Ryan Blaney’s Phoenix Victory, NASCAR Pit Road Chaos & Las Vegas Preview
Kevin Harvick's Happy Hour presented by NASCAR on FOX
Ryan Blaney’s Phoenix Victory, NASCAR Pit Road Chaos & Las Vegas Preview
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Brand
NASCAR
NASCAR is the group that runs big car races in the US, where cars race on oval tracks and other circuits.
Term
Victory Lane
Victory Lane is the special place at a race where the winner goes to celebrate after the race is over.
Concept
Brickyard 400
The Brickyard 400 is a big car race where stock cars race at the Indianapolis track. It's a very important race in NASCAR.
Concept
Indy 500
The Indy 500 is a big car race where drivers race 500 miles around a big oval track. It's very famous and important in car racing.
Brand
Team Penske
Team Penske is a famous group of race car drivers and cars that compete in big races and often win.
Term
dirty air
Dirty air is the messy wind behind a car that makes it harder for other cars to stick to the track when they follow too closely.
Term
horsepower
Horsepower tells you how strong a car's engine is and how much power it can make to help the car go fast.
Term
downforce
Downforce is like a push that helps a car stick to the road better when it goes around turns, so it doesn't slide off.
Brand
Ford
Ford is a big car company from America that makes cars and also helps teams in car races like NASCAR.
Term
tire wear
Tire wear means the tires get used up and lose grip as the car drives, especially when racing fast or on rough tracks.
Term
DNF
DNF means a driver didn't finish the race because something went wrong, like a crash or car trouble. Not finishing can hurt their chances to win the championship.
Term
pit road
Pit road is where race cars stop during the race to get new tires, fuel, or fixes. Quick stops help drivers do better in the race.
Term
four tires
Changing four tires means putting on new tires on all four wheels, which helps the car drive better but takes more time.
Term
two tires
Changing two tires means only putting new tires on two wheels, which is quicker but might not help the car handle as well.
Term
clean air
Clean air means the race car is in front and not stuck behind other cars, so the air flows better around it, helping it go faster.
Term
crew chief
The crew chief is like the coach of the race team who makes important decisions during the race to help the driver win.
Term
attrition
Attrition means some cars drop out of the race because of problems or crashes, so fewer cars are left racing.
Car
Toyota Camry
The Toyota Camry is a popular car that many people use because it’s easy to drive, doesn’t cost a lot to fix, and lasts a long time. It’s a good choice if you want a car that’s comfortable and won’t give you many problems. Lots of people buy it for everyday use.
Concept
pit crew
In car races, a pit crew is a group of people who quickly fix or refuel the car while the race is going on so the driver can get back on the track fast.
Concept
Cup Series
The Cup Series is the main racing competition in NASCAR where the fastest cars and best drivers race against each other.
Brand
Hendrick Motorsports
Hendrick Motorsports is a top team in NASCAR that builds and races cars in big competitions.
Company
Joe Gibbs Racing
Joe Gibbs Racing is a well-known NASCAR team that races cars and often wins.
Car
Chevrolet Camaro
The Chevrolet Camaro is a sporty car that NASCAR teams use, and they updated its shape this year to go faster.
Concept
IndyCar Series
IndyCar is a type of car racing with very fast, single-seat cars that race on different kinds of tracks. It's famous for the big race called the Indy 500.
Concept
Formula 1 (F1)
Formula 1 is a top-level car racing series where very fast, special cars race on different tracks around the world. It's famous for exciting races and cool technology.
Term
burnout
A burnout is when a driver spins the car's wheels really fast while the car stays still, making smoke. Drivers do this to celebrate after winning a race.
LIVE
He passed 49 cars, by the way.
Light work for old Ryan Blaney.
Speed cures everything. When you have speed, nobody can stop you.
When that dude is smiling, it just feels like we're in a better spot.
When Jordan's happy, everybody's happy.
Everybody's happy.
It's almost like we were watching the championship race again.
You don't have to do both.
You're the latest California's Kevin Harvick coming!
Hey everybody, welcome into Kevin Harvick's happy hour presented by NASCAR on Fox.
I'm Caitlin Vinci, alongside my buddy Mamba Smith.
And this is not Kevin Harvick.
This is Lane Riggs, which we're stoked to have you today.
Because Kevin is doing a little vacationing.
Yeah, most recent winner in the Crafts and Trucks series, Lane Riggs.
So I wore my, this is my only truck series shirt that I got.
So I wore my Ron Hornaday.
I got the goat here and got one of the up-and-comers over here.
It's great to be here with you guys.
I watch a show all the time.
And I know I got some pretty big shoes to fill today.
So I'm going to do my best and try to hang out and talk some racing to you guys.
I'm glad that you're here.
Yeah, it's been a good year for you already.
By the way, we would be remiss if we didn't at least mention the fact that you won just a few weeks ago at St. Pete.
Yeah, St. Pete was awesome.
I mean, we had the first double this season with the IndyCar series.
And man, what a great crowd.
And so many people I talked to at St. Pete.
They're like, we've never seen NASCAR's before.
And I'm like, just wait, you guys will figure it out.
So no, it was a great crowd.
And we got the job done.
Had to fight from the rear of the field.
Didn't get to qualify, but it was super great racing.
To be a street course, it had a lot of passing zones.
And you know, my team gave me a great truck.
Got Long John Silver's Victory Lane.
Actually, their first win in NASCAR, they've been in the sport forever.
So it was really cool for them.
And it was a great event.
And I'd love to go back next year.
And your dad was kind of stressed though, you said?
He was a little stressed.
He was spotter between turns three and four.
And after the last lap, we were like running out of fuel
and went through his section.
Somebody snapped the picture.
He was like on his hands and knees in the spotter stand,
like his hands over his head.
He was worried.
But we got the job done.
It was actually a great race and a lot of great feedbacks from us.
It was super cool to do it there.
And after the, especially the first two races of the year,
just not going our way.
What a great rebound.
Well, we appreciate you filling in here for Mr. Kevin Harvick.
It's great to have all of you with us.
Welcome into this edition.
Where can people follow us on social media, Mamba?
Harvick happy pod.
There you go.
Before we get too far into it, I got to make sure.
So guys, I got some kits out.
These are actually very cool.
All right.
These are really cool.
Shout out to my boy.
Happy hour on them.
Levi Law.
And Caitlin.
Bro's got the box with him.
Law kicks.
I'm giving you a pair as well.
That's awesome.
You totally surprised me with this.
Oh yeah.
That's what surprises are for guys.
Thank you.
I wondered why you asked for my shoes.
I was like, why does he need to know that?
That is super cool.
And this is a big race fan.
He's out of Charlotte.
So that's awesome.
It says happy hour on it.
Carolina blue.
Kevin Harvick's happy hour.
That is so cool.
Thanks, buddy.
You're welcome.
I appreciate that.
Yeah.
Kevin doesn't get a pair tonight.
And neither do I.
I didn't know you were going to be here.
It's all good.
No hard feelings.
That is awesome.
Thank you.
I appreciate it.
So today we have to recap everything that happened in
Phoenix preview Las Vegas.
I know we have some very MJ theme sips.
Yeah.
So we're going to go, we're going to go down that path.
There we go.
We're going down that path.
Okay.
So let's start with the cup series and everything that
happened out in Phoenix.
Ryan Blaney, your guy with it with a very impressive
performance.
I might add because this maybe is one of his most hard fought
wins.
He's had yet given the amount of attrition that this team
faced multiple loose wheels, having to put in his teammates
pit box.
He passed 49 cars, by the way, on the way to the victory.
Yeah.
Light work for ORB.
I'm going to call him ORB now because he's older now.
They're not YRB or old Ryan Blaney.
No, their group got it done.
And I think that was just a testament to their championship
pedigree.
Like I think back in the younger years, maybe that would
have been a meltdown Ryan Blaney moment.
And it wasn't.
And they locked in and got the job done.
