The Dale Jr. Download - 509 - Kevin Harvick - The Closer's Last Ride

Episode Date: November 8, 2023

Kevin Harvick steps out of the driver’s seat and into the Bojangles Studio to join Dale Earnhardt Jr. on this episode of the Download. Fresh off his last start as a full-time Cup competitor, Kevin returns to the show to discuss his retirement weekend with Dale and co-host Mike Davis. Although he’s developed a reputation for being a stern personality, Kevin explains the overwhelming emotion he felt throughout the race weekend in Phoenix. They also chat about the things that Kevin thought he would miss about being behind the wheel and some of the advice he received from fellow retirees. While he may be absent from the starting grid next year, Kevin will still be a prominent member of the sport both as a broadcaster, a racing dad, and a series owner. Dale and Kevin examine the transition from racer to commentator and what to look forward to in the Fox Sports booth next year. Kevin also highlights ways he hopes to impart knowledge to up-and-coming drivers through Kevin Harvick Inc. Management and being a car and series owner for the CARS Tour. Finally, Kevin touches on prepping his son Keelan for a long racing career to help continue the Harvick racing legacy, which has spanned the last 30 years. Check out Dirty Mo Media on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@DirtyMoMedia  Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Hey everybody, it's Dale Jr. And it's Wednesday, and it's time for our guest segment. Before we start to show, I just wanted to say a big thanks to Bojangles. Bojangles, obviously a big part of our family here at Dirty Mo Media. They sponsor the studio, the Bojangles studio, and do a lot for us here. We, you know, made this funny commercial years ago. We're about Dirty Rice. Everybody was giving me a hard time about that.

A lot of fun. Actually, I got a promotion right now up till November 22nd where you can get a free regular-sized dirty rice by using the promo code Dale. That's not a mistake. That's intentional that it's dirty rice. You have to place your order at bojangles.com or use their app. But that's promo code Dale for that free dirty rice. I just wanted to give them a shout out, say thank you for what they've done for us all year long

and in years past. at Dirty Mo Media. Also, I want to say specifically for our Wednesday shows, a big shout out to Ally. They sponsor our guest segment all year long, bringing us all of these incredible guests for every show. And we've got another incredible one today, Kevin Harvick, coming on. So big thanks to Ally and everything they've done for us here at Dirty Moe Media. These sponsors help us bring the show to you every week, and we're thankful for them.

So without further ado, let's start the show. It's a production of Dirty Mo Media. There he is. On in here, buddy. Have a seat. Hey, everybody. Glad you tuned in. It's time for another episode of the Dale Jr. Download.

Mike Davis, Dellenhart Jr., the Bojangl Studio. Got a great guest today. Well, how you doing, Rhiz? I'm doing fine right now. This is every week, okay, Bob? buckle in. You died on that hill. Your career died on that hill and you were hardheaded.

I was a bigger idiot. I didn't even think about it. You thought about it and didn't ask it. That makes me the bigger idiot. I think so. Hey, everybody. It's Dale Jr. back again for another episode of the Dale Jr. Download.

It is Wednesday, November the 8th, 2000, 3, episode 509. We only got one more to go. This is presented to you by Xfinity 10G network. I am a customer of Xfinity and we have our get I'll just go ahead and get the guests in here let's just do that let's just do it so Kevin Harvick's here sitting at the table and I wanted to get you in here Kevin

we're going to talk about everything I have a townhouse or not a townhouse I have a vacation house right and so I got Xfinity internet it was what was available right I'll buy some internet it's Xfinity and I've had it for four years, and I've never once had a problem with it. You know, our Xfinity drivers are always saying that in their interviews.

Faster than 10G, right? And it's kind of comical. They get paid every time they see it. Yeah. And so, but it actually really is good stuff. Well, it's, you know, Xfinity is a huge part of our sport. And I think the great part about Xfinity, I do a lot of meet and greets and things with Xfinity. And they bring people that have no clue about racing.

and they've won all these rewards because they do some great rewards programs. And but it's the same way, right? You have a good product and then you have a good promotion and then you have good people. And so it's been fun. And that to me is the rewards program for me is the fun part that I get to do with the meet and greets and meet the people and introduce them to racing. And I love how they tie it all together. Yeah, I do too.

And I love companies that stick around and invest in our sport. boy they have and they do all these other cool things not they're not just like this sort of title sponsor for the Xfinity series and they support other little parts and pieces of our of our business like us here at the Dale Jeter download but Kevin's here Kevin Harvick um we watched you go through this final weekend and you know your wife I talked to your wife you were standing there. We were in your holler. I think it was Thursday or Friday. And so she says, you know, I never seen him emotional. You know, you said after the race, I'm an emotional guy. I just don't show it. Yeah. There's a little clip on the internet of you getting out of the car

and talking to your guys and with your family, right? You had this, this, you spent an hour or more, two hours. Thank you. That was your idea. I figured you'd already planned that. I figured you'd already planned that yeah no it looks similar yeah yeah that's that's why we did it yeah yeah he spent about an hour and a half two hours on pit road just having a couple beers saying saying saying all your whatever's right yeah we saw that emotion again right there that your wife spoke about yeah um she didn't i think she did an interview also sharing with the world you know this guy got really emotional there was this dinner that y'all went to you got up to speak and you could hardly get through it yeah um your when you know what was what was that like for you we have we have seen you sort of be this

rigid very yeah you know sort of you got a hard shale right you know what i mean yeah and i think i think for for me it was um it was this the last week was just extremely difficult right and and i know you've been through this and but that last week of of knowing that there's um there's an end point to everything that is happening is different than every other week because there's always a next week. And when you have that end and you know it's coming to an end, it's like, oh man, it's actually coming to an end. And then you start to think about things. And then you start to realize how much you care about the people and how much does, you know, all those moments have meant. And knowing that they've got to make decisions in their life that they've depended on you for

for a number of years. And really from the very beginning, it's been that way, right? The people depend on you. And we went through it in a, in a, just a, you know, very awkward situation in 2001 to have to realize that the people depend on you to go forward. And with RCR, it was that way with your dad's death and then having to get in the car and drive and knowing that you needed to do that because they had to, those people needed a job. and they needed to eat and the company needed to go forward. But you go back and you start thinking about all those things and all the great moments.

And it's really, it's an emotion of happiness and fulfillment of all the things that you've done. But all of a sudden, all these things are just pouring on top of you of all these things that you've been through with these people week after week after week. And it's not just the people on your team, but for that last week of the season, for me it was about, those people on your team because I I care about the people because those people are what

make it make it all go around and they've sacrificed time and you know relationships and everything that they do so that car could go fast around the racetrack and I I just appreciate that and I appreciate the things that go with the sacrifices that it makes because we've all made sacrifices and then you get around a group of people that are making those same sacrifices for you And it's just, you know, just it got me time after time. And it was whether it was the guys and gals on your team or it was something about your kids or something about a moment or standing in the driver's meeting and everybody's standing up and clapping for you.

How hard was that? That was difficult. That's amazing. Yeah, they got me. They got me on that one too. What moments did we miss? What moments happened that we didn't see? Yeah, well, it was the kids on the radio.

You know, I mean, that, that. Did you know that was coming? I didn't know any of that stuff. Oh, my gosh. Yeah, so I'm sitting in the car and I'm like, all right, I'm finally in the car. Here comes my kids. Here comes my kids on the radio. Oh, my God.

Warming tires up, crying, trying to figure out, trying to figure out, you know, how you're going to get to pit road speed and do all those things. And it's, you know, you just, I had a lot of advice, whether it was from you or Tony or Dale Jared. or Mark Martin or whoever it was, Joe Girardi, I had a lot of great advice of how we should go about the last year. And I wouldn't have ever tried to plan it that way because it was a lot of work. But man, it brought back so many great stories and so many great memories.

And, you know, to walk out of that garage with, you know, the respect of your competitors and teams and crew chiefs and people. I mean, there's nothing better. I mean, there's not a race win in the world that you will top that standing ovation in the driver's meeting knowing that your that your people that you work with respect you and and to me that's that's really all you have right it's it's you know the respect to the people and i just uh you know i appreciate it and i'm a lot like you i love the sport and now you're trying to figure out what what do you do and what's your

responsibility of of making sure that that the sport has what it needs going forward because it gave me so much now it's like all right How do I make sure that I give back enough to help the next generation of people that are coming along? Yeah. You know, you were teammates with Burton. Burton has done such an amazing job of doing exactly that, right? He gets out of the race car, and he had already sort of become the shepherd of safety in a way as a race car driver, leading the conversations and pushing for improvements and change.

and then when he got out of the car, he continues to take more and more responsibilities on that are even outside of his broadcasting responsibilities. You talked about it yourself. You want to be at the Drivers Council meetings. You want to be in the conversations between competition, owners, NASCAR, networks. You want to have, you know, knowledge of every, you know,

working piece so that you can continue not only as a broadcaster to do a great job, but also you want to make sure the sport is going in the right direction, but helping influence those decisions. Yeah, I think obviously going forward, for me, the broadcasting pieces is super important. I think as you take that responsibility on, as you know, it's a big responsibility because you're telling the story of what you see. and but I think that relationship with the with the competitors and the drivers and

and being able to walk in those haulers and talk to the crew chiefs or the drivers and not even think twice about it like I have no problem walking up to the back of Joey Lugano's hauler and walking in and walking right up in their lounge and saying hey what's going on fellas and but I think with that and I go back to when you look back at somebody like John Madden and you look at what he could do in the booth but what he could do with the NFL and what he could do for the players and what he could do on the marketing side and I think that's important to be able to try to take what you've taken from the sport and now try to take that and share it and build on it and be able to help build other brands with drivers and I think

as Jeff and I and many others have gone through the whole driver council thing, it's very apparent that there's a lot of questions and a lot of unanswered questions for our drivers as they go forward because it's just become such a machine of, okay, get in the car, drive, you're 12, let's race late models, let's race trucks, let's race Xfinity, and here you are in Cup. And most of them had no idea why they even sat in their seat. They were just given a seat. They had no idea why they wore the suits that they wore. You know, guys, Kurt got hurt, and next thing you know, we've got concussions, and they don't know why they had the foam around their head and, you know, what it meant.

