The Dale Jr. Download - Ted Musgrave: Dodging Death, Championship Controversy & Life Full Throttle

Episode Date: August 20, 2025

Dale Earnhardt Jr sits down with Truck Series mainstay Ted Musgrave to discuss Ted's near-death experiences, his battle with cancer while driving, the time he quit mid-race, and much more. The Illinois native had a stay out of trouble mindset during his career, but unpacks his wild side that is full of exceptions. He details his rise through the ranks in Wisconsin, the glory days of racing ASA, and why he had to turn down Richard Petty's 43 seat.He shares the story of when he, Mark Martin, Buddy Parrott, and others escaped a near-death experience trying to land a plane, which missed the runway by 200 feet. The two dive into his time racing in the Truck Series, talking about the Championship that slipped out of his hands, and how he found a new home after his team suddenly shut down on him. They also break down the time his temper got the best of him, and how he would compare NASCAR today to the one he remembers. It's a conversation you won't want to miss. And for more content, check out our YouTube page: https://www.youtube.com/@DirtyMoMediaDirty Mo Media is launching a new e-commerce merch line! They’ve got some awesome Dale Jr. Download merch on the site. Visit shop.dirtymomedia.com to check out all the new stuffFanDuel: 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.Consumer Cellular: New customers get a $5 credit on first five monthly invoices. Visit ConsumerCellular.com/DJD for details. 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.

We had a plane full and we're going to Taladega to test. And we started to land. And I'm kind of wondering, I heard the alarm go off. It's like 200 feet or whatever. I just still can't see anything. I said, this ain't right. So at the last minute, I looked out the wind and we started hearing something, bang, bang, bang, bang. It was tree tops.

We were like way off the runway landing. We were in the trees. That was the scariest and closest to death I think we've all been. The following is a production of Dirty Mo Media. All right, so Ted Musgrave is the guest today, and he is out in the lobby, so we're going to get him in here quickly. Ted raced in the Cup Series. I raced against Ted a little bit. And then he got into the Truck Series and had an incredible career, winning a lot of races for Dodge, winning a championship.

But there's been some quirky little things that have happened over the course of his career. He was let go mid-season at one point from a very good ride in the Cup series. He left a team in a middle of a race, apparently. before the very final race of the season. Just one more race left. But Ted walked away. And then, after winning the championship in the truck series, this team shut down.

I mean, it's just interesting. We've got to hear these stories. Let's get him in the room. Let's get started. This should be a lot of fun. Ted Musgrave on the Dell Jr. Download. What's up? Same stuff, different day, buddy.

Yes, sir. Here's your seat. We'll get started. The hot seat. The hot seat. It's good to see you Well, it's kind of good to be here, I guess Yeah

Well, got me off of work Yeah What's work look like? Well, I help work and operate Musgrave Marine Justin, my son operates this That's right, I got my boat over Yeah, you got your boat over here

Actually, we just got done working on loose change Really? Yeah, yeah, there you all fixing that thing Yeah, well, it's a charter boat now Yeah But yeah, our business is just phenomenal right now We just can't keep up. So as soon as I get done here, I got to change clothes, go back to work. Yeah, I'm always over there tomorrow, me and me and me going to take ours out for a little while.

About time. Yeah, I know. You haven't done it in a long time. It's been hard to find the time, but I love that new, well, the old Gibson, but I love it. Yeah, we keep an eye on you. Yeah. Cool, but. Me and you never really got a chance to talk a whole lot.

No. During the racing. No, actually, I was just kind of focused on what I was going to be doing, and you were focusing. You're going to be doing. I don't know. I mean, I just never want there to make friends, I guess. You know, just there to try to win races. Yeah. Where were you born? Evanston, Illinois.

Yeah. Yeah, up there in Chicagoland area. Oh, yeah, it was tough and fun up there. I'll tell you what. But, yeah, I was born and raised up there and lived in there, Illinois for quite a while until I finally moved to Wisconsin just because of the racing. Yeah. You know, I could race five nights a week, six nights a week, seven nights a week if you wanted to. Yeah.

But Illinois was my stomping grounds. Was your family involved in racing? How did you get the bug? Yeah, well, actually, my dad, he ran a USAC stocks, Marca, which was ARCA back then. John Markham started that series. And he actually was more of an independent driver, you know, traveled around the country and raced everywhere. I mean, Langhorne, Pennsylvania's one.

He went out in Ascot Stadium. He's been all around. So the race car was in the shop, you know, the garage, I should say, at home. Well, as you know, hey, there's a race car right up my backyard in the garage. You get interested in help. As a matter of fact, I had one story where he was welding a roll cage in a car. And my job was to hand him welding rods. So I was curious on what was going on.

So I put these little goggles on from a torching, and I put those on. I was watching them weld. Well, I had no face shield or nothing. Well, after about a full day of welding and handling welding rides, I got burnt all over my face. I looked like it was a disease on me or something. That is the worst. That was the best welder in third grade, though. Really?

After watching it, I don't know. Yeah. But, yeah, that's how I started. my dad did. You know, he was in racing quite a bit. And he actually was actually a mechanic for all the trucks and, you know, and material yards and stuff like that. That was his job.

Okay. But racing was off the side. Yeah. So how did you get your opportunity to drive yourself? Well, when I first started out, like I say, when my dad was getting older, my older brother, Tom, you know, started racing. Well, my dad was like, okay, maybe I need to step back and get my kids racing. So then I got a car and I started racing at Walkegan's. My first one was a 1971 Ford Torino.

Oh, I think the thing weighed like 4,200 pounds. Well, it was a quarter mile racetrack. Walk Hagan Speedway. The only way you pass is you knocked a guy out of the way. Oh, yeah, that was quite interesting in the pits after races every now and then. But that was my first race car. It was a 71 Ford Torino. Did very well there.

You know, and that was my stomping grounds, and that's where I started racing. and actually I built later on in my career I built a nice race car and went back there and set all the track records to this day walking speedways no longer there but I hold the fastest core trophy dash and features and stuff like that so that's pretty cool yeah who were you racing against back then over at that track oh boy like bob roper and I mean there were just so many people back then you know that come from everywhere Frank Carrera and And like I say, it was so much going on at that time. You know, I was only 18 years old. I started when I was 18. My brother started when he was 17. And I was racing against him too.

So we always had a little family feud who was going to win. Is that right? Was it always healthy? Yeah. It was. It was. Because like I said, my dad owned everything. So we had to be careful.

Yeah. Did you all keep everything at the same place? Yes. Yeah, we did. You know, Munderland, Illinois. We lived there. We kept everything right at that spot. But then when I moved to Wisconsin,

with my family, you know, we first moved there to my dad, still worked in Illinois. I stayed in Wisconsin. And all I did in a shop was work on race cars. That was my job. Really? Oh, yeah. You made a living. I made a living at it.

That was the deal where... That's unique. Well, I had a race against people like Dick Trickle and everybody that was doing the same thing. Sure. So all winter long, I looked at this race car and it looked at the rulebook and said, how can I make this better. And I came up with some ideas and some things that were just crazy. Some worked, some didn't.

And sometimes if you look at the rule book, some of the rules are because of me. Yeah. You know, you look at it now, there was a rule now says, okay, fuel cells must be behind rear axle between the frame rails. There was not that rule in back then. So I took a fuel cell, bowed on the right side of the car in the middle because they weighed the cars before he went on a racetrack. right side weight, total weight. So you went across the scales, went on the racetrack, you raised a feature, and after that, you're done.

So I figured, well, heck, if I put this fuel cell in the right side, as a race is going on, I'm losing right-side weight, gaining left-side weight. I put it in the middle, so I didn't have the swinging weight in the rear. So now, it only lasted like a week and a half. Officials are scratching their heads going, what did you do? I said, there's no rule on this. You can put the fuel cell anywhere. Well, a week and a half later, there is.

