The Dale Jr. Download - 556 - Chicago: Post-Race Retaliation, Advice for Hailie Deegan, and Alex Bowman’s Two-Day Hangover

Episode Date: July 9, 2024

Dale Earnhardt Jr. is back in the studio after vacation (or was it?) for this week’s episode of Dirty Air. After an eventful weekend in the streets of the Windy City, there is plenty to discuss, and Dale is joined by special co-host TJ Majors to lend his perspective from the spotter’s stand:Dale doesn’t trust his golf cartThe rain won’t stay away from ChicagoSVG and Larson have up and down weekendRetaliation after the checkered flagThe Playoff window is tightening for non-winnersTyler Reddick had a shot on the last lapDuring the Ask Jr. portion of the episode, listeners wanted to know Dale’s opinion on:Ryan Blaney’s chances for the ESPY “Driver of the Year” awardNASCAR’s EV ProjectRodney Childers moving to Spire Motorsports in 2025 to work on the 7 car 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. And on this week's show, T.J. Majors is going to join me and co-host helping us out. Andrew's out under the weather a little bit. We got a great show coming up. Chicago, all kinds of things to talk about. Let's get started. The following is a production of Dirty Mo Media. You're Dale Jr. The Dell Jr. Download. Go, stop.

Roll! The Dell Jr. Download starts now. Hey everybody, it's Dale Jr. back again in the studio here, the Dirty Mo Media Studio, for the Dale Jr. download. And I am excited. I've been on vacation. Amy doesn't say it's vacation, but I do. It's been a summer vacation. And I've been at my beach house, remote studio. But I'm back. We're back in the DirtyMode Media studio. And I'm going to be a little bit on the chip today because I'm so glad to be. to see everybody. Haven't been here in so long. And also I got a special co-host with me, T.J. Majors. Hey, T.J. Hey, thanks for that. By the way, we call that retirement. Retirement. Okay. Well, I don't, I don't feel retired. But I'm enjoying whatever's happening. I'm enjoying whatever's going on in my life right now. Whatever you want to call it, I'm liking it. Andrew Curlin decided to get sick this morning. Said he had a fever.

So anyways, you know, he's not here today, and we called an Audible, asked T.J. to come in and pitch in. And so don't screw it up, T.J. Don't screw up the show. The chances are high that I screw it up. I say that because isn't that such a jerk thing to say? Don't screw it up? So I was getting ready to interview, I got to tell you, man, I was getting ready to interview these, I won't name any names, but I was going to interview these legends in this particular sport. Like I'm going to go interview somebody in front of a big crowd

and there's two legends of this sporting world that I'm not familiar with. It's not racing. And we're getting ready to walk up around stage and I'm so nervous about to interview these people and one of them looked at me and said, don't f*** this up. And I was like, damn, now I'm really nervous.

All right, so I thought I'd say that. I'm not really nervous. Make you feel the way I feel. Yeah, I'm not really nervous. I know you're not. Appreciate you giving us some time this morning. I know you're busy. I know you did, you know, you got to, you know, the door bumper clear show yesterday.

You got prepping all these different drivers you're spotting for. The job is a spotter, and I'm being, I'm being sincere here. The job as a spotter, as you've shown me over the last couple of years, all the work that you've got going on during the week, is quite layered. There's a lot of things happening, a lot of things that you need to do to prep your drivers, especially, you know, some of the younger drivers you work with. So thankful that you got a little bit of time this morning to come in here and help us. and Dalton's here, Alex Thames, everybody is in the studio except Andrew.

We'll give him a little bit of a hard time. I honestly hope that he feels better. I text with him this morning. Still got that great sense of humor. So we're hoping that Andrew will be back with us quickly. But I'm glad he was, you know, I like, Dalton, don't you like a guy like that? It says, hey, I'm not feeling well. I'm not going to come in.

Yeah. Don't spread your. stuff around to me. Keep that somewhere else. Yeah. Not going to risk. Did you talk to him? Yeah. I talked to him and it's kind of fine. Yeah. He puts on a good voice. You know, he can, he can crank it up, I think. He is young. Yeah. Yeah. When man, when

I get sick, oh, it's, I'm, I'm hearing. Answer the phone. Yeah, no. And I'm, and I do add a little bit of, you know, add a little tinge to my voice. Oh, yeah. A little more rass. Yeah. A little more rass. A little more gravel. When he gets sick, he gets sick.

It might be a seven, but he makes it a nine. He plays the nine really well. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. Well, I want you to know him sick. Yeah. No question here. Yeah.

That's what it was like spotting for him. And he was upset. He wanted you to know that he was upset. Yes. Just no doubt about it. All right. We're getting an inside look. I like it.

All right. So a lot to cover here, man. I'm so glad to be back in this room. Now, I did love, I don't want you to get that wrong idea. I thought the remote studio worked really well. I hope that people, you know, appreciated the effort that went in to making sure that we put great content together while I was away. But God, I got to get away. So, but I still want to be able to do the show.

So I thought that worked out well. I want to say hey to all the serious XM listeners out there. And thank you guys for tuning in. As you know, I was talking to TJ about this yesterday. TJ come by the house and the girls got in the swim pool and swam a little bit. I bought the Titanic Lego set. We got it started. We had a little update last week.

And I left it at the house. It's going to stay there. I just feel like it will just got to stay there. I want it to, you know that table that was behind me on the remote shows? I want to put it on that table. So I'm going to build it there. I'm leaving it there. I'll work on it there.

Didn't bring it home. Won't be working on the Titanic here. But I bought some more sets. and blaming Byron for all of this. William Byron, appreciate you. Great job in the cars tour this past weekend at Carraway. Second place finished. Awesome job.

Yeah, it's a great race. But he's costing me on these Lego sets. We got the Millennium Falcon coming, which is kind of like the second largest set next to the Titanic. A lot of pieces, thousands. Is that your notes or your receipt? This is my receipt in front of me. T.J. is looking at my phone.

There's a The Batman The animated series set which is kind of like the shadow box of the Batman Cave It's really neat I got that coming

The Ghostbusters car The Back to the Future car The Dolorian Yes Yeah it's pretty cool And then this retro 50s style radio I did see that too Yeah those are neat

Yeah If there's a There's a Lego for everything I bought those No kidding. I have a, I built a 67 Mustang fastback Lego. It's pretty sweet. I have to show you.

Sometimes, man, I look at those Lego sets and I'm like, that don't look anything like the damn thing. You know what I mean? Because people will be like, you know, like the NASCAR Lego, don't look like a damn NASCAR. No. I ain't buying that. No, thank you.

But these other things, I was like, yeah, I'll buy these because I look at that and I go, yep, I know what that is. So if I have it sitting out on a shelf, like TJ over here, he's like, I'm going to get the home alone house. Yeah, I want the home alone house. That'd be pretty cool. I'm like, show me this home alone house, right?

He shows it to him. I'm like, that looks like any fucking house. I'm not going to see that on your shelf and go, oh, shit, man, home alone house. I pass that house every day. I'm going to go, what is that? You're a childhood home? Is that the childhood home you grew up in?

It's all in the details. It's got the club house. It's got, you know what I mean? It's got the living room with all the little characters going by. No, sorry. No. On the outside, it's a Westchester, New York house. It is.

I know. That's all it is. I'm like, what the f*** is this, T.J? You might be a little old for that movie. Look at my shelf. I've got the Delorian. You've got a damn house from, from, somebody's going to look at a suburb in Buffalo.

Somebody's going to walk into that room and be like, dude, is that the Batmobile? I mean, I'm missing. I'm missing. So, Byron, you're in a bit. But I love these Legos, man. Having fun with that. Didn't mention that the car street.

tour ran at Carraway. We're going to do an update later in the show. We got to do that. Cars tour, you know, I'll tee it up later, but man, I keep saying this every time we talk about it, they had another epic finish. I don't know how they do it. Yeah, I don't either. I'm biased, but I think it's the best thing going right now in Oval Short Track Racing.

And there's a lot of great shit happening in Oval Short Track Racing. Sorry for all the curse words in this show. We're just excited. Whoever's editing that out, I apologize. But I'm so glad to be back. July 4th, I hope everybody had a great safe July 4th celebration. Maybe I'll drop some pictures for you guys to throw into some of the YouTube shorts and some of our Instagram shorts.

What did y'all do? So where we are, go ahead, T.J. I see you probably did that golf cart parade, right? Yeah, it's really cool there. Yeah, T.J. came and celebrated July 4th with us at the beach one year. so he knows all about it. 9 o'clock in the morning, there's a golf cart parade.

And this year, man, there was hundreds, and I'm not exaggerating. There were over a couple hundred golf carts in this parade. And so it was really bigger this year for some reason. I don't know why people were just more excited, which I love seeing it. But anyways, they dress the golf carts up

and they're themed. Anything you can think of. There was a Star Wars. themed golf cart. It's weird. It's really cool because you don't know what you're going to see. And the best part about the parade is most of the golf carts throw candy to the kids. Yeah. So that makes it even better. Oh, yeah. Kids love it. Everybody's happy. And you just, we pull our golf cart. We want to get in it and do it one day and be part of it. And we're going to do that probably next year. We're going to

probably rent a golf cart. I don't trust mine. I bought an old, I'm a cheap guy. I bought the old golf cart and fixed it up kind of guy. And so I'm not putting mine through that. It's probably going to break. Right? Backfiring down the street. Well, it's battery powered. Oh, okay.

Gotcha. It's hot as hell. And I just don't trust my golf cart to not break down on me in the parade, right? So how ironic would that be? You're watching the golf cart parade in Dale. It breaks down in front of everyone. So I'm going to rent a golf cart that we can then fix, you know, put, you know, dress up however we want.

Because that one's not more likely to break down. Right. It's probably going to be much newer. I think it's worse. Shoot. The one I have is it was a rental for most of its life, so it's been beat to hell. Yeah, Road Hard, put up whatever. I found out that this rental service was selling golf carts.

And I'm like, well, these prices are way cheaper than buying a new one. Thousands and thousands of dollars cheaper, right? So let's go take a look. I go over there and under this covered outdoor garage, this guy had like $50,000. of these old banged-up golf carts just sitting there. And he's like, hey, pick whichever one you want, man. I go over there. I'm like, all right, we're looking at them.

And I found one that had the newest batteries and everything seemed to be in one piece, not a bunch of broken shit hanging off of it. And I said, I'll take this one. We took it home, tore it apart, painted it, made it look nicer, put some newer batteries in it. And it's working. But I don't trust it to go through the golf cart parade.