And so that educating process has been a little lax over the last 15 years, 20 years, of what the drivers need to know about the sport. And I feel like, you know, there's some low-hanging fruit there that we can help teach these guys what they need to know and help them be the rock stars that they need to be. And, you know, we've gotten, everything's been so much about money and finances and, you know, how much it costs that we've kind of lost sight of how badass the guys are that are driving the cars. And I want to, I want to be a part of helping those guys build their brands up and become the rock stars that they should be. Yeah. Well, talk more about, you know, the broadcasting

and all that, but I want to drop back a little bit to the emotions that you had. You talked about the team and all of those things, and that certainly is part of it, but you also be a little selfish for a minute, right? Talk about how that felt to realize that, man, you've been a race car driver your whole life, right? You'll always be a race car driver. That's not changing, but you're, you're. Being a full-time cup driver is a lifestyle, right? It is, you're that thing every minute of the day.

And so you always knew you were going to be that every week. You know, and you were finally getting in that car and making that decision that you were not going to be that anymore. Yeah. You know, and there's a lot of things that you'll, you, what, you know, there's a lot of thing, what did you start to realize that you were going to miss? You know, I used to hate practice. And that last year I went, I started, you know, that whole last year, I was like, I'm going to f*** practice.

Yeah. I can't believe I'm going to miss practice. This is actually one of the parts I'm going to miss. And when I got down to that last race, even though, you know, you'd run all these races and be like so frustrated with the car or the balance. this ain't happening and this is not working and you're just a miserable individual even when things are great you get this little miserable part of you always living inside um but that last race i was like man i'm never going to run the wall at homestead again we were at homestead yeah for that last race i'm like damn i'm gonna i want to do this more i'm not ready to stop doing this right so like

what are some of those things that happened about you you know that that Kevin harvick was starting to have to come to terms with, you know, those difficult things. I think the, aside from getting out of the car for the last time, you know, on pit road and seeing your guys, I mean, that, that, it's been the same, right? You get out of the car and you look at the guys and you talk about what just happened and you put your hat and your sunglasses on and walk off. And, you know, the last time you just, you know, you're not, I'm not getting out of the car anymore and I'm not going to see cheddar to, to, to complain about what just happened or what went

good or whatever it was and we had such a routine that was that was so simple um you know i think one of the i think the coolest thing for me in the last race was was being able to lead and i did look to the right and just say i know they're cheering and you know i know they're i know they're happy and and i know it's it's it's a moment that i didn't know what was going to happen the rest of the race so i i did look up there and say mm that's pretty cool and i am going to miss that because i love doing things that that people don't really think you should do. And, you know, I don't know that people expected us to go out and do the last year the way that we did it.

But I wanted to do it better. And I wanted to tell a story for 30 years of racing. But, you know, I think that competitive side of leading laps and having the crowd cheer and knowing that you're giving somebody something to cheer about is something. I'll miss that side of it. But I think the thing that I will miss the most is the thing that I'm happiest to get rid of. And that's the competition mindset. Why are you happy to get rid of that?

I just, because it consumes you. It makes you happy, but it also makes you mad and miserable, right? It's that competitive mindset to be good is 24-7. You know, it's answering that text while you're sitting in the middle of dinner. it's going to that appearance that wasn't scheduled it's it's meeting it's meeting the five extra people at the motor home that that is 15 minutes before qualifying instead of instead of an hour you know it's just all those things that that that you think you don't like but keep you going because it's that fast-paced lifestyle but the competitive mindset for for me that's the miserable

side of it the good side of it is I love sitting there with rodney saying well what do you think was wrong with the car. Well, did we, were the spring stiff? Were the spring's soft? Were the, you know, did we try something different? What was the arrow side of it? And sitting there and just having those conversations with Rodney and the engineers and sitting in the competition meetings and hearing what your, what your teammates have to say. But it's also, that's the thing that consumes you constantly. Like right now, as I got out of that car and I came home yesterday and I sat there and I was driving up this morning. Usually I sit in my truck and I'm like, oh, you know, we need to probably do this. And at this point of the year, you're thinking about,

okay, well, this guy quit or that guy's here. You know, we got to make the cars better. So what do we need to do? I need to go dig into the engineering side of it or the arrow side of it or whatever it is and see where Rodney's head is at on what you're thinking about. So you have this, you have this constant thought process that has happened for, you know, 30 years. It's a routine. Yeah, it's a routine. But it's a, but it's, it's, also the thing that Ricky Carmichael texted me this morning and said, well, how's it feel to not have to worry about racing for a championship next year and worry about everything that comes with it? That's a relief. I mean, it's a relief, but it's the thing that I love

the most. So it's like an addiction. That's interesting because a lot of people, and I was even going to ask you, what were you worried or concerned that you weren't going to be able to replace that always being on a 10, right? Like always being on the edge of competition. And a lot of people, at least that have sat at this table, when they struggle, it's because that they've lost that competitive opportunity. But here it is, you're bringing up a very interesting, and I think real point, by the way, I think it makes perfect sense. Sometimes it's exhausting to be that way all the time. Well, the other thing is, too, there's very few that get out of the car that got out by choice. That's right. And so it's just a, you're building to this whole process to

the end and you know it's the end a lot of guys get to the end and they don't know where they're going what they're doing some retire because most of them retire because of the fact that they don't have a ride and then all of a sudden they unretire because they have a ride again right you know it seems it seems like the right thing to do and and i think that's that's one thing that mark martin was very clear on and you know he had the retirement tour and then unretired and he had several and raced and race several more years he's like kevin just just just make sure that you're you race until you know 100% that you're done. And, you know, I think it's, it's, Joe Girardi said the same thing. He said, Kevin, make sure you take that jersey off for yourself.

Don't let them take it off for you. And I think for me, that really hit home. And that was, you know, Joe told me that five or six years ago when I first started, started thinking about all this. And Mark was probably, you know, four or five years ago as well. But, you know, I think for, for me, I'm very satisfied with being able to close that. that chapter myself and say, hey, here's how I want to go out the last year. We want to tell a story for 30 years of racing and reintroduce the fans to the things that you've done because a lot of people don't even, a lot of people don't know who Dale Earnhardt senior is.

They only know Dale Earnhardt as Dale Earnhardt Jr. Right? And that's just the natural progression of sports in general, right? You have these generations. Yeah. Yeah. And so for me, it was like, okay, well, we need to go back and reintroduce the 29 car and we need to go back and show some of the old late models and how you came up and so that was

really something that we tried to do was tell a story for 30 years make sure you you've fulfilled that that competition itch of the for me it's the competitive mindset and how do we do it by being as competitive as possible last year because I didn't want to go out and run last so we only did that once this year we ran last at Bristol but that was really the only time that we just absolutely suck so bad that it was embarrassing but you know nobody remember I know. I remember how you were after that. Yeah. But that's that that miserable, that's that miserable mindset that you, that you live in. And it's not miserable because I enjoyed it. But it is, it's miserable for the people around you that, that are with you every day. And I think for,

for me, being able to just get to the end and say, all right, that's the end. Now we're going to go do these other things. But man, there is a lot that consumes your, your mind when you, when you do it right. Xfinity rewards is the place for Xfinity customers to get incredible NASCAR experiences this season. It's true. I even got to surprise Bridget an Xfinity Rewards member with Hot Laps around Charlotte. It was a lot of fun. She thought she was going to just get a pit crew experience, right? And we surprised her with some laps around the racetrack in the car, man.

That was a lot of fun. Yeah, that was cool. So you can check out the full video now with our friends at Xfinity Racing on social media and check out Xfinity rewards anytime at Xfinity. at exfinity.com slash rewards. So do you keep your bus? You're going to keep your bus for TV? So here's the thing.

So this whole process, the planning process, has probably been happening for about three years. So I got rid of my bus, and we have a motorhome that I feel like I can drive. So I don't have to deal with all the bells and whistles of the super over-the-top bus. So whether it's financial, buses, businesses, everything has been functioning and planned over the last few years. So we kind of, we downgraded the bus to dumb it down so I could hopefully sit behind the wheel and get it from point A to point B and get the slides out.

Wait, wait. So you're going to drive your bus to... Some point. Work. No, no, not to work. But I want to be able to, when I'm done, June 9th, not that I'm looking forward to that. but June 9th when I run when we run the last cup race at Sonoma. Yeah.

I mean, then I got to figure out what I'm going to do. So I want to be able to drive everybody in the motorhome to go somewhere. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. And just what kind do you get? I don't know. I got a king air. It's a, the bus is called king air? Yeah, it's king air.

Does it also double as an airplane? No, I don't have an airplane. I haven't had an airplane. I haven't had an airplane for six or seven years. Yeah. You got rid of that. Yeah, I've just been on the rental plan. So you've got a bus that you can now drive.

I call it a motor home. You got a motor home that now you can drive. It's interesting because I've been, you know what Kelly and LW have, that one LW drive? You drive to all dirt track races for Wyatt. I've been looking at one of those for me and Amy and the girls because it's got bunks at places for them.

Same for you. I want to be able to drive it. I want to take them places and us. go vacation and stuff during the first half of year. And so for me, that's like a huge hurdle, just gaining the confidence to say, we're doing it. All right. You guys ready?

Let's get in the motor home. I feel like I can dump the tank. And I feel like I can close the slides and we can drive down the road. Because for me, it's all about getting over the hurdle of the confidence to actually go do it. I had no problem walking in the garage and driving the car fast and doing all those things and pointing fingers and telling them what to do. But the simple things that somebody, you've never. It has done for me for 25 years.

You're not being able to do. I want to do those things. And for me, it's all about the first hurdle of making the first trip and getting over the fact that I'm worried about it might break down on the road. What do I do if it breaks down? All those things. This motor home will go to some events at work. Yeah. Yeah.

That's what you were asking, which is I think it's – I just curious. I think you're leading to something that's pretty intriguing. How are you going to change your lifestyle now that racing's over? and as you transfer to It's already done. You're already done. Have you downsized anything?

Everything. Everything you've downsized. Everything has been everything. I wanted to, we wanted to live the last two years and try to fit that in the window of saying here's the budget that we will have and here's what we need to do

and here's the things that you need to change along the way so it wasn't culture shock. And what did you learn to this process? I spent too much money. You didn't need all the stuff that you thought you needed. Yeah, and I think for us, we'll do exactly, we're going to treat it exactly like I did when I went from RCR to SHR. So we're going to change houses and then we'll purge everything and then you'll just start over. And that's just the way that we did it because it was so refreshing to have all those changes, go through all of your stuff and just feel like you have.

