The Dale Jr. Download - Jade Gurss & B Hoover: Stories From Their Time on the #8 Budweiser Team

Episode Date: October 24, 2024

This episode is all about the return of the legendary Budweiser paint scheme that defined Dale Jr.’s rise to fame. We’re diving deep into the stories that made that era unforgettable, from wild moments with the Bud crew to the PR hustle that shaped Dale Jr.'s image as a NASCAR icon. Jade Gurss and B. Hoover are taking you back to the heart of the Bud days, unpacking the highs, the challenges, and the tight-knit camaraderie that fueled it all. Check out Dirty Mo Media on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@DirtyMoMedia  Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See https://pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Well, we're seeing red on DJD reloaded today. And no, that is not a figure of speech. We mean that quite literally because if you haven't heard the news, which you should have by now. But the iconic number eight Budweiser paint scheme is officially back. And it's going to be back on track at a late model race here pretty soon. And we've done a lot this week at Dirty Mo Media to kind of celebrate this big return. Dale Jr. talked about it. We had Tony Sr. in studio earlier this week to kind of reminisce on old times.

And we're going to continue that today with two Bud crew members. We have Barry B. Hoover, who knows a lot about the car. We've also got Jade Gers, who knows a lot about Dale Jr. And so, as you can imagine, we have a lot of questions to ask these guys to get to those really nitty-gritty stories. So let's go ahead and get to it. The following is a production of Dirty Mo Media. Welcome into another episode of DJD Reloaded. We were going to do something different.

No idea that a tradition was going to be started. The racing world is Conor's Village's oyster. Is he truly the next NASCAR prodigy? Hey, you did a cartwheel down the stands. Holding your cooler, your arm never bent. It was like watching an Olympian in its pod. Welcome inside another episode of DJD Reloaded. I'm Carla Gepphard and like we've already mentioned, I have Jade and B joining me in studio today.

Guys, I'm really excited about this because you've already been kind of reminiscing off camera and off the mic a little bit about just all of the stories that you have. But this is a little bit of a reunion. I can't believe this. But, B, you said you haven't seen Jade in 20 years. I haven't seen Jade since. It's been 20 years. Maybe Dale Jr.'s retirement party. Do you remember that?

It's foggy. It's foggy. I had a good time. That's what it should be. But, yeah, it's crazy. I haven't seen him. It's been 20 years. And I live half of my life with him.

And all of a sudden, we just go our different ways. then here we are again. Yeah. Just like old times. Just like old times. And now we get to reminisce. And like we said, you know, this week, the big announcement that the Bud 8 paint scheme was backed. Did you ever imagine ever, Jade, that this would be back and that fans would maybe be just as excited as they are this week?

It was always a small corner in the back of my mind. But I hadn't really thought through in what scenario it would happen. So when I heard about this, I was just. real excited and it is it's great to see b i since i've heard the announcement my brain has gone haywire i have thousands of stories suddenly coming to mind so it's been been great to kind of think back on those those good old days with the red eight car were you excited to to see the pain scheme back it's huge um it's huge for the sport um i'm a i'm a 30 year veteran now and that's what it takes to keep the sport going, you know, passing a torch on, but it is huge. I never thought

in a million years it would happen, but I'm loving. I mean, I go on Twitter, and that's, it's lit up and red. Did you have a lot of people reach out to you when the announcement was made? Absolutely. Are you going with Dale Jr.? Are you going to be part of the crew? What are you got your old uniform? And I was like, no. Would you do that if you were asked to? Absolutely, I would. Would you, Jade? Would you get back out there and be the publicists? If we're talking a few races, I don't know about the full cup schedule these days, but yeah. A few late model races. A few late models. I could probably handle that at my age. What was the first impression when you saw the late model?

I thought it was beautiful. I did too. What? I saw Tony Jr. posted on Facebook about five days ago, and he posted just a red bud car and looked like Homestead. I was like, why did he, what was that about? And I knew something was coming. And then I saw it on Twitter. But it's beautiful. It's great. And you two are still, you know, involved in racing in some capacity, right? And you were kind of mentioning this, too, that a lot of those crew members right now are still in the business. And you kind of credited that to three different people. Yes.

Our road crew consists of seven, pretty much seven guys. And we were back in those days, you could test all the time. We were gone. I think the month of March, we were gone 23 days on track. But I have to say something about Dell Jr., Tony Jr., and Pops. Pops is Tony Senior as well. That's all I know him by. Yeah.

But you look in that garage and all seven of us, road guys, all seven are still working in the business 20 and 30 years later because of those three. Dale Jr.'s driving. Tony Jr. kept us on our toes teaching us how to be the best mechanics. And then we had our, we call him Pops. He was our dad. And if it wasn't for him, I wouldn't be doing this still today. It's because of those three. I'm still digging it 30 years later.

Do you think that aspect of those relationships are missing and racing today? Very much so. Very much so. Back in those, you know, nowadays, all the crew chiefs, a lot of them have motor homes on it. Tony Jr. and Tony Sr., they room together in a hotel. And you just don't hear about that. We go out to eat. All of us went out to eat.

when we got in fights at the racetrack, we fought together. We were a tight-knit group, and I just don't see it like that anymore, you know? Yeah. That's missing. Yeah. The camaraderie, I would have to imagine. And Tony Sr. was in studio this week. I'm not sure if you listened to the podcast, but they were reminiscing on some old stories.

Jade, you said you had a thousand of these things. So I got to know, like, what's the most memorable? back with the bud-aic crew for you if you had to narrow it down. I mean, that's the thing. There's so many. Because I was thinking about that earlier. What was the highlight? And there's probably 20 that I could list. One that sticks out the most was Dale Jr. was the very first rookie to win the Winston.

And that came about because of a really gutsy call by Pops to change four. tires late and the car was just so fast. And the victory was just mind-blowing when it happened. And sadly, because of Adam Petty's death, they had decided not to use the standard victory circle for that event. So we were on a lifted stage right by the fans, right by the grandstands. And it felt like a rock concert. I mean, it was just insanity. And then Dale Sr. was always famous for not sticking around for anyone or any reason after the race. Suddenly we hear the crowd going crazy and we don't know what's going on. And suddenly he comes running up on stage and hung out with Dale Jr. I know for Dale. That was a huge moment in his life. And so it was just this. I don't know, surreal time that night. Sadly, that also was the night we learned later, the bridge, the pedestrian bridge, has collapsed. So that added kind of another weird piece to that whole event, but it was just the whole night up until we learned that was just glorious, just amazing.

Do you have a memory from a race that stands out? That was a good one. Yeah. But the Victory Lane was really good out on the front stretch. I'm from Charlotte. So we won. We were standing out there and we said, we just won a million bucks.

The Winston back then. And we were standing out there and I could see all my friends from high school. I haven't seen. And, you know, my family was there. And I was married at the time. My wife was there. And I said, this is big. Went to Victory Lane.

