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Kenny Conversations: Dale Jr. on the Emotional Highs and Lows of Life in NASCAR
01:35:51
In this episode of Kenny Conversations, Dale Earnhardt Jr. gets real about the highs and lows of his racing career, from the pressures of qualifying to the emotional toll of living up to expectations. Dale dives into how racing technology has evolved and why friendships, like the one he shares with Ryan Blaney, are the backbone of the sport. He breaks down Blaney’s 2023 championship win and what it means for NASCAR’s future. Dale opens up to Kenny about the critical role of promoting drivers and how corporate sponsors can make or break their visibility. He reflects on his transition to the broadcast booth, the shifting landscape of NASCAR PR, and the rise of Dirty Mo Media. With unfiltered takes on the Next Gen car, stricter penalties, and what NASCAR needs to do to elevate the sport, Dale brings a mix of nostalgia, sharp insight, and forward-thinking ideas to the conversation. Dale opens up to Kenny about the critical role of promoting drivers and how corporate sponsors can make...
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- [00:01]
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- [00:32]
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- [00:56]
Kenny Wallace
Hello everyone and welcome back to Kenny Conversation, brought to you by jegs, the leader in high performance aftermarket car parts. Remember to go to JEGS.com for everything you need for your vehicle. Well, I think I'm going to steal Rolling Stones. Please allow me to introduce my friend. He's a man of wealth and fame. Dale. Dale Earnhardt Jr. Jr. How you doing, buddy?
- [01:27]
Dale Earnhardt Jr.
I'm doing good, Kenny. It's good to see you. Not as good as being there in person to hang out, but don't get to talk to you as much as I'd like to. So I've been looking forward to this.
- [01:38]
Kenny Wallace
Well, we definitely have a long distance relationship and I guess our friendship started years ago, but I specifically remember being your friend at Dave Mater's slot car track in. What was that? Mooresville.
- [01:53]
Dale Earnhardt Jr.
Yeah, that was. Yeah, we had Dave Mater the third, raced in the cup series and. But he also was a very successful short track racer and when his cup career kind of ended, he took over this little store on Main street in Mooresville and put a slot car track in there. And man, you were always there, boy, I was always there. And you know, you'd see a lot of other people in the industry. Dave was always really good. And you know, you, I still have. So you bought those wooden boxes, right, that you, you kept your slot cars in. I still have mine.
- [02:39]
Kenny Wallace
I got mine too. My tires are dry rotted.
- [02:42]
Dale Earnhardt Jr.
Yeah. And the simpler time, man, we were, I don't remember. I must have been in my, you know, 18, 19 years old and you were, you were right in the middle of your career and yeah, it was fun to go over there and, and try to figure out how to be Competitive and messing with those cars and trying to buy the coolest and latest and greatest and. And then, you know, then Dave moved out. One day this slot car track went away and, and we got into RC cars, you know, bigger stuff. 10th scale, quarter scale stuff. Kept on getting bigger, bigger. But I still got that wooden box with all of my cars in it. Just like I walked out of that building the last time I was in it. You know what I'm going to do?
- [03:32]
Kenny Wallace
I'm gonna, I'm gonna go up, it's in my, my garage. I'm gonna take a picture of it and I'm gonna post it later this week. You know, it always, it always come down to trying to be better. And you know, when we would win like heats or amains, he would pay like $8 and he'd give you credit and you could take that $8 and.
- [03:53]
Dale Earnhardt Jr.
Go buy tires and track rental time. Yeah, stuff like that.
- [03:58]
Kenny Wallace
Well, you know, as old Larry Macrent will say, junior, I'm loaded up on my notes. We're going to have a good time. So I always remind everybody, Kenny, conversation is just that we go every which way. Everything doesn't have to be in order. So I've had this up in my race shop for a long time, and I'm going to show it to you. And I want to talk about this. So this is a piston.
- [04:28]
Dale Earnhardt Jr.
Okay.
- [04:29]
Kenny Wallace
You got a good idea what this is?
- [04:31]
Dale Earnhardt Jr.
Yeah. Come out of your race car, your qualifying engine, you want to Polar Rockingham.
- [04:37]
Kenny Wallace
So I want to go a little bit deeper into it. So I'm going to turn this over. So if you look at it, it looks like they were made. It says dei and then there's, you know, looks like the number two cylinder.
- [04:50]
Dale Earnhardt Jr.
Yep.
- [04:50]
Kenny Wallace
So I drove that Pennzo car for dei. You and I were teammates. We set quick time and run second in the race. But it wasn't till weeks later I go to dei and I believe it was Richie at that time, he was the motorman and he gave that to me. But the reason I want to bring you in into this is he's. He said, Dale Earnhardt Jr. Started this. Do you know the story behind those pistons? Because that piston came out of that motor right when we had qualifying motors.
- [05:27]
Dale Earnhardt Jr.
Yeah. So the. Obviously when we could change engines, we would run a practice motor. Then you put in a qualifying engine, and then you'd put in a race motor and run a few laps on. On that motor. In the final practice, there was a huge difference. From behind the steering wheel, you could feel how much Faster that qualifying motor was. And it was built to really only do one thing, and that was go fast for a couple laps. And it would not know. Under any circumstance, at least in my rookie year in 2002, 2003, under any circumstance, would that motor ever be put in for the race. It just wasn't going to make. It wasn't built for that. You run lightweight oils and all those things and all the coatings and everything was purposely made just to be able to make it a couple laps. And so you knew that that motor would come back. And. And more often than not, a lot of the parts in that motor might not get used again. They would end up taking the pistons out and different things like that. So when the motors, you know, got the pole, we started taking those pistons, and I've got a handful of them myself still at my house. But I don't remember. I don't remember bringing that idea to Richie. I appreciate him giving me the credit for it, because it's a pretty cool idea. But, you know, it's neat to have, you know, that the piston knowing what it was doing inside that engine during that short period of time, it's kind of, you know, comparable to having something off of a rocket or, you know, knowing where that rocket went and all it had to do to lift off the ground and. And go through the air. You know, it's a. It's an impressive piece of machinery. And then to know that you were behind the wheel and. And you succeeded on being the fastest pole. You know, when I. When I look back on my career and even today, when I race in the xfinity series, I was never more nervous behind the wheel of a car than right before qualifying.
- [07:45]
Kenny Wallace
Oh, me too. 100%.
- [07:48]
Dale Earnhardt Jr.
He's terrified. Because the funny thing about it is, like, people, just. People are like, how are you not more nervous for the race? The race is a long process, and you're in control of your pace, and you get to pick and choose when you're going to push, when you're going to take it easy, when you're going to take care of the car, how hard you need to run at certain points in the race. And it's. It's. You're never. You know, you don't run a race at 110 every second. Every foot of the track. In qualifying, you do in qualifying. Your job is to go out there and overachieve. And the other thing, too, was everybody was watching. The whole field is lined up on pit road, watching every car run, every crew chief, every Car owner, everybody's paying attention. So when you get it right, that's great. When you screw it up, that's not so great, because everybody saw it. And when you were so so or average or forgettable and you were forgettable or average for multiple weeks in a row, you know, it would. It hurts your ego. You know, you felt like it was an indictment on your reputation as a driver. And I remember having some of my most emotional, challenging times as a driver when I was having this sort of stretch of qualifying in the, you know, low 20s. I. I remember one of the last couple years I raced full time. I felt like I qualified 23rd every week, and it broke me. Like I. I was. I had had all I could stand of qualifying 23rd. And, you know, the racing. The racing was hard emotionally. It was, you know, difficult to finish below your. Your expectations. But you always were going to come back and try again the next week. And even now, like when I was. I was saying, when I get in that car to qualify, the xfinity car, I had to go to Homestead just a couple weeks ago, and I think I went out first, and I don't have a guaranteed spot in the field, and I'm not getting to watch where other people are racing on the track or going to. You know, you can watch other people qualify and go, okay, he run a good line. I'm going to run that line. I didn't have any of that. And so qualifying happens five minutes after the end of practice. When my practice session ended, I got out of the car like we always do. The crew came over and said, you need to get back in. You get ready to go qualify in five minutes. And so I buckle in, and I'm still putting my gloves on, and the guy's telling me to crank the motor to pull off, and I'm like, this is crazy. And I ain't got my head on straight. You know, I don't know what I'm about to do. I ain't even thought. I ain't had a chance to think about what I'm gonna do. And I call. I mean, I was so nervous the week leading up to the Xfinity races at Bristol and at homestead, because at Bristol, I think I had to go out third. Maybe it was first. But anyways, I called Timmy Hill. I didn't call the champion or the last week's race winner. I called Timmy Hill because Timmy's had a lot of experience. Going out first, going out third, going out second. He knew how that track was going to be. He knew the pressure, and he knew, you know, I needed to know what his thoughts were on what I should be expecting and what to safeguard against. And so it's intimidating, man, even after all these years.
