From NASCAR Driver to Snowbird Director (Part 1 of 2)| Hank Parker Jr.

In today’s episode, Brody sits down with Hank Parker Jr., who now leads the marketing, sales, and programming teams at Snowbird Wilderness Outfitters. Hank was formerly a NASCAR driver and then founded Fireband Media, a production company that produced short films and outdoor television programming. 

Hank walks through his life’s story and how he started racing, moved to television, and eventually arrived at Snowbird. The Lord’s hand has been evident in his life.

Click here to listen to Hank Parker Jr.’s testimony at the Be Strong men’s conference.

Transcript – Part 1 – From NASCAR Driver to Snowbird Director, Hank Parker Jr.

It’s another Monday and it is time for another episode of no sanity required. Sorry, we’re getting these out a little bit late. Did that last week too. Just trying to get this season rolling.

And.

Life is crazy. Life is crazy. I don’t podcast for a living, so I don’t get paid to podcast and podcasting doesn’t pay the bills, but We are committed to it and it is a priority and the feedback that y’all give us reminds me every week how worth it it is. So it’s not always the priority to get things done in a timely manner on Monday mornings but I do want to start getting this thing out earlier so it’s not lunchtime on Monday when you get it. But here it is, we got you. No sanity required. And before we get into the the episode, I just wanted to kind of let you know that today and today and next week in at least these two episodes, we’ll be sitting down with Hank Parker Jr. Hank Parker Jr. Is one of my executive partners at Snowbird, but he has only been in that position for a little over a year. Well, COVID made everything so weird. I guess technically it’d be going on two years, but he’s been with us two years, but he’s lived here right out of year. Because of the craziness of COVID he was unable to make the move when we had planned on him making that move, which was the early part of 2020, gosh, 20, 20 or 21, I don’t remember anyway.

But he’s been on the board of directors for quite some time. We are as, as, Maybe some of you understand or know, I don’t know if I’ve ever talked about this at length, but we have a Snowbird is a 501c3 nonprofit corporation. That just means we have to have a governing board of directors in place. It’s funny, the other day I was, who was I with? It was a kid, local kid, who said, Maybe it’s one of my kids, one of my young kids talking about at school, somebody saying that, that they know that me and little are rich because we own Snowbird. Oh, yeah. This is like years ago. I remember this kid telling me he was dating the guy who at the time, this is, this is 20, probably 20, over 20 years ago. It was more than it was late nineties. And in this, this little guy, He had developed a crush on the then mayor of Andrews daughter. And now mayor of Andrews is not a full time job. I think it pays maybe a couple hundred bucks a week, you know, less than thousand dollars a month, I would imagine.

I don’t know, but I just know it’s a small town, small market. So it’s a true public servant, community service type job. Like the mayor we have now is awesome. You know, puts in a lot of time on his own, on his own dime. And that’s what it takes to be a mayor of a small town. But I remember this. I remember this kid saying, I’m dating. I’m gonna date the mayor’s daughter. Man, she’s rich. Her daddy’s a mayor. And I’m thinking, what a funny perception. So I do not own Snowbird Wilderness Outfitters, but we are governed by board of directors, and I am. On that board of directors and so is Hank Parker Jr. And has been for for quite a while. So currently three of the board of directors members are full-time employees and sit on the executive team at Snowbird. It’s myself, it’s me, yours truly, Matt Jones, AKA Mugs, and Hank Parker Jr. And Hank has a phenomenal story and testimony and I’m excited to bring it to you. He’ll be speaking in a future event at Snowbird Men’s Conference in the next, I forget which one it is. There’s not the one coming up this weekend, but it’s coming in the next year or so.

But anyway, excited for you to hear from Hank’s stories. Unbelievable. Hank’s a former professional race car driver, drove in the Busch Series, in the NASCAR Cup Series, and in the truck series. It used to be the Busch Series, the Winston Cup Series, and the Craftsman Truck Series. All that changed. Now what they call it all, but high level competitor comes from a, from a family of competitors. But, man, Hank loves the Lord. Man, he loves the Lord. He loves the Lord so much. And he, and he loves Snowbird. And he’s faithful, this ministry. And Hank is, Hank is a gift to Snowbird. I, I want to, I want to, as you listen over these next couple of weeks, be encouraged to know that God is sending people like Hank Parker Jr. To be a part of what’s going on here. Uprooted his family, five kids. He and his wife, Wendy, moved here with their oldest daughter, Alex, only having one year of high school left. I mean, it’s a big move of faith. And his kids are an amazing, he’s got an amazing family, an amazing group of young people. His second daughter, his second born and second daughter, Madison, is, Maddie is real good friends with My, my middle daughter, Laylee, they play ball together.

And our families are close. He built a house right across the road from me. Always give him a hard time. He took away my shooting range. I used to shoot on the property he bought. So that was where I’d sit in my hunting rifles. Can’t do that now. So, but it was worth it. Good trade, good friend, thankful for this brother, one of my, my close, close friends in the world and, Man, the team that God has assembled here is pretty unique and pretty special and Hank’s a big part of that. So hope you enjoy these next couple of episodes. Thank you for tuning in and listening to no Sanity Required.

Welcome to no Sanity Required from the.

Ministry of Snowbird Wilderness Outfitters, a podcast about the Bible, culture and stories from around the globe. So being on the no sanity required podcast, how do you feel like it’s going to compare to being on Dale Earnhardt Jr. ‘s podcast?

Two crazy hosts. Who knows? Or something. You know, you’re always opening yourself up when you come into an opportunity to be asked questions.

Oh, yeah.

Yeah. But you, both of you guys know a lot about me, so who knows where to go? Yeah.

Man, that’s crazy watching that watching, you know, we’re sitting around one night sitting around a fire me and some of the guys from here and I just pulled up some clips from that that’s a crazy ministry opportunity cuz that’s I’m sure he’s got a massive you have me idea of like the following I mean it’s got to be huge.

It’s so big. I don’t and you know, it’s always growing and changing. I can’t believe how many people have come to me and talked about you figuring me on that. I mean, it’s like there’s a resurgence of, oh yeah, I forgot you raised. And then they heard that podcast and it’s really cool. He’s got a huge, massive following and it’s unbelievable. A lot of guys step out of sight out of mind, you step out of the spotlight and kind of just drift off. But, man, he’s, I mean, obviously he’s still in the spotlight being on TV and all the things that he does. But I mean his popularity is continuing.

To grow that’s great when he was Like when he was at the height of his cup career I mean, wasn’t he like he was getting that like the whatever it is like the people’s driver award whatever that’s called fast popular driver you get every year wouldn’t he?

Oh, yeah every year every year and it was funny it was For years and years and years Bill Elliott got it And then Dale Jr. He took over that spot. I mean, I think he got it every year. And rightfully so, you know, a lot of people didn’t know how to take him, especially at first. But you got to think about, there’s two different kinds of people in the world. You know, you’ve got the guys like Mike Tyson who grew up in the slums and had to work and became successful. And that’s a very unique, special person. But then you got a guy like Dale Jr. who grew up, who had opportunity, who had financial support, but that’s a different kind of pressure. Yeah, he stood underneath that. A lot of people would have had a hard time or most people would have, I think, would have had a hard time in his position. And some people want to be like, oh, he should be successful. Look at what his dad’s done. But man, on the flip side of that, look how easy it would have been to not meet expectations to have been a failure.

Just crush people.

Yeah.

I mean, just. That’s the kind of thing that would crush somebody. I mean, it’s hard enough here about. We were talking about this before we went live, but, like, a kid, like, a kid goes through high school, is really good in the classroom or excels on the athletic field, and then they have a brother, sister, a sibling that comes through that doesn’t, that can’t live up to that hype and that kid struggle. I don’t know how many times we’ve dealt with families and, like, Ministry situations where they got a wayward younger kid and you drill into it and you realize, well, there’s these expectations because of what the older sibling or siblings did or because of what mom or dad did. And, man, I don’t crush you.