And we were all just celebrating having a beer. And there comes pops. He said, easy on the beers. We're working tomorrow. This is Saturday night. He said, we were working tomorrow just because we had a test Monday. And that's, yeah. Another good one we had was when February, when Dale lost his life at Daytona,

we all went to work that Monday and went in the shop. And another in the eight shop, there was none of this. No TVs, cameras. We went in there, and Dale Jr. Walked in. He said, I want to go back Fourth of July. I'd like to win that race. And Pop said, we're going to start on the car right now.

And that's when we started on that Budweiser car, and people didn't know it. And that car didn't go to our fab shop. It was built right there in the eight shop, hung the body on it. And if we didn't go to the Fourth of July and kicked her ass, we didn't just win it. We kicked her ass. And I don't think that car ever got passed on the track for 400 miles. And it was made that early in the season. We started on it. We started on it. The Speedway car pops, tallest Tony Jr., too.

You got a love on them. If you don't, they won't love you back. And that stuck in my brain. And that's what we did. And we went down there. Stole one back from Daytona that it took away from us. Wow. That was a good one. But we have so many hundreds of stories behind the scenes. And, you know, a lot of them, if we ran bad, you can. can count on the next week, you could test anywhere you wanted to, Kentucky or wherever.

If we ran bad, we were going to go to Kentucky Speedway. Deljur couldn't drive, Martin Truffs was going to drive, but if we ran bad and we went there a lot, went there a whole lot. There was a lot going on during the week that the public didn't see behind the scenes. And we worked hard. It's a lot of great memories. Yeah. And we're going to talk a little bit more about the car, because you got to work on the car,

But, Jade, I want to know how you got to be the publicist behind all of this and kind of be the brand ambassador for Budweiser and for Dale Jr. I don't know that one. Yeah, I'll make it as short as I can. My first job in racing was in the Midwest at a track called Heartland Park. And one of the guys that I worked with there became a good friend. And he was from St. Louis. He moved back from St. Louis.

Next thing I know, he's working for Budweiser in their sports marketing department. And I had been working for Mercedes-Benz at that time, and he called and he said, hey, we've signed this kid. We need somebody in Charlotte that'll be our eyes and ears. And would you be interested? And I didn't know who this young kid was, but I said, yeah, I'd be glad to talk about that. And then when he told me, you know, it was Dale Earnhardt Jr. and DEI and all that, it was like the most sought-after PR spot in the sport.

And so I busted my butt to interview there with all the executives and everything. And next thing, you know, I'm at the track with Dale and the team. So it was fun. And my client was Budweiser. I did not work for Dale Jr. directly, even though, you know, he and I were together as many hours as B and the rest of the crew were together. Right. That's how it happened and how it got started.

And it was exciting and exhilarating each time at the track because it was never like we were, you couldn't just walk into the track. It was always a scene in the garage. So that stressed me out quite a bit for eight years or however long I was on the deal. but that also made it very exciting start to finish. I think, you know, as a fan perspective, you've got to look at all the elements that had to come together for this Bud 8 crew and for Dale Jr. to really kind of rise in popularity when he did.

But what were, what do you think the biggest factors were back then? Well, initially, and again I talked with Anheuser Bush or Budweiser people about this a lot. We knew because of who his father was that all the racing, media would cover him. We sort of knew that coming in. I could have screwed up a hundred times, and we knew he would still be a big story within the racing industry. But my role was to expand that more into the general public. Honestly, we were trying to reach young men who drank beer. We wanted them to drink Budweiser. And so that became my job was to get a Rolling Stone to come out, and spend a weekend with us and do a big feature about Dale Jr.

And that was almost like getting that snowball rolling. Then MTV came out when we did a brief thing with MTV, and then we did MTV Cribs, and that was insane. If you weren't around in that era, I don't think people understand how impactful Cribs was at that time. And it was a new type of TV where they ran it 20 times in a month. You might miss it at 10 p.m., but at 2 a.m. if you're up, suddenly here's Dale Jr. for 30 minutes on MTV. And it just created this massive momentum and interest in Dale Jr.

And a lot of that was prior to his father being killed. Some people say, well, it's just because his dad had such a public and horrible death. And I would say, no, no, it had already started. before that happened. And it made my job much easier. And it, you know, it led to TV shows and who knows what after that. But it was, it was really the combination of the right kid, the right driver, the right sponsor, the right team. Selfishly, I think I was the right guy, the right PR guy for that time. and so it all came together in a great mix, a beautiful mix. And so I feel very lucky to have been a part of it.

And, you know, and be in the crew, you know, if we would have ran 30th every week, it probably would have not continued to build, but because these guys were winning races and doing great things on the track, it just all continued to expand and grow. and I'm as proud of that as anything else in my career. And so I just feel lucky. I feel lucky that I was a part of it. I find it interesting, too, that, you know, you were kind of going after the male demographic drinking beer,

but we've heard from a lot of fans. And because of the MTV and kind of how prominent MTV was back then, too, you really got this younger generation. And we've heard from a lot of fans on Dirty Mo Media this week about them getting in trouble in high school because they were their Budweiser T-shirt and, you know, got sent home because they couldn't wear a beer brand. But I just, you know, you kind of, you went after that demographic, but then you ended up, you know, really getting the younger generation, too. Yeah. And a lot of that was Budweiser's data and their research.

They, in that era, by the time someone reached 30 years of age, they had decided on their beer. And they were going to drink that beer the rest of their lives. So the goal was to find young men 25 to 30 that we wanted them to start drinking Budweiser and to stay with that the rest of their lives. So the goal was to portray Dale Jr. in a way that was completely honest and legitimate was that we wanted him to be a guy that the guys would want to go have a beer with. Luckily, we also had a guy that the ladies wanted to go have a beer with as well. So again, it was just all these elements just blending together perfectly.

And, you know, you can't sort of fake that. Or, you know, if you had a driver that wasn't genuine like Dale Jr. was, it wouldn't have worked. And we did everything we could to just let him be Dale Jr. We didn't try to force him into being a robot or anything like that. So it was huge. It was a great combo. And you mentioned that every time you went to the track, there was a big scene. So B, being a part of this crew, I mean, I have to imagine that you kind of were lumped into almost this rising fame of this team at the track.

Like that, what was that like to just be a part of that team? And when you would get to the track and knowing that you still have work, but then you've got all these fans, like, that's probably a lot to balance. It was a lot. I started actually on the AT Delco car, and we won, won two championships. And I was like, yeah, we're winning. So we went to the Cup series, had these budd uniforms. You know, we were young and looking good. But Pops would keep us in line on that.