I'm telling you right now, your golf car is going to be better than the rentals. Now! We rent one when we go there. I know, but I rented one this past. We had so many people at one point. For Father's Day weekend, we had 15 people at the house, 15. So you had more.

And so we had to rent another cart. And dude, they brought us like, one, it's brand new. It's like, hey, it's got, it's brand new. I'm like, wow. That might have been luck of the draw. Maybe, yeah. I don't know. Look, I'm more, I'm not worried about, you know, the rental company's cart breaking down.

Just yours. Just mine. Yeah. Because I would be too. Yeah. I don't blame you. Yeah. All right. So glad we got that covered.

Fourth of July was great for me, good for everybody else. Yeah. A lot of fun. Drink a couple beers, watching fireworks, spent some time by the pool. Yeah, we laid out, we got out, you know those, the waterway. You know, most beach towns and little beach areas up and down the Carolina Coast have the back waterway and the long piers, right? And so we went out on one of them long piers out in the waterway and watched the fireworks. It was really great because there's two different islands that were alternating on fireworks. We kind of had fireworks over here, fireworks over there, and that was pretty good.

It was better than that the spot last year that was the tide was coming in. Yeah, it was a little better. Remember we drove them to golf cart? Yeah, that was a little, that was a little nervous, yeah. Yeah, I know. So, yeah, we covered the Lego sets in July 4th. And also had a little just yesterday. Had the shit scared out of me.

I got sung by a wasp on the nose about a year ago. And to everyone that saw it, it was very funny. Painful for me, funny for everyone to saw it. How does that happen? Well, there was a was a wasp nest in the kids' play set. Do you smell it? Smell it? No.

Oh, I get it. So I'm up there with, I take one of these long things. It's a long thing on a pole that you dust maybe like a fan blade or something, right? Yeah. I take that thing. I'm going to knock this was a waston. nest down. So it's extended out probably about 10, 15 feet.

I get up there and I bump that wasp nest and I take off running and I'm about 15. We might have talked about it on this show. I'm about 20 feet away from this play set. Well clear. And dude, it was like slow motion. A wasp drew a bead on my ass and flew directly at me and I watched him

coming at me and he ran wide ass open right into my face and stung me on the nose. Stinger first. And I fell to the ground. And everybody, my kids, Amy, everybody's watching. They're laughing their ass off. And it hurt so bad.

My eyes were watering. And this was about a year ago. Okay? Fixuring that, it's hilarious. Yeah, that's what I. It's like you got shot by a gun. Dude, I was like, it was like, I mean, you know, the,

like he macawsied me and so I'm a I was like I'm impressed the little dude did that but anyways

I so I have that experience right ingrained in my in my soul traumatic very all right

I go out to my pool equipment I get home from Veach you know checking around the house you know like a man checking, making sure, you know, doing my job, right? Everything's working. Okay, this is working. That's working.

Okay, this is not working. Let me turn this back on. Let me flip this breaker all right. We're doing all the things. Internet, everything's working well. All the air conditioners are running. Okay. We don't have anything.

No problems. Nothing, right? Going through the whole house. I want to turn, I want to make sure that the, I'm going to turn the pool heater back on. All right? Kids need to swim. So let's get that going. We turn that off when we leave.

So I'm going to turn that back on. I can't connect to it through my phone app. So I know that I need to go out there and reset this outlet that will allow me to connect to this hardware. So I go out there and it's an outlet with a plastic cover on this post all around the pool equipment, which is surrounded by shrubs. So you walk out to the shrubs, big, big circle of shrubs. shrubs. There's a little path through the shrubs to get to the equipment and to the outlet. And so you're kind of in this, in this, in this jungle. Yes. So I'm down in there and I lean over and I'm going pop that little plastic cover that hinges open on this exterior outdoor outlet. And when I pop that

cover, I know, no, no, no joke, no less than 25 wasp come flat out of that thing. straight for your nose I would have gone right into the pool they come fly out and I feel them like the air off of these bad boys they are moving some air

and they're bumping into me and I turned and ran I audibly screamed and I ran way off away from them as far as I could go I don't know how

I did not get stung I don't know how probably that speed you got running man I don't know what I owe that too. That scream probably scared them all.

I don't know what I owe that too but I'm ready to pay I'm ready to I'm ready to make payment on that gift I'm not being stung I'm telling you man that shit scared the shit out of me

I open that up and then boys come out of there I was like I am f***ed I knew it right then and there I was like this is going to suck this won't be just one sting

this will be how many will this be and none I do think the pool would be an option. I don't know why. I was right next to the pool. I don't know why I went and jumped in there. I've heard that sometimes they'll wait for you, though.

If you go underwater, they'll wait for you to get out. Bell sh-h-h-old-h-old-h-ha-old. You know what? If I'm going in, I might pop up for air and go back down a little bit and then do that a few times. Just to make sure a coast is clear, right? There's nothing more like humiliating than getting scared by a bug, and you're like,

I'm not worried about that. It's just a loss for whatever, but 25 of them I'd be freaking out. Dude, I promise you, however many could fit in that plastic covered receptacle, were in there. I don't know, I don't know, man.

I feel like it's probably five. He just saw, thinks he saw it, because the past experience. Five still a lot. Hey, I ain't went back. That damn thing, that outlet's wide ass open. I ain't went back over here.

I ain't going back. What you're going to do? I'm going to give us. some time. I got Bill McCourage up. It's not take a few days. Looks like the pool's going to be cold. It's fine. It's fine. The kids are swimming it. Remember when you were a kid? You jump in that damn pool. You didn't care what the damn temperature was. You were like, eh, it's cold, but I'm going to, I'll be fine. I'll get used to it.

I want to swim. You didn't, you didn't care if it was cold. Not one bit. Remember? Then we got, you get to a certain age. You're like, nope, not getting in. That's too cold. Yeah, when that is. If it ain't 86 degrees, I ain't getting it. I think if you're old enough to like drink a beer outside of it like I think you're like

yeah it's too cold I'm just gonna drink beer in it outside of the pool. It's a good point. I think it's teenager. I think it's teenager type. Yeah, you think it's before? Yeah, I think it's before.

Could be. At high school I was still jumping off roofs and took pools. So I don't know if how much the roof that was. Yeah. Of course. Well, we're going to get into

some dirty air here, talk about the Chicago race and I want to thank Tire Pros for sponsoring the Dirty Air Segment they've been a great supporter of the Dale Jr. Download. They've been a great supporter here at Junior Motorsports, obviously, on our race cars for multiple years.

And they know a ton about cars. They are the go-to. If you want to oil change, engine repair, I know the name is Tire Pros. And you're like, hey, I need tires. I'll go to Tire Pros. But they do it all. Alignments, whatever you need, they've got you covered. Visit your local Tire Pro today.

TJ, I know you went to Chicago. I watched on TV. it looked like leading up to the weekend that we weren't going to have a similar situation as what we had last year with the weather. And then wouldn't you know it? Here it comes. We get going great start to the race, great first stage, exciting, good racing, good battles. And then the weather comes in and it's like, holy crap. I mean, it's cursed.

It felt like that. Yeah. I mean, that's miserable. I wasn't there, and I'm glad I wasn't. it there because when there's there's nothing i mean i'm i don't mind doing rain refill on a broadcast being in a booth being dry i'm there i'm already there for the race um i don't mind doing rainfall but man being out in the elements like what the crew guys what you guys what the fans have to deal with watching everybody try to find somewhere to go so they can kind of wait this out not knowing what the future

might be not knowing if you're going to get the race in that had to be pretty miserable it was definitely It was definitely kind of like the weekend was going so well with the Xfinney race, how great that race was. The leading up to it, the Saturday night, it looked like the place was rocking, man. With that concert going on, the drivers all coming out there. I think the drivers all had a great time introducing the fans there that don't know anything about NASCAR to NASCAR and being up close and personal with them guys. And then Sunday comes along and it's like, oh, we're good.

Wait, what's this? Four o'clock? Rain at four. you're like oh no so that kind of you know what but as much shade as the rain put on the whole event

man I think I think everybody rolled with it really well I mean NASCAR did a great job the fans stuck around the atmosphere at that track leading up to it again was incredible like there's so many new race fans there I did a bus tour Sunday morning for the track and there was fans

on there they'd came the year before. They're like, we had such a good time. We brought our friends back and now we're doing this track deal. Like, they have a great time. So the atmosphere is incredible. They're doing a really good job there of, I mean, every little detail's covered. And, you know, the whole Chicago team there, Julie Gesey and her group there have done an incredible job. Yeah, it's awesome. We usually kind of have an instant reaction where maybe we rank the race on a scale of one to ten. But it's so, I don't think, I don't know if it's fair to do this to Chicago. Let's just go ahead and, and, and, and, you know, and debate, you know, the future of the race.

I honestly feel like that it's shown that it can be entertaining. It can be a great product in terms of between the flags, right? Oh, yeah. And that enough, that for me is enough for it to continue. And, you know, from what I can tell, it seems like everybody there, public officials, NASCAR, everybody seems to enjoy this relationship as it is, and I think we'll see it again going forward. Yeah, I think I don't see how you don't go back there. The track to me is becoming one of my favorite road course races because the track is so challenging.

These guys are making mistakes and we go to a track like Sonoma, Watkins Glen, these guys don't make made any mistakes. And there's there's so much room for air at Watkins Glen now. There's, you got so much runoff in all the corners. It's really hard to get in trouble. And when these guys make mistakes at this at Chicago, there's repercussions for it, you know? and the cars, you see them going to the corner, the drivers are wrestling these cars. You see the things bouncing,

and, but then these cars are bouncing, and you got guys like Larson and SVG out there trading the lead every other corner, you know, and so it's becoming one of my favorite races to go to us for a road course. Yeah, I will say that the way, like, to your point, they can't get away from each other. And we saw not only some of the things you highlighted

about the battles and so forth, but also when the tempers get to boiling over. You're going to, you know, if you get into a guy, even if it's a mistake, you're paying for it in the next corner because he's still going to be there. Yeah. Right. And that's, while that's maybe not fun for those guys involved, and if you're one of the spotters for one of those cars, you're probably not enjoying that either.

But as a broadcaster or a fan, I love to see a guy get pissed off over somebody who made a mistake and try to repay them in the next corner and it just create more and more. chaos, which we saw a ton of that toward the end of the race, which we're going to talk about that a little bit later in the show. One of the things that NASCAR did, did you think that they altered their sort of approach to wets versus dries and allowed the teams to have a little more flex, you know, a little more control? I did, but I think they were more comfortable with it there too, it being a road course.