- [11:30]
Kenny Wallace
I really appreciate you sharing that with me because I'm going to go somewhere with that. You know, I really listen to what you. You have to say. I think once I start talking about it, you're going to remember. So being your friend, Sonoma, you're leaning on the back of your Budweiser car at that time at the road course, and you didn't qualify real good. And I walked up to you and I said, in our friendship, I said, what's wrong, man? And you were heartbroken. And here today, you're admitting that qualifying will break a person because it was such a show back then. All eyes. You remember saying that to me at Sonoma. You said, I feel like I've let everybody down. What you said to me, no, I.
- [12:19]
Dale Earnhardt Jr.
Don'T remember it, but I. That's how it felt, you know, I remember. I'll share this. I've never shared this one with anybody, but I'll give you this one.
- [12:32]
Kenny Wallace
Thank you.
- [12:33]
Dale Earnhardt Jr.
It was me and Amy were. Me and Amy were not married yet. We might have been. I can't remember. This was like 20, 15, 16, or 17. It was one of those years. Last couple of years in my career. We're at Richmond, and I feel like I've qualified 23rd for eight weeks in a row. I mean, it just. It wasn't. I really didn't qualify 23rd eight weeks in a row. But, gosh, it felt like I just. I had this sort of writer's block. I just could not get past that, you know, that sort of mediocre, even less than mediocre performance in qualifying. And it was bugging the hell out of me. And I didn't know why we couldn't do better. And we were at Richmond, and it was wearing on me. I'd take it home and think about it, and, you know, probably the race performances probably weren't a whole lot better, to be honest with you. But I qualified 22nd or 23rd and went back to the bus and walked into the bus and walked back into the bathroom and shut the door and cried. And I. I mean, I didn't know what else. I didn't know what else to do. And Amy come back here and she don't know, you know, why am I upset about this? It's qualified. And I'm like, you know, you're doing this all Your life, you know, in your heart, you believe you're good at it. You want to believe you're one of the best at it. And no matter what you're doing or no matter how you try to approach it, you keep getting the same result, you know, and, you know, I never, I never really cried over results like I'm physically cried over results in my life. But that'll tell you right there, that one day at Richmond, that qualifying effort was all I could take. It been building and building weeks in, week, week in and week out. I don't know why. I mean, I've. I've had some race results that hurt, you know, hurt your heart, right? But never, never did I get out of the car and cry or go home and cry over it, you know, but for whatever reason that day, I was just at my wits end, and only qualifying could do that to you. I don't know why qualifying mattered that much. Right, yeah.
- [15:11]
Kenny Wallace
Well, let me. I almost want to call an audible. And I'm going to. I'm going to go to the very end of my notes. You and I share something in common. Now. You've had way more success than me and I, and we're going to rattle off your stats later on because I like to remind people, but you and I share something in common. Your dad was the man. My brother was the man. Rusty could never understand why I was not him. And I would read, you know, years past, 20 years ago, why people are like, Dale Jr. Is not his dad. And I'm thinking to myself, well, I never wanted to be my brother. I just wanted to do what Rusty did. I wanted to do what my dad did. So you telling me that story, and we've all been there, you're no different than anybody. But do you, do you feel like, you know, coming to your wits end of qualifying, that is just because of who you are, or do you think it was just because you had enough?
- [16:23]
Dale Earnhardt Jr.
I just wanted to do good. I was. I always felt like that I was falling short of expectations. Even if no one ever said anything to me, my expectation was my father, his success. Right. It wasn't that. People were coming up to me and saying, man, you're not winning enough. You're not doing this enough. I mean, I heard the talk out there. He's never going to be his daddy. He's riding his coattails, all of those things. But none of that really, that bothered me that bad, to be honest with you. All of the talk, all the noise outside that might be negative. Never, never really Bothered me. I expected to be a champion. I expected to be a winner. I wanted badly, badly to. To win. And so when, you know, when I'd go out there and I want, you know, I look, I'd go out, run laps in practice, look at the sheet, all right, that's not good enough. Or, okay, we're fast today. Go and qualify. That was great. Nope, not good enough. God, I'm disappointed in that. And that, you know, that bothered me badly. We go to race in the race on Sunday or Saturday, you walk away with the result you expect maybe a little better. Maybe you're surprised by the result or you're super disappointed in it. And I just lived it every single day. And when I finished poorly, I would not feel okay about that until I could get back in the car and fix it. And so if I ran bad on Sunday, I was a miserable person until the next Sunday. And, you know, it just. I, you know, I. People might think that I felt a lot of pressure from the outside about, you know, my last name and my dad and his fans or my fans and just the. In the nas, you know, the NASCAR fandom in general, just having these certain, you know, high expectations of me. I had even higher expectations of myself, you know, and later in my career, I felt like, you know, I, you know, I had gotten with Steve Lat. We had sort of developed this process of improving, which I can go into detail about. But when my career was over in 2011, 12, right, I was sitting there thinking, man, I don't know how in the hell this is ever going to get turned around. I don't know who could turn it around. I don't know if it's possible. I'm no longer in the, you know, under the wing of my father's company. I'm out outside of that security and that safety net. I'm at hms. There's nowhere to hide. If you can't run good in that car, there's no excuse. And so I was sitting there around 2011 and 12 thinking that my, you know, I might wake up one day and my career could be over whether I want it to the end or not. Rick, to his credit, assured me, we're going to keep working. We're going to keep trying. We're going to keep trying. I never felt from Rick Hendrick or anybody at Hendrick Motorsports that I was on thin ice. But damn, I knew the results. I knew the success that my teammates might be having. Anyways, I get put with Steve Latard. Steve said, man, you're you know, finishing 20th in points or worse. You're running like that every week. We're going to set a goal of 15th. And I was like, okay. I was like, you know, we'll just. He just expected 15th. He didn't expect us to go run third. We started running 15th when that started happening every single week, he said, all right, we're Moving it to 10th, buddy. It's time to start finishing 10th or better. We started doing, you know, we. It took a little time, but we got to where we were a top ten car every week. And then he said, hey, guess what? I want you to go to the track, and we're going to expect to run fifth. And I was like, okay. And then we would go to the racetrack and we would run in the top five every week. We had top five speed, and we'd run there. We were battling with Greg Biffle leading the points throughout the, you know, into the summer stretch, having a great couple of years. But Steve, like, put this progress in place. That made sense, and it actually, you know, if you would. If you're standing at the bottom of that hill in 2013. And he said, hey, look up that hill. One day we're going to be running third. You'd go, damn that. How's that possible? That's going to be hard to do. Well, over time, we got there, we achieved it, and then we were winning races, Daytona 500. And he. He walked in or. I. I forget how I heard this, but I was at Charlotte motor speedway in 2014, and somebody said, hey, man, I got word that the tarp might be going to work for NBC next year. And when I heard. So when I heard that NBC was thinking about coming into NASCAR and becoming a partner, I called one of the. I called somebody that was sort of helping put all that together, and I said, you know, who they need to put in the booth at NBC is Dale Jarrett. Dale Jarrett hadn't been in a booth full time in quite a while. I think he'd been there before with ESPN and a few other people, but couldn't really remember. But I was like, man, you know, I was. I was opinionated about what our broadcast booth needed, and I was like, here's a shot for me to put in my two cents. I think the booth needs Dale Jarrett. Yeah. And they went and they went and hired my crew chief that I was running good with.
- [23:10]
Kenny Wallace
Yeah.
- [23:11]
Dale Earnhardt Jr.
And anyways, that might have been around 2013, but it broke my heart. And, you know, and so then I go into those final few years with Greg Ives and me and Greg became great friends. I had some problems physically with concussions and things like that that were definitely derailing our momentum and our ability to, you know, build as a team. And the results were hard to come by for me in that final year. And so even then, though, man, I'd go to the racetrack thinking, I'm good enough and I'm with a good enough organization to run top five. And when that didn't happen, you know, you just would be just as disappointed as if it were 10 years ago. I didn't. I didn't go into that last year thinking, man, I'm just gonna have good time and this is going to be my swan song. And right off into the sunset, you know, I wanted to win a race. I wanted to win races. I wanted to run great, and I still felt like I could. But those final few years, it was. It was hard to reconcile with the reality. The results just didn't come as easy as you wanted.
- [24:31]
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- [25:03]
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- [25:28]
Kenny Wallace
Okay, this is excruciating for me because I love you as a friend and we've gone down this road before. I think you're awesome. I think you're entirely. You're highly intelligent. Let me just. Let me just. Wow, that's very heavy for me. I want to read you your stats and we're going to go back around. We're going to have some fun. But I want you to listen intently. Okay?
- [25:55]
Dale Earnhardt Jr.
Yeah.
