The Joe Rogan Experience - #1196 - Dale Earnhardt Jr.

Episode Date: November 7, 2018

Dale Earnhardt Jr. is a semi-retired American professional stock car racing driver, team owner, and is currently an analyst for NASCAR on NBC. His new book "Racing to the Finish: My Story" is available now.

four three two hello dale hey how you doing thanks for doing this man i appreciate it yeah i'm glad to be here nice to meet you man and nice to find out that not only you're a race car driver you're also a bow hunter yeah yeah i'll do like that i saw your your archery uh equipment and all that stuff but me and a buddy of mine own some land and and I try to get out there and at least go twice a year. I just love being in the stands, sitting in the woods, just thinking about what's going on. Yeah, it's brain cleansing, right? Everything before the shot really is what it's all about.

Yeah. Well, yeah, that's a lot of it, right? Hanging out with your – being with your friends and family, you know. You need one of those techno hunts in your life, don't you? The techno hunt was pretty impressive. Yeah, that thing is, all my friends that come over here just go, whoa. That's a life changer. Yeah, absolutely.

But it's also a giant time waster. I know. I don't know. I've got a golf sim at the house, so I've got to figure out where I can put that. Golf's the one I've always avoided. I've always avoided golf because I just saw it suck away people's time. Yeah. I don't go, that's the one I've always avoided. I've always avoided golf because I just saw it suck away people's time. Yeah. I don't go.

That's the thing. Like, I don't have the time and the patience to really block that whole day off to go play outdoors. But to go over there and just hit the driver for 30 minutes on the simulator is so fun. Well, I would imagine with what you do for a living, I think what you do is one of the craziest, wildest, most demanding things a person could do for an occupation. Boy, I don't know. It's right up there. You don't know? Other than being a soldier or a firefighter or a cop or a fighter.

Yeah, fighter and bullfighting and bull riding, those type of things. Those people. Boxing. Bull riders, that's on another level. That's another level of crazy. I've hung out with those guys, and they. Those people. Boxing. Bull riders, that's on another level. That's another level of crazy. I've hung out with those guys, and they are crazy people. It takes a certain mentality to be able to climb onto a bull. Yeah, they have a certain energy about them.

Right. They got that I don't give a fuck energy, and it's cranked up to 10. Exactly. Yeah. Have you ever been in Vegas when they have the big— The finals? I haven't, actually. Oh, they're everywhere Vegas when they have the big – The finals? I haven't actually.

Oh, they're everywhere and they're all crazy. I know. They are really – I know a lot of those guys. And our paths have crossed several times. And every time you're around them, you're like, are we going to end up in jail tonight? You know, just that's a real possibility. Yeah.

I mean, they're throwbacks. Yeah, they are. They're real throwbacks. They are. Legit wild men. Ag possibility. Yeah, I mean, they're throwbacks. Yeah, they are. They're real throwbacks. They are. Legit wild men. Agree. Yeah, I mean, but driving a race car, I mean, you have a giant engine. You're strapped into a seat.

You're hurling down the road at extreme speeds right next to other cars doing the same thing. Just the intensity and just everything being on nine at all times. Like, that is a wild way to make a living, sir. Yeah, thanks. I mean, when I was little, thinking about, you know, what the hell am I going to grow up and be, my father was really successful in the sport. So I would go to the races and I would watch him race and see him win and watch him go through victory lane and celebrate and all those things. And I thought, man, this is what I got to do. I got to do this. This is, this looks fun. This looks exciting. People are, you know, people are in awe of the

drivers, the race, my father, the personalities. And I just wanted to do it real badly, but I knew that the odds of making it are tough. So there's only 40 guys in the field every weekend. So there's 40 guys in this, in the whole country that are going to get the shot to do it, you know, and me, the odds of me, even with my dad being as successful as he was, I'd have a lot of doors open to me, but the odds of me actually getting there and being able to stay, have the staying power and the success and talent, I just knew were tough. So I didn't know if I'd ever get that chance. But it is, you know, I remember the first time I went to a two and a half mile track. It's Talladega and you hold it wide open.

I was working at my dad's dealership changing oil. He owned this Chevy store in Newton, North Carolina. And the phone rang and he said, my dad, my dad was on the other end and he was in Talladega for a test. And he said, get your helmet and your suit and meet me at the racetrack. The next day, you're going to fly in the King Air to the, to the track. Don't know, don't ask questions, just do it. it and so I got there and I I knew I was going to Talladega and I thought man I must be driving this this is gonna be crazy I'm gonna go around this two and a half mile to track full speed at 190 miles an hour I'd never done I never went faster than 90 or 95 on a racetrack before I never drove anything bigger than a half mile

and uh I pulled out he's you know i got there he's like you're gonna test this car get in get ready he puts me in there and he's like you gotta hold it wide open if you don't hold it wide open the motor's not gonna work it'll hurt the motor you gotta hold it the way they tune the motor to run wide open it has to run it it has to run at full throttle if you try to go around there at half throttle to burn the pistons it'll run too lean wow all those things so he he was saying that and thought to myself, is he just telling me that just to make sure I hold it wide open because he thought I would be a pussy and not do it? And so I was like, man, I'm a little nervous to hold it wide open, but I pulled out on the track and I mashed the gas full throttle, and I'm going down the back straightaway. open but I pulled out on the track and I mashed the gas full throttle and I'm going down the back straightaway and I was like I'm looking down the back straightaway into the next corner this long

corner and I'm like how's it gonna stick you know how's the car gonna how's the car not gonna fly out of the racetrack like it I'm going so fast I don't it doesn't feel like it's going to stay in the track and uh and I kept running kept running that through my head about my dad saying i gotta hold it wide open i'm like well that's it it'll it'll it'll go wide open around here so i don't think he would you know i believe everything he says and you go in the corner and you turn uh into the corner and there is more grip than you can imagine like the there's so much grip the car is stuck to the track with such grip that you've never felt this before in your life this this grip like you can't slide across that track the tires in the car hold of the track so tough

and tight that nothing's going to make it. It just goes around there like it's the craziest thing. And so now today when I tell people, when we got this two-seater car and we take people for rides and they get in there and I'm like, man, what am I going to do? What are you going to do to explain to somebody what this is going to feel like? I'm going to tell you things to pay attention to. Pay attention to the grip. You're not going to believe how much grip this car has. You're just not going to believe that much grip this car has. Like it's, you're just not going to believe that it'll stick to the track the way it does. So pay attention to that and pay attention to how bumpy and violent it is. You know, you drive a Cadillac or any car down the street.

Well, it's, you know, six, eight inches off the ground, these big old inflated tires and big giant sidewalls. And it's going to's gonna feel nice you know when it hits little bumps our cars are rigid and suck to the ground and don't have much travel in the suspension and you know it's just it's it's built to hand to go fast not to feel good you know and it's gonna it's rough as hell and shakes shakes the hell out of you and um that's what i remember about that and and as soon as i got over that initial fear, I think that was the only time I ever had any real fear of driving a car. As soon as I was like, well, all right, what, you know, anything, nothing else is going to be as scary as that was right.

Driving a car. And I mean, flipping. And when I flipped for the first time and our, you know, the car's tumbling and flying and parts flying off the air. My, I thought to myself that I wasn't scared or I never was scared of flipping. My thought was, I just did something a lot of people are never going to experience. You know, I did something that, uh, that only a few people know what that's like. And I feel safe. I've always felt incredibly safe inside the car, you know, especially with the, I mean, in the last 20 years, the safety stuff has really been focused on and improved and better and better and better. But I look at the interior of our cars today versus 20 years ago, and I can't believe some of the stuff that we used to climb into.

So you felt calm while it was flipping oh yeah i always well i've seen cars flip right i've seen it for years right so i know it's possible so i get in there and i got turned around at a race in 1998 i was racing at daytona and i got turned around and car, so I'm flipping for the first time in my life, and this car's like over 3,000 pounds, but it flies up in the air like it's paper, man. It's the craziest thing in the world. It's so weightless, you know, and what it felt like to me, so the car rolled on its side and came down kind of on its side. It felt like somebody rolled a prop wall of grass up against the car.

You know what I'm saying? When I was on my side and I could see the ground, I felt like I was right side up because as you're flipping, the force pushes you down in the seat. So you feel eternally, you feel gravity all the time. Like you're, you know, as the car's flipping, you're, you're pushed into the seat. So you feel great. You feel weight of yourself in the seat that never changes. You never kind of come up out of the seat like that, you know? And so it was like somebody rolled a prop

wall of grass up against the side of the car and then against the roof and then against that side. And then this, you know, it kept doing that. And I'm like, it's just the weirdest feeling. And you feel completely safe. You know, you feel completely safe you know you feel like you know nothing's gonna harm me but this but and you know this you just one of the things they always talk about it's like get your hands uh on to something because the spinning makes your arms just go like this and if you watch a lot of old wrecks from the 60s and 70s you'll see the guy's arms come flying out the window, and they're just kind of flopping around.

They can't pull it. It's spinning so fast, you can't pull it in. And your arms will go like that. So as soon as you know you're going upside down, you grab the bottom of the steering wheel and just kind of watch. But I flipped my pickup truck one time on Christmas Day, and I wasn't holding on the steering wheel, and my arm went out the window you know for like a split second it banged around in the in the in the windowsill and I was like man you know I got it back in and grabbed a hold of the steering wheel with both my hands

and so ever since then I've like you know now I know like anytime I'm in a crash you got to have your hands a hold of something because that's the one thing that you can't control. You're strapped in with your seatbelt and everything, but your arms can go anywhere. And in that moment when the car is rolling or barrel rolling or flipping, it's so fast. Like you can't, your arms just go this way. It's the craziest thing in the world. That's the only fear, I guess, is that your arm could get outside the window and get crushed or something. Cause the guys have had that happen.

Yeah. I would imagine. How'd you flip when you were on Christmas? On Christmas day, my sister, uh, she knows this is she just won't be news to her, but, um, uh, it's probably not fun for her to hear every time I tell it. But we, I had a pickup truck with a tape deck in it. And I had, she got me that Walkman CD with the adapter for the tape deck that you stick into your cassette adapter. And she bought me the Walkman cassette adapter. And I'm in my truck. I got an extended cab S10. And I'm driving from my house to my mama's house where family reunion is.

My dad's there. Everybody's there. Whole family's there. I'm a little late. And I'm driving down the road, and I got to messing with that walkman, and I drove off into the ditch, and I hit a driveway cover, a pipe, drainage pipe in a driveway, and went like seven flips and destroyed this truck.

And in the middle of the flipping i remember that happening and everything all my change jacket anything that was loose in the car ended up down into one corner like floorboard everything sort of collects into that one corner as it's spinning and uh it crushed the windshield down the mirror was down into the radio. You know, it crushed the roof down real bad. I was really lucky. I had my hands on top of the steering wheel, and the windshield kept slapping my knuckles and busted all my knuckles real bad. And so then I let go, and my hands went this way. And then I finally got them back in and grabbed the bottom of the steering wheel.

