They’re talking about a NASCAR race weekend at Kansas Speedway. Different tracks make cars behave differently, so what works at one place may not work at another.
They’re talking about two different NASCAR series. The top series and the O’Reilly series don’t always race the same way, so the conversation can change depending on which one they mean.
They’re talking about electric cars (EVs) and crossover-style vehicles (CUVs). The hosts are basically saying people are arguing about what the future of racing/automotive could look like.
Drafting means driving close behind another car. The car in front cuts through the air, so the car behind has an easier time going faster and can try to pass.
In NASCAR, “the chase” means the playoff part of the season. Drivers aren’t just racing for wins—they’re also trying to qualify and then earn the championship during the final stretch.
“Kota” is shorthand for the Circuit of the Americas track in Austin. It’s a track with lots of turns, so being fast isn’t just about top speed—it’s about how well you handle the corners and tires.
Atlanta is a NASCAR track where races can get intense and fast. The hosts are basically saying Reddick has been strong in different places, not just one track.
A “last lap pass” means someone gets ahead right at the end of the race. It usually happens because their car is working better at the finish and they pick the right moment to make the move.
“Late race heroics” refers to a driver and team making decisive moves near the end—often during restarts, late cautions, or high-pressure strategy windows. It usually means they’re gaining track position or managing tires/fuel better than rivals when it matters most.
Sometimes a crash or caution happens near the end of a NASCAR race. If it does, NASCAR may add extra time so the race can end with cars racing each other instead of just staying under caution.
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wind column
They’re talking about the number of wins a driver has. It’s a quick way to compare who’s been winning races, even though other stats can tell a fuller story.
This is a stat for how many laps, across the whole season, a driver spent leading. Leading lots of laps usually means the car was strong, even if the driver didn’t win every time.
They’re talking about who’s leading the standings during the regular part of the season. In NASCAR, that lead can affect how strong your position is going into the next phase of the year.
NASCAR has updated the race car rules and design with its “next gen” package. That means teams have to adjust their setups and strategies, and it can make racing feel different from older cars.
They’re saying Chevrolet is dealing with a newer car body and it hasn’t been as quick right away. New bodywork can change how the car grips the track and how fast it feels in races.
They’re referencing a NASCAR championship event that’s sponsored by O’Reilly. The hosts bring it up to remind listeners that Reddick has won big before at Homestead.
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finish under caution vs green-flag finish
A “caution” finish means the race ends while cars are slowed down and not really racing each other. A “green-flag” finish means they’re racing normally to the end. Overtime is meant to help get the green-flag finish, but some people think it can be unfair.
The idea here is that if a caution happens late, the cars behind would line up right beside the leader. That means a big lead might not matter as much, because the restart bunches everyone back together.
They’re using “road course” as a general type of track with turns and different racing dynamics than an oval. Their point is that on road courses, big leads can last longer, so overtime can feel like it changes the result too much.
When a caution comes out, the race slows and cars bunch up. A restart lets them go back to racing at full speed, and “under green” means the race is run normally again. The hosts are discussing whether NASCAR should allow more restarts so the finish is more likely to happen while cars are racing hard, not cruising under caution.
A “super speedway” refers to NASCAR’s largest high-speed tracks (typically 2+ miles) where drafting and aerodynamics dominate. The hosts mention that strategy often changes there—drivers may wait longer to make moves because the race can effectively end right after a late restart or late-lap decision.
Running out of fuel means the car can’t keep going at race speed because it has no usable gas left. In a race, that’s usually a disaster—especially near the end—because you can’t just “make it up” quickly.
A fuel pickup issue is when the car doesn’t pull fuel from the tank the way it should. If it happens late in the race, the driver can run out of fuel or lose power right when they need to be fastest.
A red flag means the race is stopped for safety. When that happens, teams and drivers have to reset their plans, and it can completely change how the final laps play out.
A restart happens when NASCAR bunches the cars back up after a caution. Because everyone is lined up close together again, the driver who was behind can suddenly be right beside the leader, which can feel a little strange.
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Phoenix last fall
They’re talking about a specific NASCAR race at Phoenix where the finish and late-race rules mattered a lot. It’s used as an example in the discussion about whether the rules feel fair.
Stage yellows are planned cautions that split a race into segments. Teams use them to make strategy calls, and NASCAR has changed where they apply depending on the type of track.
Bristol is another NASCAR track with a distinct style of racing. They bring it up to show that not every track produces the same kind of racing, so rules might not fit equally everywhere.
Las Vegas is used as a recent reference point for how intermediate-track racing has been performing. The discussion connects it to whether the intermediate package is “falling off,” meaning it may be producing less exciting racing than before.
The intermediate package is NASCAR’s set of rules and car setup choices for certain mid-length tracks. The hosts are wondering if teams have figured it out so well that the racing isn’t as unpredictable or exciting as it used to be.
The hosts say they’ll decide about the intermediate package after the Coke 600, using it as a benchmark race. The Coke 600 is a major NASCAR event, so it’s treated as a meaningful test of whether the racing product is still delivering.
NASCAR races are split into sections called stages. If someone “dominates a stage,” they’re the fastest and earn the most points during that part of the race.
Tyler Reddick is expected to be one of the fastest drivers in a stage. That usually means his car is working well and he’s managing tires better than others.
ARCA is another racing series (kind of like a “feeder” series to NASCAR). The speaker is using it as a comparison for how the field can split into a few fast cars and many slower ones.
Joey Logano is a top NASCAR driver, and the hosts are using his “off the pace” performance as evidence that not every team has solved the current setup challenge. They note he’s been inconsistent this season, which affects how reliable the performance trends are.
Darlington is a specific NASCAR track with its own quirks. The hosts are pointing out Logano struggled there too, so it might be something about the car/track combination.
Tires aren’t just “there”—they wear out and lose grip during the race. When the tires behave differently, it changes who can go fast and who can catch the leaders.
Sometimes in a race, cars sort of split into groups—some are faster and some are slower. “Multi-group racing” means more than one of those performance groups showed up during the event.
“Silly season” is NASCAR’s nickname for the time when drivers and teams are making contract moves. People spend a lot of time guessing who will end up in which car.
A “multi-year deal” is a contract that lasts for multiple seasons. It usually means the driver is tied to that team for a while, so they can’t easily jump ship.
In NASCAR, each car has a number. “The 48” means a specific car/seat, and the hosts are asking whether Ross Chastain would take that opportunity if it opened up.
Trackhouse is a NASCAR team. The hosts are saying that if a driver has something working well with Trackhouse, it can be hard to give that up even if another opportunity looks tempting.
“Top 10s or more” is shorthand for counting how many races a driver finishes in the top 10 (or better). The hosts are framing it as a way to estimate the impact of switching to a different car number.
They’re talking about how teams collect information from the cars and share it. If a team has more cars, it can spread the work and learn faster—if it organizes the information well.
The Toyota Corolla is a regular, everyday car that’s built for commuting and errands. It’s popular because it’s usually easy to live with and doesn’t require special care. The podcast mentioned it while discussing some points someone brought up about the Corolla.
They’re saying Kyle Busch and Austin Dillon are basically in similar cars. So if one is clearly faster, it suggests the problem might be how the car is set up or how the team is calling the race, not just the car itself.
In NASCAR, the crew chief is the person calling the shots for strategy and car adjustments during the race. If the crew chief is new or making questionable calls, the driver can end up fighting the car.
During a race, the driver and crew chief talk over the radio. The hosts are basically judging how things are going based on what they heard in those conversations.
In NASCAR, each team runs a car with a specific number. The “eight car” means the #8 entry, and they’re saying Kyle Busch should be in a stronger team/car than that one.
In racing, a “learning curve” means a driver is still getting used to how the car and team work. It’s normal to have some rough results at first while they figure out the best way to drive.
“Top tier equipment” basically means the driver has a really strong team and a fast car. If they do well with that kind of setup, it often shows they’re capable even if things aren’t working as well elsewhere.
“Factory support” means the car brand is helping the team with extra resources. That can include better parts and more engineering help, which usually makes it easier to run up front.
“Chevy” means Chevrolet, the car brand. In NASCAR, which manufacturer a team works with can influence how fast the cars are and what kind of support they get.
An “OEM” is the car company itself. If they’re “knocking on the door,” it usually means they’re looking at teaming up with a race team or increasing their involvement.
The “bubble” is the cutoff line where drivers are either safe or in danger of falling out of the next round. When they say someone is near the bubble cut line, it means they’re close to needing better results.
Watkins Glen is one of NASCAR’s road-course races. The hosts are saying it’s especially important to win there because it can strongly affect the points race.
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San Diego must win
“San Diego” here is being used as a race target in the season’s points discussion. NASCAR’s schedule includes events at different tracks, and the hosts are treating this one as critical for gaining or protecting points.
A road course is a track with lots of turns and braking, not just left turns on an oval. The hosts are saying these races matter a lot for the points race.
Running position is where you are while the race is happening. Finishing position is where you end up when the race is over, and both can show whether a driver is improving.
They’re talking about a specific spot in the standings during races—around 16th. If it’s very competitive there, it’s harder to move up and score better results.
The segment references Dale Earnhardt Jr.’s 2017 farewell tour and how it performed in viewership/polls. This is a notable NASCAR media moment because it shows how star power and career milestones can influence audience numbers.
They bring up Harvick while discussing how a particular race did in polls. In NASCAR talk, drivers like him are often used as a shorthand for what kind of attention a race might get.
A “mile and a half” race means the track is about 1.5 miles long. That matters because the track layout and length affect how cars draft and pass each other, which can make the racing feel more or less exciting.
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550 races
“550 races” means a race that’s roughly 550 miles long. Longer races usually require more careful planning for tires and fuel, so the strategy can be a big part of how the race plays out.
“900 horsepower” is basically how much engine power the car is supposed to make. More power can help cars go faster, but race results also depend on tires, setup, and how well the car can put that power down.
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Tommy Baldwin
Tommy Baldwin is a NASCAR figure tied to a team. This part is basically a disagreement about whether certain drivers are being unsafe or reckless during racing.
In NASCAR, cars can end up “a lap down” if they fall behind. A “lead lap finish” means they finished on the same lap as the leader, which usually means they ran well and didn’t get stuck in trouble.
“Lap three” means it happened very early in the race. In the first few laps, cars are bunched up, so small mistakes can lead to big crashes.
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NASCAR equivalent
They’re basically saying the crash felt like the opening scene of a scary movie—right away you see something intense. It’s a way of describing how shocking the moment looked on TV.
“Riding the wall” means a car is scraping or sliding along the outside barrier. It usually happens when the car loses traction and gets pushed up high.
A NASCAR track has straight sections and turns. The “back stretch” is one of the long straightaways, where cars are going fast and things can get dangerous quickly if someone loses control.
In NASCAR, the track has walls/fences around it. If a car “goes into the fence,” it usually means it lost control at speed and crashed hard, which can end the run or cause a lot of cleanup.
Sometimes in crashes, a race car can get hit in a way that makes it start rolling over. “Tried to go upside down” means the car nearly flipped, which is a big deal for safety and for whether it can continue.
NASCAR keeps a running total of points all season. Your finishing spot in each race changes your position in the standings, which is why people talk about “point standings.”
A crew chief is the person who manages the team’s race strategy. Mentioning Jason Radcliffe highlights that the driver’s results depend a lot on the crew chief’s calls during the race.
A “short pit” means the team comes into the pits earlier than normal. They do it to try to get out ahead of other cars so they can control track position for a while.
A pit road penalty happens when a team breaks a rule while driving through the pits. It costs time, which can drop a car back in the running order even if the car is fast.
A “mile and a half program” means the team has a plan for tracks that are about 1.5 miles long. They adjust the car and strategy because those tracks drive differently than short tracks or superspeedways.
“Serving his penalty” means the driver has to take the penalty during the race. It usually costs time, so the team has to work hard to get back positions afterward.
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arrow issues
“Arrow issues” sounds like the car had some kind of aerodynamic problem. When the aero isn’t right, the car can feel off and it’s harder to run fast or pass.
They’re talking about two drivers getting into trouble with each other on the track. In NASCAR, that can mess up both cars’ momentum and make it harder to run up front.
“Pinching” means one car squeezes another so they don’t have space to race. That can slow them down and make it harder to keep speed through the corner.
The apron is the strip of pavement next to the main racing lane. If a driver goes onto it, the car can feel different and may not turn or grip the same way.
In NASCAR, the Cup Series is the main, most important racing level. If someone is trying to get a “Cup Series ride,” they’re trying to earn a spot with a top team to race at the highest level.
The “O’Reilly series” is one of NASCAR’s lower tiers that many drivers use to move up. The hosts are saying that drivers may not fully act like teammates there because they’re focused on getting to the next level.
It means NASCAR has a path where drivers start in smaller series and try to earn a promotion. If you’re trying to move up fast, you might focus more on your own goals than on helping teammates.
This means the drivers might be on the same team officially, but they don’t really act like teammates during races. They may still compete hard against each other because everyone is trying to earn their next opportunity.
A “number one seed” means you’re ranked first going into the playoffs. That usually gives you the best position and makes it less likely you’ll be eliminated early.
“Top six spots” just means the very front of the group—usually the best positions in the standings or results. They’re saying the drivers who’ve already won are occupying those spots right now.
A “wild card” is basically the surprise pick—someone who might be able to jump up and matter even if they weren’t the first name you’d expect. In this case, they’re saying the surprise driver isn’t the ones people are thinking of.
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JRM ride
A “ride” means a driver’s job/seat with a racing team. If they don’t get the JRM ride for the whole season, it can hurt their consistency and chances to perform well.
Super Chat is when viewers pay to have their message stand out in the chat. The hosts are using it as a break to read viewer messages.
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stage break
A “stage break” here is a show-structure term, not a car/track term: it signals a pause in the main discussion to read viewer messages or reset before the next segment. NASCAR fans may associate “stages” with race segments, but the hosts are using it as a podcast timing cue.
In NASCAR, “the 45 car” means the race car entered under car number 45, not a specific make/model. It’s a shorthand for the driver/team associated with that number in the field.
They mention “nine next-gen races,” referring to NASCAR’s Next Gen car era and how often a specific car/driver has won within that early set of events. This is a way to contextualize performance trends under the Next Gen rules and package.
RFK Racing is a NASCAR team. “The 60 team” means the specific car entry with that number, and changes inside a team can make it harder for the driver to get the car working the way they want.
A Green-White-Checker finish is NASCAR’s way of making sure the race ends with real racing. It means they restart, show the white flag for the last lap, and then the checkered flag ends it.
In NASCAR, cars can get “lapped” if they fall behind the leaders by a full lap. Finishing on the lead lap means you stayed in the main group and weren’t significantly behind.
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Hang the banner
It’s basically a celebratory saying—like “put up the trophy” or “time to celebrate.” In NASCAR talk, it usually means a team just did something worth bragging about.
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frame of MJ choking Hamlin
This is a reference to a specific on-track incident or moment involving a driver “MJ” and Denny Hamlin, described as “choking.” In NASCAR coverage, such phrasing usually points to a late-race mistake, loss of position, or a controversial move that cost the driver momentum.
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"rigged"
People sometimes call a team’s winning “rigged” when they think the results aren’t totally fair. They’re basically saying luck or outside factors helped more than driving skill.
Hillwood is the company credited with selling the land near the speedway. The story is about that land being used for big AI data centers instead of racing-related use.
Nashville is referenced as the next race location for the O’Reilly-sponsored NASCAR series. In NASCAR coverage, the city/venue tells listeners what track characteristics to expect (layout, banking, and typical racing style).
Rockingham is mentioned as the place where Cleetus McFarland had practice laps. Rockingham is a historic NASCAR venue, and track-specific practice time can strongly affect setup and confidence for a driver.
Practice laps are runs before the race where the driver and crew try to dial in the car. If you get more practice, you usually understand the car better.
The “lightning round” is a fast Q&A or rapid-fire segment at the end of the show. It’s a format cue rather than a technical automotive term, but it helps listeners understand the pacing and structure of the episode.
ABB is a company that helps with power and charging technology. If it’s mentioned with NASCAR testing, it likely means they were involved in the charging or electrical side of the EV experiment.
Le Mans is a major endurance race that’s known for very different race cars than NASCAR. The point here is that the car they saw looked unlike the other two, even compared to what you’d expect from Le Mans-style racing.
Hydrogen combustion engines use hydrogen gas as the fuel, but they still burn it in an engine. The discussion is about whether future racing could use hydrogen instead of gasoline or even instead of battery-electric power.
A “crossover body” means the race car would look more like a modern crossover SUV. That can change the shape for airflow and make the cars look more like what people buy in stores.
Electric vehicles are cars that use batteries and electric motors instead of burning gasoline. Here, the hosts are discussing whether EVs are actually on the table for the racing series.
A “crossover type series” means the race cars would look more like modern crossovers/SUVs you see on the road. NASCAR would be trying to match what car companies are selling now, not what was popular decades ago.
NASCAR race cars come in “generations,” like different versions of the same basic design. The hosts are saying the O’Reilly cars are using an older generation, which can make it harder to keep everything updated and supported.
“Five lug nuts” just means the wheel is held on with five fasteners. It’s a specific wheel setup, and changing standards can mean teams need different parts.
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parts and pieces
“Parts and pieces” means all the individual components teams need to keep the race car running. The discussion is about how newer NASCAR cars can make it harder for smaller teams to find the right parts.
They’re talking about adding electric-car races as an extra option, not swapping out the regular gas racing. The goal is to keep the racing fans already like while experimenting with EVs.
They’re worried that if NASCAR switches too aggressively to EVs, it could replace the racing people already follow. Their preference is for EV racing to be added in a way that doesn’t ruin the current product.
The Toyota Celica is a Toyota sports car. The host is using it as an example of the kind of specific car that used to show up in a separate, more playful racing series.
An exhibition race is a special, non-championship event. They’re suggesting EV races could be added as a fun side event rather than taking over the main NASCAR series.
The Toyota RAV4 is a compact SUV, meaning it’s a higher-riding family-style vehicle. The podcast is using it as an example of what would be seen instead of sports cars like Supras and Camaros. In that moment, it’s mainly about vehicle types, not racing performance.
