Speaker 1: This is cut to it with Steve Smith Senior at
Speaker 1: production of The Black Effect and I Heart Radio. I'm
Speaker 1: Steve Smith Senior and i' and this is cut to it.
Speaker 1: Good do it? Good do they's getting down to do it.
Speaker 1: Good do it. We asked the questions you always want
Speaker 1: to know, but no one ever asked, let's cut to it.
Speaker 1: You ain't heard am about it, then we're about to
Speaker 1: let you know. It's all I hope to hear you do.
Speaker 1: All right, Hey gee, what's up? Man? What's up? I'm
Speaker 1: gonna not say what's going on, so I'm gonna try
Speaker 1: to switch up mind, switch it up, switcher whoa, that's
Speaker 1: afternoon afternoon, Good day, afternoon, my after room, Good day, mate.
Speaker 1: You just didn't purpose um. You know it's There are
Speaker 1: some funny people in the world, and in our production team,
Speaker 1: we have a young lady named Sarah. The Sarah is
Speaker 1: O c D. She makes sure we do this this
Speaker 1: She's like, wait, like you can't let just when we
Speaker 1: need to start. She's awesome because I am not O
Speaker 1: c D. I'm kind of like whatever. But Sarah came
Speaker 1: in today and she had on glass. She had glasses
Speaker 1: on her shirt in the middle, hanging from a shirt,
Speaker 1: hanging from a shirt as if they are reading glasses.
Speaker 1: However they are not. No, so I said, those are
Speaker 1: nice glasses, and they are very nice, glass smooth, except
Speaker 1: their fashion accessories. They do not have a prescription, not
Speaker 1: one thing. Now, I said to Sarah, I said, there
Speaker 1: was your god. She says, oh, no, tell my glasses.
Speaker 1: They just look good. But yes, she puts them on
Speaker 1: before we start recording. She needs them to see which
Speaker 1: is the best. But it gets best. But there, So
Speaker 1: I said, well let me. She said, what you gotta
Speaker 1: always have accessories. No, that's a female thing. So I
Speaker 1: don't get it, and I get it. So I said,
Speaker 1: I said, so if you were to get twenty minutes
Speaker 1: down the road to your house and you have to
Speaker 1: take you twenty minutes to get back, would you go
Speaker 1: get him? She goes, oh no, I would not. Oh okay,
Speaker 1: but she said, but I would for a red bull
Speaker 1: when one of her vices. But here's the best. Then
Speaker 1: she tells me when she's driving, she's she's a police officer.
Speaker 1: She takes the glasses off, as as if it's gonna
Speaker 1: make some sort of a difference. She goes, I don't
Speaker 1: want to get pulled over or look bad and they
Speaker 1: think I need them, Yes, and I did, so that
Speaker 1: led me to and I said, are you a bad driver?
Speaker 1: Still again her glasses, her non prescription glasses on her face.
Speaker 1: Her response is, or I'm a horrible driver? Like how many?
Speaker 1: How many times have you been pulled over? Just just
Speaker 1: just raise the number twenty six or twenty seven? Top?
Speaker 1: And why have you been pulled over twenty six or
Speaker 1: twenty seven times? She's not a good driver, suspicion of something.
Speaker 1: She needs to probably get her eyes checked. We'll get
Speaker 1: off the most wanted list because you got twenty six
Speaker 1: pullovers and you're wearing now prescription glasses. You probably need
Speaker 1: to get your eyes checked, right, and and your and
Speaker 1: your record expung And she and now she has her
Speaker 1: glasses on and she's recording. They're not real. We love,
Speaker 1: we do, but this is hilarious, though, it is hilarious
Speaker 1: twenty six times, like out of the twenty six times,
Speaker 1: like give us examples, like how many of them have
Speaker 1: you gotten tickets for? Just number? How have you gotten
Speaker 1: fifteen tickets and still have a driver's license? Did you
Speaker 1: have to go to court for it? No? Actually a
Speaker 1: lot of times I get like a you know, like
Speaker 1: a warning because I'm a girl. But you know you're
Speaker 1: talking to two brothers, so we don't know. She was like,
Speaker 1: you know, I'm like, no, my black gas, I got
Speaker 1: going over twenty six times. I got a record my
Speaker 1: car getting searched. What you're doing over here? Can I
Speaker 1: help you? I'll get back onto microL fifteen times. But
Speaker 1: my lawyer when you say, oh, my lawyer, you gotta
Speaker 1: do it, don't retain them. Yeah, I got a public
Speaker 1: defender because if I get another ticket at like a
Speaker 1: moving violation, um, then they could take my license away
Speaker 1: for a year. And most people that doesn't happen to
Speaker 1: unless they've been breaking. So okay, so what is some
Speaker 1: of your movie violations that you have experienced? Please please
Speaker 1: take us down that road? Just speeding and then so
Speaker 1: like a bunch of recks, are you okay? A bunch
Speaker 1: of recks which you've never been injured? Right? Okay, Well
Speaker 1: that's that's the most important. He has not been injured.
Speaker 1: But she what what I've total three cars I've had.
Speaker 1: I didn't know this was gonna be about me today. Listen, Karen,
Speaker 1: don't get off. We're trying to we're trying to welcome
Speaker 1: people into the cut to it room, the aura. Everyone
Speaker 1: has to know about our teams, and you were just
Speaker 1: first on the list. I've only total three cars. How
Speaker 1: do you total three? Complete? Take us through one of
Speaker 1: the car accidents? Please? Oh? Um, one of them wasn't
Speaker 1: my fault. Hey, that's what I swear. It wasn't me.
Speaker 1: That's what every criminal says. It's a jailhouse full of folks.
Speaker 1: It wasn't me. I tried that once. It didn't work.
Speaker 1: What happened? What happened? Um? The my hood flew up
Speaker 1: while driving, so I pulled over. You were full and
Speaker 1: just surprises you close it first? How did your car hood?
Speaker 1: I don't know. It's really old vol though. Okay. I
Speaker 1: just so happened to be near a fire station, and
Speaker 1: thank goodness, these fire remember helping me try to close
Speaker 1: thet I know the sounds unbelievable. Well I don't hold on,
Speaker 1: hold on. Let me tell you what I tell you
Speaker 1: who it sounds unbelievable for for some of the black pholds. Listen,
Speaker 1: that's who sounds unbelievable. They're just some things. We just
Speaker 1: have different learned speed. We do have different learning spirits.
Speaker 1: Like a black guy with a tattoo stops in front
Speaker 1: of the firehouse right in my hood of an old
Speaker 1: vovo pops open. Three firemen are not coming to assist me.
Speaker 1: It was it was three. Oh yeah, and some guys too,
Speaker 1: weren't there search on? So three guys with brad approach.
Speaker 1: A black guy's a bad joke, so go ahead. They
Speaker 1: were hoping to try to close the lid and make
Speaker 1: it so latch. Such good samaritans. A drunk driver plowed
Speaker 1: into my car. Okay, So I wasn't even in the
Speaker 1: car for that one. Okay, Hey, you missed the key
Speaker 1: word that one. What about the other two? Really? Okay?
Speaker 1: So I flew off an embankment and dune we're doing
Speaker 1: nice off, We're just gonna. I didn't really need to
Speaker 1: wrap this band up. Please take me through flying off
Speaker 1: embankment because I didn't. I just got the look my
Speaker 1: biscuit that flew off the plate. I didn't drop some
Speaker 1: crackers on the floor. My dog has eaten my salad.
