Dale Jr. Download: '98 Daytona 500 Tell-All with Larry McReynolds

[Music] well the one thing y'all did deliver daytona and dad's been looking for a daytona 500 win for his whole career right and i think for the most part we all uh i say we the family um uncles and and brothers and sisters and mamaw and everybody was just thinking well maybe it ain't to be you know that you can't have everything uh you can you know you can be you know he had one almost everything but maybe that's just something that just he ain't going to get uh but y'all got it y'all had it y'all made it happen so one of the things i wanted you to do and ask you if you could when you came is to help us sort of go through that process y'all had a year together uh that you were not competitive as you wanted to be frustrated so where is the you have the whole off season to every off season if you don't have a good year you you go into that off season and you spend all those months physically and mentally sort of turning your uh attitude around right getting your hopes back up and talking to that driver and and talking that crew chief and getting all the reasons why this year is going to be better um so so kind of run us through that i mean what was the interaction like leading into 1998 between you and dad uh where was uh his attitude where was your attitude how was y'all's communication yeah i mean we we talked quite a bit during the off season um and you know he he even though i think we were we were down i don't think either one of us had really lost our confidence i don't think we'd lost our confidence in each other uh you know so so much was said and so much was written about your dad not not getting along and that really was untrue really uh yeah we had some spirited conversations don't get me wrong but but i looked at your dad as my friend and you know even after richard split us up you know your dad and i still had many conversations you know it just i think our personalities were so different you talked about the relationship that that him and curt had and him and andy had they they were similar they were kind of laid back they kind of just took went with the flow of things you know and oh larry mack is the high strung guy it's on the 9000 chip non-stop and it's it's like richard told me when he when he made the decision to to swap crew chiefs which i'm very thankful you know he didn't just come in and fire me but she probably had every right to uh he said best thing i can tell you larry you intimidated the damn intimidator that's all i can tell you but but over the off-season we we still had some energy we still were optimistic and i think a lot what was giving us a lot of optimism maybe we were hanging our hat on one thing too many was this car that was built to go to speed weeks in 1998 we built that car during the summer of 1997. that car had been in the wind tunnel and had been to talladega and tested with marcus and mike dillon probably been to the wind tunnel three or four times and been tested at talladega two or three times before your dad ever even laid eyes on it i mean i remember leaving michigan in august of 97 and going straight to detroit we had that car in the wind tunnel and we detroit or atlanta yeah that was your only choice we almost cut the body off that car after the first trip to the wind tunnel which i'm very glad we didn't because it it was it was mysterious it it the drag on the car was not that good but when you yawed the car in the wind tunnel the drag didn't go up and that backed up exactly what marcus told us the first time he tested it he said he's going to love this car he said when you go off in the corner and turn in the data backed it up and you turn the steering wheel the damn thing don't lose rpm we don't know why we couldn't we couldn't duplicate cars you know back then we put quarter panels and fenders on by that's good right there yeah nail it as long as it fits a template nail it and when we went to daytona and tested that thing in january i can still see that chester crack grin the first time he drove it he said this thing's good how come y'all didn't try to race that car in the end of 97. we only had one other race left and of course that was talladega and because that was still back when we we ran you know the the fourth of july race in the summertime so we only had the one more race and the car that we had run at talladega in the spring we ran second to mark martin and if if he'd worked with me a little more i think when we got to talladega in the fall we maybe could have won that race because the race we ran second to mark at talladega in the spring it was a caution-free race and we had figured out the six had those real aggressive pull-down shocks on well i unloaded at talladega in the fall with those pull-down shocks on i don't even know if he got the high gear going down the back stretch came in and get them damn things off yeah i said dale that's what beat us in the spring i don't i don't care i can't drive at so i remember running those they were on our xfinity cars in 98 maybe 99 before they ever got rid of them uh but mike they would tie down the car literally the the shock the rear