Yeah.

People expect you to. And then, like with, with Dale Earnhardt Jr. When his dad got killed, I think it probably intensified that pressure because now you had this rabid fan base of Dale Sr. that already loved Dale Jr. I was one of those people. Like when he started winning in Busch, I was so excited, you know? And he drove a blue car. Was it AC Delco?

It was, yeah.

I mean, I haven’t been a NASCAR fan since back then, but I was so excited because I was an Earnhardt fan. And then when his dad died, I think everybody thought, okay, the Legacy Junior’s gonna. And I. It ratcheted up, man.

Yeah. Yeah. Just to handle that pressure, I. You know, that was obviously a crazy, just week following Dellenbach’s death. And just the way Dale Jr. Handled that, he handled it with such maturity. And, you know, he’s my buddy, and I love him, and I can’t. I can’t say enough good things about him, but the. The truth is. He was kind of an immature guy in some ways. You know, he wore his hat backwards all the time. He was a little bit the rebel and just kind of crazy. Just acted like a kid in a lot of ways. But talking about stepping up to the plate, I mean, I couldn’t. That might be hard. I mean, he went back the next time at that racetrack and won the race.

I know.

This is amazing, man.

That’s a sports moment in history that I think Only NASCAR fans know, but that’s as big of a sports moment as anything you’ve ever read. I mean, to go back to that race and win it. Yeah. Go back to that track and win it.

Yeah.

Man, that’s crazy.

Yeah. It kind of gives me chills to think about it. But yeah, he stepped up, he grew a lot, and he’s a different dude as a result of All the things he’s been through and he’s a, I mean, he’s a good guy, man. He’s had to fight some battles and he stepped up and I mean, nobody’s perfect, but he is a good dude. Yeah.

For those of you that listen and don’t know racing, we’re talking about Dale Earnhardt and Dale Earnhardt Jr. So Hank’s dad, we’ll get into this, but Hank’s dad and Dale Earnhardt were good friends and so Hank and Dale Jr. grew up as pretty good buddies. Race together. We’ll tell some of those stories. Get into that. But so speaking of growing up, talk a little bit about your dad’s accomplishments, because one thing that I’ve appreciated in our 12 years of friendship now, which is hard. It’s hard to believe. Me and you’ve been. Yeah. Good friends for 12 years, but I don’t know. I would like to have one dollar for every time somebody has said something to you about your dad.

Me too.

And you have had to have heard it a thousand times more than me. I mean, your dad last night was sitting around the fire and a good friend who loves and appreciates you for who you are. But he’s like, we were hanging out with Duncan and Duncan’s like, oh yeah, man, me and my dad, my dad was crazy about Hank Parker’s fishing show and start talking about it. And like those conversations are enjoyable. But then the people that you don’t know and have that rapport with that’ll just go, oh, your dad. I used to watch the show all the time. I’ve had, I don’t know how many times I’ve heard people come up and say that to you. So talk a little bit about who a lot of people aren’t bass fishing fans, but that’s a big cult following world.

Yes, it is massive. It’s it and it seems to be growing right now. I mean, one thing that’s different, my son who’s a sophomore in high school, they’ve got a bass fishing class and they’re looking to start a bass fishing team, which is really becoming a big thing nationwide. So a bit of a history. My dad is from a small town in North Carolina, made in North Carolina, and he had a dream to be a professional bass fisherman. And so in the late 70s, he started chasing his dream and he became pretty successful. He was a guy that didn’t have a whole lot in his family, one of those guys who had to fight from really nothing to, to, to be somebody. And he had a, just a, I mean, he’s a, he’s a bulldog, and he doesn’t quit. He’s, he’s not a quitter.

And he’s crazy.

He’s crazy. And it, that’s, that’s a positive and a negative.

And he thinks I’m crazy.

Yeah.

Yeah.

He thinks you’re crazy, but he, he fought. And, and just through determination, he’s a, he’s one of those guys. He’s a pretty determined guy. And, and, and he, he became. He won the Bassmasters Classic in 1979.

Okay, let me explain for our listeners. That is literally like winning Wimbledon in tennis, the Masters in golf, the Super Bowl in football, the Daytona 500 in racing. I mean, to win the Bassmasters is you are considered the most successful best bass fisherman in the world. And for people that think of fishing as, oh, this is what my daddy does on Saturdays, like This is a huge tournament industry.

That’s right.

We were talking millions of dollars of industry just within the tournament scene. And it’s a multi-billion dollar industry in terms of, I mean, it’s a winning the Bassmaster Classic is the pinnacle of that sport.

Even to qualify. So you could, not anybody could just sign up and be in the Bassmaster Classic. So you had to fish the tournament trail and you had to place, I think was, I don’t remember, It might have been the top 50, might have been the top 75 to even be eligible to fish in that. So even just making the classic is a really big deal. And then to win it several times, he went on to win just a whole lot of tournaments. I mean, in his career, he was the first guy to win all the major tournaments in one year. And to be that successful.

And again, I think I think golf or tennis are the two professional sports that you compare it to because of there you’re the only dude out there on the course or the or the court when you’re bass fishing, you’re the guy.

That’s it.

You get in your boat and you got to figure it out. And so when when he’s doing like when you so explain a little more from I mean, even I’m curious of this because I grew up watching this stuff, but I didn’t I never understood how the tournaments work. So like to qualify There may be on a given weekend, there may be multiple tournaments all over the southeast that you could go and if you place high enough that gets you like qualifying points.

Right. And so it was, it’s changed over the years, but there was, there was a, there was a couple of ways to get in. So you could be a small time guy fishing in, and I think they would bring in maybe one small time guy who was fishing local tournaments. There was a, I can’t remember exactly how they had to do it, but there was a lot you had to be, you had to be the guy. And it was, when I say small time, it’s not, I’m not talking like your Monday night fishing tournament at your local lake. I’m talking like regional BASS affiliated tournaments. So that’s still kind of not completely small time. So you had to do that. And then you had to finish at a certain, you had to rank almost like in NASCAR, the point system inside the Bassmaster Majors. You had to be inside that top 50 to be able to be eligible to fish in the classic.

And then the classic is a single tournament.

It’s a single tournament, three days.

And they pick a lake.

And they pick a lake.

It’s not always on the same lake. No. Okay. It could be in Texas. It could be in Georgia, Florida. Probably typically in the southeast or maybe Missouri.

Texas, I mean, they’ve been all over the place. So my dad in 1989 won the classic at the James River in Virginia.

It was on the river, which the James River, by the way, is there’s places where it’s, yeah, it’s like lake fishing. Right in a lot of ways, but a lot more strategic Because of the tide because of the way that’s right because of the way the current the water the tide the terrain under the water and so and it’s a three-day tournament. Yeah How long did he go there and practice? So he go in there you said you’re telling me he goes and practice fishes for days leading up to it.

That’s right and so in the classic You know, rules change. We’re talking, you know, late 80s when I was a kid hanging out with my dad going, you were only allowed to to pre fish for the classic, I think it was 10 days or 14 days, whatever it was. And it was within a certain window. You could only fish those days. And so he would fish them every single day. Daylight.

Get up at four in the morning.

Yes, sir.

Go get on that lake or that body of water and fish till dark.

Every day he was allowed and he’s trying to learn.

Every nook and cranny of that lake.

That’s right. And he just has, you know, I mean, he’s, God gifted him with a natural ability, but he’s also one of those guys who’s worked really hard at it. But I can remember being a little kid and, you know, old school paper maps. I mean, the depth finders were paper that had a needle with ink on it that would show you, save those rolls of paper and study them. He would look at a map. Be at a lake he’s never been to look at the map and say, I think we need to be here, here and here and here’s why. And we go there.

