Hey everybody, I'm Dillon Hart Jr. and this is the Dirty 30, the best highlights from all of our podcasts this week, 30 minutes every single Friday, the Dirty 30 coming at you. Let's get right to it. This episode of the Dirty 30 is presented by Arby's new Meat in 3 Box. Get more meal for your money at Arby's. We have the meats. Which brings me to some comments made by Elton Sawyer. Oh. Yeah. Did you see that? Mm-mm. So Elton says, chase this down for me. Elton Sawyer says, you know, I guess he was talking on SiriusXM or something, and they asked him about the state of restricted plate racing or racing at Daytona and Talladega. You don't see this at Atlanta for some reason. But at Daytona and Talladega, he says they've had discussions about stage links at those two races regarding the fuel saving. So they're trying to figure out, all right, A, do we have a problem? Is fuel saving truly an issue? Is the fact that the cars ride around half-throttled the entire race problematic? Or is that racing steel, right? because he says it's conflicting that they can hear the chatter about running half throttle, but if he turns off the radio and just watches the race, he sees cars running four wide and fans standing and cheering. And so that lowers the discussion around fuel saving and modifying the racing at Daytona and Talladega in any way. That lowers it down the priority list. when considering things like bringing back the chase and some other items on their, on their to-do list. And he says in quote, what do we want to fix? I know Elton is just trying to like say to people like, really, what are we, are we, is it a really that serious of a problem? Is it maybe not such a big problem that we don't have to really try to make a change just for the sake of making a change? Cause I don't know that they know what to change, right? Yeah, same. They've talked about, you know, could they change the stage lengths? Would that make the teams run harder? Fuel cell size, I mean. Yeah. You know, we went to smaller cells before. That was a pain in the ass. You just pitted more. You know, you just pitted more. You didn't. You're still going to try to eliminate a stop if you can. I know, but it was just annoying to have to pit more. Drivers want to race. Drivers want to be on the track. Not coming down pit road because your fuel cell is 13 gallons. we did that. We didn't like it. I wouldn't want to go back to that. That wouldn't get me. I'm trying to make a change, TJ, that's going to make me want to tune in. Making the fuel cells smaller on a car ain't exciting. All right. It's not sexy. So what we could, you know, I don't have an answer, but I just, I do believe, I do know one thing. I do not like that they go out there and run half throttle and two seconds off the pace. I don't like it. I don't like it. So Elton, we don't like it. And to say, well, if we don't talk about it, is it really a problem? If it's not, if the casual fan doesn't realize what's going on, then we shouldn't consider it an issue. I don't know if I like that. I don't love that he said that. That's my problem is you're now basically telling your hardcore fans, we're not thinking about you. All he had to say is we're thinking about it, but we have to worry about the unintended consequences if we make a change. Listen, let me say this too, and this is a compliment to NASCAR. This is the only, only thing that rubbed me wrong when in all of the last couple of weeks, this is the only thing that was like, what the heck, man? That this is the only thing. All right. So we're on a freaking, we're on a good path. Things are going good. We've got great marketing, seeing all the commercials, see all the little clips, social media clips and everything that they're doing. The hell yeah, all that. A lot of momentum. It's great. It's good. They did a great job. You know, when they came out with that, you know, when we saw some like, when we saw like behind the curtain about that hell yes stuff, everybody was clowning it. What the hell are we doing? Blah, blah, blah. We even talked about it here. It's great. It turned out great. You know, and how do you keep everything a secret? You know, they can't, you know, they can't be expected to like keep everything under wraps. But it turned out great. O'Donnell's been doing great. everybody's doing good a lot of communication there's been more communication behind the scenes than i've seen in a long time with nascar nascar eagerly wants this to work they badly want this to work and they're not us that was the only thing that i was like man come on what the you know now we're all smarter than that so the fuel saving era is not an and it's not nascar's fault it's just the teams have found a way to like a strategy to like you know give them an advantage late in the race and and they've got to minimize you know when we went to this car and it's it fuels slower like it you know the tires