The Dale Jr. Download - My Experience As Dale Jr.'s Boss - Rick Hendrick on DJD Classics

Episode Date: December 30, 2025

No team in NASCAR has achieved the same level of success as Hendrick Motorsports. In this DJD Classic, which originally aired 9/23/19, Dale Earnhardt Jr. and his former boss, Rick Hendrick, sit down for an in-depth discussion about Rick's origins in motorsports, how he built up NASCAR's winningest team, and his plans for sustaining excellence in the future. Hear Rick recount the famous rental car ride between Dale Earnhardt and Geoff Bodine that was orchestrated by Mr. Bill France himself. Plus, what did Kenny Schrader do with Dale Jr. that made Dale Sr. mad enough to not speak with Schrader for a full year? The stories are plenty, and the laughs are hearty - nobody in NASCAR can replicate the subdued humor of Mr. H.And for more content, check out our YouTube page: https://www.youtube.com/@DirtyMoMediaReal fans wear Dirty Mo. Hit the link and join the crew.👇https://shop.dirtymomedia.com/FanDuel: Must be 21+ and present in select states (for Kansas, in affiliation with Kansas Star Casino) or 18+ and present in D.C. First online real money wager only. $5 first deposit required. Bonus issued as nonwithdrawable bonus bets which expire 7 days after receipt. Restrictions apply. See terms at sportsbook.fanduel.com. Gambling Problem? Call 1-800-GAMBLER or visit FanDuel.com/RG. Call 1-888-789-7777 or visit ccpg.org/chat in Connecticut, or visit mdgamblinghelp.org in Maryland. Hope is here. Visit GamblingHelpLineMA.org or call [phone] for 24/7 support in Massachusetts or call 1-877-8HOPE-NY or text HOPENY in New York.  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.

The following is a production of Dirty Bum Media. Let's rewind a DJD classic. Enjoy. All right, so Rick Hendrick, he's in the house. He's at the table. A lot of people excited about this one. I'm excited about this one. Thanks for coming, Rick.

It's great to be here. Yeah. I was wondering why you never asked me. Are you kidding me? You're a hard guy to track down. You're busy. So a lot of places we can go with this. Yeah.

But the one thing. that I always feel compelled to tell people about Rick when, you know, talking about our relationship and going to drive for him and, you know, why I decided to go to HMS and all those things is I feel like a lot of people don't know the family connection with, with, with, with Rick and my grandfather, Robert G. And so, you know, people just think that I know Rick from NASCAR and cup racing but it goes way beyond that.

So you and my grandfather, Robert G, on my mom's side, he was a body man in the business and Uncle Robert G. Jr. works here at Junior Motorsports. Jimmy G. His brother, my uncle also worked here as well. All those guys

were in racing. Y'all grew up in the same town. Yep. We grew up in South Hill, Virginia. And And when I was 15 years old, I went to Robert's body shop, and he put a scoop on my 65 Chevel. A hood scoop. A hood scoop.

What'd you want that on there for? Because it was cool back then. So he had a body shop. How old was he then at the time? Colley, I don't know. You'll have to do the math. I don't know. I mean, he was old enough to own a body shop, I guess, right?

Well, it was called a flying A station. And a couple of the drag race guys were there and Robert. And I was almost afraid to go in there to ask. would he do this scoop on my hood? And he did. And I met him then. Then when I moved to Charlotte in 1977, Robert was running a dirt car. He came over and he said, hey, I've got this dirt car. How about helping me out? And so we kind of rekindle that relationship and I was involved in his dirt car. Why would you be afraid to go in there initially? Was it just in doing? That was a rough crowd, man. Oh, was it?

They were, they were, no, I was, I was just younger than they were, you know, and there was kind of a little click there in the town. And you knew that that was he and his posse. He had a posse. That's where you got it from. The original Dirty Moe Possar. That's right. Well, all right. So I guess I don't even know how he did, but how did y'all get from South Hill down to Charlotte?

Well, I went, I moved to Raleigh. Why did you go to Raleigh first? I was going into school. No, I was going to school. What did you go to school for? I was a work study deal with Westinghouse. I'm actually a tool and dime maker. You didn't know that, did you?

Uh-uh. And I needed a couple more. You did what? Well, yeah, what, tell us about this. What? A tool and die maker, you know, it's kind of an engineering deal, and you design and make special tools. And I needed a couple more years to get my engineering degree,

but I was peddling cars and working in a service station while I was going to school, and I thought I could make more money selling cars. And I started working on them. I think I told you, Dale, I have a $300 opal story. I was working in a station, and one of the professors said, hey, I need you to tune my jag. And I said, I did. And so a wholesaler comes along.

He says, I got this opal I need to put a clutch in it. I said, I haven't got time. I've got to go to school. He said, I'll take $300 for it. So I borrowed the money from the guy that owned the service station. And then the guy that owned the JAG came back and said, hey, I'm looking for a car for my wife. And I said, I got this opal and it's got an $800 loan van. And I thought he'd give me $8 or $900 for it.

He said, I'll give you $1,200 for it. I said, okay, I need to quit working on to start selling them. This was a professor? Yeah, yeah. So basically what I'm hearing is that the professor basically talked you out of school. No, he didn't. No, no. In a way, he did.

He cut you, like the deal in itself made you realize that you could make money in other ways. Yes. From a professor, basically. He has no idea. He had that type of influence on you. I hadn't called him either to tell him about it either. Call him and tell him. It's worked out fine.

It's worked out okay. He might want some conversation for that. So you said in 1977, Robert reached out. You had the City Chevrolet store. and on Independence. The same place has always been. Same place. The same city Chevrolet that was on the car and Days of Thunder,

everybody knows very well. So in 77, I've seen pictures of this car. My granddaddy Robert G. had a dirt car, orange and white, blue 17 on it. And dad had drove this car. Darry Walchrick raced this car and Snowball Derby and other places. But at the time, I think Haywood Plowler was driving the car. Hey, Bois driving it.

Around Metroline. and different racetracks. And so I seen the city Chevrolet on the door of this car. I've got several pictures of it. And so you, Robert comes to you, go down to the dealership or something, and show up in your office or what? Well, there was a guy that we both knew seeing Taylor, and he called me and he said, Robert, Robert wants to see you.

So, you know, we talked on the phone first. Yeah. And then I went over to his house. Next to the Speedway. Oh, yeah. Yeah. And how'd that conversation? you go. He just, it was just old friends and I was intrigued. What did you, what did you give him?

I gave him a little money and some parts. Parts? Fade him in parts. How much money? And I don't remember. A couple hundred bucks. It wasn't a lot. Yeah, right. And he put it on the, and that was it. One time deal? No, no, we, we continued to help him. He'd call you up and he'd come over with some parts. I don't, tell me. I think there was a truck involved. too. Now we're getting the real. Yeah, yeah. There was a truck involved.

But, and then, then I guess, he talked me into the, the bush car. Right. So that was. And my first race,

as partners with him, the first race, your dad won Charlotte. In Charlotte. You got pictures of that. I thought this stuff's easy, man. So that was in 1982, I think.