A hybrid uses both gas and electricity. The electric part helps the car move and can make it more efficient, but it can also change how the car feels and how racing rules are written.
Aero is how the car’s shape interacts with air. At racing speeds, it can help the car stick to the track and stay stable, not just go fast in a straight line.
NASCAR uses standardized race-car rules so teams aren’t spending wildly different amounts. The “Car of Tomorrow” and later “generation” updates change the race car design over time, which can make older parts harder to find.
If a racing series keeps using older designs, the companies that make those parts may eventually stop producing them. Then teams have to find what they can, reuse older pieces, or wait for replacements.
Reusing parts is a cost-control and supply-management strategy when new components are scarce. In racing, it can also affect performance consistency because parts wear over time and may not be identical to newly manufactured replacements.
In racing, the chassis is the main frame of the car. Teams may be able to reuse it after a crash if it’s still straight and safe, but new car generations can make reuse harder because parts don’t always fit or match.
The Toyota Supra is a real Toyota sports car people recognize. The point here is that the race version should look like the actual Supra, not like a “made-up” version that only loosely resembles it.
A “Hemi” is a type of V8 engine associated with Chrysler. They’re saying the rules and what engines are allowed have changed a lot, so the “Hemi” came and went.
They’re saying the industry’s attention has been flipping between electric cars and non-electric cars. The host’s concern is that NASCAR shouldn’t chase trends so hard that it forgets what matters most: great racing.
“OEM sign off” means the automaker (Original Equipment Manufacturer) has to approve the race car concept—often including branding, appearance, and sometimes technical direction. In this segment, the host frames it as a necessary partnership so the series can build an awesome race car while still getting manufacturer buy-in.
They’re talking about rules changing on a schedule, like every few years. The point is that it’s hard for racing and car companies to plan when the rules keep flipping.
They mean the rules and incentives for car technology keep changing every few years. One year it’s EVs, then it might shift to hydrogen or hybrids. That makes it tough for car companies and racing to know what to build for the future.
Hydrogen fuel means using hydrogen to power a vehicle, usually by turning it into electricity inside the car. The hosts are saying the government might switch attention to hydrogen after focusing on EVs. That kind of flip-flopping can make planning harder for car makers.
They’re talking about the “GOAT” debate—who’s the best of all time. In this segment, it’s being used to argue whether NASCAR drivers or golfers count as “athletes.”
They’re making a point about how regular sports talk shows don’t take NASCAR seriously. They think it’s because people aren’t looking closely at what drivers and pit crews actually do.
They’re talking about the pit crew—the team that works on the car during pit stops. The point is that pit crews are extremely talented and important to race results.
The “garage” is where the team takes the car when it can’t keep racing. Even if the driver avoids a bigger crash, the car may still be too broken to continue.
Pit stops are when the car comes into the pits during the race for service. Timing matters a lot—if something goes wrong or the timing is off, the driver can lose positions.
They’re talking about the next race at Talladega and what they think will happen. It includes predictions and notes about which drivers might make the race.
A gridwalk is when drivers go out on the track area before the race for fans or media. If you don’t qualify and make the race, you usually can’t do it.
Red Bull is another energy drink brand that sponsors NASCAR. They’re predicting Red Bull will be the main sponsor on a winning car at least once this year.
Monster Energy is a brand that sponsors NASCAR cars. The hosts are talking about which energy drink companies will show up as the main sponsor on race cars.
In NASCAR, races are split into sections called stages. Drivers can earn points at the end of each stage, so strategy during those sections matters a lot.
NASCAR breaks the race into stages. A “restart to start stage three” means the race pauses for a caution, then cars line up again and the final part of the race begins. The driver who restarts well often has an easier path to win.
“Rain shorten” means the race gets cut short because of bad weather. If there are fewer laps, teams have to adjust their strategy since there’s less time to make up positions.
Bass Pro Shops is a big outdoor and fishing retailer. In NASCAR, that brand can sponsor a driver and show up on the car’s paint and branding.
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third generation racer
It means the driver’s family has been racing for a long time—three generations. That can help them learn the sport earlier and faster than someone without that background.
“Career starts” just means how many races the driver has actually started (lined up and begun) in their career. More starts usually means more experience, even if they don’t have many wins.
The Hyundai Accent is a small car meant for regular, everyday use. The podcast mentions it while talking about a person’s accent and a “random” detail, so it’s likely just being used as a model name in the conversation. It’s not being described as a race car in the snippet you provided.
A “series win” means the driver won a race in that particular NASCAR series. It’s a way to measure success in one league, not just overall.
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O'Reilly points finish
O’Reilly is part of NASCAR’s series branding, and the hosts are talking about how well a driver did in that specific points category. They’re comparing that to how the same driver did in the trucks series. Think of it like comparing performance in two different NASCAR leagues.
In NASCAR, drivers earn points based on where they finish in each race. So if someone’s “best points finish” was second or third, it means they had one of their best overall results in that series. It’s about how well they did across the season, not only how many times they won.
“Cup starts” means the number of races a driver has started in NASCAR’s top-level Cup Series. A driver with 235 Cup starts has a lot of experience at the highest NASCAR national tier. It’s often used as a proxy for career longevity and familiarity with the competition.
The “truck” series is NASCAR’s national series that races pickup-style race cars. When they say a driver’s best truck points finish was third, they mean that driver finished third in the overall season standings at their best. It shows they weren’t just good in the top series.
NASCAR’s “three nationally touring series” typically means the Cup Series, Xfinity Series, and Truck Series. Winning in all three is a rare accomplishment because it requires adapting to different car types, competition levels, and race formats. Hosts are using this to argue the driver’s career résumé is unusually complete.
Dirt racing feels different because the track surface changes grip constantly. A chassis builder helps design or modify the car’s structure so it handles correctly on dirt.
Dirt track cars are built and set up for racing on loose surfaces like dirt or clay, which changes traction and how the car behaves through corners. Chassis work for dirt track racing often focuses on durability and suspension geometry to keep the car stable as grip varies lap to lap.
“Cup wins” refers to wins in NASCAR’s top national series, historically called the Cup Series. It’s a shorthand for how successful a driver is at the highest level of NASCAR competition.
They’re pointing out that there are 41 cars entered for the Cup race. More entries generally means a bigger, more crowded race.
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no-tier cars
They mention “no-tier cars,” which sounds like cars that don’t qualify for a certain group or rule set. The exact meaning depends on the NASCAR rules they’re referencing in that segment.
This is the name of a NASCAR race weekend event. The hosts are talking about how long the race is and how the stages are split so you know what’s coming.
NASCAR breaks many races into “stages.” Each stage is a set number of laps, and drivers can earn points during each one, so teams plan pit stops around those stage breaks.
This is the main Sunday race they’re previewing. They mention the lap count and stage breaks because those affect when teams pit and how drivers earn points during the race.
This means a big stretch of dangerous storms is expected. In a race weekend, that can lead to delays or cancellations and can make it harder for teams to get the track time they need.
OEM support is when the company that makes the brand behind the race car helps the team with parts or technical know-how. More support can make it easier for the team to get the car working well.
Pole means you start the race from the very front. That usually helps because you avoid getting stuck in traffic early.
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illegal O'Reilly cars
“Illegal” in NASCAR usually means a car is suspected of not meeting the rules—such as dimensions, aerodynamic components, or other technical regulations. NASCAR enforces these rules to keep competition fair, and teams can face penalties if they’re found out.
They’re talking about Talladega, a famous NASCAR track. Because the cars run in tight packs at very high speed, the race can swing quickly and surprises are common.
Average finish means how high someone usually finishes in races over time. If a driver’s average finish at a track is good, it suggests they tend to run well there, even if they don’t win every time.
Ryan Blaney is the driver they’re criticizing as a bad pick for this race. They’re using recent performance trends to argue he’s less likely to finish well.
A “dark horse pick” means picking someone who doesn’t look like the top favorite, but could still win. In NASCAR, races can flip quickly due to drafting and late-race strategy.
“Lead laps” means how often a driver is actually in first place during the race. You can lead a lot and still not win, because the race can change with cautions and pit strategy.
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paint by numbers expected season
“Paint by numbers” is a metaphor for a predictable season where results follow a familiar pattern. In NASCAR terms, it suggests the usual top teams/drivers are performing as expected, with fewer surprise outcomes.
“Pure chaos” means a race that’s hard to predict. On tracks like Talladega, the cars run in tight packs, so small events can completely shuffle the order.
This refers to a caution period (“yellow flag”) occurring late in the race, specifically with more than five laps remaining. Late cautions can prevent restarts and green-flag racing, which affects strategy and how fans perceive the fairness of the finish.
A “restart” is when the race speeds back up and cars race again after a caution. “No restart” means the race finishes under the caution situation or without that last chance to race hard.
Concept
overtime cutoff two to go
This is about when NASCAR decides whether to keep the race going to try to finish under green-flag racing. The proposal is to only allow overtime if there are still two laps left, so the finish is more consistent.
A “caution” is when drivers slow down because there’s a crash or debris on the track. If the race finishes while everyone is still slowed down, it can seem like the drivers didn’t get a real chance to race for the win.
The pit wall is the wall right next to the pit lane. If a car hits it, it usually causes a slowdown (caution) because it’s not safe to keep racing normally.
Saying “the new Dale Earnhardt” means they think a driver is showing Earnhardt-like qualities. It’s about style and performance—how they handle pressure and race aggressively—not about a particular vehicle.
They mean racing electric cars in their own league, instead of replacing the current one. That way fans still get the style of racing they like, but EVs still get to race too.
They’re suggesting races in indoor stadiums. The reason is that electric cars don’t produce the same exhaust fumes as gas engines, so it’s easier to bring racing into cities.
Texas is another NASCAR race track where teams plan around speed, tires, and strategy. The hosts are basically saying they’re looking forward to the Texas race more than Talladega.
Term
slamming the steering wheel
Drivers sometimes yank or slam the wheel when the car feels wrong—like it won’t turn the way they want. It usually means they’re reacting to handling problems or frustration in the moment.
When a race car is “tight,” it doesn’t turn in as easily as the driver wants. It can feel like the front end is pushing wide, so the driver has to fight the car through the corner.
NASCAR races can be extended if a caution happens late. An “overtime attempt” is the extra restart at the end that gives drivers another shot to finish the race under green.
Term
hitting the wheel
When someone says a driver “hit the wheel,” they mean the driver made a sudden, aggressive steering move or reacted angrily. It usually lines up with the car not behaving the way they expected.
It means one driver forces the other car toward the outer part of the track. That can be a way to pass or pressure someone, but it can also cause a wreck if there isn’t enough space.
NASCAR races are split into stages. Drivers can earn points at the end of each stage, so teams sometimes change their strategy during the race to do well before the final finish.
Topic
30 minute charge break
A “charge break” here likely refers to a scheduled pit/stop window during the broadcast where teams can service the car and reset. In NASCAR, these breaks often line up with stage ends and allow for tire, fuel, and adjustments—so the timing can strongly affect track position.
The Dodge Ram is a pickup truck made by Dodge. The podcast is saying it fits the idea of stock car racing—meaning it’s about racing competition, not about being an SUV or an EV. They’re using the Ram as an example of that racing style.
Stock car racing is racing where the cars are based on real vehicles you can buy, but they’re modified for racing. The rules help keep the competition fair so driver skill and setup matter.
SUVs are bigger family vehicles, and EVs are electric cars. They’re mentioning these to contrast them with the kind of race cars they’re talking about.
“Flaps” here means parts on the car that affect aerodynamics—how air flows over it. Changing them can change how fast the car goes and how stable it feels in corners.
They’re talking about racing that uses electric cars instead of gas. That kind of series can feel different because the cars have to manage battery energy during the race.
Topic
next gen eight
They’re talking about NASCAR’s newer car rules/era and how it might compare to the current generation. The wording sounds like they’re not fully aligned on the exact name, but it’s about what the next car generation is called.
Xfinity is NASCAR’s second-tier series. They’re basically asking whether the new rules/car would make the racing feel as competitive as what you see in Xfinity.
Topic
Gen-8
They’re referencing a particular “generation” of NASCAR cars. Different generations can drive different handling and racing characteristics, so fans care a lot about which one is being used.
Richard Petty is a legendary NASCAR driver, so his name carries weight in discussions about NASCAR history and credibility. When the hosts contrast him with another figure, they’re implicitly talking about who belongs in the sport’s “greats” conversation.
The Super Bowl is the biggest NFL game of the year. They’re using it as an analogy to say the NASCAR take was basically “give it to the most popular person” logic.
Crossovers are everyday SUVs/crossover cars that people drive to work and family trips. The hosts are talking about them in a NASCAR context, like they could be racing.
Charlotte Motor Speedway is a famous NASCAR track. The joke is imagining SUVs and EVs racing there, but real race cars are built for that kind of track.
Concept
random driver of the week game
It sounds like a game where people choose which driver will be the “driver of the week.” It’s more about fan predictions and highlights than official standings.
A “flip” means the race car rolled over during a crash. It usually happens when the car gets turned sideways and then tips onto its roof or side, which is why it looks so scary on TV.
On many tracks, there are named sections of turns. “The S’s” means a part of the course with an S-shaped sequence of corners, and they’re saying the incident happened before that section.
Power lines are electrical cables above the track. If a race car hits them, it usually means the crash sent the car off its normal path, which is extremely dangerous.
A “paint scheme” is just how the race car looks on the outside. It’s the colors and decals the team uses for a race, and fans get excited about certain designs.
Company
Michael Walter Racing
They’re talking about a racing team. In NASCAR, teams choose the car’s look (the paint and decals), and some teams are known for having really eye-catching designs.
A late model is a common kind of race car you see at local short tracks. Drivers often use late-model races to build experience and earn chances to move up.
“For the seat” means the driver is trying to earn a spot to race—basically getting a job as a driver. It’s about moving up to the next level.
Term
watch along
A “watch along” is when people watch the race together and talk about what’s going on in real time. It helps you understand strategy and why certain moves matter.
It means there were fewer cars bunched up, so drivers could run more freely. That can change how aggressive you need to be and how you manage tires and the car.
It means you drive carefully so your race car stays in good shape. Instead of taking every risky chance early, you try to keep tires and parts from getting worn out or damaged.
Term
stole Hamlin's fuel at Phoenix in 2010
This is about a past NASCAR situation where fuel rules were involved with Denny Hamlin at Phoenix. In NASCAR, fuel is tightly regulated and teams have to plan exactly how much they’ll use.
They’re talking about problems with how loud races are at some places. Electric cars can be quieter than gas cars, which is why people think an EV series could help.
Topic
AI produced special effects
They’re talking about companies using AI to make effects instead of hiring as many traditional artists. It’s more about media production than cars, but it’s the main point of that part of the conversation.
“McDowell 25” is almost certainly a reference to NASCAR driver Michael McDowell and the car number 25. In NASCAR, the car number is a key identifier for fans and commentators, especially during wrecks and highlights.
That means the car flipped/rotated while it was in the air during the crash. It’s a big deal because it affects whether the driver can keep the car under control afterward.
They’re recalling a famous NASCAR moment from 2009 at Talladega involving Edwards. Talladega is a high-speed track where cars run close together, so wrecks can get really wild.
They’re talking about Pocono Raceway, a NASCAR track. Different tracks have different shapes and speeds, which can affect how crashes play out and what safety changes get made.
A catch fence is a safety barrier installed around parts of a racetrack to help prevent cars from leaving the track and entering spectator or hazardous areas. In NASCAR, these fences are often added or upgraded after crashes show where cars can get airborne or slide off the racing surface.
“Wheels coming off” means the car’s wheel breaks loose. That’s a big deal in racing because it can make the car spin or crash and can also throw debris onto the track.
Spire is a NASCAR team brand (Spire Motorsports) that competes in the Cup Series. The host says it’s the most interesting team to them right now, which can reflect how fans evaluate teams beyond just winning—like storylines, driver development, and competitiveness.
Concept
Dirt Clash
“Dirt Clash” sounds like a race event run on dirt surfaces. Racing on dirt is different from pavement because the surface grip changes, so drivers and cars have to adapt.
Topic
Vargas six tic-tac car 2020 or 2021
They mention a “tic-tac car” connected to “Vargas” around 2020 or 2021. The exact car/model isn’t clear from the audio text, so it’s more like a topic reference than a specific, explainable vehicle.
Concept
NRF got into a beef
They’re talking about a disagreement between someone and a group called “NRF.” In racing podcasts, these conflicts are usually about publicity, sponsorship, or how people are portrayed—not about the actual race car.
LIVE
Drivers! Start your engines!
That was an absolute war.
Not clear.
Awesome.
I'll tell you, my main reason-
What the f**k are you doing out here?
People are saying this race is like f**king idiot.
I don't care. Let me your guy.
What the f**king idiot?
Did you ever think you would see that?
All the f**king thing just happened.
Holy cow, where'd the F go?
Let's go!
And we're actually not in Kansas anymore.
What's going on everybody? Welcome back to NWP.
We got a lot on the docket tonight when it comes to talk about this past weekend at Kansas,
whether it be Cup or O'Reilly, which started just really weird.
Comments from Stephen A. Smith that have went viral on the racing side of the internet.
EVs, CUVs, just craziness when it comes to the O'Reilly series and possibilities,
but it's Talladega week.
Guys, how are we doing on this fine Wednesday evening,
where I think for the first time all year, it's like bright and sunny outside as we go live.
Yeah, it actually looks really nice.
We're all rocking our favorite NFL team stuff before the draft tomorrow.
I think Claude are actually going out to Nissan Stadium to be at the Titans draft party tomorrow night.
Is there going to be like a live stream?
Are they going to like on ESPN, will they cut to you guys when you make your pick?
I mean, probably they're doing it like in the stadium,
like people like getting down at the field and probably having it up on the jumbotrons there in the stadium, I assume.
We're just going to, they're going to cut to Danny either go in like you said,
or just going, no.
Why do we take the paper bag?
Bring the paper bag like a couple of years ago, just in case, just in case you need it.
How are you, Eric?
I've been good for you.
I'm happy to wear this Texan stuff.
