The Dale Jr. Download - Steve O’Donnell: NASCAR's Next Big Move

Episode Date: October 8, 2025

Dale Earnhardt Jr. sits down with NASCAR President Steve O’Donnell to talk about NASCAR’s latest announcement: increasing horsepower at select tracks, Playoff formats, the lawsuit, and more.In his 30th year with NASCAR, O’Donnell steps into the president role after Steve Phelps’ promotion to commissioner. He dives into the Next Gen car, the push to bring in new OEMs, and the future of the All-Star Race. O’Donnell explains that NASCAR’s top priority moving forward is getting back to its roots, with returns to fan-favorite venues like Bowman Gray Stadium and North Wilkesboro.It’s a can’t-miss conversation about where the sport is headed and how NASCAR plans to stay true to what made it great. 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.

Let's dive into one of the reasons why you came out here today. Yes, sir. I guess there's a change that's been discussed and been debated for a while now about horsepower with this car. And so there's a commitment going forward to go up on horsepower. So still a little bit of debate, but I think, you know, talk to probes about this today. So we're going to go every track under a mile and a half. You're going to see 750. Yeah, there were some debate, Darlington, Nashville.

Road courses? Road course. We're going to see it. So, yeah, $750. The following is a production of Dirty Moe Media. Hey, everybody. It's Dale Jr. back again for another episode of the Dale Jr. download. And today we got a great guest coming in here,

Steve O'Donnell, the president of NASCAR. We got a lot of questions to get to. We probably got about three hours worth of questions, and only one hour with Steve. So we'll have to be selective, and we're not going to get to everything that you want to know about. But we're going to try. All right, let's bring Steve in and get started.

All right, so Steve O'Donnell and Adele Jr. Download. Great to be here, man. Thanks for coming. Yeah, thanks for coming through. I've known you a long time. I, you've got a new role in NASCAR. You were appointed the president of NASCAR. They moved Steve Phelps up to commissioner.

Has there ever, there wasn't a commissioner. No, there was. Now we have a commissioner. Yes, sir. What was the reason for the shuffle on around? You know, I think looking more at the day-to-day, I'd say I kind of follow more of the Mike Helton role, you know, came from the competition side. I did. Try to move over a little bit to the business side and merge those two. And Steve's role, you know, looking at kind of where

the sport is now, it's obviously much bigger. Moving around with some of the connections he has, you know, with the other leagues and letting me, you know, work on the day to day and make sure make sure we're not screwing anything up, which I'm prone to do every once in a while. You've been in this deal for a long time. 30 years. Yeah. And you've been, you've seen all levels. You've worked in just about all departments.

What, I guess, would you, for somebody in basic terms, what would be the area of the sport that you have authority over today? Yeah, that's a great question. So all the areas in the sport kind of report up through me. I would say, you know, started out on the marketing side, right? So I was a victory lane guy with Bill Broderick. Really? And I was handing out hats and, you know, selling the decals on the front quarter panels of the car. So got to see a lot, do a lot, learn a lot of the folks in the industry, you know, looked at really all aspects of the sport.

But went through the weekly racing series and touring series. So that gave me a little bit of background of kind of how the sport works, and what's really important, right, the grassroots of the sport. I was told that you, you know, you've been to hundreds of race tracks. I have, seen them all. So we had, when I was working on it, we had about 110 weekly tracks. I think I went to 80 of them, a lot of banquets. But it was cool because that's where, you know, the passion of the sport is, right?

You got the young up-and-comen driver, and then you got the families there just wanting to race and wanting to go out in their neighborhood and have fun. And, you know, like the Bowman Gray's, right, you see, you know, Slate coming up, you know, with the Myers family and you see that generation. To me, if it's ever tough on a Sunday and, you know, it gets tough, you know, in the cup garage. And sometimes it's a little bit too much about money. So when you go back to the grassroots, you're reminded of what's important. So right now, I'd say concentration more on just making sure we are delivering on, you know, kind of where the fans want to go. And so the direction for us currently Dale is really getting back to our roots.

I keep hearing that. Yeah. Phelps was in, sorry, Phelps was in here when I had him on. I mean, I don't know, two years ago. And he said the same thing. And so when you say that, like what are you trying to say, what are you trying to tell me? Yeah, so I think that's fair. And I think, you know, over the last couple years we've maybe gone a bit of a different route,

trying to be all things to all people. That's not us. And when I say that, it's just being authentic to who we are. So, you know, when people pine for the good old days, right, sometimes you can look at our fan base and say, oh, that just wants to go just back to only Southern, right? And not maybe, you know, if you're a fan in New York City, you know, how do I relate or how do I come? You know, the good old days to me are you going around to music videos with a rap star, right? It's Jeff Gordon on Saturday Night Live. Those are also the good old days where you didn't have to almost fake it.

that that's who we are and so when I say that it's you know we're we're proud of our sport and this is who we are come join us you're going to have a hell of a time and we got to get back to that we've got a little bit trying to be all things all people a little bit too defensive and end of the day man we're going to have fun there's too much a serious business I get it but but having some fun yeah all right so let's let's dive into one of the reasons why you came out here to Yes, sir. I guess there's a change that's been discussed and been debated for a while now about horsepower with this car. And so there's a commitment going forward to go up on horsepower.

That number is 750 from 670. Yep. Was this an easy decision? What are the things that had to be sorted for this to happen? People think that you can, you know, there's a lot of people who think you just change it and just do it. But with the way that NASCAR works today, there's a ton of collaboration with the team owners and even the tracks to an extent, I suppose. But mainly, you know, I guess, you know, in the old days, Bill Jr. would walk in and say, this is what we're doing. Yep.

but it's but it's but it's but nascar has positioned it and allowed you know more people to be in the conversation and particularly in this case the teams so when you want to make a change like this um how long does the you know it doesn't happen overnight why doesn't happen overnight people because people think it should or could why can't you just do it yeah it's a good question so let's just base it on horsepower right so why 750 why not 800 why not a thousand So if you look at where we are today, where we can go without completely changing over the industry. You know, no secret, right? It costs a lot of money to go racing.