Speaker 1: But flying off hi bank I just have never heard continue. Um,
Speaker 1: I you know, whenever there's like no, no, I do
Speaker 1: not know. You know there's a pothole and and well
Speaker 1: I overcorrected. I mean there are some wine and roads
Speaker 1: and boone, so maybe that's it over corect. I miscalculated
Speaker 1: that one. Go ahead, Michael Jordan's I took out part
Speaker 1: of a guardrail and two trees and they had to cables.
Speaker 1: So you went out in the blaze of glorious. What
Speaker 1: you say, Hey, did they do a sobriety tests on site?
Speaker 1: I have had to sobriety tests, but not that day. Um,
Speaker 1: and both times I had not been drinking at all.
Speaker 1: It was just I was driving a little bit a
Speaker 1: little bad. Did you notice the speed in which she
Speaker 1: tried to at the end of that sentence? Beginning next
Speaker 1: she hit that. I was driving that bad the same
Speaker 1: way she hit that in bank two day fast all right,
Speaker 1: last the last one. Please, I'm loving this because you
Speaker 1: do such a fantastic job with our recording. But I
Speaker 1: did not know you are kind of bad, kind kind kind.
Speaker 1: I didn't see this one coming, like when you see
Speaker 1: people you go. She didn't hit it in bank, man,
Speaker 1: Oh sorry, go ahead, go ahead? Last one, last one.
Speaker 1: I had a CRX. You you had is the right
Speaker 1: word former in high school, and I did not see
Speaker 1: a car that was stopped. It was turning left and
Speaker 1: I just wait a minute, wait a minute, wait, the
Speaker 1: car was at a bleat stop right. I would say,
Speaker 1: I'm distracted, you know with what driver? Well, I don't know.
Speaker 1: You got distracted about podcasts or that was actually in
Speaker 1: high school there wasn't a podcast the radio. I would say, Actually,
Speaker 1: podcasts have helped I haven't had a wreck. Um, I've
Speaker 1: had a ticket in like three years. I haven't had
Speaker 1: a wreck intend And I think it's because I stay
Speaker 1: on task better because I'm listening to to podcasts as
Speaker 1: opposed to music, which makes me kind of you know, daydream,
Speaker 1: you know, you know, m hmm. Podcasts have saved her life.
Speaker 1: Have you all been in rex Hey? Not to that extent,
Speaker 1: Like we do to all our to all our guests,
Speaker 1: we thank you for your time. Um, we value you
Speaker 1: and m God bless all the other view close. That's
Speaker 1: on the roll with s get out the way. Hey,
Speaker 1: who do we have next? Coming up? On the cut
Speaker 1: to a podcast? We've got William Byron, driver of the
Speaker 1: number twenty four Chevrolet for Hendrick Motorsports, a former Rookie
Speaker 1: of the Year in the kN N Pro series and
Speaker 1: one of the up and coming young stars of NASCAR,
Speaker 1: William Byron on the cut to a podcast, William coming up,
Speaker 1: You're about to get iced up. Their questions selected at
Speaker 1: random that you have no idea of what's coming. There
Speaker 1: also may or may not be follow ups to each question,
Speaker 1: So Smitty, go ahead and ice them up. Your favorite
Speaker 1: ice cream flavor. Flavor? Uh, probably chocolate chip cookie, though
Speaker 1: Jerry's as pretty good. Will knows that Chi. Can we
Speaker 1: call you chill? Will chill? Will you? It's good? So
Speaker 1: did a little research research team. Best scene in the
Speaker 1: movie Forrest Gump. Best scene? So I was in South
Speaker 1: Carolina a couple of weeks ago, and I would have
Speaker 1: to say, like the shrimp boat scene when he when
Speaker 1: he jumps off and he just starts Yeah, when Lieutenant
Speaker 1: Dan is just like finally happy with himself and he
Speaker 1: he jumps off and goes rides off into the sunset. Okay,
Speaker 1: like that one. If you can lose one of these senses, Okay,
Speaker 1: which one would you be okay with losing? First of all,
Speaker 1: do you know whoa any of the how many six right?
Speaker 1: Sixth sense was a movie? Yeah, it was a movie.
Speaker 1: It's only five five. Let's let's go, let's so, what
Speaker 1: what are the what are your six? And then tell
Speaker 1: us for the rest of us mere mortals clearly, Yes,
Speaker 1: he is a man. I mean if I had to
Speaker 1: lose one, no, no, no, no, let's say all over,
Speaker 1: let's give us a six of your taste, hearing, vision
Speaker 1: and uh feel I guess yeah, and then yeah, like, okay,
Speaker 1: good job. Now which one of the five would you
Speaker 1: would you would? Would you be? Okay? Were losing for
Speaker 1: the rest of your life? Done zo? You know? Probably
Speaker 1: since I race, probably smell I don't you smell a
Speaker 1: whole lot car? So I can I can do without that? Okay,
Speaker 1: all right, you don't need to know if something's burning.
Speaker 1: I mean you can. I'm just saying, don't you smell
Speaker 1: something burnon? Yeah? Maybe so rubber? Yeah a little bit. Yeah,
Speaker 1: he's only had a track, all right, last one? Last one?
Speaker 1: Which superpower? Would you choose? Flying or being invisible? Uh? Flying? Why?
Speaker 1: Just because you could? I mean, you can cover a
Speaker 1: lot of ground if you're invisible, like you're just not
Speaker 1: noticed by anybody. So that doesn't sound too cool, sounds
Speaker 1: kind of creepy, like that Invisible Man movie. It's kind
Speaker 1: of creepy, So I got it. Cool. Cool, alright, so
Speaker 1: let's get down to it. Take us through. Who is
Speaker 1: william as the twentysomething your old NASCAR guy? What was
Speaker 1: your upbringing here in Charlotte? Yeah, what did you experience?
Speaker 1: So for me, I, um, so I played a little
Speaker 1: bit of football as a kid. That's pretty I was
Speaker 1: like linebacker actually, which doesn't make a lot of sense. Yeah.
Speaker 1: I stopped growing out in ninth grade and then I
Speaker 1: went to racing. But now, I I played a lot
Speaker 1: of different sports as a kid, but really for me,
Speaker 1: racing was kind of what I watched all the time.
Speaker 1: So when I, um, when I would come home from school,
Speaker 1: I think I was probably four or five years old,
Speaker 1: probably five years old, and I turned on the TV
Speaker 1: and watched a NASCAR Truck Series race And so to me,
Speaker 1: that was what got me hooked. And so my dad
Speaker 1: every year would ask me, you know, what's one event
Speaker 1: that you really want to go to and and uh
Speaker 1: be a part of. And you know, is it a
Speaker 1: football game? Is it? Um whatever? Baseball game? And I
Speaker 1: said a NASCAR race? And so we we went to
Speaker 1: Martinsville Speedway in Virginia when I was six years old
Speaker 1: and uh sat up in the stands, watched the race
Speaker 1: and was hooked ever since. I went to probably six
Speaker 1: or seven races a year after that until I was
Speaker 1: fourteen years old, and then got into um a race
Speaker 1: car for the first time. I didn't know how to
Speaker 1: use a clutch, didn't know how to use sick shift
Speaker 1: anything like that. So it's kind of difficult. But once
Speaker 1: I got going and kind of um, you know, got
Speaker 1: the rhythm of it. Um. It actually started before that
Speaker 1: on on I Racing, which is kind of a virtual
Speaker 1: racing platform, so um. So yeah, it's just been something
Speaker 1: that's been kind of at my heart ever since I
Speaker 1: was five years old. Really, all right, so you brought
Speaker 1: it up first. So I spoke to a few NASCAR guys, right,
Speaker 1: regular fans, and then some other fans and then some
Speaker 1: other people that are in NASCAR, and so I asked
Speaker 1: that there's two gentlemen that that kind of my uh
Speaker 1: NASCAR liaisons. Yeah, we got some inside we got but
Speaker 1: but these two guys, uh that I know, one of
Speaker 1: them U fifty sixty years old and they are NASCAR
Speaker 1: through and through, and so I asked them about you, right,
Speaker 1: and I consider them true blue Nascar. Um, yes, they
Speaker 1: like live and breathe. They said, look, if you're not
Speaker 1: my driver, I will talk about everyone else as like
Speaker 1: they're nobody, but my driver is the best. And I
Speaker 1: was like wow, And so I said, okay, so William.
