Watermelons & Woodchips Episode 43: Spiffy Cliff Barber

W&W episode 43 the fellas sat down with Dwarf Car / Mod Lite legend Cliff Barber.  Cliff talks about how he got started in racing from 2 wheel hare scrambles to getting a racecar.  He talks about the evolution of the dwarf cars into what they have today, being a dad of a young racer, shifting gears to lining up cars at Super Nationals, and more!
Bobcat takes everyone through a detailed journey of his Dakota Classic Mod Tour experience,  Mayhem, QOTW, Giveaway, and all our regular shenanigans. 

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⚠️ Disclaimer:
The views and opinions expressed on Watermelons & Woodchips are those of the hosts and guests and do not necessarily reflect the official policy, position, or opinions of Boone Speedway, IMCA, their affiliates, partners, or sponsors.

This content is intended for entertainment and discussion purposes only.

Transcript

SPEAKER_09 0:23

Welcome, race fans, watermelons and wood chips. Got me on the first one. Hey, buddy. Watermelons and wood chips. It's been a week. It's episode 43. Gotta look underneath it.

SPEAKER_03 0:33

Episode chocolate chip cookies.

SPEAKER_07 0:35

Chocolate chip cookies. Oh, you guys, we didn't plan this very well. We should have been. We literally thought about it. We were talking about it. We're going with the Calvin Lang 43 episode here. Episode 43. Miss the Barber by one.

SPEAKER_03 0:49

Well, hey, no, wait a minute. Cliff's four. Garrett's 44. What are you doing next week, Garrett? He's just shaking his head. He could come back. You know, if you couldn't tell that those two are related, like you look over there, they're both smiling. They look almost the same. They're almost the same.

SPEAKER_04 1:07

And Jen's always asked me which one looks more like one of us, and they neither one of them looked like me or her, I think.

SPEAKER_03 1:14

So pretty good mix. Yeah. Pretty good mix. We got our first live studio audience. Yeah. That's kind of cool.

SPEAKER_07 1:20

So guys, you guys make sure to clap when we key the clap. Okay.

SPEAKER_03 1:24

Yeah, if you see the bud light flash, that means it's time to clap.

SPEAKER_09 1:28

Right, right. Right. Well, man, you know, you had a long week. I had a long weekend of baseball again, and and uh we had more races and just a lot of a lot of stuff continuous uh continuously going on. Um but uh Bobcat, it's good to have you back, brother. Yeah. Feel like it's been forever.

SPEAKER_03 1:53

Yeah, so they let you out of Canada?

SPEAKER_07 1:56

Uh yeah. Yeah, they didn't they didn't keep they don't like cats up there. So they let they uncaged me. Um man, what a week, guys. Uh we vlog is it vlogged or blogged? Vlog.

SPEAKER_09 2:08

Vlog with the V, yeah. Okay, so I was. Is it Harve or Marv? Right. Actually, that thing is taking off. Yeah, you realize that. Yeah. Anyway, go back to the city.

SPEAKER_07 2:16

I was calling it blogging all week, and my son. We know he probably did. Ivan, Ivan and Katie corrected me uh multiple times because I'm like, yeah, we're just out here blogging all of our stuff all week, you know, and it was like we're we're going around and um man, what a week. Uh first of all, we left on Friday, right? So um we got the rig packed up. Uh we basically loaded the whole trailer full of parts and tires and motor and like we just had a full trail.

SPEAKER_03 2:52

And the five-time machine.

SPEAKER_07 2:54

We were in the five-time machine, yep. So that was very awesome. Thank you, Dad, again. Um we were riding in luxury, basically. Uh big the big motor home that he lives in in the winter time. So it's like his pride and joy. Sure. Right? So I'm logging a lot of drive time hours. Well, if you've rode with me, um I mean it can be hairy sometimes because I'm the type that I've got to look at you while I'm talking. So we'll be doing and and the speed limits there are 80 mile an hour. Okay. So we're 80 mile an hour driving around, and I'm talking to my dad like this, you know. And he's like, pay attention. You know, because I just I he taught me when you talk to somebody, you look them in the eyes, and then that way, you know, if they're bullshit and you're lying to you or whatever, you know, like you can read somebody by their body language, blah, blah, blah. So uh we pull into this truck stop somewhere, uh, like I was telling you guys earlier, and this guy's like, you know, there's the podcast guy, and I'm just like, God. Like I just, it's I I yeah. So then we pull into my not. Um yeah, no, we don't have the video um that we made yet because you know, G's gotta do some shit to it. But we pull into Minot and it's like a asf asphalt, because that's how they say it up there, ash vault parking lot, and it's in the fairgrounds. First, we we we went to Chris Tucher's first, a customer of mine. Um we went through his uh car, and then he's like, Oh yeah, just here's the address, blah blah blah. We end up at Bubbles' place in the trailer park on the way to the racetrack. But I mean, I'm we're my dad's rig's fifty-some foot long or like forty-eight foot long, my trailer's thirty-two foot long. We're on side streets, driving around this place, and my dad's like, Are you sure? I'm like, I don't know. I'm following the GPS, right? Hold on, I gotta rewind. So before we get to the racetrack, we're driving in on this road, this two-lane road, there's water everywhere, it's beautiful. So is it Caroli or Caroli? It's the oil that you cook with. Cannoli. Cannoli. Yeah. No, cannoli. It's cannoli or cannola. Cannoli. Okay, it's cannoli.

SPEAKER_03 5:20

Yeah.

SPEAKER_07 5:21

Right. So we're driving, and you know, like the corn out there is literally knee-high. Like it's super small, right? And we come up over this hill and we see this, I mean, this vibrant field. Like it, like, like they say that you can see this stuff from outer space. It's so bright. Which I don't know if that's true, but that's what they say. So we were really curious about that. It just looks like a field with a bunch of flowers in it, you know, and they grow. So they grow uh sunflowers, uh, beans, not very much corn, like, but this Coroli stuff. Canola? Canola. It's everywhere. Like, it is like wildfire out there, right? But anyway, we're driving along and I'm 60 mile an hour, and we see road construction. Speed limit 65 mile an hour. Okay. You know, we're driving. All of a sudden we get to the we start seeing the cones. There's no road. The road is gone. It's dirt. Baja Melville shit.

SPEAKER_09 6:26

And I hit this in dad's in the when I called you on Saturday night, I heard your dad in the background talking about it, and you're like, oh, hang on.

SPEAKER_07 6:36

Well, I didn't know the cones. Like, yeah, so literally, it just like when they say road construction automatically means slow down to 15 mile an hour. I don't care if it says 65 or not, because we come pulling in there and it literally was like this big dip, dirt, and then another dip, and then I mean it was crazy. We hit a turtle. I'm dead serious. I smoked a little painted box turtle at 80. My dad's like, I'm like, bud. Too late. Gone. She got I hit three birds and a and a hen pheasant. I'm not shitty in this bird. Were you even supposed to be on this road? Yeah, but no, we were on the right road. We were on the right road. But um, I mean, we're just driving along, and this bird, I mean, it gives us the whole like, hey, and then it just hits the mirror and it just gutted that thing. I mean, it didn't gutted it. And then I'm like, my dad's like, geez, you know, I'm like, you know. Like you're aiming for it. And pheasant, 40 mile an hour. I mean, it defeathered that thing instantly. We're doing 80, right? In North or uh South Dakota, South Dakota, the pheasant is their state bird. So there's a lot of there's a lot of those birds out there. You know, when we were seeing stuff, and then um when we were pulling into my knot, too, there's uh we seen all these weird numbers on the side of the hills. Like, we're like, what is that? Well, apparently, um in North Dakota, the graduating class goes out and puts their year on these hillsides. Like, we thought it was for the planes. I'm like, this is signals for all the crop dusters or something, you know, like because one was painted yellow and the other one was this or whatever. And let me tell you, folks, when they say there ain't shit in North Dakota, there ain't shit in North Dakota. Not real, well, yeah. So Johnny, he's like, where are you guys at? We're like, oh, we're here. He goes, Oh, have you made it to the big hill yet? The big hill. And I'm like, I'm like, the big hill. I'm thinking like, you know, like uh the ski hill or something, you know, like something like that. He's like, Well, you probably already went down it, but don't really know it, but it's big for around here. I mean, it was like uh the hill when you leave the racetrack.

SPEAKER_08 9:01

I mean, it was just very like we're like, oh, okay, you know.

SPEAKER_07 9:06

We went to the casino the first night, Friday night, went over there. They paid us to stay. Actually, well, they paid us to stay there, and then I got greedy. I hit for $1,140 on this choo-choo train thing. And then we got real tough, and then ended up losing a couple hundred bucks. But I mean, it was just a different place up there, man. I mean, just all the wildlife, like we're driving 80 miles an hour, and there's this family of geese walking across, and you guys know how my dad is with the ducks. He's like, Don't hit him. I'm like, we're doing 80. Right. What do you want me to do? So we I'm on the horn honking, slowing down. We get close enough to where he notices that they're Canadians. He's like, oh shit, they're Canadians, hit them or whatever, you know, which they were already off the side of the road. But it was a mama and a bunch of her babies. There's ducks everywhere, there was wildlife everywhere. Uh so then we pull into Minot, and this place, uh, for a regular weekly show, um, it reminded me of the state fairgrounds. Like, it's got the overhang, like, but you walk in, so they got a fan zone going on for a weekly show. I'm like, okay, that's kind of cool. You know, they got all the cars up there from each class. They were running legends, slingshots, um modified stock cars, no sport modes. So we go up there to check it out, and I mean you walk into this place and it's like walking into a Coliseum. All air conditioned.

SPEAKER_09 10:30

Yeah, I saw the one the one video or Snapchat, I don't remember what it was, but it it looks super nice in the car. It was like a concourse.

SPEAKER_07 10:37

Oh, yeah. Beau. I mean, immaculate. I mean, all new concrete stairs, handicap accessible. I mean, it was just super cool. We pull in there and this guy comes walking over to us and he's like, Are you John Logan? I'm like, that's John over there. Last time he was here was 1996. That was 30 years ago, guys. Like, my dad's like, yeah, it was a 20,000 win show. Some they had some IMCA modified thing up there, you know, and then he went on to somewhere else to run a bush tour series show. Um, but it's like, what are the odds of that? You know, like I mean, it was just really, really cool. Everybody was super nice. They have a catwalk inspired because of the boom speedway.

SPEAKER_10 11:22

Oh, cool.

SPEAKER_07 11:23

And that is where staging is. You pull out of there to go onto the racetrack, and we get out there and everybody's like, oh man, it's muddy out there. And I'm thinking, what? Like, I'm already shitting when we pull onto the thing because I'm like, boys, it's already slick. But it was just a weird slick, it was a black dirt track. So uh of course, when you guys when we get the video put up, or when G gets the video put together, I meet the track prep guy whose name's Smalls, which was he's not small, okay. Super cool, dude. Uh was kind of giving us the rundown of everywhere, but I mean the facility was great, the people were great, um, it's on the fairgrounds, and so a lot of the work there, like for the racetrack, is all volunteer stuff. So um we raced the first night. Um Chubby Williams basically ran me over and coming into turn one and two, and we got it all straightened back out together, and then him and I both how they line you up there is how you finish out of the heat race. So it just basically, you know, I won the heat race, he ran second.

SPEAKER_03 12:34

On that running you over, I've don't know that I've ever seen a car slide that far down a straightaway and catch it.

SPEAKER_07 12:41

I don't know how I say because it's a long slide.

SPEAKER_03 12:43

It was like a board slide on a skateboard.

SPEAKER_07 12:45

Like you just I was Tony Hawk 50-50 on the rail, but and was I had the right foot on the firewall, I'll guarantee you, because I was it was I d don't think Shelby intentionally did it. At the time I did, and I'll tell you, I got a new pair of gloves. I don't know if you guys might have seen that on Thursday night, but when I got hosed on that deal, I was I had my new gloves out the window. I don't think IMCA might have caught it, but they will catch it very soon because they're really good. I got full licenses to fly both of my birds. And uh so I just gassed out and we we we straightened out and then in the feature I just like never racing there, you know, no hot laps. So I basically got a heat race and a feature.

SPEAKER_03 13:29

Damn, show and go.

SPEAKER_07 13:30

Show and go. Yeah. And so I just didn't really know where to be, you know, where I needed to be, and um, I felt pretty good on the top, and we ended up running second. I'm like, man, this is a pretty good start to the week. And then uh the next night we uh I start eighth and they do passing points. Winner gets in and then highest in passing points, and then they take top six out of two B Bains is basically what what it was for the course of the week. I think I'm not a hundred percent sure.

SPEAKER_03 14:05

Oh, okay.

SPEAKER_07 14:06

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 14:06

So it wasn't per heat.

SPEAKER_07 14:07

Yeah, it was it the the way they ran the show uh was super cool in my opinion. Um but uh so we started eighth, and I was passing for third, and this guy and I just got together and it cut my right front down, and uh was it Jeremy AIDS, the 10 car? He has nowhere to go. I mean he comes in and gravediggers the whole right side of the car. I mean the door, the f I mean everything ripped off.

SPEAKER_10 14:34

Yep.

SPEAKER_07 14:35

So it's like holy shit, well there's only two classes, right? So um and there's not as many stock cars as there are modified. So we were th we thrashed to get the car back together. We started 12th, ran third in the B main, which put us in the A main. We started 22nd, ran 12th, I believe, the first night. Got the hard charger, got a cool North Dakota classic mod tour cooler with six BL Smooth Dog American flag styles. And we also got a six-pack of Dakota classic mod tour waters, aluminum canned waters. Okay. Um and then we kind of licked our wounds from there and drove up to Canada. Um that was pretty cool. We got to race in a different country. I'd never done that before. Um we realized and found out that they tax you for your shirts, um, and then the one and only gun that my dad ever has owned was in the rig, and you can't have those in Canada. So we uh thank God Andy uh and Sky Morris were um oh my god, dude. I just sorry, I just sidetracked there for Andy. I mean, I can't wait till I get to this part of the story with Andy. So we go to Canada and uh we're race. I'm like I I had the best draw week of my life. I mean, I basically started on the front row about everything. Which wasn't good. I mean it was good, but it wasn't good for me because I needed to win. Uh-huh. And I just the racetracks are tough. I mean, they're dry up there. They these guys bitch here, that it's dry. I envy every single one of them drivers up there because I mean we haven't even got to the slickest place yet, Mandan. But uh Estevan was super cool. The mosquitoes up there are like jumbotron mosquitoes. I swear to God. Like pterodactyls. Like, seriously, it was insane.

SPEAKER_03 16:26

Um They import them from Minnesota. I've seen them in the city. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_07 16:30

Well, they crossed the border for free. The crazy bastard didn't do it. They don't let them back in.

SPEAKER_04 16:35

No, they don't.

SPEAKER_07 16:36

Um We made it through the port very easily. The um we went to the commercial side because of the big rig. Well, then the guy gets up there and he's like, uh, are you guys commercial? We're like, no, but the last two times we tried to cross the border, we were strictly told to go to the commercial lane and not just the deal. So made it through there. We ran like 18th all night at Estevan. Um just wasn't good. Like we were having trouble getting on the right rear, so then we went full drastic and we got it on the right rear. I basically was setting the left front on people's uh deck panels and shit. And we just kind of cruised around there, and then my dad was we get all done and we're doing the race recap, and he's like, I felt bad for you out there a little bit because we did that at Stewart one night and I had to pull in because I couldn't even see to race. So we tamed her down and we go to Williston. And um Williston was like we get out there, and guys, I'm not shitting ya. It was like I'm sitting in the car, they dropped the green flag, I'm in the second heat, nobody can go anywhere. It was just kind of crummy and just it was the same for everybody, just wasn't really that racy. And I come in and it literally looked like somebody dumped a whirlbarrel full of gravel in my in my lap, on my pants, like my suit and my belly was holding like a pile of gravel, and I'm like, man, that was tough. You know, like nobody really went anywhere. So we gotta run a B-Main again. Well then it rains, and we go out there for the B-Mane, and I'm starting 6th or 7th, and they drop the rag, and I'm like, tongue out, chapstick, we're going to the front. And I start passing people, and I kind of housed Rob Van Mill, uh, the 40 car. Um we had kind of had a little altercation for 18th in Estevan, and I didn't appreciate it, and then he was flipping me off, and then we had words after the races, and then in the B Main, I'm like, he told me, uh, get your piece of shit, dump truck out of here. So in Williston, when I come to second, I said, Hey, bud, remember me? And I come in there so hot and slapped him with my tail, and that's when I that's when I got the spoiler. You guys seen the spoiler, right? Oh yeah. Okay, so then it started to rain. And I'm like, they're like, okay, guys, let's just roll it in. Brandon, uh, be brandon beaters on the on the call, you know, just roll it in, roll it in, roll it in. And I'm like, all right, we're out there rolling it in, we're rolling it in. I'm like, I'm like, man, it's like really wet out here. My gloves are wet at this point, you know, like can't wipe the shield, pulling tear-offs, doesn't matter, it's still raining. They send us back to our pit, and I'm like, everybody's all pumped up because you know the car was good, you know, and we pass some cars and from 7th, and I'm like, we're looking at the weather, and I'm like, it's gonna rain. You know, it's gonna rain more. There's more rain coming. And uh, so like I'm like, we should start loading stuff up. The fit stock car features on the racetrack packing. I'm at my trailer loading shit up. My dad's like, uh, are you gonna go out on the racetrack? I'm like, it's raining. Look at it, it is raining, like we're not racing. But when it quit raining the first time, they made us go back out, finish the four laps, then they ran the Mod Bs, then they did a little track prep thing, like whatever. And then it just rained out. I mean, we had a little meeting before this, and they decided that they were gonna run two days at Mandan. So during that, during that little uh pit meeting, I went over to Rob Manville and I'm like, hey bud, we're even now, huh? And he goes, Yeah, we're even.

SPEAKER_10 20:34

It was funny.

SPEAKER_07 20:35

He was super cool about it. He was super cool about it. And then we I mean we never touched, you know, after that, we re we raced really well together and stuff, but so then this is Wednesday, right? We talked about Monday, Tuesday. It's Wednesday. We go to Mandan, and everybody's like, oh man, Mandan, Mandan, Mandan. It's super slick, blah, blah, blah. It's like super fun, it's big, it's this, it's that. They we get hot laps. I mean, it's like state fair blowing dust in hot lapsing first session, and I'm like, we're in trouble. Like, it's this is super, super slick, right? Like, holy shit. Well, it was weird though, too, because you can charge the corner so hard up there, and I don't know what that is, but they had a World of Outlaw late model or not late model sprint car show there not that long ago, and it has the the track all screwed up. See how that works. I need to get one of those and you works again. But uh so we get out there and I start on the front row and I get passed by a kid that runs their weekly, so now I'm running second. And at the time I didn't know this, but I'm running second and I get housed by Shelby Williams again. Hold on, rewind one more time. We go back to my not. So when Shelby houses us on Saturday, my dad tells me he's like, You go to one person's pit all week, I'm driving us straight home. Yes, sir. I come in after the heat race, and my old man's at the end of the trailer, arms up, screaming at Shelby Williams. Really? Oh yeah. Oh, he was pissed. And so secretly I'm like, yes. Get him. You know, like, why did he do that? You know, so then I pull over there, I'm like, one more time. I'm driving us straight up. He goes, I didn't leave our pit. I'm like, I love it. And I know you didn't leave the pit, but watch it, mister. You know. So we get to Man Dan and he does that. And I lost my cool a little bit because I'm like, okay. What are we doing here? Like, you know, and Shelby sent me a text, and and then he seen my kid, Ivan, you know, red, and he was like, he told Ivan, he goes, just run into me with the golf cart so that way your dad's not so mad at me. And Ivan goes, Don't ever text my dad again. Don't ever text him again. You go over and talk to him like a man. And I'm like, bro, Dad. Yes, son. Like, yes. 20 minutes later, here comes Shelby in his little electric cart thing, you know. We we talked about it. We uh hashed it out, and like that's first time. First that is the first time that sounds okay. Uh we talked about it, we squashed it. Not that I you know, it was just that he he came down and was just like, hey man, you know, I'm I'm I'm sorry, you know, and I'm like, no, you're not sorry. This is the second time you've done it, Shelby. I'm like, that's not I don't accept. You know, I said, just know when the shoe's on the other foot, I don't want to see you to post on Facebook, I don't want to hear no crybaby shit. Just know you got one coming.

SPEAKER_10 24:20

Yep.

SPEAKER_07 24:21

Which I only said that because Shelby is such a head racer. Like, I I'm not gonna go out there and wipe him out. I mean, I think he knows that, but I said that and it totally got into his head.

SPEAKER_03 24:32

But the next time he sees your f quarter panel, oh he's gonna be thinking about it.