Catch fish.

Catch fish.

A fish finder is, modern fish finders are crazy. Think of looking at your iPhone or your smartphone and having a screen that shows you an underwater radar, a sonar that fish are pinging and you can see, okay, at 20 feet down.

That’s right.

There’s fish right now and they’re feeding and so you fish that. So you’re saying early days, It was like paper scrolling a needle like when you read it like an EKG or something.

Exactly. And that’s about what it looked like in EKG. And you just kind of look what you were more looking for was the structure of the bottom and the shape of the bottom. And then obviously you could see if there were fish. But what would fish relate to? What would they be connected to? And then you build your strategy based on that. That is crazy.

That’s crazy.

Crazy.

And he would look. So when he would look at a map and then go and go be successful, it was a map of the lake. Or it was that fish read that readout.

He would, he would first look at the map of the lake and then have a topographical map and say, okay, I think the current’s going to be here. I think this is going to have a shelf. And then we go out and look on the depth finder and just say, okay, here’s where I think we need to be.

And, and catch fish. And you would. Did he have, like, And it would be, you go in there and be like, okay, based on this shelf and this depth, we’re going to use plastic worms, this color, we’re going to work off the bottom. Now we’re going to use a crankbait. We’re going to just try different things. And he would, but he would be that uncanny ability that God gave him. He would almost supernaturally know what baits more than average guy is going to know. He just know he would know what baits to use.

Yeah, I think a good example would be, I’ve tried to fish one tournament when When not like a big tournament, but a kind of a medium sized tournament, not not your Monday night tournament, like I said earlier, but not a top level. I was just a kid and we were fishing a team tournament and I was fishing with a friend of his. We were in Gunnersville, Alabama. I was just there because my dad was there and he’s like, you need to fish this tournament. Be fun. And so I did it with a with a friend of his, Bruce Cunningham, and we we were fishing on this lake. And my dad took me the day before and he showed me, okay, We’re in 20 feet of water, right here is 17 feet of water. This is where the boat needs to be lined up. There’s an underwater grass bed. This is how you fish it. And so we caught a couple of fish and he’s like, I don’t want to wear it out. This is how you need to set up. So the next day we came and fished the tournament. We caught like two fish.

We couldn’t catch them. And I told my dad the fish moved and they just weren’t there anymore. And I argued with him because I was like 13 years old. I got it figured out, right? So he had heard enough. I argued enough that he’s like, okay, we’re gonna go back tomorrow. We’re gonna start at the same time of the fishing tournament. We’re gonna stop. We’re gonna weigh our fish, and we’re gonna see where you would finish if you had done it right. Okay. But I’m telling you, dad, there’s no fish there. So we went back and we fished and we smoked them. We would have won the tournament by, like, three pounds. Oh, and it wasn’t so much the bait. And this is what he was always really big on. It wasn’t so much the bait. It was the having the boat properly lined up on the hole so that you’re presenting whatever bait you have in the right way so that the fish would respond to it.

Oh my goodness.

And I was like, all right, I haven’t argued with my dad about fishing since.

I mean, it makes sense. Like it makes sense that, I remember one time watching this video where a guy was, he was a, he was a field goal kicker on an NFL team. I remember the guy’s name. He’s like one of the best field goal kickers in the NFL. Well, You know, field goal kickers, when people think of NFL athletes, they don’t think of kickers. If anything, probably make jokes about them. You remember them for either hitting a game winner or missing the game winner. They’re heroes or zeros, but you don’t remember the mundane day to day. I remember watching this video of this guy kicking and he’s like doing crazy stuff by himself. He’s out on his field and they’re filming him. He would take the ball, spin it like a top, and then kick it off the outside of his foot and make it do like a banana thing and go through the uprights. And then he’d kick it from this side of the field. He’s just doing all this crazy stuff. He’s kicking it from like the goal line and making it do like a banana curl and go through the post.

That’s cool.

And then they’re interviewing him and I just realized this guy, at this level, you don’t realize how elite a person like that is. He just blends into that crowd he’s around. What you’re, what you’re describing your dad is as elite in that field as anybody’s ever been. I mean, I mean, how many people that listen to the podcast like to fish, but don’t think about boat. I don’t think about boat position. I’ve never thought about that at time. I think, okay, I need to be, I want to be so far off the bank and cast towards the bank this way. That’s about as complex as it got.

Yeah.

But that’s next level. Yeah.

And we were fishing out in the middle of the lake, so. There was like, you’re just out in.

The very middle, in the middle of the lake.

He found this hump with a, with grass on it, and he does that kind of stuff and, and goes out.

There and catch a bunch of fish.

Yeah, it’s, it’s, it’s, it’s, you know, like you say, there, there are things that, that you do that people don’t realize that he would spend hours. People would make fun of him. He said when he was a kid, because he would stand in his front yard and practice casting, like, you’re not going to catch a fish in the. Yard, you know, your grass. But he’s a very determined guy who was determined to build the fundamentals and the basics to be the best at that. Everything. He always told me, he’s like, 99 is never good if a hundred’s achievable. And so he’s going to give a hundred percent every single time, no matter what. Even if everybody else is giving up hope and packed up and go home for the weekend, he’s, he’s not going to give up.

You’re wired that way. And I think I think your boys are gonna be wired that way.

I hope so. I you know, I’ve got to he modeled that well for me.

I’ve got a pond. Hank lives across the road for me and I’ve got a pond. Can you call that pond?

That’s the lake house man. Yeah.

Got a little lake down there. Awesome. Little house down there. I call it the lake house. It’s a pond about half the size about a quarter of the size of a basketball court. Maybe a quarter not even it’s tiny. And I’ve got a few trout swimming around in there. Thanks, boys. And y’all fish all the time. Y’all take the bass boat, drop it in Anna Haley Lake, drop it in Fontana, Hiwassee, Notley, go catch fish. And them boys, they get off school bus or get home from school and they go out there and fish in that pond for hours on. And I’ve told them I can’t keep. There’s only, there’s 10 fish left in it. I had stocked it just for them. I stocked it for the boys.

Yeah.

And let them catch all they wanted. They caught fish all summer, didn’t they? I mean, they’re just and killing them because half time they wouldn’t get eight. I don’t know where they’d end up. They couldn’t throw them back because they trout. Howard Brown says trout wake up in the morning figuring out how to die.

Yeah.

And so there’s a, I think I counted 10 fish in there the other day when we were feeding them. And I said, all right, boys, you can’t keep no more fish. I’ll catch them as long as you don’t kill them. So don’t fish. You can only fish big artificial bait. Yeah. Because they can’t swallow the hook.

That’s right.

You throw a you throw a small hook out there and they swallow it and they’re dead. Well, they’ve been down there wearing it out.

Just yeah.

And I went down the other day and they’re not casting in the pond. I remember Boone or Cade. One of them’s throwing the bait out down the yard. Just practicing throwing the bait, you know, it’s some new lure he’d gotten. But yeah, I think it’s I think it’s in the blood.

My dad. He didn’t it’s funny he didn’t really tell me this story. Someone else told me this story and I asked him to clarify about or I wanted to hear his side of it when I was a kid. They were fishing somewhere up north in the Great Lakes and you know that’s basically like being in the ocean.

Yeah.

And you had to use a compass. This is what before GPS you had to use a compass. It’s pretty treacherous. You had to be careful and you’re gonna back then you know a good bass boat now is 22 foot long back then. And they had 150 mercury on a 17, 18 foot bass boat. And beat you to death. Beat you to death. And they were fishing there and my dad was about, I think my dad said he was somewhere in the latter part of the 30th place and it only paid to like 35th. So he’s like 39th or something like that. And they only paid 35 spots. And on the last day of the tournament.