Maybe, maybe 83, 82, 83? 83, I thought. So filling the gap between 77 and 83, y'all just running, he's just running that dirt car with City on the side of it. Yeah, and I'm racing, I'm racing boats. Ah, oh, that's right. All right.

What's the boat racing all about? Why did you want to race boats? Well, I grew up on a lake, and I always liked fast boats. So I got into, I got into dragboat racing, at first with jet boats, and then with hydros, and I went from, from 100 to 170, and I had a boat that held the world's record at 222. I didn't drive it, but Jimmy Wright and Richmond drove it, and he was killed in the boat. And so when he was killed, I just stopped. And I was storing the boats over Harry Hyde Shop.

And, you know, we were trying to find a sponsor. And Max Mullerman was trying to help me with me. Yeah, he worked on the PSLs and NFL. He's a great sports guy. And so he was trying to find a sponsor for the boats. And he called me one day and he said, how would you like to be partners with, you know, C.K. Spurlock, Kenny Rogers and had Richard Petty drive the car.

And I thought, what's this a trick question? And because I knew Harry was there doing nothing. And so we kind of put a deal together. The night that Richard got caught with the big motor in Charlotte. I was sitting in the garage area with Harry Hyde. And Richard comes over to the car and Harry says, what's the matter, Richard? He said, well, my motor's checking a little big.

And so, and Harry said, well, it'll be okay as soon as it cools off. And Richard said, you can take that one to Alaska. Then he'll go cool. They ain't going to check. So that was kind of the start of, and he, I was in Germany. for a Mercedes trip. Yeah. And he backed out.

Richard backed out. Richard backed out. Yeah. Dang. And so Richard backs out of this potential race team to drive for you. And how, so what did you, what was the next decision for you? You had an opportunity. You had an out, but you stayed in there.

Well, it was already building cars. Really? Yeah. And, I mean, I think we had five people. Now, you're talking about how cheap. you can start a team. I was renting the transmissions in the gears. I was renting the equipment in the shop and renting the shop.

Man. So I started with not a lot, but I thought that we will have STP with Richard. So we were too far along and to turn back. To turn back. All right. So there's a picture of you and dad standing in the garage. Yep.

At Charlotte Murray Speedway, Dad's in this plain blue uniform. Wrangler. But it doesn't have a wrangler. It's just blue. Okay. But it would have probably been a wrangle uniform. I don't know why it didn't have anything on it,

but you're standing there with him. And he was testing your cup car. Yeah. So how did that happen? You call him up and say, I got into a cup car and need some laps. Yeah. And I knew him through Robert.

All right. Okay. Yeah, because he drove your sportsman car, won the race. So when he wins a sportsman race, you're like, hey, man, what's your deal? You got a deal?

Well, how did you get him over? Because he's kind of in between rides, not sure exactly what he's going to do. He isn't with Richard Childers back. He's not back with Childress yet in 84. What is he testing your car for? Well, we just asked him to come over and shake the car down. And so we started talking.

And, of course, I wanted him to drive the car. And, you know, but it's a startup team. Yeah. You know, no history, no nothing. Right. But at least we had a relationship. Sure. And if you see the picture, he drove the car.

Then I drove the car in a suit. with a white shirt and his helmet. Really? Yeah. I've got pictures of that too. I need those pictures. Okay. I'll go to take it.

I've not seen that one. Okay. So you got in the car and drove it. Yeah. How fast were you? I don't. A little bit faster than your dad. Bull crap.

That's the way the story goes, right? That's it. Yeah. I'm going to stick with it, too. So you were, you were trying to recruit him. I mean, there's no doubt about that. Oh, yeah. You didn't, what would you say your chances were at that?

Zero. Zero. But you were going to try. But I'm a car sales one. I mean, I've got to try, right? Yeah. I love that about you. There's been deals that you've made over the years.

And even as recently, I remember when I was on the phone with you, when Dale was out with concussion, and you called and said that Jeff Gordon was going to replace him for a few races. And I'm like, how did you do that? And Mr. H says, because I'm a hell of a car salesman. In the beginnings of your Cup team, when you're trying to build it and get guys, I heard that you'd reached out to Larry Pearson and David Pearson shut it. down. Did you ever reach out to Larry to drive your car? I didn't. Maybe Harry did, but I didn't.

Gotcha. What other drivers have you tried to hire or wanted to hire? What kind of deals maybe that we don't know about it almost came together? No, well, I've got to think now. You know, we're talking to Tim Richmond and he didn't want to go, he put it off, give me an answer, and then I hired Bodine. So you were talking to Tim. Tim first? I was talking to Tim, yeah, first. And he wouldn't commit. He wouldn't commit. He was he doing? I don't even remember. He was probably with the Ramey, I think. Yeah. So the way it happened is I said, Tim, I've got to have an answer. So Bowdoin came in and he was sitting in my office. And I said, well, this was like 10 o'clock.

And I said, I can't do anything because Tim's got a contract in his hand. And he's got a contract in his hand. I've given him to three o'clock. And Jeff said, well, I'm just going to sit here and wait. Yeah, I would have too. So I was like, okay, well, I want you because if you want to drive it, I want, God, it wants to drive. What was your sales pitch back then? What was your go-to point that you were trying to talk these guys into coming to race for you?

What was it? Why should they go to race for you back then? You know, I don't really know other than I told them I was committed and I'd race, I grew up racing, uh, modifies with my dad and Ray Hendrick and, And working on cars, I had, I was in drag racing. And not many drag racing guys have gotten into cup racing, done very well. But I knew that I probably could hire, I try to hire the right folks. But we started with five people.

And Bodine, I owe Jeff Bodine a lot because he took a chance. And, you know, we kind of established ourselves. We won three races that year. But if we hadn't, we were actually, we were going to. close the shop after the sixth race in Darlington, I think it was. We wrecked and I said, Harry, I can't go any further, don't have a sponsor, and I can't put my businesses in jeopardy. And so let's run one more race. And as Harry said, Bowdoin's good at Martinsville. He went up there and won the race. What was a sponsor on the car, Northwestern?

North Western Security Life. What is that? That's an insurance company. I did business with them in the automobile business. Yeah. Why are you chuckling? Well, because a lot of his deals are, you know, he's very good at business to business. Yeah. Yeah. Which is critical to date to today's market.

Oh, yeah. Trying to, you know, your sponsor giving them real value. How much money were you spending a race back then? You wanted to, you're going to shut the team down. Well, I think we ran a whole year in 1984 for $800,000. Yeah. And that was a lot. That was a lot.

Yeah. That was a lot. A lot to me. Yeah. Yeah. But I had five people. Yeah. And Harry was making $500 a week.

Was he happy with that? That's what he asked for. Really? He wanted to race that back. How did you get Harry Hyde to settle down? Because that guy was like suitcase Jake almost. He was moving around from team to team. Of course, he did stay with a 71 car for a while in the 70s, but he was kind of cantankerous, right?

Yeah. How did you, how did you, how did you, how did you? How'd you and him get along? And I know he didn't quite get along with Bodine in the end. He ended up going and working with Tim, which that was a great marriage. Yeah. What made Harry Hyde happy? I think when he finally got Tim, you know, he was, Tim had so much talent.