As amendment to the rule, here's my rule. Yeah. So there's a lot of them things I did up there. Yeah. But when you just concentrate on a race car all year long. Every day. Oh, yeah, you can come up with some good ideas. In the wintertime, he's sitting around thinking all the time about how to make next year's car better.

That's all it was about, so made a living at it. For sure. You moved to Wisconsin. At what age? Oh, it was probably 19 years old, 18, 19 years old. By yourself? No, no, I moved with the family up there. Why did they move?

They wanted to get out of the Illinois area. My dad liked up in the Wisconsin area. We used to vacation up at Wisconsin Dells. He loved the area, and so did we, you know. So he goes, boy, I wouldn't mind just selling out and build a home up in that area, which we did. It was called Adams' friendship. Yeah. But my dad would still have the job in Illinois.

So he traveled. Back and forth. Well, not every day. He'd come up every weekend. Okay. But I stayed there, you know, well, like I say, it snows knee-deep or even higher in Wisconsin in the wintertime. So I stayed up there to take care of the family plowed the driveways, this, that.

Is your dad still racing? I mean, I'm sorry, is your brother still racing? No. No, my brother's not racing anymore. He did finish up driving sprint cars for a while, but then after a few flips and this and then that, he kind of gave that up to him. So, no, he's not now. And so when you go to Wisconsin, did you go straight to ASA at that point?

Well, almost. Like I say, I was racing against, like I say, people like Trickle and Marsovka and Tom Reffner and all these people up there, we had our little CWRA, called Central Wisconsin Racing Association. So after running all those races and honing my skills against them people, which you really had to be good to do well, I started traveling a little bit. I'd go here, I'd go there and do pretty good. You know, I'd hold my own against the people in Michigan,

a lot of good drivers in Michigan, go to Ohio, a lot of good drivers there. So I kind of stacked up and did pretty well on it. Well, I've gotten noticed by a guy, yes. And I'd started driving an ASA for Terry Baker. Yes. Yes. Jimmy Johnson was even there one time. But Howie Lotto was my crew chief.

We ran some ASA races and again did good equipment, good people. You know, like I say, so we did very well in ASAs and that's how I got noticed, you know, threw out the ranks to get into the NASCAR situation too. You're raced against Dick Trickle. I heard stories that he would show up and not, he wouldn't even practice. They'd stop practice to let him get. let his truck in, and he would unload his car and set quick time and win the race. Yeah, that's true.

You know, we see it quite often because he'd be working in the shop. He'd be working the shop on that thing, get it loaded up for the last minute. And like I say, just roll it off the truck, get it out there, make your two laps of qualifying, get on the pole. I've actually got good at that, too, a Capitol Madison Speedway. I was doing that, too, because I'd work at Berker Forest products, and I wouldn't have a whole lot of time, like you say, you know, quick work on the car and change. I was actually changing the gear and everything else while it's still on the haul or while we're getting things ready and warmed up, pull it off, go qualify and get fast time.

Damn. Yeah. So racing in the ASA series, you race against Alan Quickey. Was Mark Martin gone by that particular point? Brown, what time is this? Yeah. You get Alan Quicky, Mark Martin. When they were in ASA, they were just leaving and getting their big breaks.

Yep. When I kind of eased in there and started. but I still had a run against people like Butch Miller. Yep. Seneca. Seneca, how, Mike Eddy, you know, all these people, that was my group I had to fight against. And Bush Miller was probably the hardest guy to beat. He was really good.

Yeah. So I guess describe the ASA series. I kind of remember what it was like or what I remember the identity or the vibe of the series back then being a kid in the 80s. but explain what ASA was like. Is it any comparable to what might be going on today? I know there's an ASA series that runs in the Southeast Super Late Models, but Mark, guys like you, Alan Quicky, Trickel,

y'all put ASA on the map. Like ASA was a very prominent, respected series, but all of a sudden a lot of the drivers going into the Cup series are coming in the Cup series are coming from out of ASA because it was like, man, if you can go up there and beat, you know, trickle or you or Alan Quicky, you know, that was a good measuring stick for a talented driver. Yeah, we had a lot of good teams, a lot of good drivers. The series grew. They went to different venues. They got, where there was pit stops too, you know, so that was all involved. So you had to have a good

crew. Sounds expensive. Well, yeah. I mean, there wasn't a whole lot of people. You had to have, some kind of a sponsor or an owner that had a deep pocket. But that's where I was actually good because I landed, like I said, with Terry Baker. He had gas stations. So he was well off. And after I drove for him, I drove for Jerry Gunderman, which G&G trucking up there in Franklin. That's Mark Martin, drove for him quite a bit too. So I was actually the shadow, I guess he could say, of Quicky and Mark, wherever they were going, I kind of just filled in right behind.

Yeah. And a lot of, like, Dad would go run some ASA races. He got him a Dillon Carr and Bobby Allison. And so a lot of cup guys would even go up there and run. And they knew that, you know, it was challenged. Dad struggled to, like, really, you know, find speed in the minimal starts that he had. But, and a lot of great crew chiefs, like Finning and those guys came out of that, you know, that series. Yeah, actually, Jimmy's brother, Jeffrey, was one of my crew chiefs too up there in Wisconsin.

So you had a good group of people, no matter if it's drivers, owners, crew chiefs, crew members, they were really good. They honed their skills up there. Yeah, there was a time when it felt like a lot of people that were coming into the industry were coming out of ASA and out of Wisconsin in that area. How do you, you know, you had a lot of success because you end up getting noticed and recognized. And one day you get a call to do a couple of cup starts in 1990, feeling. in Rich Vogler was going to race and was killed in a crash and they called you. Yeah, that was a very unfortunate. Sure.

Very unfortunate situation that, like you say, Rich Vogler was going to run some races for Ray and Dan DeWitt. And I think the first one was at Michigan International Speedway. Who is Ray and who's Ray DeWitt? The background of Ray DeWitt, you know, from Michigan, he always kind of hung around and helped racers. As a matter of fact, I think he was helping on the backside, a little butcher, a little financials.

stuff, a little bit of group together. What did this car look like? What did a car look like? Yeah, I can't remember the scheme or the... My first, the first car that we had there, it was just basically why we didn't have any sponsor. I think we had an auto value or something like that for just a one race deal. What number?

55. Okay. No, I'm sorry. I think we had number two to start with. We switched to 55 because the number two got bought out. D.K. Ulrich was involved here. Okay. And so we started a race in my first race in the...

NASCAR was Michigan International Speedway. Imagine that. You go from short tracks to all of a sudden, oh, here's Michigan. You know, there's a corner way down there. But we went there. It did very well, actually. We qualified. I remember starting to race.

Same rows Richard Petty. I look over and there he is. You know, I'm like, we're not doing too bad. I think we were like 22nd or whatever. Start of the race, we ran maybe 30 laps and the motor gave up. Yeah, it's like, oh, man, you know, I never really got an experience. So after the race, I said, hey, we liked to. to run some more races, would you mind continuing this?

I said, well, sure, you know, I think it was like Phoenix and a few other ones. And I think out of like four of the races, two or three times a motor never finished. So it wasn't a very good start of this career. But after that, they got involved with D.K. Alrick, we got some different people. They moved the team down here because it was up in Michigan. Yeah, so everything kind of got a little bit better. So I just kind of signed a contract to run that year. Yeah.

That was, y'all ended up with Jasper? Yeah, we had Jasper's sponsor because they were building the engines. They would, Hawaii, Georgia, I can't, I think about it for who actually was building them, but they would build the race engines, you know, sponsor and was Jasper. I remember, I remember knowing that D.K. was involved in some way, and that had, in my mind, as a kid back then, like Ernie Irvine drove D.K.'s number two car. Kroger, all that stuff, and then Ernie gets into the four, and D.K.'s team sort of morphed into this 55.