shock had just as much rebound as you could get in it so when the car got out on the race track the shocks would compress and they would it would hold the shock would hold the car down and when the car when the rear tires would leave the ground the shocks wouldn't come out so the car would bounce yeah backwards huge difference a bucking horse it was i bet it was painful in your lower back kidneys in your guts uh bouncing in the seat like that every uh corner exit was the worst as far as i remember but it was every lap and we qualified and raced them and you just that was just what you had to do like that's that's going back to what i was talking about 45 year old goes out there makes half a lap comes in and says take them off i ain't driving it 25 year old goes out there and goes i can do this this is what you say i need to do i got it and say are you sure this is faster oh yeah it's faster i guarantee it's faster i'm wondering how those are faster it sounds like it would slow you down being as bumpy as the rear spoiler is like an inch lower or something like you know all the way around the race you're getting that out of the damage so fast yeah so interesting so all right talk go back to the car for back to the car you built for daytona um you got a good you know attitudes are still reasonable going into this going into the uh the season he goes and tests the car or is it did you all have january tests did you drive the car yeah that's the first time he ever even saw the car was uh and he he was tickled to death so what was testing like with him when he was actually in the car you know i i think it it daytona you know but because he loved that place it wasn't bad you know and it was kind of a laid-back atmosphere you know yeah you're trying you know we that's still had our box of cardboard box full of cow configurations that we'd go through this you know all these different matrixes of cows and stuff and you know it's kind of laid back i think he always kind of enjoyed going to daytona intestines yeah i think so too i really loved those er you know that january test of daytona because everybody was everything was new everybody's got their new cars he wasn't real high on sitting in line out there waiting on nobody that was so miserable i just started i started taking my mp3 player yeah as i is uh i thought and all that stuff sit out there and i'd be listening to some music yeah um that's the only way to get through that um but y'all are y'all are optimistic i mean we were he was happy with the car did you think you had him you think this is gonna be his best shot you know probably no more than i did 97 i mean my first time there you know i i remember we had a very up and down day on pit road and uh i look up with 20 laps to go we're leading the darn thing and uh car wasn't handling quite like it should that's when you talked a lot about handling at daytona what do you mean car just would pick that push-up coming up off the corner especially on into a run when the fuel load would burn off tires would lose grip thing would especially off a turn two it just want to pick that push-up but we're sitting there leading the thing with 20 laps to go and uh fighting with elliot and and gordon and that bunch dale jarrett ernie irvin and uh i looked at richard i remember with about 17 or 18 to go and i said what do you think he said been here way too many times before with about 11 to go when that damn thing was barrel rolling down the back straightaway i totally understood what he was talking about so uh you know i thought we were in a position to win that thing our first time to the racetrack together in 97. so that was the time where he rolled the car got out got an ambulance got back out of the amy lance cranked it up drove it around when that happened now people love to you know talk about his fans love to talk about that um was that was what do you think about that i i was lost for words because i'm i'm watching you know we we all we had was a cbs broadcast on a tv in our pit box i watched the man get out of the car i had talked to him on the radio i watched to get it get in the ambulance and so i'm walking down pit road to make that turn in the garage air there by the old goodyear building down near the entrance of pit road and you know how you'll something will catch your eye and you'll go no so i saw this black car go by and i went can't be i saw him get out of the car and then i looked down pit road he was sitting in the pits and there was a damn soul around him because everybody went to the garage area so but that was just he you know he he said i i looked out that window and he said i looked and he said all the tires are up on that thing and he said that's when i got back out of that ambulance and that and that poor guy was inside he said hit that switch fire that thing up he said that thing cranked up get the hell out of my race car that's funny but the thing i love about that dale something i've always prided myself in regardless if we were winning races or struggling to run in the top 20 hated dnfs even though 97 was an atrocious year for finding victory lane by finishing that race right there and and not listed