The Dale Jr. Download - 507 - The Blaney Train

Episode Date: November 2, 2023

Dale Earnhardt Jr. reconvenes with co-host Mike Davis to close out another week of the Dale Jr. Download. The guys reflect on their episode 506 interview with Jamie McMurray, which covered his transition from NASCAR Cup racer to Fox Sports commentator. They also size up the Championship Fours of both the Xfinity and Cup Series as the NASCAR contingent heads to Phoenix to close out the season. During the Ask Jr. segment of the episode, listeners sent in questions regarding: Driver recovery after a grueling race Dale’s most memorable Halloween costume growing up Best first-date ideas Traveling tips 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.

What do you make? I am weird. You are weird. What? Mr. Dalenhart Jr. That family technique sometimes. Gives you more than just a tomato salad. That's the voice of my co-hosts.

One of my best friends in the whole wide world. Mike Davis. We're screwed. What was that me? No, we're not standing in that box together in our underwear. Aren't you kidding me, Mike? Oh, my God. It's hilarious.

Hey, everybody, it's Dale Jr. And we're back again for another episode of the Dale Jr. download. It's Thursday, and this is the reaction show. Yesterday we had Jamie McMurray on. As our guest, we're going to get into that a little bit. But we are in the Bojangles studio, and I am here with my co-host, Mike Davis, and we are giving away free, regular-sized dirty rice. Yeah, or Bojangles is.

Well, yeah. Yeah. Well, it's through November 22nd. If you want some free dirty rice, the regular size kind, go to bowjangles.com and make your order, or you can use the app. And at participating stores, when you punch you in the code Dale, D-A-L-E,

there you go, free dirty rice. Who doesn't want free food? I want free food. Especially dirty rice. I want dirty rice. So we're very thankful for Bojangles and their support of our show, and we're hoping that you'll take advantage of this opportunity

to enjoy some dirty rice. All right. We are coming off of the interview with Jamie McMurray yesterday. Mike, your first thoughts about the interview. It was enjoyable. It really was just kind of like he's an old friend. We've talked about that. But the fact is it's just kind of hearing where he is at life. I enjoyed it from start to finish, to be honest with you. Even just hearing what his thoughts are on Martinsville from this past week. It was pretty good. All right. You really had fun. You asked the question. I thought I'd answer. All right. Start to finish.

Yeah. Not one part. Well, was there a part that you didn't particularly enjoy? No. Okay, so then start to finish, you enjoyed it. Okay. Good for you. Are you still thinking about dirty rice?

What are you thinking about? What are you thinking about? I'm just being honest. Okay, okay. What's wrong with you? I want you to be honest. I don't want to stifle your honesty. Well, you're making me think about it.

Okay. I just wanted to allow you the option to correct. What was your favorite part with McMurray? I really like talking to him. Dude's a good dude. We had some good racing together. and we were friends. You know, we get out on the lake together and hang out.

He was one of the, you know, very few drivers that I would do anything with outside of the racetrack. Our lives have both changed a lot. We both are now married with kids, but he retired a bit early. He told us that. Wasn't his choice. I was so thankful that he was honest, right, about certain things like that. Yeah. And, you know, talking to him about how he's dealing with not driving and does he miss it and does it, you know, concern him or what would he do with giving the operation?

You know, somebody walked in the door and said top five expedited car, go any track you want, right? What would you do? I'm always kind of, as you are fascinated by watching their gears turn when you try to toss that in their direction, right? and having kind of gone through the last several years, I just find it crazy when they say, no, no, I don't need to. One individual specifically, Martin that we have not had on the show,

we'll tell everybody and anybody that asks about him racing. He's like, I am done. Like, I am never going to be behind the wheel of a race car again. I mean, he's adamant. It's interesting for me to like, I bug Dale Jarrett and I bug Jeff Burton all the time. What did they say?

Nope. No way. I mean, they're just like, are you crazy? Like, it's the silliest idea ever, right? And I'm like, oh, man, you know, just go run a few laps, right? They're not interested. Not really at all. And so, which I find fascinating.

There's no wrong answer. But Jamie's really young, really in great shape. and you try to make us, I think, I don't know that, I don't know how you do it, but I kind of sit here and go, I'm going to guess what he's going to say and I wonder if I'm right.

Like as, you know, Jamie being young and great shape, I would assume that a good opportunity he would do it. And he said that, right? Yeah, so you were right. You guessed right on that? I guess, yeah.

And, you know, I've sort of thinking about this. I guess I did. I guess I did guess, right. The thing is is that, you know, let's take a moment. Let's take a moment. Okay, he was right, everybody. Enjoy it. In fact, you can just back up the podcast and listen to him be right again if you want to. Don't be right again in a few more days.