- [25:56]
Kenny Wallace
Dale Earnhardt Jr. 49 years old right now. 776 NASCAR starts. You're in the NASCAR hall of Fame. That is not to be taken lightly. That's unbelievable. You got 26 cup wins, 24 Xfinity wins. You are the 15 time NASCAR cup most popular driver. And that's from 2003 to 2017. That's, that's 15 years straight. You're the 1998, 1999 Xfinity champion. You've won two Daytona five hundreds. And as we always say, you're a two time Daytona 500 champion. 2004, 2014. This one here blows my mind. Budweiser shootout winner 0304 08, 1516. And this one's even bigger. You won Talladega four straight years in a row. And Junior, there's way more. But I thought, okay, it would be ridiculous to just keep going. So, buddy, you know, I think your story is what I call. It's a cautionary tale where as great as we are, right away you went to the negative. So let's ease it up. I just read your stats. You're great. You are great. And I'm not sure codename. What do you think when I tell you all that?
- [27:36]
Dale Earnhardt Jr.
Yeah. So that's why I watch a lot of the races from my past. I love watching old races, no matter whether I was in them or not. But I do watch races that I was in. I watch a lot of the old xfinity stuff from 98, 99. Yeah, well, we gotta remember because we forget. You're right. You know, you get down the road and you're like, yeah, you know, I really only remember or, you know, really on. I left with this, you know, imprint or emotional imprint from those final few years.
- [28:13]
Kenny Wallace
The tough times destroys us.
- [28:15]
Dale Earnhardt Jr.
They do. I, you know, I was with, you know, I was around Jimmy Johnson a lot in, in his final few years and you know, it blew my mind. I'd go to the racetrack with, and, and here's a seven time champion like he has done. He, he won a championship. The time's over, right? Like God almighty. How could you ever be disappointed with a run or a qualifying run or a race weekend when you got seven championships? You know, you're like that guy never gets sad about nothing. But dude, Jimmy Johnson, one, one of the greatest drivers that ever was, would get out of a car in the last couple of years of his career and be just as frustrated and, you know, looking for answers and distraught over a run as anybody, you know, as, as this, as a 25 year old rookie still looking for his first win. And it blew my mind. I was like, damn, this guy is human. You know, he's a human being. He's got even all of that success hasn't weathered or Leathered his emotions to where, dude, he still. He feels the hurt and the pain and the disappointment of a loss or just a frustrating run or just lack of speed. He feels that as real and as authentic as any other driver in the field. And so, you know, that was interesting to me. But I, Yeah, I do go back and look at the old Bud days and, you know, kind of remind myself that, man, we had a good. We had some good stretches where, you know, we won a handful of Xfinity February races. The 300 in February. We won a handful of those in a row.
- [30:17]
Kenny Wallace
And I could have kept going, you know, with.
- [30:21]
Dale Earnhardt Jr.
I have to remember, you know, we were at Martinsville. You love Martinsville. You always ran so good there. We were at Martinsville just a couple weeks ago, and somebody was like, you know, you had a. You had a stretch of, like, five top five finishes in a row or something like that back in the Bud days. And, yeah, I remember. I'll tell you this. We. We went. I went to Martinsville for my first race and ran into everything. I ran into the wall. I ran into the tow truck behind the wall. I ran into everything. Right.
- [30:59]
Kenny Wallace
You hit everything except go out there and hit it.
- [31:02]
Dale Earnhardt Jr.
We hit everything and the tow truck. I. I had a rough day. So Tony Junior, Tony Senior, we take our car up there to go test. And when we didn't run good, Tony Senior and Tony Junior, they took you to work. And so we go up there to test Tony Jr. And you. This is. This was neat to me back in the day, but more than likely, most everybody had it. Tony Jr. Took a piece of tungsten and shaped it like the. The perch. The spring perch on the trailing arm. And so the left rear trailing arm spring perch was made out of tungsten. And so it was like this unsprung weight that would plant the left rear tire on the ground at all times. Amazing. Yeah. And so we were, you know, we wait. We put tungsten in lower A frames for the left front, trying to figure out how to make this car work. And we ended up learning that putting that tungsten on the trailing arm somewhere back there at the rear axle was the way to go. We just had to disguise it to look like part of the car so that we didn't get in trouble because it was illegal.
- [32:07]
Kenny Wallace
Good stuff.
- [32:08]
Dale Earnhardt Jr.
And, man, we went there and ran in the top five, like, six, seven races in a row. It was awesome. And every time I went, when I went over to Hendrick, they're like, you know, they're great. At Martinsville, they win a lot of races, and we'd go there, and I'm practicing in the top five, and I'm like, man, this thing's good. I just wonder if we can get a little better. Y'all ever put any tungsten? And they're looking at me like, what? We don't need that. You know, I don't know. But we're down south.
- [32:41]
Kenny Wallace
That's what we do.
- [32:44]
Dale Earnhardt Jr.
I didn't mind doing a little cheating. I always wanted some advantage. Yes. Over the competition, and that was the easiest way to get it.
- [32:51]
Kenny Wallace
So that leads me to this. You know, I wouldn't say back in the day, I think that's a little brutal. But we got this next gen car, which is a whole nother conversation. But in our day, Tony Juror, Tony Uri, Tony Senior. They could craft a race car and make that car better than everybody else's. Do you think we're better off nowadays, or. I mean, I kind of liked it where a team could craft cars because when you look at Formula one, you know, it's Mercedes versus, you know, all the other makers, you know, Porsche, Ferrari, whatever it is. What's your thought of back then? We could craft a car.
- [33:37]
Dale Earnhardt Jr.
I loved it. I. You know, I. It's. It's. There's pros and cons to both. Right. There's. There's part of me, so, you know, there's. There's part of me that loves the creativity, and I do miss being able to create a van. An advantage in the shop. You know, I. But it. It's expensive, higher. You know, you gotta. You got. You get a great fabricator that knows how to build a quarter panel better than anybody else. And he's gonna get offers from other teams, and you're gonna be at battle all the time trying to keep those people in your building. And secrets don't last long. You know, you. You. The garage is so tight. Literally working on top of each other in some of these garages up, down the, you know, the. In the series that, you know, people see everything. You're not going to hide nothing. And so I miss it, you know, I miss being able to sort of have an advantage in the shop over other companies, being able to hire better people just, you know, flat out. Yeah, you know, out spending them. But also, I love the peace of mind that the new next gen car brings. Where, man, if you. If you know how to set the thing up, you can. You can beat some of these guys, you know, and it's not. It's. It's not the parody that it brought was pretty evident in the first season. Now, as we go through the next handful of years, maybe, you know, those, you know, those high buck teams distance themselves from everybody else, just like the old car. But, yeah, I don't know. I mean, it costs a lot of.
- [35:46]
Kenny Wallace
Money is what you're saying, to outrun back in the day.
- [35:49]
Dale Earnhardt Jr.
It does, but it also sounds like it costs a lot of money this. These days too. Yeah, yeah, there's says they're out there racing Lamborghinis, right? Yeah. You know, so $350,000 race car. So I, you know, I think that, you know, in the Xfinity series, it's kind of a nice balance. If I could be honest, when I look at the trucks, right, they still do a lot of work on the bodies. They look twisted up. It's. It's very aggressive. I never loved that. You know, we go to the racetrack around 2003, 2004. I remember pulling out on pit road one time behind Ricky craven in the 32 Tide car, right? And I said to Tony Jr. Was getting ready to go out on the racetrack to practice, said, damn. I said, Damn it, Tony Jr. I think Ricky Craven's already backed his car in the damn wall. The left rear quarter panels pushed all the way over, the right rear quarter panels hanging out. And he's like, that's the way they're building them these days. I said, well, I hope mine looks like that. We gotta go to work. Slide that rear tail over and get that quarter panel on the right side flat. And it got. It was cool. But then it got too much, you know, the cars became almost unrecognizable. And when you look at the trucks today, they, you know, they got that big board on the right side and the right rear tail pieces slid way over. And I like the car to be symmetrical, you know, and even our cup cars just a couple years ago, you know, had the flat right side. The left rear quarter panel would be bent in toward the center of the car and the car. The tail piece ain't on the car straight. It's moved over a couple inches. What the hell? Like, just make them sit. Sit the tailpiece on there centered up. Put the roof on, centered up to the roll cage, tail piece center, nose piece center. And then put the body on it. And, you know, that's kind of where we are with the, with the Xfinity cars. You know, our. Our bodies are, you know, plastic. And there's areas where NASCAR's like, do not touch this. You Touch this, you're in big damn trouble. And we don't touch it. You know, we don't give. We don't get cute. And so I kind of like where the xfinity series is. It's kind of a good blend between how crazy things used to be in the cup garage 15 years ago and the. And the new kit car that they're racing in the cup series now. The rules and the way the bodies are with the composite bodies, it kind of keeps us pretty honest. I don't have to go crazy with my payroll trying to hire some insanely expensive fabricator. You know, you're a good fabricator. You can come in here and hang the body on an xfinity car pretty easily. And I'll be happy with the job you do.