Yeah. It took me a couple years to learn that. I was like, we're rock stars. We're not on drugs. But people think we were just living this crazy life and out drinking beer and having a good time. We weren't. Of course, we would go out to eat, you know, and have a couple beers,

but it was work. It was a lot of work. But it took me to like 0-1 or, two and realized that this is a big deal. And then Jay'd come on board and we didn't let anybody in our group. You know, we were just a tight-knit group and he took it to the next level. We didn't know what media meant. You know, we were just race car. And it was a perfect storm in that era what we did. And Jay was a big part of that. He took it to the next level with Budweiser. but I still look back on it today and we were the real deal.

Our whole team was a real deal. And it took me a few years to let that sink in, but we were. I wish I could go back in time and change some things. What was it like with the other maybe teams in the garage? Do you think that they noticed the significant popularity that your team had over maybe them in the time period? Oh, yeah. that wherever we'd park in, you'd park by points in the garage. And the team would be like, man, we're parked beside y'all.

We're not going to be able to get our car out because all the people standing behind the car. Oh, yeah, it was great. But we met, we had good friends. We met good friends, you know. But they were our enemies. We were there to, we were taught we were going to outrun them, and that was our job to do. But they would complain because we had people in Dale Jr. followers and cameras, they were with us.

And I think a lot of it was, most of it was where people was wanting us to make a mistake. We want to write a report, you know, we want y'all not to win. We want to see something go wrong, you know? Yeah. That happened. It was like, what's going to make Dale Jr. fail here? We want to see something. The fans didn't feel that way, though.

Fans didn't want that way. Oh, yeah, the other teams. Absolutely, yeah. Yeah. I have a couple of stories about that. Dale Jr. was mobbed wherever he went. Everywhere. And sadly, I had to be the security guard, and you can tell I'm not much of a physical specimen.

So that was tough. But where Dale Jr. would get upset is when it would impact the crew or get in the way of the car. And he learned an interesting lesson from his father. When Dale Jr. thought that the crowd was enough to impact the crew, he would go sit on the back of the NASCAR hauler where all the NASCAR executives worked. And the crowd would come in and the execs couldn't come out. And Bill Jr. said, this is what is happening with our team. And we need help keeping this area clear enough where our guys can do what they need to do.

And I always laughed. I always knew when he got up and he's walking to the NASCAR trailer. And he would just sit down on the back and sign autographs. And the crowd would converge and just crush. any chance of getting in and out of that trailer. And so we tried our best to be creative to handle the crowd. So that was one thing that Junior was insistent upon. Do you remember that too, or did you ever feel maybe a little unprepared

because you couldn't get all of your work done because of the crowds? I mean, was it that significant of an issue at the track? It could get bad. Some of these places where, especially if you go out west, When you only go one time a year, it would get crazy. And we knew Jay would take care of it. But you got to remember, that's our office. That's our workspace.

And you are every second count set to track. And these people, if it wasn't for them, we wouldn't have a job. You know, they just wanted to get a glimpse of that car and Dell Jr. But it would be a hindrance just for a little bit. And you could see the look on Tony Sr.'s face. And I think he would give it to Jade. Yeah. without saying anything.

And people understood, and I think they made it to the public. He said, listen, this guy's office. We don't go in your office. We got a job to do. We got a man's life in our hands. We can't leave a nut and bolt loose. And that Dale Jr., he would. He learned to work it.

I didn't know who come up with that, but he sure would walk over at NASCAR trailer, and that whole mob would follow him and let us continue while work. I have to imagine that there were some tracks that were probably harder to now. navigate just with the crowds that would typically be there. What tracks do you think were the hardest? Texas was insane, insane. And it was interesting because Dale won his first Bush race there, Bush series now, X-Finity. Yeah. And then won his first cup race there. And so he couldn't have been

more popular in Texas than he was. And it's hard to describe, but from the garage to the pit lane was a larger space than usual. And it would just get to the point where we would have to stop walking because the crowd was pushing in. And Junior was terrified that some young kid would get pushed over and the crowd would keep pushing. And so eventually we got NASCAR security to help us go to and from the car, to and from pit lane there at Texas. But it gave me ulcers because I felt like I was responsible not just for junior, but again, the people that were trying to get an autograph, you know, again, getting pushed over or knocked over. And it could turn a little, I don't want to say ugly, but it got very tense sometimes. How big a crowd are we talking about?

Well, Texas was 150. I mean, it was huge as far as the total spectators. But for some reason, the garage there and that area was just insane. I don't even know how many thousands of people they could get in there. Thousands. Yeah, but it was, yeah, it was very stressful to deal with that, you know, going in and out, you know, for qualifying or whatever. And so Texas was that. But it was also great. Junior was always, I'm trying to think of the right words.

Sometimes early on he was sort of suspicious of all the fandom because he originally thought, well, it's just because of who my dad is. But he won in the A.C. Delco Bush car there, which he was proud of, and then we won, and his first cup race was there. And his dad never won at Texas. So to Junior, he told me one time, he said, you know, I love Texas and Texas loves me. And I always thought that was funny, that he was very proud that he felt like he had accomplished something there. And so that's what made it even more sort of frenzied.

And speaking of B, that first race at Texas was on CBS TV. And the Pitt reporter, Pitt reporter was Ralph Shaheen. And I told Ralph about B being the same weight as Dale Jr. I'm sure you remember this. And the crews would weigh the car. And because Dale Jr. was somewhere else, B would climb in or climb on the side of the card and represent Dale Jr.'s weight. So we used to tease him that when Junior had a big meal, B better eat up tonight.

And so Ralph Shaheen told that story on that telecast. So B was like the featured crew member on that CBS TV broadcast. That's where my career started. Right there. Right there. My grandmother, grandfather, my dad was washing. That's awesome. It's funny.

I'll even go back on that. If you see the Dale Jr. stand-ups, that like in a 7-Eleven or whatever. So he would do a photo shoot like there in the shop, and we're going to do some stand-ups at 8 a.m. And I was like, 8 a.m., my man's not going to be here at 8 a.m. So I asked those stand-ups, 90% of them are me with his head on it. Really? They actually did a few. You might know it.

They did a few. I was married then. I had a wedding ring on. They blew some and it had a wedding ring on. And they were like, yeah, we got to get that. You got a photo shop that. My man wouldn't show up today. I'd fill in the same uniform.

But it worked. It worked for us being the weight and all that. You didn't have to, you know, have him at the car every second of day because he was busy, but we'll go back on the crowd at Texas. It'd get so bad even when he was coming. When we would push the car to go get fuel or push a car to pit road to get for qualify, thousands of people, so we'd have whistles, and we would, everybody would carry a whistle in a pocket, we'd blow the whistle, and it would be, you would look, and it looked like a wave of people,

and we would just cut right through them as car officials, and it got really bad, very appreciated for it. but it was very, very, very, very crowded. And people would come up, pat on a car, and be like, no, no, no, no. Let's go win, man. Don't touch anything. Yeah. But that's just how it was back then. Did NASCAR eventually step in and help with that?