go on faster and the fuel takes longer to go in that's what created this, right? What is the one thing that keeps you on pit road? Putting fuel in the car. So can you minimize that and spend less time on pit road and give yourself an advantage? Yes. That's what, that's how this happened. The single lug shortened up the tire side of the pit stop. And now fueling is the outlier that, that you need to eliminate the most, as much as you can. So they go out there and they save as much as they can. And they have to put less in the car and spend less time on pit road. And they're trying to put themselves in position late in the race with the track position to go out there and maybe have a shot at winning. And it's frustrating to watch them ride around. But I feel like if they don't change anything, people will have to set themselves apart. Everybody can't go out there and save. The guy running 20th, saving like the guy running up front, is not at an advantage anymore. Because he doesn't, you know, the guy up front is saving fuel too. I mean, the advantage is lost. So you might see some teams say, screw that. We're going to run hard. We're going to hope that the cautions fall in our favor. And that's the risk we're going to take. Didn't we see the Toyotas in one of the super speedways last year try to push the pace on everyone else? It's a couple years ago. That's what you need is like a group to get together and be like, let's try something. Yeah. My fear is, what's worse, this or running hard, Like at Talladega, when everybody ran hard, it was two by two. Nobody moved. Yeah. You know that. What would you rather have? Well, that's I mean, TJ, the you mentioned it earlier. This car, if you do, if you don't want to save and you go out there and hold a car full throttle. Right. And you go out and try to take the lead. You can't drive away. You can't. The car has so much drag that if you run wide open, you're just sitting in front of the field running wide open. Helping. Helping the guys that are saving. So the car has a ton of drag on it. That's a car problem. I don know that there many drivers mechanics and crew chiefs that would disagree Oh yeah The drag on the car and the whole package the power versus the drag If I'm out there running half throttle and a full second slower than my car is capable of going, I want you to be able to go full throttle and literally drive away from me. Drive away. Put seconds between you and me. And you can't do it with this car. Yeah, you definitely can't do it. No, and that's not all right. That ain't all right. What's the easiest fix to reduce drag? Spoiler can get shorter. Everything about, you know. What if they just took the spoiler off the back? I don't know if you could knock the spoiler off at Daytona. I think you could. I mean, they would have to. Drive it? They'd have to test to be able to get the cars comfortable again. What if they're not? Why do they have to be super comfortable, though? No, no, no. I mean, so they don't crash. I think if you took a spoiler off a car right now, you would have to spend a little bit of time putting some grip back in the back. But, and that's realistically, listen. Could the teams find that? Yes. No question. Got it. And I will, you can't change my mind until, you wouldn't be able to change my mind until you sent a car out on the racetrack and I saw with my own eyes that it wouldn't work. the if you look at some of the driver photos from daytona of the guys when they kneel by the car qualifying at the start finish line yeah and the i'd say the late 80s they were laying their spoilers back before there was a spoiler rule to 15 10 20 degrees so not there's not much there nothing so i think there was a there was a rule on the length of the spoiler they might actually just take the spoiler off um so we have ran a crap ton less spoiler at daytona in nascar in a couple different eras i feel like those cars would be a man a handful with no spoiler well man i remember and i know it's different asphalt bumpy daytona but i remember like lifting in the duels you know we'd be racing in the duels on thursday and plowing tight going in the corner up to the top of the racetrack and all the way out of the gas into the center of the corner and then back full throttle. Well, that would create. Running fourth. That would create some racing. Yeah. Oh, dude. And we're sitting there running our ass off, and I'm like, man, I can't go anywhere. You know, I'm a couple car lengths in front of me as a car. Jeff Burton was behind me, and he's running fifth, and we're all tight, lifting out of the gas, up to the wall, back in the gas. Here comes Jamie Murray rolling right around the bottom, just past us all because he's handling. Well, I'd take that. Oh, man. So that's what I was asking you at the start when you said good racing. What do you think is some different people look at things differently, like Elton Sawyer