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The Joe Rogan ExperienceThe Joe Rogan Experience

Joe Rogan Experience #1196 - Dale Earnhardt Jr.

Dale Earnhardt Jr. is a semi-retired American professional stock car racing driver, team owner, and is currently an analyst for NASCAR on NBC. His new book "Racing to the Finish: My Story" is available now.

Joe RoganhostDale Earnhardt Jr.guestGuest 2 (unidentified, brief participant)guest
Nov 7, 20181h 53mWatch on YouTube ↗

EVERY SPOKEN WORD

  1. 0:02 – 1:16

    Bow hunting as a mental reset + techno hunt & golf simulator talk

    1. JR

      Four, three, two... Hello, Dale.

    2. DJ

      Hey, how you doing?

    3. JR

      (laughs) Thanks for doing this, man. I appreciate it.

    4. DJ

      Yeah, I'm glad to be here.

    5. JR

      Nice to meet you, man. And nice to find out that not only you're a race car driver, you're also a bow hunter.

    6. DJ

      Yeah, yeah. I do like to... I saw your-

    7. JR

      (laughs)

    8. DJ

      ... your archery, uh, equipment and all that stuff. But me and a buddy of mine own some land, and... and I try to get out there and at least go twice a year. I just love being in the stands, sitting in the woods. Just thinking about what's going on and just try-

    9. JR

      Yeah. It's brain cleansing, right?

    10. DJ

      It is.

    11. JR

      It really is.

    12. DJ

      Everything before the shot really is what it's all about.

    13. JR

      Yeah. Yeah, that's a lot of it, right?

    14. DJ

      Hanging out with your... being with your friends and family, you know.

    15. JR

      You need one of those techno hunts in your life, don't you?

    16. DJ

      I do.

    17. JR

      (laughs)

    18. DJ

      The techno hunt was pretty impressive.

    19. JR

      Yeah, that thing is-

    20. DJ

      Yeah.

    21. JR

      Uh, all my friends who come over here just go, "Whoa."

    22. DJ

      Yeah.

    23. JR

      That's a, that's a life-changer.

    24. DJ

      Yeah, absolutely.

    25. JR

      But it's also a giant time waster.

    26. DJ

      I know. I don't know. Like, I've got a golf sim at the house, so I got to figure out where I can put that.

    27. JR

      Ooh. Golf's the one I've always avoided.

    28. DJ

      Yeah.

    29. JR

      I've always avoided golf because I just saw it suck away people's time.

    30. DJ

      Yeah. I don't go... That's the thing. Like, I don't have the time and the patience to really block that whole day off to go play-

  2. 1:16 – 2:47

    How dangerous is racing? Comparing mindsets with bull riders and fighters

    1. JR

      Well, I would imagine with what you do for a living, with... I think what you do is one of the craziest, wildest, most demanding things a person could do for an occupation.

    2. DJ

      Boy, I don't know.

    3. JR

      It's, it's right up there.

    4. DJ

      Yeah.

    5. JR

      You don't know? Other than being-

    6. DJ

      It's (laughs) ...

    7. JR

      ... a soldier or a firefighter or a cop or-

    8. DJ

      I don't know. I mean...

    9. JR

      ... a fighter.

    10. DJ

      Yeah. Fighter and bullfighting and, and-

    11. JR

      Yeah.

    12. DJ

      ... bullriding. Those type of things are-

    13. JR

      Those people are-

    14. DJ

      Boxing.

    15. JR

      That's on th- Bullriders, that's on another level.

    16. DJ

      Yeah.

    17. JR

      That's another level of crazy.

    18. DJ

      I've hung out with those guys and they are on another... They are crazy people.

    19. JR

      Yeah.

    20. DJ

      You know, it takes a certain mentality to, to be able to climb onto a bull.

    21. JR

      Yeah, they have a certain energy about them.

    22. DJ

      Right.

    23. JR

      That, they got that "I don't give a fuck" energy.

    24. DJ

      Yeah. They don't-

    25. JR

      And it's cranked up to 10.

    26. DJ

      Exactly. (laughs) Yeah.

    27. JR

      (laughs) Have you ever been in Vegas when they have the, the big...

    28. DJ

      The p-

    29. JR

      Yeah.

    30. DJ

      The finals?

  3. 2:47 – 7:15

    First time at Talladega: wide-open throttle, unbelievable grip, and the violence of speed

    1. DJ

      Yeah, thanks. Uh, I mean, I, um, it... When I was a little, uh, when I was little, thinking about, you know, "What the hell am I gonna grow up and be?" Uh, I was... My father was really successful in the sport, so I would go to the races and I would watch him race and see him win and watch him go through victory lane and, and then celebrate and all those things. And I thought, "Man, this is what I gotta do. I gotta do this. This is... This looks fun. This looks exciting." People are, uh, you know, people are in awe of the drivers, the race, my father, the, the, the personalities. And I just wanted to do it real badly. But I knew that the odds of making it are tough, so there's only 40 guys in the field every weekend. So there's 40 guys in this- in the whole country that are gonna get the shot to do it, you know. And m- me... The odds of me, even with my dad being as successful as he was, I'd have a lot of doors open to me, but the odds of me actually getting there and being able to stay, have the staying power and the success and talent, I just knew were tough. So, I didn't know if I- I'd ever get that chance. Um, but it is... I don't... You know, I remember the first time I went to a two and a half mile track, it's Talladega, and you hold it wide open. I was, uh, working at my dad's dealership changing oil. He owned this, uh, Chevy store in, uh, Newton, North Carolina. And, uh, the phone rang and he said... My dad, my dad was on the other end, and he was in Talladega for a test, and he said, uh, "Get your helmet and your suit and meet me at the racetrack the next day. You're gonna fly in a King Air to the, to the track." Don't... No... Don't ask questions, just do it." And so I got there and I, I knew I was going to Talladega and I thought, "Man, I must be driving. This m- this is gonna be crazy." I'm gonna go around this two and a half mile two- track full speed at 190 miles an hour. I'd never done... I never f- went faster than 90 or 95 on a racetrack before. Never drove anything bigger than a half mile. And, uh, I pulled out... He's... You know, I got there. He's like, "You're gonna test this car. Get in, get ready." He puts me in there and he's like, "You gotta hold it wide open. If you don't hold it wide open, the motor's not gonna work. It'll, it'll hurt the motor. You gotta hold it." The way they tune the motor to run wide open, it has to run it, it has to run at full throttle. If you try to go around there at half throttle, it'll burn the pistons, it'll run too lean.