SPEAKER_07 24:37

Oh shit. Oh yeah. Right. So we we squashed all that, and then we go out and um we ran like 13th. Um track was super tough. I was being a pussy and was underdriving turns three and four, and I was overdriving one and two, and it was just like, man, it was just disappointing, you know. Um so then we get up for my birthday uh Thursday, and they ruined my birthday, bud. They black flagged me for chopping a guy that I mean, I was holding my lane like they had the drone footage and shit. And it is what it is. I went over to talk to the guy that, you know, uh which was Brandon Beter's brother Brock, and I'm like, Oh yeah, favoritism around here, your brother's on the calls. So when they black flag me, but I come around, I had a new pair of gloves. See, I want a I want a velocity thing for 13th place. They brought me over a little fan pack. So I go over to the velocity deal, and I should have brought him in, but Mark hooked me up with a pair of gloves that gave you the good fuck you finger. So when they black flagged me, but I flew that some bitch from turn three all the way back to my pit area. And so that buried us in the in the B-Main. So we started dead last in the B-main, drove up to seventh, missed it by one. So I was like, that was the first show we hadn't made. So that was kind of a nut kicker, you know. And but at the same time, Johnny Carter, we had some uh customers up there, Johnny Carter, uh, Chris Tucher, and Andy Morris come up there. And since I just remembered about Andy Morris, so we're sitting in staging at Mandan, and uh we go and do our hot laps, and I'm cruising back in, and the next set of hot laps is coming out, and I hear it come on the radio. 127, do you have shorts on? What? 127. If you're wearing shorts, you need to stop at 127. You need your safety equipment on. I am roaring in the car because I know it's Andy, because there's only a few people that got three letter numbers, okay? And I knew Drew Jansen was not there, but Andy is the 127. So he's like, 127, I stop in the top of turn one. Stop, stop, stop, stop. I'm like, he don't have his headset in. Well, I knew what was going on because he came to my trailer earlier and was like, hey man, you got a radiator? I poked a hole in my radiator. I need a radiator. So he thrashed to get his radiator and shit in and didn't have time to put his pants on. Pants on. What? And gets in his car and he's got shorts on and he is pitted directly underneath of the flag stand. I've I laughed about it for 48 hours, dude. I'm not even shitting him. It was, and the best part about it was is that he so we were pitted right next to it. Well, at the time, he was in the infield. The next day, he came out and pitted next to us, and Bart Taylor, we were pitted next to him all week. And um people were coming over there and they're like, Hey, are you the guy with that was wearing the shorts?

SPEAKER_06 27:44

And he's like, Yeah, man.

SPEAKER_07 27:46

You know, he's from Muskogee, Oklahoma. He's like 6'8, he's got Urkel's black glasses on, like he's just a cool I Andy is such a great dude. And Skye, his wife, um, it was just so I'd never heard anything like that on the race receiver ever.

SPEAKER_03 28:06

It was hilarious. Like I wish We've had guys forget their gloves, but not their pants.

SPEAKER_07 28:11

Well, and so here's what his I'm gonna have me a pair, but his race suit is a race suit, but it's a pair of bibs. Oh, yeah.

SPEAKER_09 28:23

Like we saw it actually, because they were doing the draw while we were in the room.

SPEAKER_07 28:26

There's only three of them that he knows of, and they're all in Muskogee, Oklahoma. So, I mean, he's 1150 miles from home, you know, and come up to race with us and check it out. I'd never been on the tour.

SPEAKER_03 28:38

Who does your suits?

SPEAKER_07 28:39

Who does my suits? Velocita.

SPEAKER_03 28:41

Oh, I'm sure they'd probably whip something up. I exactly awesome. It'd look good.

SPEAKER_07 28:49

Right, right. So um then so we missed the show, but then I I mean I was upset that we missed the show, but Johnny Carter and Chris Teacher and Shelby Williams put on a barn burning show. Like I thought Shelby was really gonna get him. Um, and then I don't know what Johnny, if he just thought, hey shit, I need to go up here or what, but to have that feeling to watch two of your chassis that you built and are part of, you know, Johnny and I are super, super good friends, and and even Chris, you know, Chris and I have become pretty close. I mean, just being up there with them and being able to go we went to their shop, we went through their stuff. He was having some fuel issues at the beginning of the week, but to watch them guys go one, two, it was just like uh Man, like such a cool, different feeling, you know, to see how excited they were and and man the things that they said in their interview, you know, we always try to be super good about thanking our you know marketing partners and and stuff like that, but man, it was just a chilling moment, you know. And uh so then we left there and we ended up going to Jamestown the next night and um we were good all night. And uh I led twenty-four and a half laps or twenty-four laps basically.

SPEAKER_03 30:13

Yep.

SPEAKER_07 30:14

I just I got a little bit tight in the center um in three and and one and two, and it let Bader or Batter or however the hell you say his name. This dude used to be a professional football player in Canada, yeah right? And so when I got behind him to come take the checkered, I mean I could have I could have I could've roughed him a little, and then I'm like, he's like six eight, dude.

SPEAKER_06 30:40

Like, don't fuck with him. Don't don't go just take second, you know.

SPEAKER_07 30:44

So I took second. But they did make up for ruining my birthday. Uh I won a free tire. So they came down and gave me a uh free tire certificate. Um, and Aaron and Byron Fichter do such an awesome job with that little deal, and I didn't realize that the same guy had owned it and ran it for like 35 some plus years or something like that. And then them guys took it over the still like their third year doing it. They're professional, they're they're just awesome people. Like, I I had such a great time. Um, a very humbling time, very learning thing, you know, and then we turned around and drive five hundred and fifty-eight miles to come down here and race on the fucking interstate and get wrecked in the first three thirty feet of the heat race. How many times have you guys ever seen me pull out on the racetrack with my body looking the way it did on Saturday?

SPEAKER_03 31:43

I was about to tell you, I actually enjoyed it. You look like a 1999 hockey car. Okay, yeah.

SPEAKER_07 31:50

The front of the car was nostalgic as shit. Okay, it really was. And and my motor ran 160, so I'm really thinking about not running the fucking nose bees. Okay, I'm just saying.

SPEAKER_03 32:02

You were one car away from having the hard charger.

SPEAKER_07 32:04

Like we had a good run, 23rd to 7. Um, we got that extra 10 bucks, and I left it at the pit shack because the line was so long and I was tired and I was grumpy. So then when I got home, I got in my underwear, I sat in my chair, and I was like the long, long week of racing. Right. I just sat there for a minute, listen to the cat meow because Mageira missed us. You know, and uh yeah, it was all over the with. We got up Sunday and kids hated life for a while because we cut trees and back. Here we are, back to life now, back to work on Monday. What a day it was. We had an explosion.

SPEAKER_09 32:51

Yeah, what was going on over there?

SPEAKER_07 32:54

Uh so David, um, he lives up there, David Van Cannon, and a couple others. They kind of cycle in and out of there, you know. And David was over there yelling like just a normal day, no big deal. And uh all of a sudden I just hear this loud explosion, and I'm like, man, I like you can almost feel it. Like, man, that was kind of weird. Then all the sirens come, I'm like, man, they're coming. And I go out, did you see my Snapchat? Yeah. So I come out of the office.

SPEAKER_09 33:26

And basically the front yard of your place is just engulfed in flames. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 33:31

I hope he's not in there.

SPEAKER_07 33:32

Well, yeah, because he was literally there 20 to 30 minutes prior to that. And uh, so then the fire department, Justin pulls up, and bud, he's got I mean, he's got this shirt on. He was at some seminar thing, and it looks like somebody splatted paint all over it. He's got I'm like, You just get off a flight or playing golf or what? You know, he's like, but when he opened up his door, another explosion happened. Oh. I was running over there to tell him, like, hey, David was there, you know, 20 to a half hour ago, but how loud the explosion was, if he was in there, he was gonna be dead for sure. I mean, it was it shook the building. I mean, you could feel it. Um, but the fire department, man, I wasn't giving him shit today because they were on their stuff, they were on their stuff. And he Justin goes, I heard you were rozzing the boys up the other night. And I'm like, Well, yeah, bud, we're up here trying to do podcasts, and you guys are down there being noisy. We're doing training at eight o'clock at night. We pay you guys to be during the day. You need to be bright-eyed and bushy when the fire comes during the middle of the night. But it was funnier and shit. So um, yeah, just uh just a wild, wild thing. I mean, there was like four or five cars parked in the parking lot. The ambulance pulls in, they're Snapchatting it. I'm like, oh yeah, don't get out and make sure anybody needs oxygen or water or nothing, guys. Just sit in there and Snapchat it. You know, air conditioning was on. But uh they got her put down, and uh needless to say, that uh those people that were staying over there no longer have somewhere to stay over there. I mean, she's crispified.

SPEAKER_10 35:07

Yeah.

SPEAKER_07 35:08

So yeah, it looked pretty warm. It was hot. I don't know what was in there. I but yeah.

SPEAKER_03 35:15

So you got a couple of frames over there, might get a little heat.

SPEAKER_07 35:19

No, we were fur far enough away. The fire department bud was I mean, they're only a block away. Right. So I mean, thank God there wasn't a train because they would have had to take the long way, but they were there in about a minute.

SPEAKER_03 35:29

Pretty quick.

SPEAKER_07 35:30

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 35:31

They could have launched water right over. They probably could have just shot the right train track.

SPEAKER_07 35:36

So ju so Justin, like, it was just a shack, and he's like, Don't blow it over, don't blow like the water, the pressure from the water truck was like basically gonna collapse the building, right? So then they started like shooting it up and it was coming down. I mean, it was kind of cool watching them do what they do, you know. But anyway, sorry for the 30-minute go-off here about the week-long thing.

SPEAKER_03 35:59

You don't you know it doesn't happen very often. You've never done that.

SPEAKER_07 36:02

Like I've never done the North Dakota tour. You like that. That's cool.

SPEAKER_03 36:08

Right. Right?

SPEAKER_07 36:11

So yeah, I had never So that was that was what was really cool about it was is that my dad, my son, and I were able to go on this. We're the three-generation deal. Um, and Ivan was, you know, you can still tell he's young. I mean, he he was operating all week, uh, slept more than anybody on the trip, did the least amount of shit. Um and he did have one of those. Yeah, he did cook the shit out of everything that we ate. Like he is a very, very, very good cook. So gotta thank him for keeping us well fed all week. Um, like I said, my dad, um, not very often do we get to go to a racetrack that either him or I have never been to. So there were um, you know, f all those places. I mean, he'd been to my knot, but never been to any of those other places, so it was kind of cool to check those off of our list. Sure. Um it was bummer that we didn't get to go to Dickinson. Uh everybody said that Dickinson's like a really badass place. So I'm not gonna elaborate too much because on like the facilities and stuff because this video that we got is pretty I mean it's gonna be pretty cool. It's gonna tell the story? It's gonna tell the story for sure.

SPEAKER_09 37:21

Cool. The the blog video. Yeah, the blog video. Yeah.

SPEAKER_07 37:24

When we come back from Canada, they came in and they took our tomatoes. Like, we got across with them. So we we actually illegally smuggled uh tomatoes in there. Well, I wasn't giving them up my BLTs. No, no.

SPEAKER_10 37:38

We had BLTs up there.

SPEAKER_07 37:39

I mean I wasn't giving that up, you know. And then they asked us about chicken. If we had chicken, we didn't have any chicken, we just had pork, but they were super cool, it was super quick, in and out, wing bang, bam, we had our passports. Um yeah. Like I said, we had uh other than that, we didn't really I had a cone. I didn't hit I had a cone with a rig. They were cones I got my I got my ass chewed by my dad by that because it was his you know, that is his baby. But other than that, we didn't have no breakdowns on the way up. We didn't um the car did the strap bud. We sold we sold four or five watermelon shirts, I think. Okay, seven or eight. Six, seven. But yeah. When we stopped to take a piss the first time, all the t-shirts and everything on the ground. Oh car was unhooked. Oh golf cart was slammed up against the thing, tires were on top of the golf cart. Well, but we hit that dirt road.

SPEAKER_03 38:38

I did it. Shook or loose.

SPEAKER_07 38:40

We don't know if that's what it was, but that's what we're saying. Probably was probably so um but yeah, other than that, we we had a good time. I think we'll definitely make that trip again. Um like just the contingency stuff that they do at every driver's meeting, they give away stuff every night. Um, and everybody's just so nice, other than they're good quick shows too. I yeah, I enjoyed that, you know. But what what's weird about it is like when you're up there, it's 11 o'clock at night and it's still light out. Right. I'm like, Yeah, it's strange. How do people sleep around here?

SPEAKER_03 39:13

Legit. Really? Really good blinds.

SPEAKER_07 39:16

We got to, yeah. At Estevan, we got to we ran into Katie Turnball, married to Tyson. Hadn't seen her in a long time. Uh we had to pick up Monica Gustin's uh 400 pounds of cheesies. If you don't know what a cheesy is, it's a generic version of a Cheeto that tastes way shittier than a Cheeto. Just gonna go ahead and say that. A little salty.

SPEAKER_03 39:37

In love with them?

SPEAKER_07 39:38

Monica eats, sounds like she eats a bag or two a day.

SPEAKER_03 39:41

Okay.

SPEAKER_07 39:41

For as long, but it equaled out to be a hundred and thirty dollars in U.S. money in these cheesies.

SPEAKER_03 39:47

What about cheesies?

SPEAKER_07 39:49

That's what I'm saying. I'm like, God damn it. Jimmy's like, them things taste like shit. And I'm like, I wouldn't know. I've never had a cheesy.

SPEAKER_10 39:56

Uh-huh.

SPEAKER_07 39:56

So it was kind of cool to catch up with them. Tyson builds his own car, and I tell you what, guys, it was like the coolest modified I'd ever seen. Like Dan Wagner's, but like, no offense, Dan, but ten times cooler.

SPEAKER_03 40:08

Just weird or what?

SPEAKER_07 40:10

Very weird.

SPEAKER_03 40:10

Really?

SPEAKER_07 40:11

Like the weird one of the weirdest things I've ever seen.

SPEAKER_03 40:14

So four headers and then he's got a rain cap on each one?

SPEAKER_07 40:17

No, it wasn't like that, but like the the way that he built the tail and stuff, I mean, it literally looked like somebody cleaned it out. And then we even thought for a minute that it was bent and shit and everything. Like, I'm telling you, it's like the weirdest looking thing. Hopefully they listened to the show, which I feel like they're gonna, because every person that was up there asked if we had watermelon stickers or if we had the uncut shirts, or if we had I mean, it was like a thing, right? So if Tyson and Katie listened to this show and Tyson can send us a picture of the ass end of his car, you guys will understand what I'm saying. But it's like I was I was like all giddy about it because I'd never seen anything like it, you know, and I'm a fabricator, so it was really cool to see that. And um, yeah. It wasn't hotter than hell, like they all said that it was. It was actually beautiful.

SPEAKER_03 41:03

I mean, saw some people in sweatshirts.

SPEAKER_07 41:06

Yeah, that's what I'm saying. And then now they're like today, they're like 105.

SPEAKER_03 41:09

Of course. Wow. Nice.

SPEAKER_07 41:12

So anyway, move on. We're all keep going. We probably should go to a break.

SPEAKER_09 41:17

Yeah, we can go to a break, come back, click off these results real fast, and then get into talking to Cliff Barber over here. Yep, man. This isn't that bad, was it?

SPEAKER_04 41:26

Well, it's gonna be hard to follow this because you are a storyteller. I am, and I am far from that. Oh no, you'll be good.

SPEAKER_03 41:32

No, that's not true, Cliff. I know that's not true. Plus, we'll we'll pull them out of you.

SPEAKER_04 41:35

Yeah, as long as you guys are helping me with this, I'll I think I'll be fine.

SPEAKER_03 41:39

See, this is how we get rid of the stage fright. You sit and listen to this for a while.

SPEAKER_04 41:42

It's time for you to go.

SPEAKER_07 41:43

Yeah, you got 46 minutes of training here. Yeah, I'm not sure. Sorry, guys, but not sorry. It was a long week. Oh, yeah. It was it was a long week. Like it and it was super fun. Like, I couldn't believe the people that kind of follow around. I mean, there was just all kinds of people from there. Tom Barry absolutely dominated that deal.

SPEAKER_03 42:04

I mean he was what, one spot away from sweeping it?

SPEAKER_07 42:07

Yep. Lost on the last night. Second last night. Yeah. Joel Charneski got him.

SPEAKER_03 42:11

Yep. Cole had a decent week.

SPEAKER_07 42:13

Cole had a great week. I mean, I think it's the hair, dude. The hair, every time I see it, it gets a few more curls in it. It does. Must be coming with the age. He kind of reminds me of Alan Jackson's hair. You know what I mean? It is the deal with the thing.

SPEAKER_03 42:24

He's got the he's got the Wisconsin, right? Oh, yeah. But he's got a little twang to him. He got a little twang. He didn't have that before. He's developing.

SPEAKER_07 42:31

It's the northern thing. They always they all like to say hey or a. Yeah. So, or as Trent would say, you betcha. You betcha. You betcha. And they're like, like, all the people up there are super frickin' nice, except this one lady at Jamestown. John, uh, Johnny C, John um Living Legend, number five car, modified. I can't remember his last name. Uh, not Carswell. Um God damn. But they had a cone set up. I mean, this guy raced in 1966. And we pull in there, and she comes over there and she goes, You do not touch that cone. You don't look at it, don't stand next to it, don't move it. I'm like, lady, I'm like ten feet from the goddamn cone. At the time I had no idea. I thought maybe it was like an emergency lane because they had some firefighter stuff parked there and everything. Oh no. It's old boy. He's in a rage car. Gosh, I'm it's gonna drive me nuts. John something. They call him Johnny C. Living legend.

SPEAKER_03 43:37

That's his spot.

SPEAKER_07 43:38

That's his spot.

SPEAKER_03 43:39

Alright.

SPEAKER_07 43:39

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 43:40

Good to know.

SPEAKER_07 43:41

That's what I said.

SPEAKER_03 43:41

I'll stay away from the comb. Oh yeah.

SPEAKER_09 43:45

Well, you did take one out before that, so watch it, mister. Watch it, mister.

SPEAKER_03 43:51

You better go to a break.

SPEAKER_09 43:52

Yeah. Anyway, yeah, let's go to a break. We'll send it off to our partners. Um and when we come back we'll Wrap up some boon Speedway results and talk with Cliff Barber. You've been watching Watermelons and Woodchips, we'll be right back. For more than 140 years, Vision Bank has been locally owned, locally managed, and committed to helping Iowa families, businesses, and communities grow. While banking has changed, our commitment to personal service and local decision making has never wavered. When you bank with Vision Bank, you're banking with neighbors who know your name and care about your success. Experience the difference 140 years of community banking can make. Visit Visionbank.com or your local branch today. Vision Bank is member FDIC.

SPEAKER_00 44:40

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SPEAKER_09 45:14

Welcome back, race fans, watermelons and wood chips. Every time we've I've been doing really good, but the last the last two episodes. Um back from the break, and uh Jonathan gave us his his uh the I don't even know if you'd call him Cliff Notes because that was full on. That was a sort of but we'll we're gonna get we're gonna get the the full version in in blog form. Vl oh Vlog Vlabog. Yeah it's a V Oh. There's your guys there. Yeah, they're getting with it. It's all right. I'm gonna file a complaint.

SPEAKER_03 45:50

Yeah they're key they're keeping people sick.

SPEAKER_09 45:52

So yeah, yeah. Bobcat's vlog of the Dakota tour will be coming out. I'll have to G and I can get together and figure out what we want to do for that.

SPEAKER_03 46:01

But um I can't wait to hear those conversations. Yeah.

SPEAKER_09 46:05

We can't show this. But uh, you know, let's let's uh click off through some stuff. Um Boone Speedway. I actually made it on time Saturday. Yes, you did. And I I literally pulled in right as Logan was walking across the racetrack, right? Like I literally met him at the shack for the driver's meeting. So you couldn't have timed it any more perfect. We had uh had baseball games this weekend. I am gonna be late. I've already I've already told Josh I said you're gonna have to hold down the fort. We have state baseball this weekend, so another big pennant or a yeah, it's like yeah, well, and this um you never know. You could be playing at 8 o'clock or you could play be playing at 6. We play at 4 o'clock and 6 o'clock. So we've I've gotten honestly gotten pretty lucky with our games being scheduled the way the way they have, but this weekend I can't can't bail on the boys. This is a state tournament this weekend. This weekend this weekend. Yeah, this is it. Pretty much.

SPEAKER_03 47:06

So that's what you worked all year for. Right.

SPEAKER_07 47:08

It's the only reason we've been starting at five o'clock. There was other films start at eight. That was the rumor right. That was the rumor going around. The only reason we're starting at five is because Cody can't be here.

SPEAKER_03 47:20

Lots of rumors going around.

SPEAKER_07 47:21

Well, I'd rather I'd rather start at six.

SPEAKER_08 47:24

They're so great though, aren't they?

SPEAKER_03 47:26

I love the rumors. All rumors are something, man. Yeah. That's the thing about a rumor, is you know, if you want the truth, you actually have to show up in person. Right. That's why we asked you here, Cliff, because there's rumors everywhere about you.

SPEAKER_04 47:36

Yeah, they're they're all rumors.

SPEAKER_03 47:37

Oh, I thought you were gonna say they're all true.

SPEAKER_09 47:40

Yeah. Well, let's shoot through these results real quick. Um, from Saturday, started off with the mod lights. Riley Clem gets a win. Um Ryan Zeeem goes second. Austin Gray goes third. Garrett, our boy, drove started fourth, drove that thing all the way to fourth.

SPEAKER_03 47:59

Wait, not this Garrett.