Like you know where everything's at because I went through, it's the last time that I knew where everything was at because we moved our houses. We moved our race shops. And I want to do that again. I want to move everything again so that I can say I know where my Dale Earnhardt Jr. Diakast is or whatever that is, right? I want to know what my memorabilia collection is. I want to know where all those things are. And I want to know exactly what it's worth.

I want to know exactly what I spend. And I want to know exactly where everything is. and what am I working towards? And I just need a goal. Just tell me what I'm working towards. Like, well, how much money do I need to make? Or can we just live off the retirement account or whatever that is?

But it's all there. It's all been put into place over the last few years. So you'll work the first half of the year for Fox, presumably having the second half of the year off. You're a planner. So what's the second half of the year look like? Yeah, so right now, I'm going to take Delano on vacation this week after the last race.

We're going to go to Fayetteville. We're going to race dirt with Keelan. Is Keelan going to Florence in a couple of weeks? He is. Yeah. Oh, wow. I'll see you there. Yeah.

Yep. So we're going to get Rodney and Josh tuned up and let them race. So they're going to go race the late model three weeks in a row just to get their relationship. I really want to see them. knock things out out of the park as we know how hard that's going to be. So we're probably going to run a couple late model stocks next year full time. And then we're going to have the super late model. Ryan Priest is headed to the snowball derby with our super late model to run its first race.

Tag up. But through this process of the car store stuff, it's just kind of rekindled the fire to say, man, I like the race cars in my shop. And I just, I like the simplicity of. Where is the shop in a, what, is this, is this a shop that's going to be the shop for a while? I'm not sure. Is this shop close to the house? The shop is somewhat, it's centrally located.

Okay. It's right outside of Charlotte. You get to. Yeah. Okay. The big question, are you going to drive anything next year? I'm not sure yet. The door's open.

The door's open. Yeah. Yeah. I'm not going to drive cup ever again. Ever again. Never again. That's the way I feel. I just, I can't be competitive.

I can't make myself go there and say, I'm looking for a top 30 today. Yeah. What is your, what is your? That's what it would be. I'm telling you. I hear you. You'd be lucky to run 30th. Damn right.

That's why I'm surprised at human. What is your, what is your responsibilities manufacturing wise? I don't have any. No ties to anything. Nothing. No, because the late model teams in my mind were an asset for KHI management. So KHI management will still function with the driver representation, sponsors, all the things that we do. To me, as I went to all these late model races, I'm like, man, it's tough seeing your guys go get in cars and do things that you don't know anything about.

So the theory is, okay, we're going to have the late model teams, the supers, and the late model stocks so that our clients can get in the cars and we'll use the cars for our clients or special events like you did with Larson if we need to put. a Ford driver or a Toyota driver and a car is to a race, that's what we're going to do. We're going to take the nose off and we're going to put a Toyota on it or we'll put a Ford on it. And I'll be the guy that says, well, Dale can't do that. I can do that. And we'll put him in our car and send them out to the race to put on good shows. So we're going to use it for the clients. I think I want to, I don't know.

I think I want to drive something, but I'm not sure what. Yeah. Yeah. So what piques your interest? I mean, is it? So when I, you know, do you look at like, you know, sports cars and never go, man, I've never done that or like dirt racing? It's going to be.

It's going to be grassroots. It's going to be grassroots or just something that's fun. Would you ever, I mean, I know it's so fucking early, ma'am. I'm sorry. I almost feel bad. No, don't ask me because I've been thinking about it too. So maybe you can help me. A truck or an Xfinity car.

down the road man you had so much success you never look as miserable in the Xfinity cars as you did the cup cars yeah I know I think I think that's something I'd have to lean on somebody like you to say okay is that worth doing

yeah is it do you have fun in the Xfinity races yeah you know I'll say what you like about it so this is what I love about it so when you will not you will not feel this way the first year maybe not the second year because you're so fresh out of the seat, all of the things that you know that are going on inside the car, you'll recognize it immediately when you're sitting in the booth, right?

You'll go, this guy did this. I just saw him do this. I know why he chose that. All of the, you'll be able to tell us everything that is happening inside that car and in the brain of the driver. But after year three, four, five, a lot of those little tiny details that only you can tell us in that booth, you sort of get distance from and you forget, you know, if you don't write it down, have it in your notes, you'll kind of forget some of the bells and whistles,

the smells, the sounds, the anxieties, or whatever's. And so when I race in the, when I race that car in the Xfinity series, I really only want to do one. I don't want to do five. Yeah. Two, three. None of that sounds better than one. One's plenty. But it's a reminder. I get in there and I go, damn, yeah. Oh, I forgot. You know, and I'm driving it and all these things are happening. And it just is a reminder of multiple things that a driver considers, thinks, deals with. And it just sort of keeps my, you know, my thoughts about what a driver's going through in the car fresh. To your point about making them rock stars or telling people how they are rock stars. They're damn good at it.

I get in that Xfinity car and I'm like, I'm reminded immediately, these guys are no joke. Yeah. Right. And you imagine the leap to the cup level, right, of just talent, how hard they race. They're doing it every single week. And all of a sudden you jump on that escalator and you're like, holy shit. These freaking guys know where they're going. Right.

I've got to figure this out. You know, and so I love that it reminds me of just how good they are because we forget to tell people that. Yeah. You know, you get down the road and you're like, man, I haven't said that these are the best race car drivers in the world in a long time. I should be saying that more often. Yeah, and I think that's something that, I think the Xfinity stuff would be something that I would need to, I want to just make sure that I do a really good job for Fox.

Sure. Until I get done with that. Yeah. And then once I get done in June, then I can say, yeah, maybe we. We can fit this in. Yeah, maybe we can fit this in. And this looks like a good weekend, and we can go do it. So I think I could race the super late model during the week

because they have a lot of Tuesday night. races and Thursday night races and I think that's something that I want to do. But I need to go drive it first and that's part of just like you. When you walk by it every day, you're like, well, screw it, I'm going to go race it. Because, just because, and just because that's what I want to do. And I think that, I think that would be fun, but I want to pick the right one. And I don't, I don't necessarily like the way you do it. It's too stressful watching.

What do you mean? Qualifying. Dude, it's, it's terrible. Yeah. Well, let me tell you, I mean, is Dale's talking? I've got a theory. I don't ever recall him being as nervous when he was racing. I've never ever had to do it this way.

And he's now, he is so super nervous before late model races and it's qualifying. It's all qualifying. I make the show. And then even the Xfinity series races, I mean, he's a ball of nerves before it. And I almost wonder if almost subconsciously he's, that's also part of the things he's embracing about it. Because it's been a long time that you guys have felt the way you did back when you had to earn your way to the race, right? Yeah.

And I wonder if that's also part of it. Maybe it's not the most enjoyable part, but I think that there's something to that where you got, you're diving into the deep end and you're embracing the nerves and all that go into it. Yeah. It'd be interesting to see if that happens with you. Yeah.

I'm not going to do it that way. No way. How would you get a brave, man. It's by the rules. I know, but there's got to be a car you can drive that's locked in. Oh, of course. Yeah. Wait, wait, you're not going to play like the cars tour owner card, are you?

And just say, look, this is. No, he's talking about it. I'm talking about Xfinity. Oh, no, no, no. Dude, the problem with me is I didn't really think it through. Yeah. And so when I got there, I was like, oh, shit. You know, I got to go first. Right. You know, oh, haven't twice. I called. Oh, trust me, I watched both times. You want to know who I called about Homestead? Who I, who, what driver in the field do you think I called to ask for advice on qualifying for Homestead? Timmy Hill. Really? I said, Timmy Hill, I'm going out first.

Tell me what the hell I need to know. Oh, my goodness. I don't understand why Timmy Hill. He always has to qualify in that top three. Oh, that's right. Right, he's always one of the first guys. I was like, I need to know. Like, is there anything unique or something I need to be aware of, right?

And then you pick the hardest one, in my opinion, Bristol. Because everybody shows up at Bristol. Every good short track racer or a lot of them show up at Bristol. Every race the rest of the year, it's like. No big deal. 36 cars are going to start this race. 36 show up. every week and then I choose the race and it's like 41 cars are here and I'm like well

shit now you got to go out qualify like six or eight of them yeah yeah I think I think so the driving piece for for me is is is is still there I don't know what that means yet or what I'm going to race or what that what that exactly consists of won't be a lot I mean it's it's going to be that's I blame everything on you to my wife I'm like well why do we need these late models. I don't know. It's just, it's good for us to know what's going on. What do you need to drive it for? I don't know. Dale says it's fun. You need to drive an Xfinity race. I don't know. Dale looks like he's having fun after qualifying. Why are you doing this? Dale says I have an it. I need to scratch it. I need to scratch it.

But the other thing that that is super intriguing to me is the consulting piece of it for a team. Really? I, yeah, that part, I just, there's something about walking around the shop and walking into the suspension room or an engineering meeting or whatever that is or helping their drivers. So that part is interesting to me just to see if there's a piece out there that fits well with what I do. Because I also believe that that would help you, would help you with that piece of it that you're talking about deteriorating as you sit in a booth when you really are seeing the progression

of what happens and hearing what happens in those meetings and listening to the drivers and not having to experience it. So I really enjoy the chess match of the people and the parts and the pieces and the politics and everything that goes with that competition side. That's interesting. I got done driving in 2017 and I didn't care to drive nothing. But as I've gotten further from it and I start to realize like, man, still healthy.

I'm still pretty sharp. I still feel like I got a little talent. Like I'm, I need to do this. If I got to want, if I want to do it a little bit, I need to do that because if I don't do it at all, when I'm too old, when I'm too over the hill, I'm mad at myself that I didn't go a couple more times. You know, like you, I'll never race a cup car,

no interest, not even zero. Zero. Yeah. That has not changed. But it's like, I'm not, I'm still healthy. I should try to. do a couple. That's a pittal. Yeah. And that team side does a lot for me too.

Yeah. Like I get a lot of satisfaction thinking back to the KHA days and just knowing that you had a big hand in the direction of the vehicles and the people and what they pushed. I agree with that. So that team side has a pretty deep interest for me. And, you know, maybe the, maybe the car piece of it, like before we went to North Wilkesboro, we took the late model stock to carry away a few times. I enjoyed that piece of it.

And it turned out good, right? Because when Lane went and raced there, he ran really fast. And so I don't know. We'll see how that side develops. I said, you know, I get a lot out of the Xfinity races, but honestly, like halfway through the race, I'm kind of like, yeah, I could pull off. And I've done everything I need to do.

