know where it is? And luckily, I end up after about the third or four stop, somebody told me where they thought it was.

And drove over there. Drove over there. Walked in. Yep. Not knowing anybody? Not knowing anybody. Wow. And introduced yourself to Roland?

Yep. And what was his reaction? Basically, you know, he said, yeah, we're looking for a driver. We don't know who's going to drive yet. And I said, well, you know. They really had no clue. Didn't have a clue. They had a sponsor.

Didn't have a sponsor. Didn't. Where did the Hines 57 sponsor come from? The Hine, that deal come on into the, well, once Roland had come he'd come to Hickory and watch him race

and he said I gotta say you was pretty impressive I said well man I finished like ninth or something he said yeah but nobody passed you all night

you know and he said that was pretty impressive I'm gonna call Rod and talk to Rod about you so he called Rod and you know anyway make a long story short Rod call me and

hey we want to talk to you some more and blah blah so anyway Is the Allison connection at all assisting you at this time? No, no, nobody's putting in a word for you. Davey, nobody's calling helping. No, Davey would, he probably tooted my horn better than anybody as far as, you know, but for the most part, and I'm not saying the other ones, wasn't. Yeah.

I just knew Davey, Dave and I grew up together, and Davey knew, you know, I was a good racer and, you know, I'd go with Davey and help Davey a lot, and he would help me some. and, you know, we became real close friends. And, you know, he wanted to have me out there, and I understood. I wanted to be there, too, but he just wasn't meant to be. But, you know, we ended up, Rod ended up hiring me to work in the shop. He wanted me to learn the cars because I hadn't been around the cup cars. That must be nice. It was.

And hired to work in that shop. Yep, working the shop. And I did all the crushed panels and all that stuff and radiator duct work on a lot of them. that was about the extent of it. But, you know, and I could do anything as far as, you know, could weld and do whatever. But that was my job that they put me on, and I tried to do everything I could, you know, at my best ability.

When did you learn he was going to get to car? Do you remember that day? Remember that moment? Well, not for 100%. When I started, I wasn't for 100%. Yeah. We got wind at Ed McLean, which was one of the marketing guys had come to us with the Heinz sponsorship.

And, you know, Rod, basically they need a driver. They know who the driver's going to be. And so I guess that time, well, you know, come on board here. If y'all like Hut, then, you know, we'll, you know, and they started looking at a lot of the comparisons, you know, between your dad and myself as far as the age, you know, where I was and where he was. You know, we had a lot of the same, you know, I come on board. same age he was at 26 and you know it was just a lot of the same stuff like that and rod like that

and so you know we we we started you know end up getting a high in sponsorship and uh you had to been uh lord though to get you're going to go cup racing yep you had to been out of your mind for most part i was happy yeah it was i know you're i know back then you're still sitting there going, man, I'm just trying to make it. I'm grinding day to day, paycheck to paycheck. I'm working my ass off running wide open. Yep. But shoot, man, I mean, when you went home and sat down at the dinner table and he really

had a second to think about what you was getting ready to do, damn, you had to been excited. I was. Yeah, it was pretty phenomenal. You know, I never had a sponsor of that size. And not that it was, it wasn't very, it wasn't huge, but it was enough to do it. You know, I was in all of it. Of course, the way it turned out, the whole thing kind of, you know, we never really hit our stride with that whole thing. Had some glimpses, though, of, and Jimmy Spencer would come drive the car, which is interesting because you and him had a couple opportunities where y'all swap rides.

Was that, I mean, so he comes and drives as a 57 car after you. You went and drove, he comes and drives for junior after you, am I right? Drove for Bobby, too. Drove for Bobby, I see. Why did that keep happening? Was that just coincidental? I really don't know. I really don't know.

Because it happened three times, right? I think, I think, you know, there's, I think Spencer's personality, he was outgoing, you know, very outgoing, you know, very outgoing. I was pretty much stuck to myself type thing. and I think Spencer would go in there and talk to Rod, hey, you know, I can drive better than hut, put me in that car, blah, blah.

You know, and I know, I mean, that's, you know. That sounds like Spencer. Well, yeah, I mean, I mean, I know it did. Yeah. For five or six more rides, even, because the owners would tell me, you know. And, but, you know, it was one thing, I didn't care. I mean, you know, it, I just thought,

so, so quick, more incoidental than anything. that he would end up replacing you multiple times. So I thought that that 57 Heinz car was really cool. Great paint scheme, beautiful paint scheme, just a well put together. It looked like it was going to be this really, really cool deal, right? Everything takes a while to get off the ground and get successful. And it didn't run awful out of the gate, you know, but it just never got better.

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But anyway, you know, I kept in contact with Rod. He said, you know, do I have a ride for next year? You know, because not I need to be looking, you know, and tell me now, you know, nope, you got a ride. I'll say, well, I said, well, what about the contract? You know, I'm going to send it to you. I'm going to send it to you. And make a long story short about four weeks before the Daytona 500. had friends call me.

For 1989. For year two. That was for, I run the 89 season. Okay, sorry, for year two, which is 90. That's correct. Yeah, 90, that's right. And I got a phone call from my in-laws said, hey, you know, if I need a check on this, said, you know, we've heard on the news that Ossalon announced

that Spencer's going to be driving the car next year, the Heinz car. Really? And he kept telling me, man, you, you know, you know, I'm going to send you your contract and if my word ain't good enough and I don't know what is and I said well send it you know anyway, my long store is short

it was true they pulled me out and put Spencer in the car and I started the 90s season didn't have a ride basically. So you went to Daytona without a car to drive? That was what it was looking like and then I guess in TriStar

needed somebody to drive their car down there and I got in their car which car is that? That was the 68, I think it was, number 68. We ended up qualifying second round fastest there in that car. Then we got into a Schrader and somebody was in a 125 coming to the finish. He spun. He got loose.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. And took me out. And we was in the race and just won them things. And so then I proceeded. Rick Hendrick felt really. bad so he brought one of the days of thunder movie cars over for us to use and uh we brought it over there it had no windows no no no nothing you know no engine no transmission so all the guys went to work went to work and got it in there and uh we ended up starting a Daytona 500 in a and uh one of the

days of Thunder movie cars okay and did y'all run the whole was y'all free to race how y'all wanted to race or did that because i know those dayton days of those Thunder cars had a script That's correct. They were going to do a certain thing and then get off the track. But Rick basically handed you to that car and said, y'all run the hell out of it. That's right. What you do? We had no restrictions.

Of course, it was a, it was a different. Yeah, I mean. A handful. Yeah, you couldn't drive. I mean, it was just, it was a movie car. You know, the body was, wasn't much better than a car. No, no. It was, and you can imagine.

