The Dale Jr. Download - 578 - Tim Brewer: "I Don't Call It Cheating, I Call It Self-Defense"

Episode Date: September 18, 2024

Dale Earnhardt Jr. sits down with longtime NASCAR crew chief and former ESPN television analyst Tim Brewer to learn more about his legendary career calling the shots for some of the sport’s all-time greats. After growing up within earshot of Bowman Gray Stadium, Tim established himself as a hard worker and found a position as crew chief for Junior Johnson and Associates, helping Cale Yarborough and Darrell Waltrip earn Cup championships in 1978 and 1981 respectively. Tim’s work ethic was developed in his early teen years when he left his path of education to join local racer Ernie Shaw in the NASCAR Grand American ranks. Tim had a short stint with Tiny Lund before settling in with fellow Winston Salem native Richard Childress, becoming one of the youngest crew chiefs in NASCAR history at the age of 18.  Tim explains that he got hired onto the famed Holly Farms team when Herb Nab vacated the chief position and Junior Johnson made a call to Childress. Tim and Travis Carter came on board in 1978 and helped guide Yarborough to ten wins and a third consecutive Cup season crown. Tim and Dale also discuss his years spent working with Waltrip and what made him leave Johnson's team in 1982 to work for MC Anderson, reuniting with Yarborough. He also details how Raymond Beadle came to NASCAR ownership, creating the Blue Max Racing group with driver Tim Richmond in 1983. Tim talks about his friendship and competition with Dale Earnhardt Sr., his falling out with Junior Johnson in the early 90s, and how he came to be an Emmy-award-winning television analyst after he stepped down from the pit box.  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 it's the Allied guest segment, Tim Brewer, the crew chief, and the man that used to do the cutaway car on the ESPN race day shows is going to be in the room. Tell us all about his life and his career. We're having a little fun run on crew chiefs from back in the late 70s, early 80s. Tim Brewer's career stretched over many decades, and he's an innovator. Maybe we'll hear some pretty cool stories about how he was creative with the rulebook. Let's get started.

The following is a production of Dirtymoe Media. Hey, everybody. Dale Jr., Dale Jr., back again, the ally guest segment today. Tim Brew, crew chief. The list of drivers is ridiculous. Neil Bonnet, Tim Richmond, Bill Elliott, Jeff Bow, Dine. They don't run in the same park with me.

I ain't ever told nobody it is, but I'm going to tell you. It'll make the highlight real. You bet your ass on that. All right. we're here again for the allied guest segment. I want to thank Ally for everything they do for us here at Dirtymo Media for the Dale Junior Download for NASCAR, sponsoring race cars for Alex Bowman. They do so many great things across the sport landscape for NASCAR.

We need to appreciate the companies that do invest in our sport and be loyal to them. And they're an ally for us, and they bring us this guest segment every single week and help us have so much fun interviewing great people. And we got a great one coming on. Tim Brewer was a crew chief. I don't even, I mean, the list of drivers is ridiculous. Let's go over the list, all right, before he comes in here. Obviously, he worked with, well, it's not obvious.

He started out working with Thailand, Richard Childers, Cal Yarborough, Darrell Walchrop. I'm going to forget a few, I bet. Let's see, I got a piece of paper in front of me, even helping me. But there's just so many. Neil Bonnet, Tim Richmond. uh bill elliott jeff bow dine terry laboni bobby labony um jeff brabham rick robbie gordon john andreddy and uh sterlin marlin i bet there's a few more in there that we we forgot maybe he even forgot um wait david green steve grissom mike wallace kevin lepage jimmy spencer uh long, long list of drivers that he worked with directly or indirectly as a crew chief GM.

And then again went into working on TV with ESPN. And we all remember the cutaway car. That was a lot of fun. And he was great at telling us like why something broke or what innovation the team may be creating, how things worked, right? He's out in the lobby. I'm excited to bring him into the room, get this started. Apparently you asked him one question.

and he's just going to talk for two hours. We'll see if that happens. Bristol, huh? I think so, yeah. I don't know, you know, I ain't going to say, I ain't going to say I know for sure. I might get a wild hair and do it again a couple years from now, but I don't think I'll run next year. Really?

Yeah. I just, this year, I turned 50 in October, and so me and Amy did a bunch of traveling. Sure. I read where you went to Europe. Yeah, and so we're going to. I enjoyed that. It's been a fun year, and I think next year I might just focus on my work,

the broadcasting and stuff with new partners and everything. Sure. So I want to make sure that that goes good. And I don't want to have, even just like one little race in the middle of the calendar year can kind of take a lot of bandwidth. Oh, yeah. You know? And so, and I need to miss it a little bit.

You know what I mean? And I'm having fun. I'm having a hell of a damn fun time running that little short tracks with my late model. Sure. That's fun as hell. I'll take you. I'll tell you a little story. In 1981, we won the championship with Daryl Walter.

Yeah. I guess it was me and Harold Elliott and Eddie Thrap. M.C. Anderson offered us a lot of money to come to Savannah. And my son was two years old at that time. And I went, okay, let's go down there and do this thing. Well, we won like four races with Cail that year and finished second three or four times. Yeah. But it was all about getting away from the sport to enjoy time.

with my son growing up. Yeah. My son's 44 years old now. Yeah. And it was about that at the time because, Dale, I've never had a childhood. I've been working on race cars ever since I was a kid. Yeah. And, I mean, I brought something on to show you.

Yeah, let's see it. Bobby was telling me that he said, we got some film. That's Metro Lina. Oh, damn. I know. I sat on a pole and won the race with Richard Childress that day. And I know you know this. That's Dedy.

Yeah. That's Dedy. And he's in 44, white and blue 44. Yeah. I forget the name of the guys who on that car, but... That's 1975 at Dover, Delaware there. But we sat on the pole and won the race there, and I told Bobby, I said, they didn't give me credit for that one either.

You did what here? We sat on the pole and won the race up there in Metroline. But that there, that picture was taken in Dover, Delaware. You know who all those guys are? That's me, West B.Roll. Childress, Don Hardy, and that's Bill Patterson. Okay. Patterson used to be the general manager over there at RCR.

Yeah. But, I mean, that's 100 years ago. Man, the old Laguna. Oh, yeah. But I mean, anyway, these, I want to let you look at it after a while. Yeah, that one with the Metrolina, knowing that that's dad getting ready to run that car. It's 75. He ain't got shit.

You know, somehow he's talked to him into letting him run in that race. Oh, yeah. against all those guys. And he's driving that fellow's car that run, you know, six or ten races somewhere during the schedule. Wasn't a really great car. That Metrolina race sounded like a bit of a wild affair. It was a slug fest. Yeah.

Because Kail was there, and I forgot whose car he was in. And Walter Ballard, and there was a bunch of good guys there. But when we sat on the pole... I think Kail might have been in Tommy Houston's car. Maybe. be. Yeah. But, or not, yeah, it might have been.

Dick Beatty, I told Childress, I said, this thing is a little sluggage up off the corners. Look like it's a little slow right there. And I had a 567 gear in the car. Well, I told Childress, I said, this is, hey, we had a big block Chevrolet. And I said, let me put a 583 in it and we'll qualify with it. And then I'll change it. I was going real good until after we qualified and sat on the pole, I jacked the car up,

here come Dick Beatty. Oh, what are you doing? What are you doing? I got to change a gear in this thing. He said, no, you're going to, you qualify with it? You're going to race it. I said, well, I'm going to give you a little piece of advice. He said, what's that?

I said, you need to move even grandstands back about five rows. He said, why is that? I said, this thing going to blow all the hell and kill about half him people in front. Grand scans scans. Hey, hey, Childress, you know how he is? He's nervous all the time. He goes, what are you going to do? I said, don't worry.

I'll fix it. I'll fix it. He sat down in the car, and he's buckling it in. He said, what do you do? I said, I taped up the tachometer. He said, what? he said that's going to fix it i said well you at least you ain't going to have to look at the thing 70 800 r p ms but anyway that's back in the day when we used to have a lot of fun doing what we did

yeah things were a whole lot easier man you started off um they probably felt hard but looking back on them i bet you had more fun you started out in in Winston salem north carolina and going to boulman gray and getting involved and working on cars there in a modified scene is that correct we started at Bowman Gray Stadiumdale and every corner at every service station had a race car parked in it. And you know, when you're riding up and down the road and your little huffy bicycle with the handlebars and stuff

and cards on the spokes making noise, you go by Bowman Gray Stadium and my brother and I, which he was a year and a half older than me, he goes, what's that noise? I don't know, let's go find out. And, you know, we went to Bowman Gray Stadium and started watching those guys in a modified cars run back years ago and my dad he had a little old hobby car over there and it was something

to piddle with but you know we kind of got away from that and then they started doing this dirt track racing i hate red mud i hate it i said man i got to get away from this so i went to started working with a little guy named ernie shaw and richard chilis on grand american cars oh and we we went all over god's creation i mean we went and done we'd start to in Columbia, South Carolina, where there's Grand American Carsdale, and then we'd go down to Savannah, then we'd go out to Jackson, Mississippi, up

through Nashville, Tennessee, and they called us to Northern Tour, and I'm 14 years old, and I'm driving a C-550 Ford Cabover truck with hydraulic clutch, and I'll never forget it. You had to pump that thing all way through New York City to keep the fluid built up in it.

And, you know, you're 14 years old, but I mean, that's the way I started. and Tiny Lund, great guy. Went to work for him down in cross South Carolina. Drove old old 64 Chevrolet down there. How old were you then? 16.

Help me understand who Tinalan was. So I've seen, I know the stories about him. Everybody's heard the story about him. You're on for the Wood Brothers and Daytona. All of that. I know how he passed. I know, but I don't know. I've never seen a video of him talking.

I don't know what he sounds like, what he walks like. I don't know much about the man. He was a big man, probably six, five. Funniest thing I ever seen him do, when he was driving a Pepsi Cola Cougar for Tom Pistone, he grabbed Pistone, he by the ankles and picked him up and stuck him in a trash can. But Tiny was a, he was a big joker, but I'm going to tell you something. He was the best on dirt next to your grandfather I ever seen.

But he would turn that. thing backwards at the flag stand back it all way up to the guardrail stand in the gas and go down the back stretch like a bat out of the ugly place yeah but talking about your grandfather i was probably eight maybe nine years old and that's when we was doing them dirt tracks and we went to butner and i seen a guy named ralph earnhardt with a number eight on it and a guy named earl moss and a old 64 fair lane and was painted red, had a number 300 on it. Earnhardt, they run 200 laps and never put a tire mark on either car. I mean, they put on a show, and they were side by side the whole way.