Not exactly the true story. You're telling the story exactly how it happened. But I remember you coming in and driving that car and having like these flash moments. We did. Like y'all had a really, I feel like there was a race at Pocono where y'all ran top three or top five. And right before you get the opportunity to drive for Roush, right? It was those moments, right, that would get Raus interested. Yeah, what happened there, we switched some things over.

We had, at that time, we had a Pontiac, we had a Chevrolet, we had a Fort. We had all kinds of mixed stuff, you know, stuff. But we had a, we built a Ford Thunderbird. We had a pro motor, Billison engine, Ford engine. And I'll tell you what, that thing was, we called it Arnold, because it was like Arnold Schwarzen. I think had some muscle. And that's where we ran really good at Michigan, leading a race. fuel mileage got me there.

Pocano always good. So we had some really, like I say, flashes of brilliance every now and then. But it kind of fizzle a little bit every now and then. But every now and then we'd run really good. So we got noticed back then, if you remember, you know, Mark was already here in NASCAR, and I was back at Jerry Gundermans, and Mark would come up doing an appearance or race at Milwaukee. And they'd say, I'd build a car for him. And he'd come up and make sure his seat's fine and this and that.

And I'm actually working on his car. and mine's sitting over in a corner, you know, get him all ready to go. So I think it was like a repay back when Wally Donald Beck was going to leave Roush, and I left a seat open. And I think Mark seen what I was kind of doing with limited supplies, I guess you could say, in NASCAR. So he's like, told Jack, he goes, why don't you give him a shot? So that was kind of how I got over to Roush. But one of the things that kind of threw me a curve, too, was I actually had a chance to fill him for Richard.

When Richard the king retired, they call me. Really? I've actually got, yeah, I actually met Richard and Dale in men and everybody up there at the shop. We looked through the shop. We kind of try to figure things out. He's like, okay, we'd like to have you be Richard's deal. I've got newspaper articles there. Because actually one says the man who turned down the king.

Well, I couldn't really turn him down. I really wanted to try for him. but D.K. said in the contract, I couldn't do that. He's going to hold me to the contract that I signed for them, which I found out later I could have got out of. But anyway, that's, yeah, I was going to drive for Richard, but then I had to drive another year for Radius and then moved on to Roush. Right. The opportunity to go drive for Rouse and to be teammates with Mark that had to been like a dream come true. Oh, yeah. Don't get me wrong. You know, that I thought that was an awesome deal.

You know, I knew Mark. You know, it's like, cool, you know, I get to race with them and this and that. So there again, I mean, I think my first year, I mean, I've got a lot of polls. I had, like, Richmond, I think, spring and fall and Martinsville and a lot of those places had poles. It was able to run a clash. Actually, I think, you know, your dad had a really bad year. I actually beat him in point standings too at time. I think I was like sixth or fifth or whatever in points.

Things were doing pretty well. But back then, like I said, getting poles were pretty tough because it was always a short track. And Mark was always contested by it. He's always, I need more motor. Well, everybody had qualifying engines. So at Roche, what it was is your race motor from the previous week got brake cleaned. He put valve springs on it. That's what you go qualify with next week.

So it's pretty tough to get poles when you're looking over there. This guy's got lightweight cranks. He's got this. He's got qualifying motor. So getting poles was really tough for us. Right. Yeah, the first season you had three polls, 15th in points. In 1995, your second season, seventh in points.

A lot of great results, seven top fives, two top twos. And in 96 and 97, things kind of changed, started to struggle somewhat. You know, I think, you know, you would net out and prove your talent in the truck series down the road. but what was the issue that didn't allow things to work out at Roush? Because I felt like, you know, seeing you drive the 55 car and seeing those flashes, knowing the equipment you were in and seeing the flashes of potential, you come into the Roush deal replacing Wally, that deal wasn't really going well. You get in it, it starts to go, right?

But what happened to have it kind of unravel? I think a little bit, too, was when we started to add more teams. Yeah. You know, we brought on Jeff, which was fine, Danny, everything was going, you know, and Chad Little, this and that. So things kind of got little spread out, you know, let's put it that way. And then, you know, a lot of changes behind the scenes with people and this and and that.

And things just, like you say, just didn't kind of work out as well as we'd like to. And, I mean, it is what it is, you know, don't get me wrong. I think if I had to go back and do it again, I was just so, I don't know, happy just to be there in racing. I always took care of the equipment. I didn't want to tear nothing up. I didn't want to argue, demand anything. That was my problem, I think. Really?

Well, yeah. I mean, you know, like when Jeff come along, you know, oh, no, I've got to have this chassis. No, I've got to have him for a crew chief. No, I'm going to have this, you know. And it was good for him. I mean, that's made his team better. You know, I was just happy. Like, just put me in a seat.

Let me drive. I'm just so happy to be here. Yeah. Yeah, I don't want to make any waves, you know. But then again, like I say, just try to. in my previous years of owning my own cars and owning my own equipment, I didn't push it probably to the very edge. You know, I could have paid, should have been out there,

hey, I'm going to put a qualifying lap on, I ain't lifting until this thing crashes. I wasn't quite like that. That was my problem, I believe. Yeah. I feel like I would have said, I could say the same thing about myself in terms of like not being very, not being someone who demanded things be a certain way or vocal about, you know,

into personnel equipment. I didn't want to ruffle feathers or piss anybody off. Exactly. Whereas you're right. Some guys will go in the room and go, this is what I need. Yeah, that's kind of what Jeff did.

He elevated his team and he had results. And I'm just back there going, I just want to drive. I don't want to make waves. I'm just happy to be here. Hey, I'm T.J. Majors. You may know me as the co-os for the Dirty Air Show. With me as producer, Travis.

I got a question for you. Every Tuesday you come in here talking about how great your cell phone is and how the service is awesome. Where did you get it from? Yeah, man. I recently joined the consumer cellular family and man, I could not be happier. Got on the phone with them, got hooked up and only took about 20 minutes, man, and I was good to go. That's great and all. But like, how's it at tracks? Because at home my phone works, but when I'm on the road, it's crap. You know, traveling every week with the RFK-6 team, I need to stay connected, man. And I have had nothing but success at these tracks, which can be challenging. And, man, I've been able to use the hotspot, call, text, everything. So pleasantly surprised with it, man.

Awesome service. And, man, I'm looking really forward to that nice orange number six car this weekend at Daytona. I think it's a great looking car. I've seen it. And, man, I'm just going to look good in Victory Lane. All right. So, but how do I go about to get this? Because I don't have time.

I'm not trying to go staying in line at a store. Wait. Grab a number. Wait 30 minutes. Like, I just don't have time for that. That's easiest part, man. just call their 100% U.S.-based customer service representatives, and in about 20 minutes, you'll be good to go.

I chose the $2.60 plan. It's not a prepaid option. They helped me decide which one was best for me, and I know exactly what I'm paying each month. Everything is easy to understand with no long-term contract. Switch to consumer cellar now and get 25 hours off with the code DJD25. That's DJD-25 for 25 hours off when you switch to consumer cellular. Go to consumer cellular.com slash DJD.

and use promo code DJD 25. Tell me about the plane story, flying with, I guess, Mark Martin in his plane. There was a bit of a close call. Well, when you said plane, I don't know. I had so many of them. Really?

Well, kind of. You know, D.K. Alrick, we're up there flying on our landing gear and falling down and this. And one time the motor half quit. But this one here, we had a plane full, and we're going to Taladega to test. Jimmy Fennings on board and everybody, you know, Mark was going to meet us there. So we took off out of Greensboro, I believe, with everybody.

