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Term
sim work
“Sim work” is practice in a computer driving simulator. It can help you learn the track and plan where to brake and turn, but it’s not the same as driving the real car on the real track.
Term
scans
In this context, “scans” refers to capturing detailed measurements of the track surface using specialized equipment. Those scan-based models are used to improve simulator accuracy and help teams understand how the real pavement will behave under tires.
Term
lines
“Lines” are the paths drivers choose through a corner. A good line is usually the smoothest one that keeps the car fast and stable from entry to exit.
Term
dive bombs
“Dive bombs” means braking extremely late to try to get ahead at the last second. It’s risky because you have to be very precise to avoid losing control or hitting the other car.
Term
practice qualifying
“Practice qualifying” is like a practice session where drivers also try to go fast, similar to qualifying. It’s partly about learning the track and partly about seeing what pace you can run before the real qualifying.
Term
protect those big open
“Protect” here means defending your position by blocking the best spots for other drivers to pass. It’s about controlling where they can go when the track gets tighter.
Term
tire packs
Tire packs are stacks of tires set along the track. They act like a cushion to help slow and absorb crash energy, but they can still get wrecked if cars hit them hard.
Term
bail out lane
A bail-out lane is a safety area on the track that gives drivers an alternate path if they mess up a turn. It’s there to help prevent crashes into the wall.
Term
joker lane
A joker lane is an alternate route on the track you’re sent to if you don’t stay on the main course. It usually costs you time (like a stop-and-go), so it’s a penalty for going off-line.
Term
Jersey barriers
Jersey barriers are the long concrete blocks you see along roads and tracks. They’re meant to stop or redirect a car, and they’re much tougher than tire stacks.
Term
looped it
“Looped it” means the car spun around (like it rotated too far) and lost control. That kind of spin often leads to hitting something.
Place
Chicago Street course
The Chicago Street course is a race track set up on city streets in Chicago. Because it’s a street course, the grip can improve as more cars run and leave rubber behind.
Term
fastest lap
A fastest lap is the single quickest lap time a driver records during a session or race. It’s often used as a performance benchmark and can reflect how well the car is set up and how the track conditions are evolving.
Term
rubber gets laid down
As cars drive around, they leave rubber on the track. More rubber usually makes the surface stickier, so cars can go faster.
Place
Sonoma
Sonoma is a famous race track in California. It has more hills and elevation changes than some other tracks, which can make braking and cornering feel different.
LIVE
The following is a production of Dirty Mode Media.
First of all, I mean, thank you for everyone coming out.
This is pretty awesome on Fridays.
I know everybody's pretty excited.
We want to thank America's Navy, obviously,
for partnering with us on this show.
Start your journey at navy.com.
And I know some of you are already well on your way to doing that.
This is a big day for military families
and Coronado residents to be out here.
And I know we have a few NASCAR fans as well that I recognize.
So that's pretty awesome.
And yeah, I mean, it's everybody walking around, Ryan.
It's been like everybody's pretty fired up
and being like, what do you think? What
Yeah, I appreciate everybody who came out today.
And I think the weekend is just going to get better and better.
You know, today, everyone's kind of getting their bearings.
I think tomorrow and Sunday is just going to be absolute pandemonium,
which is always fun and good.
And yeah, it's an awesome thing to be out here,
to see the base like this.
I was out here a couple of months ago when we filmed the Amazon show
and they had nothing set up.
So it was fun to come out and then see like, okay,
this is how everything's going to look, you know?
And yeah, so it's a hell of an experience that we get to come out and do this.
What has it been like seeing the base kind of transform though?
Like you go out here, it's a military base,
and you come out here now and it's full racetrack.
Yeah, it's changed a lot.
Honestly, I still am in disbelief
that the Navy and Coronado are letting us do this.
I really can't believe that we're here.
I never would have thought in my career that we would be racing, you know,
on an active base and so it's just great to see everything set up.
Doing the track walk this morning was really neat.
Getting to see all the different, a lot of different surfaces out there,
you know, from kind of the main roads to then the pads here.
They're changing a lot.
It's a rough one out there on the surface,
but that's what makes it, you know, have so much character, which is good.
Yeah, what's crazy about when you do the track walk,
I mean, we saw it on iRacing and stuff, but when you're really going out there,
first of all, you see the road being really rough,
but there's parts where it goes like, all right, you're going down a road.
Oh, suddenly it's a parking lot.
There's like paved stripes like where people would park.
And then suddenly it's back to airport, airline tarmac, right?
Like you guys are standing on right now.
And there's train tracks.
There's train tracks.
So we got it all.
We got it all here at the base, so it's good.
We get a little bit of everything.
I'll tell you the coolest visual.
I think while being out there is going to be into turn three.
We see the aircraft carrier going into turn three.
So I hope I'm paying attention more to the corner and not the carrier.
When I, when I go break into that corner, we'll see.
So I asked Bubba with that.
I was for a story road and he's like, I'm not going to be the dumb ass that crashes
because I was looking at the aircraft.
Yeah, be a heck of a way to go though.
Yeah.
Like what happened?
I was looking at the aircraft carrier.
That's acceptable.
So I mean, 11 crazy thing about this track Ryan, when, when you're walking it is
like a lot of the corners are super wide.
Yeah.
It's, it's like, I haven't been, I haven't seen a road course or a street course.
I guess like this where it's just wide open.
I guess, you know, when you're trying to learn that in the sim, how did you figure
out what the right line is?
Where, where, how long did it take you to figure out how to get around this place?
Yeah, you know, we did sim work.
I will say a lot is different from the sim.
I mean, we, they did the best they could with the scans.
You know, they brought machines out here to scan the surfaces the best they could,
but walking the track this weekend, it's going to be even different when we get on
the track to practice because you can only feel so much, you know, under your feet
walking.
But yeah, I mean, you're going to try to be able to find like through, you know,
turn two, turn three, turn 45 you know, you're going to try to be finding
different lines that are the smoothest and watching truck practice kind of helped
you kind of watch and see how those guys are running.
And all right, that seems to be the smoothest line.
So we kind of have that luxury of going, you know, third out of the series that
practice and we get to watch a little bit.
But then yeah, you get to turn eight and nine.
It's a really wide exit of eight to a super sharp right-hander and nine.
So kind of how do you race around people doing that?
You're going to see a lot of dive bombs into there.
12 is kind of the same way that little section in 12, you know, and then like 14,
15 are kind of unique in its own way.
So making fast lap time with those types of corners is going to be one thing for
practice qualifying, but then racing around people.
You're going to have to run those areas a different way to protect those big open
kind of turn into tight corner areas.
So that all that stuff is kind of the beauty of racing, right?
You kind of run it a certain way by yourself and then when you're racing
around other cars, you have to kind of run it another way.
So all that, you just really learn on the fly.
And then looking at some of this track, though, there's tire packs out there.
Yeah.
Is there any way these tire packs don't get smoked?
Because we were in that, we went on a ride yesterday and you go, it's really narrow
through there and it just feels like someone's going to get right, you know,
shoved off right into them.
Yeah.
12 is that really tight corner where the tire pack is.
They made an opening now to where you have a bail out lane, which is good.
Like a joker lane?
Yeah.
Like, I mean, if you miss the actual road course, you have to go do a stop and go.
But I mean, I tire packs are going to get smoked.
For sure.
I just hope not to be the person that does it.
But if you are going to hit something, the tire packs are softer than the Jersey
barriers and the walls that they got out here.
So pick and choose your poison if you're going to hit something.
We saw in truck practice today is coming out of 16 onto the front straightaway.
Two drivers kind of took it wide and basically looped it into the, you know,
smack it with their back end on the wall.
Yeah.
Yeah.
That's a tight corner 16 heading onto the front stretch.