as a dnf we went the entire season and had zero dnfs yeah yeah yeah i had something i was very proud of is that right yeah that is uh something that i think uh me and tony senior tony junior we all sort of had that attitude too about um no matter what you need to try to get back out there and finish and i mean there's there's races where you would love to just load the thing up and go home but you know as soon as you do and and you see those results and you know that you could have got back out there and finished there's a weird it's hard to explain to somebody i think that's never went to a race and competed but there is a massive amount of de depression and guilt that you carry with you if you don't finish a race you could have finished yeah so you crash right you miss some parts and fenders and and the cars junk you're going to go out there and ride around in the way a second off the pace or whatever for the rest of the day nobody wants to do that but if you don't do that right you knowing you could have it's such an awful feeling dirty awful feeling yeah that car really shouldn't have finished that race i mean that that there was more stuff missing off that car and we were taping and bell wire with bell wire anything we could do to and i'm thinking ain't never gonna let this thing go back out there and then on my nascar scanner i said i heard the words three-car clear to go hey i'm curious um even on the years where he wasn't winning the daytona 500 it seemed like he was winning everything else during speed weeks right and i was curious did he enjoy the shootout or the clash did he enjoy the duels did he enjoy i think that man enjoyed practicing at daytona really yeah i mean he just loved to go out there and and i remember with this particular car you know we practiced every day three times a day and i remember somewhere between sunday of qualifying and in in the dual race you know your dad was notorious for leaving that garage air and going out there and being the first in line and then leading a group of cars down there for 20 laps and this one practice he just led the pack led the pack and led the pack and finally i said dale why don't you get back in the pack and let's see what that thing would do at the pack he's you know what his response was don't plan on being there yeah okay i'm gonna tell you that's the most badass response i think i've ever heard i mean how was i going to argue with that don't don't don't argue with him now was that in 98 that was 98. this was bad this was practice on maybe tuesday or wednesday that car it's almost like the slicker that track got the better that car got it just it just it didn't deteriorate it didn't go away it just kept getting better well i have to think that even after all those years of coming close i'd have to look around and go and this might actually be our year there i mean like he don't plan on being in the back well you ding you know i know 20 years and i know but that is some that's a level of confidence right there he definitely had he had some bounce in his step the entire speed weeks from the time we unloaded no questions interesting all right hold up i got one more question though about this leading into the race that was also the year you crashed in daytona and so you were like how how plugged in were you with all this stuff going on at the at the time leading into the race none yeah okay like i'd i'm uh like up to my eyeballs and uh with racing that xfinity car i mean i'd never race you know anything like that you didn't know you were getting that ride until like a month earlier that cup garage didn't even exist i had no clue that i had no clue the daytona 500 was even happening i don't even remember the duels or any of that but uh it was i was overwhelmed yeah and uh we flipped and um i had i hit my head and got a concussion and so i was on the couch at home well i knew that i just didn't know if you weren't the 500. i was so mad because i wasn't i was feeling like i was feeling sick but i wasn't sick enough that i couldn't have been there if i'd known he's going to win i'd have probably stayed sure because i'd love to have been in that victory lane um well all right uh anything unusual about race morning not really well it all kind of started started to unravel i thought it was unraveling on us on on friday your dad started feeling a little under the weather about wednesday he was almost like he had a stomach butt bug or something and i knew even the day of the duel race he he didn't he didn't feel good we won the door race pretty handedly and i i saw him in victory lane he just didn't look good so he telling you uh he had said something about he didn't feel good his stomach was bothering what have you so after kind of victory lane and pictures or whatever i don't even remember if it was the first duel of the second duel so i looked at him i said you don't feel very good he said larry i feel horrible i said okay here let's do this what do you think about this i said you're happy with this car he said car's good i said there's two practices tomorrow friday i said let's skip the morning practice you sleep in may maybe go maybe go infield care