Was that something that you knew was coming into, going into the race? Did you know that there was going to be a bit of a change in protocol? No, I didn't. I wasn't, I thought we, I mean, me, standard protocol was, all right, come down this time, everybody's putting the same tires on. Yeah. Because at Loudon, and Loudon was the first oval that we've really done that at with the rain tire stuff as well, which was, I understood it there. You're kind of checking it out, but it weren't really well. Yeah. So I think the approach of taking the gloves off saying,

Did you know that was possible? No. I mean, I knew it was possible. I didn't know they were going to do it. Did NASCAR ever tell you, hey, man, we might loosen it up a little bit? Not to me. I mean, I haven't read anything or said where, hey, we might, you know, it doesn't mean that something wasn't set out, but, you know, I didn't know personally that that was going to be an option. Yeah. Teams didn't mind reacting to that.

No, I think that's how it should be. Yeah, I do too. I think, but it's all I've been asking for. And I'm glad to see NASCAR, I guess, be a bit malleable or be able to, you know, sort of roll with the punches or just on the fly. they saw an opportunity to loosen up a little bit and say, hey, let's let them do it themselves here. Let's let them handle it.

And I think you're right. If there is a scenario where you could give the teams a little more control, it's that street course race, it's that, you know, it's that confined, controlled, you know, street course style, road course style race where these, you know, these kind of things are seen commonly in all types of road racing scenarios goes across other forms of motorsport. So, you know, they're a little nervous to do these type of things on the ovals because,

you know, running rain tires on those ovals is very new. Very new. To everybody in motorsport. Loudoun was, I mean, you watched Loudoun, Loudon was crazy when we went green in the rain. But it was one thing that we're doing now, like this thing, this race had a whole bunch of new elements to it. Like, I'm trying to see how quick the tracks drying with sun, now with overcast. There's so much more going on to it that we've got to figure out now, too, which is cool.

One of the new elements was the race turning into a timed event. I don't know that there's much debate there. I don't have a problem with it. I don't know that the fans were very concerned about that. It was pretty much, hey, I like the idea that if they're going to do it that way, they gave us over an hour to understand that was what was happening. So the teams weren't caught off guard. The teams could still understand, okay, is my strategy going to help me here?

how do I, you know, do I want to put on this? It made the teams choose, and you can debate this or tell me more if you know, it made the teams choose in that last little stretch, will these wet weather tires get me to the finish, which it worked out for Alex, or should I put the slicks on and hope that that prevails over the course of the, you know, the time left in the race? So we, you know, they let us know early enough that it didn't torporated. torpedo someone's strategy.

That's exactly. The rain and it drying kind of played into that and made it even more interesting. But them telling us early enough, your strategy wasn't set yet. Last year, I believe when they set it, there was guys that just pitted that probably would have stayed out. And it hurt their race a lot. And we know early enough now that we all know we're going to have to stop again. But now it's like, okay, when do you stop?

And now what are you putting on for tires? Yep. So it made it even more. interesting but it was it's definitely early enough to where we all have to we can adjust you know and we all it doesn't ruin your whole race yeah and it it does bring up the debate in some circles around earlier start times and i mean i've always i've always been for you know one o'clock starts or you know same right after lunch getting the race going i feel like people are just coming off of whether it be going you know if they're if they're going to you know church or just you know

a family lunch or whatever it may be. Chores. Yeah, it feels like that one, you know, right after lunch, bam, get the race started. The NFL does it every week, right? Yeah. One o'clock game, four o'clock game. I feel like, you know, I don't know,

there's reasons why the networks run it at 3 and 3.30, and there's good reasons why they do it that way. But, you know, for me, I prefer the one o'clock starts. So next year, right, this race will probably take place in the Amazon TNT break. Do you think that they're not on TV necessarily? Do you think that they could push that time up or do it at a different time and not worry about the window of TV time? Yeah, might be interesting to see if they do since they are sort of, you know, since, you know, Amazon, I don't know so much about Turner, but Amazon being a streaming platform, they have so much

freedom to do things a little differently, such as start times. I don't know whether they'll, I don't know whether they would move far from where we're at now. I mean, it feels like that wherever you want to live, you need to live and live it hard, right? If you're going to be a three o'clock start, be a three o'clock start across the board. That's what I liked about the NFL was I know when the games start. I don't have to think about it. I don't have to look it up. I don't have to wonder whether it's 1.30 or 1 o'clock or 2.30.

I don't have to. I know when it starts. That's when they start. All of them, right? And there's a batch that's going to go off at one. There's a batch that's going to go off at four. And that makes it so easy. And so wherever we're going to live, we need to live it hard.

And if we need to, you know, as an industry, be consistent. So I don't know whether, you know, Amazon or anybody would move away from the, you know, the start time, the mid-afternoon start time. but what I'd love to see is get more streamlined to where it's like, hey, every race is going to start, you know, unless it's a night race, right? Every race, you know, is going to start at X time, just to make it a little more easier to understand. But, because, you know, having to go and look and check out, you know, go to the app and, oh, damn, okay, this one's 2.30.

Well, this one's 3. And then next week it's 3. And then next week it's back to 3. It's like, okay, I don't know why that is, why the little discrepancies there. but anyway, I don't control that, so I'm not going to debate it too hard. There was some interesting comments from Christopher Bell about the weather, and we're going to, I think this is more along the lines of,

was it raining hard enough to not be racing? You were there, T.J., you were up on spotter stand. There was some, you know, we've had this sort of same conversation. There were 30 minutes there at New Hampshire. where we felt like, okay, we should be on the track. Why aren't we? We're waiting on this big sale to come, but we got 30 minutes here. Yeah.

And so was there a moment this weekend where you thought, you know, why aren't we out on the racetrack? I think there was more of a moment where we, why are we on the racetrack? It was raining really hard one time, and we were coming back to the green. And I was like, I mean, we were kind of, we had just pit, I think, so we were kind of back. And I was kind of glad because I wanted to, see what was going to happen in front of us and I would have time to get them slowed down before we got there. But there was definitely a point where like, all right, we're coming back to the one to go here. And I think we even doubled up that restart as well.

And I was like, oh, this is going to be really interesting. But, I mean, honestly, our guys are figuring us out as they go. And yeah, they're going to make mistakes and we're all seeing these guys make mistakes. But they're going to get better at it. And they're going to get better and better at it. but I thought it was all done really well. Michael McDowell made a comment that he would prefer that they remove stage breaks from the road course races, which was done.

Yeah. And which really didn't prove out to be better, in my opinion. Made it worse. It did. So I'm not going to spend a lot of time on that. I don't think that's – I don't know where Michael's coming from there. I guess there was a situation where we had a caution. leading up to a stage break.

And NASCAR said, oh, it's so close to the stage break, we're just going to leave it under caution. So, yes, that's annoying. We're at, you know, we're lengthening the caution, right? Because you're going to have, okay, we've got three laps to the stage break. We're going to run those under caution. Then the stage break. Then we're going to go through the whole process of the stage break,

which is another, you know, five to eight laps. Yeah. So we got a big, I got up. I was like, hey, I'm going to just get up and go do something because it's going to be 15 damn minutes for the next stage starts. And so you don't like that. You don't want people getting up off the couch or even worse changing the channel. And so that's a big problem.

So I don't know if I loved that idea. Why wouldn't you just go ahead and try to get them back to green even if it's for a lap? So I know what you're talking about. At that point in the race, when the caution came out, it fell just right. They were going to have to, it was like four to go on the stage. By the time they come around and got the payscar, it was going to be three to go. And then you still got to clean up the accident as well. Let me ask you this then.

Why can't you just say, why can't you throw the stage caution? Why can't you throw the stage flag and grant the stage winner at that moment? If you're, if you're saying, hey, the stage is over. Yeah, we're going to move up. This is going to take the rest of the stage. We're going to move it up right now. We're going to throw the green. We're going to open pit road.

We're going to start the process to be able to, because that is okay with me because, hey, you allow the stage break to eat into. the next stage, we do. We start the next stage all, you know, two or three laps, four laps into it because we do. Yes. If you're okay with allowing a stage break to eat away laps of the next stage, right, then why wouldn't you, why would you have a problem with saying,

hey, all right, caution's out, three to go before the stage in. Let's just call it the stage in now. Start the process to be able to get the next stage started. I guess it depends on because sometimes the stage, like at the beginning, like end of stage one, stage two to stage three, sometime are really close to different, or different windows are different.

So that might, you know, if somebody had pit in the middle of, you know, 10 last four the end of the stage and they were planning on staying out, it might change something strategy-wise. I don't know what you mean by like. You could give somebody who's short on fuel or something. We are definitely,

there's definitely going to be a situation that comes up that we probably haven't, thought of yet that it's going to make it's going to move somebody's fuel window and benefit them somehow yeah you know but i definitely know what you mean just speed the let's just go i mean track's going to be clean let's just move it up now i guess if we're going to say the caution comes out three laps to go in the stage and you let everybody know that's the end of the stage run these three caution laps we're going to throw that flag um they don't open pit road up do they no so that's the thing that's why they run it out because right so if that's the core case you're okay

you could just throw the flag yeah I mean everyone's in the same boat nobody's leaving the nobody's leaving the racing surface yeah everyone's in the same boat they're already changing so much too with like the time race and and everything you know given the pit road you know options for wet and I don't see why you couldn't just change that because even if it does kind of gift somebody something in terms of fuel mileage or whatever I kind of okay with that because the caution come out that's just the way the caution fell the caution itself inadvertently change this strategy. Anyway, that's worth maybe NASCAR looking at down the road. Sure. A lot of on-track incidents during this race, as you mentioned, TJ, challenging for the drivers.

Oh, yeah. SVG gets crashed out. That was, you know, it's interesting. We, I love this broadcast. Great job by NBC. Great, great camera shots. But Briscoe comes flying through the frame, right? Slams into the wall. Oh, yeah. Bagley with a call there. about how hard he pounds into the freaking tire barrier there, but you see him clip SVG. And SVG goes sliding out of the frame,

and then it's like a couple moments later, they're like, oh, 16 cars parked. Oh, wow, 16 cars tore up. Yeah. Oh, hey, he's part of this crash. He was. And so, but that was pretty dramatic. SVG,

and his, one of the things that I caught, so, okay, it's one thing that he crashed out of the race, that's a story. But one of the things that I caught was he gets out and goes, track house had us a good car. Did you hear that? I'm like, wait a minute, man.

That didn't look like a trackhouse car. What did that boy's doing? 16 is not a track house car. What are that boy? He did say Collegan track house, like the team effort. Oh boy. I heard it, but I heard it.

