The Dale Jr. Download - 536 - Dover: The Battle For Clean Air & Charter Ownership

Episode Date: April 30, 2024

Dale Earnhardt Jr. checks in to the Bojangles Studio for this week’s episode of Dirty Air. In a weekend that saw a near-rookie upset in the Xfinity race, aero blocking and Denny Hamlin’s return to Victory Lane in the Cup race, there was a lot to unpack: Carson Kvapil continues to impress The next generation of young talent is exciting  Best trash-talking drivers Should NASCAR take the digital rear-view mirrors out of the NextGen car? What is next in the NASCAR charter negotiations? Race winner Denny Hamlin calls in During the Ask Jr. portion of the episode, listeners sent in questions regarding: The changes to the bus stop at Watkins Glen The Washington Commanders’ NFL Draft picks The newest class of NASCAR Hall of Fame nominees 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. back again for another episode of the Dale Jr. download this Tuesday. We're going to recap Dover from this past weekend. A lot happening in the Xfinity series and the cup race. And the winner, Denny Hamlin's going to call in. Let's get started. The following is a production of Dirty Mo Media. Who's the new guy? In the studio for Dirty Air. And then Dale started singing. 99 bottles of beer.

Don't stop. There are some voices on the show. that you're going to hear keep the camera rolling back in the Bojangles studio and don't forget as we've said over the last several weeks now through May the 5th

you can get your hands on two free bird dogs by using the promo code Dale Jr. D-A-L-E-J-R you've got to place your order on the Bojangles app or on bojangles.com at participating stores that's the code D-A-L-L-J-R free bird dogs

you get two of them online Or on Bojangles app orders. Get them by their hot. That's a really... That's a really... That's a really original. Get them one out of their hot! Don't know why nobody came up with that one yet.

Oh, man. This week's Dirty Air segment is brought to you by our friends at Tire Pros. Speaking of Dirty Air, it might be time to replace your vehicle's air filter. Head to Tire Pros for a new filter. go to tireprose.com to find the location nearest you. Nearest you. Nearest you. Get them while they're hot. Get them while they're hot. Nearest you.

And that just sounds weird together. Nearest you. Find the location nearest you. Doesn't seem like there's a word missing or something, right? Nearest two you? Maybe. I don't know. Where's the grammar police?

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Lots of fun. Let's get started, man. What are we going to talk about? Let me see if I got any personal stories. There's nothing on the note. Nothing. Nothing going on in your personal life. Nothing's going on in Dale's life.

Nothing really. Sit around and watched a lot of sports. Got the NBA playoffs going on, NHL playoffs. It's a great time to be a sports fan. Obviously, the racing in the NASCAR world is popping off. And there was a lot happening in it over this past weekend. I kind of want to go into the Xfinity race.

You always like to go cup first. It's weird. I don't know. Just, you know, go with the big ticket item. Andrew puts all this stuff in order that I assume is his preferred order of how we're going to do the show. Damn, you can reorganize it. But, you know, the Xfinity race happens before the cup race. That's right.

You know, the Xfinity series is the feeder series. I just feel like people... It is a smaller series, Andrew. People tune in. They're like, damn, what did Dale think about the cup race? Yeah, but you're wanting the Xfinity series to headline this show. That's just not what's going to happen. Is that how we're doing?

The Cup Series of the Headliner? So we're building up to the Cup series. I see. Your audience is growing. I'm more so organized it based on what they want to hear first. Oh, man. Well, then that's what you should put last. That way they listen to the whole show.

Okay. Yeah. Otherwise, they're going to turn it off once they hear what they want to hear. Oh, man, I'm not listening the rest of that. Well, we've got one hell of a white flag for everyone today. I'm not going to listen to the, lesser important information coming in the back end of the show. I've gotten everything I needed.

Yeah, yeah. All right. Exfinity series, Carson Quappell, in his second start, driving for junior motorsports, almost wins the race. Pretty cool. Hey, you know, we're excited about Carson. I want to give a kid a lot of credit. Good, good smart racer.

And, but hey, you know, a lot of things happened at the end of that race to put him in that position, right? otherwise if we don't have the weird fuel the rain and the fuel and the issue and all the guys pitting and staying out and whatnot I don't know Carson runs fifth you know some circumstances put him in a position

late in the race where he's going to try to win the race and I just want people out there to know that I realize that in all likelihood if the race plays out normally you know we're not really talking about how close he comes to winning the race But still, dude has amazing racecraft. And I don't think I've said racecraft as much in my life as I said it in the last probably year, even this year, right? I probably said it more in the past.

I've said racecraft more since the first of the year that I've said it in my whole life. We're already at four or five this show. Yes. So that's significant. Racecraft. Carson is a good example of a driver that I think a lot of teams would love to hire based upon his ability to not get flustered and over-excited. And we've seen it the late restarts at Martinsville. A young driver screws that up.

I screw that up. absolutely in my first handful of months driving in the Xfinity series you put me 1997 me in that situation and I don't do the job that Carson does

and same thing for this past weekend at Dover all the chaos right the late restarts sure he didn't pull it off he got beat on the final few restarts give up you know the spot to Ryan True X in turn 3

and it cost him to win but his racecraft and his ability to take care of the car and get it to the end of the race and then not screw up and wreck or spin himself out on the last few restarts trying too hard that's what I love about this kid

and what people are going to learn about him as he races more is how like level and neutral he is temperament wise I've never seen I mean he gets out he's excited about winning he shows emotion

but even in moments like when he's I've seen him be in a situation where he's gotten so angry he's wrecked a guy on purpose after the flag wrecked the kid at Tri County a couple years back got parked for a race in the cars tour I've seen him like

lose is cool but he'll get out of car and he's like he's already calm down He's already got a pretty good level opinion and attitude about what just happened, which is really mature, right? A lot of kids get out. A lot of these kids, even adults, even grown men, they get out and they're like,

oh, I'm going to have the last word. I'm going to say something clever, I think's clever. I'm going to say something asinine or smart a-assie because I'm on TV. I got a camera and mic in my face. You know, I'm going to say something. I ain't going to be a fool, right? And they say something, right? Smart Alec.

Or they jab. They've got a jab in their little interview after the race. See it all the time. He doesn't do that. He gets out and goes, you know, says something. His interviews will be, you know, matter of fact. I like it. That's my favorite thing about it.

And so, aside from the fact he's super talented. Am I making any sense? No. Yeah. All right. Have you noticed any of that? I thought that even while he was like, you could kind of almost see that behind the wheel. Like he just, he drives mature.

There's no like wildness to him. He's very calculated. I was watching the end of the race and I was impressed by him for sure. Yeah, I get super annoyed by the, uh, these, these interviews where they have, they, they try to be smart. Or a little jab or something clever, you know, they just got their ass kicked or got wrecked on the racetrack or got the, got the bad end of the stick or something on the deal. and drivers will get in the, you know, get a microphone in front of them immediately after it, and they got to say something, right?

Like a guy ran out of talent or blah, blah, blah, blah, right? We all do it. I've done it. But it's kind of, it never does make you look good. Never makes you look better. It doesn't make you look smarter. It's intriguing, though. What's intriguing? Oh, the drama.

Hey, it is. The drama's great. Yeah. I like the drama. but it doesn't help I never come out of those going damn boy that was a hot take man

yeah got him in an interview I feel like you have to earn that I like now the other side of it you're right you're right you'd have to earn it the other side of it is like Denny right now he gets out

says some things and it's funny right I'm humored right and he's trying to he's trolling be funny yeah he's trolling people yeah now that's different Now if you can be good at that

I'm all about that That's like cutting a promo in wrestling Right But just getting out and saying And trying to slam a person Or saying they ain't no good Or they suck Is a shi-thing to do

Right And so you gotta be It's a fine line Carson doesn't do any of that No Oh we're back to that I thought we'd moved on Who was the best

We were just debating Shit talking Who was the best At shit talking Who was the best? I think Tony Stewart was. He was pretty good. Now, Tony Stewart would get out and say stuff and let little, you know,

I'm going to bring his little net. You know, he meant it and you knew it. And yeah. So, I mean, that, that was good. I like that. I feel like Denny back in the day, you know, like the Joey Lugano impression, oh, it's just short track racing. Yeah, that always sticks out to me.

