The Dale Jr. Download - 84 - Las Vegas: 'I'm ready to get them drunk'

Episode Date: March 10, 2015

Dale Earnhardt Jr. explains the team’s gamble and reiterates his yearning to win; Team member Adam Jordan joins the show; J.R. Rhodes revisits a classic Big E moment. 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.

This is Dale Jr., and you're listening to Dirtymoe radio. He didn't get him to spend his tires that good at time. I'm just watching me. I'm just going to get clear. You're now listening to the Dale Jr. download presented by Spy. Check out Dale Jr.'s signature dirty-mo sunglasses from Spy and Spyoptic.com. Hey, everybody's Dale Jr. Sitting outside the bus, just getting ready to go in and change right after the race here.

The car was good. We just didn't, you know, didn't have enough for the four, I don't think. And when it came down to that last stop, we did, you know, we took four tire, or we took two tires and he took, you know, four, a lot of guys took four, I think. But we, I like the, I like the, I like the, I like the gamble. I don't, I don't think it was the wrong call. We weren't going to drive up here and pass that four. And hell, you know, you never know when you put two tires on and take off, it might be faster. So I like taking that chance. I don't think it was a bad call. Plus, I back the crew chief everything he wants to do. He sees the race from a different vantage point than I do.

So I'm always going to back him. But Greg's doing a great job. The cars are fast. We finished first second and second last year, but we did that on luck. We ran about, you know, eighth or ninth all race long last year at Vegas and lucked around with strategy and got up there and finished second. this time we raced up there. So you can see the cars are better.

And I think that our team is really in good shape. We're having some good consistent stops. We've got a lot of new guys. I've talked about that. We've got a lot of new guys on that team, and they're doing a good job. They seem to be jelling really well together. And I'm ready to get him drunk after a win.

I'm ready to win one. So I was wanting that to be today, but unfortunately we just didn't have enough at 4, man. He was pretty fast. I've seen he had some weaknesses, but he was pretty dang strong. So another good note, solid qualifying again for another week. I know you all remember we haven't been great qualifying

over the last several years and just didn't know what was wrong. Never found anything that worked. But over the last two weeks, we've been real comfortable. We've had good speed. We just want to get into that last round. That helps us choose a better, you know, a real good pit stall. And makes the race all right. a lot easier to call when you start toward the front.

So that's been a pleasant surprise, I guess. Just looking forward to taking a couple days and thinking about what we did and what we need to do better and we'll go on to the next one. Should have another couple good cars. Hopefully your car will be good in Phoenix and Fontana's a race.

I've been really looking forward to trying to win. Can't wait to get out there and see what kind of speed and comfort we got. I really enjoy racing around that track with the grooves and multi-gros it has. So we'll see you guys later. I hope you enjoy the download. Good stuff from Dale Earnard Jr. here on the Dale Jr. download presented by a spy.

Mrs. Amanda Wolfmeyer's back. We are pumped about that. Mike Davis in the house, as always. And our man, Adam Jordan is in the house today. That's right. I'm Taylor Zarser as well. And we'll look forward to reaction theater a little bit later on. Adam, it's good to see you, man.

For years, I've been trying to get you on the podcast because you've been such a big supporter. And for some reason, Mike Davis would never call you. I'm just kidding. No, but Mike, Mike obviously wanted to have you on, and we're glad to have you in studio, my friend.

I mean, we're about to have words. I don't know how I remember it. I remember Adam saying that he was not going to come on. He refused. Oh, wait, no, that's not how much. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, and I was surprised because he said I had a lot of knowledge about this.

I was, you know, I mean, I do whatever it takes to get you in the studio. And then we let's, we expose you once you get in here. Yeah, yeah. I'm ready to be exposed, I guess. Well, you have for years on Pit Road come up and talk about how much you've enjoyed the download, which I've always appreciated. And certainly you are a very valuable member of that 88 team, and the crew has done such a great job

through the start of this season. And obviously the last few years, you guys are riding a lot of momentum. And certainly want to get your perspective today on a bunch of different things. But let's piggyback off one thing that juniors talked about, and that's just how thrilled he is with the first three weeks of the season. Obviously, you guys want to get wins. Junior wants to get everybody drunk. But third, third, and fourth,

when you had every chance to finish first, first, and first is what it's all about. Yeah, definitely. And I think going off that from, you know, we're obviously carrying momentum from last year. I think it's one of his best years and... Ten years of racing. Yeah, I mean, four wins.

He hasn't done that in ten years. Right. So I think we carry that, even with new pieces, our core group. We got some new pick group members, and of course our crew chief and car chiefs new, but our core group has been together for a while, and I think that says a lot, too.

With the new people coming in, he felt comfortable because there was a lot of phases he saw for practice and all that, and then confidence goes a long ways, and I think we're still showing that. Without a doubt. Yeah, the man's confident. He's most confident he's ever been.

And you talk about new crew chief and car chief, but the crew chief he was familiar with because he worked here, and the car chief is returning back to his original home on the 88 Cup team. Travis Mack, he's back. What's it like having Mac back? It's awesome. You know, I started with them in 2011 or 2012, my first year,

and Travis Mac was a front of the mechanic. So we got to know each other, and it's nice having him back because he's really passionate about winning, building, you know, good race cars, and believe in that Dell Jr. is the best driver, because I think we all believe that, and that shows some excess too. We should actually say what you do specifically for the team. That's probably important.