I mean, just everything was pieced together and, you know, just a thrash. I bet that, yeah. I bet that was a bit frustrating. Yep. Hold up. You're saying that Rick did that out of just empathy and just kindness? But Ken Schrader didn't do anything malicious, did he? No, no, no, no.

I think it was more, I think Rick Hendrick would have done it, whether Ken Schroeder was involved or whatever. But, you know, Ken was, I guess he was coming to the finish line or something or towards the end of the race and got loose off four in the 25 car. driving it. Yeah, I remember that, I remember that wreck. And I remember the 68 car,

he slid up in front of you and you kind of teabone him there. And, but Rick, Rick, you ran for Rick in the spring Darlington race and one of the days of Thunder's number 51 cars. You also got to work and coach Tom Cruise during the making of that movie. Mm-hmm. some.

So yeah, so what was that experience like? Pretty awesome. Yeah. You know, it, you know, to be around that whole group, it was just, it was, I was in all. How did that even happen? Like, how did they come to you? Or did you go to them and say, I want to do that? No.

Carolyn Carrier Freeman, her, her dad owned, Brayman. Bristol Speedway at that time. She was the liaison for NASCAR to the days of thunder people. Okay. She knew me from racing

and what have you obviously and she had told me, hey, you know, we're needing somebody to go drive a few of these cars from time and time and go to the racetrack. Pays really good and so I said, heck yeah, I ain't doing nothing. Let's go do it. So I did that for probably a couple months, something like that.

So that was your end to the movie scene there. And then you're probably one of only a handful of drivers that are actual race car drivers that is available to mentor, so to speak. Yeah. You know, I'll tell you what, Tom Cruise could have made a heck with a driver. Really? What makes you say that? Just his demeanor, his focus.

You know, he wanted to do things right. I mean, just, and he wanted to do it. I mean, you know, there's no, I mean, I know why his movies are so successful. I mean, you see how he is in person, just so focused and dialed in. And, you know, every scene he makes is, you know, it don't matter if it's on his 40th take. You know, it might have been right 30 takes ago, but, you know, no, I want to make it right. So when you're, when you're helping them with that film, is Tom actually driving racing? cars because I know a lot of times they're filming with a car on a trailer right well

propped up in this trailer in this car on a trailer and that's typically how you would film most scenes in the race car but he did drive you you did go out to like volusia county and he did drive a race car yep you watched him you know understand really what that might what that experience might be like yeah I don't think I ever knew till right now sitting across from you today that Tom drove a car around the racetrack right mm-hmm so you got to witness him do that. Yep.

That's pretty fascinating. It was. You know, I really couldn't believe that he was actually going to go out and do it. You thought he'd just be propped up in a movie car. I thought so. Like in a prop, right? But no, he wanted to do it. Yeah.

And, you know, when he went, it was funny when we, well, not funny, but we went out and got ready to go out and he was buckling in and all that stuff. And I was kind of walking around the cars. I always do. Just kind of look and make sure nothing's, you know, getting ready to fall off or, you know, all lug nuts tight hoodpins in. So I walked around and tell Tom, I said, now I'm a warning on something here. I said, this car, they have what they call a floating sway bar on it.

I said, it's attached on the right side only, and the left side has a rub pad. Yeah, it's clapper. I said, I know it don't mean anything to you. I said, but, you know, when you go out, I said, you can't turn the wheels to the right. You got to, you know, don't, when you warm any tires, go left and right. When you go left, you'll have a sway bar. when you go rides, you won't have a sway bar. You know, so you really have to watch, or you'll wreck it, you know.

So, man, the first thing he does is roll out on a racetrack and makes one lap. And so then he comes down the front straight away, and he starts warming the tires up. And immediately the car turns to the right. He's got a $100,000 camera sticking out the right side of about 10 foot, you know, on a pole and stuff. kills the right side camera, kills the right front of the car, everything. I mean,

that was it. He comes in, he says, man, I see what you was talking about on that sway bar. Well, I tried to tell you, you know,

you have no bar when you go to the right. Was that the only time you ever saw him drive a race car? Yeah, that was, that was the first time. Did he ever drive one after that? Yeah,

yeah, he did on the big track stuff. What? Yeah, he did, he did drive Daytona, you know, just,

Yeah. Just by himself type thing. Right. I think I heard Rick telling a story about him going out there and running some laps, you know, 170-mile an hour or something like that. And Paul Newman maybe driving some laps as well. Yep. Yep.

In one of their test cars from the early 90s or mid-90s? It's pretty fascinating. Yep. He's sort of notorious for doing all his own stunts anyways. Yeah. I didn't know that he was that way back then. I mean, that's early 90s and stuff. I guess late 80s, early 90s.

But, yeah, I mean, I guess I'm not. not too surprised to hear that he would want to do that himself yeah yeah he would have he would have made a good race driver if he'd ever you know a little bit of time but wouldn't it took much time but he was he was pretty bawledy all right around this time mike alexander's driving for bobby and uh and mike gets an injury has a couple injuries uh and you're offered to help um so this is uh this is a pretty cool moment for you because you're going to drive for these people that are your family. You know, you're married into this Allison family, know them well.

Yeah. And Bobby's trying to get his team going. It's got some beautiful Buick's Ray Best's sponsorship. And middle of season, you're going to jump in there. And you had some great runs. Run second to Davie at Michigan. Everybody was super thrilled with that.

All the, you know, you're starting, I guess, right around that time. a point where we're starting to hear about you maybe getting inducted into the Alabama gang. Mm-hmm. So, you know, you got to feel like that maybe finally things are on the right path. I did. Yeah. So driving for Bobby, you know, how great was that experience?

A dream come true. You know, he was one of my childhood heroes, him and, you know, Donnie and Red Farmer, you know, to drive for Bobby was just, you know, probably the most awesome thing you could do. And, you know, it was just, you know, I didn't think life could get any better at that time than drive for him. Yeah. He put a lot of effort to try to get his deal going from what I remember. You know, looking back on it now, you can see where, you know, he, there's a couple drivers that became owners that weren't willing. to put the monetary risk forward.

Right, right. But Bobby was. He knew that he wanted to win races and he's going to invest to do it. And I think that's where the speed in that car, you know, come from. But what was, you know, he also, you know, my own opinion of Bobby as a driver, he often was his own worst enemy,

not on the racetrack. mainly, but mostly with the people he drove for. You know, he was driving junior's cars in the early 70s, winning a lot of races. Yep. He gets in a disagreement about, you know, the direction of things or something, right? Something could have been monetary or whatever and goes and drives his own car. He'd rather just do his own thing. I'm going to go where I get to make the call, you know, and drive his own race car and

Cali Yarborough wins three championships in a row driving that thing. Right. And then, you know, but eventually, you know, he gets in the Daeguard deal. wins in the championship that he deserved. But what was he like as an owner? Very good. I can't say I had one bad moment with him. He was so, and I appreciated everything he did for me as far as, you know,

would be flying back after a race and, you know, he'd say, you know, I think you need to look at this next time doing this, or try this next time or, you know, he used to tell me all the time. He said, you know, you stick your finger in the rattlesnake's mouth a time or two, and you got to, you know, take my finger and, you know, slap it. Don't quit sticking your finger in rattlesnake's mouth a lot of times. But, you know, I would see a hole and I'd go for it. And, you know, rather than having a little bit of patience.

