A Star Born in San Diego? Corey Heim’s Historic Win
Kevin Harvick's Happy Hour presented by NASCAR on FOX
A Star Born in San Diego? Corey Heim’s Historic Win
Kevin Harvick's Happy Hour presented by NASCAR on FOX · Jun 23, 2026
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Concept
Cup side
In NASCAR, the “Cup side” means the top, most competitive level of racing. If a driver is good on the Cup side, they’re holding their own against the best teams and drivers.
Concept
young prospect
A “young prospect” is a younger driver people think could become really good. Teams look at them as a future star and try to build their career.
Person
Tyler Reddick
Tyler Reddick is a well-known NASCAR driver who’s been one of the fastest and most consistent at the highest level. Saying Heim beat him is basically saying the win was against top-tier competition.
Term
truck series
The truck series is NASCAR’s level below the top series, using pickup-truck-style race cars. Many drivers use it to prove themselves before moving up.
Term
crew chief
The crew chief is the team’s main strategist. They help decide how to set up the car and what to do during the race so the driver can perform.
Term
full-time cup racing
“Full-time cup racing” means committing to the NASCAR Cup Series schedule for an entire season, rather than part-time starts. The step up usually comes with stronger competition, more data/engineering support, and higher expectations for consistency.
Term
full-time rookie year
A rookie year is a driver’s first season in that top series. “Full-time” means they’re racing most weeks, so it’s a real test of how fast they adapt.
Place
Dover
Dover is a famous NASCAR race track. Different tracks make cars behave differently, so doing well there is a good sign.
Term
top 20
“Top 20” just means finishing in the first 20 spots. In NASCAR, that’s a simple way to say the car ran well enough to be competitive.
Term
fourth car
A “fourth car” is basically a team’s extra race entry. It can affect how much attention and setup time the driver gets compared with the team’s main cars.
Term
old style car
“Old style car” means the older generation of NASCAR race car. When NASCAR changes the car rules, the way the car drives can change a lot, which affects how competitive different teams are.
Car
Dodge Challenger
The Dodge Challenger is a car built for strong acceleration and performance. It’s a well-known model that people recognize from racing, so its name may come up when talking about competitors in a race.
Person
Austin Hill
Austin Hill is the driver the host blames for a mistake at the corner. They say he went too far past the turn and then hit another car.
Person
Connor Zillich
Connor Zillich is one of the drivers being talked about in this crash. The hosts say he took a big hit and that it’s been a tough run for him lately.
Term
cars piling in
“Cars piling in” means a bunch of cars end up getting bunched up together very fast. If something goes wrong in front, the cars behind have less room to avoid it, so it can turn into a big wreck.
Term
inside wall
The “inside wall” is the fence/barrier on the inside of a turn. If a car hits it, it can bounce or slide across the track and cause more damage to other cars.
Term
outside wall
The “outside wall” is the barrier on the outside of the turn. If a car gets shoved outward after a crash, it can hit that wall and make the wreck worse.
Person
Joey Logano
Joey Logano is mentioned to put a “teenager leading a Cup race” claim into context. The host says Logano was older than a teenager when he did it, so the teenager achievement stands out.
Term
porpoise
“Porpoise” is when a race car starts bouncing like a fish in the water—front and rear keep pitching up and down. It usually happens when the track has bumps and the car’s suspension/aero can’t stay settled.
Term
bumps
“Bumps” are uneven spots in the track. When the car hits them, the suspension can get thrown off and the tires may not grip as well, especially in the middle of a turn.
Term
locked
“Locked” means the tires stop rolling and start skidding. When that happens, the car can lose steering control and become much harder to keep on the racing line.
Term
lifted off the ground
“Lifted off the ground” means the car actually gets light enough to lose contact with the track for a moment. If the tires aren’t firmly on the ground, the car can’t grip and steer normally.
Term
marbles
“Marbles” are loose junk on the track, often bits of rubber. If you hit them, the tires lose grip and the car can slide or push wide.
Place
Pensacola
They’re comparing two different places where races happen. The point is that the driving and crash risk can feel different depending on the track.
Term
turn one
Turn one is the first corner on the track. Crashes there can be worse because cars are close together and moving fast into the corner.
Topic
snowball derby
The Snowball Derby is a specific stock-car race event. They’re using it as a reference point to explain how different tracks can lead to different kinds of wrecks.
Term
right front tire
The right front tire is the front tire on the right side of the car. If the car hits something near that tire, it can throw off steering and make the car hard to control.
Term
steering column
The steering column is the part that connects the steering wheel to the steering. If a crash knocks it upward, it can mean the steering is damaged and the driver may not be able to steer normally.
Person
Danica
They’re talking about Danica’s earlier crash as a reference. The idea is that the steering damage in this wreck reminded them of hers.
Person
Christopher Bell
Christopher Bell is a NASCAR driver. They’re saying he was hurt, and because of that, someone else drove his car during the race when the first caution came out.
Term
relief driver
A relief driver is a substitute who drives the car when the main driver can’t. In this case, it happened when the race slowed down for the first caution.
Term
first caution
A caution is when the race slows down because something is wrong on the track. The first caution is the first time that happens, and it’s when teams often make changes like swapping drivers.
Person
Brent Cruz
Brent Cruz is the substitute driver who took over when the race had its first caution. He stepped in because Christopher Bell couldn’t continue.
Term
sequential shifter
A sequential shifter is a way to change gears in a set order. Instead of choosing gears from a diagram like an H, you move forward or backward one gear at a time. It helps racing drivers shift quickly, but mistakes can happen fast.
Term
H pattern
The H pattern is the way many manual cars are laid out for shifting gears. You move the shifter into different “slots” that look like an H. If you’re used to that layout, switching to a sequential shifter can make you pick the wrong gear.
Term
upshifting
Upshifting means moving into a higher gear. In simple terms, it helps the car match the engine speed to the road speed. In racing, doing it at the wrong time or wrong gear can cause problems quickly.
Term
downshift
A downshift means going into a lower gear. It usually makes the engine spin faster so the car can accelerate better. If you pick the wrong lower gear, it can stress the drivetrain and cause damage.
Term
transaxle
A transaxle is basically the drivetrain unit that combines the transmission with the axle. It transfers power from the engine to the wheels. If something goes wrong with gear selection, it can get damaged too.
Term
stalling
Stalling is when the engine stops running. It can happen if the car is in the wrong gear and the engine speed drops too low. Then the engine can’t keep itself going.
Place
Sonoma
“Sonoma” is a famous race track in California. It’s a road course, meaning it has lots of turns, and it can be especially challenging during race restarts.
Term
restarts
A restart is when the race starts moving again after a caution. Everyone tries to get a good position right away, because it can change your track position fast.
Term
road courses
Road courses are tracks with lots of turns, like a mix of corners and braking areas. Some drivers are better at them because the driving style is different from oval tracks.
Term
curbs
Curbs are the raised edges at the track corners. Drivers sometimes hit or ride over them to go faster, but they can also make the car bounce—something that’s harder with an injured wrist.
Term
steering wheel
The steering wheel is what the driver uses to turn the car. If the wrist is hurt, holding and controlling the wheel can be harder, especially when the car is bouncing or loaded in corners.
Person
Magnuson
Magnuson is mentioned as a person talking on the radio during the race. The hosts are using it to explain that the driver sounded unsure in the moment.
Person
Noah Gregson
Noah Gregson is a professional NASCAR driver. Here, the discussion is about how he handled a tough moment during a race.
Person
Kevin
Kevin Harvick is the show’s main host. He’s making a joke about race communication—who understands what during the event.
Term
fastest lap
“Fastest lap” means the driver drove one full lap quicker than anyone else. It’s a sign they had strong speed during the race.
Person
K-Mag
“K-Mag” is a driver nickname. The important part of the clip is that this driver ran the quickest lap and seemed to have strong speed in the race.
Term
pace
Race pace is how quickly a driver can consistently go over multiple laps. When someone says a driver “had pace,” they mean the car and driver were capable of running near the front for sustained stretches.
Term
practice qualifying
This is when drivers and teams go out to test and try to be quick before the official qualifying. It’s like a warm-up that can hint which cars will be strong in the race.
Term
led laps
“Led laps” means he was running in first place for some portion of the race. It usually shows the car was fast and the team had a good plan.
Term
truck race
In NASCAR, the “truck race” is a race in the Truck Series, which uses pickup-truck-style race cars. It’s a different competition from the main Cup races, so results can vary by series.