That'll probably help, right? Tell us what you do. All right, so I'm the interior mechanic or specialist. You can say many different ways. But basically, I just take care of Dale, make sure he stays safe. He's comfortable. His AC works, which is huge. He has water under, you know, to drink something to eat during the race the whole nine yards.

But I make sure he just stays comfortable. I mean, you're like the closest thing to a PR guy. that's still a mechanic. Yeah, is that a compliment? Yeah, of course it is, right? Okay. You didn't take it that way?

Well, I won't take it that way. I like all these things he's doing inside the car. Do you put CDs in there for him, too? I mean, if they could. Well, to be honest with you, I did rig up a thing for tests where he can plug in his phone into the radio court and it plays his music through his helmet. Unfortunately, that's not race approved,

which might be a good thing because then he would never listen to us. Should we clarify it? Should we clarify and say that that's not while he's actually on track? Like, that's when he's sitting in the car. Yeah, completely sitting in a, you know, he's not rocking out. Well, and the whole reason that's not right. He doesn't do that when he's sitting in the car. The whole reason that's not approved is because our man Kislauski would tweet while he's going 200 miles an hour.

You're right. So. We're going to read for that. Yeah. Good. But, well, I mean, that is really, it's fascinating all your responsibilities inside that car, obviously, that are so incredibly important to the race. And we'll be talking a lot more about that. In fact, Mike wanted, in all seriousness, wanted to bring you in today because of this track bar adjustment stuff that is just blowing my mind.

The fact that to me, it's just blowing my mind that now Dale Jr's in charge of track bar adjustments, or all car drivers are, for that matter. We're going to play some clips here in just a second. Mike, before we do that, I mean, just a lot of things to address here. First of all, at the beginning, I know some people are going to get worked up, you know, because Junior's saying he's not going to race the four. come on. No driver in the history of the world could have race the four yesterday. I mean, that guy was in his own lane. That car was an absolute rocket ship. The best car won the race, which nobody ever has a problem with. Junior and the 88 team had one of the – I think they had the second best car on the track.

But let's just be honest here. Unless, like Junior said, we're going to get some crazy advantage on a restart, or are you going to make some big-time gamble that pays off on pit road with tires? the four was going to win that race. I don't think six tires would have done the job, to be honest with you. I think the only way you were going to beat him is take a little chance. And from what I gathered over the last couple of years of doing this on Dirtymoe radio, that seems to be what people want out of our team. If you see an opportunity to go after it, especially if you don't think you're the best one out there

and there's somebody that's in between. You know, what can you do to try to get that advantage another way? And I saw that what they did on Sunday was exactly that. It didn't work out for them, and they lost a couple spots. But I think the difference between second and fourth or second in anything is really not that big a difference in Dale Jr's mind because he wanted to go after the win. And you weren't going to beat Harvick. Now, I will say this.

A lot of people speak in hindsight. And they're like, oh, but Kevin said he had a tire problem. And my answer to that is, you cannot formulate your strategy based on an assumption or a off chance that a driver has a tire problem in the last 10 laps or a race. You can't base your strategy off. Here's what we're going to do, Dale. Yeah. You're going to come in. We're going to take two tires.

And we're going to hope that Kevin has a tire problem, which, by the way, he didn't. I mean, it obviously didn't play out. He felt some kind of vibration, but it turned out it wasn't a tire going down. That being said, you can't. formulate your own strategy based off that. It's easy to sit there and speculate in hindsight that, oh, yeah, you should have done this, but I don't think it mattered in the end. I think the team did what they thought they could do.

They lost a couple spots. But in turn, that car ran stupid fast. It was really good. He's got three straight top fives to start the season. I'm not sure we could ask for anything. Amen to that. I completely agree with what you just said. And Adam, that seems to be the philosophy.

Look, we've got to try something different. You know, if we take four tires, we're still going to be two seconds behind this guy. We got to try something else. Well, and let's talk about Harvard real quick. One, this is his sixth race that he's finished first or second. I mean, he's got the momentum from last year as well. And the great thing about that for us is it makes us work that much harder. Because we still need to learn.

And I always think it's awesome that, you know, a couple of years ago, they would be trying to fight for top tens. And now we're finished in third, four, second, and we're all frustrated. We're all mad because we're not. winning. But I think we're putting, you know, giving him top three cars. And you know how races go. Anything can happen. But we're in a position to win every race. Which says a long ways, you know. So I think at that point, we did it because it'd give us a shot to win the race.

And we knew that if it didn't work out, it's not like we're going to finish 15th. Like it was a gamble, even without having a win under our belt and being in a chase and all that, you just got to take them gambles because, I mean, it's hard to win. these races, especially when Harvick's done that, and it hasn't been done since 1996, I think. Right. Is it crazy? It was 96. He's in his own hemisphere right now,

and kudos to them. That doesn't speak to anybody else's a lack of effort. It speaks to that they've hit on something, and it's cyclical. They'll have their moment when they come back down to Earth, hopefully. Yeah, yeah. I will ask you this, though, Adam. And I said this to Taylor yesterday.