And it was foggy, kind of rainy down there, Talladega. And we made an approach coming in to land. It was Mark's pilot, actually. And we had a rental plane. It was a king air. And we started to land. And I'm kind of wondering, I heard the alarm go off, you know. It's like 200 feet or whatever.

I just still can't see anything. I said, this ain't right. Right. So at the last minute, I looked out the window, we started hearing something, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang. It was tree tops. Damn it. Yeah. We were hitting the treetops of the trees, the wings and everything.

Luckily, Captain Ron, what we call them, throttled up real hard, pulled us up out of there. We were just, we were like way off the runway landing. We were in the trees. Damn it. So, oh, man, that was close. So you made another approach and finally got in there? No, no, uh-uh. We went to Birmingham.

Oh, yeah, yeah. We went to, you know, took a, there was an ILS there and stuff. There was damage to the plane. Yes, there was damage to the plane. We couldn't fly it anymore. The FAA had to come out. I mean, there was sticks stuck in the oil coolers in the French. Oh, yeah.

That's, I mean, that's the closest you're going to get. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Jimmy Fenningly, I could see his eyes were about big of saucers to it. I've had some pretty bad experiences with planes, and I can imagine, you know, knowing sort of the cowboy style of some of the pilots that we had back then, and we were all in those king airs and just, just, You know, not really to your point, like, you know, you didn't, you know, you'd take off and be like, yeah, yeah, we should be good.

You know, the ceiling's a little low where we're going to land. And you get there and you're like, it's really low. Oh, yeah. And you would be like, oh, 300 feet. That's not a problem. And you'd get there and it's like 150 feet. Well, it's changed a little bit. We're still going to try to get in there.

That was the scariest and closest to death, I think we've all been. But that was another time flying with Mark Martin back when he was living in Florida got his own plane. And I traveled with him back and forth to the racetrack. I think he was, I'm not sure it was the King Air or his jet, but he had a pilot with him. No, it was the King Air because he flew left seat. Mark was starting to learn how to fly. So I get on board, and I'm sitting in the back, and I look, and also Mark's in the left seat. And I'm like, oh, he's captain.

He's flying this thing tonight. You know, I'm like, oh, so we get going. And the day was fine. It was no stormed on nothing. But we took off and we got up and we started getting pretty heavy clouds. So I see Mark struggling and all of a sudden I see him go, lift off his hands off. And he goes, I can't do it. Take over. You know, he got disorient.

You know, he wasn't used to the instruments and stuff or whatever. I'm like, oh, geez. Yeah. Yeah, that's pretty terrifying. In 1998, middle of the season, you got let go from Roush, despite you have full sponsorship. Kevin LePage would be brought in to drive the car. Did you see that coming? Well, kind of.

We talked about it. You know, it's like, okay, you know, things ain't right. And I mean, I even get to like Watkins Glen, you know, and I couldn't even practice because the pedals and the, went to push the brake pedal down and it would hit the steering column. I had no brakes. There was all kinds of things going on, you know, and everybody was getting frustrated and this and that.

So we just said, you know, maybe we would just make a change. It was mutual. in a way, yeah. It was a mutual, you know, you see no arguments. There was nothing going on. You know, it's like, okay, you know. But the problem is, not problem for there it was in my contract, said they had to pay me for the rest of the year.

And I could still go out and drive other people's race cars, which I did for, you know, Bill Elliott and Bud Moore and, you know, all the other ones. So it was kind of a mutual thing. You know, it's like, all right, well, it is what it is. What was the rest of that year like? Did you, you know, go in to, driving for other teams and did you kind of see, you know, where, you know, things were better or not as good with some other programs or?

Well, I mean, you do. You get to see, you know, the inside of what these other teams are like. And, you know, driving for Bill, you know, was pretty cool, you know, that was all right. But I'll tell you what, I drove a couple of races for Budmore. The nicest man I ever met in racing. You know, you go over there to his shop, you know, in Spartanburg, you know, and it's just, it's the old-time. old school stuff, you know, and, you know, I just loved them to death. The guys were great, you know, the bud was just awesome to work for.

We didn't have, you know, great equipment. We were just trying to get, you know, it's the 50th anniversary of NASCAR, and he wouldn't run a couple races. So we did. Yeah. He was kind of on a tail end of his whole deal right around that time. Yeah, Greg was still building the engines, and, you know, it was just a family operation, but, like I said, it was very enjoyable to work with him.

Yeah. In 1999, you got to drive for Butch Mock, the 75 car. I think that was the... The Hale was the sponsor on that car. Remington. Remington. That's right. We had Remington.

We had Polaris. Yes. You know, we had a couple of good sponsors. And, you know, the funny thing was there, too. You know, and Butch, you know, said, hey, we're going to, you know, get Robert Gates, motors. We're going to build this great car for a super speedways. And we took it to a wind tunnel with, like, blew the best it ever did. And take it on the racetrack, and I think wouldn't fall out of the sky.

I mean, I couldn't figure this out. You know, I'm wide open running around out there and couldn't get it going. Couldn't get it going. Robert was scratching his head. He goes, I gave you, you know, dynam motors, you know, that are great and everything. Well, come to find out. That was back when we ran like 100-pound springs in the rear and the things traveled 18 inches and all that kind of stuff. Oh, that was crazy back then.

You remember that. Yeah. Well, what happened was when they set the car up, they didn't squat it all the way down and line up the rear end and the dry shaft and all that stuff. And sure enough, what it was, the harmonics were killing the engine and stuff. That's why it wouldn't run. Yeah. When it would get into travel, we were pulling those cars down. They were putting some crazy things in these shocks to hold these cars down.

Speaking of that, remember Mark Martin killed everybody at Teledict? Yes. He had shock absorber. I mean, I swear the rebound were like fender washers. I mean, that thing, I had a set, too, and tried it and practice. And I couldn't have to hang on that thing. It was sucked down so hard. It had no rebound.

It just bounced all over the place. Make your kidneys hurt. Oh, my gosh. you know, and Mark says, I'm going to try this in the race. Well, it was fast, you know, but if you're in traffic or whatever, you couldn't hang on of this thing. Right. I went back to the normal stuff.

He tried it. Sure enough, he got the lead. And the one around him, he just, yeah. Oh, man, he was gone. That was terrible. Yeah, that was something. They got rid of those after a couple of years. But while that was around, around, because we had them even in the Bush series in 99,

and it was pretty uncomfortable. Oh, it was really bad. Bouncing around on the track. I didn't even know Talladega had bumps off a turn two until we put them things on. You're like, holy crowd. Like driving off a set of stairs. Yeah, I didn't think the car would hold up as violent as it was. Yeah, you're right.

He made it. I was telling the story about how the tires would balloon up at Dover. Middle of the race by lap 200, you'd be bouncing around that track so bad. It'd tear the interior sheet metal out of the car. But that's how violent some of those races were back then. Yeah, and then you'd think, you know, Dover, everybody's like, oh, my God, that's a long race. Remember back when it was 500 laps. Yeah.

Oh, yeah. I remember looking over at 250 laps in, and I'm like, oh, you're halfway. Yep. You would end up leaving Butchmock with one race left in the season. That is the strangest time. Oh, my God, behind-the-scenes stuff going on there. It was just hodgepodge stuff. I mean, you know, the people.

You couldn't do one more race? Well, he was actually selling a team out to Darwin Ort, I believe, out of Tennessee. He had a newspaper. And it was just mixed up stuff. So we're down in Miami and running a race. And I know the whole crew, was out partying all night. You know, you can't even get them at the race track.

You know, this is something I'm not standing for, you know. So we got out during the race, cars, terrible handling, you know, nobody really knew anything what to do. So it got down there was a caution flag, and that's back when we raced back to the caution. So the spotter comes out and says, caution, slow down, slow down. So I slow down. And in the meantime, as I slowed down, I said something,

okay, where are we at in position? We were 16th or whatever and one lap down. I said, how did I get a lap down? He goes, well, that guy right ahead is a leader. Why don't you tell me that? I could have passed him and got back on the lead lap. You know, this is down the backstretched, you know. Just things like that.