But your grandfather, he was tough on dirt. But, Tiny, Connie, he was a good man. He'd done a good deed for the Wood Brothers, pulling Marvin Panch out of a fiery crash. And they, the Wood Brothers are the same. Salt of the Earth, great people. And I went up and spent a day with Leonard, Lenny, and Eddie back February a year ago. And I was so humbled when I walked in that place. That museum that they have up there in Stewart, Virginia, when you walk in, there's a two-by-three

portrait of everybody that's ever won in that 21 car. And when they walk you through there, I mean, it's so humbling. And I'll never forget, Lenny took me back where Leonard was working. working on some 427 tunnel port cylinder heads and he was hand making them and he said hey we got a guest Leonard goes I'll be through in a minute and he pulled that old welding helmet up and he went you scoundrel yeah but I love those people up there they're great so um how many years uh did you work did you work with time I didn't work there a whole year yeah we went down and Jim Hall, he was a crew chief down there,

and there was a big miscommunications deal, and there was a lot of friction there, and I don't do friction. Sure. You know, I just don't do it. But at the end of the day, Richard Childress, I had talked with him, and that's when he was at Rockingham, North Carolina,

and we were down there with Tiny Lund's car. And Childress, for some reason or another, he put an old open gear in that car to make a qualifying run. And I'm telling you, Dale, he got loose coming off of turn four, and he hit the end of that guardrail. And I'm telling you, it pushed the roll cage out the left side of that car. I thought it killed him.

And he thought he was dead, too. But, you know, I felt so sorry for Childers that day because I'm telling you, he was close to going away. Yeah. But, you know, the tiny Lund era, that led me to Richard Childress. And that was working on his old 72 Cheval. And he's running short short. track races back then and we didn't have no money to speak of a long tank came tom garne and he

owned lc newton trucking company out of seaford delaware and that's when we got enough money to get to good motors and you know get a good chassis and you know we started running pretty good yeah and uh martinsville i think we went up there and finished fifth and that's pretty good for an independent team sure back in the day you had david cisco and you had uh terry bivins had jenry bivins had James Hilton and all those guys, you know, but it was a lot of fun. And there was probably three teams that had like two people apiece. You know, whoever was running ahead in the deal, he got to pit first. And the next guy got to fit second and the next guy got to fit third.

But, I mean, you worked back then. You didn't nobody give you nothing. You had to do it all yourself. Yeah. You worked with him for quite a while, though, 73 to 77. I mean, that's a long time. And to 77. So what changed?

You're happy, you're there, you got loyalty. What was telling you the time to move on? The biggest thing was we were at Darlington in 77, and we used to call it 3-11 race team. We had a 3-11 car, and we always pit beside each other, and, you know, Henry Benfield and Herb Nab and all that stuff. And, you know, that win in Metrolina, that set me on fire. You know, I said, we can do this.

You know, we can win races. We can be competitive. And R.C. knew it. And, you know, he was trying to fund it properly. And like I said, for a long time, we did. But K.O. Yarborough hung the right rear wheel of the Holly Farms car on an iron pole at the end of pit road at Darlington. And I'm thinking, okay, this ain't good. So I'm over there.

We then blew up in Childersus Motor. and the deal was Junior come running up there and he said Brewer, I need a rear-in-house now from one of that car. Was that when they yanked all the lines and they had that little press box kind of thing, two-story thing

on the other side of pit wall and the interior pit wall and it yanked all the wires down pit road? Well, Kale, when he hooked that right wheel on there, I mean... It was crazy. Oh, yeah. There was wires and power lines and things going everywhere. But when Junior told me, said, Brew,

I want that rear-end house on that. on half my other cars. Okay. He must have 10 guys over working on his. And I think me and Grady Click, maybe one other guy. We pulled it out and we got it sitting there. And he goes, how'd you get that thing out from under there? You said you wanted it. You know, there it is. So anyway, I helped them put it up under there and I got a picture on my phone.

I'm in a Kansas Jack uniform out there with all them Holly Farms guys and we're still working on on pit road. And I'm like, maybe 18. Yeah. But at the end of the day, Junior, he said, what happened to your motor?

I said, motor blowed up. He said, what gear you got in that thing? I said, a 400. It slows down three seconds here, so I always put a low gear in it. He goes, a 400. He said, I got a 370 in mine. I said, well, we're getting ready to find out

how good your motor is. But later on that year, we were in Ontario, California. And, you know, You drive the truck out, you drive it back, you don't get a chance to do nothing. And, you know, at that time I was getting real serious with my wife, Susan, which, you know, we got married in 78, been married 46 years, and got five years before that. And it's like, R.C., this ain't going too good, you know what I mean?

And junior called Childress. He said, hey, Herb Nab is leaving here. He said, can I talk to Tim? He said, what are you going to talk to Tim about? He said, maybe taking Herb's place. and Richard said, Junior, if you need to talk to him, he said, yeah, he said, go ahead and talk to him. And he said, Jr. call me. He said, hey, can you ride up here and talk to me a little bit? Be more than happy to. So I went up there and Junior and I were talking and, you know, the kind of money he'd come up off the bat with and I went, man, I ain't never made that kind of much money in my life, you know.

but we cut a deal and it wasn't 20 minutes Travis Carter come to the front door in office and he knocked on the door and he said junior can I talk to you for a minute? He said yeah I said well you need Travis he said come up here and talk to you about that crew chief job he said well I hired them to do that he said well you know I just want to come talk to you about it I said hey Travis can you give us a minute

he said yeah well i said just let's and i asked junior i said hey uh you got enough money in a teal for Travis he goes what do you mean broer i said well you hired me to win this championship three in a row ain't been done you want to win that championship yep I said I think Travis would be a big asset to us yeah he said do you know what you're saying well you hired me to crew chief and make good decisions and try to win this championship, I think that may have be a big asset to us. And he said, yeah, I can do that. I said, that's good, let's do that.

And Travis Carter and I, Dale, we worked together for probably four years. We never had a crossword. I filled in for him when he had to go to the hospital, and his mother had his legs amputated. And my wife, she's got appendicitis, and I stay in Talladega and Kail, he'd come by me and I could read the lead him on the

front of the car like this on the roof and, you know, he, I run down there and he said, Burr, Marcus, run in the back of me, cut my legs off. I said, sure, man, your legs are still there. He goes, burr, he scare me to death. Man, grabbed me so hard. It wasn't even funny.

But, but Kail, he was tougher in a pine knot, love him to death. I think when people always ask me about you know, they always, I think, assumed that my dad was the only person that I, that I love to follow or love to pull for in racing, but actually I thought Kail was who I was probably most impressed with in terms of just, I liked his approach, you know, I love Daddy's approach, I love how aggressive he was, I wasn't going to be

that kind of person, I just didn't have that personality, but I thought Kale's approach to driving and his style of driving and how he felt about certain challenges that he faced, certain disagreements he had with other drivers and how he handled those. I really always loved his approach. And when the crash happened at Talladega, that was a nasty deal.

So Buddy Becker's coming down the front straightaway in the Grey Ghost and has a flat tire. Either flat tire or he's too loose, but he gets out of shape and the travel and wiped out a lot of people, a lot of cars got wiped out in the wreck. But Kale gets out. And he's kind of just looking at his car and D.K. O.R.

Or somebody slides in there. Marcus. Yeah. Marcus was already wrecked. Yeah. So he's standing between his car and Marcus's, but somebody slid in there. D.K. O'Rick or somebody slid in there and hit Marcus's car and pushed Marcus' car into Kale's car. And Marcus tells about that.

Marcus told us about that story how Kale was laying there going, are my legs still there? He was afraid to look. Oh, yeah. He was. Like, he was genuinely freaked out about that. And he was tough as a pine line. But I'm telling you, you know, when you feel like you lost your legs, I mean, you know, that's very humbling. Sure.

You know, Kail, he was one of my favorites. I remember you in 1992 running around with your little good rich shirt on in the hat and all that stuff. And, you know, we're having a good year with Bill Elliott that year and, you know, chocolate and Kirk and a whole bunch of us. You know, everybody got along back then. You know, had a lot of fun. but, you know, I'm going to tell you a quick story about Cale. 1982, I never had a man hugged me like he hugged me when we won that Fifth Southern 500. I mean, we were there at the spring race and got spun out, and M.C. Anderson and the girls, they went home.

Well, me and Harold, Barry, Eddie, we didn't know no better. We stayed there. Hey, you know, it ain't over with yet. Yeah. We finished second in the first race, and he'd come back and, you know, won the second race. But Kail told me after the race, he said, you come to the house. I said, what we're going to do?

He said, we're going to drink some beer. I said, okay. And I walked in there. Dale, he's up on his, he's got a nice bar like this, but it's laminated. And it must set 20 people there. Brewer, get up here. I ain't walking on that bar. He goes, get up here.

We'll have it fixed tomorrow. But anyway, he was so proud of that feeling. Southern 500. Yeah. And hey, I was too. Yeah, I bet. I would love to hear your memory on 1980. You know, y'all barely missed that on the championship, but it was Dad's first.

Comes all the way down to the last couple of, you know, a handful of laps there at Ontario. Dad had a loose, dad had a lug nut off, had to come back down pit road and lost a little time, but, you know, got enough points to end up barely winning the championship. but the whole season, you know, was a bit out of character for y'all. Y'all had a lot of engine issues and just, you know, had some bad moments that were not typical of what y'all, you know, had done in the years past. And it was fortunate for Dad because it gave him an opportunity to try to go out there and win in championship.

But take me back to that 1980 season and watching Dad, right, do what he did. And he wasn't the Intimidator yet. He was still raw. There's a lot of articles with kale critiquing dads of determination and aggression. The biggest thing that I'm going to say happened to your dad was Jake Elder. Yeah. Jake Elder came in there with Rod Austerlund. And, you know, Dale used to say he used to grab that thing on my uniform and pulled me over there, boy.

Yeah. But Jake was a great, great, great. reader of race cars. And he could look at that car and he could talk to your dad and he could pretty much tell him what he needed. And that was a big plus for your dad. The big demise for us was, like I said, we blew up that year a couple of times. We blew up one time and Pocono and changed motor in 12 minutes. Yeah. And, you know, we come back and the press they got on us, I said, you guys can't do that. And Jr. told him, he said, well, y'all just come to the shop. So they come to the shop.

Junior, he's in the car. He drives it down off the hill. We're all set up. We had two engine hoists there. We had transmissions. We had 180 headers. We had everything on there. The timing was set.

Everything was done. When Junior stopped, we jacked the car up. When it hit the ground, it was seven minutes and 28 seconds. Travis Carter was underneath. I was on the side. Harold Elliott was in there. But that was what we went. through that year. You know, you have a little, little glitches here, a little glitch there.

When you running against people of your dad's caliber back then, it all adds up. And it don't take you long to lose. Yeah. You know, but, you know, it's like I was fortunate enough to win a championship 1981, you know, with Darrell. Hmm, you know, that was good. 1978 with kale. That was great. but we clicked. You go back to 78, we won 11 races. 81, same way with Darrell. You know, we won the Bush class. We won everything.