And he was right. Now, everything he said was always right, you know, for the most part. And, you know, I really enjoyed driving for him. Yeah. They started struggling, though, in the 92 season, having parts failures and things just not working out. And you, did you tell Bobby that you weren't coming back? What happened in 92, we were, we were having issues like in the race with falling out with different things like that. Like you said, and, you know, we just.

We'd start happy hour, and we'd go out and we'd run 15 minutes a happy hour, and the guys would say, man, we're the fastest car here, let's load up and, you know, go to the motel. And basically, we'd do that. And then the next day, you know, something would break or fall off the car that, you know, had we stuck around a little bit longer or, you know, checked on the bottom and, you know, nut and bolted the car, you know, everything a little bit better. Yeah. Things like that wouldn't happen.

Right. And, you know, we had a, had a, started having a few things like that happened. And, you know, I told Bobby, you know, Bobby, we need to, you know, we need to have a talk with these guys. I mean, they're, you know, they, you know, love to party. Nothing wrong with that. I was just, there wasn't a time or place to do that. And, you know, and Bobby said, well, you know, he said, you know, he said, you know, he said,

These guys, you know, they're from Milwaukee, Wisconsin. So, you know, you know what that people in Milwaukee like to drink. And says, well, nothing on with that. It's just not the right time or place to do that. So anyway, at that time, you know, I had people knocking on my doors. You did. You were showing. So that's a great moment I wanted to make a point at.

So you're in Bobby's car, you started having great, runs. When the car stayed together, y'all usually did show up, run fast in practice, and then back it up in the race. And so finally, people are starting to notice you and some opportunities are starting to open up where you can actually go to Bobby and say, hey, man, I got to do something different or we got to fix this or else I can, I got this other opportunity. And that's kind of how that went down. Pretty much. How do you justify, how do you justify that with your marriage into the family and how do you help everybody understand? what the decision is all about?

I think it was just basically a business decision. Did everybody get it? For the most part, I think so. I mean, it... What, no her feelings? No, I don't think so. I mean, it was a little bit there, you know, when it all went down.

Well, how involved is Donnie with the team at all? None. Not really that team. He was going... He would go to racetracks and put his two cents in occasionally. But for the most part, Bobby, you know, he run his team. me had, you know, had competent people that could do the job.

You know, the engine builders, the crew chiefs, every, you know, the guys work on the team. But just, you know, we just need to, we was having things happen that, you know, falling out of races and things like that. They just, you know, I was just ready to do something different. Oh, go ahead. You left and before the end of the year, you end up driving for Larry Hedrick in the final race of the year. how did that so you why couldn't you get to the end well I didn't leave Bobby had we run Darlington and I think it was we had a rain delay that was the first race with

Ford in the 92 season I think the race ended up getting rained out if I remember correctly it's done already over halfway anyway and they presented me with a release to release me from my contract. Did something happen during that race? No, no. Well, was there like, you know,

kind of what led up to that. Let's back up a little bit. Junior had talked to me about driving at that time. At that time, didn't know who. McDonald's car, yeah, 27. Yep. And I think,

you know, Bobby, you know, obviously didn't feel good about Junior. You know, from old times. Old times. Yeah, that's right. And so I think, you know, probably the only one I could have went. He got ticked off at that. Yeah, you know, and I get it.

That was fine. And he found his, he's already, so is Bobby probably already looking at his future, right? He's going, you're out there finding your next thing and he's going, well, I'm going, I need to go ahead and have a plan. Yep. And that plan came together sooner rather than later. Right. That's kind of how that went. Jimmy?

Svetter. No, actually, Jimmy wasn't the first one in there, I don't think. They had, I want to say, Jeff Purvis drove it once or twice. Yeah. I want to say Chuck Bowne, I drove it. He did. Yeah, I remember Chuck driving that car once or twice. And there was a couple feel in.

Yeah, a couple feel in. Then I think Spencer come on after all that. Yeah, before that year was it. Just to stay consistent with the following year. Yeah. Just got to keep the street alive. There's no way, though, that happened without hard feelings. I mean, the family, look, I know family's too well.

And families, even in the, you know, with Bobby, I mean, like, I don't know. There had to been some times where you all were like, man, that's screwed up. Well, it really didn't, not on my part. You know, I understood where he was coming from, and I had a place to go. Okay. That was a good part. you know I didn't have a ride for the rest of the year but I had a ride in the coming year but I did have a few rides that I picked up from here you know time to time and you know so at

least I did have a place to go I meant to ask you this earlier were you I'm assuming you just signed a contract you said it was a business relationship in terms of that but you're under contract though right with with Bobby yes okay so when you sign a contract with him when you guys negotiate that. I mean, like, it's, it was it pretty straightforward? I mean, was there any type of, I just know how when families start getting into the business side of it, sometimes it gets messy, right? Yes. It was kind of a weird deal because we had, we had, you know, Bobby was family. Right. And then the manager there was, was family. He was, he was married to Bobby's sister. All right.

And he was a former lawyer. Okay. See, this is getting more complicated to me. He had done, he had done, you know, contracts for me and Bobby. And it was kind of, you know, and then, I mean, it was kind of a big mess. Yeah, it seems like there could be conflict of interest or something. It was. I mean, you know, but it was a deal, you know, I was always a type look.

I mean, if nobody wants me there, I don't want to be there. That's the last thing, you know, you don't want to be in a place where you're not wanted. That's fair. Yeah. because, I mean, it just wasn't a good thing. Well, you end up leaving, but you're having conversations with not just Junior Johnson. Yep. You're talking to Richard Petty, who's going to retire to end in the 92 season.

Yep. To be fair, I feel like that the Junior Johnson opportunity sounds like the better one, but how tempted were you to go drive for the king in the number? I don't know, they changed it to 44 because I think it was Rick Wilson ended up getting in that car, I think, first. I believe that's right. Yep. So anyways, how tempted and how close did you come to getting in that? Very, very close.

You know, I didn't realize it. I'd heard a lot of, you know, through the grapevine that McDonald's was, Pettys was talking to McDonald's, and then never really heard Junior was talking to McDonald's, but I heard Petties' name was big time. And I was talking to Richard. We never talked about sponsorship or anything like that. You know, who was coming on, who wasn't. And at that time, I don't really think he knew.