Speaker 1: What about William as a driver. What do you think
Speaker 1: about him? They said, Man, he's a young I Racing
Speaker 1: virtual racer. MM, well, explain what a virtual race I
Speaker 1: racing is, because I don't know like we think of
Speaker 1: When I first heard that, you are just some PS
Speaker 1: five kind that's what I thought. I was like, I
Speaker 1: thought it was like somebody gave him the NASCAR oh
Speaker 1: three and so yeah, he played it online. Give us,
Speaker 1: give us understanding what I Racing is. Yeah, So I
Speaker 1: Racing is. It's probably closer to like a flight simulator.
Speaker 1: For you know, if you're so if you're trying to
Speaker 1: be a commercial pilot or you're trying to be a
Speaker 1: private aviation pilot, you're probably gonna have some kind of
Speaker 1: flight simulation training. And I feel like I Racing is
Speaker 1: is definitely closer to that. You know. Now for for
Speaker 1: somebody who's never been on it, it's probably they don't
Speaker 1: understand that because So what they do and I racing,
Speaker 1: is they scan the tracks. So they go and it's
Speaker 1: like a bunch of money to go and scan each
Speaker 1: race track. And they stop a golf simulator, so I
Speaker 1: get it. They go in and literally scan the whole
Speaker 1: golf course, like the river, the pond, the old bee,
Speaker 1: which I'm add a lot of times in the out
Speaker 1: of bounds sections, right, And so I get that party.
Speaker 1: I did not know that they did that for the
Speaker 1: iration because I just I thought they just it is
Speaker 1: a PlayStation on steroids. That's what I saw, the same thing, right.
Speaker 1: You know, we don't have some dumb questions, Yeah, I
Speaker 1: say super dumb. I'm talking about when they when they
Speaker 1: say there's no dumb question. No, we got a whole
Speaker 1: shuffled dumb questions. Yeah, I'll put myself out there. I'm
Speaker 1: gonna ask. Yeah. So they scan the tracks every every
Speaker 1: like oscillation in the track, every bump. So just like
Speaker 1: the you know, racetracks have like small like if you're
Speaker 1: driving down the road, you're going eighty miles, you might
Speaker 1: feel a couple of every nook and cream kind of
Speaker 1: every pothole and every little there's not a lot of
Speaker 1: potholes but but yeah, like it'll be you'll have like
Speaker 1: banking changes in little variations in the banking and they'll
Speaker 1: have all that stuff simulated. And is that only like
Speaker 1: the is the bank is like the high area where
Speaker 1: the wall is and stuff. Yeah exactly. Yeah. So so
Speaker 1: so you're in this eye racing virtual. Why does that
Speaker 1: benefit you in becoming a NASCAR or does it keep
Speaker 1: your your tools sharp? Like what is the benefit of that,
Speaker 1: because a lot of the narrative has been well you
Speaker 1: just eye racer, just virtual NASCAR guy, you know a
Speaker 1: real racer. Yes, you're not a real racer. That's that's
Speaker 1: what some people would say. I don't believe that we
Speaker 1: use simulation as like it's a monumental tool and racing now,
Speaker 1: so we don't have any practice now with with the
Speaker 1: COVID situation. So so all the teams do is use
Speaker 1: simulation to to basically simulate what the car needs to
Speaker 1: be set up as so like the ride high, the
Speaker 1: shocks in the springs, everything in the car is all
Speaker 1: based on The teams have a computer basically and they
Speaker 1: say this is an ideal LAPP that the driver would
Speaker 1: would drive and this is how we're going to set
Speaker 1: the car up. So that's really what I Racing is
Speaker 1: a part of that, and it's more of a part
Speaker 1: of it for a driver perspective, to try to sharpen
Speaker 1: your tools, like you were saying, and um, you know,
Speaker 1: it's just a tool. I mean, but definitely when I
Speaker 1: was getting started, I had never been in a real
Speaker 1: race car at you know, thirteen years old. It was
Speaker 1: the only tool that I had. So how can you
Speaker 1: not be legally capable of driving a regular car but
Speaker 1: you can get a NASCAR can drive yeahs waivers, Yeah
Speaker 1: you have to sign a waiver, but you don't even
Speaker 1: have a Yeah you're not legal. Yeah, it's crazy. I
Speaker 1: mean you So, racing is kind of like a fraternity, right,
Speaker 1: It's like it's like a community that if you are
Speaker 1: chosen to be a part of somebody's race team, you
Speaker 1: can you can submit an application. What do you do
Speaker 1: a fraternity sponsorship there? So you can buy your way in. No,
Speaker 1: I mean there's some of that, but it's there are
Speaker 1: some drivers that are considered um rich racers. I'm not
Speaker 1: going to say who. Yeah, No, I mean there it's
Speaker 1: it's kind of a balance of like the guys that
Speaker 1: you know come in and they are from a racing
Speaker 1: family or something like that. You know. For me, I
Speaker 1: wasn't part of a racing family. So for me, it
Speaker 1: was going out to the Legend Car Track which is
Speaker 1: out at Charlotte, MA Speedway and racing. Um yeah, it
Speaker 1: used to be lows and so they have a fifth
Speaker 1: mile track outside. It's kind of like where you cut
Speaker 1: your teeth. So I think, um, you know a lot
Speaker 1: of kids do that and kind of work their way
Speaker 1: up through those different ranks. We have to take a
Speaker 1: break and the morning anything, we gotta pay some bills.
Speaker 1: You got check. I love cut to It and I
Speaker 1: love it even more when you download us and subscribe,
Speaker 1: and you can follow us on social media too, Smithie
Speaker 1: where where at? That's at? Cut to It on Instagram?
Speaker 1: What about Twitter? At? Cut to It? Facebook? Cut to
Speaker 1: It featuring Steve Smith singr? What about online? And you
Speaker 1: can follow us at cut to It podcast dot com
Speaker 1: where you can buy merch and you can subscribe to
Speaker 1: us wherever you listen to podcasts. I got all my
Speaker 1: answers questions. Um yeah, I got all my questions answered.
Speaker 1: That's what I'm here for, a brother, cut to a
Speaker 1: Podcast dot Com. So I was talking two m R.
