The Dale Jr. Download - 94 - Charlotte: Are We There Yet?

Episode Date: May 26, 2015

The longest race of the year, the World 600, ended up with Dale Earnhardt Jr. and the No. 88 team stretching their gas mileage to a third-place finish; Reaction Theatre weighs in; Nationwide’s Jim McCoy joins It Takes A Nation. 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 Dirty Moe Radio. You're still clear up, I tend a really good entry to one that time, whatever you did there. I mean, it just turns some time, and it don't, T-Gy. It's not what I'm doing. Just the size of turn and something else to know. You're now listening to the Dale Jr. download presented by Spy. Check out Dale Jr.'s signature dirty-mo sunglasses from Spy at Spyoptic.com. Hey, everybody's, Jr.

after Memorial Day weekend, 600-miler at Charlotte. We thought we had a pretty good car in practice. I really liked how the car ended practice. Once we got the race started, we weren't right on the balance, right on the setup just right. Once we got the race started, we weren't right where we needed to be. We ended up needing to make some pretty big changes to tighten the car up but still felt like we were going to be pretty competitive. Greg and the guy

started making a lot of changes and consistently kind of chasing the track which was freeing up as the race went on and they did a great job. You know the car got better, car got more competitive. We started getting better track position which also improves the other car fuels and drives and I thought mid-race that we were about the third or fourth best car. The 78 and the 41 were definitely much better than everyone else and it looked like that they were gonna be hard to catch and the only thing you could really hope for was that their cars didn't like the late evening time and how the track would change drastically as the night

went on you would just have to hope that they were going to have some trouble with that but it was uh it was going to be tough to beat them it seemed like every other run you know one of those guys is a real standout so we kept working on the car just uh Eventually we kind of came to a crossroads. The track is freeing up as the race is going for the first 300 laps, and then it sort of stops. It gets to a point to where it really kind of does its own thing, and you really don't know what's going to happen.

What ended up being a problem for us was the pace picked up with the extra grip as it cooled off, and our car landed really hard and crashed the splitter getting into turn 1, So I was having a real hard time not getting beat real badly, getting in a turn one, and keeping the front of the car turning. When the splitter hits the ground, you lose a lot of front grip, and it doesn't really recover very well through the rest of the corner. So it blows the whole corner up. So we fought that, and that's hard to fix without really hurting the balance.

We add, you know, if you add air pressure to help the front not travel as much, it hurts the front grip. You can move some things around to try to help the front clear the track better, but it usually hurts the balance. So that's what happened. We lost a little track position, you know, fell back to sixth or eighth or so. Tried real hard to get that track position back on restarts, but didn't do it. We ended up just getting too tight back there behind all those guys in the dirty air. So we gambled on the, I don't really call it a gamble.

I mean, people were saying we came up short on the gamble, all that stuff. I don't really think we came up short. I feel like we got what we deserved. We had a top of the four car. We finished there. When the caution come out, it was time to pit. You could basically make it from there. I don't know why everybody didn't pit.

So I don't think it was really a fuel mileage race or a gamble. It seemed like a sensible thing to do. Come down on pit road and get a full tank of gas. We ended up coming off pit road about two. and a half laps short and just struggled back there in 15th whatever place we were in with the dirty air and rode around and finished the race all the guys had to pit for gas so that's how it worked out you got pretty happy with the result yeah so i don't you know i felt like that you know coming down pit road was just sensible because we were so going to be able to get so close to the end

and not have to pit under green i mean if we you pit there like we did and get just one cause and you saved enough fuel to make it to the end, so I don't know. It just seemed like everybody else would come. They didn't. I would try surprised. It worked out because we were not handling well. The last two runs, actually, the last probably 100 laps,

the car just got real tight entering one. We weren't nowhere near as good as we had been most of the night, and especially back there in the back, it was really tough with the dirty air. The top had been, had a lot of speedy drive up there. A car blew motor up there, which is, you know, good. You got out of the way up there up high.

But they put two, I don't know, I felt like they put too much speedy dry down. They dusted it twice, and then that stuff sticks to the track. It doesn't really, it's not sticking, you know, where you see that speedy drive against the wall. It's not sticking to oil. It just sticks to the track.

It's real fine, and it sort of, you know, really makes it impossible, basically, to run up there. And, you know, with only 100-by-ps session, in the race, there weren't going to be enough time to clean that up completely, so it took the top groove away from turns one and two, which I was using a lot with a lot of success late in the runs. I needed the hell out of that groove there at the end of the race, and I couldn't use it. I ran up there close, but I needed another three or four feet to put that thing in the wind and get it really hauling ass. That was sucked. That was frustrating.

They couldn't get everything we could get on the high side late in the run, but we really weren't running full throttle anyways, just sitting there making sure we made it on fuel. But had fun, really enjoyed the car in the middle part of the race, and I think we improved on our setup from what we had in the All-Star race, which I didn't think was very good. So we had some of the same issues, though, so we got to work on that going back later this season.

There you go. Dale Jr.'s comments on the World 600, the longest race of the year. This is the Dale Jr. Download, presented by a spy with Mike Davis, with T.J. Majors, with Ms. Amanda Wolfmeyer. I am Taylor Zarzer, and we are proud to bring you the Dale Jr. download. We're grateful for Junior's comments, as always. And, you know, Mike, it is a different feeling when it's a fuel mileage race. You know, you hate it for Martin Truex.

He's a really good buddy of juniors, and he had the best. car. I mean, if we're going to give the trophy to the guy that had the best car, Martin Truex would have been in Victory Lane on Sunday night. And, you know, Kurt Bush probably had the second best car. Listen, that happens. And we have certainly seen both ends of the spectrum with Dale Jr., at least in his Hendrick era. And I mean, you can go back further than that. But in the Hendrick era, of course, his first win for Hendrick Mike was a fuel mileage victory at Michigan, got burned by it a few years ago in Charlotte with a, on the backstretch, running out of gas with half a lap to go,

would have won the 600 in the same fashion that Carl Edwards won it the other night. And we've seen that happen in the 600 many times. I'm not here to say that it's not a part of the sport it is or I'm against it, people doing it or what I'm not at all. I'm just saying, Mike, it's a very different feeling of fuel mileage race compared to your typical race. It's its own level of nerves and anxiety. I can tell you that.