SPEAKER_09 48:01

The one in the back. Garrett the spine, Garrett. The one sitting in the lawn chair. G barber.

SPEAKER_04 48:06

That's that's typically how he helps work on the race car, too. Okay. Shots.

SPEAKER_09 48:12

Shots are fired. You're catching strays from the back, man.

SPEAKER_07 48:16

No, he's he's done really well this year. Is he the youngest? He is. Well, then he's the baby. He can sit in the chair then. No. No.

SPEAKER_09 48:24

That's not the case. Uh Brandon Cox goes fifth, Landon Elliott sixth, Garrison Anderson seventh, Colin Anderson eighth, Terry Brown ninth, and Ben George goes tenth. Um, that was a really good race. Austin Gray was running down Riley Clem, and he about shit, can't he? Yes, he did. All on his own.

SPEAKER_03 48:45

He decided Dukes a hazard two wheels was better than uh better than four. Yeah, but he got a good save. I mean, that could have been bad, and he brought it down and kept going.

SPEAKER_09 48:55

Yeah, that was uh I mean it was it was setting up to be a really, really good race there, and just uh got her up on two wheels. Turns out you need four of them.

SPEAKER_04 49:06

So and he's already tried that off at turn three and four, so he knows how that goes. Yeah, yes.

SPEAKER_09 49:12

Uh Elmquest Tony, IMC Sport Mods, Hunter Longnecker picks up a win. That's the first win for him in a while.

SPEAKER_07 49:20

He looks solid. He did an excellent, excellent job. I mean, I don't know. Uh uh ever since he got that Vanderbilt, he started driving one-handed. Did something happen to it? Did he get the finger twisted or something? So he just went one-handed or what? Maybe he's always been one-handed. I don't know. But I just noticed he went he went with the whole hang on to the cowl up here. And like, I think a lot of us probably drive one-handed, not knowing, or you know what I'm like it's there.

SPEAKER_03 49:50

I always found myself doing more with one, but having the other one on it, like, you know, because sometimes you'd lose a little power steering, and you might have to have one come in real quick.

SPEAKER_10 50:01

Right.

SPEAKER_03 50:02

But I mean, I always had two on the wheel. But yeah, I've seen a lot of guys drive.

SPEAKER_07 50:06

Were you ten and two or were you three and six?

SPEAKER_03 50:09

I was all over the map because I was on a hobby stock, no quick steer, so it was we're I'm crossing over and I'm doing the Brian Zine, but on the wheel.

SPEAKER_09 50:17

Like he took one of them turn knobs off his dad's tractor.

SPEAKER_03 50:24

I really probably should have done that.

SPEAKER_09 50:26

Oh, you hit the wall and it spins. Well, Willie Kirk uh has been super solid all year. He goes second. Uh Braden Gusson, he got third. That's a couple top fours for him. I love Braden Gusson.

SPEAKER_07 50:42

He's such a he's such a good young kid.

SPEAKER_09 50:44

Yeah, he's gonna get one here pretty soon. Just needs seat time, that's all.

SPEAKER_07 50:48

You know what I admire about that the most is Janae was always scared to come over and run with the big dogs, and they're bringing him over, and he's running with the big dogs.

SPEAKER_09 50:56

Right.

SPEAKER_07 50:57

I'm just kidding, Janae, but I'm just saying that because he didn't run here a lot. So really, really cool to see Grandpa Rick bringing over the young lad. Yeah. Um, we've all kraden, you know. Yeah. Uh it's cool to see him coming up.

SPEAKER_09 51:09

Well, it's weird to see him because like I just remember, like, to me, he's still like this tall.

SPEAKER_07 51:15

Well, yeah, I know, but he's like a young grown man. I know. I'm like, you know, like, wait a minute. The whole Gustin family's short. Where'd you come from? Yeah, he's tall.

SPEAKER_03 51:25

You know, he somehow got the height.

SPEAKER_07 51:27

It's just like Ivan.

SPEAKER_03 51:28

Yeah.

SPEAKER_07 51:29

Weird six, three hundred size 15 chewing. I'm not gonna say the other part. We don't want to know.

SPEAKER_09 51:37

Anyway, Braden Shepper goes forth. Rounds out the top five.

SPEAKER_03 51:43

I'm locking eyes with every person back in there.

SPEAKER_09 51:47

Where's he going with this?

SPEAKER_08 51:50

Sorry, but not sorry.

SPEAKER_09 51:52

Uh IMCA Modified's DE Outside Services, IMCA modified, and this was really cool. Uh Tyler Harr picks up his first ever IMCA modified win. That was awesome.

SPEAKER_10 52:03

That was awesome.

SPEAKER_09 52:04

Um Uncle Ronnie did get past him coming out of turn two, but then the yellow came out, so they they hadn't gotten back to score the lap. So Tyler goes back out front and uh doesn't leave the bottom open this time.

SPEAKER_07 52:17

So uh first modified win for him. Yeah, ever. That's what he said. He came down and bought two watermelons and two Bobcat shirts. And he was like, Yeah, I didn't really know where to be. And I'm like, Who are you? He's like, the 21 modified. I'm like, dude, yeah, you ran a hell of a race. And he's like, Yeah, and I'm like, what kind of car are you driving? He's like, I rage. I'm like, wow, see how much I paid attention to that. He did an excellent job.

SPEAKER_09 52:44

Yeah. He did. Yeah, so actually I know Tyler's uncle. So Tyler's uncle had texted me a few weeks ago when Tyler started coming up, uh, coming over here because they're from Nebraska. So I know Tyler's uncle Trent. Um, when I worked out at Hoosier, um, Trent would come out and drive our semis sometimes because the store that we owned in Maryland and Jompin. No, I'm not. I'm just listening. And uh Pittsburgh. Well, they also owned the precise store in Nebraska, so they got hooked up with Trent somehow. Anyway, so it was cool because I have a connection to him. And the first thing, like, I'm interviewing him, and you could tell he's like trying to keep his shit together because he's never won a modified race. Right, like it's his teeth from the tower.

SPEAKER_03 53:34

I'm like, this boy is happy.

SPEAKER_09 53:35

Yeah, like you could tell he was he was getting emotional, and uh and I'm like, yeah, he so I'm sending it to Uncle a Snap, and he's like, Man, I listen to you guys every week on the podcast. And he actually he won the watermelons and wood chips uh gift card from Performance Bodies. So that was a that was the icing on the cake for that deal was kind of cool because he's pays attention and listens and everything. He said him and my me and my dad will watch that every week. He's like, But my dad's not here, so I gotta get him a short. He's like, I gotta go buy some shirts for me and my dad.

SPEAKER_07 54:10

He was pretty excited. Like I I told him, I'm like, dude, he's like, I didn't really change a whole lot from the heat to the feature. And I'm like, if you can master the bottom at Boon Speedway, that's very tough for a lot of people to do to be able to be disciplined enough to woe your car up and be able to get around there on that grip, and he executed that Saturday perfectly. Yeah.

SPEAKER_09 54:29

Oh, I was gonna put the picture up that you had on our in our group message to going through these results, and I forgot.

SPEAKER_03 54:37

Well, that might be in a real I see you guys are shot of that. I might have cut that in.

SPEAKER_09 54:41

So anyway, uh Uncle Ronnie goes second, has a good run in the 10K. Chaz uh goes from eighth to third, Chaz Baca. Um our boy uh Tevor Fitzgibbon, he goes fourth from 27th. So we're I think were you and I talking in the staging area, and he was stopped. Yeah. That's when we went over there. Yeah. And uh the drive shaft had fallen out. I think. He goes, my science experiment failed. And I said, You better stick to building volcanoes then. Right.

SPEAKER_03 55:21

Trevor Fitz the science bitch. Screwed something up. Did you say Trevor Fitz? Trevor Fitz the science bitch. I was gonna say build nye the science guy, but that doesn't fit. That's way better. It does fit pretty well. And uh also when we get to the power rankings, he's gonna be pissed, just so you know.

SPEAKER_09 55:40

Right. He's texting me about it every week. Yeah, he's not having uh Corey Saurman goes fifth, Cowboy Race sixth, uh Chase Weimer seventh, Dylan Potter, Todd Shute, David Solberg ground out the top ten for the modifies. Um let's see stock cars. We've Jonathan kind of gave us a rundown of how his night went. But uh Tyler Pickett gets a win. I mean, honestly, though, Tyler's been fast. Like bitched last week, won the next week.

SPEAKER_07 56:12

Right. It was I mean, I it sounded like it was pretty good for him. No, no offense, Tyler, but that's just how it works. I mean, you were bitching last week and whining and complaining, just like we all do, and then you go out and saddled up, locked in, and picked yourself up a $400 payday.

SPEAKER_09 56:27

Yeah. Well, even in our interview, I was like, you went from the outhouse to the White House because he got black flagged last week. So he was dirty driving. Oh, he goes, he told Logan, he goes, You should have black flagged me probably two laps before that. But no, uh, no, it's cool to see Tyler get a win. Um like I said, he's been pretty pretty quick all year, really. Um Doug Smith goes second, uh, plus 17. Um Buck Shafroth, one out of your out of your guys' stable, Bob Cat, he goes third.

SPEAKER_07 56:57

Hold on, did you guys notice anything funny about Buck's car on Saturday?

SPEAKER_03 57:02

Airflow?

SPEAKER_07 57:03

No.

SPEAKER_03 57:03

Oh no.

SPEAKER_07 57:04

So in the heat race, whoever it was, they basically took his fender off, ran it through the meat grinder. He had to bring out his old white fender and put it on his black car. And this is uh Witchman, I believe, does his wraps. Yeah. So he he always has the weird like purple lines and shit through it. He put that well, this is another statement about how good Rage Chassis puts bodies on. He stuck that quarter panel on there, bud, and the neon and the neon green and the purple lined up like perfectly.

SPEAKER_03 57:37

Really?

SPEAKER_07 57:38

Like you couldn't even tell other than it was white and the rest of the car is black.

SPEAKER_03 57:42

So wow.

SPEAKER_07 57:42

He's rocking that at 141 this week.

SPEAKER_03 57:44

Alright.

SPEAKER_07 57:46

Why not?

SPEAKER_03 57:47

It was just cool as shit.

SPEAKER_07 57:48

It was cool as shit.

SPEAKER_03 57:50

We should mismatch all the panels and they all line up.

SPEAKER_09 57:53

Right. Uh Dave Smith goes fourth, Bob Daniels fifth, Chase Daniels sixth, the Bobcat seventh, Jim Gus an eighth, Jerry Miles ninth, Cody Gossel tenth.

SPEAKER_07 58:03

Did you get did anybody see the sign language going on between the 19 and the three car?

SPEAKER_03 58:07

Uh yes, and I was listening, I think uh Jimmy's Rev Limiter is functioning.

SPEAKER_07 58:13

Oh, very much so. I'm like, who is that? And I turn around and Jimmy's got, he's doing this and this. And I'm like, I'm glad I'm in front of them guys right now because when they drop the ring, somebody somebody's getting ran over.

SPEAKER_03 58:29

We talked about it in the tower. We said there is going to be a crash. And in fact, there was not. Right. He just went right to the inside and drove by. It might have been a little bit of rubbin on the way by. Right. Right. Yeah, he was he was pretty upset. He was upset.

SPEAKER_09 58:43

Hobby stock feature, Keith Berg gets a win. So dad gets one a couple weeks ago. Keith gets one this weekend. Joey Young goes second. Will Smith goes third. Uh Braden Long and Bentley Long go four or five. In the first feature, second feature, Solomon Bennett gets a win. Uh Seth Butler goes second, Braden Gifford third, Eric Knutson fourth, Wayne Gifford fifth.

SPEAKER_03 59:08

Um you hear about the trouble that Saul's been having? He's replaced like everything in that car. Did you hear what they found? Water and fuel.

SPEAKER_09 59:16

You know what's wild? So uh Aaron Fe came over to me and he and he goes, Hey, like, do you guys, does Matt have anything to test fuel? I'm like, probably. I don't know. He's like, uh Saul, Bennett, and myself both. He's like, we've been changing all kinds of stuff. Car still won't run. He's like, do you think Matt would run over here and check the fuel to see if it's got water in it or whatever? And I'm like, I don't know, I can go check. So I go down there and Matt's like, yeah, I'll run over there. And so and then Saul ends up winning the race. So I'm like, oh, they must have either found it or whatever.

SPEAKER_07 59:52

Aaron came to me and asked me if I had 22 gallons of Cam 2. I'm like, no, but I brought seven. Shit's 1450 a gallon. We're coming here with the bare metal. Okay. I'm like, God damn, you need 22 gallons? He's like, pulls out a pitcher. Matt had went over there. He did have so don't be fucking around out there, guys. Matt's got shit to test your fuel. He does. Okay. He proved that on Saturday, so don't be running the rocket shit.

SPEAKER_09 1:00:20

Well, that's what's cool. Is like he didn't have to go help those guys. Right. You know, he was down in the infield busy teching with Kevin and went out and he would have, it would have been on the internet. Oh, right, I'm sure. But but no, what I'm saying is like that that's cool that he went out of his way to go help those guys out.

SPEAKER_07 1:00:39

So and it figured out their problem. Right.

SPEAKER_09 1:00:42

And I and I, you know, obviously don't work on race cars anymore, but like knowing those kind of issues are the worst, too. You're just chasing something constantly.

SPEAKER_07 1:00:53

Same deal though. Utilize your resource. We have a chassis dyno that is 40 miles from here. Fastest way.

SPEAKER_03 1:01:02

Yep.

SPEAKER_07 1:01:03

Right. But yeah, kudos to them guys. Uh uh, he he uh come down and showed he showed me the picture of it, and you could have seen all she goes, yeah, bud, Quickstar 91. I'm like, Well, I'm not buying 91 fuel from Quickstar no more.

SPEAKER_03 1:01:17

Nope. You get 93 at Costco. That's the place.

SPEAKER_07 1:01:21

Go in and get your cakes and grapes and fill up your reactions with 93.

SPEAKER_03 1:01:26

That's right. Pick up a brisket while you're at it, throw it on. The meat they have is actually really good meat. It's really good. I have it, I'll have to bring it next time. Right, right. He can swing some big meat that way.

SPEAKER_09 1:01:39

But all right. Well, anyways, let's get to our guest. He's been sitting over here in the summer. Oh my god.

SPEAKER_07 1:01:45

Well, he's he doesn't look he's not as red as he was when we first sat down, so I think he's warmed up and ready to go. He's ready.

SPEAKER_09 1:01:52

One of the original finger dance. Yes, guys. Yeah, that's true. Cliff Barber. Cliff, we appreciate you coming on. We're like I say this to a lot of our guests, but you are a brave soul, my friend. You're a brave soul.

SPEAKER_04 1:02:07

Can you knew what I was up against here?

SPEAKER_03 1:02:10

When I texted the boys and said, we got a guest. And Cody's like, oh, who is it? I'm like, Cliff. He's like, sweet. Yep.

SPEAKER_04 1:02:17

Crap. I've known Cody for, I don't know, I've known your mom longer than you. I'm not sure you were even around at that time. So probably what year were you born?

SPEAKER_09 1:02:28

88.

SPEAKER_04 1:02:29

Oh yeah, you would have been pretty young. Yeah, Jonathan and I are both are and I are both 88. So 92 was when I got started with this. But it was on a kind of on a whim. Ed Zim and myself had raced dirt bikes around the state of Iowa forever. Here scrambles, Enduros, pretty much everywhere. And then we got old. We got to be like 26. And then we got we we decided to retire from dirt bikes. And so we we kind of separated. Did you have the mustache and the mullet? I did. Oh man. Yeah.

SPEAKER_07 1:03:00

Nostalgia. I mean, there's some where this is 3D stuff. Like I don't know if you can zoom in on it or whatever, but this is like 1990s dad right here. Mustache full mullet going on there. Had to bring it up. I just wanted to make sure you rocked it then.

SPEAKER_03 1:03:20

And I'm just saying, the coolest dwarf car mod light, whatever you want to call it, body style ever. That that's the one.

SPEAKER_04 1:03:29

There's so many people that have said that that they ruined the body styles when they went to the mod lights because they got away from the old style style.

SPEAKER_07 1:03:37

That one it was called was is a coop.

SPEAKER_04 1:03:39

Yeah, that was a coupe, and then they had the sedans that look like the station wagon. And and you could get away with a little bit more suspension stuff as far as having more room in the back of the car with with the sedans over the coops, because the coops you just barely had any room to get your any of your trailing arms in, your shocks, your pole bar. We didn't I ran something something a little bit different, didn't have a pole bar in it. Just saying Ed Zee ran the same thing.

SPEAKER_06 1:04:05

So Nota said he was gonna tell us.

SPEAKER_04 1:04:08

Wait a minute. We're gonna give up Ed deal. Okay.

SPEAKER_06 1:04:13

I've still got some.

SPEAKER_04 1:04:14

Keep going. We got rid of some of the stuff that that's now outruled because they are outlawed because they've decided to make the rules a little more comprehensive. So it's not so much gray, it's a little more black and white. You know where those parts are? He's seen them, but it they're they're hid away.

SPEAKER_07 1:04:35

Okay, all right, all right. Continue.

SPEAKER_04 1:04:37

No, so I we So you're 26. 26. You give up the bikes. With age comes a cage. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, that that's exactly right, because like Sunday, you would race Sunday, a two-hour hair scramble on a Sunday, you would feel like crap until Wednesday or Thursday, Friday sometimes. Then you figure out if you can go out and race these things, you feel pretty good like an hour after the race. You don't really have a reason to drink beer, but you still do drink beer because you can.

SPEAKER_10 1:05:04

Right.

SPEAKER_04 1:05:04

So no, uh it started out so Ed and I raced dirt bikes for whatever number of years I've known Ed since I was 18 or 19. And then then we got separated or just kind of went different directions. Then all of a sudden he calls me up, and that that was back when you had phones on the wall and you had to go to the the wall and pick the phone up and talk to people. No texting, no internet, nothing back then. So no, uh Ed called me up and said, Man, I went over to Boone and they've got these things called dwarf cars, they've got motorcycle engines in them. I think I'm gonna buy one. You have to get one or build one for me. I'm like, Yeah, that doesn't sound like a lot of fun. I'm I think I had a boat at the time. I'll show you that picture some other time. It's got more mullet to it. Yeah. But uh no, so Ed Ed called me up and he's like, and I have no idea what any roll centers are. I didn't know anything about caster or camber or scrub radius or anything on these front ends, and he's like, You got To design the front geometry for me. I'm like, I'm used to a dirt bike. You got 14 inches of travel on the front and the back and got a rake, and that's about all you really have to care about. And so we started researching. I think he bought a book, Steve Smith's Dwarf Car Racing. Yep. And I remember Edwards. I don't remember. And and so very meticulous. And the we would go out to Ed's place and maybe have a few cold ones and and read through this book and try to figure out what we're doing. I at the time I had access to a 2D AutoCAD program at work, so I'd go in after work like eight o'clock at night, and I think they still had what they call the digitizer. There's no 3D on this one, it's just line to line to a circle. So we just decided to let's design a front end and see what happens. So that's kind of how it started, 1992. I think he bought a Torgeson chassis. It was a 32-Ford, 34-ford coupe. And uh Is that that picture? Yeah, that that's the first dwarf car that I ever built. It was it was just the the roll cage and no suspension, roll cage and sheet metal. And by the way, we just had the little latch that you have the on the gate in your backyard to keep the kids in the yard. That's all we had, the doors open. I'm pretty sure all the doors were one inch 065 tube, so not thick. And then to put the bodies on, you drilled rivets, eighth inch rivets about every inch to hold the sheet metal on. So you you weren't compromising our safety at all.

SPEAKER_07 1:07:29

Let's take a look at this rod, right?

SPEAKER_04 1:07:30

I mean it it looks good from 50. Oh, it's red and white, it's already fast. Yeah. So that's kind of how we got started. And like I said, we didn't know anything about caster or camber. And we thought, well, you gotta have the top ball joint in line with the bottom ball joint. It's got a swivel, right? Well, that doesn't give the car any stability when you go through a corner. If you don't have any caster in it, it's just gonna spin out. Well, right. I figured that out the hard way several times. So I I think my first win ever was in Ed's car because that that was kind of the deal. I built the car, Ed and Jane paid for it, and I believe Jane's got every receipt of every part that was ever bought for that car. She don't miss much, she doesn't miss much. And and I think that that whole car with the driving suit, and I I think you can see that's a Moto 4 Motocross helmet.

SPEAKER_07 1:08:21

So I'm measuring the rivets right now. Yeah, we had goggles.

SPEAKER_04 1:08:25

Oh, really? No, no gloves.

SPEAKER_03 1:08:26

So one of these babies?

SPEAKER_04 1:08:28

Yeah. That's it. I was gonna bring that because you said bring a helmet. Yeah. So I thought I've still got that. I could throw it up here on the table, but decided to.

SPEAKER_03 1:08:36

Episode two, we'll give you time to you can look uh get another box together for that.

SPEAKER_04 1:08:41

It I'll have to knock the dust off. But but no, so I think that first car that that you're holding was like five grand all in. That's driving suit, helmet, no gloves.