    2. JR

      Wow.

    3. DJ

      All those things. So, he, he was saying that and I thought to myself, "Is he just telling me that just to make sure I hold it wide open 'cause he thought I would, I would, I would be a pussy and not do it?"

    4. JR

      (laughs)

    5. DJ

      And so (laughs) I was like, "Man, I, I, I'm a little nervous, uh, to hold it wide open." But I, I pulled out on the track and I mashed the gas, full throttle, and I'm going down the back straightaway and I was like... I'm looking down the back straightaway into the next corner, this long corner, and I'm like, "How's it gonna stick?" You know, "How's the car gonna, how's the car not gonna fly out of the racetrack?" Like, it... I'm going so fast, I don't... It doesn't feel like it's going to stay in the track. And, uh, and I kept ru- kept running that through my head about my dad saying I gotta hold it wide open. I'm like, "Well, Dad said it'll, it'll, it'll go wide open around here, so I don't think he would..." You know, I believe everything he says. And you go in the corner and you turn, uh, into the corner and there is...... more grit than you can imagine, like the m- it... there's, there's so much grit. The tr- the car is stuck to the track with such grip that you've never felt this before in your life, this, this grip. Like, you can't slide across that track. The tr- the tires in the car have a hold of the track so tough and tight that nothing's gonna make it... It just goes around there like it's m- it's the craziest thing. And so now, today, when I tell people, uh, when I go- I... We got this two-seater car and we take people for rides. And they get in there and I'm, I'm like, "Man, what am I gonna do... What are you gonna do to explain to somebody what this is gonna feel like?" Well, there, I'm gonna tell you things to pay attention to. Pay attention to the grip. You're not gonna believe how much grip this car has. Like, it's... You're, you're just not gonna believe that it'll stick to the track the way it does. So pay attention to that, and pay attention to how bumpy and violent it is. You know, you drive a Cadillac or, or any car down the street. Well, it's, you know, six, eight inches off the ground. These big old f- inflated tires and big giant sidewalls and it's gonna feel nice, you know, when it hits little bumps. Our cars are rigid and sucked to the ground and don't have much travel in the suspension. And, you know, it's just, it's, it's built to han- to, to go fast, not to feel good,

  4. 7:15 – 11:10

    Crashing and flipping: feeling safe inside the car + the ‘hands in’ rule

    1. DJ

      you know? And it's gonna... It's rough as hell and shakes, shakes the hell out of you. And, um, that's what I remember about that. And, and, and as soon as I got over that initial fear, I think that was the only time I ever had any real fear of driving a car. As soon as... I was like, "Well, all right. What..." You know? Anything... Nothing else is gonna be as scary as that was. Right? Driving a car. And, I've been flipping and... When I flipped for the first time and our, you know, the car's tumbling and flying and parts flying off the air, my m- I, I thought to myself that... I wasn't scared or I never was scared of flipping. My thought was, "I just did something a lot of people are never gonna experience." You know? "I did something that, uh, that only a few people know what that's like." And, and I feel safe. I've always felt incredibly safe inside the car, you know, with the... Especially with the... I mean, in the last 20 years, this, the safety stuff has really been focused on and improved and better and better and better. But I look at the interior of our cars today versus 20 years ago and it's like, I'm, I can't believe the, some of the stuff that we used to climb into, but...

    2. JR

      So you felt calm while it was flipping?

    3. DJ

      Yeah. Oh, yeah. I always-

    4. JR

      Wow.

    5. DJ

      Well, I've seen cars flip, right? I've seen it for years, right? And so I know that it's possible, so I get in there and I got turned around at a race, uh... In 1998, I was racing at Daytona, and, uh, I got turned around and the car... So I'm flipping for the first time in my life, and this car's, like, over 3,000, uh, 3,000 pounds. So it's, it's... But it flies up in the air like it's paper, man. It's the craziest thing in the world. It's so... weightless, you know? And what it felt like to me, 'cause... So the car rolled on its side and, uh, came down kinda on its side. It felt like somebody rolled a prop wall of grass up against the car. You know what I'm saying?

    6. JR

      Right.

    7. DJ

      When I was on my side and I could see the ground, I felt like I was right side up because as you're flipping, there's... The force pushes you down in the seat, so you feel eternally, eter- you feel, uh, gravity all the time. Like you're... You know, as the car's flipping, you're, you're pushed into the seat, so you feel gra- you feel weight of yourself in the seat. That never changes. You never kinda come up out of the seat-

    8. JR

      Right.

    9. DJ

      ... like that, you know? And so it, it was like somebody rolled a prop wall of grass up against the side of the car and then against the roof and then against that side and then this. You know, it kept doing that and I'm like... It's just the weirdest feeling. And you feel completely safe, you know?

    10. JR

      Wow.