Yeah. So if they, like, had a, you know, 150-mile, I'd probably just run that one, you know. But so your foot really was on fire though, right? You didn't just pull out. Yeah, that's funny. He's like, I'm going to make something up here. Boy, they're going to believe every bit of it too.

I'm on fire. Let me ask you another piece that might play into this. Keelan, okay? He's good. He can race. You know, how old is he right now? He turned 11 in July. So, like, tomorrow he'll be 20, right?

Like, they grow up so fast. Do you think that there could be one day you want to race in a race with Keelan? So first, I think it's a balance, right? My friend sitting across the table here reminded me that I needed to make sure that I balanced the things that I got myself into to make sure I wasn't too busy. And my wife reminds me of that constantly that I need to make sure that I have a balance and not just jump into so many things right off the bat that then you're having to back out of them. So that's a huge priority because I feel like some of the things that we've experienced over the last year and a half with Keelan would have been, would have not happened with some of his driving characteristics and mindset and things that went on with the things that we had to deal with with some of his driving wouldn't have happened if I was there dealing with it alongside him. Oh, he had some situations. Did he develop bad habits?

Just bad habits. Yeah, and just thought processes and things that are easily eliminated if you're just standing there, right? And when he comes off the racetrack and you just nip it in the butt right off the track. So there is a responsibility that goes right along with being a dad of trying to help him through all the things that he's going through. As much as I want him to be doing things on his own, there are some things that need to be corrected immediately. He's a kid. Yeah. Yeah. So I don't, I don't, I want to make sure that I'm there as much as possible. And right now it's, it's pretty easy because like when we go to Florence and Southern National to race the late model stock, the legend cars are going to race with him. So I can bring the whole family and we can have fun at the late model track and with the legend car and the light model and all the people. And you can look after the business. You can look after you're with your family, you're with his racing. So it's really, now I just need to sit back and say, okay, how can I design his schedule to, to really?

fit with what I'm doing. And we've already got through February with making sure that it kind of balances out with where I'm going to be. He's going to race his go-kart and his legend car, so he'll do all that in the U.S. next year. So he'll run all the national races, which at the beginning of the year starts off in Homestead. So I can go to those races. And then the the first legend races are at the road course in Charlotte, and then they go to Florida to race at Citrus, which is right down the road from Daytona, so it's easy to manage all that. So really through February, it's pretty manageable. You know, it's just those three or four months that they go do their own thing when we start

to go to the West Coast and you start to travel a little bit further, and the schedules get separated. But it's definitely, you know, a high priority. Piper's jacked up because I didn't get to see her race the first time. You know, when she ran the go cart the first time, I wasn't there. So I get to watch her race the first week of December. Oh, that's so cool. Oh, yeah.

Yeah, so that's, and it's fun for me because I get to see the just, they'd look at it from two totally different angles. It's not even the same. You don't treat them the same. You don't talk the same. Nothing about it is the same. But Keelan is, and really, Keelan's age was kind of one of the reasons. that we kind of ended when I ended the driving career that was one of the the key topics of

when I would end because I feel like from from 12 until 20 I mean those are just if you're going to make it in racing those are really the key years of of the development and the opportunities and everything that we have and his racing is is really one of the biggest reasons that we have the the late model stock teams the super late model teams because I didn't want to have to I didn't I don't ever want to have to the car. I want to develop the driver. I don't want to have to worry about the car. And there's just with more people involved in the situation, it's just hard to understand where everything is at. So his racing has been a huge part of the process of when we ended, why we have the teams, why we kept the management company. All those things had a huge, huge piece of the, it was a

huge piece of the puzzle as we went through all these decisions. So yeah, it's definitely a balance. When you talk about the balance outside, I mean, what else, is there anything in your life that you'll take on outside of, now that you're moving on from, you know, driving a cup car full time, we know you're going to be a broadcaster and you're going to race with Keelan. You've got the cars tour and there's other things. What new thing is Kevin Harbett going to do? Well, the management company is really the kind of the hub of everything that we do because it manages the things I do on the television and it helps with sponsorship. It helps with Keelan. And we started a retail easy-go golf cart store in Morseville. And people are like, why in the world would you quit and start a

retail store? I said, because I've had somebody do something for me for my whole life. And I want to be a part of something that I can make decisions that are quick, that you have to adjust on the fly, the advertising plan, or the order. And I think for me, that was just, you know, a good relationship that we've had with Easy Go, Textron for 12, 13, 14 years, whatever that exact number is. And so we added the golf cart store. We took on a little bit more at the management company because... Meaning just a couple more drivers.

Yeah, so the KHA management. Is it still got, you know, is it still in MMA? Yeah, so we still, Donald, Donald Seroni retired. Yep. Cowboy. He's still got a huge brand. Right? Yes, Cowboy. So he's still got a huge brand and we still do.

What does he do now? He does a lot of movies. Really? Yeah, he does a lot of movies. He'll do seminars and appearances. He races off-road trucks. Yeah. That's new.

Yeah, so he's also a racer. And so Misha Tate is still one of our clients. She's getting ready to fight again in a couple weeks. We just did a next level interview with it. Thanks to KHAI management, I might add. And she was sensational. I mean, I'm just going to tell you that experience. We went out to Vegas.

We were doing a show out there, and Andrew Curlin went out and got some time at the UFC. She was training for this fight, right? Just an amazing. We learned so much, and we are looking forward to putting all that stuff out. You're going to fight? You're going to do some jiu-jitsu or anything? Did you learn anything? I wanted her, I was trying to encourage Andrew to let her choke him out.

Yeah. He wouldn't do it. I did this thing one time. We were in Texas and Johnny Hendricks, he was an M&A fighter. We went to his training facility and we got in the ring and we were just doing whatever. He's like, all right, I want you to choke me out. I'm like, choke you out. He's like, yep, I want you to choke me out.

And those guys, man, they'll get them. I mean, they've got to be conditioned for stuff like that to be, hold on as long as you can before you actually go out. But I choked the shit out of that guy. And you never could get to the point of actually making him choke him out. So it was, yeah, they're different breed. I felt like Misha could get to the point of choking Andrew Curland out, though. Like that quick.

It wouldn't take much because they think it's funny. We were at a, we were at a, we were at a, uh, Anheuser-Bush appearance one year in Shane Carwin. He was a heavyweight UFC fighter, and he was fighting Brock Lesnar, who's a good friend of ours. And so Brock beat him, and we went to this AB appearance, and Josh saw him for the first time. He's like, hey, I want to introduce you to my friend. I want to talk.

You know one of my friends, and he's like, oh, yeah, who? He's like, Brock Lesnar. He's like, oh, I'm thinking of myself. Man, that was really dumb. But later that night, they were at the piano bar. and they were all drunk. And when these guys get drunk, like, it's bad news for everybody who's not around him

because they think knocking each other out is funny and punching each other as hard as they can. It's funny. He said something, and the next thing you know, he said something funny to Josh, and he took his hand, and he just smacked him right in the thigh. And to this day, Josh has this ball on his thigh

in his muscle that is forever damaged by Shane Carwin because of one of his dumb comments. And when he got drunk, Josh couldn't walk. They had to carry him out of the place. Next morning his wife came down. He's like, I'm so sorry when they get drunk. Sometimes they just punch each other and knock each other out.

Sounds like bull riders. Oh, yeah. So that was a good lesson for Josh to think about what you say before you say it. Because sometimes if you say it to the wrong person, it can be detrimental. Yeah. So are you telling me you're going to take on more, you know, be a little more hands-on with the management? Well, that's kind of the plan, especially with the drivers, right? There's just a lot of things that I can help them with that now it's not a big deal, right?

That's not a big deal that I'm racing against Harrison. It's not a big deal that I'm not racing against Josh. I'm not racing against Stenhouse. And so you can walk in there, Traylor, and walk out of the TV booth and you're going to be there the first 18 weeks. So for the management company, that's a big deal because they know I'm going to be there for the first 18 weeks every week. and you know you're going to see it from a perspective of just watching. Yeah. And you're not competing and you're going to be able to help in ways that you couldn't help before.

And so, you know, I think that's a big asset for us from a selling point from the management company because I can be so much more involved. What is interesting to you outside of the booth that's in that vein of, you know, journalism or like podcasting or XM radio? or race hub, you know, what is interesting to you outside of the booth itself? Yeah, so they hit me this weekend with, hey, who do you want to do your first feature on? I kind of had to take a step back. I'm like, first feature. I'm not even done with my last race yet. We're talking about features, but that kind of hit me too of, yeah, this is a reality.

I got to start thinking outside of the box. And they said, well, is there anybody that you don't want to interview? And I'm like, no, there really isn't. And they're like, oh, thank God. Usually we have a list of people that you don't want to interview. And I was like, no, not me. I'll interview any of them. Ask them fun questions, good questions, hard questions.

So it's fun to think about that process of having to sit on the other side of the microphone and interview guys. I enjoyed the radio show when we had it on Sirius. So as far as I know, there's a podcast piece of it that goes with my Fox. contract, you know, to do the broadcasting. So, you know, I think that's, that's definitely something that we will, I'm sure, dive into as we go forward and start to plan and do. But I think it's fun when you get people, and you guys experience it all the time because you do this, but it's fun when you get people outside of that competitive environment where they're not at the racetrack and don't have to deal with all the things that they deal with on a weekly basis. They just, it's a different

conversation. It's a different conversation when you sit them here. And, you're not, you're not, here and they're relaxed and not having to think about how fast their car goes. It's back to that it's back to that same competitive mindset and you get a little piece of that outside of it here. Hey, NASCAR fans, kick your online experience into higher gear with the Xfinity 10G network. Get the fastest internet with faster speeds rolling out every day. Plus, everyone can be online together. Even during peak hours, you'll get a consistent and reliable connection so your crew can

work, they can stream, and game all at the same time. Wave the green flag because the future starts now. Introducing the next generation 10G network only from Xfinity, proud, premier partner of NASCAR. Hey, Kevin, you know, going back to the management, you know, we had Josh Jones on a business of motorsports episode. It was, I asked him the same question. I want to ask you. You guys have a lot of young drivers, you know, as clients.