I do give them credit. The first couple years were really rough, but I do give NASCAR credit for hiring a more active security detail that began to appreciate how difficult. it was not just for the drivers but for teams and all of that so i i give nascar credit for you know eventually solving uh that issue somewhat i think the thing they come out with was the hot pass you could only you had to have a hot pass you couldn't be in a garage area when it was hot you're in qualifying you're in practice and they fixed that so that's where that originally that's we made that rule nice yeah we made that rule where was mike davis and all of this i feel like i need to ask this question. Well, Mike came on the scene. He's going to kill me because I don't recall

which season, 2002 perhaps, was working with Jimmy Spencer. And Jimmy got really good media coverage. And I liked Mike and I thought, well, if he can get good coverage for this guy, Jimmy Spencer, nothing against Jimmy, but he was not Dale Jr. So I thought if he can do that well with Jimmy He could really do some good with us. And I was a one-man band for three plus years, and I just got wore down. I told people I had a full head of hair. I had all my fingers when I started and just wore me down, but neither of those are true. But I decided that I was going to hire Mike to come aboard with me.

And so that's where he got started. and then in 2006, 2007. 2004, I think. He joined us in 2004 with my company and then became an employee of Dale Jr.'s. I think it was 2007. My brain gets a little fuzzy on those dates, but that's how Mike came aboard. And at first, Jr., in that era, he didn't want any changes or he didn't like a lot of new stuff. He was happy with what he had.

and he was not happy with me that I was bringing in somebody else. And I said, you're going to like him. He says, I don't care. I don't like it. And so then, but once Mike came aboard, they hit it off. I mean, which was, you know, to the public, very obvious from him, Mike, hosting the podcast. But I also remember, Mike, the very first year we went to Daytona and the Budweiser shootout always. started the Daytona Speed Weeks.

And we're an hour before the Budweiser shootout. And Mike Davis is hyperventiling. He's so excited that he has to like kind of, you know, rest against his knees or kind of sit down. And Junior was like, hey, man, this is an exhibition. I don't know what. You're getting all worked up. Wait till the Daytona 500 next week.

So that was Mike's debut. was getting a little hyperventilated before the Budweiser shootout. And now you're on a podcast company that he... Now he invited me here, so look at us. That's right. Let's go back to Budweiser. You actually brought some old Budweiser hats in with you. Yeah.

You have like a box of these, I guess. You have no idea how many hats I had because I try to save at least one hat for every victory. I don't know if you would do the same. So I have a lot of hats from the Winston, and then they would do four races a year where there was a million dollar bonus. No bull. Yeah, no bull. Winston, no bull.

And, damn, it seemed like we won that every time. Talladega and all that. So I have all of those. Each hat inside has a date and the track. But a couple of these I brought just because we also did a lot of neat paint schemes. People know about the baseball paint schemes. and then this was the 2000 Olympics. Budweiser was the official beer of the U.S. Olympic team.

So we ran a special paint scheme, and then this was the Budweiser. I think this is an all-star race, whoops, the Chicago All-Star game in 2003, and then that one was one. I don't think this actually became, oh, it's slick, became available to the public. I think that was a prototype

that, again, I ended up with a lot of the prototypes, And I'd kind of wear those around, even though people couldn't buy them. But we did a lot of really neat designs and things. So for me, I was always proud to kind of have the latest, greatest, coolest hat. Yeah. You know, got to keep the sun off of my bald head. And Budweiser is such a recognizable brand. And honestly, even now, you kind of go back to the Dell Jr. days.

But I have to imagine that working with them and you working for them had to provide some pretty big opportunities. What do you think some of the biggest opportunities were there? Well, I already mentioned Rolling Stone Magazine, MTV. In that era, Playboy magazine was a target for them, for the young men. And Budweiser spent a lot of money on advertising on all those. So, you know, I don't think we ever have twisted arms saying, you know, we spend X amount with advertising. How about our race car driver? But it definitely made them more open. and interested in the fact that, you know, Budweiser was a huge player, not just in motor sports, but in all sports, all walks of life, you always had that Bud logo.

So, so again, I don't think I could have done a lot of what I had done if we had some, you know, generic sponsor, you know, in that era. So that's, again, it's why I think it's so exciting for me to see it come back as it was. is such an iconic look, such a fan favorite to see it come back. I think, man, if people are like me, if fans are like me, the nostalgia this week has been great, been very heavy. So, and I'm sure for you as well, yeah, yeah, a lot of good memories. Not only from a branding standpoint, but I want to talk about performance now B, and this was a team back in the day, like showing up at a restrictor plate track. I mean, you probably had to feel pretty good

about going into that one and having the confidence level. You talk about how hard this team worked behind the scenes, but what was the confidence level back then when you would kind of get to those bigger tracks? The bigger tracks were we started winning in the speedway races. I think we won four in a row, a holiday, four in a row. And we're going to go back to one of the no-ball races. If you win a certain race a year, you'd get later in a year, if you won this race, you'd get a million-dollar bonus.

And they would pick a fan out. And if you wanted to raise, the fan got a million dollars, and they got to sit on their toolbox. And in 2004, we were at Talladega, and at that time, we weren't supposed to finish second. If you win or nothing. Yeah. I mean, that's, yeah. And there was about five to go, and it was a man and a lady, and they were sitting on a toolbox, and you could tell, I'm not saying he had a rough life. It was about four to go, and we were about third or fourth, and it got.

I started moving his hat around and I was just sitting there watching him. And one ago we took the lead and both of them put her head down like that right there and won the race and I wanted everyone to talk to him. I said, man, what did you do? I love hearing the story. I said, what did you do here? And that man told me he said, I used to be a truck driver. I used to be a truck driver.

Wow. He was 68 years old and that took him in retirement. He won him a million bucks. And that's what it's all about right there. And that's another good speedway story we have. It's just like when we won, we won big ones, you know. Yeah. Yeah.

But we were supposed to win the speedway race. Did you show up? And Tony Jr., Tony Seniors, we're not here to run second. We're here to win. And it's because all the hard work, you know, we put in those cars. They weren't given to us. And everybody's like, y'all were cheaters. Y'all were doing this and do or not?

No, we weren't. We worked on our cars, you know, and worked on them hard. late at night, Tony Jr. He would come in on days off, and we had a guy named Jerky, Tom Ryan. He lived for Speedway racing, and he just, you know, make little gadgets for these cars, and it paid off.

But we were expected to win Daytona and Talladega, no doubt. What's the one thing that you did on a car that you're most proud of? Wow. Just, you know what? Probably preparing a car. and making sure Dale Jr. wasn't hurt. You know, I did a lot of interior stuff. We did everything back then.