I also think that this weekend was almost as important as the
Indy 500 and Brickyard 400 is for Team Penske as a whole.
They won the Indy car race with New Garden.
And then they honestly dominated the weekend.
Like the 22 sat on the pole, the two qualified really well.
Obviously Ryan had a lot of speed.
You could tell off the beginning of the race that Ryan was going
to be up there.
And they just kept going back and coming back to the front,
going back and put it on a real show.
And then at the end it was like, all right, man,
like it's time to cowboy up.
Cowboy.
It's time to cowboy up and he got it done.
So it's pretty cool to see that happen for him.
To your point, I just feel like we've seen so much maturity out
of Ryan Blaney now.
I mean, he's a former champion.
But like you said, in some of those moments in the past,
it maybe would have derailed the whole efforts.
But he's a dad now.
And he even said winning feels different as a dad.
I look forward to hearing more of his thoughts about that on
Victory lap.
But what did you think of Ryan Blaney's performance?
I thought he did a great job.
And anytime as a driver, when you have to go to the rear of
the field and you see all those cars in front of you,
like just naturally as a person, you're like,
there's no way you're going to get to the front.
I mean, you got dirty air, your car feels terrible in the back,
but speed cures everything.
When you have speed, nobody can stop you.
And obviously nobody can stop Ryan Blaney on Sunday.
And Pinsky did not skip a beat.
The higher horsepower, low downforce package,
they haven't skipped a beat.
They were just as strong as they were last year or stronger.
So just to testament the team, Pinsky, Roger, I mean,
the captain, he's the man for the reason.
Banner weekend for Pinsky.
You've been in a situation like that though in the past.
And I'm thinking of the Bristol race last year where you had
multiple setbacks.
What kind of like mentality does a driver have to shift into?
I mean, I know it's your job,
but being able to overcome the obstacles.
It's tough because you lose your track position and it puts you
in a scenario where you have to be more aggressive.
But then the same time they're saying,
don't knock the nose off of it.
Be careful.
It's like, but I got to pass 30 some guys to get back to the front.
So for me, it just, it just lights a fire under, under,
under my butt and just makes me want to go back to the front
and just proved everybody like,
and the Bristol thing was my fault.
Obviously the Blaney thing wasn't his fault.
And you get really frustrated in those situations.
The other one was I messed up.
And if I don't win, I'm going to feel really bad.
So I was like, I got to win for my guys cause they deserve it.
And they gave me a good truck and I made sure I did it.
Yeah.
You think that was a championship caliber performance there out of
Ryan Blaney?
Yeah. I mean, I think if you look back to last year,
this is the same 12 team that we saw with a lot of speed,
carrying the Penske banner, carrying the Ford racing banner
in the cup series.
And they're picking off right where they, where they left off.
And now he's, I think he's second now in points already got
an early win.
165 he's at 165.
So that's, you know, there's only two guys that have won races
and four races.
Just Tyler Redick and Ryan Blaney.
I think you also look at the team aspect when he had that loose
wheel and they had the awareness of mind to bring him into the 22
pitch stall.
Yeah.
I think that was a massive, that's a massive moment because
he didn't lose nearly as much as he would have if,
especially if it falls off.
Yeah.
It falls off on the track.
You're screwed.
Yeah.
He would have lost what two-pick guys that week.
I mean, that's, that's, that's detriment.
That's something we've seen last year started happening when teams
had the wherewithal to know, okay, I'm going to use a teammates
pit box to get these tight again.
And so Joey Logano's team came in with the assist.
It was kind of funny because they were all doing the high fives
and like, hey, great job on our stop.
I think they got them all first.
They were all excited.
There's another car waiting here.
There's another car here.
There's another car here.
But that's, yeah, but that's the type of thing that teams need to
do if they're going to win a championship is having to be able
to overcome in those moments.
Yeah.
I think when you get in those scenarios, you really got to,
you practice those a little bit and it's about being adaptable
and changing the situation that you have right in front of you
and everyone being on the same page of what that thing is.
The fact that they have four cars that they can do that at,
right?
Change it.
Like with Lane's situation, if he had to do that,
that's kind of tough because you only have one teammate on the
track with you.
Yeah, for sure.
I mean, Chandler Smith, he, and with us,
we don't even know where each other's boxes are.
Like that's something that we might need to figure out, right?
I mean, after, after last season, seeing it for the first time
and such a, such a freak scenario, I mean,
I'm pretty sure this is something that drivers have to study
and plan and say 22 stall number one this week.
Make sure if you have a loose wheel,
we know we're going to go buy his box.
I mean, that's a lot of preparation in time.
And that's why we're seeing it so much more often.
We're talking about tires,
which brings me to stage two when we started to see a lot of right
fronts going down, which we knew this was going to be a possibility
going into this race based on past trends.
Were you surprised that it took as long as it did?
I mean, I think, yeah, I mean, there's a couple of different things
that were going on, right?
Like the, the new, the package that changed that how you,
how aggressive you are with the car and you're trying to find all the
grip and this track wears tires out pretty aggressively in the long
runs that we were having.
And you saw the tires failures kind of happening in bunches.
Like at the same time.
So obviously the, the length of those good years were,
were getting maxed out and the teams will push them to the limit.
But this is part of the attrition of cup racing.
You know what I mean?
It's, it's part of what you do.
And you saw SVG, he had a flat, he spun out.
He spun out.
Now twice in two races between here and Atlanta and comes back,
comes back and doesn't, doesn't hit anything comes back and finish.
I think he finished 11th.
So the tire thing, I don't think that was a good year problem.
I think it's just the teams pushing it to the limit.
What is that like for a driver when you're seeing all of this unfolding
on track and you're sitting there hoping, okay, I hope I'm not next.
We don't really fight that in the truck series at least,
but that had to be pretty, pretty scary to see like, okay,
especially your teammate.
Like I know we have to the 10th of a pound.
We have the same air pressure.
And look is a lot of the fans don't know you can pump these tires up
and nobody's going to have a tire failure all day,
but you make the most grip with the least amount of pressure with these tires,
the low profile sidewalls and the diffuser in the rear.
So the teams are going to push it and the guys that pushed it all day long
and didn't have a tire failure or the ones that are in victory lane.
So it's so tough, especially for the guys that are running that mid-pack,
need that little bit of breakaways like, man, just a little more grip.
I can do it is what the drivers are saying and the crew chiefs,
they take that last step.
But yeah, as a driver, you just hope you're not the next one,
but you can't drive it easier.
You just got to pray to the racing gods and the good Lord above,
but it's not going to be that.
Well, that's the hard part.
Right.
It's like to his point when you're all right,
we're like William Byron was pretty much around eighth all day.
Right.
And it's like, man, we just need a little bit more.
If I can get a little bit more turned out of this thing
and Rudy's got to be up on the box being like, I could get it to you,
but like, I don't know if we're going to be past this point.
And if we are now with the chase format, a DNF is detrimental.
Oh my goodness.
To your skeezing right now.
And we're going to talk about some of those guys who are already
in a pretty deep hole.
Just five races in four points pain races in one team that seemingly
didn't have any mistakes was Christopher Bell.
They executed on pit road.
Car was fast.
They did take four tires at the end when, you know,
obviously Ryan Blaney and others took two.
What did you make of that?
I guess that means it was almost like we were watching the championship
race again when Denny took four and Kyle Larson took two.
Yeah.
Yeah.
I think it's the thing is in this situation,
this scenario is the 12 was so fast.
Yeah.
He was so fast all day.
So it wasn't like we're trying to take two to steal one.
We're taking two just to get the track position to stay up front
because we believe that we'll, once we get in the lead,
no one's going to be able to get to us.
Now the 20 was coming.
It was a haul in the mail.
A few more laps.
I think he said he probably would have got it.
The dog fight was on, but that's what we love.
We love this racing for that.
Right.
We love the different strategies.