Oh, here it is. There he is. Yes, the Blaney train. We're going to get into Phoenix here in a bit. But first, back to McMurray. Eric Amarola is going to be retiring, but I think that you get the fact that, and I don't know if that's because Smithfield was leaving, what came first. Eric decided he wanted to scale. back or you know smithfield even but that being said there's a point in all of your lives and even

our lives where the grind that we're used to in our prime starts to become pretty dang exhausting and the thing that i really was i thought it was compelling and the way you guys were going back and forth was that you guys can look back at the time now that you're withdrawn from it and realize that there was a lot of uh there were moments that were fun but for the most part it didn't seem like it was, you know, that enjoyable. Yeah. And I think it's probably to do with the pressure and all the things that you have to do to be able to get into the place where you're happy.

Your happy place is in the race car. Yeah. There's so much that comes in addition to that, though, just to get to the race car that you guys don't particularly enjoy. Yeah. Well, I don't think the fans, I don't think the fans want to hear us. That's true. Say that, you know, oh, it was miserable.

but I think we are not great at articulating exactly what we're saying. And so when we got into racing, like when Jamie talks about getting into his late model and Art-O and go-carts with his dad, you're having the time of your life. I had the best time driving my little late-mall car at Myrtle Beach every weekend for four years. All of that was amazing. And when I got my Bush series opportunities, It continued to be a nothing less than thrilling. I mean, it was amazing.

First couple years of Xfinity, still great. But creeping into the picture were new responsibilities. You know, you're going to have to do X amount of appearances for this partner. We've got a new partner coming in. You've got to have to do X, Y, Z. You know, you got this thing planned with your family or friends, and they, you know, you've got to fly to Vegas. You've got to go to Florida, you got to go to Canada, whatever, right?

Yeah. Those things are fun, but they too start to litter the calendar year, and then you get into the Cups Series, and all of that multiplies by three, four, five times. And then you're dealing with multiple sponsors. Instead of having, I was kind of lucky with Budweiser, had one primary for the majority of year, and then you get multiple sponsors,

and now the drivers today, well, they got six of six. seven partners that won't dozens of appearances apiece. You know, when you look at the calendar year, your time just goes away. And when you're not doing those things, you're working, focusing, simming, meeting, thinking about your race, preparing for the next race. And so when you do all of those things and you go out and have a disappointing result, I mean, hell, even the greats had disappointing results half the time or more, right? Even some of the greatest had many, many bad days during the year.

You know, it was tough. It was frustrating. More than frustrating. It wasn't miserable. It wasn't, oh, I don't love this. I don't want to do this. You loved it. You did want to do it.

But it was so disappointing. So hard to get your ass kicked after all of that effort and then have to do. that again the next week and go back not knowing whether your ass is going to get kicked or not. And you'd have the good runs and just like, you know, just like that guy or just like me when I'd go play golf. I suck. But boy, I hit the Pim one time. I want to par four on my second shot and damn, I'm roped in again. I'm going to do this some more, you know?

That's right. Now I'm having fun. Yeah. Now you're going ahead and buying a sim or getting a golf club membership. I'm going to get better for the clubs. I'll do this more often. Just so you can go get your ass kick some more and get humbled again. And then I spent the next several rounds miserable.

Yeah. Here's something that I find interesting and I want to ask you. There is, you know, financially there is a big level up when you go from, let's say, Xfinity Series to Cup. And so a lot of the times a lot of people ready to get to Cup just because maybe they can go invest in a motorhome. Maybe, you know, they go, they could see these Cup. drivers flying around on their own jets. So my question is,

would you have taken less money to get some of your schedule back? Or is the money just too good? Because, yeah, the money's way better, but there's a cost for that, and that's because you're putting in a lot more time. That's a great question. You're getting paid by the hour.

Think of it that way. You've got a lot more hours to devote when you get to cut, but you also get paid a lot more. Yeah. That's a good question. I feel like that I probably would say yes in the back five years of my career

to taking a big pay cut to get more days on my calendar that were free days, days that I choose what I want to do. Now, look, I was spoiled rotten. You know, when you look at the week, I felt like I was busy the whole week, but I had plenty of off days. I'd have one or two sprinkling in there, you know?

So I don't know, you know. I mean, it was optics. And every driver that, myself, Jamie, and all the drivers that are competing now are blessed, fortunate. They got a great job. It's exciting. It's drilling. But even then, man, you can, and you can easily make it miserable. You know, you can easily screw up and make it miserable.

You try not to. I mean, some people are just wired where they'll, like, take, they'll get thrown into that. that mix and come out smiling every day, just having a blast. Some people can go in there, even if all the blessings, and make it miserable, you know. Get competitive.

You don't want to win every lap. And I don't know where we're going with this. Well, no, I think you answered the question. It's sort of... Where you've led me down the road now. Well, my theory is that money doesn't make you happy. and there's a lot of probably miserable millionaires out there. And the fact is, is that...

We're finding our way back. Yeah, well, you know, Carl Edwards said, I can get rid of this lifestyle. I can walk out of this easy. And that's when we were all like, wow, how can you give up that paycheck, man? And it's like, I think his answer would be, wasn't that hard at all, actually.