So did Jeff, but they kind of locked horns. Personalityes? Yeah. How bad did it get? Like what was? Oh, I got real bad. Okay. Yeah, I got.

So we were like halfway through the season, and I had already hired Tim to run the second car. So I told Harry and Jeff, I said, okay, we got to get through the year. We've got sponsors. So you guys need to get along. You can do it. So I got all the team together. And I said, and Jeff said, well, Harry, I'm going to do my best. We're going to get along the rest of the year.

And so Harry said, but I, you're a pretty. and a prima donna, but I love Rick Hendrick more and I hate you, so I'm going to try to do it. And I said, whoa, Harry, wait a minute. Let's go outside. We've got to start all over again. That's not the good first step we're doing into salvaging this. That really wasn't after an hour of me, you know, trying to sell the team and tell, hey, we've got so much to look forward to, you know, we can, you know, just, we just got to hold it together. And I mean, I'd spent a good hour, you know, putting the love on them, you know. I could just see Mr. H at the time when he goes, you're a pricking of prima donna,

and Mr. H is going, I mean, like the things that these drivers and crew chiefs put you through over the years, it's amazing you even come up. But, I mean, this is one good example. It's torture. It's really torture. become worse than it was. I've watched races even recently and where a dad would wreck Modine

and they put you on camera and you're like, we got to figure this out. These guys got to figure this out. Can't keep tearing race cars up. And then if you think about, a lot of people look at Days of Thunder and there's a particular part in the movie where they're tearing up the rental cars

and Bill France brings the drivers in to have a conversation with him in his office and all that. That was sort of taken And a little bit out of context, but from that story of dad and Jeff when they were running over each other. Now, they didn't tear up rental cars. They actually had to ride in the car together, right? That's right. Who made that?

Like, so NASCAR Bill France said, y'all going straightening this out. You're coming to Daytona? We went to Daytona. And you're going to ride in the car together. He made. Well, who did that? Well, we were having a meeting. And it was a short meeting.

In his office. In France. He said, he said, boys, who's in the room? It's Richard Childers and me and your dad and Jeff O'Don. And so, and Bill France. And he says, I've got videos here and we can look at tapes, but you two monkeys are not going to blank my show. Yeah. And he said, so here's the deal.

If they looked around the table, he said, now, Rick, you can go back and sell cars. Richard, Richard, you can, I don't know, you can go back to doing whatever. And he said, and he told Jeff he could go back up north. And he told your dad, he said, I don't know what you do, make a living. But, you know, if y'all are going to be in this sport, this is what's going to happen. And so he said, now we're going to go eat. And so your dad said, he said, I can't, I've got plans.

and Bill France said, there's a phone, change of plans. Dang. So, and then, so he said, now, Richard, you and Rick ride together with me, and Jeff, you and Dale ride together. And they didn't wreck. Yeah, yeah. Did they protest? Did they? No, nobody.

You knew when you walked in there, you didn't have any options, and you didn't get to speak. Well, Dale Earnhardt tried to get out of it. He tried to get out of it with his other plans, but that got shut down. That shut down real quick. He wasn't going to protest, though, riding together with Jeff. No, he didn't. I mean, I think he could tell when the situation was getting kind of edgy. Yeah.

Did you or R.C., go ask the drivers, how did that go? I mean, did y'all talk? I mean, like, what happened? Did you and Richard ever get together before that? Like, hey, how do we sort these guys out? No, we'd look at each other when it would happen and say, hey, we weren't, you know, we weren't driving a car. Really?

And because, you know, both of us would get. upset and yeah and i told i told jeff odine one time i said listen you don't pick up a snake and shake him by his tail let him go you go you know you go rub on him then he's going to wreck you so why don't you just quit but they just couldn't couldn't do it but the bill said okay the next race if you guys even get close to each other i won't have to park the cars and come down out of the tower and inspect them because something must be wrong with them And it might be the end of the race because I don't know if I can get across the track. Oh, it was pretty cold.

That's a threat. That's a big threat. Well, you know, he didn't, he had, he had had enough. Yeah. It was getting out of control. They were wrecking each other in Xfinity races and each other's cars and Granddaddy's cars. So Dad and Jeff got along? That was it.

That was it. I guess the car ride thing worked. Yeah. I mean, man, I would have thought they'd come to blows inside the rental car. but I guess not. So you talked about driving the car to test with Dad, but you actually ran in some cup races. Yeah.

When, I think when Tim was sick, you got in the car at Riverside, right? Yeah. Did you run more than one? I ran too. I ran a Bush race and. Where did you run a Bush race at? And Road Atlanta. You wouldn't dare go to them ovals, would you?

No. Why not? Well, I'll tell you what. One day. Did you think he is a good road racer? Oh, I, no, well, I was decent. Yeah, you ran. Didn't you run into the Southwest tour or something?

Heather, it was leading by like three seconds, and they threw a caution. And a guy by the name of Ron Horner Day. And he was on the show last week. He spun you out. Yeah. And then I gave him a truck to get him in the racing one week. He told that story, actually. Yeah, you really kind of helped him out later in life.

He didn't talk about the time he wrecked you. It's funny how they just forget those details. He acts like he had amnesia. You're driving that car. You're driving that car. You've seen Registics on our Junior Motorsports cars this year, especially having a ton of success with their paint schemes, and you probably wonder who they are.

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Were you nervous going into the cup car? You're into big boys. You're the owner like the owners aren't supposed to suit up. Not really. Actually, I was. That to me is so interesting. Well, I qualified 13th, I think. Yeah.

And then everybody pitted and I stayed out, so I was leading. And then when they got ready to restart, it was all packed behind me. And I thought, I mean, that's when I got nervous. Yeah. But I guess one of the things that I remember the most about that race is Richard Petty was right on me and went in to turn nine and he got under me but then when you come off a nine you go to the flag stand it goes back to the left yeah so if you're on the outside if you don't give the guy room you know he's going into dirt so I didn't give

Richard room and I looked in the mirror and he was doing donuts through his parking lot I don't know I haven't told him I don't know what he remembers that or not you want to what do you want to I apologize to it for that. This is the time to do it right now. You put Richard. You put Richard Chilvers into dirt. Richard, I'm sorry. I really am.

He's coming on the show here a couple weeks. Yes. We may or may not bring that up and see if he remembers. Well, he and I've talked about what if he had, you know, started racing with me. But it's just STP and curb records, I think. Yeah. But I did one other story about your dad. So they used to give you $1,000 for.

the fastest time in Charlotte in the Bush series and the Cup series. So I went over there in your granddad's car and I put a 750 carburetor on it. And so Bobby Allison and your dad and two or four other guys and I won top time. I was fastest. So I'm feeling real good and I go out again and I go into turn one. I look and all I could see was your dad's eyes and his I could see his face like it was, and I pulled right over and came in. And he said, it came in. After that, he came in over to him. He said, what happened?