said. There are some fans, and they use it in commercials and everything, that'll see that three wide and go, that's badass. it is badass and then there's some people that'll see cars strung out and a guy out handling everybody and working his way through the field and go that's badass you know so it's a little bit different for everybody but i don't when we go to daytona this is where i where i land on all of it we go to daytona and talladega but more so for the 500 it's a two and a half mile track Daytona's synonymous with running wide open, holding the throttle down, running your ass off, hair on fire. Cale Yarbrough, 201 mile an hour, busting his ass in turn four and flying up into the guardrail. You know, Buddy Baker and the Grey Ghost destroying the freaking field. Hauling ass is what Daytona and the Daytona 500 is about. You ended up building, you talked about building cars for Richard Petty. You were the one that built the chassis for the car that flipped down the front straightaway at Daytona. Not the way you want to see that go, but you talk about building safe race cars. That was a hell of a wreck. And Richard's, you know, toward the back end of his career at that point. You know, those wrecks are harder to, you know, harder to walk out of in his case. and you had to be pretty happy with how that thing held up considering all the things that went through during that crash. Yeah, because I was standing on pit road, you know, and when it happened right in front of us, I'm like, oh, no, this is bad. Yeah. You know, and when he finally stopped, you know, the flipping part wasn't so bad, but when he got hit in the left front and spun him so fast. Yes. Dale Inman's on the radio going, you know, Dale, Richard, you all right? You all right? You all right? Never said a word. Never said a word. Richard, you all right? You all right? And finally, he finally come on the radio and he said, yeah, I'm all right. I'm all right. But I can't see nothing. He said, my eyes aren't working. And when he, the doctor said when he spun it so fast that the blood vessels and all, the blood went out of his eyes. Jesus. And he couldn't see. And then, you know, he was, he was, the biggest problem he had was his knees and stuff were banged up so bad. Sure. And so I was going to a relief drive for him at Richmond. Really? The next race. he had me up there stand by and um we was in the trailer the morning of the race and and he said you gonna you gonna be all right i said yeah i'll be all right and he said well i'll just get your suit on when this race starts he said if i feel bad we'll just make stop whatever we do lose laps whatever we do and the doctor come in there started taking fluid out of his knees and i'm like there's there's no way he's going to run this race. And shoot, about first caution come out, we run good. And he said, I'm going to be fine. He said, I ain't going to get out. So I just went and took the driving suit off and watched. You ran, you know, you talk about being a standby for him. You had raced in the Cup Series a handful of times, but not many. you raced your debut was at North Wilkesboro in 93 you'd run two starts in 94 at Wilkesboro and Martinsville all short tracks you had a bad crash at Pocono had an engine from Ernie Elliott running good in practice made an adjustment and got yourself turned around backwards broke your ankle we went to Pocono and tested and we rented a racetrack back when you could rent the racetrack and we were by ourself up there that day oh you know and time wise i was slow but we had a motor in there that ernie had given me to test with and he said it's just it'll get you around the racetrack and so we kept working on it working on it and really didn't run fast and i called terry labani i said where do i need to lift going into one and he said well you need to live about you know number five or something on the board you know there he said where you lifting and i said one he said you don't have no motor you know he said if it drives good you'll be fine so we come back and ernie sent us a new motor and we got the racetrack and ernie said this thing is better than than bills i'm telling you he said it's going to be better than bills so we were top 10 fastest first practice and i had a guy dean johnson that was crew chief of me and he come over and this one spoiler at a spoiler height rule but you could put it whatever you on the angle of it and he said you can you run faster than that on another mock run i said yeah i guess so he said i gonna lay take some spoiler out of it wrong thing to do yeah i get into one down and just before i go to third gear it turns around backwards and i hit the wall with the driver's door golly and it ricochets off the wall and comes back down and i remember coming back down and the four cars on a mock run and he comes by my nose at 175 mile an hour miss me as I'm sliding backwards and the spotters