center go see a doctor whatever if you'll come out here tomorrow afternoon we'll go ahead and get our 500 race engine in and if you'll just run a few laps tomorrow afternoon let's just make sure nothing leaks everything's good and then we'll get serious in happy hour on saturday back then of course happy hour still after the xfinity series race he said man that sounds like the best plan i've heard in a while so sure enough we change that engine take our time friday morning you know crew chief still nervous because it's like damn they're out there practicing we're sitting in here changing engines you know it's just typical personality of a crew chief so we got that engine changed so this plan is right on track until about 10 minutes before that friday afternoon practice one of those afternoon thunderstorms rolled in there oh boy and washed it out okay we're still good you know we we still got a full hour tomorrow and he's still happy with this car you know we'll just we'll we'll dot some eyes and cross some t's tomorrow and we'll be ready to run happy hour so we're ready and you classic your dad man he's in that car he's buckled in he's ready to drive out the garage gate i don't even think he got to third gear going off pit road down to turn one something's wrong with this engine so he came in danny lawrence and them raised the hood they looked at spark plug wires making sure they were all on they pulled the plug wires plugs out put new ones in looked a few things sent it back out he didn't even get the high gear down the back stretch damn it i'm telling y'all something's wrong with this engine so he comes back in they pull the valve covers off and i'm looking now we've already missed 20 minutes of this practice we've not turned a lap since the checkered flag on thursday so i'm definitely getting starting to get a little uptight nervous so he pulled the valve covers off and sure enough on one cylinder there was a rocker arm that was broke and a push rod that was bent dang push rod was still there but it was bent so danny very meticulously pulled that rocker arm off all the pieces were there pulled that push rod out put new ones on ran the valves on both sides put it back together cranked it up ran fine he left pit road we we're down to 20 minutes to go in this practice but he he made a 20 lap run he said man it's good it's golden i was like okay we still i'm a big y person we've got to make a decision collectively richard danny got to get spendy clinton on the phone or engine builder i want your dad involved we got to go to the lounge get on the phone why did that happen to that engine do we need to change this engine before we race tomorrow so your dad had this habit of with final practice the last run he'd pull up and get the goodyear tire sheet he'd get out of the car the guys would push the car around to the fuel pumps and your dad would guide it and then they'd push it to the garage area and your dad would guide the car standing outside the car so here comes the three car no dale where's dale i don't know i don't know so they're pushing it in there and i'm trying to get danny's attention here comes j.r rhodes and i said jr where's dale well he's out there with some fans it's like he picked a hell of a time to mix and mingle with fans i need to talk to that man we've got a decision to make here about this engine so finally he comes by me and he walked by me like i wouldn't even stand in there and he's got something in his hand and he's he's on a mission so he's i see him over the toolbox and he's got something in his hand he's got a tube of something in his hand yellow glue and he's trying to put yellow glue on a penny and he's got it running down the arm of the sleeve of his dirt and driver [Laughter] i said what are you trying to do dale he said i got this penny lucky penny i don't put it on the dash my car i said okay if i help you put that penny on the dash of the car can we go over as a group and make a decision on this engine well after i got the whole story i felt about that tall about being ill at him about he really wasn't mixing mingling with fans he was out there with a make-a-wish child wesson miller just still remember today her wish was to come to daytona and meet dale earnhardt and he was out there you know having some time with her and she gave him that penny and said that was her lucky penny she wanted him to have good news is we did change the engine the good news is we did win the race did you find out why the motors i don't i don't know if i ever really got the reason i just you know when i think spinny and danny they they would have been okay but i think they were second guessing you know god forbid we leave that thing in there as good as this race car is and we that's why we have spare engines and we feel like our spare and the backup to the spares just as good as the primary let's put it in there and be done with it yeah i remember that story about the uh the girl the make-a-wish kid and gives him the penalty he loses a penny to the dash he brought it up in victory lane he genuinely felt yeah and he believed in that penny he had enough glue on that penny to glue a hundred pennies on