But it's just a little, we weren't a specialty. All of us, we worked on the car head to toe. I could be in the front, I can be in the rear, I can be inside. And that helped us. You know, we all learned a car. I don't know if there's one specific in the memory of the book. Was there anything that being an interior guy, was there anything that Dale maybe had specific as a driver that he would ask?

of? He liked it very clean in there, very clean. And when he would come to the car, he would come to the car, he'd want his seat belts a certain way. When he'd get in, he wanted to put, he started this, most drivers it, and he'd put his helmet and his Hans on outside of the race car. He'd have everything sitting right there perfect. Usually he wanted that where he could get it on quickly

because it would go back to the crowd. He would come there, he didn't want to mess around. He'd want to get all that, put on, and get in the car. And he learned that. And that's how we fault the crowd off. Like, I'm getting in my office right now. Yeah. Yeah.

How big of an impact did this paint scheme make on the sport? I mean, I think we're kind of seeing that maybe a little bit this week of so many fans kind of coming back out and saying, you know, giving their best memory from that time. But, I mean, I think the trajectory of it kind of changed NASCAR a little bit. I think so. And I also think Budweiser was very aware of. what we call the equity in the paint scheme. 36 weekends a year, our fans wanted to turn on the TV and see that red number 8 car. They could spot it.

They knew what it was. Today, there are so many different sponsorships for each car. You tune in to see your guy and you're not sure if he's the blue car or if he's the white car. And Budweiser didn't believe in that. They wanted you to turn on the TV and see that red paint. scheme that everyone knew. And so it was, uh, it had great equity. The irony is then, uh, he won in Daytona 2001, uh, in July with the, the baseball with the white paint scheme. And then his first Daytona 500, uh, win was with the car, the middle car that you see there, white and red. So I

always laughed that we fought so hard for that red car. And then he'd go out and win a big race and, you know, in a white and red car. So that was kind of always fascinating to me. Any particular stories with the wraps? Well, I don't know if B. would tell this story. Budweiser was sponsoring the World Series, and so they had put a paint team together for the World Series for the Charlotte race in October. And the Budweiser execs we showed up on, I would have been a Friday. and it was still the red bud car.

There had been a mix-up. And I don't know if you have a crew member perspective on that, but I think you guys stayed up the night before the race. It was actually Thursday because that was our load day, and they come in. This car has got, it's the wrong color. And we all stood there and gave you that look you're looking right there, so we just worked.

Like, uh-oh. Oh, we, yeah, this is not good. So you just, and you just pull on all the, and fix it and complain all you want to, but it's wrong. We had to fix it. You fixed it, what night? Re-wrapped on a Thursday night. And it loaded that night. Wow. Yeah, it sure did. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So that still happens today. It happens. Does it? It does. Yeah, it happens. What do you want that eight crew to be remembered as? Because I, you know, it kind of sounds like there was a the fan perspective of what y'all were doing.

But then it sounds like, you know, on the inside, as close-knit as you were, it was a little bit of a different story. Yeah, I wanted to realize what Tony Sr. taught us, not just to be hardworking mechanics. He taught us to be men, you know. I noticed we went to some places and he told me, he says, you know what? My father told me, if my kids can't go in there, I'm not going in there.

And that stuck with me. I had a little at the time, and he was like, these guys are going to go out and do that. And he said, would your son be proud of you for what you're doing right now? And that stuck with me. And I want people to realize that we weren't these party rock stars going on, flying on jets, going across the country. We were there to win races.

And that was the example that would put in our head. It was second was not an option. And we were there to work and win. We weren't there to be rock stars. Yes, we wore the Budwager uniforms, but we were there to win. It was a tight-knit group, and we learned brotherhood, you know. But Pops, outside the race car, he taught us to be men, and I love that about him. And Tony Sr. and Dale Jr. at the time had a, you know, kind of an interesting relationship.

Those two sat down in studio earlier this week to kind of reminisce on old times. But from your perspective, what was that relationship like to witness? It was, Dale Jr. he respected Pops. And I've seen Pops treat him like a dad. And I've seen Pops with these hands around Dale Jr's throats, you know, when we weren't running bad. And he would not, he would talk back to us, get mad of us, but he would not talk back to Pops. And one time I had an incident, we were to track something this. I said, well, Pops did this, and he had me doing this.

And Dale Jr. pulling it to his side. He said, do you ever say that? I'm going to kick your ass. If you ever, ever disrespect Tony Sr. again. And I just said one little word wrong. Yeah. But they had a father-son, bond. And Dale Jr., he respected Pops.

Is that how you would describe it? Absolutely. I mean, they were family. Pops was his uncle. Tony Jr. was his cousin. Even when they were small kids, Dale Jr. cheered for the Washington team and Tony Jr. cheered for the Cowboys. And it was, you know, like your cousins, you get along great, you love them to death, but you sure fight a lot too. And so

neither of them were, uh, would hold back, particularly in during the races when Dale Jr's emotions would go up and down. Um, you know, they could fight like like little kids, little cousins, but, uh, everybody had everybody's back. And, uh, so, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, And, you know, I agree with what B was saying about the crew. Again, part of my role was to make them seem like the coolest, hippest crew out there. And they really were. I didn't have to sort of make that up. They were all very young, but as B said earlier, they were in all senses a team, you know, us against the world kind of thing.

And it made my job easy in that I could portray them as they really were, the people that they really were. So it was easier than it may seem from the outside, from my standpoint, to have crew members that we could tell great stories about or that people would be interested in learning about. So it was good. It seems like an interesting dynamic, like you mentioned, kind of that hip, iconic, you know, team that you want to represent, but then also really hardworking behind the scenes. It's probably good to have that different dynamic. but it also probably has to make it hard when you need to work hard, but then you have Budweiser and you've got all these appearances that you're trying to get Dale to. What was that dynamic like?

It was rough because the number one rule was anything I set up PR-wise was never to interrupt or make an impact on the racing, on-track stuff. So we had to turn down a lot of really intriguing offers because, A. Dale Jr. was at the racetrack three or four days a week and couldn't, you know, fly off to California to shoot a TV show or something. So we were always cognizant about trying to book things based upon where we might be racing. So when we raced in Fontana, which is outside of Los Angeles, we'd book the Tonight Show or any other Los Angeles-based things just because we were there that week and we could do those before the race weekend. And so it's a lot of, you know, it's a lot of

It never was a huge problem. We were very clear with people. He would love to do it. We think it's a great idea, but he's just not available on those dates. Was there one that you turned down that you maybe regretted later or wish you could have worked it out? Honestly, the benefit of being a team for seven or eight years in the Budweiser era was that if we couldn't do it in 2002, we may do it in. 2004 or 2005. There was very little that we said that that would be great to do.