And so whatever you do, you want to make sure that if you're going to change the horsepower within the car, you've got to match it up with the arrow, you've got to match it up. And you're breaking, all these different things come into play. You know that, right, from car stores. You make a change. You've got to factor in tires. Where are we going to all those things? So 750 we looked at, we hear the fans, we hear the industry,

Yes, we want to try and see what we'll work here. If you went beyond 750, we looked at almost $40 to $50 million cost to the industry. And so if you look at our job is, yeah, you want to make a call right away, but you got to think about the out years. And so we're looking at Dodge coming into the sport. We're looking at other OEMs coming into the sport. And then our current partners. Those guys like the engine today don't want to make a change unless we're going to stick. with it. So we looked at this and said, all right, we can go to 750. You guys all good, Toyota,

Chevrolet, Ford. Yeah, we're good with that. But we potentially want to go to a new engine architecture. That's a three-year runway. So we didn't want to... Like what? You name it. It could be, it could be what you got on the street. It could be, all kinds of things. They just want the, they want the opportunity to be there. They want the opportunity to be there. They are totally open to any new OEM coming in and looking in a new architecture, but don't want to change just for change's sake. So when we looked at this, we said, all right, you know, we got Dodge coming in.

We know what they want to go. Can we put a hemia in this? What can we do, right? Honda potentially. So any of those things, three-year runway, we didn't want to say, all right, it's 1,000 now and then just kidding three years from now. We're changing it again. That's hundreds of millions of dollars to the industry.

So that's why. And I know fans, you know, who cares about it? the money, just do it. But in this case, we want to take a step. We want to marry that up with Arrow. So we're going to do a test in the offseason at North Wilkesboro. Yeah. I think some of the drivers are happy about that. Just looking at what can we do with the tires now. Good year stepping up, not perfect, right, but they've taken a step. Yeah. And so you look at tires, horsepower, some of the arrow things, let's take a look all mile and a half and under and then go from there. What are some of the arrow things that y'all talk about? Do you get in the middle of those

conversations. I let that, I'll screw it up. So I let it, you know, John Probst and the team and really working with the race teams. You know, they've got, we've got the smartest guys in the world, right, working on those cars. So I think what you'll see us do is we've got the drivers with the, with the council with Christopher Bell and others, Joey Lugano, talking about, hey, let's try some of these things. Working with three of the OEM manufacturers and crew chiefs or heads of competition, putting some ideas together, going trying it at North Wilkesboro and see what happens. When does that happen? That'll be, I think, end of the season, early December. So the goal would be, if we find some things, let's go. If we don't, we've at least started that process to keep it

going. Where will we see the horsepower? So still a little bit of debate, but I think, you know, talk to props about this today, so we're going to go every track under a mile and a half, you're going to see 750. Yeah, there were some debate, Darlington, Nashville. Road courses? We're going to see it. So, yeah, 750. All right. Have y'all had that on the racetrack? We, man, I got a check. I believe we have. You know, we've done a lot of sim work. Yeah, I'm sure it's probably been out there. Yeah, we'll see. I think it'll be good. Are you going to run? Yeah, I guess that'll be happening at Wilkesboro. Yes, sir. All right. There was a similar test at Richmond a year or two ago that netted really nothing,

which was kind of surprising, but yeah, the drivers would try some pretty big swings and not really feel much. but I'm hoping for the best in terms of being able to discover some things. You know, where do you fall on the conversation around the car? You know, I would imagine that having been a part of seeing this car get developed and it's a project that NASCAR was massively involved in and spearheading the next-gen car, it's hard not to take it personally when you hear criticisms around the car. and so forth. So, you know, everybody's got opinions I've had a million on this show about the car and what could this be?

What could that be? Where do you fall on your urgency, I suppose, and how much the car may need to change, could change? Is NASCAR locked down, stubborn to change on the car? or are you like wide open, whatever the teams? Because I know that, you know, there's a, everyone believes that NASCAR is this big decider, right? And that everything that happens in the sport is because that's what NASCAR has chosen.

There's other things that, there's other things that have happened in the sports such as number placement and so forth where NASCAR was like, hey, how about, y'all just put it where you want, right? NASCAR really just said, hey, the teams can have. Yes, sir, yeah, exactly right. And the teams are like, no, no, no, we want a specific. thing. So where does NASCAR, where's NASCAR's role, I suppose, in the change in development

and process and progress of the car? People are like, oh, the car's not changing fast enough. Yeah, so there's two things I would say. So there's NASCAR and what I try to do, and I think we do a really poor job of this, right? But there's NASCAR officiating and then there's NASCAR the sport. Yeah. And what's tough for me sometimes is, I mean, I love the sport, you love the sport. And what happens oftentimes, oh, NASCAR, what are you doing? And most of that criticism is pointed towards our officiating, which, hey, we get, that's part of it. But there's still a love for the sport. And it's one of those things that I wish we could separate the two a little bit. Having said that, next-gen car, let's talk about how we got here. Right. So the sport, as I was in the competition

space, ownership, impossible to keep going. We were going down a path of destruction. Every owner was a car parts manufacturer, every part in piece, and they were spending money on things that didn't make the racing better, and ultimately said, you've got to save us from ourselves. What can we do here? We also looked at the ownership that we had in place. No new owners really coming into the sport, impossible to even come into the sport. And you're probably going down a path where two or three guys won every race, and not a path we wanted to be on. So the idea around the next-gen car was can we come up with a model that brings the cost down, bring some new ownership in, shores up the current owners to at least make it where you have a viable pathway to go forward.

Not perfect, right, but we brought in all the race teams. We talked about, you know, RFP in every part and piece on the car. Where do we want to race? What could we do? How would this model work? and for the most part if you look at short term the racing certainly challenge

short tracks road courses the intermediates I mean I came from a time if you put one more intermediate I'm going to kill you right and now why don't we have more why aren't we going back to the Coke 600 you know why are we at the roval

all those conversations so that's good we got to fix the short track stuff but then you look at future we're always open to change so tires I think they're moving arrow the one piece that I really look at, and I think our group does, is you've got this car, you've got some things contained from a cost standpoint, but what does everybody really like? It's the ability for a team

to maybe tweak on the car, find an advantage, do something cool, what's the next iteration of that that come from a race team? Now that we've got the parts and pieces, I think long term, you could look at maybe a race team is making parts again, maybe some different things you can open up. Could you ever look at a cost cap, right? So where you open those things, up. But we've at least kind of stopped the waste list spend. And now we want to get it back to where, you know, engineer can come in, tweak on a car or OEM can say, hey, this is my IP. I want to drive something, you know, from a Ford or new technology standpoint. So we're absolutely open to continue to tweak on it. I think we just had to almost stop the bleeding of the cost and now