The tires were broken and busted off the the truck and this i got out of the truck and i was fine didn't have any injuries other than just the knuckles kind of being scraped up this this newly married couple they just or either got engaged or just got married were driving the other way and saw the whole thing and they stopped and uh they were like you all right i'm like yeah and uh of course there's this line of cars behind me stopped on the road and this one lady pulls up and i was like i need to borrow your cell phone to call my dad she's like you're in shock you need to sit down i was like no i'm not in shock i just needed to borrow myself borrow your cell phone so i walked the next car, and I got a cell phone from this person.

I called my dad, and I was like, Dad, I was like, man, I flipped my truck. I had financed this thing for five years. I was paying $100 a month. It was perfect. I was working at a dealership changing oil, probably making $130 a week. And, I mean, just got this truck for probably two, three months. And used truck, but it was good. It's junk.

I called dad, and I'm like, man, he's going to be mad. Can't be too mad because I'm paying for the truck, but he's going to be mad at me because I'm screwing up family reunion and Christmas. He comes to get me. I'd flipped this truck real close to where our farm was. So he ran over to the farm and got this flatbed truck. And he pulls out there with the flatbed truck. And he pulls up.

And as soon as he pulls up, a state trooper pulls up. And the state trooper guy and dad talked for a minute. And the state trooper's like, you know, one single car accident. You okay? Yeah, everybody's okay. Dad, are you going to put this on the flatbed and take it home? Yeah, okay, okay. I ain't going to investigate or anything.

Everything's cool. Y'all just go about your business. So he left. He did us a solid there and didn't give me any kind of traffic ticket. And so me and Dad put the truck on the flatbed, and we're driving back, and he started laughing. And I was like, man, I expected you to be really mad because he was a fiery kind of dad, you know, and pulled a belt out and go to

town. You know, he was a rough, strict, tough, tough dude. And so I thought I was going to get a good cussing at least, but he started laughing. And I said, man, what's so funny? And he goes, I was 18 when this happened. He goes, when I was 18 years old, but he started laughing. And I said, man, what's so funny? And he goes, I was 18 when this happened. He goes, when I was 18 years old, I flipped my car. He's like, I can't get mad. He's like, it's just, I'm just glad you're not hurt. I'm like, well, that's nice. So we drove back. I took a couple pictures of it and got insurance for it. Got like 11, 12 grand for the insurance to be able to buy another truck. So it all worked out. So that was the first time you ever flipped something or did you flip the race car first? That was the first time. No, the race car was next. So the race car is like,

oh, I've been here before. Yes. Yeah. And there's nothing in the race car. It's, it's not as bad as a passenger car. You only got that strap, you know, you're moving around and banging around in there and in the race car, you're in there pretty tight. Yeah. Do you feel weird when you're moving around and banging around in there and in the race car, you're in there pretty tight. Yeah. Do you feel weird when you're in a passenger car too, is for the lack of support, lack of support and safety? Yeah. You know, I,

I do because compared to the way, the way our cup cars are now, or the race cars are now, man, we're cocooned in there, the seat and everything, the headrest, you got a six,

seven point harness. I mean, in a street car, you really just got the strap. I mean, it's, um, I um i certainly uh you know and more i'm much more cautious as i get older on the highway and and people are like hey man how do you do it how do you drive on how you drive a race car and then go 45 55 on the road and it's

real easy actually you know just kind of chill does it get all your fast driving out of the way? When I was younger, I was getting speeding tickets all the time, but as I got older, I just didn't care to be in a hurry anymore. Yeah, I would figure the way you drive for a living, you would just get it out of your system. Yeah, yeah. I get plenty of, I had plenty of high-speed action and hijinks on the racetrack.

I don't, I calmed down on the road. What kind of car do you drive in real life? Well, it's funny. I, um, I just bought a brand new Silverado. I hadn't bought a truck in a long time. I had, I still have my old Silverado I bought. It's about a 0406, but there's new one. Uh, I like a lot. I didn't like the old ones that much. They just look kind of basic. The new ones are really sweet looking. The character lines and the body lines, it's just a good looking truck. So I bought that. But what I was driving before that, I got a 48 pickup truck.

And it's all rough as hell on the outside. And original faded, all messy and ugly looking. But it's got a Vortec motor and good drive train in it drives good but it's easy to work on and I just love fooling with it I took the original bench seat out and put these old bucket seats in from an 80 Chevy Blazer and so I made it comfortable and just the way I wanted it so I drove I drove that a lot this summer until I got this new truck. And I got a 76 Chevy Laguna that I love to drive. Yeah, that thing just kind of floats down the road, man. And it's dark midnight blue, tinted windows, and just a really cool car.

I love the 70s and the style of the cars in the 70s, even kind of the bigger ones like in the late 70s, like the 442 Oldsmobile Cutlass. Yeah. Those big, big, big cars. There's something about those guys that I really dig. Is that your car right there? That's my car right there, yeah. Damn.

I love that thing, man. I had a 1973 Chevelle that reminds me of that kind of body style. That's it. Wow. That reminds me of that kind of body style. That's it. I got a 442 that's sort of the sister to that, an Oldsville 442 that's red and kind of the same tinted one. I did the same wheels, same tires, same tint. I put a spoiler, like a NASCAR-style spoiler on the back and the front because those cars were big in NASCAR.

See, those cars don't get as much love as the 60s muscle cars well we'll get there i think as we get older that what's cool gets older really yeah like i mean nothing i mean this the 67 camaro those cars yeah yeah i got a 67 i thought um i had a 69 but uh like the 55 all those things will always hold their rightful place in history. But these cars, like that car right there, that wasn't very cool 10, 15, 20 years ago. No. But as we get older, that car becomes cool. And one day we'll be driving around in like 85 pickup trucks going, man, this thing's so awesome, so old school. Yeah, I think so.

I don't know about that i just think that that car might just be cool because you own it i don't know i think it's got these old character lines man it does like it does have old care you know what's interesting i was i was just talking to a friend of mine about this when in 1970 uh my mom bought a barracuda yeah and when i was in high school in 1981 i was a freshman in high school and she had this barracuda and it was like a classic car and it was like a classic muscle car right but like that's only 11 years old yeah like if you had a car today from 2007 well there yeah that wouldn't be a classic car it's just a car yeah Yeah, you're right. It's weird. It is weird. It is weird. Like a 1969, when I was in high school, a 1969, which is only an 11-year-old car, was amazing.

Like, whoa, people would stop and stare at it. Dude, look at that 69 Camaro. Yeah. Whoa. I got an 88 S10. That was the first pickup truck I owned or had. That was like the car I got when I was 16 years old. And I got one and restored it and

which was a terrible investment but um it makes sense for me because it you know because it was my first truck but and i didn't think anybody would give a shit about it right because it's an s10 it's like the the bottom of the barrel and pickup trucks for chevrolet in 1988 and and but i drive that thing around and people are like wow that's the cleanest s10 i've seen in you know 15 20 years that's it right there oh that's a nice car and so i mean that's something about seeing one of those that's in great shape yeah that it made it through yeah there's not many of them left i mean for for good reason but what was your first car my first car was a 73 chevelle, that one.

But the engine blew out on it. I got a 71. Chevelle is a good car, man. Oh, I love Chevelles. So would you get a 73 and restore it? I would get a 70. That's my favorite year. 69 and 70 are my favorite years. I go back and forth between 69 and 70 with Chevelles.

They're both amazing years. Yeah. I like those cars. They're a big muscle car. They are. They're both amazing years. Yeah. Yeah. I like those cars. They're a big muscle car. They are. It's a big ride. It's bigger than the Camaro. Yeah. I have a 1969 Nova. Really? Yeah, which is

like a smaller. Yeah. Yeah, like that right there. Woo! Daddy! That's a good looking car. That is as classic an American muscle car as you get. It's a 1970 with silver with black stripes. Come on. They used to race Novas.

My dad raced a Nova. Yeah, I like Novas because they're light. Because it's a light car and because, you know, you put a big engine in it and new suspension and, you know. Yeah. I have a Nova, a wagon that I just bought, a 66. Oh, wow. Yeah. That's my next project. Um, I bought it from a

buddy for five grand and I'm, it's in, it's, it's pretty bad shape, but I'm gonna, that's my next project. As soon as I get some time, I had this little girl, um, Isla and she's six months. Um, so it's kind of made it tough doing any kind of projects. I know what that's like. Congratulations. Thanks. It's awesome. But it does, uh but it does eat up a lot of your time. Everything is on the side right now. And it will be. Yeah. How long?

Forever. It's just forever until they move out, and then it's still a little bit on the side because you've got to call and check on them. Yeah. It's awesome, though. Yeah, it is. It's amazing. It's like getting married and having a kid and all that stuff is nothing like I thought it'd be.

No one can explain it to you, especially the kid part. They can explain it to you. I've had friends that have kids. They just go, we'll talk after the kids, boy. There's no way you're going to be able to figure this out until it actually happens. Yeah, I've had people, everybody tries to tell you, this is what it's going to be like, man, you ain't going to believe it. Greatest thing ever. Boy, you just don't even know. And it still doesn't, it doesn't help. You know, it doesn't sink in until you go

through the experience. When you go through that experience, you're like, damn, they were right. You know, this is the greatest thing ever. It's a different kind of love. It is. It's just, it's just, it's hard to explain. If I come home, my daughters run up to me and jump in my arms, and I catch them, and they give me a kiss, and I'm hugging them. There's a kind of love that doesn't exist in any other part of my life. Nothing you could have ever felt before with anything or anybody else. It is. It's just different.

Yeah, I can't wait for that. She's six months, and everybody's like, man, and you'll probably agree. They're like, it goes fast, it goes fast, it goes fast. It goes real fast. We're sort of in that moment where we're like, come on. I can't wait for her to talk. I can't wait to hear her voice. What is her voice going to sound like?

What kind of voice is she going to have, and what is she going to like, and what is she going to want me to do with her, and those kind of things. Yeah, it's awesome. Yeah. It's awesome. But, yeah, it does put your projects on the side. Yeah, my projects are on the side. Golf sims on the side. Hunting's on the side.

I ain't going to go hunting this year. I was going to go. I usually go in October or November, first of November. And you guys have a spot in Ohio, which is one of the best whitetail spots in the country. Me and a buddy of mine, Martin Trex Jr., he races too. And we've just been buddies a long time, and he's hardcore. He's heavy duty into the hunting. And so I wanted to hunt, but I'm not going to be going every week.

But I knew he was probably interested in probably buying some land and us managing it together and learning how that process goes. So we bought this land, and we've put the food plots in, not ourselves, but we've managed the land on how we want to change it and sort of managing the herd. It's been a really educational experience. I think a lot of people who don't hunt don't even understand what we're talking about the whole process yeah like if you buy a nice piece of land people who uh especially if you look at like there's a bunch of organizations that uh you know teach classes and how to manage a giant piece of property but laying out food plots and and people buy these big chunks of

property specifically for whitetail hunting yeah Yeah. Yeah. So we have about a thousand acres and, and that's awesome. All we do is bow hunt for whitetail. That's it. Well, we'll go in there twice a year, maybe, or at least once a year for Turkey. And we eat what we kill. Like we ate, we killed, uh, we got a Turkey last year and was eating it that night. I mean, that's, that's amazing, isn't it? It's crazy. Yeah. When you can eat it and it doesn't ever touch the freezer, never goes in the refrigerator, isn't it? Yeah, it is crazy. Yeah, when you can eat it and it doesn't ever touch the freezer, never goes in the refrigerator, just straight from the harvest right to the grill. Yeah.