on the radio yelling, are you all right? Are you all right? And I'm still sliding. And finally, Ernie Yellett, he's over in the garage here. I heard him yell at the boy with him, talking to me. And he said, he's still, he's sitting not through wrecking. Leave him alone. So you broke your ankle there? Yeah. Yeah, I got, the adrenaline's going. You don't realize you hurt, you know. Yeah. get out and step and your leg folds up and then then my knee was dislocated for it steering column so and just one of them deals you know you kind of wonder what year that was what year was that that was 94 i think you ran the all-star open in 95 uh in a ride sponsored by diamond rio right how did that come about well the the mr wilson owned cars he was vice president rj reynolds yeah and he had who took care of the cars we kept them in our shop and then we uh we had been messing with some people the the blue rhino people the propane people yeah they were just starting and they wanted to build a car and they knew some people in the music industry and so they come by the shop one like mr wilson did and he said i think we got us a sponsor he said you know about diamond rio and i said the trucks and he said no he said country music so he said go get some cds and listen to them yeah and so they're going to sponsor us and so it was it was a good it was a good deal they were nice really nice yeah we went to several uh shows with them and um but it was I got in the middle of a divorce, and the racing was, you know, racing with two young children, you know. It's kind of they had people come in to buy into the team, and they wanted to change, you know, because we went to Richmond, and I missed a race by 2,000th of a second, you know. And then so they just kind of like went to other directions. Yeah. I was upset, but you can't blame them. You know, there's money and there's a sport. That was the end of your career in terms of cup racing and bush starts. You know, eventually you would build cup cars for Dad. The car that Dad wrecked Terry with at Bristol was your race car, your chassis. At the time, Kevin Hamlin was the crew chief on the car. They had their own chassis shop, but they came over to you looking for something different. Well, they were buying cars from Hopkins then. yeah you know and so then uh kevin them come into the shop and wanted they decided they wanted to try something different what were you going to do different i don't know it was just my cars were a little bit going to be a little bit lighter yeah like at the time i had bought a die that the plymouth tube company that makes roll bar pipe and they made us a a um a die that i bought and they would run a mill run of my roll bar tube and it was 90 000 plus or minus a half where everybody else was 95 000 period and um and i got to choose my the carbon rated and i wanted the type of tensile strength i wanted and it made a difference yeah and so we built they come over one of two they said build us two cars but don't tell nobody yeah don't tell nobody who they're for and I got them done and they come picked them up and that one evening after work and took them to RCR and the next morning I don't think they it's lucky they still had a job really yeah it didn't go it didn't why who was mad yeah I mean people kind of over over the crew chiefs were not happy yeah that they just went out on their own and did it and they tested them you know started testing and they they were always good real good and then finally they poconoh dale wrecked last practice after qualifying and they carried mine as a backup every week and they pulled mine off and he started in the rear and i think he run third or something he should have needed just a little bit more he could have won the race that was there was a one the car he loved was serial number 44 and he wanted to run that thing everywhere we didn't run those speedways was all short track and charlotte and stuff because we were they raced at richmond one night and he got in a wreck down there and knocked right front corner off and smashed some bottom two door bars up and they called me and said look we got a bit charlotte wednesday we'll have a sanctuary shop in the morning sunday morning at eight o'clock and we need it back by that night. We had to call my guys and say, look, it's shop. We got to fix the car. We put half front clip on it, two dual bars. They picked it up and they was at Charlotte with the thing Wednesday. Dang. And then that's the car he ran at Bristol when he rattled Terry's cage. Yeah. That was your only career win as a chassis builder. Right. 