really concentrate on you got the baseline, make the racing better every single day. The car is though still relatively expensive. When I look at the next gen, the technology is incredible. But the identity, I think, of our sport has been a sport with some physicality. And while these cars, and the drivers are still driving them in such a way. uh and i wonder if it was as nest i you know when i look at the car personally i i wish it wasn't so technology i wish it wasn't so advanced more old school yeah i look at you know even parts and pieces you know and and and what it must cost to you know to to to to to make an a frame or or or you know

the whole hub assembly on the on the on the on the car um and i i i kind of wonder if we if you did if it has gotten easier for somebody to come in and and participate and the teams will say you know you hear some teams say that things aren't you know they hadn't seen the benefits you know of the yes and no right I mean you've seen Penske come out on the record for us I mean Justin Mark's going out there winning races 2311 yeah 2311 came into this sport because of the next gen car so um that's what I So it's not perfect by any means. But I think the baseline, when I talk about that, could you get back to some of those old school parts or whatever?

I think you can now. What happened with us is there wasn't a lot of great trust between our competition group and the teams, right? We've done a lot of work to, I think, improve that, have some good dialogue. And it was at a point where we asked the teams to kind of participate in, you know, hey, do you want to make this specific part? And it financially didn't make a lot of sense, right? And probably wasn't a lot of trusts back and forth either. Fast forward now to where those conversations are happening. Hey, what if, you know, could Roush make this?

Could someone else make this part? And I think that starts to potentially open it up. Not sure we'll get there. But I agree with you. I mean, getting back to that identity of what it is versus just this car over here that no one kind of put together. There's some work to do there. But, you know, it's tough to argue with some of the racing that's gone on, some of the drivers that are out there. But we can certainly improve.

That's what we want to do. I would say it's like the car, standing next to one of those cars physically is amazing. It's a badass race car. But it's like trying to race a Ferrari at a local short track. You know, it just, there's a bit of a disconnect, I think, in terms of the cost, you know, of what it, you know, what it is to put one of those things together and then to send that thing out on the racetrack at Martinsville. Yep. It just doesn't like make sense in my head. but um we'll work on yeah the um we had you know just recently over the past weekend we had some um

some comments on the radio uh during the roval that are questionable um nothing to the extent of what we saw at martinsville last year that you know brought up the the conversation around race fixing and so forth and we've had this conversation before brian france talked about the hundred percent rule and all that years ago um Do you guys, my personal opinion on what we saw this past weekend, I don't, it doesn't make, it don't matter to me. But I wonder just how much NASCAR is listening to teams on what they're telling their drivers. Where do you, we talked about it on the show yesterday. With Robin. I've heard too with Robin Perman.

Yeah. Well, yesterday we talked about my team, my guys are like, where's the line? I'm like, I don't think there is a line. I think it's like interpretation. Like I have to be okay with you, NASCAR, saying that was too far. This wasn't too far. And I have to be okay. I'm okay.

You tell me. But there's, you know, are the things, I guess, that the teams cannot say, absolutely cannot say in terms of information they're feeding the driver about what the point situation may be in the middle of a race? Yeah, no, it's tough. How do you manage it? Yeah. So we monitor every communication from every race. race team. Sometimes I would say that some of the race teams should be a little smarter and what they communicate, right? Because it sometimes makes it easy to look at things. But they've certainly gotten

smarter and different code words or whatever it may be. But it's tough. You know, we put a format in place, right? And we got to live with those rules, whatever happens. So certainly when you look back at Charlotte, you know, would there have been some questions if someone got in, sure, we would have had to continue to look at that. You know, we kind of set our... ride on this one. But it is it's a tough line to draw. We've got a lot of smart folks that kind of beat everything up, look through all the facts. But I will tell you, Dale, that if we're going to make a call, we got to be damn sure we're right because there's so much riding on this. And so all the communication and everything, you know, we better be able to go in and stand in front of our peers and

say, here's at least why we did this. And if we if we lose or get overturned, okay. But we need to be able to stand up against it. And so a lot of work goes into those things. We don't take it lightly when we're issuing a penalty or having those conversations. I mean, I learned the hard way in competition. When I first came up to the R&D Center, you know, it's hard. Kevin Harvick told me that you should be the most hated guy in the industry, right, and if you're doing your job right, tough to do, right? You want respect from your peers and folks. So you go up to R&D, you issue a penalty. What's the first thing that comes from a car? Oh, man, you're killing my sponsor you don't like me you're biased right so you think about that and you go maybe you need to be a

little bit more lenient not not letting everybody get away with everything right but just ah you know you're 50 50 let's let's kind of have a have a conversation and let that go what happens they see you doing it they do it the whole garage is doing it and now you just right it's you're done and so i learned the hard way coming up initially that hey you you got to be tough you got to draw the line it's not going to be fun, but it's your job. And we're the government, right? People aren't going to agree with you, but that's just what you got to do. So a lot of thought goes into it.

And every race, I mean, every second of every race, right? There could be a call. And you've got to be ready to do it. Yeah, I feel like I agree with that. I do feel like that NASCAR is at its best when they are very strict and stern. and matter of fact, there are some areas within the sport to where we have catered to

or dampened or softened some blows to try to try to take care of some teams that, you know, as far as their partners and so forth and how detrimental some things can be. But I guess, you know, I'm, I kind of feel like, look, man, it's... Here's the rules. Here's the deal. And I go back to, you know, it's old school. And when I say being more authentic, that's part of it.

Like, here's a deal. Come with us or not, but this is where the sports going. And these are the calls that we're making. And one of the things we did in the past that was a little bit maybe more difficult where you had, you know, some of the relationships fraying is we'd make some of those calls, but we wouldn't explain why. And so the difference now is, you know, Joe Lugano and I have had this conversation, you know, I can get his opinion. and we go a different way. And he'll say, man, NASCAR doesn't listen to me. No, we listen to you, but, you know, seven other folks said that's not the way to go. So as long as we listen to someone and at least get back to them and say, here's why we made the decision, then we're doing it right. But that's what I don't think we did as well in the past. We're getting better at that for sure. Talking about the format.

There's conversations. There's been a committee that I got to be a chance. I got a chance to be a part of, which was a lot of fun. I learned a ton. And we are talking about the playoffs and how we decide our champion. There, you know, I think everybody's got this expectation that there will be a change and it might be mainly a change to how many races might be in that final round. I don't think you're here today to announce anything.

