Johnny Benson on his time at Roush, Mentoring Carson Hocevar, & Concussions

The Dale Jr. Download

Dirty Mo Media & SiriusXM

Sports

4.8 • 9K Ratings

🗓️ 8 April 2026

⏱️ 101 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

It’s not often that racers go on to have competitive second acts to their careers after retiring from the limelight. This week on the Download, Dale Earnhardt Jr. sits down with a driver who retired a NASCAR Truck champion and retraced his family roots back to the short tracks: Johnny Benson Jr. Born and raised in Grand Rapids, Michigan, Johnny grew up in the shadows of his father John Benson Sr., one of the finest chauffeurs the Midwest had to offer in the 1960s and 70s. John made a name for himself in the supermodified ranks and served as part of the Michigan invasion of the mid-60s to the legendary Oswego Speedway, where he captured the crown jewel Oswego Classic in 1966. At home, he was an accomplished parts builder and fabricator, which is where young Johnny got his first hands on experience.

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	The following is a production of Dirty Mo Media.
0:06.7	You're Dale Jr.
0:10.0	Should I say it?
0:11.4	It's Dale Jr. podcast, I got to say it.
0:16.7	Hey, everybody.
0:17.4	It's Dale Jr. back again for another episode of the Dale Jr. download our guest segment today
0:20.6	presented to you by Arby's in their new meat and three box. Get more meal for your money at Arby's. We have the meats. We also have a great guest for you today. Johnny Benson's coming on the show. Johnny is raced in the, you know, NASCAR at the truck level, the rally or the Bush level. at the cup level. He's raised short tracks his entire life.
0:38.1	I learned a lot in the... truck level, the rally or the Bush level, at the cup level, he's raised short tracks his entire life.
0:40.1	I learned a lot in preparing for this and reading through our notes.
0:45.0	Bobby Marcos and the team put together a great sort of scope of his life and career.
0:52.4	One thing that's interesting for me is that his dad was a very successful
0:56.6	racer. I want to talk about that because I learned a lot about his dad reading books. And then
1:02.8	Johnny, his career path was, you know, kind of accelerated, clunky, start, stop, how he got into the O'Reilly or the Bush series
1:14.5	and was really successful and he yanked out of there in the Cup Series, and that struggled for a while.
1:19.3	And he never really landed into a great situation until his opportunity at Bill Devis racing in the truck series.
1:26.3	So we want to talk about all that.
1:27.4	But also, a short track racer through and through.
1:31.1	Started at the short tracks.
1:32.7	Still races at the short tracks.
1:35.2	He's recently announced that he is completely retired.
1:38.4	I don't believe it.
1:39.5	We're going to talk about that and more.
	...

Please login to see the full transcript.

Previous episode | Next episode

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from Dirty Mo Media & SiriusXM, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of Dirty Mo Media & SiriusXM and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.