The Dale Jr. Download - 480 - Pump The Brakes on Stage Breaks

Episode Date: August 22, 2023

Dale Earnhardt Jr. is back to start another week of the Dale Jr. Download with his co-host Mike Davis. This episode is a little out of the ordinary, as it involves a field trip. All the while, the guys had plenty to discuss: Denny Hamlin’s ongoing contract negotiations NASCAR NextGen’s road course problems Sam Mayer’s last lap bump to Ty Gibbs Dale Jr. getting behind the wheel at an IMSA test at Martinsville 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.

It smells like a fart in here. Does it? Don't it? All right, well. Did somebody, too? What do you think? I am weird. You are weird.

What? Mr. Dallan Hart, Jr. Bye. That family techniques, I've got it gives you more than just a great of salad. That's the voice of my co-host and one of my best friends in the whole wide world. Mike Davis. We're screwed. What was that mean?

No, we're not standing in that box together in our underwear. Aren't you kidding me, Mike? Oh, my God, that is hilarious. Hey, everybody, it's Dale Jr. back again for another episode of the Dale Jr. download, and it's Tuesday, August the 22nd, here in the Bojangles studio with my co-host, Mike Davis. How you doing, Mike? Doing well. How are you? Doing great.

I want to thank Ally for, yeah, I want to thank Ally for sponsoring this episode for us. Again, another week where we won't have a guest segment. It'll be another episode of Becoming Earnhardt coming out tomorrow. That's right. Episode 7. Yeah, and we're coming to the close. I don't think we've got one or two left. We're getting there.

Yeah, we are. I'm getting a little excited about that. Yeah, it's been a fun series. And I really like this episode 7, so people have a lot to look forward to tomorrow. Also, I want to make sure that we also thank our other good partners, Lionel. Ally and Lionel both making this possible. Yeah, so thank you for, you know, ally and everything they do for us. us.

They've been incredible for this sport and a big, big partner for the success of Dirty Moe Media this year and beyond. So thank you, Ally. And yes, yeah, it's, you know, Lionel's been an incredible supporter of us over the, over this year for sure. We got more die cast now than we know what to do with on this table. That's true. But that's not a bad problem to have.

Yeah, I think it's time changing up, man. Hey, listen, we look at the producers. They can, they can shake up the lineup here anytime of the starting grid. Yeah, I think it would be cool is if Lionel chose which diecasts were on here. Yeah. I like, I like them. But I think it would be cool if they were like, hey, man, here's our summer lineup. Almost like how you do Glory Road at different people's opinions on what cars go where.

We should let Lionel just like have a, they could have this whole stretch right here to put their sort of latest and greatest. I'm down with that. You know what I mean? That'd be fun. Anyhow, that'd be fun. But let's get to it, man. Let's get to some dirty air. Do you have a good weekend?

Well, I did. I had a really good weekend. Good. One of the things that I thought was funny that happened this weekend was the tweet that y'all put out. Oh, God, I'm sorry. Well, no, it's funny. So let's first off say that we're excited about something we're getting ready to do in Las Vegas. There is a, we're going to basically take our show live, which we've done before.

but this is more of a showcase of dirty moe media because we're going to have doorbumber clear there I'm going to be there it's on Friday October 13th at Westgate Las Vegas Resorts and casino and it's live it's going to be a lot of how many people can actually come to this about 1,400 people oh man it's going to be a big audience biggest one we've ever done in front of yeah well if you're I don't know if you're around or going to be in Vegas around October 13th or if you come into the race that weekend you can purchase tickets and learn more at www. westgateexperience.com slash events

slash dirty dash moe dash media dash live. That's a lot. It's a mouthful. Yeah. But we'll be promoting it and have been promoting it on our dirty moe media social handles. There's links there to be able to get to what you want

if you want to come and see us. But I say all of this because during this weekend, y'all promoted it by putting out a tweet. We did. And the first line in the tweet was... Spend the night with you. Spend the night with Dale Jr. Yeah, that's what the tweet said.

Right. I'm shaking, I'm sorry. There's nothing we can do to make that. I'm sorry. And I saw the responses as well. When you sent me the text, I went and looked at it and I'm like, I got nothing on this one.

I'm just going to have to apologize profusely because that could have been worded way better. Spend the night. You had a funny line in the text. It was like, I mean, maybe 20 years ago. Maybe 20 years ago that could be part of the promotion. Well, I had a lot of fun with that, and so did other people.

They were like, does Amy know about this? Right. So anyways, we cleaned it up, got a better tweet put out later today. We did. But that was pretty funny. But a lot of other things happened this past weekend. Well, time out real quick. I was going to tell you, I'm also trying to get Denny to come to that show with us.

Really? Yeah. Speaking of Denny. I think that would be awesome. he'd come because he is part of the Dirty Mo Media family. I'd love for us to, you know, when we go do these live shows, and it's, I love it to be more of a showcase of Dirty Moe Media, not just me, not just Dill Junior Download. So that's something to be cool.

I've talked to him over the weekend. He has a lot going on that weekend, so I'm sure he's going to, you know, it'll be helpful. Dude, I'm sure he does. I mean, he's got that contract thing going on. Right. But anyways, we talked about that. A lot of other people in the industry are talking about it as well. Denny finally, you know, I think Denny had spoken about this.

I'm not going to say he finally cleared it up because I think he mentioned this before and I didn't catch it. But he says that the reason why this is taken so long isn't, you know, a disagreement on payment or is it, you know, a lack of sincerity on his part or Joe Gibbs Racing's part. He thinks that that is all short up and ready to go. The holdup for his contract is agreeing to all of. the terms and how it affects 2311 racing in Toyota's relationship. You would think that that might be separate, right? Like his job at Joe Gibbs in that contract would not have anything to do with Toyota 2311 in that relationship, but apparently it's all in the same bucket.

So that's pretty fascinating. It sounds very complex and complicated and challenging. But I think Denny will get what. he wants. I think he'll get somewhere where he's happy. But he's not going to sign anything that doesn't have all of the stipulations and assists, if you will, to 2311, right? And the relationship that they'll have with Toyota.

Toyota is bringing on another team next year. With Jimmy's team. Jimmy's team, yeah. So legacy is coming on to the Toyota. camp and that might not be all of the changes in manufacturers and so I'm sure like like we were talking about with Ford and and you know Brad is Lasky and his team sort of coming climbing up the ladder that at the same time will demand more of Ford in support right as that team becomes more competitive is front row motorsports starts becoming more competitive they

look at the manufacturer and say, hey, for us to get to the next level of competition, it depends on you, you know, and how much you can help us. And so there's a lot of pressure on the manufacturers to, you know, to support these teams. And as they improve in performance, they expect the manufacturers to take notice. So pretty compelling. Well, the part, the compelling part, Dale, is there even a fractures? of a possibility that if Denny can't get what he needs out of this for 2311, does 2311 go to another manufacturer?

No, no, it can't happen. What Denny is saying to us is everything is ready for him to sign in terms of him driving for Joe Gibbs and staying in the 11 car. But he, you know, some other responsibilities and some other, you know, some other things that are tying Toyota and 2311 together. need to be wrapped up as well for him to be comfortable signing. I'm tracking with that. That's right.