Why did you quit? I said, I'm not stupid. I was getting ready to get, I was getting ready to get dumped good. You felt like it was coming, huh? I felt like it was coming. Yeah. They used to give away cars, give you a car if you wanted to pole, I think, at Charlotte. And I don't know if Tim was driving for you when this happened, but they'd give Tim the car for

went in the pole. And the guys that don't, the promoters, like I guess Humpy and them had been driving this car around for like four or five months and smoking in it and burning up the day.

Got all kinds of burn marks in the interior and stuff. And Tim's like, I thought I was getting a brand new car. He was so ticked off. They would award their car. They gave him a huge, basically a rental.

It smelled like a pack of marlborals. Well, Schreter got a, his deal wasn't that good. So I told Schrader, I said, look, if you win the pole, I'll give you a truck. And so Schrader won the pole. And we had this four, five hundred dollar truck, rusted out, smoking, just a junker. And so we brought it over to the track and gave it to him. And that was, that was funny.

You remember, I don't know if you remember this, but we always cut up a lot with Schrader. So I put a sign in the back window, the race car. driver wanted a million dollar guarantee. And so Rusty Wallace and all the guys. Of course. It was kind of, it was funny. Damn, I had to hurt his feelings a little bit.

We were just cutting back. It wasn't like real serious. It would hurt my feelings. It hurt my feelings. I mean, listen, we've had drivers in this seat. Old drivers that have been talking about times their teams, they felt like we're, you know, wronging them or something. You know, Dave Marcus was talking about, you know,

how he had to quit at a post-referral race press conference and they're sensitive. You had, now these guys are so sensitive, way more sensitive than we ever thought, right? But you don't understand. Schrader was adopted by my mom and dad. And he,

for real? They loved him. Oh, not for real. Not for real. I thought we were getting breaking news here about Schroeder. But, but they absolutely loved him.

Yeah. So we, we cut up and played a lot. He was like a brother. He was like a brother. Yeah. So one race you ran in, I remember was it,

Topeka, Kansas, the Arca Race. I'd been with Schrader for the whole week. Oh, I remember that one. He's coming on the show to tell that story. We're willing to go into details about this story. Well, we won't save it for the Schrader interview. But we will talk about, I've been with Schrader for the whole week running around and dirt races all over the country with him.

And it culminated with this final race of the week. And Topeka, Kansas, Arca Race, Dad's running, you're running. Aren't you running? Yep. and Schrader and Darrell Waltrip. Yep. And so dad showed up on race morning. Like he's going to start in the back.

Right. Not qualify, not practice or nothing. And I was not feeling good because I'd been with Schrader for a week. I was sick as a dog. But Rick comes up. I'm standing. I'm hanging out at this motor coach that was kind of home base for all the Schraders bunch. And so I'm hanging out with a lot of.

him and I haven't even seen dad yet. And, but Rick comes up and says, hey, I want you to sign, let's sign, I want you to sign a lifetime contract. And I was like, yeah, no problem. Let's do it. Yeah. And so he got, he grabbed a napkin and wrote like a short little two-sentence contract and we both signed it and we should have kept it.

I wish I wish we had kept it. Yeah. And he wanted to give, he wanted to take. it and show it to dad. Did you ever show it to him? No, because your dad was so hot that morning when he got there because he heard the story. Because of what he had done all. Who told him all about that?

I do. It wasn't me because I'm standing by the car before the race started and he walks up to me. You know, hey, catch you by your chala like that when he's talking to him. He pulled him. He got real close to me and he said, I'm going to kill Schrader. And I said, I had nothing to do with it. He said, I'm going to kill him. And I thought, I'm about 10th.

and he's in the back. How long is it going to take him to get to me? Because I'm going to move over. Yeah. But, no, it was, it was, it was funny. He really was mad, huh? I always thought he was sort of messing with Schrader like you were. He was hot.

I mean, he was mad. So him and Schrader didn't talk for probably a year. What? Yeah. He. Over that? Coincidentally dumped Schrader at Pocono the next race, cup race they ran. Whoa.

Yeah, as far as I remember. I don't know who told him what went on, but somebody did. But I was only 16, I think. I drove my truck to the airport to get on the plane. I thought you were 14. I had my driver's license. Well, you couldn't go on a club. I remember that.

I know that. I couldn't go into particular clubs. Okay. But them old Kansas clubs. And I wasn't with them. Yeah. I sat out in the parking lot at the club and watched some guy sell guns out the trunk of the Cadillac. Yeah.

I don't know why, Dillon. Howard Hats a big problem by this. This is where he learned about the aftermarket gun sales. I was so hungover that I hid from dad for several hours that morning out on the pits. Out in the pits, this guy was sitting in Schrader's pit, and this guy's glue and lug nuts on the tires, and I'm just sitting on one in tires, and it's sun's out, and I'm feeling like crap. And dad walked up and looked down at me, and I looked up at him, and he looked up at him, and he, didn't say a word, and I didn't say a word, and he just knew. I knew he knew, and he walked

away. And I didn't think he'd be that upset about it. I think that he, I felt like, damn, you knew this was going to happen. Right. Why are you surprised? Trader was in a mystery to anybody. He didn't know what you got. I honestly believe that Schrader had asked if Kelly could go on the trip and dad turned that down and said Dale Jr. should go. And Kelly, Kelly, Kelly, now that would have been something. And so, Schrader's like, All, fine. And, I mean, we went to, like, four or five. We went to a dirt track every night racing.

It was amazing. And they drank beer, and I'd drink beer with them. He bum rides, didn't he? Didn't he get your ride with somebody after the race and a pickup to get him to the airport or something? He was, it was crazy. Yeah. It was a wild week, and that's just, that was an average week for Schrader. I know, right?

But it was the funnest thing ever. Was he more mad than what he would have been mad at Bodon? Like, compare the two. Shrader or Bodon? Who gets the worse of you? You know, I don't, I don't, that morning, I never saw Dale mad. Oh. But whatever it was going on with them to happen on the track.

But this was before the race. This was family. This is personal. I knew the difference between kind of playing upset and upset. Yeah, that was tough. One of the funnest things that I like to talk about when is the, our first meeting at HMS. He likes this one.

I love this one. This is so good. I'm going to let you tell it, and I'll see if you tell it. And then you fix it. We've talked about it on this show before, and people were surprised. But I had, and you might not know everything, all of it, but you probably do. We went to, we had went to Joe Gibbs. We met with Joe and the owner of the Redskins, Snyder in his house, right?

Yeah. And they showed us a contract. and I'd been making, I think my salary was 600,000 or something at the, I can't remember it might have been twice that. But it was comparable to most drivers. It was in the lower end. So I was, but I thought that was a lot. You know, I'm like, man, you know, this is great.

And then when I went and seen this contract with Joe's handed to me and Kelly, it like short-circuited my brain. Like I couldn't believe somebody was wanting to pay me this kind of money, right? And so when I went to meet with you, my heart was to drive for Rick. HMS to me all these years had been this perfect, you know, opportunity and this best team. And they just won and one and one and one. And they had a really amazing reputation. Plus the family connection.

I had I had been racing for family for all these years. and that's such a security blanket. Yeah. And I'm like, man, I kind of have that same security blanket if I go drive for Rick. He's like, family, he'll take care of me, give me the benefit of the doubt. And anyways, we go to the meeting and he's got that paper. And he slid that thing across the table. And I was like, I ain't looking at that.