SPEAKER_07 1:08:53

Oh, it literally sticker on the sale pane. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:08:56

Oh, that made and and that was when no fear just had come out. Yeah. And and uh that was big in some of the Supercross and Motocross, and we watched all that. And so we were we were all about the no fear stuff, dangerous sports, and it was two tenths quicker with that no fear sticker. It was well, I mean the aerodynamics and everything, and I think yeah, that we didn't have the window cut out on this one, so yeah, it it was just the three-window coop and not the five-window coop. Wow, but no, it's 1992 and we were just didn't know what we didn't know. You see the half-inch chicken wire for the windscreen. That works until a quarter inch aluminum skid plate comes off the bottom of another car and hits you right between the eyes as you're going into turn three at at Boone.

SPEAKER_03 1:09:40

You?

SPEAKER_04 1:09:41

Yeah, it was me. I fell asleep. My wife was up on the catwalk, and I I just remember being in the car. I woke up and Lottie had his head stuck in the window. And I'm like, why why are we stopped? I'm like, did where's are we still racing? He's like, Nope, you crashed, you're down here. I think Rod showed up shortly after that, and of course Perry Ellsworth came right over. He was probably the second one beside Lottie because Lottie was always down there at in three. And uh I just couldn't figure out why I wasn't able to finish the race and then figured out that I I'd taken a little nap. And so then after that it was mandatory. So we did I mean, rules and safety stuff was just kind of a second thought back then. So uh I think Mike Kennedy coined the phrase cliffy bars. So we had to have bars in our windshield now. After that, you couldn't just have the the half-inch chicken wire pop riveted to the sheet metal on the car. And and the safety, everything's just evolved. I mean, the cars have evolved. It's been 34 years since that first car in 1992. And I always said that I was not gonna be the guy. I didn't want to be the guy that's like, well, back in 1980, when we were doing this, and and when people did that when I was 18, and they would be like, back in the 40s, your dad and I'm like, Yeah, I don't really care about the forties, but here I am talking about stuff 40 years ago. Hey, and here we are asking you about it. Yeah, right. And and pretending to be intrigued. Yeah. You all look engaged, so no, I it it's been a it's been a fun time. I mean, obviously life has changed, the people have changed. I've raced with people that aren't here anymore. Uh I I think Wayne Larson and Lyle Scandrit were the ones that brought these cars up originally from Arizona and kind of got the class started up here and and and it was pretty rudimentary geometry. I think the the first cars that I saw had what they call the wiggle stick, like you had on your go-kart. It was just a piece of flat bar welded to the end of a uh rod, and it had one rod going out to the right front and one going out to the left front, and that's when the car turned like you do in the go-kart. It and that's how these cars were raced. Oh yeah. And I I I think the first the one of the biggest brake rules, you had to have at least one rear brake that worked. Didn't have to have front brakes on it. Didn't have to have two rear brakes on it. Which is weird. Yeah. And they were drum brakes. They were drum brakes at the time. So so yeah, things things have really changed. I mean, obviously the cars we have now, the suspension, the shocks are crazy. You know what you can spend on shocks, and everybody's got to change different shocks for different track setup. Back then, I think we had one set of shocks. They were some old Carrera or Pro shocks that that barely worked half the time, but it kept the car from bouncing too much. And I'm pretty sure I had a 400 pound right front spring in the car, and now we're running 200 pound right front, left front.

SPEAKER_07 1:12:48

Well, I was looking at that picture, Cliff, and it's like the coilovers that you guys used back then were like bigger, way bigger than what we're using now. Right. What you guys are using now. I got the luxury of racing uh Mike Kennedy's car. Yep. And I come in and I'm like, I'm going down the back, down the little back thing. I'm like trying to shift, you know, and I'm like, because I figured it you would be able to feel it or hear it or or something. Yep. You can't. Like it that like the shifting is so and with that cloak. Yeah. And they they're like, no, on that little screen, it'll tell you, you know, and I'm like, I'm like, look, I'm like, oh shit, I'm in fourth gear in the pit area.

SPEAKER_04 1:13:33

So we get out into the staging area, and you know, the throw on them thing on the throttles on mics. I I make a longer throw so you have a better feel, but mics is Mike's is pretty short.

SPEAKER_07 1:13:43

So in my brain, I'm like, oh, it's motorcycle. Yeah. Like it's only that much, you know, but super cool.

SPEAKER_04 1:13:50

Way uh lot more flipovers now though than back then. Yeah. Way too common, unfortunately. I there there was talk, I mean, and and this is probably later in the 90s and the 2000s about giving us a little wider wheelbase and a little longer uh yeah, wheelbase and a little wider track width, and and it's just right now you can't change that because there's so many people that have all these cars you couldn't you couldn't make that kind of wholesale change. What kind of rear end did you guys run then? Same quick change? Nope, it was the Toyota. So Toyota made like a Ford 9 inch, so it was a front drop, and you could get the eight bolt or the ten bolt, and you could get like four different five different gear sets with that. So it was just like having a a Ford nine inch in your car. The only problem is you have cage all around it. So it it it took longer to change one of our front loader rear ends than it would for a Ford 9 inch because of that.

SPEAKER_07 1:14:47

Okay, so with that so the motor or the transmission is the same as what's in a bike.

SPEAKER_04 1:14:54

Yep. You just there's a coupler that you buy that you take the sprocket off and you bolt it on and it's got the four bolt flange for your for your U-joint drive shaft.

SPEAKER_07 1:15:05

So, like a lot here's another question, I think a lot of people you can turn them things like 13, 14,000. Our our rev limiter is set to fifteen thousand. Okay. So how often did you actually have to change the gear like to go from Marshalltown to Boone? Do you change the gear or do you just do with the gear shift?

SPEAKER_04 1:15:22

We we do change the gear with this because it's the winner's quick change. So we do change the gear. We we had been running the same gear, but then we figured we would go a little bit it's one tenth of a point lower at Boone just to try to get a little more pull off the bottom. But with the old Toyota stuff, it was so hard to change the gear. Uh we didn't change the rear end gear, and and usually if you change the gear in the transmission, it's too big a jump between so you you we've we've got gear charts that that are just stupid as far as trying to figure out exactly where you want to be with what gear, what your final drive needs to be.

SPEAKER_07 1:16:00

So what I mean, what are you looking to turn that race car on a typical night? I mean, are you turning it nine, ten thousand, or is it I mean, are you like we're thirteen or fourteen thousand?

SPEAKER_04 1:16:14

We're fifteen when we hit the corner. When he we hit the corner, ideally, if if you watch any of the YouTube videos, I've got lights that come on. I you can program the dash inside the car. And I've got lights that come on, I think fourteen five is the first set of lights that come on, and fifteen is the white light. So if you ever watch any of the videos, that that's basically when he's lifting or breaking to get set the car to get into the corner. So ideally, and of course, like say you've seen some of the the all the classes are on the chip. Right. And we're no different. There's there's guys that turn them tighter than us, but we're trying to get through a season without blowing one up.

SPEAKER_07 1:16:52

So Garrett, how do you work with the smart man? Is it is it tough for you to like because he's got I mean he's got lights to tell you, okay, bud, we're at 14,000, we're gonna go up to 15 here in a minute. Like that's pretty cool. That that whole if if nobody's ever seen the the the cluster for a mod light, stop by one of these guys' pits, seriously, because it's it's a really cool thing, actually. Like being able to sit, well, I tell everybody, like the cockpits are the same size as a big car. Yeah, yeah. Like, and people can't fathom that. And I'm like, we built one car, we built that Will's car. Oh, yeah. Um Will Noble's car. Will nobles car. And I'm like, when we were building it, I'm like, man, this is like a little Tinker Tonka. Like it's just everything's it's the same stuff, but it's just smaller. Yeah. Um do you still did back then? Well, we talked about how unrigid the race car is.

SPEAKER_04 1:17:49

How much has that evolved now? I I don't I I think there's just so much with the with the bars, we've got different bar angles, everybody's changing their bar angles. You're changing your roll center by moving your A arms up and down on on the front. So there there's just so many things that you can adjust now that we really back in the day didn't even consider. We the the shocks on the cars, the shock mounts were just hard welded. I mean, you just had your shock mounts up there. Uh everything is adjustable. I mean, the the the brackets you have on the the rear end, you can move your shocks up and down, you can move them to left to right, you can do anything. So it it's almost too much of an adjustment, I think, in a lot of ways, because then you're just chasing, you're trying to figure out where the best uh setup is. And I've kind of taken the the avenue that let's just put the car in a pretty good place and let the driver drive the car and let the track will come to us. Like you said, you watch the the mod lights out there and you can tell kind of what the track's gonna do for you guys based on on what we're doing.

SPEAKER_07 1:18:55

So what kind of tire did you run on back then? Because they seem like they're a little bit bigger, almost kind of like a trailer tire almost, if you're like the you know, the goal or the the chrome hold.

SPEAKER_04 1:19:07

Yep. So it it I think it was whatever Berg Duffs had for sale because Berg Duffs and Ames there there was no real wheel dealer, but oh wheel-wise, but tire-wise, it was mandatory we had to run McQuery's. Oh, and we did finally get, I think Lottie lightened up a little bit to where we could cut out the wear blocks, but we we couldn't open up the tire, we couldn't sipe the tire, we couldn't sand or grind the tire. You never would have known that the mod lights started out grooving tires before any of the big cars. We and we could, but all we could do was just groove out the block. So if if you walked by, a lot of times you're in the pits right now, you see all the long strips of rubber. All you'd see by our pits is just little Z because you would cut out like an inch and a half of the wear block.

SPEAKER_10 1:19:49

Yep.

SPEAKER_04 1:19:49

And that that's all that you would cut out, and you couldn't couldn't do anything else to to help the tire.

SPEAKER_07 1:19:55

We talk about how the mod lights get a real tire, a real rubber tire, and we've talked about uh a couple of times how those tires could like if you're easy on them, they could last you ten nights or more.

SPEAKER_04 1:20:10

Yep. Is that true? That is true. And if you're not I mean now we can run softs in mediums.

SPEAKER_10 1:20:16

What?

SPEAKER_04 1:20:16

Yeah, we've we've got compounds. I mean so what? So yeah, we've we've got some options. And and and so and we can cut them, we can sipe them, we can do do some work to the tires. We're not stuck with whatever came out out of the tire press. So we've got option we can run 205s, 215s, and 235s. So if you want to run a really wide tire, nobody has really experimented with that too much, but it seems like the the two 205s for the three spots in the car and the two fifteen's on the right rear. And we typically run a medium because I'm too cheap to buy soft tires and burn them off every week. Now, how long will a soft tire? I don't know. I've never tried one.

SPEAKER_03 1:21:00

Have you as anybody you know?

SPEAKER_04 1:21:03

I think you need to try a soft tire, bud.

SPEAKER_07 1:21:06

I think you need to try a soft tire. I don't know if you need to get a paper route. Or maybe I don't know if your mom's favorite or dad's favorite, but you need to schmooze one of them for a soft tire. I think that right rear, especially at the Marshtown Speedway.

SPEAKER_04 1:21:23

We we did have a sponsorship deal drawn up here that we were looking at fabrication. Didn't see me before the show started. I snuck that sponsorship contract in there.

SPEAKER_03 1:21:39

I heard you got a call from your lawyer. I just I didn't want to tell Jonathan because you know I didn't want to make him worry.

SPEAKER_04 1:21:45

It's got to be all up on the up and up. Absolutely.

SPEAKER_03 1:21:48

Yes. Um I do want to tell you, you are the first I didn't get I didn't go to my first race until 96. It was my first year I ever went. But you hold the distinction. For me, you are the first person I ever saw go from dead last to the win. And I saw you do it twice.

SPEAKER_04 1:22:07

But you're not telling the rest of the people there were like six covers in the world.

SPEAKER_03 1:22:11

I don't need to tell them that. Let me let me tell my memory. I just that white and blue four bell alarm pump. That thing, it just was sharp. It was always clean, it always looked like it was brand new. And yeah, and I I only went to Stuart, you know, but I seriously I watched you go through just knife through traffic like it was nothing. I'm like, I don't know what this guy's got going on, but it's different than what everybody else is doing.

SPEAKER_04 1:22:45

It was that trailing arms I was telling you about earlier. I don't know. I Stewart was always really good to me. I mean, I I enjoyed the track. It was a long drive, it was a Sunday night, and Mick back then was the promoter, and he was really good about letting the us get out of there pretty early. There were nights that we kind of hung out with the Ron Little Bunch and Don Port Wine and some of those guys and and probably stayed a little bit too long for a Sunday night to get up on Monday. So they knew how to have a good time. They they had a really good time, but we we tried to avoid that so we could get home and get to work the next day.

SPEAKER_09 1:23:19

So Don is trying to see if Andy's got pants on up there. I think he does. I mean the one pointy something.

SPEAKER_07 1:23:28

He left his purse in the trailer.

SPEAKER_03 1:23:33

It took off like Andy's pants. Uh but Stuart was good to you. Stuart was good to me. And a thing that we talked about a little bit before we got on, Des Moines.

SPEAKER_04 1:23:47

Des Moines, yep. Driver's Dream Race. How do you how fast do you think you guys were going down around Des Moines? I don't I don't know because I over a hundred. We had to be close to a hundred. So this one was 2001. Does that sound right? Yeah, that's the driver's dream race that year. And I had the wrong gear in, but I it worked out well. I I probably should have run a little bit higher gear. But yeah, that that was the basically the wife, but the wife and I had been dating for a year at that point.

SPEAKER_03 1:24:15

Okay, so we're starting to date ourselves now. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:24:18

Yep. Um she loved the mullet too, huh? She did. Yeah. The yellow shag carpet at home. That's always a classic, too. Look, you got the 3M on there and the Jocko's. Look at the motorsports photography. Jocko's Jake Elmquist ran Jocko's back then. So I I think I got a like a 10% discount. I thought, man, I've reached a big time. Of course, the electronic fuel pump was like seven bucks back then, but saving saving 70 cents is still right. That's right.

SPEAKER_07 1:24:48

Still confused in his prime doing the old dance up on the flag standard.

SPEAKER_04 1:24:52

Look at the tan on that guy.

SPEAKER_07 1:24:54

Uh-huh. Yeah, we always thought he was half Indian.

SPEAKER_04 1:25:04

But no, I unfortunately for me, that that was the year because I was kind of well, I was on the Mad Cra board at that time, and and we had determined that let's take a little money off the top, because we had paid the driver's dream race a thousand dollars to win. And I said, let's take the money off the top. I said, let's pay the guys that drive from Minnesota and Nebraska and come up. And so we d knocked it down to 500 bucks, and that's that's the year that I won. That's when you won. Okay. Yeah, I think Ed Zeeum won the year year before, so he's still got that thousand dollar check up in his shop if you ever go there to see it. So mine's 500 bucks. I don't think I ever saved the check. I I've got old tires from 92, but I can't save that check. I don't know why.

SPEAKER_10 1:25:46

Wow.

SPEAKER_04 1:25:46

Well, you got a big shed. Not big enough. Well, Jonathan, they're little tires. Yeah, they're little tires. That's true. That's true. You gotta keep that in perspective.

SPEAKER_03 1:25:56

Take up a little less room.

SPEAKER_04 1:25:58

That's true. So, no, I mean, it's just thirty years, thirty-four years. I mean, Bruce Badgley, who's been our photographer, he took the wedding photos for us. I mean, every it's not it comes down when you've been in it this long, it comes down to the people that you're doing it with and not the fact that you're racing. Uh you go to the races every Saturday and every Friday just to hang out with the people. I uh I edit a lot of the YouTube videos for Garrett, and when you watch a heat race, it's like two minutes. The feature might be six minutes. I think the 18 lap feature is like five something this last weekend. So it you put in so much time working on the car and you really the actual seat time is very little when you start looking at at the amount of video that that you produce, and it's just you think, why am I doing this? And then you realize it's it's for the people that you pit with. The mod light guys, like you said earlier, we have potlucks. The the ladies have potlucks all the time. We had walking tacos Saturday night. Come over if you need a walking tacos. Yeah. I mean, you got bang. Well, I'll tell you what, the cookies. Yeah. Uh yeah. Uh huh. Those are the JBM, so Jen Barber Motorsports which started out as a joke and now is it's a real thing. It's a real thing. It's a real thing, I'm telling you, those things are nasty.

SPEAKER_03 1:27:19

Yeah, I'm gonna be sending a 1099 for them because they're gonna do some damage. I'm gonna eat some more. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:27:26

We're not taking them home, so you guys want to roll them up. I think Garrett needs a couple more.

SPEAKER_03 1:27:30

I think he dropped half of one, so he's uh well, everybody's a fan.

SPEAKER_04 1:27:35

So yeah, that that's everybody asks, well, does Jen bring in cookies this weekend? She's like, no, bringing meat for the walking tacos. They're like, oh, can't you just bring cookies?

SPEAKER_09 1:27:45

They only want the cookies.

SPEAKER_03 1:27:50

You don't even need milk with these, they're so good. They're good.

SPEAKER_07 1:27:53

No, you don't need the milk, but it's just the fact that to wash it down. Cookies and milk. It's whatever the little

SPEAKER_03 1:28:00

Hey, it's that salt. Maybe we should get it a couple boxes of these before we go to Florida for when Peyton has his cookies and milk talks.

SPEAKER_07 1:28:08

Cookie and milk talks.

SPEAKER_03 1:28:09

We might be hitting you up, Jim. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:28:11

Yeah, you just could start something like that. Absolutely.

SPEAKER_03 1:28:13

That's not a bad idea.

SPEAKER_04 1:28:16

I think she would make her way over here on Monday nights to drop off cookies for you.

SPEAKER_03 1:28:19

We may have to make that to put a new sponsor up on the board.

SPEAKER_07 1:28:25

So you do all this stuff, you have all the success. Then you kind of step away for a while. They're back there. They're back there. You guys ruined that for all of us fans? I mean, you guys look pretty good, so I mean they you did all right. But then all of a sudden, Garrett Barber comes out of nowhere. Just wham bam Jesse. Yep. It's like, did you see? I'm like, yeah, bud, I've seen it. You know, and I got a little bit of shit because Jason, I I, you know, like when we were talking about who was your favorite mod light driver, right? And Brian Zim's like, Bud, you're not even gonna mention my dad or Cliff Barber. And I'm like, I forgot, like, I forgot, I'm sorry, you know, but Jim Cooper, because he had the old coop. Yep, yep, yep. Like it kind of the mad dog. It looked like the gravedigger car, but you know, shrunk down. It did.

SPEAKER_04 1:29:24

Like he was one of my sedan then. Is that he had the sedan?

SPEAKER_07 1:29:28

Yep. But I just remember, I don't know, there was just something about the deuce, right? Right. And there was something about the four car and Mike Morrell. Like is that how you saw his Morel? Yep. Yep.

SPEAKER_03 1:29:40

Two four and a six. Two four and a six.

SPEAKER_07 1:29:42

Two four and a six. Yep. And Mike always had that red and neon yellow and blue, and like man, you guys were the guys, you know, and and and Brian Zim, we always like to bust him up a little bit, you know. But he sent me a message that was like, I just can't believe you forgot about dad. And I felt so bad because Jane used to come out to Harris. Yep. And man, I mean, she had every note, measurement to the T. And I just got such a kick out of it because she'd talk to Roach, and she would be like, you know, she's real small, and she'd be like, looking like this through her glasses, and Roach is like six, eight. I remember him. He'd have the old Walmart cutoffs on with the frickin' scrunch boot on, you know. It's like I just got such a kick. But those bodies, I mean, your guys' bodies looked phenomenal. So a lot of a lot of memory, because that was when him and I were up in the grandstands when you were out there ripping and kicking kicking ass. We didn't know how cool your mullet was then. But we knew how to get it.

SPEAKER_09 1:30:45

Yeah, I know I I that definitely underappreciated. We knew yeah, we knew how fast now as a thirty now as a 38-year-old man, I I very much appreciate the photos you brought you brought in.

SPEAKER_03 1:30:56

So Ben George just texted me. Oh no. I told him I was gonna read this in front of everybody. We don't even need the lid, do we? No. No, right. He said, My first race ever in a mod light, I show up to Marshalltown, parked next to Big Sexy, and I'm telling him I grew up watching my dad race in the grandstands, and the white and blue number four was my favorite dwarf car. He says, Let's go three trailers over and meet the guy. I'll never forget it.

SPEAKER_04 1:31:22

So that's pretty cool. Yeah. Very cool.

SPEAKER_03 1:31:26

Ben, uh he's told me that before, that you're you were his favorite. And I've heard that from a lot of people. I mean, but it's just it was hard to get that. Like I said, when you showed up, the thing looked brand new every time. And that blue four stuck out. And oh, and not to mention you just drove to the front almost every week, too. So that made it a lot easier.

SPEAKER_04 1:31:45

Well, and I didn't want to be one of those guys that win and everybody hates because you're always winning. So I I think I had a pretty good hate sandbag every once in a while. So no, I still do. I still try to help people out. I mean, I want I want people to do well. I I want people to have their cars set up because they're racing with my car, and I don't want them to be squirrels all over the place. So the more you can help them be consistent in the corner or get down the straightaway. I mean I mean I'm not the setup guy. I would give that to Randy Bryant, but I I can get a car pretty close to where you can drive it to the front if you need to. But just be predictable. And and so I was always trying to help people. I still build parts for many of the the dwarf mod lights, I guess, nowadays.

