Ward Burton visited with Claire B. Lang at Martinsville. Credit: Autostock

Claire B. Lang interviews Ward Burton

Claire B. Lang is the host of "Dialed In", which airs Monday through Friday from 4pm-7pm ET on XM Satellite Radio's 24-hour NASCAR Radio Channel 144. On Friday morning Claire sat down at Martinsville with Ward Burton, who was visiting the track for the first time this season.

Claire: Ward, it's great to see you here at the track again. You can't keep a secret in the garage for more than 30 seconds, because you walked in here and it was like a whirlwind of "Ward Burton's here!"

Ward Burton: (laughs) I don't know about that, but you never could keep a secret in this garage, so nothing has changed.

Claire: You're looking good, and you're here to sign some autographs?

Ward Burton: You know, it's been quite a few weeks since I've been to a race track from last year. I just felt the need to come down. It's only an hour from home, and I haven't really had an opportunity see a lot of people and you know they're getting ready to get busy here in a few minutes for practice, but I miss it. You know, I was coming down the hill here in Martinsville and smelled that tire rubber, and I've been smelling that for 20 some years, so it's a little different. A lot of other things I'm doing in life I'm really enjoying. I'm kind of getting a renewed, refreshing energy in me.

Claire B. Lang

Claire: Well, what are you doing with your time, and I assume it's not that fast pace of being on the road. What's life like been like for you?

Ward Burton: It's still fast-paced, you know? This past week I was in Roanoke meeting with folks we have a great relationship with at Carilion Health Care Center, and have shot a few commercials with them. Tuesday I was meeting with Sharyn McCrumb that wrote "St. Dale" and we're writing another book together. Wednesday I was working at a conservation model in Virginia with the Ward Burton Wildlife Foundation. Yesterday I spent some time at the office and with my wife, and today I'm at the race track, and Sunday I'm getting ready to take two kids that are battling cancer turkey hunting and fishing. And actually one of them is right here from Danville, real close to Martinsville. That's a lot of fun, and I feel like we can make a difference in reaching children's lives.

When you race Nextel Cup, you have to give it a hundred percent. And when you give it a hundred percent, it's about 80 percent of your time. So I'm kind of enjoying having a schedule that's pretty much, not always but somewhat in my control.

Claire: Do you miss racing? I probably get at least two e-mails as day saying, "You haven't talked to Ward this week. Is he coming back?"

Ward Burton: (laughs)

Claire: Do you have it in your heart that you want to race again, or do you think that you have some other purpose at this point?

Ward Burton: Oh, I definitely think I have other purpose, but I was doing that even when I was racing. Without racing, I would have not been able to make the difference that eventually -- hopefully if I live long enough -- we're going to be able to make through the conservation message.

At the same time, I love this sport, and the people in it, and there's a lot of parts of it I miss dearly, and there's some parts of it, like the schedule or not being in a competitive ride, that I don't miss. But you always have to take the good and the bad. You know, my mom had told me a couple of months ago that I used to watch "Old Yeller" when I was a little kid.

Claire: I loved that, too! That was a while back.

Ward Burton: (laughs) I had to order it...

Claire: (laughs)

Ward Burton

Ward Burton: (laughs) and paid 20 dollars for it, but went and got "Old Yeller" yesterday and my children and I sat down and watched it. I hadn't watched it in probably 30 years. But at the end of it, the southerner was giving the boy a speech about what happened to the dog and he said, "Life can throw you some punches sometimes. You just can't stay down too long, 'cause life is a joy." And that's kind of the story of my life right now.

Claire: That's very cool ... meaning that you may or may not want to come back racing.

Ward Burton: Well, I'm just saying that. I've had a great career in this sport, and I was very lucky to even be here. At the same time, how it all went down in the last year or so wasn't a lot of fun, and I got kind of punched a little bit last year. But, life goes on and I look at this sport in a positive way, and most of the people in a positive way, and I don't think there's anything in North America even close to what NASCAR racing is about.

Claire: It seems to me that you've got your head screwed on quite straight, if I could capsulize what you just said...

Ward Burton: (laughs) Well, some people say I'm tied together with duct tape, so I don't know. I've got a real clear vision of who I am and where I'm headed and, yeah, I've got to find other ways to make a living, and I don't know exactly where that roads going to go down. I'm working on putting together an outdoor show, or concepts for it, and we'll see what happens.

Claire: When your agent or your business manager comes to you and says, "You know, there's this Truck ride. There's this Busch ride." Is it almost like you don't want to hear about that right now, or are you more like, "Well, I'll listen." You're not running to the phone seeking out stuff, right?

Ward Burton: No, and to be honest with you probably in some cases I didn't return calls as quick as I should have.

Claire: You can't be confused about where you're going.

Ward Burton: Right, you can't be confused on where you're going. It's confusing right now because I haven't set the helmet in the closet fully, but the helmet is laying on the floor. And I don't know whether I'm going to put it back on or not. That makes it a little bit confusing for responding, but I'm not going to say "No" to something initially, but for me to go in something in racing, I want to have some excitement on the track, and the capabilities of being competitive ad winning, and off the track of building relationships for the sponsors, and intermingling with their relationships, and meeting the fans.