And so, you know, yeah, and so, yeah, he's just trying to get, he's trying to get his team in the best position he can. He's trying to make sure that Toyota's going to commit to what he thinks he needs to continue.

And you can't blame, it's a business man, it's tough, and it takes a lot of support. And so, but I think it gets done, no problem. I don't think anything changes. I don't think Denny goes anywhere.

I don't think 2311. changes. I think everything moves forward. But I do understand now why it's taking so long, and that would definitely drag things down. Some of our listeners might not know this, but our friends at Lionel Racing, the official die cast of NASCAR, have an entire line of

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If you're already a 164-scale diecast collector, or if you're thinking about starting a collection, you want to check out the latest NASCAR Authentics releases. What's great about Lionel is that in addition to offering the diecast of the most popular Cup Series drivers in their NASCAR Authentics line, they make sure that smaller race teams and up-and-coming drivers are represented as well. The best way to find out when the new NASCAR Authentics'Linexx team, The authentic cars are coming to your Walmart Target or Meyer store is to follow Lionel Racing on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.

You'll find out everything you need to know there, and be sure to also visit lionelauthentics.com. Start that collection now or add to the one you've already got. Going into Watkins Glen, man, William Byron wins, his fifth win of the season. He was fast in practice. Once he got the lead, nobody could run him down. Denny and those guys were just hanging around second half to three seconds back and Byron was just lights out.

We don't really know how Michael McDowell would have fared because he gotten some trouble on pit road, drove through too many boxes and this and that and the other. But he had some good, decent speed in his car. I think if he was able to keep the lead, I don't know if Byron could have gotten it from him. A very fast race, hour and 58 minutes,

shortest cup race in the modern era since 71, 72. Yeah, it flew by. 90 laps, there's a lot of laps, though. But we had no stage cautions. Right, which is nice. Those are 15 minutes apiece. That's right. We had one yellow for four laps, just like the week before at Indy won yellow for three laps.

Right. Indy was a pretty decent race. This race not going to win any awards. No, but there was. thankfully for this race there was enough other compelling storylines to kind of keep you interested i mean listen i'm not going to lie i'm watching a soccer game and trying to follow along at the same time because my my uh daughter was playing in in greensborough so i'm watching you guys also uh you know yelling at her and i'm kidding about that but it flew by it was so fast but the but the chase elliott situation

blew my mind yeah yeah i mean like like him running out of gas like how i know how that happens, but how does that happen with all that's on the line? I don't know. You know, I've, they talk about going to the switch, right? So basically, just let's just imagine it's a little, not quite exactly like this, but imagine you got a 22-gallon tank in your car and you got all this fuel, right? And so you're going to run, you know, you're going to run around town until it gets close to the E. And then you're going to pull in a gas station and fill it up, right?

but imagine if you had a little switch where it gets close to the E and you know you flip that switch and you can drive until it stumbles right or you you know you or you know it gets close to that E start stumbling you flip the switch and the switch is going to give you 15 miles guaranteed right you would probably always drive it to the switch right got to see how far you can run that then no you would just be like you know, I don't feel like going to a gas station. I don't feel like going to the gas station right now. It's close to E, but I'm going to let it sputter.

When it sputters, I'll take it. That's how we would do it, right? We'd all get there. So this is kind of what the cup guys have. They don't have a gas gauge, but they got a switch. So they'll run and it starts sputtering where your tank's empty. You flip the switch. Now there's this little small compartment in the bottom of the fuel cell

that's holding about a gallon of fuel. And that's now where you're drawing fuel from. When you flip the switch, you basically change the pickup line from the main pickup line that takes all the gas out of the tank to no individual pickup line in this very small reservoir that's going to give you enough gas to get back to the pits. That's all that's for. And as long as I've remembered using this switch,

it was good for a lap. It was absolutely going to get you back. to pit road but nothing more and as far as i know it has not really changed and so when they told him that he would have three laps on the switch i i didn't i didn't want to say anything on tv because i thought well they would know better than i would right they built it you assume it sure they built the thing so if they think it'll go three laps then they know it'll go three laps but it didn't and so um You know that I don't know what the misinformation was. I don't know whether they had a problem with what they believed was possible.

When he said, hey, when you hit the switch, you got three laps. That sounded odd to me because that's a lot of laps at a long two and a half mile racetrack. And that's a lot of gas in a reservoir. That's a lot of gas in that tank. that they're holding in that reservoir. That must be different than anything that's ever been, you know, yeah, it's different. It was a lot of fuel for it to run three laps. And so it didn't, obviously.

And so maybe the system is similar to what we've always ran, and what I'm familiar with is the kind of system they had. And I just, you know, listening to, you know, the team's comments after the race, and Allen, the crew chiefs comments. He's like, hey, man, we can't win the race doing what everybody else is doing. I think that's great. He's a hell of a crew chief. Yeah.

He is a badass. And so I like what they tried. They were thinking, you know, maybe come to pit road first, get a lucky caution, something like that. They could flip it, get them up toward the front a little closer. I don't think they had the pace to, like, drive through the field. That being the distinction, right? If they had it, then you can do what everybody else because you're not done them. The top five didn't change order.

Hardly much at all in the last 30 laps of the race. Nobody was driving through the field. Nobody. Even if his car was the best car on the track, I don't think he's driving through the field. So they had to do something, and he tried something unique, and I tipped my cap to him because it was pretty aggressive. I appreciate that he said what he said. I also, I mean, did you hear what he said on the end car?

I'm sorry, in the radio during the race? Like when he ran out of gas, he was like, I was fed bad information, or we got bad information, which to me just means there was a miscalculation with the engineers. I can appreciate that. In fact, it's the most relatable thing I've ever had to NASCAR race doing bad math, and therefore it doesn't add out, and you end up having to take the class over again. Oh, wait a second. I just had a college flashback.

But the fact is, is that we have just bad math or something. Maybe that was a miscalculation. And, man, what a time for that to happen, though. I know it. God, that's up. The question at the end of the day, though, man, is do. All right, so two road course races in a row, one yellow, a lot of green flag racing. At Indy, we had a really great ending.

Pretty compelling, good battles up front, some several battles throughout the field. It was a pretty decent race. Very field good story on the finish with McDowell winning, but then we go to the Glen. Everybody likes the Glens. Great party scene. Love the Glen. Lots of campers sold out Grandstand. Ninth sellout in a row at that place.

But a very similar race in terms of green flags, no cautions. And the question at the end of the day for me is, are the fans going to start calling for the stage breaks cautions to come back? Oof. Right? And I don't know that I hate that idea. I never, I don't look back over, I mean, if I said it, find it. I don't believe I ever said these, you know, taking away the cautions at the road courses is going to make the racing better.

It's less yellow. It's less restarts. It's less strategy. It basically makes the strategy very straightforward. You're going to run the race backwards. You're going to pit. You're going to run to the stage if you can. Get your stage points and come right to pit road.

