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This is Later with Lee Matthews The
Lee Matthews Podcast. More what you hear

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weekday afternoons on the Drive. New
from the award winning book publisher Octane Press,

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Trophies and Scars, a personal and
profoundly remarkable, revealing story of the

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life and times of NASCAR Hall of
Famer Ray Evernham, who is joining us

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now to talk about just that.
Ray. Welcome, Hey, Heylee.

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How are you good? Sir?
Good to have you along today. Okay,

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you always wanted to be in NASCAR
in some way or form, but

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your parents didn't. I gather,
Well, it's kind of god about people

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ask me, why how'd your strategy
get into racing? So, I don't

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know. My dad was a fantastic
athlete, you know, played a lot

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of baseball, football, you know, really great, but racing was my

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thing. And you know, so
don't don't really know where that that gene

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came from. But they used to
shake their head. I always tell everybody

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my dad looked like Buddy Ebsen,
you know, from the Beverly Hill dat

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least, And he used to shake
his head at me like I was Jeth

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grow all the time. Well that
was that was what I was getting at

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a lot of people get into NASCAR
because their parents were gear heads or maybe

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dad was a hot rodder or something
along those lines. Yeah, and again,

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it just was something that I really
took to and it was my uncle

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that started taking me to the races, and you know, mom and dad

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supported it once I started, but
it really, you know, it was

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a local stuff around New Jersey at
that time. Grown up in the sixties,

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almost every gas station had a you
know, a little modified stock car

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or something, and there were just
a lot of them around our area and

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a couple of local tracks. And
loved the open wheel cars, the midgets,

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the modifies, and there was a
guy that lived not too far from

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us named Mario Andretti. That was
the guy that I grew up. And

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we're talking to NASCAR Hall of Famer
Ray Evernham and yeah, it seems like

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in those days too, when you
still had carburetors, there was a lot

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more tinkering going on with engines like
that. Yeah, and everybody kind of

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had to build their own stuff,
right as as the sport has progressed,

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So I had the tools. You
know, we're seeing c machines and you

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know, all of the rapid prototyping
and you know, laser cutting and all

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that. You know, now a
lot of people are just you know,

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buying their cars and pieces. Back
then, you couldn't, you know,

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when I come from a time when
you had to if you wanted to race,

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you had to build it. You'd
had to buy something used from somebody

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else, or or build your own. And it so to me. It

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was a great time and I got
to work around a lot of people and

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learn a lot of things. I
just bought a brand new twenty twenty four

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model and I shudder every time I
opened the hood because I don't recognize anything

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under that hood anymore. Well,
so you just get your laptop out and

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plug it in. Yeah, yeah, Ray Evernham is with us. He's

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a NASCAR Hall of Famer. And
you did do your share of driving,

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but at some point you decided maybe
this isn't for me. Well, you

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know, I had been bouncing around. I really wanted to go Indy car

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racing and whatnot. Then I met
this this Jeff Gordon kid, and I

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realized in my heart there's no way
in the world I'm ever going to be

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as good as that kid. This
kid is special, and I was good

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about. I was good about building
cars and setting cars up. But you

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know, together Jeff and I had
you know, I had magic. You

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know, we we had magic and
we still do, you know, when

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we get together and do something.
So you know, it was perfect timing.

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You know, everything happens for a
reason, they say, And you've

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got to be You've got to be
willing when when sometimes change comes up and

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you're not really ready for it,
but in your heart you know that it's

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time to change. And again that's
what the book is not just about racing.

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It's you know again, it's about
business. It's about life and you

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know some of the things that you
that you face as as life changes,

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whether that's from an injury or illness
or you know, or sometimes sometimes it

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just doesn't work out you know the
direction you want to go, and that's

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why we call it Trophies and Scars. Trophies and Scars is the name of

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the book. Ray Evernham, a
NASCAR Hall of Famer, is with us

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to talk about it. You also
detailed your spearheading the return of Dodge to

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NASCAR. What brought that on?
Well, you know, we talk about

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you know in the book there that
look was sitting on top of the world

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being Jeff Gordon's crew chief leading the
Rainbow Warriors. We're the best in motorsports.

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And then you get an opportunity where
a company comes to you and says,

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hey, I want you to start
something for us. Design a car,

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help finish this motor, get the
race teams, built parts, all

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of these things, and lead this. And that was one of those ones

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where you really at some point when
you've got even though everybody's telling you how

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great you are, you really want
to know if you am I good enough

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to do this? Can I make
it without Jeff Gordon and Rick Hendrick?

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You know? Can I do this
on my own? And that was kind

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of a personal challenge to me,
and it was time to grow. You

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know. In my heart, I
knew that we had done everything that we

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could have done and won three or
four times over with Jeff and Rick.

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But this was a This was an
opportunity for me, I think, to

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prove that I could do something on
my own, and more so to prove

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that to myself. Ray Evernham is
with us Trophies and Scars as his book.

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It's not just a memoir, but
it's about business and achieving your goals

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and setting goals. Uh, most
of what you learned you were self taught,

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aren't you. Yeah, But you
know when you say that, that's

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like saying, hey, you know, I went to college and I was

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self taught, right. You know, I was fortunate to have worked with,

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you know, early in my career, to work with some of the

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greats in motorsports. You know,
the Andrettes, the voice answered Petty Earnhardt,

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you know the Gordon you know,
and the people that Rick Hendricks surrounded

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us with, and you know,
being able to be in a Penske organization

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for a while. So you know
that just what I learned from the the

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people along the way. And again
that's why it was important for me to

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write the book, because not everyone
who taught me something that was very valuable

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that was necessarily a superstar, right. It wasn't Roger Penske, always a

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Rick or ANDRETTI. You know,
there were a lot of people in my

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local racing area or just you know
friends that taught me some valuable life lessons,

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and you know, I wanted to
make sure that they knew that that

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little bit of encouragement or that lesson
really helped me get to where I am

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now and where he is is a
NASCAR Hall of Famer, and Ray Everingham

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is with us trophies and scars.
Is the name of the book. What

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do you think is the Is there
one single innovation that has stood out in

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your head as far as development of
engines in NASCAR? Is there one that

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stands out over the others? Oh? I think in general the amount of

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rpm that they turn and the materials
they put in these engines. Now like

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they have increased temperature, these engines
can run it, you know, two

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hundred and thirty two hundred and forty
degrees of engine temperature and they turn incredible

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RPMs. So from the engine development, you know, what the manufacturers have

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done producing these things amazing, It's
just amazing. You know that they have

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to keep restricting the horsepower because they
could be making close to a thousand horsepower

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out of a you know, a
pushrod engine, and again I find that

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just amazing. But I think most
of the probably the biggest technical advantages that

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NASCAR can be proud of, is
some of the things that they've brought from

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the safety standpoint, with driver restraint
systems, seating and things like that.

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I really think that's where NASCAR really
really stepped it up. He steps it

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up in trophies and scars. Ray
Evernham, the NASCAR Hall of Famer,

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joining us to talk about this book. The book is available everywhere from Octane

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Press and we thank you for joining
us. Well, I appreciate that and

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look forward to catch you out.
Wish one of these days I get back

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out at Oklahoma City and Tall So
it's just something magical about that place too.

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Love going through there. Oh you'd
love to chili? Have you ever

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been in the chili bowl? Oh? Yeah, Okay. Thanks for listening

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to Later with Lee Matthews, the
Lee Matthews Podcast, and remember to listen

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to The Drive Live weekday afternoons from
five to seven and iHeartMedia Presentation