I was like, I don't even want to know what it says. You really said that to him? I don't want to see what that says. He said it. And I said, well, okay, don't look at it. It was actually, it was, it was, everybody was a little nervous, you know, and I really wanted to drive the car. And Ricky had told me my son, he's going to drive for us one day. So I never thought it would happen.

And so I had labored over this contract for like, with Marshall for like weeks before I was going to show it to him, you know. And so we go in the room and sit down and I said, well, here's, here, Dale, here's, here's what we can do for you. And he said, I don't care about that. And I thought, give it, though, okay. Let me have it back. Don't look at it. But he said, but then it was kind of funny because Marshall was in with us. And Marshall was kind of, he was kind of uptight.

And so Dale, we were talking about it, Dale said, I thought we had it. We were all done. He said, I have a couple of things that I want. And I'm thinking, oh, here we go. This is going to be big. This is going to be real big. And he said, I want the skirts on the car, painted the same colors of car.

And it took me about a second to say, what? It still blows my mind. Okay. And I think the helicopter, you won the helicopter for a couple of races. To Martinsville, Darlington, maybe. I guess. Unlike any negotiation you have ever had. Never, never, ever.

I mean, don't care about the money. Don't care about that. Yeah. And somebody had to eventually look at that paper, though. But, yeah, well, I told, I said, you and Kelly sort that out. Yeah. Whatever y'all agree to. I'd already had more money than I knew what to do with.

So, like, money wasn't, money didn't motivate me and make me happy. You know, what made me happy was, my car looks. Side skirts. Well, if the side skirts aren't painted, ruins the entire car. And I drive the car. I want the dang thing to look good.

And then... I never understood drivers that don't care about what their car looks like. Oh, we had two sponsors hooked up. And so we're in a meeting with them. And we go through everything with them, all the big stuff, the numbers and everything. And he said, oh, there's one more thing we've got to have.

Dale's got to design the car. They said, what? No, we can't. I said, that's the deal. Dale's got to design the car. That's a deal breaker. And I'm sitting there. We're looking at all this money, and we're going to blow it over.

He's going to design the car. Yeah. But you did, and it looked good. Yeah, it's all right. It's all right. I look back at, I remember sending him the paint schemes. And it felt frivolous. Like sending Rick the ideas that I had.

Right. I'm like, hey, Rick, you know, I want to be involved and I want to send you some of these and you can show them to whoever. And I felt frivolous. Because it was. I mean, like, it felt petty. Like he doesn't have something else in his life going on at the moment. He's got to sit there and mess around with paint schemes. That was the most important thing.

Well, in my life, that was at the top, near the top of the party list. Had you had problems with side skirts? I mean, did you ever get your opinion sought out at DEI? Where did you get burned on this? We had black side skirts, and then I think the last few races we might have started paint them red. Okay. So, you know, if you really need to know, the first time I ever saw all this done really

well was when Rusty Wallace started his Xfinity team, he had a bright, yellow and black number 66 car, and I think Hank Parker's brother catfish drove the car. Billy, yeah. Billy Parker. And then eventually Rusty's son drove. but this car had these side skirts painted on it, and it was freaking beautiful. And it looked like it was so low to the ground

compared to other cars without sidescurs. I said, I'm hooked. Never, for the rest of my life, I'm going for painted sidescurs. Well, go ahead. Finish the time. Well, I was saying, like, I was going, I'm the one out there driving the car,

and I felt like, God, that's kind of a good thing that the driver cares what the car looks like, and it's a motor. Like if you like the way the car looks, you're going to want to take that car and do something good with it. You know, I never understood drivers that don't have an opinion or a care, I guess, about what the car looks like. You know, to me, the design and the beauty of the car, like trying to win best appearing car and trying to have good craftsmanship and trying to build a pretty race car from the inside out has always been something that was important to me. Well, you did, Jimmy did that.

Yeah, my uncle Robert. Yeah, with Jimmy Johnson. Oh, Jimmy Johnson did that with the ally car, yeah. He sent me. Well, he said you worked with him on it. Well, I just gave him my opinion, but if you call a couple text messages back to forth working with him. But he sent me his, he's like, hey, man, I'm going to help design this car.

What do you think about X, Y, and Z? And I was like, this is what I would do. But, yeah, so Jimmy, maybe I rubbed off on this big time, seven time champion. Listen, you know, we learned. from Kislauski a few weeks ago that Mr. Penske is deeply involved in the paint schemes and the looks. It checks off all the paint schemes. How about that? Yeah.

Did you know that? I did know that. I heard that. The question is, I'm not so quirky after all. Right. So how much do paint schemes in the look of your race cars actually matter to you? It matters a lot. I like for the cars to look good.

Yeah. And there's some paint schemes I haven't liked, but usually between the driver and the sponsor, that's what they want. So you don't typically get involved. Have you ever just absolutely killed a paint scheme idea saying that will never be on my race car? You have. I have. What was it?

I'm not going to say. Do it. I wasn't going to ask, but I knew he would. I knew he would. Nope, nope, not going to happen. Was it reset? No. Was it Dale?

No. Why can't you say if it was so long ago? I'm just, I'm not going. You don't have to say just nod. Just go start going to drivers. Well, I do know. I came up with the paint scheme for the 48, the new one. You did?

No, no. I came up with one and they killed it. Jimmy killed it. Oh, no. He said, that's too old-fashioned. That's too conservative. Really? And that's when you do a bouncing back for it.

So I actually liked the one that came up with. Yeah, I think it's a good-looking car. The ally looks good on the hood. What was a conversation like when you sat down with LaTart and told him that he was going to be my crew chief? Did you sit down with him? Yes. All right? Yeah.

He thought he was getting fired. Do you know that? No, I didn't know that. That's what he says. He thought he was getting let go. If you go back to that particular point in time in that career, in my career and his career, when he starts to tell the story, I'm thinking that he's going to say that when he heard the news that he was going to be my crew chief,

he was going to be a little disappointed. Like, oh, man, I'm going from Jeff Gordon to Dale Jr. has been struggling. This is going to be a hard, tough hill, but he was actually relieved because he thought he was going in there to get let go because he and Jeff hadn't done so well. I just felt like

he would be exactly what you needed. Boy, was he. And so, I mean, I think the day after I told him, he flew up to your house. He drove up to your house and spent the day with you. Yeah. Yeah. So So that's, this is, you're amazing.

See, the Tart's amazing too. And like you said, he, when he heard that news, he went home and thought about it. And the next day called me and said, let's get together. You know about this deal? We're going to work together. We're going to do it together. Because he felt like that it was sort of his last opportunity too, because he had kind of failed and this thing that he and Jeff had going on at ground to a halt.

