Steve Wallace is following in the footsteps of his famous racing father, Rusty. Credit: Autostock

Q&A: Kenny Wallace/Steve Wallace

Kenny Wallace is 10th in the Busch Series points standings and will make his seventh career start at Gateway, while Steve Wallace will make his track debut on Saturday, which will be his 10th career series start. Both were guests of the NASCAR media as the Busch Series heads for St. Louis this weekend.

Kenny, can you talk about your family's racing heritage from your dad, Russ, to you and your brothers, Rusty and Mike, and now it's kind of coming full circle with Steve?

Kenny Wallace

Kenny: Well, I would say there's a lot of pride and tradition in the Wallace family as far as auto racing goes. We grew up watching my dad win every week and that set the tone for this type of auto racing life you know. You look at Dale Earnhardt where his dad won all the time and you know, then the Big E went on to do it and we follow that same pattern. My dad won a lot of championships and over 500 races in the Midwest around the Missouri, Illinois area.

So, you know, Rusty and Mike and myself, we worked on dad's cars. Of course I did the smaller jobs because I was the youngest and Rusty and Mike, they did the fabricating and the welding. You know, it was a family affair, and it was truly racing all the time. And if we didn't do good, we were all quiet, you know, on the way home after the races and we were all bummed out, and so that's the type of atmosphere we grew up in.

We grew up in an atmosphere where we ran second or third it was very devastating, I think that's the drive that it gave my brother Rusty to go out and start this whole Wallace legacy in a lot bigger manner. If it weren't for Rusty, I would have never went NASCAR, and Mike wouldn't have, and of course Steven wouldn't be doing as good as he's doing right now.

Steve, you've said you wanted to carve out your own niche in NASCAR, but at the same time it's got to be a great help to have such experience to fall back on with your grandpa and your dad and your uncles. Can you talk about that?

Steve: Yeah, it's definitely a big help. You've got dad who is a Cup champion, won a bunch of races, finished second a bunch in the championship, and Mike's had a good career, he's won some Busch races and stuff like that. But it definitely helps, you know, for example we were at Martinsville this weekend and I've never been there before as far as actually driving on the racetrack.

Going there, started about when I was four years old I guess. Dad got in the race car first and like he made some laps and got a handle real good and then I got in it. Those are just characteristics and benefits of like having a racing family. When my dad is not there and I have a question, I'll go to Kenny or Mike or whoever, you know.

Steven, we all hear about baseball dads and what have you. Could you give us the good of having your dad involved in racing and then the bad of having him involved with your racing?

Steve Wallace

Steve: Well, I tell you what, I would say it's more good than bad. I've had a very good season so far. The finishes haven't been good, but we've led laps and we've ran up front and we've proved to people like we are fast. But I was talking to Kevin Harvick the other day and when he debuted in his Busch race career, you race 14 cars straight in a row, like Richard Childress stayed with him. But I think if I wasn't driving for my dad, I might be fired by now.

So it's definitely good -- it's definitely good to have your dad as a boss and as a driving coach and all that stuff. But like he's definitely helped me out. You know, hopefully we can get our finishes on track. You know, Martinsville, we were second quick in all three practice sessions. And the overall outcome of like the race wasn't that good, we got wrecked on lap two and just went downhill from there but he definitely helped me a bunch.

What's it like going home and living with the boss?

Steve: Well, when you run bad or when you run good it just all depends. Like mom is real big on cooking. We have dinner every night. We sit down at the table and talk about stuff. So if I run bad and look like an idiot he makes me feel like one. But if I run good, I'll kind of the superstar at the house. So it's definitely a real mood setting type deal.

A question for Kenny. When you see Steven race and you think about the history of the family in NASCAR, what are your emotions?

Kenny: Well, it's very important for me to make sure Steve knows everything he needs to know because, you know, in August, I'll be 43. And I know for a fact that you know, my career when I reach around 47 years old, I'm looking at NASCAR, my NASCAR career coming down to an ending. So it's in my best interests for Steven to outrun me or compete against me.

I like to challenge Steven, because just like the Andrettis, Michael and Mario, it's not going to do me or the family any good if Steven doesn't run good. He's the last of the Mohicans, and my brother Mike's son, Matt, he's very young. He's only single digit age, or nine, ten years old, something like that. So I really, really want to make sure that Steve knows everything that he needs to know. I don't want him to go, oh, I didn't know I need to do this on a restart or I didn't know this.

If it were not for Rusty I would not be where I'm at because Rusty gave me all the shortcuts, and that's what I want to do with Steve. Any time he's around I want him to come down and talk to me and ask me things because I want to make sure that and it's my job -- I've told Rusty if there's anything in my power, and one day if I quit racing, I want to go to work for Steven.

Steve: You can drive my motorhome.

