Cleetus McFarland and Squirrel McNutt's FULL Press Conference — 2026 Talladega Superspeedway

[0:00] check check check we'll go ahead and get this started um does anyone have a question we'll [0:09] start in the middle here with steven and then back to dalton steven toronto nascar pole position this [0:16] first question is going to be for cletus it was announced this week that you're going to be [0:20] running the o'reilly race at nashville obviously the plan had been to run here but you weren't [0:26] approved by nascar to do so nashville is a little bit of a way to rub it in [0:31] oh sorry about that just kidding um nashville is kind of a in between a kind of a shorter track [0:37] like like you're um you're currently currently eligible to run and a mile and a half so what [0:41] was the process like at rcr to uh decide you know hey let's let's go to nashville and uh get some [0:46] more experience in these cars well rcr when they you know when we first got the news back from nascar [0:52] which we kind of expected based on a hectic drive at rockingham that we were only approved for the [0:58] shorter tracks they really just looked at it as nashville's probably a safe bet considering the [1:05] slower speeds and the turns more time for me to just learn the car and the horsepower and it aligned [1:12] with my schedule tommy's express it all aligned with them so it just kind of worked out on its own [1:19] we didn't uh pick nashville with any other intention of it just kind of working out [1:23] and uh hopefully if i do well in nashville i can you know keep working my way up bigger tracks and [1:30] you know make it to daytona in the spring and speaking of bigger tracks this will be a question [1:35] for squirrel uh it feels like only a couple weeks ago that you made your arca east debut at hickory so [1:41] between that and now going from hickory to talladega i mean how i mean how crazy is it to think that [1:49] you're going from uh you know short track like that to the biggest and baddest track possible [1:56] yeah i mean uh it's not too crazy uh we were out here in crown vic so i'm pretty used to speed [2:02] uh did probably 50 laps in a crown vic got her up to 160. so that was pretty great hickory then we [2:09] went to rockingham then kansas they're all pretty fast you know baby steps arca had me do baby steps [2:15] it wouldn't let me do uh daytona now we know i got it so i'm feeling really good i'm gonna be [2:21] driving much more aggressively now because i was on the road to daga but now i'm here so i'm here to [2:28] win we're gonna be shaking and baking he texted me last night he said i'm letting the cat out of the [2:33] cage at daga so right you know he's been on probation essentially until this moment i mean y'all [2:41] are gonna see a whole different squirrel i think by the way he didn't put a scratch on his car [2:45] last three races so he did a great job three clean races and one top ten i felt like a shake and bake [2:52] was coming thanks guys we'll go in the back to dalton we're all hopkins with front stretch have [2:58] you been introduced to the talladega boulevard well dalton let me tell you a little something about [3:04] the road to daga it originally started with our good buddy greg biffle and our cheap rv challenge last [3:10] year where we had one of the greatest rvs of all time i believe she was a 1986 winnebago [3:18] we called it the daga baga we drove here we camped out on daga boulevard uh the entire time we were [3:24] here we had fans come into our rv while we were sleeping 3 a.m we know the daga boulevard very well [3:31] and we're glad to be back uh and cletus follow up for you how important is it to have a place like [3:38] that with the lore that it has to attract fans into this sport well i mean talladega [3:44] is uh quite possibly the most like lawless place i've ever been you know inside like it's almost [4:00] its own country and i just really can't believe how incredible it is inside the racetrack of [4:08] talladega like you you're entering a new country i'm surprised they don't ask you for a passport [4:13] i'm surprised they don't rip your sleeves off but the like you said the lore the aura [4:18] of talladega is is definitely like nothing else it is way better than all the racetracks as far as [4:27] having a good time goes it's incredible all right we have a question all the way in the back i'm sorry [4:34] i can't see i think what he was asking about was how do you feel that you can like bring so many people [4:40] to it and they're supportive is that kind of what you were getting at i blacked out look we just got [4:48] a lot of a lot of really great americans their rider dies with us and that's the best feeling in [4:55] the world dude there's people hanging out for practice exactly they're just fired up i mean [4:59] they're glad to be here they're all sleeveless yep watching us turn left americans coming out to support [5:06] us at daga one other thing about daga we do know but we haven't seen is there's a daga jail we've been [5:12] threatened with it but now that we know the boss man of daga i'm honestly not worried at all euclid [5:21] no i was actually thinking whoever finishes lower or finishes worse should have to spend the night in [5:25] daga jail i'll sleep on that one all right we'll go ahead in the back when you guys whenever your [5:34] first race just what was your first experience kind of going at speed into the corners i did the [5:39] like track experience and i'm like oh god but is it is it kind of normal when you've done it at [5:44] other tracks or is this kind of different when you're going into turn one here i would say [5:52] talladega is probably the easiest because it's so wide and it doesn't have the kind of drop [5:59] that daytona has so you know just because i drove daytona first i think when i came to talladega i was [6:06] really feeling comfortable george mcnutt here your first ever super speedway was just right now tell us [6:14] yeah my first ever time doing it in a real car was just now five laps um so far rockingham is my [6:21] favorite track ten times scarier than talladega i'll have to say push you're going in there and uh [6:29] you just have to trust that the car is going to make the turn certainly doesn't feel like it's going [6:33] to and then you just pedal to the floor but here it's great because you don't lift you just turning [6:37] left and going fast it's the most american thing on planet earth are there any final questions we'll go [6:46] back to back to stephen i did want to ask one follow-up question just to set the record straight [6:52] about the motor at kansas last week it was uh i think it was a crimp in the uh in the oil line so [6:59] did you guys uh did your team get that straightened out and find out so the team does not crimp the oil [7:06] lines in this situation and the oil line was crimped by a third party and based on what i saw it just [7:17] looked like it was improperly crimped just not fully seated in the fitting which we make crimped [7:25] you know fittings at our shop all the time i've messed up several in my life just wasn't crimped [7:30] properly and after whatever 70 laps it just couldn't hold you know 80 psi and blew all the oil out so it [7:36] just like fell out it yeah the fitting was fine and then the line was just there and you could see the [7:43] end that was crimped and it just slid out of the fitting all right yeah just uh figured i'd ask [7:48] because i saw that in the video and i didn't want any uh this information out there like you were [7:52] trying to talk with brendan about yeah yeah all right thank you we'll come right up here in the [7:58] front hey guys i'm at the abc 30 30 40 here in birmingham um we do a lot of football throughout [8:06] the year so i always have to ask people to come to daga and think about your answer here alabama or auburn [8:14] auburn roll tide really you're roll tide honestly i don't all right then i'll go with you on that roll tide [8:25] that's what everyone gets us to say when we're out and about i mean i feel like it's way more [8:30] common for us all right thanks guys good luck this weekend