And I never thought I'd say that because all my other teams are embarrassing the great city of Houston the last couple of weeks, unfortunately.
So yeah, excited for some football stuff tomorrow.
More excited to talk racing today and Talladega this weekend, baby.
Arca, O'Reilly, Cup, the real draft.
Thank you very much.
It's all draft.
We're just drafting through the week, frankly.
Love it.
We already got a flip out of the way before we even hit Talladega.
Or that's just the appetizer for the weekend.
And Dave is going to take a bite out of every field.
But let's talk about Kansas.
So the Cup race, we can dance around and talk about different aspects of it.
But let's just take everything head on when it comes to the biggest story here.
Tyler Redick is a quarter of the way through the season with an over 500 win percentage on the year, which is not impressive in many other sports.
But in racing, that's not Formula One.
That's actually accomplishing something.
Gee, it's almost like someone on a show thought he would win at least seven races before the chase.
You're looking like a genius right now.
Honest to God.
And you did predict that at two or three wins, I believe.
So this wasn't like the third one.
Yeah.
It's not like he said this last week.
You know, Danny's been on this train for a month or two now.
And he had a little pick last week.
That's right.
It was a good week.
A couple weeks in a row for picks.
It was a good week for Danny B.
It was a good week for Tyler Redick.
Now he's, I mean, he's just on fire.
It's so interesting because he's not dominating most of these races.
I think Kota may be the one exception where you're like, yeah, he was dominant, held off Shane Van Gisburg and most of the afternoon.
Like, but other than that, he led one lap in the Daytona 500 Atlanta.
It was a last lap pass Kansas.
It was a last lap.
That's essentially I think he led 10 laps at Kansas.
I mean, he had a great car at the end.
He ran down Denny Hamlin before that final caution and overtime.
But, you know, these races are a lot of these wins are requiring late race heroics.
He's not winning them by eight seconds.
You know, so I think that's what makes it maybe the most improbable is not only has it been a variety of tracks.
He's also winning these races in dramatic fashion in Kansas.
It's funny.
This Kansas race, I think we'll get into it.
I'm sure it was not the most remarkable race.
It was fine.
But somehow even the least remarkable Kansas races find a way to become remarkable with this car, this package.
NASCAR rules NASCAR overtime.
We still got ourselves another thrilling Kansas finish.
It just, it's just par for the course at this point.
Well, and I won't go as far, you know, it's just, you know, I'm not going to.
Well, I actually don't have any tin foil.
I think it got robbed by NASCAR Twitter this week, but at my house, but like, I'm not going to go as far even as far.
I'm not going to say that he's like a fraud or something like that, because he did have that when you talked about Dakota, he did lead.
I think 77 laps at Darlington and a win is a win on the book.
It doesn't matter really how you get it or where you get it.
But I will say, I don't think that like, even though statistically on the wind column, it's similar to like 1987 day Larnhart.
It's vastly, vastly different just because of 199 laps lead on the year.
When you compare to some of the others in the field, his team owner, 575 already with Denny Hamlin, 499 for Kyle Larson, 272 for C bell and 244 for Blaney.
So it's like he's still up there statistically.
And I do think he's a championship contender.
And if anything, the favorite with, with how I'd made the prediction, he wouldn't lose the points lead for the regular season.
He's got still a ways to go on now in 17 races, but it's got 105 point lead.
It's just, it's impressive that in the next gen era, yes, maybe luck at times might have fallen into place for him.
But that this team has executed and put themselves in position to win at pretty much every kind of track on the schedule now.
It's definitely given me early feeling similarities to 21 Larson and 17 Martin Tricks Junior in terms of just how consistent they've been.
And maybe even more so because Larson, especially in 21, took him 10 races to win his first one that he looked dominant after that.
We haven't really seen a driver start off this consistent in a long time.
Nine starts seven top 10s.
You know, forget the fact that five of those seven are wins.
He's still, you know, and he's still in the top 10 for, you know, majority of these races right now, which is, which is what you need to be a championship contender.
The only other driver who equals that is Ty Gibson for just not as much, not as many wins in top five obviously right now.
They're really close on top five actually, but the win, the wins is the biggest kicker because of how many extra points you get for winning races right now, which is why I am glad we're in a position this year where points matter so much this season.
And we're seeing, we're seeing, you know, there was obviously a reward in the last system for winning, but we're seeing the true reward and a point system that rewards winning right now in Tyler Redick.
And that's, it's kind of awesome that we're getting to see that right now this early in the season.
And I'm very, very satisfied to see how Tyler Redick has done, especially considering how last year went for him.
Yeah, I think, I think right now everything's just coming together perfectly for Redick obviously the Toyotas are fast and I think some of that again has to do with Ford's inconsistency and and Chevrolet having a new body a little slow out the gate obviously half the
this is like the perfect conditions for Redick or any Toyota to have this kind of run though to Jarrett's point like, I know everyone wants to say hey the 45s obviously cheated up look at that extra horse but look at how much more speed they have.
But again, if you look at some of the underlying stats he's fifth in laps led fourth in stage points earned. Again, it's a lot of late race dodge the record Daytona only minimal cosmetic damage on that record Atlanta.
It's, you know, had a teammate behind him to push it Daytona when the dust settled it's, you know, over time at Kansas Cody where it doesn't spin out Tyler Redick blew this race and that final green flag run when the fuel stumbled and he hit the wall.
So like, it's kind of just been a lot of dominoes falling perfectly into place for these late race heroics and Redick's no stranger to late race heroics I mean we watched him win back to back O'Reilly championships at homestead homestead in the cup car remember what he did there two years ago that pass.
In turns three and four in the final lap like everything's kind of just coming together perfectly for reddit these last few weeks and the odds of that continuing through a whole 36 race season are slim.
He's definitely a championship contender probably arguably the championship favorite at this point because he'll likely start the chase with a 25 point advantage, but he's not dominating these races the way you would expect when you just look at the stat sheet and see five wins and nine races.
I'm just thinking about this week and you know that having football in the brain. It kind of reminded me of my team a couple years ago in 2022 the Vikings had 13 wins competing for the number one seed.
Had like the amazing heroic comeback victories against like the Colts in the bills. Every single win of theirs of other than like one or two was single score.
They got bounced in the first round and I'm not saying that Redick's going to be that way because he has had more. You know he's had impressive wins he's impressive runs everywhere even places that he might have struggled in the past.
But I do think it's closer than a lot of the tin foil hat side or a lot of the people who are like oh he's dominating like it is much closer and I don't think he can keep it up the entire regular season.
The big thing is can you keep it up with minimal slip ups in those last 10 which to be honest do play decently for him after what we've seen these first nine races.
So we talked about the finish a little bit and this kind of surprised me because I saw a lot of people talking about it. I didn't really talk too awful much about it Sunday night.
But there's been a lot of talk now I've noticed about overtime and about like its place and things like that again.
And I know we kind of I think we had like this conversation after like Nashville and in 23 was it 23 that 24 24.
That's right because we had we had five over times on the show.
The Logano championship season. That's that's how that's how I remember it.
I mean that's right. Yes.
What I guess what are your guys kind of takes on that because for me like I have the theory that people are kind of likening overtime finishes and like the entire race before it in a weird way.
It's almost connecting it to like how the championship used to be where it's like oh we went all race and now it just you know we two laps or whatever.
I'm just I'm surprised that it's this much of a talking point since I think it's like the second one of the year for cup or something.
I saw a tweet somewhere and I don't remember who it was.
I can't remember if it was just a random fan or if it was another talking head or a driver or media or who it was.
But someone I thought made an interesting point.
What if overtime went away at all tracks besides drafting tracks like those are the races because those are the races were think about it.
We get the most frustrated when they can't race back to the checkered think about the recent five hundreds that ended under caution.
And then we applauded them when they finally said all right we'll hold the yellow if we can't you know like because you know you're exactly right.
If we're being completely honest let's say overtime had never existed.
If NASCAR tomorrow announced hey if the race has a caution late we're going to go beyond the scheduled distance and the second third fourth place guys are going to restart right next to the leader.
Literally door to door with the guy who might have just had a six second lead because that's the thing like Danny and and Redick had an 11 or 12 second lead over Kyle Larson and Christopher Bell.
Over time Christopher Bell and Kyle Larson decided this race.
I mean Larson damn near almost won it.
So no it is it is a total gimmick if we're being completely honest it is in a lot of ways very similar to how the old championship format was.
I made that comparison last year actually when defending having a playoff format because I'm like hey we're cool with overtime at least I thought we were apparently we're not anymore.
So I'm surprised we're not cool with a similar championship style format but no I think realistically if we wanted to do away with overtime at a track like Kansas or a road course where big leads are common.
Maybe we keep them for super speedways where fans really want to see a green flag finish if at all possible and typically out of super speedway the leaders never more than a car linked out front anyway.
So what's the harm in just having another restart and trying to finish the race under green.
I don't remember who said that maybe someone can.
I think it was someone on Reddit might have said it.
Maybe it was like then linked to Twitter.
I don't remember where I saw it but I thought hey that is an interesting perspective and maybe in the future that could be a rule change that people can get behind.
I feel like I kind of like this idea.
I still haven't finished emblem and latest video guys.
I'm like 20 minutes in I haven't had time.
It's awesome but all of the stuff he vented about on this show a few years ago is all in that video but it's like so eloquently put it's amazing.
Sorry Danny.
Here's the idea.
I like Zeke Turnbaugh one over time per cup and two for a rally and three for trucks.
I kind of like I like that idea.
That kind of just puts it in order of you know should be should be experienced you know.
For me I just the way I was thinking about it was kind of like this like at the end at the end of a lot of races.
Like there's always the urgency but you know there's a lot of times where you know you kind of know like oh if a caution comes out you get bailed out.
Or if a caution comes out later for instance like a super speedway you can get bailed out first different things.
And it works different ways but like for instance Denny Hamlin and Tyler Reddick were so far ahead at the end of that race they had earned that spot.
And whether it was the car or Reddick because Reddick had said that there was like maybe a fuel pickup issue or like the ran out of fuel he thought he did he got into the wall.
He had to go over to the second port or something like that they said.
Yeah yeah lost the lead to Denny after they battled back and forth and it's like that's a huge screw up.
And the way I kind of think of it is you know and again there's pros and cons to both ways of it but that mistake at any moment if a caution could bring out the finish of the race and like the last couple laps when they're that far ahead.
Like that finish is that much more urgent because you know like at any moment the race could end or you could have those extra three laps two laps whatever to make it up on each other.
And then like in a super speedway you see so many times now people will just wait until the last lap to make the move or right before the last lap because they know like oh if I make the move with two to go and I make it back to the line races over you know.
Whereas like I feel like there could be more urgency if you were thinking like shit man I got six to go maybe we could get it going but if it's a big rack or red flag or any of that.
I know there's downsides to it too but I just I think that the reason the fan base is harping on this so much as one the big bad wolf has been slayed with the playoffs for a lot of people and then that's out of the way.
But I think it is NASCAR has talked about going like back to our roots and we're going kind of back to what we like before and stuff.
Honestly I think if if something's going to change they're going to do it across evenly all tracks.
So like I'm fine if they went to just one that way we don't have the absurdity but you can you can have the balance like NASCAR is trying to do balance right now.
Well I would say one overtime still doesn't change what happened at Phoenix last fall now obviously the new format changes that but like there is still the problem ultimately of like restarts in NASCAR.
You know restarts and other mirror sports are similar but they're all single file usually they're sometimes lapped cars in between like it's you know it's a little different but in NASCAR again the second place guy gets to restart literally right next to the leader regardless of how far behind they were like that is a little gimmicky.
I think we can all admit that I've been okay with that I've accepted all these years because I like door to door NASCAR action that's when NASCAR is at its best so the more of that we get the happier I usually am.
But you know at the end of the day when it comes to these late races a guy like Hamlin at Phoenix with a huge lead a guy like I guess it was also Denny that maybe everyone's just Denny Hamlin fans and now we're just finally learning that.
You know Denny Hamlin loses back to back races and overtime and now we got to abolish overtime maybe the fan base has quietly been on then Denny fans this whole time but you know like it is a little silly so I don't know.
And to your the only thing I will also add as you said like if they make a real change it'll probably be across all tracks.
You're probably you're probably right although they've shown in the past like stage yellows they did get rid of those at road courses but not everywhere else.
Like I do think it's smart in some ways to not treat all tracks the same because the style of racing is so different at road courses versus Talladega versus Bristol for example so if they did want to have modified overtime rules for different track types.
I don't think that would be too difficult to keep up with maybe I'm wrong but I think they could figure out some sort of balance.
I'm fine with like doing it differently in different places like I'm okay with that.
NASCAR I feel like in the past has either had controversies come up because of said differences look at like 2015 at Talladega or has abandoned it immediately because you know a lot of fans will then get upset like the stage yellow thing at at road courses when they took them away.
I was fine with it.
I came on this show and I was like let it play out just because the car sucks doesn't mean to get rid of it and now all of a sudden we're back carping on get rid of stage yellows and all that but kind of shifting to another topic.
You kind of talked about style of racing we kind of alluded to it at the start of of where you know even in Kansas isn't 100% where we wanted to be it still can deliver something crazy at the end.
And the racing was I don't think what a lot of fans were expecting it to be or wanting it to be as a lot of people in my chat were saying like first 80% was boring and then like the finish was good.
My notes that I took for the race half of my notes were from the last 30 laps.
It was it was pretty paint by numbers like restart so and so gets ahead end of stage rinse wash repeat go into stage three.
So do we think after seeing this after Las Vegas feeling like in my words like a 550 race a little more is the intermediate is the intermediate package falling off in your guys opinion.
Let me decide after the coke 600 is my answer to that because last year's coke 600 was pretty entertaining for the majority of it.
Let me decide after that one.
Yeah I think maybe it is a little and I think that's just because the teams continue to learn and get smarter and have optimized their intermediate setups because if you look at Las Vegas and you look at Kansas minus the overtime at the end.
It's almost the exact same race.
It's JGR 2311 and Hendrick up front.
Our Roush Fenway keselowski literally finished 6th 10th and 11th in both races.
And Penske sucked in both races.
Like they were the exact same races.
So it's clear at this point that like the Toyotas and some of the Hendrick cars have figured them out and are that's why you're going to see Kyle Larson dominate a stage.
You're going to see Danny Hamlin and then Tyler Reddick dominate a stage.
It's the same thing we saw at Las Vegas.
So I think it really just comes down to several teams have hit on it perfectly.
They've reached perfection and others are still struggling.
So what you get then is what I compared to an ARCA race where there's like 10 cars that look really fast and could maybe have a shot at the win.
And then 20 cars they're off the pace by comparison.
I mean Joey Logano was off the pace compared to the leaders on Sunday.
And you know I know we saw that at Darlington but that's not usually the case.
Joey Logano has seemed off the pace a lot this season though to be fair.
He has been up and down.
That's true. Darlington was rough as well.
He lost most power of his hair I guess.
He was Samson.
So that's all I'll say is I don't know that it's the package yet because we still saw multi-group racing, fast cars could pass, tires matter.
That played a role in Reddick running down Hamlin.
So it still had elements of what we'd like to see but because some teams have hit on it just like at Las Vegas it's becoming predictable.
And I think that's the problem.
Yeah I mean you look at the finishing order did get jumbled up by the overtime and the difference of tires but either the guys that were up front all day outside of I would say Kyle Larson.
And then the ones that finish up front.
Reddick, Chase Briscoe, Hamlin, Bubba Wallace, Ty Gibbs deserve better than ninth.
Corey Heim was running top 10 pretty much I'd say 70% of the day.
Riley Herps 14th place finish.
I mean my own halves have been Toyodathan this year.
It's always on.
Yeah it is.
That's a running joke with me and my family.
It feels like Toyodathan is always on man.
I feel like I see commercials for Toyodathan year round.
I know I don't but it feels like it.
Yeah they got what's her name?
Jan from Toyota.
The only good member I have a Toyodathan was it my first month as I salesman in car sales.
And I made a lot of money in Toyodathan.
You probably were happy if Toyodathan was always on.
Toyodathan is a good time as a car salesman.
Months after that and that's why I don't do it no more.
Well and then on the flip side here, Trackhouse and Kyle Bush, it's just more of the same struggles.
So when you look at Trackhouse this past weekend looking at the finishing order, Ross Chastain, 26th place finish.
Connor Zillich 29th and honestly he didn't deserve even that high with how they ran.
36th for Shane Van Gisburgen and again mild thing 35th.
It's just more of the same.
I mean I'll put the points down at the bottom and I'm not going to wait until he comes on screen because he's so far back.
But Kyle Bush is 27th in the point standings and he is seven times closer to being 30th than to being in the chase right now.
No wonder he wrecked Raleigh Herbst at Bristol.
That's his closest competitor.
They're one point different from each other.
That wreck made the difference apparently from 27th through 28th.
He's vaping with who he's around because that's who he's around.
It's just, I don't, the Kyle Bush stuff we kind of beat to death last week but I wanted to kind of talk about Ross because you know we talked about there's a big silly season coming up.
There's, we really haven't heard too much.
I went on the J. Ski Team Driver chart and Ross Chastain it says 2026 plus which I'm assuming means like possible more years.
He's in the We Don't Know category.
I'm going to be honest.
If the opportunities there, I think he should jump ship with the kind of what Corey LaJoy was talking about of how Trackhouse is basically like in the same bin as RCR at this point, which they really are.
I know everyone's going to look at the 48 but what if, and I don't think he's the same driver as he was in 2022, what if, what if it's the two?
Because Austin Cintrick this year and Cintrick could move to the 21 because Josh Berry hasn't performed.
He had a multi-year deal starting last year.
Chastain is a cleaned up Penske guy.
It would be something interesting.
He ain't the same guy who was though three, four years ago.
Like he really, he's, he's mellow.
He's pretty mellow.
He would take the one if my question then.
Well, let's start with just, yeah, that's another, that can be another question.
But yeah, Ross is the A plus free agent in all this.
He's the headliner.
I mean, let's just ask a question.
I think it's obvious if you're Ross Chastain and the 48 is available, would you take it?
Yeah.