And what is, if you could, you know, I hate to take this. big broad stroke through this thing because it's you obviously have to get specific on a lot of things but if you could take you know from a 50,000 foot level on the one thing that these young drivers need the most today whether it be a piece of advice or things that they need to focus on and they're in to get to the next level what is that what is that from an um you know consultant standpoint or whatever that is well the thing that I tell them all the time and it's very consistent with with most 99.9% of the young guys is nobody cares about you more than you. So don't depend on somebody else to make it happen. And I've been that way with Josh, right? I know he's got my back and I know

he's going to do it. But I also know there are some little details in there that I might answer the question differently. And he's not going to get offended if I tell him, say, hey, let's not do that. Let's do this. But in order to do that, you've got to know what's going on. You've got to care enough to to ask the questions and you've got to care enough to go and do the things that you're not supposed to do. Just because it says you need to do nine appearances in your contract doesn't mean you can't go to dinner tonight with the marketing guy or the CEO or whoever's here at the racetrack or go play golf with them or whatever that is, like just start asking questions because nobody cares about you more than you. And if you want to be successful, you better be as involved

and know as much about it as possible because if you don't, you will at some point, you will, at some point be the fall guy because when it when the when it gets messy the crew chief is going to say I just don't think he's doing a good job and then it's going to be a decision well is it the crew chief or the driver and that we've seen that play out a number of times and and if you don't have the knowledge and the ability to walk into whoever's office it is and stick up for yourself and and you don't have that constant communication with all the people that are making those decisions so that they know who you are, you're pretty vulnerable to get shoved out of this deal pretty quick because it's a big business and there are a lot of decisions that are made from people who aren't driving the cars.

And that's just the bottom line is if you're not involved in as many aspects of it as possible and trying to figure out how to know more about it, you're going to get left out at some point. Yeah. So have you thought, you have done TV. a lot. So this isn't like this new thing. But I don't, you know, you've never called a cup race. Right. Right.

So this next year coming up, you're going to be calling a cup race with drivers that you just got off the racetrack with and drivers that you've race with for many, many years, drivers that you may personally not enjoy being around. Have you, that was not hard. It's not a difficult thing. But what was interesting, I think, for me was to go into the booth and talk positively about a driver that I had. real frustrations about, right, personally.

I'm like, I know this guy isn't a good dude. But I got a call, hey, man, he drove a hell of a race today. Right. Right. Have you thought much about that? Long. Right? Long.

Yeah. Long few years. Yeah. And I wanted to make sure that as many of those, I don't feel like there's one situation that I feel like. that with any of the drivers currently. Like there was a time when I would tell you that, man, I don't know how I'm gonna say much positive about,

when we were in the wars with Kyle Bush, it'd have been impossible to talk about positively about Kyle, right? Sure, right. And I've spent enough time with Kyle now and Samantha and Brexton and I feel like, and I think that the driver council stuff has really helped a lot of this. And I tell a lot of the drivers this as well.

It's good that you guys are getting to spend time with each other and understand each other because that's like your dad's generation. That's the difference between how we grew up racing and how they grew up racing. Those guys all wanted, they all communicated with each other and they all hung out together and they all did things together. And then we slowly got away from all that as everybody just scattered and did all the things together. Having these meetings where the drivers all have to sit in the same room hasn't happened in years. I mean, we had some kind of half-ass driver council meetings

where a few guys participated and a few guys didn't. But it's very rare that there's multiple drivers missing from a driver council meeting and an update from NASCAR. And I feel like the NASCAR driver communication, most people would tell you that it's probably terrible. I would tell you that the NASCAR driver communication is better than the team to driver communication by a lot. Wow.

By a lot. And I think that's one thing, and that's one thing why I push, I like to push our drivers at the KHA side of it, or any driver for that fact. Just any driver that I speak to, you have to be more informed with your team because the drivers in today's world just are not informed well by their teams. And they get left out of a number of conversations and don't know the details.

And it's, as we know, there are a lot of politics with everything that happens with the RTA in today's world and the things that go on. But in my opinion, the NASCAR to driver communication is as good as it's ever been, and it's better than driver-to-team by a lot. So we have a big urgency to fix the short track package, right? There's a big test in Phoenix coming up in the middle of summer or the middle of winter. There was the new tire that came to Martinsville that seemed to bear some fruit. I thought the racing at Phoenix was better.

this time around. Cars were hard to drive. Yeah, they slipped and slipped. So, yeah, so I'm certain coming out of the seed and your eagerness to make sure that things get better, what are some of the, you know, what are some of the low hanging fruit there as far as where NASCAR can look or where you think they're going to play? Yeah, I think they're going to take a big swing at it. I think they're going to take a big swing at it at the Phoenix test and really try to wrangle the short track system back into where it needs. needs to be the short track package.

How big of a jump was the tire in that, you know, the tire at Martinsville, how much looked like a good direction? How much is the tire involved in all of this? Yeah, well, I think that the tire is definitely involved in a lot of it. But I don't think it, you know, I think a lot of times what has happened is, you know, we go softer on the tire and the tire goes faster and lasts longer.

so then it confuses everybody. Okay, we made the tire softer. We could put more heat in the tire. But the tire went further. And the tire went faster, lasted longer, and fell off less. And so I think everybody is wanting to go back to the drawing board and take a bigger, I think they want to take bigger swings at it. And I think they need to take bigger swings at it.

The only thing that concerns me is, and you've heard me say this before, but I just don't know that there's enough power in the race car. ever since we've and I get it there's way more to it than just saying hey we need more horsepower there's the master plan of the car to bring more manufacturers and people in

but if that race car would blow the back tires off of it and you had to think about putting that throttle down it would change the way that you race and it would change the way that the tires wear and it would just change so much because when we went to this new style car we got to a point at Charlotte where we were taking it

testing and everybody was out of ideas. And they're like, okay, well, just do whatever you want. So we called Doug Yates and we got an intake spacer that was bigger than the 550 horsepower that they wanted us to run. And we put 750 horsepower in it. And immediately, you know, we went like second and a half faster on the racetrack, on the scoring monitor. And everybody was like, oh, what just happened?

Why is that car going so much faster? And, you know, the cars are going down and back straight. And all of a sudden here, when, you know it's coming down the back straight away and um that's how we wound up with power back in in the car was we put that spacer on because you couldn't you could literally could not drive the cars behind each other because they were so tight well that that problem has has you know consistently been a problem and and i think they're going to i think they're going to take big swipes at the tires i think they're going to take big swipes at just the you know

the the whole package in general but in my opinion i think it'll be hard to fix it unless they go faster getting in the corner and you go slower in the middle of the corner with that said uh i feel like for the very first time in and a long long time during the state of the sport uh address with uh donald and steve phelps they mentioned that everything was on the table including horsepower yeah and so yeah maybe there's some hopefully a plan at least try that theory at the test well think about it when we got out of the car they were making a thousand horsepower today they make 700 and 50 and you put mufflers on them and they make less. So, you know, I just, I'm a, I've just, since we had the test of putting the 550 horsepower

package on the car, the cars have just become more aerosensitive. But if they were way too fast getting in the corner and he had to get way out of the throttle and do all the things that you used to do in the car with, with the entry speed and the grip levels, you know, I think it would, gee, I wish they would just, try it. Yeah, sure. But I know it's, I mean, it's a massive undertaking for the manufacturers. Yeah. And the shifting.

Well, shifting is tough. And when you added the fifth gear, it just made it it possible because the ratios are closer together. I think with the, I don't know that you can take it away though, because could you imagine being in the middle of the corner and being it like, yeah, just no power at all?

Yeah. Then it would be, then it would be even worse. So you're kind of caught in these weird spots with with gear ratios and things like that. But, you know, if the, I think the engines, I think the Rev Limited is 8,900, I think right now is what the rule is from NASCAR. But I just think with the way that the technology and the parts

and everything that we do now, I don't believe that higher horsepower would be that big an issue for the engine manufacturers, and we would take a step back on, you know, engine issues. but if if a few engines blew up here and there who cares right i think that's what i don't want to break motors but i really want them push to the limit yeah everything about yeah the way i am with racing is like i want the drivers to get out and go i got nothing left i want the car to know the tires the brakes the engine has nothing left right yeah the engine bills didn't go down yeah

you could yeah you can test for that the engine bills have not gone down since they since they went to these rules because it you know you're now you're looking for one horsepower Well, looking for one horsepower is actually more expensive than looking for 10. Yeah. Because when you're in the windows that you're in. So it really isn't cost effective to keep taking power out because you're looking for smaller increments to make gains. That's a great point. So the truck race this past weekend at Phoenix, put your broadcaster hat on.

Disaster. Yeah. So me and Mike had a debate about that. And I do agree that the drivers, you know, bear a lot of responsibility. But as a driver who's been in these situations, how much does the format of the chase or the playoffs, I'm sorry, bear responsibility? That elimination, because to me what we saw in the Xfinity race at Martin'sville is identical. Some would say that it is not the same thing. Whereas the truck race at Phoenix and the Martinsville Xfinity race, to me,

were both chaos and unnecessary. Yeah. But I think it's unavoidable regardless of the maturity inside the helmet because of the elimination factor and the racetrack you're at and what's on the line. Well, I don't like it coming down to one race. Yeah. I just, you know, I don't know that it represents the whole scene. season well. I think when you look at a whole season, it's not about one race. And I think there's,

I don't know how to do it. I don't know the right way to do it. I understand why they did it. And I like the excitement that comes with it. But I don't like the, I don't like that we get ourselves into these scenarios where we have to talk about, you know, guys crashing each other intentionally and not just, not just the pure racing piece of it that the guy that has the best season wins. And, you know, I think, you know, some of the things that Denny had put together with the point system and just the, you know, the percentage of races that maybe decided the championship, maybe being a few races, or, you know, I think there's a, I think there's a way to do it where you have that excitement and don't have to have it come down to one race. Yeah. And I think,

I think the further down you go in the series, I think the more, the, maybe the worst the advice gets on what you should do to win a championship in those particular moments. And so it's a fine balance between keeping it exciting, but also keeping it pure enough to where it rewards the people that have had the best year and not just winning or losing in one particular moment. So I don't like how it, personally don't like how it comes down to one race because, you know, I tell people, I say, well, you don't win a championship like Dale used to win him.

Yeah. And, you know, I think that to me it's, you know, when you start talking about being able to compare those pieces of the puzzle when, you know, you have Dale, Dale, who's won seven championships and you've got Jimmy Johnson who won seven championships. And then you've got, you know, like even when we won the championship in 2004, We won the championship, but we didn't have the best year. 2015, we had a way better year and felt like that was the year that we earned and should have won the championship with when you look at the whole season.