SPEAKER_09 1:32:33

Well, and and like that group we've talked about it before, like that group of guys seems to be like the closest more close knit, right? Obviously, it's kind of a smaller niche group, I guess you could call it. Right, yeah. Smaller group. Yeah, but he you know what I'm you know what I mean? Like it seems like anybody that wins a race uh mentions Cliff or Randy or somebody that has helped them along the way or is still helping them. Um and that's really, really cool. Like I said, you guys do the the Mad Cred deal, the potlucks, like um and I mean we're pretty consistent at high twenties, low thirties now, right as far as cars go.

SPEAKER_03 1:33:21

It wasn't that long ago we were in the teens. Yeah. And it's it's been picking up steadily, and I mean I I would attribute that to the closeness of all you guys. But then I'm not gonna say I don't like the word affordability because racing it's it's not a part of it. But it allows you guys to come together, go out and have fun. Yeah, sometimes you have some bad stuff happen. You have some guys get upside down or whatever, but you also have some damn good racing going on. Yeah. And and getting to watch your son, you know, go out. And you watched him from a different perspective on Saturday.

SPEAKER_04 1:33:55

A little bit different. I didn't get to see much of him. I did see him when he went around the pace truck. I'm like, I'm not sure where he's going, but he came I did see him when he came back to get in line, but that's the only two times I saw him.

SPEAKER_09 1:34:05

I was looking at Logan and I was like, the hell's going on over here.

SPEAKER_04 1:34:11

He just taking an extra hot. I thought he I think he thought he deserved it. But no, I I mean, yeah, we they rained out Friday. We didn't go over Friday. It was the wife and I were gonna do a date night, and so it rained out Friday, and all of them, the mod light guys, ended up at Applebee's over there, and they're all I I don't know, I guess they have like all you can eat wings and riblets and whatever. So you can imagine what Applebee's thought when all these car race car drivers come in and they're they're all ordering that. I guess the ladies didn't order that, but pretty much all the drivers ordered that just all the people looked at them weird too, because whenever somebody walked in, they all went like it's like the secret secret handshake, a secret wave.

SPEAKER_07 1:34:55

That's my way. What did you think about the finger wave like back in the day, like when they said that you were supposed to wave like this, or do you know who started it?

SPEAKER_04 1:35:07

I don't know how it started. It I think it came up from Arizona when the covers came up. And I I thought it was kind of funny when you were kind of promoting it here on your show. Yeah, I think it's great. Yeah, and Garrett Garrett hopped right on the bandwagon, and so I I got YouTube, or I didn't put it on YouTube, I cut that part out because people don't want to watch him waving at the crowd.

SPEAKER_07 1:35:26

So, but no, going down the front stretch, he's got the little finger wave, so he's well I noticed too, like some of the new guys, they're like doing the whole lift lid thing, and I'm like, guys, come on, like sticking your arm out the thing and doing this is way cooler than doing the lid lift, or whatever they're calling it.

SPEAKER_03 1:35:42

Lift your lift the lid and then get your hand out there and do that. I mean, you could that that game in the craft you're like that we'll have to bend George John Brantham because it's arms about info level.

SPEAKER_07 1:35:55

Oh, but then he can just take his other one out. Back in the day, like every one of them did that. Yeah, that was like the thing, like everybody's you know, stuck their finger out there, and I like I'm down on the fence. I was excited about it, you know what I mean? So to like when I seen a couple guys doing that, I'm like, man, that's like bring it back. Yeah, like that's and then we everybody kind of like went with it, and then kind of we st there's still guys doing it. And Jerry, my my one of my favorite things about Jerry lately is that he does pump the shit out of that. He does. I mean, he really does. I mean, he tries to get it pumped out.

SPEAKER_03 1:36:37

He always first feature of the night, he always works on people on their feet, and then he brings the finger dance in, yeah, it's it is cool.

SPEAKER_07 1:36:43

It's like the little hype up to the start of the features, you know. You got the little guys out there, and then you got somebody like John Brantham step out of it and it's like that guy's not so little. In that little car. Holy shit.

SPEAKER_03 1:36:55

How in the hell does he get in that?

SPEAKER_07 1:36:57

Right, but then it's like you forget that their cockpit is the same size. Like I keep saying that because it does not look like they are, does it? I mean, it so were they the same size back you know, were they a little bit smaller, or is it that evolved too?

SPEAKER_04 1:37:12

Yeah, that that's evolved some because the seat back rule is a little bit different. Because everything's based off your front spindles, how far back your seat has to be and the and so that has increased a little bit, which all that does is take room away from the front side of your rear end. So now your J bar or your your uh pan hard bar, whichever one you're running, now you got a little bit less room to work with there. So it's kind of a trade-off. Fortunately, guys like me, short legs, long body, I can give up a little bit of that that seat room and leg room as well.

SPEAKER_07 1:37:44

So I heard you say that you still build some parts just for some random cars? Yeah, like is this like secret pull bar shit like what you and Ed had going on, or is that only a Garrett thing?

SPEAKER_04 1:37:56

No, that's no the whole the whole car. So I've Oh right now I've got three cars Garrett's car, Grant Anderson's car, and uh Corey Saunner's car that I've built. What do you call them? CBR CBR CBR race cars. CBR. Okay, I didn't know that. All right, all right. Um I've been trying to build another car this summer with with the plan I've got people that have asked to for me to build a car, and it hasn't happened because Grant's car's been in my shop, Garrett's car's been in my shop, and Corey's car has been in my shop because of accidents. Boys, quit wrecking your shit. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_09 1:38:34

Hey, we got another one on the schedule. Could you please stop thank you?

SPEAKER_04 1:38:39

That that's what the people the people on the schedule are like, you guys gotta leave Cliff alone so we can build the cars up.

SPEAKER_07 1:38:45

I knew that Randy had started the bullet chassis thing. Okay, so I was like, holy shit, that's pretty cool that Randy started doing that. I mean, Randy's been racing in the Mod Light series for a long time. Yep. Um, my neighbor was actually on uh Ron Graham.

SPEAKER_04 1:38:58

Okay, yep. Yep, I know Ron Graham.

SPEAKER_07 1:39:01

Yep, he lived right across the street from my parents' place. Um and uh yeah, he's not nervous no more. Um so I just know Randy, you know, and so like when he started that bullet deal, I'm like, holy crap, I mean that's kind of cool. Then I got the opportunity to build, it was just a one-time deal. Like that deal kind of didn't go the way that we all anticipated it to, which I was fine with because it was like, man, we're already super busy, and you mod light guys are weird. In a good way. In a good way, in a good way. Weird in a good way. I'm just saying, like, there's just so much going on with all the tabs and the the front suspension stuff, and we need to beef this up and we need to do that, and I'm like, this is a lot going on, you know. And I was trying to do it to just see it well, it was basically they were gonna bring the car to me and have me just weld it together for them. I thought that was kind of what I'd heard. Yeah, it basically they they had all the stuff, they brought it to us, we welded it together, whatever. Um and then I that whole deal just kind of fell apart, which whatever, you know. But it was really cool to build it and then but like building the body, like everything's just small, you know. So how long have you been building CBR cars?

SPEAKER_04 1:40:15

So actually Ed's car, the 41 car, 92 was the first car that I built, and we started with the Torgas and Jassy and then I did all the suspension. Uh I probably built probably 99 was like one of the first ones I built. I picked a couple pickup trucks. Uh I built uh John Gardner out, I don't know if you guys remember him, Troy Hudson. Uh it was his stepdad. But he he he had a pickup truck that I converted because that one point. I remember that thing actually, yeah. We we weren't allowed to have mod lights. We could have the pickups, but we couldn't have a mod body on the same chassis, same suspension, same air. We cannot put that sheet metal onto our cars. It had to be a pickup truck or an old car. And that that rule kind of there was a guy out in eastern Iowa, Harold Hill, that was big into dwarf cars. I think he had like four or five of them, and and he was modifying them all up. And at that time we had a bumper rule that your bumper couldn't be so far in front of your wheels. So everybody's nose was pretty much straight up and down, so it looked like a refrigerator on the track. I mean it looked there was no character to the car. Hideous. Yeah, and and they finally loosened the rule up so now you can get a little bit more rake because the modified nose is really right, and these look a lot more like the modified nose. So do you like that or do you like the old school? I I like the style of the old school, love the style of the old school. The new stuff, it's pretty easy to build sheet metal and their flat sheets with like a couple bins and maybe a roll or two in it. But otherwise I I like I like building the cars. I've I've gotten to the point in my life I I tried like Josh said, I tried to race. I went in circles Saturday and went and called racing. And and I have more fun building the car and watching Garrett and just there's no pressure. I just sat in the lawn chair until it's time to go race, and then I get walk up to the catwalk and find a spot to stand. So I I don't know, that I still enjoy the racing. It was a lot of fun, don't get me wrong, but it's got to a point where I'm I really enjoy the the fabrication and hanging out with the people. Right. And I don't piss a lot of people off if I'm sitting in the trailer up on a catwalk. Come on to my trailer, come down to my trailer, Cliff, I'll teach you how to do it. Just stand in there.

SPEAKER_07 1:42:32

Josh, are you gonna ask your question? Well, I have to.

SPEAKER_03 1:42:36

Yeah, I mean you have to.

SPEAKER_04 1:42:37

Let's hear it.

SPEAKER_03 1:42:38

How'd you get your number?

SPEAKER_04 1:42:40

So racing dirt bikes, and I was rac at that time racing hair scrambles, and it was in the eighty six, eighty-seven era, and I ended up with that number because at that time we were all basically a 250 class or an open class or a 125 class, and they decided they were gonna make a double A class, and so the top ten writers in points, no matter what class you were in, got your how you finished in the state that year, and I finished fourth in the state in the double A class.

SPEAKER_09 1:43:13

Yeah, that's how they're like, Yeah, like I think that's how um I think Tom Barry's dad was a national number eleven like back in the day at one point in time. So that's wh how he kept the eleven, because like that was how you finish your points. That if if you got a single digit number, that's because you were that's where you finished, yep. No shit.

SPEAKER_04 1:43:35

So I mean it's just like supercross and motocross now. You the number one plate is reserved for the number one finisher. Everybody else can re revert back to their old numbers. So yeah, I just I've got a lot of old racing, motorcycle racing pictures with the number four, and I always had a Suzuki, so I've still got I've got like a 1985 Suzuki GS 1150 sitting in the shop. Just it's in mint condition and probably should be ridden. It's got 13 right. Well, get on that thing, brother. Come on.

SPEAKER_06 1:44:07

Oh, oh, Shannon's saying, come on, see that in the kids. That's what both of the kids want to.

SPEAKER_07 1:44:23

We're not coming over again on Friday.

SPEAKER_04 1:44:26

Again, that's the problem with adult children. They don't understand what date night is for us. It's different for them. Right.

SPEAKER_09 1:44:34

He's got a mullet wiggy buttons on and ride through the town.

SPEAKER_04 1:44:41

I got my my tank top on, bike beater, we're ready to go. Hell yeah.

SPEAKER_07 1:44:45

That is awesome. But what's cool that you know we we asked, I talked to you a little bit off air about, you know, do you have your helmets and your suits and stuff like that? And just hearing that you have a 1985 Suzuki just sitting there in mint condition tells me that you probably kept all that stuff. My dad's always hounding me about it because he's like, Man, when you get my age, he's 60. Yep. He's like, You're gonna regret that you don't have that stuff. And thankfully, my grandmother kept like all the paper articles, and he's got most of his suits, a few I mean, he lost some in his firehouse or in that we had a house catch on fire and stuff. But man, if you're out there and you're a racer and you're old school or even young school or whatever you are, don't and you have the ability to keep your stuff, keep it because like when you get old, like I mean, I just turned 38 and I think about this shit. It's nice to have that suit. I keep forgetting I did have dad's old suit that one day.

SPEAKER_09 1:45:49

It's uh and I took a try it out.

SPEAKER_07 1:45:52

You know what I'm saying though?

SPEAKER_09 1:45:53

Like my dad brought over the duffel bag from 1989, and it has that suit, that white one, that he's holding me in in that corner picture. He that's the suit that he had in the he's like, Oh, your mom found this in the attic. I'm like, holy shit, it's like a rainbow. I put it on, I put it on, and I'm like, You were the same size as me, brother. I don't know.

SPEAKER_04 1:46:14

That's pretty cool. Well, that's the shirt that Natalie's got on right there, is an old school. That's the OG. Oh, yeah. Yep, and that that's that was kind of the same thing. Jen just found it out laying in a tote out in the shop, and Natalie's like, What are you gonna do with that? And I said, I don't know, probably put it back in the tote. She's like, Can I have it? So that's awesome. So she got and it's still got the number 10, the Ron Little number 10 patch on there. Oh, oh shit. Nice. Yeah, when I had uh intensity did the shirts for me, and I said, You gotta put the 10 on because that was right after Ron had passed. So I said, That's gotta be part of that.

SPEAKER_03 1:46:49

So is it the number 10 or the helmet with the 10? Because it had multiple. It was just the round black with the white 10 on it. Okay, but yep. Yep. What year was it that Ron passed away? 99. 99. That's uh well you probably were there that yeah. I was parked parked right next to him.

SPEAKER_04 1:47:06

Yep, and I I think I'd gone home and heard later that that had happened. So and I still I see Lacey and obviously Joe and Mary and now Nate, who's usually out in corner number two, and oh yeah, he's we're we talk to him every time we get a chance and give him grief for not being here during the weekly shows and show up once a year and takes all the glory, hangs out in number two, and and but no, it it's like I said, it's all part of the family. You you know generations. I mean, I can remember when you were little. I I for some reason I think the first story that I really remember was you being in trouble.

SPEAKER_02 1:47:43

Oh, weird.

SPEAKER_04 1:47:46

It it's all clean. I think you had gotten a four-wheeler stuck down in the mud pit at Supernational's. Oh, yeah. That that was the first story I really knew that that you were kind of the trouble that you've ended up beating.

SPEAKER_08 1:47:58

Well, well, they told me that I couldn't do it. Okay. Told me that I can't do it, I'm gonna do it.

SPEAKER_04 1:48:05

Yeah, but it's my understanding you weren't able to you got about halfway through and left the four-wheeler.

SPEAKER_07 1:48:10

Well, that's because we pulled the fence down. Um the fence was still. Yep. The deal was is if I could make it across there, I was gonna get a barrel of fuel. Remember? And I backed that sucker up, man, and I hit that thing, and it would just, I mean, it just that there was a lot of water in there, dude. A lot of water, and then I was sick for about two weeks after that. Oh my bad. Soaking wet.

SPEAKER_04 1:48:39

Boon Lake. Yeah. Oh man, no bacteria in there. I'm sure it was fresh water. It's probably fine. It's probably fine.

SPEAKER_03 1:48:45

I don't know how many campers probably got dumped upstream of that back in the day.

SPEAKER_08 1:48:50

I don't know if you need to know that, Josh.

SPEAKER_03 1:48:52

I don't know if that happens anymore. Well, I was out there in 2001, the year they got so much rain. Oh. You remember that year? Yeah, I do. It flooded that hole. Yes. We were standing in the camper and Hoosier. Well, I don't know if they'd have been Hoosier's then. They might have been McCreary's. It well, whatever. Race tires were floating down, and we were grabbing them and throwing them up on top of the camper, and coolers full of beer. It was all kinds of stuff. It was tents. Wild shit.

SPEAKER_04 1:49:18

Yeah, I couldn't believe how crazy that was. It was wild though. That was that was a mess. That was a lot of water.

SPEAKER_09 1:49:24

I remember one one one year. I it might have been the same year. I was nah, we were maybe a little older, but same same deal where the uh pit campground flooded, and you could see coolers floating and whatever else, and so Chad Christiansen. Somebody yelled something at him, and I don't remember what the deal was, but the guy was flipping off to him. So Chad just reaches over and unplugs unplugs his Gamper out and drops it, drops it in the water. He's like, plug it back in. Oh man. But it was like there was coolers floating, lawn chairs floating, like all drive.

SPEAKER_03 1:50:11

Well, you know, where that all ends up in the main driveway and goes into that culvert. There was just collections of coolers and everything that would float just sitting there. Um I know we gotta go to a break.

SPEAKER_07 1:50:25

We need to go to a break, and then we gotta come back to. Am I shut off?

SPEAKER_03 1:50:28

No, you're just you're like in the water, but I feel like I can't. Your right rear is like lagging back. What's going on? There you go, you gotta do that. That's better. I still feel like I can't.

SPEAKER_09 1:50:39

You gotta put some put some lead in that thing. Get it right.

SPEAKER_07 1:50:42

Yeah, we need to go to a quick break here and uh thank our great marketing sponsors, and uh we're gonna come back because there's some some really good barber questions we're gonna ask him in this next segment here. Uh so with that being said, I think we can send it off to our great marketing sponsors, and you have been watching Watermelons and Workshop.

SPEAKER_01 1:51:11

Welcome to the Adobe Lounge located in Boone, Iowa, at 915 West Mamie Eisenhower. Our hours are Monday to Friday, 1 p.m. to close, Saturday and Sunday, noon to close. Come enjoy some of the strongest drinks in town and the best homemade pizzas around. Whether you're stopping in to relax, meet friends, or grab a bite, the Adobe Lounge is the place to be. See you soon.

SPEAKER_05 1:51:42

This is Dustin Jarrett, and you are watching the Watermelons and Wood Chips podcast with my guys Cody, Josh, and the Bobcat.

SPEAKER_09 1:51:54

Welcome back, RaceFans, Watermelons and Wood Chips. And uh we were talking to Cliff, um, but we have to announce well, we did put it online, right? So by the time this comes out, it'll already be up online. But uh the winners for the passes to Lucas Oil.

SPEAKER_07 1:52:14

Yeah, LucasOil pass uh Josh sent me a text message of it. Amber Richards picking up, right? Is that right? Yeah. Amber Richards, Amber, and Ambered. Amber Ambered Amber and Wes Richards picking that up, uh, courtesy of the watermelons and watermelons, wood chips, loaf fabrication. We did have a couple other people that were drawn, but you weren't subscribed to the page.

SPEAKER_10 1:52:40

Yep.

SPEAKER_07 1:52:41

If you guys, you guys are like a bunch of young kids, you don't listen. All you gotta do is read. We learn how to do that in third to fifth grade, maybe a little younger. But uh it's real simple. We put a post on there, we give you the directions. It's like getting an owner's manual for something. If they give you an owner's manual or they tell you to do something, just do it. It's real simple.

SPEAKER_03 1:53:03

It's a $300 and some dollar value.

SPEAKER_07 1:53:05

$300 and some dollar value, and you didn't do it because you guys will all be rage clickers or clickbaiters on Facebooks, but you can't follow a simple instruction. And that's okay.

SPEAKER_03 1:53:16

And it's free.

SPEAKER_07 1:53:17

Uh Amber and Russ Richards are greatly appreciative of you unclickers on the first couple uh you unclickers?

SPEAKER_03 1:53:26

That might be a sticker.

SPEAKER_07 1:53:30

So congratulations to those guys. Um we were gonna I'm I'm I'm super pumped up about the Silver Dollar Nationals this week. Um starting Wednesday, qualifying there at the Shelby County Speedway. Uh doing uh it's actually an MLRA race for the late models on Wednesday, and then it's qualifying for the IMCA stock cars, IMCA Modified's Wednesday, and then they're racing for 5G come Thursday, both classes, and then the big boys start.

SPEAKER_03 1:53:58

Wham bam.

SPEAKER_07 1:53:59

Well, I think the big boys are on Wednesday too, but it's like a 5,000.

SPEAKER_03 1:54:02

Yeah, it's not it's like their their actual show kind of starts on Thursday.

SPEAKER_07 1:54:07

Yeah, the Lucas show starts on Thursday, but they're having another show that pays a little bit less, which I'm I'm assuming a lot of those drive well. We always say that, and then you see some of these other big touring events, they might have it, they're like, uh, we're gonna save it for you know Wednesday or Thursday's program. Um so we'll be tuned in listening to the old Dean of Dirt uh made the trip uh out to Boone County last night for that big event, and now has drove his little tan butt over to Beatrice, Nebraska to watch this 16,000 to win IMCA modified show that we're watching here in the background right now. Um super cool. Thanks for everybody that participated in the drawing. Um it's just one more reason to watch the show. I mean, we're giving away cool stuff all the time. Um so we want to thank uh everybody at Log Fab for busting their tails on that and being able to support that. Everybody also too here at Watermelons and Woodchips for doing such the cool drawing. But with that being said, we've got some dad questions to ask over here to the number four.

SPEAKER_10 1:55:18

Yeah.

SPEAKER_07 1:55:19

Okay. I mean, when did you know Garrett was gonna be serious about this, or did you push him, or did he come to you, or how did it work?