If the two is available, I think we all say, yeah, you would take that.
Like if a spy or someone had me offered as my question, if a spy or seat was available, would you take that over the one car right now?
No.
Yeah.
See, that's why I'm kind of split too, because I do think spires trending up a little.
The Hendrick Alliance is valuable, but you do have a good thing going with, with Trackhouse.
You know, you hate to sever that relationship.
You know, you have to think about that too.
That's a tough call.
I'll ask the question.
Would, uh, would Ross Chastain have one more top 10 this year if he were driving the two car?
What do you, what do you, what do you have one more top 10 than he scored this year, which is one?
Top 10s or more if he were in the two car?
Probably.
Yeah.
Well, Austin Sinterk has the same amount of top fives as Ross.
Oh, I, oh, if you're asking me, no, I think Ross Chastain's a better driver than Austin Sinterk.
100%.
Yeah.
But my, my thing is, I don't think it's necessarily what makes sense to Ross.
Like whatever's the best option he's key should take.
It's, does it make sense for Penske and would they do it?
And I, I don't know if they would do it.
Tim Sinterk makes sense to me.
That move Austin to the 21.
Yeah. Cause I mean, it's, it's Josh Berry really, you know, going to be the best longterm option there in that car.
I mean, yeah, I'm kind of, I don't know.
I'm kind of out on Josh Berry ever being much more than.
I'm thrilled that, you know, the guy, the little guy from Hendersonville, you know, right here in our town won a cup race legitimately won a cup race.
I'm happy for him.
He, you know, he seemed like just a career light model guy.
He got to have a good experience in the Xfinity series.
He won a cup race.
If that's all he turns out to be, then so be it.
It's a, it's a fun, it's a fun up and down ride for Josh Berry.
But, you know, if you're Penske, I've said this for a long time.
The two is your flagship car.
Kizlowski won them their very first championship in the two.
The two was synonymous with Rusty Wallace for a long time.
That, that too, in my opinion, is always going to be Penske's flagship car.
But for now, with the success of Logano and Blaney, it feels forgotten.
Well, I'm kind of traveling down this hypothetical road a little more.
If Ross were to leave, would Kyle Busch perform better in the one car than the eight car?
It's a tougher question than it was nine weeks ago.
I think I would say yes.
I think being a three car team, you should divvy up data and resources better than a two car team.
I'd go yes, but only slightly.
I go, it's, it may be on par.
I mean, Jared, you sent us something earlier that what Corolla Joy was saying,
and it gave some good points that, you know, when the next gen car first come out,
teams like RCR, teams like Trackhouse, they had better availability to a lot of the top stuff that GM was putting out.
Now it doesn't seem like they do as much.
And it, you know, early on in the next gen car, we saw Tyler Reddick win three races.
The next year we saw Kyle Busch win three races.
It's a, it's a clear difference now between both those things from where they were a couple years ago.
So I only ask this and I only say that I honestly don't think he'd perform much better for a few reasons.
One, I think Ross is a better driver right now than Kyle Busch.
I think Kyle is starting to age out.
I'm still on that side of it.
The other one is Kyle Busch is getting outrun in the same equipment by Austin Dillon.
And Austin Dillon's not a bad driver, but he shouldn't be better than Kyle Busch, even in bad equipment.
Yeah, there, there's a clear difference in talent between Kyle Busch and Austin Dillon.
My only pushback will be Bush has a new crew chief who, I mean, based on some of the radio transmissions,
I don't know that I love his, I don't know that he might be in over his head a little.
I don't know. He's new to the cup series.
I don't know. I'm reading a lot into a couple of unsavory radio comms.
And maybe it's unfair for me to put this on Kyle, but I think that's where Kyle is the veteran driver needs to take the leadership side.
And at least over the radio and through interviews, Kyle kind of just passes the buck and I get, he's frustrated.
He deserves to be in a better ride, I think, than the eight car and RCR equipment.
But he's just, if he hasn't given up, he has apathy at the, he has fallen into apathy, I would say at this point.
And it's just, I don't know at 42 years old if he's got it.
I don't think he's at Kevin Harvick's level at that age.
I don't think he's at, you know, a lot of different guys that excelled past 42, 43 years old.
Hell, I don't even know if anything will be available to him that's better than the eight car next year.
That's the craziest part about it all.
I hope he gets one more shot because again, last time we saw Kyle Busch in a competitive car,
he put up the same numbers Tyler Reddick put up in a competitive car.
And right now we're talking about Tyler Reddick as a championship contender.
Now Reddick is younger and maybe his ascending still has been ascending Busch to your point is older.
Maybe he's on the descent, the decline, but I'm just saying last time he was in a good car, he won three races and 15 starts.
And it wasn't that long ago.
So I agree.
I don't think Kyle's what he, 100% of what he was in his prime, but I think he's still good enough to match a Ross Chastain and equal equipment.
But to your point, are we going to see him in a good enough car where he can show that?
Maybe not. I don't know.
As long as we're talking about track house and stuff, I'm just throwing out some wild ideas.
There's a lot of investors, you know, that are banking on Zillich doing well.
And if they're not too confident, it's going to happen at track house.
I mean, I know, I know they technically think that NASA, he's on a longer term contract for a rookie with Zillich over there.
But I mean, what if, what if Hendrick and sponsors want to buy that out and just get him, keep him in the ADA, but the Hendrick font 88 and just get the 48 a break.
I mean, I made that prediction earlier this year that I thought Hendrick in the next two years would buy out, would buy out Zillich's contract.
And maybe Zillich and Bowman do a ride swap and Bowman's a 99 next season.
For Bowman.
We're only nine races into this season, guys.
I mean, I feel like we're a little, I know it's our job to debate these.
We're keeping it interesting.
I mean, the chat's invested, I see it.
People are calling it trash house, whack house.
But like, I get it, but it's only nine races.
It's, yes, it's nine races this year, but it's years of seeing the same track down.
No pun intended.
I'm just saying, I think it's early to give up completely.
Kids 19 years old, if he struggles for a couple of years, I mean, Kevin Harvick kind of deal with RCR equipment for 12 years.
I'm not saying, I'm not, I don't, I don't think Danny's saying it either.
I don't think he's 33rd in points because Conor Zillich sucks.
I think he's 33rd in points because the team is failing him.
And like, I think, this is his learning curve right now.
It's just a 90 degree angle.
He has no room for any error whatsoever.
Like we saw what he could do in top tier equipment and he went out and showed the generational talent.
And I don't use that phrase lightly that he is.
And he's not, he's just, he ain't going to do that with spy.
I mean, Ross, who is a tenured driver, championship caliber driver is mustering up 20th in points, barely beating out A.J. Allmendinger with no factory support on the year.
Like, I don't think that's the drivers.
Just, just another idea.
I'm floating out there right now.
What if, um, you know, if track house is not, it's not pleased with how things are going with Chevy, what if they're going to position themselves in a good opportunity ahead of colleague to be the, the, the face of it.
They're going to have to dodge whenever they come in and be smart.
No, that's that.
And that's the reason if you're a zillich or whoever, I don't panic after nine bad races with track houses.
Like, yeah, track house has been slowly declining since their peak of 2022.
I think that's facts.
SVG obviously inflated their stats at road courses last year, but they're declining.
But yeah, that's one of the options is there's at least one OEM knocking on the door, getting a cup.
Could track house be that team?
And boom, maybe suddenly track house gets a boost in the next couple of years.
They're going to want something better than almond anger and tie Dillon.
I don't even know if tie Dillon goes with, but let's look at the points.
So since we're talking where people are at.
Um, so red leads, reddit leads for those on the list on the audio side by 105 over Hamlin 120 over Blaney, then 138 over Gibbs, Larson 143 back, Elliott 152, 182 back for Byron and Buckeye.
Lava tied 193 back to Brad Kozlowski, ninth in points.
Brad Kozlowski starting the year on a broken femur, probably only going to get better as the year goes on.
You would think impressive run for him.
Bell minus 196, Bush or 198 and then host of ours jumped up into this group now minus 220.
So who, who stands out outside of, you know, I brought up Brad, but like who's standing out or like needs to get the move on or anything from this group.
Cause this is kind of the group of like who's going to try and get up to that top three or four.
I mean, even though we shouldn't be surprised, host of ours still outrunning his equipment, in my opinion.
Yeah, maybe a little bit.
No, host of ours stands out him being on this list, but you took it.
Brad Kozlowski is the big one, like for missing the chase last year.
I mean, this time last year he was like 28 than points or something all like he off to a terrible start in 2025 or whatever reasons.
So for him to bounce back this year, I think he's taught, he's like this year's chase Elliott.
You know, he's not really showing winning speed consistently.
He's to come close here and there we go.
Like Darlington, they had winning speed, maybe, but he's just top 10, top 15.
He doesn't have a, I think his worst finish this year is 20th.
So he's on a nine race top 20 streak plus whatever he, however he finished last year.
Like he's just not making mistakes, smooth and steady, getting good points.
How many times after a third or he's the bionic man.
He really is inspector gadget, man, discovering new heights for our FK racing.
Well, and I'll point out one that I think needs to get a little giddy up more.
And that is, and it's not his fault.
He probably should be seventh in points right now, but Christopher Bell, one 96 back, plenty of time.
And I honestly, he can easily be seventh in points, leaving Talladega, but he's a championship guy.
I'm looking at Bella, somebody who's going to be competing with Reddick, Hamlin, Blaney.
Um, you know, the, basically the, the left hand column that, uh, on the screen and they're starting to run away a little bit.
44 points between himself and Elliot.
And I think right now this top six, if they keep pulling away, like that's going to be your battle for who's going to be up there with Reddick.
You said he should be seven.
Wait, can you guys hear me?
Okay, so I didn't know if it was that thing where it was lagging.
You said she should be seven.
Who is seventh?
It's like the most quiet seven place I think I've ever seen in my entire life.
Me and Claudia was just talking about this yesterday.
Oh, it fooled me that William Byron is in seventh place because it's been the most quiet seven place I think I've seen all year.
Just five top tens and nine races and two top fives.
I mean, I feel like I don't see him in the front that often, but yet there he is seventh in the standings.
I mean, he's been bad.
He's been bad the last two races.
He was bad at Bristol, ran 30th, and then he ran 15th at Kansas, put tires on like Brisco at the end and squeaked out of top 10, but he was not a top 10 car at Kansas.
So they've been just kind of off for a couple of weeks.
And then on the other end, the bubble cut line here.
So Priess is up 38.
Logano 14th up 28.
17 up.
Chase Brisco has jumped in.
Suarez on the cut line, plus 13 over.
Cindrick SVG out.
Sondrick.
God damn it.
Condrick.
Condrick.
Minus 32 for SVG, 36 back for McDowell and then 40 over 40 back, 46 back for Chastain and Allmendinger.
And then it's 60 plus back for the rest.
So outside of Condrick, who, uh, who stands out up here.
Uh, SVG dropping out of the top 16.
That's a bummer.
That's happened a little quicker than I was thinking, but he's had a couple of finishes lately outside the top 30 Las Vegas, Kansas.
The intermediates that we thought he'd figured out, uh, one reason or another, track house, I guess, hasn't figured them out.
So he seems to be the victim, maybe of his equipment right now.
But, you know, other than him, I think, I guess Daniel Suarez, the fact that he's still holding on to a top 16 spot a quarter way through the season.
Yeah.
I thought we'd only see one, one spire car make the, make the chase, let alone two.
And the third ones are 19th.
They're all in the, on the bubble.
Yeah.
I'm surprised that McDowell is, is the third one in that far back.
I will say 32 back for SVG.
It only hammers home.
My thoughts that I laid out last week, like Watkins Glen must win.
San Diego must win.
Sure.
And Sanoma must win.
Being a foreign in his side, like it is for whatever reason, that's got them behind the eight ball here.
I think it could be the difference with how close, uh, with how close the points could be at the end.
And laying on to those, you know, to hope that they can win those three road course races and get those points.
Well, and I saw a chart.
I don't know if it was Daniel Suspitas that put it out or who it was of like most improved running position and finishing positions this year.
And, and it's like SVG and Herbst were the two highest in that.
Um, so he's, he's still, what amazes me is outside of again, disaster, two disastrous weeks in a row for SVG.
Like he is still out running and being a better driver this year than he was last year.
It's just, I think the competition is a little tougher, I guess, around that 16th place line.
But plenty of time to go. There's 17 races until the chase.
So we're going into double digit races on the year this weekend.
Um, all right, with that, let's look at the ratings.
Cup got 2.9926 million viewers on big Fox up 26% from last year, which was on FS1 though.
It is the highest Kansas spring race since 2016.
It comes with the caveat that all of those races, uh, between then and now, and including that one, we're on FS1.
Uh, it is, is actually the third lowest non-delayed Fox race in the network's history.
Uh, only I think it's two Sonoma races.
I want to say we're lower than it in viewership.
So it's like on a surface looks good, maybe not as good as some people are trying to spin it on, on Twitter.
The O'Reilly series still keeps doing its thing.
Uh, 1.18 million viewers peaked at just under 1.3 million.
I believe it was up 12%.
Was it up 12% from last year on the same weekend, which I think that was Easter.
So take that as you will either way.
But it was the most watched O'Reilly Kansas race since 2023's race on NBC.
Uh, so still in good company, still up double digits.
One note I want to make on the, uh, or one observation on the cup ratings.
I think it is noteworthy that this race earned more viewers than any Kansas race since 2016.
I know there's wrong cable, but cable races in 2017, 2018, 2019, you're telling me not one Kansas race got over 3 million viewers.
I think that does drive home the fact that Kansas has historically not been a ratings win.
So yeah, 2.9 million on network TV doesn't look great.
And like you said, third lowest in Fox's history, NASCAR history, but I think some of that is Kansas has just been.
It sounds like Kansas has never been a big ratings draw in the spring for whatever reason.
I think it's that.
And I do think it's that when you take it out of people's vision for a month and a half, people forget.
Uh, because I think it was too, I have to check my notes here, but I think it was two or three years ago.
Might have been two years ago.
Richmond was on a similar weekend in April.
Uh, and it got on big Fox and it got 3.3 million viewers.
And then was it, was it 2022 on a very similar weekend on big Fox, Richmond had almost 4 million viewers.
That's crazy to me.
Yeah.
So it's like that.
I mean, if you look from just four years ago, like that's a quarter of the audience, not there, which drives home.
Like, yeah, I mean, they're going to spin it plus 26% year over year, but it's like, yeah.
It's not good.
Like you said, it's mixed.
It's not good.
Yeah.
It's not a good, it's not a good rating, but I think it comes with the caveat that Kansas for a decade now, even on cable has trended lower than the average cup series race for whatever reason, which I don't, maybe it's because there's two of them a year.
I guess Kansas City, it's not a huge market, not a huge NASCAR racing market historically.
So, I mean, I guess by comparison, Richmond is in the heart of NASCAR count country.
So I don't know.
But yeah, I just thought that was noteworthy.
I was surprised that no Kansas cable race.
And like the, I mean, the 2017 Dale Jr.
That was his farewell tour.
You're telling me that didn't get 3 million viewers?
I'm just surprised to hear that.
For the poll though, it was roughly around 10K.
11% said it was a great race.
50% said good.
So 61% net positive on that 30% average, 9% negative.
Looking at previous polls, this was the 14th of 15 polled Kansas races.
The only one it beat out was that cursed race in 2020 in fall, which I unfortunately attended.
Look at this.
This is Harvick.
Yeah.
The arrow race of arrow races.
Ninth out of 10 polled 2026 races, it only outrated the clash.
That surprises me a little.
Of mile and a half races, it's 45th out of 61 polled since 2019.
So in general, people were not as happy with this race.
That's lower than I would have thought because there's a lot of 550 races in those, in that 61.
Well, I mean, to be fair, the first one in 2019, we all were like, oh my God, this was great.
And it just went downhill from there.
So there were 2019 had some decent ones.
So, yeah.
So Napa racing fan got the top comment.
Is it positive, negative or meme?
I'm pretty sure I saw him in the chat a minute ago.
That's like the name on this one.
Meme, which means Danny, you're getting it wrong because I never get this right.
We need more power.
900 horsepower.
That's a meme.
That's kind of a meme, I guess.
Yeah.
All right.
I'll take a half victory on that one.
Nenu008 is the top comment.
Says, I think Trackhouse is still out on the track trying to finish.
We're kind of talking about that.
SBG says, I do not ever want to hear Tommy Baldwin talk about drivers being hazards racing for nothing ever again.
Oh, Luke.
Luca, did he cause them?
No, he's involved with Rick Ware racing.
Oh, I thought it was Tommy Baldwin.
Tommy Baldwin had the call to keep him out 20 extra laps longer.
And he took, to his credit, he took full responsibility for that on DBC.
I hadn't listened that far into DBC yet.
I thought he was referring to, I know his son Luke has had a couple just rough breaks the last few weeks in the O'Reilly series.
Really, I don't, as far as I know, they haven't been his fault just wrong place, wrong time.
Ross, Crash, Stain, Alex Bowman, lead lap finish.
Hang the banner.
Hang the banner. Let's go. Let's freaking go.
He was top 10 for a minute.
Oh, man, I lost the hang the banner thing to pop up on the screen.
I don't know where it went.
I can just put this up in there instead.
That is a cursed double on that one.
Oh, man.
You always hard of a Luca.
Maddie says, I am loving this season so far, mostly because of the resell market.
I have cornered on tin foil hats.
Nass Carl says, race was a snooze fest until the final 20 laps.
And cars boy 95 was one of the gutter comments this week.
So that comment said, school walkout for Denny Hamlin 12 30 Monday afternoon.
Oh, come on. Why are we just like, that's a meme.
Denny Hamlin.
We're showing empathy towards Denny.
It has to be voted.
So there was the O'Reilly race as well.
And just as soon as we get into talking about it, Carson Quap will flipped.
Yeah, I was, I don't remember what I was doing Saturday, but I, you know,
watched the Arco race and then I went and did something, I guess.
And I got back to my TV late.
I flip on the TV and I just see the underside of the number one car.
And I'm like, what, what, what did I, I look at the corner.
I'm like, I did, I meant it's lap three.