Speaker 1: Hart Jr. Talked to him about you and he gave
Speaker 1: me this information, which is basically, you've embraced the narrative
Speaker 1: of being known for a I racer virtual racer. But
Speaker 1: he told me that that's not necessarily true. You have been,
Speaker 1: like you said, racing at a young gauge. So well,
Speaker 1: is is he kind of true on that or you
Speaker 1: just kind of embraced that. Yeah, I'm an eye racer,
Speaker 1: but you've really been You've been UM driving for a
Speaker 1: long time since you're what years old, fourteen? And so
Speaker 1: really for us, um, you know, when I was so
Speaker 1: I raced for Dale in late models, which is kind
Speaker 1: of like a it's a it's a full size car,
Speaker 1: but it's not a full speed car, like it doesn't
Speaker 1: go two miles an hour. But that's how I got
Speaker 1: to know Dale. And I do really think the I
Speaker 1: racing thing has become definitely part of my my story,
Speaker 1: but you know, it's not all my story. Like I
Speaker 1: I really I raced, Um, I've raced for ten years
Speaker 1: now and a pretty long time, not as long as
Speaker 1: some of the kids, you know, grew up racing seven
Speaker 1: years old, but you know, really for me, and you know,
Speaker 1: I've been able to win in each series and and
Speaker 1: progress forward and um, you know one Rookie of the
Speaker 1: Year I think four years in a row. And and
Speaker 1: you know, won the championship in the in the series
Speaker 1: right below the Cup series, which is kind of it
Speaker 1: would be like your college level sport. And so you
Speaker 1: win that championship and then you're able to move up
Speaker 1: into the next level. So um, so yeah, I raced
Speaker 1: for Dale in that series and we have a great
Speaker 1: relationship through that. And then you worked with Kyle Busch
Speaker 1: as well. Yeah, so I know Dale and Kyle are
Speaker 1: very similar working with um. Would you say, no, I know,
Speaker 1: if you picked you quit down Kyle is Uh. I've
Speaker 1: been in some meetings with Kyle where he just lays it,
Speaker 1: lays it to everyone, and Dale is a little bit calmer. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it doesn't really do that much. But but but wouldn't
Speaker 1: you say obviously both of those individuals having as much
Speaker 1: success of both of them having UM, would you say
Speaker 1: you picked up a little bit of everything from both
Speaker 1: of those. Yeah. Kyle to me, Kyle kind of taught
Speaker 1: me the uh the basics of of racing racecraft, you know,
Speaker 1: like he he taught me, you know, how to be aggressive,
Speaker 1: how to how to manipulate other cars, other people on
Speaker 1: the track. Uh, Dale was more. You know, Dale taught
Speaker 1: me a lot about the off track stuff, a lot
Speaker 1: about how to handle yourself, how to manage your team,
Speaker 1: you know, how to encourage your team to get better.
Speaker 1: So I'd say totally different guys. M So you got
Speaker 1: to you got on racing expertise, Yeah, and then you
Speaker 1: got off racing expertise with which and NASCAR is extremely
Speaker 1: horton because you can just from an outside perspective, you
Speaker 1: can be average, are okay, but you can make so
Speaker 1: much more money if you have the right personality and
Speaker 1: conduct yourself in the right way off the field as well. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: definitely true. And why why do you believe that is? Why?
Speaker 1: That is? Um? I think that fans gravitate towards Like
Speaker 1: you said, fans are really loyal. So like you, you
Speaker 1: spoke of two examples of two guys that you know
Speaker 1: are loyal to their driver. Right, So that's how NASCAR
Speaker 1: fans are. Like, if they have a driver, it's like
Speaker 1: that guy. They with that guy for a long time, like,
Speaker 1: and it doesn't matter if he changes teams. Or you know,
Speaker 1: whatever he does there with that dude, So it is
Speaker 1: part of that, you know. I've always come at it
Speaker 1: of from the performance side, where it's like, if you're
Speaker 1: not performing, I don't see why you would be popular.
Speaker 1: But I think that it's, um, there's two different ways
Speaker 1: to approach it. For sure, you can be a popular
Speaker 1: guy and not as as mounted. But I think as
Speaker 1: the sports gotten peeled back and people understand it more, um,
Speaker 1: people are gravitating towards the guys who are successful. If
Speaker 1: you're not into NASCAR and you're being a driver, yeah,
Speaker 1: can you see how people are a little bit confused
Speaker 1: on what the purpose of driving in the circle? Always
Speaker 1: it's a good point. It's a good point. I mean,
Speaker 1: I mean, I guess it's a simple concept. It's one
Speaker 1: big left her. Yes, it's a simple like I guess
Speaker 1: I'm trying to get you. I've lived in Charlotte long
Speaker 1: enough to know about NASCAR, but I'm trying to get
Speaker 1: you to make me a believer into getting into the
Speaker 1: driver's where I'm literally I'm I'm your biggest fan. Like breakdown,
Speaker 1: why Nascar? Why do I need Nascar? Like so it's
Speaker 1: very technical, so like it's a you know, it's a
Speaker 1: sport that like if you And the reason that that
Speaker 1: I Racing platform is so good is because it brings
Speaker 1: a casual fan in, right, who can just say how
Speaker 1: much is that? How much I race? I raise and
Speaker 1: virtual you could do it for probably three hundred just
Speaker 1: like Okay. So when I was looking at a day
Speaker 1: in of life with William Okay, I saw you had
Speaker 1: it in your in your living in your apartment. In
Speaker 1: your apartment, I think it was in your guest room
Speaker 1: or your your primary bedroom. And it's probably some time
Speaker 1: after he recorded back. Yeah it was. But how much
Speaker 1: is that one cost? Just to give the fan? Who
Speaker 1: means that's a lot of money he got, he got technology,
Speaker 1: all that stuff. How many screens? Didn't have three? Three screens?
Speaker 1: H D four K? Does it? Is it a lot
Speaker 1: of HD M I cables? Ye, there's a lot of yes. No, No,
Speaker 1: it's it's um. That one was probably twenty grand, right,
Speaker 1: but yeah, but I've had it since I've started racing
Speaker 1: in Cup so that's probably two three years. So I
Speaker 1: used my money to buy it because I was like,
Speaker 1: you know, it's important. Does your trainer come over your
Speaker 1: pit pit coach chief come over to help you. I'm
Speaker 1: not trying to be funny, I'm really asking now it's true. Ever,
Speaker 1: actually this afternoon, my uh, one of my spotter he
Speaker 1: you know who like communicates with me on the radio.
Speaker 1: He's coming over to to help me rinch this. So
Speaker 1: he stands on top of the grandstands and he he
Speaker 1: is my eyes and ears. It's almost like offense coordinators
Speaker 1: in the box. Yeah, so you think of like if
Speaker 1: they're calling a play, he's kind of a play caller.
Speaker 1: So if somebody's like there's plays in NASCAR somewhat like restarts,
Speaker 1: like every restart, so you have a caution flag and yeah,
Speaker 1: as soon as you have the yellow, there you go.
Speaker 1: That's what I'm talking about. You see how anywhere else
Speaker 1: but here. Yeah, so as soon as you have that,
Speaker 1: you have a restart is double file and it's like
Speaker 1: they call it. Yeah, so you'd be like like you
Speaker 1: were on the interstate and there's like a start line.
Speaker 1: So you have a box and the leader controls that.