I heard it definitely put emphasis on track house. That that car ain't never been in Colleg's garage. I think his interview was really good though. Did you think that, does that car ever been on the shop floor at Colleges? Or do you think it was a full track house effort? It had to been. I don't know if it hit the shop floor. I don't know where the truck picked the car up, but I don't know if it hit the shop floor.

No, my mind. T-Mack was crew chief on that deal. He used to crew chief here at June Merchport. So I was wishing SVG for a great day for T-Mack alone. Yeah. Yeah, T-Mack. He's, he's had, I mean, I like T-Mack. He's done well from when we work with him.

crew chief and Daniel Sores and then they removed him swapped him for somebody else and it hasn't really changed much on performance wise with the 99 car and I feel like T-Mack just isn't getting the credit he deserves in terms of how good of a crew chief he is but tough deal for them

if SVG doesn't get taken out do you think he wins top three he wins second third something like that yeah I think he's hard to be between him and Larson again I don't know though you know if you put some of them guys are quick quick, man. And I feel like the gap is closing on this course between them and him. I think if it's a track house car, he wins, but that colleague livery slowed him down just a little bit.

Just enough drag to bring him down. I'm just kidding. Chris Rice. I'm just getting a hard time. That's what I mean, if Chris Wright, I think he slowed him out a little bit. We got to get him a hard time. Denny said Bowman was fast all weekend though. So there was a lot of guys that were fast like completely throughout the week. He was. He was. TV. Yeah. TV mentioned Bowman in the pre-race talking about his, you know, his consistent finishes on road courses.

And I was like, yeah. I was like, you know, it's not a name you traditionally think of in terms of, you know, road course success. But, you know, they did a good job, man. Pointing that out. He goes out there and wins the race. He's quietly having a really good year. I don't think he's getting enough credit for the year that he started with.

I mean, he's been top ten of the points like and it's hard to do so you saw some emotion when he gets out of the car and he mentioned which we all we often forget right he mentions the break the back the back issue that was you know difficult he had an incredible year going up until that point when he broke his back I think he was in the top two in the point he's leading the points yeah right so he's he's doing well very well as well as anyone, breaks his back, and when he came back from that, the team had no momentum. They got no results from that point forward. I forgot about the head injury. He suffered, I think, at Texas. Yeah, Texas. And that's a process of at least six months of truly kind of getting back

to feeling like yourself. Because I don't think this is his first time having some issues with head injuries. I think he had some issues many, many years ago before he actually ever got his full-time Xfinity ride. So he's dealt with that in the past, and that can be difficult to get through. And he had, when he mentioned that, dude almost broke down talking about how tough that had been and how he felt counted out, right? That really made me, that really hit me personally because I too had been starting to feel like, what's the, will Bowman ever get it going, right?

What is the deal? there was a period of time when he was winning more races than anybody in the sport there was a little chunk of about a six to eight month span where he was the most successful driver in terms of victories in the sport it was about four years ago, three or four years ago right around when he won at Chicago

and he kind of rattled off about three or four wins there maybe I'm wrong but I don't remember that time period oh well you know he's got seven wins Yeah. Right? And so there was a little chunk where he was as good as anybody in terms of victories. And so you can check it on race and reference there and see what I'm talking about.

But then he had these troubles and stuff and he's just a, you know, Blake comes in. They're excited about Blake as crew chief. This is going to really turn things around or try to, you know, maybe change things, bring it on Blake. And it's just been a tough struggle, right? And so, I don't know, I'm happy for Bowman. Now we'll see if that, you know, they can carry that momentum going forward. Yeah, he won four races in 2021. Right.

So there was a span there where he was, he was equaling some of the other drivers like Larson and guys that were winning more races in the sport. Larson ended his day in the tire barrier. You know, that each lap, you know, getting more, that was, you know, that's one of them situations where, you know, the weather and the lack of experience, I think, for all of our drivers in some of those scenarios, just kind of jumped up and bit this guy. He was getting more and more confident with each corner. And man, you know, we learn that once you got a tire sliding in the wet, you're not recovering. Now. Especially when there's no runoff to your point, T.J.

At those racetracks. Yeah, there's no room for air. You start sliding. He hit the damn wall pretty hard. He hit really hard. I kind of waged it in there kind of between what wall in, yeah, wall entire. He got stuck. But this is, I mean, this is one of the, this is with Kyle Larson. He's, he's super fast all the time, but he is very aggressive. And he puts himself, he's guys, he's a guy that just can't stop himself from taking a risk like that just because he's fast. I mean, this is like when the bottom's not working in a sprint car, you swing to the top and try it, right?

This is him just moving around trying to find speed. And most of the time, he finds speed. makes it work. And this time it just bit him. But he'll, he's going to learn from this and he's going to come back and he's going to be better. So he put on a great show on Saturday so I know he can road course race. Yep. So there were some other contact. And unfortunately it was after the race. Lots. Lots of contact. What was interesting, I guess, okay, so, you know, Bowman gets into Bubba and turns to just, you know, goes in there, locks off four tires up, cleans out Bubba. He admitted to it. He said as much multiple times during the rain delay in victory lane. All his post

race, he's saying, hey, I know Bubba's mad. He ought to be mad. Don't penalize him. He hit me after the race. He should have. I deserved it. Doing everything he can to not only keep Bubba out of any kind of trouble, but also he wants to not get ran over by Bubba in the next race. Yes, he's doing damage control. Yeah. And so, but I, you know, so that went on. And then we also had, we also had Chase Elliott in an incident with Daniel Suarez. And Brad Casalski was a victim of that.

Well, that was it. We weren't. Right. Yeah, we were, we were just taken out in the Suarez and Chase deal in turn 11. We were in front of Daniel and Chase drove into him and just sent us into the tire bear. and then the next corner Daniel didn't like Chase hitting him so Daniel spun Chase out and then Chase runs him down

after the race. So heading into like second to last corner Chase bumps Daniel which sends bumps the 6 into the tie barrow. Oh yeah. Right? Yeah. So Daniel's like, well, I'm sorry 6.

I'm sorry Bragg is lousky. Well, Chase goes by both of them during that situation. So in the next corner Daniel's like, oh, okay, I'm sending you. So it was if you watched the end car footage it's insane. Daniel hooks

Chase in the left rear headed toward a right hander. Yeah he wiggles a bit of it. He didn't. Jason didn't have a chance. No, he wiggled him. I mean, he didn't straight up hook him. He wiggled Chase enough to where Chase had lost control. But yeah, Daniel said no, no, you're not.

He said afterwards, he was like, he pushed me a little bit then I pushed him with all my intention and I ended up hitting him pretty good on the very last corner. My bad on that. With all my intention. With all my intention. My bad. Yeah. I did that with all my intention. Yeah. My bad.

You know, one thing I do know is you don't mess with Daniel. And me and you were talking about this yesterday. Daniel, T.J., if you bump into that guy or mess with him, he has this reputation that he's going to get, he's coming back. He's going to get you back. Oh, yeah. You're not going to get away with that. Yes.

Now, that's absolutely right. That's Daniel. He, if you bump Daniel, he, he, if you bump Daniel, his goal, that run, does not go from moving forward in the race. It goes to making sure you're not in front of him anymore. So, you know, and Chase learned that the hard way. After the checkered, Chase ran him down. Yeah.

I didn't actually see this with my own eyes. What happened? I mean, I just watched the N-car. Yeah. That's all I saw was the N-car and Chase just weaves through the traffic. Similar to Bubba and just gets to him and does a little swerve at him, maybe makes slight contact, then gets in front of them

and just locks the brakes up. Okay. So do you view, so the debate will be, will Bubba be penalized or fined? All right. Do you think that both of these situations are identical

between Chase and Bubba? The only, they're not identical, but they're... Sorry to put you on the spot. The reasons, the reasons these situations are happening are the same.

I mean, one guy, they don't, they're not happy. with how they got raced by the other guy. So they want to show their displeasure. And I think when I don't think Bubba meant anything more than just to pay bump. Alex happened to be closer to the wall and he bumped the wall. I mean, that's it to me.

So some people have said that the, you know, Jeff Gluck, for example, said that the precedent was set way back around 2006 when Carl Edwards swiped at me at Michigan and Carl got 20 grand or something like that. Carl's swipe at me was a T-bone. A T-bone. That wasn't a swipe. Near, damn near T-bone. It was a really hard hit. So I think, you know, that fine for him was 20 grand. This wasn't anything like that. Your hand was out the window, too.

Like, your hand was out of the window. I don't think that that matters. I just don't think it matters. I know that that's bad. I know that that looks bad and it's scary because, you know, a car could, if you got your hand out, that's my fault for having my hand out the window. What the hell am I doing, right?

Shouldn't have my hands out the window at any time. So, but, so I won't, I won't, I won't lay this, I won't let that affect my decision on, my opinion on this. I, I, all, I do like the old throwback idea that, man, you know, if you piss me off enough, I want to be able to go, I want to be able to drive up to your car and adore you a little bit.

I don't remember where we were at. Oh, we were at Martinsville, and Tony Stewart, I wrecked somebody. I spun somebody out. I don't remember who it was. Denny. No, I don't think so. But I spun somebody out.

Tony Stewart was mad about it. Yeah. and Danny were getting into it and Tony came in. Yes. Tony comes up, he ain't in this. But, Wachash comes out, and Tony comes up to me and starts

revving up his engine and swerving at me. So I just turned, a fucking left, knocked the damn right front off his car. I was so mad. I'm like, who the f***er? Sorry. I know we can't use this

if I do this. I'm sorry. Oh, we can? We got blapers. I'm like, this ain't even your deal, man. No, you know, you ain't going to come up and try to tell, you ain't going to come up and try to govern me or try to, you know, you know, try to tell me what I'm supposed to be doing. And so I'm like, I'm like, you want to swerve, do you?

Oh, how about, how about some contact? Want a little contact? Now you're going, now you're going to think twice. So that was during the caution, middle of the race. when the race ends, you know, maybe you don't do what Carl Edwards did. You get spun out or something like that. Say, oh, we were at Charlotte and running an Xfinity race. Brad is Alasky, you're probably spotting for him at the time in the Navy car.

I was. Brad's running really good, top two. I'm running fourth in the 83 car, had Lance McGrews as my crew chief. we're having a great night. Denny's up here with all of us, and Brad and Denny got into it. Yeah. Caution comes out, and Denny pulls up, and I think he...

He swipes at Brad. Swipes at Brad. Knock the left front fender off. And this ain't, yes, this isn't like a tap. This is like, I'm going to ruin your day. And so I'm like, I got to go up and hit his fender now. This guy hit my guy's fender. I got to go get his fender.