So it's a complicated puzzle when you put the pieces in there from the pureness of the sport and racing and also the entertainment piece of it that goes with keeping and exciting. So that part is a fine balance. But I think the other thing that can also eliminate a good chunk of this, it's just officiating it, right? Right. You know, if everybody felt the host of our piece of it was 100% intentional, they should have parked him for two laps or parked him for the rest of the race.

Let's go back to Indianapolis when he hooked a guy on the front straightaway, whether it was a year ago or whatever, like those moments is where we failed. Yeah. and led to what we saw, you know what I mean? Yeah, well, I mean, let's just go to the cars tour, right? Yeah. I mean, we have those specific conversations, and that's just not how we want to teach those kids how to race

and not the message that you get from your team member to go out and your actions on the racetrack. Sometimes those aren't the way that you need to represent yourself. So I think a little heavier officiating on those types of moments, and we've seen it ramp up. You know, we saw, you know, with the Bubba Wallace incident and some of the Chase Elliott incident and NASCAR, NASCAR ramped it up. But, you know, I think that there's, there is a line to cross from a rough driving standpoint that used to be officiated. Like, I just, I think you could, I think you, especially in the truck series and Xfinity series, teaching them that way, sure you might let a little more of that go in the Cup series because it will, it will fix itself by the time it all rolls back around.

And that part fixes it, but there's so many guys and gals that come and go in the truck series. And those intentional moments, you know, I think with a little stricter officiating could be, lessons could be taught in a way. Yeah. Not to bang, you know, not to harp on Carson Hosevar too much, but I compliment him because of his ability, right? Imagine him with this activity and not the ability he has. He'd be out. Yeah.

His career would be in the trash. Yeah. Right? The only reason why anybody, one of the reason why he still has a hope of a career is because he really does have genuine speed and ability. The dude is fast. Yeah. And if he fixes all these issues, he becomes, you know, the champion he wants to be.

Yeah. And I think back to Martinsville when I dumped Bobby Hamilton, right? And, you know, they left me out on tires and you dump him. And the next thing you know, you're in the middle of the shit. that you've got the whole garage up in arms and then you're getting stories written about you and what's not good. But it teaches you. It has this way of teaching you how to do things correctly.

And the thing that we used to have were, especially in the truck series, you used to have the Skinners and the Hornets and all these guys that had been there for a long time that were going to put their arm around you and take you over to their motor home and make you sit down and explain the world to you. by forcing beer down your throat and you were going to listen one way or another, but it taught you. And when you come to the Xfinity races, every week there'd be 15 to 25 cup guys in the field.

And so those lessons are a lot harder to learn in those series. And I think being able to make the officiating a little bit stricter on those moments, those guys need those lessons. And they're not going to get them by the other 18-year-old, 19-year-old, kid that's next to them it's just how they've raced their whole way through and at some point we have to write that ship in order to teach those processes correctly yeah what other things

you know what a you're you helped me and and Burton and got in this sort of ownership group and we all came together to buy the cars tour right and now we've had our first year under our belt we're wrapping up our season what about what have you learned about that how has that benefited your life what are you excited about going forward i mean being a series owner is new for all of us i think i don't believe i don't know if you've been a series owner in your past but uh i'll be honest man i mean it's like it's kind

of like getting out of the race car and going in the booth seeing a whole new perspective and having a whole new appreciation for challenges right yeah of all these different parts of the industry Well, for me, the piece that has been the most fun is the four people in the ownership group. And I think we have to include Kelly on that because she's a pretty big piece of the puzzle that keeps it all going. Every day she's working on that car's true. I know. And it's – but I think there are – and I think some of the situations everybody looks at from a different angle. but I think the piece for me that has been the best

is the fact that everybody can listen to everybody's opinion. I don't ever remember anybody ever getting mad at each other in any of the conversations that we've had. Even when you disagree or I disagree or Jeff or Justin or whoever disagrees, it's like, okay, well, that was a good point. That was a good point. And we arrived at a solution that in the end, a lot of people would tell you that maybe it's not the whole case,

but it's always been in the best interest of what is best for the racer and the series. And I think as you look at that, there's a lot of things involved in it that I had no idea were involved in it. I think for me having ownership of the series, but also having the cars and being able to understand what it costs, what the engines are. I had no idea before we got involved in all this, like what the options were for engines, what the tire compound was, how much it cost a race. And you listen to some of the team owners and the things that they bring up. And it's just the simple things.

And I think that that simple approach that we've brought to it of just trying to take something that was already great and make it better has been fun to be involved with. So, yeah, sure, there are some hard decisions and things that happen along the way. But anything that's worth having will have hard decisions to make. and but I think the group to me is the is the most fun because it's just something that's new for all of us and we've kind of all taken a little piece here and there to take on together but it's fun like yesterday I got a text from Butterbean just you know just hey man have a great day and and Brandon Pierce and so to be able to connect with with some of those guys personally and be able to communicate with them like that's what we want right we want to be able to

to help them understand what racing is all about at different levels and give them a bigger platform to be able to expose how great they are to the world. And I think that part is fun and I think it'll get better. I do too. To both of you, what has been the biggest learning for each of y'all this year in owning that series? Well, I have been running in a series for at least a decade,

but to Kevin's point, learning about the challenges of the owner. I mean, I've owned a car, but I really didn't dive into the books of this. I'm like, we're racing. I don't care what it costs, right? Kelly, figured it out. Let's, you know, we've got a lot of partners

figure out who wants to help us here, and we're going to go do it. They're all looking to just spend more money. Yeah. Just let them spend it here. So the financial implications of it. The financial challenges of not only the owner, but the series, right?

now learning the the the the delicate numbers of the the series itself right and um trying to understand where you can get better that's not i i think my favorite thing my favorite thing about dales i've learned so much about who he is because he is the cheapest guy i know in the i mean he is the he's the biggest cheapo i've ever met in my life but i think i think the the thing that has that pushed he and Burton over the edge the most is us hauling our own fuel. Yes. Oh my goodness. We yeah. We hauled

our own fuel and I mean I don't know the series has probably done this for a while but the idea of us being responsible for those gallons and gallons of fuel driving up and down the road was just too much of liability for me to for me to to be okay and be at peace out. Yeah. Burton was even worse. Burton was

so bad. But when When he talks about, you know, you just figure it out, we're going to go race. That's what we've always done. Well, that's not what everybody else does. Oh, really? No. No.

I mean, it's a lifestyle. Methodical. Yeah, I mean, a lot of these guys, it's a business or it's something that they do after their job. So it has to make sense. And you would think one of the great moments that I thought we had with the owners was, hey, we don't want to travel Thursday night. Is there any way we can push practice to a little bit later in the afternoon so that every race that we go to, we can leave Friday morning so everybody doesn't have to get hotel rooms.

and have meals and doesn't have to take an extra day off of work. You think extra day off work. Wow. I mean, you think of those types of things. So you push practice back two or three hours, and next thing you know, you're saving everybody a Thursday night hotel when we go to Langley, and you're saving Thursday night hotel for other teams

when they go to different racetracks. But you give them enough simple time to where they can drive to the racetrack safe and when the race actually starts. That was, I think after Hickory, everybody everybody had had enough because we wrecked some cars and had some issues in the pro late model race and we didn't start till like 1030 or something it was crazy and just working with the teams and the racetrack and flow to say okay we're going to start at eight o'clock and if we got to move some stuff around we got we got people that are streaming this and we need to be

consistent that was that was probably the one thing that was the that was the biggest hurdle that we had to overcome throughout the year and and I think it when you listen to the team owners it also helped them get home in a reasonable amount of time and it i know i wouldn't take my kids to a race that started at 1030 anywhere no that we've got a lot of work to do but it's been fun and uh yeah i mean i it's me and kevin always kind of knew each other we there were points in our careers where we would maybe spend more time having conversations or or talking to each other but he had his life his kids his marriage his his business responsibilities and interest and i had mine and this has kind of gotten us to where we do a lot of time talking to each other and communicating.

So as you've learned about me, I've learned more about you. It's been a great. I came up to him. I believe it was Bristol a year and a half ago. So I was talking, I went to Burton first, and I said, Burton, I might do this. It's not that expensive to get this. I think we could do it. And he's like, I'm in.

He said, I think we should talk to Harvick. I said, all right, I'll do it. And I think maybe Burton mentioned it to you, but I'm sitting on my golf cart. He comes out of his motorhome to go to practice. And I said, hey, I'm going to buy this cars tour. I don't know if you're interested. And you're like, I'm in. What are we doing?

What is it? Yep. He said, I think he literally said, I'm in. What is it? Yeah, I actually was there. I was actually there for that because we had that ultimate experience at Bristol. And I remember that at all conversation. That was actually pretty good.

I mean, y'all are already figuring out how sponsors, funding, All those things, and I'm like, wow, simple golf cart conversation. It blew up. Made a lot of progress right there. That's right. I got to be honest. I mean, I'm fascinated by this in both your perspectives. I mean, because, like, you were talking about policing the sport, you know, as we were talking about the truck race.

But cars tour is not immune to having those, you know, pit road garage skirmishes and whatnot. And so we just had one. You just had one. That's right. So that was my question is that did you guys, you know, was that another challenge? Was that something that you guys might have had disagreements or? release different opinions on how it would be believable that you would. I mean, everybody's got an opinion on how to fix, you know, things that are hard to fix, right? So I'm just curious about how

the ownership group came together and discussed stuff like that. Well, that was pretty, that one was pretty easy. Was it? Yeah. And, you know, I think when you, when you look at that, I think one of our goals has always been to, okay, how can we help point everybody in the direction of how we want them to race and act and do it in our series first. And I think that was just one of those scenarios where it was like, nope, that's not happening here. And we don't want them to fight. We don't want them to hook each other in the right rear. We don't want them to do that because really, if they just race hard and they're going to run into each other naturally and they're going to have some disagreements, but there is a line. There has to be a line, right? Because it's just there's a limit to how you want it to be.

And I think when you look at, like when I look at taking Keelan and saying, okay, when's the right time to put him in a late model stock or a super late model or a pro late model, I think to myself, I'm like, holy crap, I'm going to have to hire security, right? And that's not. I mean, think about the other families that are out there racing. It shouldn't be just a free-for-all of just chaos all the time. Like the environment has to be correct for families to function. and feel safe and do the things that they need to do. I mean, we'll figure it out. We'll figure out how to race and how to, you know, be able to be at the point to be aggressive. But, you know, some of the things that Delane and I talk about is, okay, is he ready for a 40-year-old man to jump on his hood? Is he ready for, is he ready for a fist fight in the pits?