And you see that in Truex as well. He's not continuing to drive because of the pay. He's only continuing to drive because he's found some enjoyment in actually driving this next-gen car and running well with it. And he thinks, you know, we're good. We're running good enough. I think I'll stick around one more year. Well, how long does he do that until he doesn't have that fun year?

And he's like, yeah, okay, I'm done. Yeah. He ain't going to miss a damn minute of it. He doesn't strike me as the kind of guy that would have the edge. He will disappear. Yeah. He'll disappear. Into the woods with his boat.

That's right. But I had a good time talking to Jamie. There was a couple of things that I thought was interesting. Jamie, we didn't get into it. I was almost, I didn't really, you know, he talked about it. I asked him if he raised go-carts on ovals. He said he did on dirt, and he goes, you know,

I didn't like it because it was dirty. And he's a germaphobe. Big time. Big time. Yeah. And then I thought, well, I'm not going to ask him if he wants to go run a late model stock car store race. There's no dirtier place out there, right? Well, there's, it's, you know, you're going to get some dirt on your nails here.

That's right. You know one thing we didn't talk about? What do we not talk about? That year he had where he won the Daytona 500, the Brickyard. He kind of did. Yeah, but like just the significance of that year. Bono. That's true.

He did, but, we touched on it. That was such an amazing feat, you know. Won some big races. Yeah. Yeah, he did. All right, well, we're going to move on and preview Phoenix. We got the Xenity series, Sam Mayor, Justin Algar, Cole Custer, and John Hunter, Nemichek. Obviously, I'm pulling for Junior Motorsports to win the championship.

I could, you know, Sam or Justin. Justin's 37 years old. This is his fourth appearance. I'm sorry, this is his seventh championship four appearance. His seventh. Wow. All right. Never won a championship.

His best finished was second in 2020 for wins this year. this is Sam's first championship four appearance 20 years old four wins this year total so Sam's younger Sam will you know you'll likely have another opportunity next year as Justin will but I hope one of them win it and with that said I hope Justin wins one at some point in his career he deserves it he's put a lot of work and effort into it and I think he deserves it the other two drivers Cole Custer and John Hunter Nemichick statistically I know that Austin Hill won the regular season championship, man, but when you look at, you know, the statistics throughout the year, Coles Custer and John Hunter Nemechek's names are right there at the top of a lot of lists.

I expected Cole Custer to have a great year, but he won two races and both that were at road courses. I was shocked that he didn't win more mile and a halfs. But he's had fast cars, so I'm not counting the guy out. I just was, I feel like that even he might say that they fell short of some expectations this year. John Hunter Nemechek is moving on to the Cup Series next year driving the 42 car for Legacy Motor Club.

He's got seven wins this year. I expected him to come to this season and dominate. And when we unload cars in Phoenix and start practicing, I will be looking closely at the lap times of that 20 car to see how we match up. So I think the 20 car may have an edge on overall just pure speed. Cole Custer, if we get those late restart, Late Yellows.

Cole Custer is a restarting machine, but also is Justin Algar. Those two guys would be really sitting at an advantage if they're able to restart late in the race on the front row or even in the second row. Cole and Justin are really great at attacking on restarts. Sam can go in there and win it. I told him that. I said, don't feel like you're the underdog, even though, you know, looking at statistics and age and experience, I tell him to focus on the success he's had in the playoffs and feel

like that he goes in there as one of the favorites to win it. I feel I would not be shocked if Sam wins it. You got any input? No, no. I think you framed it up nicely. I'm pulling for Justin Algar. I don't mind saying it. You can't say it, but I'll say it.

I think he's due and I want it for him in a bad way. Although Sam Mayer, I agree with you. Did you just make that again? Did you really? Yep. This podcast on Thursday has turned in to just throwing paper wads into a basket and seeing if we can make it. Now I'm kind of wanting to go.

He couldn't even see it either. I couldn't even. All right. Andrew, you know what? So. Smart ass this guy. One of the things that I think is an interesting narrative around the Xfinity series is how will teammates race in this final event, right? That is coming off.

I say that because we're coming off of Martinsville where a lot of things happened, good and bad around teammates, right? The choices they made. With all of that conversation in the industry, you have to imagine that there may have been a bit more focus in the competition meetings amongst all the teams about what is expected. Like, what is your role, okay?