We were talking on the phone, and I'm like, I didn't have a problem with the two-tire call. The one thing that I noticed is that they bring him in for two tires and after the tire change is complete, you keep him there to get enough fuel in. How many seconds did they stay to get that extra fuel in? Because at what point does it say, well, if you're going to stay there, why don't you go ahead and change lefts too? Does that make sense? Because what I saw come out was that when Dale Jr. returned to the track, Kevin wasn't nearly as far behind him as what I guess we hoped. You know what I mean?

Because he passed him pretty quick. And so was it the extra fuel that we took in that sort of neutralized that? Or was it just that he was that much faster? Well, I mean, at that point he had a really fast car. And we look at it as far as the math goes. We needed 11 gallons, which it takes longer than a two-tire stop, but only a second longer. Okay. So a four-tire stop would have took an extra five seconds.

We were two seconds behind him on the track when we made that pit stop. so we knew we were saving four seconds over a four-tire stop, even waiting on gas. So that's why when we came out, we had a two-second lead. Well, at that point, yeah, he has four fresher tires, and if he goes green, he has a good chance of passing us. But if you get an immediate caution, well, then the tires go through a cycle. The car changes. You have still a shot to get a win. So I think that's why we made that gamble, just because of the time, we knew we were only two seconds behind him.

If we took two tires and he took four, we would have a couple seconds only. That explains it, Taylor. It really does, and it's fascinating to listen to that because you can just imagine all that communication that's going on with you guys before that last stop and trying to determine all of that. But, you know, it's funny because, Mike, I was with you. It made a lot of sense. You know, man, it seems like five or six seconds go by on each side of the car. But that does, as you explain, if it only going to take one additional second to get that 11th gallon in, then. Obviously, you go for the gamble, and junior like the gamble.

Right. Well, I... And look, at the end of the day, like you said, nobody knew about the vibration or whatever, but you got to try something different. When the class of the field is clearly proving that they're the class of the field, you've got to try something different. So I don't fault anyone for the decision that they made there.

Hey, listen, the moral of the story is racing at the front every week is what people want. You definitely want wins. But the fact that this team is contending, leading laps every single week is a good sign. One last thing I want to ask you, Adam, before we play some clips here, he mentioned qualifying. I love how he said, don't know if y'all remember this, but we haven't been good at qualifying here in the last few years. I think they noticed. In case anybody didn't notice, we hadn't been so good at qualifying the last couple of years. Adam, what's changed here?

Because every day the 88 has been at the track, and I mean every day in Daytona, the few days in Atlanta, the few days in Las Vegas, you guys have competed at the very top of the charts, practice, qualifying, and the race. What's changed? Confidence, and I'm going to give you a little bit of insight, but maybe nobody knows. Oh, yes. Yes. Yes. So last year we struggled with qualifying. We did that.

Yeah. At the end, that's not like news. Stevie made a deal with us that if we made it into the third round of qualifying, we got a team dinner. Oh, I remember this. Which for us, food, it's huge. It's a fit of. Hold on. Was Davis allowed to eat if y'all got into the third round of qualifying also?

Taylor, not only that, but I'm going to tell you something. I started getting back on the road and qualified and all of a sudden started picking up. I'm not saying why. I'm just telling you. Well, I'm also going to say this. And you look better, but I'm going to say towards the end of the year when you were out on the road, I noticed that you packed down a few pounds. Listen, I'm not even saying polls and top five.

If we qualified 11th, baby, we're going to dinner now. It's like a celebration. I don't understand why Mike Davis was included in these meals. But go ahead, Adam. Because they needed the reservation. Yeah, exactly. Stevie black. All right.

So, Davis, check this out. I think we're feeling a little like Mexican tonight. And then so next thing, you know, you're trying to find a Mexican restaurant in Loud New Hampshire. Good luck. Yeah, that sounds dangerous. That's true. That's right. Anyways, go ahead.

Yeah, so I think that carried on. Now, granted, we haven't really got the dinners this year. We did after Vegas because we gave Greg so much crap about it. Yeah, like, come on, dude. This has got to carry over. But I think it's for us. It gives us something like. I mean, obviously you want to qualify all the time, no matter if there's an incentive or not an incentive.

But I think it gave all us pumped up. And Dale was like, even when we qualified, when we get into the third round, we all cheer. And people are like, what are they doing? Like, they got to be weird. And Dale made the comment. This doesn't happen much, y'all. Just forgive it. He's like, man, I get pumped up for that.

And I don't go to the dinners all the time. Like, that makes me excited, you know? So it's more than that. But I think carrying it over, car set up, Greg. He's really smart. Kevin's really smart. Do drink holder probably? Yeah, definitely that.

All of that, I think, plays a big difference. And I think really is confidence knowing that he can actually qualify. That's really interesting. I was wondering why I saw you doing a cartwheel in Atlanta. Yeah, there you go. You guys got to the third round, and you tried to reenact, what was his name,

Dwayne Wayne from White Men Can't Junk? We go in Sizzler. We go in Sizzler? I was wondering what that was. You just went back to like 1991 or something, right? I got a lot of things here in my art. Adam was probably like four or five probably. Come on now, we're going Sizzler.