And I'm like, I that's what, how?
So that was a glad he's okay.
But that was a jump scare.
That's like when that's like the cold open in a horror movie where they show the like
monster, like viciously killing someone right off the bat to be.
And just to set the tone for what this movie, what this is about to be.
That was a, and that was the NASCAR equivalent.
The worst part, and it kind of made it very clear that, you know,
the production crew, the commentary crew is not at the racetrack.
They're just, just reacting.
What's that?
Whatever's on screen, if they are, if they are to track,
you're just looking at the screen, they were reacting to the 07 spinning.
And all of a sudden they're like, Oh gosh, the one's upside down.
Well, that's, that's how I reacted watching.
And I think I even tweeted it.
I was like, Oh, Monday and spin is going to bring out the caution on lap.
Oh my God.
And my best rich Evan's voice.
No, I mean, I'm glad he's all right.
I'll say that.
But it's shocked the hell out of me.
But I guess at this point we've kind of beat it to death that when it comes to Kansas,
man, you're going to see some wild ass crashes, a couple of Riley trucks.
So you name it, like there's going to be huge hits, flips, guys riding the wall,
like the ride in the dentae.
I mean, it's just nuts.
We have seen, um, Almerola's wreck, um, where he got hurt.
We have seen Chris Buescher nearly flipped there.
Priest had a crazy one, right?
Am I wrong?
He has one too.
It was one of the JTJs.
I can't remember if it was Buescher or, or priests.
One of them was priests.
Okay.
Priest nearly flipped there.
Sainte-Smith did flip.
Anthony Alfredo flipped there.
And now Carson Quaffle has flipped there.
Did, did Erik Jones have one in like 2017?
I know there was a big ass crash or somebody like damn near went into the fence on the
back stretch.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Let me look at that one.
Yeah.
They're saying it in the chat that yeah, he did.
Um, yeah.
I mean, it's, that's just this track.
It sneaks up on you.
Uh, oh yeah.
He, he, he, uh, he tried to go upside down, but it didn't go all the way.
Well, someone who snuck up on a few people, not me, because I've been in this guy's corner
for a while longer than most people, even though I didn't pick him this week because
my pick decided to sell at the end.
Uh, Taylor Gray gets the win over Creed and all guy.
I had to hold them off towards the end, but another solid run for him, a much needed
victory for sure.
Vaulting him up to ninth in the point standings.
Pretty good gap, but we'll look at the, you know, talk about the points in a moment,
but ruining my perfect weekend sweep because I had Creed, but he finished second.
Taylor Gray, that was his first top five of the year.
So he's been okay, but yeah, hasn't been as good as I was hoping because he finished
last year pretty strong thought year two in that car.
I, you know, I love his crew chief, Jason Radcliffe.
I think he's still the winningest O'Reilly crew chief ever.
One, a bunch of races with Kenseth back in the day.
Uh, he made the call here to short pit, get out in front of the double zero, the, the 20,
the 20 of course had their pit road penalty that helped.
But, uh, yeah, a much needed win.
Like you said, Jared, because he was, I think 12th or 13th in the standings.
Now he's comfortably in the chase for the time being hopefully just going to continue to move up.
Well, and, and two, when it comes to Taylor Gray, he did run top five at Vegas too.
So they have that mile and a half program figured out.
He just got, you know, crashed in that one.
Uh, but overall, I mean, JGR was on it.
Brandon Jones, my pick this weekend, uh, just a wheel getting out of the box was what
cost him a shot at the wind.
And I honestly think when you look at the intervals at the end of the race, he made up
the amount of time that he was behind before serving his penalty.
And then some, again, old racing saying one thing to catch him and other would pass him,
but he was about the only one that could pass in any lane at any point, even with the arrow
issues that was going on.
So we, we have seen time and time again, we get to Chicago and later on, Jared, I wouldn't
be shocked that Brandon Jones gets redemption and wins there because those tracks are very
similar.
Remember in 2019, how close Bowman was to winning Kansas and then he did win Chicagoland.
Like, and he, and he was actually one of the cars that was on track for testing this week
too.
So he's already got some track time on it.
So if Kyle Larson is not in the O'Reilly race at Chicagoland on July 4th, I'm picking
Brandon Jones.
If I have the opportunity, like I'm just letting y'all know way in advance, he's my number
one pick going into it.
Hopefully you do have the number one pick.
You're still in the basement.
I don't know.
I've made a pretty good effort to stay there this past week.
Same with RCR man.
It was, it wasn't good across the board for RCR this weekend, whether it was their poor
performance in cup or this little civil war on the racetrack with Jesse Love and Austin
Hill love kind of going down the track, pinching the 21, I believe kind of messing them up
arrow wise on top of it.
At the same time, if you really slow down the replay and watch, Austin Hill kind of
goes onto the apron a little bit under the white line too.
So it was just a horrible, it might have been even the arrow issues that caused him to do
that.
Terrible RCR turn of events there.
But do we think this, obviously I don't think it's going to carry on this weekend.
Maybe one of them, you know, leaves the other dry.
I don't feel like they work together very well at the super speed ways.
Those cars are so damn good.
They kind of just are their own lone wolves and it doesn't seem to matter.
What would you mean?
I don't know.
I don't know.
I mean, I think, I mean, Jesse Love kind of owned up to you.
He said, Hey, like Austin was like racing me harder than I thought he was going to.
So I was trying to race him hard, went a little too far.
Like he owned it.
I think for the most part, I'm sure it's one they'll talk about.
I don't know.
I mean, Austin Hill, I don't know that he really gets along with anyone on the track,
even his teammates, he's had, he's had issues with teammates in the past.
And then I feel like Jesse, I don't, I mean, I think Jesse loves.
Part of me thinks he's just kind of one foot in, one foot out.
He's already looking the head to try and get a cup series ride.
Yeah.
I think this is more just indicative of, and I talked about this on my show today,
but like Dale Jr. has even said at JRM, you know, a lot of these young drivers
come in there and it's the me show, you know, there's no real sense of, Oh,
this is my teammate.
I'm part of a team.
They're all about themselves.
Cause they see the O'Reilly series is just one step on the ladder.
They're going to move on hopefully before too long.
And, uh, and I think that's just what you get.
I think even teammates in O'Reilly are teammates only in name only at the end of
the day, Jesse loves, got his own agenda.
He wants to go cup racing next year.
He's the defending champion, Austin Hill, 30, 31 years old.
He's got his own agenda.
Like they're just their teammates, but they're not afraid to race each other
hard cause at the end of the day, I don't think anyone in the O'Reilly series
really has each other's best interests in mind.
It's kind of every man for themselves.
So I don't, they'll probably race each other hard going forward.
Maybe RC will whip them into shape and tell them you can't do that anymore.
And maybe he'll get through them.
Maybe, maybe he doesn't.
I guess we'll find out.
Time will tell.
Well, looking, you know, I have him on the bottom here.
Justin Allgaier with 520 points is 131 over Sheldon Creed.
Now with his points lead, Creed has not cracked the 400 point mark yet.
And all guys in the 500s, it's a runaway freight train, nine top 10s in 10 races.
To be fair, Corey Day and Sheldon Creed have eight top 10s in that span.
But just absolutely dominant by all guys.
I know cup is much more competitive than O'Reilly.
So I'm kind of already just putting in pen.
Unless there's a major penalty, Justin Allgaier is going to be the number one seed.
I mean, there's what 13 races, 14 races to go until the chase in O'Reilly.
I think 14, I don't see them collapsing.
It's amazing to me the way the standings look.
You have your top two Allgaier with three wins, Creed with one win.
But you got one, two, three, four, five driver gap with zero wins
before you get to three in a row to each have a win.
And it's the, we're not seeing that, you know, even become close to the case in a cup series
because all the guys have wins are pretty much taking up the top six spots right now.
And look at the eighth, ninth and 10th are those guys, Hill, Gray, Swalloch.
Rhett's laugh, unfortunately caught up in that early rec.
So he falls back to 11th in point.
Still a good decent gap.
I believe he could be a player this weekend to watch out for.
The wild card and this whole deal, it's not Sam Mayer.
It's not Ryan Seig.
It's not Brennan Poole.
It's Brent Crews, 16th in the points.
He's got a ways to go to make it up.
But he's currently, I think he's going to get there.
This is crazy because I thought Sam Mayer was going to be a championship caliber driver this year.
Brent Crews is only 35 points away from him and he's made four less starts.
The difference between Creed and Mayer seasons so far cannot be overstated.
That is second to 14th.
Feels like Mayer's in some mess every other week.
It's crazy.
But yeah, I think Brent Crews is going to get to the top 12.
I think Rajah's season is going to be impacted by just not getting the JRM ride
for the entirety of it.
Yeah, yeah.
Because every time he's in it, he's running top 10, getting stage points.
He's in a good take in.
So he's got a legit shot the win this weekend.
And to be fair, he had a lot of speed at Daytona.
If that carries over to the Talladega, he's a threat to win.
But I agree with you.
If anything happens to, well, ironic enough, if anything happens between Jesse Love and Austin
Hill, like if they just crash each other, then he's got a shot.
Well, I think that'll cover it when it comes to Kansas.
Let's head to our first Super Chat stage break of the night.
I think we'll do it.
Start off with Bailey here.
Kyle Busch, I'll make life hell for the 11.
Buddy, you got to try and keep up with him when he's lapping you first.
So mean.
The Slothnerd.
My Jaco Flocco pick is a big one on the last lap.
How am I doing?
I like that.
Oh, monkey.
Snapback says NWP intro better than anything Fox can do.
Well, there's no way I.
That's all.
Jack, go give him a subscribe to pay him back.
Tag to his channel down below in the description.
I had meant to mention this last weekend after the O'Reilly Bristol race.
But look out, Connor.
The clumsy zillich has a sword now.
That's dangerous.
Would you be falling on the sword?
But it's my first dad joke I've made since having a kid on here.
Alex, why do I have the feeling that Ride the Dente song was written by written by a
subtle version of Khan from King of the Hill?
I don't know.
Ride the Dente.
Uh, Pac-Man rumor has it.
Skull is Minna.
It's a cool train.
Okay.
Rumor has it.
Skull is Minnesota fan speak for okay.
Green Bay one.
We can leave now.
God, I hope this reversing of the stages works.
Well, the thing is in the last 10 years, y'all have lost to us more than we've lost to you.
So, you know, get good.
Didn't they have the same amount of wins as a team that was led by J.J. McCarthy last year?
Same amount of playoff wins.
To correct a super chat from Sunday in the nine next-gen races, the 45 car has won four of them.
And his...
Talk about snapping back to reality.
Oh, man, overtime needs to go.
I'm biased as a Hamlin fan and had six wins taken away.
But if the race ends under caution, so be it, fans will never be happy.
That's true.
We will never be happy.
That is pretty true.
Wait, would you say Kyle Busch's worst start of the season is as bad as Brad Kozolowski's last year
in the first half or about the same?
Imagine Kyle Busch pulls off a strong second half.
I can't imagine that because he's just been bad the last few years now.
Yeah.
I mean, Brad was at least...
There was a lot of upside beforehand and there was a clear reason why he was bad.
And there's, you know, when it comes to just the shakeups at RFK for the 60 team.
Kyle doesn't have the excuse.
Let's see.
I think Mitch's next year says, I'm all for restoring the legitimacy of the sport with the format, stages, etc.
But I'm torn on the overtime debate.
Deserving winners should win, but damn, Green-White Checker finishes are entertaining as hell.
That's the balance.
That's true.
They are entertaining.
That's the balance.
Let's see.
Who here had the ERV reference from Sunday?
I don't know.
Is this like a Kevin Harvick word of the week or something?
Have we missed?
We're probably...
I'm not even sure what ERV means.
Oh, man.
Are we Ankh?
Three Ankhs.
Ankh status.
I am Ankh.
I'm 30.
I'm Ankh.
I'll do a couple more here.
Ross Crastain for the first time since 2025.
Alex Bowman has finished on the lead lap.
Hang the banner.
Oh, did Joy play his in the background?
I'm sure Cito can add that in post.
Yes.
Palm Tree says I was almost sympathetic for Bush,
but he's back to being that bit-chee douche I grew to hate over the last 15 years.
I think he's just cranky at this point.
I think he is, too.
The frame of MJ choking Hamlin hilarious.
I should have put that in this week.
I should have.
Danny lived it.
Not mad at MJ.
He was just mad that he lost that race.
Imagine Michael Jordan being there at your lowest to rub it in your face.
It's like I won, but I also lost.
Like, how do you feel?
Oh, Palm Tree, by the way, in the chat says they censored my comment,
so I had to split it up when it came to bit.
Oh, that makes sense.
Let's see.
I think we can do this one and then one more.
Also, anyone who says 2311 success is rigged,
must have forgotten about front row,
which is easy to do considering their sub 20th most weeks.
Sadly true.
Outside of Todd.
Todd's done well to get up there at times.
At this point.
At least he has left distractions with them now.
That's why they're doing better.
At this point, with how much shit is going on with Kyle Bush,
I wouldn't be surprised if he flipped like 07 at one of the only tracks he can win.
Yeah, let's hope.
No, let's hope he keeps all four wheels on the ground.
I hope he keeps all four wheels on the ground,
but it's like this total modern Kyle Bush luck.
But that's the first Super Chat stage break.
We'll cover the rest at the end of the show.
So don't worry, we'll cover them if you've left some.
But guys, I'm going to be honest.
I can't.
Oh, well, I'm actually hearing a little rumbling from playing outside,
but I can't hear too much rumbling.
But let's bring it on in.
I think we're going to have a little bit of stormy weather here.
Let's go to the lightning round.
Of course, we have the NWP channel, which I keep forgetting to do this.
I don't even know where the hell I put it.
I think there's a, I think we still have that one QR code we can pop on screen.
I've completely lost it.
I don't know where the hell.
Give a lot of fun.
Give a lot of fun.
Let's go stomp to our other channel already.
What are y'all doing?
We're 59 away from one K.
We can probably figure something out that'll be fun for people.
I know what to do.
I haven't, I haven't got to do this a while since we just always play random driver now.
I mean, if you guys want to, I mean, you don't have to.
I mean, we would appreciate it.
It's there as an option if y'all want to, you know,
please, sir, please support our second channel.
Please sir, can we have some more subs?
Also some news for the end up EP 400 fan crowd out there,
because we've already starting doing stuff for that and testing.
We actually, and John has it up testing because we're using the gen six again this year.
It's this part of the cycle.
We're testing a package for the gen six that the setup that's tested
allows for around 210 to 212 mile per hour laps in the draft.
It's wild.
You can see the speed difference, crazy crashes,
but that'll be sometime in late August around Daytona week.
But I figure I should let everybody know now so that they can plan accordingly
four months ahead of time.
We're already planning stuff out.
Honestly, like it's pretty damn awesome.
So there is that.
I was actually doing some research and I found out the land outside of Chicago land
speedway that was sold off by Hillwood is being turned into one of the largest AI data centers
in America, $20 billion being put into its size of Central Park.
And according to WGN, these data centers also have a very loud 24 seven high pitch ringing sound.
So yay, the size of Central Park.
It'll be right across the street from Chicago land right next to the drag strip.
And if you've been to the Chicago land speedway and been near there,
it's really close.
The people in the neighborhood are pissed and their government,
their government as is very often in America sold them out for money.
And I'm not happy as a race fan either because I stay at Chicago land speedway throughout the
whole weekend.
And if my tonight is wasn't enough white noise I had to hear.
Also, I wouldn't be surprised if they use all the electricity and we have like the lights go
out like gateway.
Yeah, no more night races at Chicago land ever.
Gate, not gateway.
Cleetus McFarland, his next race will be at Nashville for the O'Reilly auto parts series.
So, you know, if you want to see Cleetus, there you go.
Hey, you know, hopefully you'll run better than you did last time.
I hope he had 300 laps of practice at Rockingham.
He'll have about three minutes of practice before that.
No one how Cleetus is, you know, persona is going Broadway after the race.
He'll probably be out there.
Oh, Cleetus on Broadway.
That'd be a fun video.
The next week will be on Danny's channel, April 29th.
See you there.
Yeah, Eastern time.
All right, that will do it for the lightning round.
And I guess we'll head right on into headlines.
I love these graphics.
Jets awesome.
I don't have a sound effect for headlines headlines.
So there was some talk in an article, I believe that was published by the Sports
Business Journal and Adam Stern, and it was a lot of the future of stock car racing.
I'm just going to be a bit general with it.
It was talking about, you know, the identity of the top three series that while cup and
truck has their identity for the OEMs, O'Reilly really doesn't.
And I find this interesting because the three of us had the same conversation
when it wasn't a big news story.
I want to say two weeks ago we were talking about this came up briefly, I think
said that there's a possibility of compact vehicles, CUVs in the future, maybe EVs similar
to what NASCAR and ABB tested at Chicago.
We're going to test at the Coliseum before the rains came.
I actually have been able to see and look into that car.
It's wild.
If you have ever had the chance to be near it, it is so different.
But I saw it was that car right next to like the original next gen design,
right next to the car they had in Le Mans.
And it's insane how different this car is from the other two.
But there's a possibility, you know, of five, 10 years in the future, depending on which way
car culture goes, that maybe we see a crossover O'Reilly series when it comes to the cars.
Maybe they use EVs, maybe they use hydrogen combustion engines in the future.
Those are all things that basically they said they could do.
They could talk about doing their keeping as options to do.
NASCAR fans ran with it and were pretty vocal.
And it wasn't just NASCAR fans.
It was people that work, you know, on the cars.
People that are, you know, driving on the racetrack.
Dale Earnhardt Jr., both on Twitter and his show, was very vocal against this.
I believe he's even said before that if they went like EV compact vehicles for O'Reilly.
He'd be tempted to just pull JRM out of the series entirely, which is we'll see if he stands up.
He does.
And I don't think he says that stuff lightly.
I will add this real quick, because there was some confusion.
So most of John Probe's quotes in that story were about using, potentially using in a few years,
the crossover body on the next, or on a in the O'Reilly series on whatever platform they come up with.
There was a line in the Sports Business Journal article that indicated he had also said
they could use electric vehicles in the O'Reilly series.