But, you know, how close do you have your ear to that conversation? Do you have a preference? Where do you follow on that? You've been in a sport a long time. You've seen it all. I've seen both sides. I've seen both sides. I've seen it all as you have.

So I'm in that conversation daily. I think about it all the time. Here's where I'm at, first off, right? We got rules in place for this year. What I don't want to do is take away from whoever wins the championship this year. Those were the rules. Everybody knew them. Let's go race.

and whoever wins that championship, I'm going to stand behind that driver and team and say, that's our champion. Haven't said that, right? So what gets me to think about, what gets me to think about it is Christopher Bell, right? So Guy who will come in, have a conversation with me behind closed doors, doesn't go out and tweet about everything and say, hey, here's what I think, here's what I think, just gives me an honest opinion, which I agree with of, hey, man, if I roll off. 10 wins in a year, right? And I go to one race and a couple other guys get into me or whatever

and I'm not the champion. Okay, four years in a row that happens. I don't want the next Christopher Bell, who's 10 years old right now, thinking about NASCAR, wanting to go to NASCAR, wanting to be a champion, say, huh, this is a little bit more of a chance on a one race, right? And I also look at it like Christopher Bell, to me, is a superstar in our sport. You roll off four championships in a row with eight wins and a body of work, whatever that may be. That's good for our sport. People are talking about him. And so there's a couple things.

That's one I think about. I think about the Daytona 500. I think about how big that race is. And one of the narratives is, oh, he's in the playoffs. Man, it's the Daytona 500, right? Yes, it's in the playoffs. I like you have to win. Nobody can question.

I will argue till I'm blue in the face. that the racing has changed in terms of if you got to win the race. Some racing has changed. So there's some of that element I don't want to go away. And then just looking at, you know, future stars, drivers, drivers coming in, having a multitude of races potentially that you got to put a body of work together, right? So I think about all those things, I'm not giving away where I'm at, but I completely recognize, you know, where we're at today. I also recognize that. I also recognize that a number of folks that are out there pretty vocally were part of this, right? And everybody said, hey, here's what we're going to do. And everybody signed up for that. So I think all I would

want is wherever we go, you know, we're going to communicate that, but we need the industry to buy in. We need, to me, the biggest thing is we need the drivers to feel like whatever's in place I had the shot and, you know, we can start questioning, right? If something happened, hey look in the mirror versus maybe something happened in a one race scenario. That's where I know. Yeah. I feel like it's been a profound conversation really, honestly, all year long.

And I agree. I think I have the opinion that I'm thankful that we're not going to announce anything until prior to the championship being decided, which is great, because I too don't want to discredit this year's champion, whoever that may be. And I don't want to discredit really the champions that won under this format. I think this format is the most difficult format. Is it my favorite? No, but it's the absolute most difficult, like pot luck.

God, anything can happen, one race deal. And so I'm looking forward to whatever that may become. And I'm almost thankful that the sport became open-minded to the conversation. Yep, right? I think, so I can't believe I'm sitting across from Washington sweatshirt. is a Giants fan. So you get other sports, right? And so a Giants fan, Giants won the Super Bowl.

They're a wild card. I think most people in football are okay with that. They're like Giants Super Bowl champion. Our fans aren't like that. And that's okay. But I think a format was put in place. Yes, to attract new fans, more exciting. But you can't do that at the expense of kind of where your existing fans are.

And so that to me is part of the conversation, too, of thinking you can do some things that may bring in new folks, but when I say being authentic, be authentic with who you are, and those fans will come and newer fans will come. And I think that's a little bit of a different when you say, what does that mean to me? It's more of that. Yeah. Hey, everybody. It's Dale Jr. here. You've probably heard me talk about my Chevrolete dealership in Tallahassee, Florida. Part of the Hendrick Automotive Group. We've got a huge selection of new and used vehicles, and we specialize in commercial trucks. In fact, we're proud to be

the number one seller of crane trucks in the country. Whether you're upgrading your daily driver or growing your fleet, our expert team is here to help you find exactly what you need. But just don't take my word for it. Here's TJ with a recent customer review. 10,000 out of 10 recommend Alex and Brandon, the general manager. They treated me and my son like family. After bad experiences at four other dealerships,

Dale Jr.'s Chevy changed everything. Thank you for my 2006 Chevy Tracks LS. My life changed on September 5th, That's the experience we aim to deliver every day. We've got hundreds of trucks in stock offer free delivery anywhere in the continental U.S., and we're part of the top-rated dealer group in the country for online reputation. Check out our full lineup at Dell Jr. Chevy.com Chevrolet. Together, let's drive. Let's talk about the lawsuit. How can we make this go away? Oh, man. So... Why is this not going away?

I would say, here's what I can say. I can't get into too many details. But what I can say is we didn't bring a lawsuit. We don't want a lawsuit. I've spent 30% of every day working on a lawsuit versus talking of fans and getting the sport going, which is really tough. We filed something yesterday and we asked for the court to set up a mediation. The reason we did that is because we had a mediation in New York. I can't get into the details. We don't want to be in court. Don't get me wrong. We'll defend ourselves in the sports to no end, but we want to see this go away. So our next step was to try and get in front of a judge in Charlotte and just say, hey, what can we do here, make this go away? That's our goal. I'm still not sure what the other side wants.

We don't believe it's a case that's a monopoly. We believe it's a contract dispute, which it is what it is. But our goal is to make this thing go away and get back to race. Do you think that, so in the past month or so, a lot of, you know, everybody's been talking about discovery, discovery. Yeah. All these things that might come to light, NASCAR having to open up its books and so forth. And there's been a bunch of anticipation around that. But some text messages did come out. Yeah. Did you know, I guess, in the days ahead that that was going to happen?

Yeah. So let's go back to that, man. I'm, you know, I'm a big boy and not afraid to shy away from stuff. Right. So this was two years of a negotiation, right? And you know me well enough. I'm a passionate guy. Where my emotions on my sleeve, probably too much, right? But in the text messages, I'll just refer to mine. What came out was the way it was presented in court was that I said, F the teams. I didn't say that. I said in April, the context was, if we did this deal the way it was, I felt like it would be an F to the team. I was defending the teams to my boss, which was Jim France. And so I was a little disappointing that it came out initially without the context. Hate the language I used, right?