And then you're going to do the same thing in stage two. And as soon as you get inside the window to finish the race. you're coming to pit road you're not going to sit out there and get called with the yellow just like we've always ran road courses so the the with the stage cautions the strategies were really they were like there was like an extra set of there was like an extra strategy to try so right right so 100% right so without the stage cautions there's like one and a half strategies with with stage cautions you've got about three different routes to take right and so and you know that the person that stays out to get that stage point is at a disadvantage to the person that threw it away and pitted before the end of the stage.

Because when the caution comes out, that's going to leapfrog that person forward. All of those things were really compelling. And you had a lot of cars that were maybe not very fast at some points of the race toward the front on restarts that would jumble up and make things exciting. You had somebody that was a more dominant car now in 10th place on a restart that had led most of the last stage, going to fight their way through. That's all gone. And so if NASCAR turned around today and said, we're going back to stage cautions at a road courses,

I wouldn't throw my hands in there. I'd be fine with it. Maybe there's certain road courses that you apply that to in certain ones you don't. There's some road courses on the circuit that a caution lap takes half a day, it seems like. Well, the CODA is a long course. Yeah.

But, you know, there's ways around that. And that, look, I don't go to Cota, so I don't care. That's right. Ultimately, that's what this is about, right? I don't broadcast it. I don't go to it. I give a crap. How long the cautions are. He's honest, folks. If nothing else, he's honest. I don't want to go to Cota, track limits and all that mess. Can I make a counterpoint, though, that I'm going to tell you, you've rubbed off on me a little bit. Oh?

Yes. So I've always been the kind of guy that just likes to be entertained. and so throw the cautions out there. Let's see the different strategies. However, maybe it's a little of the Becoming Earnhardt series. Maybe it's a little the nostalgia that you're rubbing off on all of us. But there's something I've actually found that I appreciated the last two weeks of it more being a pure traditional race where I'm okay with the fewer cautions and the ass whoopens because I'm actually appreciating what Michael McDowell did

and appreciating what William Byron and his team did because they went out there and they laid the stick to them, right? And if maybe it's because it's a road course, I don't know. I would love to hear what other people say, and I'm sure they will on social, but like if it was one, if it was the, you know, the Fontanas or the Michigan's or the Poconos, maybe I have a different feeling.

But in these two weeks, I have found myself appreciating an old school ass whoopin. Yeah. And I don't know that, it has that with the cautions and the stage breaks because it just jumble it rewrax them right no yeah yeah or at least it gives you a different strategy where somebody who is you know doing something wonky comes in and takes it from william byron or maybe macdale i don't i don't know man i'm just saying i'm learning something about myself yeah i'm evolving i hope everybody is but this

one i i could i could appreciate it yeah well this goes all right so add this if we're throwing all of this conversation into a YouTube, you've got to add this part of the argument. The Xfinity race on Saturday, was that a better race? Yes. All right. Better race.

You still had one car dominate, but you had a lot going on, right? You still had a lot going on, some good racing. Good point. On Sunday, the damn top five in the last 30 laps just sit there and ran two car links apart. You know,

The leader was a second half out in front of Denny, and then it was Denny, and then, you know, nobody could pass. That's the problem. Go back to the car. Yeah. Yeah. So, okay. Okay. So I would prefer, look, if stage cautions have to come back, let's put that in our pocket and let that be the last resort.

All right. We know we can do that. That's the easy thing to do. But let's not do that right now, because it doesn't really fix what. I think is the real problem. And that's that at the Glen specifically, they need to try to find a little bit better tire. The tire doesn't fall off.

They start off running, what, if they run in a 73 flat, they're running a 73-70 at the end of the run. The tire doesn't fall off enough, which doesn't really, that's not going to fix everything. Look, we go to Richmond, we have three seconds of fall off. They all fall off the same. They still don't pass. So fall off will not.

really fix at all. But the tire is so good that they're qualifying every lap and the cars have a lot of grip. And there's not even real big mistakes. Like when they're running through the bus stop and coming through the carousel around me, it's chaos. Every race. Sunday? Not much at all going on.

That's interesting. You would know that was an interesting vantage point you have. The only problem I saw people having was getting all up. that over the curbs. Well, they're jumping a damn curb. Okay. You know, the rest of it was pretty straightforward. Nobody getting loose and wrecking into the tires or nothing.

You know, and hardly any real passing going on through there. So there's two, there's some, there's something about the package, the grip, the downforce, all those things. and maybe whatever they're trying to learn on this short track package, what they're trying to develop in the short track package is something that they could take to the glen. Because good Lord, even if we did have stage cautions in about two laps, we're back to where we were Sunday. We're going to have cars in single file,

a couple car links apart, not a whole lot of passing. Okay. I'd be, you know, I would be a little bit, concerned if I'm NASCAR watching that race, I would want to have more going on. I definitely want to have some more excitement inside the top five at the end of that race. All those guys were just so even and nobody could get, nobody could get close enough to really take advantage of each other. And that tells me the cars have a lot of grip.

They're relatively comfortable. they're not easy to drive. They told me that. I mean, AJ Omineer got out and said, these are hard to drive around here, but we're qualifying every lap. We got a lot of grip.

The tire doesn't fall off, and you're just hauling ass and, you know, there's no change. You didn't really see somebody, you know, really fade on the long run. And when they did fade,

everybody behind them would just stack up. They still couldn't pass a car that was really struggling. It was hard to get around a car that was just slapped slow. Yeah. You know what I mean? Yeah.

And that place is unique compared to other road courses because it's faster. Arrow plays a big role. And that might have been a bit, you know, so that's another direction, another place to look. At Watkins Glen,

this looked probably, you know, Hawkins Glen, it looked the way it looked because it's faster and it's more aerodynamic dependent and getting in dirty air is a bigger problem there than other road courses, possibly. Anyways, let's move on to Xfinity Race, man. We had a hell of a finish. Sam Mayer wins, second career win. He won earlier this year at Road America just a few weeks ago. He booted Ty Gibbs out of the way in an overtime restart down in turn one.

Ty Gibbs said, I don't know much. I don't know how much of a conversation you can really have with Sam. He has more starts than I do, and it's only his second win, and I really wish I could have gotten my 13th. That was a dig. Yeah, it was a dig, of course. I have been looking forward to sitting down here and talking about this. Good, because I've been eager to hear your opinion on it.

I very blatantly did not ask you about this on Texas, because I wanted to hear it with everybody else. So, first and foremost, fair or foul. what he did on the last restart, what Sam Mayer did to Ty Gibbs. Ty Gibbs, who had dominated. Yeah, so I'll answer it like this. I will always tell my drivers

that I would prefer them not to wreck other cars and get upset, get angry, don't wreck people on purpose, and don't get into situations on the racetrack track that are in. embarrassing to the team or, you know, put everybody and our partners in a bad light, right? I tell them that. And but at the same time, you know, they're out there driving their race cars. They're out there making decisions, and they're the ones that have to live with those

consequences. And when we win a race, pretty much regardless of how we won, I'm going to go to Vic your landing to stand next to that driver and take my picture. Winds are hard to come by, and these drivers are young. They're not, you know, they're flawed and they're developing, and this is part of Sam's process. But also, there's a big, big, long history between these two guys. They just flat don't like each other.