Look, you're a teammate. This is what we'd like you to do. This is what we would expect of you in moments like this, this, this. Maybe it's a non-factor. maybe it absolutely does not come into play but be paying a little more attention to that I think in the Xfinity series especially to how teammates

you know compete right and whether they're able to assist each other and maybe whether they're able to make it more difficult or challenge some of their enemies out there in the competition out there moving on to the Cup series Kyle Larson's going for his second championship

and Christopher Rale's back again for his second championship four appearance and he finished third last year and then William Byron in his first championship four appearance at 25 years old man the oldest driver in this group is Kyle Larson at 31 years old and then obviously the you know the favorite the odds on favorite

the man who's you know just dominated the last couple rounds of the playoffs. Ryan Blaney. He's coming in to bring it home. Sorry. He can't even say it with the straight face. This is his first championship for appearance. He's finished seventh in points in 2019 and 2021. He's 29 years old. Really, you know, for a driver, that's, you're kind of coming into your prime. William Byron's a fantastic race car driver. He will only get better as he ages. you know Christopher Bell, Kyle Larson, that 28 to 31 year old range, you're really starting to reach the peak, or you're nearing the peak of where youth and the risk-taking and urge to be daring

crosses with experience. So we have a lot of drivers that come in, young, that have raw ability, and they're very fast. They lack a little racecraft, which is basically experience. And, man, that 28 to 31-year-old range, right around 33 even, is this sort of perfect meld of the two.

And so these drivers, it's interesting, man. When I first came into the broadcast booth, we were pitching this narrative of the Young Guard, Chase Elliott, Blaney, against the old guard of Harvick, even Keselowski and other guys. And so the veterans went out and won all the races and said, yeah, your narrative's dumb.

But now here we are, years later, where, again, we've got a 25 to 29, 28, and a 31-year-old driver are all going for the championship. So I like Blaney, ran second at Phoenix. I think the last two times probably could have won last year, but Ligano was racing for the championship. We do not know for sure, but I have to wonder, could Blaney have won that race if it had been his title to win, right?

He's going in with a lot of momentum. Byron has had an incredible year. Kyle Arshin, you can never count out. I counted him out, though. Didn't put him in my final four, but here he is. Hey, I'll take the criticism. Bad choice. You don't mind taking that because you've got the Blaney pick.

You're right. Yeah. Well, I mean, I got a few right. Yeah. Your championship pick ain't even in here. He ain't even in the room. He has a good podcast. And Christopher Bell's back, man.

Are you all overlooking Christopher Bell? Yeah. I overlook Christopher Bell all the time. All the time. I forget he's out there. Is he going to be a threat? I think so. All right.

I don't know. I don't know. It's my analysis. I think he's in the second half of the forward drivers. Like I feel like. He's actually the underdog. all four. Yeah, I would say, but

Bell, I feel like, at least for me, exceeded my expectations of him in the playoffs again this year. He did it last year. I know. Right? Had basically a similar season, but then came on in the playoffs, won the right races.

Oh, but any finished third last year out of the four. I mean, you know. What's interesting this year is he's the only Gibbs car in it, and I feel like every time that helps. If somebody else, he's kind of shared the

spotlight with or whatever over there. So that might give him some... Okay. Yeah. There you go. So Gibbs can focus solely on Christopher Bell and Christopher's teammates can then practice and work

to help him. There's an hour, I think, of practice. So yeah, you want some teammates out there trying things and giving you information and you plugging that into your car and making your car better. I think that that works better. I think that that is more reliable

today than it's ever been with the next-gen car. With the old cars, everybody had a little bit of different this, a little bit different that. Yeah, our front ends aren't quite the same. My a-arms are a little different. My mounting points, my jacking this, that and another. And so trying something that worked for your teammate wasn't always just 100% reliable.

You put it in your car, not go faster and go, well, what the hell? But in the next-gen car, it's like, you know, if they try it and it's faster, it's almost every time 100% plugs in to your car. and you get the same result. So having teammates out there helping you, Blaney will have teammates, Byron and Larson, they'll have a couple cars. I mean, that'll be critical in those laps of practice

what those other teammates did, aren't even racing for the championship, how they might influence the overall performance of these four drivers. I got a question. Who do you think of these four? Actually, let's take both series, Xfinity series and Cups series.

Who do you think of them as the one driver that would choose to win at all cost, including maybe even racing dirty, to win a championship? Sam's definitely on that list. At 20 years old, you're going to mature with age. You're going to make different decisions as you get older.

So he's prone would be the best year to use. He's prone to make whatever move he needs to make, right, to win this championship. championship. I wouldn't put it past Justin. Justin's very clean though. Very clean. Yeah. It takes pride in that. Justin's very clean. So maybe he doesn't. When given the opportunity, the championship right in front of him, maybe he still needs to do it his way. I think you're right. Right. John Hunter will move you. John Hunter will definitely move you. All right on the cup side. Cole Custer will move you. Cole Custer drove through half the field in Martinsville just to get where he's at.

So I think he definitely will move in. But at least Cole tells you it's coming. I was like, hey, man, hey, I'm going to have to hit you here, okay? All right, don't be up too upset, okay? This is a situation we're both in. I don't hate the player, hate the game. I like that. I like that.

He's not asking for forgiveness later. He's like, hey, man, I told you we were going to do this. Moving on to the Cup series, honestly, I don't, you know, the funny thing about the Cup series is much harder to make the distinction of what driver might do something truly dirty to win the championship. I don't know that any of them are willing to do that. I think that they'll, I think they'll race hard. They'll make contact.