It just irked me so bad. I said, you know what? I pulled it down pit road. I pulled it behind the wall to the hauler and got out. Before the end of the race. Before the end of the race. Holy sht. Yep.

And actually, Ricky Rudd blew a most. motor or something. So he was out of race. He was standing her. And they tried to get him to fill in in the car. And he's like, oh, no, I'm not getting in that. So actually flew home with Ricky. Really? Yeah. Yeah. I jumped on to place. You got an extra seat so I can get home. He goes, come on. Yeah. Man, that must have been frustrating. Yeah, it was frustrating. Yeah. Well, I mean, you can only take so much. Yeah. You know, I know you never hear about this and stuff. But you seem like a level, I mean, you know, you seem like a really level guy. Again, you don't want to ruffle feathers?

No, I don't run a rough But it gets to a point where you're trying so hard You know, you're trying so hard And some stupid stuff holds you back You can only take that so long Well, this would present an opportunity for you You would find your home in the truck series But I'm curious

Had you other opportunities to race in the Cup series That you didn't take? Yeah, there's some times where you, like I said, You look at the team I'm there to win. I'm not there to run around 26 and say, put a suit on, I'm a cup driver.

You know, I'm not that way. You know, if I don't have a chance to win, run top five, be respectable out there, I don't want to do it. So I had an opportunity in the trucks.

I went over, I knew that there was an opportunity maybe to drive the cup car at ultra-motorsports. So I went over to see Jimmy Smith. Oh, Jimmy Smith's, man, I'm sorry. I just signed Mike Wallace, you know,

the car. I'm like, oh, okay, I'm sorry. I just thought maybe I had an opportunity. So I went back home, and by the time I got home, my phone rang. I'm like, okay, what's this? Hey, this is Jimmy Smith. Teddy. I forgot to ask you something here. I just remembered. He says, I need a driver for my truck. I said, truck racing? He goes, yeah. He says, the number one mowpar truck. He says, this is factory sponsored by my, you know, best of everything. He says, it's yours if he'd like to try this. I thought, well, yeah. Why not? You know, if I'm out there to go win races and go for championships, I know, it's in a truck series.

It was the most fun I ever had. Yeah. I mean, it was great, you know, I had teammate, you know, I had Jason Leffler, I had Scott Riggs, you know, sometimes Jimmy Spencer. You know, I had a bunch of different teammates that drove the number two truck. That's right. I drove the number one truck. Yep. But I had a great team, great equipment.

You know, that's what it takes. Yeah. You know, and the attitude. And we went out and it's won a lot of races, had a lot of fun. Yeah. The truck series would be a fun series back then with a lot of guys sort of in the same position as you. Mike Skinner, Tabadine, a lot of people found sort of a place to, you know, enjoy racing and enjoy the purpose and the reason why you fell in love with it in the first place. Yeah, you know, a cup racing was 36, 38 races, you know, a year. You're hardly ever home.

All the pressure this and that. And the truck races were like 24. He could have some weekends off. He raced on Fridays and Saturdays. days. It was just a breath of fresh air, more or less, like a little recess and have fun. You go race. So that's why, like I say, a lot of us liked, you know, Hornaday and everybody else Skinner and Sprag and, you know, on down the line. And it was just a lot of fun. You know, the people were different too. You know, they weren't so snobby. They'd help each other. You had a lot more fun. Each garage, I think, I don't know what it's really like these days, but each garage from the cup to infinity to the truck, the pressure and the cutthroat, all that

stuff sort of relaxes. Each garage, I think Xfinity Garage is completely different in culture terms to the cup garage. A lot of people don't understand that. I can't imagine the trucks. I've never raced in the trucks, so I don't know what it's really like. Oh, you missed it then. Yeah. Oh, you missed a great opportunity to go with that. I mean, like I said, it was so much fun. The racing was great. We, I don't know, it was just such play. It was more or less like going back to what you used to do when you're moving up the ladder. Yeah. You took a couple steps back, said this was a lot of fun back then, like going back ASA racing. Yeah.

Yeah, you would have a lot of success. You know, your Cup series was, your Cup career was over, but you would have this entirely new, complete chapter through racing in the truck series. You got seven wins in 2001, second to points to Jack Sprague, 2004, from 2002 to 2004, your third in the championship points each season. But in 2003, you announced that you were fighting bladder cancer. Well, yeah, I had that. I don't remember that.

I didn't remember you even having to go do that. I mean, you don't. You know, it's just everybody has their own little deal. How did you manage to, how did you discover what was going on? Well, actually, how I discovered it was Jimmy Smith took myself, Jason Leffler, and we all went up to Salt Lake City, Utah for snowmobiling. I think, you know, even Walker Evans was there. And, you know, we had a great time.

I went to the bathroom and I had blood. Like, oh, oh, this ain't right. So it continued on. So I'm like, I better go see a doctor about this. So I went to the doctor and they said, yeah, you've got bladder cancer. You got a tumor in your intestines and this and that. So I was like, oh, great. You know, here we go.

Is this something that was a, I mean, did you know about your family history? Was there any kind of connection? No, no, no, no. Nothing that made this sense. This was just completely out of the blue. Oh, blue. Yeah, completely out of blue. So, yeah, they had to go in and get this golf ball size tumor broke up and pulled out of me.

I'm not even going to tell you where or how it came out, but it was not nice. Yeah. So I was in a hospital for a day or two there. Then I had to go back and do a chemo, you know, for like a month or two months. So this was going on while I was right. I'd go do chemo on Tuesday and then go race on the weekend. Yeah. But it didn't bother me that much.

Really? No. Yeah. Well, I always say even the first time they even had a backup driver from Martinsville because Jimmy Smith says, I'm going to have somebody here just in case you can. I was fine. I think it was the best Martinsville race ever ran. So you got the cancer taken care of and that's a...

Well, here's the thing. I was going back from my last treatment, Dr. Cass here in Morrisville. Yeah. I was going back to his. practice for the last treatment. I went there and the place was closed up. I'm like, what the heck happened here? He was killed.

He was health nut, you know, running a bicycle all the time. Yeah. Got hit. Oh, shit. Yeah. So I never got my last treatment. And then to find out what was,

if everything's okay. So I'm like, I hope it's okay, you know. Oh, yeah. You have no idea. That hadn't bothered you? No. I never go see a doctor. I don't have a doctor.

I never, go, I never go doctor. I don't take, if I get a headache, I don't take aspirin. I don't take anything. Really? Yeah. Hey, foot to the floor till it's done. That's crazy. I guess it's, I guess it's, uh, I guess it got taken care of. Yeah, I guess so. Thank goodness. Yeah, they're kidding. Hey, TJ, you know that I got my own Chevy dealership down in Tallahassee, Florida. We're part of the Hendrick Automotive group. Yes, I have heard of Darren Hart Jr. Chevrolet. I bet you'd be surprise on what type of Chevrolet vehicles we specialize in. If I had a guess, I'm going to say it would probably be Chevy trucks.

Well, we definitely sell plenty of those, but actually we're really big in commercial vehicles. We actually sell a lot of crane trucks, or the number one seller, actually, in crane trucks. Okay, I definitely did not see that coming. Yeah, pretty neat, huh? So for any of our listeners shopping for commercial vehicles, here's some things you need to know about us at Dellenhart Jr. Chevrolet. We have hundreds of trucks in stock. so you can find what you need fast.