Yep. That's one of the good ones. Yeah. Who's not good at shit talking? Can you think of a moment where, You heard somebody and you were like, ugh. Uh. Not good.

So you put you boys on the spot. That's what it's like when you're doing that shit to me and ask you. I remember. You're like, hey man, what's your favorite sitcom? It's like, what? Yeah. What's your favorite day of your life ever? I'm going to write down.

Favorite sitcom. I don't know. The first thing that comes to mind is Harvick after Bristol. When he just said, I'm ready to rip someone's freaking head off. I'm like, that was kind of. Oh. That's entertaining. No.

I mean, yeah, but I feel like there could have been something, I don't know. That's hard for me to say, I'm not coming out of the race car. Harvey said it was the maddest you ever been. Yeah. Yeah. I feel like Larson could be a better one, but he just never does it. He's just right middle of the road, you know. Someone who kind of reminds me of Carson is Blaney gets so animated over the radio and then after the race.

Oh, yeah, there's nothing. We're all good. Like, I wonder if more drivers are like that and they just don't push the button. So I'll say this. I think some of it is drivers, like you forget when you're in the car and you mash the button on the radio and you'll say whatever they hell,

you think you're talking to your team. You forget everybody's listening. You forget TV's going to put that shit on there. You forget TV's going to, you forget race hubs going to blast it on their little radio. You don't think about it. And you're like, you think you're just cussing to your crew chief or your spotter.

See about if that guy. You believe that freaking guy? And so when you get out of the car after the race or anytime, right, in the media center or whatever, you know if you say something, they're going to run with it. It's going to get ran over and over, used over and over, it's going to be in the next article. It's going to blow up. So you've got to be careful because if you're going to be critical of another driver or talk about somebody, it's going to be going to be. it's going to be the story. They're looking for stories, right?

They're looking for conflict, drama, anything kind of colorful a driver might say, it's going to get a lot of attention, right? Especially in social media and so forth. So drivers, they're careful, man, they dial the way back. They ain't going to get caught. They ain't going to get talking.

Well, he does it in the car, because you forget. Right. When you're in the car racing, you forget all about the social media world and all that shit. Yeah, okay, I see what you. Yeah, and you're mouthy and you're mad all the time.

As soon as an engine starts, you're mad. Race car drivers, let me tell you. When you crank the engine, generally starts your motor engines, everybody gets mad. Everyone's your enemy. You're out to get everybody. You're like, the firing of the motor just, you know. Trick does something to you.

It does something. To the psyche. Yeah. And so at least little inconvenience, you know, popping off on the mouth. out of the car and they're they don't they don't want to be uh in the media they don't want to be they don't want to be they don't want that sound bite replayed over and over and over and over so they don't do it is there anything you remember that you said that you're like oh i wish i didn't say that

like after the fact like you see it on race up next week yes all of it no all the time it happened yeah i can't there you go again i don't remember i don't remember specific freaking i don't remember where you were on, yeah, whatever day. Okay, it was, oh yeah, it was August 15th, 2000. I'm not asking for dates. I'm not asking for specific. Bob Hockris and, let's say there were 16 media members at the back of the truck and it was 1145 right before practice started at noon. And I remember it was probably about 68 degrees. What are you doing? That's not what I was looking. I had a chicken sandwich for lunch. There's some, there's some like notable radio things you've said. Like maybe there's one, not looking for

specific date or year, like, oh yeah, I remember, I said something stupid. Nah, I think... I will keep throwing you under the bus, asking you all these such questions, though. I love it. I want you to. I think, just like you don't want to be in the wreck, like, okay, here's a great example.

So, Chase Elliott and Denny Hamlin, Martinsville, right? Val goes down and they get out of the car and they're hollering at each other, Chase is mad, and Denny wrecks him right and Chase is mad. This is all playing out and you're genuinely angry

and you're not thinking about all the times this is going to be used to promote the next race, right? Or it's still being used. We still see the clip of Chase in Denny's face outside of the car after the race, right? And so maybe, you know, you go through that process, you're mad and now, you know,

if you're chasing that situation, you're angry. You're not settled. And now you've got to get ready for the next Martinsville race six months later and that shit starts popping back up on social media. And it's in all the commercials. It's in all the promotions around that race coming up. Hey, you might see this.

This is what happened last time. You might see this. Oh, over and over and over. And you're the guy that feels like he got the raw end of the deal and you're still not happy about it. And you're like, God, I don't want, oh, this is, I'm annoyed. You know, this is annoying seeing this being reminded by this. I don't, I wish that, you know, those are the, you don't want to, you try to avoid doing

those kind of things, even though sometimes you get so mad about it, you can't help it. But you regret, like, man, I don't want to ever, I don't want to be in that situation. Because I don't want to see it six months later when they're promoting the next race. And so, same thing with sound bites and all that kind of shit you might say outside the car. Where are we going with this? So all that to say, Carson did a great job. There's a lot of young drivers. The Terradown mentioned this in their show.

There's a lot of young drivers like Carson coming down the pipe. This is always something exciting to be, you know, fans should be thrilled about this particular thing going on in the sport. We have these, it's kind of funny. We have these like lulls where there's really no excitement in terms of young talent. And then there'll be like a burst, right, of a little pack. of guys that sort of cycle through the trucks in the Xfinity series, and five or six, right, are coming in, and two or three might make it to cut.

Yeah, one or two of those, a couple winners. It's kind of fun to watch that process. I think Carson Cople's in the middle of that. Connor Zillich, there's a handful of young drivers kind of creeping in. Caden Honeycutt. I think Caden Honeycutt is very impressive. He drives for us here at Junior Motorsports on the e-sports side for I racing

in the Coke series. And he's racing the cars tour for a while. But he's getting these little spotty starts and trucks and Xfinity cars. And it's good equipment, but he does really well with it. And that's hard to, you've got to watch those guys, right?

Carson's getting in a great car and he's running great with it. But you also got to watch these other young kids that are getting in a car that's traditionally maybe a 10th to 15th or 10th to 20th place car and then he'll run 8th with it you're like hey all right got to that's that's something got to watch this next time he comes into the you know comes into the next time he enters a race we'll pay attention see if he does that again um so pretty cool it's almost like a draft class and that's something that we don't have

in NASCAR but it's kind of funny to think back of like the era of William Byron and Chase getting in right and then like you speak of there's a couple different eras of people so i'm excited for this next group yeah i am too you know it's it seems like that uh you know there's some real good good talent i'm not sure i think carson i think i know what carson can do how far he can go connor zillich um is going to get great opportunities looks as if he could turn into quite quite a talent um You know, there's a handful of them. So anyways, the Xfinity race, how'd you guys feel about all the, you know, the rain and going back to green and

wait a thing? I am always entertained by the prospect of rain because it throws that wrench in the strategy where like no one really knows how to play the radar and you saw like Allgaier and Custer were kind of pushing it and then they had to end up pitting. And so I'm always entertained by like, oh, you never know when. the last restart is going to be everyone's racing harder, closer, you know, harder than they would normally at, you know, 25 to go, 30 to go. Yeah. I thought it was a great race. Track rubbered in, cars running everywhere. A lot of places you could go, a lot of good racing.