- [38:39]
Kenny Wallace
Two weeks ago, not exactly on that subject, but we were at Martinsville. Somebody asked Ryan Newman who was the hardest guy he ever raced on short tracks. And Ryan Newman said the toughest short track racer he ever raced against was you, Dale Jr. I can remember you getting tired of, you know what he call him?
- [39:06]
Dale Earnhardt Jr.
Q. Yeah.
- [39:09]
Kenny Wallace
You would move people. You moved Todd Bodine at South Boston getting into three. You moved people in short track racing. Were you surprised that Ryan Newman remembered that about you?
- [39:22]
Dale Earnhardt Jr.
I thought he misspoke and he was trying to say dad, but no, I.
- [39:28]
Kenny Wallace
Thought he meant you.
- [39:29]
Dale Earnhardt Jr.
I know I watched that clip and I was really taken aback that he would mention me out of every driver that he's ever raced. But me and Ryan did have some. Some hard races. And I mean, Ryan Newman's had a hard race with everybody. But, you know, I. Me and Ryan had a couple instant incidents on. And they weren't on short tracks. They were in Atlanta. Back to back races so fast. We're running the. I'm running the top. I've got the top figured out. This is like 2004, 2003. Ain't many people got. Got up to the top of the racetrack yet at that point in time. And. And I'm up there flying and I run. And when you come off the top of turn two at Atlanta in 2003 and the guys run the bottom, you're going to be about 10 mile an hour faster. Yeah. And Ryan, the way he races, which is fine. We love the way Ryan races. Ryan would come up off the bottom and pull right up in front of you, and you got to stop and you're going to mile an hour faster and you got this incredible run off the top of the racetrack and you just got to stop or Go to the inside. And I'm like, I don't like that, Ryan. So I ran in the back of him and spun him out, and he wrecked his motor coach was right next to mine. I thought, he's going to whip my ass when I saw him at the driver's motor coach slot after the race. But it would come. He come up to me, and I said, man, I got to run off the top. Why in the hell would you pull in front of me? Just leave me the outside lane. And he said, well, why don't you go the inside? And I said, well, I'm running the top. I want the top. And you pulled up in front of my ass. I'm going too fast. I can't stop. And we had this little conversation about it. We get back there to the very next race in Atlanta, and he does the same damn thing. I mean, it was a carbon copy. And I jacked him up and spun him around again. And so we. You know, I think. And we had some other, you know, good races in our career. And so I think those two moments may have imprinted on him that I was aggressive in nature. But I. I felt like I kind of was. I certainly wasn't as. As rough as dad was. But when I. I remember racing in my first Xfinity race at Michigan. I'm running seventh in this number 31 blue car. I'm only running, like, five, six races that year, and just trying to. You know, I'm trying to prove that I belong in there. And I'm racing with Dale Jared. He's in the number 32 band aid car, big old Ford. And I. I catch him off of two, and I bump him in the left rear. And he come over the radio and said, are y'all sure that's Junior in that car? Not. His daddy ran over me like his daddy would. And I. You know, when I first started in my career, you know, when you called a guy, you ran into him a little bit, right? You. You'd use that headlight. Yeah, use that little right front headlight and kind of slide them on up the racetrack a little bit. Just get them up off the bottom and go buy them. And, you know, then I started racing in the cup series all the time, and Mark Martin, bless him, changed the entire culture on the racetrack. One guy taught the entire field how to race. And, you know, when you ran a guy down, you didn't race the crap out of him. You let him go. He's faster. You know, it's. It's halfway in the Race. Why do you want to hold him up and slow both of you down? Eventually, he's going to get by you anyways. But you damn hold him up and you cost both of you straight away. Mark Martin taught us that, man. You just let him go, and then later in the race, you run him back down. 50 laps or a hundred laps later, he let you go. And if you don't, then you. Then you can hit him, right? Yeah. And so you know, Mark. Mark taught us all how to race. And I cleaned my act up a little bit, and certainly wasn't quite as rough as I. As I might have. Might have been earlier in my career.
- [43:50]
Kenny Wallace
You just took us through two cultures, you know, of racing here. I caught you. You haven't pulled over, so now I'm going to knock the hell out of you. And then to Mark Martin and I, you know, Junior, we were racing 500 miles, and, you know, I've had that talk given to me before.
- [44:11]
Dale Earnhardt Jr.
Hey, boy.
- [44:12]
Kenny Wallace
Harry Gantt, we're not racing each other. We're racing the leader, you know, and we're losing time battling side by side, so. Yeah, I like that. Take two different takes.
- [44:23]
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- [44:44]
Dale Earnhardt Jr.
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- [44:44]
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- [44:55]
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- [45:19]
Kenny Wallace
Okay, let's. Let's lighten the load up here. Let's have a little fun and do. I'm not saying rapid fire, but. So I did a show on Monday, and I gave you a trophy. I've given you this. This is the Rick Slayer. Whoo. Okay, so the reason you get this trophy is this. Okay. How in the hell did you know that Ryan Blaney was going to win the championship this year? Become famous. You called it. So here's your trophy. I'm giving it through You. I'll send it to you. But what was your deal with. I know you love him, but what did you see early in the year?
- [46:04]
Dale Earnhardt Jr.
Well, I'll be honest, I picked Ryan Blaney to win the championship because I think Ryan Blaney as a champion and successful in NASCAR is good for nascar. I didn't pick Ryan because I saw something on, you know, in his performance. I just knew that a Ryan Blaney championship would be positive for us and be. And he's. So. There's a. There's a lot here. I will. I'll tell you this. So I remember me and Dave Blaney came in together in Xfinity series. He had this really badass paint scheme. The 93Amaco car. I remember it.
- [46:42]
Kenny Wallace
He was fast.
- [46:43]
Dale Earnhardt Jr.
Yeah, he was fast. Kick ass little race car and really quiet, nice, mild mannered guy. He was a father. He was a family man. I wasn't right. So we didn't become friends because we just weren't on the same page. But I thought the world of him, respected him immensely. And then I'm standing on the grid at Kansas for Ryan's first cup start. We had all watched Ryan sort of piece together these little opportunities in the Xfinity series and eventually get a deal with Pinsky as a developmental driver and get opportunities driving this 22 car. And so we were all a witness to that and kind of pulling for him. Mainly pulling for him because of his daddy, right? You knew who his daddy was, and you're like, I liked his daddy, so I'm gonna pull for the kid. And then you get to know Ryan. And it turns out, man, I mean, he's just salt to the earth. He's just as cool and as easy and as low level as his dad. And so I sit there and talk to him on the start finish line or on the grid for his first start. We qualified side by side. I probably qualified 23rd. And. And so, hey, that's Michael Jordan. And so I was like, hey, man, you know, nobody cares where you finish. Don't worry about that. Go out there and run all the laps, learn. If you wreck early, you're not learning. I was like, nobody expects anything out of you, performance wise. All right? So you don't have to feel like you've got to measure up to a certain thing. Just go run the laps and have fun. This is going to be neat. It's going to be surprising and interesting to you, and just make sure you get everything you can out of it. And so I see him, you Know, I see him renting a house connected to my property. I used to own this piece of property, and I sold it to Brad Keselowski. Well, he rents this house from Brad to live in it. And his neighbors, like, earshot from my mother, who actually lived down the hill for me. So we're all neighbors. So him and his buddies, Bubba Wallace, and they're all running around on my property on four wheelers and stuff.
- [49:02]
Kenny Wallace
These young kids being goofy.
- [49:04]
Dale Earnhardt Jr.
