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I think I could make a 1,000 mile race. But I would definitely have to take pre-race precautions to make sure I could make it that far.
I love racing and I've always enjoyed racing. I love to try and go back to the local short tracks and do those races. And sometimes I do.
I'm a huge sports fan, but I am also a huge supporter of the United States of America and our militaries and everything that we've got for us.
My goal has always been to be known as a racer who is diverse, someone who can go to any venue and any racetrack anywhere and compete for a win.
There can be an easy way to interpret things some times and it seems like maybe I'm on the wrong side of those interpretations a lot of those times.
The thing you want to be able to do is to be well-liked when you retire. I know right now I'm not close to retiring, and I'm not close to being liked.
When you're able to dominate and just kick everyone's butt and just wipe them out, I think that's when you feel the greatest, when you put it all together.
Yeah, I mean, you always work hard, and certainly there's opportunities to do some bold moves, and sometimes they pay off for you and sometimes they don't.
Certainly, different people show their emotions in different ways. Unfortunately for me, mine has never been very gracious and I don't know that it ever will be.
There's no better benefit than being out on the racetrack, learning what's going on with the track and the tire and all that stuff. To me, that's a big influence.
We're at the top echelon of motorsports, and we've got guys who have never won Late Model races running on the racetrack. It's pathetic. They don't know where to go.
I might be confident in what I do, and sometimes you can be cocky and confident because you know what your abilities are and you know what your car is going to give you.
Our dad is not one to impart advice or gloat or reminisce about the good old days. But he's a race car guy, been a car guy forever, and he always wants to talk about cars.
As far as fan perception, it's probably worse than it should be. I think it's getting better, but I think I still get perceived based on the things I did earlier in my career.
I just try to go out there and be who I am and compete and bring home as many trophies as I can. That's what being a race car driver is all about and that's why I do what I do.
I'd say the late 70s were probably pretty cool. Obviously the cars weren't safe and the tracks weren't safe and all that stuff, but I think back then it was more about the driver.
I watch football all the time. I enjoy getting home on Monday nights and watch 'Monday Night Football,' and 'Sunday Night Football' when we get home early enough on Sunday nights.
Even though Richmond is a three-quarter mile, it's a fast short track... So it gives you - maybe you could call it a false of security a little bit, but it seems to be working for me.
I don't know that many guys have ever been able to accomplish being able to win at every single active track that they've made starts at, and I look forward to trying to complete that feat.
You've got guys out there that are good spokespeople for their sponsors or whatever. They do a good job of selling merchandise and all that. And then you've got guys that are just good wheel men.
It's funny to watch sometimes. You're walking through a crowd of people or whether you're just out there for driver intros, the amount of reaction you get and the people you're affecting is pretty funny.
Anyone who knows anything about me should know by now I am certainly not exactly a good politician. I am also willing to admit to you now that I never went to any classes that had anything to do political science.
You don't really get it from NASCAR that they want you to be the bad guy or the good guy. They'll kind of joke around with you and be like, 'Hey, that was really good this past weekend. You did a great job for us. Ratings were up.'
I don't mind taking chances. Sometimes those chances get me in a loophole that's hard to get out of, but that's just me. That's my drive. That's my fire. That's who I am. That's who I want to be and who I feel like I am when I'm fast.
For as much as I tend to run my mouth sometimes, I would have definitely stacked up better in the 1970s or the 1980s when there wasn't as much media or there wasn't as much publicity and sponsorship around the sport that you had to be PC for.
You've got to be able to take the highs and the lows, and certainly I am not very good at taking the lows. I'll be the first to admit it. But when the highs come your way you've got to treasure them because you never know how many more you'll get.
I think my reputation is pretty fair among the drivers. The drivers know what they get when they see me or talk to me - if they get the chance to talk to me, because some of them I just don't talk to because I don't like them, so they should know.
We have fans who bake cookies for the team or they make cupcakes or muffins and stuff like that. And then they always ask us if we enjoyed it and how it tasted. I'm like, 'That was so long ago. I don't even remember what I had for breakfast this morning!'
When I jumped ship from Roush Racing to Hendrick Motorsports, I couldn't believe the amount of personnel here that get along with each other. It's pretty amazing that there are so many people under one roof, where Roush is more spread out and it feels so different.
Once you get on to the racetrack on Sunday and you strap your helmet on and you come down especially toward the end of the race, it's every man for himself. It's me against the world. It's me against everybody else. Sometimes you're against your critics, as well, too.
Some people tell you, 'I'm your good luck charm - I've been to eight races in my life and you've won six of them' or something like that. So it's kind of like, 'Well, you need to come to more then!' Other times, fans just want to talk about previous times they've met you.
Throughout your career, whether you're getting into the sport or have been it in for a number of years like me, there will always be obstacles. The important thing is how you deal with those obstacles and come back from any disappointment or setback, no matter how big or small.
I mean, when I was growing up, my family was always into racing. So, we'd always have the TV on on Sundays watching the Cup races or whatever, and ultimately I kinda thought about wanting to become a race car driver. I thought it would be cool to get paid to do what you love to do most.
I like running my Super Late Models here and there and there are times when you go to those events and they are for $2,000 or $3,000 to win. There's no money involved in that; you're basically spending your money to go racing in those things but it's so enjoyable. For me, it's kind of like a golf game.
Hendrick definitely realises that we're young and trying to learn - and wrecking cars is part of how you learn. Jeff Gordon went through 20 something clips in his first season, but Rick Hendrick realised he had to take a chance on Jeff Gordon. They wrecked a lot of cars, but Jeff Gordon has given him four championships.
It was a battle all day with our M&M's Camry. I don't know why, we just didn't have what we needed. We never seemed to have the ticket we needed today. We got better all day, which was a positive and salvaged something out of nothing -- so all things considering it was okay. It's so late in the year, you're just running laps now and getting what you can get and seeing if you can win next weekend at Homestead to finish the year.
Practice for us went pretty well. It started out slow, but guys did a real nice job on the M&M’s Camry today to get us to where we needed to be. Everybody back at the shop is building some great stuff and TRD (Toyota Racing Development) making some improvements for the Chase here this weekend and whatnot. Having a good time there in practice means a lot, but there’s obviously a lot of things that need to happen in the race this weekend for us and getting off to a good start and being able to carry that into the next 10 weeks.