They won't avoid contact, but they're not just going to clean a guy out or they're not going to knock you totally out of the groove. they drive in the corner door you'll use you up a little bit they'll do something and they'll get physical but it won't be enough that you can just get out of the car and go that was bullshit how can you live with yourself right I don't see the cup guys doing that now the Xfinity guys maybe

I think it's time to do Smash Jr we've been putting this off off all week we have yeah we're going live and we're live all right hey everybody it's Dale Jr here in the Bojangles studio, my co-host, Mike Davis. And I am going to stick around for this, Asch, Jr.,

because my wife just said that she's going to get Ila from school. So, yes, we've had a great week. We've got a lot going on, talking about Martinsville, talking about Phoenix. We've had some conversations about it, but I'm sure there may be a question or two in this little Asked Jr. So let's get started, Andrew. Yeah, let's start kind of Martinsville related. This one comes from Nicholas.

You know, in the case of William Byron looking just absolutely exhausted after that Martinsville race, what does recovery look like for a driver after like a grueling race like he had? Yeah, I mean, there's a lot of options on the table in terms of getting over that. The first thing that's probably the most important is to get fluids back in your body. And so, you know, you can go to the, you can go to the, get IVs if you wanted to but it's actually you know go get you something to eat

put some food in your belly and drink a lot of water and go you know try to get you some rest by probably by with a race like that it's probably Tuesday morning before you start really getting back to normal you'll be tired and

drug you a little bit on Mondays but because that was really hard that was really tough most most races you bounce back really fast, but the heat and just the temperature and soaking in that temp for so many hours really takes a while to get over that. I can imagine that that would take a lot out of you.

Yeah, you run Iron Man's and all that good stuff. Yeah, it takes a while to recover. Yeah, you push yourself to the brink, right? And so what is that like for you? Like when you're getting done with that, it gives you, what do you feel like the next day? At least after my most recent Iron Man, it took probably until like Thursday. Friday of the next week to actually feel back to myself. Gotcha.

Yeah. So I think, I don't know. That's probably longer than most. Right, Mike? I take a long time. It feels like you weren't in great shape actually. Judging by our experiences in the Iron Man's, I'll say that's pretty. I'm usually back on Monday or Tuesday.

Yeah, yeah. Sorry, I'll work on getting back quicker for you guys. Do better, Andrew. Do better. This next question, happy Halloween. It comes from Ronald. Is there a most memorable costume that you dressed up as when you were a kid growing up? Memorable.

I got a football uniform when I was six, and I think I used that three years in a row. Nice. I so badly, so badly wanted to grow up and play football in the NFL. And so being a football, I mean, I was like, nobody was changing my mind. I'm a football player this year, next year. Hey, I'm a football player. You're not, I'm good. Don't need any help.

I've got it. I had the pads and the whole we get up. The funny thing though was, man, this is like 1982. And so I had like all red uniform, white and blue stripe with the shoulder. No number. I mean, it's generic. I mean, we went and got the very bargain basement. Baller on a budget.

Yeah. Football. uniform get up. But my pants had the pads. I had the hard pads, the thigh pads, the knee pads. Helmet with the plastic two bar.

The two bar. Oh, yeah. That one, it would bite into your forehead. Oh, yeah. It's just a little too small. Just always biting right into it. And leave a mark. Yeah, like leave that thing right there. They're like Peyton Manning when you got to that. Right. Just like it. Trick-a-treat. I'm Peyton Manning. It's 1982.

Is it, is it cool? seeing people dressing up as you every year for Halloween? I ain't seen that. I mean, every once in a while, they used to have these costumes that they sold when we were racing full time. They had costumes, you know, the kids could buy. And so every once in a while, they would be a parent. They'd send you a picture of their kid, you know, on social media or something.

That was pretty cool. I'll see in somebody's kid trick-or-treating as Dale Earner. is probably going to be my favorite thing that I'll see on social media during this period of time outside of my old family. But yeah, like somebody's kids dressing up like my dad, having never seen him race a lap, and probably not knowing a ton about his career. That's pretty interesting. You talk about the three years in a row. I remember I had a three-year stretch of being Jimmy Johnson. Yeah, and my buddy was Jeff Gordon.

Wow. Yeah. What age were you when this was happening? Uh, probably. Yeah, like this, this year tonight. Tonight. This will be four years in a row. Probably like elementary school.

Yeah. Man, elementary school. Yeah. All right. It's fun time. Yeah. What's the Jimmy Johnson costume consist of? We got like, you know the, like they sell like the jackets, like the leather.

So we, we, we, I got. the Jimmy leather jacket and then my friend got the Jeff Gordon. Just anything? Any blue? I think he was anything. Right. Whatever matched.