That extended car has been putting on some awesome, awesome races this year, entertaining weekend and week out no matter of the track. That was part of me, very frustrated, right? So we're sitting there at one point I think all of our cars are in the top 12 getting down toward the end of the race and I'm thinking obviously I want to win but I'm thinking man this is going to be this will be a great day if this is how it ends. This will be a great day for us. We need to get these results and then the rains are coming, cautions out and I'm thinking

okay Custer's going to win this thing. Then they're like oh nope we're going to go back green and I'm like oh crap Custer comes down pit road guys of pitting some are not pitting and now all these potential decent finish for all of our cars are like up in the air um not naskars fault just how it's playing out um i don't think they could have done anything different or should they have done anything different i don't think so brandon jones had a great qualifying effort decent race gotten a little bit of trouble there

sammy ran out of gas uh we've got an issue with his car where he's having uh fuel pickup issues. That car had four gallons of fuel in it when he ran out of gas, right? There's an issue going on that we can't quite understand. He was going to have a great top five finish, I think, and that cost him some trouble. He had to come down pit road to put gas in. It got in the back, gotten to wreck. Algar was sitting in good shape for a reasonable finish. Don't know if he would have been able to beat Custer, probably not, but, you know, typically runs really good at Dover and was looking like he's going to get another top five and got caught up in a crash. so I think

AJ Almondinger missed a corner or something happened there I can't remember what happened somebody got older 98 wasn't it got loose a lot going on at the end of the race

week after week man I mean that's part of racing man you sign up for it and you know that you're sitting there at some points in the race where you're thinking this could be a good day we could get good results and then sometimes it all unravels comes apart

and can be kind of frustrating but the cars had good speed as we traditionally do at Dover, so we're happy about that. Moving on to the cup race. Yes. Denny Hamlin holds off Kyle Larson, hard charge to the win. That was fun to watch. A lot of talk about air blocking, a lot of different opinions about it.

I mean, I could give mine. I don't know. Yeah. What's your tag? What's my tag? I don't know. You don't know. No, I do. I just feel like I don't want to, you know, everybody's had an opinion about it and for me to add in, ain't going to move the needle. But I'll say this. So I wish it were different. Now, there's a couple things that could happen that probably won't ever happen. One thing they could do is get rid of that digital camera. The digital camera allows the driver a very, very good understanding of exactly what's going on behind him.

a traditional old school mirror is blocked by roll bars and those little slots in the back of the windshield make it sort of difficult to understand what's exactly happening behind you there's blind spots that you don't know where cars are actually going

or where they're at in the corner and so that that is that traditional mirror is so imperfect that it's perfect, right? And I honestly feel like, now they won't do this because they spent a lot of money on that digital camera, but I think they should get the cameras out of the car.

Denny said post-race in his press conference that he did not use the mirror when he was blocking Larson. He was relying strictly on the spotter to tell him where to go. I'm sure. I think that I would still take the mirror out. I went and raced a race one time. And the cars, it was a super late model cars. They didn't have no mirrors.

And I found that really fascinating because not knowing what's happening behind you put the driver in a very precarious situation. It's just limiting information and it made it more difficult. right to know what to do and how to how to and you had to trust your gut you had to you had to hear and listen and feel kind of where the cars might be around you and i just feel like that that digital camera is just too much too good too helpful cow bush said that the car is a defensive tool now instead of an offensive tool and so i feel like the camera kind of helps aid in that and so If the camera, if you take the camera away and all of a sudden you see people get more offensive, I would like that.

I think as long as it's not a safety issue, right, you could take the camera out and make the drivers go back to a more traditional mirror to try to see what they can see. To your point, Andrew, the spotters are really steering the ship in that scenario telling the driver what is happening behind him. and that would be even more important information. The spotters get paid a lot of money. And they, I feel like the camera has, you know, is a detriment to their, their future role in how, you know, in their job, right? So if I'm a spotter, I wouldn't be lobbying to get rid of the camera,

but I might, you know, if they got rid of it, I'd be like, good for me, you know. Makes me more important. Job security. I'm very more important. Yeah. But I would think they could take those cameras out at, maybe not everywhere, right? But in some situations where arrow blocking is going to be pretty critical.

Jeff Gluck, he was tweeting about this last night, and I saw even like Chris Gavehart commented, like, is this arrow blocking thing, is it anything new or is it any different than just straight up mirror driving? like what's the difference between arrow blocking and mirror driving or even is there one? It's the same. I mean, that is the same thing. But there's a couple things. There's a couple things to it. So on one side, there's nothing wrong here.

And this is just a change and a shift in etiquette in how we race. 20 years ago, the way you raced in the etiquette and how you let people that were faster go and you're going to catch them later in the race. race and they're going to let you go. Now, there was still good racing when it mattered or when it got down to the end of the race. It got, there wasn't no give. It was all take. But in the first 300 miles, you took care of each other. You didn't put each other in bad situations.

Now, there were some dumb drivers out there that drove down in the corner on your door. And when they, you know, you're like, hey, man, you should have let me go. I ran you down from a freaking straightaway. What the hell are you going to wreck both of us? Now, you know, that's gone. That type of etiquette and. There's no more of that. It's gotten harder to pass, right?

So you can't allow cars to go by and risk not being able to get that same courtesy down the road, right? Because you can't get back by them. Man, when the green flag dropped, there was not a bunch of movement in the field. Guards get strung out, and they were kind of stuck behind each other in their wake.

Now, the track got wide, and it provided a lot of great grooves. tire was great, rubber to track in, could get runs off the top. All kinds of cool things were happening there. But the etiquette in racing has changed tremendously where there's no give and take. It's all, you want to pass my ass, you're going to have to work. I'm not giving you nothing, and I'm actually going to make it harder. I'm going to go and take your airway, and I'm going to try to keep you behind me because I can.

I'm not losing this spot. And that's the way all the drivers seem to be mentally throughout the entire race. And there's a lot of young drivers coming up through into the series that race harder and don't give an inch. And so the etiquette has changed, right? That's fine. And that's good. That's actually a good thing. We want that.

I like that. I want it. That's, you know, if you go back to like the, probably the 80s, we had a lot of that. Like, I'm not, you know, dad certainly wasn't giving a spot during a race. He wouldn't let somebody buy and see, you know, let them race on and see them later. You know, Mark Martin come in and sort of ushered in that type of approach, and it became adopted by the majority of the field. And that was the way we raced for quite a while.

So, I mean, this new style of, you know, no giving and all taking has been in the series before. and it's good. But I will say, like, listen, I heard Jimmy Johnson talk about in a social media clip how a car, he was trying to pass Daniel Suarez in practice. And he said, when Daniel come across the front of his car and cut off the stream,

when he said that, that's the difference than in this car versus anything we've ever had. There is air that goes under the splitter and reaches the tail of the car underneath at the diffuser. And that is creating a majority of the downforce for your race car. And if you shut that off, you lose all downforce front and rear. And your car just slides across the racetrack, right? And it's like a switch.

he used the word stream. It's air streaming under the car. And so when Daniel Sores pulls down in front of him, that stream turns off, like shutting off a spiket. All that air now that was going under the car isn't there anymore. And you instantly lose grip. You instantly lose grip. You instantly go slower.

And so has arrow push, has dirty air been around forever? Yes. Everybody that's arguing that point is right. But this car handles it differently. This car produces dirty air differently. And the drivers have learned

it's easier to make dirty air a problem for the guy behind you with this car than it used to be with the old car or anything in the past, right? And so I think that's what we're dealing with is we've created a car that's so dependent on that air underneath it. And the drivers know how to disturb that easily with this car. And so you can create all kinds of problems for everybody behind you. Whereas I don't know that the old car was the dirty air was prominent.

It was a problem depending on how big the rear spoiler was and how, you know, and all of that, and NASCAR could make it worse depending on how tall that rear spoiler was. But it wasn't, it seems to be pretty simple and straightforward with this car how to disturb the car behind you. It seems to be much easier. Now that's why people are saying, well, it's a defensive tool now because it's become easier to be that way.

And so that is the problem that there isn't a solution for. NASCAR is not going to, NASCAR, I mean, when I say NASCAR, I'm not talking about Steve Phelps, I'm not talking about O'Donnell. I mean the whole sport owners, everybody. We're all down the road with this next gen. This is the car. This is what we have. We're not changing the underbelly of this car.

They're not going to change the front splitter and take the, take the fuser off. It's not happening. So this is the way this car races. This is how drivers will use it. So if the car throws a bigger wake, it doesn't throw a bigger wake. It doesn't. It just relies so much on the air under the center of that spoliter that gets to the diffuser.

When a driver can shut that off, when a driver can drive across the nose of the car behind him, he knows he has instantly taken hundreds of pounds of downforce away from that car. It's like, how easy is that? Right. Hell, yeah. I'm going to do that. Yeah.