Term
dive bomb
A “dive bomb” is when a driver waits until the last moment to brake and then tries to pass right as they turn in. It’s a risky move because you have to be very precise to avoid running wide or hitting the other car.
Term
chase
The “Chase” is NASCAR’s playoff system. It’s when only the top drivers keep going toward the championship—here, the host says it starts with the top 16.
Place
Daytona
Daytona is a major NASCAR race track. Because it’s fast and close-quarters, things like drafting and getting a good exit from turns matter a lot.
Term
tire wear
Tire wear means the tires get used up as the car drives. As the tires wear, they can lose grip, which makes the car harder to drive fast the same way every lap.
Term
the line you drive
The “line” is the route the driver takes through a turn. Choosing the right path helps the car keep traction and exit the corner faster.
Term
wind draft
Draft is when one car benefits from the air pushed aside by another car. If you follow closely, the air resistance drops and you can go faster.
Term
Passes are made off the corner
A lot of passes happen right after a turn. If you can get out of the corner faster and with more grip, you’re in a better spot to get ahead.
Term
throttle
Throttle is how much power you’re asking the engine for by pressing the gas. In racing, the timing of when you get back on the gas after a turn can make the car accelerate better.
Topic
Cup Series
NASCAR’s Cup Series is the main, top-level racing league. So “Cup Series winners” means the best drivers in NASCAR are winning races.
Place
Watkins Glen
Watkins Glen is a famous race track in New York with lots of turns. The hosts are saying Zillich and SVG had a crash there, especially near the last corner.
Term
mind games
In racing, “mind games” means trying to get inside another driver’s head. It’s about making them doubt or react differently, not just going faster.
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I slid up on the couch and I was like, what in the **** just happened?
I could never imagine standing on the brakes and letting somebody gather it up
when we're four laps from the finish.
It's getting hot outside, people are getting heated up.
Noah kept repeating himself.
He kept, why'd you wreck me?
Yeah.
Why'd you wreck me?
Right, Scott, Kevin, we hope you come back.
Welcome to Kevin Harvick's happy hour presented by NASCAR on FOX.
I'm Kevin Harvick.
She's Caitlin Vinci and Mama Smith is here.
He is here.
I'm fresh up for that eye.
Yeah, you made it.
So I was like, what did I do this time?
Yeah, yeah.
No, it was the red eye was aggressive.
I bet it was.
It was, we got a little delayed too.
So I think I left like one o'clock our time and then landed like 6.30, like back here.
He said he slept right up until the start of this show, basically.
Pretty much, yeah, pretty much.
I don't blame you, you know, when you're coming back from the West Coast.
This is that's a long trip.
Yeah, but you know, Red Bull took care of me this weekend
and they sent me back home with some Red Bulls.
So we had a couple of sips and we're good to go.
Thanks for sharing the wealth.
Yeah, well.
She brought some over here.
Didn't know you need some.
Welcome in guys to another episode of happy hour.
We have so much to talk about leaving the inaugural race at San Diego.
And of course, we'll preview the next road course coming up of Sonoma.
He's got a whole list of sips today.
We're going to be hammered by the time we finish that.
Hammered and giving out kisses.
That's right.
So gosh, this is it's hard to even know where to start
when it comes to talking about this weekend.
All three of us were on site for the race weekend.
What did you think just from your overarching view of what this was?
What did you feel about San Diego?
It was pretty spectacular.
I mean, really from the time that I got to the hotel, I stayed on the island.
And, you know, I think just seeing race fans, seeing the base,
seeing the cars on the racetrack, the aircraft carriers, the planes,
the helicopters, the sailors, but the enthusiasm from everybody
that you saw was through the roof, excited to be there, excited for the challenge,
excited to see what everything looked like.
And that's how it came across.
It came across as just an absolutely spectacular event from top to bottom.
You know, the base did a great job of hosting everybody.
And it was just fun.
Everything about it was everything fun.
And then we wound up having some great races.
But I think in a situation like this, it's not about the race.
It's about the event.
And I know some people are there to race and sometimes you're not.
Sometimes you're just part of the show.
And, you know, the show, you know, wound up being the race.
And we had some good races at that.
But the event overall was spectacular.
To your point, it was a sporting event.
But I think it was about our country, obviously, with the 250 anniversary.
And I loved meeting all the different people from the Navy.
And also, I felt like some news stories were unearthed from people in the
industry that had spent time in the military and in the Navy.
You know, we were telling different stories on the broadcast from people like that.
So we've all been a part of a lot of sporting events.
I think this one is going to rank exceptionally high for all of us for what
that spectacle was. Yeah.
We got to go on that boat, by the way, the USS Carl Vinson.
How was that?
It was really, really neat.
And then, you know, me, I had to do a bunch of research about the boat.
And I wanted to know different things that had happened on it.
And the amount of historical events it was a part of for our country.
It was very interesting just standing there and being a part of it.
Well, hold on.
Should we really call that a boat?
It's not a boat.
It's not a boat.
This is an island.
Is it a ship?
It's an island.
There's more people on that ship than there are in the town that I grew up in.
I got yelled at for calling somebody's yacht a boat.
How's your boat?
That's not a boat.
That's a yacht.
Oh, fair.
OK, so Kevin's already correcting me.
We're off to a great start.
Is that a ship?
Or I'm just glad your sunburn's gone.
I knew you were going to say something about that.
Sunburn.
It was a 16-hour day for us.
You weren't as sunburned as Ron Hornaday.
He looked like a fully grown ripe tomato.
So did I.
I was a cherry tomato at the end of the show.
He looked like strawberry shortcake.
Y'all were, y'all.
Good sunburn cheeks.
Y'all had a lot going on down there.
It was a lot going on.
You had your sunscreen on, right?
No, no, no.
I came out of the oven like this, so I'm good.
Yeah, I don't have to worry about it.
A little more gray in your building.
Well, no, the gray is looking good.
I actually got a haircut right there in the midway.
Yeah, what was that all about?
Yeah, so wall, the shaver.
They were doing an activation, and if you signed up,
they gave money towards the vets and stuff.
Oh, that's neat.
So sat down, signed up, got a free cut.
What'd you sign up for?
To give some for them to get money away.
Oh, yeah.
And then they got a free cut.
Look at that.
Look how great I look.
Well, Mama comes back with a new look.
Point of the story is San Diego was awesome, right?
I mean, what was your interpretation of the whole?
It was honestly one of the coolest things
that I've been a part of or witnessed.
The energy was palpable.
It was you could tell there was a lot of excitement
from the get.
And a lot of times we don't get to,
we're not in market that long.
Right.
And because we're not in market that long anymore,
I think we lose a lot of these type of opportunities.
Like Red Bull had a party, Brad Perez threw a party.
There was just a bunch of parties,
a bunch of things, obviously on the aircraft carrier.
So I thought it was, yeah, the boat.
I thought it was just great and everybody had a great time.
The fanfare was amazing.
We had so many closers, C-L-O-S-E-R-S closers that came out.
And a lot of new fans.
And a lot of new fans.
A ton of new fans.
I think it was posted, I think Adam Stern posted.
You got it there?
If you want me to read it.
40,000 seats were sold out.
67% of the ticket buyers had never attended a NASCAR event.
And attendees came from 50 states and 17 countries.
That's pretty impressive.
They did 40,000 on Sunday.
They did 40,000 on Saturday.
And I don't remember what the number was on Friday.
They just opened the whole thing on Friday.
So, but it was awesome.
We had a group from New Zealand that came by the RAM display.
I mean, it was just, they were so excited.
SVG'd out.
But they had their American hats on.
I mean, it was just a great time.
Very good time.
So, obviously, conversation's already beginning about
if we should go back.
Do you feel like this should just stand alone on its own
as a one-time special event?
100%.
I think we've done this so many times.
You make a spectacular first event,
and then you try to do it two and three times,
and it just becomes,
then everybody starts poking holes in it after that.
And there were some holes,
but nobody's poking holes in it yet.
Because it's the first one,
you know that things are not going to be 100%
on all the things that go with it.
But everybody gives you some grace on the first one, right?
And I just think that with the size of the island
and everything that went with it,
I think you could easily have some holes poked in it.
If you did it again as just a, as another race,
if you want to do the military-based thing,
I love that idea.
I do too.
You can go to, you can take your pick.
All over the country.
We got a lot.
Take your pick.
And I think that, you know, if you want to do it again
in four or five years,
that would be spectacular too.
I know it's a great market
and I just, you know, we leaned in so hard to the clash.
Year one, it was good.
It wasn't great, but it was good.
And then as we came back in year two and three,
it was not good.