But then NASCAR communications director Mike Ford came out afterwards and said,
oh no, John never said anything about using electric vehicles in a series.
He was only talking about the body.
So I don't know if Stern misquoted him or if that was just a misinterpretation or what,
but that's part of what I think Dale Jr. and a lot of folks were reacting to us.
Electric vehicles in O'Reilly in the next few years.
After the clarification, it sounds like that is not even being considered as a possibility.
Crossovers are.
So I think for the time being, this conversation is more centered on the O'Reilly series platform.
The car might change in the next few years.
And if it does, is it possible they switch it to a crossover type series to more closely
match cars that OEMs are actually selling on the streets because we've seen it.
A lot of the classic sedans, even the Camaro left and now recent rumors suggest it might be
coming back like sedans, those types of cars, not as popular in America as they once were.
Crossovers are much more popular.
So I don't know, I get where NASCAR is coming from in the sense of, hey,
it'd be great to have a sedan crossover and truck series as far as brand identity,
all that makes total sense.
But I also understand fans immediately being like, what are you doing?
The O'Reilly series is arguably the best racing today.
The cars are delightfully old school.
It's still the old gen six chassis and platform.
There's still five lug nuts on the car.
You can still slip and slide them around.
Like it's such a delightful racing product.
Now, why are we talking about changing it?
So I get both sides of it.
I do think the reality is they probably will need to update the O'Reilly series car
in the next few years simply due to, you know, a lot of O'Reilly teams used to get their parts
and pieces as hand-me-downs from the Cup series, but now the Cup series doesn't use those parts
and pieces because they've got a next gen car now.
So some O'Reilly teams are still, it sounds like, building new parts and pieces, obviously.
But we've heard Jude Dale Jr. tweeted about it.
I've talked to, I've heard from others that are like with smaller teams have talked about,
hey, it's harder now to get parts and pieces for some of these cars
than it was even just a few years ago.
So we'll see.
Maybe the economy, maybe the business behind the scenes can change
and they can find a way to keep something like what we have now going well into the future.
Otherwise, NASCAR may step in and we could see a completely revamped O'Reilly series
in just a few years.
I don't know.
I just hope the racing's good.
Here's where I'm at with the EV.
I like the idea of NASCAR having an EV option and an EV type of race,
but I don't like the idea of forcing it to take over something that we already have.
The way I would run an EV series, the problem is EV stuff is not going to be cheap by any means to do.
I wish it could be like what used to be the goodies dash series back in the day.
That was a six-cylinder race car, I think, but it was just something fun that was separate
from really what NASCAR is.
And it got Toyota Celica, so I have a race car.
I mean, it was a unique piece in terms of racing history.
That's how I would see the EV series, personally, being something more fun like that.
We're running like 100 lap at top races on some short tracks,
maybe some big tracks with it, but I don't like the idea of forcing it to take over something else.
Which is what they're not going to do, it sounds like.
So I do think a fourth, if they want to do some exhibition EV races, that'd be cool.
Danny, how would you feel if instead of Supras and Camaros,
it was RAV4s and Chevy Equinoxes in the O'Reilly series one day?
Still gas-powered?
Maybe hybrid.
I don't know what will happen in five years, but I'd say still gas-powered.
How would you feel?
As long as they roar and the racing's good, but I'm really scared.
Just you elevate the top of it and make it, I don't know if a truck can do it.
I don't know.
But maybe it's good.
Maybe it's not.
I don't even know.
It's hard to say.
It'd be weird.
Well, I question too, like the aero side of it too, at the speeds you would want them to go.
Oh, does that make sense?
The OEMs would like it because it's easier.
It's easy to say like, look how good that RAV4 is on the race track.
God, you want to buy one?
You want to buy one now?
I'll tell you when I'm back.
The dirty side of it all.
The dirty side of it all is whether it's two years, five years, 10 years.
Like because NASCAR has moved past the old platform that was the COT, Turn Gen 6,
which is what the O'Reilly series is, they're going to run out of parts.
They're not making as many as before.
I mean, when I was at the R&D center, they talked about that and about how much they
try to reuse different parts.
If it's not compromised in a crash, they'll make sure it can be reused.
And that's only going to go down to trucks more.
It's going to go down to ARCA more.
I saw, I think it was either a tweet or a post on Reddit of an ARCA car that was used either
at Kansas or going to be used this weekend, that the chassis for it was used in Danica Patrick,
one of Danica Patrick's nationwide series races.
And before that had originated as the 2003 Dale Jr. Budweiser shootout chassis.
You're not going to be able to do that with a lot of these major components
because of how different the next gen is.
So you're going to have to next genify the lower series at some point.
Just because of how the way that the racing flows all the way down.
Dale Jr said, even down to the late model scene, it's going to start, you know, having issues with that.
That's, that's the bad thing or the sad thing about it for us fans is that
it's going to have to change at some point.
It's been the platform for this series for 16 years.
Most generations of cars in NASCAR on the cup side don't last that long anymore.
Ever since the COT into the, I guess the COT and gen six are basically the same thing with different bodies, but it's,
I'm just going to hold on to it as long as I can because it is the, it's the best racing series in NASCAR.
I'd argue it's probably the best racing series out there right now consistently that's on a big major stage.
And I just, it's going to have to happen eventually.
And I hate saying it.
And I don't want to, but I think the message that I would put out there is, you know, maybe,
maybe a crossover body would race great at Kansas or at Talladega.
Maybe they can convince us that would be the case.
And if so, okay, but I hope when they have to change the car, their number one goal is,
Hey, how do we make a great racing product?
If the cars don't look exactly like their showroom counterparts.
If it's not the exact, you know, CUV that, that Toyota and Ford want to sell, like that's okay.
Create a car that's going to put on an amazing show.
And I hope the OEMs get on, on board with that sign up.
You know, maybe they get like a sports car series.
You know, the Toyota Supra right now in the O'Reilly series looks kind of silly to me.
Make it actually look like a Toyota Supra.
You know, make it, maybe they could mess around with that, make it look like a Corvette.
That would be kind of cool.
Maybe that could be the O'Reilly series new identity.
I don't know.
I just, more than anything, I want them to focus on making the racing good,
rather than constantly trying to appease the latest, you know, auto industry trend that,
I mean, we've seen the Hemi is gone.
The Hemi is back.
The Camaro is gone.
Now the Camaro might be back.
EV is in, EV is out.
Like they changed so rapidly.
I don't want NASCAR to put off, to feel like they have to put all their eggs in one of those baskets.
Just build an awesome race car that drives good and hopefully the OEM sign off on it.
I won't dive into it outside of a surface level, but
I mean, the car industry and regulations around it have been seesawing back and forth every four years.
Yeah.
And it's, it's going to be at the whims of politicians, basically.
And it's just going to trickle down through racing, through the auto industry, through all of that.
So yeah, I, I don't know what direction it's going to go in, because if we're just switching
things up every four years for all the people that are going to be in power over regulations for it,
we got four years where EVs are the big push.
We can then know, well, hydrogen fuel, well, okay, maybe we should really push hybrids.
It's just, it's all over the place.
At some point there needs to be alignment.
Like what direction are we going in?
Because I can't imagine the automakers at this point are happy about the fact that we're having to seesaw like this.
NASCAR can't be happy about it.
I feel like this article in part was put out there as a feeler to see where the fan base was to about it.
I think NASCAR does that at times two.
Yeah.
But we'll see.
That's, that's all we can really say at this point, because it's all when it's
Yeah.
At least it's at least two to three, maybe five years down the line.
So we'll see.
So you know what we can talk about in here and now we can talk about a Stephen A Smith.
Never thought I would say this on a NASCAR show.
We go from being divided about something to being united on something.
Stephen A Smith managed to unite all of the anti Toyota people with the pro Toyota 2311 side.
It's really not worth going into it too, too much because if you're closed minded to NASCAR,
you're just closed minded.
I feel like Stephen A Smith at this age in his career, he is very closed minded in NASCAR.
Well, I'll give the rundown at least.
So Stephen A Smith was on, I believe, his serious show or one of his million shows.
He's, he's got to earn that billion dollar paycheck or whatever he has to pay.
He does sales operas.
Like he does the most random stuff.
He's on general hospital.
I saw his clips too.
And it's like funny as hell to watch because he's trying to be all serious.
And all I'm thinking is, all I'm thinking is him staring across the table,
dead-eyed at Skip Bayless in 2013.
But they were talking about the goat conversation and LeBron and all that.
Cause of course they were, it's been the same conversation for 20 years for,
for those ESPN folks.
And somebody had called in and said, well, what about Richard Petty?
To which Stephen A Smith said, you know, basically that NASCAR drivers specifically
zoned in on NASCAR drivers and golfers are not athletes.
You can be a quote, you can be behind the wheel of a car in your 60s and 70s for crying out loud.
A golfer is not an athlete.
A NASCAR driver is not an athlete.
Just because you got to walk the course for 18 holes for four days that don't make you an athlete.
And then I think you'd double down on the NASCAR side too.
I love that he just throw shade at golf out of nowhere.
Just randomly says, by the way, Rory McElroy, you're not an athlete.
Does ESPN have any golf coverage either?
It's a good question.
I don't know what they do.
It was CBS that had the masters and all the big tournaments and it's NBC and Fox Sports that
have NASCAR plus prime, which is stealing away from a lot of the ESPN and Disney side of things.
And then ESPN lost F1 events and they can't relate and be like, well, we love F1.
They have no, they have no racing, no high profile racing.
But I, I think we're all in agreement.
We can, you know, anyone who's actually in the know about racing, whether it's IndyCar, F1, NASCAR,
everything goes into it.
Yeah.
We all know that.
I think the bigger picture here is that this is again, that mainstream sports discussion
basically dismissing NASCAR and racing in general.
It's just sort of a sideshow to a lot of them.
It's not that big on the big stage.
If they would take time to truly look at some of the best drivers and what they do to stay at
that level, they would shut up.
If they would take a look at the pit crews and what they do, like most of these pit crew members
we have, a lot of them are like former D1 football players.
Like these guys that, these guys came to NASCAR because it was going to be their next opportunity
in professional sports.
Like it is, it is crazy where some of the backgrounds these guys come from.
But you know, we'll say this, do we have some drivers who are just fat AF, a few,
but how are they doing compared to somebody others?
So I'll say this to your point though, Jerry.
Yeah, it's a shame that's the mainstream sports gatekeepers, if you will, because in a way that
is kind of what Stephen A. Smith is.
He represents the worldwide leader, I mean, really, that they're so dismissive
of NASCAR and that is a shame.
It's where I kind of do hope and where I was, where I think a guy like Michael Jordan has
been valuable, especially this year with all the success, seeing Michael Jordan, like a lot of
like normal mainstream sports fans and channels and accounts, highlighting Michael Jordan
at NASCAR, highlighting Tyler Redick, doing historic things to start this season.
Tyler Redick's a fit dude, he's in shape.
This is also not, it sounds like I'm patting myself in the back and I'm not,
but this is why when NASCAR came to me and said, hey, we have an idea for a show where we like
break down film with the drivers and we'd love for you to help host it and produce it.
I was like, yes, because anything that shows the amount of prep and precision these drivers
that's demanded of these drivers week in, week out, how thoughtful this, how methodical they are,
it's not just mashing the gas turning left.
These drivers train, these crews train to Danny's point and the drivers have to study,
have to be aware of any and all situations. It is not simply mashing the gas and turning left.
And I'm hopeful that guy's like Michael Jordan being more involved.
I even think to a degree, Cletus McFarland, I think his struggles at Rockingham,
he's a driver, he's a better driver than three of us, we all can say that he's a great driver,
but he's so new to NASCAR, you can't just show up and be great.
NASCAR is a lot harder than that, it's harder than it looks.
So I hope some of these stars, some of these new narratives will infiltrate the worldwide
leader and will hopefully change the minds of the Stephen A. Smiths of the world.
But yeah, clearly we still have a ways to go.
Yeah, but one person at a time, that's the best way we can do it.
Well guys, let's have some fun. We've gotten all the serious stuff out of the way.
Let's have a little fun. Let's go into our prediction segment this week.
So for the predictions, each host will make two NASCAR motorsports or show related predictions.
Again, we play fast and loose with that, especially on weeks like this.
Predictions, we'll keep track of them in our accountability session.
We'll try and keep them concise, but if they're a fun prediction, they can go either way.
Eric said, Toyota will lead more laps Saturday than the Lakers will score points in game one.
Got that correct?
Problem is the rocket scored even less.
You did say Clears McFarland would finish 8th or better in the Kansas Arca race.
He was running 10th when his engine blew.
Hell of a save on his part, but that save only got him to the garage.
I said, Toyota would lead the most laps of the whole weekend combined.
And it, yeah, that probably was a layup in all honesty.
I probably should have done a tougher one than that.
All right.
And Danny said, Cory Hyme will finish top 10 in the Kansas Cup race.
He was on track until about that last round of pit stops and run,
but he ran top 10 for a decent part of the day.
So this year so far, Eric at 62.5%.
I'm at 47.62.
Danny at 31.82.
All time I still lead at 37.62.
Eric at 34.4 and 32.27 for Danny.
So Eric, I believe you lead us off.
I just thought of my second one.
I'm going to start with this.
No, I'm going to start with the second one.
Both of my are Talladega related.
First prediction, RCR.
No top 10s yet this year on the Cup side.
RCR gets a top 10 at Talladega.
Not for your prediction, which driver you think it is.
I would say Kyle Busch.
I'll do a Talladega one.
Daniel Dye will be in the gridwalk with Michael Waldrop.
It has to be.
He's got to make the race.
There's 41 cars this week.
So he could miss it and qualify.
Energy drink fun here.
Monster Energy, Red Bull, and Rockstar Energy
will all finish 2026 with at least one win
as the primary sponsor of that car.
Monster Energy already has one.
That's a bold one, but I like it thoughtful.
I just thought of this one.
This one sounds cynical, but with all the way the stages
are lined up now, there's a good chance
drivers are basically mashing the gas
and going the entire stage three.
I think that's what we're hoping for.
But unfortunately, that could result in gridlock,
hard to pass those final 40 some laps.
So my final prediction is that whoever is leading
the restart to start stage three is ultimately
going to win the race on Sunday.
I'll do one about the ratings.
Talladega will have under 4 million viewers
for the first time in the spring race.
One way or another, whether it's rain shorten,
rain delayed, rain doubt, fully run.
I think it goes down in ratings.
Last year had, let me get my numbers out here.
Last year had 4.041 million.
I think we're going to have less.
Denny Hamlin is like me.
He loves, he loves bass fishing.
And for that, I'm going to say Denny Hamlin
will drive a Bass Pro Shops car sometime
before the end of 2027, any series.
That'd be so cursed, but also I feel like it looks so good.
All right, that'll do it for predictions,
which means we're going to our next fun segment.
You got to hide the chat for it.
Random driver of the week, week, week.
We have the weeks.
I think I've told, I've said it before that,
like my grandpa has a story of meeting
Ving Reims in an RV store or something.
He just like went in to get something for his RV
like 10, 15 years ago.
And Ving Reims was in there getting work done on his.
He's like, aren't you?
Yes.
That's the guy who does the Arby's voiceovers.
Yes.
That's such a bad ass.
And like every week.
He was the big muscular black dude after Bruce Willis
and Pulp Fiction.
He was the cop in Dawn of the Dead in 2004.
He's been in Mission Impossible movies too.
Was he in Lilo and Stitch?
Wasn't he the voice of the character?
Yeah, it was a bubble.
Yeah.
He's awesome.
I'm a big fan.
Anyway, I think we're tied.
If my notes are correct at 39 all between first 40 Danny.
Yes.
In the last five going from for this back to here,
Eric got Brad sweet and Tony Stewart.
Danny got Nelson PK Jr.
Then David star for Eric and Dave Marcus for Danny.
That was a good one.
Hopefully we can actually get free with a few clues.
We've been getting them very early here lately.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah, we have.
Unless it's that made up cars character that Jared had for us.
Speedy Thompson deserves respect.
He's on the 75 greatest drivers list, wasn't he?
Or was he not?
I don't recall.
And 50.
I know.
I just keep making fun of that situation.
All right.
Well, let's get to it.
This random driver is a third generation racer.
This random driver also is a Florida man.
Florida man.
I'm bringing the buzzers and everything ready.
I actually got them all put in the right tab so they don't repeat on a loop this time.
This random driver's daughter actually is a current member of the South Carolina Game
Cox equestrian team.
It's like horses and stuff.
A horse girl.
Like University of South Carolina, you said?
Yep.
The Gamecocks.
Interesting.
This random driver's career began on dirt modifies.
I like how they're like, Eric, read the chat.
It's like, no, they're hiding it.
Like, both of them are hiding it.
No, we can't look at the chat.
And fairness to the game.
If we know what you're saying, then that's a problem.
No, I'm not going to.
I'll wait.
I have a guest.
I'm going to wait for one more clue.
God, give it a shot.
No, I don't want to burn it yet.
Give me one more clue because I don't want to sound like I don't want to sound foolish.
This random driver made 79 career truck starts.
Made.
That makes it sound like he's retired.
So that might not be.
I'm just going to throw.
We may have even done this guy already.
So I'm going to throw him out there anyways.
I'll say BJ McLeod.
BJ McLeod.
Okay, that's fine.
Got two more guesses.
I don't think who I'm thinking of would be from Florida.
His accent is not sound like Florida to me.
This random driver has one career truck win.
It's all a win.
This random driver had 127 O'Reilly starts.
Chat's kind of all over the place.
Some got it.
Some don't.
We'll see.
Welcome.
This random driver also has one career O'Reilly series win.
Okay.
All right.
So it's like a guy who had some success, but not much.
I think it shook it off the door.
But this random driver's highest O'Reilly points finish was second.
Can you tell us what year that was?
I might give it away.
Okay.
This random driver also had 235 cup starts.
I can hear it.
Can I call time out?
I'll just let the cat in for a second.
Get in here, Rathbone.
This is going to be one of those top 15, 16 moments
that Cito puts up at the end of the year.
That's the first time we ever had to ask for a time out.