Oh. Yeah, it's great. It's incredible. I love deer jerky. It's probably my favorite. And we fry turkey nuggets and stuff like that. I mean, it's pretty cool. That's awesome.

Yeah. So that's a cool little getaway for you too, right? A thousand acre little slice of heaven. Yeah, yeah. And it's pretty cool. That's awesome. Yeah. So that's a cool little getaway for you too, right? A thousand acre little slice of heaven. Yeah. It's driving distance. So, cause I love a road trip. I mean, if I wanted to, I could fly up there, but I like the road trip. The whole thing for me really is everything before the shot that you take in the, you

know, on the deer. It's the drive up there with your buddies talking about what you're going to do, what you can't wait to do, what's been going on with everybody. Getting up there and getting everything laid out, looking at the map on the wall, you know, get that big laminated map on the wall, be like, man, this is a big good stand. Which way is the wind blowing? Let's talk about the wind. What's the wind going to be doing tomorrow morning?

Where are we going to go tomorrow morning? You know, and then, you know, everybody know everybody has you know everybody gets their hands into cooking dinner that night somebody you know everybody gets a side or something they're dealing with and managing and it's just fun you know just a lot just spending time with your buddies because you don't never know we don't take that time anymore we don't really make time anymore and it's kind of you go you're gonna go do that for two days you know so you're gonna make time to be with each other and enjoy it i like taking my buddies and like taking friends of mine that don't hunt or haven't ever hunted and letting them sort of understand what the experience is like and it's pretty cool it is cool but it's tough to get someone who's never

hunted before who isn't in a hunting sit in a stand yeah i can't get my wife to go i wanted amy to go she's she knows what hunting's about she's into it but um she don't want to go we got it we even got the redneck blinds you know the real comfortable deals and you're sitting there in the chair move all you want yeah you ain't gotta worry about your scent too bad or anything like that and she won't even go sit in that i'm hoping little isla will want to go so we'll see yeah maybe it's better that she doesn't go you need a little break yeah you need a little place where like if you guarantee like if she wanted to go every time you were going right then you're like oh come on what do you want to be like honey oh but you like it too much yeah yeah well i would imagine like again something with what you do for a living having

something that's peaceful and quiet and out in nature would be very important to kind of balance out the just the wild hectic nature of race car driving yeah i mean for me that's um getting when i get in the stand and i sit down and i look out across the you across the field and look at the land and everything. Man, you ain't got to worry about answering no email or getting back to this guy or setting up this appointment or answering this question. Or, you know, it's just it's even better. It's better than going on vacation like we go on vacation with my wife or with my buddies or whatever. You still can't really ever really, you know, disconnect from everything you're doing. It seems like, though, when I go hunting, I can completely get rid of technology, you know, if I want.

And, you know, it's just – and sitting in the woods is peaceful. Yeah. You know? It's good for you. It is good. It is. It's therapeutic. Even though nothing's happening, it's kind of cleansing in a way.

Yeah. It's a weird way. In a weird way. I think human beings have a certain amount of requirement for time and nature. Yeah. And you don't realize you have that requirement until you're out there. Yeah. You wouldn't know it until you go sit in a stand and you're like,

wow, I needed a little bit of this. I think even a park, even people that go to Central Park in New York City, they go to that park and sit down by a tree and they just feel better. Yeah, exactly. That's exactly what it is. Yeah, I mean, in your work environment is a concrete slab that you're driving. What's the fastest you go? 215. Yeah.

When that passes you, you realize how fast 215 really is. It's like, jeez. You sit in that car, do it long enough, you forget. Do you have apprehension about the horsepower wars with just modern consumer cars? Because I look at some of these cars that they're putting out that are amazing, like the new Corvette ZR1s, like 700-plus horsepower right from the factory. The Dodge Demons, like 800 horsepower. They're putting out these insane race cars right from the factory

that any dummy like me, I could just go to, if I have the cash, I could go to a Corvette dealership and pick one up. And all of a sudden I'm on the highway. Yeah. Yeah. I don't have a problem with it now until it becomes a common occurrence where people don't know how to control it. You know, or don't know how to manage what they're doing behind the wheel or something like that. But until that's like a common issue, i don't know that it'll need regulation

yeah yeah i don't necessarily think i wouldn't be surprised though that one day it may be you know regulated because everything gets you know governed at some point yeah maybe too much right maybe we should just appreciate the fact that you can do that i know i mean i want to be able to build whatever i want to build. Right. You know, right. And if I want that in production, I ought to be able to produce whatever they want. I agree. But I feel like I feel it the same way I feel about guns. Like I'm very pro Second Amendment. I feel like I am a responsible gun owner. I have a lot of friends that are responsible gun owners. I've used guns for hunting. I think you should have a gun for protection. I don't

think there's anything wrong with that. But I don't think it would be a bad idea to have some sort of course that you have to go through so you understand all the aspects of safety and precautions that you should take and how to correctly load a gun and clean a gun. Absolutely, yeah. But this is not really the case right now.

And it's not necessarily, I'm not talking about gun control as much as I'm talking about gun safety and gun responsibility. I feel like the same way about a car. I feel like if you're going to go out and buy a Corvette ZR1, I mean, the kind of body-mashing acceleration, the G-forces you can get from something like that right from the factory, 0 to 60 in under three seconds, that's an insane automobile. Maybe someone should take you around a track a little seconds. That's an insane automobile. Like maybe someone should like take you around a track a little bit. That's a great idea. I guess that would be the case. If

you were going to buy something like that or get in the car like that, you would need some kind of a trainer course that you'd have to pass. Three hours on a track. If you're, if you have to have a particular license to drive 18 wheelers down the interstate, you know, there should be a style or a type of license that you need to achieve to have a certain type of, you know, there should be a style or a type of license that you need to achieve to have a certain type of, you know. You want to go buy a Viper ACR and take it on the road, those crazy race car Vipers that you could just drive. You should probably know how to drive that thing.

Especially the Vipers. Yeah. Those things are a little bit of a handful. They're a little tail happy. They're pretty tail happy. Yeah. They're so crazy, too, that the race car one with all the vents and all the aero all around it, that is just an insane thing that you could just go buy that and take that on the road.

Oh, yeah. Giant-ass V10 in it. It's pretty crazy. It's awesome. Yeah. Do you drive fast cars on the road ever, or do you mostly, are you just like, just mostly driving normal, relaxed on the road? So I got a lot of speeding tickets when I was younger. That's a shocker.

Yeah. And I, and it seemed like it would just never fail. Anytime I got behind the wheel of a Corvette or anything like that I would get pulled over for you know rolling through lights or rolling through a stop sign or reckless driving or whatever and I kept I mean it happened as recently as two or three years ago I got pulled over for rolling through a stop sign and speeding and and guy's like man you don't need these tickets like what are you doing and i was like you're right i don't know what the hell i'm doing i don't need to be driving this damn car is what's up i need to get out of stupid car i don't need no corvette with all this Uh, and I've, I've got this original, um, I got this original, uh, 65 Impala that's

been in my family since it was brand new. And it's kind of been the community car. It was passed around, got banged up on the corner, corner, right front corner, a couple of crashes here, a couple of crashes there. You just got, I needed a car cause his was broke down. So he used it for a while and such. And it was just, and I finally got it. I bought it for a while and such. And I finally got it. I bought it for two grand from my dad.

And I've fixed it up. It's got a two-barrel, 283. Wow. Doesn't go anywhere, right? And I'd just as much rather drive that car as little power as it has, knowing I won't get myself in any stupid trouble, you know, being in a hurry or being impatient. And so that's, you know, that's what I try to do. I actually, I don't care about as much what kind of power the car has as much.

I like a driver. I want to, I like nice cars. I like, you know, frame off restorations, but I'd rather have a driver that's reliable and easy to work on. And I think that's why I like that 48 pickup truck. It's got the Vortec motor, which is just a, you know, it's not a powerhouse. It's just dropped in out of a junkyard crash. And it's easy to work on. Like me and a buddy of mine put an electric wiper motor in it the other day

because it had an old vacuum in it, and it just didn't work. And it's easy to work on. We put these seats in it, and we got an old ammo box for a console and shit like that. Do you just enjoy it because it's also, it's, it's, it's something that's sort of related to what you do for a living, but then again, not in kind of just a project. Automobile? Yeah. Um, I, uh, I think the reason why I like to work on cars is because it, I don't know, it makes you, uh, it put, it makes you a little invested in the car.

There was a, there was a pin. There was a point in time where I was just kind of like, that's cool. I want to buy that. I'll get that. I'll drive that a year. Now I don't like that anymore. Oh, that's cool. I want to buy that. I'll get rid of this one and get this one. And that got old real fast for me. And so I started to, that's when I, that's when i put a little more time in that 65 impala and fixed it up and and i'm like that's i'm never i'm never selling that car never gonna sell it um that 48 truck i'll never sell it just because of the work i put into it or the you know the time the time that i've spent with it uh i've had i mean you know and i i've got there's people that are helping me work on these cars i got a buddy's people that are helping me work on these cars.

I've got a buddy of mine that actually helps me work on these cars. But when I finish that Nova wagon, I'll probably never sell it, even though it's probably nothing special if someone else were to look at it. But it's what I, you know, it's what I put into it. Yeah, you've got sweat equity. Yeah, you've got sweat equity. And the more you work on these cars, the more confidence you get in trying to do more, getting into the jobs that you didn't think you were capable of doing. Have you ever thought about a buildup straight from scratch? That's probably what this little Nova wagon is going to be. Yeah?

Yeah. I wanted a Nomad. So my dad had a Nomad, and this thing had polished aluminum underneath the floor pan. And he'd park it on a mirror in the shop so you could look underneath it and look how good the damn thing was. It was frame-off, hardly ever seen the road. I mean, just clean as it could be from end to end. And I love road trips. The Nova wagon, I mean, the Nomad is the perfect road trip car.

But I just don't want to spend the money on a Nomad chassis and body. They're just ridiculous to buy. And I want to build the car. I'm not an expert modder. So this Nova wagon's perfect. It's a wagon. It's not a Nomad, but it's a little smaller, which I like. And if I screw it up, it's okay. Um, if I screwed up a Nomad build, I'd be pissed. Why are Nomads so expensive? I don't know. They're just rare, and it's like the old 55 Chevy wagon. I'm trying to put into my head what a Nomad looks like. What year?

Like a 55, 56, 57. Pull up like a 55 Nomad. Oh. Yeah. See, that to me is my ultimate car. Wow. But damn, man, I mean, they're just so high. That's a beautiful car, though. That's a different era, you know?

When you look at the muscle cars of, like, the 1960s, and then you go to something like this, like, that's a whole different world. Yeah. It's a different kind of thing. I'd like to get—there was this one Nomad this guy chopped up and narrowed up, and he made one of those things. It's like a rat rod out of it. Yeah. That was an idea for this Nova wagon, but I don't think I'm going to chop it up. I think I'm going to keep it as is.