You never want to see that out there. It is what it is. But where we are today, you know, Jim France comes in my office and, you know, I'm like, oh, man, this isn't good. You know, I'm trying to defend the teams on this. And he said, look, I don't hire yes, man. I hire people to tell me what they feel is right and how do we get to a good deal. So I feel like, you know, all that's out there. I knew it's out there.

There's no surprises. The other side's kind of emptied their bucket of here's all our text messages. It sucks. It sucks getting deposed. But it is what it is. And I stand by the fact that, you know, I was trying to put a deal together that that worked for everybody. We made some changes since I said that before we got to the end deal.

And, you know, I feel like we got to a place that other teams, you know, got their arms around. Yeah. in the last week or two there was a lot of teams that came out wrote some notes of support of the charter system and I feel like while they didn't basically come out

and say hey we saw with NASCAR on this whole thing they were in support of the charter system and very in support of something some settlement some way for this to be to be handled did that move the needle at all 2311

all those guys, they came out just right after that and went, well, this basically just kind of claims, you know, makes all the claims we're making. So what I think that did, Dale, is it helped, you know, it's being positioned that NASCAR wants the charter system to go away. You know, Jim France, the one thing about Jim is charter system is in place and said, I will live by whatever we signed. He had a choice, right? He could have said, you know, we don't want, we don't want charters in the future. No, we've seen the value grow for teams, which is awesome. And what we wanted to come out there because you go to trial and we saw it written was the charter system could be up in the air. Well, that's not good.

That's a lot of, that's a lot going on there. So I think the team saying, hey, there's a concern here. If this goes to trial that anything could happen to the sport, including charters going away, that's a concern. And I think it's a position that, no, don't worry about that. We see it as a concern. And, you know, if it goes away, it's not a win for NASCAR. that charters went away. We support charters. We've got 13 teams that signed up with them. Yeah. That, I don't understand how now that charters, now that the charter system exists,

now that people know there's real value and the ceiling is still unrealized with the charters, it could be in the hundreds of millions of dollars down the road. I mean, these things are multiplied like crazy in terms of value. I don't see how you put the tooth base back in the tube. even if NASCAR did prefer that. I don't know that that's realistic. No. In any way, possible. Nope.

So what is the one thing? I'm sure there's not just one. But if you went to 2311 tomorrow and said, we're going to make them permanent, does that end this battle? I have no idea. How could you all not know that? How could, y'all have been in mediation, you've had conversations. How could you not understand?

understand what might trigger real progress. Yeah, I'm going to leave that deal. I mean, honestly, there's been one mediation, as I've said. That's it. Was that the August? That was court appointed in New York, yeah. So there was no, there's been no other conversation, there's not been a time at any point in all of this where everybody's kind of been in the room or at least on the call to say, hey, is there a route? Not to my knowledge. Damn. All right. And so, So the mediation in August was managed by this dude from the NBA. I'm not sure where he was from. He was the mediator.

Yeah. Some guy that's from the NBA. And you guys want a court-appointed mediator. We'd like to see that. We'd like to see we didn't get anywhere, right? So we thought, hey, someone in Charlotte can help us get somewhere. Let's do that. The mediation in August was very brief.

Pretty brief. Yeah. You walked in with some terms? I think so the way mediation works, and I can't get into a ton of detail. All I can say is that I think there's an understanding from both sides. Hey, what do you think, right? Leave, talk to the other side, what do you think? And then is there any proposal you'd like to put forth?

I think that happened. And then, you know, meeting broke up. So there was a conversation between both parties briefly. But, yeah, no real progress. So, you know, hopefully we can get something going because our goal is... There's a... This has gotten... I guess the next question, I guess, is this is...

The way to get you guys to settle is everybody's got to swallow pride. Everybody's got to... This has gotten personal. It's already, you know, it's very personal on both sides. And the dislike is apparent. How does... You got to fix that, I suppose, at some point. because look, I mean, in the end, no matter what happens,

if you go all the way through court, you're going to be here, NASCAR's going to be here, and they're more than likely going to be here. So, I mean, you'll have to get in the sandbox at some point. Yeah, I don't disagree, but all I can say is when you get sued for something and you want a settlement with things that have nothing to do with what you sued for, it's hard to make sense of that. So that's the struggle right now. And I can tell you that, listen, willing, able, our folks have said, you know, and that's

why we filed what we did. Nobody wants to go to court from the NASCAR side. We want to concentrate on racing, man. That's all I can say. Well, if it does go to court, then there's, no matter, I think both sides would appeal. That's another year, year and a half. Yep. I feel like that this has been detrimental.

thousand percent i would i would compare it towards it's not exactly the same but i in terms of how it makes the fan feel i would compare it to work you know work strikes work stoppage that we see in other sports those are absolutely detrimental when there when there aren't any games but this this is a turnoff i don't disagree i know and so but it's it's hurting you and them it is but um you know we're going to defend what we believe is right that's all i can say is uh we put something in place that 13 other team owners signed up for. 13 other team owners are actually working with us right now to help grow the sport. And, you know, we've got to defend what we think is right.

Is it fair to say that, you know, without the charter system, without when the charter system wasn't there and there wasn't a guarantee from NASCAR that this, you know, if I own the charter right, now that the agreement's in place, I'm guaranteed a certain amount of money. Before the charter system for the fans, what was I guaranteed before? Yeah, no, I think it's a very fair question. So you look at the original Y charter system, right?

The original reason for a charter was guaranteed starting position. And so what happened, you and I go back, right? When we had 60 cars at Daytona 500, Tabasco would come in, right? Millions of dollars sponsorship going home, going home, going home, And at the time, we all thought, ah, it's okay. It's a big business, NASCAR, and sponsors didn't, right? That was a big blow. And a lot of money left the sport from potential sponsorship.

So the owners asked for permanent starting positions. Now, the challenge with that, if you're NASCAR, right, if you just sort of looking purely at the fans, and I don't know if you see this, but fans missed the days when the Gatorade, when those races made, yeah, it mattered. Yeah, it mattered. Right. They love 60 cars. Who's going home?

All that went away. That's okay, because we said we want guaranteed starting positions. So then the guaranteed starting positions were also, okay, what money can we also guarantee as part of this? So we looked at that as well. So the original deal was guaranteed in every race, and there'd be a set amount of money that you could be based on. And then the third piece was this value.