Yeah, that was a great line. I don't know why I didn't get an Academy Award. But that's fascinating, though. And obviously there's extra incentive, but that does build camaraderie, and you guys clearly have plenty of that. All right, let's, Amanda, we got to play some track bar. Yeah.

I really want Adam to explain what we're here. I don't know about you, Amanda. This stuff blows my mom. mind. The fact that Dale Jr. is pushing buttons, changing the track bar, and then getting on the radio saying, I just made a track bar adjustment, scares the fire out of me for one. I think it blew his mind at first. You can tell. You can tell. All right, well, let's play this clip and then let's talk to Adam about it. He wants, like, a confirmation or reaffirmation here that he has made the right decision with the track bar. Let's hear it. Worked that track bar at all. Yeah, four chance. I'm going back to zero,

I'll let you work on the car. If you won't be to make the adjustment back to zero, correct, and I'm going to make an air pressure adjustment here. I hope I just made the right decision here. Please confirm immediately. That's basically the first thing I got out of that, Adam. But how are you guys reacting to all this? Well, I think it's a tool that one, we're all not used to during the race,

and he's really not. And I think it scares him more than it does us, because we know what it's going to do. And, you know, he's made some comments, like in Daytona, that he doesn't really look at things in the car. out the windshield and that's it. Sometimes out the rear. Sometimes out the rear.

That's right. For us to give him a display to show where his track bar is, I think he kind of, you know, like he's not really used to looking at that and being like, oh, that's where my track bar is and I can move it. So he just, I guess, was really fine-tuning it, and he was dropping it down because the track was going really loose. And that really helps you through the run. and as the race went on, he learned that that adjustment could help him out even more and more.

And I'll elaborate later about the race and how he ended and how it really helped him. Okay. Well, Mike, let's play this other clip because Greg tells him about the changes Jimmy Johnson made. Stryk bar down 70s. 10. Deport. Forty-eight car hat there. It's down one and a half.

1.5. My goodness. I feel better, buddy. Don't be scared. We'll keep on two of this. but I don't know why that makes me chuckle, but my goodness. I mean, there's all sorts of four-letter words I might throw out. You know, my goodness.

So he was obviously calm and collected during that, but you guys are obviously comparing things with 48. I'm sure you're keeping notes on 24 and the 5, and who knows, maybe other people too, Adam, to see what kind of changes they're making. Yeah, definitely. I think we all pay attention to that, which helps. And at that point, that's when Jimmy got the lead.

And we had a caution, and we were talking about that. And the track was going really, really, really, really loose. And I think Dale was scared to keep going more because he didn't want to mess up. I mean, he knew he had a good car. Like, we knew we had a top three car. And he was afraid that if he adjusted it too much and the track bar thing failed, what would happen? Or, you know, like, it's hard to tell what all, you know, would run through his mind, you know, because he's just not used to it. And that point seven is, like, three quarters.

So it's an actual, you know, inch to decimal. Which is significant. Yeah, which is a big change. Well, I think just the track was moving that far loose, that you could go down as far as you want to tighten you up and it would help you. And I think he was afraid to do that, but once he learned the 48 did that, that helped him later down in the race when he was really, really loose the last run.

He just kept dropping and dropping it to helping finish the race. Is this the type of thing? This might be a dumb question, but can you, only adjust this when you're under caution? Do you adjust it when you're on pit road? When can you actually adjust it if you're Dale Jr.? He can do it in the middle of the corner. Okay.

So if he's so timid about one, if he's afraid he's going to dial his car out, can he just not dial it back in? You can, which, you know, I guess he's still discovering this. Yeah, yeah, exactly, which you think it's easy like you put it down, doesn't work, you put it back up. Right, you don't like the radio station, you change it to a new radio station, right? That blows my mind. Well, you notice he said he could, but I'm not so sure they want him to do that while he's in the corner. Yeah, we would much rather than do it on the straightaway. And I think he's still playing.

You know, like we said, it's still a learning game. He's still learning how that can help him through a race and how he can change that. And another thing that's great about it, if it does fail, we still have the option to make them adjustments on pit road. Oh, really? Yeah. So, like, it's still, we still have the track bar hole. Right. You know, we can still turn it with the rear tire carrier, whole nine yards.

and you'll hear him in a couple clips. I'm not sure if I'm going to play one about him resetting it after he made it on a run. Well, we're mainly doing that is because we're coming down pit road and we're making adjustments. So you don't want to like, unless he tells Greg where he's at, like sometimes he did, you don't want him having the track bar half inch low and we're making an adjustment on a half inch flow. We'll let you guys deal with it. Exactly. Like he's still kind of wanted us to play in our hands.

Like he resets it every run. We adjust the car to make it better. and then if it's still bad, he uses the track bar to help him out even more. Taylor, I don't even know if you guys know this. And Adam, I was listening to PRN's broadcast at the beginning of the race. And the funniest thing happened between Jimmy Johnson and Chagin'ouse. Jimmy had been adjusting his, right? And the car wasn't good.