And he looked at me and he kind of said, this is our, this is both of our final shot. You know, we're going to have to work hard and make it work. I said, you tell me what you want to do. And I'll do it. You sort of felt like you were at the, uh, out of options as well. So Rick had delayed and delayed and delayed like you're sitting across the table and I don't want to put you in a uncomfortable situation. But I felt like that I had gotten.

a lot more leeway than a lot of guys would have in that situation. We had struggled, we'd failed week after week, year after year. And I was like, man, you know, I don't know how much further Rick can go with this, the way it's going. I don't know where the sponsors are mentally over at all. So I felt like, yeah, when, and we, you know, we'd change things. We'd change crew chiefs. We'd change people. We'd move things around.

but this was a big shift moving me from one shop to the other with an entirely new group of people. And I thought, yeah, this has to work or this will be the end. But it ended up working out. How close was he in his assumptions of the situation? Was he sort of out of options? No, no. We just, I believe, you know, we're all in the people business. And okay, we're kind of business you're in.

It's got a mesh. It's got to fit. And you've got to get that right combination. And I could see it and feel it. It wasn't right. And I felt like Stevie could do it. And Dale told me a couple of times that that shop was never as good as the 48 shop, 2448. So I knew I had to get it in his head that he was going to be in that shop with that team.

And Steve was already there. And so it just worked out. Yeah. And, no, but I never, I never thought about this as the end of it. I thought about it. I'm not going to, I'm not going to let him fail. You know, I'm going to, we're going to keep going, changing until we get it right. Is it because there was a confidence issue going?

I mean, I mean, he pretty much had lost his confidence as a race car driver, right? I mean, it was building him back up where he, you know, he used to feel like he was the best driver on the racetrack. When you don't feel like that, you've lost an edge. You've lost several tents, right? Yeah, well, we, we didn't give him. what he needed. And we just, again, the combination wasn't there. But because we started off a bang. We'd go down off Daytona. Like one everything. We went, I remember we went to Vegas to test and we were fast. And all the cars were fast. All of us were, but we were, me and Tony Jr.

were really good. And Jeff came over and said, dang, he's like, you're impressive. And I thought, dang, this is awesome. Like, it's working. And then we went to Daytona. And, won the shootout and won the qualifying race. And, you know, we had a great season all the way. I mean, we weren't winning races, but we were running first and second in the points. You were running up in the points. Yeah, me and Kyle Bush were first and second.

They were right together. And then he dumped in Richmond. Yeah, but then we went on and won at Michigan, and we had a pretty solid year. It didn't finish out in the playoffs very well or whatever. But it started out great. Yeah. And it kind of went off the rails.

Yeah. Why? Why did it go off the rails? The me and Tony Jr. We're getting pretty hard on each other, especially on the radio. And I think, so for me and Tony Jr., that was kind of normal. We did that all the time back in the bud days. But when Rick and them heard it, they were like, dang, this is bad.

These guys. I want, I want, I want, I don't know who won the race, but one of my cars won to race. And here comes the media. And I thought they wanted to talk about the race that we just won. They were going to talk about Dale and Tony Jr. going to add it on the radio. And I don't remember all of it. But it was just, it was so much focus on you.

And everybody was expecting, you know, a lot. Yeah, DW said, and we were going to win six races the first year. Oh, yeah. And everybody was listening to everything y'all said. Yeah. So it was a lot of pressure. I know. A lot of pressure on all of us.

One of the worst, you're always doing a lot of great deals, but I think one of the worst deals you ever done was swapping that helmet for that race car after Homestead. I do think you got the short end of the stick there. Why did you do that? I couldn't believe it. So he calls me up and he says, hey, I got a question.

He's like, after the race at Homestead, I won't a helmet. And I said, great, because I've been thinking about that car. He goes, that's, That's a deal. It was like, dang, that was easier than I thought. Well, I thought you deserved it. And, you know, I'm happy with the deal.

I got the helmet. You got the car. So you collect helmets, but also you collect a lot of guitars. Yeah. What's the deal in the guitar collection? How many you got? And you're all autographed, right, by different. I got over 200 now.

Geez. Yeah. Why, what, do you just take a good, If it's autographed by any singer, or is it a particular? No, no, no, no. I love music. Yeah. And I can't sing or can't play, right?

But in 84, our race in Nashville, we won, Chad Atkins gave me a special edition guitar. Yeah. And then that was the beginning of it. And then Tim Richmond was friends with Bruce Springsteen. And so I'd go to the concerts with him, and he gave me a guitar. So that's how it kind of started. Yeah.

And then we won Richmond. with the rock and roll 400 and that was a beautiful guitar. Dang. And so, and then through the car collection, guys, you know, entertainers started coming. And now it's amazing the people that have actually played there inside the building, you know. Do you have a Huey Lewis in the news guitar? I do. Because Tim and Huey Lewis were pals.

Yeah. I was listening to Huey Lewis this morning. Was you? Yeah. It's amazing you said that. Yeah, underrated. I wish he. I wish he was still touring.

He can't. Something happened to his voice. Yeah. Where is the next batch of cup owners coming from? You guys, you know, you and Penske and all those guys been owning cars for a long time, where's the next group coming from? You know, I don't know. I think it could be, I think with what they're getting ready to do with the new car

might bring more people in. Yeah. And you just never know. I mean, you think that somebody, like maybe some of the drivers, like Brad or some of those guys. Yeah. At some point, my side, they won't own a team. Yeah. What happens to Gibbs, Penske, Hendrick, when you guys are gone?

How do you position that company and who, you know, to continue? In our situation, we've got my son-in-law is the president, but also Jeff Gordon as a partner. so he'll be there to take care of it. And you and him have just talked about that. You're like, I don't care what you want to do. You're doing this. If he wants to turn it into a boat racing operation. If we get him to come to work.

So you think that, why do you think the new car would create opportunities for new owners? I think it's going to take, it's kind of a, it's a car that you're going to buy all the pieces from someone else. Yeah. You don't need the engineering to build the chassis. Somebody's going to build the chassis. So no 15 or 20 or 30 different chassis out there. And the body's going to be a flange-fit body. And the components will all be numbered.

And if it does what they say it'll do, and you can run in multiple races. How many automotive stores have you opened up with drivers? You got one with me, one with Jeff. Jimmy, Terry Labony. Terry Labani. Who else? That's it.

Have you opened up stores with anybody else that would be? Oh, Boris said. Boris. Boris. Yes. Yeah. You and Boris are pals? Yeah.

Yeah. He came to you with an opportunity or what? The difference between Boris and all your other guys, he works. He doesn't work hard. I went out there one day and he's breaking down tires on a tire machine. So you. You're saying that Dale Jr., at Dill Earnhardt Jr., Chevrolet,

he's not breaking down tires and he's not... Yeah, he does go down and pump the guys up. I need to go down there. He does. It's been a while. I'm due for a visit. You are due. Yeah. You want to go?

Yeah, I'll go with you. You want to go together? Yep. That'll be fun. What have you learned about eyeing talent in drivers since you started as an owner? How do you find talent? What do you look at?

Well, you know, I just look at raw ability and car control. And then, you know, have people tell me, hey, you can watch this guy. Yeah. Have you watched that guy? And James Finch was my talent scout. Right.

So you got some scouts. James told you about Chase? They did. Yeah. He's watching Chase down there in the Derby in Florida. Called you up and said Chase pretty good. I didn't look at him. So I did.

And there was a lot of guys that we. Who told you about Jeff Gordon? I saw him. You did. Yeah. Where at? In Atlanta. Sfinity.