That was an interesting night. I, that needs to be able to happen. those things like that drivers need to be able to do those things right or wrong I'm not saying their right choices I'm not saying it's what the driver should do yeah

but the drivers need to be able to have a little bit of a of a jab or two some flexibility in the car because the jab after the car is even worse fine after the race, I'm okay if Bubba goes up there and hits the 48, and I'm okay if somebody goes after Chase or Chase goes after somebody.

I don't, and if they want to find them, that's fine. I don't care. I don't think the driver's mine too much, you know, 5, 10, 15 grand. Don't take points away. Don't truly deter this because this is what racing's about. Yeah, it feels like small track, you know, America, like all the, after the race going and bumping people. Now, there is a line. There is a line where it's too egregious, too aggressive, too dangerous. And you've got to know as a driver where that's at and not to cross it.

But these type of things for me is kind of in our DNA. It's like the gloves coming off at the hockey match and a couple of guys getting an opportunity to throw a few punches before the rest finally come in and go, all right enough. The fans have seen enough, you know? Yeah. And I think we see people do that, like, they do it after the race congratulating each other even harder than what that was, too. Yeah. Like if I was racing with you. You know, the door on this guy right here. Yeah. That's Matt Kenseth. Yeah. Down the back straightaway, 2001 July Day Tom. I kind of wish I hadn't done it because look at the freaking door. It's not, I mean, it's freaking ruined. Oh, it's awesome. But I pull up beside him and I went to tap him, and we were both so, like,

like he, I guess he was so happy for me and I was so happy. And we just crank the wheels. Yeah. Just burn the right side of this car. And just sort of like, er. But you're doing it and you're happy. You're happy when you're doing it. So, but it's still like, what's the difference? Yeah. Yeah. I don't think, I think it's perfectly fine. I mean, if I had won a race and you were in it, I would fully expect you to come up there and hit me hard. I draw the line. If the guy ends up backwards. Yeah, you can't spin them out. That, that's over the line. Yes. That right? Yeah. I don't think a little bumping after the race. Now, you know, I don't, it's 20 years into this. I've seen it every single week, you know, during a race or after race. Yeah, I agree. All right. Bowman wins

the race, changes the playoff just a little bit. I mean, he was already up there in points. Yeah. But what it does change is around the 16th position. That's the big area here. Yeah. So, yeah. Now you've got all 400 cars are in the playoffs. Yep. I think, yeah, that's a great point. Doughton, all four, Hendrik cars are into playoffs. Bowman breaks at 80 race losing streak. And, you know, looking at the point situation, Truex in 13th, still in a good position, plus 125. Ty Gibbs still good at 84, but the concern begins with Ross Chastain and Chris Busher. They're plus 53, plus 45. Those are full events. Like having a full race lead over another

driver is a pretty comfortable place to be right now, but should anyone win below the line is their fear? Right? Chris Bush or Ross Chastain, they're kind of battling each other to not be that guy that gets bumped out by a winner below the cut line. That is worth paying attention to. Then you got Bubba Wallace, Briscoe, Cobb... I think all of these guys need wins.

You think so? Oh, yeah. I think no better than how Bubba's been running. from him on down, you're going to need a win to get in. So, and it's, you know, I'm a big, you know, everybody knows it, big Josh Barry fan, guy just announced he's going to the Wood Brothers next year. So he was like 70 points out a couple weeks ago. Now he's 152.

He had a terrible race this past weekend. Yeah. Two in a row, really. Yeah. So, you know, McDowell, all these guys. They all are in must-win scenarios. And so, which I hope that they, one of them or two or maybe three of them might get close to at least delivering. I don't, I don't necessarily want one of them to win or not.

I don't have a, you know, I don't have a, like, I don't want or not want anybody to win, but I want them to try to flirt with it for the storyline and the excitement that that will deliver. I feel like Kyle's going to do that at some point. Yes. Kyle will. Bubba will go, you know, somewhere. Yeah. He'll be real fast. Yeah. Yeah. You know, Daytona could be anybody's race. There's nothing better than having a win. I can tell you that right now. I was about to ask you, like how good to feel this year compared to last year?

Last year was nerve-wracking. This year having the win, and honestly, we should add two, honestly, with Talladega. But it's so much relief to have a win right now. Yeah, I'm thinking if you guys didn't have a win, you'd be right in front of Ross Chastain. maybe about 70-ish points up of the cut line. Actually, we're 9th or 10th in points regular. Like, we've had a really good last few months. You have 558 points right here. Yeah, what's that, 10th or 9th in points?

That's two less than Ty Gibbs. Yeah. So if you don't, you know, have a win, you would literally be in the area. Yeah, 14. Yeah, yep, you're right. Yeah. Tough spot for you, buddy. Luckily, you got that win. Luckily, we got that win.

I think we called Brad, Kessler. He was going in the offseason. We did. I mean, we have three or four second places this year as well, so. Yeah. Oh, we do got to mention Tyler Redick. If Tyler Reddick doesn't hit the wall, he wins the race. No question.

He was flying. Oh, yeah. He was absolutely going to be right on the bumper of that 48 car going into at least the final two turns. And if he can't clear him out, move him enough to be able to get by him. I don't think he does. I think he wins the race I don't think he moves him

Well maybe he don't have to No But I mean last resort He at least gets a chance to move him I think he learned If he can't just drive by the guy At Darlington I think he learned That that's probably not a wise decision

Because some of these guys you're moving If they don't make the playoffs They're gonna make your life Really hard I'm just saying What I'm freaking point is TJ Is that I think if you don't hit the while He wins the race

He's gotta feel terrible I thought he was actually gonna win the race One point at the end He was He's gotta feel He was flying yeah Yeah he was I mean Ty

timing-wise, he was easily catching it. It was going to come down to it. I wish that we could have seen that. I feel like he's been in that position a lot. Another thing that I thought was interesting was I saw a tweet from Landon Castle where Landon had criticized, he's like, hey, man, in the past, I've criticized

other forms of motorsports, particularly via supercars, for penalizing drivers for contact, just getting down in the corner and bumping a guy, moving him up the track and going by. and he's like, but today I'm really appreciating how disciplined that has made SVG because SVG

will catch every car and never touch them and hound the hell out of them and finally get away, get around them. Like our, me and most of our other stock car guys can catch a car at a road course or a street course like that and really find it challenging to be able to set the pass up, find a way by.

SVG has, he's so schooled in what it takes to pass a car, a slower car without contact on a road course. It is fascinating to watch. I really appreciate Landa Castle making that tweet and pointing that out because it really, once he said that, I was like, yeah, that is a great point. He is incredible underbreaking. I don't know if you've, like I've watched a little. little of it is replay here. Every time he starts to break, the back of the car starts to step out and he catches it. He is on the edge because I think he does that deal with both feet and he's

incredible at it. Dude. I think the cool thing about him is like you could put blank cars out there and you know which one he's driving. Like no number, no, no, I agree enough. You can absolutely tell which car he's driving. He made one, the only mistake that I saw him make was in turn 12 in the Sphinny race. He did miss time the apex of the corner and he clipped the wall. And that's when Sam cut him a break because Sam had him lifted up. the corner and Sam lifted to let him go again. That's the only mistake I saw him make. Mentioning the Xfinity race, SVG goes on and wins.

A thrilling battle with him in Larson and Stage 1. Joey Lugano driving the 15 AM racing car. This has gotten a lot of publicity. Haley Degan and A.M. Racing have both posted on social media that they are parting ways. AM Racing has Josh Berry tentatively scheduled to drive the car at Pocono this coming weekend. but Joe Ligano was asked to jump in it at Chicago, goes out there, you know, stays out of trouble, two-time champion, smart racecraft, top 10. You know, he did go out there and light the world on fire. This will be heavily debated.

What does this mean for Haley Degan? How does she find a way back to getting herself in a program that continues to help her progress? TJ, you've actually, I think you've worked with her in the past. So, you know, you would be a great person to chime in on this. I'm sure you guys talked about it on Doorbroper Clear. Yeah. I think that she absolutely should pursue more opportunities

either in the trucks or the Xfinity series. I do not know enough about AM racing to be able to make a, you know, to make a decision on what, talent uh, Haley has and whether she really truly deserves to continue. I believe she should.

Um, and I think that in a good scenario where, um, you know, she, I think in the right situation, there's enough want to,

um, that she could actually turn into quite, quite a, accomplished racer at some level. Whether it's, I don't know if it's a cup level. but I think, you know, in the right scenario, she could become a contender.

Yeah, I agree. In the trucker of the Xfinity series. The Cup's a whole other beast. But you've worked with her. What do you think? So, you know, I think Haley is incredibly talented. I've, you know, I went and did the first couple races with her. I think I went to Sonoma and was spot for her.

She sat on a poll for the West race there, which is that race is filled with Cup guys and stuff. And she goes out there and qualifies on the pole for it. I think we run fifth, six, seven, something like that, but competitive. Yeah. So I just think the situation didn't pan out as well. Haley, she doesn't have enough experience in these cars to go and tell you, hey, this is what I need to feel at this part of the track.

This is what I need to feel here. And the truck is so different than what the Xfini car is. She just doesn't have the experience to say that stuff. So putting a guy like Joey in there and Josh Berry, they can say, hey, you guys need to work on this. Yeah. Hey, you need to work on that. Joey wasn't in that car to get, you know, he was in the car to get experience for the cup race and to let them guys know, hey, this is the part you need to work on because obviously, I mean, obviously the car can get better. So, but Haley, I think Haley needs to just go and be surrounded by A. She needs to go and be surrounded by people that can tell her this is what you need. This is what you need to feel. This is what you need to do here. And then she can learn them scenarios and learn that feel and then grow as a driver. You know, it's hard. She just doesn't have the experience to go in there and tell them guys,

hey, this is, you know, the car's way off here. You could go out there and run one lap at any of these tracks in the Xveni car and say, hey, this thing's way off. She doesn't know that. So she can't, you waste time trying to figure that out. But I do think Haley's incredibly talented and given the right scenario, I think she can be successful. Yeah. I, um, this made me think about this. And, um, I don't know if, I don't know if this will make sense or not, but, Haley is a product of a very challenging system. And this is the same for a lot of drivers that I've worked with and a lot of drivers that I've seen that work their way from,

you know, whether it be racing at Millbridge to late models to super late models, the truck and Xfinity opportunities that eventually come along. And a lot of times, you know, whatever the financial support is for, driver. It is very difficult wherever that financial support is coming from, whether it's a sponsor, whether it's family,

whatever that support is, it's still a lot of money, a huge commitment, and it's not forever. And so what happens is, and this is, I believe, somewhat similar for Haley, is, so in a perfect world,

you would let Haley or any of these other drivers, run in that, you know, that K&N series or run super late models or run trucks, a few more years, right? Sure. And what happens is that there's a bit of an urgency to try to move up and take the very next available opportunity at the next level because the support financially is not forever. and you do not know when that finally dries up, for whatever reason, you lose that financial support.