Right. They don't. They don't. And I don't know that you can ever have a race like that where one of them is not going to run into the other. Right. And, you know, what Ty Gibbs did on the restart before that up through the S's wasn't very egregious, but it still was, if I'm Sam, I'm still feeling disrespected.

Oh, he was fired up. Yeah. Oh, he was fired up. It wasn't egregious. Look, man, the guy just took his line. But if I'm in the, if that's Ty in that car, he's going to love that. You know, you're not going to love it. And I thought that.

conversation over the radio was interesting when Sam's mad, Sam's embarrassed that that happened to him. So in Sam's tone, he comes on the radio and he goes, dude just ran me into the wall up through the S's in front of the field, tried to wreck me. And he's embarrassed that it happened. He's mad that it happened. And he wants to send the 54 off the track. Like all in that moment, he's got all those emotions going on. He wants to wreck the 54.

He's madder in hell. He's had enough. And the spotter comes over the radio and says, you know, we'd have done the same thing. Kevin Hamlin. Yep. Kevin Hamlin comes over the radio and tries to walk him back. He does. And he's like, man, hey, we'd have done the same thing.

It's fine. Regroup, go back after it and get it. And Sam, I think, heard. Interpret it, yes. Hey, man, do whatever you got to do. take him out. He totally did because he goes 10 F and four. Yeah. We're like, wait he said, did he hear him right? Right. I'm like, no, no, man. He meant, you know, go get, you know, go try to win the race. Yeah, win the race. But don't clean him out. He didn't be, he didn't say

you to go clean him out. And so Sam, you know, I think this is what was going on. He headed down into the breaking zone to turn one. I think that Sam had every intention of running in the back of the 54. Every intention. No question. But he did wheel hop. You see the car get loose and slide, and that did send him

into the 54 a lot faster than I think he really wanted to go. Right? And it knocks the 54 out, right? He spins him right out. Now, I think if you're going to hit somebody like that, you definitely don't want them to be able to get back to you. So there's a small window of

I don't know if I really want to spend the guy out, but I definitely don't want him to be able to get back to me. I got to knock him out there pretty good. So, but he did slide the rear tires into the corner, so he didn't lie about that. You know, the wheel hop thing that he talked about. He either locked the rear, you know, the car turned sideways under braking. So something was going on there. Maybe he was just wrecking.

You know, I don't know if he will hopped or he's just actually spinning out into the corner. But he went in there, went in there. there over his head. I think he had every intention of hitting him. And I was fine with that. I really was. And I know that it's hypocritical because there's, I don't know how to, I don't know how to articulate this any better. And then, man, there are some days when moving somebody out of the way is good and some days when it's bad. And it might be, it might be dependent on what side you're on. Obviously, our car won the race, so, hey, I'm on the good side of this one. It probably depends on the track as well.

Like if Lockins Glen on a final restart like that, people are going to make contact. So I will say this, man. There's been times when I've been pretty embarrassed by some things we've done on the racetrack. Saturday was not one of those things. I didn't feel any embarrassment. I didn't feel, I mean, I know that they've had a lot of history,

and I know Sam feels like he's been on the bad end of it. A lot of times with time. and this probably won't be the last, you know, the last incident between them. I don't, you know, I don't know when they'll meet on the racetrack again, but if they ever get in proximity of each other, they'll be more fireworks. And there ain't nothing, nobody can get in,

no, there ain't nothing nobody can do to get in between it. Does Ty owes Sam a payback? Sure. Yeah. Ty owes him. Yeah, I think that's fair. Yeah, I mean, dude, he got turned around, he got spun out. he was

tie was dominating the race so yes you got one we got one coming Sam's got one coming and we'll just have to remember it because we'll be mad about it but then we're like wait a second

wait that was payback yeah but it's like a prize fight you know you punch you counter you get punched you get a good combination and the guy wants to come back in the next round and bring it back to you and I think this is kind of what that is you want to know who frustrated me in that race

the most Cole Custer why he was running over everybody in everything running off the car i mean in the bus stop where you were he i mean uh didn't he yeah he caused the wreck that took out algar yeah took out algar there towards the end i was right there so like cole custer seemed like he was in over his skis he's kind of made some odd decisions this year kind of like a i i don't give a damn in some moments well that certainly came across right that's how we're to interpret it that's the impression that's definitely an impression I get. He seems like he's kind of in this like, you know what, is what it is. Sorry.

Yeah. Well, I don't know where he finished, but man, it just seemed like he was all in the place. That sucked, watching that seven get turned around right in front of you. Right in front of me. Yes. Holy smokes. Yeah, that did suck, I bet. Yeah, that was disappointing. And then Josh spinning out, that was a bummer. I thought he's going to have a good finish. Sitting there in third, he kind of spun out coming around the carousel on the final lap, I think. Right. That costs a lot of spots. Here's the thing about Sam.

It feels like he has turned this immaculate corner where he was this immature kid and all the stuff. Like you're just hoping for top tens. And now he just goes and clicks off two wins where he at least say what you will about how he won this race. He's there at the end. That right there was a big accomplishment. He was always taking himself out of situations.

And that seems to have changed. Now the question is, man, do you start having to really kind of figure out what he can doing this playoff? Like, I mean, obviously, I know you, I'm not asking you to go make predictions on your own team. No, I'm not going to, but I think, look, Sam, Sam ain't changed. Sam is not miles different. Really? No, it's just been a couple weeks since he went from the guy that hadn't won a race

till the guy that's won two races. I just think pump the brakes a little bit. Okay. Let's not get, let's not go. Don't crown him. Crown it, yeah. We wanted a couple road courses where he's very good. He's good at road courses.

We're going back to Daytona. We got, you know, Darlington and Kansas and a bunch of ovals where we'll see, like we'll get to see him in those moments where he makes either the best decision or the worst decision, right? Right. We get to go back to those racetracks where he gets put in those positions again, and we'll see.

All right, man, you're making this, you're making the better decision here? Are you making a veteran decision there? Are you calmer? Are you more calculated instead of just race, race, race, race, race, race, you know? We'll see. I've got to see a little more of a sample size. I think he certainly feels like he's got a lot of weight lifted off his shoulders. He said that.

A win's going to make you feel like, you know, man, finally. but the pressure is still there. I mean, with pressure comes the potential to make mistakes. And Sam is still the same Sam that we had two months ago, four months ago. I mean, he's growing and maturing, but it's at a good moderate standard pace. I'm not going to sit here and say that he's not going to make more mistakes. He's still going to have a lot to learn. He's still going to have a lot to learn.

Yeah. You know, and still flawed, just like anyone that would be in his position. And he's going to, you know, he may surprise us some more. He may still make some mistakes that Sam, you know, has made in the past. It's all about, you know, it's a process. It's a... All right, we won't put him in the Hall of Fame yet, okay? Okay.

You talk about pressure, though. The thing I'm really hoping is that when we go back to Daytona next week, week, you know, you talk about being embarrassed. Embarrassing. Fair to say it was embarrassed the last time we were at Daytona. So the pressure, let's not put it all on Sam. Let's just put it on all our junior motorsports drivers. Try not to wreck each other this time.