This might be a dumb question here. You, like, what does the diffuser specifically do? Like, you've mentioned it a few times now and how it impacts the car. It creates a vacuum. So the air coming underneath the car gets the diffuser. The lower you get that diffuser, that air is getting faster and faster as it goes toward the back of the car. The lower you can get the car to the ground, the faster that air goes, and it creates a vacuum that sucks the car to the racetrack. Okay.

Right. and that diffuser is channeling that air to perfection, right, to try to suck the back of the car to the ground. So the closer you get the diffuser to the ground, the better it works. And if you just block the air that's coming under the center of the car from the rays in the splitter, right, then all that air coming to the diffuser is gone and all that downforce is gone, right? Got you.

Okay, this is making sense to me. So I guess where my head is going is like if we're not going to change the way that this car creates a wake, is there a way that we can change how the car behind can have an advantage, right? I think that's where a lot of this plight for horsepower and grip and tire comes from because it's like, okay, fine, don't change the arrow, right? And we're not, we understand the car is the car, it is what it is. I think that's where a lot of this comes from is it's like, give the car behind an advantage to. to break that, which had jumped the wake, you know, yeah, I can see where a lot of driver's heads are at now. It is making sense, like you're saying. Well, I think, you know, that's why there's not every solution or every direction you wanted to go, right? There's, listen, I, I don't really

think there's a problem problem. Right. Listen, if there's 20 more laps in that race, I don't think Denny can hold him off anymore, right? The five's coming, getting closer and closer and closer, I think it's eventually going to be a pass. It just happened to be like, you know, there wasn't a pass and this is why, right? We're talking about that. Is that a problem? Do we need to address that? I don't think so.

But I do believe that what I do here is that drivers are getting smarter about how to block. So let's take that, let's make that harder. Let's make it harder for drivers to know how to block. If we can't change the car, let's take away the information from the driver. so that he really, you know, to Denny's point, has to rely more on the spotter. The spotter is earning his paycheck, right? And it's important.

You have a great spotter, and the better spotters are going to make more money. And, you know, and I think the digital camera aids in the driver's ability to know where to go, to take the air away. And the drivers, if they get on here, I'll ask Denny. He might say I didn't use it. I still stand by the idea that, well, some of them probably are. And I'm not going to listen to what the winner said. He won.

He's happy. Nothing's wrong. Same thing for the winning crew chief. I love those guys. They're great. But I don't, I kind of take what the winners are saying with a grain of salt. Because they had a great day. They love it.

nothing wrong we won right what is second through 35th have to say about you know taking the mirrors out i'm sure they probably wouldn't love it because they like to know where cars are they like the ease that that mirror gives them that digital camera they love being able to see so easily right what's around them and i'll tell you when i got in that car that did not have a mirror in it i was nervous is hell. I'd never race without a mirror. This is crazy. Who the hell does this? But man, at the end of the race, I was still in one piece, and it was harder. And I had to be, you know, I had to make moves not knowing whether I was going to clear the guy behind me or wreck, you know. It was challenging. We didn't have spotters either in that race.

Jeez. That would have been, you are flying blind. Yeah, blind. That would have been, you know, so there. That's my opinion I think I think we're all right We had a good race It was pretty entertaining I was surprised

I look at Jeff Gluck's pole I was kind of surprised It was like in the 59 I thought it would be lower Really Yeah I thought that the air blocking And arrow issues would

Have a lot of people complain The track widened out Which I think helped a lot Listen the tire Good year The tire all did What it's supposed to be Yeah phenomenal

Great job Still like to see It less side wearing a little bit putting some rubber down. The left side doesn't put the rubber down on track. I wonder why that doesn't. We're getting there, I think. I wonder why. Well, where the bottom groove, where the left side tire runs against the apron stays clean. Is it putting rubber down and just picking it right back up or what? I don't know. I'd love to talk to good year about that. But I'd like the track to rubber in from the freaking edge of the apron all the way, right? Like, almost like it was doing

Sunday. It got pretty high though. Feel like the higher the better. Let's go. All right. Keep it on. Yeah. Here's one thing we can talk about that I thought was interesting. Jeff Gluck, Jordan Bianchi, put together a really great article on the athletic about the current conversation around charters. It didn't really say anything that jumped off the page, but it does.

there's not any breaking news, I guess is what I should say. But it is the best sort of summary of where we are now. And I think that it says a lot of things that I've been curious if people realize was going on. And I think that you should go read it if you have a chance. I am a subscriber at the athletic only because Jeff Gluck and Jordan, are there. They have such great coverage. But, and they write such great, you know, they chase this kind of content. They did a lot of work to put this story together.

Got a lot of great opinions from different teams. So this is pretty interesting. NASCAR and Jim France, the summary of the article basically is that NASCAR and Jim France are kind of sitting here going, hey, it's, it, we're not moving on, on your demands, right? We're going to stick to our guns. We're going. And the teams are sensing they're going to get down to the last moment

and there's going to be pretty much a take it or leave it type of deal. There's the opinion that Jim France is very aligned with how his family has ran NASCAR for he's very traditionalish in how they run the sport, right? And I think that if 2311 and Curtis Polk, Jordan, all of those, those guys are heavily quoted in this article, they are saying, hey, man, we've come from other forms of sport, right, with other entities like basketball. And they aren't run this way. And we need that, we need that franchise. We need that charter is a franchise.

and that's that we need ownership of that for permanent ownership forever right whereas NASCAR's a bit apprehensive to give the charters to the teams permanently naskar never i don't think one of the charters to ever become a franchise that you that you own outright nascar wanted to have some hold some ownership of those charters to be able to take them back should a team not operate to the standards that they expect right so it's interesting interesting to me, so fascinating. Watch this because Jordan and his team have come in from other forms of sport, right, where they see different business models, and they're coming in to NASCAR going,

why are y'all running it like this, man? This isn't. Like, there's better ways to do this. And here's how it works in other forms of sport, and we should adopt some of, you know, these sort of practices, and everyone can succeed and flourish, right, but. But it seems like Jim France and NASCAR are not, is, they're a bit apprehensive to change the business model. And they want to, they're about progress and growth, right?

But they're thinking, we're not ready just to, you know, turn on the faucet and open the floodgates or whatever you want to. They're not ready for all of that, all of those demands to be met, I guess, or all that change. It's very, very interesting. and I cannot begin to imagine how this plays out. If 2311 isn't here and the France family, I think, is operating

and communicating with the traditional owners that have been here forever and the other teams, I think this deals closer to being done. Denny seems like maybe it's because he has a podcast, but he seems a lot more outspoken than the rest are on the current charter negotiation. Apparently, some of the smaller teams are start. So NASCAR has decided not to meet with the RTA or the teams as a group anymore.

And they're now going out and meeting with them individually, one after the other, right? Have a bit more of a structured conversation without so many voices in the same room, right? And they're making some progress, specifically with some of the teams in the back half of the field. So these smaller teams are sitting here going, you know, I think we probably take. this deal, right? Or there seems, in this article, it seems to suggest that some of the smaller teams are NASCAR's benefiting from these one-on-one conversations with these teams, right? But then, on the flip side, you have the Hendricks, the RFK-2311 that are like, hey, it doesn't matter. We're not going to sign this agreement if it doesn't meet these

So you have this, there's a, there's a bit of a, you know, there's a bit of a challenge, I think, for all of the charter owners, the teams, to all stay on the same page. That'll be a bit of a challenge as we get closer and closer to the finish line. And then, you know, there's just some interesting, very, very interesting quotes in this article. Curtis Polk says like, you know, he talks about the lack of leverage that the teams have, which you would, I mean, I'm reading the quote. It says it as much. He's like, you know, we lack the leverage that we need.

And so it's interesting as heck that they would, they feel like, you know, they're fighting, right, for all these demands that they want. or they're fighting for what they believe that they should acquire with this charter situation, the new agreement. They're also, you're also learning, right, that really, man, there's not a, what levers do the teams have other than not showing up, right? Just saying, hey, you know, we don't have agreement. We're not going to run the clash, right?