Do you agree? Yes. Because, you know, I know. I know Junior said in that race, he goes, let's go for it. I don't care. I don't care about points. Let's go for the win. They agreed on that.

But you still don't want to run out of gas and finish, you know, 19th on a day when you clearly were better. You know, so, yeah, these things have a whole level of anxiety for it. Now, it's interesting to hear that Junior says, I didn't even feel like that was a fuel mileage race. He just, everybody should have pitted there on lap 338. And he couldn't really understand why they didn't. T.J. anxious to hear what you got to say about that. But the two cars that were to class of the field, we actually beat them. Yeah.

So, you know, we have no reason to. It was absolutely the right choice then. Yeah. I mean, we didn't beat the one. You know, the two finished in front of us shouldn't have finished where they finished. So, you know, it's just one of those races. I enjoy it. I enjoyed that race, to be honest with you.

I know, you know, people don't love fuel mileage. I don't even like the anxiety that comes with fuel mileage races. But you know what? That is an element of race that you got to just embrace it and own it and get good at it. You really do. TJ, there was a few years ago. You guys remember in Casey Mears one? Yeah.

Same kind of fashion. Yeah. And I remember being in the infield, watching the end of that race. And there were some Dale Jr. fans there. They were all fired up and upset. And one of them, he was one of the first people I ever heard. And he was hammered. And he was one of the first people I ever heard said, man, I didn't think there are going to be any math tonight.

And it was really, I mean, people were, how the hell did this just happen? kind of deal. But that's what happens in a fuel mileage race, T.J. Hey, tell me this, TJ, because Mike and I were just talking about it. So Edwards and Biffel both pitted also on lap 338, right? Yeah. And Junior was the first to come in. So what happened? How did they get in front of Junior?

Did it happen during Pit Road, or how did that happen? No, actually, I think we lined up next to the 16. The 19 might have beat us out. I can't. They were either one row in front of us on the outside, but we, our lane did not roll on the restart. Right. We restarted P-11 on the inside row.

On the inside row. Yeah, and we got jammed up down there and got held up, and that allowed them to get a couple more cars than we got on that restart. And that's all it takes. I mean, they weren't way up and head of us there for a while. They were, you know, I was looking up there, and it only takes two or three cars to build a four to six-second lead, really, because you get tight behind them and you kind of ride there.

That's right. And it doesn't take but a couple cars between you guys. And, you know, I was watching them. And I didn't, I honestly, I didn't think we were going to make it, to be honest with you. I feel like when he would come by and, you know, we were supposed to run 80% throttle, he would come by and he was still pulling away. I know he was running the high line, but he was still pulling away from the guys behind him on the straightaway. And I'm like, man, there is no way.

Right. There is no way he can be 80% throttle rate here and drive away. And he was, I asked him later, and I feel like his 80% is really about 90. And I kept asking Greg, I'm like, Greg, you know, should we save? Should we do this? And, man, he was, but it evidently it worked. But, you know, I see his side of it, too, how he doesn't really consider a fuel moderate because we got what he thought we deserved.

Yeah. And we probably deserved a third or fourth. I agree. I feel like the 11 kind of swap positions with the 41 late in the race. The 11 was pretty strong late. And the 41 kind of lost that little edge that he had early. And Truex didn't. He had it late there, too.

He was running the 11 down still. Truex had the car to beat, but I feel like we had a third or fourth place car, and we didn't really, we kind of got lucky and played the cards right, but we didn't really steal anything or anything like that. But, you know, we did outrun the 16 and the 19 definitely got away. It was something they probably wouldn't have got to do. But we've run in the top five for most of that race.

Yeah. In fact, you could argue, you could argue, Mike, to the point T.J. makes and the point the junior made at the beginning, we might have, the 88 might have gotten, It might be the only car in the field that got what it deserved on Saturday night. It's third if you go by, you know, if you do pit and you come back out or there isn't that crazy few mileage gamble, or if you do take the gamble, either way, that's exactly what they deserve. Yeah, because, I mean, didn't Kenseth finish right behind us?

Yeah, we actually had a race in the last lap a little bit. Right, right. Which is another reason I didn't think we were going to make it, by the way. One more laugh in Drew X because it was both. I'll tell you that. Because he was coming. He was coming. Yes, he was.

Yeah, he needed about five more laps, and I think maybe five to seven more laps, and he would have won that race still. But it is interesting. If they're not going to be side-by-side across-line racing each other, it may as well be a fuel mileage race to me. I was more nervous about a caution coming out. Yeah, you know, you never know when they're going to fall with them type of races. I mean, guys, I like when they can get up there and run the high groove and stuff,

and, you know, it leaves room for air. There's less room for air. And, hey, you know, if they see a guy get in the wall, it's like, it's 50-50. whether they see it as it be in a caution time or not. You know, you never know what you're going to get. They can see a guy brushed the wall, and the next thing you hear is put it out, and yellow lights are flashing,

or you see a guy ride the wall for a whole corner, and if it's not a, I don't know, if it doesn't look like it was a good enough wall ride to be a caution, we'll just continue green. So, I don't know. Yeah. Hey, TJ, let me tell you what I thought the biggest positive was from the 600 the other night.

You could absolutely argue that the fourth most competitive hit Hendrick Carr at Charlotte Motor Speedway out of the current drivers is Dale Earnard Jr. Casey Kane has made that his personal playground. Jimmy Johnson might as well name the track after him with what he's done. Jeff Gordon speaks for all three of them have numerous victories at that track. So it's not that Dale Jr. has performed poorly there. It's just the rest of the entire team's drivers have been historically great there.