So I think the fastest car won the race,
but the strategy and the strategy worked out,
but you have a overtime finish, one more caution,
something different.
The 20 is going to virtually.
Yeah.
What'd you see out of bell?
Yeah.
Just I think that through the whole day when you saw the Pinsky
dominance early, I think they were one, two, three for the majority
of the race.
I was like, there's nobody going to touch them.
I mean, you have three of them up front.
One of them is going to get it done.
And then after Blaney had his issues,
the gunner kind of fell off a little bit and didn't have the
long run pace.
I'm like, Bell's got the best car now.
I mean, he was just smoking them.
Yeah.
It was crazy.
And then at the end when Blaney only took two and there was
only seven guys that took two.
I'm like, I think it was like 20 laps to go.
And I'm like, there's no shot that these guys on two are going
to hold this guy off.
I mean, the last time it was a green, white checkered finish.
It's four versus two.
This time it's a 20 lap to the finish like that.
When they took two, I'm like, it's over.
The 20 cars got this and just, it just shows how much track
position matters.
Clean air for these cars.
Yeah.
And I think that his crew chief knew if you put him out front
and you give him that clean air, he's going to do all he can
to defend it.
I was intrigued by the battle between, it was, you know,
the Toyotas of JGR and 2311.
Because Bubba came from a long way back to get himself up in
the mix as well with Tyler Reddick.
And then the Penske cars, it was like, it was, that was the
whole top 10.
And it was just a dog fight.
And then the Penske cars by attrition started losing bullets
and it got down to just this one.
And it was interesting to see that unfold.
Bubba Wallace, he is third in the points right now at 153.
He's having a good year.
Like, Lane, can you, maybe you have some good perspective on
this.
When you're having a season like that as a company, right?
But your teammate, maybe the one getting maybe the best breaks,
the luckier breaks and like finishing them off and winning
it.
But you know that you're doing just the same amount to win
those races.
How tough is that staying locked in?
Yeah, it's hard because you see and you're like, man, he's got
equal equipment.
And you know, I look at last season with Chandler Smith,
he was in the new team in the shop and they just got that
team together last.
Through it together.
Through it.
I mean, he talked about it all season long.
They just, I mean, literally it was like after Christmas,
they're like, we're going to start a second team.
And I was like, what?
And they did that.
And we struggled to start the year and they got the first two
wins as a company.
And then your question like, is it me?
Is it the equipment?
What was it?
And then later in the year kind of flipped the other direction
and we kind of had the edge and it's just all about timing and
just staying true to yourself, staying confident in you knowing
that as a race car driver, I can make it happen.
And we're just not getting the right days.
And I know that you have to be confident enough yourself and
say, well, no matter what, no matter what race,
it's not even with a teammate.
If I was in the winner's car or truck,
I could have done the same thing.
And having that confidence in yourself knowing that you could do
it if you had the right scenario on that day is what makes
the difference and having a confident race car driver every
week and you ship the racetrack.
Yeah. 2311 definitely has a lot of confidence across the board
with both with two of them.
One team that should have confidence as well as Ty Gibbs who
had a top five performance was in the mix at the end for the win.
Making some statements.
I thought we were interesting saying I have the right people
around me right now.
The right guys that makes a difference and we're running
really well because of that.
Yeah. I mean, I think we all were monitoring the
His statements.
Yeah. His statements to the JGR deal with Chris Gaeper
and how that's all going.
Obviously, I'm not going to speculate if that's what he's
talking about or not, but it does matter having the right people.
And I think when you have a driver that feels like he has
the group around him that he can trust and that you're pulling
for him.
I think that matters a lot.
And obviously the relationship at JGR with Chris Gaeper
and them was a great one, but it didn't just deteriorate overnight.
Right.
So you could one could think that, okay, maybe there was a
little bit of friction there and that relationship and it just
wasn't working.
Some of those things just don't work, but it's working right
now for Ty.
I think one of the moments that probably allowed him a
shot of this win was him almost running over his cousin.
This is funny.
Jackson.
Jackson Gibbs.
Yeah.
Jackson Gibbs, front tire changer, two tire stop, right?
We were just, we were talking about that off camera.
Two tire stop.
And this was how they got the lead.
Jackson jumps from, yeah, here it is.
So Jackson jumps from what middle?
Yeah.
Right at the Camry.
All over.
Athletic display there for the former football player.
But felt the heat off of the hood of that car.
So, Lane, let me ask you, in that situation, you just got to
go, right?
Like you guys are trained when the jack drops to go.
Yeah.
When the jack drops, you go no matter what.
And I've had conversations with my front changer, Blake.
And I was like, do I need to wait on you a little bit?
He said, I don't care if I take a bumper to the shin.
Go.
He's like, I'll figure it out.
Blake's gone.
I was like, okay.
Look, he's got the Mohawk and everything.
Shout out Blake, by the way.
Shout out Blake.
So, no, he's going to like that.
But no, he says, go.
I don't care.
I'll figure it out.
As long as you don't hit me so hard, you knock my gun into the
next box.
We're good.
So, just go.
Oh, that's exactly what happened.
But I do think we're seeing a lot of maturity.
I've been using that word to describe Ty Gibbs.
Because it really does, to me, seem like he's coming into his
own in this series.
And it really hasn't taken him that long in the grand scheme of
how long he's been there.
Yeah, I know.
And when you look at Ty, he's a winner.
He's been winning since he was in late models.
He's won at every single level.
He's going to win at the cup level.
But you got to have all the pieces together.
And Kevin always likes to talk about your circle of life.
Circle of life.
If you don't have this circle of life together, then it's really
hard to make anything really go, anything be really successful.
And I think Ty is starting to get that.
I think he's growing into his own person and who he wants to be.
I think that translates directly into being a better race car
driver.
And now, you know, when you look at the company, like we're going
to get into it here, but like Briscoe being so far back, like now
he's got a big hole to dig out of and Ty is in a situation where
he's like, no, we're in a good spot.
So I don't want to lose this.
So he needs to just keep stacking days, stacking those days and
stacking those points.
Someone in the Penske stable who had a rough go there at the
end was Joey Logano.
And I want to go back to the incident that started the 10th
caution of the day.
AJ Almonddinger kind of got into Joey.
It sent a chain reaction.
What did you see from that incident, Mama?
I mean, it's just a tough restart, right?
They're getting all they can get.
The craziest restarts in the game right here.
You're four or five wide and the gap just closed.
Lane, I feel like it was one of those deals where they come out
of the dog leg and AJ was there and then the hole just closed.
AJ tries to get out of it.
He just barely catches the 22 and then it sends that chain reaction
going.
Yeah.
And a lot of things, a lot of the people that watch the race
don't understand.
I mean, we listen to our spotters a lot.
I mean, I've heard six wide through the dog leg.
He's like six wide four inside.
Like it just happens so quick.
You don't know what's going on and you have to be really aware
of your surroundings.
But the spotters there in turns three and four, they're looking
directly away from this.
Like that camera view you just saw, that's what the spotters
are seeing.
You can't really tell death perception wise where they're at.
So I've watched both the in car cameras and it's like Joey
felt like he only had one car on his outside and he was all the
way at the wall.
So he came up and AJ had this massive gap in the middle and he
had a run.
You got to take those runs that are there and it's hard to place
blame on either of those guys.
I mean, that's just the Phoenix chaotic restarts that all the
fans crave to see.
Kind of one of those racing deals.
I will say the Fox had a great in car camera of Joey when he
got hit and I from the outside that looks like an extremely
vicious hit.
And I'm not saying that he didn't feel that, but it looked like
everything and the safety of everything did what it was
supposed to do.
So that's always a great thing when you see that.
That was the incident that ended Joey Logano's day.
Prior to that, there was the eighth caution on lap 217.
Starts with Joey kind of getting into Ross Chastain.
Once again, chain reaction, bunch of drivers knocked out.
Vicious hit for Austin Syndrick in the process.
I was just, that had to hurt.