SPEAKER_04 1:55:28

No, it it was not neither. I think when he was little, he was probably two or three years old. We everybody's got furniture in their living room, he would get on the footstool and he had Hot Wheel cars, and he would just roll them back and forth like six inches at a time. And he would just be like tranced, in a trance, watching the tires wheels go around on the Hot Wheels. And he would get uh cardboard I had cardboard pieces in the shop from boxes, and he would draw up racetracks and he'd draw fans in the stands on these just the two-dimensional with the Sharpie. And so I I knew that he was really into it, and he started watching some of the NASCAR races as he got older. And and as he was growing up, I really wasn't I didn't have a car, wasn't really around. I sold the car, I think, when he was four or five, just before he started school, I think. So I d I didn't have a car, he didn't grow up around a race car at that time. But he knew that I was going to supernationals and and working, so he kind of knew of the races there, but he would know all the NASCAR drivers' names, he would know the guys that that are like not qualifying. I'm like, how do you remember these guys?

SPEAKER_07 1:56:35

Proud dad moment right there, bud. So way to be on top of that one.

SPEAKER_04 1:56:38

I can't remember what I had for lunch, and he he can tell you NASCAR drivers from the 70s that I've probably never heard of either. But I don't know, he's just always been involved, wanted to be around races, and then we've started going. Obviously, we've got a uh newspaper article from when he would set in the stands with his mom, and they'd uh Natalie and Garrett would both have their earmuffs on, and mom was pretty rigid about that. You could if you're taking them off, you're not going to the races. So we started going to the races when they were little just to watch, and and obviously I was working uh as good friends with Perry Ellsworth out in the track, so I knew a lot of the people, Nathan Freel our families go back to the 50s. So it just Nathan's the water truck guy. Yeah.

SPEAKER_07 1:57:22

Just so everybody knows Nate, the water truck man.

SPEAKER_04 1:57:24

Yeah. So it just I knew everybody there, so that's kinda how I started going back. I got I became good friends with Ron Bragg and he was the guy at the that let the cars onto the track at the at the time. So I was always there and then he was wanting to tag along, and then Jen would go over with the kids and then leave early 'cause it was their bedtime. And uh I don't know, we started talking more seriously about it as so I ended up with cancer in twenty twenty two and I had uh enough tubing on the ground in the shop, taking up space in the shop to build another race car. And I thought I guess I just as well make something of this. I I got a second chance, I'm cancer free. So I thought I'm gonna make it. Well, congratulations, first of all.

SPEAKER_07 1:58:08

That's a very, very awesome thing to hear. We're glad that you got remission or however the hell is that how you say it?

SPEAKER_04 1:58:16

That's it, they call it NED. So it's no evidence of disease. Oh. So I'd never heard it until I went through it either, so I got to ring the gong.

SPEAKER_03 1:58:24

It's the best Ned I've ever heard of.

SPEAKER_04 1:58:27

So I I thought, you know, I'd get a second chance and and I'll build I've got it all the tubing. I've got this car is three-dimensionally on the computer, so I can rotate it. I can he talks about Garrett rolling the wheels and stuff. Yeah, I started. I'm just saying. Anyway, sorry, I just had to bring that up. So no, we did I just started building a car and and it it worked out that he was at the age where he was wanting to drive, and I'm like, you know, you always are a little skeptical whether he's really gonna be serious about it or if it's just a novelty thing and and and how serious he wants to help. We did have that that father-son conversation about if you're gonna be driving it, you're gonna be wrecking it, you're gonna have to help. And not just setting out in the I've got two very nice recliners in the shop and a big screen TV, and he spends some time on that. And I and we had that that conversation. I'm like, you're not gonna just sit out here and watch me work on the car. I'll do it, I'll get it built, and then you're gonna help with the maintenance on the car. So yeah, it was it it all started after that. I just built the car, and then he was wanting to go for the IMCA national rookie points, and he could only run, I think, ten races at at the time, and that was what two years ago. And so we ran those ten races, nine races, I think we ended up with, and then I raced the car after that, and then he drove it last year and ended up qualifying for the A main for the uh supernational. Which is something that you didn't get to do. No, I don't have that helmet. That is not my helmet. Yeah, and I never did let you're right, go ahead. Uh I mean, I'm just throwing that out there.

SPEAKER_06 2:00:07

Garrett's got one on you, okay.

SPEAKER_07 2:00:10

And so, like, when was when did you know, like, okay, I think we got a driver here. I mean, was was it the moment that he picks up one of these hot rods? One of these cool, like, there aren't very many of these for the mod lights. Like, this is a cool thing. Is was it that moment or was it like, you know, the first time he wrecked it real good and he wasn't scared of it.

SPEAKER_04 2:00:37

No, I think in hot laps over at Marshalltown he ran into the side of a guy when they were slowing down. So that's how we became friends with Jackson Carr and the car family, was because Garrett had doored him going going into one and two, and I said, Yeah, that's not how you should be driving the car. No, I I think it it came probably the tail end of his the year that he was just running a few random races. He I'm like, Oh, he's got a little car control and some throttle control, and and and respectful of other drivers, he's not using the car, he's not using eight wheels out there, and and I I think that's if you can protect your stuff and save your stuff and and be good to your stuff, your car is gonna work better for you. You're not chasing a setup if you're fixing it.

SPEAKER_07 2:01:20

I mean, we were kind of talking a little bit, it's like Cliff Barber just vanishes from the racing world. Yep. I mean, devastated many kids across the country because of how good he was at the finger dance and how fast he was, right?

SPEAKER_10 2:01:33

Devastated many kids.

SPEAKER_07 2:01:35

I mean, I'm just saying. And then all of a sudden, this 44 car comes out of nowhere. And not only does he come out of nowhere, everybody's like, oh my god, that's a barber. Is it is it any relation to Cliff? Well, it's gotta be because he's in a frickin' mob light. And then he goes out and he's starting to win races like right away. Like picking up kind of where the old man left off. Yeah, he's I mean, that's I that's uh I my son is 17, hasn't really showed a lot of interest, but like this last week when we went on the North Dakota tour, like he sh he put in the work, he's put in the effort and was there, and it was like that. Yep. Like I I can't I hope that he won't I mean I kinda hope that he wants to raise, but at the same time I'm thinking the shit but I tore up a lot of shit too. So I can envy and my dad just loves it. So I'm waiting for that at a boy moment for my son. And so seeing how much success he's had right out of the gate, um, been a Garrett Barber fan since then, just because I'm like I mean, I used to like the one four, now we've got a double four, and he's winning races, and like, where'd this kid come from?

SPEAKER_09 2:02:51

So Well, he started to get better towards the end of the year, too, and started clicking stuff off, and then was that and then it's like when he got that though, that was like by like this, like nine thousandths of a second.

SPEAKER_04 2:03:03

I mean, it was close.

SPEAKER_07 2:03:05

He was like really good out of the gate, then it was almost like he kind of got like a girlfriend or something, then we kind of slowed around a little bit. Yep. That that's this that's this year's is that what it is? Yeah. Don't worry, I'll send you an email about how to handle that later.

SPEAKER_04 2:03:21

It is funny though, because he he won three races at the end of the year, and I'm pretty sure he only led one lap of each of those races. Then then he gets to start on the pole, I guess, for the topless race, and we've got fuel issues. So he led more laps in a race that he finished, like I don't know, fourth, fifth. I can't remember what he actually finished. So that the laps that he's led isn't doesn't equate to the wins that he's had.

SPEAKER_07 2:03:46

So well, that's another thing that you got to put on your checklist that dad didn't get to, you went topless. Yeah, that's true. I mean, that was super cool though that you guys got together and did that just because the mod lights have kind of evolved into the mini modifieds, right? And that's like a topless thing, and I thought it was really cool that Chris was okay with you guys doing that just because I had said something to Brett about doing a topless stock car race. Oh just because you know if they're doing topless mods, I mean there are open wheels. Let's give us vendor guys some some open roof, and then I'm like, well, it'd be kind of hard, and it'd look really weird because it would it'd be hard because your your quarter panels and stuff, you know, attach to the roof versus I think you should just go doorless and stall. Doorless? Yes, just doorless. Well, if the if the cockpits weren't completely enclosed like they used to be, it'd be way cooler because you could see our legs and shit like that. Was one of the coolest things when the doors got ripped off back. We wouldn't be wearing shorts, but we'd we would definitely be seeing the race pants.

SPEAKER_04 2:04:48

So I I do think since we're talking about the topless, we need to get in. It's not the twin topless if we're gonna do this next year, right?

SPEAKER_07 2:04:55

Yeah, it's gotta be the triple topless. Absolutely. BZ or uh Chris Burke, he I think he's already on it.

SPEAKER_04 2:05:02

He's got the triple threat, triple threat going on. And I watched your episode after you drove Mike's car. Yeah. And I think Chris was on, I don't know, that episode or one after that. So I I'd almost gone over to Pitt to his pit to say, Chris, you just need to hop in Garrett's car and hot lap it because have the same experience that you had. Yeah. So this is an open invitation to Chris to come hot lap car. Oh, there you go. Hotlap Garrett's car night.

SPEAKER_07 2:05:28

CB1. I envy Chris getting called out by Cliff Barber on the episode. Come on. That's gonna hit the papers tomorrow morning, folks. Stay tuned for that one.

SPEAKER_08 2:05:44

Holy moly.

SPEAKER_03 2:05:46

CB12 and a half. I love it. Cliff, I gotta I gotta ask you, there this has stuck in my mind for a while. I saw a big change in the dwarf cars when Troy Hudson, you said him's name a little bit ago. Yep. When he jumped out of, I think he was in a hobby stock. He may have done a little sport mod racing. But then when he got in the dwarf cars and then they started to become the mod lights, that's about to me when that thing evolved. Was do you know what what was going on? He won everything there was to win.

SPEAKER_04 2:06:17

He did. I mean, and and he had a really good car and a well-built motor. So I mean, kudos to him. He did everything right. It everything worked well for them.

SPEAKER_09 2:06:25

Well, it had to be the car builder, right? Because then you put build that car.

SPEAKER_04 2:06:28

No, I didn't I built his his brother-in-law or his stepbrother's car. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay. So now never mind. I can't take credit or blame for either one. So no, I I don't know if it seemed like it did kind of take off after that. I don't know if that had an effect. It may or may not be.

SPEAKER_09 2:06:44

Well, it probably just like you know, like we talk about sometimes it's you know, all ships rise with the tide. Yep. I mean, he was so much faster than everybody for that stint, or whatever you want to call it. Like, I think it just forced everybody to get faster too.

SPEAKER_03 2:07:00

Well, you didn't you didn't see those cars pulling the left front up. Yep. And Troy came out and he was looking like John Logue, miniature. I mean, that thing there's times I'm like, damn, he's gonna flip that thing, he's so far up in the air, but his he was gripped up.

SPEAKER_07 2:07:15

Yeah, but that's also when they started tumbling a little bit more, too. They were getting a little bit more. I mean Yep.

SPEAKER_03 2:07:24

Getting on the right rear farther than anybody else.

SPEAKER_04 2:07:27

Yeah, because what what does Jerry say about the inertia winning out, the force of inertia winning out over the force of gravity, and that's when when you start to get up and your role center gets higher. I mean, absolutely your center of gravity. So you're you're fighting the center of gravity versus your role center, and it's a fine line. Yeah. I mean, you want to be right on the edge, you want to get, like you said, gripped up as much as you can, but you can't go too far and and go over.

SPEAKER_03 2:07:50

But you should also know that you know what you're talking about. Jerry does not, he just has that written down and he says it really well.

SPEAKER_07 2:07:57

He does say, I mean, he does have a lot of believers.

SPEAKER_03 2:08:00

I'm just kidding, Jerry. Don't get mad.

SPEAKER_04 2:08:02

But and from a physics standpoint, the inertia does win over on so he I've yep, I've got to give him that one. So but no, it's it's I don't know, it seemed like in the I think the Andy Hinneger, there were a couple of Hennigers. Oh man, I forgot that name. And and those guys that they were Andy and Tim, right? Yeah, Tim, yeah. And they they were all and and they were all in on this thing. So I mean they they were working on the car setups, and and again, it's we all had to raise up, rise up with to to meet where they were at to to be competitive with them. And and I I think it's worked out for the the class as a whole.

SPEAKER_03 2:08:39

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 2:08:39

You look now, we get twenty-five to thirty-two. We were missing like five cars last weekend that that are here on a regular night. Mike Kennedy was gone, uh Hartleys were gone. So we we missed and the car was gone. So we missed several cars and we were still at thirty cars for this weekend. Which is great. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_07 2:08:59

We talked about here a couple of times just how big the Supernationals is getting. Yep. You know, I mean, I know that they run these mod lights in other parts of the country. It'd be really cool to get them guys to come out to Supernationals and maybe break that hundred car mark.

SPEAKER_04 2:09:14

Yep, that's what we're shooting. That's what we're hoping to get this year. Right. And we've got it's uh it's I guess there's a movement with almost everybody that wants to race. People move here, you got the Chaz Baca that comes in, you've got Fitz coming in, they're coming from all over the country to race with us. Well, now we've got some of the benders. There's a a daughter or a wife and husband that are gonna move out here to to race with us. Really? Yeah. They're they're gonna I'm not sure what the timing is, but uh they're coming out soon. They heard about all the cookies and crocodile. We're coming there just for the food, okay? Uh-huh. That that's Bobcat's coming over for the cookouts next time.

SPEAKER_07 2:09:53

Oh, I'm gonna be coming over. If there's cookies like that and shit over there, I mean everybody's like, he really got a mod like. Are we gonna be around him? Just going over to CBR over there for talking and a quick drink.

SPEAKER_04 2:10:07

I mean, you did hot lap Kennedy's card, so he's kind of an institution also.

SPEAKER_07 2:10:12

I felt like when I was over there, everybody was like, What's he doing?

SPEAKER_06 2:10:17

And then I'm like, I'm like, he's in our world.

SPEAKER_07 2:10:21

I get in there and I'm like, man. I mean, Mike's a big boy. Yeah, Mike's a big boy. So I'm like, I better really tighten these belts down because the seat's a little big for the old Bob Cat.

SPEAKER_03 2:10:34

But you hadn't had that feeling before, had you? Easy. Oh nah. Your current seat is getting bigger.

SPEAKER_07 2:10:42

Oh, yeah. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, it is, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 2:10:44

You've stretched it out, now you gotta pull it back in.

SPEAKER_07 2:10:46

Well, when the doctor basically says that you're a fat ass without actually saying it, and it's the first time you meet this gal, you listen.

SPEAKER_03 2:10:52

Okay.

SPEAKER_07 2:10:53

Well, my other one retired. Uh so then I had to go in for a checkup, and she was like, uh, hey, bud. I'm like, back it down.

SPEAKER_03 2:11:03

So you're almost to the age. Does she have small fingers?

SPEAKER_07 2:11:07

Uh uh. I checked those out though. I was like, Yeah, you're gonna need to know that information. So you know, Josh. Yeah, okay, boys. I'm glad you guys remember that so well.

SPEAKER_04 2:11:21

But uh yeah, no, Cody's not saying anything. Nope. Yeah. Right.

SPEAKER_09 2:11:25

Because I'm in the same boat as we're the same age.

SPEAKER_04 2:11:28

He's more terrified than I am. He probably hasn't had that doc that talk with his doctor yet either.

SPEAKER_07 2:11:36

So Yeah, well, that's why I went in there because I was kind of feeling stream. I don't know, I was kind of feeling fat and lethargic and like whatever, you know. Oh I think that might be the Muffet's man right there, and it's only Monday.

SPEAKER_04 2:11:54

Oh man. Yeah, that that baby went hard. That one gets my vote. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 2:12:02

Um I see they're all stopped. Yeah, that that one's a little behind, so I get to watch it here in a second, I think.

SPEAKER_07 2:12:07

That one's ahead. Ah shit. But yeah, I I I basically just thought I was I was like maybe my dad's diabetic. Sure. And so I hadn't, you know, we're all stubborn about going to the doctor, you know. And so finally I'm like, man, I'm just kind of feeling like crap. And uh so I went to the doctor and she basically, like I said, you know, and so I'm like, okay, she's like, well, just imagine, you know, go home and pick up a 40-pound sandbag and just carry that around with you. And I'm like No. I'm like, okay, I don't want to tell you that you're right, but you're right, you know. So uh really just kind of locked in and and uh well and that picture right there. Yep. Look at this. See my gobbler. See my gobbler, dude.

SPEAKER_10 2:12:53

I mean you see it.

SPEAKER_07 2:12:55

But it's like I was 253.6 uh three months ago, four months ago. And uh basically just cut my sugars other than tonight. I've had more sugar tonight than I've had in the last month. It's okay, they're really good. I'll sacrifice for that. I'm gonna feel like shit tomorrow morning or maybe even later yet, but those cookies are badass.

SPEAKER_03 2:13:19

Maybe you won't because they're that good.

SPEAKER_07 2:13:20

No, I'm gonna, I can already feel it's just like I don't know, it's weird. Like it's been very weird because I've always ate like I used to be an awesome, you know, like a Tonka crane operator. I'd I'd get all torched and get relaxed in bed, and I'd be like this in my bed. I'd be like, with like popcorn and chips or whatever, you know. And so Ormonica's cheese chips. Yeah, cheesies. Cheesies. Yeah. So I just kind of just kind of quit. Uh we've just quit doing all that kind of crap and uh cut out a lot of sugars and where are you at today? Uh right now I weigh 203.1.

SPEAKER_03 2:14:00

That's 50 pounds, brother.

SPEAKER_07 2:14:02

That's 50 pounds, yeah. Just all diet. All diet, yeah. Um the only workout I do, we can't talk about it. Okay. Um she's blushing.

SPEAKER_02 2:14:14

No, she's not.

SPEAKER_04 2:14:16

This is why I like clip. We just tired of one hit there just real quick, you know.

SPEAKER_07 2:14:22

But um throw us a little bit. Love it. Um, so yeah, I just I I do need to, you know, I feel a lot better. I mean, it's just crazy how much better a guy feels, you know. Um so it's like all last week when it was super hot and everything, too, you know, it wasn't we weren't sweating. Yeah. You know, I just I just feel a lot better. So um and I thought man, if I want to be around and I don't want to be a diabetic. Yeah. You know? Not that being a diabetic's bad. I just I hate needles, so I don't want to really do the old insulin thing or anything like that. So if you can avoid it, avoid it. Right. Well, and then it's like, you know, you talk about your little hap deal, like it just kinda happened out of the blue, right?

SPEAKER_04 2:15:07

Yep, out of the blue I didn't feel bad, it didn't feel anything.

SPEAKER_07 2:15:10

You just never know.

SPEAKER_04 2:15:11

Yeah.

SPEAKER_07 2:15:12

So, um, and my kids, you know, they kind of I kind of love my kids. It's kind of important.

SPEAKER_03 2:15:18

Yeah, right.

SPEAKER_07 2:15:20

My daughter's only 14, you know, and I'll be honest, I really want to kick them out of the house so I can be an empty nester. They'll come back.

SPEAKER_03 2:15:28

They'll come back.

SPEAKER_07 2:15:28

I know they're yeah, yeah. That'll have that'll happen fast enough. Well, what I don't get is it's like, I don't know, when I was growing up, as soon as I graduated high school, I'm like, See ya, see ya. I'm out of here. I hate my parents' rules. And I can sit on the couch in my underwear, man, without having my mom come down, you know, or whatever. You know what I mean? Yep. The only thing that sucked is I couldn't go to the refrigerator and get all the really good stuff that mom was buying to cook for dad and the family or whatever, you know.

SPEAKER_09 2:16:00

I was offending for myself, but McDonald's got a lot of my money, but I'm still really bad at I I am like an ice cream fiend. Oh yeah. Dude, I'm telling you. Like I at night, that's I've got to say a word. I will sit and just about your ice cream?

SPEAKER_07 2:16:17

I can't even talk about it because I would have been driving down and getting me a bowl.

SPEAKER_03 2:16:20

Hot dog glizzy ice cream. Did you see that?

SPEAKER_09 2:16:24

Yeah, I did. I don't know how I feel about it.

SPEAKER_03 2:16:26

I don't know how I feel about it. I ate a pint of it.

SPEAKER_04 2:16:29

You did? I ate a pint of it. I guess we know how you feel.

SPEAKER_03 2:16:33

My reward for for hitting 100 pounds down.

SPEAKER_07 2:16:37

Which congratulations. I mean, a lot of people know. See, you were I mean, I just thought that you were just That was yeah.

SPEAKER_03 2:16:47

That was 331. That was 12 years ago.

SPEAKER_04 2:16:51

So I can't even imagine you that big.

SPEAKER_03 2:16:54

Yeah, it's I got pictures. It's pretty scary, but uh yeah, my reward for that was a pint of ice cream that I don't know how I felt about it either, but yeah, hot dogs. Was it good? It was good. Brioche bun pieces and ketchup spiced caramel mixed with vanilla ice cream.

SPEAKER_09 2:17:13

I do not know. I mean, I love ice cream, right? But I don't tell you. I don't know if I could do it.

SPEAKER_07 2:17:18

It's like, remember when they came out with green ketchup? Oh yeah. Yeah, I couldn't eat it. I couldn't eat it. It looked like baby shit.

SPEAKER_03 2:17:28

I couldn't do it.

SPEAKER_07 2:17:30

I'm sorry.

SPEAKER_03 2:17:31

No, that that was uh yeah, that was but yes, I'm with you with the ice cream.