When I was in high school, there was a man in the neighborhood when I was a kid that had a 55 Chevy, and it was the greatest thing anybody had ever seen in their lives. And we would all wait while this guy drove by in his 55 Chevy. We just couldn't believe it was a real car that someone could own this. It was black and mint. It was a beautiful car, manual transmission. He would just drive by in that thing and we would all just have our jaws hanging out. When I was a little boy um had hot wheels my favorite hot wheel was the 55 white black 55 chevy that had the flip hood the flames on the front it was like an original hot wheel and ever since then you know that's kind of that's

kind of been my car but i went from the regular you know sedan to the wagon i think that no that nomad's pretty awesome do you have like a full garage set up we could do repairs on things yeah it's kind of a farm shop so it's it's it's dirty we fix lawnmowers we do some modding on our cars whatever needs to be done in there i park my uh i park my bus in there i got a bus that we take to the racetrack and so i mean it's kind of kind of just a big building. We just got a sandblaster in there. We got a big old, we got sheer in there. We can do anything.

It's a man shop. Bike bender, yeah, whatever. Man shop. Yes. Yeah. Nice. So tell me about your book. Yeah.

One of the things that was surprising that i had heard was your your experience with concussions you know um tell me about that so when i've had concussions in that flip i was talking about 1998 at daytona i got a concussion from that crash uh i'd had concussions throughout my career at many different points and didn't think anything of them. I thought when you, you know, when you got a concussion, you joked about it with your buddies about how it made you feel, and you just rested until it was gone. And you raced through it, and eventually it'd go away, and you were fine. You know, it was just something that would go away, and you never thought anything about, you never thought about seeing a doctor.

You never thought about getting treatment. You didn't know there was even treatment available for a concussion. You just thought it was something like a bruise. So this is going on throughout my whole career. I was testing at Kansas Motor Speedway in 2012, blew a right front tire, hit the wall at 185 miles an hour, and it screwed me up. And so that was a really not, you know, that wasn't a typical crash, not something that drivers deal with usually in their career. This was something that was unique to me, and it was just a terrible impact at a bad angle

at a very, very fast rate of speed. And I got out of the car and I knew something was wrong with me and I couldn't, you know, I couldn't, I felt, you know, just like I'd been hitting a head with a bat, uh, shocked and shell shocked in a way, or just couldn't, I couldn't shake it off. You know, you just kind of wanted to shake your head and get it out, whatever it was, and you couldn't. That's the way I felt immediately after that crash. We went, our test was done because the car was killed.

So we went over to this place to get some lunch, and we're sitting there, and I started getting sick, nauseous, before we ever, you know, I wasn't eating. Uh, we just ordered, we just sat down and I started, I'm sitting with my team, all my guys, and I'm, uh, starting to, I feel like I'm gonna throw up right there in front of them and I'm getting nervous. And I don't, I haven't said to them that I feel this way, you know, so I don't want to tell them I feel this way. But my crew chief, Steve LaTarte, is like my, like a brother. I was like, Steve, I am getting sick and something's wrong with me. I don't know what's wrong with me, but I got to get out of this room. It's a business, lunch hour, it's full of people, noises, talking, chatter, shit going on, and I got to get the hell out of there.

And as I was getting up to leave, my wife come walking in. They were, she was coming to get me. We were going to Washington Redskins Monday night game and sitting on her box with Dan Snyder and whoever else is there. So we had them plans to go. I said, Amy, I'm gonna go lay down in the car. I just got to lay down in the car for a minute. And I laid down in the car all the way to the airport. I'm thinking, this is bad.

This is worse than I've ever felt anything, but hopefully it's going to go away. And so we get to the game. We went to the Redskins game. We watched the game. Did that whole thing. We watched the game, did that whole thing. And I went about four weeks of feeling bad and sick for about four weeks, and it finally went away. And I knew that was unusual for it to be that long.

But in my mind, I wasn't thinking doctor. I wasn't thinking treatment. I wasn't thinking anything like that. It didn't even cross my mind to tell anybody or that I really needed, I thought, you know, I thought that I had been dishonest and not, uh, you know, I hadn't, I hadn't been honest with everybody about the way I was feeling, but I didn't ever think that it was going to cost me anything. So I thought, all right, I'm feeling better. I'm good. Go to this race. I've been racing the whole time, right? Finally, four weeks later, I'm all right I'm feeling better I'm good go to this race I've been racing the whole time right finally four weeks later I'm great I go to another race I'm racing I crashed and it all came right back like as bad as it was if not worse and that's when I said I got to go to the doctor

this is bad I can't you know I can't even you know I can't keep crashing like this. Just putting these concussions so close together is a bad deal. It's dangerous. And I couldn't bite my tongue. Like, my attitude and my emotions and shit was out of whack. Like, I couldn't control my anger. And I was like, anybody say something I didn't like, I'm like, you know, I wanted to tell them to fuck off, you know. Right.

And that was just not like me. I couldn't, like, keep myself calm. And everything that I heard, like, made me angry. It was the craziest thing. Even people just talking about stuff would just get under my skin. And I'm like, ugh. Real impatient. Um, and there was some new symptoms, but I finally, uh, I went to the doctor and, and, uh, got to,

I went to this neurosurgeon in Charlotte, Dr. Petty. He's like, I want you to meet this guy in Pittsburgh. His name's Mickey Collins. He works with the Pittsburgh Steelers and the Penguins. And I'm like, all right. I go up there, and I'm thinking I'm going to meet this guy that works with the Penguins and the Steelers, and he sees, you know, players. But he's a doctor that sees anybody and everybody. Like, there's kids in there, you know, that got hurt playing on the playground. There's workers, you know, carpenters, housewives. Everybody's in that damn waiting room to see this man.

He sees about 25 people a day. And he's an expert on head injuries. And he's got, you know, he's just he's on the cutting edge of whatever the hell the new shit is. He knows it. And he's, you know, his team and his people are investigating it. And so he fixed me. So I go there, and I'm like, this is what happened. This is how it happened.

I crashed. I hit it. I didn't tell anybody about it. I was sick for four weeks. I got better. I crashed in this race, and I feel sick again. And he was like, well, these are two different injuries, two different parts of your brain.

The first injury, you bruised this right front I feel sick again. And he was like, well, these are two different injuries of two different parts of your brain. The first injury, you, you bruised this, uh, right front edge of your brain. Uh, when you hit the wall, he said this, this second crash, uh, you twisted the base of your brain and injured some things in the back of your brain. And that's why you're having the emotional and different things like that. So, uh, uh but we he went deeper into it than that he was like you know we did all these uh tests and um visual tests and all kinds of stuff for for and i'd go back to i mean we did this thing we i went through the gamut for a whole day of doing tests and then i went back every uh week uh before i you know and in two weeks I was back racing again. I was clear.

And so he took an injury that I hid and took four weeks to heal and healed it in two weeks. What did he do to heal it? He gave me, I never took any medication on this particular issue. He gave me home exercises and eye exercises. There was, I had problems with focusing and making my eyes work, tracking your logic like a bird flying across the sky or anything like that. I couldn't, my eyes couldn't stay on it. If I looked at you, my eyes would bounce off of you and they just wouldn't stay you know if you said hey man we'll take a

picture and you held up a camera and i tried to look at the lens and smile my eyes would want to jump off of that object they would want they didn't want to to look at what i wanted them to look at and track anything going anywhere and what was the cause of that um, the brain has the ocular stuff. Uh, I mean, you can have injury to that part of your brain, or you can have an injury to the vestibular part of your brain that, that, that may, like, if you have bad balance, then that your eyes and your balance work together. And so if you have vestibular issues, that can create ocular issues and that can create that that can affect your anxiety and depression and things like. So all these you can have an injury to one part of your brain that affects four other areas. And so and we talk about that in the book. Mickey comes into the book and I'm, I'll talk,

you know, I'll say, this is what I was feeling. This is what I did. And Mickey will come in behind me and say, this is the medical science behind that. And this is how we treated it and why, but I would have an injury to one singular area of my brain, but I would have four different symptoms affecting four different parts of my brain, four different senses. And, you know, he would have to hone in on the one that was broken and then know to fix it. And when he started fixing it, all the other ones would start communicating together. The brain would start working again, balance and visual, and all those things would start to work again and anxiety and all those things would, you know, begin to come back in tune. Now, when you said he fixed it, like, what is he doing?

Well, so he gave me physical exercises to do. I had some balance issues. Basically, if I turned my head or looked up and down, I would get dizzy and sick. Like, my stomach would turn if I turned my head left to right, if I looked up and down, I would get dizzy and sick. Like my stomach would turn if I turned my head left to right. If I looked up and down, just sitting there, like the best thing for me was to sit on the couch and not move. And so like literally not move. And I felt fine then, but if I moved an inch, man, it was like, make it make your stomach nauseous. And so I did a lot of motion. I did a lot of exercises that created a

ton of motion with my head, um, lifting heavy balls up and, uh, passing them over my shoulder this way or that way, taking a ball and turning around and hitting it this way, taking the ball, turn around, hitting that, just doing that for, for hours and hours and hours. And so I would train, basically, uh, I was training myself to, to balance again, you know, training my mind, training my, my body to balance itself again. And if, and my, if I couldn't see a horizon or a flat surface, uh, I couldn't tell which way it was up and yeah, it was so bad. And, um, the visual stuff, there was these, uh, I had a string with these balls on it and I would hold the string on my nose and hold it out here. And I had to look at all those balls and it would, my, my, my eyes are focusing. Just all it's doing is really just making my eyes change focus from one to the next and the next and back and one to the next and next and back.

And there was this eye chart on the wall, and it had all these letters and all these numbers on it. And I had to look at that eye chart and turn my head back and forth this way, but look at that eye chart and count from A to Z but backwards. Do the alphabet. So I'd have to look for the letters. Where's Z? And go backwards. Or 1 to 20. While you're shaking your head.

Two, three. Yeah, and standing up and walking backwards and walking forward. And what is this doing to your mind? How does this fix your mind? What is the process? You know, I don't know what the real, I don't know what, it's the, I've had, the problem with me was my vestibular system. So my ability to understand balance and understand horizons. And so I was putting my mind in a perplex, in a complex environment or making my mind do complex things that you don't do every day.

And it's just firing up these parts of your brain and exercising them? Yeah, it's kind of like stretching this muscle. You know, it's like they used to say when you would get hurt to go into a dark room and hide. Or, you know, no electronics, no TV, just sit in a dark room and wait. Yeah. no electronics, no TV, just sit in a dark room and wait. Yeah. And what they're, what they believe today is that exposure is what helps pushing yourself into these complex environments and doing things that are really challenging for yourself. Even doing that. If I put you in front of that eye chart and made you turn your head back and forth and walk, walking two steps forward,

two steps back and doing, it would be, it'd be difficult for you. Um, you um uh so but for an injured person it's super difficult it has to be really challenging um but it just sort of tunes the mind or retrains the brain to do balance to balance it retrains the eyes to to track on objects and to lock on objects and stay on them and what's crazy is it sounds like physical rehab like if you had a knee injury it is a physical yes there's a lot of physical rehab to it. Yeah. There's a ton of it. We don't think about that when it comes to the mind, though. I know. We usually think of the mind as like something that needs to be healed with medicine. Yeah. I agree. Probably 85% of the work that I did was physical

therapy. Did you change your diet or anything like that? Because they say inflammatory causing foods or inflammation causing foods. I did not. I did not change. I drank, strictly drank water. I didn't drink anything other than water. And, uh, I incorporated bananas and things like that into my diet that I never ate before. I didn't care. Because of potassium? Yeah. Yeah. And what, what effect does potassium have on brain recovery? I just hear that it's good for your brain. It's good for your brain. You just heard? Yeah.