And I just don't want to see us get into that situation again
because you really feel how special the event is
when it's one, a one-off type situation that is very unique.
You get those numbers of people wanting to go to those styles
of race tracks.
I'm just not sure that it's something that you want to do
again at the exact same site back to back in years.
I'm not saying you couldn't do it in four or five years,
but maybe rotate it around to, you know,
the different bases around the country
if you want to do a military appreciation thing.
But it makes the most sense this year
because of our America's 250th birthday,
the Navy's 250th.
So there's a lot of things that make sense.
And it was absolutely spectacular.
It took a lot of planning, time,
a lot of effort from everyone's part involved
and massively successful event.
But I'd just be scared that you take the...
Water it down.
Yeah, water it down.
Yeah, to his point, it took two years in the making,
we were told, to make this come together.
But I agree with Kevin.
I think it's like one of one.
And I kept saying that to myself while I was there.
I was like, we need to enjoy this
because I don't know if this will ever happen again.
And I think that that is the right call
to move it around and not return next year.
Yeah, I mean, I think you can look at,
you can point to the Pocono where we used to go there twice,
we used to go to New Hampshire twice.
It was like, okay, going twice.
And now it's great.
That's almost like...
It's like a couple of our normal races
are like spectacles now because it's a special thing.
And I think that if we kind of take that same approach
and maybe just move it around or same with the street course,
whether it's on the Naval base or in a city,
I think that I know logistically it becomes an issue
and it's tougher because you have longer contracts
to make it all work.
But like if we can get away from doing it back to back years,
maybe it's one in, one out, and then one back in,
anything like that, I think will make it better.
And just people, it'll keep everyone
juvenated up to want to come and see some more stuff.
You have to make it a commodity.
Yeah, well, I mean, you go right to the Chicago thing.
Like I would not go back to Chicago either.
It's a great market.
But why not go somewhere that 100% wants you?
Yeah, I mean, it's not like everybody in Chicago
doesn't want us, but it just doesn't,
it doesn't feel like that that's an area that,
especially right in the city,
I think a lot of the surrounding areas love NASCAR racing.
And I think Chicago land will be super well attended
and it always was all the way up until they shut it.
So I don't know, I just,
there's so many markets that we're not going to, you know,
and I bring up Seattle and I bring up Colorado and
you could just keep making,
you could just keep making Utah,
like go to South Dakota, North, I mean, take your pick.
We made this thing to where we can do anything.
Yeah, we made this thing we can do anything.
And it's like we're, we're like handcuffing ourselves
almost to just what we know.
And it's like, no, no, no, keep going,
keep doing, going down the path.
Like Chicago was spectacular.
It was awesome.
I'll give it to you.
It was awesome.
But I don't understand why we wouldn't just
take the same thing and that we could move all around
and just take it back to the same spot.
And we've got so many markets that are so pro NASCAR
that have so many hardcore NASCAR fans
that we're not even there.
And this track, this track was a way different version
of a street course.
And I thought it was a way better version.
And we don't know what we don't know.
The first time you go to Chicago, right?
They figured it out and made it work.
But this course versus the Chicago course,
night and day, I feel like from a street course.
Both events were great.
Yeah.
But I just, I want to see those numbers
that you talk about with new fans every time that we do it.
Yearly.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Well, we can all agree it was a great event,
very special to be a part of it.
And we got some great racing, like Kevin said,
and a first time winner in the Cup Series.
We love coming in here on Monday,
getting to talk about a first time winner in the Series.
Kevin, you have a keen eye for young talent.
When you watched Corey Haim on Sunday,
what stood out to you that sets him apart?
Well, I think it's the same thing that we've seen
over the last couple of years in the Truck Series.
He just doesn't get rattled.
When he talks, when he races, he doesn't get rattled.
We know that he has a tremendous work effort off the racetrack,
work ethic off the racetrack, and how he prepares and studies.
Look, we talk about having 100 races for the rookies to come in
before you can expect the success.
And we're talking about race 13.
But we're also talking about the same guy
that has been successful every time he's got in the car,
for the most part, and been competitive on the Cup side.
So I think for 23-11 in general, I think that
they have somebody who is going to be pretty damn good
for a long, long time as a part of their stable
to build something on and look at it for them, for 23-11.
They don't even have all the sponsors,
hadn't had the sponsorship sold for him this year.
But they're like, we're going to keep doing this.
And now you look at it, now look what you've got to sell.
Now you're looking at the guy
that could be the best young prospect to come along.
And now he's won a race before he even gets started.
He hasn't even started yet.
Now you can build a real program around him
because winning cures all problems.
And the ultimate sales tool to be able to do that.
But he's just got this ability and this knack for grinding away.
He doesn't get rattled. He's stern in his approach.
We heard that after Honeycutt was complaining after Michigan.
And I think that he was just like, oh, he needs to get thicker skin.
Yeah. So I think it's a great moment for our sport.
And he beat one of the best in Tyler Reddick.
It was really neat to see that.
And obviously I covered Corey Heim in the truck series.
And every crew chief that would work with him to your point
talked about his work ethic, his studying,
his time away from the racetrack.
They also noted he doesn't have a lot of distractions
outside the car, which they said for a young driver can be pretty rare.
He just has a tremendous level of focus, I think, on the task at hand.
And it's going to be really neat to see what he does
when he goes full-time cup racing.
Are we looking at a multi-wind first year, you think, potentially?
You mean when you say first year, like next year is full-time rookie year?
I would say you might as well start looking at it.
I mean, I think that Corey, I've said it before on the show,
ever since last year, he ran Dover in a Legacy Motor Club car and ran top 20.
That, I felt like that spoke volumes and everything I needed to know.
I found out right then.
He's ready for the next step.
You just got to put him in the right equipment to do it.
And then he gets in a car, a fourth car, that like usually the fourth car is like,
OK, right? Especially with the old style car.
I think it's easier with this car to probably make it a little closer.
And they have a great group of mechanics, obviously, back at the shop,
that they can put together to then bring an effort like that.
So Corey Heim is a freaking dog.
And he's a can't miss prospect.
And the fact that MJ and Denny like understood that and locked it up.
And the fact that some other people had an opportunity while he was
kind of waffling in what was going to be Corey Heim.
But it sounds like Corey had a lot of conviction about wanting to be at 2311.
I think he's talked about in some interviews that this is where he wanted to be.
So maybe there were conversations and he was just like,
I believe in this place and what it's going to make me be able to become
as a race car driver and betting on yourself.
And then it's showing up.
There's nothing like that.
Well, there's a lot to be said about environment, right?
Like we've talked about the chemistry and things that go with this sport.
And when it feels right.
And I think that it also probably for them and a lot of the employees show some loyalty,
which is you're loyal to a certain point.
And I think that his loyalty has been pretty long winded in this scenario
with not having a full time anything this year and going out and look what it's turned into though.
I mean, he's got multiple truck wins, got a cup win.
He could go win the truck championship if he declared.
Like he can.
He could just start with a playoff start by whatever deficit he's behind.
He could do it.
Like he can go in that thing.
It's amazing.
The phrase already being thrown around of a generational talent to describe Corey.
Would you say 13, 13 starts?
Buxton said this.
Listen to this though.
What did he say?
You got Corey.
Connor Zillich.
Brent Cruz.
And you look at Blaney, Reddick, Carson, Hosevar.
All these guys are young.
Morrison still young.
I mean, you're talking about, you're talking about early 30s.
Like some, I mean, Chase Elliott's 30.
Chase, Bubba.
Carson Hosevar's in his 20s.
Yeah, yeah.
But my point, his point was, look at what NASCAR has set up for the future as far as,
as far as the young guys, but not just, like they're not just young guys.
Like they're good.
We got a core group of young guys that is, that are studs.
C-Bow, Chase Briscoe.
Would you, did you say it was a 13 start?
Yes.
The last guy that won in the 13 start.
Do you remember who that was?
It was Jimmy Johnson.
Jimmy Johnson.
Yeah.
Just saying.
I'm not saying he's going to be the next go.
What took those guys so long?
I mean, unreal, right?
13 starts.
13 starts.
I mean, you did it in what, like three?
Three, yeah.
I mean, I mean, what are we talking about?
Mc Murray did it in two.
Mc Murray did it in two.
I mean, what are we talking about?
What a bunch of hacks, man.
What a bunch of hacks out here.
How about our guy, Mc Murray?
Oh man, just wheeling out there.
Uncle Jamie.
Uncle Jamie.
Come on, man.
Can't let Clint beat you like that.