Yeah, being in Chicago, he's always cold, so, you know. Get a helmet or you just have none of that. Didn't have a helmet. I got a hat. You were just literally a Jimmy Johnson fan. Yeah,

you were dressed up as a Jimmy Johnson fan. Not Jimmy Johnson. The leather jacket. That seems so Jimmy. Yeah. So, I didn't win any costume contest, so. but you and your friend probably got beat up a lot right oh my gosh

nah we weren't wearing like Kyle Bush or Joey Ligano costumes I feel like you'd be more prone to this next question is coming from Ian what's a good I guess I guess Ian is going on a first date what's a good first date idea that's a good question

well let's weed out the bad ones yeah first all right any family function that would be not good don't take any first date to a family reunion or anything that involves family right yeah wait did you do that

I don't remember oh my it depends how I wonder how old he is I mean like and I know that you're probably not going to know that but like that matters doesn't it let's just assume that he is 25 all right all right

so just got to pick a number damn it we got to finish this well all right 25 if you're asking for first date advice at 25 you got bigger problem wait he's going on his first date with this person not his first date ever i understand that and yet i still stand behind if you're still looking for first date advice at 25 you got issues not everybody is so lucky to marry in such a young age no mike not we weren't all i'm not wrong i'm not wrong on this one you you need to hang you're one of the lucky ones your your blainty prediction doesn't get you to the dating advice uh you're not right about that.

You're one of the lucky ones there, buddy. Let's say, like, 15 or 16. What's the advice? You don't think that's creepy giving him advice, 15, 16-year-old on dating advice? First date? I'd rather he be 25. All right, be 25.

Goodness. Go ahead. This sounds like something that you'd ever even thought about going on a date until you were like almost 30, probably, right? I went on some dates before I was 30. Did you? Yeah, okay. Plenty.

Go ahead. What's your advice to 25-year-old Ian? I can't wait for this. I'm hanging on it. So, Ian, just don't do it in a family function. Family functions are bad, yeah. Oh, man. I think, you know, I think you got to scratch off the Applebee's and all of those, right? Like the chain restaurant. Yeah.

Wouldn't you say? Yeah. All right, let's take them off. Movie theaters. Movie theater's a bad one. Yeah, because, dang, man. You can't talk. You can't get to.

know. All right. Sounds amazing. Mike? Find me a date where you don't have to talk. That's it. Mike married her right away. Took her to the movie.

She never said a word. I married her. I went to the movies looking for her. I think that, I think a good first date, man, is like picnic, right? What do we do? Go to a park. A picnic. Go for, hey, go for a walk.

go to the park, you know, take some food. Play bingo. Go to Shoney's on Wednesday nights. Nope. We took the chain restaurant to off, Mike. So, okay, in Mike's case. Go knit a crochet. In Mike's case, we'll take off.

They are Nana. All right, go ahead. No shonis or no dinnies in Mike's case. Okay, so a picnic and, you know. I mean, I'm seriously. dude you can sit down in a park it's an easy neutral spot conversation needs to happen you can ask each other what they like what they don't like um going for a walk is a great place to and do those type of things the first date doesn't have to be this like the actual location is not that important right it's really

what happens like you got to get to know this person don't take them to a part party. Don't take them for don't take them to the bar for drinks. Yeah, I think the bar for drinks would be Alex, you're in trouble. Good. You just took out basically Alex's entire social life. Yeah. That's it.

I would take, if I was looking for a girl that liked to go to the bar for drinks, then I'd take her to the bar for drinks. Yeah, okay. Alex Thames would be the best person. But I ain't looking for that girl. We're looking for. That's true. My go to is it just an activity?

like mini golf or anything like that where you can kind of get them out of their like stiff, you know, first day is stiff. So I actually don't like dinner on the first day because you're sitting down at stiff. They're usually self-conscious about what they're eating in front of you. So usually an activity. That's a good call.

So afternoon? Afternoon's great, yeah. Something kind of like off the beaten path from like every other person that does. Interesting. I like it. I like that too. We'll go with that.

Well, you got any advice, Mike? No, I like what Alex said. You like the mini golf? Yeah, that's a great idea, actually. Yeah. All right. What if, like, are you supposed to let them win? No, you got to.

Oh, no, no. You cannot lose. You can't lose. No. You can't lose. Now you're nervous. Yeah. Now you're feeling some pressure.

Yeah. They like that competitive side, though. If they don't, then they're not the one. Took her to minigolf and figured out that she just wasn't the one. Alex. This is just not going to work out. You mean you can't hit that windmill? What the hell's wrong with you?

God. You have a windmill? I had her by six strokes and she didn't get a shit. He wasn't competitive enough. Take her bowling. She picked a red ball. I like, what are you thinking, lady? I don't mind bowling.

Bowling's good. Yeah, bowling's a good spot. Yeah, because that's, you can. You can dominate a girl at bowl. The other thing with bowling is you can take your time. Does it help your cause if you ask for the bumpers? Yeah, no. I think that's a deal with.