Everything. And, you know, you have those good years. But when you have those bad years and you've got people as good a caliber as you are next to you, that's the determining factor. That's just like Richard Petty. You know, I still laugh at Dale Lemon. I said, Dale Lemmon, oh, won 200 races.

He said, yeah, Richard's. said of probably one 300 if I hadn't been a crew chief. But you surround yourself with good people, Dale, you'll be just fine. Yeah. You surround yourself with idiots, you'll become one. I mean, that's just the way it is and the way I looked at it. Yeah. But Junior, he always told us, boys, don't let nothing fall off of my race car.

Yeah. And that's, you give K.O. Yarborough, Dale Earnhardt, a race car that's bulletproof, and they're going to win a lot of. races with them. So how did you handle the relationship between Kale and Jr? Because there were times when Kale would say something. Kale would get out of the car and talk, you know, say, well, damn, you know, we'll win these races when the motors quits blowing up and Junior would get pissed. Oh, yeah. And Junior would go into the meeting and say, well, if he don't, if he thinks he can do any better, he can go drive somebody else's race car.

Oh, yeah. Right in the middle of a season where they've won three championships together. and here we are sitting here just on the verge of winning another one. How did you manage that friction? Well, that's like Kale had a Shasta sponsorship. And, you know, you got there on Pitt Road, and you'd see all our soft drinks laying on the ground and all the Shasta's in there. Then here, Jr.'d come.

He'd dump them out and put the other one. And I'm going, can you guys get this figured out? You know what I mean? But, I mean, that's just the way it was. That's when the – Junior got the last word, though. all the time, every time. All time. You know, because did he have, were there moments behind the, you know, when there were there moments away from the media at the shop where you saw Jr. go,

Kail, I need you to stop. Why are you saying what you're saying? Don't say it publicly. That's where they were, they were men. You didn't get in on those conversations. Oh, yeah. You know, when he said, Kail, I need to talk to you for a minute. They go off in the office and shut the door and they were men. Same way Junior taught me how to do it. He said, you always take a man aside and show him what's doing right or what's he doing wrong. And I mean, you learn a lot. You hang around Banjo Matthews and Junior Johnson and Harold Elliott. And that's another thing. Harold Elliott, yeah, we tore up a lot of motors, but he won championships in 76, 77, 78. We won one and 81.

Oh, by the way, he won 1 and 89 with the rusty wards. Why the hell he ain't a Hall of Fame? I have no clue. You know, but Harold Elliott, he was a good man and he was my friend. But I mean, Harold Elliott, you know, I go to war with him any minute, any time, any day. You know, he was that good, Dale. Yeah. You won a lot of races working with Junior.

You kind of mentioned family was one reason, but why do you leave after the success of 81 you got Darrell Waltrop Jr. They're on a, they're a great pairing that's going to have success. Winning races. Got a great part, got an iconic car in the Mountain Dew number 11. Can't seem to do any wrong. Car to beat every week.

The truth of the matter. When Eddie Threat said that MC Anderson might be interested in us, I said, okay, that's fine. So Harold, Ellie, and myself, Harold, we get in the car and we drove Savannah, Georgia. To meet with MCN. What does Junior know about all this? He didn't know nothing. Because Junior's deal was still on the table.

But when they start stacking money up on a table and you ain't never seen that kind of money before, you know, it changes your mind quick. But at the end of the day, I made a comment to Jeff Hammond. I said, you know, it's a possibility that y'all might be leaving, so you might need to be ready, if I leave. What does he do?

He calls Harold Johnson. Oh, the newsman. They put it on TV. I'm in Winston-Salem at John Morris Christmas party with a bunch of federal judges and stuff, and, you know, we have pretty good a time, And anyway, long story short, I come in there at the next morning and Jr. says, y'all get up here, I want to talk to y'all right now. And he's sitting behind his desk and he's got old coat on

and he's got them big old brook hands on. And he's like swinging that foot and that desk is coming off the floor about like that. And he said, I hear you boys might be going somewhere. I said, well, there's a possibility. I got an opportunity. I ain't saying I'm going. but I said, I got an opportunity. He said, well, how much money are they going to pay you? I said, more than double. He said, they ain't that much money around here. But Hammond's the one to lit the fire on that damn wagon.

Yeah. But, I mean, you know, at the end of the day, you know, whatever, that's fine. But as Mike Hill told me later, and Darrell Walter will tell you today, he said, Timbrew built me 14 race cars that year to win that championship. And you don't take springs off of them, you don't take shocks off of them, You don't take ballast out of them. You pack the wheelbarrings and put them back over there. And that's the way the deal is.

Yeah. And when I left, I was like, hey, there you go. Junior, he gave me a pretty good bonus. And I give him a set-up book. And that was the end of that. But like old Mike Hill told him, he said, Jeff Hammond was Daryl Waltrip's crew chief. He said, I was junior's crew chief. Yeah.

And my job was, don't mess with them race cars right there because Tim Brewer got a lot of cars that went a lot of races. And Mike Hill told me, he said, Jeff Hammond couldn't even screw that up. But, 82. I sent some competition between you and Jeff. Well, it wouldn't have competition to me. Well, I mean, in terms of, like, there's some animosity? I don't like the way I was done.

But you've had, I mean. Jinder and I had an opportunity to talk it out, we could have probably resolved it. But at the end of the day, his attitude and my attitude, you know how that goes? Yeah, but fair enough. But I mean in the decades since, I'm sure you've crossed paths and talked about. Sure. It's like anything else, you know. But you never worked again together.

Well, there again, when Raymond Beattel didn't pay some of his bills mainly mine, you know, I said, you know, whatever. But junior, he went to bat for me on a deal, a personal deal. And I said, okay, I owe you one. Well, he called me at the end of 1984, and he said, I need to collect that debt. I said, what do you need? He said, I got Darrell and the Budweiser 11. He said, I got Neil into 12.

He said, I need you to come back up here. And if you take care of that 12, I'll take care of this 11. He said, one of us going to win the championship. And that's when Darrell, they cut all the bodies off of them cars at the end of 18. 82 and that's one of Monte Carlo's on them yeah and the Pepsi Challenger right they couldn't hit their ass with neither hang they had a rough year with that yellow car oh boy terrible and darrell he liked he liked to give it all up at Daytona when he got T-boned by Marcus right there so at the end of the day they had junk they had junk and I sold junior I said okay I'll come back and I never forget

old Gilbert Connolly one of the body guys up there he smarted off when I soon as well I walked in the door He said, well, I guess we're going to get no bonus this year because Brewer's back. He's going to get all the money. I said, hey, Haas, did you cut your deal with Junior? He said, yeah. I said, well, I cut mine. You got it? But the Doug Reicher, he was up there.

And, you know, I looked at their cars and this, that, and the other, and I went, and I said, Junior, there's a better way of doing this. And I love Banjo Matthews to death, but Michael Offlin had some really good race cars back then. And I called Mike. I said, hey, can you give me a chance? He goes, yeah. So they put me a body on it. We go to the wind tunnel, and that's with Neil Bonach's car.

And we had a pretty good race car in 85. Yeah. I mean, we were leading the race with five laps to go, and motor blow it up. In a tribal. Exactly. And Neil liked to hit the end of pit bull down there. I mean, it scared me to death. But five laps, and Bill Elliott won the race.

Dale, I do everything I had at them. I mean, Junior told me, he said, well, I run up on him, I'll beat him. I said, really? I said, I got a load of cam two fuel propylene oxide. I got everything in the world. And I said, I threw it at him. And Bill, Neil told me, he said, Brewer, when Bill goes down the corner, he said, I see him back out of the gas, and I see him get back into gas because I see a puff of black smoke come out.

He said, he ain't even holding it wide open. He said, I'm doing everything I can do, and I'm holding it wide open. Yeah. I said, all right. Later that year, Southern 500, the junior said, I'll run up on him, I'll beat him. I said, yeah, sure. Hey, how'd that work for you?

Bill won him a million bucks. Not too good, huh? Yeah. So I go back home, I told Neil, I said, I'll build you a better race car next year. And I took that tread width down from 60-half inches down to 58 inches. Well, I told Neil, I said, I'll get you that nose band back, and I won't get a little bit better body on that car.

I built him a 56 inch tread with a car. Then Bonnet told me, he said, bro, this thing will fly. I said, okay. What cost Bill Elliott at the championship in 1985 was the shifter forks in the transmission at Riverside. Keith Sawyer, guess what he put in my race transmission for the Daytona 500, the same damn ones? And we had made billet, shifter forks for it.

And I still got it in my toolbox in my garage at home. And I go, Leaky, why did you put them in there? Well, I didn't think you'd tear them up. I said, Neil Bonnet can tear up an anvil. You know, you don't never, anything you break, you throw it away and you redo it, but that's what cost me to Daytona 500s. So I want to step back before, I want to talk more about working back at juniors with Neil. but you mentioned Blue Max or Raymond Beetle

you helped put that program together. So you left juniors to MC Anderson's and kind of got, MC Anderson's gets bought, right? Yeah, Raymond Beale. By Raymond Beal. Raymond Beal used to come to the shop all the time. Drag racer.

Yes, sir. Because he used to come to the shop all the time and he'd go Brewer. If I ever started, race star, team said, NASCAR, you'd be interested. I said, Beatle, that's down the road. Just, you know, give me a call sometime. But when MC Anderson told me, he said,

hey, this thing's for sale. Why did he want to sell? Because K.O. wouldn't run for a championship. Well, he knew that. He knew it going in, but he reiterated it. Dale, we finished second at Daytona 500. We finished second at Darlington. We finished second at Atlanta.

We won four races and won races at Michigan. And, you know, he said, I got a championship caliber team here. And he wanted to run more races. Yeah. Why didn't he just get him a driver that would run more? He wanted kale. He said, kale won't run for it. I ain't going to do it.

Yeah. So he put it up for sale. I called Hal Needham. Travis's boss man. He'd come to Savannah. Picked him up to airport. He goes, Brewer, what's that smell down here? I said, it's bag air.

I said, people down here call it to smell of money. Yeah. He said, this place stinks. But you know how Hal Needham was. He was a good guy. there for. He was going to buy the race team. And he was going to put Tim Richmond in the car

and, you know, we were going to run it. Well, that didn't materialize. I call Raymond Beal. He's already got a car. He's already got Harry Gas car. He's going to have two. He's going to have two teams. But Lou Bannel, he

funded Hal Needham's movie car. He said, I got so much money in that thing. You don't need another race team. You need to finish that movie car. So that was kind of nipped that one in the butt. But at the end of day, Beetle. He

come down there and cut a deal with MC, and I could have bought in to the thing, but I just made some money. You know, I ain't going to spend all the money. I just made. I mean, at the end of the day, me and Harold, we look at each other and go, hey, we'll just work for Beetle for a while.

Okay, that's fine. So, y'all, did Beatles say we're going full time, and we're going to go Tim Richmond? Cales moving on. He's going to the 28. Dale, I went to Detroit. Michigan with a meeting with Stroh Brewery.