God, I can't wait to watch him ride that bull.
When is that going to happen?
When is that happening?
I don't know.
You think he...
That was the bet on the table.
There's no way that he, I mean,
he's, I don't think he's ready for that.
Maybe a sheep.
I don't think Jamie was ready to bowl.
Yeah.
I don't think he's ready for that.
No.
No.
I've seen, I've seen Cowboys.
The best part was Clint's tweet.
Did you see?
Yeah.
He had to be on the bowl.
And he said, I guess I set the bar too, too high.
Too high.
That's so crazy.
I guess, well, whatever he said.
But good Jamie was talking about.
Oh, he said, I guess the bar wasn't too low.
Clint never sets the bar too, too high.
We're talking, of course,
about the Craftsman Truck Series race that Jamie was in
to be determined on when the infamous bull ride will take place.
So one of the biggest challengers for Cory Hyme was Tyler Reddick.
And I know you two may not agree on the final laps
and how things transpired.
You felt like it was a classy move by Tyler Reddick,
allowing Cory to kind of gather himself.
And you serve no differently.
Yeah, you are.
It's your, you know, your names on the show.
I'll go ahead.
No, I want you to go first.
You're the one who made the X post on it
that talked about how classy it was.
So explain your side first.
OK, fine.
I'll explain my side.
Sit down.
Let me, let me, let me put the professor in the chair here.
OK.
Listen, so Tyler had the lead, right?
And they were running really hard.
Cory's been stalking him for however many laps.
Cory passes him clean.
This is, OK, so here you go.
Here's Cory, really applying pressure.
That jump, by the way, was crazy that day.
Yeah, it was.
No, the photos of that were great.
But so Cory, Cory passes him clean.
And then Tyler, racing hard for the win, obviously,
crosses him back over.
What kind of cooks it, gets loose in,
bumps him up the race track, Cory gets in the fence,
and then Tyler lets him gather and gives him back the spot.
I feel like that was a classy move on the standpoint of
that's your teammate and you're making sure
that the company is still going to win.
Because if he doesn't do that, like, who's to say, Cory's like,
all right, now I'm going to give the bumper back to you.
And then they both wrecked.
And now, luckily, Bubba was the next car.
So, but now the company might not have won
off of something that really didn't need to happen.
So, and then Tyler gets a flat tire anyway.
So I think it was a classy move.
And it's not like he gave up.
He went back after him.
If he didn't get the flat tire, they might have still duked it out.
But I just thought it was a really classy move.
I don't think you'd see it much if you weren't teammates.
And if you didn't have a 10 second lead on the rest of the field,
but I thought it was classy.
Here's my question.
Racing, racing for a championship,
doing all the things that you're doing.
Is that what Denny Hamlin would have done?
So first, it's funny.
Denny said it really speaks to Tyler's character
as a person for him to do that thought.
And he applauded it.
But we know that the owner is applauding that
because the guy that drives the 11 will drive through anybody in the field.
He is not.
I honestly hated it.
He hated everything about it.
I just, you know, I think Tyler was racing hard,
got loose, got into his door.
That's part of it.
He's not going to drive into the wall if he lets off.
And if he catches you again,
but I just, I could never imagine standing on the brakes
and letting somebody gather it up when we're four laps from the finish.
I hear you.
I just, I don't get it.
I was, sat up on the couch.
I was laying there watching the race.
And I sat up on the couch and I was like,
what in the fuck just happened?
Let me ask you this.
Let me ask you this.
Have you ever been in a meeting post two teammates
wrecking each other for the win?
And then neither the company didn't win?
You say you're sorry.
I was racing hard.
What, what, how's that, how have those meetings?
Like what is the owner like?
Everybody was still rolling.
No, I know true.
But like if they, if they would have wrecked,
that's your wreck.
That's a different, that's what I'm saying.
That's a different scenario.
I think if, I think if the 20,
if the, if the 67 catches me again,
I let him go, right?
Like I know I owe him one at that point,
but letting out a freaking throttle
and just letting him, watching him.
I mean, it's not like he, I mean, he all but stopped.
I just, I, I, I see the nice guy side of it,
but I'm a winner and, and I know how hard these races are to win.
And when I'm racing hard and something's happened,
you can go back and watch me get loose
and we're going to bang doors and, and,
but we're talking five laps to go,
four laps to go in the race.
I don't get it.
I think that doesn't make any sense.
I, I'm not even, I don't even know.
I don't even know how to get to the point of saying,
oh, slow down.
I'm going to let him save it.
I think, think that's the thing for me is like he,
Tyler is the vet and he's racing hard.
You're trying to win, doing all the things.
But like he, he overcooked it.
Like it was his mistake that he did.
If Ty, if it puts now Corey in a really bad spot,
like if Corey runs him down, I wouldn't have expected Tyler.
If Tyler, I know what Corey would do.
I know exactly what Corey is doing.
Cause he did it to, he did to Hulsavar.
When Hulsavar was in the middle,
he's going to use the bumper to ship him.
He did it to his teammate last week at Michigan.
He's going to ship him.
And because he did, because Tyler,
I don't think Corey has given him enough time
to even let him, let him buy.
You know what I mean?
I think he's going to get there, move him and see us.
So I don't know.
I think it kept a situation from being worse.
And then Tyler got a flat tire anyway.
So even if he didn't let him go,
I just didn't like anything about it.
He said he tried to battle back and he overdid it.
Ended up getting beat by their own stuff
with Tyler Redick's remarks.
Look, I, I like both guys.
I think they're both great race car drivers, but I, I, I just,
it makes me sick to see somebody let off the gas
when you're racing for the win.
Is that different than being.
It looked like an F1 race.
Is that fair?
Is that different than being at a super speed way
and instead of taking the run, you stay with your teammate?
Um, I don't think so.
You think that's the same?
I think those are strategized.
I mean, I think that's, I think that you're strategically
trying to align everything on a super speed way.
This one, you're just racing your ass off
trying to beat the other guy.
Like your head, your head to head at that point.
And I, when I look at it, I was like, oh, we got loose.
Oh, they hit doors. Oh, he's in the marbles.
Yeah. What?
It's your faces.
What just happened?
That's going to make the show open.
I know it.
Can someone clip that, please?
Yes, I don't like it.
Differing opinions on that of how that all transpired at the end.
I want to go back to a pivotal moment in the race,
which was the fourth caution that came out
when Austin Hill misses the corner,
takes out favorites for the win with SVG and Connor Zillich involved.
This totally changed the whole complexion of the race.
I'm sure while you were watching, you're like, well, that
didn't see that necessarily happening.
So early, these two guys no longer in contention.
Yeah. And, you know, you look at SVG, Ty Gibbs, Connor Zillich,
Austin Hill was running good.
McDowell was in there.
McDowell was in that wreck.
Man, it was hard.
You know, turn one is it's super fast.
And Austin just overshot the corner a little bit and
got into the, got into Connor right there.
Very similar to what we saw, you know, the day before,
as far as the cars piling in,
Sam Mayer got into the inside wall
and knocked everybody into the outside wall.
But it looked like Zillich was hurt right here.
Did it not?
Yeah, he said it was a big hit.
Yeah.
I hate it for Connor Zillich because this has just been
weeks and weeks now of disappointments for him.
He did lead the first cup race for a teenager.
He was the first teenager to lead a cup series race,
which is kind of neat.
That's what they said.
Oh, I guess I guess Joey Logano was already 20 when he did that.
So, you know, obviously they had speed,
just did not get to see that through.
The interesting thing was they weren't,
they were not dominant to start this race.
Like they were, the 88 was kind of,
they start fired off and he kind of dropped anchor,
headed to the rear, rear.
And then the, you know, the 97 was fighting.
It looked like Shane was having to use all his superpowers
to keep, to keep to run third, to run third.
And Blaney, I mean, Blaney and Bubba were on this.
They were on the stick.
This weekend and giving Shane all that he could handle.
And, you know, Shane, you could kind of see the, the bull,
the bull, the red bull was kind of starting to use
them horns a little bit, kind of, you know,
around the 17 and some of those other guys,
which was super entertaining to watch.
Yeah, super entertaining.
Yeah, please.
Super entertaining to watch, but a little frustrating,
I'm sure, behind the wheel, but, you know,
it was certain to look like it was starting to come to them.
They had some good strategy.
I thought it was going to work out in their favor.
And then it looked like Austin just kind of got in there.
The car porpoise a little bit, it was really bumpy.
And you can see it locked, it kind of like locked up.
And it like lifted off the ground,
so it wasn't slowing down anymore.