This is like the very first run. And Chad says, okay, first thing, and without even being told that he was adjusting it, and he goes, put your track bar back to zero or back to wherever it started. before they started making adjustments on it. Chad just automatically knew that that thing was being fiddled with, and he told him to go ahead and get that back to where they started, so he knew how to adjust to make the car better. Pretty good.

Good stuff this week explaining all of that. We've got to have Adam back all the time, but we can't let him go yet. He doesn't know this. He doesn't know this, but he just worked himself into a full-time role. Yeah, I mean, that's what I was thinking. That's good stuff. All right. Coming up in just a minute, we have the Take a Nation segment,

But hey Mike, do you know what would make these angry junior nation fans happy again? Tell me, Taylor. The happy lens. Oh, they need a couple of those. Yeah. A pair of spy sunglasses with the happy lens. And if you haven't experienced their happy lens yet, you need to. Go online to spyoptic.com and check out Dale's signature Spy 88 collection.

It includes the Dirty Mo, McCoy, Quanta, General, and Farrow for the ladies. Inner discount code, Daytona. Well, are we still doing Daytona? Yes, that's the way we want it at checkout and receive 20% off of your purchase. I feel like the wheels are coming off. Yeah, Mata's back. Yeah, there you go. All right, so let's call Reaction Theater.

Wow, what the freak is wrong with Junior Nation today? I don't think they had enough adult beverages or maybe too many. Or maybe just pushing that clock ahead now where they lost their sleep in our cranky, cranky, cranky. My God, you know, great guys made a call. He went for two. It didn't work. Junior was happy. I don't get it.

We're doing great. Greg Eyes is doing great. Junior's doing great. The team is doing great. Let's just have a few more drinks and be happy. Get your sleep. Three beers. Bye.

I think that's terrific advice. Yeah. I think everybody should be fired up about what they've seen so far in the season. Very fired up. Don't be cranky. Is the three-bure limit for fans or us? What was that towards? It depends on the situation.

I would recommend in the pits there be a three-beer limit. Oh, okay. All right, who's next? I just hated to hear Dale Jr. say today that it didn't matter if you come in. Say it didn't matter. He had a second-place car today, and taking two tires couldn't do nothing but make it worse. I don't know why in any world they called that. Second place is what he had.

That's what he just kept with. points matter at the end of the season. It matters all through the season. You know, guys, I think we've said enough about this. I love the attitude. I love what he said on Pit Road to Fox after the race. We got plenty of second and thirds and top fives and everything. We need wins.

Let's do what we can to try to win the race. That move was done to try to win the race. I have no problem with it. Also, I will say this. I guess it didn't really need to be explained, or I guess we feel like it doesn't need to be explained when Junior alludes to something like that. Obviously, he knows there is a mathematical difference.

Even I know there's a mathematical difference in second place and fourth place and points, although it's not that much. That being said, clearly he's talking about trophies, right? I mean, unless you win, second, third, and fourth, fifth, it doesn't matter because you don't get hardware to take home and you don't get to have that good drunk that he talked about at the beginning of this show. And that's what he's talking about. Is that self-explanatory?

I mean, every driver says that, right? Yeah. Yeah, everybody wants to win. And then I think a lot of people's reactions would be different if we took two tires and did win. That's right. Oh, we went for it. I love that we went for it. Everybody, let me just tell you, I can only speak from experience, okay?

But on my Twitter timeline, nobody had a problem with it until he was passed. That's it. This is great. This is the move to win. God, I hated that move. Yeah. Stupid. You know.

Who's next? Casey Kane, you overrated pretty boy punk-ass little bit. Learn to restart. you held up junior more than once get out of the way, be a team player, and know your place and your role. Quit being a little... See you later.

Dale yeah, great top five. I'm sober, but just pissed. Bye. Man, wow. Kane feeling it this week. Know your place, know your role. That's the best part. Yeah, Casey, you're not trying to win a championship or qualify.

You're here for everyone else. Yeah, I don't think that's the way it works. I will. Yeah. Sober, huh? I don't think those guys on the five team subscribe to that. All right, who's next? Three top fives to start the year, Earnhardt, Jr.

Passing cars door bumper clear all the daily a day. Tammy Johnson crashed. Tarvick's freaky fast. Took two tires, lost that bet, but we'll get up another day. No beers, but I do have a cold. Cold medicine, that'll get you at the same place. You've got to give them some points for creativity. I was almost...

If you can sing and rhyme, I'm going to put you on. Oh, yeah. Just so you know. That's an automatic. That's an automatic. Amanda has given me part of the qualifications to getting on reaction theater. I almost thought Jimmy was going to go in the stands and start cheering when he had to go to the garage, just to be funny. You know, because he loves to play the blame JJ game and get on the same side as the fans.

Hey, what about last week, the caller that said that, you know, when is junior going to be deserving enough to get Jimmy Johnson's call? and his luck. Right. Are we singing that same song this week? Yeah. That guy hit the wall so many times. He had plenty of bad luck on Sunday. All right, who's next?

Am I the only dude from Junior Nation understands why we took two tires. I'd rather take a gamble, then take four tires and run second. I mean, what's the f***? I mean, hell, it's why junior shit, you ain't going to go up their job all that for. I knew when they come out of their road took them two tires. I said, hell yeah, get a little clean air, get through traffic, caution free. Hey, we might pull away.