Me and Beal, we walked in there that morning. We left that afternoon with a check for $2.3 million. There's a lot of money back then. Sammy Swindell's going to run the sprint car. Raymond Beal's going to run the drag car. Tim Rich was going to run the cup car. Yeah. End of deal.

And we bought all that stuff down there in Savannah. And Larry McRillanell, he was my truck driver back then. And McCarrimels, he's down there in Savannah loading that stuff. up and the guy from the front office come out he said hey you can't leave here with that truck yet he said why is that he said check ain't cleared yet and larry calling me so what i'm going to do i said you got a sleeper he said yeah i said laying a sleeper and tell a guy come get you when the check clears bring on back yeah meanwhile joel haupner you remember him his family built the world trade center joel houtner owned a car that was driven by david pearson number six

There you go. That's when, you know, they were in a place that was now Blue Max. Okay. And unfortunately, we were in Bristol in 1981, and that's with Daryl. And Houtner had an offshore boat, and the throttle man showed up sick. So Joel got in there, and he was going to be the throttle man. Boat come over to bow, killed Joel Houtner. Damn.

Yeah, killed him, dead. I mean, that was a bad year because George Beard got killed that year. He was a head guy at good year. But, I mean, at the end of the day, Beattles says, hey, I bought all this stuff down there, but I can buy all Joel Halter stuff. And that Blue Max Racing building, I mean, it was second to none. You got the money. I got the time.

Yeah. So we went in there and bought all that stuff. And then we had Harold Elliott, had the three almond brothers and all that stuff in the motor room, had old Harold Fagin. I got a picture if you want me to show it to you. So you got them two race teams and merged them together? Yes, sir. In terms of equipment, cars and all that.

I think it's on my phone. I show it to you. That's all right. But I got Raymond Beatle, Tim Richmond, Slick Posting. You remember Big Slick? Yep. And Harold Fagan. I got all those guys.

Wayne Dalton. I think there's 15 of us in the picture. Banjo Grim. Banjo. Banjo Grimm, Larry McReynolds, and me were the only three alive today. Yeah. But I mean, that goes back. That's history, man.

That's history. But we formed that thing, and Pontiac, Ed McLean, he was dead on me to run a Grand Prix. Yeah. And that was the biggest brick in the world. It was ugly race car. Oh, it was terrible. Yeah. So I told Slim after the test in Daytona, I said, you remember that Lamontz that Bobby Allison had?

He said, yeah, I said, I'm going to build you one. Yeah, that Lamonts that Tim Richmond had was a brand new built car. Yes, sir. Yeah. Brand new. And so they had already started cutting a spoiler on that car or doing something trying to minimize its advantage. Everybody had four and a half inches of rear spoiler.

And every side. His car told me and said, do you run that car, you get three inches. Right. So nobody messed with the car anymore, but you did. Yeah. I had Tim Richmond. Y'all ran it at Pocono and all kinds of places. on the pole, wanted to race at Pocono.

Yeah. Set on the pole, Charlotte. You know, long story short there, I had Dorsey Patrick up on top of the truck, taking pictures. And that left front wheel would be on that yellow line. That left rear wheel would be about a foot, 18 inches, and Tim Richmond, like a mule eating briars.

As long as that thing would turn, hey, he didn't care. You know what I mean? Yeah. You're dead. We're in Talladega in 1983. Tim had a rough night. Saturday morning, he didn't show up. Your dad comes by.

Where's he at? I had a rough night. I ain't seen him. What you need? You give me a plug check? Yeah. The old man crawled in that thing. I said, hey, we don't.

I got a picture of this. So there's a picture of dad in the 27 old Milwaukee car, and I've always wondered. I wonder what the hell he was doing. I'll tell you what he was doing. He got out in that car. I said, don't run about three laps. Typical Earnhardt. run 10, come in there, pull the one in that down, checked out.

Ain't seen nothing. You know, like, hey, how'd that do for you? Yeah, right? Ain't said nothing. He went and got in his car, went out and run it. He'd come back after a while. He goes, Brewer, tell me something. I said, what's that?

He goes, my car going through that trial, will take your breath. He said, this thing goes through there, like shot an error through there. How you make it do that? I said, damn, earn, I forget. He said, you didn't forget. I said, you think I'm going to tell you how to do that? I said, this thing ain't got but three inches of spoiler on the backup, but I said, NASCAR forgot one little thing.

Dayton-Tal-Legger, that's all this cat needs is three inches of rear spoiler. You guys were running around there with them boards on the back of them things with four and a half inches. I said, hey, that's a double-edged story, but that bit them in the butt. Yeah. But I finally did tell him. I said, I guarantee you, you've probably got four degrees of castor in the right front, and you still got negative in that left front wheel, don't you? He goes, how you know that?

I said, I know Dale Earnhardt because that negative caster helps the car from the middle of the corner off getting tight at short tracks. I said, dude, you run a 200 mile iron down here. You better put you about five positive over here and three positive over there. I said, I have had seven and five. How do you get away with that? I said, goes good, don't it? He went, I can't complain. But live and learn.

But the old man, he had a good eye on him. And, I mean, he got on me pretty hard one day. He goes, what the hell do you cheat so much? I said, I don't call it cheating. I call it self-defense. He said, how do you figure that? I said, the last time I looked on the roof or the door of my car, it didn't have Dale Earnhardt on it.

Yeah. He goes, you know how you smirked and grinned. He got it then. Yeah. It's self-defense. Yeah. And I had great guys. I had Tim Richmond.

I had Neil Bonnet, had Daryl Walter. But that's Dale Earnhardt. You know what I'm saying? Daryl Andrews sat beside of me every race. His job was to monitor your dad. Really? It'd clock your dad. That's all he did.

He carried tires. And hey, I used to laugh at him. Daryl, he'd be sitting there and he'd bust out laughing. I said, what the hell did he say now? he said, Richard, I'm telling you right now, I've held Davy off all day long, but Robert's getting ready to pass my ass, I'm telling you.

And I knew what he was saying. The engine. I mean, he were pretty blunt. He called Children's on a radio one day. He said, what any hell did Brewer do to the right side of that car during that pit stop? I don't know.

He said, what does he think? He said, Bowman Gray Stadium running a modified car? He said, what are you talking about Dale? He said, when he started to race, Terry had his tires on the inside defenders. Not that three and a half, four inches outside to what? I went, hmm, guys got a good eye on him, don't he? Anyway, I laughed, but I'd been over to Tiger Tom's a couple weeks before. You'd have rambled through some of the old stuff and see what's going on.

Dale, I found 11, 10 and a half inch wheels with three inches more offset than the cup cars had. but I didn't find them and I went hey y'all put me five sets of tires up in a sleeper and let's take them back to the shop we at North Wilkesboro so okay I put them wheels and them tires together we took them back in there

the next day at first pit stop it looked like a modified car running around the phone grade stadium and your old man he was hiring a chap I bet but it was a game you know the last time i went to the racetrack was friday afternoon

at martinsville when you run the race on sunday and i think we did a radio show on serious satellite radio that's the last time i've been to the race track that was a 14 yeah damn that's the last time i went to a race track dude

when i walked i walked you know i just when they take something away from you that you can't get back you know and you know how hard and how tough it was to build it you go I ain't young enough and I ain't got the heart to do that again. Yeah. And you know racing your dad and Bonnet and Tim Richmond and you know dealing with men Leonard Wood Glenwood Bud Moore you know them them people they demanded respect. They did.

If you didn't give them respect, they'd kick your ass. Budmore pull a knife out on you in a heartbeat. But I went to his funeral and seen him laying in that casket. And he had told me years ago, he said, Brewer, when that tailgate fell on that truck, and we were on that beach, he said, this guy got killed and this guy got killed. And he said, I'm probably 18 years old. He said, I scared to death. In World War II.

Yes. Yeah. But, I mean, those were men. Oh, yeah. You know what I mean? and you grow up with people like that and you see what's going on this day and time. Hey, brother, mind over matter.

You don't mind? It don't matter. Yeah. And, you know, I just, like I said, I didn't have a heart and I didn't have a people. Pete Wright called me last night. And Brewer, what are you doing? I said, get ready to go to bed, man.

He said, you get an old. I said, dude, I'll be 70 in February. Yeah. But, I mean, do I act it? No. Probably no. No. But at the end of the day, Dale, I didn't have.

have the heart nor the financial means nor anything else to do what I wanted to do so I just turn around walked yeah well I mean it's um I think you know we all kind of got a we're all faced with that reality one day when there's a and I kind of struggle with it too like I have such a I have such a passion and connection and connection to the history what the what the what the what the actual temperature and vibe was like in the garage and in the pits on a Friday or Saturday during the 80s and 90s. Obviously, I wasn't lucky enough to be around in the 70s, but, and it's different today. It doesn't feel the same. It's different, not worse, not bad, not that I don't like it.

But I don't feel, I feel like it's past me by, you know. I don't relate to the car like I used to. I don't necessarily relate to the drivers like I used to. To your point, right? I mean, I kind of, we all sort of have a bad habit, I think, of really kind of hanging on to how it used to be, right? And, but every once in a while, like this past Sunday, I'll see something that reminds me of what I love and always loved, right, about NASCAR, like that finish to the race at Waukeye. Glenn with Chris Busher. I'm like, that right there is why I'm still here,

why I'm still hanging around. Because every once in a while, it's the same old NASCAR that I've always known. I'm going to give you a good piece of advice. Banjo Matthews told me one time, and old banjo was a smart old dude now. He said, Brewer, as you go through life,

your emphasis change. He said, when you're young, you're interested and I'm 10 foot tall and bulletproof. You know, I can go do this and I can go do that, and I can win this, and I can win that. Then you have, you're making a little bit of money, and then that changes you a little bit. The only guy that never changed was your dad.

He'd run for two cents if he knew he could win. He didn't care about the damn money. He'd go selling a souvenir making some money. But Banjov told me, he said, what's going to change a guy more than anything else is family and children. And that's going to, you know, that's going to make you think twice about, well, when you go off down in that corner, if you ain't looking down there at that yellow line, you're looking up there at that wall and that little green man's going, I'll bite your ass, I'll bite your ass. And when it's time to do that, it's time to go do something else. Oh, yeah.

But he said, you'll never have a race car driver, have an engine builder that can carry a heavy wallet. but your dead didn't apply to that because like I said he'd run his tongue out it's like him and koh yarborough I told koh one time I said you know you won the race by seven laps you want everything but the grandstands well I didn't know they was up for grabs you know they wanted it all oh yeah they wanted it all and they would give it all to get it oh yeah and you don't see many people like that anymore you know they want to argue about the money they want to argue about the souvenir money And that's like Jeff Bodine. That's the worst cat in the world to argue about money.