My doctor didn't say start eating this stuff, but it was just, you know. You get tidbits. Like when you go and get injured like that, you're going to get people texting you and giving you information here and there. And you kind of take what you want and go, ah, you know, I don't know about that. Did you ever mess with CBD at all? CBD. You don't know what that. But, um, did you ever mess with CBD at all? CBD? You don't know what that is? No. No. Interesting. Um, CBD is a non-psychoactive form of hemp. Yeah. And, uh, it's a radical inflammation fighter. And a lot of people that have like some pretty

significant injuries to the brain, a lot of fighters take it like right after fights. A lot of fighters take it right after fights. It used to be—it's still questionable federally. There's some pushes to try to make it illegal just because of pharmaceutical drug companies kind of putting pressure on them. It doesn't do anything in terms of get you high or anything. No, I actually read a little bit about that just a couple weeks ago because it controls anxiety. Yes. And it's helped a lot of people with that. One of my biggest, one of the problems that I face just on a, you know, on the regular every day is where my anxiety is. Is that because of being famous? I don't know. I think it comes from like your childhood and just things that you experience in life. Like what are you anxious about?

Just general social situations? Yeah. Yeah, I mean, I would avoid, I've gotten a lot better. Like I go, I would avoid concerts, even if I love the band. I would. Just because there's too many people there? Yeah. But is it too many people that are going to bother you?

No. No? I don't think so. And I like being bothered. I don't mind people coming up to me and saying, man, that's cool. I know who you are. I mean, that shit feels great. Right.

It was more about, like, am I going to be accepted? Is it my scene? Is, I don't know, know man i just always had a lot of anxiety over oh okay so anxiety about whether or not you're going to be fit in fit in yeah okay so you felt like an outsider when you're younger yeah yeah so that anxiety i don't know i still feel um i i don't you know so that shit goes away hard it takes a long time for that to go away yeah yeah yeah like my wife um she uh likes ashwagandha you ever heard of ashwagandha yes yeah so she she likes that and i take that every once in a while and i think that shit works

pretty good yeah kind of keeps you calm and yeah yeahhmm. Yeah. Yeah. So, but I've never tried the, I've read about, when I was reading about ashwagandha is when I read about that stuff you're talking about. I'll get you some. All right. It'll help. CBD's amazing. Okay. And you know what's really good?

There's some muscle balms that work really good on sore joints and stuff. I mean, but like, and nothing I've ever used before. Better than anything. Mm-hmm. CBD just gets right into the muscles and just relaxes all the inflammation. And the best part about it is it's 100% natural and no side effects. There's nothing. But in terms of like there's a bunch of different CBD oils you can take.

They chill you out, but they don't get you high or anything. You're not weirded out, but they just calm you down. And I wonder how much that calming down is because of inflammation, just reducing inflammation. And just, it just, it seems that your body has, uh, your body knows what to do with it. Your body's like, Oh, I know what this is. This is good. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I got Ted Nugent into it, man, Ted Nugent before he came on here, he was telling me how he's all anti-marijuana and this and that, and we had this conversation about it. It makes people lazy.

I'm like, I don't think it does, man. I think people are just lazy. Yeah. And I told him, because I know he's got some serious knee problems. He had all these knee surgeries. He's a madman. He used to jump off the top of the fucking stage and land on the ground and blew his meniscus out. I got him on the CBD bomb now.

He texted me the other day. He said, there's not a thing I've ever used. It's helped me like this before. Really? Yeah. So now I'm having cases sent to him like every week. Nice. Yeah. He loves the shit.

I mean, he wants to endorse it, which is hilarious. Yeah. Like the Motor City Madman, Ted Nugent, super anti-marijuana, wants to endorse a cannabis product that's helped his knees. Yeah. Yeah. But it doesn't do anything to you psychologically. It doesn't affect you.

No, yeah. Other than calm you down. Yeah, that's what I read about it. Yeah. It doesn't have that part of the drug that makes you high. Well, my friend's son has, it's a type of epilepsy, Brendan, and he started giving his kid CBD oil, and it stopped the epilepsy in his tracks.

Yeah, I think I read where they're, started giving his kid CBD oil and it stopped the epilepsy in the tracks. Yeah. I think I read where they're, um, it's been used for that for years. Yes. Yes. Yeah. Yeah.

To help, uh, for, um, seizures and stuff. Yes. Yeah. For seizures.

Yeah. It's just a radical inflammation decreaser. It just figures out a way it does. It has some sort of an interaction with your body where it just reduces inflammation. But it's just, like I said, it also calms people down, alleviates anxiety and no side effects. That's the most important one. Some people, it gives them a weird stomach. They don't like the way, but I think they're probably taking too much or maybe it's expired or something like that. Yeah. I've never had those issues, but I'll get you something. I should look into that too. Yeah. So what else did they do with

you? Did you do any cryotherapy or anything like that that also would reduce information? No, no. Basically I went and, um, in this, in 2012 we did basic, basic, uh basic physical therapy and eye therapy, eye tests, and different eye exercises. And in two weeks, I was back in the race car. I raced for, that was in 2012. I raced all the way to 2016. Two weeks you felt 100%. Yeah. That's amazing.

So with all these crazy exercises you're doing, when did you feel like it had settled in? Like, wow, this is really working. Pretty, I mean, if it was a two-week period, it wasn't, you know, it was a day or two, I guess. You know, I mean, I can't even remember. I can't remember that far back. A day or two. Yeah, I mean, I imagine it was feeling pretty good after a couple days. I'd have to, I don't know.

I mean, I don't know if it affected me right away. But I know I was, by the time we had, I take an impact test, which is basically kind of measures memory and things like that, all kinds of different stuff. And my measurements had come back to my norm, you know, my basic. You know, they kind of make you take the impact test beforehand. So that gets your blueprint of how you are. And then whenever you get injured, you take it again.

And they align that up against that and say, okay, yeah, you're deficient here. This is a problem. Maybe it's not diagnosing a concussion, but it's asking us to look in this area. not diagnosing a concussion, but it wants, it's asking us to look in this area. And, um, so you have a baseline and then you have whatever post, you know, your injury or post crash, uh, baseline is. Um, so I was matching all my normals on that impact test. And that was kind of the trigger for them to go, man, if you feel good, you look good here. All the things are saying that you're back, man if you feel good you look good here all the things are saying that you're back you know and i wanted to go race so i felt pretty good is it a a strange feeling knowing that you can't see what the damage is like a brain injury is a strange one right because it's affecting everything in

your body but you don't you don't it. Like if you have a broken arm, you're looking at it, you know, it's in a cast, it gets fixed. You know, you're, you're aware of it. You're doing rehab on it. You're looking at it while you're doing it. There's something about the brain where it's all like, you can kind of mind fuck yourself and say, eh, I think, I think I'm okay. Yeah. That's why. So in the, in the book, I talk about these notes. I started taking after that crash in 2012. When I would wreck after that, I would get sick and I wouldn't tell anybody. And so I started writing these notes in my in a journal in my phone. And from 2013 all the way to 2016, I had this long journal of crashes and how I felt.

And I would crash on Sunday and I'd write in the journal on Sunday night, Monday morning, Monday at lunch, Monday at night, you know, every three times a day, every day until whenever I felt good, which is usually either Wednesday or Thursday of that week. And I was writing these notes because I couldn't tell if I was getting better than the brain injury or any type of head injury. I mean, if you said, how's it feel Monday? And then you asked me again, Tuesday, I'd be like, I really don't fucking know, man. It just, it's there. Right. I don't know if it's better. It just feels bad. And so I would try to write as detailed as I could on a day on a Monday and then try to write as detailed as I could on Tuesday and reread Monday and see, is it better? I can see in the comments or, you know, I can't really remember exactly what I was feeling Monday, but in the comments, it seems better. And I would

write these notes. Right. And so I kept doing this and I thought I was treating myself and eventually it caught up with me. Like I had about a dozen concussions in a period of about two and a half years. Wow. And I got to where I couldn't walk. And I called my owner and I was like, man, I need to talk to you. I can't race this weekend. I can't hardly walk. And my balance is so bad that I can't get up off the couch without holding on to something and walking across the room without grabbing stuff as I go. And he was like, we got to go back to the doctor. What are you doing? He was mad. He's like, you know, what are you fucking doing getting to the doctor? Why aren't you at the doctor?

And I was like, you're right. I need to go to the doctor. I mean, a concussed person doesn't have good judgment and self-awareness. You know, you're just in a freaking, you're in a, it's like being hung over. Yeah. It's the worst hangover. You can't make decisions. And so I went back to Pittsburgh and saw Mickey again.

And I had to stay out the entire whole half of the year in 2016 to get better. It took me five months to get well instead of two weeks. Wow. And that time, um, I was on, they put me on medication that would drop my anxiety levels. So the anxiety levels would stay down so that I could concentrate on, uh, the injury. What medications? I don't know exactly the names, but it was very, very small doses, and it would take about three weeks for it to kind of kick in. I'd have to take it for a while before it would start working.

But it just made me real chill, and it made me not analyze myself every single day when I got up. When I got up, I wouldn't go, hmm, is it still there? Is it as bad as it was? Let me walk across the room and see how I feel. Let me go do this and test this and try this and try this and try this all day long and see how I feel. It made me stop doing that because I was driving myself crazy.

And he gave me a lot more physical therapy, basketball, movements, anything that got my head moving. I'd do those exercises for about two weeks. Some of them would stop triggering symptoms. I'd go back to his place in Pittsburgh. We'd go through about 30 more exercises and I'd take home about 15 that made the symptoms trigger. And I'd do them for about two or three weeks and some of them would stop working. I'd go back to him. We'd go through more physical exercises till, you know, kept doing that process over and over and over. I took the medication for about a year and a half. Um, and I had a lot of, they gave me this, uh, computer program for my eyes and I had a lot of they gave me this computer program for my eyes and I was wearing these I would wear these 3d glasses and this computer program would try to take these 3d objects and

go to 2d and back to 3d and my eyes would literally try it would felt like it's trying to rip my eyes apart it hurt like physically hurt when this object would try to go from from 3d to 2d and it was going very very slowly and it felt like it was trying to rip my eyes apart and imagine your eyes are tethered together so when you look left they both go there right and they both go wherever you look they go together like they're supposed to and mine didn't want to do that mine you couldn't physically see my eyes toed out or going the wrong way. You couldn't see that. But when I try to look over here, they both didn't go to the same place. And that was that action or that, that computer program was strengthening that activity of my eyes,

trying to do something together. And would walk so if I I've got these buffalo on my property and they're across the field wait you know 200 300 yards out across the field out the back window of my living room and if I walked across the floor every step I took would knock my eyes off of the buffalo like they're way out there and I could look at them but if I took a step my eyes would shake and would shake and I'd have to find them again. You know? And so that computer program would strengthen my ability. It's called gaze stabilization.