I was in Atlanta and just, I don't know why I was there on Saturday. And I was, you know, that was one track that had a pedestrian tunnel. So I'm going through the tunnel, getting ready to go up in the suite because we had sponsors at both days. And I see him come down to straight away and go in the corner. And I thought he'd, you know, blown a motor because the tires were. You could literally see the smoke off the tires. And so I said, well, watch this guy. He's going to crash.

And so they said, well, that's that Gordon kid. And I'd watched him on that Thunder Sprint Car show. That deal, yeah. And so I went, this is the weirdest thing. I went to motorsports the next couple, I think it was Monday or Tuesday after the race. I walk into Jimmy Johnson's office, the guy that ran it, not the driver, Jimmy. and Andy Graves was sitting in there. And I said, that's a shame that Gordon kid's got a contract with four.

And Andy said, you don't have a contract. He had one the next day. So, yeah. Dang. But it took a chance with him because we had no sponsor, no nothing, and just felt that strong about him. You talked about how Tim was a little hesitant to sign a deal before Jeff came. How did you get Tim to come drive for you?

Well, Tim wanted to come after the first year. And so he came and, of course, he and Harry didn't get along the first half of the season. No, the mood, Days of Thunder, that story's true. But they went test. And then they hit on it. And man, this second half of the season, I think he won either set. Yeah. It's first to second.

What did it take for Harry Hyde to like you then? You had to agree with. Harry. He had to. He sounds like Tony Sr. Yeah. Like if you didn't have any talent, he'd tell you to your face. But Tim Richmond had talent.

Jim Bodon had talent. Harry was a better salesman than Harry could manipulate things. And so he was slick. He was smart. But Tim didn't care. I mean, I remember at Riverside, Harry said, okay, this modus fresh. this motor's got 50 laps. This one's got 25 more horsepower

than this motor attempts. I don't care. We'll put it with whatever we want in the car. Yeah. You know, he didn't care. Sure. Is that a good comparison, Tony Sr. With Harry Hyde, I mean, because like, we just,

people that didn't know him, I just, I love the stories about Harry. And I'm still trying to figure out, like, what exactly? We've asked people that knew him on, on this show. Like, you know, what was Harry Hyde really like? Well, I went over there when my boats were stored, and he had this trailer.

house trailer, mobile home. And he had pictures all in it. I'd go in and he'd tell me stories. He was a storyteller. And he told me, he said, I could build a car today, go to Charlotte and win the race. And I believed him. I mean, that's how convincing he was. But Harry was, he built his stuff bulletproof.

I mean, it was heavy, but he had helicopter coolers, oil coolers, and his stuff didn't break. Yeah. When I was a little boy back in 1987, I had a driver that I pulled for. I liked the underdog, and Jimmy Means was an underdog, and ran his own equipment

and typically ran in the back half of the field. But when Tim was out of the car there in the middle of that season, you put Jimmy in the car. How did that all come about? He ran the one race at Charlotte for y'all. Yeah. And he qualified, didn't he? Fourth.

Yeah, I think. And he ran really well. Yeah. I think he got a wreck early, big wreck. He got a bunch of cars. Dad was in it. It was one of those deals that we just wanted to give him a chance. Yeah.

Well, what did the, like just, hey, we need a driver. Who do you want to give a chance to you? Jimmy means, I just think we should give him. How did that happen? You saw him do something? Well, Harry thought he had talent. Wow. That's cool.

That's a hell of a compliment. And then somebody told us, hey, this, he's really struggling. I want you give him a chance. Yeah. I still give him parts and motors. Yes, you do. Yeah. For his exfinity cars.

Isn't that cool? You know, that's a common denominator that we get a lot now that we've been talking to people in the sport a long time, is that there's always a Rick Hendrick helping me out story. Sure. It's really, it's been happening. I think it's a testament to what you've done for people in the sport.

And you've got a lot of people drive for you at this point. I don't know who it was. It was Matthew or Dale, but listed all the drivers that have driven. for Hendrick Motorsports at some point in our notes, and I couldn't believe how many people that is. How many is it? Here.

Jeff Bodine, Dick Brooks, Brett Bodine, Tim Richmond, Jim Fitzgerald, yourself. Jimmy Means, Benny Parsons, Darrell Walschard, Rob Maroso, Ken Schrader, Bobby Hamilton, Tommy Kendall, Kyle Petty, Greg, Sack, Stan Barrett, Jimmy Horton, Ricky Rudd, Hutz, Vanderm, Seral Vanderm, Jess Gordon, Alisher, Jr., Terry Labony, Jeff Purvis, Jack Sprague, Tobadine,

I'm Ricky Craven, Wally Dollenbach, Jr. Randalladay, Jr., Jerry Nadu, Jimmy Johnson, Joe Nimichick, David Green, Brian Bickers, Kyle Busch, Casey Mears, me. Brad Kislauski, Mark Martin, Casey Kane, Riggins Smith, Chase Elliott, Alex Bowman, and William Byron. If my math is right, that's 45. Golly, I don't remember that. I don't even remember. But, you know, back, back, I guess, in the late 80s and 90s, we decide that we want to run another. the car and put somebody in it. We do it.

A lot of times, too, Rick, in some of those scenarios, there was some injuries. DW had got hurt at Daytona. I think that's how Cyril Vandermer, I don't name that. How are you going to say that? Cyril Van Damir. He's probably one of the greatest rally drivers, and he drove the GTP car. He could not be beat until if the car broke, but he was good. Yeah.

So you have it. That was an extra car, I think. Yeah, Craven had some injuries that you had some guys feeling for. Terry had a few races he missed. Yeah. You did. Regan. I did.

Regan had a feeling for you. A lot of those drivers are won off races, but still a pretty cool list. And I ask you all the time and we'll let you go after this. And then sometimes, I remember we did the movie Days of Thunder. Yeah. So we'd have to take like six. I ain't counting those. You're not taking?

No, we didn't count those. Bobby Hamilton. Bobby, well, yeah, Bobby's in there. But I thought, yeah, Bobby's. Bobby Hamilton's in this here list. I thought. Oh, gosh. Tommy Ellis also drove one of the movie cars there.

He's not in the list. Yeah, he's not in the list. Is that just cup, by the way? Just cup. Okay, just cup. Yep. So we missed one. Tommy Ellis, I guess.

That's when they put a $300,000 camera in their rear bumper. Yeah. And I said, you don't want to do that. At Bristol. And so we got to have it. and I think fifth or six lap. Somebody destroyed it. It destroyed it.

So you literally entered cars to the race for the movie. Yeah. Had to. Yeah. That's amazing. There was a, they two cars started at the back of the Daytona 500 that year, and they were tasked to run just 40 or so laps, and then they were going to pull in.

But they were out there on the track, just getting shots of them. So, and that was, that's what made the bit, I think that's what made that movie so good is the ability to be able to have, like, real action. We went to Phoenix and took Bobby Hamilton in the black 51 car. Yeah. And I think he's had on the pole.