Yeah. And we became friends after the race. I'd call him up and he might come over and sit in the basement bar and talk about the race weekend or whatever. And we just got to know each other really well. He wins his first race in the 21 car at Pocono. And I called him and I said, I'm bringing all the beer. Don't you worry about it. He said, my crew's coming over. I said, I'll handle all the beer. Don't worry about it. We'll be there, and can't wait for you to get home. And so we ended up. I got a picture that I sent to Dave just the other day. We took on the back porch that night of the whole team, his whole crew and all of us, right? And all his friends, Bubba, Ricky Stenhouse, and a bunch of other people. And so, long story short, I've just really always thought a lot of Blaney. The other thing that people may not entirely realize is that everything that anyone has ever asked Ryan to do that would promote the sport, he said yes to going out to the west coast to do sitcoms, any interview. He started his, you know, the Glass Holes podcast. You know, all of those things were just, you know, he didn't make a lot of money. It wasn't like somebody said, here's a briefcase full of money. Do this. It was just, hey, man, I. I'm getting. You know, I want to promote myself. I want to help promote the sport. He's always really been active, which I admire a lot. I didn't have. I didn't have a whole. I mean, I was doing a lot of things in my young career to promote the sport, but they weren't my ideas. They were, you know, Budweiser and all these other people were pushing me in this direction. He has more foresight vision to understand how valuable that that work is outside of the race car. And so I've always liked that. And so I thought, man, you know, I want him to win a championship. I want him to be a champion. I want him to be a successful winner. Year in and year out on. On our. On our. On our. On our tour. I want that for him personally, but I also want it for our sport because it would be great for our sport to continue to develop superstars. He's a well known name in our industry, but I want him to be well known in the mainstream. And so that's just why I picked him. I said, man, I want him to win it. I hope he wins it. And there was part of me that saw a very similar sort of season that Joey had the year before. Joey wasn't lighting the world on fire. When we went to Phoenix, and we're interviewing the final four drivers, the championship four, Phoenix, everybody was thinking that Joey wasn't in the mix, right? He wasn't really a threat to win that championship. But when they. You know, when they got done, he was the champion and won the race. And I thought to myself, man, if Blaney can get the Phoenix, why can't he win it? He could probably win it. Phoenix is a good track for him. It's great for Pinsky, but getting there was going to be the hard part. And there were some very, very close calls where he almost didn't get it, get through. But, you know, once he's. Once he made it to Phoenix, man, the rest of the industry was like, oh, Blaney, he's the favorite. Blaney's the favorite. Look at Martinsville. Look at this. Look at his stats at Phoenix. Blaney's the favorite. And he went out there, had the best car in practice, and then the race got the job done.
- [52:42]
Kenny Wallace
So I made a big stink a week or two ago. I said that I love nascar. It's my life. I want it to do good. But they got to do a better job at getting these drivers face in the mainstream. We once asked, well, somebody asked Kyle Larson, hey, when you won the championship, what happened? And I was shocked. He said nothing. He said, I won the championship. Didn't even matter. So about two weeks ago, I did the Kenny Wallace show. This is the Kenny Conversation. This is more serious. I said, nascar, and everybody's got to start promoting these drivers. And Steve O'Donnell liked that on my Instagram. And I thought, oh, boy. So I want to know from you, we have four drivers finished in the top four. Blaney is 25 years old. All the way up to Larson, 31 Junior. Do we have the drivers? And with NASCAR building this new center, you know, there by the Concord Regional Airport, can they get these drivers to where people know them? Do we have the right drivers.
- [53:57]
Dale Earnhardt Jr.
Absolutely. We, our drivers are great personalities. They're entertaining people. Listen, I mean, Jimmy Johnson is one of the most interesting, coolest guys that I've ever met. I mean, this guy has a, he has a fun sense of humor, likes to goof off, gets wild every once in a while. And he, you know, he was, he was with Lowe's and he was with Hendrick and a lot of things sort of quelled that sort of personality from really ever coming out. He wasn't all that eager to showcase that side of him to the rest of the world. You know, for whatever reason, that person that I knew never really became that well known to, to the rest of the world. They only knew him as Jimmy, the same time champion that drives for Hendrick Motorsports, sponsored by Lowe's. And I knew him as these, as this really kick ass fun guy that I love to hang out and drink beer with, falling off the roof of.
- [55:11]
Kenny Wallace
Go Karts and Break.
- [55:13]
Dale Earnhardt Jr.
Yeah. And so our, all our drivers are fun bad people. And I feel like that it is somewhat NASCAR's responsibility to take advantage of their avenues and their, their, the things that they're connected to and the access that they have. They, they certainly do work to get the drivers into certain places right outside of our bubble. The, one of the things that I, we talked about this on my podcast a little bit a couple of weeks ago. One of the things, if we think back to it, Kenny, so if we look at my career, I had Budweiser and Budweiser probably had more access and ability to shoot us into the Stratosphere more than any other brand. And they did, they took advantage of all of that. Sending me to boxing matches, getting me into the Rolling Stone, getting me into all of. We did, we did all types of articles in publications that weren't asking or calling for NASCAR drivers. Right. We did MTV Cribs multiple times. Damn, I must have Cribs. I did Crips three or four times.
- [56:35]
Kenny Wallace
It was awesome.
- [56:37]
Dale Earnhardt Jr.
You know, we, we were, we did. I went to MTV and introduced during the MTV Music Awards, Lincoln Park. That stuff was, you know, it was, was. It wasn't uncommon to see a NASCAR driver to CMT Awards, but at the MTV Music Awards, you weren't seeing NASCAR guys there. That wasn't the power of the Earnhardt last name. That was Bud, man. That was Budweiser.
- [57:04]
Kenny Wallace
You wore your hat backwards. That was good.
- [57:07]
Dale Earnhardt Jr.
So the corporate sponsors are really the ones that have the most leverage to be able to get a driver into a certain space that they can't get to. And they have the most to gain from it, the most to benefit from it. And so we kind of got to. We kind of got to get our partners to really use their leverage to get these drivers out there and put them in places where, you know, we're not getting access to. You know, the other thing that was different about my time was, and I don't want to get any trouble for saying this, maybe I don't, but the PR people that a PR person's job in NASCAR is to secure their driver interviews and speaking opportunities, whether it's in print or video, whatever. Their job is to get their driver in front of cameras and in front of microphones as often as possible and try to make as big a splash on a weekly, daily basis. Right. Their job is to promote this driver, get this driver in front of the camera. Well, right now, all of the PR people are usually employed by the race teams. In 2004, man, or when me and you were racing, the PR people were spot. Were hired by the sponsor. And so when you're a PR person that is employed by Budweiser, there's a lot of pressure. You better perform. They don't want to, you know, they don't want to see you getting, you know, getting an art, getting an article or a piece written in the local paper. That ain't going to do it. They want to see you on the front page of the USA Today. They want to see you on the front page of the Rolling Stone or that's a song. Yeah. US Week, US Weekly, whatever. Right. They want that driver to be on the COVID of the Roll End Stone. Yeah. So it, it was. I wonder now, you know, since that shifted, the PR people are now really more employed by the race teams that the motivation and the real true role of the PR person has evolved. And maybe there's a, you know, the corporate. The corporate sponsor didn't want to manage that cost. Right. Of that salary for the PR person. Now the teams had to take it on so that the driver had a PR person. If they, you know, if they don't have one, they. They're rolling around aimlessly. Right. Without really getting any kind of opportunities to be able to be speaking in the media and working in the media and promoting themselves and their sponsors. So maybe if we can figure out a way to get that shift back to where these corporate sponsors are investing in people that will help push this driver and get him promoted. Right.
- [60:20]
Kenny Wallace
I think I love what you're saying.
- [60:22]
Dale Earnhardt Jr.
Yeah. So to go back to your Point, like NASCAR carries some responsibility, but I think they do what they do. They're doing everything they've always done. They're doing all they can. I don't see them doing less than what they were doing when I was driving. I think they do a lot. What we're missing, I believe, on. On. On the promotion of the drivers is corporate America, how they used to push drivers out into the world. And so you know that. That's a. I don't know. That's not the whole answer. There's a lot of little things. Right.
- [60:56]
Kenny Wallace
But you, you and I are on the same page. I don't mean to interrupt you, but I'm. I'm the bad boy. I believe that we are in a new America. Everybody is scared to death to make a mistake. And therefore I said, if you don't say nothing, you don't sell nothing. Yeah, we're boring and we're both on the same page. Except I say it a little more aggressively. With that being said, this is down my list here, and allow me to say this without any repercussions. You are extremely popular. You are one of the most famous athletes in America. I've sat there and watched you and Jim France talk. You're friends, people admire you. The industry looks up to you. How do you deal with that? I mean, I know that you know that you, you hold the key. How do you deal with that? Is it, Is it a burden or do you like it?
- [62:05]
Dale Earnhardt Jr.