Speaker 1: So your spoder's job is too it's like being ablementry
Speaker 1: school when you like a single file line. So your
Speaker 1: spoder's job is to kind of communicate yourself, will you
Speaker 1: like communicate where those guys are and how to how
Speaker 1: to take advantage of it? All right, let's talk ball. Okay,
Speaker 1: they say it's no dumb question, but we're gonna ask
Speaker 1: a few dumb questions. Let's do NASCAR one oh one.
Speaker 1: So you're sitting around, How long is it NASCAR race?
Speaker 1: Probably four hours? Four hours and a half, four hours,
Speaker 1: three and a half hours. Now I've seen they come
Speaker 1: out on stage and they announced all the drivers, and
Speaker 1: some of those drivers have sponsors, liquid sponsors, say, some
Speaker 1: have Coca Cola, Pepsi, some have water data rade. All
Speaker 1: of them will be partaking into a liquid that will
Speaker 1: at some point come out. So, if you're in a
Speaker 1: car that long one year exhalted, you are spending a
Speaker 1: ton of energy. You're sweating. So have you eaten prior
Speaker 1: to your race? So yes? Okay, all right, Okay, you
Speaker 1: eat quite a bit, okay, burning lots of calories. Well,
Speaker 1: these calories are getting stripped down, and your body will despose,
Speaker 1: will get rid of. These are useless pieces of food
Speaker 1: that you no longer use after three or four hours,
Speaker 1: How you do number one and number two? Because I
Speaker 1: ain't never seen a TV time out of Nascar. Yeah,
Speaker 1: there's not. So so you're just holding your booboo. You
Speaker 1: don't the whole time. You don't. I mean you can
Speaker 1: go number one. I mean you can go number one.
Speaker 1: You can't you just go Yeah, we ain't gonna just
Speaker 1: skip over there. Like so you're doing one, you'll say
Speaker 1: once in and what six? So you're telling us, and
Speaker 1: I'm using air quotes, you've been in the car, yeah,
Speaker 1: six hundred times, and you're telling me you pet on
Speaker 1: yourself once. But I know, damn well, you didn't pete
Speaker 1: in the pool several times in your lifetime. So you're
Speaker 1: telling me you got that kind of power. Adrenaline, man, adrenaline.
Speaker 1: It's like, as soon as you're in the car, you don't,
Speaker 1: you don't think about anything. There's only one race, and
Speaker 1: the reason that happened was because there was a raind lay.
Speaker 1: So it's stalled kind of my like, um, what do
Speaker 1: you call your routine? Pregame routine? So I had a
Speaker 1: routine of like going to the restaurant and probably fifteen
Speaker 1: minutes before I get in the car, and that it
Speaker 1: all got messed up because rained lay. So I had
Speaker 1: sat for like two hours just sitting there waiting let
Speaker 1: me ask you this being around Smitty and I know
Speaker 1: you're also you're a you're a football fan. You're from Charlotte,
Speaker 1: so you're you're your Panthers fans. So you probably have
Speaker 1: some memories of this guy, of this guy playing um
Speaker 1: when on Saturday afternoons. I will remember him turning into
Speaker 1: if you ever watched the movie Gramdmas. I don't know
Speaker 1: how old you are, if you ever watched the he
Speaker 1: may or may not have saying it. So, so you know,
Speaker 1: you have Gizmo who's nice and cutly, he's friendly, and
Speaker 1: then like a little bit after let me, let me
Speaker 1: get to the point. And so then after in the room,
Speaker 1: I know you're I'm a co host. I mean you're
Speaker 1: you're still here, so you you know, he go from
Speaker 1: kind of the Gizmo to the Grandplin. Like around Saturday
Speaker 1: afternoon is when he would seriously when he would start
Speaker 1: preparing pre gaming for you an get irritable. Yeah, So
Speaker 1: so around start as when you started building up with him.
Speaker 1: For you, when do you typically start getting amped up
Speaker 1: for a race? Because we know you typically have commitments,
Speaker 1: whether it's a sponsor opportunity to whatever the case. Maybe
Speaker 1: when do you typically start like getting up getting yourself ready, man,
Speaker 1: to be honest with you, probably Friday afternoon, like I
Speaker 1: start to do I start to watch some film and
Speaker 1: do some things there. And so we have like our
Speaker 1: meetings on Tuesday, I'm sure, like similar to any other
Speaker 1: like athlete or sport, Like you go into your meeting
Speaker 1: and you talk about what went well, what didn't go well.
Speaker 1: We watch film. We have a lot of metrics to
Speaker 1: measure and that film. How do you watch film on driving? Yeah,
Speaker 1: so we've got ah. It's this app called smt or
Speaker 1: it's a basically a computer um simulation, so it shows
Speaker 1: all your all your inputs, like like your driver inputs
Speaker 1: would be your throttle or your you know, gas break
Speaker 1: and you're staring wheel so that it's different for every driver,
Speaker 1: so they can ding you on you know, you're not
Speaker 1: being tending to on the st rool, Yeah, if you do,
Speaker 1: if you're not driving it right, it's like a question
Speaker 1: that it's kind of like a whole performance report, like
Speaker 1: you you getting graded it you are like PEP getting
Speaker 1: graded on pit road speed, which is critical like when
Speaker 1: you come down pit road with all the other cars
Speaker 1: you know, a fraction of a few miles an hour
Speaker 1: can make a huge difference. So we come down to
Speaker 1: the roads. Is there a limit? Is there a speed
Speaker 1: limit on pit rolls? Now, it's just based on human air,
Speaker 1: it's just human error. So you just you hold your
Speaker 1: foot and you drag the brake at the same time
Speaker 1: and it's like going down the highway trying to hold fifty.
Speaker 1: So so that's how sometimes I've seen pit guys get
Speaker 1: hit at times. So it's not like a it's not
Speaker 1: a local speed or designated speed that's supposed to have. Yeah,
Speaker 1: you have to. I mean there is a local there's
Speaker 1: a um speed that you have to run. But you
Speaker 1: try to push that like to you know, we're like
Speaker 1: point four miles and in football we call that to
Speaker 1: two and through the whistle. Yeah yeah, And so okay,
Speaker 1: so you they're telling you input so gas and throttle, UM,
Speaker 1: hand placement um, and then you said pitt roll kind
Speaker 1: of pit roll speed and then um and then what
Speaker 1: else are you watching film on? So restarts? So like
Speaker 1: the restarts we talked about is uh, you'll go back
Speaker 1: and look at you know, who took advantage of you.
Speaker 1: You know, did a guy did a guy gets your outside?
Speaker 1: Did he push you in the corner? You know, did
Speaker 1: you make the wrong move? So you kind of you
Speaker 1: kind of analyze what you did right or wrong? Are
Speaker 1: there any unwritten rules in Nascar? Like I noticed if
Speaker 1: somebody gets bumped, people get upset. Take that. You take
Speaker 1: that the hard Why because y'all for me? Like for me,
Speaker 1: I think y'allving bumper cars. So you kind of come
Speaker 1: parent that to like a late hit, like I'm gonna
Speaker 1: remember that you yes, right, yes, right right. Let's say
Speaker 1: you're raising a guy for a position and he gets
Speaker 1: underneath of you and he's trying to pass you. Right, Well,
Speaker 1: if he gets frustrated and he moves you up the
Speaker 1: track after a few laps, kind of you kind of
Speaker 1: take that to heart. So you're what do you do? Man?
Speaker 1: Next time I get back to him, I'm shipping him
Speaker 1: into the corner. Shipping, I'm sending him for a ride.