And there’s probably 50 people.

There’s probably 150.

Okay. 150 guys.

The last day, a big storm came up and they were going around telling people, don’t, don’t try to make it back to the way in. Just don’t, don’t weigh in. But the way in was still open. And those guys were, everybody was just saying, I’m gonna wait the storm out, stay here, I’ll miss the way in.

And but some guys had already gone and weighed in.

Well, yeah, some of that fished really close by, but my dad was halfway across the huge lake, and they’ve got eight foot Seas and it’s thundering and lightning and raining. And so my dad sits down on the boat and gets a rag out and puts it in his mouth. And he, back then you had a partner. And the guy that was his partner said, what are you doing with that rag? He said, I don’t want to lose my teeth when I go across the lake. And I was like, okay. So my dad drove back across the lake wide open, wide open, tore the trolling motor, lost most of his fishing rods. The depth finders broke off from the waves. And he made.

He said, to make way in.

Yeah, he said, I made. I came in 30 second and I got paid.

That is awesome.

I appreciate that.

So he told you he verified the story?

Yeah. And that’s just how he lives his life. And then. And that. That was a good life lesson for me.

Yeah, buddy. Hey, if that doesn’t, like, resonate with, like, every dude, you know, that’s right.

That’s cool, man. Whatever it takes.

So you can remember the 89 Bassmaster classic.

Yeah, in 1989 when he did the pre fishing the practice it was like a month before the tournament I spent every day with him. I remember I had strep throat and I’d get up and we’d go fish and and he didn’t have a whole lot going on. I mean he he had a strategy going into it, but it wasn’t a wasn’t like he Like I got this in the bag matter of fact, I think he he came from the furthest back of anyone in a Bassmasters classic and on the last day and one. So he had to work at it and it was pretty cool. It was a moment that I got to have a part in it because I spent all that time practicing with him and helping him build his baits and getting everything ready. It was really cool. And so for him, what’s cool, that was 1989. He had already started his fishing show in 1984. And I think it was 84, but in 89 he retired right after he won the Classy.

Went out on top.

Went out on top.

More guys should do that. And it’s different sports and things.

He had a family at home. He had five kids and he could see where it was going. He was always on the road and he wanted to spend more time with his family.

And when he retired then he put more just into doing the show.

That’s right.

I mean, I’m like everybody else. I watched him. You know, I can remember in middle school and high school watching him. So if he started a show in ’84, I probably started watching it in ’85 as a middle schooler. Yeah. That’s pretty cool to think about. I would go emulate him on, I lived, I could walk to Biltmore Lake when I was in middle school and high school. I’d crappie fish it once that was on, you know, you know how crappy they are. You catch you catch way more than you’re supposed to on a naked hook if you want to. I thought I was Hank Parker, man, and nobody told me that crap would become the dumbest fish on the planet for about four days, you know?

So then.

We start off talking about Dellenhardt Jr. And growing up in the shadow of Dale Sr. So, man, you’re coming up. What do you, what’s it, I mean, what do you, as a teenager, what do you do when you’ve got a daddy that’s that accomplished, that celebrity in his world? Because again, I can’t, I can’t state this enough for people that don’t follow bass fishing. It’s like having Dale Earnhardt or Michael Jordan or Tom Brady as a dad. In that world, he was the Tom Brady. He was the Michael Jordan. And so is it, at what point, and you may have never thought this question the way that I’m going to word it, and we didn’t, by the way, we didn’t plan this conversation. We just sat down, hit record and started talking for those of you that are listening. But at what point does it go from, this is my dad, he’s my hero, he’s awesome to, okay, what am I going to do as a man now? What tracks am I going to make in the world? ’cause every kid has got to figure that out. What do you do when your dad’s that driven?

Was it? Yeah. Did you want to be a bass fisherman at one point?

I’m sure you did. I did. I love to fish. I’ve always, I still love to fish, but I’ve always liked hunting a little bit more. And my dad and I, the way we hung out with the way we spent most of our time together was hunting. We did fish a lot. But we spent more time duck hunting, deer hunting, turkey hunting. That we loved it. And so like you say, I grew up with my dad, my hero. Obviously, if we went to hunting camp, everybody wanted to talk to my dad. And my dad’s wired a lot like you. He’s going to be the last person at the campfire every single night talking to every single person. And that’s the way he’s wired. And so everybody wanted to hang out and talk about fishing and hunting and, you know, just wanted to hang out with my dad. And so, you know, as I got to be a teenager, you see that in most of all of my other buddies, their dad went, got up in the morning and put on a coat and tie and drove at eight o’clock in the morning to a building and went to work.

My dad didn’t do that. And so I was probably, and, you know, you, you, you adjust to the environment that you’re raised in. You like my world was fishing and hunting. I didn’t really it was, you know, there was a moment when I realized, like in school when they had career career day and they were asking what your parents did, teachers didn’t know what to do. And I said, my dad fishes. And they’re like, okay, okay, wait a minute.

We we don’t live on the ocean.

Yeah. And for me, it was confused just as confusing when other people say, my dad does this or does that. I was like, what does that mean?

My dad is in sales.

Yeah, what does that mean? So I remember trying to figure that out and then starting to think. And I think more for me than trying to figure out what I was going to do in my life. And just kind of based on, I’m sure everybody’s experience is different. I like the idea of the fact that my dad made a name for himself and that people liked him and people respected him. And so I wanted to be that and I love to hunt and fish. I certainly wanted to do that. Hunting fish, whether that was a hobby or professional or whatever, I just wanted to whatever. I wanted to do it. But more important to me, I think, was I want to be that guy that everybody wants to talk to and they respect him. Like people respect my dad and I wanted that kind of respect. And I’m sure most young guys Or most men now can can remember back to that point in their life where hey, I want to be respected for what I do and so for me, I wanted, you know, I didn’t have I couldn’t have that story like I I didn’t grow up in a tough family environment that didn’t have my mom was pretty wealthy or independently had her own money and then my dad was super successful and My parents loved me.

They cared for me. They came to my events or whatever it is. So they were there. I grew up in a great family with means. So I don’t have that rags to riches or from nothing to successful story. I couldn’t do that. So I was trying to figure out what do I do to have respect from another dude? Like when they hear my name or I meet them, they have that kind of respect that they do for my dad. So that that’s more where I landed. Then how, what, how, what I’m going to do to get there.

Yeah. And so that turned into racing. Yeah.

And so I was on a hunting trip with my dad, and my dad has a farm in South Carolina where he now lives in Union, South Carolina. And Dellarin Hart came down and was hunting with us, and he brought Dale.

Jr. And what age are you at this point?

15. Okay. Somewhere in that range. And we started, he was just, he was kind of funny, he was kind of crazy, a little bit like my younger brother Ben.

And.

We just kind of hit it off and we got to be friends. And you know at this point in my life I’m thinking, hey I’m gonna follow my dad’s footsteps, I’ll be a fisherman, I’ll do something in that world. You know just a side note, I don’t think people really, obviously I’m 47 now and I can look back But when you have a dream to go do something, so many people will have a dream to be like play football or be a fisherman or be a race car driver. You can kind of get sucked into the side options of what that looks like and where your whole life becomes about whatever that thing is, whether it’s that sport or whatever, and you’re doing something that you really didn’t want to do, but you’re still connected to that sport. And for some people, that’s where they, they, they, they are happy with where they end up. In other words, people compromise.