Like you go from tarmac.
So fairly smooth ish concrete.
And then you go on to really rough pavement asphalt.
So that transition is that's a fast corner.
It's really rough.
That's kind of a how brave are you type corner like 16 and turn one or how brave are you
type kind of faster corners, but it's super rough.
So they're going to have to be really precise in how you do it.
And there's not a lot of room for error.
Like the margin is super small.
If you make a mistake and then there's no runoff, right?
You're just going to loop it around.
And if you do loop it, you're probably going to end up in a wall.
So there's going to have to get up to speed with that.
It's kind of a give and take.
Yeah.
Kind of wild that you guys, it's a brand new course.
There's so many unknowns and you have 50 minutes of practice to go figure it out
on the longest track in NASCAR.
Same for everybody, right?
We're all figuring it out together.
But that's the fun part.
That's the challenge of going to these new places and things like that.
And drivers and teams enjoy that.
How quickly can you all as a group figure it out together?
And how do you work through practice?
How do you work through qualifying?
And then you're just going to keep getting better in the race.
Like as you get more laps and more track time,
you're just going to get better and better at trying to find new things.
And I think like Chicago Street course was a big indicator.
A lot of guys are in their fastest lap,
two thirds of the way into that race when it was dry.
Because the track gets faster on these street courses just because more rubber gets laid down.
And the drivers figure it out too.
So you're constantly learning, especially when you don't really have a lot of practice today.
Did you see any of the truck series practice?
I tried to watch as much as I could.
What did you think off of turn one going into turn two where they've got that decline there?
It basically looks like a jump almost and then some drivers were getting air.
Oh yeah, yeah.
X games out here now.
It's good.
But yeah, that's a really big downhill into turn two.
And then it's kind of another downhill into three right in the braking zone.
So not a lot of elevation changes out here unlike Sonoma is a big hilly climb.
Those two spots, those two downhill braking areas are going to be tricky.
Big wheel hop spots.
So that's going to be ones to work through.
Well, obviously everybody's going to be watching Shane Van Gisbergen.
He is quite the dominant driver on these type of tracks.
Where do you think it would be to make it fair for everybody?
Where should he have to start to give everybody a fair fight?
Half a track behind everybody.
Okay.
Last stage though.
Last stage.
Last stage, half a track behind.
I think he could still get to the top five.
Yeah, he's unbelievable man.
I mean, everyone talks about it all the time.
And when Shane came over and ran the Chicago race, you know, 23 years ago.
It was his first race.
Everyone didn't really know Shane, but I watched him in V8 Supercars for a long time.
So I knew how great he was.
And this car is very similar to the V8 Supercars over there in Australia.
So I knew he was going to be a problem for the rest of us.
And he's just the talent level that he has.
And he's getting really good on the ovals too.
He's just a talented race car driver.
It's taken him a while to get used to the ovals just because it's his first time doing it.
But he's come a long way there.
And then, you know, yeah, just the street racing and the road course stuff, he's just so precise.
And he can be faster and more precise than he's running 85%, you know.
So it's just his skill level on this stuff is very, very far advanced.
SVG or the field?
SVG.
I can't, I can't release that information.
But his track record is pretty good, man.
He's going to be the one to beat.
I mean, obviously when we come to these places and he's the bar that everyone tries to get to, you know, he's the new bar.
And it's been difficult to try to catch him.
Well, I think we have a microphone out here somewhere.
If I'm not mistaken.
Mike Davis, there he is.
He's back back in the back and we got some people live here.
So let's let's see if Mike has a fan question.
What's up guys? How are you all doing?
So I'm here with the bad ass.
Come here.
This is Lieutenant Contney.
And you see that big boy over there, that helicopter?
He flies that.
So that's his?
That's his.
That's his.
He brought it from his house.
So Lieutenant Contney, tell us what your call sign is because he has a question for you guys.
So my call sign is prison Mike.
Yeah, we know prison Mike.
Jordan and I personally have met prison Mike already.
We did.
We gave you guys a tour of the helicopter.
But my question is, what would your guys' call signs be for each other?
Ryan, go ahead.
Well, when we filmed that movie, they gave me whiskey as a call sign.
Whiskey.
I didn't know how I felt about that.
I'm like, is that a personal dig?
Do I drink too much or what?
So I was whiskey.
So I want to stick with that.
Well, I've kind of named myself Scooter for the weekend because Jordan's already laughing.
Because it's a great nickname for him.
I'm scootering in.
I bought a scooter from Walmart a couple days ago, 39 bucks.
Put it together.
I'm used to putting together my kid's scooters.
So I got that thing going.
I don't have a rental car and I'm staying over here on the island.
I'm scootering in.
Jordan's been making fun of me the whole time.
But then I see that Blaney and Chase Elliott today.
We're sharing a scooter.
We tanned him a scooter in here this morning.
It was, yeah.
I tried to get him to sit on the handlebars.
It would have been fun.
Yeah.
Yeah.
The scooter is the way to go.
I'm staying at the Dell and I just wrote down Ocean Boulevard and get here in no time.
Here's my issue.
I've learned that I don't really have a problem with the scooter because everybody's using them.
It's the helmet.
He has this like little child helmet that just makes him look absolutely ridiculous.
And it's like lose the helmet and you'd have a little bit more self-respect.
First of all, I'm bald.
Okay.
So I don't want to just be going out in this beautiful San Diego weather.
We're at a baseball.
You can't get sunburned.
Well, second of all, I'm trying to protect this, you know, like I'm not, I'm 45 years
old.
I'm not saying I'm the most coordinated.
I'm not like two race car drivers.
Yeah.
I mean, they're able to have a little bit more balance.
Could you get a helmet that fits then?
If anybody wants to buy me a helmet, I'm glad to give one a try.
But I just brought my bike helmet from home because I figured plan ahead.
I bought it.
You should get a full face helmet.
There we go.
Visor down and everything.
Absolutely.
I thought about getting some roller blades to pull that trigger.
The whole, the problem with roller blades is, is if you go transition from like a smooth,
like, you know, surface and then it gets a little rough and then it just, it ends up
bad.
Sounds like you have experience with that.
And then you're looking, oh yeah, I don't, I'm not a, don't own two roller blades.
And then you're looking for a patch of grass to fall into.
Well, Jordan, what would your, what would your call sign be?
I would let you guys pick.
What would you pick for me?
I think that's the way you have to do it is you have to have someone else pick your call
sign.
They told us when we toured the base.
Maybe like Casanova, kind of a ladies man.
I don't know about that.
That's what I'd say.
Scoop.
Philly cheesesteak.
Down in a Philly cheesesteak over there.
The Arby's good.
I'm sorry.
I didn't really have breakfast today and they offered me Arby's.
I'm going to eat it.
He wants to be scooped because he's breaking the news.
He wants that.
But, but prison Mike and some of the other ones when we were here were telling us that
you don't get to pick.
Yeah.
You don't get to pick your call sign.
It's not like you, you know what I'm saying?
That's such a great one, dude.
I met, I was, when we were out here, I met a guy.
His call sign was, gosh, it was either, I think it was rabbit or lettuce.
And I was like, how'd you get that sign?
And he was like, I just, it was rabbit.
And he was like, I just, I eat a lot of lettuce.
Okay.
So they gave him.
Yeah.
It's sort of like, you know, people are like making fun of you essentially, right?
Yeah.
In a good way.
Natured way.
Right.
We think.
It's up to you to ride in a scooter.
Yeah.
Yeah.
I think we, hey, Mike, I gotta, I think there's a gentleman out there that has a question.
Well, he's, he's a, he's a good looking guy with the aviators and the green hat on.
He's got a question.
You don't have one?
I'm not messing with him.
I ain't got it.