So the thing that I was most proud of on Sunday night was that absolutely the best team, the best Hendrick Motorsports driver, was the 88. And going up against three legends at that track. So I think that's a real positive takeaway. I mean, the mile and a half program is really going great right now. Yeah, I don't think we've necessarily been bad there, like you said. But Casey's definitely had his time there.

But I feel like if we restack the cards right now, we wouldn't be the fourth car there. I think we could argue we'd be the second best car there. I think Jimmy is still, Jimmy's still probably the number one guy when we go to that place. And, you know, I think honestly the way we've run the last few years there, two, last couple years at least, I feel like we could, we could be the second best car there now. But in the past, yeah, we've struggled and never really come out of there with positions we wanted, but we've been in position to win two races in the last two years there, or two, three years there.

I mean, that's pretty good. Taylor, were you like me when Jimmy John? Spunned the first time and didn't hit anything. Did you think like I thought and say, yep, he's your winner. Because he does it all the time. Because he does it. If he didn't hit anything. In fact, even when he hit the wall the second time, I was like, yep, I still think he's going to win.

He falls on his butt all the time at that in the same exact spot on that track all the time. Yeah. He bust his butt and it's unbelievable. I mean, Jr. did that at Kansas a couple years ago and laughed it off and everybody goes through that. But it is remarkable. You know what I wanted to ask T. about is absolutely Mike I did think he was going to win when he didn't hit anything you just heard in the beginning of this podcast junior say sometimes it turns tj

sometimes it don't i don't have anything to do with that yeah um clearly you had some loose race cars out there on uh on sunday night yeah i don't i mean i i i don't necessarily agree with his statement on that i mean at lester's my uh you know that little little fanviz and i got doesn't doesn't turn the car or gas and brake for him um but But, you know, it's just... Shots fired. He just gets frustrated sometimes, and that's his way of, you know, and once he calms down, like, a lap or two later, he'll start clicking off good laps,

which is very, which is one of his strong points, he's able to recover from being angry. Like, this, you know, seven, eight years ago, five, seven years ago, he never, he wasn't as good at it. But now he's, now he's one of the better ones at it that when he gets frustrated, he's able to recover from it within a lap or two. and get over it and get back to running the lap times that he can, you know, chip away at and run good laps, and he'll run somebody back down even after he does that, and that's one of his strong points now. But, you know, he just needs to find his rhythm, and he'll get loose one time, have a little mistake or something, and just gets frustrated, and that's what that, you know, that's what that transmission is right there.

It's just him being a little frustrated because he just comes back the next five or six laps and runs really great laps, and then, you know, we don't ever hear about it again. So. Mike, what T.J. said about the 88 team. in its current performance at Charlotte Motor Speedway, I totally agree with. And that's exactly the point I was trying to make is, you know, historically, if you look at wins or success at Charlotte Motor Speedway, you know, junior would be fourth among his teammates.

But he's not right now in the present. Clearly, he's one of the best two drivers in the shop, and he had the best finish on Sunday night at Charlotte Motor Speedway. And that gives me tremendous confidence. Yeah, yeah, totally. I think we show up at Charlotte expecting. to contend for that win, and that hasn't always been the case. And let me tell you why.

How about that old movie made that got us all out of our seat when he went four wide, T.J. Oh, my goodness. Taylor was even tweeting about it, and I might have made a little joke about it, but I'll wait until... Yeah. How about that? He threw shots at T.J. He didn't know that yet. Well, I said that I said T.

I said T. I'll probably take credit for it. But what happened there? Of course. It's just when cars get side by side. They slow each other down, and we, We had a good run off the corner. We weren't side by side with anybody,

and we weren't being slowed down where we were able to carry our run. And, you know, he saw an opening, and I guess the guy on the inside, I can't tell how far they are apart when they're side by side, you know, down the backstretch, if there's three of them. I can't tell if there's four feet between them or a whole car length. So to me, that lane, the guy on the bottom usually blocks all the way down to the line.

And so I can't tell how far he is. down there but evidently he saw an opening and that guy wasn't he probably didn't know to protect it you think you're three wide yeah why just ain't nobody gonna go in yeah ain't nobody gonna go four wide here next thing you know there's that there's that there's that one bar there goes yeah there goes the one bar on the bottom but we made the corner and we didn't slide up we didn't take anybody we didn't mess anybody up every when you race guys with that ability up there too you know they're all probably they have really good awareness and and um and know when to lift and control their cars and all four of them did it.

But yeah, he saw an opening and went for it. And I saw the run was going to be good enough. And I didn't think, you know, I was 50-50 on whether he was going to do it or not. And I thought it was awesome. You know what it made me think about, Mike? That might be my favorite move in NASCAR. Like in, and let me tell you what I mean. Like in baseball, I love a diving catch.

In golf, I love when somebody makes like a 50-foot putt and a big turn. tournament, you know, crowd goes crazy. Steph Curry hitting a three. There's just, I mean, you can talk about dunks or whatever, but. I like layups. Yeah, exactly. It's a layup for him, but him hitting those threes are great. In NASCAR, when you see your favorite driver, and certainly in our case, it's Dale

Jr. When you see them on a restart, make a move like that from top to bottom or bottom to top with two or in this case, three other cars involved to try to make a move to beat them all, that's the most fired up I can get for a move in the sport. I mean, just gave thousands of people a reason to stand. Yeah. Yeah. The net gain was only one spot because he gave two back.

But honestly, he could have lost three spots in that moment. Wolfie would have lifted. And I think everyone would have actually appreciated the fact that he went after. Yeah, I appreciate it. And that was like 130 laps to go in the race. You know what that does for guys on the team and stuff? We watch that. We watch out.