So, like somebody that wants to be a, a basketball player, but they don’t end up being good enough, but they could be the manager, right? The equipment manager. So they’re close. You know, Tuck was telling me that at Virginia Tech, the two guys, I was asking about the two guys on the sideline that hold up the cards that play call. I was like, those guys look young. They look students. And he said, yeah, they’re guys that were real good high school football players, but not good enough to play at the next level, but they want to be involved in sport. So this afford them that opportunity. That’s what you’re saying. Yeah, that’s exactly what it takes to stay in that.

Whatever it takes to stay in that. And you better have a passion for what you’re doing. And you know, obviously there’s a lot of people that are called to that. And I can come back to that as the conversation develops. But my point right now is that I could see I wanted to be a professional fisherman. But I didn’t want to sell debt finders for a living. Does that make sense?

Yes.

Like I like fishing enough, I’ll go get me a job selling shoes and fish on the weekend, or what have you. So I liked to fish and I just assumed maybe that’s what I do because of what my dad did. Well then I hang out with Dale Jr. And racing, we grew up in the capital of NASCAR, the Mooresville, North Carolina area. I’m from Denver, which is just down the road.

Denver, North Carolina, the true Denver, the real Denver. Yeah.

Yeah, I always tell people, Denver NC, not Colorado, is what the NC stands for, not North Carolina. But we, so, I mean, I knew about racing. We watched it on TV, but I’d never really been to a race. And so I got really interested in it. And so I went to a couple of races with him. Funny enough, a kid moved into town, moved into you know, our, our area neighborhood. His dad was a professional race car driver who had just gotten out of prison. And I actually went to my first late model race with him and his dad and just got out of prison. He just got out of prison. His name’s Gary Balou. Phenomenal short track racer. And he won the race. And I got to seeing all this stuff racing. I could make these connections to fishing. Hard work, dedication, innovation, don’t give up, work all night long, put more work in and outwork everybody else and you can be successful. And I started seeing that stuff and I was like, wow, this is pretty neat. And what kid at 15-16 years old doesn’t like hot rod cars, you know? So I started hanging out with Dale Jr.

Mostly with his legends racing and he had a street stock car. We’re in his shop one day and his dad comes in. I mean, he was just an intimidating guy, you know, and I look back.

And I was the nickname fit.

Yeah, it fit.

And I’m the intimidator.

I look back and I’m thinking, ah, you know, he’s just normal. I mean, he wasn’t in my mind then. I mean, this dude’s six foot five and he’s ripped and, you know, all these things, but he really just a normal dude who.

You said he’s like 5’10, 170 pounds.

Yeah, he might have been six foot tall. But he’s just a normal dude who was a winner and that was intimidating. And he came to me and Dale Jr. Standing there and you never knew if you were in trouble or not, just the way he had his presence, some of that dad presence. And he came over and he’s like, Hey, Dale Jr. Tells me you want to race, why don’t you buy his race car? And I’m like, that’s an awesome idea, but I don’t have any money.

You’re a teenager.

Yeah, what do I do with that? Man, my dad got excited about it and he got behind it 100%. So he bought me this old 1974 Malibu.

That ain’t late model.

No, this is like Thunder and Lightning street stock. This is one step above demolition derby.

Okay, one step above demolition derby, dirt track racing.

So I went out there and raced that weekend. My dad went and bought him a car. The next week.

So you went out? Yeah. So you went and how old were you?

16.

And went and ran a race that weekend.

Yeah. No practice, no nothing. It’s like a different world. And how’d you do?

Did you even finish?

I mean, I did really good. That was crazy. So I finished like in the top five. Whoa. You know, one of those things where I was just dumb enough not to know better. Yeah. So my dad’s like that. It’s awesome.

He went and bought himself.

We bought him one. He loves to go fast in a bass boat. Why don’t it work here? So what was the race?

What racetrack?

Concord Speedway.

All right.

That’s where Dale Jr. And Kerry, Dale Jr’s brother and Kelly, his sister, all three of them raced there.

Okay.

And they had two matching cars and I bought one of those cars. And so they were kind of moving on trying to do some other stuff like late model racing.

Which would be the next progression.

Yeah, it’s kind of like two steps up really.

Okay.

And so my dad came up there and I realized real quick, you know, people think that race car drivers don’t have any fear, but that’s not true. If you don’t have some type of limit, you’re gonna die quick. Yeah, yeah, you know, you’ll crash out. My dad don’t have that fear button, so he didn’t know. So my dad’s like wiping out. He’s kind of, he’s pretty good. But he’s crazy. And so I was like, oh my goodness. So my dad really got into it, you know, and my dad ended up buying a bush team and Neil Bonnet’s son, David Bonnet, drove for him. And, you know, Jake Elder was the crew chief and he’s the guy that was the crew chief that they built the storyline off of in Days of Thunder.

Really? Just a crazy– Robert Duvall’s character.

Yes. So Jake couldn’t read or write, but he was just an extremely intelligent man, just in his own way. And it was just different. And the sport was evolving and changing and growing. But it was really, really cool to see how my dad really got into this racing. My dad wanted to try it some himself, but he started this team and he started racing, which only paved the way for the opportunity for me. So first race I go out there I finished like fourth or fifth as.

A 16 year old kid.

Yeah lights start going off in my head. You want to be respected? Go fast Do something dangerous and be good at it. People are gonna like it, but I think that that was in the back of my head But what was really on the fourth front of my thoughts was hey, this is awesome. I can do this. I can win at this you know, maybe some false expectations really but or premature, but I just liked it. And I liked the work and I liked the drive. I liked the things that it took to be successful. So I ended up starting racing that car. I flipped it and destroyed it in a race, like my fifth or sixth race. And we bought an old Camaro out of an old lady’s front yard, put a roll cage in it, put that engine out of that Malibu into that car. And the next weekend took that thing. Still had this stock paint job on. I just put a number on the door. It’s a big old sticker with my number. That’s it. And I won the race. That was it for me. I’m done.

You’re hooked.

I’m doing this. Let’s go.

Well, what was your number then?

Oh.

You had Dale’s kind of a progression of Dale’s number. That’s awesome.

Because that was Dale Jr’s number. And I bought the car. I wasn’t gonna buy new stickers.

Oh, okay.

Yeah. So I just stuck with that number.

Yeah.

And, and my dad was double zero. So from there we started, we started advancing, just moving up the ranks. So I, I won several of those races and the street stock races.

Okay. And that was what, that was street stock.

Yeah. Tell me 93, 94.

93, 94. You’re on the street stock. And what is the progression? You got like street stock, then what would be the next progression up most.

You know, every track on And it’s changed over the years, but it would be different at different tracks. But most of the time you had like your four cylinder class, then you had street stocks. I started in street stocks. I never raced any of the four cylinders. Then you would have like a modified version of a street stock and they would have different names for them. But you could do more stuff to the car. You could put different springs and be able to adjust the car more. And then from there, there might be another step between there. But then you had late model stock. And then after late model stock, you had super late model. And most tracks didn’t have super late model. Most tracks, their premier division was the late model stock. You had a two barrel carburetor, you know, a pretty standard body and chassis. That way, everybody was on a pretty level playing field. Now, in the super late models, I raced at Concord Speedway, super late models where you could run any carburetor you want. With aluminum heads and you weighed you had, you pretty much could do about whatever you wanted with the chassis.

And so you could get a mechanical Advantage, right? You combine that with a good driver and you, you, you’re going to win races.

They didn’t have a whole lot of rules. There were some rules, but it was more like what you see on dirt, like super late models on dirt, pretty much like Outlaw cars. You know, they, they had. You couldn’t have wings on them, but you could do all this crazy stuff. But so I went straight from street stock to late model stock. Dale Jr. And, and, and a lot of my buddies stayed in the true late model stock cars. And that’s what they raced. You could race those at Myrtle Beach and Hickory. You could take that same car and race multiple tracks. And so I raced at Concord for a year in that late model stock, and then I just moved right up to super late models. And the reason for that was there was a lot of guys in there who had had a career and were wanting to be racers but kind of past that age to really make it. But these guys were very successful and these guys were very competitive. And so you weren’t just showing up racing against 10, 18-year-old kids and maybe one 30-year-old. Racing against guys and veteran drivers.