It would make it to where when I walk, I don't, you know, if I'm walking or bouncing across the room, I could still look at you in the eyes and, you know, like a normal person. Right. And when I was at my worst, I couldn't do that. But that took a long time to fix. And the book basically is me admitting making those mistakes. I should have went to him as soon as I got sick again the first time

instead of trying to document it myself and hide it and manage it myself and trying to get to whatever the end of my career was whenever that moment was and retire thinking I was going to walk away without anybody ever knowing. And I had to retire after that. After that 2016 year of missing half a season and going through all that, I didn't want to go through it again. I had one more year on my contract in 2017, so I finished that season, and that was that. Were you apprehensive while you were finishing that season? I didn't want to get hurt.

I didn't want to go back through that whole process again and go through that rehab again. I didn't want to get sick again. Me and my wife just got married on New Year's of 2016-17, so we are newlyweds. She's pregnant. We're going to have a baby. You know, I didn't want to go through any of that stuff sick. You know what? I told my doctor, you'll like this since now we know each other so well. When I was ill in the hospital or when I was

with Mickey in Pittsburgh, as my wedding was on New Year's, and I was, this was probably around October, or right, no, this was probably in August. I said, I need two things. I was like, I need to be able to go through my wedding. On my wedding day and my wedding night and that whole experience, I want to do it with a completely clear head,

and I want to be able to remember everything. I don't want to be on any drugs. I don't want to have any symptoms. I don't want to even be thinking about my head or reminded about it in one, in any moment during that night, I want to, my wedding to be perfect. And I want to be able to climb up in my deer stand without feeling like I'm going to fall out of it. And he said he'd fix it. And I was hunting that, I was hunting that October wow or that November you you um in in doing these exercises and in fixing the the issues that you were facing were you were you concerned though about long-term effects

you know I uh absolutely over the last five years it's years, it's been hard for me to turn my back on articles, stories about NFL players and their history. And these guys, you know, the whole lawsuit brought up so many stories about what these guys have went through, what their families have went through. It's been impossible not to read that stuff and fear that, is that something that's going to happen to me? Do I need to be worried about my long-term health? And it took me the longest time to watch that concussion movie because I just didn't want to know what he had to tell me, you know. And I, eventually I got to a place where I thought, I talked to Mickey, you know, when I was hurt in 2016, I said, Mickey, why aren't you shutting me down? He shut down some player. I don't know the guy's name.

I don't know whether he was a hockey player or a football player, but the guy was making millions of dollars, and he was in his mid-20s, and Mickey had to say, you can't play anymore. And I wanted Mickey to tell me that. I didn't want to have to go out the room and say, y'all, I'm retiring. I don't want to do this anymore. I wanted and say, y'all, I'm retiring. I don't want to do this anymore. I wanted to say, y'all, Mickey said I got to retire.

I don't. But he wouldn't. And he said, you know, you're not where that guy is, and I don't see what's going on. I don't see anything going on with you that tells me you can't race if you want to race. I said, well, what if I get hurt again? He said, if you get hurt again, I can fix it. It's up to you if you want to go through that. He said, you're just as likely to get hurt as you were before the injury. Um, you're going to race in

racing and racing's dangerous. Uh, you got to make up your mind, whether you want to go out there and risk getting hurt again. And if you do, I'll fix it. You can come right back here and we'll fix it all over again. And I was like, and I was like, all right, if you're not shutting me down, then you must not be worried about my long-term health. And he's like, no, I'm not worried about your long-term health. There's nothing going on here that I see that would make me concerned about your long-term health. And so with all that said, I got married. I had a little girl. I'm sitting there on them days at home with them. And I'm thinking to myself, what if I'm sitting here worried about CTE or my mind going away? And it never happens.

Am I going to sit here and worry about that at 44 all the way through my 50s and my 60s and 70s and then one day wake up at 80 and go, damn, I lived a pretty good life. Why did I worry about all that? Why didn't I enjoy what was in front of me? And so I'm going to enjoy what's in front of me, not going to worry about CTE, not going to worry about my long-term health. And there's another thing, too. The conversation about concussions has really just skyrocketed in the warp speed over the last five or six years. And the way they treated me in 2012 to the way they treated me in 2016 was completely 180 degrees because they know so much more and they're so, you know, they understand so much more about treating the injury. And so if I do have any problems, whenever that is, I'm confident

that there'll be something there for me, that there'll be something there to give me a good quality of life. I had a hell of a run. I had a lot of fun. I raised hell. I partied. I won. I lost. I raised hell. I partied. I won. I lost. And if it all ended now, I wouldn't have missed out on anything other than my wife and my little girl. And so I'm content with where I am.

All I want to be able to do is just be a good father and be a good husband. And I think I'm going to have that opportunity. But if anything does happen to me, I think that there'll be some technology, some information, some medicine, something that would give me a good enough quality of life that I would be able to enjoy those things. I think you made the wise choice in retiring. Oh, yeah. And I think that, look, I'm very familiar with head injuries. I'm around people that have had them all the time. And I think it's something that we're understanding now more than ever before. But someone like you writing a book about this and your experience with it, I think is really important for people. I think it's going to help a lot of people. It's going to help a lot

of people understand it. And the more we talk about this, the more this gets out there in the public, the more it helps just regular folks that have had concussions understand what a significant thing this is. Yeah. This book is to not discourage you from doing what you want to do. If you want to race, race. If you want to fight, fight. If you want to do whatever it is, play football, I'm not discouraging anyone from doing that. I'm encouraging it.

I'm just saying that whenever you are hurt, wherever, if you ever do find yourself with an injury, don't make the bad choices that I made. That's really all I'm doing here is to share with people the mistakes that I made. I never would have known about Mickey had somebody not taken me to him. I would have never even considered the fact that there was treatment for a head injury had I not met Mickey. I mean, there's people out there today that don't know there's treatment, that they're living with these injuries, our veterans, that don't think that they can be healed. There's people in my timeline all the time saying, man, I'm glad you're talking about concussions.

I had one and I'm dealing with it all the time. Boy, it's just nagging me every day. And the truth is that you don't have to even live that way. There's a better quality of life with the information that they know today. Even if this injury was 10 years ago or 15 years ago, there's stuff today that can help give you a better quality of life. And so that's what the book's about. It's an amazing time.

And when you think about the fact that 2012, you had an injury and they treated you one way. 2016, they had already advanced their techniques. And I'm sure they've advanced even more now in 2018. It's amazing. Yeah. And we're living in this. We're living in this big learning experience right now. Yeah. I know they're starting to do some stuff with stem cells as well. And there's a guy named Dr. Neil Reardon that I've had on the podcast before

that he did wonders for Mel Gibson's dad. And so Mel Gibson came on and wanted to talk about this. They have to do treatment in Panama because they can't do a lot of the treatments here in the United States because they're not legal yet. But the effects that they're having on people that they're bringing down to Panama is just mind-blowing. And I'm hoping that's going to also help people with traumatic brain injuries and CTE and some other things as well. Yeah. Yeah, I'm excited for them to find a way to detect CTE in the living human being. They already have. Figure out ways.

They've figured out a way to do that now. It's very, very recently they've started to do that. But, you know, it's a major concern, obviously, for fighters. But I would imagine that someone in your line of work, it's not thought about the same way. Like if people think about it with football, they don't think about it in terms of they don't. They directly associate boxing with head injury. They don't directly associate race car driving. Yeah.

And I'm hopeful that there are a lot of drivers that have experienced what I've experienced and crashed the way I've crashed. And there's drivers that will race their lives without it, you know, without ever having that experience. And I'm glad for that. But for the guys that have. I've had veterans, retired guys, call me, say, man, I've given my doctor's number to so many damn people ever since. I've spoken up about this in 2012 to now in this book. Mickey says there's at least three people a week that come in his office

talking about me, and that's why they're there. And so that's the whole mission, man, is because Mickey gave me my life back twice. I'm telling you, man, at 16, I was in bad shape. And I was without my wife and without Mickey, I don't know that I would have made it out the other end. and this book or anything else and this podcast anything I'm any ever any opportunity to talk about this is only to push more people to Mickey so that he can do the same thing for them he did for me that's amazing there's a guy named Dr. Mark Gordon that's also been on this podcast before that it does a lot of work with TBI and soldiers and football players and stuff like that so there's there's a lot of other doctors out there that are specializing in this

and realizing this is a significant issue. Just so happy that those people are out there. Yeah, yeah. Well, they're getting some good, you know, they're getting some opportunities to actually, you know, get up there and speak up about it and make it known. And I know there's got, I have Mickey. There's a bunch of Mickeys out there. And they're, you know, and there's a the, I have Mickey. There's a bunch of Mickeys out there and they're,

you know, and there's a lot getting learned right now. Well, there's just so many people that are silently suffering that don't want to open their mouth because they don't want to appear weak. That was, that's part of it too. Yeah. A lot of, a lot of people don't want to, there's people, there's some people that just don't know where to go, you know, or don't think that they can afford it or don't think that they're they're gonna get that out you know like when i when i first went to mickey i thought i was gonna go in there and see just stealers and nhl players right right that's how ignorant i was about it and you know he sees every man that's awesome yeah now do you mean being a race car driver is such a wild, exciting, powerful way to make a living. Do you ever get the itch now?

Yeah, sure. I ran a race about a month or two months ago at Richmond, Virginia. And we have an Xfinity level. We have an Xfinity series that's sponsored by Xfinity. And it's basically our college level. They race on Saturdays before the big show on Sunday at the same track. And it's an abbreviated race. And I got a couple, I own a couple cars that race in that every week.

And so I ran in a race at Richmond to scratch the itch a little bit and had a blast we ran great led a lot of laps had fun accomplished everything we wanted to accomplish um i'll probably run one more next year at another track and probably do that every year until i just don't feel like doing it anymore just for fun yeah just for fun but no more than that and i never go back to the cup series the so the cups people talk about it like, man, you can just go back. It's like you can't just go back. It's like it'd be like one of the fighters, you know, just taking a couple years off and then jumping back in for the championship match.

You know, you just – it's too elite. You know what I'm saying? Well, that just happened. Conor McGregor just came back after two years off and fought Khabib Nurmagomedov and got smashed. Yeah, so it's a good point you're making. I mean, he probably would have lost anyway to Khabib. Yeah.

Khabib's just a monster. Yeah. But who knows? Yeah. He might not have. If I would go back, it would take me six months just to get up to speed, not even really even get competitive, just to get up to speed physically and mentally. Bring yourself to your A game.

Yeah. And it ain't something you just get out of and go back in. People on the outside looking at, well, you're steering, you're shifting. What's the big deal? Yeah. Hit the gas, go. It's such a, man, if you take a week off, you just get so behind. What is it that you get behind?

Well, so our sport, I was talking about this with a friend today, and he made a good point. He said there was a guy, he says our sport is the only one where the ball is governed and the ball is inspected, like the race car, the car, right? The physical car itself. So technology is one of the things that is, like what's fast today will be obsolete and slow six months from now. You wouldn't even think about running it.