But, you know, Junior had sent Barney Hall down to talk to me at a racetrack and see if I'd be interested in driving for him if he could acquire a sponsor. And so I said, sure, you know. You know, and so Junior sent word, let's, you know, flying out Monday morning to go talk to the sponsor. Well, I didn't have no idea who the sponsor was. So, Junior has the 11 Budweiser car.

Yep, and the 22. And the 22, so you're going to be the third. No. What happened? 22 was going away. The bill Davis. Yes. Am I right?

Yep. Yeah. And so now the 27. The 22 is just going to absolve in the 27. The 27 is going to absolve in the 27. going to be the news number two. How did you make the call? How did you make that decision?

Well, we went to, we flew to Chicago. Like I said, I never even knew where we was going to. I just knew he was going to talk to a sponsor. You and Junior. Me and Jr., and we flew his plane. What was it like hanging out with Junior Johnson? I've never spent more than five minutes with that, man. I can't imagine flying an airplane with him going somewhere.

I mean, I don't have a million questions. we got along great as far as I can't say anything. I'd be asking him all kinds of questions about, you know, the old days running moonshine. Yeah. We talked about a lot of that. I bet. He could go on and on with stories. Yeah, he had a lot of good stories.

He'd go on and on stories, but he ain't going to tell you where you're going. That's right. Well, he probably would have an ask, and I just felt like I was getting ready to find out. No, I really didn't ask. I trusted him and I knew it was, you know, I felt like I was in good hands. And, you know, when we got there, obviously, you know, once I seen when we was going, I knew, hey, you know, didn't know this was a possibility because I'd heard petties. It's funny to me, you're talking about the petties.

We're talking to McDonald's and junior takes you to McDonald's. Back in 81, Junior Johnson tells Richard Childers, it's. time for him to get out of the car and there's drivers that could drive for him and bring sponsors one one in his mind was dad with the wrangler deal his dad's leaving um jadie jr jonson this this guy hanging out in the hills in wilkes county moonshiner wearing his overalls every day knows more about the industry and the the massive moves of corporate America within the NASCAR system than anybody. How did he know to not only orchestrate his own deals but others?

He was, you know, it was so interesting to me. Like you talk about a guy I would walk up to you. Some guy, some PR marketing guy comes up and says, hey, man, I got a Heinz deal for Rod Austerland. Like, how amazing is it that back in the day, people were walking in the door going, I got a sponsor deal. Anybody interested in that shit? God, I might of that'd be nice. But damn, Junior knew it all.

He did. He was worse than the spotters in the spotter stand in terms of the gossip ring. I think Junior had a lot of inside stuff. I mean, obviously. He did. You know, Ralph Seagraves, you know, T. Wayne Robertson. Yeah. I mean.

I bet he was. Yeah, they were all. Those people knew what was going on. They knew. It's fascinating. They knew what was coming. and how they knew, I don't know. But, you know, it's like people would go to them,

hey, the thing might enter in the sport, what do you think? And, you know, and in it, oh, yeah. Junior's like, well, I don't have room for you. Let me send you over here to this team. That's right. I'm going to help this guy out. He needs some. He needs this.

It'll be good for him. But, I mean, the sport at that time was just huge. It was just, it was huge. So fortunate to be able to be in it at that time. Yeah. I mean, it was just, stuff he's seen now, it's definitely changed. So you went and met the CEO of McDonald's, which is probably pretty crazy,

thinking sitting there in his office going, how in the hell do I get here? You got Junior Johnson with you. Y'all agree to a deal. And this is, I mean, you know, this got to feel pretty fantastic. You've already had a pretty incredible introduction to, to NASCAR at the top level with Rod Osterlin and Bobby Allison, and now you're driving for one of the most famous, successful racing owners in the business. You got the number, you're kind of the B car.

Is it the B car? Do you feel like a B car back then? I mean, the B car is the bud car. That damn car is pretty iconic. Yep. No, I really didn't. I really didn't going into it. Who's helping you?

Who's your crew chief? Well, when I agreed to go there, it was going to be Mike Bean. Okay. And, you know, I felt like that was one. One of my reasons for going there, I felt like Mike Beam and myself, you know, with his background, you know, we were both country folk and type thing. I felt like a personality was with mesh. I talked to him a lot, you know, in previous years leading up to it. Not about driving as far as that, but just help him.

You knew him well. Yeah. And I just felt like he was, you know, he was going to be a good place to go with him. What happened? We get there. We get all the deal done, the sponsorship done, and then in the... You got a contract signed? Yep, everything's done.

Do you want to share what you were getting paid? Grineford, Jr. in 1993? It wasn't a lot. It was probably, I say not a lot. It was probably $300,000. It's not too bad. Yeah, I mean, it's not bad, but not compared to what happened years later, but not for me, but for other people. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

But, you know, during the winter, you know, Tim Brewer ended up leaving the 11 car. Junior moved Mike Beam over to the 11 car with Bill, and he promoted Mike Hill. and on the McDonald's car and he and I would just you know we were totally opposite you know it just

you know we couldn't kind of reminded me of the days you know in Australon you know if if if I wanted a longer upper a frame

on the right front he wanted shorter if I wanted you know such and such, you know, softer spring, he wanted a stiffer one. You know, we were just budded heads and it just, and I knew, you know, we finished fourth at Daytona 500 in 93 and, you know, we come back home or come back to the motel and Pam and I get in the elevator and we're going up to the room and Pam says, you know, golly, why ain't you

happy? You just finished fourth in the Daytona 500. And I said, it's going to be a long year, you know, and I knew, I just knew that, you know, our personal. wasn't going to jive and the way it turned out they didn't. Yeah. It was just the whole thing was a flop. You made a decision for 94 to go drive for Travis Carter, the number 23 camel cigarettes car. You and Jimmy Spencer would swap rides.

Jimmy would come out of that car and go to the 27. But before we get there, in 93, Davies killed. You're one of your best friends. Yep. first of all I guess you know how did you how did you handle that situation how did that affect your focus and your your your opinion or your position on your future racing well back up a little bit in 93 obviously I lost my racetrack best friend

I lost my personal best friend in Kalira, got him Mike Crawford. And I lost, there was about two or three of my really close friends that got killed during that, you know, a month or two right there that I'm like, man, the whole world's closing in. What's what's going on? Yeah. But there's no doubt, you know, the Davies thing was hit us pretty hard, you know, just trying to stay focused. and, you know, Dave and I, you know, fly the racetrack together. I'd fly with him, you know, for the most part, most of the time. Did a lot of stuff together.