I don't feel it. Really? Yeah, I don't feel that way. I feel like that every day I gotta get up and earn respect. Every day I gotta get up and earn my place in the sport. And I, you know, I don't take it for granted. I don't, I don't just assume that I'm going to always have a spot at the table, you know, and so I, you know, I love broadcasting. I love doing that. I hope to be doing it for a long time and. But I don't, I don't. I don't just assume, man, I'm going to be a broadcaster as long as I want. I, you know, I think, you know, some. I have a pretty great relationship with nascar. I think sometimes you'd be surprised at how, how much I get myself into trouble on my own podcast. Maybe running my mouth a little bit too much. You know, I get, this happens. This has happened. This is exactly how it goes. Every single time something happens in nascar, I get mad about it. I go on my podcast or over to a buddy or whatever, right? And go, that's B.S. why'd they do that? That shouldn't have done that. Why that? I don't know why they did it that way. That. Had never done it this way. And then if I take a minute and go talk to Mike Hilton or Steve O'Donnell, they'll go, let me explain to you why we did it that way. And by the end of the conversation, you're going, oh, man, that makes total sense. Like, I get it. And so a lot of times I don't really. You know, a lot of times I get myself in a little bit of trouble. And so that makes me feel like I've always got to be earning back, you know, my space, my place, my role, my job, whatever it is. And this whole thing. And I always want to be involved in the sport one way or another. I want to matter. I want to be an asset to it. I want it. You know, I want to make a difference. I want to add to it and raise it up and. But sometimes my actions would say different, right? Sometimes my actions would tell you that I'm pushing back against it. And it's a. That's something I got to personally work on, you know, you get. I truly believe, man, that, like, my role in life outside of, you know, being a. Being a dad and a husband and all those things, and running. Running Junior Motorsports, I'm sitting in Kelly's office right now doing this interview. My. Outside of just the things that you see, my role is to make NASCAR better every day.
- [65:20]
Kenny Wallace
Absolutely.
- [65:22]
Dale Earnhardt Jr.
Now, do I live that way? No, not every day. I get it wrong every once in a while, but that's truly what I want to do. That's where my heart is right, and. But sometimes I get it. I get it wrong and, you know, but trying to wake up every day and wanting to be an asset to something, I don't ever think you wake up feeling like I'm the center of this universe or I'm, you know, you don't wake up, like, understanding your importance. You just wake up every day going, man, I want to matter. I got to do something today to make a difference. I got to do something today that, you know, Mike Hilton or Steve O'Donnell will go, man, that's. I'm glad he's on our side, you know, or. I'm glad he's in this business. He's helped us today, you know, and it's. It's. It's hard to move that. It's hard to make that difference sometimes. And sometimes you get it wrong and Sometimes you, sometimes you hopefully get it right.
- [66:27]
Kenny Wallace
I find this amazing how humble you are. You know, a year ago I commented on why Carl Edwards left and.
- [66:41]
Dale Earnhardt Jr.
A.
- [66:42]
Kenny Wallace
Little birdie told me you might have. That one was a little rough. It was, it was my take. I didn't mean anything mean by it, but I can, I just want to let you know, I relate. You know, that was on the Kenny Wallace show.
- [66:59]
Dale Earnhardt Jr.
It's exactly that kind of thing. You know, you'll, you'll, you, you know, we do these shows, we work to provide content for people and give people entertainment or a unique point of view. And sometimes, you know, you say things without thinking about how it might affect the other person. Right. Or the other side. And so sometimes I'll get critical in nascar and I think, well, they ought to be used to that, right? They ought to be used to people being critical about them. And they, you know, I, I look, you know, it, content is content. It's all good, right? We're all talking about the sport. Whether we're talking where we like something that happened or don't like something that happened. But sometimes, sometimes you can take it a little too far.
- [67:46]
Kenny Wallace
Answer that.
- [67:46]
Dale Earnhardt Jr.
Let's see who it is. No, it's Kelly.
- [67:52]
Kenny Wallace
We got too far.
- [67:54]
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- [68:19]
Kenny Wallace
Do your mouth.
- [68:20]
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- [68:23]
Dale Earnhardt Jr.
Good burger.
- [68:26]
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- [68:51]
Kenny Wallace
Okay, so dirty mo. Yeah, I'm, I am your biggest fan. This is must watch podcast. I absolutely am addicted to it. Your team does the most fantastic job. They figured it out. The shorts that you put on Twitter or podcast. I have our local dirt racers. They dirt racers who hate NASCAR because they're jealous of it. They listen to you. I listen to you. So what I want to know is I find you sometimes to be a.
- [69:30]
Dale Earnhardt Jr.
Little shy.
- [69:32]
Kenny Wallace
Where did this dirty mo Media. I never saw this coming. How did this start?
- [69:41]
Dale Earnhardt Jr.
Mike Davis is. Mike Davis was my PR guy that Bud had hired to manage my role as the Budweiser race car driver in the Cup Series. And so. But Mike Davis and I were at the racetrack together every day. And then I hired him to be kind of a brand manager for me. I really didn't even know what a brand meant, right? But he come on board to sort of manage my brand, which meant basically everything under the umbrella that I had connections to. He was going to manage those partnerships and try to keep building our brand, growing our recognition and value. And so he came to me one day and he said, man, we need to get into podcasting. And I was like, I've never listened to a podcast in my life.
- [70:37]
Kenny Wallace
Right.
- [70:38]
Dale Earnhardt Jr.
I don't plan on it. I don't. I'm not a podcaster. I'm not going to listen to podcasts.
- [70:43]
Kenny Wallace
Busy racing, baby.
- [70:44]
Dale Earnhardt Jr.
Yeah. I listen to the radio and I listen to music and I watch tv. Yeah. You know, so he's like, trust me, podcasts are going to get popular. You're going to want to be in this space. And he told me how it was going to work, and all I really had to do was record into my phone just sort of a brief synopsis of my race day every Sunday, and then I'd mail it to him. Him and another couple people hosted the show forever. And it grew and grew. You know, it was very popular with our core hardcore fan, right? And it was this great, neat piece of content that only they, you know, could get in this one space. And the other thing that I loved about it is, you know, you would you get out of a race car and run your mouth or. Or you get to the racetrack on Friday and go in the media center and run your mouth and be all smart Assyrian. Because race car drivers have massive egos. And we're all real smart assy people know everything we do. We get in there, we go in the media center, and we tell. I'm going to tell y'all what's up. This is what's going on. This is what I think. This is what. This is what's right. And then they write the story, right? And then you read the story and you go, damn, blew that out of proportion, you know? And so the podcast was great because you control the narrative, right? Your message is your message, and you are in control of it. And whatever you want to put out there, you put in that show, that podcast. And I started, you Know, maybe dialing it back a little bit on my interviews outside of the podcast, being a little more reserved. And then when I wanted to say something important that I thought mattered, I'd go on my show and do it. And then eventually I went to Mike and I said, I think it's time for me to host or co host. So we've been doing that a while. I never thought it would become what it has become. I never took the interview side of it that seriously until I became a broadcaster. And then I was starting to use the interviews as practice. I'd always been interviewed my whole life. I admired people that gave interviews. Dan Patrick, to me, is probably the best that does it. And then I started asking myself why I thought that and why do I think Dan's so good and what's his technique? And then I started trying to incorporate it. It's not a mistake that our, that our podcast studio kind of looks similar to the man cave at Dave's place and so. Or at Dan's place. So I, I've just admired Dan for a long time and tried to mold my style of interview a bit like his. You're never going to be that good, but you. He asked short questions and that enforced. That forces the subject to expand. Right. If you put all of the answers in your question, you're going to get a real short answer. And so, you know, he just can do. So he can just ask three little. He just say three words of a question question form and get this really great answer. And so I, I don't know. I. I tried to use the podcast and the interview as an opportunity to become a better broadcaster and a better storyteller. And it's really been fun. We just announced that Mike stepping away. The Dirty Mo media business has gotten so big and we got so many things we want to do that it's taking more and more his time and he can't put what he needs into the Dale Jr. Download to be great as a co host. And he has kind of been wanting to step away for a while now. And finally we announced that on our final show of this season. So the Dale Jr. Download will be somewhat similar to what it is now, but it will be a couple new faces in the room.
- [74:37]
Kenny Wallace
When you had me on, you were like my therapist. You were absolutely incredible. I was shocked how well prepared you were. You pulled out of me things that I forgot. You went step by step. I just wanted to comment. You are there. You are incredibly good.
- [75:01]
Dale Earnhardt Jr.
Well, we got a. We got a good team around Us. That helps me with the research, to be honest with you. Yeah, so. Yeah, so I've got some good help there. And the one thing that I will tell you that I was, my boss at NBC, Sam Flood, told me, he said, you're curious and just lean into that. Lean into being curious in everything you do. And so when they send me to do the Kentucky Derby, I'm scared to death. Yeah, I'm gonna do live TV at the Kentucky Derby. I don't know about horse racing. I don't.
- [75:33]
Kenny Wallace
I love it, you know, And.
- [75:35]
Dale Earnhardt Jr.
And so for, you know, for a month, you've got to dive in and become an expert. They don't expect you to get it perfectly right. And so when you don't know something, don't be scared of it. Don't be scared for the audience to find out that you are clueless. Like, lean into it and ask questions and be curious. Because I'll promise you that more often than not, the viewer at home or the person that's listening is also wanting to ask that same question, you know, and they're also curious, but they're scared to raise their hand and go, hey, why is they. Why do they do it this way?
- [76:11]
Kenny Wallace
You know, how many people don't raise their hand?
- [76:14]
Dale Earnhardt Jr.