They travel and race a lot up north. So you had these super late models more up north than we really did. It was in our region. You had them in Florida, kind of a small band in our region, and then up north. So you had guys like Matt Kenseth and all that stuff, racing them up at Slinger Speedway up in Wisconsin. And then you had guys like Pete Orr and, and, and guys like that down in Florida racing them. And then a small band in North Carolina where we would have big races. And these races were typically, you know, your late model stock race every Saturday night would be 30 laps and that was it.

A shootout.

Just a shootout. But with these super late models, every month we’d have a 200 lapper. Oh. Or a 400 lapper.

So you’re getting into long races.

Long races, big time competition. And my dad felt like, And I felt like at the time and it was right, I think was to let’s just jump right into the big dogs and mix it up because you’re a learning curve. I mean, if you’re shooting basketball on the JV team, it’s a big difference when you go from there and you play with guys in college. Yeah. Right? You up your game. So that’s what we did. We moved right into Super Late Models and for me, all that horsepower in that type of car really fit my driving style. I really liked it. I was not the kind of guy who was going to go out there and hold it wide open just to do that. I was going to be the kind of guy who could manage my tires and win races.

Okay. And so I’m– you-‘re a thinking driver. Yeah. You’re not just hit the throttle and turn left. Right. You’re thinking three steps ahead.

That’s right.

Five steps ahead. And doing it in the moment, what’s going to matter five steps ahead?

That’s right. So my very first race in a super late model, the guy I went to my first late model race with, I mentioned Gary Bilt got out of prison. I’m racing against that guy who had raced in the Cup Series, who had raced in all these different things, one of the most successful short track racers of all time. And I won my second race doing that. And so it was like, All right, so you think about it when I was in the street stock, senior in high school, I went pretty quick and light bulbs go off and I’m like, I can do this. A couple of years later, I’m in an elite late model series, win my second race. So I felt like this is proof that I can do this. So I spent some time Racing that, not a lot, about a year and a half. And then I moved from there to a traveling series called the NASCAR All Pro Series. It was a full-fledged NASCAR touring series. Every race was at a different racetrack every week. And it was those super late model type cars with a few more rules.

And you were– and are those guys or drivers then full-time with that?

Most of them were. So you had guys like Jason Keller, Jeff Purvis, Jack Sprague, you had a lot of different guys who raced in that series who went on to be very successful.

That’s a big name.

Yeah. And so I took off racing in the, it was called the Slim Jim All Pro Series. And that was, you know, people ask me if I miss racing. I probably miss that more than the rest of it.

That was your favorite segment or level? Yeah. That’s what I was going to ask you, of all these different levels, because we’ll get into, we’ll keep going here to help. I mean, you went all the way to the top, but that was your favorite.

That was my favorite. And so I think the point I’m trying to make in all of this is that my dad was very hands on in all of this. He was at every single race. He was my spotter. But he was also a guy, it wasn’t like we set out like, I’m going to be your mentor and tell you how to do this. Because he didn’t know how to race. I mean, that’s not what he did.

It’s probably better.

Yeah, but there was, like he would say, a lot of guys in the late model series would have crew chiefs. I don’t want you to have a crew chief. You and your brother figure it out. Instead of hiring and bringing in a crew chief, I had a mentor, a guy named Freddie Query. And he was a retired school teacher who had become a race car driver. And he’s, I mean, just legendary where we live. One of the greatest late model racers of all time. And he’s an extremely intense dude. I mean, very intense. And we hit it off, and he, he would teach me how to drive, fix cars, build cars. My brother, catfish, he’s two years younger than I am. He had a love and a drive for racing. He ended up becoming a driver. He drove in the bush series for Rusty Wallace, but. He was better at building cars and being a fabricator than I was. I just did what I needed to do to go out there and win races. There were certain elements I liked better than others, but he was better. He was more gifted at that than I was.

And. But freddie query came up, became my mentor to teach me not only how to just drive, but how to think and then how to. How to. To. To make my cars better. So how to set cars up, how to build cars. How to, how to do all the things that needed to be done to win races. So I wasn’t like just some kid who had a rich daddy and said, there’s the car. You show up on Saturday with your helmet, your shoes and go.

That’s right.

I was, I was, I didn’t have some, I was setting my own cars up. I was, my brother and I were hanging the bodies and doing this thing. Obviously there was people that helped and did a lot of stuff along the way, but the, the It wasn’t just handed over to me. So when I started racing in the All Pro Series, it was a big jump for me because you’re traveling, new tracks, new situations, different people, more competition. And my rookie year, I won it. I won it at Louisville, Kentucky. And that was pretty cool. I led one lap.

The last lap.

Yeah. Last. I made a pass on the back straightaway in the last lap, and it really kind of sets the stage for me in a lot of ways because.

To win that early, it turned people’s heads that are higher up. Yeah.

It gave me opportunity that that, you know, you can say, hey, yeah, I won at this local track last saturday night. And most people like, yeah, that’s, that’s nice.

That’s great.

But when you say, hey, I won in the all pro series. Oh, okay. So there might be some potential then, you know, and so I only raced two years in the All Pro Series and We they had Miami Homestead, Florida was a brand new race track and NASCAR scene. I was, I dominated that race and ended up losing because they threw a caution at the, at the end with a lap to go. I had a transmission problem. But there, a bush team saw me and asked me if I drive their car. So I kind of got my big break.

Okay.

To, to drive a, a bush car. It wasn’t a very good one, but.

You’Re, but it was an opportunity jumping in the bush. Now, that’s legitimately Pro.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Mark Martin was in the race. Jeff Gordon was in the race, you know? So it’s like, okay, so it’s a different deal for our listeners.

If, again, if you don’t know. Racing at all, even if you know racing in a modern context, it’s no longer called the Busch series. What’s it called? Infinity?

Xfinity. Xfinity.

Xfinity.

So.

Think of these levels that Hank’s been describing. You’re going up level. I guess the close thing in sports might be, again, comparing it to a more maybe well-known sport would be in baseball. You’ve got the minor leagues. You got single A ball, then double A, then triple A, then the majors. Yep. And the bush series would be right up under the, the cup series. So those guys, a lot of those guys would race both, which you did, too. So, so when you’re saying, yeah, man, I’m racing against Mark Martin, Jeff Gordon. Those guys are racing the cup series, right?

They’re, they’re doing both that same weekend.

The same week.

So, like, Dale Earnhardt would be running. The cup race on Sunday, but he also ran the Bush race on Saturday.

Saturday. And typically it would be the Bush race on Saturday, the cup race on Sunday.

That’s right.

Back then it’s called the Winston Cup race. And then it became next.

L. Yeah, it’s the cup series now.

Now it’s just a cup series because he used to base it off the sponsor. So the, the cup series, then right under that was the feeder series. So those guys are all pro drivers, top high level. They’re the best of the best.

That’s right. That’s right.

And you’re that quick, you’ve climbed into that series. A good show and at homestead gets you a ride in the Busch series.

There was 75 cars that entered for that race, but they only took 36. And I ended up qualifying 30th, so I got in. And I think I finished, I finished like 12, somewhere between 12th and 15th in that race. And so they hired me for the next year.

In that bush race. The first bush race.

That’s right. So they asked me to come be their driver for a limited amount of races. It’s like 10 races. They gave me a 10 race deal for the next year.