Speaker 1: I'm going to push him into the corner faster than
Speaker 1: he can get. How is that received? When that has happened,
Speaker 1: it's like checks and balances, right, It's a shouting match.
Speaker 1: It's a shout at each other. When I see you again,
Speaker 1: I bro, you're gonna see him in like fifteen more
Speaker 1: minutes when his next left his car. His pit crew
Speaker 1: is right next tell you they'll take care of it
Speaker 1: if I your crew is ready for the bah. Yeah,
Speaker 1: so you got ready? So yeah, I got. I got
Speaker 1: a guy that played uh, he played football, Clemson offensive line.
Speaker 1: And I got a few different football players. And you've
Speaker 1: got a new wide receivers because those are the real
Speaker 1: all stars. You got all slow power people. Man would
Speaker 1: be ready for the people go down, Like I would
Speaker 1: take a I take a I don't even know the instrument.
Speaker 1: I just pick up something. One of those mechanical tools
Speaker 1: come across this line. I saw on your show you
Speaker 1: had your daily goals. Yeah, and you had win a race.
Speaker 1: You've had some top ten, some top five finishes, a
Speaker 1: couple of seconds. Right, What would be the ideal place
Speaker 1: to win your first race on? What track? Like the
Speaker 1: super Bowl of NASCAR when you can win your first race?
Speaker 1: What track do you want to win your first race? Um?
Speaker 1: To be honest, Charlotte just because I grew up here,
Speaker 1: So that's probably the the most relevance to me. You know,
Speaker 1: if I go and win at Charlotte, MO Speedway, It's
Speaker 1: gonna be a big deal for my family. It's gonna
Speaker 1: be a big deal for me because I grew up
Speaker 1: like I grew up at that track thinking what would
Speaker 1: it be like to to race here, you know, with
Speaker 1: everybody so or a NASCAR So that one's probably big.
Speaker 1: Dayton of five hundred is the biggest race of our season,
Speaker 1: so that one's probably isn't that the first race? Yeah,
Speaker 1: first race of the year. So why is the first
Speaker 1: race the most important? I wouldn't say it's the most important,
Speaker 1: but it's the biggest magnitude. Like it's got like tone
Speaker 1: almost it does set the tone, and it's one of
Speaker 1: those things like you either win a championship or your
Speaker 1: Dayton five champion it is because you just it's almost
Speaker 1: you almost think of your your biggest game almost being
Speaker 1: your last game. That's when you win a championship, and
Speaker 1: for you guys, it's your first game. So it is
Speaker 1: almost different from probably what you think of like a
Speaker 1: football or basketball or even baseball. With the World Series, Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's different. It's different, and we have you know, the
Speaker 1: championship though, has taken on way more relevance over the
Speaker 1: last fifteen years, and so it's I mean, I'd rather
Speaker 1: win a championship than I would the dates. You know,
Speaker 1: either one, you're going to be considered like one of
Speaker 1: the grades. Probably in football learned sports they have the
Speaker 1: locker room yea. For NASCAR, what is considered the locker
Speaker 1: room where the where the young guys get to learn
Speaker 1: from the older guys. It's more within your team. So
Speaker 1: you have your race haller, so it's like an eighteen wheeler.
Speaker 1: You're eighteen wheel haller and um that goes down the
Speaker 1: highway and all your team guys, everybody lives in that
Speaker 1: space at the track. So once you arrive at the track,
Speaker 1: everyone goes to that haller and hangs out. So you
Speaker 1: know your picker guys, your engineers, and and myself. So
Speaker 1: that's kind of your area for your own team. The
Speaker 1: interesting thing about the sport is that you don't really
Speaker 1: there's no locker room for the drivers. Like the drivers
Speaker 1: all hang out separately. So I think that's why there's
Speaker 1: like kind of that animosity sometimes because you don't ever
Speaker 1: get to talk to me before a young guy like you,
Speaker 1: how are you able to interact with some of the
Speaker 1: veteran drivers like uh, I mean, I know Jimmy Johnson
Speaker 1: as a teammate, But when do you find those opportunities
Speaker 1: to to be able to glean from someone who was
Speaker 1: a little bit more established or a veteran. So you
Speaker 1: just have to reach out, like you just have to
Speaker 1: like go and say, hey, I need some help or
Speaker 1: I or I need to learn this or that. I
Speaker 1: you know, I sat down with Kevin harvick Um a
Speaker 1: few years ago when I was a rookie just to
Speaker 1: understand what to learn from him. Jimmy obviously is a teammate,
Speaker 1: and Dale and Kyle, so people you know. And then
Speaker 1: if you have an issue, I think the best way
Speaker 1: to handle it is to text or call the guy
Speaker 1: or go see him and say, hey, listen, you know
Speaker 1: I wrecked you or I screwed up or or if
Speaker 1: you he wrecked you, then you expect kind of a
Speaker 1: phone call or something. I just I just never thought about,
Speaker 1: like you you know, the drivers kind of operate like
Speaker 1: a solo independent maybe even like if I if I
Speaker 1: take that, and then I think about, like what you Steve,
Speaker 1: what would happen if you were a young gun locker
Speaker 1: room and you never got experience or you've never been
Speaker 1: never been around the bedroom at all. That's what I'm
Speaker 1: sitting there when you were saying, I'm like, wow, so yeah,
Speaker 1: so how much I don't know I'm going on ledge
Speaker 1: does it get lonely kind of race him? Yeah, you
Speaker 1: have to kind of have like the thick skin, like
Speaker 1: because somebody will say, like in racing, I feel like
Speaker 1: what happens a lot is like you don't talk to people, right,
Speaker 1: So another driver, if he's mad at you, he might
Speaker 1: say it to the media, you know, or he might say,
Speaker 1: like in his post race conference like this, y'allo beef.
Speaker 1: Y'all will beef in a minute, that beef through the media,
Speaker 1: but won't say nothing to each other. Like I know,
Speaker 1: because I've seen the Hollers are like they're they're close
Speaker 1: to each other. It ain't like he over you. Ain't
Speaker 1: that y'all? Not a Disney World where his his his
Speaker 1: trailers parked by small world and then he's over there
Speaker 1: in a whole different part that they're pretty close together,
Speaker 1: Like well, what do you do with like, uh, to leave?
Speaker 1: I actually mean to leave at that moment, we weren't
Speaker 1: seeing that. But I mean I've when he was with
Speaker 1: I think Denver, when he was with Denver. I UM.
Speaker 1: I was in Philadelphia covering UM A game, and then
Speaker 1: I wait stayed after the game. I was watched the
Speaker 1: game and my summer was with me, one of my boys,
Speaker 1: and so to leave actually came up, took a picture,
Speaker 1: not actually have the picture with Boston and said, which
Speaker 1: was very surprising to leave, said, I hated to go
Speaker 1: against your dad because he always made me work hard
Speaker 1: and it was really cool, and I was shocked that
Speaker 1: he was He said that to my boy. So, you know,
Speaker 1: there are some guys that we just don't mess with,
Speaker 1: Like there's some guys, some players that you're like, I
Speaker 1: just don't see out eye. There's some guys that I
Speaker 1: would see them right now. They could be on fire
Speaker 1: and now drive by. But then there's some guys where
Speaker 1: you know, maybe it was just a little bit of
Speaker 1: rambunctiousness in the in the game, but you're they're mature
Speaker 1: and you're mature sometimes to talk it out. But then
Speaker 1: there's some other guys where you're better off talking to
Speaker 1: a wall than communicating with them because they have a
Speaker 1: death set their mind. But but I think the difference
Speaker 1: with your sport and ours, in football or any other ones,
Speaker 1: I think tennis and golf is pretty similar like that
Speaker 1: just so independent. I think it's um. I think that's
Speaker 1: a good thing because it teaches you a little bit
Speaker 1: of mental toughness. But I also think it's kind of
Speaker 1: a it's cold. Yes, Like you go by, like when
Speaker 1: I was a rookie, you'd walk by, um, an older driver, right,
Speaker 1: and you'd be like not you know, You're like not
Speaker 1: sure what to do, and he just just looks straight
Speaker 1: through you. So it's like you're kind of like, alright,
Speaker 1: what did and how did that play into your psyche?