And, you know, that one hit home, especially, you know, for Pam, too, because, you know, it was obviously our cousin, and I grew up together. But, you know, it was a pretty tough deal. Yeah. Did I see a note of this? Were you potentially supposed to be in that? helicopter? Yes, what had happened.

During the 93 season at Loudoun, Davy and I had talked on Saturday. He said, hey, he said, Neil Bonnet's son, David is going to be testing at Talladega Monday. He said, if you want to, you know, come fly out. We'll take him helicopter and fly up to Talladega. So I said, okay. I said, that sounds like fun. We'll go up there and help David, you know. So, anyway, we, Saturday night at Loudoun, all of the McDonald's crew and myself went out to eat at a place,

and we all got food poisoning real bad. And at a place called Cheers up there. Anyway, we all did eat the same thing, and we'd spent all night throwing up and everything and come Sunday morning and myself and well the rest of the crew that went out to eat that night. you know, was all in the infirmary the next morning at the racetrack, getting, you know, fluids and stuff. Ended up running about 20 laps in the race, and I had to get out of the car. It was just, I had nothing in me, couldn't hold my head up. And so anyway, they carried me back, put me in a hospital, local hospital,

to get all IVs and all IV'd up. And so Davey ended up running a race, and he flew on back. And I was going to end up having to take a commercial. flight back Monday morning when I got out of the hospital. And so when I landed in Birmingham, I'd actually done forgot about. I'd agreed with Davey going with him. And when I got back in Birmingham, I'd seen walking down the airport and I seen seen on TV where, you know, Dave Allison had a helicopter crash and it wasn't good, you know, looks really bad. And so, so anyway, then got home and we got Pam.

when we come back to hospital, and of course, you know, David did pass away. But, you know, it was just, it was a very bad deal. Yeah. Did you know Red was in the helicopter with him? I didn't until I got the hospital. Yeah. I sure didn't. I hadn't even dreamed anybody else was even going to be in there, you know, as far as

because I was, that was, I was supposed to be there. You know, I had agreed with him. We was going to, you know, I was going to fly back with him after Loudoun race, and then we was going to get up and fly the helicopter. Monday morning and fly over and help David. But do you look back on, do you know, do you look back on that next year, say, you know, you had all these tragic things that happened that affected you?

And do you look back on that last year and second guess some of the choices you made? Do you feel like that so, you know, you're a decision. to change cars, right, to leave Junior Johnson and go drive for Travis Carter. I guess what I'm trying to say is, you know, when I think back to 2001, when Dad passed away, man, I was in a fog for a year and I'm, I would, I should, I shouldn't have been handed any responsibility. Absolutely. To make a decision on anything, right?

Because I was not going to make the best decision. Yeah. Right. So do you kind of look back. and go, man, I wonder what if I'd have tried to stay with junior, or maybe I would have been better off to have done, you know, because I imagine you were probably in a bit of a fog. Without a doubt, you're right. Especially when you look back on it, you don't realize a lot, you know, when you're in the

middle of the fire, like you do, you know, a year later or two years later, or three years later, you know, just, man, I shouldn't have been out there doing that. And, you know, it does, it had to affect the performance. There's no doubt. You know, when you have that kind of tragic stuff happen, that close to home, you know, you got to think, you know, am I doing the right thing here? Yeah. You know, Clifford died, what is it, a couple months later? Or a year later.

A year later. Yep. That's right. A year later. I mean, Allison's got hit with so many things. Sure did. The family dynamic had to be shaking, you know, just to the core. Yeah.

And so, yeah, like, it, I can't even imagine the amount of grief that was going on within the family. It was that. I mean, they were, the family was definitely feeling the grief without a doubt. It was pretty, pretty phenomenal, how much it was. You end up swapping rides with Jimmy Spencer, you go drive for Travis Carter. Travis Carter, I never really ever spent any time around that guy. I saw him at the racetrack a lot, heard him speak, do interviews, massively respect him because of his history and the sport going all the way back to, you know, working on that de-wit car with Benny Parsons and all of those years in the 70s. Another guy that must have been so fun to be around.

But I don't know. You tell me, did you have fun working with Travis? And does it, you know, had a blast working with Travis. You know, Travis had a different personality, but Travis wanted to win. You know, he wanted to, you know, he would do whatever it took to win, you know, run good. But, you know, a lot of people didn't know this. And I'll probably expose some things that, but for the most, most part, you know, basically Travis was listed as the owner, but it was still a

junior Johnson car. Really? Yeah. It was, it was, it was, they had taken a lot of the McDonald's cars and moved them to Travis. Is that why that was so easy for y'all to swap drivers? Yeah, yeah. Okay. There's a connection there already.

Yep. Yeah, it wasn't. Junior had pretty much said what had happened was, you know, McDonald's wanted to see some results. And, you know, I got it. I understood. Yeah. Go to it. And, you know, and said, you know, what do you think about here?

And I said, man, you know, of course, like I said, I already knew all the sponsors, you know, as far as on the R.J. Reynolds folks. Yeah, right. Good people. You know, man, it wasn't going to get any better than that. And, but we spent, you know, the whole. whole time we took like said a bunch of the bunch of the you know the 27 cars moved in to the 23 team and then you know the stuff that a lot of it was outdated and you know it was the stuff it was it was it was and you know our first new car was indy uh that year and we got a new hopkins car

and um you know we ended up i don't remember where we finished the indy but it was qualified I had to make the race that was the largest field ever. That was the first indie. First India. That's correct. You know, it was huge. And we basically, like I said, we took, for the most part, it was a 27 team that just got moved over in that deal. You race there for one year, right?

And then Jimmy comes back. Junior gets enough of Jimmy in 12 months. Yep. And he's like, where can I send this? Shipping him over. The satellite team. sends him right back to where he came from. So you're rideless for 95?

Mm-hmm. Well, you do. I'm beating the bushes, obviously. Still hadn't given up yet. I went to... I was somewhere running to Richard Broome, who was a crew chief for Quaker State team, Kenny Bernstein's team,

and told Richard, hey, if I can help you guys in any way, just let me know. you know and he said well i might need you to drive another car here because we you know we're going to make a race driver out of steve kinser and i said i said yes sir you know let me know if i can do anything yeah so uh Kenny bernstein hired me to uh right from the start to my job wasn't i wasn't ever going to be in a driver of the you know he's not hiring me to be a driver of the 26 quaker quaker state team he was hiring me to help steve kinser make steve kinser a cup driver the best we could do. And so basically I'd go with them to test. I'd get in one car. He'd

get another. We'd start off with eight new tires and he'd let him run, you know, eight or ten laps. And then I'd go run eight or ten laps. And then we'd get out there together with follow each other. I'd follow him. He'd follow me. I'd be on a radio talking to him the whole time, you know, you know, ease in the throttle off the corner. A car ain't going to take it. You know, it ain't going to take that kind of throttle down. I said, I said, I said, follow me. Let me show you something, you know.