And at that point, you’re obviously full time. How’s that work at that level? They give you a salary or is it like commission based on where you rank and how much money you win and you get a cut? And, and, but they’re, they’re the owners, so they’re kind of controlling that. But you can make a living at it at this point.

That’s right. Yeah. Most of the time, the way it would work is you would have a base salary and then a percentage of what the car made, and that could fluctuate. Like, for me, most of my contracts had to do. If I finish, if I finish first, I would get, like, 50 of the pot. If I finish worse than 10th, it would go down. So that percentage would would greatly go down. So it would incentivize me to win. And then you would get a base salary as well. And so starting out, like when you just get your foot in the door, you don’t really have that much leverage. So for me it was just a percentage of what the car made.

And you’re just happy to be there.

Yeah, and we made it to the party. And I was helping pay for tires. So that was a huge expense.

You were helping pay for tires.

Right, right. So it was just, It was just an opportunity. So I took off the next year. We’re going to run about 10 races. We went to Daytona. We didn’t make the race at Daytona. And that’s all. I mean, that’s 99% car, 1% driver for qualifying in Daytona.

Because at that level, every driver is good enough. Yeah.

You’re just putting a brick on the gas pedal and going around the track to qualify. But I learned a lot. And, you know, I have my I’d already dabbled some in the Busch Series trying to make races in my dad’s car and was unsuccessful. It’s just it’s hard to explain the level of competition when you have that many guys, 70 plus people to show up to make a race and they’re only going to take 36. I mean, there was one time at Charlotte, there’s people. I think they had 100 cars there trying to make the race. It’s crazy.

And they’re gonna take 36. Yeah.

It was just ultra competitive.

Yeah.

So that, it was Mark 3, the number 78 Mark 3 car I was driving for. And then I got injured in Texas pretty early. So that’s like the fourth or fifth race of the season.

Just the big wreck.

Yeah. I had a big wreck in Texas where I don’t remember a whole lot of it. I just, it was in practice.

That’s when it freaked your dad out so bad.

Yeah. Yeah, because I think they, I had a head injury and I had some swelling. My brain was swelling and they airlifted me to the hospital. He had to drive himself. And I can’t imagine now, you know, with five kids myself, what that would be like, you know? So back then I didn’t think it was that big of a deal, but I kind of can see his side of it a lot more clearly now. I was so, I was airlifted, had a head injury. They did some stuff and it ended up being alright. It wasn’t that big of a deal. And NASCAR suggested, or my doctor, I should say, through NASCAR, suggested I take some time off and I didn’t. And I went back to the race. We’re gonna race Hickory. My throttle sticks and I hit the wall again. And it was, that’s a really, so I went from a, a mile and a half racetrack where you’re running 200 miles an hour to a quarter mile racetrack at Hickory Motor Speedway, where you’re running 90. I hit the wall and it knocked me out. And I was. I had another concussion, so that was two back to back.

And it was like, all right, doctors. He’s like, all right, for real. Yeah, you’re 23 years old. Let’s talk, you know? And so I took a little break. To get healed up. I was having a hard time remembering things, like being focused, being clear, having some problems with my vision, all that sort of stuff. All the fun things that go along with that. So I took some time off and then I started racing my late model a little bit and picked up once won a couple races and started driving for my dad the next year.

And that’s in the Busch Series.

And that was good. I didn’t win any races that year, but we were pretty competitive. And I spent a couple of years with my dad’s team. We were just underfunded. It just takes so much money. Just takes so much money. And then GNC got into sport and they wanted me to drive for them. So I went to drive for another team and my dad said, Thank you Lord. No more buying tires, no more wrecked race cars and all that sort of stuff.

Finally shut this door because there’s somebody mowing outside. It’s so pretty here. We got the doors open in the luxurious NSR studio upstairs of the barn. I think nobody would be surprised to know that we do this upstairs of a barn in the old hay loft of a barn.

Fitting. Very fitting, man.

So you go to, you go to drive the GNC cars, Bush Series car, too.

Right. Right. And I went to race my first year there, and I’ll never forget, just really cool when I. It was, it’s a big deal to move from a family-owned operation where everybody’s scraping to make it, you know, like, I didn’t get paid as much or, you know, if you wreck the car this week, we’re not going to race next week. That type of thing to going to race for a legit race team that, that, you know, it’s a, you know, it’s different for your daddy to fire you than someone else says, you’re, hey, you’re not performing. We’re gonna put somebody else in there. Like that, that’s a reality. Mm-. What, you know, so I went to drive for the team, CC Welliver, and Tim Feitl was one of my teammates, and he was a seasoned guy. He had won several races in the Busch Series. Just good, dude. He pulled me to the side and he pointed at all my new race team, all these guys. I’m getting this is like you’re gonna spend, you know, 10 months with these guys and hotels at the racetrack. You’re gonna fight and when you fight a battle together and you have success and you have good days and bad days with a group of guys, you build a bond that’s just hard to replace.

And so I’m looking at all these new guys. I’m getting ready to go into this new race team and the new race season. And he said, look at, look at all that. I want you to look at all, look at your eight race cars. I had eight race cars lined up with my name on them and all that stuff. You know, it’s just crazy. And he said, these are the good old days, so go do it and enjoy every second of it. I was like, what good advice? What good advice?

Yeah.

And so I won a race that first year with those guys and, you know, Things were good. I Dodge came into the sport, got involved with Dodge. I started doing a lot of testing. So every Tuesday I would go to Kentucky Speedway with Ray Evernham’s team and I would do a 500 mile test in a cup car.

Every Tuesday.

Every Tuesday. It was crazy.

You fly up there?

Yeah, I would fly with the team up there.

Private jet.

Yeah, well, it was a charter plane. Yeah. And we would go up there and we would test and we would test new stuff, crazy crazy stuff, crazy motors. It was a really good learning experience. I learned a lot. And we would have telemetry and I could see my data compared to Jimmy Johnson’s or my data compared to Bill Elliott’s and whoever’s. I could look at all this different stuff and I really learned a lot. Well, we went to Dodge. We switched from Chevy to Dodge in our Busch team and I won a race at Pikes Peak. And so that was pretty cool because it was the first guy to win a Busch Series race in a Dodge.

Yeah. That’s cool.

That was a cool experience. And so Ray Abraham gave me an opportunity to race in the Cup Series for him in the number 91 Dodge at Rockingham Speedway. And so that’s it, man. That’s the pinnacle.

That’s where you made it.

Where you, yeah, yeah. And you’re looking at that and I’m sitting there, I mean, how cool is it? You’re for a lot of people, you may have something else you like, like it might be Bill Belichick and football or, or, or a famous coach that you couldn’t imagine working under. I mean, it was a surreal moment to be sitting in a race car and Ray Evernham’s talking to me, you know, like, holy smokes.

Just a few years ago, you’re running around the track at Hickory or at Concord.

Yeah.

Concord.

Hickory. And all these different places like that. And it’s so it was really cool. And he is Ray Evernham is a very unique individual. He’s one of those people that has the ability to connect extremely well and to convince you that you can do something that you might not think you’re able to do.

And name some of the drivers that have driven for him so people can.

Yeah, he was the crew chief for Jeff Gordon all the years that Jeff Gordon won his championships. He was the head of the Rainbow Warriors pit crew team. That’s what he’s best known for. And he started his own team and Jeremy Mayfield, Bill Elliott, Casey Atwood, several different drivers drove for him then. He was just, you know, he’s an icon when it comes to crew chiefs. A genius, an absolute genius, neat guy. So, man, I feel like I’m on my way and GNC is really excited about everything that’s going on. We’re gonna make a few changes with the way that we did our team, but their ultimate goal was to take me to the Cup Series with GNC. And Chip Ganassi asked me about mid-year if I would come drive for him in the Cup Series. It was one of those mobile cell phone service cars. I can’t remember back then, but he asked me to come drive for him and I turned it down because I felt like where I was at with GNC was going to be very successful. And so here I am. I’m on my way. Things look good. I’m meeting all of those things like the inside of me.