That had to hurt.
This one was a little different because it was on a restart,
but like down when you get down off the flat, it's super bumpy.
It's super rough.
And I think it was one of the deals where Joey got to the
bumper right at the same time or right before Ross went over
one of those bumps and it just kicked him sideways.
And like after that, it was on and they just slid all up the
racetrack right into everybody.
Syndrick to your point takes a big hit here.
So you see it, they go over the bump and then all of a sudden
the one is sideways.
When you get pinched in the wall like that, you hit once and then
he hit twice.
That second hit definitely hurts more.
Yeah.
I mean, anytime you hit a wall is way worse than hitting a car.
We have safer barriers, but those walls don't move.
There's concrete behind those walls.
And I mean, I'd way rather hit a car.
People ask all the time, how does flipping feel and all that?
I've never flipped, thankfully, but I'm like, what?
Knock on wood.
Knock on wood.
But it's like hitting a solid objects hurts.
And I know for Austin Syndrick, I know he's sore today.
He said after, you know, his infield care center visit that it's
frustrating for him because they've had so many fast cars to
start the year, but he doesn't feel discouraged.
He said the team has shown me a lot in the first four races.
And I don't think these numbers are reflective of where he's been
because he has been in the mix a lot so far this year.
Yeah, I think for them, they just got to buckle down.
They just got to start getting stage points, start getting some
finishes, finish out these deals.
Again, it's not like it was last year or the last few years where,
all right, we've got wrecked.
Well, we can gain it all back next week by winning a race.
There's just no way to do that.
Now, you obviously want to go win races and you want to be up front,
but finishing the races now are probably almost more important than
winning the race because you need those points to keep it going.
He's got a long way to go.
I think I wrote it down.
He's 173 back.
That is deep in the field right now.
Big hill to climb.
Big hill to climb.
But we are starting to get into a more steady rhythm of tracks.
Like to start the year, it's been kind of crazy.
You had the two super speedways.
You have a road course.
You go to Phoenix, which has its own challenges.
Now we'll be going to a mile and a half Vegas.
We're going to Darlington.
We're going to Martinsville.
So I think we'll really start to see a good read on like where everybody is at.
So he had a frustrating day.
So too did Chase Briscoe.
You mentioned him earlier.
Again, like I look at his finishes, 36 second, 37, 37th.
And he's like led laps though in every race.
I think it's one of those deals where he's, they got to do the same thing,
but they just got to go and finish.
Like they got to do the same thing that the two has to do,
but they're faster on a week to week basis.
So I think they, they have the capability to at least get into the chase with their speed.
But you can't let it go.
I can't have another week like this.
Like I think all the Mulligans are gone.
I think he's got a string together,
like 20 straight of like solid finishes to get into this.
Yeah.
And I was pretty frustrated for myself after Atlanta two in a row.
And I'm like, that's terrible.
We went from like 26th to fifth in points in one race.
So a lot of people don't realize those, those wins and that 15 bonus points
when you win a race, that's still a lot of points.
And you see, I mean, that's credits reddit to being,
having such a point lead over a second right now.
And something that I've talked with my team about is like, if we're in a hole,
you can't have bad days.
You got to have strong days.
You got to have solid days.
Well, the guy that's leading the points has that same exact mindset.
We got to have strong days.
We just got to finish.
Got to have good days.
Can't have any more bad days or can't have any bad days.
Period.
It's like your mindset really doesn't change.
It's the same either way.
If you're leading by a lot or you're in a big hole,
you just got to go out there and have solid days.
And you're going to hear that a lot this year.
Solid days.
That's what matters.
Finish races.
I think that the, the stage points are definitely going to help.
Like they lessen up below.
I think that's the important part to the, the season structure right now,
because you can make up more.
And even if you don't win to your point,
well, I got second and look at all these stage points we got.
That's a really good thing too.
Yeah. Chase Briscoe.
We've been talking about him.
47 points.
Austin syndrome 52.
So yeah, already in a 178 back.
This is what everybody wanted though.
We wanted this.
We wanted this system in place.
And I do think it's going to make it incredibly intriguing as the year
continues on though.
Yeah, it is.
And I think one thing that I've been thinking about this whole time is by
the time we hit, you know, the in season challenge, right?
So there'll be, I think there'll be about six races to go before we're
into the chase.
There's going to be about five guys probably locked in.
There's going to be a bunch of guys that are fighting to stay in.
They'll be in good points position, but they'll really be like from 15th
to like 20th that have a shot at making the chase.
And then everybody else is just going to be trying to salvage their season
and win races and do something else.
Because I think they're going to be too far back.
If you do not get into that 20 ish range, it's going to be almost impossible
I think to make the chase.
I mean, you're having to shift your mentality totally, right?
I mean, from what you've grown accustomed to in terms of trying to run
after a championship, right, Lane?
Yeah, just going back to the old school days and trying to think DNFs
are like the killer.
They just kill you.
And it's difficult.
Now you have some stage points to save you, but a DNF is, I mean,
it's way better just to lick your wounds and finish 15th than a DNF.
It just hurts so much.
Takes you back to late moderating my days in the car tour.
I was going to say, maybe that'll help you.
And I was, I should have, would have, could have won like three cars
tour championships.
I finished second in the championship, I think two or three times.
And those stung, especially when we had such a long year is like we were defending
the whole time or we were gaining points.
And also my national championship season as well was the same kind of way.
Just those solid days, even if you don't win the race, you just got to just take
it on the chin and know that today wasn't your day, salvage those good days.
And you know, if we're racing for the win, you know, maybe take a little more risk.
Those 15 bonus points, they help a lot, but the difference between third to fourth,
fourth to fifth, like, is it even worth it?
If it is, is it even worth the risk of trying to pass the guy to get that extra point
when there's that risk you could wreck and ruin it all?
You know, it's just a different mindset for drivers.
And I feel like a lot of us and even the cup guys haven't really figured that out yet.
Like that happy medium of aggressive to get points versus passive to save points.
It's got to be a tough balance.
Yes, for sure.
And I think that a lot of people are going to look back at these first few races
and have a lot of regrets in their head about decisions they made on the racetrack.
You got to figure out, like, how aggressive, like someone who's going to stay aggressive,
Carson Holtzvar.
Oh, gosh.
Carson Holtzvar is going to stay aggressive.
And it's worked out for him so far.
And it's worked out so far.
He really wasn't involved in anything.
He wasn't involved in anything.
There you go.
All he did was go from the back of the field to the front of the field.
Like all he did, the Spire cars were fast.
He was not in the eye of the storm.
But you do got to, is this risk versus reward?
You got to gauge that real time while you're 200 degrees in a race car.
So one driver we haven't touched on yet who finished 11th.
What you briefly did was SPG.
He is learning these other types of tracks, which could signal trouble for the competition.
Listen, man, he's a world-class race car driver.
He is.
He had one year at this level in the year prior, before, before a different type of vehicle.
So this is in the second year.
And it feels like he's been here forever.
And now it seems like he's a perennial top 10, top 15 guy.
And he's ran like a handful of super speedway races.
Like forget all the other forms, all the other types of racetracks we have.
But like the first two, and he found his way towards the front.
Obviously Kota, we expected him at the front.
And now we're back to Phoenix like, okay, let's see what he's got.
Oh, he's got it.
He's got to resolve because they went to the back.
His graph of his timeline was back to front, to back to front.
To finish on 11th was absolutely wildly impressive.
And I think everyone is going to start taking notice because it also means that
Trackhouse is back on the right path with their race cars.
If he's going to be good, that means Ross is going to be better.
That's another bulldog that you don't want to deal with.
And then you got Zillich who's, he's going to find his way.
What do you think's been cool about watching what SPG has done?
And since he came over to our sport.
It's made us better.
I know everybody's said it before, but I mean, even a guy that doesn't race against them.
Hopefully I will be one day and I'm like, I got to get on my game.
I got to get on these road courses.