And then we ended up not doing it. It was really, again, another benefit of having a sponsor that was loyal, was consistent, that had developed a long-term plan. It wasn't just, you know, we're on this car three weekends a year and we have to do everything in that tiny time frame when our paint scheme. is on the car. So I think that paid off in a lot of ways as well. Same with the team. The team was very cohesive, very similar through those years. So there wasn't a lot of turnover or new people. And, you know, so it pays off. It's, you know, and it, people look at, I think about the Golden State

Warriors when they were winning all the time. People love Seth Curry and they love the Splash Brothers and all that stuff. And they were the cool team, but they also won championships. They worked hard just like these guys did. Yeah, they were cool. But that was secondary to winning and to performing on Sundays. You know, that's what pays the bills and that's what these guys were hired to do. appearances are definitely important commercials kind of come up a lot too when you think about that time period

I want to know really from both of you what your favorite Budweiser commercial was from back in the day there were so many in fact this week somebody posted a couple of them online that I had forgotten about like they did a mad max commercial where juniors driving the car through the desert and there's all these grizzled characters on cycles and all that chasing him down and he finally spins to a stop and he gets out. And he says, just because I have Budweiser on the car doesn't mean I have Budweiser in the car. And they're like, oh, okay, sorry. And, I mean, I had forgotten all about that. He did another one with this beautiful actress where she gets out of the car and his corvette.

he sees that she had left her lipstick there. So he goes on this mad dash again through the desert to try to meet and she gets off the plane. And he says, I think you forgot something. And she says, that's not mine. Again, it was just, there was such great ideas around those ads. And people may remember after his father died, Dale Jr. had written like an essay about his father the year before. And after his father passed, we were not able to do the Budweiser commercials that we had written and planned for. His father was going to be in the Bud ads that year. So they went to Dale and they said, we think it would be great if you want to read that about your father and we'll do an ad. And it ran not much, only three or four times, but

it was, I mean, I get emotional now thinking about it. It was, you know, a very moody piece, but it was perfect tone for, you know, I mean, everybody was in mourning, not just us, but all the fans. And this was Budweiser's way of working with Dale Jr. to, I don't know, soothe is the right word, but that one comes to mind as well, even though it rarely aired, it was just perfect. for its time and place at that time. So I don't know. Do you have any favorites?

I really, that's the kind of behind the scenes that I didn't see. I'm learning such stuff that you guys did when we were, you know. You were wrenching and we were. What are some stories that we're missing then? Like what are the really good stories that I don't want to like let you all go before we get to these? Oh man. This is a family program. Yeah, we've had all kind of good stories, airplane stories, you know, flying the West Coast.

We used to back then we'd fly with Joy Meyer. I think he's been on the show. He was our pilot and We had a Brazilia and we all know it was a prop plane. We all knew where to sit because it vibrated like you said on the far right the fourth row down It felt like you ran a weed eater all day long. So everybody knew that you'd get there We flew in weather. You know some people didn't see trying to land I remember landed in Atlanta and it was just looking snow white and I looked out and I was like, there's a junkyard down there. And then you look, and there's a runway, and the runway's the wrong way, and we pull up. Just tons of stories behind the scenes that people never did get to see. I've lost stories.

I could just go on about them for an hour. Another one in our shop is funny. Our teammate was Steve Parks and Michael Waltrip. And we worked, they worked seven to four, pretty normal hours, but our hours were seven. But there was no leaving hours. Our leaving hours, when Tony Sr. would go pick the broom up. So about five or six in the afternoon, everybody would look around. Like, oh, pops has got the broom.

Okay. Then you start, and that's when you go home. You didn't know when he was going to go home. Yeah, and that was our time to leave to go home. But you had to be there at 7 o'clock next morning. But no time for, you didn't know. You just, when Pops got that broom sweeping, it was time to go home. What about Dell Jr.?

Any stories that we need to dig out about him? Oh, how long you have? Yeah. Our longest podcast, yeah. Yeah. He took care of us. Yeah. You know, I'm wearing glasses again. At Christmas, he would give us a bonus.

And then all of a sudden with that bonus, we would get a 1099. And we were like, somebody's got to tell Junior quit doing this. 1099's killing us. We nominated Tony Jr. and they were saying, and Dale Jr. was like, what's a 1099? What does that mean? I said everything you give us and are taking it back. He would start giving us gifts and things.

He would think deep. And at Christmas he'd come up to me and handed me a blank check to Dr. Chris and Barry to have my eyes laser cut where I didn't have to wear glasses again. Wow. Yeah, I didn't know that. Tony, Sr. like Harleys, and he gave Tony Sr. A aluminum motorcycle trailer. But he would, you wouldn't think that.

but he would dig deep and he was good to us. He took care of us. Very much so. Yeah, very much so. You wouldn't thank that part of him, but he took care of our, he knew we had a good group there in a tight, tight-knit group, but he took care of us. Jay, did you ever have to talk him into an appearance? Oh, you have no idea. You have no idea.

The funniest one that I think about is MTV, we had done a couple MTV shows and they invited us to the video music awards. and he didn't want to do it. He's like, no, I'm not going to do that. And at first I couldn't figure out why. And finally, I had irritated him enough to finally get him to admit why. He says, I don't want to go to that in a damn Mooresville suit. Like apparently he was embarrassed by his clothes. And that just, that floored me that he was thinking in that manner,

that he didn't want to look like he wasn't. you know, cool and fashionable. So we arranged for a stylist, and it was the only time we ever had an outside stylist, you know, dress him up. Because I went along, I got to wear a gaudy leather jacket as well, so it was good for me. But do you remember what he wore? He wore, it was, this is funny because it was before 9-11. He wore this Italian black leather jacket. And after the show he wanted to buy it. So I called the stylist and I said just let me know what that costs. And she says, well, after 9-11, the government was making them give all that back. Like you couldn't just import it from Italy and then it would disappear. And he's like, no, just find out how much. And she said,

no, really? I can't. I have to account for this to go back. So he was upset that he couldn't buy this cool leather jacket. But that was the one time we really styled him or had went out of the way to make sure that he looked top-notch at the music video awards. One last question, and this doesn't really have anything to do with Budweiser, but just because y'all have kind of mentioned it in your own way about how the garage works, how the sponsorship works, I'm curious because, you know, you hear about NASCAR now and just kind of the difficulties there, not so much of the difficulties back then when

Dale Jr. raced because of his own branding. Is there anything that you would insert back into the sport to help with that, to bring back what was, and maybe you can't recreate what was, you know, in the early 2000s. Maybe that, it's just to be appreciated for what it is, but I think a lot of people out there would love to see it back to its prominence. That's the hard part, is that Junior was the perfect personality at that time. I think NASCAR has some really good guys in there now, but some of them are just not comfortable in front of the camera, or they're quieter, or they're just not very outgoing. So I think sometimes that's an issue, but you can't create that. You can't make someone

what they're not. You can do that for a short time, but there's no way being on TV 38 weekends a year that you can hide who someone is if they're quiet or whatever. So it's not, if it were easy they would, you know, it would be easy to just implement. So I hate to say, well, here's the five things I would do. It's very complex. That's a tricky question. And from a team perspective, yeah. Very tricky question. Yeah. Well, does this make you want to get together with like all the other but-eight crew guys and have a party and like reminisce again? Yeah. Absolutely. Absolutely. You have a, we drink Bud Lights. Oh, well, yes.