I want people to respect me. Well, now I’ve got that. I’ve got it in a way. I mean, and the funny thing is, once you kind of achieve that, it’s never really enough. I mean, I still, well, I need to be in the Cup Series full time. Well, I’ll need to be there and I’ll need to win a certain amount of races before I get there. Well, I need to have people like, you know, so it just, the goalposts kept moving for me in my mind. But man, I am, I’m at that place and, we’re at the last race of the season back at Miami Homestead Speedway where I got my start was a phenomenal track for me. I’ve won several races there and I just love that racetrack, before they reconfigured it and, I finished second in the race and GNC The corporate guys were all there at the race, which they came to most of them. They were great, awesome guys, fun to hang out with. They were really cool, but they were at the race and they told me at the end of the race, hey, we’re going to drop our sponsorship.

We’re moving on. In racing, that’s it. If you don’t have a deal at the end of the year, like by October, this is November, if you don’t have something wrapped up early October, you’re in trouble.

For the next year.

Yeah. And I had turned down that ride with Chip Ganassi and I had turned down other opportunities to be loyal and stay with those guys. And what had happened is the big part of their sales was ephedra and the government put a band on ephedra, shut their business down. I don’t think that GNC’s ever fully recovered from that, which whether that was the right call or not, that’s not my point. My point was I was out of a ride. So I’m scrambling trying to figure out what I can do. And so I started talking to some different people. I got a sponsorship package put together to go drive for Roush Racing. And so I was going to drive for Roush and we were down at Daytona testing and that sponsor backed out and went with another team. And so here I am. You know, I’m at that point.

So was that a team Roush was going to add to their already?

No, I was taking an existing ride they had. Todd Parrott was going to be my crew chief. I mean, oh, it was going to be awesome. I mean, it was going to be awesome. I was going to have killer equipment. And so back to where my dad talks about never giving up or he modeled that without even really having to say it. I mean, I’m at the point. I just want to give up. I’m real. I mean, you know, it’s defeating, devastating and. And a challenge to. To not let this get to you. But you just can’t stop. So when that’s at Daytona, Daytona was in like a month, three weeks to a month when I lost that deal because the sponsor decided to go somewhere else. So I had to scramble to find something. So Dale Jr. Calls me and asked me if I’d run like three or four races for him in the chance to car. So absolutely, yeah, we’ll do that. And I put together, interestingly enough, two other races with that same sponsor who bailed on me. Talk about being humbled and having to swallow some pride. But I did it and I raced like five races that year and my worst finish was fifth.

Oh man.

And so I thought this is going to be a good opportunity for me. I drove the Bass Pro Shops car. Johnny Morris was super excited. What a great opportunity this would be for him to have Hank Parker on the Bass Pro Shops racing team with me driving it. My dad connected it. It just made a lot of sense. But Bill Jr. And those guys had made a commitment to Martin Truex. And, you know, my point in telling all this is, like, I could walk through the kind of the way all of this shook out. But the truth is, with every turn that I made, it seems like something really fell apart. And so what I did was I didn’t quit. I kept trying to put together good deals, but I was not going to go get in a car that went out there and ran three laps and then came in and parked and just get last place money. They call those starting parks. And you know, it pays, every position pays in NASCAR. So what you could do is only buy one set of tires.

Go qualify.

Yeah, you had to practice one lap. Just roll around at 30 miles an hour in practice, qualify, go fast qualifying so you can make it.

Yeah.

But then just come in after three laps of the race or four laps or whatever you wanted to do and collect last place money. You can make it, you back then you could make a pretty decent living doing that, but I’m not going to do that. I’m not wired that way and I’m not criticizing anybody who’s done that, but I just couldn’t do it. And so I put together a pretty good ride in the truck deal. But it wasn’t, you know, I had some, their schedule wasn’t as robust. So I started doing TV. I started hosting TV shows. They came to me, the TV thing, they just kind of came to me. And, you know, at this time I’m married with two kids and you’re fighting, fighting for my career, fighting to make a living and trying to figure it out. And so I did the truck deal. And started doing TV and the TV opened up all these opportunities. I could have never dreamed. It’s not something I really wanted to do, but I enjoy being an idiot and cutting up and being hyperactive and talking and that’s what people like for TV. So I started doing the TV and then which led me down to the end of my racing career where my truck deal fell apart.

The team shut down. They ran out of money and I just started doing TV full time. And then at about that time we started a hunting show with my dad. He wanted to do a hunting show because he had got involved with a product that they sell in Walmart and other big box stores.

Khmer Deer, shameless plug.

Khmer Deer and we wanted to be able to highlight that product on the television show. So that’s what started in about that time, about my second year and that’s when I ran into you. We went on a hunt together and you asked me about getting involved with Snowbird, being on the board from a marketing standpoint. And it’s been kind of crazy how the Lord has progressed to get me here. So I went from doing the TV show to really growing the TV show to starting a production company.

I really want to drill into that, which we’re going to do in the next episode, but I really want to drill into that because I want, I feel like it’s going to be so, I want people to understand, I want people to look behind the curtain here at Swoop. I think so many people, they listen to the podcast or they come to an event or multiple events, but there’s got to be a curiosity. I talk to people, how do y’all do this? How do you run this? What, how’s the board work? How did it, what? And I, and I want I’m excited.

To.

Drill into what you do here and what a game changer it’s been for us. Because you went from being on the board to being here full time in a few years. But I want to walk through that story. Where I want to pick up is, and we’re going to stop here. Where I want to pick up in the next episode is let’s go back briefly, overlap into your race career, When you met Wendy and Because that’s when the Lord started to really work in your heart.

That’s right.

Because she she had come out of a kind of a wild and crazy life and you’ve been living the NASCAR life and the Lord is so cool when he does this he started to work to bring y’all together and work in your lives and then the gospel story starts to really get woven. Yeah so anyway, we’re gonna stop right there. Thank y’all for listening in And that was a good stopping point for Hank and I. So we actually continued that conversation over the next couple of days and I’m excited to bring the rest of that to you. But for today, we’re gonna stop there. And if you get a chance to come up to Snowbird Outfitters in the next year, look forward to having you meet Hank Parker Jr. And get to meet him in person. This is a man who loves the Lord, loves Jesus, loves Snowbird, and is excited about what we’re doing here. I’m thankful to call him friend and so grateful that he’s my brother in Christ and also partner in ministry. Thank you for your support again as always, thanks for listening in. I’m gonna share in the next episode, I’m gonna share in the intro to the next episode before we get into the rest of our conversation with Hank.

I’m gonna share some emails and comments from listeners and hopefully you’ll be encouraged by that. Hope you guys have an awesome week. Thanks again so much so much. I can’t I can’t reiterate iterate reiterate iterate and reiterate and reinforce what it means to us that you listen means a lot. Thank you so much and oh one other thing before we go Last week’s episode where we looked at the life and legacy of my father-in-law Steve Coleman the big Kahuna Lots of awesome comments. Thank you all for that and then I want to let you know that on the 24th of which is less than two weeks away, we’re gonna be having a memorial service, a celebration of life at Snowbird Wilderness Outfitters. So if you’re able to come, it’s open invitation, open door. Anybody knew him, loved him, we’re gonna celebrate his life and legacy and look forward to celebrating that and his home going to go be with Jesus. And thank you so much, all of you, again, for your support. It means a lot. And we’ll see you next week. Thanks for listening to no Sanity Required. Take a moment to subscribe and leave a rating, it really helps.

Visit us at SWOutfitters.com to see all of our programming and resources, and we’ll.

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