SPEAKER_09 2:17:35

That was I have because I I go to the gym probably three or four times a week and like and just if I miss a day I get like jittery, you know. But like it's probably because I'm eating so much freaking ice cream at night. Like you know, just I don't know.

SPEAKER_03 2:17:52

It is the nighttime I believe the nighttime.

SPEAKER_07 2:17:55

That's the worst for you guys. That's the diabetic killer right there. Eating that shit and then letting it sit in your gut all night.

SPEAKER_03 2:18:02

Yep. But I do want to ask you, not like I don't want to pry too much, and if you don't want to talk about it, it's up to you. But is there something to be learned? Like, did you you said you didn't notice anything, they just caught it.

SPEAKER_04 2:18:13

But yeah, I we'll talk off the air on this one. Just it's more more kid friendly. Sure. But but yeah, so we'll we'll discuss that off the air. Yeah. It's nothing secret, it's just but uh yeah.

SPEAKER_03 2:18:27

Yeah, so good it's a good thing. It's a really good thing.

SPEAKER_04 2:18:31

Yeah, it kind of goes back to date night and we'll leave it at that. Okay. We heard it here first.

SPEAKER_07 2:18:37

We heard it here first, and watermelons and so we're gonna go into uh what is the proudest moment of uh being the car owner of that number 44 over there. You know, what is you know what what's your proudest moment for Garrett to to to date, and what is the biggest sacrifice as a racing dad that that is one that you're like, man, I really like it, or man, this really pisses me off.

SPEAKER_04 2:19:05

Yeah, I I I think the proudest moment was I was sitting down on Perry Ellsworth's four-wheeler when he was racing the the A-feature qualifier for the qualifier for the A-feature.

SPEAKER_07 2:19:15

For the supernational.

SPEAKER_04 2:19:16

Yeah, for Supernationals. It's rookie year. I I don't know how many races you had under your belt at the time. And I looked up at the board, I'm like, 44 is in second place. I'm like, sweet. So I got off the four-wheeler and started watching.

SPEAKER_09 2:19:28

Yes, because I remember you you'd miss the finish, right?

SPEAKER_04 2:19:31

Yeah, because I got off the four-wheeler. I was walking over to the inspection just to say, hey, good job on your second place finish. And then then I felt somebody said something to me, like I'm like, well, I'm we're okay with second, and I think I don't know, maybe it was even you said point uh pointed up to the board and his number was in the top of the board. I'm like, there's no way that just happened because Keltner had a great lead on him and got underneath him coming off of off the four and got the lead by nine thousandths of a second. So and I I think it's funny because my wife will will replay that moment all the time because I think Jerry had said and Dan Keltner takes the oh no, it's Garrett Barber for the win. And so I I can't quote it as well as she can, but no, that that's probably the most proud moment that it that I had. I mean, going down there and he's got the the Nick ring on and the Casey's hat and got it.

SPEAKER_07 2:20:26

Well, it was the first time for the family, right? Uh as far as they didn't have this when you were racing, so like that I've been in that position, and not a lot of people know this, but there is a cup underneath uh that is an actual cup purchased from the Dollar Tree that they put on there, but that is nostalgic as shit. Like this used to be the Pizza Hut Kids Cup.

SPEAKER_04 2:20:56

Oh, okay.

SPEAKER_07 2:20:57

Okay. I totally made that up. But I we we and you know, and the helmet that does lift up, it is a perfect size helmet for the Dolly Parton doll that they used to sell back in 1990.

SPEAKER_03 2:21:14

I thought he was gonna say Corey Source. I really did.

SPEAKER_07 2:21:19

But um, you know, they didn't they don't they didn't have this when when you were racing. So I know the feeling of getting one of those and to do that not only with a car that you guys built in-house, but how close this I mean you brought your whole family here. Yep. That's the first time that we've had this on the podcast, which is super cool to have you guys here and to share these moments. Like those are so memorable and unforgettable, and to do that your rookie year really, really staples your name into the mod line. I always call them Dorf Cars because that's what I grew up on, right? Are you a dwarf?

SPEAKER_04 2:22:04

It's hard for me to go to mod like. Okay, good. I'm not the only one.

SPEAKER_07 2:22:08

But some now somehow, sometimes people are like, you want to fight over that? I'm like, I mean, if you want headbutted, I'll do it. I mean, I don't I don't care. But you know. So that is an awesome, awesome thing that you guys got to you know experience. And hopefully it there's many, many more of those to come.

SPEAKER_04 2:22:29

So and and that's what makes it hard because he wanted his rookie year. Now there's nowhere to go but down, right? Well, the best you can do is maintain the vacant. Get the taller one. Oh, get the taller one. Yeah, it's still short, right? But it's a little bit taller now. That's really cool. And you get your name on the back of everybody's t-shirt race.

SPEAKER_07 2:22:49

You know, the other thing I was thinking about too is you guys' committee, because aren't you on the committee for don't they have still have a committee for the mod lights or the dwarfs?

SPEAKER_04 2:22:58

Yeah, the man could get I'm not on the committee anymore. Ben George kind of heads that up. You guys have talked about it. Well, Ben, I think we need to get a race.

SPEAKER_07 2:23:05

Do they have a race of champions for the mod lights? They do. Yeah, they do. They do. I didn't know they had that.

SPEAKER_03 2:23:11

Yep.

SPEAKER_07 2:23:11

Sorry I blew up about it. Sorry, Ben. I will not be sending you that email. Um But there are a lot of, you know, I feel like your guys' class is getting more and more and more exposure, especially around here. Like they're starting to, you know, like they have these like the Corn Husk or the Corn Belt classic deal. Like that brings in some cars. Like I'm a big John Badilla fan. Yep. Uh just because he's a cool dude and he pitted across from us at Supernationals and they have sent us a playlist that was a banger.

SPEAKER_03 2:23:39

It's the chops.

SPEAKER_07 2:23:40

Dick. Oh, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 2:23:42

It's totally the chops.

SPEAKER_07 2:23:43

Totally the chops.

SPEAKER_03 2:23:44

Put a mullet on that guy. Look out. Cliff Barber 1992. Why?

SPEAKER_09 2:23:48

Well, we got a guy that can tell you how to grow one.

SPEAKER_07 2:23:51

I was gonna say casino set three, scene four, the movie. You guys remember that movie? Yeah, like old school gangster stuff.

SPEAKER_04 2:23:59

But um So I'm I'm gonna swing back because Josh asked a question off camera, and and as you said, we haven't been doing this that long. So how I got started working at the racetrack is Supernationals in 2004. Jen was my wife was pregnant with my daughter. And so I think Lisa and Kim, Lisa Seabring and Kim. Yeah, they they said, Hey, what are you doing for Supernational? I said, I'll probably come Saturday night and watch. They said, How would you like to work? And I'm like, I got nothing else going on. I've raced all year that there and all season, and I got nothing to do that week. They're like, Well, would you come over and work? I said, Sure, I'll come over. Where do you want me? They said, Well, you'll work with Tommy in the lineup area. So that was how it started 22 years ago. Okay. Started working just because we weren't allowed to play with the big cars.

SPEAKER_07 2:24:50

So free beef burgers and hot dogs and popcorn steaks. Oh, jeez. I need it. I'm gonna need an official official shirt come this year so I can get free steak Sammy's.

SPEAKER_04 2:25:02

If you haven't noticed, I've I've parked my truck right next next to the steak sandwich guy. So so I've got make it friends.

SPEAKER_09 2:25:08

Yeah, if they're getting pretty good.

SPEAKER_04 2:25:10

You're getting pretty good at reading duct tape numbers too. Oh yeah. So yeah, I didn't notice that. We do sometimes we ask them to put a little brighter duct tape on because and some of them come up. I mean, most of the guys you know or you've seen them over the the last few years. So and and we get some new guys in the lineup area. I mean, that they're like, Well, this car doesn't have the right number on it. Why'd you put it there? I'm like, Well, that's the guy. And it does help with the MRP, because then a lot of them if you can't figure out the number, you look at the top of the car and they write the name on the car. So there's there's other ways to distinguish what the car is. But back in the day, with just the old paper, you just and sometimes I'd scratch off the wrong number. There'd be like a 111 and then another one would be 111k. Like, well, I guess I got that guy in the wrong number, so you'd have to get yellow on the headset. And they finally give us uh our own channel now. Yep. So we we don't have to get yelled at by Josh. We it's it's always like the three wide lineups that cause us the grief, because I'm like, man, we need to keep it quiet because Tommy's like, you guys are on the radio too much, they're still going on on the track, and you try to be aware of what's being said on the track if they're but it gets so hectic, especially like during hot lap time.

SPEAKER_09 2:26:22

The hot laps in the staging area are the worst. Well, you know what? And like usually when the uh the sport compacts, I wanted to call them Bumblebee. The Sport Compact the Sport Compacts, because they're like they're cleared out in the field, so they'll come stage because they don't want to wait, which I understand, but then you can just have a huge line of cars and Dusty's out there like just frazzled. Yeah, you know, and but it's just because there's so many cars, and seems like most of the time once you get through that hot lap session, everything kind of calms down, but like that half hour, 40 minutes, whatever it is, of just hot laps, hot laps, hot laps, like it it is pretty wild.

SPEAKER_04 2:27:07

Well, and and the only thing that compares to that is the the Bs. When you get cars like a 20-car or 24-car B that comes up for lineup. Sorry. I was trying to look back there.

SPEAKER_03 2:27:23

Just notice when you change the time, when you fix it, then it starts counting down. We figured that out last week, but we you weren't here, so this is a surprise.

SPEAKER_04 2:27:32

I'm like looking at it, I'm like, wait a minute. I saw his face. I looked a couple times and didn't think much of it. I didn't either.

SPEAKER_07 2:27:40

Like, well, Josh fixed it, so it's that's what I but I'm like, I know we were at like an hour 50, and it was like an hour 48. And I'm like, well, maybe they just backed it up like an extra four and a half minutes or something.

SPEAKER_03 2:27:51

I don't know.

SPEAKER_07 2:27:51

It's like groundhog day.

SPEAKER_03 2:27:53

Yeah, we were gonna rig it up so that you when you hit it, it would just start counting backwards, but we couldn't figure it out.

SPEAKER_07 2:27:59

So keep jacking around, boys. You guys are gonna get cowbunged.

SPEAKER_03 2:28:04

This worked out. This worked out.

SPEAKER_07 2:28:05

Oh, really?

SPEAKER_03 2:28:07

Okay, all right.

SPEAKER_04 2:28:09

Sorry, geez. Yeah, we got a little off track track. I think it was a good diversion. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 2:28:16

But the lineup stuff, yeah, because it can get it gets wild down there. And I I don't have you guys you're seeing numbers from across the country and guys that you haven't seen all year.

SPEAKER_04 2:28:24

And how do you do you like the tablets? Do you I so I use my phone just because of the weight of the tablet? Yep. So I I use my phone. Uh I just scroll up and down. The w the worst thing is if you get a like like Cody was saying, you get cars coming that are two or three heats and you're trying to scroll really fast down to the next heat and the next heat and you try to find them. Sometimes that gets to be tough. With the old paper, if I had a car on a heat that was two or three down, I would put a circle on them. So that was a car that I knew was back there. I just kind of kept them at bay for that that amount of time. So yeah, I d I use my phone most of the time just because it's lightweight and I've got it I've got it there and it's just out.

SPEAKER_09 2:29:04

We've talked about trying to make it a little more interactive before, right? Where you click and it put the check mark on it, but I know that that I think for the MRP boys, it takes another to gotta write another script or program or whatever to do that.

SPEAKER_04 2:29:18

So Yeah, because I think I've talked to you and maybe even said something to Colton in the past that man, it'd be so nice if we could just put a click and it'd be a yellow or a green or a red or even if they could put a checkbox so that just something that yeah.

SPEAKER_03 2:29:32

I mean it's all it's all a database. Sure. You know, but it's the how they link that with everything else and get it all to work together. So um but yeah.

SPEAKER_07 2:29:44

Well, could you guys just figure it out so we can quit bitching about it? Not you guys, they weren't picking up. I'm kidding.

SPEAKER_03 2:29:52

Yeah, Josh and Ross, let's get that dial down there.

SPEAKER_04 2:29:55

They're like, it's just the lineup guys, they can just scroll through, it's not a big deal. Yeah. They're just standing there eating steak sandwiches.

SPEAKER_09 2:30:03

Well, this one guy's got his truck parked right next to you. Yeah, that's right. Well, should we go into our special segments here real quick? Um so we talked about the Moff at Ford Mayhem. Um, excuse me. Um I my vote for Saturday was probably that B May and the sport mod B. That's right. Because they ended up getting hooked up, and then because I came up to get I think came up to get the microphone, and I sat up there, and then by the time I I mean I was down back in the infield and they had cars trying to line them up and they were trying to unhook cars over. I don't even remember what happened.

SPEAKER_07 2:30:40

I just all the stock car guys were pissed in the lineup area. Sitting there. I don't really know, but I was just saying, I'm like, I hear Logan get on there and go, guys. Which, first of all, there was one girl out there. So it's not just all guys. So he needs to be better about that. Because she's probably calling a therapist on Tuesday because she's being included in a one group, but there he's like, Why are we half throttle? We're still yellow. And I'm like, oh boy, here comes the tongue lash. And then Sarah got on there and was like, Alright guys, stop on the back stretch. I'm like, boy, they really just fucked up. Yep. Yeah, they had a mess going on. They had a mess. But you know what? Sometimes that happens. Even the professionals uh have that happen. I mean, I we've seen it all week at the Dakota Tour. I mean, sometimes you have to be uh snappy and stern and like but you know sometimes you may not know that our headset's not working either.

SPEAKER_03 2:31:42

True. But yeah, there's some give and take. I mean, anytime you're dealing with electronics, right?

SPEAKER_07 2:31:49

That was why I always appreciated Bud Big Block out there on the front, just throwing his shoulder out every week on getting cars lined up in the straight line. Remember old Bud Murray? Remember old Bill Olsen and the old 225 spring? I remember him. Oh yeah. I thought that was the coolest thing ever. He had that coil spring on the back of his hoof there. You know what I'm talking about? It gave him a little initiative. I don't know what it was, but I mean he was bouncy.

SPEAKER_03 2:32:15

Yeah.

SPEAKER_07 2:32:16

He was bouncy. We get that flag going, boy. That thing looked like it was reared up like a modified.

SPEAKER_03 2:32:21

I think he just had him for when he jumped off the wall. He didn't, you know, it was a little bit of a uh shock absorber when he hit the ball.

SPEAKER_07 2:32:27

Didn't want to pull Connor McGregor and only last a minute 29. I mean he got 16 million for it, so I mean whatever. He did all right.

SPEAKER_03 2:32:33

Yeah, poor poor guy.

SPEAKER_07 2:32:35

Sure he's not hurting.

SPEAKER_03 2:32:37

Yeah, I would say that that was probably my vote too. That or that or the 1999 hobby stock look that Jonathan was carrying around. But I don't know if we give him the Barn Hill had had a good one.

SPEAKER_09 2:32:47

Barn Hill did have a good one. He he uh popcanned that whole right side. Hank stops him, bungee cords, and I'm watching him. Hank's like straps one on there. So then he takes one, hooks it, and then straps it all the way over to the the cliff bars on the front. And and uh and then Owen just pulls off anyway after he straps.

SPEAKER_03 2:33:08

Got all that done, went right to his cliffs.

SPEAKER_09 2:33:10

He wanted that bungee cord. The benefit. Oh, and we're gonna need those back if you can uh or you will get a bill sent to you.

SPEAKER_07 2:33:19

We've talked about that before too. Um, you know, I will say that the hit that Ethan Roby landed on Iowa Pipe and Gradings number twenty-two B. Yeah, they brought that car in, and I have never seen a wheel bent the way that that wheel bent. I mean, it was a bassett wheel and it didn't bend the the rear end. Like you can pull the axle to no, it's great. It's just for how hard I mean you guys seen Ethan's car and he's been keeping that thing looking super nice too. And then that happened is it's just K.

SPEAKER_03 2:33:56

Two weeks, two weeks on that body? Yeah, not quite Yeah.

SPEAKER_09 2:34:01

About a week and three quarters.

SPEAKER_07 2:34:02

Different different look for him too. Yeah. Different look. Going the blue. They brought that. Not a blue fan, but it does look good on Ethan's car.

SPEAKER_09 2:34:08

They brought that out for the Fourth of July.

SPEAKER_07 2:34:11

I wasn't here for that. So yeah, I missed that one.

SPEAKER_09 2:34:13

Yeah, we ended up having Ethan and CB25 and uh Brett Thomas out front for the national anthem that week. And it was actually Doug Robey's idea. He's like, we gotta get the patriotic cars out there for that. I'm like, yeah, that's a great idea. Let's do that.

SPEAKER_07 2:34:28

Right. Well, yeah, because you guys didn't have the Eva Eva destruction. I see I noticed that that hurt the grandstands majorly.

SPEAKER_03 2:34:34

Yeah, that's it's people love that event. They really do.

SPEAKER_07 2:34:38

I mean, I don't think people, even on a Saturday night, I don't think people really give a shit if they're there late or not. Like they weren't lighting fireworks off in North Dakota until well uh 1145. When the sun went down. Literally. Yeah. Seriously. Yeah. Pretty wild.

SPEAKER_03 2:34:59

Yep.

SPEAKER_09 2:35:01

Well, we had Elmquist towing question of the week. If you could bring one former dirt track driver back in their prime for one more race, who would it be and why?

SPEAKER_03 2:35:11

That one took off.

SPEAKER_09 2:35:12

Yes.

SPEAKER_03 2:35:13

Um it was a pretty good one.

SPEAKER_09 2:35:16

I I saw somebody said Jonathan Logue, right?

SPEAKER_03 2:35:19

I saw that.

SPEAKER_09 2:35:20

I did. Bring back a driver in his prime.

SPEAKER_07 2:35:23

Yeah. And you guys also seen what I posted on there too. Sure did.

SPEAKER_03 2:35:28

There was a special character in there. There was there. Uh-huh. Um, I thought I saw Rusty Krause said myself. That one cracked me up. But uh, there was some good ones. Uh Denny Stoneburner had plenty of mentions. Saw John Logue a few times. Saw Jonathan Logue. Um Jennifer Van Sickle, you're hilarious, by the way.

SPEAKER_07 2:35:52

Yeah, we did see your. Yeah, I mean, we bring Josh back in his prime claiming years back then. He was picking up them Rochester's real cheap, wouldn't he?

SPEAKER_03 2:36:02

I couldn't just get I couldn't just go back for a week. I'd have to come back for three because you gotta load up and then go right.

SPEAKER_07 2:36:07

In defense, he was milking cows back then and shit was tight.

SPEAKER_03 2:36:10

It was rough. Yeah. Um, but the ass tattoo contest is still happening. We're going to make it happen.

SPEAKER_07 2:36:19

I you guys should have done it at the beginning of the season because I was a lot rustier because I've been on it.

SPEAKER_03 2:36:24

Oh, that's alright. Because I'm I mean, I just I don't care. I just want to get in that car.

SPEAKER_07 2:36:30

Cody, don't worry, but I'll help you.

SPEAKER_03 2:36:32

I just I just want to show the see and oh, and oh, so Colton's not here, but I have a feeling that it's gonna come down to a three-man race.

SPEAKER_07 2:36:43

Yeah, Colton, Cody, and Garrett.

SPEAKER_03 2:36:45

Yes, and I cannot wait. But we could be surprised.

SPEAKER_07 2:36:48

We could be wrong.

SPEAKER_03 2:36:48

I mean could be shocked. Garrett could go out and rip off a qualifier and put us both in danger. Who knows?

SPEAKER_07 2:36:54

He does drive a Ford Ranger, it's hard to say.

SPEAKER_03 2:36:56

And he is a red, so he may get in that car and something special could happen.

SPEAKER_07 2:36:59

That's right. We had a bunch of people uh bring up Dave Farron. Yeah, yeah. Dave Farron was probably one of the best wheels.

SPEAKER_04 2:37:08

Stewart, I remember him at Stewart all the time. He was always battling with those guys. Yep. Ron Little, Dom Portline.

SPEAKER_03 2:37:15

Yeah, and oh man. Just the amount of times that I got to watch that guy race and didn't really think about it at the time, of course. But you know what I mean? So yeah.

SPEAKER_07 2:37:26

I remember just going showing up down in Des Moines. Yeah, yep. And there'd be old Dave in that white and purple car, and he'd have a cigarette going a mile one hundred, ma and paw one hundred, you know, Paul Mall red that's like the strongest frickin' cigarette you could even imagine.

SPEAKER_03 2:37:46

Yep.

unknown 2:37:47

Yep.

SPEAKER_07 2:37:47

Man, he nostalgic shit right there. Building his own cars. Um he lived not that far from the racetrack. Still, still, even uh when because when when I went back there in 2013 and well, that was my first year, so no, it would have been in 2014. 2013 and 2014, we were racing down there. He still lived not that far. Uh what was it, 14th?

SPEAKER_03 2:38:12

Right over off of Guthrie.

SPEAKER_07 2:38:13

Guthrie. Right off of Guthrie. Still over there, living over there, and I think that's where he passed away. God rest his soul. But uh great, great, great racer. Yep. Great racer.