Yeah, we drank Bud Lights. Are y'all going to go to Florence? Any plans to go to Florence for the race? I'm not sure. Okay. We can't commit to it yet, but. I'm not sure. I check my schedule.

Yeah. Because this is still, I'm still doing, excuse me, for a living. So we'll say how it goes. I fly out Sunday, go to Homestead. I test Homestead this coming Monday. So tight schedule. But I would love to go. Are you working with a specific team right now?

or kind of all over? Kind of all over. Anything to do with Chevrolet. We support all Chevrolet race teams, so I'm doing all that. It's pretty cool. How about you, Jade? I'm now writing books.

So I'm old enough that the full-time travel is no longer really the lower that it once was. So I've been writing some books, a couple about Dale Jr., a couple about more IndyCar topics. And so that's my current love and much better on my travel. itinerary not having to be done. And you've already written books on him. So these are some additional ones? I'm still sort of juggling a couple of ideas, none of which I can really share in public. But yeah, it's something that I love doing that I'm going to keep on doing.

Awesome. Well, it was really fun talking with you all today. We appreciate you joining us. And yeah, if you think of any other stories, we'll have to have you back on. Oh, absolutely. We could go off of hours. Do you have one that's two or three hours and then we can go through a long I think the Dell Jr. Download is usually about that. Yeah. Well, thank you for having us. Yeah, thank you. We got more coming your way, but first we're going to take a quick break when we come back.

It is your favorite segment of the week, Asch Jr. That's next. Hey, everybody, it's Dale Jr. here at the Dotymoe Media Studio, and this is the Asr Jr. segment of the Dale Jr. download. We want to thank Xfinity for supporting us here at the Dale Jr. download. They've been a great sponsor for the Ask Junior segment of our show for, it seems like, forever. and we're helping them celebrate their Xfinity Mobile. Customers for Xfinity Mobile now get exclusive access to Wi-Fi speeds of up to a gig in millions of locations nationwide.

With its nationwide coverage, you know that it's always going to come in clutch. You can take NASCAR on the go, whatever it is, NFL, whatever you're watching, whatever you're enjoying. You can do it with Xfinity Mobile. And they're a proud premier partner of NASCAR. They're a great, great partner for this sport. So we're very thankful for them. But we've got your questions, and we're ready to dive right in. And it is a bud themed Ash Jr., because we dropped some big news today.

The Bud 8 is back. And so this first question is from Matthew Largan. What is the favorite bud commercial that you were in? And I actually have a list that can help jog your memory here a little bit. You had Ed Helms and you were his designated driver. That was a Super Bowl commercial. The lipstick. The lipstick one.

The Clydesdales. You switching numbers. The Desert Mutants Car Chase, the CD player. Yeah. All good. So out of those, or maybe there's another one that I'm missing. My favorite, I wasn't in it. My favorite one was the Farewell Lord Huron video that they put together when we retired from Cup Series.

They didn't have to do that. They did that out of their own pocket. and that was just really a nice thing. But the one that I was in, my favorite one that I was in was probably the lipstick one. Yeah. Yeah, that was just, that was fun. I remember the Ed Helms one was great. Me and Ed were in that car on a trailer getting towed around in the neighborhood,

what seemed like for hours. And then for him to go on and be, like when I, when Ed Helms was in, in that commercial, I was asking him about his work and what he was doing and he's like, man, I'm going around the local clubs doing comedy sketch. Wow. I'm just doing common, like doing, that's what I do. I work, I do stand up around town and got this opportunity to do this shoot and I'm pumped, right?

He's really excited because it was going to be a Super Bowl commercial. And naturally a funny guy and then he becomes this mega star. and so that was pretty cool because he was, I mean, he's on my favorite show. I was like a massive fan of the office. Right. And he then becomes part of that show. And I'm like, holy crap. So that was neat.

The great thing about Budweiser on their commercials is it was always first class. And you knew that the writing was going to be good. You knew it was going to be funny. If it was intentionally funny, it was going to land. And we had a lot of fun. the zombie or not the zombie but the what was the one where they took the desert mutants yeah they were that was correct yeah that was really cool we i got a bunch of pictures from that i have pictures from all of this yeah like i collected all i still have a big collection of that and um we all took we all took

we all took a picture together i mean all those all of them yeah and they it was funny because they're when i got there and we started shooting we're shooting there in character right There was no conversation beforehand. Really? Like they were like method almost? Yeah. Like, Oh yeah,

when I showed up, yeah. We rolled camera and began to work. And after about an hour or two, we'd break for lunch. And then you're standing around and they're just talking like normal people. And it was like,

man, I really felt like y'all were real there for a while because of the, as we're, you know they're not. Like you're shooting this and you're like, man, this is so elaborate.

and then you have no idea what they sound like and then they start talking and they're like it's normal people and I don't know that was fun all those those are great moments you like sign the chainsaw at the end no no yeah oh at the end the commercial I did yeah and you're like oh yeah guys there's no bud in the car oh yeah and then they yeah it's like name was Steve or something

yes you know that was the because I went on a whole rabbit hole watching these old commercials yesterday and the writing and all of them was good. Like even Ed Helms like, oh yeah, I live right by the bar. Or the lipstick, like, that's not my lipstick. Yeah. Yeah, a lot of good stuff.

This next question, I want to make sure I get your name here correct. It is from Lynette on Facebook, and she wants to know what's like the coolest appearance that you've done with Bud. Yeah. The Bud appearances were,

you know, they didn't feel like appearances. A lot of times you were going to concerts or boxing matches. And so, you know, a lot of, I mean, there were the traditional, like, autograph sessions and things like that. We went to a lot of bud distributors, you know, and would meet bottlers and distributors. But, and those were fun, too, because just seeing the scale of a business like that,

Walking into a building that was full of beer was a thing to see, right? Yeah. And also, and I think this might be an opportunity for the public, but you could back way early, we went to the offices in St. Louis and toured. and the Clydesdells are all down there downtown, at least they were at the time. And we went through the whole brewery and saw how they make beer.

And so that to me was fascinating. I really enjoyed that. Man, I remember the very first photo shoot with them. I went to St. Louis and was doing the photo shoot which would ultimately end up being our rookie card that we had for, I believe, 1999. So on that rookie card, I'm leaning up against the car that I race for them for five races in 99 as actually leaning up against a sawhorse, a wooden sawhorse, and they made it look like I was at a racetrack.