Hey, prison Mike has an idea on a call sign here.
Mike, it's all yours.
I think we're going to let scooter ride.
And then for Jordan, I think we're going to go with Tinderella.
Oh, I love that.
I think that's it.
Tinderella.
Tinderella.
Oh man.
Lovely.
That's beautiful.
Thank you, prison Mike.
I will accept that humbly.
Yes, you will.
You've been swiping right or left out here.
What are you even doing?
Yeah.
It doesn't matter if you accept it.
Right.
That's officially your call sign for now on.
Tinderella.
Tinderella.
I'm going to have a lot of fun with that.
Thank you, prison Mike.
Beautiful.
I loved, I loved being here.
There's a pit board, by the way, prison Mike.
Have you seen it?
The Sam Hunt, one of the Sam Hunt cars has their pit board as prison Mike.
Really?
Yeah.
There you go.
That's where you need to be this.
Yeah.
Home the sign.
I mean, what do you think in general just about being here?
I mean, you spent a lot of time here.
Yeah.
You came for the promo video that they did, and you came back to film NASCAR vs. the
Navy.
But by the way, who's seen NASCAR vs. the Navy on Prime?
Oh, cool.
What an amazing acting job this guy did, right?
I mean, jeez.
It was fun, man.
Like seriously.
Are you actor, race car driver, or actor or no?
Semi professional, race car driver, amateur actor, and tattoo artist.
Tattoo artist.
It's off of, tell it out your notes.
No, I've spent a lot of time out here.
It's gorgeous.
The first time when I came here was my first time in San Diego in general, and it's, gosh,
it's a gorgeous area.
Can't really beat the weather out here, honestly.
So I've had such a good time and just getting to meet the people here from the base.
They've been amazing to us.
Wookie, who kind of runs this place, he's been fantastic and getting to talk to him and
getting to visit the iBar has always been a fun experience.
And did you guys go to the iBar?
Oh, yeah.
What was your favorite thing about the iBar?
The mugs and the ceiling.
Yeah, mine too.
I thought that was so cool.
You know, getting the coins.
I bought like $300 worth of coins, and I was just putting them in mugs.
Oh, that's cool.
Yeah, you can buy drink coins for people.
I just think the mugs on the ceiling, that's just the, that's one of the coolest things,
I think.
Go in there, grab your mug, have a drink, and put her back.
Now you're a big hat guy, and if you walk into the iBar, a lot of you probably know this,
if you walk in there and you're wearing a hat, you have to buy a round for everybody that's in there.
And your hat can't be on the bar.
Your phone can't be on the bar either.
And you cannot touch the model airplanes.
Can't touch the planes, that's around.
But so did you, did you have your hat off before you went in, or did you have to?
Yeah, I learned the rules.
Okay, good.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, pretty quick.
Sometimes I would just put my hat on just to have an excuse to buy a round for everybody.
Oh, really?
Yeah, I would be like, I don't know, or something.
But no, that place is great.
But no, this has been a fantastic experience.
Well, we also came out here a couple of weeks ago with the Navy.
And Jordan and I got to tour three squadrons.
And of course, I'm going to brag here because I got to say he's already annoyed.
I got to do the flight simulator for Osprey, and I successfully landed it on the aircraft carrier in the ocean.
I did kill everybody twice.
It was my third time.
Other than that, it was great.
It worked great.
You know, third time's a charm.
Jordan never, I mean, he immediately killed everybody.
No, I accepted that.
I didn't want to spend 45 minutes practicing like you did as everybody sat around and waited.
Everybody's sitting around.
We're getting ready to leave.
And he's like, oh, can I do it again?
And we're all looking around like, are you kidding me?
And he sat there for like 45 minutes.
And we're all just sitting there.
Five minutes.
No, that is blatantly false.
And we're all sitting there like, okay.
And we're just twirling the thumbs for like 45 minutes as he does this.
It's like, OK, great.
Congratulations.
Woo-hoo.
For Jordan's turn, they're like, hey, just ease up off the runway.
So all of a sudden, he skyrockets straight up.
And our instructor's like, all right, so we're actually in commercial airspace now.
And then he just starts pulling on the joystick and immediately inverts us and crashes us.
Yeah.
It's just getting a feel for it.
Yeah.
You got to know the limit.
That's why you just hit reset.
That is exactly it.
Anyway, in America's Navy, every role matters to the mission of keeping America safe, Ryan.
OK, I got to do a read here, guys.
So sorry if I'm scripting it.
With over 150 jobs to choose from, you can be part of a team that's making a difference
every day in a specialty that fits your skills best.
Whether you're flying fighter jets, driving aircraft carriers,
embarking on classified special operations missions,
or you're one of the mechanics who make our missions happen.
Every job makes an impact on our nation.
Want to learn more about what job is right for you?
Visit navy.com today and start your journey.
America's Navy, forged by the sea.
What a great read.
Thank you.
Round of applause for this actor slash ad reader.
Thank you.
I graduated high school.
It was good.
I can read.
But by the way, before we move on, speaking of Ryan Blaney's acting,
who's seen the Undercovers episode?
So about half there.
So Eli Manning has this show, The Undercovers,
and people, as you would think, go undercover in disguise.
Ryan went to the Team Penske Shop as this old British man named Hamish.
I mean, it seemed like in the episode, you convincingly fooled many people.
Yeah, that was a lot of fun to do.
We filmed it in the winter.
So you go in there, sit and make up for like two or three hours.
They gave me an ungodly big nose.
Like, definitely fake, you could tell right away.
And then they just ship you out into the wild for like five hours.
They're like, good luck.
Don't mess it up and don't blow your cover.
My gosh, this is kind of nerve wracking.
And the director was in my ear.
It looked like a hearing aid, so it kind of fit the character well.
But he would kind of tell me what to do if he had an idea.
So there was one, I licked a carbon fiber splitter.
And that was all him.
He was like, lick it.
I'm like, this is odd, but yeah, I guess this guy would do it.
But that was a lot of fun to do.
We fooled a lot of people.
I think a couple people caught on pretty quick.
But there was a lot of people, like when I did with the pit crew guys,
none of them had any idea.
And I didn't even tell them until the episode came out.
Like I just wanted them to watch this episode and be shocked that
that was that old guy poking me in the belly with his cane.
Yeah.
So that was that was a lot of fun.
It was a good time.
How did they bring in this group of people?
They marketed it as like, oh, it's a it's a tour of Team Penske.
You know, whether you're a fan of Penske or not,
like just to be able to see the race shop, what goes into it.
We're going to film it.
That's why they had cameras there.
So they came up with like this whole story of why there was cameras,
how they got the people out there to the shop.
And then I was just one of the people.
Yeah.
It was it was fun.
It was fun.
I'm happy no one caught on too quick.
You said you thought a couple of people within the group though kind of caught
on to you.
It didn't come across that way.
I thought so.
There was one guy that was a big fan.
Oh, yeah.
And he kept talking to me.
I'm like, this guy knows like immediately.
And I asked him after the show.
I was like, man, did you know that was me from the from the rip?
And he was like, no, I just like talking to old people.
Okay.
That's awesome, man.
But no, there was there was some guys, I think they kind of knew.
And then the director would be like, get away from him.
Get away from him.
I'm still talking to him.
Yeah.
Yeah.
The guy that was you're talking about.
I mean, this guy has a plain t-shirt on it because not everybody was wearing it
was NASCAR fans in general.
So not everybody's wearing plainy stuff specifically or Penske stuff.
And this guy like kind of makes a beeline toward Ryan.
And but yeah, he really seemed to not know and he just was being friendly.
So like people for him.
Yeah.
It's good guy.
How about how about when you went to the go-kart track?
He goes out to this go-kart track.
He starts puttering around and then he ends up ripping laps.