No. And so, you know, lean into it that you don't. Hey, be honest. You don't know everything. And we're going to find out what we don't know. You know, I really enjoy doing that kind of work. When I go to the racetrack and I'm working on Sunday, though, I'm supposed to know. So I can't lean into my curiosity as much there. But when I'm doing the podcast, I'm sitting down with you. I just want to know what your story is. And so I'm just going to keep digging until I learned all I want to know and heard all I want to hear.
- [76:49]
Kenny Wallace
So Dirty Mo Media has door bumper clear, which is very popular, but I feel like you deserve another trophy. Somebody at Dirty Mo Media. And this is what I want to know. Who created Actions Detrimental? Who chose Denny Hamlin? Because it is must listen, you know, for all the right reasons. Yeah, tell me about Actions Detrimental specifically.
- [77:17]
Dale Earnhardt Jr.
That's another Mike Davis idea.
- [77:19]
Kenny Wallace
I'll be down.
- [77:20]
Dale Earnhardt Jr.
Yeah, so Mike's the leader of the whole thing now. I, you know, so I come to Mike a couple years ago, and we had. There was. There was a player at the Panthers from Carolina Panthers, football player that we had worked with a little bit. And I was like, mike, we. This guy is pretty sharp. We should probably. We ought to do a podcast, and he could be the host, and we'll have a football podcast. Dirty Mode Media can be more than just racing. And so that conversation has sparked, you know, this sort of intention going forward to, like, grow beyond just my show and door bumper Clear. We. It's been difficult for us to get outside of our NASCAR world, but Mike wants to have like an SEC college sort of podcast. He's a massive Alabama fan, and we would probably, you know, learn a ton doing something sort of outside of our familiar space of racing. But we have always. We've. We've had big conversations with Kyle Busch and other drivers about doing a podcast with us here at Dirty Mo Media. I talked to Blaney a couple years ago about his podcast, and if he's going to continue to do it, if he would ever move it to Dirty Mo Media. So we've had this interest in having more drivers doing shows in our building. We talked to Denny. I did not think Denny was going to be interested. We went and met with him and his team. We spelled it out in front of him, and it's like, look, man, this is, you know, this is not a lucrative thing. You're not going to walk away, you know, you know, rich off of doing podcasts. That's not what this is about. You do podcasts to control the narrative, share your message. Anything in the world that you want to tell people about, you save it for your show, and they get it exclusively right there from you. And, you know, you have a race team and all of these assets that you need to be telling people about and that you won't people to know about. And this is a great way for you to promote what you're doing and what you're involved in, but it's also a great way for your partners to gain content. And so if you've got a sponsor on, you know, Tyler Reddick's car, well, now you can sell them. Not only sponsorship on the side of that car and on the side of the hauler, but on the podcast. Right. This action's detrimentals, you know, thousands of people tuning in. Exactly. You know, they're gonna be thousands of people watching this. And I can. I can, you know, you can brand my show. We have the Bojangles studio and, you know, Ally and Xfinity and all these brands are now really involved in Dirty Mode Media because they're getting good return. And so it's. It's a business. And we all know that Denny is very sharp and so more than likely he takes his actions detrimental and maybe creates his own sort of podcast media company one day. But we told him, we're like, start with us. We've got all the listeners ready for you. We'll put you right into our server and right in front of all of our fans that we already have. And then you can learn from this experience and then take it and do what you want with it. But it's been a lot of fun and got a little bit of trouble early on when he admitted wrecking Chastain. I didn't know if we were done podcasting at that point with Denny Hamlin, but he kept digging.
- [81:18]
Kenny Wallace
Best thing that ever happened.
- [81:20]
Dale Earnhardt Jr.
Well, you know, I was. I'll say this, man. I was surprised in a good way that he stuck to it. He stuck to podcasting and continuing to do his show. And I'm curious, he wants to sit down with me, down in my studio and go over what that experience has been like for him. You know, podcasting is you're very vulnerable. You admit to your own flaws and mistakes, and you can't be bull people on a podcast. You know, people gonna see right through that. So when you turn that mic on and that camera, you've got to tell the truth. And that's been an interesting experience for Denny to have to be that vulnerable and that transparent. So I'm eager to sit down with him and sometime in the off season and sort of interview him about that first year experience of hosting his own show.
- [82:15]
Kenny Wallace
Yeah, I, you know, I admire what you all are doing. That's why I had to. I agree with you. I just wanted to say my experiences are the same. Kenny Wallace show is where I run my mouth and I gotta gauge when I get in trouble or not. Kenny conversation. This one right here is where I shut up and listen. Coffee with Kenny grew on its own. I really appreciate you telling me this because there's no doubt in my mind. I mean, there's the great Joe Rogan, but buddy, in my mind, you know, I mean, obviously, I don't think you're far behind. I like what you're saying about Mike Davis going, as Felix Tabata says, sounds to me like Mike Davis is getting ready to make you worldly. Sounds like you're going to go into Stratosphere and you deserve it, junior. You're very good at what you do. All right, let's turn the corner. Coming down. This is kind of. This is rapid fire right here. Best time in your career. Worst time in your career.
- [83:24]
Dale Earnhardt Jr.
Best time in my Career is probably the 2004 season. We won a Daytona 506 races. It was disappointing because we didn't. I didn't know what kind of. I didn't realize that we could have won the championship that year. You know, no point in that season did I wake up and go, damn, I got a shot at this. And I regret that. I wish I had seen it because I remember my dad telling me, and I remember reading in an article or seeing in a video where he says, man, there was a point in that 1980 season where I thought, damn, I might could win the championship this year. You know, he's up there leading, leading the points. And it just dawned on him one day, he's like, I could be. I could actually win this championship. We might could do this. You know, he thought at some point, you know, the Allisons and the Petty's and the Walters were going to just start rattling off finishes and put him in the distance. But that never really occurred to me in 2004. So regretfully, I think that was probably my best shot at a title that never happened. The worst times for me were probably 09 to 2011 or 09 and 2010. Tony Jr. And I had a really good start in 2008. We both moved to Hendrick together. I told. I talked Tony Jr. Into making the move. I said, this is going to be great for both of us. We're going to be well taken care of here at Hendrick. Rick loves us both. We got I don't know how far into the 2009 season, and things unraveled. The timeline's a little murky, but we started off great. We went to our first test in Vegas and shocked Jeff Gordon about how on how fast we were and how well we worked together and how Jeff's like, man, they're gonna make us better. This is awesome. We were running really well in the points. We finally won a race. We had great speed, and then it just stopped. We just stopped performing. We couldn't get it right. Me and Tony Jr. Me and Tony Jr. Would argue on the radio like brothers, and that was normal for us. Kind of like a little bit like Truex and James and Small. James Small, his crew chief, they. They catch a lot of hell for arguing over the radio, but they get out and they're like, ain't no big deal. But me and Tony Jr. We were brothers.
- [85:55]
Kenny Wallace
Yeah, Family.
- [85:57]
Dale Earnhardt Jr.
Yeah. We fought like hell on the radio and our team was embarrassed, you know, oh, my gosh, you hear what they said to each other?
- [86:05]
Kenny Wallace
And you did that with the Budweiser car.
- [86:07]
Dale Earnhardt Jr.
Oh, yeah. But at Hendrick, it was different. They didn't. They didn't. They didn't think that was great. You know, they didn't think it was not good. It just was a bad look. But me and Tony Jr. Didn't realize that we needed to keep our mouth shut. But anyways, they. We all sat down and talked and talked ourselves into making a change. And so Tony Jr ends up going to Junior Motorsports and. And then I got teamed up with McGrew and, you know, things. We just could never really figure it out. I struggled pretty badly during the next couple of years and man, I just was. I mean, I was as miserable down bottom of the barrel as I could be. It was very, very, very challenging.
- [87:01]
Kenny Wallace
Thank you for telling me that. So NASCAR today.
- [87:06]
Dale Earnhardt Jr.
Sorry, I was supposed to be rapid.
- [87:11]
Kenny Wallace
It is rapid fire. I guess what I mean is, you know, we're coming to the end here, so. No, I love it because everybody wants to know because, you know, everybody feels like Dale Jr. Has a charmed life. Everything's perfect. You need. And. And this is a. You know, Junior, sometimes it's okay to make people feel that they're normal. And this whole Kenny conversation, you have done just that. You know, you have made everybody feel normal. And I. And I appreciate that. So you go as long as you want. So NASCAR today, what do you think about it?
- [87:50]
Dale Earnhardt Jr.