And it was off into the fence, it went.
Yeah, and, you know, turn one is,
I mean, that's a pretty high speed corner,
but man, that workout on the exit or turn one
got some, that barrier on the exit.
It got a workout.
That one in the exit of the last turn, right?
Last turn, and that's, you know,
when we started truck practice, being in the booth,
I'm like, you know, we don't really,
we don't really know what the problem
corners are going to be, but 14,
14, 15, 16 were definitely the problem corners.
And 16 was a problem corner
because of what you're talking about with the bumps.
Oh, it was insane.
Yeah, there's a bump right in the middle of the corner.
And if you'd get offline, there was a lot of marbles,
which in turn one, same thing, right?
Like you, you get those, those swells of bumps
that are going through the corner
and then the front end starts to skate.
And you see that 33 just slide the back just a little bit.
And then you're just in a four wheel drift
with unfortunately Connor Zillich on the outside of you.
And then you get up into the dirty stuff and off it goes.
The competitor in you, did you wish you could erase that track?
No, no, he was, he was getting the booth.
The, I will say the, the last corner, right?
Underneath the bridge, you could watch the cars.
The, the roofs would dip under the wall,
like if you were standing there.
And that's where like, we saw Uncle Jamie get in trouble.
And Justin, all of those guys got in trouble in the truck race
and come out of there and they were in the gas
because that's all the speed and there was no more grip.
It was so funny when they, when you came off a turn one
and you go down and turn two and they come over that jump.
And it looked like a video game.
The fact that we were talking about it,
like it's a, like it was a jump because like it was a jump
at a NASCAR race in the middle of it.
It was insane.
Yes, very insane.
And we also saw some craziness in the O'Reilly's race.
You referenced it.
I want to go back and look at some of that,
those incidents as well.
You see it here.
I mean, it's just, just speaks to, you know,
the difficulty of this place
and people trying to figure it out.
Yeah.
Well, this was way into the race.
They definitely, you know, they, they definitely had plenty
of laps at that point, but I think that Sam Mayer just
misjudged getting into turn one and got that.
I mean, he hit the inside wall hard a lot.
And on those street courses, when you hit those barriers
like that, it basically just takes the car and points it left,
done it, did it at Chicago.
And you see him right here.
He just, you know, it's hard to keep track of where you are
when you're behind cars, especially when those walls,
they're not like normal radius of corners.
They're kind of, they're kind of jagged, but they don't,
they don't always have the same curve to them, you know.
And so sometimes it's just like it, and it'll flatten out
a little bit.
And then he just misjudged it.
Yeah.
It's not like, it's not like racing at Pensacola
for the snowball derby when that wall down in turn one,
you could know what exactly what it is.
He kind of hit it behind the right front tire too.
So like also really kind of hit.
Oh, he hit it early.
He, yeah.
He misjudged it bad.
Yes, yes.
And then he, then he hit, then he hit the wall hard.
Real hard.
Broke the wall in half, knocked steering column up about a foot.
It looked like Danica.
Remember when Danica wrecked that, it was a Daytona
and the steering was way, that's what it reminded me of.
Yeah, it was big hit.
Speaking of misjudging, I want to go to another situation
that we saw on the Cup Series race.
Christopher Bell obviously is still dealing
with his injury from Michigan.
He didn't really have a set plan going into the weekend
because I asked him about this last week,
but they ended up having a relief driver
filling for him at the first caution,
which was Brent Cruz.
So obviously the team working diligently here
to make this change.
But then there was an engine issue for Brent.
What did you see here from watching the data and information
from Brent's car?
You know, based upon the in-car camera, you know,
I think that obviously Brent got put in a tough situation
with something that he doesn't have a lot of experience at
and I think is inexperience of the sequential shifter
gotten away and third gear is not at the top of the H pattern.
When you see the in-car camera, you see him,
you see him when he's supposed to be upshifting,
downshift and then pull it back.
You know, so I think he went from what I believe was second to third,
trying to go third.
Yeah, he was trying to go to third and wound up in first
and then that broke the engine, the transaxle,
and everything in between.
So yeah, it looked like he put the car in the wrong gear.
Yeah, and I mean, I think social was kind of hammering him
a little bit, which I'm like, this happens.
You said you did it.
I remember Ryan did it earlier in this year on Pit Road
and he just kept stalling and he didn't realize he wasn't,
he was in second and not first.
It's hard when you come from an H pattern to a sequential
where you have to pull the shifter down every time to upshift
and push it up to downshift.
The question is.
H pattern is there's only two of them up
and that's first and third.
H pattern is pretty solid.
The question is guys, with C Bell's injury,
because I did talk to Christopher too
and he's pretty dejected that he can't race
to his full potential right now.
Do you pull, do you pull this move again in Sonoma?
Like, like, is it going to be the same situation
and do you put Brent Cruz back in?
In my brain, if you think,
Denny's already talked about Brent Cruz being the next guy,
if you think Brent is the next guy,
then get him some, get him some experience.
More laps.
Well, I think he started sixth or seventh Brent
on one of those restarts and went back to like 28th.
Yeah.
So I think you got to decide if he is,
is he actually ready?
Because the road courses are his forte, right?
Yep.
And supposed to be the thing that he's exceptionally good at.
So you got a very short sample size to decide if you're going
to take that chance again on the inexperience,
because in my opinion, he shifted into the wrong gear
and could Christopher Bell have just rode around all day
and finished that good, right?
That would be my question.
But when I look at the points, it's a big decision
because Bell, I mean, you do that again.
They lost, well, he didn't lose that much actually.
He only lost 10 points to the cut line,
but it's 60 points to being out of the chase.
Mm-hmm.
That's not that, that's not that much.
And I think that, you know, you got to decide.
It's a tough decision.
Real tough decision.
Do I think Brent Cruz is going to be competitive down the road
in a cup car?
Yes.
Do I think that, do did it look like he was ready
to jump on in and be the cup guy?
We didn't, it didn't look like Cory Hyme, did it?
No, but I wouldn't expect it to look like Cory Hyme.
On a road course?
No, I still wouldn't expect him to look like,
like I think Brent is an exceptional road course racer,
but even, even Connor didn't look like Connor the first time
he got in it last year.
You know what I mean?
Like it looked better, but it didn't, it wasn't like.
So I think those are the things that you got to decide
from the inexperienced side of it,
because you're going to go through all these things
with the shifting and the wrecking
and not knowing how to drive the car.
Do you want to do it now?
With pressure, the problem is there's pressure now
and there wouldn't be later.
Do you think it would be more sensical
for some other candidates to be in the car instead?
I don't even know who that is though.
The guy you would have put in one place.
I mean, you got Omarola that has driven the cup cars,
but he hasn't driven a cup car in a long time.
Been to Sonoma a lot.
I mean, I don't know.
We'll have to see what the decision is.
That's a tough decision to take him out.
Is his risk feeling better next week?
I don't know that answer either.
It's a six-week recovery process.
Yeah, I think you don't get it from a state.
So, you know, and Sonoma is a lot easier.
It's a lot less shifting, bumps.
The bumps was the biggest part, I feel like.
Just trying to catch it.
And just, you know, Sonoma just doesn't have that.
Like, you're going to hit a couple of curbs and, you know.
So, but there's a lot less shifting.
And I think that's the big issue is just
where is he holding on to the steering wheel
with his hurt wrist?
Right.
I think you leave it up to the driver.
I think you let him decide.
But I think if you put Cruz back in,
and I think you're going to risk the same thing
that you had it at San Diego with, you know,
those high-end mistakes.
I also think anyone else you put in
is just going to ride around.
Like, I don't think they're going to,
like, I just, what is that what you need?
But that's what I'm saying.
Like, I don't, you know.
Bel can ride around.
That's what I'm saying.
You, I'd leave it up to the driver at this point.
There's going to be a lot less attrition.
So, you're going to have to go.
So, I don't know.
We'll have to continue following that story
to see what Joe Gibbs Racing decides for the weekend.
All right.
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So, it's getting hot outside.
People are getting heated up on the racetrack.
I would like to reference Noah Gregson
versus Kevin Magnuson incident
that resulted in a confrontation
after the race between these two drivers
where one just kept repeating the same thing
and the other one just started to get really annoyed.
What do you guys make of this whole situation
and did it warrant the confrontation
we saw between the two drivers after the fact?
Well, I mean, I've gone back and watched it
and I saw the incident that I believe started it
with Magnuson getting into the back of the four
with a late pass.
But I don't know that there was enough there.