    11. DJ

      You feel like, you know, "Nothing's gonna harm me." But this, but, and he- you know, this, you just... One of the things they always talk about is, like, get your hands, um, onto something because the spinning makes your arms just go like this. And if you watch a lot of old wrecks from the '60s and '70s, you'll see the guys' arms come flying out the window and they're just kinda flopping around. They can't pull, uh... It's spinning so fast, you can't pull it in. And, uh, your arms will go like that. So as soon as you know you're going upside down, you grab the bottom of the steering wheel and just kinda, you know, watch. But, um, I flipped my pickup truck one time on Christmas Day and I wasn't holding onto the steering wheel, and my arm went out the window, you know, for like a split second it banged around in the d- in the, in the window sill. And I was like, "Man." You know, I got it back in and grabbed ahold of the steering wheel with both of my hands. And so ever since then I've, like, you know, now I know, like, anytime I'm in a crash, you gotta have your hands ahold of something 'cause that's the one thing that you can't control. You're, you're strapped in with your seatbelt and everything, but your arms are, you know, can go anywhere. And in that moment when the car's rolling or barrel-rolling or flipping, you, it's so fast. Like, you can't... Your arms just go this way. (laughs)

    12. JR

      Yeah.

    13. DJ

      It's the craziest thing in the world. That's the only fear, I guess, is that your arm could get outside the window and get crushed or something, 'cause guys have had that happen.

    14. JR

      Yeah, I would imagine.

    15. DJ

      Yeah.

  5. 11:10 – 15:44

    Christmas Day pickup-truck rollover: distraction, seven flips, and dad’s surprising reaction

    1. JR

      How'd you flip when you were, uh, on Christmas?

    2. DJ

      On Christmas Day, my sister, uh... (sighs) She knows this, so this won't be news to her. But, um, uh, it, it's probably not fun for her to hear every time I tell it but... We... I had a pickup truck with a tape deck in it. And I had... She got me that Walkman CD with the adapter for the tape, tape deck that you stick into your, you know, your cassette adapter. And she bought me the Walkman cassette adapter and I'm in my pi- I'm in, I'm in my truck. I got a extended cab S10 and I'm driving from my house to my m- my ma-maw's house where a family reunion is. My dad's there. Everybody's there. The whole family's there. I'm a little late. Um, and I'm driving down the road and I got to messing with that Walkman, and I drove off into the ditch and I hit a driveway culvert, a pipe, drainage pipe and a driveway, and went like seven flips.

    3. JR

      (laughs)

    4. DJ

      ... and destroyed this truck. And in the middle of the flipping, I remember that happening. And everything, all my change, jacket, anything that was loose in the car ended up down in the one corner, like floorboard. Everything sorta collects into that one corner as it's spinning. And, uh, it crushed the windshield down. The mirror was down into the radio. You know, it was f- it crushed the roof down real bad.

    5. GP

      Wow.

    6. DJ

      I was really lucky. I had my hands on top of the steering wheel and the windshield kept slapping my knuckles and knocked all my, busted all my knuckles real bad. And so then I, I let go, and my hands went this way, and then I finally got 'em back in and grabbed the bottom of the steering wheel. It broke, it, the tires were flipped, you know, broken and busted off the, the truck. And this, uh ... I got outta the truck and I was fine, didn't have any injuries other than just the knuckles kinda being scraped up. This mar- this newly married couple, they just, or either got engaged or just got married, h- had, were driving the other way and saw the whole thing, and they stopped. And, uh, they were like, "You all right?" I'm like, "Yeah." And, uh, of course there's this line of cars behind me stopped on the road. And this one lady pulls up and I was like, "I need to borrow your cellphone to call my dad." She's like, "You're in shock, you need to sit down." I was like, "No, I'm not in shock, I just need to borrow my cel- borrow your cellphone." So she, so I walked to the next car-

    7. GP

      (laughs)

    8. DJ

      ... and I got a cellphone from this person.

    9. GP

      (clears throat)

    10. DJ

      I called my dad and I was like, "Dad." I was like, "Man, I flipped my truck." I had paid, I had got, I had financed this thing for five years, I was paying $100 a month. It was perfect. I was working at the dealership changing oil, probably making $130 a week. And ha- I mean, just got this truck for probably two, three months. And, um, used truck, but it was, it was good. It's junk. Uh, I called Dad and I'm like, man, he's gonna be mad. Can't be too mad, 'cause I'm paying for the truck, but-

    11. GP

      (laughs)

    12. DJ

      ... he's gonna be mad at me 'cause I'm screwing up family reunion and, and Christmas. (smacks lips) He comes to get me. Uh, I'd flipped this truck real close to our, where our farm was, so he ran over to the farm and got this flatbed truck and, uh, he pulls out there with the flatbed truck, and he pulls up. And as soon as he pulls up, state trooper pulls up. And the state trooper guy and Dad talked for a minute, and the g- uh, state trooper's like, "Yeah, one single car accident. You okay?" "Yeah, everybody's okay. Dad, y- y- Dad, are you gonna put this on the flatbed and take it home?" "Yeah, okay, okay." You know, "I ain't gonna, I ain't gonna investigate or anything. Everything's cool. Y'all just go about your business." So he left. So he did us a solid there and, uh, didn't give me any kind of traffic ticket. And so me and Dad put the truck on the flatbed and we're driving back and he started laughing. And I was like, "Man, I expected you to be really mad." 'Cause he was a, uh, fiery kinda dad, you know, and, and, uh, pull the belt out and go to town, you know. Be ... He was a rough, strict, tough, tough dude. And so I thought I was gonna get, um, a good cussing at least, but he started laughing. And I said, "Man, what's so funny?" And he goes ... Uh, I was 18 when this happened. He goes, "When I was 18 years old, I flipped my car." He's like, "I can't get mad."

    13. GP

      (laughs)

    14. DJ

      He's like, "It's just, I'm just glad you're not hurt." I'm like, "Well, that's nice." So we drove back. I took a couple pictures of it, and, uh, got me, got insurance for it. Got like 11, 12 grand for the insurance to be able to buy another truck.

    15. GP

      (laughs) So it all worked out.