And we have people there that can help you with custom orders. So if you want to build the exact vehicle you need, we can do it. We offer complimentary delivery anywhere in the continental U.S. Plus, Hendrick Automotive Group is the nation's top-rated dealer group for online reputation. Visit Dalejunerchevi.com and click commercial to explore the wide range of available commercial vehicles. Our team at Dellenhart Jr. Chevrolet will give you a world-class experience. Chevrolet, together, let's drive. There was a controversial finish to the 2003 championship,

and I was really surprised at your ability to put this behind you. You were penalized in the very last race for passing to the left on a restart and scored last on the lead lap. There was a lap truck in front of you that NASCAR deemed that you'd moved left to pass and you lost a championship to Travis Quaple. Me and Travis are good friends. His son's race, my late model. Doing done.

My exfinity career. Yeah, great kids. Y'all waited 10 minutes, the whole field. Oh, yeah. The whole series waited 10 minutes after the race to find out what NASCAR was going to do, and they decided that they would uphold the penalty. And you were scored. If you had not been penalized, you win the championship, the penalty would cost you the championship.

Well, here's how it is. And you well know, too, because he raced on there at Homestead. And the late day, looking down the front straightaway, that sun is right in your eyes. You can't see nothing. It was the last caution of the day, like five laps ago or even less, maybe three. So I'm lined up, and I'm right behind Mike Bliss, which was the second team truck for IWX and Travis Quappell. He brought another, you know, and Mike Bliss is driving it. So I'm lined up right behind.

them. And I've got to pass him and I think one other truck to win the championship, no matter whatever happens, everything else. So I'm right behind him. We're going on the front stretch and get the green and you can't see the flag man because it's just sun's in your eyes. I just listened to Spotter and Spotter's like, green, green, green. I took off and the next thing I know, everybody lureds forward and then locked it up. There was a stack up. So instead of running in the back of Bliss, you know, because he locked it up pretty good, I moved to the left real quick to avoid him because if I hit, I would have knocked a radiator out, have been done. So I jumped to the left,

passed him, and everybody was so slow, I kind of kept going and blending the line. So it took like a lap or so, and then I hear over the radio, Eddie Thrap, my spotter says, hey, you've got to get back behind Bliss. I said, what do you mean? He got back behind? It passed before, oh, man. So I'm looking, and he's quite a ways back. I figure if I let off and go all the way back there,

there's no way I'm going to pass back all the way back up here. It was like the end of the race. like the last lap. I had no opportunity to really get back. But if I would have thought about it at the time, if I moved to the left, oh, wait a minute, that's a penalty to do this. Maybe I would have had time to do it. But you're thinking, okay, I've got to pass you to it.

Got to get this somehow. It slipped on us. I remember the team owner, Jimmy Smith. Jimmy celebrating, thinking that he had won the championship and then being told in that moment that they, might not be the champion. And I know that you would go on and win the championship two years later in 2005,

and he would close the team after that year. That was wild. Yeah. You know, I wonder, I know that it's a couple years removed, but I wonder if that experience had anything to do with his, you know, winning that championship. He's like, I'm done.

Well, if you remember, Jimmy Smith helped start the truck series. Yeah. And he always wanted to win a championship, you know, and that was one of the big things. So in 2005, when we did win the championship, we said, oh, this is great. You know, Mopar, Dodge, everything, you know, everybody was all happy. That was our big sponsor. Well, they left the series at that time.

You know, after I won the championship, you know, Dodge pulled out of truck racing. So we kind of scrambled over at Ultram Motorsports to find, you know, another sponsor to send. We actually switched the Fords then. We built a Ford. Robert Yates was building the motors. We're going to go back for a second. The championship. It was like a week or two before Daytona testing.

Jimmy called up the shop over here from California. Hey, I tell you guys this, but we're closing up. Damn it. I mean, yeah. I mean, it's just right out of the blue. Yeah. I think what it was is he lost every year he'd make a million dollars. You know, through the sponsorship.

He'd take a minute and stick it in his pocket and then go race. well I think this following year it wasn't going to happen so he's like okay I won the championship it may cost me a little money to run next year let's close up damn yeah that's that was a shock to everybody at this you know the whole place was yeah crazy so everybody scrambled for jobs what did you do well that's when I went over to germane racing I quick called up over down there and said hey you know here's the situation Todd was running there and I kind of worked my way into that Shiggy Atori was the driver at the time of the nine truck. So, you know, Bob Germain and all them guys said, you know, let's get Teddy in there now. He just won the championship. Maybe you can

help improve the team, this and that. So I went down there and started running for them, Todd being, you know, partner in this deal. So him and I were teammates. And the problem there was I never had really good success. I did win Texas and did no run okay, but I never had success, like you said, with the right people that I had over at Ulter, the right equipment. The equipment altar was standard stuff, standard spindles, standard chassis, refined, perfected. That way in the race, any little thing that goes wrong, we know how to fix it, or how to adjust. When I went over to Maine, it was all crazy. You know, I had spindles with high inclinations and shocks to do this.

And it never drove, I never got comfortable with that type of deal. And, you know, if you drive from one team to another, how much changing it is. So here's your story. I know you're coming up to, probably. So I had limited success. I hated these trucks to the way they drove. So finally, I convinced them, I said, hey, we're going to Memphis next week. Can I get a truck set up like I used to drive?

You know, here's the setup, here's the spindles, here's the stuff we had. I wonder last year with the stuff, could we try it? All right, all right. So they did that. They changed a truck over, had a truck all set up ready to go for Memphis. Well, I'm up in Milwaukee, a hometown track, you know, used to run good up there. winning truck series. I'm struggling to stay in the top five in this race.

I'm like, good. I could get rid of these trucks or whatever. Last couple laps, I'm going on, turn one and restart. And I get taken out. I mean hard. Head on under the wall by a lap truck, you know. So I'm wrecked her. I'm backing up, you know, and I see this guy that's wrecked me, Kelly, Terry Byers or something.

Yeah. He's going to fire it up. He's been roused. He's firing up. He's going to take off. I'm like, oh, no. And I've been out here, buddy. And I just nailed it.

so I made sure he wasn't going to finish the race. I was frustrated. Yeah. You know how it is. So anyway, I knew that wasn't a good idea, but I got it out of my system. So anyway, I said, okay, I'm looking forward to Memphis coming up now. I could get back in one of these trucks that I like. Well, I got a call Tuesday from Wayne Aughton saying, hey, hey, I'd tell you this,

but you've been fine and you've been suspended for the next race. I'm like, oh, geez, you know, I ain't got a chance to try this. But, all right, whatever. So I called Mike Hillman, Sr., which is General Manager. Jermaine said, I got a phone call. I'm not going to be able to race Memphis. I'm fined. I'm suspended.

This, this, we've got to find a driver for the truck. He's like, all right, let me call you back in 10 minutes. So I'm sitting there thinking to myself, okay, who would I put in this? What am I going to do? So he called me back, you know, 10 months later. He goes, okay, I just talked to Todd. We're going to put Randy LaJoy in it. I said, well, I mean, I love Randy to death, but he hasn't run a truck in quite a while.

And I know what's going to happen. They're going to change a truck back over, make my guys, work twice as hard. Randy's going to put his seat in there and Randi Ljoy seats, which he likes. I just got like a Richardson. Yeah. My guy's going to work himself to death. I said, come on. I said, I've been thinking, why can't we put Brad Kalilowski in this thing? That's right. I says, he's my same high, same way, just built like I am. He's not doing anything. And I know from the previous year or two, he came and filled in for Kelly Sutton in a truck. And I watched him because I was following for a little bit.

And I said, this guy can get around this racetrack. He needs. He's got a knack for Memphis. So I finally convinced him to put Brad in it. This is a story of people don't know the truth about it. You know, so I convinced him, put him in there. Sure enough, he goes out there, wins a pole, almost wins the race. That's it. Yeah.