Kenny: No, I'm not going to work.

What have you learned most from moving up to the Busch Series?

Steve: I've learned a lot. Surely I come from racing short tracks like around the southeast, and I won a lot of big races and I kind of stepped up to this season where I'm returning mostly the shorter tracks like occasionally there's Kentucky and stuff like that but like short track racing is short track racing.

I went to Martinsville and just drove like I usually do on all of short tracks. But definitely you learn a lot from like guys like Kevin Harvick, Kenny Wallace; the man is a legend, Clint Bowyer, all of those guys really help you out a lot.

The Busch Series is like for surely not like -- not like it has been in the past. There's a lot more competition. It's all Nextel Cup teams and stuff like that. It's definitely hard and when you're running up front and running good with those guys, you're surely showing something.

Kenny, what about your job as driver, if any, is stressful to you?

Kenny: Well, it's always stressful when you go through that pit bay; it's all business. I have a couple different faces I put on. You've got Kenny Wallace, who is the personality, the TV guy. And then you have Herminator, who is my nickname which has been my whole life; that's the racing end of me.

We built all our own race cars our whole careers and I think the most stressful thing about racing is, and I learned it from my brother Rusty and he's right; and the most stressful thing is making sure you have the setup right so the car will handle.

As we've seen with Dale Junior, if the car doesn't handle, you can look like a hobo. Anybody can drive a fast race car, anybody. The most stressful thing for me is to make sure that I do everything in my talent to help the team get the car set up to it competes.

Kenny, you finished in the top 10 in the championship point standings in the nine seasons you've competed full time in the Busch Series. What exactly can you contribute that consistency to over the long haul, and especially as Steve talked about, the fact that the Busch Series as it is today, it's never been more competitive.

Kenny: Well, I would say a mixture of things. The first thing was when I was Steven's age and I started -- Steven was racing earlier than I did, but I started racing at 22 because I was busy helping Rusty build his race cars. The very first thing when I started was Dick Trickle told me one day and it hit me like a ton of bricks, that you must first finish to finish first.

So in other words, if it's a 250-lap race at Martinsville, you can't be tearing your fenders off because you're going to need those at the end of the race. I've wrecked plenty of times on lap 50 and looked up and the guy I was racing with leading the race and it really pissed me off, you know. So that's biggest thing that has helped me.

And then the other thing I've learned is that if your car is not good that day, don't get into beating matches with people. Take the best finish you can get, and I learned that from the late great Dale Earnhardt. The reason Earnhardt was a seven-time champ was when his car was good, he would race you and, when his car was bad, he took the best finish he could get. I'm the same way. If I've got a really good car, I'm going to fight you for the lead. If I've got a really bad car, I'm going to get the best finish I can get without tearing my race car up.

There's been a lot of talk lately about a lack of give and take particularly on the Cup side, is it the same way in the Busch Series?

Kenny: Yeah, there is, but the difference is that in the Busch Series, everybody is just trying to be a hero. I would say once you get from 15th, 18th on back, you know, you've got guys trying to fight for superiority, trying to get recognized. And then in the Cup series you've got guys that are really hard headed and they want their space and they want respect. And that's the difference. In the Cup series, everybody wants respect because they are big time. And the Busch Series, everybody just wants to be noticed because their careers are starting out. I understand what you're talking about. You know, you're talking probably about the turn four at Pocono.

When I talked to Steve last week, he said out of all his racing relatives, he thought personality wise he's most like you. Do you agree with that and is that accurate?

Kenny: Absolutely.

Steve: I told them I was your kid.

Kenny: That's awesome, dude. It's too bad Steven has got to hear this, but I must tell the truth. I have a great deal of love for Steven. We're nephews and that's as close as you can get. He's just incredibly -- he's full of love and he is hyperactive, he has Tourette's -- he's got all the stuff that I got that p---es people off right away. So people can't stand to be around both of us for very long at a time because I wore Kenny Schrader out my whole career, and then you know Steven could wear you out.

But he's just a sweetheart of a kid. I just enjoy having him around me.

We just had him here at my house in St. Louis for about a week and a half. He went dirt racing with me. He's seen a side of me that he's never seen me before, going to dirt tracks. Whenever anybody has something not nice to say about Steven, I have to remind them that he's 18 years old and that he's a kid still and, you know, he's a lot like his father, too, though.

And Charlie Chase, who was Rusty's best man at his wedding. Charlie Chase had to remind people in NASCAR Rusty's first year that Rusty was a diamond in the rough. And Steven is the same thing. Steven is a hell of a race car driver. But everything is all new, you know. He didn't know everything and a lot of the things Steven has got to find out on his own.

So I'm there for him and his dad is, too. It's easier for Steve to talk to me. Nobody can talk to their dad like they can their friends or their uncle. The end.