And I don't know, is that, is that really how we want it to be? I don't, I don't think so. Yeah. I think you can have just hard-nosed competition and disagreements and all those things on the racetrack without just acting like a bunch of heathens. Does Keeling catch aggression? You know, Wyatt Miller does. I mean, White Miller.

It's exactly the same. Okay. It's exactly the same. And that's just part of it that you've got to deal with, right? And you just, you deal with it as you go along and you try to make all the right moves. And it's just he's always going to have a better motor, a better car. and you just got to learn to deal with that, right? And how's he doing dealing with that?

I mean, I still think they're young enough to where they're still not 100%, but they hear it, right? I mean, they still hear it from the kids whose dads and moms are telling them that that's the only reason that they're beating you. And I tell people all the time, I say, you know, we're fortunate to be in the position that we're in and you can't do it like me. There's just, there's no way that a parent who knows nothing about race. racing can do it like we do with our families. It's just you know all the people, you know how to

do things, you know what to expect, you know what's fast, you know what's slow, and you know what you're looking for. Most parents that aren't around racing don't know what they're looking for. So you have to do it differently because, and you have to teach the parents as well along the way. This is true in every sport. Every sport. Good heavens, yes. It's true in every sport. I'm a soccer dad. Trust me. I see knuckleheads and I try every week not to be that guy. right? Yeah. Because you want to. And do you think your kid's going to be better than messy?

Right, right. That's exactly right. Messy's kids going to have a better soccer player than you because he's going to, he's seen in his whole life, and he's going to be able to teach him better. And so that's just the way it's going to be with Wyatt and Keelan. And, you know, that's just part of it. Yeah. I'll say wrapping up the car tour conversation, you know, when we got, when we bought a series

that was healthy, you know, we didn't save. The Cars Tour. We bought a series that was functioning and had all of these protocols already in place, right? Jack and had already had a, we went, a lot of decisions we made, even recently, we went back to what had been, what had happened in the past with Jack and how he'd handled it before. And a lot of times, very, very similar, similar decisions were made. We don't let anybody leave this room without talking about creativity. I don't know if we talked about that with you in the past, but in some of the, like,

Everybody has done something to their race car to try to find an edge. All right. You're now retired. It's all in the past. Statue of limitations. Nothing's going to come back and get you. You're two days for me. What was one thing either you did or maybe you saw someone else do, another car or another

competitor that was just so impressive that you think maybe we haven't heard about it. Well, my favorite thing was that's at the super speedways because I think that's where most of us all got the most creative. But it was, it was, so if you remember, they used to have a little sniffer that would go around the intake manifold. Well, that was created because of us. What was the sniffer doing? The sniffer was looking for air leaking between the intake manifold and the heads.

So we were a little off at the speedways, and we came up with this system that when you would push the gas pedal down, the front studs of the intake manifold bolts were slotted so that the intake manifold how harder I would push on the gas pedal it would raise up and we would pick up like a second damn yeah we'd pick up like a second

so you'd hit the gas and when the gas pedal would go all the way down you'd have it stop a little bit short and basically you'd use the carburetor to pull the front of the intake manifold up that's beautiful so that it would suck air Well, then they kind of caught wind of it. So they started using this sniffer. Well, then we would use the, we would use that,

we'd use grease to pressure lubricant to go between the intake manifold and the block and the heads and everything so that when it would come back down, it would seal itself back up and pass the sniffer. Explain the sniffer. I mean, like, it was a wand that could detect air being sucked. sucked into the engine or or got it yeah wow yeah that was pretty you take pride in that that you should it's very creative yeah yeah it takes a that's what I mean it's I think the

the fun part about it is is like we all know how hard it is to get something through that tech shed and when you get something through because you just read you know you work through the navigated through the loops of the the rule book it's it's it's to be celebrated get the windbag out. When we would go to Dover, we would have this, we would go to Dover. We ran so bad at Dover when we would go up there. We would, we would have like a shiny, you remember those shiny insulation pieces that you'd have under the car? And they still may be there.

I don't know. But anyway, we would have them, we would have multiples of them tie strapped to the drive shaft tunnel. And when you needed a caution or you're getting ready to get laughed, you'd just go go in there and pull those tie straps loose and the piece would fall out the back of it. That's awesome. But not as creative as the intake. I think that's the award winner right there.

That's impressive. We were at California Speedway one time and we were winning the race and we had a red flag and we were sitting there in a red flag and I went to fire the car back up and I'm like, man, it feels like all the tires are flat.

They were. They were all flat. All four of them. Damn. All of them. them all of them my gosh what year was that it's probably what had to be 2007 really that was when all the all the whole poking started in the tires yeah with the with the little bleed holes we did a little bit of that yeah everybody oh yeah everybody did a little hole poking our holes our holes weren't meant to

stop right hey you know you mentioned kevin at the beginning um how it's been nice kind of reconnecting with some memories like that otherwise this happened all year made in large part by the fantastic video series and the work that Stuart Haas does. I mean, like, it's all been really good. What's been your favorite? 29, this one, Richard. And just seeing the two companies work together,

I think that says a lot about, I think that says a lot about where I ended. And just being able, I went up and went to RCR fan day. and signed autographs with Richard Childress. And just sat out there and just talked with him. And Richard and I have just developed a great relationship again. How much of this year has been about reconciliation, right?

Richard and I have been in a pretty good spot, but this is a pretty big level. And I think to see that 29 on the side of that car one more time at North Wilkesboro was pretty neat. It meant a lot to him. It meant a lot to me. and it meant a lot to the fans. And I think for me, look, we had some great success in the four car. A lot of people know about the four car, but the popularity of this particular number and car

is it pushes buttons of people who might not watch every week anymore. And I think this is your diehard NASCAR fan. But just being able to just talk about old times with Richard, Todd Barrier, came to RCR fan day, and we sat up and did a Q&A together. I've got a Ford shirt on, he's got a Toyota shirt on, and chocolate's in the middle. And, you know, I think that for me, I mean, that's really, I came to North Carolina, Richard gave me a break, and, you know, we both agreed to disagree on why I left the team, but when I walked in there and did that myself, I think that, and I told him I was leaving the team,

I think that for him was as respectable as you could be. And circling all that back around and being able to have him included in the last year, have Stuart Haas. I mean, I walked in in November of last year and we started planning the retirement tour. And the second meeting, I said, is there anything you want to do? And I had a list. And before I walked out of the meeting, I said, one thing I want to do is I want to run the 29 car at the All-Star race. and they both looked at me and they were like, is that even possible?

I said, yeah, it's possible. Chase Elliott did it. And they said, well, who's going to call Richard? I said, well, I'm going to call Richard. So I called Richard. I said, hey, here's my idea. What do you think? He's like, not a problem.

I'll tell Tori. That was it. I mean, it literally took five minutes. And from that point forward, RCR and Stuart Haas Racing started working on the merchandise and all the things that came in together. And then I called Bush. and I said, hey, what would you guys think about this for the All-Star race? And they came up with their 2001 logo to tie it all together and off we went.

All right. So you're a massive, you talked about your experience as a car owner, your knowledge and ability to jump into any organization and improve it not only as from behind the seat as a driver, but management, personnel, you're just, you're a jack of all trades for a race team, right? You're this incredible ace in the hole, right? And so you're leaving Stuart Haas, a massive void. We know Josh is going to drive that car, but beyond that, like, how does Stuart Haas move forward continue to be productive, right? How do they replace a guy like you?

And I don't even, Josh, isn't really the conversation I'm wanting to have. It's more about like, you know, Rodney's awesome, amazing. You know Rodney better than anybody. What does this organization have to assure they do so that they continue to be productive beyond your driving career? Well, I've had this conversation with Josh and Rodney separately. and, you know, I think for them, I think that they just have to be, they have to be aggressive and they got to know what's going on. I think Ryan Priest has done a very good job with his team

and his crew chief, and they've made that car better all year, and they've got to the point where they're running respectively. I stepped out of most of the competition meetings for most of the year because I truly felt like they needed to figure out who their leader, was going to be and who their voices were going to be in making the decisions because, you know, it's run a little bit different with Gene and Tony not being there all the time. And, you know, I think it's important for them to establish how they're going to go forward. I don't know how they do that as far as, you know, who's going to make the decisions and who's not going to make the decisions. But, you know, I think one thing for me in the last year was, okay, I need to

I need to dial it back just a little bit because they need to figure out how to go forward. And so that's going to be, you know, I think that's going to be, you know, something that Tony and Brett and Zippy and they all have to figure out what their system is. I've tried to step back and just have them develop that. So hopefully they've got a good idea of how they develop that going forward. I think for Josh and Rodney, it's really kind of thinking about it a little more selfishly, right? It needs to be just the four car. It doesn't need to be, they don't need to worry about Stuart Haas racing, right? Just be selfish and worry about, worry about what you have, and worry about your crew chief and how do you push what you need through the system? Because that's really the most important

thing is how do you push what your needs are through the system? And you have to build it around you. and that's Ryan's Ryan and Chad have done a good job with that on the on the 40 41 car but um Josh and Rodney have to build the people around them that want to be there and they they want to they want to push in the same direction that they do and those two are going to be they're going to be good together it's going to take you know just like everything else it'll take a little bit of time and there's going to be some some rough patches and and um you know I've got to deal with Josh a little bit as we got through the end of the season with some of the races that he ran and we had some great conversations about the roval and just curbs and and at that point he was like man that was that was fun you know

I enjoyed having those those conversations and for me it was fun too because he's just a guy that that takes it all in and absorbs it and tries it and uses it and and so it's been but it's been hard for rodney too you know he's he's gone through these 10 years just like I have emotional he's feeling all those as well. And now it's now it's just time. Now you've got to for him he's still in that competition mindset. So you've got to push those things aside and just ignore them and

be selfish with him and move on to what you're doing next. Otherwise you're going to be behind. Yeah, I saw that. I just paying a little bit of attention to him this week and this weekend it seemed like that he was a mess. A mess. Having a hard time. Yeah, he's been a mess for a while.