30 Mo Media and Sirius XM right now teaming up here for the stage and the fans on with Daytona. Hey, crowd. Good to see everybody. Got Jeff Gluck here, Freddie, and Jeff Gordon has joined us today. Jeff Gordon. Hey there. Dale, your dad had a love-hate relationship with every competitor, by the way. You know, like he would put his arm around him, hey, buddy, let's go hunting and fishing and let's do this, and then the next week spending him out wrecking him on the track. So, you know, you just kind of, you became aware and familiar with that. That was the kind of relationship that you could potentially have if you got into that inner circle. And I just always looked up to him, had the most respect. And then, you know, as my career started taking off, the business side started taking off. And, you know, back then we used to fly on planes together to tracks. And you just, you spent more time. You go up in the hauler, you know, the NASCAR hauler, and you just spent more time together as drivers than I feel like they do today. And you get to know one another, whether you like it or not. And so, you know, just created some conversations with, you know, him and myself about your – I remember he's the first one who told me, you've got to own your rights to your likeness. He's like, if you don't have that, you've got to go get that. in your next driver contract. You need to control the licensing. He was the one that really led me down that path. And then, of course, when Action Performance came along and the die-cast market just blew up, he was leading that charge. And he knew that, hey, it's not just a one-man show. It was, this thing's going to be bigger, and the sport's going to be bigger, and the fans are going to get more access to things if all of us come together. And so he came to me and said, now, of course, his way of coming together and throwing an idea, hey, here's what you're going to do. A contract's going to come to you. There's no email. The contract's going to come over. You're going to look it over. If you want to have a lawyer look at it, that's fine, but you're still going to sign it one way or another. That'll happen on Tuesday. You know, like that. And you just go, okay. And listen, every one of the deals worked out really well. So I'm glad it happened the way it did. Yeah, that's pretty awesome. I always enjoy knowing that how you guys were able to like he and you and him and all these other guys like Schrader and Rick Mastin they all have stories about runnings on the racetrack with that But off the racetrack, y'all all figured out a way to put that aside until the next Sunday and do business and do things that were successful together. and then you'd get out on the racetrack and, you know, run into each other and flip each other off and be mad as you could be, you know. Yeah, there were two times that I don't think I've gotten over it yet. I can remember the first time, and I looked, this was such a huge life lesson for me as a driver. It was my rookie year in 93, and I think it was the last or maybe second or third. No, it wasn't the last race because it was in Phoenix. The last race back then was in Atlanta. So second or third to the end of the season. And he was, as he always was, in the hunt for the championship. He didn't win at 93, did he? I don't think he won at 93. I know he won at 94. Anyway, so I'm racing like I'm in seventh, something like that. And he and I are battling for that position. We had about equal cars. And somehow I got ahead of him maybe on a pit sequence or something. And he's just right on me. and I gave him the inside. And we raced side by side for about two laps. And that was one and a half too many. Oh, yeah. And we went down to turn three and I thought I gave him enough room and boom, around I go, pow, on the wall. And I was like, man, I didn't know I came down on a crowd like that. I realized later I didn't. Yeah. Yeah. It was just his way of saying, hey, kid, yeah, that's not going to get done, especially with me. So I never, you know, I made sure that I was always understanding the situation. It was situational awareness was what the lesson was. And he had more on the line than I did that day, and I didn't even race him that hard. And then what was the other one? Oh, shoot. Gosh darn it. I'm going to think about it here in a second. It sounds like you're over it. Yeah. I'm definitely not. Oh, oh, no. No, it was, we were at Michigan practice on a Saturday. okay and and we we were about to take off pit road and ray overham comes over he's like he's like listen just you got a good race car we're just trying to get this thing you know for the for the later practice right get it get a ride don't worry too much about right now and he's like just you know let dale go because dale like when in practice but he would run a practice like it was a race he wanted to race you as hard as he could in practice so we always kind of knew just stay away from, from racing anybody really. And so, so I remember I come off pit road and, and let him, he yarded, you know, he was way out there, over straightaway ahead. And then I start running and my car's really good. And so I'm, I'm, I'm closing in on him. And then all of a sudden he starts really