We're like, man, yeah. Our driver wants to win. He's all that. They showed a shot of the crew when he made that. I mean, they were pretty fired up. Yeah, that's what I'm saying. I mean, you get a hat, man, you're like, heck yeah, man, this guy's going to do what it takes. This is the guy we want to drive our car.

You know, we're excited, man. This is our guy, you know, and that makes us all pumped up and want to, you know, do an awesome job. That's really cool. Hey, two other things I want to mention before you get to reaction theater. One is we mentioned Martin Truex Jr. Certainly fans of Dale Jr. have know what it feels like to be Martin Truex Jr. when you're having a great year, but you haven't won a race. Two years ago, certainly the 88 team was in that position.

Martin Truex Jr. has the second most points right now of any driver in the sport. He's well behind Kevin Harvick, who has been a machine so far this year, but he's got the second most points of anyone in the sport. Now, he'd be 10th in points, and with the way that he's driving, he's almost a certainty to get into the chase because of their performance each week. And being on a team like that, what an unbelievable year. The 78 shop is having there in Denver, Colorado. But Mike, we know what this feels like to be so close so often as True X has been to accumulate all these points but not have a win.

You know what would suck to me? And I noticed this how people were trying to boost up Martin spirits on Twitter and after the race. And I was thinking to myself, this might actually aggravate me just as much. And that's when people like, hey, your win's coming soon, man. Your win's coming soon. You hate hearing that. If I'm Martin, I almost don't even want to hear people talk to me. You know, just tell me that.

I might believe it. I don't know. What do you think? Yeah, no, it's, it is. It means you haven't done it. And it's just a reminder of that you haven't won. Yeah. Well, here's the deal.

Martin's won races before. Martin's won races. So it's not that, you know, hey, you're going to get that first victory or something hasn't been. Martin's a serious contender right now. Like when we go to the chase, whether he wins or not, he's going to be tough to beat. Like, we very well could be going to Homestead racing the 78 car for the championship, and he could be winless.

You know, he is that good. And he's not running like 10th and 12. He is running top 4, 5 every week. He's 11 top 10 so far this year. He's making me nervous. He's been outstanding. And, yeah, T.J., he's won races before, but it's been a while. And the last time he won races, they kicked him out.

out of the chase with the craziest most controversial, ridiculous thing I've ever seen. And then he lost his ride somehow. He was the guy that lost his ride out of all that. That might have been a blessing in disguise for him. Maybe so. That team has really struggled right now. Michael Walter Pracing. Clint Boyer's not in the chase right now in 17th position.

I'm trying to keep tabs on that with who's not in it. Boyer's not in it right now. Menard's got a healthy lead in 16th over Boyer who's in 17th. Danica's 18th, Biffel's 19th. Tony Stewart is still 30th, Mike. Still 30th. He's 134 points out of the chase if he doesn't win a race. He's got no chance to make the chase unless he wins a race.

One win can turn that around, man. It's just won even a few miles. TJ, if he does not win a race, he will not make the chase. He's got no chance. Yeah, but I'm saying if he, If one of those guys could win a race and take off, though. I mean, it could happen. I mean, you never know.

What Brad did last year. Yeah. Yeah, when he won the championship, he heard his leg come back, he caught a rain shower on Pocono and pitted before everybody came out, leading the race and won, like, however many races the rest of the year. He did, but he didn't have 202 points when he left Charlotte. I can promise you that. But if I'm Tony and I'm sitting there in 30th, then I am that guy that takes those stupid risks every race.

You're going to see people do that. I'm going six wide if I'm Tony. I mean, because, see, that's a. It's actually if you're not on the bubble, if you're not the Boyer and the Danica and the Greg Biffel where you're 17th, 18th, they still got to be concerned with points. That's a tough spot to be in. That's a tough spot to be in.

You don't want to do the wrong thing. Right. You do need all the points you can get. Yeah. But if you're 30th, no tires. I mean, just gas and go. Biffle's scruci have had to be nervous to that the other night. I mean, look where he's at racing for them points.

And he runs out, man. That's a huge complication right then. When we get back to Daytona, 4th of July weekend, that's going to be just completely nuts. Because you know there's going to be so many people that feel like this is our chance. Reagan, Gillilin, you know, those guys that are both in the top 30 right now. Reagan's run for three different teams so far this year. That's going to be crazy.

Hey, one last thing. I want to make sure you're giving my boy credit here, Mike. You're not making fun of my friend Lending Castle here. You're giving him credit for what he did. Now, he's nuts. Make no mistake. There's no way you meet or most people listening would get out of our car after the race and run back. To Charlotte.

Why would I make fun of it? That was the most cyborgish, crazy thing. I mean, like, no. I wrote him into the white flag. Was there a reason for the run? Was it for charity or something? With Snap Fitness. Yes.

Which is a sponsor. Which one of his sponsors, yeah, to do that. That's awesome. Yeah, publicity. Landon is a loyal listener of the Dale Jr. Download, by the way. I almost wanted to have Landon on this show today just to discuss it. And I just with Memorial Day and then us taping first thing Tuesday morning,

I just didn't want to have that conversation with Amanda. I know you weren't making fun of him, but what you were doing, what you were doing was my reaction to. What? How? You're running to the Hall of Fame? Junior ran from the chopper to the house. Does that matter?

This was somebody said, hey, what would it take for Del Jr. to do that? I'm like, Dale Jr. wouldn't drive to Uptown Charlotte right at this hour. No, I was impressed with Landon and kudos to him. When I saw it, I was like, wait a minute, is my timeline not right here? I was like trying to scroll and make sure hours are right. Yeah, wait, he's stretching. They're stretching. He is in great shape.

In the garage and all the toolboxes are done up. What? He's going to run now? Yeah. Landon had a top five at Talladega, I believe. Was it Daytona? He had a top five earlier this year in one of those restrictor-played races. Super guy.