    16. DJ

      Yeah.

    17. GP

      So that was the first time you ever flipped something, or did you flip the race car first?

    18. DJ

      That was the first time.

    19. GP

      That was the first time.

    20. DJ

      No, the race car was next.

    21. GP

      So the race car is like, "Oh, I've been here before."

    22. DJ

      Yes. Yeah.

    23. GP

      Wow.

    24. DJ

      And it's nothing. And the, and the race car, it's, it's not as bad as a ... A passenger car, you only got that strap, you know?

    25. GP

      Right.

    26. DJ

      You just, you're moving around and banging around in there. And in the race car, you're in there pretty tight.

  6. 15:44 – 32:57

    Street driving after racing: being cautious, favorite daily rides, and loving ’70s iron

    1. GP

      Yeah. W- do you feel weird when you're in a passenger car too, just f- the lack of support and-

    2. DJ

      The lack of support and safety?

    3. GP

      Yeah.

    4. DJ

      Y- you know, I, I do, because compared to way- the way our cup cars are now, or the race cars are now, man, we're cocooned in there. The seat and everything, the headrest, the st- you got a six, seven point harness. I mean, in a street car you really just got the strap. I mean, it's ... Um, I certainly, uh, you know, am more c- I'm much more cautious as I get older on the highway. And, and people are like, "Hey man, how do you do it? How do you drive on r- how do you drive a race car and then go 45, 55 on the road?" And it's real easy actually, you know. You just kinda chill. Uh, when I was-

    5. GP

      Does it get all your fast driving out of the way?

    6. DJ

      Yeah. When I was younger I w- I was getting speeding tickets all the time, but when I, as I got older, I just didn't care to be in a hurry anymore.

    7. GP

      Yeah, I would figure the way you drive for a living, you would just get it out of your system.

    8. DJ

      Yeah, yeah.

    9. GP

      You probably just-

    10. DJ

      I get plenty of, I had plenty and, plenty of high speed r- action and hijinks on the racetrack. I don't ... I calm down on the road.

    11. GP

      What kind of car do you drive in real life?

    12. DJ

      Well, it's funny. I, um, uh, I just bought a brand new Silverado. I hadn't bought a truck in a long time. I had, I still have my old Silverado I bought. It's about a '04, '06. But they, this new one, uh, I like a lot. I really-

    13. GP

      The new ones are badass.

    14. DJ

      I didn't like the old ones that much. They just look kinda basic. The, the, yeah.

    15. GP

      The new ones are really sweet looking.

    16. DJ

      The character lines and the body lines, it's just a good looking truck. So I bought that. Um, but my, the, what I was driving before that, I got a '48, uh, pickup truck. And, uh, it's all rough as hell on the outside and, um, original faded, all messy and ugly looking. But it's got a Vortec motor, good drivetrain in it. It drives good. Um, but it's easy to work on and I just love fooling with it. I took the original binc- bench seat out and put these old bucket seats in from a '80, uh, Chevy Blazer. And, uh, so I made it comfortable and just the way I wanted it. So I drive, I drove that a lot this summer until I got this new truck. And I got a '76 Chevy Laguna that I love to drive.

    17. GP

      (laughs)

    18. DJ

      Yeah. That thing just kind of-

    19. JR

      ... float-

    20. DJ

      Floats down the road, man. And it's a, it's dark midnight blue, tinted windows and just a really cool color. I love the '70s and the style of the cars in the '70s. Even the, kind of the bigger ones, like in the late '70s, like the 442 Oldsmobile Cutlass.

    21. JR

      Yeah.

    22. DJ

      Those big, big, big cars. There's something about those guys that, that I really dig.

    23. JR

      Is that your car right there?

    24. DJ

      That's my car right there, yeah.

    25. JR

      Damn.

    26. DJ

      I love that thing, man.

    27. JR

      I had a 1973 Chevelle-

    28. DJ

      Yeah.

    29. JR

      ... that reminds me of that kinda body style.

    30. DJ

      That's it.

  7. 32:57 – 40:38

    Restoration philosophy: ‘drivers’ vs show cars, sweat equity, and the dream Nomad build

    1. JR

      Do you, so do you drive like fast cars on the road ever? Or do you mostly, are you just like, just mostly drive a normal, relaxed on the road?

    2. DJ

      So I, um, I got a lot of speeding tickets when I was younger, uh, th-

    3. JR

      That's a shocker.

    4. DJ

      Yeah.

    5. JR

      (laughs)

    6. DJ

      And I, a- and it seemed like it w- just never failed. Anytime I got behind the wheel of a Corvette or anything like that, I would get pulled over for, you know, rolling through lights or rolling through a stop sign or reckless driving or whatever. And I kept... I mean, it happened as recently as two or three years ago. I got pulled over for, um, rolling through a stop sign and speeding. And, uh, and the guy's like, "Man, you don't need these tickets. Like, what are you doing?" And I was like, "You're right. I don't know what the hell I'm doing."

    7. JR

      (laughs)

    8. DJ

      "I don't need to be driving this damn car is what's up. I need to get outta this stupid car. I don't need no Corvette with all this power."

    9. JR

      Right.

    10. DJ

      And so, uh, and I've m- I've got this original, um... I got this original, uh, 65 Impala that's been in my family since it was brand new, and it's kind of been the community car. It was passed around, got banged up on the corner, corner, right front corner. Couple crashes here, couple crashes there. This guy needed a car 'cause his was broke down, so he used it for a while and such, and it was just pa... And I finally got it. I bought it for two grand from my dad. And I've fixed it up. It's got a two barrel 283.

    11. JR

      Wow.

    12. DJ

      Doesn't go anywhere, right? And I'd just as much rather drive that car as little a power as it has, um, knowing I won't get myself into any stupid trouble.

    13. JR

      Right.