I mean, at that point, like once you're ripping the laps, did people you think people were
like, all right, I think they were like, oh, that's somebody.
Okay.
That's somebody.
But yeah, that was a fun part.
I went through the dirt one time.
I off-roaded it did not expect it to be as rough as it was off-roading it.
But that was that was then we got like a legit fast go-kart and made some laps and then we
revealed ourselves.
But it was fun.
I wrecked.
I wrecked a couple people on accident, ripping by them.
But it was good.
You can't get mad at me.
I'm just the old guy.
You can't drive good and see.
And I'm just holding on for dear life.
Mike, you have another question out there.
Groucho has a question for you guys.
Well, first of all, Ryan, I didn't know who put the chips in our steins, but I found
one in mine the other day.
So I appreciate that.
But my question is of the drivers, who would be who do the best in boot camp?
Who would be the first one to cry?
And who would get kicked out for disciplinary reasons?
That's a great question.
All right.
You got all that?
Who would get kicked out for disciplinary reasons would probably be Noah Gregson.
Yes.
That's not a dig it.
No, I'm just, you know, who would be the best?
Man, I feel like Suarez is pretty fit and athletic.
I think Daniel would do a really good job.
Chase Elliott would probably do a really good job.
Who would, who would cry and quit?
Gosh, all of us, dude.
I don't think we could make it.
I really don't, you know, we couldn't, couldn't do what you guys do, couldn't make it.
Mentally, I feel like I'd be okay.
I don't think physically I could do what you guys do.
Like, and mentally, I'm probably off as well.
But yeah, I think all of us would, would ring the bell pretty quick.
I think you'd be all right.
I think there's others that would do worse than you, Ryan.
I think there's others that would do worse than you.
I feel like I'd be middle of the road.
I would be, I would be middle of the road.
I was going to say, we saw Groucho's mug.
He helped us in the I bar and stuff.
So it was great.
You went to the bar?
Yeah.
He gave us the whole tour and everything of the I bar.
How good of drinkers are they?
They're doing okay.
I would give the award to Blaney and I don't know anything else.
Blaney is going to win that award.
Am I right?
Yeah.
I don't want to do my own horn, but yeah.
So I think we're going to play a game now.
All right.
This is a blind ranking game and Jordan is the host for this game
and Ryan and I are the contestants.
All right.
Let's see how this goes.
Here's the game.
We are going to blind rank these.
I'm going to ask you five drivers, one by one.
I want you to answer this.
Which driver would you be okay babysitting your kids?
So Blaney, we'll start with you.
He has a seven month old and I have a seven and a five year old.
So it's a little bit may vary.
Taking care of a baby is slightly different than giving the kids their iPads.
So we'll start with Ryan and the first driver on the board is Stenhouse.
Where would you rank him one through five on this?
I'd rank him at two.
Two.
Why is that?
He has a young one.
Okay.
Yeah.
So he's been through it.
Jeff.
Yeah.
I mean, I'll just put him at three.
I need to leave myself some room here.
You know, I don't know who's neck.
Who else is there?
So I'm just leaving myself.
Speaking about Stenhouse, I think he would be really good in the boot camp
because he is the cross training stuff.
Okay.
Number two, a guy you know well, your teammate Joey Logano.
Where were we ranking him?
Joey's got like 11 kids.
I mean, Joey would probably be number one.
Oh, wow.
I've locked in.
I've locked in one and two really quick.
Yeah.
I put Joey's one.
But you're right.
He's got a lot of kids.
So that's gotta go somewhere.
All eight ranges too.
You know, so he knows.
I mean, as Ryan said, I mean now Joey's also has foster kids.
He's got kids of his own.
I would be very comfortable with leaving him with my kids.
I'm putting him number one as well.
I don't need to.
P1 on the board.
That's not a surprise.
So let's be honest.
Okay.
Number three is Connor Zillich.
Young at Connor Zillich.
Five.
Yeah.
Kids like 20.
Five?
No idea how to change a diaper.
I don't even think he's 20.
I think he's 19 still.
19?
Well, even worse.
Yeah.
Who's changing whose diaper?
Yeah.
I would come if I'm like, hey, Connor, watch my kid.
You know, for like six hours, my kid would have the same diaper on.
Everywhere.
I mean, I wouldn't change a diaper either.
Yeah, that's fine.
Gotta get in there.
But yeah, he's five.
He's five.
Wow.
You may regret that, by the way.
I'm putting Connor at five also just because I'd rather have somebody that's a parent
preferably.
I mean, there may be other non-parents on here.
But yeah, I mean, I would just rather have somebody with a little bit of experience.
So.
Well, you're going to regret this.
And here's why.
Next one on my list.
Noah Gregson.
Yeah.
I would, you know, I'm confident with Connor at five and Noah, he's friends with a lot
of like driver's kids.
Right.
Like he's good with kids.
I put him.
We're going to go for.
Yeah.
He's a big kid.
Yeah.
For the older kids, they love him.
I feel like Noah would change a diaper.
I feel like he would.
Oh, it'd be a mess.
But yeah.
Yeah.
I mean, for me, I actually think I might put him at number two here.
I think that Noah would be like a lot of fun.
Again, like I've got a seven and a five year old.
They want to be entertained.
Right.
Again, the baby thing's a little bit different.
You got to make sure they're fed.
You got to make sure they're down for their nap.
You got to change the diapers.
By the way, Nicole here, she took care of my oldest daughter for the whole first year.
She was our nanny when we were living in Portland.
And now she, she keeps track of Ryan Blaney's radio chatter.
Yeah.
Which is never that exciting.
You never say anything interesting.
She's got her book.
She's got her book right there.
Keeping track of how many f-bombs he's dropped.
I feel like I have a fairly low count this year.
Yeah.
What is it, Nicole?
So, so.
I can't hear you because I have these things on.
What is it?
There's, there's trucks anyway.
2023 pace?
That was a good year.
Yeah.
That was a good year.
I just want to say though, you are very, very creative when it comes to adding adjectives
and things on top of words.
It's a Picasso like.
I appreciate that.
I'd like to think of myself as a thesaurus every now and then.
The f-bomb thethorsis.
Yeah.
Thethorsis.
All right.
Who's my three?
Bubba.
Oh, easy number three.
I mean, if he was, he would be P1.
He would be P1.
You know, but those spots are taken.
But yeah.
Bubba, easy P3.
Okay.
Yeah.
And I have to put him at four.
That's the only one I have left.
Now, I obviously regret the spline rank because he would have been great.
He's got two young kids.
Yeah.
He's got a year and a half old.
I think his daughter's like three or four months.
Yeah.
I mean, especially with, in your situation, he's, I mean, you step right in.
Oh, yeah.
So real quick, Ryan's list is Logano, Stenhouse, Bubba Wallace, Noah Gregson, Connor Zillich.
Jeff is Joey Logano, Noah Gregson, Ricky Stenhouse Jr., Bubba Wallace, and Connor Zillich.
Yeah.
And please don't, somebody's going to tweet this to Bubba and he's going to get pissed
at me.
He's going to say.
I hope so.
Just know that he was the last spot.
I'm going to have to explain this in context for him next time I see him because otherwise
he's going to be like, what?
I hope he does.
If he could redo, if I could redo my list, it would be different, but that's not the
game.
That's what the blind ranks all about.
Well, you got to know it too, which is just, that seems high, but I get it.
He don't want to fun.
You know, he's going to be fun.
It's like the fun uncle.
All right.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
How long do you want the fun uncle around the kids?
Well, I mean, we're not going too long.
It's a.
Going out to lunch.
Yeah.
An hour or two tops.
All right, Ryan.
So the outlook on the season.
We're 10 races left in the regular season here, including this one.