Oh, yeah. And it's really cool that he did that. And yes, none of us could do that. All right, Mike, before we go online to spyoptic.com and tell our listeners about the happy lens, do you found your sunglasses? Yes, did you know this? Did you get tipped off? Hey, listen, I have a great staff that provides me with all the things I need to be prepared for. I did find my sunglasses, and I actually feel bad that I've been blaming my kids this whole time when actually they were here at work.

Geez. Amanda found them in the big camera bag that carries our camera that we taped with J.M. 360. And when I made that trip to Coloey to shoot the 360 with Josh Jones kicking the field goal, I must have just put them in one of those side pockets. And so Amanda comes down the hall the other day and she's like, I think I'm about to make your day, if not year. And you know what? She was 100% right. It made my year. Very good. I love these sunglasses, man. I love mine too. Again, does yours have a little smiley face in the corner? Of course.

Yeah. Yeah. My daughter, Grace, found that little smiley face in the corner. It does make you happy, the happy lens. Can I just say real quick? We had SpyOptic, the guys from SpyOptic here last week at Junior Motorsports. Man, do they got some cool stuff coming? That's all I'm going to say?

Yeah. It's all I'm going to say. But I'm pretty partial. The ones you've given me. The McCoys are phenomenal. Dude, wait till you see what's coming. I'm telling you. All right.

It's going to be awesome. Well, for the time being, go to spyoptic.com. Check out all the Dale Jr. signature Spy 88 collection includes the Dirty Mo McCoy, my favorite, the Quanta General Farrah for the ladies. Once at checkout, enter discount code nationwide 88 and receive 20% off of your purchase. Let's go to reaction theater. Hey, man, I just got to say something that needs to be said tonight. How great is it that we live in a country where we can sit here on a Sunday night and watch NASCAR and watch NASCAR. Dale Jr. in a country where these troops have fought for our freedom and have done everything they've done. It's worth taking a call just to say thank you to all the men and women who have served for our freedom,

who have done so much, and we get to watch Dale Jr. do what he does. That was a gutsy call at the end. Way to go, guys. Keep it up. Love it. What a great call. Amen. You know, Mike, there is nothing that soldiers, fallen soldiers, who we certainly honor a Memorial Day, would want more than us to enjoy our life here in America and enjoy the great liberties that we have, the freedoms we have, and enjoy NASCAR races like we do. They certainly want us to remember the sacrifice, the ultimate sacrifice they made, but they want us to go on enjoying our lives.

I can promise you that. So many countless soldiers have told me that. And I'm glad that a lot of Dale Jr's fans understand it. Well said, and I thought it was very, very cool what NASCAR did. about putting those names of fallen soldiers on the race cars. Yeah. That's very cool. All right, Amanda, who's next?

Well, do we believe in Greg eyes now? Back in Vegas, everybody was raised and held because we gambled and we finished fourth. Then we gamble when we finished third, everybody on Facebook and Twitter blowing up and said it was a stupid call and, you know, should have stayed out. Why? We had an eighth-place car. I love it. I love the gamble. I love the way the direction his team is hidden.

We're not quite like we were yet. Last year, we were taught, but we're getting there. Greg, guys, he's a smart son, and Dell Jr. is going to get him another win, probably a couple more wins this year, and we're going to win this championship. Junior Nation, baby. Yeah. Thank you, sir. Good stuff.

Before we talk about Ives, Mike and T.J., one thing I love about Amanda is she provides the notes for me, not only for the entire show, but certainly for reaction theater. And she dictates some of what. reaction theater callers say and she did provide a little bit of the language that was used in that last reaction theater call which I appreciate so it gives me a sense of where we're going right right right you know yeah that's good hey by the way she abbreviated that curse word to mother of M-O-T-H-A-F but it gave me a sense of where we're going next what's how I know she knows how to shorthand profanity.

Hey, one thing about Greg, we were texting a little bit. TJ, you were on this group text that we were going back and forth after the race. And Greg said a little bigger adjustment at the end, and we would be doing a lot of media this week. Pretty interesting now. How about that? Who's next? I want to start off this Memorial Day weekend.

God bless America. Thanks for all the troops for all you do. Any veterans listen to this, thank you very much. And second, Jr., Great race. Way to get it to the finish line, man. I know how much you want to win this race. Well, I just want you to know you're going to win it in the fall, baby. That's someone that's going to count.

It's going to get us to the next round in the chase. And we're going to win it this year. Great call, Greg on the gas. We'll get him in the fall, baby. We'll get the 600 next year. Keep up the momentum, boys. Let's get it. Oh, yeah.

God bless America. Good stuff. Absolutely. And I'm sure a lot of confidence, T.J., for when y'all get back to Charlotte. Oh, yeah. Lots of it. We have lots of confidence every week now. Who's next?

Hopefully after the race, Jr. hit every one of those sun guns on his pit crew on top of the head with a hammer, because they absolutely stunk up the joint tonight. Come on, guys. Y'all got to pick up the pace. We can't keep losing spots on pit road. Come on. Listen, Mike, it was a rough night. I mean, I don't know what to say.

I mean, it was. There's going to be rough nights, and that was a rough night for the pit crew. Here's what I wonder. You know, didn't Jr. have a loose wheel earlier in the race? He had a vibration going on Yes he did have a vibration They didn't have a vibration They're loose or not

But yeah They never alluded to it on the radio As far as what the reason was But it was definitely vibrating And then because when they went and changed the tires again He said the vibration was gone I wonder if They had to play it safe

To avoid that To avoid that being the case We've had vibration We've had loose wheels this year It's been a problem I don't know what the reason For the slower pit stops I know we did lose a position or two a lot when we came in,

but I wonder if, I know we've talked about on this podcast where pit crews are trying to hit four, or basically the bare minimum of pit of lug nuts that you can hit with the wheel still staying on, I wonder if you had to go and just hit all those things and make sure that wheel don't come off. Yeah, I think we're still in the process of trying to catch up some of our competitors in that area.