We all lost money at the clash. We're not coming. We're not going to do this. You know, we're not going to do some of these things because we're losing money doing them. It's going to be interesting how it plays out. I don't think it will get messy. And I mean, you know, people, I keep seeing this sort of, you know,

I keep seeing the split with IndyCar and Card and all of that crap that happened to them, right? I keep seeing that sort of mumblings about that in some of the articles, even in this article, they mention it. And they say in this article that it's unlikely that we get to that point. think we'll not get to that point. There's not going to be a public, ugly mess. I just don't see that coming if I had to guess. I think that what ends up happening in my book, I think,

or I believe that NASCAR holds true to some of the demands and both there's a compromise. Say if there's four things that the teams want, that NASCAR doesn't want to give them, they may get two, right? Or they may get one. And so, but I don't think the teams walk away with everything they want. I don't think NASCAR gets to go down the road without allowing a few new parameters in the charter agreement the teams are asking for.

But it's interesting, man. this article seemed to really lay out where the teams are at pretty well. I'm going to have to go check this out after the show. But obviously you're a team owner in the Xfinity series. There's not that charter deal in the Xfinity series, but does that kind of help you see where these cup teams are at and understand their perspective? Yeah, I see both sides of it because, so look, man,

I'm frustrated that, you know, I'm frustrated that I, I don't know, man, it's tough. I wish I was, you know, there's a lot there, Andrew. I wish I'd have been smart enough to buy a charter when they were cheaper. That's the first thing I want to say because I know anything I say after this, people are going to know, well, you had a shot, you had a chance. You missed it, you missed it, bud. It's over.

And I did. There's no way at the current selling price that I personally am going to go out by a charter myself. And so it's not sour grapes. But I know the teams

want to be successful. I know that they want certain, I know that they want certain things in this new charter deal to be met. They want to own the charter outright. If I had a charter today, I would want that. If I owned a charter and had one

right now on this table, I would want, on it forever. But I'm also a traditionalist in, I am not, I'm nervous and apprehensive about this direction that we're going, where the barrier of entry for somebody to compete at this level as an owner is going to be more challenging financially, maybe. Right. Now, you don't have to have a charter to race. You can enter a race without a charter.

Carl Long, we talked about it on DJD Reloaded, how he's going to try to do that. I don't know. You know, I'm all for our sport prospering, making money, doing great. But I also am like, hey, man, I like to see that happen at a nice slow pace, right? and all of these all the change that's coming in I'm I'm just like fighting against some of that internally and and even though I don't know like hey okay if you give if you give the teams everything they want what happens to the sport right is that is that detrimental in any way to to competition or whatever right does it I don't know I don't know the answer to that.

I'm nervous, right, about what that might happen. And if we don't give the teams what they're asking for, are we holding ourselves back? Are we keeping ourselves from being coming global, from becoming lucrative, from becoming profitable, right? It says in that article, man, the team's lost money, clash, teams lose money every year. Right. That's nothing new.

I've never made any money racing. You don't make money racing anywhere. I would love to know where somebody is racing a race car and making money doing it. It ain't happened in my life at the street stock level, the late model stock level, the trucks, the Finity, never. And every

cup team I've ever known didn't make money. And so, but, you know, the teams think that that's possible and the teams think that that's realistic and should be happening. But that's so foreign to me. Like, b'b, make money?

I don't, nope. I feel like that would make sense, though, for a team to want to be in the sport. That's where I'm struggling because I'm locked in this mode of, dude, racing's always been, like, how do you want to, how you make a small fortune? You start with a big one and no racing.

You know, that's always been, that's always been the known factor. If you're going to get in racing, be ready to spend some money and not, you're not going to walk away profitable. And so for the, I don't know if it's even realistic for the teams to think that they can even get profitable, but maybe. Maybe they could. I mean, we break even here. I'm not saying we're losing money.

We break even running in the Xfinity series. So I think breaking even and making money in the Cup series is realistic. But it just, I've always known and failed and accepted that, you know, racing as an owner as an owner was a difficult thing financially. So, yeah. Well, I guess we, I mean, I could talk, I know we won't have enough time, but I could talk to Denny about this forever. And he's very opinionated about it.

And he's pro teams, right? He's going to be pro charters, pro teams owning charters. It's going to be for all of those things. And I think that everything that they're asking for is realistic. And I don't have a, I don't, I'm not, there's nothing that the teams are asking for where I'm like, ah, that's wrong. that's they shouldn't get that or they should fight you know NASCAR shouldn't let them have that but I'm just fascinated but also slightly concerned about like what what what the ultimate agreement is and

what it means for the future of the industry and longevity and success of NASCAR as a whole right what's the best thing for us going forward I'm you know I think uh there's a you know I'm concerned about like where, you know, short tracks, the short track package, road courses, the product on these tracks and the future of the sport and the car and the next gen. And there's just so many things that are like, there's so many things that are happening and so many things to so many storylines. It's a very busy, busy time. Feels like it's a lot to juggle.

Yes, yes, yes. So now this, right? And this is playing out in the background and maybe. the most important thing. Right. Right. This is probably the most important thing going on in sport right now outside of the chase for another championship. All right, so we got Denny Hamelin, the winner at Dover, calling in from his house in North Carolina. How's it going, Denny? It's going pretty good. Life's good. So coming out of Dover, did you call your shot to win that race? when you said, hey, we're going to win Dover on your podcast,

did you really believe that? Yeah, I wouldn't say it unless I meant it. I don't know. Maybe you were taking a gamble. Maybe you're a gambler. Maybe you're taking a little gamble there. I make sure I'm strategics with taking the shots, though. Like, you know, I did it 12 years ago.

Why did you think Dover was going to be the track? Past history. Because I was pissed off after two bad weeks on the racetrack where I crashed going for the win and then I crashed saving fuel, I guess, at Talladega. So I was going to have a little extra motivation in my veins. You are running. I know it seems like I say this every year.

But like you're running better right now than I think you ever have as far as just like being the guy. But this has been the MO for Denny Hamlin for like the past. five years. You're 43 years old. I always say that 43 is when drivers start to nose over when the performance starts to go down. But damn, dude, I mean, how long you think you can do this? I think as long as my body will let me. That's going to be the X factor is my body. It's just it's gone through a lot for sure between knee surgeries, shoulder surgeries, chronic back problems. You're black glass, dude. It's bad. It's really bad. So,

I think that, you know, I'm trying really, really hard to work on the maintenance of that, you know, because I think that that is going to be the determining factor of it, not on track performance for sure. But I feel good now and I feel good, you know, have felt good over the last few years. And so I just think that, I don't know, I'm going to go as long as I can when I know that I can win 36 or 36 weeks. And the minute that that number changes, then I'm going to have to reassess. Well, inevitably, if you keep running like this, it's going to come back down to, you know, everybody's going to be wondering if, is this the year, is this the year, is this a year? I think that what feels different or does it feel different, does it not feel different, about this particular season? It just seems like to me, y'all are running better. The cars have more speed every single week. you all seem to have found something in performance that you know were lacking last year yeah i think the pit crews the biggest jump in performance that we've had year over a year if i had to equate it um i think that you know last few years you know to be framed every time i came

down pit road it was we were going to lose most likely um and this year it's we're maintaining or gaining and that is a huge factor in your performance and your result weekend, we go out, because, you know, you take that one pit stop where I go from third to the lead, we'll switch that. And if this was the previous year, it would be third to six. You're not going to hear from me the rest of the day, just simply because of the track position meaning so much because the cars are so equal. So I just think that that's what we've hemmed up on the 11 team. That was our weakest link for a while, but it's, it's much better now in these kinds of. guys are doing a great job.

But, you know, we also, as a team, we've got to do our part. Me as the driver, Chris is the crew chief. And I just think that our relationship is five years in now. And we're just getting better. And we understand we're starting to build notebooks on this next-gen car of what it likes at certain tracks and what it doesn't. And, you know, it's, I think what's different this year than others is that it's harder for teams to catch up.

You know, we don't build our own chassis anymore. You know, it used to be right around the Coke 600. All these teams would come out with new chassis to get them, you know, you put about 10 weeks on them, 12 weeks on them before you get into the playoffs. And then you release another chassis and it's always faster. And it's like everything stays the same through the whole year. There's not a lot of gains to be made for teams that are behind at this current time. So it's a lot different.