I mean, he kept running into the back of him after that
because of the brake checks and the blocking and the swerving
and everything that happened.
So, ultimately, he left him no option whatsoever other than...
And then you fight this whole fight if you're Noah Gregson.
You're fighting this whole fight
and then the guy wipes you out and you hit the fence
and you lose anyway.
After you've lost 20 seconds to a car
that's two seconds faster than you behind you.
But, you know, listening to Magnuson on the radio,
he's like, I have never been in this position.
I don't really know what to do.
So, anything you guys can do to help me,
but it is not Noah Gregson's best look.
I think he kind of looked bad in this scenario.
I love it.
I mean, at least he didn't say, suck my balls, mate.
I mean, that's the...
I thought it was funny when Kevin was like,
do you speak English?
I...
Just point blank.
There it is right here.
They're just...
It's honestly kind of the same thing over and over again, right?
I'm saying he said the same thing over and over again.
Yeah, no, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Yeah, I just...
I love, I mean, I love watching that.
I think it was a high-level entertaining.
And also, guys and girls,
K-Mag ended up with the fastest lap on the race
at the end of the race.
So, like, he had pace and he knew he had pace.
He just needed to get by Noah.
And, like, Noah's had a tough year, right?
Like, his teammates are out running him
by a pretty good margin
and it just hasn't seemed to really click
with him out front row.
And so, it's frustrating.
And so, you know, he's probably...
This is probably a boil over,
but I don't think...
I don't think it needs to happen.
It's not like you'll see each other again.
No, I don't think...
I don't know, they might, because if I was...
I don't know.
If I was somebody that had a decent car
and wanted to put another campaign together,
I'd put K-Mag in it.
He did a good job.
That's the best I think anyone's done outside of SVG.
That's the best I think anyone's done on a one-off for us.
And I think that the suck my balls, mate,
was his incident that he had in F1.
In F1, that the F1 site posted today
that I thought was pretty funny.
But my favorite line out of that whole thing was...
When he said,
Do you speak English?
That's what I'm saying.
Yeah, because...
Fuck off.
Noah kept repeating himself.
He kept...
Why'd you wreck me?
Yeah.
Why'd you wreck me?
He's like, what's your fucking problem?
And then eventually it was K-Mag was just like,
You being in my face is my fucking problem now.
And like, that's my issue now.
Welcome to NASCAR, Kevin.
We hope you come back.
I do hope he comes back.
That's not our normal situation.
We definitely don't want that to set the tone.
I want to hit on two more things quickly.
Jimmy Johnson was back in a truck race.
Jimmy Jam.
Yeah, I wanted to mention that to him,
but then I wasn't sure if it was the sentence.
He loved it.
He thought it was great.
I told him to put it on a t-shirt.
I thought that he had a good showing.
I know he didn't have a good finish,
but he looked good in practice qualifying.
He led laps.
It was good to see him back in the truck.
Yeah, well, the truck race was good.
Yeah, I'm talking trucks.
The truck race was really good.
Led some laps and was very competitive.
I would run that last cup race and be done with it.
Those cup cars, it's impossible to be competitive
unless you're doing something every week on the cup side.
So I think he's got one more.
One more.
Yeah, I hope he just hangs it up after that
on the cup side of things
and go have some fun in the trucks.
It didn't sound like he had much fun.
He was aggravated with all the competitors.
Get to that in a minute.
That's just the way that they race now.
That's true.
I liked watching him do it, though.
It was fun.
I just like seeing Jimmy around.
I also think that having someone like Jimmy or Kevin
or even when Biff would do it,
it gives a bar for the young guys.
And they're like, I don't want to look stupid
in front of these guys that I respect.
So I would think it would make you want to be better.
Jimmy obviously didn't think that they wanted to be better,
but I think it was a more weekly occurrence.
I think it would help maturity.
Speaking of looking stupid,
this was an interesting incident that happened
when a fan was able to jump the fence
and have a conversation with Sheldon Creed on track
during a red flag,
which we have now learned that individual
is facing federal charges.
Shocker.
But Hal, just this is the funniest thing.
I mean, remember when this happened to Matt Kenseth
at one of the tracks, a fan came out on the...
Yeah.
I mean, this guy scaled the whole fence, though.
Yes.
This, listen, there are high-powered rifles
in the parking lot when we park.
Yeah.
And you're going to jump onto the track?
The nerd of this man.
Who is this person?
There were three machine guns on the tower we were on.
You know what I'm saying?
Look at him.
But I was impressed with his athletic prowess
of just being able to scale this very quickly,
and then the next fence as well.
It was fast, and he had no fear of doing it.
That is impressive.
I was surprised that there was nobody around.
Right.
It took him a while to find out where they were.
Yeah, but I mean...
You're on a naval base.
I'm sure people saw it, and they were like...
I don't know.
I'm sure someone said stand down.
You know what I mean?
I'm not sure what's going on there.
Those guys and girls are head on a swivel.
I feel like they see everything.
That was a shocker.
That was shocking.
No one really were.
It was shocking.
I'd say the juice wasn't worth the squeeze
for that little moment in no way.
Sheldon Creed saying he was hammered.
It's like playing Grand Theft Auto,
and you walk onto the military bases.
Five stars automatically.
Like that's exactly what he just did.
That's insane.
What a time.
A time was had in San Diego.
So we're putting that one in the rear view mirror,
and we're moving on to another road course
in Sonoma, California.
Wine country.
Everyone loves to go out there, of course.
So, Kevin, last road course race of the season.
That's hard to believe.
I know.
It is hard to believe.
Will and I were talking on the speed episode.
They're seasons over at the end of August.
And you think about we've got nine races left
on the cup schedule.
Before we even get to the four.
Yeah, but I mean, until the chase is here.
Yeah, that's what I'm saying.
So, I mean, it's getting to be crunch time.
And when I look at this,
big miss from last weekend SVG.
He's now outside of the chase.
The big surprise to me in the points is A.J. Almendinger.
Who is that?
Say that again?
Dinger.
A.J. Almendinger.
Yeah.
Yeah, it shocked me.
I haven't been paying attention.
He's been there all season.
21 points off the cut line.
And so, the reason that I say this is we're going to Sonoma.
And I look for A.J. Almendinger and SVG to have big weekends.
SVG's got to win.
I think to keep him.
If he doesn't win this weekend, he's not making the chase.
That's my prediction.
And I don't think that's too far out on a limb.
The guy that was probably the most disappointing
in San Diego was Austin Cendrick.
And he is plus eight.
So, not too far from being on the outside looking in.
Priest always, he just keeps grinding away.
They're letting Joey Logano hang around.
Don't let him do that.
It happens every year.
Don't let him do it.
He just let him hang around.
He's getting pissed off.
And he was kind of just up there every once in a while this weekend,
but wound up gaining 11 points to the cut line.
So, you know, McDowell is still floundering down there.
21st, 34 points out.
His teammates are eighth and ninth in the points.
So, definitely some issues with the 71 car
compared to his teammates.
And Chastain's actually only 40 points out.
There's a lot of guys that have a shot at making the 16.
But we're going to Sonoma.
Like Chastain has run good there.
Almond Dinger, McDowell.
Zane Smith.
Zane Smith.
He's been pretty solid.
You know, he's been pretty solid on the road courses.
So, I think this thing is wide open.
The bell part is the one I have the question mark about.
Because he was off at Pocono.
They got him in the game with the strategy call.
And obviously had the issues at San Diego.
I mean, he's busted up, right?
So, how far down does he fall before he can get himself back
to a spot where he's competitive?
So, you know, I think he's the question mark that I would...
Normally, I would say that that plus 60 is going to be good to go.
But I think he's the question mark.
I think William Byron plus 59 is fine.
Eric Jones.
I mean, could be a bad weekend for him at Sonoma.
Yeah.
So, you know, I think Sonoma is...
It's a wild card weekend.
A good part of the year.
You know, I think there's a couple of these guys
that need to capitalize on going to Sonoma,
but very different than what we just did.
Very lower speed, a lot of technical corners
that you just need to get the car in the right spot,
get the car placed, get the throttle down.
And not a lot of places to pass, right?
Like you can make a pass going into turn two,
but it's kind of a dive bomb.
You can do the same into three,
but it's kind of a dive bomb.
11, right?
Is it 11?
You can do the same into four,
but, you know, so seven and 11
are really your two firm passing spots.
But Sonoma is a...
It was always one of my favorite racetracks.
It's a fun racetrack.
A lot of technical rhythm corners that you...
You don't do a lot of shifting, honestly,
at Sonoma because of all the different
low speed types of corners.