But I remember going to the studio. I remember doing all of that. And so it was, I have so many great memories. I was a huge fan of boxing, and they sent me to some boxing matches to watch, you know, some of my favorite boxers. And they,

the other thing that was always incredible with Bud, was they had their national sales convention. And it was an annual thing. And you would, it would be in some big city. And at the event, there would be thousands of bottlers and distributors and employees of the of the company. And you were going to sit down and watch each individual brand underneath the Anheuser-Busch umbrella

tell you about their plan, marketing plan for the coming year, which was a lot of fun to be honest with it, because you got to see all these commercials. commercials, right? And so you were going to see the Super Bowl commercials and all of the funny commercials that they had planned before anyone else. And it was really entertaining. And it also helped you understand what was important to the brand and what matter to them, right? And I remember the very first one that I got invited to, I had no clue that there was going to be 10,000 employees there, right? It was giant, like 5,000, 10,000 people.

It was huge room. Had no idea, right? And I'm with dad. And they're like, you're going to get called up on the stage. You're going to go up on stage and you're going to say a few words about how excited you are about this opportunity to drive for Budweiser. And so dad's a pro. He ain't nothing like this.

He's done this all the time. I'm nervous. And so we go up on stage and dad says something pretty, you know, pretty normal. and what you would expect him to say. And I said, so they hadn't won races in a while. And I said, we're going back to Victory Lane. That's what I said. And they like that.

They got excited about that. I'm sure. And then I come off stage and dad goes, well, you better deliver on my promise. I guess you're going to go up there and say that all talk to talk. You're going to have to go do it now. And I was like, well, hope we can. But the best thing about going to those events, man, was all of the people that they, all of the other spokesmen or spokeswomen or all the other ambassadors would be there.

And so, man, you're sitting in, you're, and they set us all together at these events. And so it's a big, giant room, stadium seating, and we would all sit together, and it would be, Think of any spokesman or ambassador that Buds had from 99 to 2007, and they were sitting there. One year, Tim McGrath-Hale, they would be all of their PBR bull riders, any of their sports ambassadors, athletes, golfers. Everybody, anybody that had any sort of a connection to them.

Yeah. And it was probably about 40 or 50 people. That's cool. Actors. They were all sitting there. I mean, it was neat. You got to rub elbows with some pretty cool people. Yeah, I've had that this is definitely going to be fun, bringing back some nostalgia and some good memories.

And, you know, the car looks amazing that we're going to race at Florence. It does. Yeah, the car looks great. We're going to go down and make sure it's fast. and 250 lap race. I love the long races. It gives me a lot of time to sit there and kind of plan my approach and wait out the competition a little bit

and see if we can't put ourselves in position late. We got time for one more question, and it's a popular one. It's one of the more popular ones I've seen on social media, Facebook, YouTube, but this one, Jason asks, what is your favorite win in the Bud 8 car? I know that's hard to narrow down. Yeah, you don't have them.

all the wins have a different importance to you, right? And so now there are some wins that certainly are down the list, but I can't tell you that my All-Star win is less of a favorite than our Daytona 500 win in the Budcar, right? Or the 2001 July Daytona race, I can't tell you that it. it's more or less important than our Dover win. You know, it was a, you know, there's, you know, there's some races there that probably don't measure up to the All-Star race or the Daytona 500 to the July race or the Dover race.

Those four are pretty cool for different reasons. And, yeah, I feel like that the, I guess, the July 2001 race was really the period at the end of the sentence of a very personal time. And so that one stands out.

You know, just winning the All-Star race and having Dad there, that's a favorite because that was one victory lane where we really spent a lot of time with Dad. Dad usually would come, want a race, dad would come in Victory Lane, and then he would leave. And then the team would do whatever the team was going to do. And he never went to the media center after wins or nothing like owners traditionally do now. But at the all-star race, that Victory Lane, he stuck around.

And we really laughed and, you know, he was in all the photos and back slapping and hugging everybody for, you know, for an hour. And then, you know, trying to win the Daytona 500. It meant much to dad to win that race. It was like the most important race to win in his mind. And I mean, to a fault maybe, but if my dad thought it or believed it, then I thought it and I believed it, right? I think we all might do that as sons. Like if we really believe, if we really trusted our dads, whatever their choices were or,

you know, whatever their decisions in life were, we really put a lot of stock in it. And so growing up his son, I'm like, Dayton 500 is the most important race. Always will be. You can't change my mind. If there's a race to win in our sport, that's the one. Nothing will ever change my opinion about that. And so when we finally got to do that, I didn't know if I was going to have to chase that forever or maybe never win it, ever. So when I finally got to get that win, dang.

What a relief. to do that. Yeah. Yeah. And I love watching that race. I love watching all of them. The Daytona 500 win is my favorite because of having to set that pass up without any real drafting help. Like trying to figure out a way to create a run to get alongside of Tony Stewart was like seemingly impossible for me at the time.

And I didn't know if we'd be able to do it. But if you watch that race. and watch the throttle and how I'm messing with the throttle and trying to time the run for the exit of the turn 4 and finally getting it done after like 20 laps of trying to figure out how to get this card and create the run. The run had to start somewhere else on the track and where did that need to be

so that when I come around to this point I would really have him in a bad spot. And so it took me a while to figure it out. Well, good stuff. I saw a lot of people asking about merch. You can get it now at shopjurination.com. And that's going to be pretty fun. Yeah, go ahead.

I want to say, you know, we, I'm excited that everybody's receiving the news well and really excited about this and appreciative of it. I am too. I want to thank Budweiser, and we spent some time talking to them about what we could do together. And we landed in a really good spot for me. I love late model stock and grassroots racing. I'm excited to go to Florence and drive this car. And we were, you know, considering putting some merch together, but I only wanted to put merch. together if we had a race to run.

And so we got it, we got it, we got it together. We've got a couple pieces out there and we've worked hard upstairs on the design. And I've had some input on that a little bit. So I hope you, hope you like what we come up with. If you can't go to Florence on the Saturday before Thanksgiving to see the race, you'll be able to tune in on Flow. And the great thing about Flow, obviously I race on, I race about two or three races

or maybe three to five races a year that are broadcast on flow. But if you subscribe, you get everything. You get the cars tour. You know, there's no stuff hidden behind a paywall or anything like that. So it's one subscription. You get everything that they got.

Late model stock racing, the cars tour, modified races, dirt racing, sprint cars, all that stuff. And all kinds of other sports. I mean, if you can think about it, it's on there. It's incredible for the price what you can get. But if you can't, see us live. Maybe you'll tune in and check them out.

Awesome. Well, that's a good place to end Ash Jr. this week. Thanks to Xfinite again. Appreciate, Dale. A lot of great questions this week from the fans. We always love to hear your responses from those fan questions. And, yeah, that's going to pretty much wrap us up today on DJD Reloaded. A big shout out to B. Hoover and to Jade Gers for joining us again.

today some great stories of just reminiscing from that bud eight crew and that iconic paint scheme that's going to be hitting the track here coming in November but yeah that'll do it for us today we'll see you back here next Thursday check out dirty mo media on twitter facebook tick and instagram