You're going gutters or nothing. Bowling's a time-consuming and take your time, conversational kind of thing. Well, Tiff's here. We haven't even asked Tiff. Like Tiff, first date. Come get on a mic. She's coming over. Oh, yeah, she's going into that.

She's probably going to give the best answer and we're all going to be okay. Activity is good. I'm with you guys on that one. Although all this talk about dominating your state on the activity is ridiculous. Okay. Yeah. Do you remember where Doug Powers took you? Actually, I think we went to a Panthers game because I was a Panthers fan and they were playing the Colts.

I've seen sporting event on the do not list, but that was good? Yeah, it was good. Because you can talk or not. All right. Like, if it would have been awkward, we would have just watched the game, but you can talk on the way to the game. You can talk during the game. Like football, you know, there's plenty of breaks.

Yeah, good point. Okay, so sporting events. If you were competing against Doug in an activity, would you want to... Like, sporting events is good for me, but we also knew each other before that. So, like, he knew that wasn't going to be something I did. He knew you were a Panthers fan? Yeah. Gotcha.

Yep. But, like, if y'all were competing, do y'all get a competition? competitive with each other. Absolutely. And so if he would have taken you to mini golf and you would have beat him, would you have. Fine. I would have not assumed anything was wrong with that.

No, I know. I'm more concerned about what he thinks about the... He would have been sad. Yeah. Right. Can't see her anymore. My show and way home. Oh, man.

All right. What a good question. Who's that, Ian? We sit there and picked his life apart Don't even know him And then it ends up being a really good question Sorry All right

There's a few options Anyways What do we got time for one more Tim's? Oh yeah One more Let's see Let's find a good one This is from Jordan

You know you're on the road a lot Obviously working for NBC Being a driver Part-time driver Best travel tip for for just being out and about so much. Best travel tip. Yeah.

Like what's my, what's, okay, um, what are, I mean, I'm just going to go to what, what do I, what do I,

what do I, what do I, what do I, what, is that, is that helpful or no? Best travel tip. Like a travel hack? Yeah.

Yeah. I mean, no, I ain't got to travel hacks. Everything's already done. I mean, I don't, I don't, I don't got a hack. It's just,

just go yeah yeah i mean uh help me out mike i'm trying to think myself i mean um travel tips i mean like listen i don't know that anybody in racing is the best person to ask that question to and that's that's that's not a bad question i got a question all right go you all right yeah so traveling we use it we use different apps right um what is i think i could completely, I could be completely wrong, but I think that there are better apps than others in terms of GPS. Okay. Yeah.

And I got, I've met some people that, I'm a ways guy. And so, and I met some people that aren't. I don't like that one. You don't like that one. Yeah. That was a whole thing in Pennsylvania. Now that I remember, you were all, you know, me and you were in.

Picking us apart because. I didn't like Waze and you did. In Pennsylvania? Yeah, when we were going to the Kyle Larson event. Remember, we were driving an hour from the airport? So, you know, that to me, I think I'm particular about Ways. Ways for me is, you know, when I look at, when I compare the apps, say I'm going to drive somewhere, right?

And I look at all the alternate routes. Waze gives me the quicker route than I see even the built-in apps on my phone will give me. It is also I take this one particular drive quite often It's about a four About a three and a half hour drive And there's always The potential for this 45 minute delay

On this trip And all these other apps won't steer me around it But Waze always does Ways is like hey man You're going to get off this really shady exit And you're going to go down this back's road And you're going to be you know It's going to be one lane between two rocks

And it's going to be kind of weird but it's going to be much faster. And you're like, all right, the other ones won't even approach, you know, sending you there. We were driving to Bristol for the Xfinity race this year, and I ended up on a road where we literally were, there was something delaying the two-lane road, the highway, and everybody was taking this back road. And it was literally room for one car to go through this sort of 50-foot span where it was just rock walls down both sides.

and it's like touching the mirrors of the truck. And we drove through, then like three cars would drive through the other direction. This was like this process. And had I not been using Waze, I would have been sitting in line on the highway, right? And so, Waze. That's a good travel to right there.

Yeah. I use Apple Maps. It's hit her mess. See, I think Ways is better. Yeah. Yeah. I mean. If you would have been on a first date years ago

and she used, didn't use Waze. It would have been the deal. I was going down this, I was going down a five-lane road. And over this bridge, there was an accident. I knew the accident was there.

I'm about a mile away. I can see the traffic. Waze is like, get your ass in the right lane. That's the, it's all, it's all funneling down to this lane is the open lane. Your Apple's going to be like,

hey, traffic, crash. Yeah. Good look. Waze is like, you know what? There's an accident and it is blocking the four lanes and you need to be in the right lane. And, you know, that's helpful. Here's a question. Do you guys have the audible Siri instructions or whatever it is on or you mute?