I don't hear the media talking about that as much as probably it should that, you know, if someone is behind, you're just going to be behind. I mean, you know, if you're half a second I'm behind, you're not going to get there. If you're maybe a tenth behind, you probably could get there with some setup stuff or some driving technique stuff. But it's just harder today to hold in it, you know, hold off the competition. But the competition's hands are tied a little bit because they just don't have as much to work on as they used to. Yeah. So there was a lot of conversation about air blocking and all of that

And we all know that dirty air has been around forever It's a little bit different with this car because of how dependent the car is on the air Underneath the car to the diffuser So the way you the way the dirty air is disturbed by the lead car is different And you guys have gotten smarter at how to use that to your advantage If I took so all the drivers are starting to pick up on this, right? And some are really, really aggressive with it, like Chastain.

And if I took the mirror, the digital mirror, out of the car, would some of those guys get worse at arrow blocking? You know, I heard Kyle Larson bring this up, and I've refuted it immediately because I said, well, I don't use the mirror. Right. But now that you mention it, I mean, I think that when I hear Kyle's, opinion and I hear it through, I think, well, maybe he uses it more than I do. Maybe I need to

start using it more. So I think that maybe him and Chastain and those guys have learned how to use it because I think those two are probably, in my opinion, the best two defenders that the sport has on protecting their position. So I think there's something that they've learned there. They're using in the mirror, obviously, you know, the digital mirror. I don't use as much. I just felt like if I took my eyes off the road for a second, I would lose track of where I'm at and probably make a bigger mistake. So I've always just relied on the spotter, which is why you saw me not really covered the top completely at Dover because he said he's run the top.

And so I'm like, well, I'll just kind of run sort of up there to make sure I put him in a bad wake. And not only that, I'm trying to get around traffic as well. So I think that it probably would affect some people, but it would not affect all. And you're definitely not going to change the spotters telling us where cars are and us defending based off of that. Yeah. I, do y'all use the old traditional mirror at all anymore? I do. I do at short tracks. I don't run the mirror dash at all tracks. I only run them at speedways, intermediates, things like that. But I do use it still.

It is still a tool that I use just to check my gaps. Am I pulling away from somebody or am I not? So I'm probably more old school when it comes to that stuff. All right, man. Well, we had a, I wanted to, I don't really have a question, but I do know that you're involved in this. I'm so fascinated about the charter conversation that's going on in the sport. The athletic, Jeff Gluck and Bianchi put out an article in the past couple of days or in the past 24 hours that really, really, I think, sums up where things are today. There's been some debate, like O'Donnell comes out and says, we're close, the teams come out and say, nope, we're not close.

That's not right. But I think if you've read this article, I don't know if you have Denny, but I feel like it does a really good job of giving all of us an understanding of kind of how far along we are. I think you're correct. I have read it. I think the four main key pillar issues that we've tried to address with NASCAR or in that article, one being the permanency of charters. There's really a wide range of reasons why that is important,

you know, especially for the teams that have purchased charters to have them have the ability to be taken away at any moment is not ideal. By any means, people like, you know, Rick Hendrick, Joe Gibbs have invested in the sport for decades and decades and deserve to give their kids that permanent charter and it be something that is able to be passed down. obviously a correct sharing of the revenue is is one that is big right now you know there's three stakeholders in this sport the tracks the teams and NASCAR and you know to be quite honest two of those stakeholders make nine figure profits a year and one stakeholder loses seven-figure profits per year. So there's clearly a disconnect, and I wish that the fans were more informed

of how offset this deal is and how unfair it is to the teams. But, you know, that's an issue. You've got, you know, we've asked to have a sharing of any future revenue, so we're not going to dig in anyone's pockets from NASCAR from anything that they've made or established in the past. And it's, you know, anything from this point forward,

we've asked for, you know, a third of that. And they've adamantly said no. And we've willing to give extra rights up to give that. They've said no. And then just governance. You know, it's certain protections that the teams need in case of transfer of ownership. So there's a lot of different things that are key pillars. And this is kind of the first time I'm saying it publicly,

because I think we've reached a boiling point where, you know, it's, it needs to be, it needs to be fixed. And certainly we're dealing with, you know, certainly one individual that won't come out publicly and tell his story of why he won't give these things to the teams that have invested heavily in putting the show on each and every week. When is the day that this has to come to an agreement? It doesn't have to. I mean, it doesn't have to, but Is it there like a day where it's like, hey man, okay, the current agreement ends? Yeah, at the end of this year,

and then there would be no charters. And it would be ignorant of fans to say, well, that's great, no charters. Well, then we just wouldn't show up when we don't need to. You know, the clash, we won't show up at that. The All-Star race wouldn't show up at that. You know, maybe there's some races that pay less. We just won't show up to those.

it's just not financially good. So, listen, I'm sure there'll be owners not like that I'm saying this publicly, but I've just reached the point of frustration that, you know, it's just boiling over. Well, bud, I'm going to cut you off where you get yourself in big trouble. All right, thank you. Hey, man. I know you're having a good time behind a wheel at race car, and we're having fun watching you. It's going to be another fun year watching you try to grind.

it out and get into the playoffs and see what happens. I appreciate you, man. I think you're a great asset to the sport. I appreciate you being honest about your situation with your team as an owner. Congratulations to Reddick and Michael and all of that at Talladega. That was awesome to see. Thank you for your role in that as well. So we'll see you, man.

Appreciate you being a part of the team. All right. Well, thank you all. All right, buddy. We'll see you. Man, I didn't think we'd get into that conversation today. But I read that article, I read that article from The Athletic, actually. After I dropped I off at school today, Ila turned six, by the way, today.

Wow. I was six years old. Happy birthday, Ila. I read that article. I'm like, man, we should talk about this. This is fascinating. What's you guys think? You could certainly hear it in Denny's voice.

Yeah. I feel like that, you know, again, I keep using the word fascinating, but the teams are, the teams are, I'll just say, both sides seem hardheaded about how, you know, how they want to go about this. Not, and I don't mean that in a bad way, look, man. I'm lack of better word to describe it, but they both, both sides seem stuck in how they feel about this. So, yeah, she's going to, for me, I mean, it's just as interesting as watching the last, you know,

10 laps of the Dover race or the end of Talladega. Watching how this plays out to me is like watching a race come down to the finish, two drivers trying to duke it out. 100%. Yeah. Yeah. I wanted to get your thoughts on this before we go to Ash Jr. Ash Jr. I saw, I saw an ass.

Adam Stern tweet that basically a Kroger executive said, you know, talking about that number moving, that they're loving the NASCAR numbers moving forward on the cars. Yeah. What do you think of that? I mean, I guess it's good that these brands are benefiting from it. Yeah, I saw that as well. I'm sort of gotten used to it, you know? The numbers, like, I'm looking at this car right here.

It looks pretty normal. I'm looking at this 17-car, Chris Buescher, on the table here, and it looks fine, right? And I remember when they moved the numbers forward, I was so angry about it, so frustrated with it. But I want to remind everybody, there was a small brief moment in time where it was proposed to the teams that they could basically put it wherever they wanted, as long as it was between the wheel. If you want to move it forward, you want to leave it in the middle, if you want to move it back. You do whatever you want. I wish that would have happened. I just wanted, I mean, why not?

Why did you not want that? And I think that was actually on the table and everybody was like, hey, if everybody signs off on this, we're just to do it this way. Put it where you want. That's the way it should be. Put it where you want. I kind of like it uniform. Like there's a consistency. Yeah.

If you're going to move them ever on. should. You're probably right. If you can move it back, everyone. Damn. Yeah, you're probably right. That was so easy to change your mind on that. I just, you know, that's a great fight harder.

That is a great, that is a great point. But I mean, it is good to hear a sponsor come out and say, hey, we actually are benefiting for this. We do like it. Because, dude, there's some cars. Listen, with the number slid forward, every sponsor. ought to be able to make this really freaking cool. And there's some cars where you're like, what are they doing? Right. Wouldn't make a difference if the number was in the middle or four.