You know, we're coming back on an airplane from Pocono, and he's sitting there with a briefcase, probably got 50 grand in it, one's, tens, five, whatever. And all my guys, all we've got hundreds. And we're sitting there trying to play poker, and we're trying to get change and making change and this, that and other. Just same way we used to play.

Have fun. Yeah. Yeah. Passing the time. And he's sitting there with a briefcase full of money, and he could have said, here, I got changed for all that. And it would have made life a lot easier from me and my case.

Hill and Pete and Jr., Bud Green, a whole bunch of us. But he sat there on that thing, he said, I could have made change. What are you talking about? Well, I got a briefcase here full of money. I said, what a hell did you? I said, we don't care how much money you got. Yeah. You know, we don't care.

We just won't have a good poker game. But it's, he come in one morning, he said, they track mud in my motor home. Yeah. Can't you buy another mat? You know, whatever. Yeah. But, I mean, he complained about stuff that didn't, make no difference about nothing.

You know what I mean? I mean, get a life, dude. This may be my favorite time of the NASCAR season. It's when the on-track drama starts to ramp up and each driver fights harder and harder because each win might mean survival and a shot at the championship.

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incredible job making the raced win diecast look just like the real thing. These diecast are incredibly authentic. Remember when the trackhouse team put a giant taco on Daniel Suarez car at Atlanta earlier this season? Well, Lionel Racing's Atlanta win diecast has a taco on the hood too. I have Lionel win diecass. I have Lionel win die casts in my collection, and you can too, by ordering them at lionelracing.com, team stores, and authorized lionel racing dealers. And don't forget, you can find a wide selection of diacast at the Lionel stores in Concord Mills Mall near Charlotte Motor Speedway and Opry Mills Mall in Nashville. I want to go back to going to, going back to juniors and helping Neil and

working on Neil's car, the, you know, you would be around. down Darrell and you're back at the organization that you'd left. You hadn't burned any bridges because Junior and you were back together. But Hammond was there. It was very competitive. That was back in the day when driver's dad and Darrell Walter openly would say they didn't love being part of a two-car operation. Marcus Quatt quit Austerlin because he said,

dying being a part of a two-car team when they were bringing dad in so i mean the idea of a two-car team wasn't a wasn't a grand one uh at least for for some people so how did you how did you make that work it was real simple i wanted the best carburetor i wanted the best motor i wanted the best but so did darrell walter yeah and you know the kick the kicker there was you know i worked hard to put all that together and we're at daytona and here darrell is he's over over there whining the junior. Brewer's got the best motor. Brewers got the best car.

Brewer's got the best this. Junior said, well, why the hell don't you go over and take it away from him? It ain't going to happen. I said, here, I'm going to do you a favor one time. I said, here, I'm going to pull that motor out, that cabrager and the whole thing out, and you put it in your car. I mean, it's like day and night.

But Dale, I had an oil pan on that thing. Joe Gassaway used to get on me so bad. He said, what is that? A belly pad? I said, no, it ain't a belly pan, but I said, I learned a long time. ago Harold Elliott we put a big old Lexan oil pan on the motor on a dino and we pulled a hammer on that thing we'd go in there and look and that thing was just

overflowing with oil we wound up putting a oil pump on that thing that long and over scavenging it sucking literally all of all off the connecting rods the crank shafts and everything else but we learned a lot about big oil pans make horsepower and I had one on Pontus cars that I'm telling you it It was like probably a 10, 12 horsepower. About like that carburetor, the old Rump Pitman hat up there, that four car. Yeah. I mean, it's like when Tony left to go to work for Felix, they tested a week before we did.

Well, one of the inspectors called that carburetor. And when I get to Daytona, you know, I got Sterling Marlin. I got the four team. Man, we're going to rock and roll here. They come over and got me, said, hey, Brewer, let me tell you something. You bring that cabrater off that truck? we'll find you 100 grand to kick you out of here. What was wrong with the carburetor?

Runt Pittman. I'm going to tell you something. The most knowledgeable man I ever worked for as far as an owner was Larry McClure. He knows lift on the camshaft. He knew duration. He knew rocker arm ratio. He knew everything. But they worked on that carburetor.

And everybody else had 5-16th core studs holding a carburetor on. We had metric studs. Because you got metric studs, you can push that carburetor. carburetor back, pull that plate forward, and you align those boosters with the center of the restrictor plate. Oh. And that made the horsepower. Yeah.

I mean, it's like, oh, yeah, that's a pretty good thing. But when you got 12, 15 horsepower at Dayton, Talladega, and we got down there, and they said, you pull that carburetor off there, you know, you're out of here. Okay, that's great. And I told Sterling, I said, let me tell you something, Hans, when you pull out to pass somebody, you ain't got 15 horsepower more than they got he go we lose three spots then he here he come again then he pull out again i go sterling you don't have the damn carburetor yeah but i mean 15 horsepower you know what that's worth deton and talaga yeah but that carbure with larry mcclure

and old runt pitman they had it going on plus they had the exhaust system on the car yeah and i go up there and hey they're going to put me in a nass car jail yeah And I'm going, okay, this ain't going to work too good. But it's all about when you work and put the heart and desire into something like Larry McClure put in his Speedway program, you're going to be successful. And that man spent money like, no tomorrow. Same way at Juniors. We went to the wind tunnel, which I wish I'd have never went there. Because come to find out, you remember Terry Lace?

Yes. Oh, yeah. Chevrolet guy. Oh, yeah, Chevrolet guy. And it's like everything you learned in a wind tunnel. Went everywhere. There you have it. Yeah.

And it's like, I wish I'd never, I told you in there, I said, if I could go back and do one thing and racing again, I'd never set foot in a wind tunnel. When I went to Marietta, Georgia, that was great. What I got. I even went to a place in Norfolk, Virginia. They flew all the World War II airplanes in. Right up there next to Langley Speedway. Oh, yeah.

And you talk about cold. Dale, I was there in February, and we had coats on and gloves, and I mean, we froze our ass off up there, but we went up there because the information wasn't going nowhere. Right. It's not like Gary Acres over here, you know, at the wind tunnel. Yeah. When junior, or I guess when Rick Hendrick comes and tells Darry Waltrip he's going to hire him and Hammond's going to leave, is that what opened the door for you to get back on the 11 car?

Because you stayed there with Terry Lubbony, Jeff Bodine, Bill Elliott, back on that red bud car, number 11. How did that transition from Neil's car to that, back to the 11 happen? When Neil's car went away, the junior said, Brewer, I want you to stay. I said, okay, that's fine. I said, how are you going to cut this up? He said, I want you to take care of the road courses and the short tracks.

I said, okay. And let Hammond go do the speedways. That's fine. I don't want to race all races anyway. Dale, I had more titanium on them cars than you can ever imagine. The first short-track car I built for Terry Laboney, I had 600 pound of lead in that thing. 600 pounds. What was traditional?

200, 200, 20-V pounds? Maybe 300 at best. But I had holes that big all down the right-side frame rail. I had titanium bell houses, titanium trailing arms, titanium sway arms, hubs. I even had some wheel studs, but they didn't work too good. You hit them with a lug rack with an impact, green. French, they willed themselves. But I guess the people at Chevrolet were picking up the tab for all that stuff.

But unfortunately, at Pocono, I think, Terry got hurt a little bit. Darlington, he got hurt. Well, I had my brand-new short-track car there, and we went to North Wilkesboro to test. and Terry he was like God awful fast but when he got hurt the junior said well we've got to put Brett Bowdine in the car and Brett done us a good job he finished about fifth

but the best day of my life up there was Hammond had his car and Pete Wright and a bunch of them over there working on that car the 17 tied car no on the number 11 sorry yeah testing yeah and I had I had my short track car there.

We beat them by a second and a tenth. A second and a tenth. That's hard to believe. Oh yeah. And Hammond, he loaded his car up, put the skids under it, got in the truck himself, and left. And Pete come over there, he said, if y'all needed any help, we could, you could use us. And I went, yeah, Pete, hell, I'll use you.

It ain't no big deal. But we came back to following fall and took Terry LaBani in that car and won the race. But meanwhile, I built a Riverside car. and I'm sitting there, them guys are in Pocono. I told Hammond, I said, here, you can use some of this titanium stuff. Well, he left the cross member in the car, and it broke the cross member and fell down on the tailpipes. Okay, that's gone. But I'm getting ready to go to Riverside, me and Wayne Dalton, and, you know, I got my car ready to go, and it's, I mean, it's a killer.

I mean killer. Well, Hammond comes in there Monday morning and goes up and tells Junior said, if Brewer goes to Riverside, I quit. Why? He said, what are you talking about? He said, if Brewer goes to Riverside with Terry, I quit. Junior said, well, just pack your stuff and get the hell out of here then. And he come back and told me, he said, hey, he said, you're up.

What do you mean, I'm up? He said, well, Hammond just told me what he told me. I just don't pack of stuff get the hell out of here. I said, okay, that's fine. But I didn't sign up to do this. All of them. I signed up to do the short tracks and the road courses. Well, and then here comes Shorty Edwards.

Oh, we're going to go to Riverside. Then we went out there and sat on the pole and, you know, it's like anything else. I inherited it back. Yeah. I was drafted, so to speak. And, you know, but at the end of the day, it wasn't a bad deal, and I loved it. You know, because somebody come up to me one time and Mike Mulhern. we're sitting in the truck at Atlanta in 1992.

And when Mulharn come up in a truck, Junior was sitting there and Bill and I was sitting there. And he goes, hey, Brewer, I got to ask you a question. I said, yeah, Mike, what's that? He said, well, it's kind of personal. I said, Junior and Bill, I said, it ain't personal. I said, what I know they know, you know, I'm good. He said, where it is Richard Childers wants to hire you to be the crew chief.

for the Good Wrench team. I said, I have not talked to him about that, but I said, Maulharing, what you got to understand, I got a lot of blood, sweat, and tears in this Budweiser team, and all I ever wanted to be was the crew chief of the Budweiser car. Yeah. You know, and that's it.

Yeah. Junior knew that he was going to let me go, but he didn't pull me off to the side and go, hey Brewer, you probably need to go on down your way because I'm going to go a different direction. But he didn't have a guts to do that. Yeah. And he hung me out.

Because I could have went to Richard Children and said, you know, Kirk left. Yeah. I'll do this deal. You're the guy. I'll do it. Yeah. And I would have loved to done it with your dad. Yeah.

But Junior, I got a letter. He did not. he took Mike Bean and Sterling's car and went to Daytona and tested and Roger Gregory. The junior called my lawyer John Morrow and told him. He said, I'm going to give Brewer a letter on Friday. I said, okay. Anyway, I got a call from John Morrow on Wednesday. He said, hey, you need to come over here to office.

I said, okay. And you know, Mara, but I mean, I walked in the office and I got, six-pack of Bud Light and Janie said, where are you guys going to do? I said, I don't know. John called me. I have no clue. And I give John a beer.