You have two remaining, Danny, and two challenges.
I forgot to add this one on the truck side.
This random driver's best career truck points finish was third.
So second O'Reilly, third in trucks.
And this random driver is one of the few that did get wins in all three
nationally touring series.
So I've got a cup win, at least one.
I bet it's wrong.
I'm just going to throw out Ken Schrader because I know he did modified some stuff.
Ken Schrader is wrong.
So one and one.
Let's see.
As for OEM, this random driver ran in Chevy's, Ford's, Toyota's, Dodge's, and Pontiac's.
This is a 2000s guy.
They're like everything possible.
Also ran for Morgan McClure during the time in Arca for this random driver.
Morgan McClure.
Exploiting a gap in my Arca knowledge.
One win in all series at least.
Not that he's going to help me, but did he win in Arca or do you know?
I'm not going to answer that.
Oh, it's a disrespectful.
This random driver became a dirt track driver and chassis builder after his NASCAR career.
Oh my gosh.
This should give it away, but.
This random driver recently actually had brain surgery.
I don't recall anything like that here recently.
Relatively recently.
Has the chat figured it out by now?
Are they consensus?
Not consensus.
Oh, okay.
So this is a tricky one.
All right.
Not an easy one this week.
Okay.
Sorry.
I did chassis work for what kind of cars?
Dirt track cars.
Just in general.
This random driver has two career cup wins.
Hold on.
Who would have ran that many and had two cup wins?
Someone put in the chat, Kyle Larson.
Sad morning too, buddy.
Known handyman.
Not the last year he hasn't.
Everyone remembers when Kyle Larson drove a Pontiac.
Yeah, it helps.
I actually got to see this random driver win.
Oh, Chicago land winner.
Maybe maybe Michigan winner.
I had a lot of races mapping.
You have David Ruderman.
Correct.
Oh, good poll.
Well played.
I was, I was.
Honestly, you said Chicago land winner.
That gave it away.
That's why I was saving the numbers.
Because there's no way I could do it out of order
without double zero being there.
Yeah.
Yes, I'll play Danny.
There weren't too many clues actually.
We actually got far this week.
How about that?
That's a good one.
Danny takes the lead at 40.
A healthy segment.
The first of 40.
10 away from that 50 mark.
Yeah, I've got a prediction on.
All right.
Let's head on in to Talladega, baby.
We got a few notes coming into it.
So Danny's already in our Google doc.
I do it every time.
Every time.
He goes right in.
He immediately is like, let me just update this real quick.
I love it.
I love it.
No time.
Okay.
Sorry.
Oh, I do it for you too when you get an error.
Oh, yeah.
He does know it every week.
It is funny though.
Immediately.
I'm like, oh, there it goes.
Okay.
So Daniel Baldwin over here just changing the leaderboard.
Real coming down.
All right.
We will have full fields for both series this week.
41 entries for cup, which I believe is the first time we've had 41 entries,
like over 40 entries, I should say, for a Talladega race since like pre-COVID.
Oh, cool.
So yeah.
And I think it's like outside of Daytona.
It's like only the second time in that span.
The only other time being the Chicago street race, the last one there.
So Jesse Love will be in the 33 for RCR.
Joey Gase in the 44 for NY Racing.
Beard has Casey Mears in the 62.
Fincham in the 66.
Danny Dye for Live Fast.
Those are your open cars this week.
As for the O'Reilly series, a couple of no-tier cars.
Quap will be in the one for JRM.
Tyler Anchrom making his first start with Jordan Anderson in the 32 car.
Natalie Decker returns in the 35 for Joey Gase.
And Raja Karuth, it will be in the 88 this week, which like we talked about could,
could be big for picks this week.
As for the races, we have the Agpro 300 for O'Reilly, 113 laps on Saturday at 4pm Eastern time.
25, 25, 63 are the stage lengths.
The CW has the coverage on TV, MRN and Sirius XM on radio, Austin Hill, the defending winner.
And then Sunday, the Jack Lynx 500, 188 laps, 98, 45, 45 the stage break up.
That's just so weird to say.
3pm Eastern time on Big Fox.
Last over the air race until the end of August of this season.
When it comes to the regular season, at least Fox won.
Also, you can get the coverage.
MRN, Sirius XM radio, Austin, Condrick, Sintrick, the defending winner.
Danny, tell me something good with the weather, please, please.
Well, unfortunately, it's, it's not really the greatest situation in the world.
But here's what we got from our good friend, Jeff Borek meteorologist.
The end of April brings a typical pattern for the Tau Daga weekend.
Reference James Spann on Twitter for the best local and third or forecast details.
He said that he will be updating things at X when he can as well.
A pair of storm systems move through Alabama for Friday into Saturday.
And the other one will mainly be Monday into Tuesday.
The stronger system will be the second one,
bringing a severe weather outbreak across the plains, deep south and Ohio Valley.
The first system impacts the race weekend,
bringing waves of scattered storms in from late Friday through at least portions of Saturday.
The O'Reilly Auto Parts series qualifying will be in jeopardy.
And then Saturday's on track activity is on hold fruity afternoon.
If timing speeds up, there is more hope for Saturday's activities.
Unfortunately, the front stalls out,
and it will be difficult to entirely clear out East Central Alabama
until drier air tries to move in as soon as Saturday afternoon.
Campers, of which there are a lot of you,
need to be weather aware on Friday and Saturday for the potential of strong wind,
frequent lightning, heavy rain, a quick spin up tornado and small hill.
Has 30 shelter in mind the second you post up,
and be ready to act on a severe weather plan.
For Sunday, quick moving mid upper level ridge,
clear skies out and brings more opportunities for sunshine and dry weather.
The second system swings through to region Monday,
bringing scattered storms as soon as midday Monday
and the potential for severe weather late in the day.
As the storm prediction center always has the area outlined for it,
certainly try to leave by noon or so.
And yeah, basically what Jeff was saying there,
there's a big focus at the start of the weekend and then after the weekend.
But because stuff is going to be messy at the start of the weekend,
we may see a race have to push to Monday and things still get shaky right there.
Hopefully we just thread the needle.
A little more positive for everyone but me, pick points.
Which we have in the style of the NFL draft this week.
Danny leads with 164-9 over the chat.
Eric is 11 back and I am 25 back looking just like my Minnesota Vikings logo there.
I'm glad to say the Titans logo first and something for once.
Yeah, well, yeah.
Jared, this means you get the first overall pick.
Yes, it does.
And that means that we are going straight on into the picks for the O'Reilly race.
And my winner pick for the O'Reilly race is Austin Hill.
I'm actually, I'm shocked.
Are you shocked, Eric?
I'm a little surprised.
I really thought he was going to go with JJ Yalie.
He's the only forward in the field so he has no drafting help.
I thought that was going to be his win pick.
OEM support with that being that only car.
That's a super powered Ford but.
Chat wants Jesse Love.
Well, hold up.
I'm next, right?
Am I next?
Yeah, Eric's next.
Sorry.
Yeah, you're right.
Maybe I want Jesse Love.
Yeah, I want Jesse Love.
Thanks, chat.
Appreciate it.
Sorry, chat.
I just screwed you.
You went instead.
I feel a lot of Brennan Bull.
Brennan Bull, baby.
Wow.
Are they actually going to do?
I mean, he was almost there at Daytona.
There's actually a decent of 44s coming up.
Do I need to put 88 v 44 pole?
It might be at the level you need to go.
I was saying more 44 and I thought I would.
All right.
Uh, I'm put 44 and 88.
All right.
Danny, are either of those in your picks
or you want to put one up?
Jesus Christ, I'm seeing how many are coming in.
All right.
This one's not going to be close, is it?
Ah, how about that?
I'm going to have to find if they got the PNG
ready for the number for the tweet on Saturday.
I don't know where to look for that one.
I was going to do this one.
All right.
One of those isn't my three.
All right.
Well, I'm going to give them on my end.
Five, four, three, two, one.
End poll and.
Brennan Bull.
Wow.
Shout out, my guy, Brennan Bull.
He's going to be very happy to know that.
Should I tag him?
Should I tag him?
Unprompted.
He will be.
Did you see the tweet from Alpha Prime Racing the other day?
Whoever runs their Twitter account.
They're like, hey, last week as a team without a win,
as a winless team.
Should I just like tag all of them?
Maybe they're just bringing the most illegal O'Reilly cars
Tal Daga has seen since Marty Robbins.
You might need to text him like, hey, this is who's tagging you.
So he's not like, why am I getting tagged
and liked in all of this stuff?
He'll get it.
He'll get it.
He'll get it.
That's fun.
All right.
Well, I'm, shoot, I'm pulling for Brennan.
So I'm, I'm, I'm conflicted this week now,
knowing the chat has, has picked the 44.
Well, that was going to ask, why didn't you pick me?
You were the pick before.
I know.
Now it's going to look bad.
Sorry.
Sorry.
I had to take Jesse's off.
What can I say?
I have three options here and all of these could be fun stories.
But I do, I do find myself just picking stories at Tal Daga.
One of them, one of them was the 88, but I just don't know.
Like, I don't know if any of these guys are going to win this weekend.
That's, that's the thing, but you know what?
I think my favorite of these stories is Parker Redsliff.
So I'm going to go with Parker Redsliff.
Oh man.
I like that.
It's the last laugh.
He's the one I had in the highest like priority of these guys anyway.
My three were Parker Redsliff, Jeb, Jeb Burton and Roger Kareef.
Well, Eric, you had that same reaction.
I picked Jeb last year.
Jeb Burton and, and didn't it work for you?
Better.
At least one of the people on this.
He's got a, if you look up the, if you look up average finish at Tal Daga for the
Raleigh series, Jeb has a good average finish here.
I don't doubt that, but it's bold.
Still bold.
But Parker, for what it's worth, has been doing good in that car at other tracks.
I feel like he could have a legit shot here.
Well, let's go to the cup suck pick.
I was looking at the numbers and they are very bad for one, Ryan Blaney.
That'd be my suck pick.
Yeah.
The Penske cars run good and then don't finish good.
No, although I'm going to go William Byron.
He's been slumping lately and it's been the last top 10 he had on a drafting track
was this race a year ago.
So he's had a hard time getting the good finishes lately.
The chat's going Fox.
Yeah, sure.
I'm like minded to Jared, but I'm saying his teammate, Logano.
Yeah, that, I mean, they're probably going to lead a bunch of laps and then get caught
up in somebody else's mess at the end.
End up being upside down.
So dark horse picks.
And this is fun because you can just turn it on and Ted, I think I picked this guy's
my dark horse pick last summer at Talladega, Kyle Larson, because he's a dark horse at
super speedways.
And he's been surprisingly consistent recently.
I'm going to shock you guys.
Riley Herps.
Yeah, I could say it.
I thought of it making it my win pick, but that would be a little too spicy.
That would have been bold.
That would shock me.
He almost won the 500 and he had a couple top tens here even before he got to 2311.
I think I've got a win pick that's going to shock y'all, but I think that one would
shock me even more.
Is the chat going 34 or 35?
I'm seeing more 35, honestly.
I've seen a guy spanning 19, but I don't think that's an underdog.
I'm saying 35 more, honestly.
Yeah, 35.
And as it should, 2311 has got good super speedway program.
And then I'm going to go with Todd Gill, and I'm taking the 34.
That's a solid one, which leaves one more.
Who is going to win the cup series race at Talladega?
Tough week to have the first pick, Jared.
Yeah, because I honestly, at this point, I don't even really care too much about who wins,
lead laps, all that.
It's who consistently ends up at the front and who has been at the front this year too.
And I feel like it's been kind of a wishy-wash kind of just mundane, not mundane, but just
sort of like kind of paint by numbers expected season outside of maybe just reddit being dominant,
but like the Toyotas are good at most places.
Chevy's a little off, different stuff like that.
I think we need to go pure chaos and no one embodies chaos
like the Hurricane, Carson Hosefar.
He's been pretty damn good here.
I think his average in the last four is like 10.0 or something.
He's leading at the white flag of the Daytona 500.
No, that's a perfectly valid selection.
I want Brad keselowski.
That's who I want.
He was part of my list.
Will that tie him or put him past Dale Jr. and wins at Talladega?
What is he at like four?
That was at like five.
Is he at five?
But he might be past.
He's at four or five.
I'm honestly not seeing anything consistent enough with the chat yet.
Yeah, I've seen 45s.
I've seen 60s.
I've seen 60 a lot.
A few 12s just came in.
Let's see.
He's at six.
He's got six.
He's got six.
I'm shocked there's not more 45s.
Honestly, I really am.
So what numbers do I put into pick?
By the way, I don't know why I'm like...
There's nothing that's consistent enough.
I guess 60 and two is the most I've seen.
I won't keep saying Condrick.
They're just doing that for the...
Well, I guess he won last year.
If I say they're just doing that for the meme.
Pull 60 and two and 12.
That's the ones I think I say the most.
Yeah, I agree.
62 and 12.
All right.
So I'm going to start.
It's such a weird wake for picks in every series.
So you say 62 and 12?
Yes.
They're all aboard the Ford freight train.
Well, you do that.
My pick is none of those.
And I'll just go my number one pick,
all week Eric Jones,
and especially that Doritos car.
Oh, yeah, Doritos car.
If they pick the 60,
this will be probably the craziest lineup
that we'll have put up for win picks.
Oh my God.
It's like almost, I mean,
the 60 is pulling ahead a little bit, but...
I don't at least feel better about this one
than no offense, Brent and Paul.
Ah, he's running away with it, man.
Yeah.
All right.
I'm going to end it.
So let's review.
Jared has Carson Hosebar.
Never won a race.
You have Brad Kozlowski.
I have Eric Jones.
And the chat has Ryan Priest.
Never won a points race.
This is the most chaotic Ford.
And we didn't pick any Penske cars.
We picked them to suck.
Well, some did.
Wow.
Wow.
Oh yeah.
Good point here in the chat.
Priest DQ'd last year in this race.
Don't forget that.
Honestly, if he can just not DQ and not flip,
it's a win.
It's a win in his book, so.
Yeah.
Remember when Priest cheated on NWB?
Don't do that.
All right.
Well, let's finish this baby off.
I will let you know that again,
next week we will be live on,
I'm pointing the right way down there.
I'll point it myself.
His channel, there, that guy.
I don't know why it's so hard to look at myself
in a mirror like that.
Hi.
We'll be on Danny's channel April 29th, Wednesday night,
8 p.m. Eastern time.
All right.
Super chats.
I think we're picking it back up with 23 keys.
Clip in.
Fans demanded overtime because,
oh, by the way, there's a lot of,
not a super chat.
Fans demanded overtime because there were races
where yellow came out with five plus laps to go
with no restart.
If it ends with two left, most wouldn't complain.
My solution, make overtime cutoff two to go
instead of the white.
Yeah.
I mean, it depends on my track.
Maybe you can make it four laps, five.
I don't know.
Yeah.
Because we had the Indy 500 had that drama
a few years back where they ended under caution
and it felt like maybe they could have gotten it restarted.
Was that the one, though,
that somebody hit the end of the pit wall?
Yeah, I think so.
The COVID year.
That might be right.
Let's see.
Imagine someone three years ago hearing these conversations
about Ross being talked about potentially going to Hendrick.
Yeah.
I mean, we were there.
We were there.
We saw it firsthand.
Honor is a fetus compared to Danny.
I thought it said to Danny.
I'm like, why are we picking on Danny?
Oh my God.
I got, my eyes got unk status.
I can't wait for Carson Hosevar to take the lead at Talladega
and then Clint Boyer to say, look, it's the new Dale Earnhardt
and then a rag 10 seconds later.
Clint has that effect on people.
Stephen A. Smith, NASCAR drivers are not athletes.
Yeah, we debated that.
Donovan McNabb on Jimmy Johnson.
Do I think he's an athlete?
Absolutely not.
He sits in a car and drives.
He's not an athlete.
Yeah.
Where's Donovan McNabb now?
Not on TV yet, for sure.
I feel like, I feel like now Donovan McNabb would be like the pro athlete
equivalent to Ben Stiller in the uncredited scene of dodgeball.
My take on EVs.
I'm all for a separate racing series similar to what formula E is,
but as far as replacing the O'Reilly series, heck no, that's,
I've stood in this stance for a while that I want and I want an EV series
that can go and race inside domes around America,
go to like Minnesota and US Bank Stadium,
go down to the weird ass one in Atlanta.
Like you can bring it into cities as long as you're not having a million fumes.
Elliott will be in the 88 at Chicago.
All right, then Brandon Jones is my pick.
If I'm last still, I'll link that one in.
O'Reilly is too good to botch.
Don't NASCAR.
Well, they're not going to change it at least,
probably even in the near future.
By the way, Eric, Donovan McNabb these days.
He focuses on coaching.
Youth sports mentorship and philanthropy living in Arizona.
He serves as a quarterback's coach at Brophy college preparatory in Phoenix.
So I guess that might have been right or wrong both.
Hey, NWP, NASCAR, Kansas O'Reilly.
Holy quaple cars on its roof.
Congrats, Taylor Gray.
Cup great finish, boring race mostly.
Unbelievable.
Reddick and Jordan on five wins this early.
NASCAR certainly is another one here.
Motorsport at Kansas and Long Beach.
ARCA, good thing.
Cletus and host of art were in it.
Boring race as usual.
Long Beach IndyCar.
Surprising.
Alex Palo has never won at Long Beach until now.
Then back to snapback.
I'm more excited for Texas than Talladega.
I mean, honestly, if there's a chance it could be the bigger wild card of the two.
I applauded Ty winning last week, but then he threw a hissy fit in his car slamming the steering
wheel like a toddler throwing a toy as soon as he got tight instead of persevering.
And he's right back to a whining pope baby.
I'm not going to get too many people in the car being excited.
I'm going to stop Tando.
I mean, and he probably should have been better than ninth, honestly.
Ty gives so tight.
Yeah.
I guess that's the part in the race they're referring to.
I don't know.
That seemed to be the other things we've heard.
Yeah.
This showed him like hitting the wheel at one point, which I would be for one overtime attempt
only.
That probably be the balance side of it.
I know they say Danny gas lights, but to me, it sounds like he's being passive aggressive.