That'd be nice. Yeah, we've got, there's like a YouTube video out there of all of the junior motorsports cars wrecking each other. There's like an account of all of the moments where we've either wrecked each other or been in wrecks together. And it's more than, it's way more than it should be. But I've always said when you put four fast cars on the racetrack, when you put four cars on the racetrack,

they're going to tend to run around each other and tend to run into each other. It's just happened with more frequency this year. And yes, Daytona in February ended in the worst possible way for us. You know, just snowballed, out of control. Hopefully we do a better job coming up this weekend. It's so confusing, though, man. The Xfinity Series has a couple more weeks.

weeks before the playoffs starts the cup series only you know this this is the final race is the dayton is the final race before the playoffs um does that confuse anybody else yeah they're different yeah god i wish they weren't i know and the trucks is already in the playoffs yeah the truck playoffs has already started yeah what the hell yeah come on come on now that's a bunch to keep up with um if i people always ask you man what would you do if you're president i change that Playoffs start now for everybody. Bam. Right.

All right, Mike, so we got a little surprise for today's show, something that's come up. It's actually become public information, okay? I think the racetrack and a couple people have shared that we were invited to attest at Martinsville Speedway. NASCAR owns the property. EMSA and inside the EMSA umbrella is the Miata MX-5 series. and it's a pretty compelling racing. Some of our Chevrolet development drivers compete in this series

is a great way for them to get road course experience in an underpowered car that has really, really competitive racing. And so there's been this idea within NASCAR to take this car to Martin'sville. They're going there to test, and they're testing all day Monday, and they're testing today and if this goes well, we could see this car race at Martinsville and possibly other short tracks.

How fascinating. And so we got invited, we got to go. We're going. We're going right now. We're going right now. Then it's like a road trip. That's right. So we're going to get in the car.

We're going to drive. We'll shoot a little, we'll BS a little bit. Okay. Shoot a little bull on the way there. We're going to get there. We're going to test one of the cars. And I also have a little. little cool news about that. One of my friends is there, Chad McCombie. Okay, Chad McCombie. Everybody knows,

Chad. Chad's there with a couple of X5 cars of his own, and I've asked him if I could drive his. He said, sure, so I feel super good about that. He's an incredible race car driver, and he's going to have been there all day Monday getting this thing sorted out. I'm going to have called him and talked to him before we get there, but maybe we'll call him on the way. Okay. And so, listen, we can bring the, The listeners along, right? We're going to go to Martinsville, hop in a car, go watch you turn some laps. That's fun. And we'll see what we can do here.

Yeah, this will be a lot of fun. So we're going to go get in the car. Show's going to keep going. All right, let's do it. Grand Tourismo, based on a true story, is a movie about a team of unlikely underdogs, a struggling working class gamer, a failed former race car driver, and an idealistic motorsports executive. Together, they risk it all to take on the most elite sport in the world, directed by Neil

Blom Camp. The movie features an incredible cast led by David Harbor, alongside Orlando Bloom, Jiamen Hansu, Jerry Hollowell Horner, Archie Medecki as Jan Martin Burrow. Some of the most famous racing competitions in the world are recreated through the use of actual Nissan GTs, drones, and practical effects. The racing sequences are so realistic that the real-life, Jan Martenborough himself actually served as a stunt driver for the film. This is a movie that needs to be seen on the screen. It's an inspiring, thrilling, and action-packed movie. Grand Turismo, based on a true story, is exclusively in movie theaters this Thursday. Get your tickets today, rate of PG-13. Off we go. There you need them. You need a map. I don't know, man. Something about driving to

Martinsville with you is always a little nerve-wracking. Well, let's try to make this one less nerve wracking. We'll try. Let's do a podcast while we do it. That ought to make it help. This podcast while we're driving, that ought to know. So what are we going to do? What is this? All right. So I was, you know, on social media over the past couple of days before the race this weekend. There was a lot of chatter about the MX5 cars having a test at Martinsville. Everybody's excited about it. There's this little pocket.

of the world in the sim racing world, specifically in I racing, that has actually ran the MX5 at Martinsville. And so there's this little group that I know that I communicate with on a regular basis that is like all over the top of this idea of the MX5 running at Martinsville. And they're already convinced, like, hey, it works online, it's fun online, this will be great. And then there's this other group that's really excited about this series as a whole because the races at Daytona, Road America, they're all great. The MX5 races are exciting. This is a part of the MSSys series that's owned by NASCAR, so it's a property of NASCAR.

So I'm already aware of the chatter online about it. I was walking through the bus lot at Watkins Glen this weekend on a Saturday after the Xfinity race. I got down from my perch and I'm walking back to the bus, getting ready to give me some dinner. And I see Mike Helton. And we started talking about everything. We talked cars tour. We talked everything. Just about what's going on in each other's lives.

And he said, hey, man. Clay's here, Clay Campbell, that runs Martinsville. president of Martinville. Yeah, runs the Martinsville Speedway. And they're standing there, I'm shaking Clay's hand. And I'm like, so in my mind, I've been trying to get in NASCAR's ear and in Clay's ear a little bit about how we can get

the cars tour to Martinsville. And not necessarily at the late mall stocks because I think our big event at North Wiltsboro every year for the late mall stocks is what we want. We don't, we're okay. not deluding or fooling around with what Martinsville already does with their late-mile stock cars. Which is significant.

It is. They have that 300. It's historic event. But the pros, our pros, we need them to have their marquee event. And I think the pros could be some sort of a companion to something at Martinsville. So I'm standing there talking to Clay and Hilton. that's in the back of my mind that I'm going to, I want to make, I want to mention that to them before I walk away. And, uh, Helton goes, hey man, what are you doing this week?

I was like, I don't know, this and that another Tuesday he says I'd like it if you'd go to Martin's deal. And I usually do just about everything Helton says, right? So Helton is kind of the, Hylton's the guy and I trust what he tells me to do and what he thinks I should be doing or interested in and when he needs me to, when he wants me to do something or ask me to be interested in something I'm usually going to follow through. But he's like, hey man, can you go to Martinsville on Tuesday? I think you need to go up there and drive one of these cars. We're going to try to see if this series will, this MX5 series will work at short-term.

We think there's some possibilities there even beyond Martin's Deal. And so I said, well, I got a podcast on Tuesdays, but maybe there's a way to blend the two together. And so anyways, we had a great conversation. I called you, got on text message with our team. We moved a lot of things around. We did some podcast on Monday to be able to get on the road and go up here and drive these cars. And we'll be able to package all this up and put it out today. And so we've got to run up here.

We're going to be here an hour and a half, maybe max two hours depending on time. We've got to come back home because there's other things I've got to do at the end of the day. That's right. that are unrelated to all of this. So we're doing this really fast. We're going up here and listening already from how the test went Monday. It sounds like everything's going well. So I got a ton of questions.

So I don't know if they're in any particular order. Do you want me to just fire away? Okay. Now, first and foremost, what kind of, what do you think, being that the objective is for Mike Hilton saying that we're trying to figure out if these cars can run at Barton's Hill. What kind of feedback are they looking for out of you? I don't think they're looking for any feedback out of me, really.