And so, you know, he let me buy, I'd pass him and, you know, look up in another lap, and I'd be a half straightaway ahead of him, you know. And okay, let's come in, let's swap cars. And so we'd swap cars, and we'd go back out there and do the same thing. And another, run another eight or ten laps, and I'd be half straightaway ahead of him, you know, and I'd keep telling, you know, just, you know, I'd follow him and, you know, just, it tried to try to make, you know, it was tough, it was a tough transition for him. So Steve is one of the greatest wing outlawed drivers to have ever done it.

You know, everybody, everybody knows that. I think he was coming into a tough deal. Yep. With Kenny's team. But what was the one thing, I think, you know, what was the one thing? I think that, you know, what was the one thing that you would say was the biggest challenge for him that probably he never kind of got a grasp or got a hold of? I think, I think the biggest thing was he was used to the wing.

You know, I'd say like, you know, what do you do in a sprint car like going, you know, going in the corner? Oh, I just tip it back on the wing and I keep, you know, going in there, you know, you can't do that here. You know, we don't have wings. It was just a lot of different things. They would, the finesse wasn't there. You know, it's just, I guess, I guess that type of race and you didn't. A cup car, you run off the right front back, back then.

You know, most, most cars in NASCAR around that time, probably, you know, if you over drove it, you're going to burn the right front off the middle corner. Whereas today, these days, they turn a lot better than they did. But I bet his, the way he drove a race car, car was all the right rear. Yep. You know? Yep.

And the front tires were hardly on the ground. Yep. And so imagine it's a bigger transition even than it is today. No doubt. For like a Kyle Arson or somebody to come drive a stock cart. Whereas I was hoping that that was going to work for Kinzer because I thought having such a massive name, even though that NASCAR was a big deal. And he was moving out of the wing outlaws to come to us. I thought, man, if he could make it, that would, what a crazy.

pipeline that might create. Yep. So, but what ends up happening there? We run, we go run five or six more races maybe with Steve. Gets into races, just struggles, you know, wrecks, get some wrecks, and just couldn't seem to make the adjustment. How did he handle that? He was getting down on himself.

Yeah, he had told me, he said, HUD, I don't know why I'm even out here doing this. You know, we was at Jefferson, Georgia, one time, testing down there for two or three days. And he said, I don't even know why I'm doing this. You know, I was making, you know, making really good money doing what I was doing. I don't know why I wanted to go do this, you know.

And I can go back and do that, you know, if this doesn't work out. And I said, well, you know, that's good you got that. Yeah. But I understood. But he was definitely going down the average. knew that I don't think he wanted to go down it, but it just, he had already developed so many habits from what he was doing.

It just couldn't, you know. Did he, did he leave? Did he finally say, I've had enough? I think so. I think, I think, I think him, he and Kenny had got together and, you know, said, look, I mean, you know, we've tried everything. Yeah. You know.

You would get in the car. and finished the season and they closed the shop at the end of the year. So, I mean, you know, that was pretty interesting that, you know, maybe Kenny was sitting there going, hell, I might go on out of the door with you. It sounds like, Steve Kinzer. They both said. We walk out. He's like, I'm kind of jealous.

Yeah. I'm kind of jealous. I'm going to go with you. But so you finished the season with them. Yeah. Yeah. How'd that go? Well, we sat on the poll at Rockingham.

We had some really good runs. that car. You know, top, I want to say top fives. Like I said, we had my one and only career poll. Yeah. And we, it was, I thought, man, you know, this thing is better than what I thought. Yeah. And Kenny made it come one Tuesday or something on the act we had run rocking out.

I think, well, there might have been right before that. Right near the end of the year. Yeah. And said, got all guys together and said, hey, guys, hate to be the bearer bad news, but at the end of the season, we're going to shut the team down and, you know, going to sell everything. I'm going to focus on my top fuel championship and try to win one more championship. I'm like, holy crap, man.

I mean, the best team I'd had, you know, since Bobby's, really. And, man, this thing had a lot of promise. And was the deal with Quaker State going away? Was he? I don't know really if that was the issue. I think he was more, it was a more deal for Kenny. He just wanted to focus on what, on his top field stuff. That was what his excuse was to.

Did you hear the story about when he got behind a wheel of one of them cars early when that team started? They were somewhere, Atlanta, I think, and it was when they had the Buickla Sabre bodies. I guess maybe Morgan, Joe Rutman. I don't know if it was Rudd or not. Somebody was driving the car back then, and they let Kenny get in one, and he bounced it off the fence, the first lap or something like that, and never drove one again. But there's pictures on social media with the damn thing, firewall beat.

You jump into the Stavola Brothers ride in 1996, and this is a good moment for you because you have one of the best run of your career at Darlington lead tons of laps, fast car run second to Jeff Gordon, should have won the race. Brand new race car is, you know, that's got to feel pretty incredible. Finally start to run, you know, up towards the front with more regularity.

Yep. Yeah, the team was starting to jail. There again, it was a lot like, It was a lot like Junior's team, you know, or Travis's team when we went there with the Smoking Joe's thing. We'd inherited a lot of stuff, you know, older cars and what have you. And we were just now starting to, you know, get some new cars done. Who was the Stavola Brothers cars coming from? I think Loughlin.

Yeah. I think for the most part. But you were having, you were driving some old stuff at the get-go? Yep. Yeah. So they're older cars. Yep. And we had come time to do.

for Darlington, that was our first Ronnie Hopkins car. Yeah. And we had had some experience with Ronnie's cars at Bobby's. Because we had, us and Rusty Wallace, it kind of helped the old man Hopkins come up with a whole spindle combination and, you know, Roll Center combination that he had on those cars in the 90s, early 90s. But anyway, we went to Darlington.

a brain new car, I'm rolling down pit road and can't explain it to this day what happened. Rolling down pit road, getting ready to go out and practice. I'm like, took the steering one on it. Wow. Man, it's like, wow. You know, I'm like going like 30 miles per hour or something down the pit road.

You like what you feel. I keyed the radio button. I said, my crew chief, Philippe Lopez. I said, Philippe, you ain't going to believe this. I said, this car is going to be really good. Well, how do you know? You said, how do you know, you can tell? I said, I don't know how I can tell it, but I said, I can tell you it's got a feel like no other.

You know, it just, it had grip. I mean, just that I'd never felt in a cup car. And from, I mean, we got on a racetrack with it, and it showed. I mean, it was just, it was fast right out of the gate. You know, we end up qualifying, I think, 10th or something, which was hoping for better. probably wasn't the best qualifier either. But we, you know, come race time with that car, made very little changes in it. And, man, that thing just, it was unbelievable.