the basket it won't go anywhere that is so neat and it's so cool to hear that story because that it's such an uh there's no other way we would ever hear that uh but but that was a prevalent part of his whole celebration was that penny i remember as a fan just when he won that that was something that really stuck out was that the girl um she was handicapped yeah the penny he brought her into victory lane and that was that was a story and and man to hear you say that now i'm curious where where were you guys going to start before you changed the engines well we had i think on the second row because we had won the dual race because you won the door one the door so now you're in the back yep and well back then no you didn't have to go to the rear changing engines yeah we changed engines like we changed tires they did so you could still start all right so yeah we didn't give up so the decision to change the engines was much easier than i was it was just the fact of having an engine that had not turned a single lap that was the only little thing you're nervous about but i i was a lot less nervous about that engine than i was one that had had an issue on saturday even though it ran fine for those 20 or so laps on saturday what about the race itself like what do you take away uh before you even get to the end did things happen in the race that that stand out to you today it was it was almost as flawless as as the whole week was you know pit stops were good car drove good i i don't know if we if we made any adjustments on that thing throughout the day it was minimal it may have been a little bit of air pressure it may have been a little bit of wedge or a little bit of track bar here there it was it was just bare minimum uh when i went to work at rcr before we went to daytona richard told me said i just need to pre-warn you about something as you know dale and bill france jr are really tight and bill france jr has a radio and every once in a while it's it's rare every once in a while he'll talk to dale on the radio under caution so the whole 97 season i never heard bill france jr i guess there wasn't really a lot to talk to us about in 97. so the last caution comes out i don't know 20 or so laps to go and i called for two tires we come in leading we leave leading everybody else did two tires so it wasn't like we were rolling the dice or anything just felt like we didn't need to i felt like a lot of people was going to go with two and i didn't want to put him in the back with 15 or so laps to go so make the pit stop we got the lead behind the pace car waiting on the one to go and and man i was as uptight if you'd thumped me out of probably crumbled so all of a sudden on the radio i hear this voice it says hey sunday money this is captain jack and i'm thinking who the hell is [Laughter] who is on our radio and richard saw me and he knew i was about to have mia come apart captains jack is about to get cussed out whoever kept it and richard about tackled me and he kept pointing to i went oh captain jack and he just said hey sunday money this is captain jack why don't you go snag that big one today of course your dad knew who it was he said 10-4 we're going to do it wow i was about to my nascar career was about to come to a close right there cussing captain jack so that was the name of the boats you know i i got it i don't know if anybody got it yet of course not especially the guy that's not the kind i totally forgot about bill france jr and captain jack having the radio the president of the sport going on jumping on the radio man and he's about to get cussed out if richard hadn't stopped me oh my gosh who in that race had your most attention there in the last laps as far as who y'all were racing against two penske cars you know rusty and uh jeremy mayfield um but i i i'm gonna tell you unless something happened the confidence i had in dale earnhardt when you put a car out on the racetrack especially daytona and talladega i knew unless something weird happened which had happened many times we as we know that that it was ours to lose that that there's just no question that that we we're not gonna get beat you know a lot of people look at me today and say you're my you're our guy you got the man the daytona 500 and i stop him i go look that's a flattering comment i just happened to be the guy that was his crew chief when he didn't have a flat tire going off in the turn three on the lap didn't hit a seagull on the back straightaway didn't blow an engine leading the race i just happened to be the guy when it all finally came together and none of those things happened to that three car you know one of the things that always amazed me about is you know like on youtube well i just had to say like you're i know you're humble but there is a uh there the feeling that people have that feeling that you are the guy you're the guy that delivered that um that elusive wind that was so important to dad um he did not want to end his career without something like that um that feeling is legit like it's real and um i know that you uh he had some great cars he had some great opportunities there's some weird things that went on and reasons why he