It smells like a fart in here. Does it? Don't it? All right, well. Did somebody, too? Fess up. Damn. I do, too.

I smell it now. All right. There's a podcast stopper now. Just whoever did that, just go ahead and fess up, Gracie. She's mortified. It is. Awful. Maybe it's...

Yeah. Maybe it's something back that way. I don't know. Hopefully it's something that we drove through, right? Is it getting less potent? It's getting more potent. Is it less pungent? That's a hell of a word at it.

Pungent. Well done. We did just find it. I think it's going away. It's gone. It's better. It's better. All right.

All right. So, they don't need any feedback from me. So they have people that are, they have people that are regulars in the series testing. Those regulars in the series are going to give them the real information that they need. They've already had a couple cars out there sort of mock racing and competing, you know, seeing how they can race side by side and all those things. And one of those people that's there is Chad McCummy.

If you remember Chad McCommey's name. Oh, yeah. Chad played me actually in the three movie, that ESPN NASCAR movie. And Chad races in the car store, Laymall Stockside, and he also races in Emson. And in the pilot series, and I guess he has MX5 as well, or a couple of those cars. Bobby Labani is going to be up here as well. Oh, that's cool. Yeah.

And so, you know, I don't know if Bobby has good feedback, they'll use it. If I have anything that I learn, I mean, they'll use it. But otherwise, I think they really need to lean and will lean on the guys that are driving these cars all the time. And so it sounds like it's going well, and I hope to get a dozen laps or so. Do you know whose car you're going to drive? No clue. Okay. I'd probably prefer driving Chad just because of the connection that we're going to.

Yeah. That we have, but, um, and we're about the same side, I guess. He's a little skinnier of me, but, but, you know, you know, uh, similar enough to where he can play you in a movie, but, um, okay, so the other thing I want to mention is we should give a shout out to Chevrolet being that they're allowing you to do this. That's true. So that's a good point, Mike. We can't just run up on down the road and go drive, um, different manufacturers whenever we

want. And so yeah, we have to call Chevrolet, we have to ask Chevrolet if they mind. This is a series that they don't compete in, so it's not a direct competitor for them. And they know that we're trying to be a good ally to NASCAR and be an asset to them. And so they don't, they don't see a big problem with it. So I'm very thankful that they're like that. They could absolutely tell me they don't want me to do it and I would not do it. That's right. Yeah, that's right. And so I'm thankful they're allowing us to go up here and have a little fun and

checks a lot of boxes. Also gives us an opportunity to, people are excited about this, they want information about this, they want to know how this is going, gives us an opportunity to jump into that sort of content creation cycle around this, which is fun. We're driving all the way up here, it's an hour and 35 minutes. to be there less than that or around the same more. I mean, we're going to do more driving than when we'll be at the racetrack today. That's true.

We're putting in some effort. That's right. But it's kind of fun. I mean, to be honest with you, when do you get a chance to drive just these other cars? And if you've ever looked at these MX-5s, people listening to the podcast, I mean, they look like they're a blast. Like, what do you know about the car that you can tell us? Like, how much horsepower do these things have? I don't think they're going to.

Not a whole lot, right? Not what you, yeah. I mean, they've obviously probably less power. I don't really know exactly how much, but it's a four-cylinder motor. Okay. It's, which doesn't really mean anything. I mean, you can get a lot of power out of that, but it's going to feel a little bit slower on the straightaways, but probably faster through the corners because just looking

at some of the comments from the drivers, it's got a lot of grip. And the fact that it doesn't go as fast on the straightaway, you really, you really, you really, can fly through the middle of the corner. You know, just like our Xfinity cars, they might go a little slower on a straightaway at some race tracks, but that allows them to go faster through the corner. That's right.

And that's why they, you know, at a place like Bristol or short tracks, sometimes the Xfinity cars are qualifying faster than the cup cars because they're a little bit lighter and a little bit quicker in the middle of the corner. But I'm sure it's going to feel fast in the corner and it'll be fun and

it'll be interesting to drive a convertible around a racetrack I know right that's the other thing about these things They don't have roofs That's right

And so driving a convertible around a racetrack will be different I think the only time I've ever raced a convertible Was in a match race with Jeremy Mayfield at Charlotte Motor Speedway

I think I was still in an Xfinity series Humphi got a couple of cars Cut the roofs off of them Of course it Of course this is a humpie idea And it was sort of like a appetizer for their legends racing, their summer series or whatever was going on.

And so it was on a race weekend or like a Wednesday poll night or something, I don't know, but me and Mayfield, I think it was Mayfield, did a little match racing on the quarter mile on the front straightaway, banging around. Many people remember that, or know that there was a NASCAR convertible series back of the Way back in the day. Ralph Arnard raced in it a little bit. But it was a, yeah, there's a book, one in them blue books on the convertible series. That's right. Yes, sir.

I'm pretty excited about this because not so much, you know, the Mazza or the X, MX5, the car does it. The car is not the big deal to me. I know that the car, the car is not. not the important part of this for me. For me, it's something to do with short track racing. Which NASCAR in my mind could lean into more.

I don't know really what the vision is for this. I know this is an effort of Mike Helton's and Jim France is excited about it. I've talked to Jim a little bit. At Watkins Glen as well. And so I know this is like a, they have an agenda right to make see if this is possible to race it

Martinsville and other short tracks as well and so I think that it's I'm all excited about anything that NASCAR wants to do around short tracks what do you mean about is it possible I mean did these things primarily race on road courses what it this car races on road courses as a companion to the emsa series so wherever emsa goes wherever you know they they go race the MTSA series with the prototypes and the GT3 or whatever, you know, all that stuff. So the MX-5s will run, you know, the day before, or they'll run a couple races. And so this will, they've never raced on ovals.

That could be true. Yeah, so this is, yeah, we'll see how they do. I wonder how they get around this thing. And you said you talked to some people yesterday that were at this test, and you said it's going pretty well. Yeah, I watched some videos online and listen to some comments. And we might could call Chad here in a bit. Oh, that'd be fine, yeah. Chad McCombie and see how things are going.

What a good dude he is. I mean, everybody knows Chad is the guy that played you in the movie. But the fact is, is that when you were at Wilkesboro last year and you were doing those interviews with these other drivers. Chad was one of them. And man, I learned so much about him just in that half-hour conversation. Kind of just a true racer, you know, by definition, the truest racer. Just does it for the love of it.

But super good. I mean, like, I love watching him race as well. But been at it a while. I don't even know how old he is. I know he's like a timeless. Like he. Right. Right.

When I think about Chad McCombie, I'm thinking like a 20-year-old or something. I know that's not how old he is. He's got a family. Yeah, he raced in the truck series years ago, raced to ARCA for Andy Hillenberg. He had a truck ride and actually really had some good races. Came close to winning a few. I remember him running good at several races in a mile and a half like Atlanta and Texas.