    14. DJ

      You know, being in a hurry or being impatient. And so that's, uh, you know, that's, that's what I, that's what I try to do. I actually, I don't care about as much what kind of power the car has as much... I like a driver. I wanna ... I like nice cars. I like f- you know, frame off restorations, but I'd rather have a driver that's reliable and easy to work on. And I think that's why I like that 48 pickup truck. It's got the Vortec motor, which is just a, you know, it's g- it's, it's not a powerhouse. It's just dropped in out of a ju- out of j- out of a junkyard crash. And it's, uh, it's easy to work on. Like, uh, me and a buddy of mine put an electric wiper motor in it the other day 'cause it had an old vacuum on it and, and it just didn't, didn't work. And, uh, and it's easy to, it's easy to work on. I put, we put these seats in it. We put a, we got an old ammo box for a console and shit like that.

    15. JR

      Do you just enjoy it because it's also... It's, it's, it's something that's sort of related to what you do for a living, but then again not, and kind of just a project?

    16. DJ

      Automobile?

    17. JR

      Yeah.

    18. DJ

      Um, I, uh, I think the reason why I like to work on cars is because it m- ... I don't know, it makes you, uh, it put e- It makes you a little invested in the car. Uh, there was a s- there was a pin... There was a point in time where I was just kind of like, "That's cool. I wanna buy that. I'll get that. I'll drive that a year. Now, I don't like that anymore. Well, that's cool, I wanna buy that. I'll get rid of this one and get this one." And that got old real fast for me.And so I started to... That's when I st- that's when I put a little more time in that 65 Impala and fixed it up. And, and I'm like, that's... I'm never le- I'm never selling that car. Never gonna sell it. Um, that 48 truck, I'll never sell it, just 'cause of the work I put into it-

    19. JR

      Right.

    20. DJ

      ... or the, the, you know, the time, the time that I've spent with it. Uh, I've had... I mean, you know, and I, it, I've got... There's people that are helping me work on these cars. I got a buddy of mine that, that actually helps me work on these cars. But, um, when I finish that Nova Wagon, I'll probably never sell it, even though it's probably nothing special if someone else were to look at it. But it's what I, you know, it's what I put into it.

    21. JR

      Yeah, you've got w- sweat equity.

    22. DJ

      Yeah. And the more you work on these cars, the more confidence you get in trying to do more, getting into the jobs that you didn't think w- you were capable of doing, and-

    23. JR

      Have you ever thought about a build up straight from scratch?

    24. DJ

      Um, that's probably what this little, uh, Nova Wagon's gonna be.

    25. JR

      Yeah?

    26. DJ

      Yeah. I wanted a Nomad. So my dad had a Nomad, and, uh, it was, uh... This thing had polished, uh, aluminum on the, uh, on the underneath floor pan. And Miur- he'd park it on a Miura in the shop so you could look underneath it, you know, and look how good the damn thing was. It was a bol- it was frame off, hardly ever seen the road. I mean, just clean as it could be from end to end. And I love road trips. The Nova Wagon, I mean, uh, the, the Nomad is the perfect road trip car. But I c- I just don't wanna spend the money on a wa- on a Nova, I mean, a Nomad chassis and, and body. It's... they're just ridiculous to buy. And, um, I want to build the car. I'm not a expert modder, so this Nova Wagon's perfect. It's a wagon, it's not a Nomad, but it's a little smaller, which I like. And if I screw it up, it's okay. Um, if I screwed up a Nomad build, I'd be pissed.

    27. JR

      Why are Nomads so expensive?

    28. DJ

      I don't know. They're just rare, and it's like the, you know, it's like the ol- it's like the old '55 Chevy Wagon. It's just-

    29. JR

      I'm trying to put it into my head what a Nomad looks like. What year?

    30. DJ

      Like a '55, '56, '57.

  8. 40:38 – 47:55

    Concussions in NASCAR: the 2012 Kansas crash and discovering real treatment

    1. DJ

      (laughs)

    2. JR

      Nice. So tell me about your book.

    3. DJ

      Yeah.

    4. JR

      Um, you... One, one of the things that was surprising that I had heard was your, your experience with concussions.

    5. DJ

      Mm-hmm.

    6. JR

      You know? Um, tell me about that.