Well, you did.
And I did.
And I did.
Hey, it worked out great.
And shout out Joey Hand at Ford Racing.
He is a huge help to me.
All the Ford Racing drivers at road courses.
He's another world class racer that I think he could do just as good.
And if he had the right opportunity in NASCAR as well.
But yeah, I hunkered down.
I did my homework.
I've been doing road course racing on iRacing.
No more, no more super speedways on iRacing.
I do the road courses and get beat by all the overseas guys every day.
So it definitely likes a fire in you to try to be better at things that you aren't the best at.
I still love that tagline.
Well, it wasn't really a tagline, but it was like the short track racer from North Carolina.
Yeah.
Who would have thought, right?
I mean, it's just something that was so out of my comfort zone, you could say.
But I like the road courses.
They're fun.
I put in a lot of work and effort.
It's just, it was like my first win again.
It was like something that's so different than what I normally do.
And now I'm like, I wonder how I'm going to stack up against those guys at the premiere series.
And we hear in a couple of years, hopefully, hopefully I can stack up and not be off the pace.
When you look at, when you look at SVG, I mean, I really didn't think that I'd even bring this up at all this year.
But do you think that he might win, win an over race this year?
Like, I could see it happening.
It's way more possible than last year.
He ran around Ross all day speed wise.
I mean, they weren't super far apart.
I mean, Ross won some races.
I think, I mean, he won the Coke 600 last year.
Any race car driver, just like us at the road courses want to be better at him.
He's getting his butt whipped on the ovals every weekend.
And he's got that same fire under him as all us oval guys have on the road courses.
He wants to win just as bad as we do or worse.
I mean, I think another part of this story is a Connor Zillich element to it, right?
Because he came in and I feel like he's helping elevate SVG in some ways.
And Ross doesn't want to be beat by the new kid coming in either.
Like everybody's stepping up their game a little bit over there because they have to.
Everybody is.
I mean, I think obviously with the, what we had before in all the road courses,
like SVG is like, this guy is just waxing everybody's ass and then Connor's doing the same thing in the O'Reilly series.
Yeah. And now, and now Connor gets to step up.
Ross has been the cornerstone.
So he's still that, but these two guys are highly talented.
They are some of the best drivers in the entire world and they're just trying to figure it out.
And they're starting, you know, maybe at a slower point than Ross is right now,
but it's not going to take them very long to get there.
And if you have three very solid race car drivers that can win on any surface,
because that's basically what we're talking about,
because Ross is not a slouch on a road course.
He can, he can wheel on road courses too.
So now trackouts is looking at a three headed monster at that place,
just trying to beat, beat at all competition.
We're talking about drivers with a lot of talent and one that does come to mind is Kyle Bush,
who was also involved in multiple things yesterday.
He finished 17th, but I mean, it was just like, all of a sudden he'd be there again.
I was like, Oh, all right, good for him.
When he got, when he hit the wall at the very beginning of the race,
like in that first run, I'm like, damn it, Bobby, like this is just not,
this is not what I want for, this is what not what we want for them.
We've been saying for years for a while to have a turnaround.
Yeah, I just, but, but you know what?
They did show a lot of grit because they didn't, they didn't throw in the towel
and neither did the driver.
I think the fact that Kyle Bush stayed locked in that shows a lot of where they're headed.
That means that tells me that their team atmosphere is in the right place
and they feel like they're making gains on it because he didn't just quit on it.
So I think that's important.
I think that union of him and Jim Pullman as his crew chief will be a good pairing.
Like they're both kind of the rough and tumble like gritty humans
and their respective positions.
So I do think that that is going to be a good change for Kyle.
Would you see out of him in the race?
Yeah, I mean, I just feel like RCR is kind of struggling with speed still.
And you know, Jim Pullman, these cars are a lot different than what he's used to
and what he's normally done in the shop.
So I think it's just going to take a little bit of time, but I said,
Kyle's very mentally tough for what he's had going on for years now
and not winning a race last season and just the struggles week after week after week.
And he's really matured as a person, the guys that he was years ago
that would, you know, crash out about really anything that didn't go his way.
He's really got his head on a shoulder screwed on right.
And he's learned and matured a lot over the years.
And that's something that a lot of us drivers aspire to be like,
to have the mental toughness that he does.
Like I said, I hope that he can win a race this year.
I'm not going to say that it's going to happen,
but I think that everybody wants to see that.
He's only 19 points out of 16.
Yeah, I was looking at that, which is encouraging.
But he's like where he's run is where they've been running.
And he runs perennially right around the cut line with the eight groups.
So it's like, if they can just find a little bit more,
and maybe he can clean up some of the like mid race spins and some of the red,
like they can clean some of those things up and pit road,
they can clean those things up and just have solid days.
They'll probably be in the chase.
You mentioned pit road.
And I do want to touch on that briefly before we move on,
because I feel like this is the first race so far this year where we've seen
quite a bit of mistakes as it pertains to the pickers.
A level of concern on that.
Well, you better get it.
You better get it together because people,
these race teams do not sit on mistakes anymore.
They will exchange and change and move pieces in and out.
If they think that you're not getting it done and you're the one holding back
the team from winning, unfortunately in the era that we're in,
we don't have time to wait for you to figure it out and get out of your head.
Like we need that action right now.
So if you're struggling right now and you're one of the teams that,
if you're on a team that has already been back in points and you're kind of
struggling on pit road, expect changes to be made if you don't get your stuff together.
Yeah, it's a very liquid line of work as you can call it.
Being a, and I don't envy to be a pit crew member at all.
It's so much pressure.
It's like the drag racers.
It's like you have a few seconds.
You wait around all day for these few seconds that matter the most.
Your job's on the line in these couple seconds, but it's just like those drivers.
You got to push to be better, go faster, go faster.
But if you make one little mistake, then you're the odd man out.
And you're the guy everybody's looking at that failed the day.
It's so difficult because early in the race, I was hurt.
Well, the Pinsky crews aren't really fast enough.
And I bet they're saying we got to have faster stops.
We need a second here.
We need a couple of tents here.
And then you go push that little bit that you're not really comfortable doing.
And you make a mistake and oh man, you suck.
You're terrible.
You messed up.
It's so difficult.
And I don't want to be in their position at all.
I respect what they do.
And it's difficult.
I'm glad Ryan Blaney was still able to win.
Yeah.
I'm sure the pit crew is as well.
No, for sure.
And that was, I think that's that moment, the money stop, especially for the 12 group.
Like we have failed our job a couple of times.
Now it's right.
We're back up where we can win this thing.
We got to get it done and they got it done.
And like it wipes away all the mistakes you just had because when it really mattered,
you guys came through and we believe in you.
And that that's a big, that's important.
Yeah.
And I still want to show this video of the pit crew because we were referencing it earlier.
Here's Joey Logano's car headed off to get back on the racetrack.
Yeah.
Let's go.
No, this is comical to me because literally I'm not exactly sure of the chain of command
of how this works in terms of how one team articulates to the next that they're coming
in to do this, but it's pretty impressive when it all comes together.
Yeah, I would, I don't know, Lane.
I would have to guess that they're, they're on a channel that they can get to.
And it's like, Hey, we need, and it's like real quick.
And there might be like a team manager or team principal in between kind of making that
happen.
Cause I don't know if those guys are really like that quickly talking to the other guys
on the box.
So someone's making it happen and they were smart to get it done.
Very smart.
Yeah.
Pit crews are going to be on their game the next few weeks.
We've got some tough tracks.
I think about Darlington.
Lots of stops on the day when we go to that racetrack in a few weeks.
Everyone wants tires at Darlington.
So that was everything that happened in Phoenix.
We are staying out on the West coast and headed to Las Vegas Motor Speedway,
mile and a half race track for the weekend.
First mile and a half of the year.
What are you thinking for that?
I know you're going out.
Yeah, I'll be out there.
I'm going to go to a beer park.