And, you know, we've all talked about where you need to be in the point sannings before
to go in the chase.
You know, there's a lot of people that say top three is the way to do it.
Top six with this new system.
Where do you think you need to be in the point sannings by the time this thing starts for
the playoffs?
I read that stuff of like, oh, you need to be in the top six, you know, and, but honestly,
I think you can be, you can be anywhere.
Like you can, you see big point swings all the time and, you know, the way the format
is for winning all the extra points you get.
Like, yes, obviously you like to be in the top half, but a guy who's 12, I don't think
you're not out of it.
Like to start, like you're, you know, not too, too far behind.
So, I mean, personally, goal for us, like realistically, it's going to be hard for us to get to one
or two with Denny and Tyler.
So we're just trying to stay third.
You know, we're in a heck of a race between, you know, Chase, Ty, Larson, C-bell.
You know, we're kind of all in the dogfight.
So hopefully we can stay third here and start to, start to chase towards the front.
One of the popular topics of conversation this year and really the last few weeks has the,
has drivers adapted to this new format and their driving style?
Are they more or less aggressive on the racetrack?
And it's kind of all over the board.
I, racing out there, I don't think the racing has changed a ton.
I don't think drivers are more aggressive or less aggressive.
I think it's just, it's normal racing.
Like you have moments to where you're going to see super aggressive stuff.
And then, you know, there's some moments to where, you know, hey, I just, I need a salvage a decent day.
But that's the same as before.
You know, that's the same.
You're always wanting to have a great day or just salvage something.
You know, if you can scrap out a top eight, you know, then that's, that's what you got to do.
So I don't think anyone's been laying up because, you know, they're looking at points more.
So I think it's just the same, same great racing.
I'll tell you, I do look at the points more than I ever have now, just because you're curious of where you're at in that battle.
Because the swings can be really big each way.
But no, I don't think the Autrack product has changed.
I still think it's the great racing that we see week in and week out and, you know, drivers going for things because winds are much more important, I think.
So, yeah, I think what's going to be interesting, Ryan, is like, yes, this is sort of similar to the old chase, but the old chase didn't have stage points and it didn't have this many bonus points for winning.
And I think we're going to get like a few races in because in the old system, you could already start to see, oh, Jimmy'd win early on or he'd start to pull away and be like, all right, here he goes.
But I really think that even if somebody has a bad race or gets off to a mediocre start, there's enough time with stage points and you go win real off a couple wins.
I mean, look at what Denny's done the last month, month and a half.
You know, I mean, no one thought, you know, everyone was like, oh, no one's going to catch Reddick.
You know, no one's going to catch Reddick and Denny has caught fire and he's only 19 points back or something like that from 130 or whatever he was.
And that's happened within three weeks, four weeks, so that's going to happen.
Like you can see these big ebbs and flows of it.
Yeah.
All right, Mike Davis, are you back out there?
We're calling you for another fan question here.
I've got a couple.
Do y'all have time for a couple?
Yeah, absolutely.
First of all, Blaine, you pointed him out.
I mean, look at this man.
He's a specimen.
Tell us your name and what's your question.
I am Lieutenant Connor Gidry.
My question is, wait, what's your call sign?
My call sign is Elsa.
He might, he might kill me for making a vast question.
I was with the Connor last night.
So my question is, you guys keep going on about SVG versus the field.
I like to think a red-blooded American is going to win the first race on a naval base.
So if it's not SVG, who do you guys think is going to do it?
And Ryan, are you still lying to people about your golf handicap?
He doesn't believe me about my golf handicap.
What is it?
It's an eight right now.
He doesn't believe me, though.
Wow.
That makes two of them.
He's never seen me swing.
He doesn't believe me.
Who do you guys think is your favorite rather than SVG?
I would put Zillich in as having a chance.
I think he's, yeah, he's out of rough season, but road courses are right in his wheelhouse.
I think he would be able to adapt to this pretty quickly, be up to speed.
You know, I think that also it has to help being teammates with SVG to some extent.
I mean, you're not going to be too far out of the ballpark looking at all the data that he has and set up wise.
So I know it's kind of a stretch for a guy that's never won a cup race, but I put him up there personally.
I agree.
The three drivers that jump out at me, Tyler Redick, Ty Gibbs, and Michael McDowell.
All really, really good on road courses.
We saw Redick win a road course this year.
They're in the game.
I mean, Ty Gibbs at times has been close to SVG.
And so, yeah, those are the three that come out to me.
I think those are all, those are really good.
Yeah. And Connor, by the way, he helped us get through a lot of this experience out here.
We got some cool magician patches from the squadron.
He quizzed us on some NASCAR trivia.
So, yeah, we appreciate you, Connor.
Thank you, buddy.
And by the way, Connor, I went up on a helicopter on top of it to do the maintenance.
He helped me up there.
And Jordan was standing there saying, oh, I wish I hope he falls.
It would not have been funny if he would have fallen.
Like, seriously, this guy trying to do military stuff who's not qualified for it.
And he took it bigger.
Like, we would all laugh, right?
Well, we were, Connor, we were way up high, right?
I mean, that's the thing is, yeah.
15 feet, 15 feet, right?
He said 15, not 20.
Okay.
If I fall from 15 feet, that's still going to be quite painful.
You would have been fine.
It would have been funny.
It would have been funny.
It would have been hilarious.
Well, thank you, Connor.
So we got some comments here now.
And we, this is one that we may have touched on earlier, but we can go to it again.
You know, unfortunately, Blaney, I feel like you get asked this every single time,
every single, everywhere you go.
This guy, John Henry from John Henry NC.
Blaney has a talent to invent words that contain the word, the F-bomb.
So, I mean...
You can say it, Jeff.
You don't have to say it.
No, I would hold not to swear on this.
Here.
Yeah.
But also, I was recently talking to Kyle Busch's former PR rep, and he thinks that
there's a real chance that Kyle may have invented the term buckets of that.
And I Googled it, and I was like, because, you know, you would hear Kyle be like,
this is a wrecked bucket of that.
And I'm like, no, surely that's out there.
And according to Google, if you look, the Kyle Busch mentions pop up.
There hasn't really other people that said that.
So, inventing words that contain that, that may be a real talent.
It's always fun, man.
You just combine things and hope it sticks, and it's good.
But yeah, the bucket of F is, that's a Kyle Busch classic.
Yes.
That's a great one to describe what you're driving.
Yes.
Yes.
Another comment here says, I met Ryan Blaney at the Dover Track walk a few weeks ago after
the O'Reilly race, and someone asked him to do a Jell-O shot, and he did.
Yeah.
Nice.
How was it?
It was good.
It was good.
It's hard to turn down a Jell-O shot.
You know, like if someone offers it, you kind of got to do it, because I feel like you
get judged if you don't.
And it's rude.
It's building fan relationships.
Right.
It's building, you know, thank you for making this for me.
I hope you didn't put anything in it.
And besides Jell-O and alcohol, and you know, we're going to do this together.
It's always weird doing Jell-O shots with random people, because it's awkward eating
a Jell-O shot.
You know, you kind of, you got to scoop it out of the thing with your finger or your
tongue.
It's always a little awkward.
But yeah, I remember that group.
They were fantastic.
They also handed me a beer, which was even nicer of them.
And the group, they had the Jell-O shots, backpacks of beer, they were stocked up for
this track walk.
And they also had fake mustaches.
Oh, they were hardcore.
They were in the club.
Yeah.
Yeah, they were in the club.
So, best way to become a Ryan Blaney fan is offer you beer, and then you're going to
become a fan of them.
Of course.
Of course.
It's just a mutual two-way street.
I mean, I will say though, like the Jell-O shot thing does concern me.
You saw Denny take one on prime last week when he was at the victory thing.