But then we learn how really strong to four. was. We knew he was strong, but then we really knew. Everybody bashing Greg Eyes, that's why he's on the pit box, and that's why we're calling a reaction theater. Yeah. That's a good one. Mighty big, Greg Eyes to call in his reaction theater. Yes, right. And disguise his voice

and everything. He plays that redneck role really well. I got to tell you, Adam, man, that four, I mean, I know it's been six straight weeks of this guy just in a different zone, but what we saw in Las Vegas to me might be the best example of it. Yeah. I mean, he's doing stuff that it's really hard to do.

I don't think, and I guess people should need to give him some credit, because it's really, really hard. Like, nowadays, the competition is so close that what he's doing, it's incredible. So, I mean, I give him props, but I hope we beat him still. Heck yeah. That's your voter sports seat time

has really paid off for him. I don't think there's any question. That's changed everything. That changed everything. It was a game changer. Who's next? Based on Twitter, I'm sure everybody and their brother's called bitching about the call Greg Ives made at the end there. Let me tell you something.

We weren't going to win that damn race. Kevin Harvick was too damn fast and two tires. What that gamble was about the only way we were going to get it done. And here's the other thing. We took two tires and we still finished top five. So you know what? Everyone just needs to shut the hell up, let it go. Be happy with a top five finish.

And let's go kick ass at Phoenix. Hell yeah. Hell yeah. Good attitude. I like it. Bohonix up next. Get us a win out there. It's been a while.

Who's next? First off, who in the f*** tells an Earnhardt not to be scared? What the hell? And the two-tire thing at the end, come on. I mean, come on, what the hell's going on? Where's Steve Lickartless bringing back? That's all I got to say. I don't understand.

I think she's referring to when Greg said, don't be scared to move the track bar. That's what made that call happen? I guess. I mean, that's a fireable offense. Mike Davis? Come on. No, no, no. I mean, that's not the same as tough.

I don't understand, I guess. Do you add to... No. No, I'm more confused about... We have three top fours. That doesn't count, Adam. Quit trying to be rational here. I don't know what the woman meant either.

I know this. She's upset because we didn't win the race, and it's Greg Yves' fault, and Steve LaTart would have won. I think that's basically what she's trying to say. There's that, and then somebody tweeted me yesterday talking about how Dale Jr. is an awful teammate, and he should never treat a teammate that way.

And I have no idea what that meant. Do you guys? I don't know, but that other caller thinks Casey Kane's a bad teammate, so. Yeah. I mean, Jimmy's a bad teammate, too, because he didn't let Junior win last week, so who knows? I think we could all agree. Jeff Gordon is the only bad teammate. I'm kidding.

I'm kidding. Who's next? To hear Del Jr. being pissed about qualifying. I had an idea this race was going to be a hell of the race to Team 88, but man, did it blow my expectations out of water? They're getting a little redneck towards T.J. Majors there. I mean, I kind of like that. Yeah, he gave them T.J. Hale. And then a few minutes later, Junior comes on.

Sorry. Man, it's a whole different team with Team 88 this year. Just excited to see what the next few races was brain. Dale yeah. What was that about? Yeah, I think it's when we did that too tiring. It was just in a lot of traffic. I was at the beginning of the race.

We did something. And we were in a lot of traffic. and TJ was trying to explain because I guess somebody was about to spin out to explain where to go. I think Dale had it under control, but didn't. You know what I mean?

Like at that point it was loose, so it was hard to drive. So I think he was so fired up because he knew he had a decent car that he just felt like sharing something with TJ. Yeah, which is right. For us, it's not a normal, you know?

No. It's great to see. Right, right. We encourage that kind of behavior by Dale. All right, who's next? All right, all you guys on Twitter need to calm down. There's no difference between a second-place finish and a fourth-place finish. Greg, guys, is going to be a great, great cruise chief.

All of you on Twitter, calling for his have already, it needs to calm down. The guy's three races in to his new job, okay? Just give it a break, all right? They race way better than they did today than they did at Las Vegas last year. The only reason they finished second because they took a gamble on appeal. Give it a break. We're going to win races, and we're going to win a championship. calm the F down.

I got to tell you, man, I mean, I just don't know how anybody could feel more confident about championship hopes after three weeks than I just don't know how that's possible. I'm not saying they're going to win the championship. I'm not saying that all these wins are going to come. I'm simply saying, Mike, how could you be more confident based off of what you've seen so far? I'd be pretty confident. I could be more confident if I was Kevin Harvick right now. I'm kidding.

The confidence is there. I mean, personally, I think it's the comfort level he has with the interior of his machine. You know, and then there's that. That's what I thought. Right. I mean, you know, Adam puts that little fuzzy dice in the rear view there. That's right. It's like the new car smell.

It does. The scent in there is unbelievable. I mean, it's, you know, how can you have been a orange-scented play? Of course it is. That's the secret. Right. Right. Let's play one more.

That's the sound of no one talking about Greg Ives. You know why? Because he's a bad motherfucker. Teams are on top five alter races. What are you going to do now? What are you going to talk about now, NASCAR? Not good at Guy's and Dale Jr. And the number 88, that's right?