I think everyone is. There's one company that's quite a bit better. than the rest right now. And, um, yeah, and we're trying to, they've put some time and money into it and, and got it better. And now they've set the bar a little higher in that area and everyone's trying to scramble and we'll, it'll even out. Um, you know, it's, it's hard for our guys that are, we're trying new stuff and

trying to make, trying to close the gap. They're not just having to do this stop that they've been doing for a long time. Things have changed the last year or two and this year, especially. And they're having to adjust themselves. Hey, listen, Mike, you brought Joe in here, Joe Slingerland in several times, and he was on with us last week. He hadn't sugar-coded it either. No. He's been very honest about it, saying, look, we're going through a transition phase.

He has a lot of confidence that ultimately they're going to be where they want to be come chase time. Let's go to the next one. Hey, what's up? First time caller tonight. I just will congratulate the 18 nationwide Chevrolet for a Strom P3. We'll say two things. Maybe a T.J. can answer this. It's wonder if TJ ever gets frustrated when Dale gets a little upset with it on the radio.

I know they have a pretty good friendship, so I wonder if he ever takes it to heart or if he just knows the situation that's going on the car. And number two, Mike Davis, what do you think about that command of the start engines at the ND 500 man? That was absolutely the most hysterical thing ever. Somebody trying to steal the show, look like they were up there going to babysit, and next thing you know they want to be part of it. So anyway, thoughts on that.

Great job, guys. See y'all next week. Go ahead, TJ. I mean, you don't, you know, it's never fun at the time, but I've driven myself, so I realize some of the frustration that you can experience when you're in the car and the different, it's like when you put that helmet on and you get out there and that thing doesn't handle good, it goes to another level real quick. One good, one thing that's really good about being friends with him is, is that, you know,

at the end of the day, I know we're still going to be friends, whether he gets mad or not, you know. and I'm glad I have that relationship with him because if I didn't have that relationship with him with some guy is cussing you that you don't really know it's not going to be good you're not going to enjoy it you're going to go to work next week not want to go work with that guy again it goes in one ear and out the other with me

but I'd also say this T.J I think one of the reasons why he might be perceived as hard on you at some time is because he loves you like a brother I don't think that he'd be as willing to be as honest with some others because of how close of a friendship he has with you yeah I just think it works out better

how it is man and it I don't take it to heart. If he does get a little bad, normally after the race, he's, you know, he apologizes for it and stuff. But it really, he doesn't, he's really tamed these days. It's nothing now. I will address this question by saying that if Mary Holman George backslapsed somebody like this, every command to start in it, I'd be all for it. Yeah.

That was hilarious. It was very funny. She slapped her, she took the old karate chop to the neck. That was awesome. That was interesting. It was awesome. Who's next? Pretty good run for the ADA guys right there.

Well, Greg Eyes gamble. I don't think that anybody should not Greg Eyes anymore. I mean, the man took the gamble, and we wound up finishing third out of the deal. We got a lot of really, really good tracks coming up for Dale. Cocono, we got Michigan, we got Tala Vega, Daytona, Richmond, Phoenix, Bristol. So let's all be positive, guys. Go get them, Dale. Eight beers.

Sonoma. He's a road course ringer. Sonoma coming. I can't wait for Sonoma, man. Yeah. Hey, watch Truex at that place. Yeah, I hope he watches the back of our bumper. I know, but I'm saying true X as well as he's running.

Did he win Sonoma? He won't Sonoma, yeah. I really wouldn't. I really think that you guys are going to win one at Sonoma here soon. I'm not ready to go to the Glen like Old Davis is over here. He's more likely to win at the Glen than he is Sonoma. No, I disagree, man. I disagree.

He knows how to stay out of trouble with places like Sonoma. We just ride around at the end of the race. It's going to go our way eventually. It's going to take a little bit of luck. We're not going to be the fastest car. We're not going to be, we're not going to dominate all day. But we're going to be riding third or fourth sometime, and something's going to happen to go our way, and he's going to be able to pounce on it.

I would agree, Mike. Three or four years ago, he was more likely to win at the Glenn, but I'd say Sonoma now. Maybe. I'm just saying he has top five that's like it's Glenn. Yeah. Who's next? Well, this is a bill yesterday, man.

And when's the issue tonight, my dad threw all my beers. out in the yard and that night and I couldn't find them. And all these damn frogs are going to shut the fuck up long enough for me to say this. But damn, that was a good race. Junior, they, Greg Eisen, Jr. did a great job, calling aside to save enough fuel to get to a third place to finish. And if these damn frogs were shut down up, I would continue talking. But hell yeah, it's been a good night other than my beer getting thrown out on the yard

and they happened to salvage it. But I've had about 13, so it's going to be a good party tonight. Good third place to finish. All right. Tell you. I tell you what. I mean, anytime a dude cusses out frogs, we're going to put you on Reaction Theater. What do you make this call, knee-deep in the swamp?

I know, man. I kept waiting for the... That's pretty strong right there. Cussing out the frogs. That's pretty good. Reaction Theater is open 24-7. All you have to do is call toll-free 1-855-7-4-0. 1902 and leave us your voicemail message and we'll play the best each week right here on dirty

mo radio time now for it takes the nation presented by nationwide all right everybody well you know what we started this segment at the beginning of the year it takes a nation presented by nationwide to give you an inside look at some of the people behind del junior that have been influential in his career have helped him along the way this you know includes friends and family and employees but with me today is somebody that I can even make the argument is the most influential in his career right now because he is his sponsor. I'm telling you, nationwide insurance came on to 88 this year, and it has been nothing but fun for us, and I hope it has for you, Jim McCoy.