And then on his actions detrimental podcast this week, he was like, yeah, maybe I shouldn't,
you know, I don't know who this, but you know, you're a likable fan favorite.
So you wouldn't think somebody's trying to do anything.
Oh, I hope not.
But yes.
Oh, I hope not.
Yeah.
But somebody that's...
But like an accident or something.
Right, yeah.
That would really be messed up, man.
Yeah, yeah.
That would be so messed up.
Hey, here's a Jell-O shot.
They're secretly a fan of another driver, and they're just trying to like, you know,
hurt your chances.
Yeah.
That would be messed up.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Mike Johnson here says, bro, looks like he would be a llama farmer, LOL.
This is on brand for YRB, which it is because you do have a llama and other assorted animals.
Yeah.
So we've gotten another llama since the first one I got.
We had two.
We had to trade in models.
We got one in the winter.
His name was Cusco after Emperor's New Groove.
He was a big boy.
He was six years old, 351 pounds, and he was not very nice.
He was nice at first, but he was...
So the story with Cusco, we came from this llama farm near Winston-Salem, North Carolina.
It's a winery and a llama farm, which is just an amazing place.
The guy breeds llamas.
He has like 120 llamas.
We got Cusco.
Cusco was a breeding llama.
Six years old, still had everything.
And so we took him home with us, and you could only get one llama because they protect like our goats and chickens and stuff like that.
If you get two, they just bond together and they don't care about the animals they're trying to protect.
So we only had one, which is kind of cruel, but that's how you're supposed to do it.
And so poor Cusco goes from six years of his life being a breeding llama, just living life to nothing.
And so obviously this guy was a little angry.
Understandably.
Understandably.
I could only imagine.
So he got pretty aggressive.
He reared up and pushed down my mother-in-law's boyfriend's kid.
Oh.
So after that, that was kind of the final start.
He charged at my wife every like a couple of times.
So we were like, we probably need to trade him in.
So we got a six-month-old llama.
His name is Kevin.
Wow.
I don't know why we come up with Kevin, but he's kind of like an albino llama.
Like he's all white.
I got super bright blue eyes, and we think he's deaf.
Oh.
We don't think he's deaf.
Does it respond to anything?
No.
No.
Unless he sees you, he don't know you're there.
So we had an idea that he was deaf.
We're like, man, I think he can't really hear very good, because he'd walk in the
pan and walk in his shed, and he would never respond.
And then he would see you out of the corner of his eye and he'd freak out.
Like he'd scare him.
But you'd be like, Kevin, Kevin, and he would not respond to you.
So we've been having some problems with llamas.
Like I don't think it makes it for a pretty good livestock guardian being deaf.
Like Massacre could be happening behind him.
And he's just like.
I'm no llama expert.
But that seems like that would be high in the list of things you'd want if you're
going to hire a llama to be your guard, your protector.
Well, we didn't know that he was deaf.
I don't think the owner knew he was deaf either until we got him.
But we're sticking with Kevin.
I was going to say, do you say they're Sikh?
Can you return them?
No, we probably could.
The guy's super nice.
We would trade in.
But I would hate to trade another one in.
But Kevin's good.
He's part of the family.
He's a lot smaller.
He's only 150 pounds.
But yeah, he has hearing troubles.
You get a llama punch card every time you get a llama.
You punch a hole.
Right.
You get 10 of them.
You get a free one.
Yeah.
But yeah.
But he's done a good job for us.
So we did lose a goat.
It wasn't Kevin's fault.
We did not lose a goat.
Well, if you would have heard, he saved it.
She passed from natural causes, unfortunately.
So that was a rough one because we got our three goats.
They're all sisters.
They're all girls.
And we had them.
We got them when they were like three months old.
And we had them for two years.
So we kind of raised them.
And so that was a rough one.
Her name was Peanut.
We lost Peanut.
So that was a sad day for me and my wife.
But we had to get another goat.
So we'll have to get a couple more goats now.
But she's buried in our backyard.
We got a headstone for all that stuff.
A little pet cemetery action going on.
But yeah.
So hopefully we get two more.
Don't laugh at this.
It's sad.
I've just laughed at the pet cemetery.
It was sad.
It seems like it's a...
It's stunk to dig a hole.
I'll tell you that.
That sucked.
Losing a pet sucks.
It's awful.
All right.
Moving on.
Another comment from Blake at Frosted Blakes 6.
That's a great name, by the way.
In awe of the mustache, that is majestic.
Even Ron Swanson would bow down to that.
Wow.
I appreciate that.
Ron Swanson, that's a good comparison.
I get Flanders every now and then from the Simpsons.
I don't know what I think about that one.
Yeah, you don't want that.
Yeah, the Flanders one.
But it's accurate.
You know ones that you're like, I don't know about that,
but it's accurate.
You're like, I can't really argue with that one.
But no, I appreciate it.
That's a nice comment.
I think the mustache, people either love it or hate it.
It's kind of 50-50, I feel like.
But yeah.
That's a good look.
Yeah, it's not bad.
My wife likes it, so that's really all that matters.
It's distinguishing, at the very least.
Mustaches are making a comeback.
They are.
I'm happy about that.
They disappeared for a couple decades,
and now they're coming back.
You should get one, Jeff.
Why don't you go to mustache?
Sometimes, every now and then,
when I'll shave the beard and you leave the...
You know how you have a beard?
Yeah.
You shave it, you leave the mustache.
You're like, how does this look?
I don't think it looks good on you.
What does your wife say?
I don't think she cares.
I don't think she cares.
Well, that's how I did it.
That's how I got them.
Oh, OK.
Shaved my beard down.
I had the big old beard in the winter,
and for like a week, I play with it.
I'll do button chops, goatee for like a couple days,
sole patch, and then I got down to the mustache.
And my wife was like, it actually looks kind of good.
And I was like, all right.
Well, if you like it, I won't keep it.
Well, by the way, I was on Sirius.
I was co-hosting a couple months ago,
and we had Roger Penske on.
And I was hoping that Sirius would make this a clip,
and it never seemed to get out or get any traction.
But I asked Roger, what he thinks of the stash
as early in the season, because for a while, you thought,
oh, it had to be Penske perfect, every clean shaven.
And he was basically like, Ryan Blaney wins.
Like, if you win races, if you're running up front,
I have no problem with any facial hair.
And I was like, OK, Roger, there you go.
Yeah, that's pretty accurate, I think.
If I was running 30th every week, I would probably not be this bold.
But yeah, he's been good with it.
He enjoys it.
He's one of the first people that ever saw it.
Like, I shaved my mustache, and then I went up to Detroit
to see him like a week later.
And he was like, oh, looks good.
Like, thank you, boss.
I appreciate that.
I was nervous.
I was on the plane.
I'm like, I wonder what he's going to think of this.
But he liked it.
He liked it.
Kimberly, she's one of the people that's been,
I recognize her Twitter name, Crazy49.
She's been coming to Tweet Ups since 2009,
so she's a true hardcore fan.
She wants to know about the referencing the undercovers.
If there's any ever time when you do give yourself pep talks
in the car like you did on the go-kart track
without pushing the button.
Are you ever talking to just yourself?
No.
Not really.
I don't really know.
I don't think I ever talked to myself in there.
So you were just doing that for the episode when you were on there?
Yeah.
They wanted to have voiceover and stuff in there.
They wanted you to stay in character
just so they have something to lay over when they're showing that.
But no, in the car, I'm never just like, come on.
You can do it.
Believe in yourself.
No, I don't.
I'll never do that.
The accent.
It was so good.
I was like, surely he's going to slip up at this point.
That's what I thought too.
Because at the beginning it was Australian and British.
Jump back and forth.
Yeah.
But then you kind of leveled into a consistent...
Right.
That was the tough part was, you know, am I going to...