And so beer park, it's on the strip.
It's a bar on the strip in the Paris hotel.
So they doing the holler parade and they line them all up and they asked me to come out
and be the hype on the mic.
You know what I do best.
So getting the people excited.
We're going to be handing out free tickets to the race on Sunday.
So I'm excited about that.
But I'm also excited to find out who's where everybody's at.
This is the first real test.
Yes.
I mean, Phoenix was a good test too.
But we predominantly have mile and a half races, right?
So this is a really good understanding of where our programs are at,
how far behind we are and who is behind.
So I'm looking forward to that.
I expect C bell has been really fast over all the course of the season.
And he's so good at Vegas.
I expect a little bit of redemption.
Yeah, I expect him to be up front.
But also, man, team Pansky, they get it done at Vegas.
It's hard to count against those guys.
Yeah, they've won a lot of races at Vegas too.
It's going to be difficult to bet against any of the people that finished up
front at Phoenix because I mean, their era means more at Vegas.
And we're going to see where they're at a little bit better.
But Phoenix, it matters a lot too.
I don't think that anybody that finished up front at Phoenix is a fluke.
Yeah.
So you obviously have run the trucks at Las Vegas, two races there,
top five in 2025.
What is tough about, I think people think mile and a half,
and it's like pretty straightforward, but they aren't actually.
So what are the challenges of Vegas?
Yeah, actually, to build off of that is funny.
Before I started racing the mile and a half,
so I was like, dad, what's so hard about mile and a half?
They're all the same.
He's like, son, you're in for it because they are not the same.
And Vegas is a very unique one.
The biggest thing is just the bumps in turn one when you run the bottom lane.
I mean, even the cup guys,
they don't even qualify on the bottom lane just because they have the cars so low
and trimmed out for qualifying.
It's faster to hold more throttle higher up just to stay over the bumps.
And both ends are very different from each other.
It's a wide racetrack.
It's really cool seeing the varying lanes there.
Tire wear is pretty, pretty massive.
You fall off pretty good tires or worth it.
It's a great racetrack.
I hate we're not going there this year for the truck series.
I like that track a lot.
I think it's fun.
But, you know, it's definitely a good track for the fans being somewhere on the
West Coast again.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Hopefully we have a really good race.
It's a place where we've seen a lot of strategy too.
You know what I mean?
Like I remember it wasn't that long ago where Ryan Blaney had a tough day and then
he pushed Logano basically out in front enough to where Seabal couldn't run him
down and Logano ended up winning that race in Vegas.
So you never really know if it's going to be a last second caution.
We've seen cars flip at Vegas before, which is insane.
Redick went over one time like everyone's pushing because I think this is one of the
places that they feel like they can and there's multiple grooves and it makes for
some exciting racing.
So a few weeks ago when we were circuit of the Americas, we saw a lot of drivers
cool suits not functioning correctly.
It was the first really hot weekend of the year.
It's supposed to be 90 degrees in Las Vegas this weekend.
So in terms of just the conditions that you've dealt with or that the drivers will be
dealing with, what does that present?
And the trucks aren't nearly as bad as the cup cars are from what I've heard.
I've never driven one, but you're talking about the hot air coming out of the hood
and everything.
It's really in right side windows for those guys.
It's hot for them.
And I mean, it's not like the old days where it was like, you need to toughen up.
They didn't have cool shirts in the 80s and 90s.
The cars are a lot different.
I mean, they were pretty open back then.
So cool shirts are almost a must for those guys.
And thankfully my interior guys do a great job because I've never had an issue with
a cool shirt.
Knock on wood.
Hey, shout out to your guys because they do a great job and shout out to my cool shirt
because it hasn't broken yet.
Hopefully it never does.
But like I said, it wouldn't be as bad for me, but I mean, we saw a lot of people fall
out at Kota.
It's hot and I mean, you're doing a lot of work and man, it gets really hot in those
race cars.
So it's the cooler body is the cooler mind is the better you can make decisions.
Yeah, I must say one.
I got to give credit to one guy though.
Who's that?
Ricky Stenhouse Jr.
That does not use a freaking cool suit ever.
Not one.
How is that even possible?
He's built different.
He's a dog.
I need to ask him about this tomorrow and we see him because I mean, you would think
you would want to use every possible resource available to you to improve the performance.
But you would think, but I guess he doesn't.
I guess he's like, nah, screw it.
I've used a cool suit one time and it was night and day.
I'm like, I'm a whole new driver all over again.
Yeah, you can run five more of these.
It's no problem.
Yeah, no problem.
So it makes a difference.
But yeah, whether this weekend will definitely be tough elements for everybody who is out
there.
Take your sunscreen.
Take your sunscreen.
I want to briefly touch on who are we very concerned about level of concern for team.
I think one of the obviously, you know, ones is Alex Bowman right now.
He was not competing this past weekend due to vertigo.
Anthony Alfredo was the reserve fill-in driver for the team.
But they're in a tough spot because they had tough races to start the year.
Now this major setback and it just feels like I feel for Alex because it just seems like
every year there's something that happens to this team that's keeping them from really
producing the results they're capable of.
Yeah.
One shout out to Anthony Alfredo for coming to the restruct prepared, doing his job.
He did a great job in that thing.
He got caught up in a wreck.
But like for all intents and purposes, he did what he needed to do for that team all
weekend.
But when you talk about Alex Bowman, I feel bad for my guy because to your point, it just
seems like there's always something that's kind of holding him back and he is a very
good race car driver.
He's won at the cup level multiple times.
Like, and so for him to not be able to compete now for, it seems like the third or fourth
time for something that is out of his control.
I talked to him a little bit and like, you know, he's, he's in good spirits about it.
Like they're going to, they're going to figure it out.
But like, he won't, he's a race car driver.
He wants to be in that car.
And on top of that, over the last three years, his name has been on the chopping block for
losing his ride almost every year.
So now he comes into this year thinking that they're going to have some good momentum,
some good things happen.
The year didn't start great at Daytona.
And now he's dealing with this after Kota.
And now he can't even, can't even do what he does best, which is drive race cars.
So I hate it for Alex.
You know, I hope that they get it figured out, but most importantly, I hope that he's
healthy.
Yes.
Like I want him back in the race car, but his health as a human being when he does post
race car life is what's most important.
Yeah.
We're thinking about Alex Bowman and hoping that he can recover quickly.
Based on what you've seen in the cup series so far this year, which teams do you kind
of like, oh, you better get on the wheel here.
Who's in a hole?
Who are we concerned about?
I feel like so far we haven't seen as much speed out of the Hendrick camp as we all anticipate.
You think of the big three.
You think of Penske, Gibbs and Hendrick.
Of course they have their new body, their new Camaro body this year.
And I think that that has a little bit to do with it.
I mean, the balance is off.
Don't know quite what you need in your race car.
It's kind of, I mean, any change you have is going to be difficult to figure out because
it's definitely different.
I think that though there is some speed to what they did, they wouldn't create a new
nose or new body if it was worse.
Right.
So it's definitely going to be better.
They just got to harness that energy.
That's a great point.
That is a great point.
They're not going to make it if it's if it's worse, like it's just the point blank period.
So I think that as the year goes on, we're going to see more speed out of them and they're
going to figure it out.
As always, I mean, when is Rick Hendry ever failed as a team owner and had bad cars?
I mean, I know that he's had his years, but they're going to figure it out for sure.
But I think that it's just going to take a little bit of time.
Kyle Larson's always very good when we go to Las Vegas and he showed a lot of promise
yesterday too at various points in the race.
So what do you make of Hendrick right now?
Cause Kevin's been saying it for a while.
Like this is the point in the season where we're really going to see that new nose and
like what they're up against or what they're still trying to figure out with it.
Yeah.
Cage has been, I wouldn't say concerned, just intrigued about that situation.
I'm pulling up the points right now.