Because they're on point all year. It's going to be like this all year. I love it. I love this attitude. I love the confidence level. Clearly you hear it in Dale's voice and Adam's voice and everybody's voice right now through the first few weeks of the season. Reaction theaters open 24-7.

All you have to do is call toll-free, 1-855-7-4. 01902 and leave us your voicemail message. We'll play the best each week right here on Dirty Mo Radio. Time now for It Takes the Nation presented by Nationwide. You know, when it comes to a segment on being on junior side or being part of junior nation, I honestly cannot think of anyone more fitting for this than the gentleman that's in here right now. That's J.R. Rhodes.

But the interesting thing about you, J.R., is your Earnhardt story goes way before Dale Junior. Oh, yeah. When did you start with Big E? May of 1994. The first race was the All-Star race. And how did you get that job? I started in Daytona Beach.

I worked there for 12 years for the racetrack in the PR department. Dale had lost his PR guy to NASCAR, Kevin Triplett, who's now at Bristol. Kevin left, and they were looking for a replacement. And I put my name in the hat. Been working hard, went to school, been working at the racetrack, trying to get a position. end up moving to the PR side and Dale seniors came up. I put my name in the hat and they took a chance on me and that's how it started. What was your impressions of Dale up until that point?

Like, were you a fan of his? Did you care at all? I've never pulled for another race car driver that wasn't named Earnhardt. And I started in 1980 watching racing. And from that point, the first guy ever met in racing was Dale. So I've always been an Earnhardt fan. So he was my hero. And then I got to be around them at the racetrack throughout that time.

So it became more and more getting to know him, becoming more and more what he did. And just really was a huge fan at the same time and joined him as a friend. And that started basically your, I don't know how we call it, a carousel of hats that you have worn in your career with the Earnhardt. What was the name of the agency that you started off with? Champion, then progressing over to DEI. And now to Junior Motorsports, you have started a production company. We've got Whiskey River, all of these things that you basically run yourself,

with the help of a team for sure. But you wear so many hats when it comes to the Dell Jr. machine. I honestly don't even know where to start. Yeah. I guess I never said no. Right. It was where it came. I was like, let's try this.

I'm like, okay, let's try it. Hammerhead Entertainment, the studio that you operate, basically started with you taking a camera around with Dell Jr. Just documenting things. Pretty much. Pretty much we started filming the stuff. and started the XM radio show. Dale Jr. Unrestricted.

And it was like, well, who's going to do it? Who's going to help put it together? I was the one that was there the whole time, so I did it. Which turned into the production, which turned into Hammerhead, which videos back in the day. He was like, all right, well, let's try this. And so it was just like the word no just didn't happen. Like, let's try it.

And those things seemed to grow. And they grew into Hammerhead, which is a great company that a team over there's running doing television commercials and web content. And then the same conversation came up about Whiskey River. Let's open up a bar. All right, sure. Let's try it. And we've been very, very successful with that as well.

But throughout the years, I mean, I started doing the PR, started doing the day-to-day, and then just grew and grew and grew. I really wanted to have you on this segment last week because if anybody out there with a Pulse didn't see the IMDail documentary on Spike TV, they really need to go to SpikeTV.com and watch it because it was fabulous. Great show. But when I watched it, I couldn't help but notice that J.R. Rhodes makes cameo appearances quite a bit in that. Most significantly in the segments where Dale Earnhardt and Rusty Wallace were feuding at Bristol.

And I think there was a water bottle involved. There were some words exchanged, and right in the middle of it is my man, J.R. Rhodes. Do you remember this? Oh, yeah, Saturday Night Racing, man. And like when you think back, can you go right back to that moment when you think about that incident, or is it sort of a fog? No, I'm very, very well remember that one. What was the situation?

Well, the situation was Rusty was pissed the entire race because Dale wrecked Rusty early in the race and put him back to the back of the line. From that point on, Rusty was mad. Dale actually, they actually, I want to say they penalized him and put him to the back of the pack too. And he drove all the way through, and Dale was in the top five, drove through the whole race.

He was in the top five. Well, Bristol at the time, they had fences. that would divide the garages which are no longer there. Well, Rusty pulled his car into the garage area where he was, and there was a fence that he couldn't get through, and Dale was at the top five, so he was at the gas pumps. Rusty was at the fence saying something. Well, he wanted to get Dale's attention.

So the next thing we know, a flying water bottle comes through, and it's thrown by Rusty. And then he works his way over to where Dale's at, finally. And next thing I know, I'm in the middle of it. I'm keeping Rusty away from Dale and Dale from Rusty and making sure neither one I'm hit each other after 500 miles at Bristol. So it was very, very intense there for a while. The lesson I walked away from that was the next day, Dale, after he watched the video,

comes to me and goes, hey man, never hold both my arms. Always leave me one arm. So in case I have to swing, I can. So that was the lesson of the day and always remember it. Always leaving him an arm. leave me in arms so I can swing if I need to. Did you think that they might come to blows at all? You never, you know, yeah.