So every rung on the ladder that develops above you, whether it's the truck series or Xfinity series, no matter how good or bad that rung is, you grab it. Sure. And I think a lot of times drivers then ultimately end up in bad situations that don't pan out. pan out for them. And this is one of those scenarios where I think that she felt like, man, I really got to take

this. This has been presented to me and I got to take it. It's Xfinity. I think I fit those cars better. I think I'll do a better job in this series. And she took it when it might not have been the opportunity she should have chosen. Yeah. What other things she could have done?

I do not know, whether it had been stay in the truck series. But I see this with a lot of drivers that are trying their hardest to get to the very top, taking the next opportunity that presents itself at the next level, and trying to progress as quickly as possible, because you know, you can't sit here and fund, you know, a late model program or a super late model program or a truck program or a K&M program forever. Yeah. And, you know, and they're like, well, we're spending all this money.

Let's just go spend it here. And Lynn, they're spending all this money. Let's just go spend it here. And they just, you know, they just end up in bad situations. It's all about timing. It is. It is. It's about timing.

Sometimes it works and sometimes it don't. Yep. But it's frustrating to see it. Yeah. Because I, you know, you know that if Haley, if you could have, if you could have, you know, predicted or chosen Haley's path, you would have certainly sent her in a different direction, right? If you could have taken the last five years and done something differently with Haley's career, you would have not put her on this path. You would have done it differently. And I could say

that for a lot of different drivers that I believe had the talent, but just ran into the wrong situations. Yeah. And don't forget, in the beginning of her NASCAR career, the bigger track stuff was during COVID. Yeah. So her first lapse on all these tracks when she first got in the truck series was lap one, turn one. We didn't even qualify. Yeah. So we lined up in race, and that was her first, that was her rookie year. And I don't know that, you know, this is a young team.

Yeah. Right? Yeah. Trying to put itself together, trying to build, you know, some notes and get a foundation and getting a young driver that lacks that, you know, lacks experience. Doesn't help them grow. Doesn't, you know. And so, you know, they'll very much benefit.

fit from what they learned with Joey and whatever they may do going forward. But I would say, you know, Haley would probably be better off with a team that has some back, you know, some foundation underneath it that's been a team that's had these type of drivers come in and that knows what they need, how the sort of, I don't want to use the word coddle, but almost knows how to handle these inexperienced young drivers and how to protect them. Yeah, that's been shown a little bit when she ran Vegas. Yeah. In that first, first Xfinity race, she ran Vegas and ran between 10th and 15th all race.

And whose car does you drive? That was a Stuart Haas car. Yeah. So, and for her first race in Xfinity, and Vegas isn't by any means the easiest track we go to with the characteristics of the track. Yeah. And for her to run 10th to 15th in her first race, you know, that's what she needs. Well, I think it's best that they're going their separate ways. And I think AM should definitely try to, you know, tab some Josh.

Barry types that can sort of help them say, hey, man, and they need to listen to these drivers. Hey, this is what's wrong with your program. Hey, this is where you're short. This is what's, this is where your, your, your performance is lacking. And they can build their program and then maybe go back to, you know, hiring a full-time driver that you get better names to. Nor people, better names want to go and work and drive for you. Yeah. And, and, and maybe Haley can find herself a situation. Um, she doesn't need to upgrade. so much in terms of race teams, but there are some great teams out there that might be in line with her funding and support that have been around a while, right, in the series that do just this,

right? They take on these sort of projects and develop them. We'll just have to see what happens. I'd hate to see her just go elsewhere. I know, yeah. I hate to see her give up on stock car racing all together. And she is, I mean, she's good for the sport, too. I mean, there's a lot of kids.

I mean, when I worked with her in the trucks, I mean, you know, Stella, my youngest, she's like, I'm a whose favorite driver? Haley, Haley. I mean, kids gravitate towards that stuff. Yeah, for sure. All right, I want to thank Tire Pros again. This segment of Dirty Air was brought to you by the great folks of tire pros. There's few people who love cars as much as I do, but these tire and service experts,

they equally love the drive from all changes to alignment. brakes. Tire Pros gives your vehicle the TLC it deserves. Tire Pros is unique. Each location is owned by men and women in your community and they have the added support of over 600 plus locations nationwide. So if you want to, you know, show your car a little TLC, take it to your neighbors, take it to your friends in the area at your local Tire Pros and they're going to take care of you. All right, everybody, Alex Bowman, the winner at Chicago. has called into the show. And Alex, you have myself, Dellenhart Jr., and T.J. Majors on the show.

So thanks for calling us today. How are you doing? Yeah, thank you for having me. I'm on day two of a hangover, so we're here. But, yeah, definitely a great weekend for us. And, yeah, it was cool to finally snap the winless streak. I appreciated all of your transparency during your post-race. interview about how lit you are going to get. I wonder, like, do you know the ounces of

bourbon that you consumed? Yeah, I don't really remember. I'm being honest. Yeah, honestly, probably less than expected. I knew how bad yesterday was going to hurt, especially when we still had all our meetings. So, oh, did you, did you get up for meetings yesterday? Yeah. How many, what time did you go to bed? Did you go to bed? Like 8.30.

8.30 in the morning. And what time's the first meeting? 11.30. Are you able to zoom in or is it a physical meeting where you got to be there in person? I was there in person. Oh, my God. Did it, did you smell like a liquor cabinet? I don't think so.

I mean, maybe Chase was sitting next to me, so you'd have to ask him. You can't smell yourself. if that that point though I mean yeah I still can't smell much of anything I feel like I'm hiding all right hey I love it man so you know there's not I don't know many drivers that party like you and I did when we would win a race there's not I mean I was bound to determine that if we won we were going to go home we're going to drink as hard and as long as we could and so I'm glad somebody is is doing those things to date how much

one of the more interesting things I think is is who's still there at you know 6 o'clock 7 o'clock in the morning so who were the who are the soldiers yeah I mean pretty much everybody was still there when the sun came up a couple people had kind of started

to disappear I think I mean some people were like a sleep upstairs. What are y'all doing for 12 hours? You're listening to music. You rewatch the race? Well, I mean, we didn't get home until like two something.

Okay. Oh, okay. It was pretty late start. Gotcha. But we hung out. There was some Taco Bell and pizza here when we got home. Yeah. Somebody took care of you. You had some, yeah, your girl was home.

She didn't come to. Yeah. Yeah. Chloe had us hooked up when we got home, which was good. But we kind of just hung out, had a good time drinking. Everybody ended up in the pool at some point. Wait, wait. Not everyone had, no one, surely no one travels with their bathing suits. So how does everybody end up in the pool? I mean, I ended up in the pool with all my clothes on shoes and everything. Okay. So to be honest with you, last night when I finally was trying to live my life and eat some food, I ordered some door dash and I went to the front door and all of somebody's clothes were on my front porch.

I was going to say, all of it. The better story would have been, a better story would have been that Bubba Wallace was there delivering the door dash. And he got in your pool fully closed. And he threw you in. So, I don't want to hijack this, but this reminds me. of when we won Martinsville. Funny story. We win Martinsville.

And we play, I play music right. You've been to my house. And so we're rocking out. We're playing music or whatever. Well, they had a replay of the race. They were running on, I guess, whatever network it was. They just decided to play the race over. So we got that on the TV, and we're watching it a little bit.

And we're, hey, you know, we're laughing. Things are happening in the race. Like people are running over each other, spending each other out. My teammate at the time, Casey Kane, was at the house. partying with us, drinking with us. And this was the Martinsville race where him and Vickers got into it. Oh. And when that came on and we started all reacting to it, whatever our reaction was, I didn't think it was bad, pissed off Casey. And he left, like me right then and there, left the freaking party. And I was like, so anyways, a little nugget there. But so did you play music?

I feel like we played a little bit of everything. Kind of have a big playlist that typically gets played on the boat that jumps around through like every genre, I feel like. So we just played that, which was cool. I think my neighbors are probably not happy. I had a new neighbor move in last week. Tough introduction. Nine o'clock in the morning.

Did you invite them over? That had been the right thing to do. I don't even have their contact info. I haven't met them yet. Just knock on their door, man. Two o'clock in the morning. He lives in a very, very, I don't know, the rules in your neighborhood are relatively tight.

Not where I live now. Did you move? Everybody here's super cool. They've been awesome. Yeah, my old neighborhood was a pain in the butt. That's the one. Yeah, I didn't know you moved. I live off the middle of nowhere with the crazy HOA.

Yeah, HOA's or no joke. Yeah, yeah, the people here are awesome. So hopefully my new neighbors don't hate me too bad. We blew some speakers out in the back patio. They hate you. They hate you. They hate you. They hate you.

Yeah, it's a rough deal. It was a long night for sure. Well, you better fix the speakers. Yeah, I mean, we got another shot at this. You could win Pocono. You better have them damn speakers right. Yeah, yeah. You can't have bad speakers.

So it's been a win, it's been a long time coming, and you had some comments when you got out of the car in Victor Lane or on the frustrated way, wherever you were, and you said, you know, I had the broken back, I had the head issues from Texas, and there was a lot of an emotion in your voice. I don't know that we all, I think all of us, the industry, had forgotten just how difficult some of the past several months have been for you.

And so, you know, I think we forget how difficult it is to come back from, you know, from either the, you know, the head injury from Texas and the broken back, obviously. So, you know, you got to, you know, you got through all of that. and you've got I've been in I've been in situations as a hendrick driver where I've struggled for a very long period of time I know what it feels like to break that windless streak in that equipment it's got to be a big relief you've got to be thankful that you were given that opportunity to prove that you you belong there yeah for sure I mean you know how it is you start to second guess yourself and like start to think like what if Vegas was going to be the last

win and um you know it uh has it's certainly been a tough two years so um to be able to do that it just meant a lot obviously to have mr h and an ally and and everybody stick behind me through some some really difficult times um meant a lot to me so just super appreciative for the opportunity but Yeah, I mean, to break the winless streak, to get Blake his first win as a crew chief, really, like, a ton of guys on my team have never won a cup race before. So to be able to share that with them was super meaningful. And, yeah, I mean, it's obvious, right? Like, my teammates have been super successful the last couple of years, and we've struggled. So to be able to overcome that means the world to me.