Yeah. And run all, you know, just all day. It was like that. Well, at 143 laps, it's the toughest racetrack on the circuit. Yep. I bet you, you know, you're probably disappointed not to win the race. But still, to have been that competitive and, you know, you drove. passed, I watched that race just a couple

months ago, you drove past dad and you know, passed all the big dogs multiple times throughout today. Yep. But the next week y'all take that car to Pocono and it crashed in qualifying. Yep. And you never, you talk about the feel in the steering wheel. Yep.

You never had that again. No. No matter how hard y'all tried, you couldn't recreate the magic in the car. No. Y'all struggled in 97. 98 is their last year. Mm-hmm. Stavola Brothers closed shop in 98 because we bought the number.

Yep. For a hundred grand, I believe, is what Daddy paid for the number eight. Wow. Maybe it was way less than that. I don't know. But some money was spent to get that number from them. The Stavola brothers, after qualifying, after failing to qualify for the first, for five of the first 11 races in 98, the Stavola brothers turned you loose.

You drove a little bit for Jackson. Fasper Motorsports, Andy Petrie, filling in for David Green, Robert Presley. What made you want to retire finally? I reached a point with probably burnout was probably the worst thing. You know, I was tired of struggling. I had been doing it for quite some time and just I was just ready to try and do something different. Yeah. It was time.

I know Pam, when I come home from, you know, my last Bristol race. So your last – so wait a minute. Do you remember the last cup race you ran? Bristol, 2002. You came home from that? And what would – I come home. Had you made a decision that day?

For the most part. Yeah. I come home and I said I've reached a point and I feel like I'm done. You know, I want to do something different. Was it emotional? Was you fine with it? I was good with it. I was just tired of struggling.

I'd, you know, just done, exhausted everything I could do to live out the dream. And it just, I just felt like it was, you know, I'd been in it long enough that, you know, it wasn't going to be any good for the rest of the time. So I need to try and do something different. Did you know what you're going to do? Well, the only thing I knew to do at that time, you know, was taking me back to the old junkyard. You know, I had to, I knew the salvage business. I had an opportunity to buy some land over in Cleveland by my in-laws and 37 acres.

And I decided I'm going to build an upscale automobile salvage yard. In Cleveland, North Carolina. In Cleveland, North Carolina. Is that what you did? And in 2002, I started. I started trying to get all my permitting and all that stuff. And in 2000, it took me almost two years to get it all built. In 2004, I started it and kept it going until 2014.

And had a gentleman come in wanting to know if it was for sale. And I turned around and asked Pam, I said, you know, our goal was to look at it for 10 years. And if we'd make any money, you know, after 10 years, you know, after 10 years, and we'd keep it if not. I was going to do something different. And so I turned around and looked at her and I said, are we making any money? And she went, yeah, it's for sale.

Yeah. So I made him a price and two months later he'd come back and broke me a check and so thankful to get out of that thing. No shit. I hear you. Then you went to stock car steel. How'd that happen? Well, went to, had another friend of mine

that had a, it was building wooden boats at the time. repaired wooden boats, a place called cruising classics over in Morpherful. Really a neat place. I kind of was always intrigued a little bit with boats and stuff like that. So anyway, I got into doing that for about a year. Were you just fabricating and working in the shop? I was working on boats, helping repair. We built some new ones just from scratch.

I mean, they are just immaculate. I need to show you that place sometime. I was talking to Greg Fernelli after about a year or so, and he had said, well, you know, if you, I got a job, I think you might like to have. And so I went and talked to him about possibly running SRI performance, the use part, use parts, because I'd come from that, basically, in my salvage yard. So I was basically, I felt like a shoe in for that. And so we sat there and talked, and he said,

said, you know, there's no doubt you wouldn't be good here at SRI, but he said, I really need somebody to be a warehouse manager at Stock Car Steel. He said, you ever thought about, you know, working there? And I said, I said, no. I said, he said, well, you know Steele and Loonum? Yeah, I know it all, but still is a lot. I don't know. Anyway, make a long story short, we ended up.

I said, let me think about it for two weeks. So two weeks come and went and called him up and said, send you guy over here or you or somebody and show me what I'll be doing. So we kind of walked it out and I agree to take it. Was that kind of nice to be doing something that was connected to the sport in a way? It was. Yeah, it really was. I enjoyed it.

Great place to work. Great people. It wasn't great when I got there. He gave me free range to basically do what I want to do as far as run it, you know, get the people in there. I wanted to get in there and things like that. And we went through our share of people. A lot of people coming and going.

But, you know, once we got good people, they stepped up to plate and paid them good. And it became a fabulous place to work. And the place was, you know, really got to rocking and rolling good. And it just become, it was really kind of neat. You know, I've seen a lot of the racers. You know, I got to come over here to your place a lot and bring material and, you know, get to talk.

some of my friends, you know, as well as other racing people, and it was just, you know, it was a great job. When you got out of the race car after Bristol, did you ever consider driving anything? I don't care if it was at a local racetrack or what. Did you ever have the itch to maybe get in anything competitively again? Yeah, I mean, you know, Taylor, my son was racing. He was short track racing and stuff,

and I would go with him. You know, he would, you know, say, Dad, you know, need you to get my car and try it out, you know. Of course, he never would let me get in it when it was good. It was always when it was bad. Yeah, fix it. It's not hailing right. So, anyway, you know, a few times I got in it, and it was like, man, this thing, we need help, you know.

And so, in a few times, you know, we'd take it back and cut the clip off of it and put another clip on it and go again. And I think, you know, things like that with my experience helped that. and but no to go back you don't do anything else in the sport you know i just really really didn't have any itch to do and not not to drive again that's interesting um you got diagnosed with a rare blood clot disorder at 46 yep what's that um i had i had um uh got to um um got to a a point where I couldn't walk from here to the here that wall without being out of breath. And anyway, I'd went and, you know, done stress tests, different things like that.

And doctors tried all sorts of stuff, you know, nothing was helping. And finally, one day I got up and walked from me to you to a bathroom at my shop. and I come back and sat down. I'm out of literally, I couldn't really breathe. So I told Pam, I said, you got to take me to the doctor, you know. So I went up, turn my computer off, and she said, oh, leave your computer on. We're going to be right back. I said, I'm not.

And I really, I didn't know what was up, but I knew something was pretty bad. And so sure enough, she carried me to a regular doctor, and he sent me right straight to the hospital. And I got diagnosed with a rare blood clotting disorder. It's a long name, about three names long. I'm not going to say it, but anyway, it very rare in men, very common in women who miscarriage. Don't know where it comes from, but anyway, I was basically had to live on blood thinner the rest of my life. This is something that developed late in your life? Yeah, sure did.