So his, and obviously, you know, knowing our connection through the movie, as odd as that is, every time I'd see his name, I was curious as to what he was up to. And so I've always kind of followed him and what he had going on. And him being a part of the car store, racing late model stocks and having the chance to get on the track with him a couple times. Myself has been really neat. Just a well-spoken guy really unassuming and he races everything he works hard and pretty cool guy yeah that is cool yeah so we'll see him later and uh be good to see Bobby always fun to run into Bobby Levani another sort of similar personality unassuming soft-spoken yeah not not a

guy does a ton of talking but funny and always nice what why is he there I mean what What's his connection with all this? So Bobby's just quarter, Bobby is sort of just doing this, you know, since he's, you know, retired from full-time cup racing, he's turned into this sort of, I want to do whatever I want to do, do it all kind of thing. He races modified in the Smart Tour. He's done that for a couple years, which I wish he racing the late models with us,

but we'd love to have him over there. but he still loves the race. We talk about this at the back end of all of our shows just about with all of our retired drivers is like, man, wish you were doing something. Wish you were out there racing something. It would be cool to be able to watch you and follow you alone. So Bobby's a perfect example of that, getting back to some roots, trying some new things. and I think he's just curious, you know,

and he probably got the same phone call I did. And he's like, yeah, I'll come on up. I'm not doing anything. I'm Bob with Bonnie. I'm doing every day. I'm on my own schedule. That's right. Okay, Dale, so now I want to ask you about Martinville

because, you know, we're joking about how we used to drive there and it was always tense or whatever. But the fact of the matter is, Martinville is my favorite racetrack. Really? Yes. Yes, my favorite racetrack. And I actually have some really good memories of us.

So when I think about Martinsville in terms of your racing career, what is the things that jump out in mind? And I know you may say the win. I got it. No, no, no. But like when you think about Martinsville. Yes, let's talk about it. The car without the fender.

That's right, which I think was one of your greatest races ever that people don't give you enough. Because you finished fourth. Yeah, yeah. 2004. Best fourth place finish ever. We were proud. Yeah, we were happy.

Yeah, that was cool. So, so go way back to, it might have been 1983, it's 82 or 83. I think it was Harry gets first win. Somewhere along the way at Martinsville during the race, Harry gets some contact

with his right front and it peels his fender away. this is dry he's driving old buick headlight bezel and all that stuff's ripped away and so but he wins a race and he takes this for harry again in my mind it's an iconic photo but next to the damaged fender with his trophy right and it's like hell yeah everything about that picture short track racing race winning car got damage got the trophy it's hairy freaking gant just a cool cool moment yeah and then you fast forward to when he's trying to win four in a row, Mr. March. October, I believe. Whatever it is, Mr. October.

Yeah, I think it was later in the year. You're right. They had that Camberd Rear and Housing and all kinds of cool stuff with that car. Andy Petrie had built. Some cool front geo he was telling us about in our show. But he ends up getting some damage and rips the whole right front corner or the left front corner tears up the race car and ends up winning the race. Now, this car is fast either way because they won four races in a row with it.

But being able to take a car that's missing big, important parts, aerodynamic stuff, like fenders and so forth, and running well with it is kind of a lost start. It just doesn't, you know, his arrow became more and more dependent in our sport. Being able to do that at a short track even was tough. And so, you know, I don't, I got, I think, a very start, early start, the very first lap of the race or whatever, I think I got a, it was a crash way up in front of us. For some reason I want to feel like I started it, but that might have been a different year. But either way, there was a big wreck in front of us. Right.

Or I do, I tried to dive three, why, I can't remember, because anyways, we go down in the corner and there's a big crash and everybody. kind of piles in, we hammer in there and crash into somebody and somebody runs in the back of us and both right and left corner are dinged up and the right front fenders tore all the heck. And so we come down pit road and they're trying to fix it. Break hoses and ducks are getting ripped off by the right front tires. I'm pulling out of the pit stall and in that moment, But honestly, I'm sitting there thinking, man, I got to drive this tour up thing for 500 laps around here. This is going to be a long, damn day. That's right.

I'm thinking we're going multiple laps down. I want to say you fell three down at one point. I don't think so. It wasn't three? I don't think we ever got lapped. Oh, no, no, you did. No. Yes, you did.

No. How did we make them up? You made them up. I'm telling you were lapsed down. I don't think so. We'll have to look at this. We'll debate that. But we...

We get out there, we might have lost a lap in the pits fixing the damage, but I think we'd stayed on the lead lap. And so I just didn't think we had a shot of anything good that day when that happened. We get out there and we're running around, and we're in the back, racing with the back markers, right? And I'm doing everything I can to keep up with them. So I'm running as hard as I can to run 35th. and it and it's not good i'm like yep and i'm on new tires as is everybody else around me

and i think as soon as that you know that new tire goes away we're going to start fading worse our car is going to start handling worse as the tires get worn and get hot we're going to have more and more problems with our car because of the fender missing and all that In reality, the opposite happened. The longer we ran, with that right front tire hanging out there, staying cool in the air, allowing, with all of that being pulled away and all that brake temperature and everything, being able to dissipate and not be trapped under the hood, our car got better and better and better.

And everybody else slowed down, we really just didn't fall off as it. just didn't fall off as much. And so on long green flag runs, man, we could drive up through the field. And we should have won the race. But I got underneath Ryan Newman in the middle of the corner. I shouldn't have done that. Ryan's already hard to pass as it is. He's a really annoying son of a gun to pass.

And which is his M.O. And he's so super proud of it. But right in the middle of the corner, he kind of gets up the racetrack. and I shoved it in there and he comes back down and I don't have a fender or nothing. I can't hit him with the tire. I was like, I'm going to knock the toe out. We cannot have hard contact with the right front. So I was very aware of that.

And I drove my car into the curb and spun myself out. And so we had worked our way, I think, into the top 10 at that point, had to go all the way back to the back. That's right. And then drive ourselves back through the front. It was deflating for sure. Yeah, that was a tough moment. Oh, my God. We got all excited.

All the way back. Yep. We got all excited in it. I made that mistake. If I, you know, I don't know. Can't go back and change it, but end up driving back up toward the front and was sitting right there. There was a five-car, four-car battle for the wind, nose the freaking tail, and we were right in there in the middle of it.

Yeah. Which was fun. And you're right, man. I mean, there's, you always remember the wins. You've got the trophies on the wall that remind you of them. I've got several trophies in the house and at Junior Motorsports and everywhere you go, you see them and you think about that day and look at a trophy and go, where is that from, what year is that?

And then you have these other races that you never forget. don't have a physical memory, right? Don't have a trophy. But there's only a few of those that you remember because of overcoming adversity or something happening that day, something you dealt with or the team dealt with. And that's one of our, I think that's one of my favorite races.

I know you're pretty fond of it. Love it. I love it, but you know what? I may have got that confused when I said multiple laps down. You're right. I think it was just multiple incidents. Like the one that was very, early. I remember the one with Newman. I can still see that. That was so, so dejecting. But then coming back and I remember the elation, I mean, let's keep it real here. It wasn't like

we were on the car and doing hat dances and things for a fourth place finish. But I remember the media, particularly I remember Jim Utter being at the car when you got out and he was just like, that was something. That was one of the greatest drives I think I've ever seen. And I was still pretty new with you. Like I hadn't been working with you a ton, but the first race you go, you win the Daytona 500. I remember the second week we went to Rockingham and you did well, you had a top five at Rockingham and that's when I realized that you hated Rockingham. And so finishing the top five there was almost like a win, right? And so, and then, so there were these moments that you were just showing of just like just the driveability and the talent and all that stuff

was just there. And it wasn't always in just wins. That was the one that stuck out. Yeah, that's one of my The last race at Rockingham, we ended up with a fifth place finish, I think. I hated Rockingham. I should have loved it, but I never had good results there, and I never felt comfortable. I never felt like the car was doing what I needed it to do, except for that last race. I felt like we had a really good race going when Kurt spun us out, and I was racing with Dad. That's really what made me so angry about that day when Kurt wrecked us at Rockingham. Oh, that's right.