Yeah, I wanted to give you a chance. I know how Rick is and he's, you know, he's very proficient at seeing things through, giving things time, being, you know, very common sense oriented in difficult situations. But also your relationship with ally, I think, served you very well during some of the more challenging times. These people love you. And I know that by have some inner workings with some. You know, some things we've done together with paint schemes and having, you know, allies support here at our show.

I know how much that relationship means to them. And you've, you know, you've driven the 88, you've driven the 48, two cars that, you know, I was synonymous with the 88. You jump in Jimmy's number 48. That's a difficult situation for you either way. But you've kind of made this ally relationship yours. When I think about ally, I don't think about Jimmy Johnson. I think about you.

And I got to believe that, you know, out of everything you've ever been through in motorsports, that this relationship with ally has to be one of the things that you're most proud of. Yeah, absolutely. You know, I didn't know what it would be like when I first got to team up with them and come over to the 48 team, but they have been just awesome to work with, you know, from the top down, everybody there's just great people obviously they're a really really fun group I think Andrea was probably getting after it about like I was on Sunday night so yeah they're

just really fun to be around everything we do together is super fun they've really supported me through through tough times but also supported things that mean a lot to me, whether it's, you know, the animal shelter stuff. I mean, we've raised like three quarters of a million dollars for homeless pets together. Obviously, they've supported my sprint car program and my chili bowl stuff. So they've just been awesome to work with. And what a great group of people to get to work with. So I enjoy that a lot. And yeah, I'm glad they like me as much as they do. It's certainly appreciated and it makes my job a lot of fun. Yeah, buddy. Well, we're glad to see you in Victor Lane. I know that was a lot of fun for you to win at that racetrack, a very iconic city of

Chicago. A big win for you guys. Hopefully it creates some momentum going forward. Hopefully we'll get you back on the show soon. Yeah, sounds good. Thanks for having me. And if we win Pocono this weekend, you two got to come hang out and do it. I'll come by for a few. I ain't drinking no bourbon, though. I'm only coming if your neighbor comes. I saw somebody holding a Miller light. I'll drink one of those if you got them. I mean, we got beer, too.

We got whatever you want. All right. I hear you. Whatever you go for. All right, man. Take it easy. All right. See you guys.

See it. Man, I always thankful to be able to talk to the winners every single week. And I say that every single week. It's new this year for us, T. It's new this year for us, T. And it's nothing that we take lightly. We really appreciate it. Great to be able to pick their brain a little bit and, you know, known Alex a long time.

So good to see him. Yeah. And good, you know, the guys got, what you say, seven cup wins now? That's not, that's not just, you know, you don't win seven cup races by chance. No. Yeah, hopefully they got some more momentum that they can carry through and make a good run in these playoffs. It's, you know, it's going to be a, it's going to be important, I think, for them to do, to have more. success, right? I know they feel that pressure still, but let's move on to

Ask Junior. All right, everybody, thanks for tuning in today for this portion of the Ask Junior segment of our Tuesday show, Dirty Air. I also have with me today filling in for Andrew. Andrew's under the weather. Didn't make it in today. So I asked TJ Majors to drop in one of the incredible characters on Doorbopper Clear that you listen to every Monday. has joined us today. So thank you, TJ. Appreciate it. This segment of the show is brought to you by Xfinity Mobile. They are a proud

premier partner of NASCAR and they provide you with the fastest mobile service with 5G and millions of Wi-Fi hotspots all across the country. Anytime you're in a crunch or a tough spot, they're going to pull through. I have the service and I'm very happy with it.

So thank you, Xfinity, and make the switch today. And you can save some money with Xfinity Mobile. let's get to the questions, Dalton. Yeah, man. First one, we are having a question from Mark. What do you think the chances are for Ryan Blaney to win an S-B that he's nominated for?

Wow, you know, I don't know what the chances are. He's got some tough, is any driver of the year? It's driver, best driver he's going up against Max for Stappen, Alex below, and Matt Hagan. He's not going to beat Max. You don't think so? I just don't think so. Of course, though, the last several weeks,

Max has been beatable. I don't know if that matters to the I don't know how that might affect the votes but when is the SPs? I believe it's this week if not next let me double check that but they are Ryan is going so that could change

If he's going then I would think that maybe he knows that he may win it maybe we're going to have to wait and see I hope he wins it because hey I got an SPs

I got one did you? Yeah what'd you win for driver the year 2004 I think 2004 yeah and so anybody that says that ESP's no matter

and it's a made up award they don't have one next question well you can still vote for Ryan so go vote for Ryan oh you can yes go vote for Ryan Dalton comes in saves the day I did vote for Ryan

let's vote for Ryan we can help this how do we do that go to I believe just ESPN.com or ESP's you know somewhere on their There's just Google SPs and you'll be able to vote for. You'll find your way there. Jeez.

All right, the YouTube video will help you learn how to. Yeah, go to YouTube, Google how to vote for Ryan Blaney. Espies. All right, moving on to the next question. Big weekend for NASCAR with the EV car, right? So what are your thoughts, both of you, on the EV project? Man, so many people were freaking out. I know.

Yeah, I tweeted out about that. I was like, you know, I thought, I sat on it for a day. and I was like, you know, don't want to have a reaction and they didn't have to reel it back. But I got to thinking, and I, you know, they had this little video of it, you know, thralling up and taking off. And I was like, dude, that looks exactly like the slot cars that I race.

Me and Kenny Wallace used to go to the slot car track at Dave Maiders. He had a Dave Mader, a prolific racer in his on right, used to have a slot car track in Moorsville. When I was really young, I still have the box and all my cars and everything. And I used to meet Kenny Wallace over there and we'd race our slot cars. It's just like that.

And then in around the early 2000s, me and the Uri's got heavy into RC cars. And I had a bunch of those pan carpet cars that would be raced on the indoor tracks. Just like that. It's a big toy. That's all it is. Nothing to be scared of.

I saw that there was like some talk that NASCAR and Nitro Cross are going to get together and that's probably where we'll see that be implemented. Well, everybody was like, oh, what are we going to do? What's this replacing? What's this replacing? Everybody's like, I don't want it to replace anything. And then, like a couple days later, or eight day later, Adam Stern says, hey, NASCAR may be investing in Nitro Cross.

And now they're going, all right, well, maybe that's where this car could live. There could be like a pavement, you know, portion to Nitro Cross that this car could exist. So I'm not worried You know look I'm not worried about it Sort of infringing on What we love about NASCAR in the three series The top three series and truck couldn't

Exfinity and cup And yeah It doesn't scare me at all either I think it's actually I think it's kind of fun to watch If it turns into a little A 30 lap race before You know at a track we go to or something

I look at like the FIE or whatever it is And yeah they have like little exhibition races or a little series it runs. I mean, and you see some names in it show up once in a while, and I think it could turn into something like that. There was a bunch of comments about the way it looked. Okay, I don't have a problem with the car, but the way it looks, you know, and this is, NASCAR is not great at designing a generic, you know, initial introduction car, right? Like, you know, okay, you know, they're not car designers. We get it. You know, this is not what it's going to really truly look like when it's all said and done.

Once the manufacturers get a hold of it, if it were to become a series, they would certainly want it to look more like, you know, what you're selling on the street. And NASCAR, they kind of, you know, this is sort of, they gave it a bit of a car of tomorrow vibe, which, you know, won't serve them very well. But, you know, I'm not too worried about the visual, you know,

look of the car. I was kind of hoping they get like a street stock series so I can throw a number on my car and maybe run. There you go. Put the Tesla in there. T.J. does on an electric vehicle. He's just letting everybody know. A little humble brag.

Yeah. When it works. Keep it charged. Yeah, it did break on him and locked him out. And he had to have somebody come over and put a little 12-volt battery in there that needed to be replaced. A little defibrillator. There goes. It was the worst possible time, too.

That's the worst. Yeah. I mean, if it can open the door up for more manufacturers to bring some stuff in, I don't see what the problem is. Thirteen hundred horsepower is pretty big deal. We'll see. All right. one, news just broke this morning. Rodney Childers is going to be the crew chief for the number seven car at Spire next year. Initial thoughts, reactions, how are we feeling? Yeah, there's a little bit of

that. I'd heard that rumor being a possibility. I think it's a great get for Spire, right? Sure. Spire continues this, you know, sort of, you know, put up or shut up, sort of, hey, we're in. We're no longer just looking at the financial bottom line and trying to be profitable at all costs in terms of a big cost and performance. They are now going after performance. They are spending money and focusing more on results, which I have to applaud them for. and if Corey continues to be the driver, I think this is the opportunity. I think he has to be incredibly excited

if he's the driver of the car next year, which I wouldn't, I have nothing to believe that he wouldn't be. He's had a bit of a tough go lately and critics are coming out about whether, you know, there needs to be a new direction for the seven car. And I think this is his opportunity to maybe try to go get the results that he thinks he's capable of getting.

Rodney's one of the best in the garage. He's got a few years left. And, you know, I think eventually Rodney's going to find that, you know, general manager, technical director role that gives him a little more time with his family. But he's got a few more good years on that pit box left. And this could be exactly what Corey Lejoy needs to get his career. career where he wants it to be. Yeah, Rodney, no matter where you say Rodney goes, we're going to say that's a great get for them because Rodney is incredibly talented as well.

And he knows how to call a great race. He knows how to put cars in position at the end. And he knows how to make cars go fast. So this is a, this is a, Corey's got to be pumped. I would say, too, it's a missed opportunity or a loss for other teams that may have been interested in Rodney. You know, imagine where, you know, if he had went to RCR with Kyle Bush, imagine that pairing, right?

Rodney and Kyle together. Kyle wins races. I think it gets back to Victory Lane with Rodney. Even Rodney, you know, having taken Petrie's spot over there as sort of the technical director, head technical director, would have been a grade higher. Yeah. And so, and staying with Furniture Row, what that might have been for that team if they're trying to continue to develop into a contender as they have over the last couple of years.

It was a missed opportunity for several teams that could have tried to lower Rodney there. Gotcha, yeah. The only other stuff I have is front row is making an announcement tomorrow. They're going to be announcing their driver. Noah Gregson seems to be the leader for that position. And yeah, there was also some news that Austin Dillon said that there could be some shaking up next year at RCR. So we'll see what happens. Everybody keep your eye on it.

Yeah, the front row stuff is going to be interesting. There's still like a murky, you know, there isn't. An unknown. Unknown about like the fourth Stuart House charter really. Yeah, I don't think it's really been accounted for you, has it? We don't really truly know where that thing's going to land where it will live. And so there's still a lot to shake out. Front row will be interesting.