They're not using this the right way. Right. They're actually really bad at this. Yeah. And so, you know, and there's some examples out there. Even in that tweet in some of the comments, there's like some cars where people are like, look at this team. They suck at this, right? Look at these This monster don't even know how to use the space We're giving you all this space You're not even using it right We've gotten better at it

But yeah that was a shocking period Like when you see oh my God Like they didn't do anything to change it They'd just move the number four There's just all this void Yeah It's pretty funny But yeah

To the teams Like and I think the 47 They had a car That he ran this past weekend It's that was a great example of the number moved forward and looking good, right? And the sponsor placement on the back side of the door being a good thing. Yeah, all right, man.

It's working for some sponsors. That's good. I mean, if it wasn't, why do we do it? But hey, it's working. Serving the purpose. Good. This week's segment was brought to you by Tire Pros. There are a few people in this whole entire world of 3 billion people.

there's a few people that love cars as much as I do. There's more than that. It's like seven, almost eight billion. Eight billion? Oh, yeah. Seven point nine billion. Well, there's only a few that love cars as much as I do. Three billion.

It's probably right now, well. Per this read right here. I'm in the top one percent of seven billion. That's fair. In terms of loving cars. It's still a lot of people. Yeah. 700,000 people.

It says few. Oh, yeah. That's not a few. But hey, these tire and service experts, see, they equally love cars. They offer a huge selection of brand name tires and full service repairs from all changes to alignments to brakes. Tire pros, is it just tires, guys? Tell you, man, you go into one of them shops, they're doing it all. They got the computers, hook your car up, find out whatever's wrong with it.

They can fix anything. I've been to one of these. Have you guys been? You haven't seen it? It's not just tires. Okay? I'll go there on my next day off. All right.

Just hang out. It's unique because each location is owned by men and women in their community. And they have the added support and resources of over 600 locations nationwide. So next time you want to take your car in, show your neighbors. These are the locations that are owned by the men and women in your community, your neighbors. You get it? Yep. Show your neighbors some love.

Take it to your local tire pros. Welcome to another episode of Dirty Air, but this is Asch Jr. We're knocking out our Tuesday show here. Ash Jr. brought to you by Xfinity. If you checked out, we used to talk about it, the Xfinity Internet, now we're doing the Xfinity Mobile. 5G coverage everywhere. Hot spots everywhere.

Never going to let you down. If you make the switch today, you can save with Xfinity Mobile, Xfinity Proud, premier partner of NASCAR. We love everything that Xfinity does for NASCAR. They sponsor Xfinity series. And they also help us here at Dirtymo Media. Have a lot of fun. Anyways, we're back.

Were we live last week? I think we were live last week. I think we were live. Yeah. All right. Well, glad to be back. How's everybody doing? Doing good.

Yeah. better. I know some of the people that are listening may have heard about the hats. We signed some old 2006 bud hats I found in the back of the storage bin at my house. And we had 50 of them yesterday and now we're down to 25 before we started recording. Maybe we've sold a few since we've been in here. Those are popular. People were mad because we didn't put them online. Got to get here. You got to get them while they're hot.

Yeah. Hey, I don't run the store. That's a Kelly Earnhardt question. I'm just kidding. So you got some questions for us today? I have some questions, yeah. I'm going to try and not throw you on the spot as much this week. Don't put me on the spot, man.

So the first question, what is 917 divided by four? It's 229.25, correct? Almost still. All right. This first question is coming from Kyle. What are your thoughts on, I guess, there was a picture posted on social media changes to the bus stop at Watkins Glen was it

Oh where they took the curb down Yeah yeah yeah yeah It's fine You're good with it? Yeah Was it like and Larson showed his like mouth guard data Was it as rough as Listen I haven't drove an next gen car through there

But I don't I can look at that data And tell you that I don't want nothing to do with that The drivers are So one of the thing that's changed at the bus stop is so 20 years ago you never went into their side by side like if somebody got underneath you in the breaking zone

you kind of you get to like the 400 300 marker or whatever and you kind of got to make a decision like is it going to outbreak me and it's basically like a personality test it's like this guy

is this guy going to be like stubborn and try to charge it in this corner yeah probably okay I'm going to go ahead and let him get it and take the spot because we cannot go in there side by side. You're going to hit and somebody's going in the sand trap. When they got rid of the sand trap, they paved it. Now you can hit, spin out, and get going.

You're not going to get stuck. So now they started racing in their side by side, arguing into the bus stop. Like, you know, jumping curbs and getting crazy. And taking that curb down, it's just, just going to make them race through their harder. This is a win for anybody who's watching a race at Watkins Glen. Especially if you're standing up there doing radio style like I was doing for NBC.

I loved it. I was always going to have something to talk about. So for people watching at home or for people in the, you know, at the racetrack, taking that curb down and allowing them to even be more aggressive and race even harder into that is good. I see nothing wrong with it. And so, and, you know, it takes the unnecessary physical abuse that's happening to the driver out of the equation, right? So, yes, please.

I mean, is it necessary that we beat the drivers up going through there? They're not going to go around that curb. It's faster to go over it. So they're going over it, all right? You've got to protect them from themselves. So it's going to be fine, people. Yeah. Good.

It's good to hear. This next question, I've seen, I saw this. I wanted to say, there's a guardrail, right? Yeah. And so somebody may hit that. And that's okay, too, right? Let's not, you know, the first person that bounces off that guardrail because the curb's not there, let's not all freak out and go, well, that damn curb, they shouldn't put the curb.

They took the curb out, now look what happened. It's racing, people. It's okay. Yeah. This next question, I saw a bunch of people asking this one on Twitter. NFL draft was this past week, weekend. Thoughts on how did the commanders do? Well, I just read the, you know, I read social media, and it seems like that everybody's giving them great grades for the job they did.

So I was, you know, I'm, you know, This isn't going to matter a lot of people because there's probably not a ton of Washington Commanders fans on here right now, but our offensive line particularly left tackle. We've got a new rookie quarterback coming in. That is the offensive lines, the engine, the drive train of every successful team,

and we got to fix that and we needed to, and I hope we did. I like the pickup, though. Jaden Daniels. He was, former son devil. Hey, we'll see how it goes. I'm not sure.

I'm not going to, there was so much debate about, you know, who's the best second quarterback, right, to come off the board, Drake and Daniels and JJ from Michigan.

There was so much debate about who, you know, they're going to miss on, somebody's going to miss, right? Now, we'll have to find out time will tell

whether we made the right choice or not. But it ain't going to matter if he can't, you know, be protected. This next question coming from Marco, there are new additions to the NASCAR Hall Fame ballot. What did you think of that? I think they added Biffle, Randy Dorton, Ray Hendrick, Jacks, Bragg, and Bob Welbourne.

All of these people are, all these people certainly deserve consideration. No question. I mean, there's no wrong answer. it's more about your own opinion your opinion out there and our individual opinions about who we feel like

should go first and I guess as I'm learning this process and getting to know more and more about the Hall of Fame I'm really surprised at how difficult it is

for myself and anyone else to really appreciate the impact that somebody that race, say, in the 40s, 50s, 60s, 70s had. We can currently, all of us, you guys, and especially me at 50 years old, we pretty much have a pretty good understanding of some of the players in the 80s and early in the 70s even, and their impact. And we still feel like we've got a good understanding of how important they were and whether they measure up. But it's surprising to me that we, it's surprising to, and I guess you can make the argument for me as well,

having been inducted into the Hall of Fame, there's a lot of people that haven't gotten in that should be in, that are typically from our older past, right? And then there's Larry Phillips. Everybody, like all of the racers,

like Mark Martin, all of the guys that know and raced with Larry Phillips are like saying he is beyond qualified. Like this is a this is a big miss that he's not in many many years like larry's been on the ballot right and he's not gotten in and it's because he didn't make an impact in the cup series or the affinity series or the truck

series that we all know so well right he was racing at all of the short tracks around the country in different forms but super ultra successful and so the people that know that type of racing and people that came up through that will tell you that larry phillips was amazing, should be in. Absolutely. 100s and hundreds of races, right? But he's not getting in. You know? And, you know, and someone like me, right, that won 26 cup races

and a couple of Xfinity Series championships hops right over him. And so another guy that I mentioned on social media, Ray Elder, won six. He won six West Coast NASCAR championships. You know, on the West Coast, NASCAR had a Cup Series. And there's any argument that it was not as competitive, obviously, as the East Coast. But we've got drivers that are in the Hall of Fame,

are considered for the Hall of Fame, that raced in limited competition, but we're successful, right, back in the 40s, 50s and 60s. And there's the conversation around Richard Pets, and his 200 wins and some of those wins being against relatively non-competitive fields. But it's wins nonetheless. It counts and it should count.