Yeah, and I've had to stay away from him a little bit because I didn't want to. Two people. making them, yeah, two people a mess. Yeah, he's not good. And he just cares. And, you know, Rodney and I have become great friends through this whole process and best friends through this whole process.

And, you know, I've thought to myself, okay, well, how far should I interject myself into what he and Josh have going on? And, you know, I think it probably should be pretty far, right? And to a point of, you know, how much is too much to say, hey, let's go to lunch today, or how much is, hey, what's up today? Sending him a text or giving him a call. I mean, those are things that I've been thinking about is how much is too much or is it not enough

or what's right, what's wrong as far as continuing that relationship and friendship to help those guys. And that's why I felt like the late model stuff was so important, not only for them, but for me. The next couple weeks. Yeah, with Josh running those next few races is how can we help speed this process up to make it right?

Yeah, this weekend, Josh and the 62 of the KHA management car will be going to Hickory for the fall brawl and then Florence to race the South Carolina 400, which I'll be there as well. And then finally the Thanksgiving Classic at Southern National is the final kind of late model stock race of the year. Yeah. Is there anything that you didn't get to say this weekend? No, you know, we, you know, we went through a number of periods of time.

And I think for me, it's, I can say it much less emotional now because, you know, you're not in the middle of the competition and the people. But it's been a great ride. And, you know, I think as you look back at everything and you kind of, analyze everything. I've been very fortunate to have a lot of success and experience a lot of things along the way. And I think the part that I'm looking forward to the most is being able to walk in the racetrack and look around because I've walked in there for so many years with my head down thinking about how am I going to go fast today? What do I need to do today? Where am I lifting? What do I have to do? And I know I'm going to have things to do and everything that goes with the TV

side of it or the management group or whatever but it's there's really nothing that'll that'll ever be the same as sitting in the seat and having that competitive mindset and in there digging every week with with the teams like like that but i you know i think um we did it how we wanted to do it really you know after we got through 2001 um everything else had a purpose everything else had a plan everything else was intentionally pretty much done yeah and you know i think going through the the last season and doing it the way that we did it. We're very fortunate that we had the group of people around us. Jess and her whole team at Stuart Haas Racing.

Yeah, she did all the social media and everything that went with the last year. Like it would have never looked like that if she and her team weren't there because they just did an amazing job of trying to accomplish the goals that we set out. And that was telling a story of 30 years. being respectful to Stuart Haas Racing and RCR and how do we leave being able to walk in every person's trailer and have a good relationship with everybody here and I think we're able to accomplish that.

It's a big responsibility when you think about it. If you're going to take that on, you've got to do it right. If you don't do it right, you're exposed in that I think they did it extremely well because that is a big responsibility. To tell that story or recap that story, so much, there's so many layers to it. Here's one thing I want to get your response to. I think that there was a lot of emotion beyond just you and your team. And if you get into

the fans, there's a lot of emotion about your retirement. And I think it's because you do represent a little bit of the last of the old guard, right? I saw a statistic, and I'm assuming it's correct, that you were the last full-timer that raced in the pre-chaise pre-playoff era, right um and so now all the full timers um they don't even know what it was like before 2004 um and it's like dang and by the way it's inevitable right we could all agree it's inevitable but it also sometimes reality just kind of stings a little bit and it's like man i miss the old days man i miss the tony stewart and harvick and dale junior and everybody me and this i felt emotion personally just because I mean, I know you, I like you and all this stuff.

And I'm seeing you and Delana and the kids crying. Now all this big softies that have kids going to cry. But the fact is that I think a lot of fans, even if they're not Harvick fans, can appreciate the fact that we're missing something now with you gone. Do you, do you, have you been able to confirm that or pick up on that in the way fans have interacted with you in the last several weeks? Oh, it's been all year. All year. Yeah.

And I think, um, this year. year was this year was good for me too because it made you remember that there's way more to what you do than just driving the car like you mean a lot to people in ways that is different to pretty much everybody you know it's it's the it's the stories that come with the the person who had fighting cancer or the person who was struggling getting through COVID or it's the you know the person who sat and watched with their grandpa when you won your first race or whatever that story is they all had a story and yesterday I flew home commercial I think with half the crowd in in the airport and I heard but I heard a lot of stories and and and those people that that got the nerve to come up and

say something were all from somewhere different yeah you know somewhere from Connecticut and somewhere from California and somewhere from Texas and yeah but that's been that way it's been that way all year and and you you start to realize man this is this has got a pretty far-reaching touch on on people in in in their own way and we we we I wouldn't have done this year but if it wasn't for the people the way that we did it Marcus Smith was a big part of of doing it the way that we did this and and even Tony and his group were like hey here's the things we didn't do and one of them was all the things that we did right it was we didn't get to work with JGR we didn't get to go back and touch on a number of different paint schemes.

We didn't get to go back and tell some of the stories that we wanted to tell. So we listened to that advice. And I don't think we, I'm sure we could have done it better, but I don't know what else we could have done because we put a lot of time and effort into every single week, for the most part, of a paint scheme or a helmet or number, something that we went back and looked at or paid tribute to. there was I mean we went back and made fun of the situation with Joey Lugano and

all those different situations we tried to to come up with as many things as possible that we knew the fans would wrap their arms around because that meant something to a Joey Ligano fan or that meant something to a Chase Elliott fan or that meant something to it I mean there's a connection in so many ways and we tried not to hide from any of it and I was like man this is not how I would operate but it's not it's not about me yeah it really wasn't about it wasn't it wasn't it wasn't about so much there was so much so much so much more to it than just me driving the car i think you and biffel could have recreated the bristol thing that would have been one thing like you could have yeah jumped in try biffel was in he was in some of the videos

right i know like so they incorporated there was reconcilia i don't think that you were looking for reconciliation because you probably have done all that years ago yeah but there was for fans that's a hundred percent and what you should do is you should have just come in here when you have another one of those business segments and just talk about because I'm old enough to where they had to go back and find pictures that weren't digital. So. And NASCAR did a great job of like I go back and to California Speedway when we did all that stuff with the Spears car and the West Championships and the helmet and everything.

Like they had video from a cameraman on Pitt Road that was just for whatever reason filming my car. And he got every freaking lap filming our car. And he had the green flag. He had checkered flag. He had Victory Lane. And it was just going back and finding all that stuff. And we just put together a little display for the Hall of Fame that I'll go in next month. So it's got all my championship cars.

Well, Winston and his whole gang came over to the shop. Well, my mom saved everything. So I've got championship jacket from first go-kart win. and I've got replicas of the first go-card. I've got all the championship car from the Cup series is still completely intact. Rick had all the, had him save all the engine parts. It's got all the original parts, pieces, engines, confetti. We restored.

Richard gave me the Xfinity championship car. I've got the I-Rocket. So you've got all this stuff, and we finally were at a point where we could put it all together and share it. But that piece at the Hall of Fame will be, it'll be pretty cool to see all that stuff. stuff in one spot. It ain't right. Yeah, I saw somebody wrote down a list of drivers that have retired in the last handful of years and I'm like, that's the whole field from like 2002.

Yeah. All the, all of the drivers. Man, I appreciate you giving us some time today. This has been fun. Enjoy it. Yeah. It's therapeutical every time I come here. It is nice. It is nice. The normity of your career and the actual retirement season and the final race, is still really fresh on everybody's mind, but I can tell you that I'm looking forward to seeing you in the booth next year. I think everybody in the industry and all of our fans are excited about that and what you will become and continue to do, how you'll learn and find your way in this new sort of chapter of your life is going to be great for NASCAR. I know you'll always continue to be an asset for them. The best advice I got is in the

booth is it's never as bad as it feels but it's never as good as it feels either. Yeah. There's somewhere in the middle, right? Yeah. So you'll have and you'll find those wins and losses, right? You'll be competitive with yourself and with ratings and all those things and you'll get out there one day and go, man, I didn't do it that day or I didn't have a good this or that. And you'll be judgey and analytical of yourself.

But I wish you the best, man. We're going to continue to work together on a cars tour. will be seeing each other at industry functions, and it's going to be great. Because a lot of these guys, man, they retire and you just don't see them anymore. Not me. They just quit going.

So I'm glad that we're still going to be able to see you quite a bit. Well, I appreciate it. And it's going to be fun. That's the part I'm looking forward to because our sport is, I mean, it's great. Everything about it is for when you're not on the competition side is pretty fun. I'm looking forward to enjoying all that and working with Fox and, golly, I don't know how I'm

going to control Boyer though. I don't know how you're going to control Boyer. Nobody does that. That's going to be a challenge. You're probably the only person that I can think of that could actually keep him in between the lanes. Yeah. Well, when Richard pulled him out of the body shop, somehow I got volunteered to take him all over

the country. So I went to every test that he did the first year. and we taught him how to race. I watched him crash his first car at Texas and back it into the wall on about about last six or seven. So he's been there, done that too, and I think it'll be, it'll be a,

it'll be very entertaining, I think would be the best way to put it. I think you're an awesome job. I've watched you, you know, do the work you've done for Fox already in some of the events and you're natural and seasoned and ready to rock, and hit the ground running kind of thing.

I agree. I'm ready. I'm ready. I don't know about, I'm ready to rock. I don't know about the rest of it. That's yet to be determined. But the great thing about what I'm getting ready to do with Fox is they've let us do this for, gosh, it seems like 10 years up in the booth with the Xfinity races and everything. It's almost like we had free training to get to the point of having a second job.

So I'm sure it'll be more work. than just showing up, though. We'll see. Like we have been. We'll have to interview you at this point next year and see what you think. Yeah. Well, you better get me about June, though. You're going to be gone.

I'll quit when you're starting. He'll be trying to figure out how to get the slides out of his boat home. That is like the new fun part of life is when Fox ends their part and we start working, it's all a boy or social media post where he's halfway across the world on some boat, some yacht. And he's like, woo-hoo! And you're like, what a asshole.

Anyhow. That's great. Thanks for coming. We appreciate you. Always an ally. Thank you. Kevin Harvick on the Dale Jr. Download. Man,

I'm really excited to have Ally help us bring the guest segment every week. It's one of my favorite parts of the download. We get to talk to so many different people in racing, outside of racing. But everybody that comes in here, I want them to have had a good time. I want them to want to come back. I want them to feel like an ally to Dirty Mo Media. Thank you, Ally, for your continued support of the download and the entire Dirty Mo Media team.

Check out Dirtymo Media. On Twitter, Facebook, TikTok, and Instagram.