Six months? Yeah. Really? Yeah. Wow. Yeah. Really? Yeah. Wow. Yeah. I mean, it's it's it's constantly evolving. And somebody next door, the guy next to you and the guy next to him and the guy next to him is always constantly trying to build a better mousetrap. You know, and and everybody's in what's new and badass today is going to be OK and not very good six months from now.

and badass today is going to be okay and not very good six months from now. And they're constantly, so the teams are constantly working, and if you're not in those cars and current and in that flow, in that changing, in that cycle, in that wheel, then you can't, you're behind. Like when you get in the car and you get around the team, like you're behind on what's in the car, what's happening with the car. And I don't know, it's just not something you just jump in and out of because you're not really the key component. Like your body is, your body as a fighter, you know your body,

and your body is the tool. A football player, same thing. Quarterback, his arm's the tool, right? In racing, it's the car. And so if you're not in it and around it every day, you will be behind on technology, understanding what's happening, what teams are doing, what you need to be doing. The damn dash is full of switches with all kinds of shit going on and this needs to be on and this needs to be off and

this needs to be back on and off and on and there's you know levers there's brake levers some drivers have four fucking brake levers there's like a rear you can shut off the left front the right rear the right front you can put all the brakes from the back to the front from the back from the left to the right i mean that's just the brakes and yeah the back to the front, from the left to the right. I mean, that's just the brakes. And yeah, I mean, there's just so many, there's just a lot going on that it would take you a while to get back up to speed if you were to take some time off. It's not, it's just not as easy as it used to be. I had no idea there were that many brake options. Oh yeah. Yeah. I mean, you can have as many as you want or as little as it used to be. I had no idea there were that many brake options. Oh, yeah. Yeah.

I mean, you can have as many as you want or as little as you want. Some guys really think that that stuff's a good tool for them to be able to adjust the brakes and change how the brakes work on all four corners of the car. And some of them do. They move them during the race while they're racing. You know, they're changing them and fooling with them. You know, in an Indy car, you know, you can adjust the roll bars and all the wings and all that stuff and start, you know, in those cars and stuff like that. So, I mean, there's a, as a race car driver, there's, there's a ton of stuff going on in that car that people don't even know about.

Yeah. So. So it would just take you a while to get all that stuff automatic in your mind. Yeah. I would get in the, I would get in the car and forget about those tools and forget that I have those adjustments and knowledge and be getting beat by guys that are using it every day. Now, how, what, how much time are you in a car in a race? Three hours, probably three and a half hours. Do you do anything or do you take anything to keep you concentrating at your full potential during that time?

Vitamins? I never did. I just mixed water and orange Gatorade. So you have your electrolytes? Yeah. 50-50? Yeah. Jimmy Johnson, several of those guys do energy chews, different things.

A lot of Gatorade-oriented stuff. Gatorade's a sponsor for Jimmy, so he's going to have the Gatorade chews or whatever. Just because you must be sweating like a pig in those things, right? You sweat a ton. You lose anywhere from about six to eight pounds a race. It's all just water weight, and you just put it right back on in a day or two. Is it really hot in the car? Is that what it is?

Yeah. So in Chicago this year, it was 150 degrees in the car. Whoa. So it's a sauna. Yeah. We had these temperature gauges in the car, so we're seeing them from the broadcast booth. Jesus. We can see during the in-car camera, it'll be pointed at that temperature gauge, and

all of the guys' cars were 150 degrees inside all the drivers. And it was miserable. That's insane. So was there any fear of people blacking out from, I don't know. You know, that's something that I've always kind of been concerned with. Um, I think that we don't have that concern today,

but it is coming and we need to, like if we have 150 degree in-car temperatures, I think that we need to think about how to try not to have that, you know, try to do something to where, man, is that really necessary that we put the drivers through that? Is it because the engine's in front of you and as you're driving, the heat from the engine just blows into the driver's compartment? Yeah, that and the brakes, everything, the brakes are, yeah, the brakes are going to be a thousand degrees on, on the calipers and that heat's radiating into the car. Wow. Um, the drivers can open up these knack, knack-a-ducks, uh, to,

to allow air into the car, but that, that's going to hurt. Slows it down? Well, yeah, it's going to slow you down. It's going to hurt the performance of the car. And so, um, the drivers try to trim the cars out so much that there's not a lot of air moving around in the car and it's so low to the ground there's not a lot of air moving around under the car either so that air under the car is just kind of baking in there and just sitting in there um so they're miserable they're miserable miserable miserable car that's when i watch races and i'm like you know i'd love to get out there and do that for a few minutes, but damn, running three hours in a 150-degree race car, it's miserable.

That's crazy. It is the worst experience. I can't imagine being in a sauna just sitting there for three hours, never mind driving a car around a bunch of other cars. Having to focus on something, yeah. Everyone's going 200 miles an hour. The worst part is when you slow down. Like the caution comes out cause that it gets hotter. Like it just, when the car,

when the college comes out and you have to come in and change tires and you're sitting there and you go about eight or 10 pace laps at 50 miles an hour, you're just, that's when you get to think about it. You know, that's when you're sitting there going, damn, this is hot. You know, while you're racing, you're almost so hyper-focused on what you're doing. It can, hot. You know, while you're racing, you're almost so hyper-focused on what you're doing. It can, it kind of doesn't bother you as bad. Distracts you. Yeah. Is there anything they can do to cool you off with your suit? Does your suit do anything? There's these new vests that we wear that has a gel in it and it's, uh, you plug into a little machine that pumps it. Ah. And so you unplug it to get out of the car. Um, those work really well. I actually used one the last year of my career and it was very comfortable.

So there's some innovative stuff out there. They have a helmet cooler. There's a hose that plugs into the top of your helmet and it blows some air in there. It's a little bit cooler. But those two things draw so much amps that the teams don't want to use them. The drivers want to use them, but the crew chiefs don't want you drawing that many amps off the alternator. They want to use amps for other things that are going to make the car go faster. Yeah.

Not make you comfortable. That's why there's no AC. Yeah. Yeah, I would imagine. Yeah. Man. Now, when you think back on doing all that stuff that you did do and think about those kind of races and think about all the endurance and all the different aspects of it. Does it ever seem kind of crazy that you did it?

Yeah. Like that I raced? Yeah. I mean, now that you're not racing, you're like, whoa, what a wild way to make a living. Yeah. Like, I can't believe it happened to me. No shit. Like, my dad was sort of this invincible hero, and I wanted to do what he did.

I didn't think I was going to get to do that. When I started doing it, I was thinking to myself, I can't believe this is happening to me. When I started to win, I won a few races. I never, man, I never. So when I was in, when I was 20 years old, I wasn't thinking, man, I'll be a champion. I'm going to win 20 races. I'm going to win 50 races. I'm going to kick some ass. I was thinking, I sure would love to do this and pay my bills. I would love to do this just for a living, not have to work. Changing oil wasn't the best, you know, wasn't where I wanted to be. Right. Working in the service department was fun, but damn, I wanted to be a race car driver.

And so when I made it, I didn't really, I wanted to win, but damn, I just wanted to be able to make money to afford to do it for a living. And that's all I ever wanted. So the wins, Daytona 500s and all that shit was a bonus. And when I look back on it now, I'm like, man, I was so lucky. Holy cow, was I lucky to do what we did and do what I did and win what I did. And very lucky. Do you think you had such great success? Not just because obviously your, your dad is one of the greatest of all time, but also because your love for it was what propelled you. It wasn't trying to seek fame or fortune. It just,

you just truly loved racing and that's why you became so great at it. Yeah. My dad's, uh, the link to my father opened up a shit ton of doors for me, opened up so many opportunities for me. All even today, um, it made my path much easier than some other fellows that I know. Um, but I think that my, my passion for it and my, uh, yeah, my love for it and my uh yeah my love for it my love for its history my wanting for it to be healthy the sport uh all those things is what probably made me make good decisions as i went along you know and when i would talk or get in a position to make a comment or say something i always tried to think about how that would represent the sport um i didn't understand what building a brand meant till way too late in my career good yeah i mean good to people that are concentrating on that it's always a mess yeah i don't know i mean i

wish i'd have known a little bit about trying to build my brand and i wouldn't have been such a hard ass and hard to work with a lot of times. Like there's been, there were some sponsors I loved and I did everything they wanted. And there was some that I just weren't as, I wasn't as good as I should have been. You know, I wasn't, you know, I have regrets, but I'm just saying like, as I was going through this career, I wasn't thinking about me, me, me. I didn't even know how to build my own brand. I didn't know what that meant. I was thinking about, man, I love this. This is great. I can't believe I get to do this. I can't believe I'm here. I can't believe I'm racing here, racing

this person, driving this car, got this sponsorship. Everything was the best of the best. I had great sponsors awesome awesome equipment um everybody always nice you know hey how you doing everybody's so nice my wife just hates that because everywhere i go i'm like everybody's so nice how was this but they were so nice she goes everybody's nice to you you know she gets so bent out of shape why did she get mad at that cause she says she's i don't know she just says you Because she says, she's, I don't know, she just says, you know,

us normal people, we don't get everybody nice. Yeah. You live in a different world. Yeah. That is interesting. Yeah. You live in this world

where everybody's happy to meet you. Yes. Like a hot chick. Yeah. Kind of. Yeah. Right? Me being like a hot,

like you're a hot chick everywhere you go. People are like, hey Dale. It's like, hey, Dale. It's kind of similar, right? I suppose. Right? I guess.

I mean, hot chicks don't have any idea what the world's like. Everywhere they go, everybody loves them. Yeah. Yeah. People are super excited to see them. Yeah. They know there's danger out there in some of these men, but everybody's very friendly to them.

Yeah. Right. Yeah. It's very friendly to them. Yeah, right. Yeah. It's very similar. But a large lady with unfortunate looks, so there's a different view of the world. Yes. Yeah. Yeah.

How much did you learn about racing from your dad? Hardly nothing, man. I mean, I would get asked all the time what your dad taught you about x y and z and we never talked about racing um really never wow yeah we never talked about racing even when you started racing professionally yeah wow yeah we never did um i he was always uh don't, you know, finish. He, he, he was, uh, so worried that me and Kelly wouldn't finish school that we would give up on school. He gave up on school as an eighth grader at 16 years old. He was 16 and eighth grade and quit and never finished high school. Never got no GED, nothing. And people would come up to him and say, people would talk about him um even while he was alive

and ever since and uh say look what this guy made of himself having quit the eighth grade that's awesome and he always hated that that was embarrassing uh for people to you know he was embarrassed that he quit he knowed how bad it disappointed his own father. So he was always like worried about where I was, who I was hanging out with, whether I was, you know, doing my homework. And then even when I started racing, it was who I was hanging out with, what I was doing with my free time, what I was focusing on, whether I was, you know, thinking about, you know, what I was focusing on whether i was you know thinking about you know what i was whether i was on time for sponsor appearances and never this is how you drive

this corner this is how you get around this racetrack he never talked about that stuff it was always the person being a man being right being good to people being on time being ready to work uh looking your best um general you know morals and values he didn't we never sat down and talked about racing like i'm gonna show you how to get around this corner and this is how you shift and shit like that well in that respect it was probably brilliant of him. Because look, the championships came, and you also turned out to be a great man. Thanks. I appreciate you saying that. I don't know. I always felt like that when I was younger, I kind of let my father down

because there was this one time I was probably 12 years old and there was this me and my buddy we were gonna play man we're here we're outside we're gonna play outside my dad's standing over there and there was a bucket full of shit and he's like hey come here pull junior pick that bucket up move it over here and I went over there and tried to pick it up and I was like I can't lift it and he got so pissed off at me because he knew I didn't try and he got he said to my buddy Ryan he was Ryan come here pick the bucket up take it over there and he turned around and gave me this look of pure freaking disappointment and I felt like that set the tone for our relationship wow for one bucket I. I feel like that that was our relationship in a nutshell for most of my teenage years.