didn't win that race but um you know that that feeling that that you played a big role in helping him succeed uh and win that race i mean it's it's real and whether you can play it down all you want um and that's just you who you are but well i felt like the weight of the world that was lifted off my shoulders i wanted to ask you like that race the caution comes out right there was a wreck on the back straightaway john andretti and somebody else spins down the back straightaway and they throw the yellow so instead of the traditional biting your nails to the very bitter end off of turn four coming to the checkered who's going to get a run instead of that going instead of living through that you know y'all are racing back to the yellow across the finish line you know the race isn't going to get restarted right right no overtime right so you go you have almost this an um uncharacteristic or unusual uh lap to let it sink in right yeah looking around in the what are you doing well i i still was not taking it for granted dale you just you weren't gonna i was not going to to say this is done until i saw him truly come underneath that checkered flag and you know danny culler our spotter when the wreck happened over there coming off turn two on the back stretch it was really not a bad wreck but it was enough to bring the caution out and danny knew the deal and i made sure and stayed off the radio let danny talk him back you know you got to bring and of course i can remember danny you got to bring it back to the line champ you got to bring it back to the to the line and then the minute that happened i said you've got to make sure maintain caution lap speed we got to get back around here one more time i didn't want that to be the next freak thing that happened is we don't maintain caution lap speed and cars pass us or something freak happens and so yeah until i saw that car truly take that checkered flag mainly i guess because of what we had been through in 97 and what i knew the three car had been through for 20 years trying to win this thing i wasn't going to count those chickens until that thing was absolutely underneath that checkered flag yeah what happened then it's all a blur is it yeah honestly i mean i remember victory lane i i remember you know going to the unicow suite with with your dad and richard and having a toast and going to bill jr's captain jack sweep he gave us all a cigar going through the media car wash down on pit road richard and your dad myself and then the guys had taken the car and and tore it apart for inspection and then you have to put it back together and honestly i remember all those things but it didn't sink into me it was pouring down rain when they finally loaded that thing back in that little trailer to be able to put it into to the daytona experience the next morning and none of my family was down there they were all home sick with the flu and i remember walking in the pouring down rain from the garage to my motor coach and it was about 11 30 quarter to 12. and when i sat down to take my shoes off that's when i think it finally hit me i went damn just won the daytona 500 with dale earnhardt i don't think even though i remember everything that went on but there's one other one other moment dale and mike that i'll never forget as long as i live it was in victory lane i've told this story a lot it was in victory lane and things were kind of settling down a little bit you know but there's still pictures pictures after pictures after pictures and the crew was still there and the car was still there but i remember kind of taking a a step back in in watching your dad and teresa and quite honestly watching richard and judy it's their first time too and i was fortunate enough six years prior to experience it with with davey but it it's still just as special there's not that it's i'm sure if you win a third one it's just a special two but to watch especially your dad and richard it's almost like watching your kids unwrap their presents on christmas that's what it meant to me to just take that step back and just kind of take it in and watch their smiles and their actions and how much it truly i'll never forget that as long as i live so you just watched that video and i'm sure you enjoyed it well you need to listen to the whole podcast the dale jr download is available on all podcast platforms

Channel: Dale Earnhardt Jr.'s Dirty Mo Media

Views: 788,520

Keywords: Dale Earnhardt, Daytona 500, Dale Earnhardt Jr, Dale Jr., Dale Sr, Larry McReynolds, NASCAR, Dale Jr Download, Dale Jr podcast, Dirty Mo Media, DJD, DMM, Daytona, Great American Race, Larry Mac

Id: 3YF9qwovaVY

Length: 32min 44sec (1964 seconds)

Published: Thu Feb 11 2021

Reddit Comments

[u/MyNameIs_Jordan]

Larry Mac's memory is incredible

[u/Intimidwalls1724]

I love Larry Mac

Forgive me but it really warmed my heart last night when they first showed him and he immediately started pointing at Mike Joy on the screen and hollering “that’s my boy right there” at his old booth partner

[u/[deleted]]

Who was Dale's final crew chief?

[u/CaptainRon16]

I love me some Larry Mac

[u/mruab]

Anything with Larry McReynolds is always good