It did go Australian, old British for a while,
but then I finally, I think I leaned into the character a little more.
I started to become him and that was easier.
You had all these clothing options.
You really went all in.
You really got into character.
It was a method.
They had, well, I showed up to make a place and they were like,
all right, pick what you want to wear.
I'm like, oh, awesome.
I get to go shopping here.
I kept a couple things.
I kept a sweater.
I'm stealing this.
I'm keeping this.
This is a great winter sweater.
So yeah, it was fun that they let you really kind of just pick out what I wanted to
to make this person look how I wanted him to look.
There was a comment in the show too that I thought,
so that was like, you actually learned stuff walking through the shop that you didn't know.
I was curious, what did you learn?
I learned, gosh, they were giving us a tour of, I think a couple of like the old Indy cars
that they had there.
And then like an engine and I learned some stuff about it.
Like, oh, Travis Geiser just taught me, you know, about this motor or this old Indy car
that I didn't know ran this race or finished, you know, won this race or something like that.
So I learned a little bit.
Did Travis have any inkling at all?
Oh, yeah.
He knew he was he in on it or is he?
No, but I think he sniffed me out immediately.
Okay.
Yeah.
I couldn't fool him.
Couldn't fool him.
He knew he spends too much time with me.
He knew right away.
I am curious about the sweater though, because like, is this a situation where they have
the wardrobe and you're like, all right, I'm just leaving with this and nobody says anything.
Or did they say like, oh, feel free to take it.
Did you just kind of be like, I asked them.
I said, can I have the sweater?
Okay.
And they're like, yeah, we just we just went to Goodwill and then just bought all this
stuff.
And I was like, great.
And I was like, yeah, I'm going to keep this sweater.
That's okay.
Done with this sweater.
They gave it to Goodwill.
Now Ryan Blaney has kept it for his winter look.
Yeah, it's it was good.
I kept a sweater.
I think I kept an old watch that I was wearing.
I kept that.
I love this.
I love this.
But yeah, I thought what made it even better was I had a bunch of snacks with me.
I thought like that's usually, you know, older folks have a lot of snacks with them,
at least my grandparents.
That's my grandfather always had snacks with them, like crackers, oranges.
So I just had snacks.
And you're handing them out.
I love his handing them out.
And the people are walking up to you saying, hey, do you got can I get some more?
Yeah.
Yeah, it's good.
Yeah.
I think Mike out there has another fan question.
Is that right?
I do have another one.
And by the way, fans, if you're here and you want to ask these guys a question, I think
we'll have about five or 10 minutes to have some rapid fire.
So if you have any, just come back here, line up around me.
And then I have met a strapping young man back here who does have a question for Blaney.
How did it feel to win a cup championship?
Yeah, that was awesome, man.
You know, I grew up around the racetrack with my dad.
And, you know, seeing these guys win championships and me wanting to be a racer, that's what
you want to do.
It's the pinnacle of, you know, what you start racing for.
And the coolest part about that was sharing it with all your crew members.
You know, there's 15 guys that go to war with each other and me every single weekend to
share that and have that memory with each other forever.
That was the best part of that whole thing, seeing them on the stage and just being able
to, you know, hang out with them.
Like I said, have that memory because, you know, you win races with these people.
You might forget a race here or there, but you're never going to forget that you want
a championship together, you know, so you're going to carry that with you the rest of your
life.
So then to have my whole family there as well, you know, my dad, the guy who started me wanting
to race, to see, I think for a dad, like, and now that I'm a dad, really proud of your
kid, right, to do what he loves and succeed at it.
So I was just really lucky, but the coolest part is sharing it with everybody that works
so hard weekend and week out.
That's one of the most special things about that moment.
Guys, my man here, Jesse, has something he's been showing it off to me.
I want y'all to see this.
Ask our members club.
Yeah, but you see how many signatures are on it?
It's a lot.
Guess who's not?
Am I not on it?
Ryan Blaney's not on it.
I'm going to sign that before I leave.
That's what I told him.
I'm glad you said that.
If there's any space, there's a lot of signatures.
He already has a space picked out for you.
So Jesse, we're going to make that happen for you.
Perfect.
He's got a few others.
He may even be asked for your help.
I got another question here.
Tell us your name and where you're from.
Steve, I live here in San Diego originally from upstate New York.
All right, Steve, what do you got?
Hey, Ryan, being a third generation driver, what advice did your dad give you years ago
that you kind of ignored that now you wish you had followed?
Yeah.
Oh, man.
You know, dad, it was, gave me a lot of advice growing up, but I feel like one of the more
important pieces of advice that he gave that I look back on, that was always a like be fully
committed type of guy.
Like every time we went to the next step, he was like, are you 100% in?
You know, you can't be 99% in because, you know, you're not going to have the full love
for it.
So I try to treat that with everything.
Like if you're trying something new or just everyday life, you know, like be 100% committed
to what you're doing, because then you know that you're going to strive to try to be better
at that every single day.
So that was something that my dad taught me when I was younger.
And then there's kind of cliche to say, but like make sure you put extra effort in, you
know, just go the extra step.
Don't do the bare minimum.
I guess they kind of correlate between each other, but dad's always been a big commitment
guy.
So I say whatever you're doing, you know, you have to have a love for it and you have
to be fully committed to it.
Good life advice.
Try to.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Dad's full of wisdom.
You're still letting your child know.
Yeah.
Yeah.
I try.
Mike.
Got another one here.
What's your name and where are you from?
My name is Tim Miller.
I'm from Chula Vista, California and I retired military with my friend over there, Lenny.
There he is right there.
The question I have for you is if you weren't a cup driver, what other job would you be doing?
Yeah.
Unemployed.
Lama farmer.
Lama farmer.
Yeah.
I don't know that.
So I've only ever made a living.
99% of my life was driving race cars.
That's how I've always made a living.
And the only other thing I ever did that I ever made money at was before I started racing,
I would sweep my dad's shop floors, clean toilets.
Like I'd be probably a hell of a janitor.
I think I can work my way around the bathroom pretty good cleaning.
And I'm pretty meticulous on cleanliness and stuff.
So I'd be a good janitor.
I feel like I could be pretty good buffing floors.
You keep your house pretty clean then?
I try to but with a kid it's just a disaster.
Really?
It's a disaster.
Yeah because there's so much other stuff going on.
My wife and I, we have to like every two weeks it's like we kind of freak out and we're
like we got to clean.
We got to do this stuff.
But we try to keep it clean.
Is the whole house like that or is it just like one room?
It's mainly like two rooms.
You know like your living room is kind of a mess because that's where his kind of play
areas and stuff.
I would say mainly just like our living room and kitchen are kind of a mess because you
got food going on.
It's not bad.
But everything else I feel like is fairly good.
He's not walking yet though.
Oh is it change when your kids start walking?
When it walks.
He's like recoiling and hearing support of children.
How many so when your kids started like walking around, Jeff, did you and your wife take all
the safety protocols?
Like locks on the cabinets, bumpers on all the corners.
Wearing helmets?
Honestly this is kind of crazy but this is something that Brad Kozlowski said years ago
that stuck with me before I had kids about how he was handling his kids.
He said you just kind of have to let them make a mistake if they're constantly falling
and you're scooping them up and then you almost like oh oh oh sometimes they have to fall
and be like oh shoot I shouldn't do that again.
Now you try to teach them like hey stay away from the corner of the table or don't pull
down this glass thing but like even with stairs we actually never put up the gates.
We were like we were there like right there like hey let's go down backwards or just carry
them down or whatever.
We didn't let them just go down.
Right.
But yeah I mean I feel like they kind of just got to learn and if you're always just picking
them up to protect them then and plus it's very difficult to baby proof everything.
They're going to get into something.