Speaker 1: That same driver that, let's be honest, you grew up
Speaker 1: here in Charlotte. You've already told us since the age
Speaker 1: of six you fell in love with with with racing.
Speaker 1: You weren't born, you weren't born from a racing family.
Speaker 1: So you see this legendary driver we're got gonna name
Speaker 1: many names were not about that, and he looks through you. Yep,
Speaker 1: that must have some type of intimidation factor that the
Speaker 1: next time you see that dude, he's right next to
Speaker 1: you on the track on the fourth turn, what do
Speaker 1: you do? Do you bump them? Do you hit him
Speaker 1: a little? Oh? You're not going ignore me now playing. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: I think it's a it's a respect thing, like it
Speaker 1: takes it. Gosh, you know, I see a rookie driver coming,
Speaker 1: Like I'm in my third year now, if a rookie
Speaker 1: driver comes in, I kind of do. I learned from
Speaker 1: the veteran guy. So so so you're not gonna change
Speaker 1: a little bit. So you're not gonna change anything. You're
Speaker 1: just gonna kind of go. So you're not really gonna
Speaker 1: do what you're supposed to do. You're not gonna do
Speaker 1: what you have what you call to do because you
Speaker 1: have to you I would say you would have done
Speaker 1: the same thing. Shut up. So like there's a we're
Speaker 1: really good friends, so we just get to tell how
Speaker 1: we feel. Shut up. Like I see you on the
Speaker 1: fifth term, sucker. I mean it's true because like there's
Speaker 1: this there's this like code right that we were talking about,
Speaker 1: and like that guy has to earn it from you,
Speaker 1: so like he has to pass you a couple of times,
Speaker 1: he has to race you a certain way over the
Speaker 1: course of a few races before you're like all right, okay,
Speaker 1: Like but each time that guy passed you the first
Speaker 1: couple of times, you're like, I'm like, I'm going right
Speaker 1: back after you. Like, it's not gonna make it easy
Speaker 1: for you to because it just wasn't easy for me
Speaker 1: to go up against a forty year old guy, you know,
Speaker 1: and you don't like four year olds. He took it,
Speaker 1: he took offense today, nothing to get some nothing to
Speaker 1: You're gonna get forty at some point. How long do
Speaker 1: you want to race? Gosh? I mean as long as
Speaker 1: I can, as long as until I until my reaction
Speaker 1: time and my senses are not strong enough to do it.
Speaker 1: All six? Yeah, all six. I think it's about that time,
Speaker 1: So we'll take a little breathing. Good do it, Good,
Speaker 1: do it. Let's getting down to do it. Good? Hey, Gerard,
Speaker 1: why did you get that T shirt? You mean this thing?
Speaker 1: Oh yes, I got it from cut to a podcast
Speaker 1: dot com where we have exclusive merchandise. Shout out to
Speaker 1: our guys at seven or four shot. But yeah, you
Speaker 1: can go on, buy you a T shirt, subscribe to
Speaker 1: us wherever you listen to podcasts. You're racing a lot.
Speaker 1: You grew up here in Charlotte, North Carolina. You've been
Speaker 1: around some great racers. You talk about Jimmy um Dale.
Speaker 1: Our heart lives here. Kyle Bush. A lot of these
Speaker 1: other drivers live here in North Carolina, ain't Heck, you
Speaker 1: were probably in the same subdivision or neighborhood with some
Speaker 1: of these racers. How do you how do you stay grounded?
Speaker 1: And where does your faith for you kind of where
Speaker 1: does that play in in your in Nascar? Because for
Speaker 1: me as a believer, at times I have struggled with
Speaker 1: the the physicality of ballum, the the the macho demeanor,
Speaker 1: some of the language that is used, and I felt
Speaker 1: on it as well as how does you how do
Speaker 1: you stay grounding in your faith and in in not
Speaker 1: allowing your success to make you feel like you've done
Speaker 1: this all by yourself. Yeah, I mean that's a great
Speaker 1: like question, I think honestly, for me, like my faith
Speaker 1: probably grew the most once I got out on my
Speaker 1: own in racing, which was really like once I was
Speaker 1: out in the car on my own, trying to make
Speaker 1: it a Nascar like, it really becomes about, you know,
Speaker 1: your faith, because you know, there's a lot of things
Speaker 1: that go on inside of the car that you can't
Speaker 1: always control, so it's like you have to like somehow
Speaker 1: let that stuff go. Like I still find myself it's
Speaker 1: a tough balance because you know, I probably are not
Speaker 1: the perfect Christian by any means. Like when I'm in
Speaker 1: the car, I might cut the word on the radio
Speaker 1: or might say whatever, but it's like to me, that's
Speaker 1: the heat of battle. But like when I'm outside the car,
Speaker 1: I think about the blessings that I have to be
Speaker 1: in in that opportunity and try to make the most
Speaker 1: of that, and you know, just try to understand that
Speaker 1: it it's bigger than just you know, that one race
Speaker 1: or like there's got to be a plan that is
Speaker 1: in place for me to kind of try to live
Speaker 1: up to and try to achieve. So well, this part
Speaker 1: of our podcast, who had to call it a deeper
Speaker 1: three and these next three questions just allow us to
Speaker 1: take maybe a little bit of a deeper dive into
Speaker 1: you as a person beyond your jersey or beyond your car,
Speaker 1: or for your profession again maybe even your wensy. Yeah,
Speaker 1: but but first question, Smithy has up on deck and
Speaker 1: we'll enter the deep three. Cool, how long do you
Speaker 1: plan on racing? Realistically the next ten years? I'd say,
Speaker 1: I hope, so that's not bad, and keep racing then
Speaker 1: and then you're just gonna disappear. I don't know. I'd
Speaker 1: like to race some other stuff like maybe some Indy
Speaker 1: car um, maybe some like dirt stuff like dirt racing
Speaker 1: like uh rally cars. I don't know, just whatever I
Speaker 1: could get my hands on. Honest, I'd like to do something.
Speaker 1: Maybe not full, maybe not thirty eight races like we
Speaker 1: do every year, but race, you know, fifteen to twenty
Speaker 1: times a year. It would be great. You've mentioned a
Speaker 1: couple of people that you know, whether it's Dale or
Speaker 1: whether it's Kyle or people at Hendrick. You've had people
Speaker 1: on the track who have been able to impact your life.