I think NASCAR today is moving in the right direction. You know, there's some things that I can't explain away that aren't great. You know, our. Our TV numbers are question. You know, the TV numbers confuse the hell out of me because I had a. I had a. I was very entertained in the playoffs. I thought that the championship race itself was very entertaining. But I don't know where the numbers are. I don't know why our numbers aren't better, but all of the big changes, the next gen car, all of the other things that we've done. The racing at the mile and a half is phenomenal. There's. There was a very big concern over the short track package. We'll call it the short track and road course package because it kind of affects both. But there's already some sort of light at the end of the tunnel with that, which I really wasn't expecting at this point in the year. I thought that the, you know, any kind of advances or progress made to make the short track racing better was going to be another 12 months down the road. Goodyear had a tire at Martinsville that I think Helped us understand a direction to get better. There's a big test in Phoenix that NASCAR and the drivers are fired up about. We had one already at Richmond, did not bear any fruit. But we are going to Phoenix in the winter to continue to work on the short track package. And there's some real excitement around what NASCAR wants to try. And for the first time, I think they've said that everything is on the table, even horsepower, if I read the quotes correctly, from, from O'Donnell. So, you know, there's, there's a lot to be excited about. And I, you know, I feel, I feel pretty good about it. You know, there was. There's some stretches and some moments over the last decade or so that I wasn't so sure about and had big concerns about, but the next gen car has been. Been better and I'm happier with it personally than I thought I would be. And yeah, I mean, I, I think the xfinity series is great. There is a big debate internally about what the identity of the xfinity series will be. Where is this series five years or ten years from now? Obviously, I care deeply about that because I'm, I'm an owner in the series. You know, what does nascar, what do the new TV deals look like? Who's in the. Who's involved in those TV deals? How will that affect our popularity and who can see our sport? All of those things are, you know, have everybody a bit on edge over the next probably 24 months. But once all of that's in the rearview mirror, we can sort of focus back on competition and trying to put on amazing races.
- [91:07]
Kenny Wallace
The next gen car. Your opinion on the next gen car, what is it?
- [91:13]
Dale Earnhardt Jr.
Well, I like it at the mile and a half. It's awesome. I know the drivers complain about dirty air, and dirty air has been around since the second race car got built. I don't know that you can ever fix it entirely. Sure, it's been worse at times throughout different packages in NASCAR's history, but when you watch a mile and a half race, I mean, look at Charlotte. Let's look at the world 600. Nobody. I mean, the last decade at Charlotte on the oval, it's been a bit of a hard sale. So much so that we built the roval and took away one of the oval dates.
- [91:57]
Kenny Wallace
Good point.
- [91:58]
Dale Earnhardt Jr.
Now, in Jeff Gluck's was it a good race? Poll, the World 600 was second this year. In the last several oval races at Charlotte have been probably some of the most entertaining races of the year. And so the mile and a half stuff's great. I know the drivers don't love the new Atlanta because it's just kind of wild and tough, but I loved that race.
- [92:23]
Kenny Wallace
I show.
- [92:25]
Dale Earnhardt Jr.
It was, I was. I believe I've. That's the most entertained I've been by watching a race in a long damn time. I was blown away by how thrilling all of the action was. And that race ended as in a rain, you know, rain shortened event. But I still thought, to me that was the most entertaining handful of laps I'd ever seen.
- [92:55]
Kenny Wallace
Yeah.
- [92:56]
Dale Earnhardt Jr.
To your point. To your point.
- [92:57]
Kenny Wallace
They're going back at the Brickyard. They're going away from the road course now.
- [93:02]
Dale Earnhardt Jr.
Right.
- [93:02]
Kenny Wallace
To your point.
- [93:04]
Dale Earnhardt Jr.
I want to, I do want to say, I mentioned it, you know, the short track package has to get better, but nascar, Goodyear, everybody's at the table, everybody wants to make it better. And they, they're going to try their hardest. And I think they're going to, they're, you know, they're not going to take the shortcut to try to get there. They're going to go through this methodically and try everything to try to get some answers. And now when they get those answers, we may have to be patient before all of the teams can get access to this new parts and pieces, whatever it is that they think they need. But I'm really happy with what I'm seeing in NASCAR in terms of how they're trying to move to figure this out. Because I want the short tracks to be just as exciting as the mile and a half stuff. And that's important to me. Short track racing is our roots, it's our history. It's where we came from, it's where all of us learned to race. Yeah. It's a discipline that we absolutely have to have.
- [94:07]
Kenny Wallace
Last but not least, your opinion on the fines tech inspection, how we're going about governing the sport right now.
- [94:16]
Dale Earnhardt Jr.
I'm pretty good with it. I always said that I want NASCAR to be strict and I want penalties to be severe. Yeah, right up your alley. Yeah. Look, when I get caught or busted or in trouble, man, it sucks. And I, and I don't love, I don't love that experience.
- [94:39]
Kenny Wallace
Yeah.
- [94:40]
Dale Earnhardt Jr.
But in my mind, I think that in racing, whether it's a cheated up part on a race car or a behavioral issue in the pits or a driver behind the wheel with a behavioral issue, you gotta nip it in the bud. Let's not, we're not gonna tiptoe up onto this. I want a deterrent right then and there. That that driver will never want to experience again. Right. And so, you know, I think that NASCAR's, you know, made a. You know, they made a stand on messing with this car. They're not gonna, you know, it's not gonna be fun if you get busted fooling around with these parts. They made that clear. And I'm, I'm. I think that, you know, for the most part, we won't have much to worry about in terms of teams trying to cheat or do something with these. These race cars. The behavioral issues is, you know, like the intentional wrecking and so forth forth. It's a. It's a judgment call. It's not as. It's not as clear, right or wrong. Right. NASCAR has to decide was their intent, do they want to assume or guess? You know, they won't. They won't black flag a driver for self spinning unless he admits it. Even though, you know, you're watching that and you're like, that dude did that on purpose. Purpose. You know, they're not going to go there and make an assumption unless they've got hard facts and evidence. Right.
- [96:12]
Kenny Wallace
Unless Denny Hamlin admits it.
- [96:14]
Dale Earnhardt Jr.
Right. So that's. That's where it gets tough for me, because I'll see something that I know was intentional, and NASCAR sometimes doesn't act without real evidence. And so it gets a little frustrating sometimes. But, you know, other times, you know, they don't always have to have that admission of guilt, but, you know, that, that, the. The behavioral issues. Sometimes I feel like, you know, certain drivers would have been able to learn quicker what not to do if NASCAR were a little more harsh in some of those decisions. There's some times when a driver's wrecked another driver on purpose and nothing got. Nothing was. Nothing was done. Right. It was just kind of. It looked a little suspect. We're not sure if it was on purpose. And so they. They don't do anything. That driver really just gets away with it and thinks that he can do that again next time he wants to.
- [97:15]
Kenny Wallace
Yeah. Well, Dale Jr. You are by far the biggest voice, most respected voice in our sport. I want to thank you so much for coming on Kenny Conversation. And remember, everyone, we are in podcast form. You can listen to Dale Jr. On your way to work. On the way back home, itunes and Spotify and Dale Jr. I owe you. I gotta give you this, you know, I gotta give you the Ric Flair trophy for picking Blaney to win the championship. And thank you so much.
- [97:45]
Dale Earnhardt Jr.
Well, there's a couple things. I love you to death. I Appreciate your friendship. We've been friends for a long time, and I. It means the world to me. And you're one of my favorite people. I love what you do. I love what you're doing with all of your content that you're creating. You. You know, you. You put yourself out there, and it's fun to watch people care about you. People want to know what you think. And lastly, I'm tired of. I. I'm tired of looking at that race shop that you're in all the time. I want to go and be there. I want to come sit down with you and drink some beer. It's been a long time since you and me sat down and had a cold beer in a can. And I think every time I see you in that shop shooting one of them videos, I wish I was there.
- [98:42]
Kenny Wallace
Please come. You're welcome anytime.
- [98:44]
Dale Earnhardt Jr.
I know I am, but damn, we got to make it happen. Stop dragging our feet.
- [98:48]
Kenny Wallace
Okay, so here's my dream, by the way. The show's supposed to be over. Here's my. Here's my dream.
- [98:54]
Dale Earnhardt Jr.
You.
- [98:54]
Kenny Wallace
You come in. We don't really disguise you, but you. You ride shotgun in my pickup truck, and we run Saturday night at i55 people. Then we come back home and it's hot. We got the swimming pool, the hot tub, you know, bring Amy to whatever, and we have a good time.
- [99:12]
Dale Earnhardt Jr.
I'm doing it. We're going to make it happen this year. We're not going to. We're done fooling around and talking about it. We're going to do it.
- [99:19]
Kenny Wallace
Kenny Schrader and Ray Mahler will love that.
- [99:21]
Dale Earnhardt Jr.
I love you, too.
- [99:22]
Kenny Wallace
And thank you so much, Junior.
- [99:24]
Dale Earnhardt Jr.
All right, buddy. Check out Dirty Mo Media on Twitter, Facebook, TikTok and Instagram.
- [99:36]
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- [100:07]
Dale Earnhardt Jr.
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