So I 1,000% agree if Junior Motorsports was a cup charter owner, you know, 10 years ago, 20 years ago, right? Put your life into the sport. You said, hey, that's enough. What did you have? And that's not good, right? You've put all kinds of things into the sport. So if he wants to get out at some point and that value is now going up, that's great.

And I think that will help, you know, someone invest because they see their value going up. So those three things were the reason for charters. Those were the reasons when we went back in. We felt like we delivered on those. And that's where we were at. The money comes from the TV deal. Was that money, you know, where was that money before?

Was that money getting to the teams through points, through race purse money? Where was that money coming to the teams before? Through the purse. And so am I basically getting the same money that I was getting before or am I getting new money, more money? No, so all the new money from this new TV agreement, you know, fans I know hate talking about money, but all the new money that came in went into the charters for this deal. So the new money that we received from kind of baseline to this one, all went to the teams. But that's through guaranteed.

I like the old winter circle, those types of things. So we have, hey, you show up, you're guaranteed this amount of money. And then there's the other incentive to you've got to finish within X, Y, Z, and you get paid. Yeah. And so, but that has ratcheted up through the charter deal. Yes, sir. What I would have been guaranteed or expected to. to earn over the course of participating all year long

versus what I would get today now in the charter deal is much more money. So I, outside of the charter not being permanent, I don't see why I would be upset with the charter deal. Like if I don't own a charter. No, no, I agree with you. I think the... I don't own one.

I've never read the agreements fully. And so I don't pretend to know everything about them. but what when I I'm close enough to to some owners and close enough to the sport to go all right to your point uh I now have a charter that I could sell 50 million dollars if I could you know if I wanted to also am guaranteed 10 to 15 million dollars a year uh to you know money that I can I can use toward my program and I'm guaranteed a spot um I don't know what else I would want then otherwise I mean the person side of it. I don't know if that's even a big deal. I don't know that I need it to be

permanent because I don't know that you could turn it off. I think that's our, that's our challenge is when we looked at it, you know, I think it's almost how you position it to. You know, you look at, you know, other sports, you know, there's renewals, right? And so we looked at it right or wrong that, you know, you need a renewal term. You don't know what the next TV deal could be, so we wanted to be able to negotiate. So why wouldn't you just say, hey, you the other permanent, but we're going to write an agreement that your take on these. I mean, other than you making them permanent, what are you doing? What are you worried about? I would just, you know, you could just make a permanent. Why couldn't you just do that and just say,

hey, you're getting a percentage of the TV deal, whether it's $10 or $800 million, you're getting this percentage of it. And if this whole thing goes down, fails, you know, just because of this management we all we all failed yeah why couldn't you just say yeah they're permanent going do what you want with them i think a lot of things would would come with that right well uh you know there's there's some open teams too that that part of the sports been built on um you know they still not like they could still or they could not like all you got figure all those things out um so i think look short term we got a charter agreement we got a long term charter agreement do we want to look at other ways we could tweak it and both sides say how can we make this better?

A thousand percent. Was that one of the big things back when the teams were all pushing for? Permanency? Permanency. Yeah. So is there anything else that's not being discussed that they wanted that they had? Because I talked to some owners and they'll say, I got a good deal, not everything, but I got most everything. What are some of the other things?

Aside for maybe just more money. More money. Yeah. It was big. Talk to me about. So talk to me about one particular thing that I learned recently. And this is unique to our sport. And maybe why we can't compare ourselves to deals that other sports have done with owners and so forth.

NASCAR tracks. NASCAR owns a few. Marcus Smith owns a few. Maybe there's some independent owners out there as well. they are in a different they are not considered similar to other sporting events arenas like baseball arenas and NFL arenas and what I believe I've learned is that if you wanted to upgrade or change or do anything to your ballpark, you have some benefits and some breaks that allow you to be able to do that in such a way where you're paying a discount,

I suppose. Where NASCAR doesn't have that. Our racetracks aren't under that umbrella. So if we want to upgrade the press box or the TV booth or put in a new grandstand or put in a big screen, that all has to come out of pocket. Correct. And there was a real opportunity, I think, in the last bill that went through the big, big beautiful bill or whatever for that language change and it didn't happen.

And so the tracks are, and I think I did not know that that was the case. And I'd always wondered why our tracks at times are sluggish to upgrade, why we've kind of lost, the gap has grown, I think, right, between. what I experience as a fan at a NASCAR race versus what I might experience going to a Washington game or a Giants game, right? And is that a big deal? Is that a, is that a, is that, is that. I think that's important.

Problem, yeah. So, so, so let's talk about like when you asked about negotiations. You can explain that better than me. Yeah, no, no. I think that was, that was good. But when we talk about sitting across the table and negotiations, right? and you're told that you should never race at Darlington. Why does NASCAR race at Darlington?

Get out of there. Go to some new city or go to somewhere else. I look at that and be like, what are we talking about here, right? Arlington's a part of our sport. But, you know, that's set, right? And so that's kind of a framework coming maybe more from an other sports thought process that, you know, you can just go to anywhere city and say, hey, build us a new track and, you know, we're going to bring the cup series here.

That unfortunately doesn't happen for us. And there's reasons for that, right? So Marcus Smith invested a ton of money in these tracks and took a bet, right, on a sport and said, I'm going to build these tracks. Jim Fran, Independence, Indianapolis, all these folks did that for the most part without a lot of public funding. And then you look at our sport and you can criticize this and this would be fair of you built racetracks. You didn't build entertainment facilities, right? And over the last 20 years, it changed to where you'd have multi-purpose facilities.

We were stuck with racetracks. Your viewed as just a racetracks. We're viewed as just a racetracks. So you can do some concerts and different things. But in terms of the setup of what you can do, a bit challenged. And then you look at, oh, I'll just leave, go to somewhere else. That's our sport. You know, that's iconic.

You know, these racetracks are iconic. So you've got to catch up and catch up. We probably didn't do as much as we could have, you know, 20 years ago. but I think you can see the investment we're trying to make at certain tracks to catch up. And we're trying to make the tough decisions of what's a facility that, you know what, it's just past its time. And we're not going to invest here. We're going to move this.