slowing down. And so I'm like, okay, he's going to let me go and I'll, and he'll get in behind me and i i remember i come off of turn two yeah come off of two and i mean he's checked up on the outside i get a big run and all of a sudden he gets right to my quarter panel just enough where i can't clear him and we go down three and i'm just like surely he's gonna let me go so i'm just gonna drive in real deep no no he drove in deeper right on my door and sucked me right around and I backed that thing in the wall, destroyed the car. Yeah. And he was unscathed, as usual. And so, man, I got mad. And Ray was pissed at me. He wasn't mad at Dale. He's like, what did I tell you? I said, he was letting me go. I thought he was letting me go. So that was another life lesson. Has there been moments that you remember being on the other side of that where you were teaching a young driver on the racetrack how it's done? Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah, definitely. I mean, that's why later, you know, I realized, especially the 93 thing, like as a rookie, every rookie that came in, you had to teach them that lesson. Like, it was your duty. When they came, if they thought they were too good or they were running up front and, you know, using up a little too much track or whatever, you're like, yep, here comes that Dale Senior moment. I might not have wrecked them, but I definitely moved them. Oh, I'm sure. I learned a lot being around you on the racetrack and in the office as well. It's been a lot of fun over the years. And I appreciate you giving us some time today. It's awesome to sit up here and just listen to some of these stories. You're a great icon in the sport, man. And it's awesome to see you as involved as you are. And I hope you have a good weekend this weekend with your guys. Hopefully you run 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 with that 40 out front. Listen, you say you got a better car this year. You finished 10th last year, so you got some big shoes to fill now. But no, it's going to be great. We're excited. We're just excited about this year, the Daytona 500. And we got a great car, great chance for all of our guys. And can't wait to work with you and Justin, the 40 team out there as well. It's like an extension of Hendrick Motorsports. It's really cool to be a part of that. And thanks for not calling me a pioneer. You called me an icon instead. I think I like that. You're not pioneered yet. I think when you retire, you're gold. Carl Edwards called me a pioneer one time. I laughed at that. But I'm honored that my hood is at the studio. That's amazing, and I can't wait to get up there and see it in person. Awesome. Jeff Gordon. Thank you, guys. Thank you. Thank you, Jeff Gordon. So we got a little bit of an announcement to make. Jeff, you want to do this? Sure. But I have to tell everybody a secret, I guess, because, you know, when you do a podcast right after the race, you haven't heard what anybody else thinks. So, like, I haven't heard Action Sentimental or DBC or Dodging or Download. So sometimes you're just kind of like, I'm like, man, this just happened. We got off the pit road. We come to do the podcast. And I'm, like, talking about stuff. I'm like, yeah, I think this is right. I think this is what people are going to think about this. But my show is just after the race. So I don't have anything else to say. So I'm going to be doing a Thursday show now. It's going to be on the Teardown feed. It's going to be on my YouTube channel. Is this the name of it? This is the name. The name of it is the Glutcast. Is it? The Glutcast. I love it. You picked that name yourself, didn't you? They said that I had to have a name. Because it's on the Teardown feed, it has to have my name in it. And I was like, I don't know about the Glutcast. I don't think anybody's going to forget it. I'm pretty excited about it. I love listening to y'all's content. I learned so much about things that are being discussed in the sport from y'all. I think you keep all of us sort of up to speed on really truthfully what the big conversations are in the garage and in the industry. And so I'm pretty excited about this show and look forward to it. I mean, it'll be interesting to see kind of how what your perspective is going in, and then how you may change what you say and do on the teardown after the race, right, because you've got this preview and this post reaction now. I'm looking forward to it. It's a teardown, the glut cast. All right? It's a weekly spinoff of the teardown. I'm going to say it just like that. Yeah. So it's debuting February 19th. New episodes dropping every Thursday. And there'll be an audio version as well as a YouTube version. We'll all be checking that out. All right. That was another episode of the Dirty 30 presented by Arby's new Meat in 3 Box. Get more meal for your money at Arby's. We have the meats. I'll see you next time.