And so you look at it, Chase's ninth, or sorry, Chase in the nine is fourth, Kyle Larson
is fifth, William Byron, or 10th, sorry, I just did that backwards twice and William
Byron is 11th in the 24th.
So like we're, the speed isn't there, but they're doing what they need to do, but it's
not like the speed isn't there.
They're running perennial top 10.
So they're in the mix.
They're just not lights out yet.
And I think not being lights out at the beginning of the year is okay.
I think you want to get hot at the right time.
And a lot of times throughout the last few years, I think we've seen teams be hot at
the beginning and really cool off middle of the year.
I think about a way of buying middle of the year, like was kind of non-existent for about
six races.
He had like six finishes, four out of six races last year at some point where outside
the top 25 still won the regular season points by a full race.
But like, that's not, you know, that's not what you want when you head into the post
season and your chase time.
So I'm not as worried about the Hendrick team.
I am very, very concerned hitting the panic button on the 19 of Chase Brisco.
Not because I don't believe in them, not because they're not fast, just because the
hole that they're in is massive and it's just going to be a lot.
So I'm interested to see them start chaining together some wins.
Well, it's crazy because what did we say the number is until the post season?
It's only like 22, which sounds like a high number, but it really isn't really
not. Think about if you're already way behind the eight ball and the amount you
have to make up.
So we think about it as a 38 race season or whatever, but it's not.
No, it's a 26 and then a 10.
Correct.
So that's the big difference.
We have to differentiate that.
So you're not going to Vegas, obviously, because the trucks aren't racing.
But you said you were in sim this morning working on Darlington, right?
Yeah, working on some Darlington stuff.
I got some good tracks coming up for us.
I'm excited about Darlington, Rockingham, Bristol.
A track that I've been really good at.
So got a good little slew of them coming up and always trying to spend time
at the Ford racing simulator, you know, get pretty much all the same time I want,
which is great and shout out to them and thank you.
It seems like it's been paying off for us.
So yeah, I came over here trying to get a little unzombified.
When you're in a it's crazy.
You wake up in the morning, you drink your coffee, you go and then they put you
in a pitch black room and it's like go, go drive.
And it just gets like four hours a week.
So usually Mondays are our day for front row, myself and Chandler Smith.
We learn a lot and the team has the rest of the week to kind of decipher
through the data that we made and got some time to figure some things out.
So yeah, it's always, it's always good.
I spend, I try to spend as much time in the sim as possible.
It's only as good as us drivers make it.
So you did that today.
I will be joining you in Nashville tomorrow to preview all of the motor
sports that's coming to the state of Tennessee, IndyCar, NASCAR, NHRA.
So that'll be cool.
We'll be doing a little activity tomorrow for Bristol Motor Speedway.
All right.
Guess what?
What?
It's your turn.
I can stop playing.
Uh-oh.
What I do.
Welcome to everybody's favorite part of the show.
God bless.
Momba's social sips.
And if you don't take a sip of that, you're not doing it right.
High quality H2O.
Awesome.
Good H2O.
You're not doing it right.
He's awesome.
Ladies and gentlemen, ever since the season has started, Michael Jordan has been
even when the season ended, Michael Jordan has been the face of the conversation.
Oh, yes.
They didn't win this weekend, but before the weekend started, he got a
shout out from a one Irvin Magic Johnson, which I just think is really cool
because like Magic Johnson is one of those high level athletes.
You guys, if you can't, if you're not watching and listening, Magic says,
I want to congratulate my friend, Michael Jordan.
Once again, his 2311 racing team won its third straight NASCAR race to start
the 2026 season making NASCAR history.
And I just think it's cool when we keep getting these other high level,
high profile people interested in our sport.
I mean, I think that once again demonstrates the Michael Jordan effect.
Right.
Like he's really introducing it to people who probably never paid attention
to the sport before.
There were multiple like media outlets out at the track this weekend covering the team.
He's just elevating our sport in such a unique way and what him and Tyler
Reddick are doing and Denny Hamlin obviously is the co-owner.
It's pretty special.
Like we haven't seen something like this in a long time.
Yeah, it's really cool for us drivers to see so many more people.
And, you know, people I went to high school with.
I see they'll repost high school.
I went to high school and, you know, they've never really cared about racing.
Didn't know anything about it.
And now it's becoming starting to become a mainstream sport again.
And people are really starting to pay attention to it.
They'll repost my stuff and text me and say, and I can't believe you were doing
all this back in high school and now we get to watch you on TV.
So yeah, shout out to Bahama, North Carolina for the accent and in my rig
family heritage.
So yeah, I'm just going to embrace me.
But no, it's really cool that a lot of people that haven't watched motor sports
even are watching NASCAR and people that, I mean, we look at the Indy car series
and how they're, they're meshing with NASCAR, the collaboration they had
the past two weeks has been really great.
The crossovers are great.
You have two largest American motor sports working together again, just like
the glory days.
So, I mean, motor sports and American motor sports is alive and healthy right now.
It's a great time to be a race fan.
I'm going to be saying that all year.
Right here on Fox, that's the only way that you can get that crossover.
So also, there was a really cool ad that was also done in conjunction,
kind of with the 2311 all they're winning and it's basically just talking
about, they're talking about, um, yeah, so they're talking about being
relentless in this ad.
And I just thought it was so cool because nice cakes with their massive
brand that obviously cover the Jordan brand and all the shoe game stuff.
So, um, that was them rooting them on to get their fourth consecutive, which
they came up a little short, but honestly, I was shocked how close it was.
Tyler Reddick was right in the mix.
So I thought that was really cool.
That's a neat spot.
And I think a lot of people associate Michael Jordan with like growing up
watching sports and like it's cool for them to see him again in a sporting arena
like that, right?
It's cold.
It's cool to see him winning because, uh, there's a lot of us that didn't, I
remember him winning, but there's a lot of people that don't.
They remember maybe him with the wizards, not with the bulls and then ownership
of the Hornets.
They didn't win a whole whole lot.
They won a little bit, but in motor sports, he's found success.
And when, when that dude is smiling, it just feels like we're in a better
spot right now, just feels better with Jordan's happy.
Everybody's happy.
All right.
This is actually my favorite sip of the day.
Favorite sip.
So Pado award.
I really like Pado.
I think he's a really cool guy.
He's a really, he's a really great race car driver.
I got to meet him and we ran some sim laps at the air McLaren facility.
But he, uh, in between, uh, Saint Pete in Phoenix, he had a quote and he was
saying, I'm tired of Indy car being the support, being like the supporter
series.
Okay.
I understand that.
Like you're a big dog and you want to be the top dog, but then, then he saw
Jeff Gluck's post and, uh, he said, I need to, um, attract this a little bit.
So in Jeff Gluck's post, it showed, uh, the viewership numbers show the
viewership, um, and obviously for a Riley one point.
Right.
And the Indy car was 1.4 million.
There you go.
Right.
Those are good numbers.
Oh yeah.
Let's not act like one million truck race with lane rings.
One point.
Not bad networks since 2018.
Not bad.
So I think he understood that.
And he said, I stand corrected.
I'm happy to be here with NASCAR this weekend.
Pado, we're happy that you're here.
We ain't mad at your brother.
Just keep, keep coming by, keep coming by rising tides, raise all ships.
That's the age old phrase.
And it's true.
And listen, you guys saw it.
The stands were packed for the Indy cars, for the car race.
The stands were packed for them on Saturday.
Exactly.
So it was great.
We want to have that mix.
I mean, you know how many fans, like especially younger fans that have
never seen an Indy car in person and they were already just camping at Phoenix
or decided like, Hey, let's go to both the races today.
I mean, yeah, I mean, a lot of people.
And just like when I was in St. Pete, the people coming up, I've never seen NASCARs.
I mean, just it's, it's, it's a great crossover and you have, I feel like the open
wheel side and you look at like the F1 NASCAR debate all the time, which one's
better, but just being a fan of motorsports and getting to see both of them
and the respect for both series and both types of motorsports is great.