That truck's good, isn't it? You know. So that's caught your eye, caught a lot of other people's eye, and, you don't put Brad on the map. Yeah, it did. Yeah. But the only thing is, I'm still pissed off about it. He never once thank me. Really?

He's never once a thank you for putting me in. No kidding. And then about a year or two later, he tried to steal my sponsor. Really? Team ASC. No kidding. Yeah, double whamming. Yeah.

Thank you. I didn't know that. I didn't know you had anything to do with that. Yeah. They wanted to put Randy LaJoy in it. But I kind of stood up for it and said, you know, don't work my guys to death. They're going to change the spin. I'm going to change everything.

Put the seat. Just plug right in. He'll fit right in the same way, everything. I want to change anything. Yeah. Damn. That's incredible. You know, the opportunity at Jermaine would last for two years.

and they would end up putting Justin Marks in the truck after 2007. You only had a couple more races after that. You know, this is a question I always kind of like to ask guys that come in here. How did you manage facing the reality that maybe your racing days were behind you? Well, I had all the things kind of going. You know, like I said, the racing stuff is starting to wear it on. And I race 33 years straight every single year from when I started. There was never a year that it didn't race.

Getting tired of it. Yeah. Getting tired of aggravation. You know, getting all that kind of stuff. And I had some other deals going. I was flipping homes, buying, you know, homes and reselling them and doing this and doing that. So I'm financially, I'm all right, you know, and I'm just like, you know, maybe it's time to just quit on this stuff here.

It's enough. I'll fill in every now and then maybe for somebody or whatever, but just full-time stuff is just getting. enough. Was that an easy decision? It was. Did you have some hard days? I mean, there's still some times it's like, you know, man, I wish I'd get in that

truck ago one more race or this or that. But at the same time, it's, you know, between my wife, with her health and all kinds of other things going on, you know, it was a good decision. Yeah. You know, I wouldn't change it. You have, you know, a son, Teddy Jr. that races. Mm-hmm. how has that experience sort of helped fire and keep the competitive fire going

or sort of, you know, quench the thirst of that competition that you need or used to being a part of? Well, he races, he races on the dirt late model stuff, just whenever he wants to. Right. You know, he doesn't go in for championships or go for that. He's like, hey, you know what, I'm going to go race here or race there. And I only went to like two of his races. Oh. I don't go to racetracks and stuff like that, but he's still racing.

and that's fine. Actually, you know, I got him in the racing deal when he was 16 years old. I got him in at Roush Racing working in there. And he progressed on to MB2 and Tyler Jetton, actually, DEI. Yeah. You know, Teddy Jr. was a very well-like person. You know, Steve Miel just loved him. Yeah. You know, so he's still in the, I think, a J.R.I. Sachs right now he works over there. He doesn't work for a race team anymore. Yeah. Do you follow the sport anymore? A little bit. Don't get me wrong. I did go down to the Roval like two years ago. It was my grandson's birthday and first birthday. I said, what would you like? Because I'd like you to take me down to the roble.

I said, well, okay, I guess that'd be one of the things I could do for you. So I actually got some pit passes through Penske to go down into the garage area. So I took them around, met some old friends and this and then that. But the atmosphere and what was all going on down there at the racetrack, jail, it's nothing like I'm used to. Even when I talked to the people, too, that I do see, you know, they just shake their heads. I kind of looked around and said, I don't think I want to come back. I'll watch it on TV.

I'll tape it and that night. I'll zip through it a little bit. But I got too many other things going out to Marine business. Sure. Where is your championship trophy from your truck maze? Do you know? Dumpster? No, actually, I actually, you know, I do have it in the house.

Don't get me wrong. I got trophies from back in the ASA days to, you know, and Copperworld Classic and Winchester 400 and all them races. You know, I've won. I've got all those things sitting there. It's like right now, everybody said, where's your championship ring? I don't, I wore that championship ring during the banquet. Bankrupt's over, put it in the box, put it in drawer. Yeah, I'm the same way.

Yeah, I don't flash stuff around. I totally understand that. There was a story that you told about, um, a barbecue with dad. I guess dad had an appearance in Wisconsin. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Your dad did show up at the little farm we had there with Jerry Gunderman. We had a little cookout and a little picnic afterwards because him and Benny Artel flew up there and it was just before Michigan.

And your dad flew up at a Chevrolet dealership. I don't remember the name of it. But he did an autograph session and this and that. And, you know, I knew Benny. Benny was from that area of Milwaukee. He knew Jerry Gunnerman

and all that kind of. stuff. So he convinced your dad that after the autograph session, we're going to drive down here to this little farm we had. You sit outside. We got a picnic table out there in this big oak tree. Have a little barbecue. Just nobody there. It's just nothing. No, not like you're going to

have an autograph session. Nobody knew about it. So your dad's like, yeah, that'd be kind of relaxing. So yeah, he did bring him over there and we sat down at a barbecue and just goofed around, looked at the barn, just goofed, you know, stuff like that. So he actually asked me, he goes, oh, you know, when you had an over to Michigan. I said, well, I'll be driving over there maybe, you know, tomorrow morning and this. And he goes,

you can just jump on the plane with me right now if you want. I'm like, really? He says, yeah, come you know, so sure enough, you know, Teresa and him and Benny and I, you know, off to the airport and you gave me on there, gave me a flight over there to Michigan. So it was pretty cool. Yeah. When, when, when, when, when, when were you, where were you, where were you, what were you racing when he was born? When he was born, I was actually racing, you know, like, say, central Wisconsin you know in the five nights a week yeah I think he was born when I was at a racetrack yeah you know the usual deal you know how it goes and you have a son named Justin daughter named Brittany yep exactly and Justin raced as well uh we did have Justin

racing for a while you know we ran hickory we ran you know carrow we ran some racetracks around here and then we sent him Wisconsin for a year he drove up there at uh Madison and the Dells and stuff try to hone his skills he drove for uh Joe Wood Jerry Wood you know Kansas was there too you know it's a good group of guys. He won a lot of truck races and things like that up there. But like I say, it got to the point, though, where racing was getting kind of expensive. And I knew that, you know, it's, hey, am I going to mortgage my house? Am I going to put everything up for collateral to try and get my kid to be a superstar? Sure. You know, and how many times does that happen? You know, not a lot. You know, you've got to get

the right breaks and all that stuff. So we kind of backed off to racing part of it, you know, so it's just for fun now. So, yeah, so I guess these days you're spending your time over at the marina and five days a week at the shop. You still flipping houses? No, no, actually, I had to stop flipping houses because I was doing that. My son Justin was running the marine business. Well, he came up with throat cancer and stuff like that, the point where he couldn't work. He was doing radiation chemo and all that kind of stuff. So he had a good business going, and I'm flipping the homes.

and I was kind of like my last house anyway. So I had to quit that basically. Come over there, work on. This is how I got thrown in the fire in the boat industry, was I had to come in, work on the stuff, help the business keep going while he's recovering. Well, after recover, it came back. He still was kind of weak.

I had to stay there and keep going. Well, I'm still there. Yeah, never left. What's a week for you kind of entail? Where are you spending your time? Well, it's basically over there. The business is crazy. We've had so many people moving the area, so many people have boats,

you know, are so fewer and fewer mechanics. We could work seven days a week, 24 hours a day there are due. I mean, it's that busy right now. And that's where I spend all my time. When I do get home, I get six acres to land to take care of and cut grass to cut and this and that. So that's my Saturday, half a Sunday, Monday morning, back at the shop, you know, nine to six or actually later sometimes.

Who do you stay in contact with from the NASCAR industry? Well, let's put it this way. A lot of them bring their boats, you know, to us. You know, we work on your stuff. We very little because you never use it. But, oh, yeah, you know, it don't matter. Matt Crafton brings his stuff, you know, and this guy brings his stuff. You know, there's race teams, race people that all around that bring our boats and we work on them.