So you've seen us try some things like going to Chicago, going out and doing some different things, going to San Diego. And if I go back and you and I go back a long time, and I know you're a short track guy, if we had some things to do over again, you know, one of my first. races, you know, the old Bush series, I'm at Hickory, right? You're at Rockingham. You're at North Wilkesboro. And some of the crowds were challenged a little bit, but we just, we're going to Vegas, we're going to California, we're going to Texas. And the way we did that was not the right way. Like, we kind of felt, we've left people feeling deserted. And so one of the biggest lessons I've learned

over my time here is we can go to San Diego and we can try something new. You better be at Bowman Gray. You better also be kind of mixing and matches. And, you know, with what you're doing. And so our mindset now is more so, can you go in and improve a short track? Can you bring a cup series? Can you do something cool, modernize a little bit, and then introduce some new tracks? But that is our big challenge. The idea that you're going to go somewhere and your Formula One and they're going to write some $40 million check, I haven't seen it. And so you got to invest what you can. But try and catch up and try and do some things that are maybe different. I don't know if you've gone, like, if you go to Spa in Belgium, it looks like Watkins Glen, right, when everything's gone.

But when you go to a Formula One race, it's like, holy shit, this place looks awesome. But it's all temporary stuff that they bring in. Yep, I went to the Miami F1 race. Yeah, yeah. All of the buildouts for all the hospitality is. It's unreal, right? There are three, four-story buildings. They just plop up for a weekend.

So we're learning some of those things, too. How can you do some, you know, Red Bull coming back? Some of those things, like, what can we do to, you know, kind of fuse some things that are going on at the racetrack as well. But it is a challenge that you pointed out. Yeah, I was, I didn't know that the tracks, you know, I kind of, I kind of didn't know that the tracks were basically in such a tough spot, you know, comparable to other sporting of, you know, venues and that they weren't viewed similarly and allowed the same benefits,

I think, in terms of being able to upgrade and so forth. And we're trying. Like, we're seeing some things. Like, Iowa was a good example, right? where we went out there and, hey, we can bring cup race, they'll do some things. Maybe I'm repave in or some of those things, which is good. But not to the point where we're going to go build you this Taj Mahal. That's not happening.

Those days are gone. Yeah. If they change legislation, that opens that. That helps. For sure. To allow you to be a multi-use venue. Yeah. And I think, you know, you've seen, you know, one of the things I forgot to talk about

with the playoffs, right? One of the biggest things, at least I think our fans wanted was you got to rotate wherever you're going, right? We want to move around. So going from Phoenix, we're going to Miami. To me, that needs to continue. And I'm not advocating. We're going to be at one rate.

I'm just saying in general where you finish the season. And part of that could be, hey, let's get ahead of it now. If we're going to go to Charlotte, if we're going to go to wherever, we're going to bring you this championship, your season-ending race. We need some help for that for the industry. And that would also go to the teams and the fans as well. Hey, everybody. You want the latest Dale Jr. download apparel?

visit shop.dardimomedia.com. We're always adding new stuff all the time, especially like when we say something silly on this show. We'll put it on a t-shirt. Again, check it out at shop.dirtymodea.com. Is there anything new on the schedule to discuss? Huh. I'm trying to think what we did.

Yeah. We've had... Where should we be going, Dale? Yeah, well, that's the great one. Bowma Gray's badass. I'm glad you're doing that. It was a pretty fun experience. just as a fan.

The San Diego Street Street race is going to be great. That's a new market, new city we've never been in front of. I've got friends out there that are thrilled.

Mexico was great. I enjoyed it. I had a blast. You know, when you were there, it was awesome. It was. And you guys did a hell of a job for us.

But just, you know, it's, listen, I'll be honest, it was good, it was a good attempt, but, you know,

all right, turn the page and let's try something different. Chicago land coming back. Yeah. That's going to cost some money. It will. Yeah, definitely will.

We're not going back as it looks right now. So we're putting some money in there. Is that like, what's the attitude around going back to Chicago land? Is it, all right, we'll do it and see what happens? Or is it, do you feel like it's got a long-term? Potentially. So we're not giving up on the street course either. So I think you could see, I could see something where you're doing both.

I could see something where you're swapping. But Chicago land for us, you know, we're going back to put on a heck of a race and see where we go. You know, I think we've, from the last time we were there, right, our racing was pretty tough. We'll bring back the Tropic Andoacandle ball, right? I have that thing cruising around there. But, no, we want to go there and it's going to look good. Going back to Miami for the finale, you left there. We did.

And I'll tell you this, man. I understood why we left but I will tell you that there is something about the vibe of being there in that time of year the weather's great but being in that racetrack knowing that all three series are going to decide their champion

it's got a feel it's got a feel and I don't I'm with you I don't know how to explain it. It always felt like you're I don't know if it's driving down from North Carolina but I always remembered, you know, Sunday night, you know, whenever Monday you're driving back. It just felt, it felt right.

I think we'll bring that back. We're doing a lot to the track. Guillermo down there, promoters really doing a lot of cool things that I think fans will see like, wow, this isn't the homestead that I left. This is going to look really cool even compared to last year. But I agree with you. And that's what we've got to bring to any new market we go to. There's a big conversation around the All-Star race.

It feels like, you know, Marcus is going to kill me. but it feels like that it was a collateral damage for you know everything that happened and everything that changed Wilkesboro getting a points race badass like I am thrilled and that's that's like the final you know the final leg in its entire story arc of coming back right is to get the points race but it feels like that the all-star race there was really nowhere else for it to go and that Dover we all can go, you know, we all can go, you know, man, I can think of a bunch of places that it could go besides Dover, but that's where it's headed. That's where it's headed. Yep. How do y'all, you know, and how does NASCAR, what role does NASCAR play in making sure that that's a success?

Is it successful as it can be? I know Marcus, having known Marcus over the last several years, I know his hands are all over it. Yep. Every day. Yeah. So I think. A lot of conversations on that, right? So you can say, you know, they just parked it at Dover, right? But the initial reaction's been pretty good. Now it's our job to deliver the best race there.

That race has been challenged, right? So what can we do as a group getting our arms around? What could make this as cool as possible? Do I have the exact answer now? No. But Marcus has pushed us, and I think it's been good on, can you use the All-Star race to try some things for the future? That was my next question.

We went last year until we were almost a run what you brung. Right. And we got kind of vetoed at the last minute. See, that's another thing where I feel like NASCAR didn't get enough credit. Now, I know, you know, people might call me shield, but I know I know all this things that are going on. And I know where NASCAR is like, hey, man, we gave you a chance here to do this. And, you know, you didn't take it. So that was a –

I think going back, right, we can do a better job on that too, though. Just in fair. I don't want to say, oh, the team said no. So we probably, you know, shorter time span we got with them.