But Ray Elder wins six championships for NASCAR in a NASCAR-bannard series on the West Coast in a Dodge. And when the NASCAR teams would travel to Riverside and the West and East ran together, he beat them twice. Yeah, he ought to be in there. He's not even on the ballot. I haven't even heard his name being, his name's not even been uttered in the room when they're talking about this. Not that I've heard.

I've been in the room when this, the conversation's happening around who. And I've, maybe, you know, it's my mistake for not maybe bringing him up. But, you know, and there's several Ray Elders, right? If you want to talk to historians and people that know this sport really well, they've all got a guy. You know, there's a lot of people that believe AJ should be in.

You know? I don't know. That's a tough one. It's not the hall of statistics. It's not the hall of success, you know. And so there's a good argument for AJ. And he was on the ballot last year, right? And he's not on the ballot.

Right. It's interesting. But, yeah, I think that, you know, and Samard! Damn! Samar, dude, was unbeatable in the Bush series, in the 80s, and up even before that racing and sports series in the 70s. Oh, man. And he got knocked off the ballot,

and I almost feel like I should apologize to his family. for that. That's horses. He should have been not getting knocked off. He should be going in. It's his time. This was his year. And he was so close, I think, several,

over the last couple of years, he was seen to be getting maybe closer to that induction. Now he's off the ballot. All right. You made some good arguments there. I don't think, I don't know. Hey, you put their names out there, you know. There's no wrong, there's no wrong answer and everyone's, everyone's, everyone's, everyone's, it's, everyone's, it's, it's, and it's, it's, and it's tough, especially when you knock it down and you only got, you know, three people going in.

When it was five, it was a little easier, but that was a long night. Um, and then there seems to be this, there seems to be the, that, whether they're alive or dead, weighs on someone's vote. That shouldn't matter. What the hell was that? What does that matter? It's a Hall of Fame. That's what it should be about.

Whether they're alive or not alive. Whether they can come and give a speech or not. I don't know. Yeah. Yeah. Anyways, that's a good, we've got a tight show. Yeah. Tight show today.

So that's probably a good place to Endash Jr. this week. Oh, okay. All right. Well, I appreciate everybody. It's been a lot of fun. Xfinity has done a lot of great things for us, and we appreciate them, and we're promoting their Xfinity mobile.

Great coverage. Wi-Fi hotspots all across the country, and they're doing a lot for our sports, so we want to support all the businesses that spend money and help NASCAR grow. Alex Thames from Dirty Mo Doe is now at the table, Tampa Tims, as he's known. You have a good weekend?

at Dover? Betting wise, no. No. But you cashed out on Bowman to win. Yes. Made two units there. Yeah. So at what point in the race?

Can you do that? Yeah, I think it was second stage. He was running second towards the end, I think. That was the highest he's ever been, and I said that's a good place to stop right there, and that's the only bet I won all weekend. So that was great. But the predictor, the professor's predictor, he got four of the top five correct. So he had great time.

Dang. Yeah. Yeah. The top ten, I think. How good is the professor's statistics, right? It's really good. It's usually right on. Really?

Yeah. If the race goes as planned, it's pretty good. But then you have things like Byron and Bill crashing out. That hurts you. So would you say that you're going through a rough patch? I am. You are? Three losing weeks for me.

Three? Yeah. Oh my gosh. All right. What is your approach when you have a little bit of a stretch like this? this. A lot of people, I think, is the, the, a lot of people try to go a bit harder. Not me. Try to win their money back. I know. That's the wrong way to go about it. That is the wrong way to go, right? Because it's a roller coaster. Like, I had a really hot start, and now

I'm going down the downslope. So you just kind of got to take a step back, lower the volume down, maybe lower the amount of units you're putting on it. Yeah, it's not increased. Not increase. Just get confidence back. Get a winning week and then go from there. There is. So tough. I know. It's tough. I know. It's tough. It is. You want to make it all back, but you're not going to. You want to. You want to.

It's hard to make it all back in one week. You got to be steady with it. Yep. All right. So what's the predictions for Kansas? Kansas? I mean, look, the way the year's gone, if it's not Joe Gibbs or a Hendrick car winning, I mean, what are we betting on?

I mean, 2311's probably been the closest. They've been really good here. They're good. Yeah, they're good at Kansas. Three out of four races, I think, with three different drivers. So you got to throw that. the early lines of the books, they pretty much agree with that. It's JGR

HMS and 2311, so. Right on. Who do you think gets a win? I think Denny goes back to back, to be honest with you. It'd be hot. I know. He's having a hot start to the years. All right, man. Well, we appreciate it. Dirtymo Doe drops every Thursday on our Dirtymoe media

platforms. You don't want to miss it. Steve LaTart Tampa Tims. They're going to cover all the races every week. Kansas coming up. Any other sports happening right? Well, you got you guys been talking anything about NBA playoffs, NHL playoffs? A little bit, a little bit, yeah. I'm more of the NHL playoffs guy.

It's crazy. It's nothing like hockey playoffs. It's very intense. Yeah. Yeah. We have golf coming up this week too. They think they're in Texas, so we'll talk about that as well.

Yeah. I'm enjoying the, like, the both teams score props and stuff like that on NHL. Yeah, those are fun. I'm not, it seems like, you know, it's anybody's guess on who's going to score the actual goals. Yeah, exactly. Right?

Yeah. And same in soccer too. Slear impossible. Yeah, it's impossible, but it's fun to. See much of a risk for me. Yeah. All right, ma'am. Enjoyed it.

Thank you, Tampa Tams for coming on. Let's go to the White Flag. All right, everybody. It's time for the white flag. Dropped Sunday night. Let's the tear down. Jeff Gluck, Jordan Bianchi. Always getting great insight from those guys immediately after the event.

Getting that emotional, you know, response. Way too early. Those guys, they, you know, if I'm not. them, I'm like, hey, I kind of like my Tuesday slot where I get to think about it. Yeah. I get to walk off the ledge a little bit. I've genuinely enjoyed them as my post-race coverage.

I wouldn't have it any other way. Yeah. I wouldn't have it any other way. Because they're both opinionated and emotional at times, right? Especially Jeff. He gets pretty bit out of shape about something. Yeah, he does. Dropping Monday as well, actions detrimental with race winner, Denny Hamlet, door bumper clear.

Two great shows. Tomorrow. Speed Street with Connor Daily and Chase Holden. They got Scott McLaughlin coming on that show. That's going to be good. And then Thursday, Dirty Mo Doe with Steve LaTart, Tampa Tims, the professor. DJD Reloaded, also out on Thursday. Carla and T.J. Majors called up with Michael McDowell, Jamie McMurray, talking about how to block on the Super Speedways. I wonder if they'll talk about air blocking this week.

Yeah, right. And tomorrow, as we mentioned, Chocolate Myers is the guest with Kirk Shelmerdine, helping me interview Chocolate about his career. And I think we'll actually ask those guys as well. about the current state of the sport. A couple little nuggets that I have to mention. Chocolate is still pretty much involved in what's happening in the sport,

and I want to get his opinion on where he thinks things are. And then Kurt said something in his Hall of Fame speech where he really was frustrated with how the teams and the crews can't work on this current car, right? And they don't have the creativity. So maybe he'll be a little more measured. he dropped the bomb there at the Hall of Fame Beach

I was like whoa right in front the whole industry yeah Kurt he didn't care be good to see those guys that should be a great show we'll see you tomorrow check out Dirty Mo Media

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