SPEAKER_03 2:38:25

So who would you guys bring back? Who would you bring back, Cody?

SPEAKER_09 2:38:28

Uh actually, you know what? One of these I saw, a couple of them actually said Nate Caruth. Oh yeah, Nitronate. Man, like he was I think he just got burnt out from doing the pavement stuff, and now he's got a really he's him and his dad out of that successful concrete pumping business. And uh I've talked to him like, hey man, we when are we gonna get this thing? He's like, Man, I really want to, but I think he's got a boat now, too. So that boat, boats expense.

SPEAKER_07 2:38:56

I tell everybody camping's expensive, boating's expensive. Everything women are expensive. I was gonna say something else, but I'm just gonna say women. But everything's expensive. So Nate Cruth, quit being a puss. Get that checkbook out. Let's get I think he'd be really good in a stock car.

SPEAKER_03 2:39:20

Yeah.

SPEAKER_07 2:39:21

You know what I mean? I mean, I know a guy that could build one, right?

SPEAKER_03 2:39:24

Real close.

SPEAKER_07 2:39:25

Real close, yeah. I mean, we'll take we'll take real good care of it. What I miss is hearing Bob's laugh at the track. Oh, yeah.

SPEAKER_09 2:39:31

You know, man, it was always fun right, you know, running around with those guys and when Nate was pretty young, and and uh, you know, I I'll never forget when he when Bob the Rig. Yeah, Bob and Bob was out of town. I don't know if you've ever heard the story. No. Bob was out of town, they were at like a wedding reception or something. Nate jumps in the rig by himself, drives it to the racetrack. How old? Probably 16. Oh, maybe.

SPEAKER_03 2:40:01

Alright.

SPEAKER_09 2:40:01

Like uh they didn't have a small rig. No, it was like a big toter, like, yeah, like and that might have been I think that was when he had the like the black the bla all black Punisher car with the orange numbers on it, and drives that thing, gets it to the racetrack, ends up winning the race by himself. No one else there helping him. I think Blaine Ryder actually was there, maybe came and helped him, but like gets there, and then Bob sees his toter at the racetrack, comes hauling ass in there, riffing Nate's ass. He's like, But I won! But I won. So then all was well in the world for a little while, but I think Nate got grounded from the toter for a while.

SPEAKER_03 2:40:49

Well, wendon usually changes things, but in that case.

SPEAKER_07 2:40:53

Your mom just called me a jackass.

SPEAKER_03 2:40:57

Mine if the shoe fits. Uh mine'd be Danny Wallace. I he was one of the first ones I got to see ripped, man. He'd rip the topside. Most guys were running down around the tires. The tracks were a lot slicker back then, it seemed like, but man, he'd go right up against a wall and sparks flying off the right rear, and he was fast. He was good. So it'd be cool to see him again.

SPEAKER_04 2:41:25

Yeah, I I can remember him at Stuart, but just like you said, just always fast. And and down to earth. I mean, you could go talk to the guy. Just another guy in the pitch, yeah. Nice guy. Who would you bring back, Cliff? I don't know. I think all the all the ones that you named off, uh Jenny Stoneburner, I'd I think uh he would probably be top of my list, of course. Dwarf Guards, Ed Zeeem, I would like to see him. Yeah, Jim Cooper would be another another one that I would like to see in their in their prime racing. So I don't I don't know. Uh Rick Brown. I love watching him. I love the Flying Farmers. Flying Farmers. Uh Steve Jackson. Campbell. Campbell was always fast. So I don't know. I I don't know if I could pick just one. I think they were all ones that I was fans of. Red Rocket. Red Rocket. So I thought about him. Good old Larry.

SPEAKER_03 2:42:20

So about you, Bobcat?

SPEAKER_07 2:42:24

Man, that's that's a loaded question, isn't it? It is so loaded because there's just so many good racers out there, man, that have just, you know, Greg Davis. I mean gosh dang, Steve Jackson, um my dad, um, CJ Rayburn, um just man Mike Smith. I watched Mike Smith one time at Webster City lose the steering wheel off of his late model going down the back stretch. Never hit the wall, put the steering wheel back on it.

SPEAKER_03 2:43:04

That's that's a lot of luck. And a little bit of skill to get that done in that amount of yeah.

SPEAKER_07 2:43:10

Yeah, I yeah. I mean, you know, there's so many, you know, like you Yeah, there's just so many good guys out there that, you know, Clinton, Austin, Llewellyn. I mean, those guys were I didn't like racing with them, but I loved racing with them because I learned a lot from them and they raced hard. They raced clean. And um, gosh dang, there's just so many. I mean, I could keep going. Like, I'm looking like the picture of Matt Stonbrenner's car in there.

SPEAKER_09 2:43:40

Yeah, that thing was the coolest stock car.

SPEAKER_07 2:43:41

That was the coolest stock car of Scott Davis back in his prime and the uh back when they were doing the Bud series and the Napa series and shit. He was almost untouchable.

SPEAKER_03 2:43:52

How about Scott Baker?

SPEAKER_07 2:43:54

Scott Baker. Oh, yeah. Yeah, Gorman? He was Storm and Gorman, Bud. I mean Yeah. You just keep going for the missile Mike Molly. Come on, baby. Oh yeah. Oh man, I remember Toby and Danny up there just shredding on the mic back in them days.

SPEAKER_03 2:44:13

We got a sport compact going for uh about a triple roll there, and yeah, here, watching. Oh, yeah, I can see it on this one too. Okay, good, because you're gonna shit your pants too quickly. Oh boy.

SPEAKER_09 2:44:26

That's a good one.

SPEAKER_07 2:44:28

Oh dang. I've done I've done that right there, uh, not that hard, but right there. Um my stepdad about fought one of the fans in the grandstands after that.

SPEAKER_03 2:44:38

Clint Llewellyn ended a national championship chase in that very spot.

SPEAKER_07 2:44:42

Yep. Well, yeah, it was a little further. A little further, but yeah, it's that's it's pretty treacherous right there.

SPEAKER_03 2:44:48

Pretty close. Yep.

SPEAKER_07 2:44:49

So we I did see that uh some people obviously, you know, the Steve Kenzer, Scott Bloomquist, uh Wolfgang. Um, I I think it's really just kind of depends on where you're at in the country, who you think trade or shouldn't be.

SPEAKER_03 2:45:06

What racing you watch, and you know I mean hell, there's NASCAR guys, I mean, who wouldn't want to see Dale Earnhardt back. Right, you know?

SPEAKER_07 2:45:14

That really changed NASCAR for sometimes.

SPEAKER_03 2:45:17

You think about think about the containment seat that you sit in right now. Would you have that if it wasn't for him? Maybe, maybe not. But it it changed a lot of people.

SPEAKER_07 2:45:30

Yeah, but you know what? I've been seeing a lot of a lot of stuff on them Hans devices, you know, that what do they call them? Dead stops? Where you know, where you're sitting and and somebody comes up and and hits you like this and it's it's like jarring, you know, because all this is attached. So I still wear neck brakes. Okay. Are you a haunt you wear Hans? Hans. You do wear Hans? Yep. I'm a neck brace guy. Um I've I mean I've been knocked out in the car at only at Boone. Um I did wear it when we were at Bristol because it was mandatory. I mean, if it was mandatory, I would wear it. But it just really gives me a uneasy feeling in here, and Andy Morris actually he has screwed up his shoulder from it. It's some something that happens in asphalt all the time. It's called a dead stop, or I don't know. I'm not against him. I'm just saying it's just like it's a comfortability. Comfortability thing. Like I'd be able to I like to be like Jay Schmidt and Inspector Gadget where I can like turn my head and remember how he used to do that? It was like he'd stick his head out the window and it's like, what's he doing?

SPEAKER_03 2:46:33

Oh, he's watching the guy behind him. Yep. Yep. Shannon Anderson was that way too.

SPEAKER_07 2:46:39

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 2:46:39

Yeah, I can remember seeing it.

SPEAKER_07 2:46:40

Every time I'd see Jay, I'd always think about that dinn-in-in-in-nee-in-ny.

SPEAKER_03 2:46:46

Go go gadget neck. Yeah. Go go gadget neck. I always thought Michelle looked at him kind of fucking.

SPEAKER_07 2:46:54

Well, she did.

SPEAKER_03 2:46:56

Uh, what do we got left? Power rankings?

SPEAKER_07 2:46:58

Power rankings.

SPEAKER_03 2:46:59

Oh, Trevor Fitz is gonna be so happy.

SPEAKER_07 2:47:02

Just run it down, bud. We're on like the three-hour mark.

SPEAKER_03 2:47:05

Yep. We're uh our our top ten overall. You got Cowboy Ray and one still. David Smith shot up a couple to uh second. Mike Smith is right on dad's heels. Uh Brian Zeeem somehow one-footed his way up to fourth.

SPEAKER_07 2:47:23

Where are you seeing all this? Which page?

SPEAKER_03 2:47:26

It's on like page two, I think. Okay, I don't know why it put that in that order. It's kind of weird.

SPEAKER_07 2:47:30

I got gum on my paper, so I can't see it. Anyway.

SPEAKER_03 2:47:39

And more mayhem.

SPEAKER_04 2:47:42

That gets my vote.

SPEAKER_03 2:47:43

That's pretty good. That's pretty good. Um yeah, Brian Zeeem up to fourth. Austin Gray, uh, he's in fifth. Jimmy. Jim Gustin's been kind of dropping a little bit, but he's hanging around. Uh Corey Vanderwill, Will Smith. Doug Smith got himself in the top ten for the first time, and Jake McBurney dropped a few. Um yeah, Doug Smith, the biggest mover, uh, got himself into the top ten for the first time. BZ went up four. He's he's still number one in the mod lights. Um and I I think I'm supposed to ask Cliff, you've been around Brian for a long time. What makes him so tough?

SPEAKER_04 2:48:22

I I think just their dedication to car setup. I mean, they they spend time. I'm gonna say it's his mother. I was gonna say they, but it's Jane. Seriously, so if she's savage, dealt with her, so it's always my car, my part. I need so love Jane, and it's always been never been Ed's car or Brian's car, it's always my car.

SPEAKER_07 2:48:42

Yeah. So I love that about her. I love her too that she's got that little girl now. Yep, you know, that she comes and they come walking by the pit every Saturday, and I'm always like, hey, and Jane's always like, hey, hey, like, you know, trying to coach her and she's such a sweet lady. Yeah, but don't let her fool you. She's savage. Yep, I think she's more savage than the boys.

SPEAKER_04 2:49:06

Oh, for sure. I think she drives the race car to the track, and Ed comes in the van later, and then he watches some supercross or whatever's racing at that time, and yes. Then he goes home after the races, and Brian backs it up for her, and then Brian will stay have a couple beers and and Jane takes the rig home. Wow. So she is the charge. Oh yeah. She is the savage. So I I think just as a family, they they work on the card. She's very meticulous with the notes and and keeping track of car setup and everything. So that's why Ed's kept her around for so long, too. Well, I I I think that he doesn't know what to do to do without her, so yeah. Right. Yep.

SPEAKER_03 2:49:49

Um so yeah, that's it.

SPEAKER_04 2:49:51

That's uh that's I thought you were gonna say it's the one-foot thing, but I I did that back in the day, so I've at least I've had to relearn how to drive with two feet, but I was a one-foot driver back in the day. Interesting. And I hate people that say back in the day. And now you're one of the things.

SPEAKER_03 2:50:10

And now I'm now that guy. Uh your mod top five, Jeremy Mills, Jake McBurney, Corey Saurman, Chaz Baca, and Todd Shute. Stock cars, David Smith, Jimmy Gustin, Doug Smith, Tyler Pickett, Devin Smith. Yeah, three Smiths in the overall top ten. Uh Sport Mods, Mike Smith, Randy Havlick, Jake Sackow, Willie Kirk, Dusty Massolini, Hobby Socks, Corey Vanderwill, Will Smith, uh, Wayne Gifford, Joey Young, and Eric Knutsen, and then in the mod lights, Brian Zeeem, Austin Gray, Josh May. Can you read that fourth name there?

SPEAKER_04 2:50:49

I think that one says Garrett Barber.

SPEAKER_03 2:50:51

It does, doesn't it? I believe. And then what's oh, Ben George. Ben George. That's right.

SPEAKER_09 2:50:57

Not Kyle Larson.

SPEAKER_03 2:50:58

Not Kyle Larson, but close. And I have to mention Trevor Fitz, you're seventh in the modified, and I did a deep dive on that for you, buddy. Five DNFs. That hurts. That hurts. That's that's the because this one's configured, you lose points with DNFs.

SPEAKER_07 2:51:14

Yeah, it doesn't seem to affect only certain drivers, so don't let them get you two to us right now.

SPEAKER_03 2:51:18

You notice it's not affecting Garrett too much. He's doing pretty good.

SPEAKER_04 2:51:21

Um he did have a DNF, though.

SPEAKER_03 2:51:24

He did. Well, if he didn't have that DNF, maybe he'd be above Josh Man.

SPEAKER_04 2:51:27

Yeah, we've we've got to get our hand signals down.

SPEAKER_03 2:51:29

All right. Oh, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 2:51:30

Does that make you proud seeing Garrett in the top five of that deal? It does. Good. I'd heard rumors that you guys had that power ranking out before the, I think before the season started. Yep. And that he was in there with Jeremy Mills. I'm like, that's that's even more because he's with that name. The the name of the people that he was with at during that time has probably made me the most proud. So absolutely.

SPEAKER_03 2:51:53

Very cool.

SPEAKER_07 2:51:53

I don't know if your dad's like my dad and they don't tell you that they're proud very often, but when they do, it's like I'm taking this baby to Thanksgiving. We're gonna talk about this over a dinner roll and a piece of turgo. I don't give a shit.

SPEAKER_09 2:52:13

Three years ago you said you're proud.

SPEAKER_07 2:52:16

The whole time that you're talking about it, your old man's like, I never said never.

SPEAKER_04 2:52:21

Then it'd be like, check the transcript. But no, I'd I do uh would like to give a shout out to Saurerman. We were talking about the mod lights, the dwarf car family. Obviously, Steve and Vicky was a big part of the dwarf car back then, and and and Saurerman is still Corey is still putting money. I don't know if it's Corey or Steve who gave the money, but putting money towards our class, and and Garrett took home some of the Salerman money with a heat win Saturday night, and then I was trying to get the 15th place because apparently they gave 50 bucks to that. So Jeff Stinslin and I, before the races started, had a little wager going on who was gonna get that. And I'm like, well, I'm I'm gonna finish behind you, so I'll get it. He actually ended up getting the 15th place Saurman money. So big shout out to Saurerman for putting money toward the mod light. Corey's short enough, he should still be in a mod light. Yeah.

SPEAKER_07 2:53:13

Um, but he it's kind of cool to see that he moved he went from a mod light to a modified and he runs really, really well. Yep, yeah. That just kind of tells you that the fucking speed excuse me, geez, Garrett, cut that out. I just would have full, like full we're in the shop talking mode over here with the F-bomb on that one. But it's it's cool to see that the speed transition is very similar.

SPEAKER_04 2:53:39

I mean you very, very cool. Mike Molly went from mod lights or dwarf cars, and Todd Shute was another one. Yep, yep, and Matt Meinicke. So there's there's been some that have made the transition to and and have ran really well.

SPEAKER_07 2:53:52

Ran yeah, like picked it up like right away. So so anyway, close it out, Cody.

SPEAKER_09 2:53:59

All right, man. Well, hey, we want to thank you guys and your family for showing up, bringing cookies and and hanging out with us. I'm just thank you, Jen. This has been this has been pretty awesome to to listen to you talk. Uh I mean sometimes when I get these we get these guests on, I'm just like star, they probably think I'm weird because I'm just like I'm lost in the story. You are weird. Well, right. But but you know what I mean. So it it is cool to like hear hear the old stories and and like I said, I'm kidding. We're gonna have a weird fear. I don't have a speech impairment that I know of. Good point. I do.

SPEAKER_04 2:54:42

But anyway, we do thank you for coming on and hanging out with us. And I appreciate the invitation and a chance to tell some of the history, hopefully, the history and at least my story of of the mod lights and the dwarf cars and my connection with everybody that's still in the class and everybody that's been in the class.

SPEAKER_07 2:54:58

So Well, we've been going with the Mod Light minute, but it was a little bit longer than a minute here with the Cliff Barber, one of the all-time legends of, in my opinion, one of the all-time legends of the Mod Light class dwarf car finger dance waiver, one of the originators, uh chocolate cake makers, best chocolate chip cookie we've ever had on the show. Easily, easily, hands down. Um man, what an honor it was to come have you come in, and and I was just as excited as the boys were. I didn't say anything because I'm kind of I was a fanboy back in the day, just because you were good, you know, and that's um I love good racers and I think it's super cool what you that you are still building cars and now your son's into this deal, and I can relate to that because my dad's kind of an OG like you are, you know, and you guys were some of the best in the business and passed that torch on to your son and and my dad passed that torch on to me, I think he would appreciate it if I wasn't, maybe. So handsy and loud and well, you know, you raced with my dad. My dad was pretty but also too. See, my dad always says this, but his crew members would kick anybody's ass. I mean, if they you know, back in the day that's what how it was. You know, it's and they always had three or four of them. Right, right. And I mean they drink beer with you all night too. Yep. But if you run the old man over, you ran the ghost over, there was I mean a couple of stories where they took out lights at the boom speedway with a shotgun and stuff. So yeah, you've never heard that?

SPEAKER_03 2:56:32

No, I have not.

SPEAKER_07 2:56:33

Yeah. Chris Swank, Chris Swank shot Lottie's tires out on his through with her one day because they took the wind from my dad, so Chris went to his house and got his gun and shot the tires out on Lottie's four with her. Needless to say, he had to replace them. Well, they shot lights out out there one night too, because they took the Hawkeye Challenge wind from him. See, I see I really tamed that side of the things down. I didn't remember bringing up.

SPEAKER_03 2:56:58

So your ass tuning wasn't that big a deal.

SPEAKER_07 2:57:01

Right, right. But so no, it was just it's just super cool to see you know people keeping their families into racing that have been a part of racing for a long time. And I didn't realize that you and Ed were like peas and carrots. Yep. And starting this whole coop thing, and like that makes you even more of a badass, in my opinion. I think if there's a Mod Light Hall of Fame, this guy's right there in the top five.

SPEAKER_09 2:57:25

Yep. Agreed.

SPEAKER_07 2:57:26

I mean, I'm just a dwarf car. Dwarf car, yeah. It's actually the dwarf car. Well, I'm trying not to say it because people get busy about it. I've had threatening emails called. Yeah. So he uses email not very often. We're gonna go to the Mavis Beacon file. Mavis.

SPEAKER_09 2:57:43

Mr. Howard. Mr. Howard, yeah. But anyway, Jonathan, I've seen Jonathan get kicked out of keyboarding class several times. We were in the same one. I'm not surprised. Mr. Logue out in the hallway. Going to the drinking penalty. Anyway, we want to thank our partner, Central Iowa Diesel Performance, Elmquist Towing, Adobe Lounge, Moffitt's Ford, Logue Fab, P1P Canopy, Vision Bank. Everybody that continues to support this, Farley's as well. I keep forgetting about the sign down there. Barntown Brewing and Yeah, it's been been awesome. So continue to engage with our posts and like, subscribe, all the things. Um, and we'll have more giveaways down the road. So um hey, real quick though. She did? Yeah. All right.

SPEAKER_07 2:58:42

I was just gonna bring that up. Uh congratulations to them. Stay tuned for the Silver Dollar Nationals coming up this week. Also, 141-10,000 to win King of the Creek. The 141 Speedway can't catch that, catch it on flow. It's gonna be a lot of heavy hitter stock car guys going up there. Sounds like there's a bunch of guys in the area that are out-of-towners that are making this whole big deal. I think there's a little over $35,000 on the line this week for IMCA stock car racing. Wow. Um, and then to come into that, boys. I mean, we're like six weeks away from supernationals here.

SPEAKER_09 2:59:19

It's hard to say. We're like a week and a half away from salute to veterans already.

SPEAKER_07 2:59:23

Just gonna say a Jason Becker reached out to me the other day. He's coming next week. Uh is he? Good, I won't be here. I'm kidding. Uh the salute to veterans race coming up to another great, great uh event. We're gonna have they're gonna have the IMCA stock car race of champions at the Spencer uh Speedway up there, and then it'll be Algona, I believe, is the Sport Mod race of champions, and then Saturday will be the modified race of champions at the Bootin Speedway, increased purses for all of those races. Catch it all live on IMCA TV. And Cody, I'm gonna send it over to you, Tim Taylor, and shut her out.

SPEAKER_09 3:00:06

Well, again, we thank you guys. Uh, continue to, like we said, engage with us, like, subscribe, all the things. Um, that's all we have for Watermelons and Woodchips. We will see you next week.

SPEAKER_04 3:00:21

Good job.

SPEAKER_01 3:00:47

At 915 West Mainey Eisenhower. Our hours are Monday to Friday, 1 p.m. to close, Saturday and Sunday, noon to close. Come enjoy some of the strongest drinks in town and the best homemade pizzas around. Whether you're stopping in to relax, meet friends, or grab a bite, the Adobe Lounge is the place to be. See you soon.