First of all, thank you for sponsoring Dale. Thank you for the partnership that we've had with Nationwide for, I don't know how many years it's been. It seems like at least 10, or has it been about 10? Well, this is our seventh year with Dale. Six years is a PSA relationship, personal services, and our first year is primary on the 88, and we want to say thank you. It's been an honor for us. We've learned a ton to be involved in this great sport of NASCAR and to have the Dale as our spokesperson has been a blessing. I've said many times on this program, I am a huge fan of the ad campaign that you got going on

it takes a nation. Yeah, so our tagline is join the nation. It's all about putting our members first and everything that we do to help our members get protect what's important to them and get their lives back in order. So as we looked into it, we've had six great years of Dale and I think we've done 12 different commercials in seven years with him now. This was our first opportunity to put him in a nationwide fire suit with the 88 car on track and really wanted to build on this idea that NASCAR, it takes so many people to make a race happen on a given weekend. It takes so many things for a driver like Dale to be successful. Obviously he's very talented, but his family support, his friends, his team members, as crew chief, and his sponsors, everybody coming together as one nation and obviously

playing off the junior nation piece as well. The fans play a big part to be successful on any given weekend. So we shot the commercial here at Charlotte Motor Speedway in January. It came together extremely well. I had a lot of Dale's friends and family and team members there to be part of it. And we think it's turned out incredibly well and we'll continue to run that in race broadcast. I just recently saw some of the videos, the web bignettes, just on an approval standpoint. Let me tell you something. Those things blow me away. Have you guys started releasing those yet? No, we're going to on Tuesday, I think June 9th. So that'll be the first video comes out. We've got a great series of behind the scenes with Dale Jr.

And I think that was my favorite part, too. We sat down with, you know, Kelly and Dale and Greg Ives and Sonny and Sean and some fans and just, you know, got to know how, what their connection to Dale was, what, you know, what had a number of questions. We asked, you know, special moments they could share. And the stories are just so powerful. And, you know, Dale is such a down-to-earth, grounded person. And you can tell, you know, the people he surrounds himself with are all.

also incredibly special. And we're excited to share that with the fans. There are a couple minute videos at a time, and we're going to roll them out on a weekly basis for the next 10 weeks starting in June. They are phenomenal. And let me just tell you, they're all great. They're all great. But the one with the fans will blow your doors off. I'm telling you people, just wait for it. Yeah, our partners did a great job. And you never know. I mean, it's two full days of getting a lot of different materials and a lot of different time. And sometimes it's like watching paint drive. they cut it together and it all came together really well and really showed it was a great way for nationwide to kick off our new relationship new expanded relationship with dale as majority

primary on the 88 why dale junior why did you ever get started with dale junior in the first place he's just such a good fit for nationwide as a as a company as a whole you know we we love the sport of nascar you know in 2008 we looked to expand our relationship with nascar as being the the title sponsor of the NASCAR Nationwide series. During that first year, we actually found out we had a long existing relationship with the Earnhardt family, starting with Ralph and Dale Senior and Dale Jr., both from an insurance and business relationship. So it was just such a perfect fit for us in him to be able to talk about all the products that he has. It's not, you know, it's not just a spokesperson. He truly has our auto home life business, pet insurance.

You name it, he's got it. And he's just a very, very good fit for us. And for us to then take the relationship to where it is this year, the nationwide series was a great partnership for us. We learned a lot. We probably wouldn't have been ready to be the majority primary sponsor of the 88, you know, back in 2008. So it prepared us for it.

It allowed us to transition. We announced in May to take 12 races. And when National Guard made the decision not to come back, we jumped right in. And, you know, we're on the car 20. 22 times this year, which is going to be a lot of fun. How many times do you hear the jingle in a week? I hear it a lot. Whether it's my kids at home or yesterday in Panera,

they see the nationwide and an eagle, and they'll hum the jingle. We obviously working in advertising. We're always working on different projects. But even out the racetrack, you walk past somebody, they'll jingle. It gets stuck in your head. Well, how do you try out for the jingle singer?

Who's it? Janet Kramer. Janet Kramer. She doesn't. is okay she's all right so and we're always uh open to auditions well do you do open auditions we can take one right now are you interested i mean i think janet kramer's time's come and gone honestly i think that it's you know i think you need a new voice let's hear we can go are you are you going to take me seriously am i going to be taken seriously could i actually have a shot

at being on a nationwide commercial or my voice it's uh if you perform well we'll uh we'll send it up the approval channels we'll see let's let's hear i need some uh all right man now i'm nervous All right, here we go I don't know Are you gonna like Simon Cow me I will critique you yes Just be prepared Feedback is a gift

All right here we go Ready Nationwide is on your side Boom I nailed it I nailed it That was our jingle That was our jingle I don't think Jana's got anything to worry about

But I appreciate you Well maybe me and Janet can do a duet Could maybe we get down Mix it up a little bit Let me try one more time. All right, here we go. So was that too low or was it? A little low.

So I got to go higher? All right. See, I'm so scared because I don't know what's about to come out. And it could be so off. All right. Nationwide is on your side. That was much better. All right, let me do that again because I felt that was choppy.

Oh, that was bad. Nationwide is on your side. Yeah, you're right. Janet's feeling good right now. I feel good about my performance. You're a harsh pretty. I appreciate it. You definitely have maybe the face for radio, the voice for print.

Yeah, I don't have a face or voice for radio, but we do the best we can. Dude, thank you. Jim, I appreciate everything you're doing for us. No, it is truly been a great partnership with Junior Motorsports and to be involved with, you know, Dale, obviously, and then we've also with Brad and Danica when she was in the shop and Chase and Regan and everybody else over there. It's just really good people and that's the consistent theme in the sport as a whole, but especially the deeper relationships we have with you guys in Hendrick Motorsports. It just makes our job a lot of fun and to be successful.