I actually enjoy that part of it, and have been real lucky over the years to feel like there's a lot of folks that support me. It's very humbling. So there's a lot of parts of it that I do miss, and some of it I don't, but I don't want to come back just for the sake of coming back. I want to come back with some excitement and a splash if it happens.

Claire: You know, I've heard it said that life is sort of like a stream and that at certain parts you should jump on the inner tube and just kind of float where it goes.

Ward Burton: (laughs)

Claire: Should a great ride come your way that you just couldn't turn down you would go that direction, but you're not wanting to get into it if it's something that you're going to have to struggle with.

Ward chats with Scott Riggs last season. Credit: Autostock

Ward Burton: Well, I struggled last year and a half, and it kind of took the sails off of me a little bit. It just wasn't a lot of fun, Claire, and if I feel like I'm with the right situation and got the right support, which there's about five car owners out there that can give that to you in Nextel Cup, I could get real excited and give it more than a hundred percent. I don't know if that opportunity will happen or not.

Claire: In the meantime, you got your head on straight, you're working with the kids and you're giving back. Of course, a lot of people will be rushing you thinking you're here looking for a job this weekend. We just love having you back in the garage. We could talk stories of racing forever, and you don't have to be out looking for work to come back and hang out with your friends here at the track.

Ward Burton: Well, thank you. No, I haven't even had an opportunity to see my brother yet, but I'm not here looking for rides. If someone wants to get in touch with me they know how to get in touch with me. I'm just kind of here because I felt like it had been a while and I need to come, and also at the same time I'd be able to do something for one of my old sponsors, MBNA, and from there we'll go home and do a few things with my wife tonight, do a little work on the farm tomorrow, and get ready to entertain some kids Sunday.

Claire: How about your kids? Tell me about them. I want to catch up.

Ward Burton: Well, Sarah's doing great. She's in N.C. State, and she's such a sweet girl, and she's doing great in school, and she's got her head on very straight...

Claire: Where did she learn that? (laughs)

Ward Burton: (laughs) Not from me at that age, I can tell you that! I don't know where she got that from. We'll have to decide whether that's Throckmorton genes or Burton genes, I don't know. (laughs) Jeb's doing good. He got his first big wild turkey last Saturday, and he has some struggles in school just like I did, but he's starting to buckle down and do a good job on that. I'm going to get Jeb out Sunday to meet the children before he has to get ready to go to school Monday morning.

Claire: Is he interested in driving at all?

Ward Burton: He is and he isn't. He's got so many other things gong on with some of his other sports like baseball, and he's getting involved with basketball, so we'll wait and see. I'm not pushing him; he's going to do what Jeb wants to do. And Ashton, my 3-year-old, he's doing great.

Claire: He'll be the wildfire...

Ward Burton: He's gonna be the wildfire. He just has fun with everything. I took him fishing, actually, late Wednesday afternoon, and he likes to dissect the bass's eyes, and then let him go back in the pond. (laughs)

Claire: You're talking about family; your brother is right next door. He was just doing the breakfast club, talking to the media. He told me a story about when he first learned how to drive, and how he knocked out the lights or knocked the power out in your town or something. Do you remember that?

Ward Burton: Oh, yeah. I remember that. Dad had built a '57 Chevy for him, and it wasn't long after that he hit a telephone pole leaving the driveway, and the hospital had to go on emergency power. So thank God for Caterpillar generators. (laughs)

Claire: What did you think at the time?

Ward Burton: Ummmmm ... we had had kind of a ... conversation about an hour before then, so ... I was just glad he wasn't hurt.

Claire: It's great to see you again. People ask about you all the time. I think they got the message of exactly where you're at. Are you having fun here just hanging out? What are you going to do while you're here?

Ward Burton: I'm going to go up on the Cingular 31 trailer and watch Jeff practice and some of the others practice for a few minutes, and then I'll get ready to go sign some autographs, and them I'm going to go home. You know it's kind of weird for me. The first time I came here to race was back in the '80's in late model stocks, and that was a one-horse trailer with a little cart behind it. Now I don't have a horse to ride so I kind of feel a little bit out of place, but I'll be fine.

Claire: Do you still watch racing on TV?

Ward Burton: I love the sport, and I've watched, not all of them, but I've watched more than half of them from start to finish. Heck, I was a NASCAR Nextel Cup, or Winston Cup fan back then, before I was even driving so I'm interested in it, and yes, I'm a big fan of it and I'll always be.

Claire: And you and your brother still talk racing? Do you give him hints and ideas? He's doing pretty well.

Ward Burton: He's doing well, and I'm glad for him. We have been playing phone tag with the cell phones for the last two weeks. We finally caught each other last night, so we talked a little bit about the Cup race at Bristol and the Busch race where he did well at.

Claire: Listen, it's so great to see you. Everybody's listening coast-to-coast on XM Satellite Radio and I know I hauled you out of the garage. It was kind of you to do that for me.

Ward Burton: Yeah, and I'm looking forward to getting my new truck so I can get this XM Radio on my truck because that's a cool option you can get on one of these vehicles.

Claire: Thanks so much, Ward, and enjoy your day at the track. Always good to see you.

Ward Burton: Okay, thank you, Claire.

Courtesy of XM Satellite Radio