Speaker 1: Who are who are? Who's that one person or maybe
Speaker 1: a couple of people that you have off the track
Speaker 1: that invest in you that maybe you looked to as
Speaker 1: a mentor. Uh So there's two guys. There's uh Dennis,
Speaker 1: this guy Dennis Lambert, who he was my original crew
Speaker 1: chief so it's kind of like my original coach when
Speaker 1: I first started racing, and he kind of taught me
Speaker 1: the ropes and he was pretty hard on me. So
Speaker 1: he you know, kind of he was always honest, like
Speaker 1: he was never gonna like look at a race and
Speaker 1: be like, oh he did great. You know when he didn't,
Speaker 1: so he's good. I always always text him and we
Speaker 1: go out to eat and stuff. And then this other guy,
Speaker 1: Max Pappis, who's an Italian guy, and he's, uh, he
Speaker 1: used to race Formula one and like IndyCar and all that, um,
Speaker 1: all those kinds of races, so he kind of understands
Speaker 1: the industry. So I to him with any questions I
Speaker 1: have about, you know, what he sees in the sport,
Speaker 1: what he sees me doing versus maybe where I could be.
Speaker 1: So just kind of those two guys, i'd say, final question,
Speaker 1: M I like this question because it's a different one.
Speaker 1: You can answer however you want. What would you say
Speaker 1: your relationship where racing is relationship? Um, it's really pretty
Speaker 1: consuming for me, Like I'm it's probably most everything that
Speaker 1: I think about every day, Like there's not much else
Speaker 1: that I would want to do. Like I feel like
Speaker 1: if I went a week without doing it, I'd be
Speaker 1: like I start to go insane. So I think it's
Speaker 1: kind of I have a girlfriend, I have obviously a
Speaker 1: great family, but it's definitely like I'd say eight or
Speaker 1: ninety percent of my life is probably around racing. So
Speaker 1: so you are fully committed at this point in racing. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean there's random based off your m answer, so
Speaker 1: everything else is back seat somewhat at this point. Yeah.
Speaker 1: Like it it definitely like if I'm not doing what
Speaker 1: I want to do in racing that I'm not happy.
Speaker 1: Like it's just kind of how at this point twenty
Speaker 1: years old, Like that's what I that's what I want
Speaker 1: to do. He's kind of what I want to achieve. Yeah,
Speaker 1: but you have all the chips in racing, Yeah, but
Speaker 1: should it be that way? I don't know. Was it
Speaker 1: like that for you in football? That's a great question.
Speaker 1: When you got too deep forward, you just completely messed
Speaker 1: up our segment, will you? I think at different times
Speaker 1: it has been and and then there's times where I
Speaker 1: want to know parts of it just because you were
Speaker 1: checked out. I think it's just that I really you
Speaker 1: haven't raced enough yet. Right, You've had three years of
Speaker 1: you know, three years of success, but then there's gonna
Speaker 1: be you can have three years of success and then
Speaker 1: that rough year or that rough patch can just do
Speaker 1: a number on you, right and and and that's where
Speaker 1: I started to realize and I started to come to
Speaker 1: the conclusion of I love ball. I lived it, breathe it.
Speaker 1: But there were times that I lined up and I
Speaker 1: was like I could do without this. Sometimes what was
Speaker 1: it before? After your three year? More? It just it varied.
Speaker 1: It really depends on it. Like the time thing. No,
Speaker 1: it wasn't a time that it was just sometimes the
Speaker 1: circumstances or it'd be how you know when they say
Speaker 1: it arrange the poors? Just how bad is pooring? Right?
Speaker 1: Just like when you it's like that two hour you
Speaker 1: had that our delay. It messes up everything, and then
Speaker 1: that messes it up and then it's a chain reaction
Speaker 1: and then next thing, you know, let's go and then
Speaker 1: now you all now you're all fickled and intense, and
Speaker 1: it's like, man, I can go home right now because
Speaker 1: we are perfectionists, right, So yeah, now that's good to know. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I'm curious. I was curious about that. Like, yeah, I
Speaker 1: mean there's some days, man I would I wanted to
Speaker 1: do it till I was fifty, And then there's other days, Man,
Speaker 1: I don't want to do this. You don't want to, Dane,
Speaker 1: I don't even want I don't even want this past
Speaker 1: all right, were you sitting on the sideline and you
Speaker 1: go and that sucks, right, So yeah, that's cool. Yeah, Well,
Speaker 1: I just want to tell you, man, I really appreciate
Speaker 1: you taking the time, thanks for having me watch you.
Speaker 1: If you were believer, but after talking with William, I
Speaker 1: just want to ask you, like, are you a believer?
Speaker 1: And that's funny? What do you mean believe? Are you
Speaker 1: saying like it's a cult. I learned a great deal
Speaker 1: of information. I got to ask some questions that I
Speaker 1: kind of felt dumb asking a regular NASCAR guy that
Speaker 1: outside of the podcast, because you don't want to be
Speaker 1: like Steve's over there asking the dumb people questions, right,
Speaker 1: So I felt well comfortable. I think he was really
Speaker 1: shocked at some of the questions we did ask and
Speaker 1: how we asked. I really love how you talked about
Speaker 1: the culture being lonely, being on the road, um, talking
Speaker 1: about how the veterans cheat the young guys, and then
Speaker 1: also how as a young guy he said, hey, when
Speaker 1: the other young guys come on due do those guys
Speaker 1: the same way. It was really good to hear his
Speaker 1: perspective and the ins and out of NASCAR outside of
Speaker 1: the dudes constantly just hitting the left in banking, you know,
Speaker 1: doing all of the uh, the glitz and the glamor
Speaker 1: of Nascar and understanding the nuts and bolts of it.
Speaker 1: It was really cool. Yeah, I agree when he talked
Speaker 1: about the drivers maybe not always coming together and not
Speaker 1: having this you gotta look on the outside and like,
Speaker 1: all right, they all those guys have to talk to
Speaker 1: each other. They operate in silos. Every car is different,
Speaker 1: every racing team is different. So he definitely gave us
Speaker 1: a lot of insight into disbanded some of those things
Speaker 1: that you just kind of think all those guys know together,
Speaker 1: all those guys are cool. No, not necessarily, you know what,
Speaker 1: I forgot to ask him, what's that? Man? You know
Speaker 1: one thing I noticed in Nascar there's two different people
Speaker 1: you either a villain as a NASCAR driver or a hero.
Speaker 1: That's it's like w W, but except they ain't acting
Speaker 1: and they really they really got beef. They really got beef.
Speaker 1: But um, I think he's young enough. I think he's
Speaker 1: question is gonna be he's the young hero right now.
Speaker 1: Eventually when he become a villain, I don't know, we'll see,
Speaker 1: time will tell, but you gotta watch him. No, I
Speaker 1: ain't got a villain bone. His body cut to It
Speaker 1: with Steve Smith singer. That Is Me is a production
Speaker 1: of Cut to It LLC, Balto Creative Media, The Black
Speaker 1: Effect and I Heart Radio. For more podcast from i
Speaker 1: Heart Radio, visit the i Heart Radio app, Apple Podcast,
Speaker 1: or wherever you listen to your favorite shows. From Cut
Speaker 1: to It Executive producer Steve Smith, Singer co host Gerard
Speaker 1: little John, talent and booking manager Joe Fusci, social media
Speaker 1: manager Payton Smith from Balto Creative Media. Cut to It
Speaker 1: is produced by Brian Balta Chevitch and Meredith Carter, with
Speaker 1: production assistance by Alex Lebrec, Production manager Sarah Pollock. Theme
Speaker 1: music by Alex Johnson, lyrics and vocals by Anthony Hamilton.
Speaker 1: If you ain't heard about it, then without to let
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