So it's a fun place.
Fun place for the fans to go as well.
What are you looking forward to about it
and who are you watching?
Uh, I love Sonoma County.
I love going out there.
It's just...
Oh, no, there's always good energy.
The one thing about it,
I wish that we went there when the grass was green
because it looks immaculate when the grass is green.
This is... I didn't even know...
I didn't even know it got green.
It's like a whole different place.
It's like...
You think you're in Europe.
I didn't even know it got green
until I went with the Ferrari Challenge Race.
I'm like, oh, the grass actually isn't always brown here.
Yeah, I've never seen anything like that.
I had no idea.
It's beautiful.
But it's gonna be fun.
And I think, you know, you talk about A.J. Amundinger.
I think he's been running all year,
somewhere between about 15th and like 20th.
And I do like how the chase goes,
takes the top 16 because it, you know,
it gives you a chance for a guy like that
to make it into the postseason
and try and make some noise.
So, and then also guys right after,
not too long from now, is Atlanta too.
So Echo Park.
So you don't want to mess up here.
You don't want to mess up there.
And you don't want to mess up there
because when you're not a maximize Sonoma and Echo Park
because the playing field is different than all the other games.
What about Daytona?
Oh my gosh, forgot about that.
So you got three out of nine.
Yeah.
A road course in two super speedways.
You got to, when you get to Daytona,
you got to be in striking distance.
That should be your goal.
Whoever you are, if you're on the outside looking in,
you want to be in striking distance by Daytona.
If you're on the inside,
you want to be too far away to be caught by Daytona.
You've got six other races
that you can have a little more control.
And one's loud.
And one's indie.
One's indie.
Yeah.
So, I mean, it's a tough run to the end of the regular season.
So it's a good time of the year.
I'm really excited.
The way the points are laying out.
And we didn't mention them,
but honestly, shout out to 11, Denny.
I mean, they gutted it.
I really thought he was going to run like 25th.
Yeah.
He's plus eight.
And it went from, or minus eight.
The flip, the flip was big.
He's continuing to cut that.
That was a huge win.
Deficit.
The flat tire going down.
He was, I mean, that really changed,
that changed the whole complexity.
It's getting very interesting as these races continue to click by.
Before we get to the sips,
we do have a mail bag question this week from Joey Dutcher,
saying, my boys five and six years old are new NASCAR fans.
And through the influence of grandparents,
my boys started getting interested around Daytona last year.
I am a big fan myself.
Throughout the last year,
I've listened to this podcast in order to understand more of the sport.
It has been very helpful hearing more about the mechanics of the car,
tire wear, et cetera.
Kevin, with that said,
he says, I do have a question for you guys.
How do drivers get good runs?
Is it the line you drive skill, wind draft,
missing bumps, all of the above?
What say you?
It's, it's very simple.
Passes are made off the corner.
There you go.
Yeah.
That's it.
So I tell Kealan that all the time.
We talk about it all the time
because he thinks that you can dive, bomb it in the corner.
And that's what the run starts off the corner.
So you get in the throttle,
you got to turn before them and get in the throttle before them.
And that's what starts to get you the position on,
on that left of your quarter panel to set up that pass.
There you go.
Thank you, Joey Dutcher for sending in the question.
There's nothing better than when you know you're better than someone
and you get that thing pointed and the gas up
and you just kind of ease out up next to them.
They're like, well, I'm dead to rights.
Like they don't even give you, they don't even try.
It's great.
All right.
We appreciate you, Joey.
And your sons as well, being fans of the show and fans of the sport.
Yep.
Just turn it off now, Joey.
Turn it off because right now it is mama's social steps.
He's taking the reins.
Ladies and gentlemen, my friends of the north
and the 17 other countries that came to join us in San Diego,
you got to stop by the Ram display.
I really appreciate it.
It was cool.
There's a lot of closers, closers.
There's a lot of closers out there and we had a lot of fun.
So let's get into it.
Some guy that was having fun to start the weekend.
He put a lot of work in.
Got to give him credit.
Carson Hosevar was fast this weekend.
He was fast on Twitter too.
So Kay Adams was coming out to came out to the race.
They had a lot of celebrities out actually.
They did, yeah.
And Kay came out.
She was very inquisitive all weekend on social and fan
joint gauging and she's like, just met Carson.
What do I need to know?
That's a very wide question.
And Carson fired back, very nice meeting you.
You have to send me that video while you were in the pace car.
And I didn't know what that meant.
And so Carson rolled up next to her,
I guess because she was riding in the pace car.
Yeah.
And probably fired up and waved or whatever.
Right.
And a fan got it, which was cool.
And she thought it was wild because it was obviously.
But the best part, this part, Kevin, thanks for the kisses.
Wonder what that means.
That's from Carson to Kay.
I'm still trying to.
Maybe Eric.
Figure out who Kay Adams is.
She's an NFL broadcast.
Yeah, she's she's a G.
Yeah.
We honestly should probably have her on because her perspective
from the sport from where her first race would probably be cool.
But yeah, she's a lovely lady and Carson was a shooting a shot.
Thanks for the kisses.
Thanks for the kisses.
And then I don't know if he actually got kisses or not,
but I feel like we're going to find out.
You think she likes his belt buckle?
No, probably no.
I don't think he has one of those belt buckles for real.
That's on the fire suit.
Yeah.
He should.
You know, he does actually.
I actually know he does.
Yeah, I think he wave sent him one.
Okay.
Yeah.
All right.
It looked like it looked like Woody.
They come out with a new toy story movie.
New toy story.
Yeah, I'm excited about that.
It could be Woody.
He should be.
He should do a Woody.
Oh, it would be a great Woody.
He should do a Toy Story car.
Yeah, he should do that for Halloween this year as Woody.
That'd be perfect.
Yeah, Sheriff.
So, shoot your shot, kid.
I'm here for it.
Jimmy Jam.
Jimmy Johnson race.
We just talked about a little bit ago.
Race in the truck race was having fun.
I think driving, not racing, the competition.
And this is kind of what he had to say about racing
with the new young bucks of the truck field.
Maybe the cup series has changed, but I just,
there's so much carnage in so little respect.
I've never experienced anything like that.
Racing up front is always a bit more give and take,
but trying to come through the field from 10th or 12th
wherever we were, I mean, every truck was wasted.
And I'm like, okay, I'll just get through these guys.
And, you know, I just got wasted in the process.
So wasted.
It's truck racing.
I mean, look, truck racing has always, always been rough.
And I think that the, really the whole generation of racing has,
like he just, it's just different, right?
Like it's just, and I think I'm more tolerant of it
because I watched it.
And I've watched it from the time Keelan started
as far as the legend cars, the go-karts and how rough it is.
Like they're just aggressive.
And it's just, that's not how Jimmy and I started.
Like it wasn't like that.
Like you didn't tear up, you didn't,
you didn't intentionally tear up the cars
and by running into each other, now it's, it's rough.
I think it should go back to how it used to be.
You think?
I mean, I, I mean, I don't, you know,
there should be some respect paid for sure.
Yeah. We didn't have it in the Sips, but a little side sip.
Yeah, a little side sip here is Adam, Adam Andretti
and Parker Klingerman going, going at it too.
And Parker, oh, he was just getting wrecked for a whole lap.
And Adam's like, who are you?
And Parker's like, I didn't even know your last name was Andretti.
That's a disgrace.
And it was awesome.
Like that was so great.
So little side sip.
Um, and now we got, um, so racers are tough
in all motor sports, I feel like.
I was really excited when I saw this video, uh, to show you guys.
Okay.
So you weren't a racer.
I'm tough as Nick.
Watch this.
You said tough, tough.
Watch this.
Oh, yeah.
Oh, he just gets up like nothing happened.
I don't know how old this, this guy is,
but he looked pretty young when he pulled the helmet.
Oh my gosh.
Gassed up, full into the wall.
So this is like, I think this is like that, like that flight,
flat bike, uh, racing.
They're all ass too.
And it was like the throttle home.
And watch this.
It's got back up.
Yeah.
That's a good guess.
Violence.
Have you guys ever ran into something like that?
Yes.
At least one time I was going to the, uh, I was going to the rifle
range or the gun range downtown and I just, I was riding my bike
and I was pedaling my ass off, off.
And my chain came off when you're pedaling hard and it just goes into free will.
Oh yeah.
And that thing I got the wibble wobbles like this and I hit a light post head on.
Never made it to the gun range.
That hurt.
Blame the bike.
That's awesome.
Well, that's the best way to end the zip right there.