I have one. He goes, I got some bad news for you, Brewer. I said, what's that? He said, you're going to get a letter Friday. I said, really? I said, what's it going to say? He said, your services are no longer needed, Junior Johnson Associates.

I said, that figures. Junior, he's down in Daytona testing. I said he's going to have Roger Gregory as henchmen do it. But I said, that's fine. Ain't no big deal. Why do you think that happened? Some personal stuff on Junior's side. You know, having Floss went through the divorce.

And, you know, we had two airplanes. Junior and Bean got in one airplane and went to the Waldorf Astoria, Tearberry, flew in there. And I stayed home with Floss and took her to her brother's funeral. And Junior and Floss was like family to me. Sure. And, you know, it's like anything else. You think that soured him a little bit? No, that didn't, but I know what did, but it ain't worth getting into it.

Sure. Yeah. So, you know, at the end of the day, I made a comment. I said, well, that figures Jr. is going to give me a letter because he didn't have whatever to tell me in front of me. And I said, that's fine. but you know there's and Bill Elliott called me he said Junior called me and told me you weren't going to be there next year I said well you know you can jump up and down stomp your feet or do whatever you want to but if you do Bill he'll stab you in

the back just like he did me and I was in press conferences with Junior Johnson before and reporters would ask me hey Brewer don't you want to own your own race team and Junior go Brewerer don't you want to own race team and Junior go Brewer's got his own race team. You know what that loyalty will do for you? Nothing. Get you in trouble.

Damn. But he took something away from me. And at the end of the day, I went over to Terry, Bobby Labonis with Bill Davis, and, you know, we had the Maxwell House team, and it was okay. But Bill had good people over there, and this, that, and the other, but Dale, it wasn't home. Yeah. It was not home. And, I mean.

You won five races with Bill Elliott and nine. close opportunity to win the championship. So it is kind of shocking that the relationship with you and Junior had gotten stressed and strained so much so that it's another one of them deals. It seems like level heads could have prevailed and somehow kept it going. But we see it a lot in our sport through the history of the sport. I think one of the most outstanding opportunity, or one of the most outstanding examples would be, you know,

David Pearson and the Wood brothers, right? Just a miscommunication and misunderstanding that more than likely had a conversation happened, they might not have split back in 79 or whenever that happened. 79. Yeah. You know who put the tires back on the left side of that car that day? Who knows? Me and Travis Carter.

Yeah. Because we were right down the pit road. And when he come down there, he had those old Clement Wheels on that thing. and I went, well, well, maybe they'll fit. But, yeah. And Pearson, I love David Pearson. Yeah. You know.

But looking at the research of that whole deal. Miscommunication. Like, you know, getting upset, getting mad, not willing to really kind of come together and get in the same room and figure it out. Something. They should have stayed together, just like in this case, you know, with your, you know, five wins in 92, you and junior should have figured out, maybe how to make it work. And I hate.

And I want to say this. I want to say this, and then I want you to respond. I hate that you feel the way you feel about Junior because all the things y'all did together. I hate that you still carry this frustration about him and because I believe that had y'all, if you could sit in the room and talk today, you'd figure it out.

But I didn't get a vote in that. I know. Let me tell you, you know who my best man was at my wedding? Who? I know. And so the guy, you know. But I didn't get a vote. My lawyer, John Morrow, went up there that Saturday after it. I understand. I'm not here to change your mind. I'm just saying, I think that your anger and frustration over that while justified, I just wish, I know that if you had an hour or two with junior, y'all could have figured it out. Sure. And you wouldn't feel that

way the rest of your life. You know, Dale, after we came back from Dover, Delaware in 1992, we were leading the race. Left side tires were questionable. With 25 laps to go, I called Bill on the radio. I said, hey, Clyde, bring her down here, we're going to put some fuel in it and give you some left side tires, give you a seven-second lead. We're going to knock this thing home. He said, okay, Brewer.

Bill's coming down pit road. He's halfway out down pit road. And Jr. grabbed me by the arm. He said, put four tires on my race car. I said, Junior, you don't need four tires. You just need two lefts. I said, put four tires on my car. Okay.

Dale, I could have done any damn thing I wanted to and got away with it. Yeah. But out of respect, I put four tires on that man's race car. Yeah. And when I come up from that left front tire, I took that air wrench and slung it back through that wall. Damn near broke his ankles. He said, what's wrong with you?

I said, Junior, we're running to win the damn race. I said, we ain't racing Davey Allison. We're racing Ricky Rudd. Well, you've been asleep or what? I was hot. Gary Dee Hart come over to me after the race and we tear the cars down. He said, Brewer, that was a gift.

You give me that one. I said, Dee Hart, I didn't give you a day. damn thing. I said, you go over and thank Junior Johnson. He's one to give you that. And I called Bill on radio. I said, hey, you got 25 laps to go. You're seven seconds behind. Good luck. And we got beat by that much.

After the race, I swear to God, Alan Hill was my spotter, me, Pete Wright, Mike Hill, Bud Green, all this. We come out of the garage area and we're walking up to racetrack. And some drunk is hanging on the fence. And he hollered over there. He said, Brewer, he was robbed

a day. And Alan Hale, he's about two guys behind me, he said, yeah, it was the inside job too. Junior turned blood red. He was there. He was walking with us. And he turned blood red, and he never spoke a word to me on that airplane all the way home.

And what got us burnt now, we eat dinner every night together. Saturday night, we go to dinner. We go to dinner. We talk over water deal is, okay, we get to Phoenix and we always went to dinner. And we put that

race motor in Saturday morning. I went, this thing, something right about it. And I didn't say nothing. It goes back to don't criticize my motors. That's Richard Childress and Junior Johnson. Don't criticize my motors. He got on Austin Dillon's ass. Don't you criticize my motors. and I come in there Sunday morning and I wanted to tell Junior hey man we need change this motor but I said well that's just going to pull five gallon of gas on the fire

it ain't going to be worth it damn what happened to us burn a piston three four laps in rode around there all day Dale I didn't put rags on the vents on the valve covers I put a furniture blanket on it because it's blowing out so much oil and Kyle Petty made a comment he said

you know when I come in the pit he said it's easy to spot he said that 11 car would be down there smoking it looked like somebody's having a big barbecue down there but I mean had had we had dinner that night you could have talked to him he told me after the race he said

Tim I started to tell you to change that damn motor this morning I said it's funny you say that because I was going to tell you the same thing but that got us behind we go to Atlanta with Bill, qualified 11th. Get those guys to tell you what I had to do. The junior bought this brand new rig, and we took to Daytona.

Well, when I got home, I told Henry Benfield, I said, take all that stuff, all that trailer, and put back my old trailer. The doors were falling off. But when I got to Atlanta in 1992 for the fall race, Steve Mill and Larry McRennels stood over there, and they said, watch Brewer. He's going to take a cutting torch. to this thing here in a minute.

No, I ain't going to do that, and I'm going to stay cool. You couldn't get the back door open. You couldn't get the back door down, and I couldn't get my car off that thing. The new trailer. Yeah, a new trailer. That he bought and paid too much money for it. He was the biggest piece of junk. Got it out of Winder, Georgia down there.

That thing pissed me off to no end. But anyway, I told Henry Benfield, I said, and I'm out there bleeding the valves off to get my car out. And Steve Mill, he goes, Brewer's going to burn this thing right here in the garage area. You wait and see you. I said, when I get my race car out of it, I might burn it. Funny thing, Robert Yates comes over. He goes, hey, Brewer, are you having a good day?

Not really, Robert. And, you know, he's leaning on the car, and he looked inside. He goes, Brewer, this is that car that you loan me. After Davey crashed in Charlotte, Robert asked me, said, hey, you got a car. car I can borrow. Sure. I said, I got all my cars laid out, but I said, my Atlanta car ain't going to use it in a while. You know, I'll loan it to you. It sat in the top of Robert Yates' truck for five weeks. I said, don't paint it. Don't pull the decals off of it, but if you need it, you know, we'll work on it. He looked down there, he turned white as a ghost. He said,

this is the car you loaned me. I said, damn, Robert, why did you, I'd have raced it. We won the race. Yeah. Won the spring race, because Mike Wallace spun out up there and turned two. And I called Bill on radio. I said, beat them back. Beat them back, Bill. Beat them back. He goes, what are you talking about?

I said, just beat them back. We beat them back. I said, congratulations. You got a lap on the field. He goes, Boer, they're going to put you in the NASCAR electric chair. I said, dude, I ain't done nothing. I said, I just play in the hand. They dealt me.

But they dropped that green flag. Harry Gant and Dave and all of them took off. But Bill called me. He said, man, he said, think we're going to make it? I said, if we don't have a caution, we're going to win. I said, you know, you're going to be the hero down in Georgia again. He said, well, I hope so. I said, you know who the nervous guy in the house is?

He said, who's that? I said, why is Kendra's some nervous? They said, why is Kendra's some nervous? I said, if he reaches over that yellow flag, I said, somebody's going to shoot him. You know, you're in Atlanta, Georgia. But at the end of the day, Junior and I miss me, miscommunication. Yeah, that cost us. That's where two hard heads come together.

But it's just my, as much my fault was his. But at the end of the day, that race, you know, I hear all the time, Alan Quickey had discalculated and Alan Quickey had discalculated. I had a pretty good calculation on it. But when I called for something to happen on the radio, it didn't happen. I had them right there. it didn't happen yeah

so anyway Bill Elliott I still love him to death you know it's one of those deals where Alan Kowicki won the championship it was meant to happen

because I'm still here and he won him a championship and he was a good guy and he had some great guys working for him but you know we knew what we needed to do that day but where we fumbled a ball

was in Phoenix. After that year, you'd end up working with Bob Labani and Jeff, you'd go work with Robbie Gordon and John Andretti, Jeff Bodine with his race team, Morgan McClure, you know, a lot of different teams

over the remainder of your career, but eventually you'd get in TV working with ESPN. And a lot of people from maybe a generation younger than me, remember you as the guy at the cutaway car, helping us understand some of the issues that teams might be having that day

or a part or something that broke or something that was new in the sport. And you had a really good reputation managing that part of your life. I guess what I want to know is how challenging was the, how challenging was the choice, I think, to step away from the competitive side of it,

the competition side, right, being a crew chief or a GM, or being on the side trying to take a team to the racetrack and be great. How hard was it to step away from that and get into the television side of it or change your whole life? That's really simple.