There's a little, I think, spire may be. have some some developments possibly there's still some you know I think we know what's going to go on at track house but not not everything's been announced entirely right in terms of you know colleague and a few other things there's Rick Ware may still have some things that they have unsettled on their second car unsure there so there's still a lot of things that could happen over the next couple of months and it should like the next week two three weeks four weeks should shake out quite a bit. It's already so early.

I mean, I feel like Silly season started like way early this year. Daytona. Like so weird. Well, the Stuart Haas thing kind of kicked the dom, you know, kicked the ball down the road and got it going and inevitably, you know, created a stir and, you know, that's kind of why I think that happened. But everybody needs to know what they're doing, you know, by August. Pushing into September is really getting late for trying to get those announcements out,

trying to start to develop Yeah, prepare for next year Everything you need in terms Not only just, you know, cars and crew and people But merchandise and all of those things That stuff's, you know, well out in front. So that's why you want to get those deals announced and done as early as possible.

All right, it's time for Dirty Modeo. We're going to bring in Alex Tim's Alex. Big weekend in Chicago. Huge. Yep. How did you do? Personally, I did terrible. Oh, no.

But Steve earned a lot. earned a steak dinner at Phoenix with an Alex Bowman win. What? Him and the professor had a side bet because professor did not think he was going to win. Yep. He did, and Steve gets steak dinner. Well, you know, just tell me some of the bets that you made, some of the things that you might have done differently.

So I had SVG to win and Christopher Bell to win. So I think the only thing I had to do differently there was just not have Chase Briscoe spin out. But the driver slicks, I was looking really good before they all pitted for the slicks. Or the wets, I should say. slicks but uh i think i had you know john hernemeichick top 10 uh chastain top 10 bell win it was all looking good and then they all pitted and they all never recovered yeah it looked bad for them i'm surprised you didn't have um a bowman top five to bowman top 10 i did have a bowman top 10 is my only bet i

won actually got you all right good job um going into polka no man i mean you know unlike chicago we've got a pretty good um bag of notes uh on this racetrack and what's been going on there lately what's your best bets? I can't wait to get back to Pocono. Some predictability. Probably Hamlin, Lars and Reddick, some combination of those guys. They're always good there.

But my long shot, believe it or not, Daniel Swores, runs very well there. So I might find some good value with him. All right, Daniel Suarez, would you just put a top 10 bet on him?

His average finish there is like, yeah, top 10. Like he's within the top 10 of average finishes. Maybe take him in a couple head-to-heads or something like that? Yeah, if you could find some head-to-heads with him, definitely target them there.

Nice, man. All right, bud, well, Dirty Modo comes out. every Thursday. You guys will have a lot more detail analysts of the weekend coming up for Pocono. When you do release Dirty Mode on Thursdays, you don't want to miss it, folks. Even if you don't bet, they do a great job of just kind of handicapped in the field, telling you what to expect, who might be the heavy hitters, some of the surprises to look at, and you can clown them when they're wrong, which I like to do too. So thank you, Alex, for coming in, man.

Thank you. All right, it's time for our Cars Tour update. Blake and the boys are going to let us know everything that went on at Carraway, an incredible, incredible finish to that race. Another banger from the Carre Store. The Carraway Speedway has a longstanding history with hosting an event on the heels of the 4th of July holiday. 2024 would be no exception as the track opened its gates for the 47th annual Firecracker 265. And for the second year in a row, the ZMAX Car Store presented by Sound Gear was the headliner. Thunder Road Harley Davidson Poll qualifying would offer a warm welcome back to 2012. series champion Jared Fryer, who was making his first start of 2024 after an offseason

non-racing-related injury kept him out of the car. He would be joined on the front row by two-time champ Carson Quappell, with Dylan Ward and Heath Causey representing his hometown heroes making up row two. The first half of the race would be pretty tame, but that would all change following a wild ride for NASCAR Crasford Truck Series driver, Corey Heim, who found himself in a less than ideal situation with 58 laps to go. If you're going to make a lot of these passes, We got a car on its side. It's Corey Heim. Another car wedged underneath the side of the Lee Pullian Performance No. 55.

And Heim's car is sitting on the driver's door. That's Jacob Hefner, who's trying to roll backwards, and that's going to tip the car on its roof. Two laps later, the team car of that of Heim, Brendan Butterbean Queen would almost mirror the disaster that struck his Leapolium Performance teammate. Heard Hall hanging tough on the outside again. Cool tires. Dylan Ward, a huge moment. They're three wide. Queen goes up.

Queen into the outside wall. He keeps it rolling straight. We stay under Green flag conditions for now. A near replica of what we saw on the front stretch with Corey Hyme. When the race resumed, it was a non-stop bare-knuckle brawl between Carson Quappell, Connor Hall, Brent Cruz, and 2024 Daytona 500 champion William Byron making a start in a second-prepared junior motorsports car. Ball would finally wrestle the lead away from the competition and appear poised to be

route to his second win of the 2004 season on the tour until a caution fell with less than 10 laps to go after Jacob Hefner rolled to a stop in turns 1 and 2. Racing that resulted from the ensuing restart left everybody in absolute awe. No matter who comes out on top of this race, it's going to be one of the most hard-fought victories of this season. Cruz back to the inside as Guapo tries to cut him off. Cruz is down there. Some more contact made. Cruise up the hill. Connor, Hall may look to me. Cruz, he goes up the hill.

Three wide, they're looking off in turn two. Connor Hall goes up in the second. They'll come around this time. Two lefts to go. Connor Hall, can he go from fourth to first and just a handful of laps as he slides off the corner? And it would have been hauled by a bumper that time at the line. Byron inside, trying to get up to third.

A car off the pace in front of the leaders. That's McCaskill, who about slows to a stop. Race is still green. Here comes Cruz looking for the top spot. Hall is able to get by. They'll be side by side as Hall washes up the racetrack. White flag in the air. One more trip around here at Carraway.

Cruz into the side of Hall. Hall up the racetrack. Now William Byron looking for away as they have brooks three and four for the final time. Who's going to get back here first? Connor Hall hangs on. He slides up the racetrack. Brick Cruz is going to bump and run his way by, and he will win the Firecracker here at Carraway.

William Byron was able to nip Hall for second at the line. what he called a very fun night in his return to grassroots racing with the junior motorsports team. Biner Hall finished third, Jared Fryer, fourth, and Carson Quaple completed your top five. You know, I mean, it is what it is, right? That's hard racing. That's what short track racing was. I got moved to the third groove probably more times than I can count on my hands. So, I mean, I would expect the same for him for the win. The pro late models were also back in action for the first time in over a month. And after winning his first ever Mali poll award to start today,

Justin McKee would survive multiple attacks from multiple drivers on multiple restarts to win his second career cars tour pro late model race and the first with the Setser Racing and Development team. Super thankful with all these guys, Chevy, Joshua, Scott Speed, Lauren Reneer, everybody helps me get here. Kleinberg's race chassis, Brandon, Dennis, all the guys that help me. Donna Jones was second, Caden Quappell 3rd, Jimmy Renfrew Jr. finished 4th, and T.J. DeKare rounds out your top five finishers for the Prolop. late models. The series now takes a few weeks off in preparation for the biggest in-season race on the calendar, the annual throwback event at the Hickory Motor Speedway. Both the late model stocks and the

pros will be in action on Saturday, July 27th, with fans, drivers, race teams, and the series all set to be dressed and ready for the occasion. Be sure to keep an eye out across social media channels as teams start to reveal their throwback plans. If you'd like to join us for the race or learn more about all that is upcoming with the ZMAX cars store presented by Soundgear, visit cars racing tour.com. And if you can't join us at the Speedway, we've got you covered all year long on Flow Racing. The ZMAX Cars Tour.

I'm Eric Brennan. All right, it's time for the white flag. Hey, this is our rundown. This is the dirty-mo media sort of reminder of all the great content that we have coming out every single week. Sunday nights, the tear down with Jeff Gluck and Jordan Bianchi. They dropped that covering everything that happened to Chicago. two guys with boots on the ground telling you everything that's going on in the sport.

And Mondays, actions detrimental with Denny Hamlin. That has come out. And door bump are clear as well. The spotters from the roof chiming in on everything they experienced from their vantage point this past weekend in the windy city. Dropping tomorrow, Speed Street with Connor Daly and Chase Holden. Connor has a bit of update some news. He's going to be running a couple truck races at IRP, Kansas, and Homestead for niece in the 44 truck.

Awesome. We can't wait to hear about that on Speed Street. That drops tomorrow. And then our Gary Nelson interview here on the Dale Jr. download also drops on Wednesday tomorrow. So Thursday, DJD reloaded and Dirty Motto catch up on all the great bets to make for the upcoming race in Pocono. Dalton has the tweet of the week.

Yeah. I got a couple. They stood out to me, but one on July 4th specifically. No context NASCAR tweeted, going to lose two fingers tonight so I can always be holding three for Dale. I saw that. And I made sure to retweet it and say, please don't do that. The other one was we talked about Martin Truex Jr.'s bass fishing show.

Someone came up with the name Martin. That's it. And I was like, that's already a TV show. You can't do that. But it would have been funny. Yeah. Well, the question of the week from, I guess, Chase Elliott last week was pretty popular. Got a little traction out there.

Great question from Chase. And we're going to do it again this week with Tyler Reddick. All right. So yes or no. Scooter Gang for Life? Oh, am I, am I, am I guess so. I guess I am.

Yes, Scooter Gang. I, uh, yeah. T.J. I was real confident. I was waiting for this. TJ bought an electric scooter. I did. This is what happens.

So we got a few seconds here. T.J. is like, hey, man, look what I'm trying to buy on the internet here. I'm sitting with him when I'm bidding on this thing. And he's bidding on this electric scooter. I'm like, damn it, now I want to electric scooter. And so I go on my Instagram. All I see is electric scooter ads. And Amy's like, what are you looking on? What are you looking at there on your phone? I'm like,

electric scooters. And I can't stop it. I don't want electric scooter. I don't need one. But they just keep coming into my life. I kind of want the Titanic now. Ligo. You got Tyler Redick and this guy over here, TJ. Surrounded by it. I am. I can't get away from the scooters. So I'm Scooter Gang, whether I want to be or not. Scooter Gang for Life. Anyways, shout out to everybody out there in the Scooter Gang. Thank you again for anyone listening on SiriusXM. And that's the, oh, TJ, thank you for coming in today.

I appreciate it. Get well, Andrew. Great show today. Had fun. We'll see you tomorrow. Check out Dirty Mo Media on Twitter, Facebook, TikTok, and Instagram.