Thank you guys for joining us.
Closers.
I love y'all.
I'll see you in Sonoma.
Let's get it going.
Well done.
That was good.
All right guys.
Time now for our last call here on happy hour.
And we got to grade the burnout from the first cup win for Mr. Kory Hein, which
Hang on real quick.
Yeah.
Imitation is a best former flattery and I'm glad that people have taken our burnout segment
and brought it to their other, to their segments.
I didn't even notice, but our friend Kory LaJoy has a burnout board all of a sudden this year.
Kory.
It's also called last call.
It's also called last call.
So we appreciate y'all.
Just remember where it came from.
That's all.
That's fine.
Anyway, go on.
So what do you think of Kory Hein's celebrations and the way he came down with the team and all
of that when he won?
He started off, it was pretty good.
I like how it reminded me of SVG's burnout a couple years ago when he did the, was it at Chicago?
Sonoma.
We did all the high, if Sonoma, you're right.
We did all the high fives down the wall.
He got the first one and then the car kind of faded away and they missed the rest one, but
they missed the rest of the guys.
But it was a solid burnout.
It was.
Not bad, not bad kid for your, for your first cup series burnout.
So that was, that was pretty good.
I don't think it's top three.
Okay, but it was good.
I love that he already has a signature move too.
Like he has his own thing.
The Heim time thing.
That's a little more points.
So maybe we'll not, not top three.
Yeah.
Top five.
Top five.
Yeah.
The Heim time thing.
You know what's cool about like Heim time?
I mean, I have a reminder with Shadoi, like, like Shadoi Sanders is like, this is, or like,
this is fun.
Like he leans into it.
He used to do the eight town down because, you know, he's from Marietta.
Corey Heim.
He used to do eight town down like Atlanta.
Oh, eight town down.
I'm sure.
I never saw him do that.
Yeah.
When he first won.
When he first won.
I like that he switched it to Heim time.
Yeah.
No, Heim time is fire.
It is.
Good job, Corey.
I like it.
Not so great for the standing's sake.
Kevin is still leading, by the way, with 77 points.
But both him and I picked SVG.
So we didn't pick up anything with the day.
So I'm at 56.
You're at 53.
You did.
Well, no, you didn't get points, but you picked Ty Gibbs, who ended up 15.
Yeah, I should.
I should get like one point for just not wrecking or not.
He wrecked.
No, hang on.
Hang on.
I'm finishing.
They didn't even, the whole right front splitter.
No.
Oh my God.
Everything was gone.
So, but that was exactly why I didn't pick SVG was because I'm like, I just feel like
he's going to get taken out somehow.
Now, I didn't think that it was going to be because they weren't fast enough.
Yeah.
And that's kind of what got him in the situation because they weren't in control.
So bummer.
So now we have another decision to make on what we think is going to happen in Sonoma.
I'm still sticking with the SVG because I think he will redeem himself this weekend.
I mean, last year, he put a waxing on like this was a very
easy, easy kind of wind from smoke.
It wasn't even close.
So do we have three votes for SVG or what are you guys thinking?
Do we want to win or do we not want to win?
Yeah.
Go ahead.
You were already talking.
You're already talking.
I don't want to.
But it was such an ass-whip last year.
Like, you know what?
Give me Connor Zillich.
Oh, wow.
Okay.
Zillich.
Give me Zillich.
Two first time winners in a row maybe in the Cup Series.
Did Zillich not beat SVG in the O'Reilly car there?
Didn't that where he beat him?
He did, yes.
They were battling hard together.
Or is that where they wrecked?
No, they wrecked at Watkins Glen.
That's right.
Last corner at Watkins Glen.
And they wrecked also in Chicago.
Yeah.
Okay.
So Kevin, what are you thinking?
You took Zillich?
Yeah.
He did.
Okay.
I'll take SVG.
He's having questions like he wasn't going to do this whole time.
He does those mind games for a second.
It's not even a mind game.
It's like, so next play in with you.
Next week are you going to, wait, next week are you going to go back to 11?
Probably.
Probably.
Because we're going to Chicago.
Can we have food producers?
Can we do a run it?
Can someone tally up how many times he's picked the 11 and the 97?
It's about four this season.
No, it's more than that for sure.
You're like a, you're like the same sore loser that the rest of these losers are.
I try, you can't pick the same.
Oh, we got to make new rules now because he's played the system blah, blah, blah.
He's been what?
Yo, that's how you know he's been watching social media because y'all been getting to him.
Keep firing away.
Well, they don't get to me.
He's getting, you're getting to him.
Does anything?
No, look, I've lived in a 50, 50 life forever.
50% love me.
50% hate me.
Oh, come on.
They all love you.
Closers love you.
Speaking of, speaking of, we had an email question come through.
It says, hi team.
We are in Australia and our big fans of the show watching every week.
Mamba always says closers or closers.
We aren't sure.
Just wondering what they are.
Thanks legends.
Kind regards, Alicia and Scotty Simpson.
That's fine.
It's, well, what do you say?
You said close your closer.
By the time I get to the closer part, we've done the sips.
So I've, you know, sometimes I'm a little, a little sauced up.
You know, I got to figure out what this word was.
That what did, what did SVG say after the race?
Oh, he said he's filthy, filthy, filthy.
Yeah.
See, they asked him.
We can't tell you.
You don't know if mom was saying closers or closures.
So it's closers.
It is closers.
It is in the door.
We learned that filthy meant.
Mad.
Mad.
It's filthy mad.
Filthy mad.
Which I, it was awesome.
It's kind of like the, the C word.
They're not supposed to say that.
Don't say the C word here.
Yeah.
But you can say melt.
There's different words that are not appropriate.
You can say melt though.
Like will does.
You can say melt.
Melt.
Melt.
And that technically means just like what a mess.
Well, yeah, I think you like melt down.
Yeah, melt down.
I was like, melt.
Okay.
I like that.
We're going to make that a thing.
Will's, Will's going to keep giving us new words.
I know.
We get so educated when Will is in the makeup room.
It's true.
Yeah.
No, wait, in case they, in case they didn't know,
because they asked if, what I was saying, the closers,
you're a closer.
If you watch the show, you're a closer.
If you like Kevin, you're an older closer.
If you like Caitlin, you like style and you're closing.
You like being cool.
Yeah.
But you like me and you're a closer.
See, they, they, they, they don't really know how the closers
came about.
Came about.
Oh, you're going to tell them.
Why don't you tell us?
Tell them, tell them how the closers came about.
Because Kevin could close the deal on the racetrack.
He would come at, he would come at a nowhere.
It was called, I was called the closer.
So the closers are just kind of a throwback to my nickname.
His fan base, yeah.
Yeah, but you had like, you had like three wins in a season
that you led like two laps basically,
which I don't even know how you do that.
Because you got to lead at least three to have three wins.
Right.
So it happened a lot.
Yeah.
That's the backstory.
It's got lucky a lot.
Very good.
Just seemed to be.
When the light for the brightest in the stage was the biggest.
You know who always showed up?
Kevin freaking Harvard.
That's right.
True statement.
What a statement to end the show on.
This has been fun for Kevin, Mamba, myself.
We'll see everybody after Sonoma.
About this episode
Hosts kick off with reactions and then zoom into the weekend’s bigger picture: leaving the inaugural San Diego race, touring the USS Carl Vinson, and soaking up an aircraft-carrier atmosphere tied to the 250th anniversary. They break down why Corey Heim’s win stood out—he “doesn't get rattled,” beat Tyler Reddick, and looks ready for full-time Cup racing. The conversation also turns to late-race incidents, sportsmanship, and what to expect next at Sonoma, including passing spots and “wild card weekend” pressure.
Original notes
NASCAR just made history by racing on an active military base for the first time ever, and the inaugural Anduril 250 at Naval Base Coronado did NOT disappoint!
In this episode of Kevin Harvick's Happy Hour, Kevin, Kaitlyn Vincie, and Mamba Smith break down a historic weekend in San Diego. We witness rising star Corey Heim capture his first career Cup Series victory in just his 13th start after an intense late-race battle with his 23XI Racing teammate Tyler Reddick and a hard-charging Bubba Wallace.
Plus, we break down one of the weirdest track security breaches in NASCAR history after an individual jumped the fence to have a conversation with Sheldon Creed on-track during a red flag.
Finally, the crew looks ahead to Sonoma Raceway for the final road course weekend of the season, answers your fan mail about how drivers build up momentum for passing, and Mamba brings the heat in Social Sips featuring Carson Hocevar and Kay Adams.
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