Just like you said, I worried about it, worried about it, worried about it, worried about it. But when I walked, when we came through that tunnel, coming at Daytona, when we started our ESPN thing, you know, a typical deal. I looked around and I went,

damn, this is pretty neat. Yeah. You know, I ain't got to worry about winning a race or beating nobody. I don't care who wins. Yeah. You know, I'm just here to do a job. Yeah. You know, but what was really reassuring to me

when I sat down in that chair and Rusty was over there and they took him off to go do something, Brett Muslberger was sitting beside of me. Now, Brett Muslberger, I've won't have. watched him forever. I've watched him call the Masters. I've watched him call. When he's calling a basketball game, I can tell you who he bet on five minutes in. But he tapped me on my hand right there. He said, hey, laddie, this is the way we're going to play this today. You're going to carry us today. And I'm thinking to myself, yeah, I got a pitcher. Me carrying Brett Musselberger on national

TV. That's like a snowballs, jams on hill. But anyway, he said, the way we're going to play this is, I hadn't been around about 10 years, Brewer. I said, yeah, I got that. He goes, you're going to ask me, you're going to say, hey, Brewer, ask me this. I'm going to ask you, and you're going to answer it. And he said, you're going to carry us today. My first show. Yeah.

And it's like, okay, Musburger, but Jack of Root told me, he said, take him to dinner, make sure you buy him a nice bottle of wine, and get up under that wing, and he'll fly you right to the top. I got nominated for three Emmys and a one. one one. And I'm on a plane with Richard Childers one day. He said, hey, Burr, you won that Emmy? I said, yeah. I said, if we win me another an R.C., I'd give you one to go in a museum. He said, because

people don't understand. Richard Childers built every one of those cutaway motors for me, and I had five of them. And Larry McReynolds used to come over all the time and he'd go, hey, bro, what's this? Do you? I said, here, what's this? And I'd flip that switch and that motor start running and turn. And he went,

I ain't even got one like that. said, yeah, watch this. I pull that thing in gear and you can see the gears and the transmission and the rear end and everything started moving. He goes, he just slammed the door and went out the door. And I went, you ain't mad, are you? But Larry and I were still good friends. You know, we pull for Alabama all the time and we're always texting back and forth,

but saving ain't there anymore. So, you know, I got to find me something else to do on the weekends. But I cannot tell you what a tremendous life I had. coming out of Winston-Salem, North Carolina, and playing with the race cars and being fortunate enough, I don't tell too many people this. I went two weeks into the ninth grade. No high school education, no college education, no nothing.

I funded programs at NC State University. You know, August Bush, Edsel Ford, people that good at your tire and rubber company, wind tunnels this out. another I hung with all of them. Yeah. And I mean, enjoyed every minute of it. And when people look at you and go, you did what?

It's like, I never worked a day in my life deal. It was a game for me. But when they started finding me $50,000 for a template infraction, it wasn't fun no more. Yeah. And it's like, what are you people doing? What are you doing to the sport? You know, I could tell you a story about Gary Nelson when he come to Daytona.

And Bill Elliott today, he'll tell you that in Sterling Marlin, the trick I had on that car, Bill Elliott, he went, Elizabeth. I said, there ain't no needn call on her pal because she ain't going to get us out of the penitentiary on this one. Yeah. And he said, well, I've seen Junior at that gate, you know, that little gate that used to go out to back, Kate 7 or whatever it was. he said I met Junior on a dead run while ago I said really I said he's probably halfway back to Wilkesboro

he said you mean Junior ain't gonna be here if we get caught I said you think he's gonna let him hold his feet to the fire he's out of here I'm telling you dude he goes Brewer you got you got to be the bravest man in the world I said it's a game yeah that's all it was to me it's like I told you dad yeah it's a game Was that the year y'all changed the trailing arms on the 11 and the 22 up in the hauler? I might have something to do with that.

That might have something to do with that. What was the trick? McReynolds has been trying to get me to tell him that for years. And it's like I told him, I said, now you see it. Now you don't. You know, a buddy of mine. I don't know who told you that one. Brad Means, Jimmy's son.

So, Brad, you know, Jimmy and those guys, they're pretty, like you said, Daddy had an eye on him, all those guys down in the garage. You know them guys. They all were watching. They don't know what you're doing, but they know you're doing something, but they don't know what it is, you know. Well, that's just like Jim Baldwin. He used to work at NASCAR. Well, Childers, he hired him, and he went over there. And Baldwin was Childers's inside man.

And everybody had inside man. Yeah. When, you know, when you walk in that gate, somebody's going to tell you, hey, Brewer, they're on, they're on fuel cells today. Hey, Brewer, they're on lower control arms, they're on this, on that. I had my inside guys, too. Yeah. You know, when I'd have, Dale, I had a house out in Pofftown, North Carolina, about 6,300 square foot, big colonial, big white columns in front of it, swimming pool in the front yard, river, ponds and all that stuff. At Christmas, I used to have 125 people at my house, but Beatty wasn't invited because all

his people was there. Oh, it was a game to me. Yeah. But, I mean, everybody left with a country ham, big old cashew, a half gallon of liquor, and a little envelope. That's a little bit of the end of the day. Hey, you take care of business when you take care of business. Yeah.

You know, that's like the Hall of Fame thing. Deb Williams called me about a month ago. who said, hey, Brewer, congratulations. I said, for what? She said, you've been inducted into the Hall of Fame in Darlington, South Carolina. I said, well, that's great. I said, the first one I've ever been inducted in.

She said, are you serious? I said, yeah, I ain't a North Carolina Hall of Fame. I ain't NASCAR Hall of Fame, but, you know, Darlington. Yeah. That means a lot to me, Dale, because it's Darlington, South Carolina. But to reap the rewards,

man, I did that a long time ago. And, you know, what we're talking about today is stuff that I did 25, 30 years ago. Oh, no, lifetime ago. Yeah. And, you know, I'm fortunate. My son, he's 44. In 1979, we were in College Station, Texas. We blew up everything we had on the truck in 79 with K.O. Yarborough.

I get back to the hotel, got a message at the front desk, call home. I called Susan, I said, hey, what's going on? She said, your grandma passed away. Okay. And Junior's standing right there. He said, what are you going to do, Brewer? I said, Junior, I got to go home and bury my grandma. I go with you.

I said, okay. So we came back to Charlotte and flew, went back to Winston, Salem, I bury my grandma. But she raised me. Bertha Bell Cooks. She weighed every bed of 88 pounds, maybe 90. Rassel, fight you all day long. Loved her.

But anyway, long story. short, we go out to College Station, Texas, 1980, sat on the pole, let ever lap, won the race. Kail bought me a big old cowboy hat and Travis and all of us. I'm sitting in the airport,

and Benny Parson goes, hey, broor, come on, let's go to Vegas. I said, man, I can't go to Vegas. Who's getting ready to have a baby? June the 2nd, one year later, my son, Scott was born. And I walk, I come to Statesville, let Travis out, and Linda comes out, said, you got to get

home you got to get home susan need you okay whatever i walked in the house set my bag down still got my cowboy hat on took susan straight to the hospital she had the baby yeah but you know my grandmother she literally raised me you know she died june the second 1979 my son was born june the second 1980 yeah you know big man he he'd take her for away and he'd give her but at the end of the day I couldn't be I'd like to say I wouldn't change nothing but I would

if I could but you know I look up in that rear view mirror what goes that way ain't gonna come back around this way but I mean it's like your daddy I'm sitting at St. Elmo after he had that big crash in Talladega him and Sterling

and Susan and I we're sitting there eating at St. Elmo's and I look up and it's a big shadow coming over me and I look up and I go hmm you ain't 10 foot tall and bulletproof huh dude and Teresa busted out last she said Brewer you want the only SOBs in the world tell him that and get away with it

yeah but you know it's like Bill Franz Jr he told me he said Brewer when you come up in this truck and you got a complaint you shut that door and you call me anything you want to and we'll work it out. But he said, if you hit me in the press or in front of a TV camera, he said, I'm going to hit you with both barrels. And that's the way he taught your dad, me, Richard Childress, and all the following that he

had. But your dad, Bill France Jr., and T. Wayne Robertson, at their demise, it all changed. Yeah, yeah, it's definitely a different sport these days. Man, this has been a long one. This has been fun, and I'm glad that you came here today. We've had a bit of a run on what I would say, our throwback crew chiefs. Buddy Parrott was here, and Travis.

Travis came through, and so it's kind of been fun because it wasn't really intentional, but it's kind of been fun because each one of you, each one of you've kind of been mentioned in the conversation at one point. And so I love being able to kind of like step back in time and imagine what it's like being around the sport and being around the cars and the men and the garages and what the temperature and vibe must have been like. And this was been fun for me. I appreciate it. I admire what you've done.

I think when we all sit down and look at your career and not just the mechanic and the crew chief, but also the impact that you had in the innovation you had on the way we watch races in the broadcasts. You certainly left an impact and made your mark. And I'm thankful for that. I'm thankful that you were able to come here today and be so honest with us and transparent. and you look great coming up on 70. Thank you very much. You know, as far as the TV career, Rusty Wallace, you know,

because when he called George Boattenheimer and said, I got a guy for you. I mean, when I went to ESPN, that was one of the great experiences. But to come here today, you know, I don't live, I live in Troutman. Yeah. I don't live five miles from you. You probably fly over my house. house all the time you know I watch your stuff you know I've never been to your go-cart

track never been to your place out there but I hear it's pretty nice but you know my son you know he gets on me all the time you know I got this place in troutman I've had for pretty good while a nice swimming pool all that stuff and I've started me a place in Myrtle Beach and I got three bedrooms and two bass and you know I built a crow's nest up on top of it and I can stand on top of the crow's nest and it's about 10 but 12 with my chairs and all that stuff. Natural my cooler, a little butt light in it. But I can see the waves break and I built me a cocktail deck where I can drive my golf cart up under it and I had it underpins so it don't rain on it.

Susan and I would kind of like to go down there and hang out. My son, Scott and his wife Samantha and my granddaughter Sloan, they went down there for the weekend of Darlington. And he hadn't been there since I bought it and he went, what are you? buy that thing for. And I've rebuilt it completely. And he said, Dad, you didn't tell me this place was that nice.

I said, what did you expect? You know what I mean? He goes, Dad, Sloan loves this place and, you know, we love it. But what I love about my place at the beach, it's in the Apache campground, but I've got a park model home down there, Dale. But what I love about it, I can set up on top,

and they got all them campers and motor coaches and stuff down there on the bottom that I look across, and instead of having a backstretch at Rockingham or Darlington or Tallinnah or Daytona, I got the Atlantic Ocean to look at. You know what I mean? Oh, yeah. And Annie Schrader came down there, I don't know, about two months ago, and she said, Brewer, you better hope Kenny never comes down here.

I said, why is that? He'll put a cooler beer up there, and he ain't never going to leave. I'll tell you this, man, when I'm 70 years old, if I got a place on the beach, I won't be having no place in Troutman. I'll be at the beach full time. That's for damn sure. Well, hey, I appreciate you. Yes, sir.

I appreciate you asking me to come on. I really enjoyed it. I hadn't done one of these things in quite some time. But your family, grandfather, and I want to tell you a few stories about Robert G, but we'll leave that for maybe the next time, but I love him to death. The best one I'm going to tell you, when I'm sitting in my office at Blue Max Racing and Judy Tucker's, my receptionist secretary, Robert come in one day, and Judy told him, said, Robert, you can't go in there.