Your rookie season. Kurt was driving the 97 car. He had just gotten in that car. They were between drivers, and so he's getting his first couple opportunities. And Kurt was good. You know, he was talented and fast. And he ran over me, and, you know, we've all done that. I did it.

I've ran over plenty of people early in my career. not knowing to be patient. But I'm having that particular race. I'm racing with Dad. And I'm, you know, I think we're running like somewhere from 7th to 12th all day. And I was doing my best to try to just kind of be where, you know, keep up with Dad, keep up with Dad, keep up with Dad, like finish close enough for ahead of Dad. Anytime I got a chance to, like, have a race.

where dad and I were near each other. We hardly ever raced each other that 2000 year. When I was a rookie, you know, you run 30-some races and you'd think that you'd race with each other a lot. We hardly ever raced each other that rookie season. A couple of races, but not many. Passing here, pass him there, but never really no door-to-doors.

But that day, we were around each other for a majority of the day, it seemed like. And then Kurt spun us out. going to get a good happy you know I thought I was going to get a good result at Rockingham for the first time that I was happy with and it didn't happen but then we went there for that last race and I think we all kind of knew it was the last race I think the yeah the story was already out about what was happening where we were going going away from Rockingham and I thought you know what I'm not going to

drive this car so Rockingham is worn out eats tires up If you run really hard and as hard as the car will go, you're going to be in trouble on the back end of the run. That was kind of part of my problem early in my career is that I always ran as hard as I could get the car to go and didn't manage my tires. And that was a place where you really had to manage them. And so for that race, that last race, I said,

man, I'm just going to run a good, clean pace and straight. I'm going to run straight off the corner. I'm never going to spin the tires. I'm never going to slide the right rear. I'm never going to drive the car in and push the right front. I'm going to run every lap and keep the car directly underneath me and keep it straight off the corner. And, man, we just did that all day long, all day long, all day long,

and ended up with a pretty good result. So I was pretty happy with that to be able to finally figure, kind of finally figure out the puzzle for Rocky Am. You know what I remember about that? Kurt Busch race where he took you out. Was that not the one where you came, I think you went to the garage, came back out just to annoy him and rode him.

And then that's one of the funniest back and forths on the radio. Tony Senior's like, NASCAR says, knock it off. And you're like, yeah, I got these radio. I can't understand you. And he goes, I said, knock it off. And you said, I said I can't hear you. Yeah.

I wanted to wreck him, man, so bad, but I knew I couldn't do that. I knew that that would draw, bring more problems. And so I ran right on his bumper. I had really new tires, and he was out there on old tires. We'd just come back on the track. And if I'd come on the track and he wasn't anywhere around, I'd probably never mess with him, but it just so happened when we'd come out on the track and blended back in the track, there he was.

There he was. Like, yeah. That green and yellow car came missing. I'm going to run right up on him. And instead of going by, I'm just going to stay right on his bumper and worry him as much as I can. That was funny. Here's another memory from Martinsville that I have, just these random things.

Ready? Sean Brawley going with us almost every year just to get a bag full of hot dogs. Yeah, my buddy Sean, you might have seen him remember him and Sonny in the nationwide commercials, but Sean and I've been buddies for a long time. And Sean's a drag racer, loves drag racing. He's a Ford guy, loves fords. And so we've always kind of butted heads about that.

You know, Chevy versus Ford and Oval's versus drag racing and all that. And boy, but he loves the Martinsville hot dogs, and his dad did too. And so we would go back and forth, you know, to the racetrack. We were going to go up and come home Friday, Saturday. And he'd either go with us on Friday or Saturday just to get that bag of dogs. He didn't even care about being at the track. Nope. He didn't care about watching practice or nothing.

He just is going to go up there and get 15 hot dogs and come back home. And, man, they're good. And by the time that he would get them back home, he'd have a few. But his dad, like his dad would always be out there at the driveway waiting on him. And the bag had already been greased through the bottom because those hot dogs are so nasty. I woke up his morning and wondering if this thing, this concession stand would be open today. I was wondering it too.

Golly, I'd eat one or two of them. Yeah. So back when we were driving the bud car, you had Tony Jr., Tony Sr., Tony Sr., Kevin Pinell, two beers, and all those guys. And when we started parking in that new infield garage, the roof on that garage is really low, right? So fans can see over it onto the back.

straight away from the front stretch grandstands. And so literally the beams of the are like right above your head. They're like at you know seven and a half foot at their lowest. And so every team did this. You'd start the weekend, get in there on Thursday and unload, get up in the morning on Friday and start going through tech. And that on Friday, everybody would write their names on the beam and then you would do it. and Mark every hot dog you ate. And it was a competition on every team who ate the most hot dogs. And I'm talking some of these guys were eating in the 30s and 40s over a weekend,

like 10 dogs a day. And so I think if you go into their, I think they've painted over those marks, but you can kind of still see them through the paint. I'll look for them. Yeah, you might ought to see if you can find any. That's history right now. Yeah. But then that kind of just went away. I don't know. People, you know, teams got more, you know, the people that were working on teams got more health conscious, you know, eating 30 hot dogs, 40 hot dogs over a weekend, I guess, wasn't impressing your crew chief, right? Or a teammate. Certainly when you got to Hendrick Motorsports, they didn't find it to be near the accomplishment.

the DEI did. Exactly. I will say, yeah, I'm sure even back then, Hendrick guys weren't keeping count. They were more likely hiding the numbers. But our team, man, we were like, and I put my name on there, man, I'd be mid-packed.

I'd eat about 12 or so over a course of a weekend. God, they were good. That was back when your metabolism was running like crazy and you could just eat anything you wanted. All right, so that was a fun drive to Martinsville, Mike. And I don't, was I, did I know where the hell out of you? No, you were great. On this drive?

Yeah, yeah, okay, yeah, okay. Sure. All right, so we're nowhere near under the same amount of pressure that we were in 2004. Um, but I'm excited to get in this car. So we're here, we're going to jump in, we're going to take some laps, see what this is all about. Yep, and then I guess our plan would be on the Thursday show, the download. You're going to tell us all about it. All right.

We'll record as we go drive back. But that's fun. It's been fun having the listeners ride along on a road trip with us. It is. It is. This is something I like I think we should do more of. Thanks to NASCAR, thanks to Chevrolet for allowing us to come up here and do this. And don't forget, becoming Earnhardt comes out tomorrow, episode 7.

And then Thursday, we'll tell you how this little test went. I'm expecting it to be a lot of fun. But we'll see. next time.