I mean, does it really sound like I'm paying passive aggressive?
I mean, what do you guys think?
You can say I am, but maybe I'm not.
Either way, it's manipulative.
I like it.
Core AI CEOs.
What human lives?
What's that?
Did did see Heim and Herps racing each other hard?
Yeah.
I mean, yeah.
I think I closed Heim, ran him up the track a little bit once.
Herps finished ahead of him.
Okay.
Stage one.
Now let's have a 30 minute charge break.
That would, yeah, that'd probably be.
Yeah.
Not fun.
Indy Carson with another one here.
I appreciate your show after enjoying every minute helping elementary students succeed in
school and elementary church group every blessed Wednesday.
Thank you.
Thank you very, very good.
And all that you do.
Yeah.
Micah, the only identity needed is damn good racing.
That's where I like it.
I like it.
Yeah.
We got Hell yeah and cup, damn good racing in O'Reilly and keep on trucking trucks.
I don't know what they say.
Guts, glory trucks.
That's a ram thing.
It's stock car racing, not SUV and EV.
I mean, if that's the car is doing.
You want a truck racing?
Yeah.
And if they, if they, that's the cars they're making.
I mean, yeah, that, I don't think that alone is a strong enough argument against.
I think there are other ways to argue.
I mean, if you could make an entertaining Toyota four runner racing series, I'd still
watch it if it was good.
Yeah.
Blake says finally able to watch live.
Miss the last couple because of small group and seeing Christian artist, Phil Wickham or
Wickham, I don't know how pronounce it.
Wickham.
I was wondering if you say it all once or not.
Also, how many flips this weekend?
I'm going to go one.
I didn't want to go all in and make this a prediction.
I'm actually going to say zero.
I think we had one last week.
We're going to see none at Talladega.
I think it'll be Saturday if it happens or whenever they run the O'Reilly Arca races.
Because I think cup with all the different flaps they're putting on these damn things
every other week.
It's like, I think they're doing, they're probably going to stay on the ground.
Knock on wood.
See, EV as a new series is okay.
Don't replace Bush.
Agreed.
Bush series.
Could the next gen eight with Xfinity quality racing, could the gen, maybe exactly, could
the gen eight or the next gen eight, I think he's mixing next gen and gen eight.
So that tripped me up.
Have Xfinity quality racing?
I mean, I would hope so, but there's no guarantees with, unless it's just putting
something new on what the current plan is.
I like this next one.
Wait a minute.
So Stephen A Smith defense, strip leathers, but not Richard Petty.
That's right.
I saw that rant.
We're talking about the movie cars, right?
You thought I didn't know cars?
That's the thing about Stephen A Smith for me is like, there's times he makes so many
clown takes and you know, you know, when you talk sports three, six hours every single day,
like you're going to make some bad takes.
Yeah.
I mean, look at us.
We have two, three hour shows and we've had some doozy bad takes before.
We've had a low segment for a stupid hot take.
You remember that?
Yeah.
And it turned into lukewarm takes because we kept being so damn wrong on the hot take.
So it's like, he also can be really good with stuff and a fun personality.
But my God, man, like talk about not knowing what you're talking about.
I would love to see Stephen A try and race four hours, four hours.
I mean, you know, all this talk about, all this talk about the approval process,
Cletus McFarlane, put him in, put him against Cletus for an hour and Cletus would run laps
around him even.
Let's get Stephen A Smith in an ARCA car.
Come on, guys.
Like there's, it's just, it's crazy how people don't know there's a clear difference.
ESPN in 2013, they should have just handed the Daytona 500 win to Danica.
It would have made history.
Why would any NASCAR fan want ESPN back?
Yes.
That was Skip Bayless.
I actually made a short and I think they got like a couple thousand views or whatever
about that was the worst NASCAR take ever.
They genuinely said that on the show and we're debating that.
And it's just like, would you have ever said, if you would have imagined someone's like,
they should just, come on, they should just handed Tom Brady the Super Bowl.
Like he's the most popular jersey sale guy.
Like it would be good for the sport.
Crazy.
Mark Martin had a six packet 50.
I agree with Stephen A Smith and NASCAR drivers aren't athletes.
They're finally tuned to athletes.
Go ask Smoke.
That one's all over the place.
Drivers have lost many pounds in races.
That's athletic.
Yeah.
I think the one I heard at one, I forgot who it was.
Somebody lost 15 pounds.
Can they learn like up to 3000 calories and like one, just a small race?
Yeah.
And like, I saw somebody too was like, I think in an F1 race, an F1 drive.
Or lose like seven, eight pounds too.
So it's like, it's, it's not for the faint of heart.
After reading the John Probst comments about crossovers, I got the image of
RAV4s, Mach E's and Blazer EVs racing around Charlotte Motor Speedway.
Not sure if I would want to see that.
Hope he was misquoted.
Aloha everyone.
You see a Jensen.
One of those things that if you asked an AI to just come up with that, it would look like
the most, it'd be AI slop or garlip.
It would look like way more AI slop because it's just hard to even imagine that.
Yeah, it is.
I can't, I can't imagine it honestly.
Like a field of those of like 40 or 38.
I just, I can't do it.
Not yet at least, even, even if they weren't EVs.
Scott says, Eric and Danny sure are lucky.
I'm not in the random driver of the week game.
They'd have a lot less wins.
Probably right.
What do you say?
Only thing I remember from DR, I'm blanking, DR.
David Ruderman is his wins.
Beef with Kyle Busch, his Texas truck crash, 2013 Phoenix crash and Watkins Gun 2011 crash.
You know what I remember?
David Ruderman, the end of that 2012 Martinsville race.
That's, well that didn't see him win.
The Watkins Glen flip was definitely something else.
That was scary in the moment when they flipped to it.
You just see him like already on his side.
Oh yeah.
He was like flying across.
It was such a weird spot too because it was like before the S's, right?
Well, he hit power lines too.
Like if you watch back, like your TV, he hit like chords too above the track.
Yeah.
He did that in the errands during machine.
But you know what, he won in, what was it?
Tums at Chicago?
He'd be Jeff Gordon in like a 600 start or something.
Yes.
He won in Tums in 2010, right?
2010.
Yes.
One of my favorite paint schemes that he had during that time was actually his best
Western scheme in like 2011.
That was a good one.
Michael Walter Racing in those years had like the best paint schemes
in my opinion.
It was really hard to beat them.
That and the rims of the wheels looked really awesome too.
Just got Danny B.
What was rougher for you to watch any Alex Bowman race this year or Cody Rhodes versus
Randy Orton at WrestleMania Night One?
So I only got to watch Night Two because my wife and I, we were working a catering event for her
for the catering company she works for.
We were both working together.
So I didn't get to actually watch that one.
I only got to see the highlights and it was a bloody mess.
I did enjoy Night Two.
I really did what I saw of it.
Night One, I heard a lot of mixed reviews about it just in the highlights.
I saw of it.
Didn't look like it was that great.
So I'll go with the Bowman when, sorry with the Bowman races, what little bit they've
gotten to be, they've been a little bit easier to watch because I did watch that.
Oh, there I am.
Fun fact, Dodge scored its first wins in NASCAR since 2012.
Landon Huffman in his broken antler late model won at Wake County and Tri County in the NASCAR
local racing series.
Landon finished third in the Ram race for the seat.
That's right.
That's cool.
Good for him.
Calypso, that wasn't Tommy Baldwin's call.
It was mine.
Off topic, but it's over.
The 12-game losing streak is over.
God, I hate my meds so much.
Going to the game Friday, pray for me.
You know who Blue Jimmy reminds me of?
Have you seen the video that one teenager leaving the Jets game?
I hate the Jets so goddamn much.
I hate them.
They're my team, but I hate them.
And I'm just sitting here in purple pain for different reasons, being like,
kid, I feel you, man, but I don't make it.
I can relate.
It'll make it worth it.
It'll make it worth it one day when your team goes all the way and take it from a Cubs fan.
I was about to say, I was like, speak,
spoken as someone who's never seen his football team go all the way.
I mean, for what it's worth, at least my team has made it to a Super Bowl.
I might have been really young and didn't really remember it, but at least,
at least I've, at least they've been to one in my lifetime.
Yes, I'm about to say mine's been to four.
It's just, you know, in my dad's lifetime and grandpa's lifetime.
And then the Eric's credit, they're still younger.
They started up after mine, left town.
Oh yeah.
Your, your, your team is like super young.
I mean, Titans technically, they're the Oilers, but the Tennessee Titans,
two are kind of young and their existence.
They started in 01, I think, or 02.
I don't know.
The Texans, 02.
Yeah, because that was the last expansion.
We're changing our stadium name back to what it was in the early 2000s.
So maybe that's a good omen for us this year.
What's that?
What's that going to be called?
Reliant Stadium.
Reliant Stadium.
It's an energy company in Texas.
I think it's in Texas.
I don't know.
I just, I just think in my team is, I think going into year 66.
And so like of our teams, like mine's definitely the oldest.
And then out of the NFC North between the Vikings, Lions, Packers and Bears,
like we're the babies.
Yeah, like two of those teams, I think are over a hundred years old.
And I got it.
I, Scott's in the chat still probably like, how old's Detroit?
They, the, the Lions have to be, I have to think they have to be around that old
or at least because they've been around for so long.
I'm thinking of your team and someone brought up wrestling not long ago.
Minnesota, the Vikings saying it's actually going to be home of SummerSlam this summer.
Hey, we got two WWE wrestlers that used to be Minnesota Vikings, Brock Lesnar and Roman Reigns.
That's true.
And they, well, no, only one now.
Brock actually retired at WrestleMania.
Okay.
Let's be, you know, I meant, I, I just funny because they look so tiny at the time.
Where are we at?
Where are we at?
Uh, if the EV race in Dome's idea came to Toronto, I'd go, yeah, that's the thing.
Like I would, I would go to it.
I would want to see it.
Like I'd probably do, if I couldn't go to the first one, I'd want to do a watch along
because I feel like that would actually be really a cool watch.
Not so fun fact.
Cody Ware, the Cody Ware of the lower series is back.
As Ryan Vargas has gotten tired of tearing up monster trucks in the Canada series will
be in the arc race.
Ryan, Ryan's a good guy.
What has Ryan Vargas ever done to deserve haters?
I remember talking to Ryan back in like, was it 21?
I think where we're like, Hey, why, why didn't you make a move?
Like the, the field kind of cleared up and he's like, there's some of us that's just,
you just, you got to stay in line and preserve the car.
And so I've learned to preserve the car better and, and, uh, oh my gosh.
They're, oh my God, we just got three more in a row.
Oh my gosh.
Do you got that sound?
Do you show me?
Be good, Jared.
Do you need someone else to?
Fucking Gremlin just entered my ear, ear hole.
It's a park.
Oh, that was Cartman, wasn't it?
Oh, and I, it wasn't me or wasn't it me who stole Hamlin's fuel at Phoenix in 2010,
gave the idea of tape on the girl at Miami and blew Byron's tire at Phoenix last year.
The boogie man.
The Calypso lore is, is interesting.
Uh, I saw Danny's thoughts on, is it Oba Femi or Femi?
Oba Femi.
Oba Femi, first Brock Lesnar mania match on Twitter.
I just wanted to ask Danny, what was his favorite match?
Mine was Dominique versus the demon.
They said out those two, right?
I feel like the demon I should be able to say, right?
Dominique, Dominique Mysterio.
Dominique.
Craig Mysterio's son.
Okay.
My favorite match of night two was probably the main event, Roman Reigns versus CM Punk.
CM Punk, his whole big issue when he left WWE originally in 2013 was that he was never
seen as a WrestleMania main event talent.
Well, there was his chance.
He got to do the main event, the grand finale of WrestleMania with the guy who has been
the king of main events at WrestleMania since his entire career, Roman Reigns.
So they put on a good show.
It lasted a good amount of time, especially compared to some of the other matches.
A lot of people complained all the matches were short this year, but that one was good
and long, lengthy.
There was no crazy interference in the running.
It was just a good match between two.
There was a little bit of blood spilled in the match, but not too much compared to like
not before.
Good story.
Roman Reigns wins.
It makes sense.
And CM Punk got to have his time as champion.
I think it was a overall good result.
What?
It's just an ordinary cra-
Oh my goodness, Quaffle.
Accurate.
I agree, Jared.
Make a separate EV series, but leave O'Reilly alone.
Maybe a NASCAR EV series would solve the noise issues.
Some people are having with tracks like the national fairgrounds.
I'll find something else to complain about.
They honestly would.
On Stephen A. Smith and ESPN, any company that cares more about AI and theme park money
than their own animators and writers deserves no respect from us NASCAR fans.
That's right.
They laid off a ton of people on the Marvel side of things in animation and CGI.
And it sounds like they're going to work to use the special effects to be more AI produced.
Which I mean, all the AI looks like Disney already.
So I guess like maybe that was it.
Maybe that was like the Disney Psyop for them using AI as special effects.
So they just put it out there and everyone.
What's your guys' favorite NASCAR crash?
Mine is Allguyer and Gilliland 2014 Kansas.
Uh, B, Brendan Gaughan, 2019 Fall to Aladega.
Chicago Street parking lot.
McDowell 25.
I like when Boyer did like a 360 in the air and was still able to drive to Pit Road
in the duals or whatever that race was.
My guilty pleasure is rewatching McDowell's qualifying crash at Texas in 08.
Another another good one.
Actually, 08 and 09 Watkins Glen had some insane crashes that happened in both cup
and a nationwide series.
I think just whatever that was about those two years, like coming out of that one turn,
especially just out of the car.
That's like crazy for some reason.
I'm trying to think.
I don't think too hard on like favorite crashes.
I guess one of the weird things that you're like, which ones do I go back and watch?
And I'm not like, I love it.
You know, yeah, that's the thing.
Um, I mean, the most iconic one I can think of is, is Edwards and 09 at Dega.
Like, I remember being at my grandpa's house, me and him watching it and like,
because they pan the camera away from Brad and junior racing back.
So for a minute, we're like, Oh my God, did he win?
And it's like, no, I didn't.
But I just remember that's the wreck that always comes into my mind where I'm just like,
Holy hell.
And like another, another good one is Casey Kane at Pocono in 2010.
Yeah.
Yeah.
That one was crazy.
Where that was before they put the catch fence on this.
He was in the bushes.
He was in the shrubs.
The bushes saved him from flipping, basically.
Because that's, I'm surprised they didn't put a fence back there when that dude ran
across the track and like the late eighties, early nineties.
Like I'm surprised they didn't do it then, but it was a different time.
Oh, that was a good one.
Ryan Newman, Oh, three day, 20, 500.
Played that everywhere for you.
The wheels coming off of it.
That inspired the opening to NASCAR 2006.
I remember that.
Let's see.
What are each of y'all's favorite current cup series team?
I had to switch from Stuart Haas racing to JGR to follow Briscoe.
Well, I don't really play favorites, but if the one that's most interesting to me
right now is Spire.
Yeah.
Yeah, that's true for interesting.
I think 2311 is interesting right now, but I don't have a favorite.
Spire is interesting, of course, until something changes with him.
And he's, if he's no longer racing with Bowman fans, I guess it's got to be
Hendrick for me technically.
But when Bowman is done, I don't know if I'm necessarily going to have a new
favorite after that.
I kind of, you know, just pick somebody before I started doing YouTube after
junior left.
So that's just kind of how I got into that place.
But when he's done, it may be harder for me to get one.
Mets win, hang the banner, and dial F for Donald Bush.
Made it just in time to spam Dirt Clash from Supercrash.
Uh, you wouldn't take a super, that's a soccer practice.
Why would we race a RAV4?
The only people who do our 16 year old showing off in high school, and I used
to race my 2001 in power around the back roads of Illinois and Wisconsin over
the weekends at times.
So I don't know.
Super chat of eternal pain and suffering.
They're Scott, by the way, overall than the lions are 96 years old.
So yeah, they're, I was always thinking they got a long, rich history,
especially like you look back at like those teams in the 50s too.
Fun fact, I think it's long enough now that I can say my dad actually took care
of a member that was on those championship winning lions teams.
And the dude was still even really old, still apparently really strong too,
which I thought was pretty cool.
Uh, the Vargas six tic-tac car 2020 or 2021.
Is that the reason people hate him?
Is that why he's haters?
I know, I know that's when him and NRF got into a beef.
Well, around that time who wasn't.
Um, also they cut my favorite series, the owl house, because it didn't fit their
brand. I'm assuming that's where the profile picture comes from.
I think that's talking about ABC and that stuff.
That does look like an owl.
Uh, even though it was a show about magic and witches, great neuro, uh, div rep, by the way.
Yeah, you think magic and Disney would align.
That is true.
Yeah.
The next car wrestling podcast with Danny V talks.
It's still NWP.
Yep.
And 23 priest flip.
Emerends call of it was or is memorable.
Yeah, it was.
Uh, and that'll do it.
That'll do it.
So again, we will be live next week, April 29th on Danny's channel.
That'd be a lot of fun talking.
Talladega heading to Texas, um, heading into May, month of May already.
So yeah, month of May, month of May gets busy for racing.
It's busy for me fishing.
I've got some tournaments coming up here soon.
Oh yeah, man.
It's going to be fun and we can't wait to see all of you guys on Wednesday nights along the way.
Uh, so I guess that's it.
Have a great night, everybody later.
Just let me do my job.
About this episode
Kansas delivered late-race drama again, and Tyler Reddick’s early-season surge is the big storyline: multiple wins across different tracks, often decided in overtime or final-caution chaos, while his team’s execution keeps him near the top in laps led and stage points. The hosts debate overtime’s “gimmick” effect and whether it should be limited or track-specific. They also dig into intermediate-package predictability, Trackhouse/Kyle Busch struggles, and Talladega week—full fields, severe-weather concerns, and a chaotic set of win picks across Cup and O’Reilly.
Tyler Reddick is on fire, sporting a winning record a quarter of the way into the NASCAR season. We break down all things Kansas and look ahead to Dega. In between we talk about the future of the O'Reilly Series with CUV and EV talk as well as the bad take Stephen A. Smith had heard around the NASCAR world.
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