He's talking to Raymond Beedle, the owner. Robert says, that's okay. I don't mind you. He came in there, and he sat down in the chair, and Beatle, typical deal. I'm getting my butt cheat out for, hey, you're spending too much money, you're doing this, you're doing that. And I go, okay. Raymond, I got to go.

Brew, that's a business meeting. we got to sit there and finish this. I said, no, I got somebody to talk to. Somebody come in and got to talk to him. Who's more important to me right now? I said, Robert G is. He said, why is that? I said, because he ain't going to chew my ass out for spending too much money. You can believe that.

But I sold him. He said, Ivan, you got to sell me that petty blue pickup truck with the black fenders. I said, I just bought that thing from Ralph Cigres. You've got to understand. I might get lucky in that thing. I said, how's that? He goes, I get that thing all dollars. up. He said, I go over and pick Maria up Sunday morning, carried a church. I said, yeah,

how's that going to get me lucky? He goes, well, after lunch, he said, you know, I'm going to get that old thing wound up and get it pulled back in high gear. He said, I'll reach over and pop that cowl induction thing up. He said, blow her dress up overhead. Oh, it might get lucky. I loved him to death. Yeah, he was a special man. I know that you, you won't share the secrets on that on that on the junior johnson cars that said on the front row with the trailing arm changes up in the hauler give me one innovation one you know one trick that you're probably the most proud of that come out of your creative mind i'll tell you what i combated we're on pit road and darrell walter's number 88 comes down the pit road

And that thing is splattered buckshot all over everything. I went, really? Hmm. That's a pretty good idea. And I asked him and said, how much y'all putting in there, old buddy parrot, you say, loading a cannon, loading the cannon. He's putting about 20 pound of buckshot in there. Yeah.

They don't run in the same park with me. I went and got me. I never told nobody this, but I'm going to tell you. And it'll make the highlight real. You bet your ass on that. I went over to Francis Allen in the parks room. It's like when I got them sportsmen wheels, I got me four brand new wheels. And I had me one little area up there at juniors that when I went in there and shut that door, don't come in there.

I got me four wheels and I put me in some three-eight studs and some big body washers on eight points all the way around it. I made me a form. We got me old rear end bucket, melted me 40 pounds of lead. and poured it in four wheels. Damn. What's four times 40? 160. So that was on the wheel.

And the car would go over the scale with those wheels on and then race with a different set of wheels. Damn. I bet it was a whole lot faster without all. Kelly Arborough come to Wilkesboro test. He said, what are you doing? I said, I got a little trick. He goes, what's that going to do?

I said, you'll see. and new set of tires went out and run torn laps done all that gonna pull them off put the light ones on it regular standard wheels and I'm gonna go to a lecker chair over there this probably cost me getting in the Hall of Fame because people are gonna think I'm a damn cheater or something other but anyway first pit stop I take them things off

what would your car do if you is a 160 pound light it would be easier to drive that's important but Darrell Walter I'm gonna tell you had the best one on him. I left and went on done my deal. Well, Dale, when I came back, I had Neil Bonnick. I run a thousand and sixty-seven laps up there with Leo Mel for good year. And anyway, we're up there to spring race, and things ain't going real good.

And we need near as good as we need to be with Neil. Well, Neil, he said, well, you know, I just don't. don't know this out and the other. I said, dude, it's Wilkesboro. You got to be the best you can be at Wilkesboro. About that time, Darrell come up in a truck, and I asked, I asked Jr., I said, hey, where are my four wheels at? He said, hell, I don't know. He's somewhere over in that garage. He said, ain't nobody got crazy enough to run them damn things, but you? I said, well, I asked Darrell, I said, hey, I'm going to use two of them wheels tomorrow. You want two of them? he said, I don't need them two wheels to kick your ass at North Wilkesboro.

I said, okay, that's fine. I told Rick Peters, I said, put me four tires up in a sleeper, that truck, and tell Beatty you've got to take it to the house. I went and found them wheels. Mounted them four tires on it. Next morning, I come in there. I pulled 160 pounds of lid out of that race car. Put my wheels on there.

First pit stop, I took them off. Guess who won the race? Neil Bonnet. Guess who runs. Second, Darrell Wawkes. After the race, we down there in the truck, and I'll never forget this. We're just, we're sitting there talking to Junior there. When Darrell comes in, he goes, Junior, Brewer cheated me.

He looked at me, said, you cheat Darrell? I went, no, not really. Darrell said, I know damn well you did. You offered me two of them wheels. You run two of them wheels on Bonnets car. Junior looked at him, he said, didn't Brewer offer you two of them wheels, Darrell? He said, yeah, he said, I didn't need them damn wheels. wheels beat him he said you're right brewer used all four of them you can see the steam come out at

at somebody's ear and i laughed i laughed but it's a game oh yeah but back then dick betty come to me he said brewer we'll start weighing these cars i said baby you're a little late but i loved old dick betty yeah but he used to spank my hand all the time but but i mean at the end of the day you think it ain't hard to pull some of this stuff off. Yeah. And that's like the scales at Charlotte Motor Speedway. You remember they used to have the big digital numbers up there? Well, all you had to do is put a magnet on the scales for whatever you wanted to take out of your car. Yeah. You go back there to the engine room, you get on the gram scales, and you go, okay, 110 grams, hmm, that's 100 pound. You just, you know, whoever was on the scale,

you just have him Eddie Thrap or me, whoever was there, just stick the magnet on it. You could go through a hundred pound light. Damn. And then, I forgot who it was. Might have been Thrapp. He goes, Brewer, I got a problem. I said, what's that?

He goes, I didn't get the magnet off the scales. I said, you better go back and get it. I'm telling you right now. But it was a game, man. It wasn't like Maurice Petty when he won that race over there with Richard Petty and we run second with Tim Richmond. And they tore the motor down. and Chief backed up against the wall

he told Gasway he said hey I claim 388 cubic inches right now and Gasway says ain't no way Chief said I built the motor I know how big it is you know yeah but not to mention four left side tires but other than that I mean it was a game but to answer your question about you know the ESPN thing Richard Petty came up to me at Watkins Glen New York we were sitting down there at the airport waiting to go out.

And we'd been on air, and I had a pretty good field time that day. And the king, he'd come over, he put his arm around me. He said, Brewer, I'm going to tell you something. And I always call him King. I said, what's that, King? He said, don't let this blow your dress up. I said, okay, King, what's that? He said, of all the people they throw it to, every time they throw it to you,

you get it right, Brewer. Don't let that blow you dress up. I said, okay, King, I'll see you later. Thank you. But come from Richard Petty. And when he tells you something like that, it means something. Yeah, sure. But we could sit here and talk for days and days about different stories,

just like, you know, I'm sure you guys had some tricks over there at DEI. Oh, heck yeah. But, I mean, you know, it's like. You just race against it. It had to do it. Self-defense. Like I told you old man. Like I told you old man.

Hey. The trick is, I want to do it. win the race, get the trophy and the money, then I'm splitting. I'm getting hell out of here. But at the end of the day, man, I loved it. It was a game. It kept me young. And it kept me off streets and out of trouble.

Yeah, for sure. Well, man, I appreciate it. That's some good stories. This has been a lot of fun for me, and I want to have you back. I definitely want to hear some stories about my granddaddy Robert G. I know you've got some good ones. So we'll have to do that one in the next trip. I appreciate you.

Thank you very much, brother. bet you man thank you thank you all right tim brewer on the dale junior down all right so a great conversation with tim brewer and um uh boy you just asked the guy a question and he just goes and goes um makes my job or my role in this easy and uh boy you took us everywhere we talked about everything and i love the innovation um you know they he had those wheels that he made and put all that lead in to make those wheels heavy and they weren't weighing the cars post

race. So all he had to do is get the car across the scales it started the day and he was good to go. Until NASCAR eventually started weighing the cars after the race and then he'd have to figure out another hole in the rublet. So

anyways Tim Brewer-Manny's you know I think about Tim and I do forget like all the things that he did, all the teams he worked for, all the races that he won, all the championships that he won, I do, I don't forget about his TV role, but I think I do, I do forget the impact that it had. I know that when he was doing the cutaway car, he had, you know, people appreciated

that, that insight and that involvement. And he was quite a character, you know, and with his gold rings and his watch and all that stuff, sitting there talking about a rear suspension of a car. But, and, you know, a little bit taken aback by his frustrations with Hammond, Jeff Hammond, and Junior Johnson. And, you know, I don't know. I, you know, because I look at, I look up to junior Johnson, I'm like, you know, Junior Johnson is Junior freaking Johnson. How could anybody be, you know, how could anybody feel the way that Tim feels about him? I'm sure there's people that are pissed off at Junior Johnson. I know the man, you know,

was, was, you know, stood his ground and what, you know, did what he believed in. And that might not have been good for everybody. But, you know, I, you know, I hope that Tim can find some common ground there with that. But because they had so much success together, right? That would be like Jimmy Johnson and Chad Canal's breaking up and just being in a steady feud for the remainder of their lives. Unnecessary. So anyhow, great conversation.

I think that the innovation stories were probably some of the more brazen ones we've heard in this room. Maybe, maybe not. The spoiler with the Hared Gant's spoiler was, I mean, that's pretty crazy. But they didn't have, they didn't race it, they said. They just run it and qualifying because they were scared to race it. But pretty cool. So I'm thankful for Tim. Thankful for Ally, bringing us the guest segment every single week.

And they brought us another ally. We've had a little run on some vintage crew cheese. I didn't want to say that with him in the room. Call him vintage. But we've had a little run on some vintage crew cheese. And they all have kind of connected. certain ways in their careers. So that's been enjoyable for me.

It gets me back into some of the history of the sport that I want to learn more about. And so thank you, Ally. No matter what you're saving for, whether it's race tickets to the race this weekend at Bristol, a new car or a home, we're all better off with an ally. All right, it's time for the white flag.

Dropping every Sunday to tear down with Jeff Gluck and Jordan Bianchi. And then Monday, Action's Detrimandal with Denny Hamlin and door bumper clear. We had Connor Zillich, the winner of the Xfinity race as a guest on door bumper clear for Monday. Dirty Air with T.J. Majors was a lot of fun yesterday. Today's Speed Street, Connor Daly and Chase Holden, are going to recap

Championship weekend in IndyCar. Easy for me to say. And then dropping tomorrow, DJD Reloaded with Asht Junior and Moore, and Dirty Mo Doe. We'll see what some of the best bets are for this weekend at Bristol. Maybe talk some other sports, NFL, some other things going on out there. and remember to leave us a five-star Apple review. We will read it right here.

Leave one and I promise you next week. I'll read that for you. All right, y'all have a good week. Check out Dirty Mo Media on Twitter, Facebook, TikTok, and Instagram.