    7. DJ

      So when... I've had concussions. In that flip I was talking about in 1998 at Daytona, I got a concussion from that crash. Uh, I'd had concussions throughout my career at many different points and didn't think anything of 'em. I thought when you, you know, when you got a concussion, you joked about it with your buddies, about how it made you feel, and you just rested until it was gone. And you race through it, uh, and eventually it'd go away and you were fine. You know, it was just something that would go away and you never thought anything about... You never thought about seeing a doctor, you never thought about getting treatment. You didn't know there was even treatment available for a concussion. You just thought it was something like a bruise, you know? So this is going on throughout my whole career. I was racing at, uh, I was testing at Kansas, uh, Motor Speedway in 2012, blew a right front tire, hit the wall at 185 miles an hour, and it screwed me up. And so that was a really not, you know, that wasn't a typical crash, not something that drivers deal with usually in their career. This was something that was unique to me. Uh, and it was just a terrible impact at a bad angle, at a very, very fast rate of speed. And I got outta the car and I knew something was wrong with me and I couldn't, you know, I couldn't... I felt, you know, just like I'd been hit in the head with a bat. Uh, shocked and shellshocked in a way, or just couldn't... I couldn't, uh...... shake it off, you know. You just kind of wanted to shake your head and get it out, whatever it was, and you couldn't. Um, that's the way I, I felt imme- immediately after that crash. We went ... Our test was done 'cause the car was killed, so we went over to this place to get some lunch and we're sitting there and I started getting sick, nauseous, before we ever sh- you know, I wasn't eating. Uh, we just ordered, we just sat down, and I started ... I'm sitting with my team, all my guys, and I'm, uh, starting to- I think, feel like I'm gonna throw up right there in front of them. And I'm getting nervous. And I don't, I haven't said to them that I feel this way, you know? So, I don't want to tell them I feel this way. Um, but my crew chief, Steve Letarte, is like my- is like a brother. Um, I was like, "Steve, I, uh, am getting sick and something's wrong with me. I don't know what's wrong with me but I gotta get out of this room." It's a bus- it's lunch hour, it's full of, full of people, noises, talk and chatter, uh, shit going on, and I gotta get the hell out of there. Um, and as I was getting up to leave, my wife come walking in. They were ... She was coming to get me, we were going to watch the Redskins Monday night game, and, uh, sit in the owner box with Dan Snyder and, uh, who, who ever else is there. So, we had them plans to go. I said, "Amy, I'm gonna go lay down in the car. I just gotta lay down in the car for a minute." And I laid down all the way, in the car all the way to the airport. I'm thinking, "This is, this is bad. This is the worst I've ever felt anything, but hopefully it's gonna go away." And so, we get to the game. We get ... We went to the Redskins game, we watched the game. Uh, did that whole thing. And I went about four weeks of feeling bad and sick, for about four weeks, and it finally went away. And I was ... I knew that was unusual for it to be that long, but in my mind I wasn't s- thinking doctor, I wasn't thinking treatment, I wasn't thinking anything like that. It didn't cross my mind to tell anybody or that I really needed ... I thought, you know, I thought that I had been dishonest and not, uh, you know, I hadn't, I hadn't been honest with everybody about the way I was feeling but I didn't ever think that it was gonna cost me anything. So, I thought, "All right, I'm feeling better. I'm good. Go to this race." I'd been racing the whole time, right? Finally, four weeks later, I'm great, I go to another race, I'm racing, I crashed. And it all came right back, like, as bad as it was, if not worse. And that's when I said, "I gotta go to the doctor. This is bad. I can't ..." You know, "I can't even ..." You know, "I can't keep crashing like this. Just s- putting these concussions so close together is a bad deal. It's dangerous." And my ... I couldn't bite my tongue. Like, my attitude and my emotions and shit was out of whack. Like, I couldn't control my anger-

    8. GP

      Hmm.

    9. DJ

      ... and I was like, anybody be s- anybody say something I didn't like, I'm like, well, you know, I wanted to tell them to fuck off, you know?

    10. GP

      Right.

    11. DJ

      And, I, that was just not like me. I couldn't s- I couldn't, like, k- keep myself calm. And, uh, everything that I heard, like, made me angry. (laughs)

    12. GP

      Yeah.

    13. DJ

      It was the craziest thing. Even people just talking about stuff would just get under my skin. I'm like, grr. Uh, real impatient. Um, and there was some new symptoms but, uh, finally, uh, I went to the doctor and, and, uh, got to ... I went to this neurosurgeon in Charlotte, Dr Petty. He's like, "I want you to meet this guy in Pittsburgh. His name's Mickey Collins. He works with the Pittsburgh Steelers and the Penguins." And, uh, I'm like, "All right." I go up there and I'm thinking I'm gonna meet this guy that works du- works with the Penguins and the Steelers and he sees, you know, players. But he's a, he's a doctor that sees anybody and everybody. Like, there's kids in there, you know, that got hurt playing on the playground. There's workers, uh, con ... You know, uh, carpenters, housewives. Everybody's in that damn waiting room to see this man. He sees about 25 people a day and, um, he's an expert on head injuries and he's got, you know ... He's just, he's on the f- cutting edge of whatever the hell the new shit is, he knows it. And his, you know, his team and his people are investigating it. And so they're ... Uh, he fixed me. So I go there and I'm like, "This is what happened. This is how it happened. I crashed, I, I hit it, I didn't tell anybody about it. I was sick for over four weeks, I got better. I crashed in this race and I feel sick again." And he was like, "Well, these are two different injuries of two, two different parts of your brain. The first injury, you, you bruised this, uh, f- right front edge of your brain, uh, when you hit the wall." He said, "This, this second crash, uh, you twisted the s- base of your brain and injured some things in the back of your brain, and that's why you're having the emotional ..." And different things like that. So, uh, but we ... He went deeper into it than that. He was like, you know ... We did all these, uh, tests and, um, visual tests, and all kinds of stuff for, for ... And I'd go back to s- I mean, we did this thing. We d- I went through the gamut for a whole day of doing tests, and then I went back every, uh, week, uh, before I ... You know, and, and in two weeks I was back racing again. I was clear. And, uh, so he, he took an injury that I hid and took four weeks to heal, and healed it in two weeks.

  9. 47:55 – 1:02:20

    Vestibular and vision rehab: retraining the brain like physical therapy

    1. GP

      What did he do to heal it?

    2. DJ

      Um, he gave me ... I never took any medication on this particular, uh, issue. He gave me, uh, home exercises and eye exercises. There was a ... I had problems with focusing and mi- making my eyes work, tra- tracking in object, like a bird flying across the sky or anything like that. I couldn't, my eyes couldn't stay on it. If I looked at you, uh, my eyes would bounce off of you. Um, and they just wouldn't stay, you know. If you said, "Hey man, I'm gonna take a picture," and you held up a camera and I tried to look at the lens and smile, my eyes would wanna jump off of that object. They would want ... They didn't want to, to look at what I wanted them to look at and track anything going anywhere. And s-

    3. GP

      What was the cause of that?