I mean, I think if you're a motorsports fan, you should be a fan of not all of them,
but most of them at least.
I agree.
And I was in Phoenix for the arc race on pit road, but I did walk through the
Indy car garage at one point and it was very neat to just see a different series
part of our weekend.
And I feel like overall the reception was very positive.
It was nice to have some of the Indy car drivers on the Fox broadcast,
have the booth go up and integrate with our booth in the cup series.
It's just for me as a race fan, I love seeing that because I, to your point,
I just love racing.
So I'm not, I don't, you know, pick and choose.
I think it's cool to have it and it's helping.
You're seeing the numbers supporting this.
It's helping everybody.
Well, we're all racers at the end of the day and we want to go the racetrack
and see it thrive and succeed.
So ladies and gentlemen, closers, if you want to leave a voicemail, 805-317-4175.
If you want to leave a mail bag question, Harvick, happy hour four at gmail.com.
Lane, welcome to the best segment of our show.
He just can't.
He will beat that.
The closers tell me it's not me.
I'm just, I'm just letting you know what they say.
He says the fans tell him this all the time.
So we're going to go with it.
All right, time now for our last call.
And we have to grade the burnout for Mr.
Ryan Blaney at Phoenix.
And he's notorious for always doing very cool post-race celebratory moves.
So he used to not, Lane, he used to not do burnouts.
Right.
And I don't know what happened.
I think he just, I think he started listening to the show and realized
that we're grading this.
And now he's doing this was one of the better ones that I've seen him do.
And like I said earlier in the show, I just think that this moment meant a lot
for Team Penske to sweep the weekend.
I think they put a lot of effort into that.
I think it showed him his burnout.
It did.
So what did you think of it?
Yeah, I give it, I don't need to rate it right here.
Yeah, it's like a grade.
It's a grade.
Like a letter grade.
I give it, I give it a, sorry, Ryan, B minus on that one.
Okay.
It was pretty short.
I like to see the tires blow off of him.
Like I will blow the, I will blow the crush panels.
With your celebrations.
I will say that I'll blow it up because you never know when you're going to get
your next race and my crew chief Dylan, he's always like, easy on the engine.
Easy on the, I just turned the radio off.
My burnout here, but I love going against my favorite is to go against the wall.
And all my crew comes in front and they're all hyping me up.
And after the race, you're like, man, your water temp got hot.
And I'm like, I wasn't looking at that.
But, you know, I like the long burnouts.
And then what about his car rolling away at the end?
They didn't show it to later.
I thought it was worse than it really was, but I could have been chaotic.
Yeah, I will say, I want you to think about your next burnout a little bit,
your celebration, because I want to be able to bring it on the show.
So like Kevin's really big on the pageantry and the stylistic stuff of it.
So when you can like high five your guys or get involved, man, I'm just,
I'm just like, you know, I will look, St. Pete, I did four separate burnouts.
I will say, I don't know if everybody saw it or not, but I hadn't, I realized
after the finish line once the fuel settled, I had enough.
So I did one in turn one, I did one in turn five, I did one in turn 10.
And then I came back and did another one on the start finish line.
And I still had enough fuel to get back to victory lane.
So there you go.
And you was a concern.
You may not have enough fuel in that point.
I said, if I got to get towed back to whatever, I gave it my all.
I was a pit reporter at Bristol when you won and a piece of the tire hit me in the head.
I'm sorry about that.
Literally, I almost gave me a consumption.
All right. So B minus we're saying for that one potentially.
Okay. Let's take a look guys at the point standings.
I'm excited about this because I'm still leading 18.
I got six points for picking Christopher Bell.
So leader in the clubhouse.
Kevin picked up some 10 for picking the race winner of Ryan Blaney.
Good by him.
Actually, this is for this part of the show specifically, I'm so glad that you're here
and he's not at nine right now, but three points for buyer.
We all picked up points.
We all made up some ground, which is exciting.
So now we get to do it all over again.
I guess I'll go ahead and go first.
I'm not sure how this works, given the fact that Kevin's not here.
So he's just getting an automatic zero for the weekend.
Automatic zero.
He needs a waiver to get into the chain.
Like he no, no, no, this didn't reach out with a pick.
This is the automatic zero for this weekend because he didn't.
No, I am because he didn't even have the thought process to be like,
Oh, I should put my pick in.
So I have a pick.
This is what he gets for not being here.
It's on vacay.
I don't care.
We're working.
Well, we are actually, we are working right now.
And I am picking Joey Logano for the weekend.
Four wins out at Las Vegas in the past.
We've been talking about Penske all throughout the course of the show.
How they are strong right now.
I'm going 22.
Let's say you go ahead.
Yeah, I was going to say Joey Logano as well.
I think that his nice he's going to want some redemption after Phoenix
after not being able to finish the race.
I mean, they qualified on the pole, had the fastest raw speed car of the day.
And I feel like they struggle with that.
A lot of times having that raw speed and and Joey is determined.
So, I mean, I think it's going to be Bell Blaney and Logano top three is my pick right now.
I think it's hard to how do you bet against those guys right now?
What a company guy, you know, I did there.
What you got, Mamba.
Man, you know, I really want to go see Bell really, really bad.
But you're not.
But then again, Briscoe needs it really, really bad.
I like this. Yes. OK.
So I think I'm going Briscoe because I just think that they know that they need to go off and win races.
They're going to be aggressive.
They've been good.
They've had a lot of bad luck.
They've led laps in every race.
And I just want to say this is what you get, Kevin.
This is what you get.
This is what you get.
He loves it.
Mamba loves it.
I do love it.
It's all about competition.
It's all about it's friendly competition.
All right, closers, make sure you subscribe to our new YouTube channel.
Check us out on Harvick Happy Pod and all the social channels.
Well done by you, sir.
Your first time as an analyst and filling in for Kevin Harvick is not easy.
Great job. Really big shoes to fill.
And I said, thank you guys for being here.
I hate he's not here as well, but glad that I could take his seat.
No, you don't need to hate that.
Good luck to you.
Well, thank you all.
Hopefully I can do it again soon after another win.
Yeah, absolutely.
Thanks for being here.
All right, subscribe on YouTube wherever you get your podcasts,
and we will see all of you after Las Vegas.
About this episode
Ryan Blaney's impressive Phoenix win was the highlight, overcoming multiple setbacks including loose wheels and starting at the rear to pass 49 cars. The discussion delves into Blaney's maturity and championship mindset, Team Penske's strong weekend with IndyCar success, and strategic teamwork like using a teammate's pit box to save time. Tire wear and failures during the race sparked conversation on driver mentality and team tactics. Guest Lane Riggs shares insights from his Truck Series win and the challenges of race adaptability. The episode also previews the upcoming Las Vegas race and touches on NASCAR pit road chaos.
Original notes
Ryan Blaney’s incredible comeback victory at Phoenix Raceway highlighted a chaotic NASCAR weekend filled with loose wheels, tire failures, pit road mistakes and dramatic strategy calls that ultimately decided the race. On this episode of Kevin Harvick’s Happy Hour, Kaitlyn Vincie, Mamba Smith and NASCAR Truck Series driver Layne Riggs break down the wild Phoenix Cup Series race including Blaney’s rally from multiple pit road setbacks to win for Team Penske, Christopher Bell’s late charge, Ty Gibbs continuing to show speed, and the many incidents and tire problems that shaped the race. The crew also looks ahead to the upcoming NASCAR weekend at Las Vegas Motor Speedway, reacts to trending motorsports stories in Mamba’s Social Sips including Magic Johnson congratulating Michael Jordan’s NASCAR team and Pato O’Ward clarifying his IndyCar comments, answers fan questions from The Closers, and makes their picks for the next NASCAR Cup Series race.
0:00 - Intro
3:25 - Phoenix Weekend Recap
37:24 - Las Vegas Preview
48:32 - Mamba’s Social Sips
55:29 - Last Call
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