He looked at me as, you know, I don't know what he's going to mount to. I don't know what this kid's going to do. I don't know what skills he has or whether he's going to ever get his act together or whether he's ever going to figure himself out. And I probably didn't give him much reason to think different. But then when we got, when I started racing, when I started racing at late models, I ran 159 races, and he never came to one.

Through 94, 95, 96, 97, I raced at myrtle beach south carolina every weekend and he never once came down there to watch me and so he didn't know whether i was a good race car driver or a bad race car driver he didn't know whether i was you know working on my car or understanding how they you know what what how to build the car, fix the car. And when I would do good, I'd come home and I'd have a trophy and I'd say, hey, man, I won. And he'd go, well, who wasn't there? And I'm like, shit.

He really did. I remember coming home with a trophy and I could not wait until he would walk. I kept my car in this building that was his. And he put all his deer head up there, called a deer head shop. I'm talking 35, 40 mounts in this place, a couple elk. And he'd come in there every Monday morning before lunch. And I had that trophy sitting up. We'd brought it home. Man, it was right in view.

As soon as he walks in i got my car working on my car and he comes in there and i'm like i'm like he's like so you won huh so he's a trophy i was like yeah we did and he's like such and such must not been there because there was this one guy named robert powell used to beat us all the time and he goes robert must not been there i was like no he wasn't he wasn't there you're right i was so pissed off man i finally won a damn race and i thought that he was going to come in there and slap me on the back and man you know give me give me a good talk um did it give you more motivation that he didn't do that i i don't think so i don't think it did i think it made me

want to it did not make me want to win more um but then one day so right around the end of 1997 i was out of money he was like hey you know you're out of money you ain't gonna race i was like shit my life's coming to an end as far as I know it. You know, I'm not going to, I guess my racing career, this is it. It's coming to an end, 1997. He was sitting down talking to, he had a car that races in the Xfinity Series that I told you about on Saturdays, and his driver was leaving to go to a cup car, and he was talking to his best friend Tony Sr. is the guy's name that actually crew chiefs that car and he's like who we gonna get

to drive this thing who should we get we gotta hire some driver and Tony Sr. said why don't you put Dale Jr. in there he goes what are you serious you really think so he's like you're gonna spend a little money on this car why don't you spend it on your own kid? You know, why don't you just put, I can probably make a driver out of him, Tony Sr. says. So they made the decision to put me in this car in the Xfinity series. You'd think that dad would come tell me, or we would have a press conference, might be a press release at least.

I walked into, this is a month before the race season starts. I think I'm out of racing, right? I ain't even talked to anybody about what I'm racing or if I'm racing in a couple months. I think that it's dried up, opportunities are gone. I walk into the shop to get something where Tony Sr.''s car tony senior's race car was and my name was on the roof and i was like i thought it was a joke like a mean joke a prank and they were laughing tony senior and and uh some of the guys in the shop are laughing and i'm like man that's messed up man y'all are dicks for putting that name on there this ain't no funny in there and

they were like it's's true, man. I was like, you mean I'm going to race this car? I'm racing this car? And they were like, yeah. I was like, really? And, I mean, obviously I was thrilled. Like, man, I couldn't believe it. But this is the way I found out.

Not from my own dad. And I'm like, dad, I'm racing the car? Yep. I mean, like days later when I see him. I'm like, so I'm going to race that car? And he's like, yep, yep, sure. Better get ready. That's it?

Yeah. And, I mean, he was the strangest dude. He didn't really. But once, so I started racing that car. I had great success. We won six or seven races the first year. We won another six or seven races the second year. Championships in both seasons.

So, I mean, the choice to put me in that car worked out better than he probably ever imagined. Ever. In 159 late model races that I ran from 94 to 97, I won four. In 159 late model races that I ran from 94 to 97, I won four. In 159 late model races, I won four. So he put me in this car on a whim and a prayer. And we ended up winning the championship two in a row. So he is thinking, damn, this little shit can drive a car. And that's when our relationship completely changed.

That's when his arm around me. We were doing shit together. We had sponsor deals and promotions together. We were doing photo shoots together. I saw him all the time. And we talked about all kinds of, you know, we talked about life, girls and everything but racing. You know, we didn't talk about racing much, which is fine. But it was awesome.

And so 98, 99, and then 2000, I went to Cup. He built a Cup team around me. We had Budweiser come in for $10 million a year, which was the biggest sponsorship anybody had at that time. And then he got killed in 2001 at the start of the season in Daytona 500 so those three years, 98, 99, 2000 were as good as it could get wow

that must have been amazing it must have been amazing for you to turn that corner yeah, it was like a light switch he went from not really engaging with me me not comfortable around him feeling ashamed um not me not measuring up he's because he's 10 foot tall cowboy boots black hat tougher than shit not gonna you knowator. That was his nickname. And I was blonde, pale, short as hell, not a muscle on me, and had accomplished nothing, you know? Right.

And so, but overnight it was, like, completely changed. We started running great, and people were coming up to me, like, you're freaking you're doing awesome and you know and he's and he was uh he was real happy with that he was pretty proud it's crazy that he never talked to you about racing no that's just so strange i can't imagine there was one there was only one time that he did that we were at a track called bristol tennessee we were at a track in bristol tennessee uh it's a half mile high banked racetrack and we run 15 second laps around there it's really fast and it's it's kind of technical and tough to get around um and i'd been race i'm out there practicing and i wasn't i wasn't doing it right. And he got up on the, uh, he got up on one of the haulers

and got on the radio and started talking to me. And he was like, Hey man, I'm gonna tell you how to drive it. And so this one day, one time in this one practice for about five minutes, he's like, I'm gonna tell you how to drive his track. So I'm out there driving. And I'm when I, he's like, lift right here. And I'd lift and he'd get in the gas. Okay. I'm turning there tell you how to drive his track. So I'm out there driving, and he's like, all right, lift right here. And I lift, and he's getting the gas. Okay, I'm turning there. And he's just telling me how to drive the track. And that was the only time he ever did that. Just think how much it would have improved you.

I know. It really helped me there that day. I mean, when he told me how to do it, I'm like, holy shit. I would have never thought of doing it this way, and this is way better. So, yeah, maybe he could have given me a few more tips on some things. I mean, come on, man. I mean, that's, that has to be so crazy. Cause that's your profession. Yeah. And your dad is a superhero. Well, I think that, you know, I finally made it to cup and I think had he lived, he would have been in my ear all those years. You know, do this, do this, don't do this.

This is the best decision today. So maybe he just wasn't in a hurry to do it because he didn't know that he wasn't going to be around for it. Right. You know? How hard was it to race after he was gone? I thought about whether I should quit or not um you know i i probably if the if it hadn't paid a lot of money and i didn't have partners and people that were depending on me or counting on me i probably could have easily walked away from it

but we had a great partner in Budweiser that was incredibly supportive. I had a lucrative opportunity in front of me personally to be a race car driver for as long as I wanted to, which I wanted. And I just had to go through missing him really bad for a few months. I had to go to the racetrack and everywhere I looked, there's dad. There were fans mourning. There were signs and paintings and things. There were just markings and acknowledgments and just shit everywhere for like a year. And I appreciated it and I knew

why it was like that. Um, but it took a while for me to, uh, sort of get to where I didn't. Um, I was, I went, there was a little period of me, a period of time where I was real self-destructive and just like, uh, mad, you know, at everything. And, um, you know, took me a while to calm down and get to work, you know, for, for, for a while there, it was just sort of going through the motions. The, you know, I mean, you must've always known, I mean, everyone knows there's dangers involved in racing cars. But when it hit someone so close as your own father, that had to change what racing felt like to you. Yeah, I'm sure it would have completely been a different experience emotionally had that not happened had you know racing for me would have

meant something completely different you know I just was he was in he was this he was this invincible guy that you know wasn't supposed to get hurt, wasn't supposed to, I mean, he was, he, he was, he was supposed to get hurt and drive hurt and be tough. And, um, he wasn't supposed to get killed and leave us all, you know, he left the whole sport, you know, and, and no one knew what to do. Like that was like the whole sport was sitting there going, shit, what do we do? He was the guy for everyone. Even the competitors looked up to him like he was the guy, like that's the man. So it was tough on the whole sport, a big giant void for the whole sport. for the whole sport.

But I, you know, we just huddled together, me and my team, me and our company. You know, I raced for my dad's company, so that whole company kind of just kind of held itself together and everybody kind of pulled together and worked our way through it. That first year in 01, just that year, you know, that he was killed, that was just kind of a tough year. I don't even really remember anything much about what happened that year you know that he was killed that that was just a kind of a tough year i don't even really remember anything much about what happened that year um won a couple races uh but it was uh otherwise you know the races where we didn't win i can't even i don't even remember much about them you know just retaining too much from it it was just kind of a daze you know oh four was a great year i think we kind of finally were coming out of the, you know, just retaining too much from it. It was just kind of a daze, you know.

04 was a great year. I think we kind of finally were coming out of the funk, you know, around 2004, kind of coming out of the cloud of that. I would imagine that being a race car driver and having your dad be who he was always carried a lot of weight. But did he carry more weight after he was gone were there more eyes on you yeah i thought so um you know i thought he he was tough he knew who he was to the sport he knew he knew that you know he carried uh he carried a big massive fan base and he knew that people listened when he spoke and all those things. And so when he was gone, I think some people kind of looked at me to try to carry that same load and even be that same person, and I just wasn't going to do it. I was like, man, I'm this short, scrawny, pale kid.

I couldn't be who he was. I'd have been faking it, and I couldn't be the intimidator. So I just have always, ever since then, been me. And if that's good, if you like that, um, great. Uh, I think I've been relatable, honest, genuine. Um, and the fan base that I gained when, when he passed away, I thought we nurtured that and grew that. And I think we did a lot of great things, uh, in and outside the sport to do that. So I'm kind of proud of all those things. I thought I handled that well, considering there are a lot of different avenues to go

at that time, and I think I chose some good ones and certainly probably could have made some different decisions and have regrets. But for the most part, I was able to, you know, add to his legacy a little bit. That was something that was important to me. I didn't go out there and win 90 damn races. I didn't win seven championships. But I didn't hurt his legacy. I added to it, made a lot of people happy. There was an Earnhardt on the track. You know, that was good for a lot of people happy uh there was an earnhardt on the track you know that was good

for a lot of people dale you got a great perspective well thanks you really do in your book it's called racing to the finish it's out now go get it folks thanks thank you dale yes sir man i appreciate you having me i really appreciate you being here it's great to meet you great to meet you too thank you we should do. Thank you. We should do a hunt. Absolutely. Let's do it. Let's do it. You name it.