    4. DJ

      Um, the, the brain has-... the ocular stuff, uh, I mean, you can have injury to that part of your brain or you can have an injury to the vestibular part of your brain that, that af- that may af- l- like if you have bad balance, then that ... Your eyes and your balance work together. And so if you have, uh, vestibular issues, that can create ocular issues. And, um, that can create, um, that, that can affect your, uh, anxiety and depression and things like ... So all these ... You can have an injury to one part of your brain that affects four other areas. And so ... And we talk about that in the book. Mickey comes into the book and I'm, I'll talk a- you know, I'll say, "This is what I was feeling, this is what I did." And Mickey will come in behind me and say, "This is the medical science behind that, and this is how we treated it and why." But I would have an injury to one singular area of my brain, but I would have four different symptoms affecting four different parts of my brain, four different senses. And, um, you know, he would have to hone in on the one that was broken and then f- know to fix it. And when he started fixing it, all the other ones would start communicating together. The brain would start working again. Balance and visual and all those things would start to work again, and anxiety and all those things would, you know, begin to tu- come back in tune.

    5. JR

      Now when you said he fixed it, like what is he doing?

    6. DJ

      Uh, he ... Well, so he gave me physical exercises to do. I had some balance issues. Basically if I was ... if I turned my head, uh, or looked up and down, I would get dizzy and sick. Like my stomach would turn if I turned my head left or right, if I looked up and down just sitting there. Like the best thing for me was to sit on the couch and not move.

    7. JR

      (laughs)

    8. DJ

      And so like literally not move. And I felt fine then, but if I had moved an inch, man, it was like m- it'd make your stomach nauseous. And so I did a lot of motio- I did a lot of exercises that created a ton of motion with my head. Um, lifting heavy balls up and, uh, p- passing them over my shoulder this way or that way, taking a ball and turning around and hitting it this way, taking the ball, turning around and hitting it that ... Just doing that for, for hours and hours and hours. And so I would train ... Basically, uh, I was training myself to s- to balance again. You know, training my mi- training my l- my body to balance itself again. And if ... And my ... If I couldn't see a horizon or a flat surface, uh, I couldn't tell which way was up.

    9. JR

      Oh.

    10. DJ

      And yeah, it was so bad. And, um, the visual stuff, there was these, uh ... I had a string with these balls on it, and I would hold the string on my nose and hold it out here, and I had to look at all those balls. And it would ... My eyes are focusing ... Just all it's doing is really just making my eyes change focus, uh, from one to the next to the next and back, on to the next, next and back. And there was this eye chart on the wall, and it had all these letters and all these numbers on it, and I had to, uh, I had to look at that eye chart and turn my head back and forth this way, but look at that eye chart and count, and count, uh, do from A to Z but backwards.

    11. JR

      Oh.

    12. DJ

      Do the alphabet. So I'd have to look for the letters. "Where's Z?" You know, and go backwards. Or one, one to 20. You know?

    13. JR

      All while you're shaking your head.

    14. DJ

      One, two, three. Yeah, and standing up, and walking backwards and walking forward.

    15. JR

      And what is this doing to your mind? Like how d- how does this fix your mind? Like what is the-

    16. DJ

      (sighs) I-

    17. JR

      ... what's the process?

    18. DJ

      You know, I don't know what the real ... I don't know what ... It's the ... I've had ... The problem with me was my vestibular system, so my ability to understand balance and understand horizons and ... So I was putting my mind in a perplex, uh, in a complex environment, or making my mind do complex things that you don't do every day.

    19. JR

      And it's just firing up these parts of your brain-

    20. DJ

      And it's, yeah.

    21. JR

      ... and exercises them?

    22. DJ

      It's kind of like stretching this muscle. You know?

    23. JR

      Oh.

    24. DJ

      It's like, it's like they used to say when you would get hurt to go into a dark room and hide and, or t- you know, no, no electronics, no TV, just sit in a dark room and wait.

    25. JR

      Yeah.

    26. DJ

      And what they're, what they believe today is that exposure is what helps. Pushing yourself into these complex environments and doing things that are really challenging for yourself. Even doing that ... If I put you in front of that eye chart and made you turn your head back and forth and walk, walking two steps forward, two steps back, and doing ... It would be di- it'd be difficult for you. Um, uh, so but for an injured person, it's super difficult. It has to be really challenging. Um, but it just sort of tunes the mind or retrains the brain to do balan- to, to balance. It retrains the eyes to, to track on objects and to lock on objects and stay on them. And-

    27. JR

      What's crazy is it sounds like physical rehab.

    28. DJ

      It is.

    29. JR

      Like if you had a knee injury or something like that.

    30. DJ

      It is a physical re- Yes, there's a lot of physical rehab to it.

  10. 1:02:20 – 1:09:49

    2016 relapse: a dozen concussions, months-long recovery, meds for anxiety, and why he retired

    1. DJ

      That's why... So in the b- in the book I talk about these notes I started taking. After that crash in 2012, when I would wreck after that, I would get sick and I wasn't telling anybody. And so I started writing these notes in my d- in a journal in my phone and from 2013 all the way to 2016 I had this long journal of crashes and how I felt. And I would, uh, crash on Sunday and I'd write in the journal on Sunday night, Monday morning, Monday at lunch, Monday at night. You know, every... Three times a day every day until whenever I felt good, which is usually the Wednesday or Thursday of th- that week. And I was writing these notes because I couldn't tell if I was getting better. The n- the, the brain injury or any type of head injury... I mean, if you said, "How's it feel?" Monday and then you asked me again Tuesday, I'd be like, "I really don't fucking know, man. It just... It's there."

    2. JR

      Right.

    3. DJ

      "I don't know if it's better. It just feels bad." And so I would try to write as detailed as I could on a day, on a Monday and then try to write as detailed as I could on Tuesday and re-read Monday and see, "Hmm, is it better? I can see in the comments or, you know, I can't really remember exactly what I was feeling Monday but in the comments it seems better," and I would write these notes, right? And so I kept doing this and I thought I was treating myself. And eventually it caught up with me. Like I had about a dozen concussions in a period of about two and a half years-

    4. JR

      Wow.