So I kind of, you know, every now and then they come in, we talk about things, this and that. You know, it's just, it's good to keep in touch that way a little bit, but at the same time, it's, business to business here. Who were some of the guys that you race with in the truck series that you trusted and had friendships with? Well, Hornaday, he was really a hard-nosed driver. I liked him, and we worked together. Actually, we did a TV show, actually. Hammerhead. Productions actually did. Yeah, remember that? Okay, it's Customs deal. Horton, cool guy. But right now I just don't have time to go out and see these people anymore. Everybody's busy. Everybody's busy. You know, and that's the thing, you know, racing kind of kept you busy. Now that I'm out of racing,

I'm busier. I have less time to myself than I did before. I know. Yeah, it's like, oh, I'm going to retire. They say retire. I haven't retired. I'm working harder than all than I ever did. Yeah, I can understand that.

I'll be 70 or December. And I'm still six days a week, you know, sometimes 11 hours a day, you know, getting this stuff done. I'm there every day. Yeah. Man, if I have your energy at 70, I'll be thrilled. Well, I think what happens, though, Dale, if you sit down and you don't do it. Yeah, you start aching and pain and things. Uh-uh.

I'm, like I said, foot to the floor to the end. I'm not giving up. Yeah. Well, that's a great attitude. I've enjoyed talking to you, man. This has been a lot of fun. Yeah, we've had some good old times thinking about things, you know. Yeah.

But at least we've got some true stories out there. Yeah, that's right. I appreciate you coming through, man. You know, you left your mark on NASCAR. You had a great career and a very successful career in a truck series. And a lot of people, you know, were called the beautiful, Dodge car or truck that you won a lot of races in. Maybe we ought to start a rumor.

You know, Dodge is coming back in the truck series. Should we start it? Yeah. Hmm. Should I get my uniform ready? Yeah. That'd be awesome. They should have you drive it out on the platform to announce it, but when they're

finally ready to go. But they should at least have you there, man, all the success that you had in the truck. Oh, I had a lot of fun. Yeah. Well, it was a lot of fun talking to you, man, really, some of these old stories. Appreciate your time today, bud. No problem.

All right, Ted Musgrave on the Dale Jr. Download. Hey, everybody, you want the latest Dell Jr. download apparel? Visit shop.durtymomedia.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.dirtymowmedia.com. That's a great conversation with Ted,

and always fun to catch up with him. I remember when he came into the Cup Series and the 55, and that car had kind of struggled and I don't know man I don't know why I was paying so much attention but I remember how they like started getting a little better then they'd show up running the top five and you're like damn um it just was like it was you know it was like a basically a 30th place car slowly developing into a contender they weren't going to win any races but you know they would they would roll up in there and be hard to, hard to deal with every now and the end. And you, you would chalk it up to Ted.

And, you know, he was the new, he was the one element that was new to the team that brought them, you know, to this level. And you're like, wow, this guy must be pretty good. And then, obviously, Mark Martin Roush and those guys took a gamble. And I always was puzzled as to why that didn't work out. for him because they did come in, set on some poles, had like a, you know,

out-of-the-gate flash of like what could be and something that could get better and build into something better and it just didn't happen. And he goes on and runs in the truck series and wins races in a championship. And so you're like,

well, if they had given him the opportunity at Rausch to jail with the right people, the right chemistry, the right crew chief, whatever it may have been, you know, he might have had a whole different story in the Cup series because I think the talent was absolutely there. And I never knew, I'll be honest, I'll be honest here. I always thought that

Ted Musgrave was difficult to work with. I didn't know him at all. I was making this assumption off of nothing. But, you know, when I, when I, when I, when he, when he, see him walking around in the garage, you could tell, you know, at times he was disgruntled, or you could kind of see on his face, the frustration and the anguish over results or things just not sort of starting to click. And I just kind of assumed, just by his body language, that he might be the kind of guy that in the garage, in the hauler or in the shop or in the office would be the kind of guy that was just constantly complaining. and and sharing, voicing his frustrations and difficult to sort of appease.

But hearing him describe it, it's like he was the exact opposite. Like he, you know, when things weren't going well, he was like, I don't want to make it difficult. I'm not going to demand change or ask for something that I think could help. I don't want to be problematic or seen as difficult or to work with. I never would have guessed that about him. But, yeah, I guess, you know, it seems like that now he had some moments like he would lose his temper. And we saw that with the Kelly Buyers deal in the truck race at Milwaukee. But, you know, so he had a button that you could push that would definitely get him off, set him off.

But, yeah, I always kind of been curious about Ted and, you know, what his perspective of his career was. and a lot of guy I know he's born somewhere else but he's got a lot of Wisconsin in him they're sort of you know they're there he's very similar in personality to some of the folks that I know from that area

that have been in the Cup series over the last 30 years they all kind of have that same sort of attitude or personality mentality around things sharp sharp people really great minds for racing the you know Matt Kenseth and those kind of guys and

they all have this really this ability to like prioritize racing over everything and like you know all winter long race car race car race car race car race car you know go home eat take care the family wife do things but race car race car race car every day

until you know until they finally get to the top level where other people are doing things for them. But man, yeah. We missed it, you know, not being able to really live that sort of mid to late 80s heyday of ASA, where Dick Trickle, Alan Quicki, Mark Martin, in, you know, 85-ish. ASA in the 80s was insane. And not being able to really experience that was I went to a couple races with Dad, but I saw it from afar.

and that was an awesome series. And it's wild, too. You know, like NASCAR Cup Series, Xfinity Series, those things have been around for decades. But when you get down to the lower levels, some of the successful series, they have these very small sort of moments in time. And then they're gone.

But, yeah. So anyway, it's awesome to be able to catch up with Ted and see how things have been going for him and what he's up to these days and over there running the marina where we keep the houseboat giving me a hard time for not being out on it.

Yeah, I love that boat. Don't get on it enough. But anyways, yeah, glad I got to come through. Hope you enjoyed it. All right, it's time for the white flag. The Teardown was live on YouTube and Twitter following the race.

Shout out to Jordan and Jeff for getting things in and getting things done Saturday night. It was late. Action's detrimental dropped on Sunday. Good job by Denny Hamill as well to get in after a tough race. They had a great show. I listened to Denny's show this week and really enjoyed it.

Door bumper clear dropped on Monday as well. Bob Pockris was the guest. Always great having Bob in. And yesterday, TJ and I did a episode of Dirty Air. And today, Herman Schrader, Speed Street comes out. Tomorrow, bless your heart with Amy. It's going to be a lot of fun doing that show on Thursday. another episode that is new for you guys.

This is going to be a lot of fun to see how y'all respond to this. I think it's a great idea. So maybe you'll check it out. It's called Dirty 30. And it's going to drop Friday. It's a half hour of highlights from our three Dell Jr. Download episodes this week. So it's a half hour of highlights.

So it's highlights from Dirty Air, the guest interview and bless your heart does bless your heart count as a Dell Jr. download episode? Yeah, it's basically a way for people to listen to the DJD feed if you miss something it's got a little taste of everything in there.

My goodness. All right, well, we'll see how you all enjoy this. I think it's a great idea. I think it'll be pretty fun to listen to. Get you a little highlight reel of everything going down this week. I think it'd be cool if we took all of our shows and squished them into a dirty

Media. 30. I wouldn't rule that out. 30.30. I mean, hey, I think it'd be good because then people might hear something from the tear down a little clip and go, damn, I need to go hear the rest of that. Mm-hmm. You know? Anyways, that should be fun.

We'll see how you guys respond. Thanks for listening. And we'll see you tomorrow for another episode of Bless Your Heart. Check out Dirtymo Media on Instagram, Facebook, X, and TikTok.