You never know. It's very, very easily, you know, being at Bristol and the intenseness that goes on at Bristol. And that seemed like I didn't know that, but that was fuming. If Rusty had to wait 450 laps to get his point across, he'd just been sitting on that. Yes. And, you know, probably just getting angry. Well, J.R., thank you for doing this. Sure.

Again, you have been on the junior machine and behind the scenes for, Longer than any of us in this building, not named Kelly, probably. Pretty much. I think that's probably accurate, right? Yeah. The first person I walked into when we worked at Champion was Kelly. Kelly worked there with me. Right.

So you're a fiercely loyal person and somebody that's absolutely an integral part of the Dell Jr. Machine here. So thank you for doing that. And fans, listen, for behind the scenes content all season long, go to Nationwide 88. The Twitter handle and the Facebook page, Nationwide 88. They've got that thing covered. And also, remember, they're on your side. Just like J.R. Rhodes.

Oh, yeah. Nationwide is on your side. Good stuff from a man, JR, and from Mike Davis. All right, Wednesday. Kelly is joined by another woman who keeps Dale Jr. in line. His Hendrick Motorsports PR guru Laura Scott. No offense, Adam. No offense, Adam.

You know, I know that you're the interior PR guy. Did he just call you a woman? I think so. No, I mean, but, you know, he's the interior PR during the race guy. But nevertheless, anyway, Laura's coming on Wednesday. And she does a great job. It's awesome. And she's on this week's episode of Fast Lane family presented by Wella Professionals.

Thursday, check out Junior Motorsports Up Front with Regan Smith and Heath White. Should be interesting what Regan has to say about Vegas. You can also keep up with all of Dale Jr.'s press conferences throughout the year on said Jr., presented by nationwide. And, of course, don't forget about the Monday recap presented by a spy as Miss Amanda recaps the full weekend for the Junior Motorsports Exfinity Truck and Late Model teams, as well as Dale's Sprint Cup series run. Are you going to make Adam read the white flag? No, I think I'm going to do it. Because I want Adam to come back.

Here we go. Well, Junior State Out West, Adam. That they're out there. It's why TJ's not here and all this stuff. So there's not a lot going on this week as far as junior schedule goes. So that being said, I don't mind to brag a little bit that we had our Atlanta win celebration breakfast this morning. That doesn't affect anybody. Yeah, we did.

I missed it. It's actually happening tomorrow morning. Oh. Amanda. Let's start that over. No, that goes in. That goes in. That is not edited out.

She's back, go. She's on top of it. She brought her A game. I got a question for you, Tyler. Yes, sir. What has Kevin Harvick done at Phoenix? He's punked. Tyler Overstreet.

That was at Texas. In Phoenix, he's won 11 times. And we put out a little video this past week about what has Kevin Harvick done at Phoenix, and you can check it out at JARM Racing.com or on YouTube or Junior Motorsports YouTube channel, but you've got to check it out because it's also the debut of my daughter appearing in a video. But along those lines, Phoenix is giving fans an awesome ticket package if you want to attend both races this weekend. It's the Kevin Harvick No. 88 ticket special. Get you in both the Xfinity Series race on Saturday and the Sprint Cup race on Sunday for the price of $88.

That's right. That ticket to each of the races for a single price of $88. Go to Phoenix International Raceway.com to take advantage of that. Also, Taylor, we've got new Dirty Moe Radio stuff in the Junior Nation retail store, as well as on Shop Jr.Nation.com. That's shopjrnation.com. What you got? The new Dirty Moe Radio hat, of course.

I mean, come on. You know, between the hat and the spy sunglasses, you really have no excuse to have sun in your eyes. Or a sunburn. Yeah. Well, you could. If your T's july, you can. Yeah, you could. You know, he has that little raccoon look going on.

But, yeah, the new hats are in. You should get one. And also, the Xfinity Series race this weekend at PIRR is on Saturday. Cup races on Sunday. Check our websites for all the race info, TV information. And that's about it. It's really just all about Adam Jordan today. You crushed it, my friend.

He did. He did. He totally crushed it. Thanks for having me. Hey, you better come back. Yeah, I think if you all invite me, I'll come back. Don't really like. No, no, like next week, man.

We'll see you on Monday. For Adam Jordan. For Dale Earnhardt Jr. for Mike Davis, for Amanda Wolfmeyer. I'm Taylor Zarzer. This has been the Dale Jr. Download presented by Spy. Thanks for listening to Dirty Moe Radio. Well, that wraps week three, I think. Week three of the download for this year, 2015.

Yeah, and you know what? I mean this seriously, and I can be serious occasionally. It was good to have you back in. We didn't have you last week, so it was good to have you. And I didn't miss Chick-fil-A yet, so. No, you did. You know what you did miss? Last week, I kind of took the liberty of awarding out some spy sunglasses.

with a happy lens. You did? And I missed that. And so that was a lot of fun. But the spy sunglasses were a hit. Good. Good. You got to get people to buy some.

Well, you know how you do that? You can go online to spyoptic.com and find your pair of signature 88 sunglasses. They have Dirty Moe, McCoy, Quanta, Farah. General. I think we covered them all. If you go to check out and enter the code at Daytona. Daytona. You get 20% off your purchase.

We're rusty, aren't we? I am.