I have it on. See, that's the thing. I would actually consider going to a different one. That lady talks too much. Yeah. What? It like interrupts your music. What?

Interrupts a lot, right? It's like, turn right on Shepard Boulevard. And it's like, then you got to wait. All right, now that you're on Shepard Boulevard, turn right. And it's just like, what are you? Are we married or something? And you didn't tell me? I mean, like, God, shut up.

Sometimes the only update is to continue on the road. I have right. I don't need to know to continue going straight. I have that turned off as well. Yeah. I don't have anybody telling me, I've got it on the screen. I can see it. Yeah, I can see it.

I can see it. I thought you meant Siri in general. Oh, no. No, no, just the map instructions. You had Siri on or off in general. I off. God. Somebody's wrong.

Wait, what do you mean Siri on or off? You got, hey, Siri turned on. Oh, I'm pretty sure I do. The fact that you don't know. Hey, Siri. Nope. No. No.

I guess I thought I did. I do. Because, I mean, I use it all the time for calling people. Like my wife or my sister or whatever, right? I don't use it any other reason. But I'm all, every time I get in my truck, my mind goes, it's time to call somebody. It's time I need to talk. I never set down to go over things, right?

Like Tony Mayoff manages all the requests that come in for my schedule and all that stuff. And he's sending me email after email. Hey man, I need you to tell me, are you okay doing this appearance? Are you okay going here and doing this? And I never answer them. get in the car, go, hey, Siri, call Tony. And now I'll say, hey, Tony, go through those emails. Let's talk about it.

I thought you'd say, hey, Siri, say no. Siri's calling him right there. She was just calling him. He was just calling him. Butt dial. But dial. Anyways. I, um, I, um, we got off the, the road hack, but, um, the one, the first thing I was

thinking of was like, what can I not do without? and it's probably, you know, obviously my Spotify playlists. Yeah. Yeah. Good music on the road. And man, I'll be driving down the road in my suburban with my kids in the back and Amy. And Amy will be like, she'll just reach over and turn it down. And I'm like, don't you hate that?

Yeah, I get the same way. It's like even when the music's at a comfortable talking. volume and someone turns it down oh i take it personally she don't say nothing she just reaches over and goes yeah and i'm like hmm hmm i mean that yeah i'm the same way i'm biting my lip i'm grinding my gears for like 50 miles i'm like i can't believe that can't believe i'm with you on that and i'll take it a step further if you touch the temperature dial without asking yeah like that that that's a pet peeve of mine yeah god don't i have to have it on auto and sink, right?

So both sides are on the same tent and both sides. And Amy will be like, bust it all up and I'm like, dude, it's gonna be fine. Like I've got it on, you know, synced up on auto. It's gonna cool us to 68.

We're gonna be great. Whatever, right, 72. And she's like, crank it up, I'm cold. Crank it down. I'm hot. And it's like, it's blowing like loud all the time.

And I'm like, you know if you just put it on auto. it'll give you the perfect amount. That's right. You know what I do before we get in the car for the long drive to avoid the volume? I get into the radio before the kids and Amy get in the car and I push all of the noise up into my speaker in my corner of the dash.

So I turn all the room speakers off and Amy's. And so she'll have it turned. I'll turn it up and it'll be sounding. perfect for her, but it's really good and loud for me. And she has yet to say, man, is my speaker broke or, you know. You know what that sounds like? That sounds like a travel hack.

That is his advice on his travel hack. Here's what you do. You turn all the speakers off. We walked all the way around that mountain to get to the hat. That's a good one, though. Yeah, if you're annoyed by your wife turning the sound down, before she gets in the car, adjust it all to your speakers. Man, travel hacks, standing advice.

That was good as to you. Yeah, all right. All right, it's time for the white flag. The Cars Tour season finale is this weekend. It is at Carraway Speedway. Carson Quaple, Butterbean, Queen. They're going for the championship in the Car's late model stock tour. Also, make sure you tune in.

The pros will be racing as well to close out their year. You don't want to miss it. Saturday, November 4, starting at 1.30 p.m. Only on Flow Racing. Also, I'm going to be racing in the South Carolina 400 at Florence Motor Speedway on November the 18th in a second JR Motorsports entry, sponsored by Bass Pro Shops. Me and Carson will have dueling Bass Pro Shop cars. It's going to be a lot of fun. Dirty Mo Media, make sure you tune into all of our shows this week.

Door bumper clear, actions detrimental, and Speed Street. We had a great conversation with Jamie McMurray yesterday. And if you missed yesterday's Dirty Mo Live, you can catch the full. replay on our YouTube, Andrew, Travis, and Dalton. They had some very special guests join them. So you want to check that out. And finally, Dirty Mo Doe, we'll be out later today. They've got you covered when it comes to the best bets for the season finale in Phoenix.

So have a great week. And let's all go to Phoenix and have a great time closing this year out. We'll see you. Check out Dirtymo Media on Twitter, Facebook, TikTok, and Instagram.