    5. DJ

      ... and I got to where I couldn't walk and I was... Called my owner and I was like, "Man, I need to talk to you. I can't race this weekend. I can't hardly walk and, uh, my balance is so bad that I can't get up off the couch without holding onto something and walking across the room without grabbing stuff as I go." And-

    6. JR

      Jesus.

    7. DJ

      He, he was like, "We gotta go back to the doctor. What are you doing?" He was mad. He's like, "Y- you know, what are you fucking doing getting to the doctor? Why aren't you at the doctor?" And I was like, "You're right. I need to go to the doctor." I mean, a concussed person doesn't have good judgment and self-awareness, you know? They're... You're just-

    8. JR

      Right.

    9. DJ

      You're just in a fricking... You're in a... It's like being hungover.

    10. JR

      Yeah.

    11. DJ

      But the worst hangover. You can't make decisions. And so I went back to Pittsburgh and saw Mickey again and I had to stay out the entire whole half of the year in 2016 to get better. It took me five months to get well instead of two weeks.

    12. JR

      Wow.

    13. DJ

      And that time, um, I was on... They put me on medication that would drop my anxiety levels so the anxiety levels would stay down so that I could concentrate on, uh, the injury and-

    14. JR

      What medications?

    15. DJ

      Um, I'd ha- I don't know exactly the names but, um, it was a... To... It was very, very small doses and it would take about three weeks for it just to kinda kick in. I'd have to take it for a while before it'd start working. Um, but it just made me real chill and it made me not analyze myself every single day when I got up. When I got up I wouldn't go, "Hmm, is it still there? Is it as bad as it was? Let me walk across the room and see how I feel. Let me go do this and test this and try this and try this and try this all day long and see how I feel." It made me stop doing that 'cause I was driving myself crazy. And, um, he gave me a lot more physical therapy, basketball, e- m- movements, anything that got my head moving. Um, I'd do those exercises for about two weeks. Some of them would stop triggering symptoms. I'd go back to this place in Pittsburgh. We'd go through about 30 more exercises and I'd take home about 15 that made the symptoms trigger and I'd do them for about two or three weeks and some of them would stop working. I'd go back to him, we'd go through more physical exercises till... You know, kept doing that process over and over and over. I took the medication for about a year and a half, um, and I had a lot of... They gave me this, uh, computer program for my eyes and I was wearing these... I would wear these 3D glasses and, uh, uh, this computer program would try to take these 3D objects and go to 2D and back to 3D and my eyes would literally try... It would... It felt like it was trying to rip my eyes apart. It hurt, like physically hurt when this object would try to go from, from, uh, 3D to 2D and it was going very, very slowly and it felt like it was trying to rip my eyes apart. And imagine your eyes are tethered together so when you look left they both go there, right? And they both go... Wherever you look they go together like they're supposed to and mine didn't wanna do that. Mine, I... You couldn't physically see my eyes toed out or going the wrong way. You couldn't see that but when I'd try to look over here, they both didn't go to the same place and that was... That action or that, that computer program was strengthening that activity of my eyes trying to do something together and I would wa-... So if I... I've got these buffalo on my property and they're across the field wa-... You know, 200, 300 yards out across the field out the back window of my living room and if I walked across the floor, every step I took...... would knock my eyes off of the buffalo. Like, they're way out there and I could look at 'em, but if I took a step, my eyes would shake and I couldn't... I'd have to find 'em again, you know?

    16. GP

      Wow.

    17. DJ

      And so that would s- that computer program would strengthen my ability... It's called gaze stabilization. It would make it to where when I walk I don't... You know, if I'm walking or bouncing across the room, I'm s- I can still look at you in the eyes and, and, you know, like a normal person.

    18. GP

      Right.

    19. DJ

      And if I... When I was in my, at my worst, I couldn't do that. And so, uh... But that took a long time to fix. And, uh, the book basically is me admitting making those mistakes. Uh, I shoulda went to him as soon as I got sick again the first time instead of trying to document it myself and, and hide it and, and manage it myself and trying to get to whatever the end of my career was, whenever that moment was, and retire, thinking I was gonna walk away without anybody ever knowing. Um, (smacks lips) and it... And I had to retire after that. After that 2016 year of missing half a season and going through all that, I didn't wanna go through it again. I had one more year on my contract in 2017, so I finished that season, and that was that.

    20. GP

      Were you apprehensive while you were finishing that season?

    21. DJ

      Yeah. I didn't wanna get hurt.

    22. GP

      Yeah.

    23. DJ

      I didn't wanna go back through that whole process again and go through that rehab again. I didn't wanna get sick again. Me and my wife just got married on New Year's of 2016, '17, so we are newlyweds. We're getting... She's pregnant. Uh, we're gonna have a baby. Um, you know, I didn't wanna go through any of that stuff sick.

    24. GP

      (laughs)

    25. DJ

      You know what I told my doctor though? You'll like this, since now we know each other so well.

    26. GP

      (laughs)

    27. DJ

      Um, when I was ill in the hospital... or when I was with Mickey in Pittsburgh as... my wedding was, uh, on New Year's and I was... This is probably around October or right be- no, this was probably in, uh, August. I said, "I need two things." I was like, "I need to be able to, uh, go through my wedding, uh, on my wedding day, and my wedding night and that whole experience, I wanna do it with a completely clear head and I wanna be able to remember everything. I don't wanna be on any drugs, I don't wanna, uh, have any symptoms. I don't wanna even be thinking about my hit or reminded about it in one- in any moment during that night. I want, uh, my wedding to be perfect. And I wanna be able to climb up in my deer stand-

    28. GP

      (laughs)

    29. DJ

      ... without feeling like I'm gonna fall out of it." And he said he'd fix it, and I was hunting that... I was hunting that October, yeah.

Episode duration: 1:53:19

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