Was there anything going on during your racing career that you didn't know about? Didn't know about it if it was. Yeah, and so didn't know anything. And from what I can gather on this disease, it's what happens a lot of times. And I don't even know where it comes from. It's not heredity. It's not something to catch.

So you're on thinners. It's a pill every day? Yep. And do you ever forget to take it? Yeah. Yeah. Try not to. Right.

But yeah. You know, and I've learned, I've been on it now so long, I learn how to eat and, you know, drink with it and all that stuff. You know, you've got to watch because if you have any alcohol, it'll make your blood too thin. Right. And a certain vegetable, just high in vitamin K, it'll make it too thick and things like that. You learn how to do, how to process.

Yep. Did that have any effect on your inability to drive any race cars? Yes, it did, really as far as later on, you know, anytime like Pam would go berserk when I'd get in Taylor's car. Yeah, yeah. Because that was dangerous because of this condition? Yes. there was really their fear obviously was to have any kind of head injury or anything like that you could bleed internally wouldn't even know it because of the thinners that's correct right

I got you okay I've learned though with it you know my blood's thinner than most people who's who don't take it but my blood also clots better you know clot you know so it's almost like a one counterbalances the other so you know but there's never if i ever want to go back and run a NASCAR race of any kind there's no doctor that would sign off on it and say it's okay for you to drive yeah basically you can't do it yeah although i really i really feel like you know because i've i've cut myself you know working on race cars cut them you know cut them you know working around steel right that's right yeah you know i did it cut it a lot and it's and it's always stopped and it's So, you know, but it's just, it's just my number is thinner, but there again, like I said,

there's no doctor that would ever sign off on it says, okay, to go drive a race car again. So that shit right there would drive me crazy. Like, if I wanted to stop driving race cars because I was burnt out because I was just, I was good, I had enough, yeah, fine. But if somebody came to me and said, you can't drive anymore because of this condition, then I'd be more frustrated that that was not my choice. That would make me want to drive. Right, even though I probably don't want to drive.

Right. You know what I mean? Yep. Don't tell me I can't do it. I want to do it. Yeah. And, and, and, uh, but you handled it really well. Like you're good.

No itch. No. I mean, you know, there is times, uh, you know, I would like to do it occasionally, you know, just a pedal. Just a pedal. Yeah. You know, but, um, but I'm okay. I'm okay with, you know, I had a good, I had a good career.

You know, I, you know, when you look back on it, you know, I was one of 43 people that got to do it for, you know, almost 15 years. That is a great thing. I used to say, I want to honor that by saying this. People would tell me, you know, you're going to grow up and be a race car driver like your daddy. And I'm like, do you know that out of everybody in this country, there's only 43 guys that get to do it on Sunday?

That's the odds, even of all the, you know, the brakes and doors open to me. That's right. The odds aren't good for anybody. And you're right. You're one of the ones that got to get there, and you were there for a really long time. Yep. Well, I guess that's a great segue to something that we want to share with you today. Okay.

We have the Darlington race coming up here in a very short period of time, and it's on Mother's Day. And we wanted to honor you in your career. We have a really unique connection because I would take over the number eight car. after you and the Stavola brothers would end up dissolving that team. And we wanted to honor you anyways for your career. You have, you know, you have meant a lot to the sport. You've left an impact on a lot of people's lives. Appreciate that.

And just wanted to share with you how we plan to honor that career here in Darlington in a few weeks. This is a good-looking race car. Holy crap man wow man that's awesome right there that is cool right there so man that is awesome and it is our privilege hut to be able to take those

colors out to the racetrack I know that you know we're very fortunate to have some solid drivers here at junior motor sports Josh Barry's going to be driving the car got the correct number on there and old circuit city low circuit city colors

and Josh will try do a great job for you, going to one of your racetracks where you had one of your, you know, best career runs. Yep. I appreciate that. That's awesome, man. It really is. You know, it's pretty cool.

Yeah. I love the throwback weekend because it gives us all an opportunity to celebrate the history of the sport and the people that were part of it. And you're a fixture in the series for many, many, many years. And, you know, and we, there's a lot of people still talk about you today. Really? in and around the conversations in the sport. And I'm not sure if we're the first ones to do a Hutt Strickland throwback or not.

Has there ever been one? Do you know of? I don't know of one. Well, what an honor it is for us. Well, I appreciate that. I really do. That's awesome, man. I tell you, that's really cool. Would you sign that for us?

I'd love to. Yeah. We do a little work with our foundation. So if you could, yeah, if you could do that for us, we'd appreciate it. Man, this is awesome. Yeah, buddy. You know, how this process kind of works is, is we come up with maybe one or two ideas

that we'll send to our partners like tire pros. And this was our, this was our A choice, our first choice, and luckily for tire pros, and they selected the one that we like the most. And so we got to thank tire pros for understanding the importance and the impact of the throwback weekend at Arlington and being able to take a race car out to the racetrack that fans are going to recognize. And that's going to give everyone an opportunity not only at the racetrack,

but during the network broadcast to celebrate you celebrate you and all the other drivers with their paint schemes out there. We're lucky that we got the right number. And so it's all come together, man. I really appreciate that. I really do. We're really happy to do it.

It's an honor of ours, and we're so thankful to have you even come here and talk to us. My pleasure. Glad we got you before you got your feet in the sand. You're not going to get him back after that. I'll be back. I'll be back. Yep.

Yeah, for sure. I'll be back. I got kids and one grandkid and one grandson and I got another granddaughter on the way. So be coming back to see her. Yeah. Well, I know you deal with the blood clot disorder and you've got that under control. But like I said, when you walked in the room, you look damn good. Thank you, man. For 62, 61 years old, you're taking damn good care of yourself. I had a good cook through the years. Did you? People are going to be so excited to hear from you.

I know you probably've done a few interviews throughout the last several years in the sport and industry. Not a lot. Well, everyone that hears this is going to be thrilled to know how you doing. Great to hear all these great stories. Thanks for sharing with us. Yes, sir. And we can't wait to go to Darlington and celebrate you. Yeah, I'm with you.

I can't wait to see how that car runs. I'm sure it's going to run good. Josh has got some good finishes there. I'm sure he'll try to – he'll probably put the right side on the wall a few times. Maybe we'll send you. If he ain't, he can do his job. Maybe we'll send you the door. All right side door.

I'll hang it up in my house. I'll get some garlic and stripes on it. I got a man cave in the bottom of my house, so that'll go good there. Then you'll get it. No problem. I appreciate it. Yes, sir. All right, buddy.

Thank you, Hut. Hutt Strickland on the Dale Jr. Download. 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 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.