Yeah.
So it's almost like a false sense of security if you have everything locked you think oh
they're good and then all of a sudden you hear a huge crash of something and you're like
so I don't know what's your plan going to be.
I have no idea that's why I asked you.
Yeah.
I have no clue.
He's about to start crawling so that's going to be now when you set him down and they're
in a different spot than where you set him down.
Right.
That is the real first game changer because it's like you put him here.
You can go to the bathroom.
You can go heat up some food whatever and you'll come back.
They're still there.
All of a sudden when they start they're like whoa.
You know we're chasing them around.
Can you put a leash on them or something.
Oh jeez.
I see those kids at airports with like backpacks but it's a leash.
Oh yeah.
My parents used to put me on on me all the time.
Oh really?
Yeah.
That says a lot.
There we go.
It says a lot.
One of those retractable claw glitches.
They lock you in.
My mom would get mad at me and I would listen.
She would literally just yank it back and I'd be like flying back.
This is something for your therapist Jordan.
Yeah.
Plainly sitting on a couch.
I thought this was a therapy session.
Tell me about your childhood.
Oh we've got Shannon back here.
Our legal expert.
I don't know if this is going to be a legal question or not.
I was going to ask her to introduce herself but you just did a good job of it.
Yes this is a familiar face.
Shannon does have a question.
Actually we have two left.
Shannon and I got a friend right here and then I think we'll be it.
That'll be it for us.
Shannon go ahead.
What have you found most surprising about being a parent that nobody warned you about?
How much they go to the bathroom.
It's unbelievable how something this tiny can cause so much mayhem in their diaper is unbelievable.
The amount of diapers you go through is just crazy.
So I'm just taking a picture as you say as if Jordan's face is here explaining this.
The amount of blowouts that they have.
It is an absolute disaster but it's part of it.
Like I get in there.
I'm like good job man.
That was a good one.
Like I got you.
I'll clean you up.
So that's and what I tell you the craziest part was after he was born you know you're
in the hospital for like two or three days and then they just ship you out the door.
Like they're like good luck.
See ya.
And you're like oh I don't know what to do.
That first day when you get home from the hospital is so it's a crazy experience because
you and your wife look at each other and you're like okay here we go.
We have no one no help.
Like you can't just push the nurse button and they come in and answer questions.
Chat GPT has been amazing.
I was not a big chat guy until I had my son and I asked it so many questions.
Like random just weird things or yeah like is this color poop normal.
You know like yeah.
So yeah are you familiar with blowouts Jordan.
This is not this is why I don't have children blowouts or fun blowouts.
I mean we're not talking about oh a little bit leaked out the diaper we're talking about
it goes all the way up there back.
You're like whoa how did it get up here.
Yeah it's the worst when they're sitting in a car seat is when you get the big blowouts
because there's nowhere for it to go.
Yeah just launches.
Sounds so disgusting.
Yeah man.
My stomach is like turning right now.
Sorry.
It's part of it.
It's part of it.
It's great.
You should have more kids.
Sounds like.
Throw up.
Projectile vomit is good to.
Really like across the room.
Dude yeah my son was sick a couple months ago and he he was just projectiling everything
he drank all the milk he drank.
That's terrible.
And he he was he was laying on me.
I'm on the couch.
My buddy's over and I'm feeding him and he kind of starts.
Sorry I'm talking about baby vomit and stuff.
That ship's already sailed.
Yeah but like it was it geysered.
He said it went four feet in the air and then it just it just rained down on me in the couch
and you just sit there and you're like you don't even get upset.
You're just like all right like whatever.
You're ruining the couch.
That's what I care about.
No I just heck just wipe it off man.
It's fine.
We'll get a new couch in 10 years.
Like you just got to live with it.
I think that's the amazing thing too is like the amount of patience that you realize that
you have.
Yeah.
For this kind of stuff.
Like I could have never thought that I would be able to do.
I would have been like you know if you told me that when I was in my 20s or something out
of like no way could I.
And you're like wow okay I can actually sort of deal with this.
That's kind of amazing.
I hope that answered your question.
I'm sure that's what you had in mind.
She's right there now.
She came closer.
Was there a two parter?
No.
It was just the one.
Okay that's a surprising thought.
We can move on now.
This is great.
The trees just move on.
Sorry we kind of I kind of rambled there.
This is the parenting thing though.
Like you get on a roll talking about poop.
I could talk all day about dad life and child's man.
That is your hobby.
Your child is your hobby.
I'm going to go hang out with Kevin instead.
For our last question I am really praying for a change in direction here.
So here you go.
What's your name?
Arthur.
Where are you from?
I'm from Virginia.
My dad moved here for the Navy.
Right on man.
Awesome.
What's your question for these guys?
If you were in the Navy what job would you want in the Navy?
Great question.
I would love to be a pilot.
I think that would be fantastic.
I don't know what I would...
Osprey's are really cool to me.
I would love to be an Osprey pilot.
Yeah those things are just an amazing machine.
So yeah I would strive to try to be a pilot.
Or try to be a seal.
That's one of the coolest jobs I think in the world.
So one of those two I would try.
What about you guys?
Honestly I would have never said I would want to be a pilot before.
But I'm telling you doing the simulator...
You felt it.
It felt natural.
I got the bug for it.
Honestly I was like I know we're here.
We're going to be busy.
But I wonder if I can get that simulator again.
I don't know.
I can't get it out of it.
The only thing I'm qualified for is to be a chef.
That would be it.
A chef?
Hey.
I'll hang out in the kitchen.
Every job is important.
You're just going to be on the carrier.
I'll whip it up.
You don't want to trust me with a gun obviously.
You know it would be an awesome job.
It's the guys that...
I don't know the term for them.
The guys that are on the aircraft carrier that...
The sticks that get lost to jets.
Those guys are awesome.
Under song.
Those guys are out there.
Planes coming in and out.
That's a whole level of crazy right there.
A massive huge thank you to all of you coming out here.
This was really awesome.
Especially those of you who spent the whole hour with us.
Hope you enjoy.
All three races are going to be quite unpredictable and fun I think.
Obviously a huge thank you to America's Navy as well for sponsoring our show.
We can't wait to meet some of the newly sworn in sailors backstage.
And remember you can start your journey at navy.com.
America's Navy forged by the sea.
Thank you all so much.
Great to see everybody.
We'll see you the rest of this week.
Thank you guys for coming out.
Appreciate it.
Thanks for all the questions.
About this episode
Racing and real-world grit collide at Naval Base Coronado as The Dale Jr. Download hosts Ryan Blaney for a live show with the U.S. Navy. They walk a course on an active base, comparing sim learning to rough, wide-corner reality, then dig into racing lines, late-braking “dive bombs,” and safety features like tire packs and a bail out lane. Between on-track strategy talk, they also cover street-course grip, points momentum, and plenty of off-track banter—scooters, call signs, and even flight-simulator Navy stories.
Original notes
Ryan Blaney is joined by Jeff Gluck and Jordan Bianchi LIVE from the Naval Base Coronado. The guy's chat about what it's like seeing an active Navy base turned into a NASCAR track, what their experiences were like coming out here, and what their call-signs would be.
Where does SVG need to start for the field to have a shot?
The Chase is finally back, but just how close do you need to be to have a shot? Some say top-6...but not Ryan Blaney.
Ryan's mustache has been the talk of the garage, but what exactly did Roger Penske say when he saw it?
Jeff and Ryan also blind rank drivers they would let babysit their kids. Plus, what it's like dealing with blowouts, upset llamas, and more.
America’s Navy. Forged by the Sea. Start your journey at Navy.com.
Check out Dirty Mo Media on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@DirtyMoMedia
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The Dale Jr. Download
Dirty Mo Media, SiriusXM
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