And our associates, our agents are so proud of this relationship as it continues to grow and really work for us. And that's a big part of because of everything you guys to do, to help us be flexible and do things like we're doing with Dirty Moe and the production today and everything else to really put Nationwide out there in a big way to the consumers. We're going to keep pushing, buddy. I promise you that. And listen, I've been saying it every week. My man here, Jim can back me up. I'm telling you guys have been awesome on the social channels. Nationwide 88 is where you must go if you're going to follow Dale Jr. If you're a Dale Jr., and that thing is growing, by the way. You guys have been growing leaps and bounds.

Our social teams working day and night to make sure that they're staying on it. Everything that's out there, they want to get as much visibility, but our Facebook and our Twitter, and I think we're going to probably launch some Instagram here in a little bit. So we've got some new things that we're going to bring out for the fans to follow that. Can't wait for that. All right. Thank you, everybody for listening this.

Thank you, Jim. And don't forget, nationwide, nationwide is on your side. Nailed it again. Good God Almighty. You didn't like that? On behalf of everyone listening here, Let's hurry along to a white flag. Well, it wasn't the only frog that you heard on this podcast today.

Yeah, that's a fair point. All right. White flag right there, white flag. Well, it's not a terribly busy week this week for Dale Jr. He's got some work to do today, but otherwise it's all about Dover. For Dover this weekend, Junior Nation, you've got a full plate of racing to watch. Friday night, the Camping World Truck Series race from Dover is on Fox Sports One. Cole Custer will return to the seat of the Double Zero Hoss Automation Chevy Silverado.

Saturday, the Xfinity series races on Fox. Junior Motors will have three cars enter, the number seven Breyer's Ice Cream Chevy of Regan Smith, the number nine, NAP Auto Parts car of Chase Elliott, and the number 88 Raghu,

Chevrolet of Casey Kane. The Sprint Cup, FedEx 400, benefiting autism speaks, will be televised on Fox Sports One. How weird is that? The Cup races on Fox Sports One, but the Xfinity race is on Fox. That is a little strange.

It's really bizarre. It's so weird that I almost wonder if I have that right. But I do. I've got that right. I think you do have it right. Yeah. Anyways, we should mention that Dale Jr. reached 1 million Twitter followers last week.

Did you know that, Taylor? I saw it. Yeah. It got me thinking. TJ, pay attention because I want to get your day. What is more likely to happen first? Dale Jr. reached 2 million followers or Greg Ives to tweet once? Oh, man.

That's a question. I want great to tweet once. I'm going to say that Ives gets on Twitter. Yeah. He's on Twitter. Yeah, but he needs to like you. I'm going to say Ives tweets before. Junior gets to 2 million followers.

Well, Greg has been on for a year and a half and he has zero tweets. Did you guys catch this? The widow of Chris Kyle, the American sniper, was at Charlotte Motor Speedway over the weekend, and she said that Chris Kyle was a junior fan. Did you know that? Of course he is, was. Teia Cowell. I don't know if I'm pronouncing that right.

Teia Taya Kyle said that they had met a few years ago and Chris was just taken aback by Junior's humility and it made him not just a junior fan, but a NASCAR fan. I mean, how cool is that? He was the coolest dude in the world. world this guy. I'm telling you, man. You never know when you're making an impression on somebody. This was years ago they met, and then here it is

2015. Obviously, I just watched American Sniper the first time last week, and that movie's awesome. It's a damn good movie. Yeah. And I really have so much respect for Clint Eastwood and Bradley Cooper and the rest of that crew that tried to be as accurate as they possibly could. I also

had it written in here. I know we already talked about it on the podcast, but, you know, landing freaking Castle made an impression on me. doing what he did. But I thought that was really cool. We talked about it already. Lastly, I do want to say this. A huge thanks to everyone who came to Junior Motorsports

Fan Day last Friday. We had a huge turnout. TJ, you were here. Probably the best we've ever had. Yeah, that's awesome. And it was wonderful to meet just people that listen to this podcast and also the other Dirty Mail Radio podcast. We met a lot of them.

Brought a lot into the studio just to talk about them. We had a kid come in. I think he was 15 years old Amanda. Come in here and told us what Ford stands for. Fast only. rolling down hill. He was funny. He's tweeted me more than Taylor's tweeted the last few months.

But thank you guys. I really appreciate it. I know we say thanks a lot, and it sounds clichés, but we really enjoyed last Friday here at Junior Motorsports. It was a true pleasure. So thanks, and that's it. Well, you have everything to do with it, my friend. What you've created is quite phenomenal.

It really is. I'm amazed at the crew you have around you and all the great work that they do. and just how far Dirty Mo Radio has exploded. So you should be beaming with all the people that are now part of Junior Nation and part of our Dirty Mo Radio crew. And that includes every person that listens to this podcast and all the other ones too. This has been the Dale Jr. download presented by Spy for Amanda, for Mike, for T.J. For Dale Earnhardt Jr. I'm Taylor. We'll talk to you next week.

Thanks for listening to Dirty Mo Radio. Well, it was Memorial Day yesterday. Amanda, did you go out on the lake? What did you do? I was not on the lake. I was poolside at one gathering and then at a wiffleball gathering later in the afternoon. Wiffleball gathering. Didn't see that one coming. But that sounds fun. My gosh, I love wiffleball. Yeah. Either way, you would have needed sunglasses. I did. I sported my spies. There you go. I had to. It is getting to be summer. I don't know when summer actually starts, but it feels like I think it's June. I think Memorial Day is the official kickoff.

Okay. Well, either way. way, there's no better time to get spy sunglasses on your face. The happy lens. That ought to be their slogan. On your face? On your face? In your face? In your face?

It would be in your face. It's like that. Is that what you're saying? Okay. Yeah. Spice. It's summer. You're going to be at the pool.

You're going to be at the lake or in Amanda's case, you're going to be the Wiffleball games. You need sunglasses. Protect your eyes. Get happy. Amanda, how do you get them? You can go to spyoptic.com. Find your pair of Signature 88 collection.

And once you're at checkout, enter a discount code nationwide 88. and you're going to get 20% off.