Your movie? That wasn't supposed to happen. That's hysterical. You know, speaking of Days of Thunder, it blew our mind that Steve LaTart had never watched the movie, being that he's such a Hendrik Motorsports guy for all those years. You know that? I didn't know that. That was the one flaw in his whole tenure at Hendrick Motorsports,

He had never seen Days of Thunder while he worked at. He might have won a few more races had he watched that movie and known the connection in the link. It blew our mind because, I mean, that's basically the Hendrick Motorsports, you know, story. Even if it's fictitious in the movie, it's inspired by you. And so as Dale Jr. can do, as only Dale Jr. can do, he guilted Steve on social media and, you know, got Junior Nation behind it, forced him to watch the movie, and then he came on the show to give the review

of it. And he liked it. Yeah. He liked it. So I know now you can rest easy knowing that Steve You were friends with Tom Cruise. You still are today. Still are. Yeah. Why did you get so heavily involved helping them make that movie? Because y'all had to help them, y'all provided a lot of race cars and equipment and

y'all were advising and so forth. And, I mean, did you worry about losing a lot of money there? Well, the way that happened. I'd been a little nervous. I didn't have any money. Well, I did spend a lot of time building cars and so forth. And we probably put too much effort in trying to help them. But Tom and I and Paul Newman drove together in the SCCA.

Ah, Tom Cruise raced? Yeah, yeah. SCCA? Yeah. Yeah. That's going to be the odd history. Oh, is it? Oh, awesome.

All right. We're going to hear that. I guess it's an odd history. Yeah. And so one day we went to Dayton. and just testing, playing around. And Tom was driving the Bush car. And he said, you know, we need to make a movie about this.

So the next thing I knew. What? Yeah. Hey. And so then Robert Town came to town and went up, talk to your dad. And Robert and I are still friends. Who? Robert Town.

Yeah. So I was at the farm shop with Kelly when Tom Cruise walked into door to sit with dad. And him and dad went in his office for about hours. and just sat. And the rumor is that they tried to talk dad into playing Rowdy Burns, through the bad guy. I don't know that. Yeah.

I don't know. I don't know that. We were hoping. We were hoping he would confirm that. Well, Rick, I was listening all, I was listening all those drivers, and you've been around this sport for a long time, and I asked you this all the time, why are you still doing it? Like, you got all, you could, you're old enough, successful enough.

You got a car dealerships just cranking along day after day. Why don't you go sit on a yacht somewhere and just goof off the rest of your life? What makes a guy like you or Penske or, you know, other guys similar to keep going? What's the motivation? For me, it's the people. It's the people at motorsports that have been there from the beginning and 35 years, you know, giving the guys their 20-year watches. And you've built something.

I didn't what all the people together did. That's special. And we've kind of built it one brick at the time from 5,000 square feet and five employees to what it is today. So 500 employees? 600. Yeah, you gained 100 employees since I was sorry. Just that you got that money back.

You got that money, but you were able to invest it for 100 new employees. I have to pay him so much. That's right. That's right. There was a reason he didn't want to look at that. piece of paper. That was a hundred employees worth of salaries on that paper. And I look back at like meeting Chase when he's 14, meeting William up here when he was about 14. Yeah. And seeing those guys come along, seeing the young guys become crew chiefs, it's just, it's been, it's special.

I mean, to me, it's, it's the reason to continue, uh, is the people, being around them, watching them not just exiting and, you know, something that's been special. Yeah. Yeah. I called him one time. I don't remember what was going on in the sport, but something was happening in the sport where everybody was, everybody was a little nervous.

And I called him one time and told him to take a million dollars off my salary if he needed to. That's right. No, wait, nervous about. Just there was some. The economy was. Economy, yeah. Oh, yeah. back in 2009, 2010.

I'll say that's the only driver that ever I've been associated with in all my years that said, hey, I want you to take a million off of my salary and give it to the guys in the shop. Don't have to cut anybody's pay. I'll give up a million dollars. Nobody else ever. What was your response? Pretty amazing. I was shocked.

I mean, I just shows you. He was like, you're, you sure? It shows you the character he has. He was like, and his relationship with people. You're feeling all right. He was like a little, he didn't know how to take it. But if those sideskirts changed, then that deal is off. I want my million dollars back.

That's right. I've always been just fascinated by y'all's, the dynamics of y'all's relationships. I mean, you know, you told a story about, you know, the actual deal and, you know, coming to work for Hendrick Motorsports. But you have so many more. I love the story in the general's office, you know. Oh, my God. You know, when we were up in Washington, D.C. Oh, golly, yeah.

That was a rough start. I guess that's my point, is that you've always, at least to us, you've always sort of laughed off moments. None of the National Guard generals saw me. Well, tell them real quick what happened. How could they not see you? He was sitting on the couch. He was sitting on the couch, and they were going through. You had a four-star general, and you had a,

my bird colonel that was going through the charts and the program for racing. And you started snoring. You put your head down. And the general said, that's enough of that crap. We don't want to talk about that. He was tired, too. Putting him to sleep. I was freaking out.

I thought, this is it. One day on the show, you have to get Kelly. And you have to get her to tell the story about her not going because she had a, stomach problem. Yeah. And you called her and said, hey, Kelly, where are you? And she said, I can't go. That was to this deal.

Yeah. And you said, if I got to go, you got to go. And I'm listening to the end of it. And all of a sudden, he said, hello. Hello? That's so funny. When we sort of had agreed to terms on the deal or whatever, the contract, I said, Rick, I said, I ain't, now you know I ain't never tucking my shirt in.

Oh, yeah. I'm not going to be like, you know, the most of the drivers that you've hired. And he goes, I, yep, sure, you got it. No problem. Well, I took a shirt in. We go to this deal to meet the generals at the, at the, we're in Washington, D.C. You can see the Washington Monument out their window. Right.

And he and I got my shirt tail tucked in. and I've got on some nice pants, and I'm walking into the building. And I'm just thinking in my mind, like, where's Rick? And I turn around, and Rick's behind me taking pictures. That's, yeah, that's a moment. And he was like, I need to document this. Yeah, yeah, he was the paparazzi at that moment. He was real proud of himself.

He's like, look what I got done here. Y'all had a lot of fun. I tell you what, those years, for all that we went through and you went through from a competition standpoint, and then to, you know, end up with a tart. The dynamics of y'all's relationship has always been fascinating. And you're, listen, I'll go to my grave talking about how special you are to a lot of people. And, you know, we're definitely two of them.

Well, listen, I've watched one of the things that amazed me is we were always been real close. And so we're down in Key West. You know, he's a bunch of guys and having a good time partying. And then about a year or so ago, a year ago, I look up, he's coming down the dock with a stroller, and I thought, man, have times of change. I've seen it from the early days to growing up being a special father loving his little girl. So we're family, and I treasure that, and we'll always be. You guys are special.

Yeah, Rick and Linda have come by the house. I took time out of their day. Come by the house at Sea Island. She'll be here in a bit to say hey to you. Cute as a button. Yes, sir. All right, man. Well, we're glad he came.

We'll have to get you back on here in maybe some time next year. We've got more stories to tell. More stories. Lots of stories. Check out Dirtymoe Media on Twitter, Facebook, TikTok, and Instagram.