We got enough time right now to say, seem like everybody could get their arms around us. Yeah. learned we used to you go to kentucky open practice day Thursday four hours of practice Friday Saturday terrible the more time on track usually right create some problems so the less we can have known at dover would be the better I agree man I have a lot more stuff right here on my

list that we're not going to be able to get to today but I'm thankful for the opportunity to talk to you you're you've been around this deal a long time and I feel like you understand the vision that was created, you know, 75 years ago. And I feel like that with people like you involved in the sport, we'll stick near and close to that vision going forward. Look forward to having the opportunity to get you back in here and dig more. I know there's like, you know, the 24 hours news cycle. If we give it a month, they'll be a hold. Listen, I'd be in here anytime.

There are people in the sport who I got a ton of respect for. because you could do your career and then you could leave 24 hours seven you care about where we're going we're not always going to agree right but I love the passion that's all I bring to the sport too I'm not always going to get it right but I love the sport I want to get back to having some fun with the industry and I think you'll see that next year and if we go a little bit off we'll turn it back around but I think there's some really good things to come awesome well thank you buddy I appreciate your time today thank you sir Steve O'Donnell and the Dale junior download All right, so Steve O'Donnell on the Dale Jr. download,

I bet there's some stuff that we didn't ask him that you wanted us to ask him. But I had the sheet in front of me, and I had an hour. And we got to about 40% of the stuff that's on this sheet. So we're going to have to get him to come back. He will come back. I've known O'Donnell for a long time, and I gotten a couple ass-chewings from him about some things I did in a race car. The guy definitely loves a sport.

And, I mean, he's passionate about it to a fault. But he's the president. And I think he's a great guy for the job. Definitely knows the sport. I have seen this in the past. We're not always going to love what he does. We're not always going to love the decisions. but every time that I've had a real problem with something that happened in the sport,

when I talk to those guys, I at least get the reasoning behind the decision. And I can understand at least if I was in their shoes why that decision was made. I still might not love it. But I trust him. I do. I really do. and I'm glad that they, you know, kind of hire within, especially a guy that's got so many years. He's seen so many levels.

One thing we didn't really talk about because of the, you know, it kind of falls down the line a little bit of some of the things we did discuss is his connection to the regional series. He has lived in that regional bubble of weekly racing, and he talked about that. And I love that that will matter to him. He won't, I don't believe that he will forget to make sure that that is healthy and that's doing what it needs to be doing. Because obviously we both have, I think he does and I do too have a very, you know, big place in our heart for weekly racing and short track racing and trying to figure out how to make that better every day. So that was, you know, there's just a, I don't know, he's had some, you know, he's definitely, he's definitely, with some tough things in his life personally, and I know that's made him tough and strong and be able to handle this type of deal. He will tell you what he thinks, and he'll get heated

and upset about some things. But I kind of miss that about NASCAR, honestly. You know, I feel like I feel like there's some areas where we do need to get a little meaner, a little tougher. and so I kind of think that he'll bring some of that energy. And I felt like, you know, I got to ask some questions, and I know he wasn't going to answer all of them, but, you know, yeah, I'm just anxious to see how this lawsuit deal works out. I can't wait for that to be a thing of the past. But, and I want everybody to just get on down the road.

I agree. I feel like, I hope, you know, I hope that NASCAR can sort this out. And I want NASCAR to remain. I want NASCAR, Jim France, all of that to remain as is. I like the way that the France family has done things all these years. I don't disagree with how they run and manage a sport and what they've done and decisions they've made. Now, there's some things that happen, you know, in the sea. that I didn't love.

And there's some things I've said about the, you know, the current car or what have you. But in just a global term of, you know, Bill France Senior, Jr., Jim, I've known Jim forever, man. That gym's a badass. So I just, I want that to all remain intact. I think the charter system is great. I want, I mean, I don't own one, so I don't care if it's here or not. but I think for the team owners that do have them, it's great, especially for a team like the Wood Brothers and some of these other teams that really do genuinely,

this is what they do for a living, right? They don't have, you know, Penske has other businesses. Rick Hendrick has car dealerships. He races to win and not for a living. So it's great for teams that do it for a living, right? But I also want Denny Hamlin to be an owner. We need owners. We need these guys, you know, our owners are getting older,

and I want Denny Hamlin to be a successful owner in the series. I love that he's got Michael Jordan involved. I love that Michael's at the races, that Michael cares, that Michael wants to win. He's the real deal, you know, as an owner, not just a name and a face. But so I kind of, you know, I kind of want the world to go back to the way it was. But we'll see if it does.

they've got to get together and sort it out. And even if that means going through court, they still have to end up at some point ready to move forward together. If you have something that has an identity, a business, an organization, something that functions and it has earned and established an identity, that everyone in it really loves and appreciates, You have to hire within.

You have to hire someone who understands the vision that understands the identity. If you hire somebody that hasn't lived it, hasn't been in it, does it know it, and you bring them in there, they will change with their ideas and their vision. They will change the identity. And in this case, NASCAR is a sport, would change forever. it would become people complain at times I do as well that it's unrecognizable in some areas it would become completely foreign to me and so I love that they hire within I love that they've got this guy and he's been in the sport for for a couple decades and he knows it and you give him the steering wheel or the joystick or the control and he he'll steer it in the direction you

expect it to keep going you know that's what I think is a good a good thing about Steve And he mentioned he's comparable to Mike Helton. When Mike was in that role, nobody worried. We didn't, none of us lose any sleep at night. Mike was a badass, and he too had been in the industry for most of his life, and we didn't worry about where we were going. We knew it was going to be all right, you know. And so I'm hoping that Steve will bring that same energy and that same confidence back.

I thought Steve Phelps did a great job as well as president. He tackled some difficult things and managed some difficult moments. But I'm equally as excited about Steve being in that role. And so, yeah, that's kind of where I'm at. Yeah. So I'm glad he came in here and gave us some time. And, yeah, it's fun to have that conversation with what I've wanted to have. And, yeah, we'll try to see if we can't have it more often.

and get him in here more often. Maybe every quarter, sort of a state of the sport. State of the sport. Hell yeah. All right. Well, let's get to the white flag. All right. The tear down was live on YouTube and Twitter following the race.

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