“My knees were bleeding, I couldn’t get a sponsorship”: Dale Jr.’s guest recounts what forced him into illegal activities despite imprisonment

Dale Jr.'s guest Gary Balough recalled the dire circumstances that led him to indulge again in illegal activities despite serving jail time for drug smuggling. Balough talked with the legendary NASCAR driver and lifted the lid on the challenging situation forcing him to do the unwanted.

Balough was a NASCAR driver for five years but earned fame through a dominant Late Models and Dirt Modifieds resume, amassing over 1000 wins. However, a shady side of him was about to come haunting back - he smuggled drugs to fund stock car racing efforts. Despite narrowly escaping law enforcement, when Balough’s men carried 15000 pounds of marijuana on their boat, Balough was later arrested at his home.

70 people got arrested in the $300 million drug smuggling, and Balough served 45½ months behind bars. However, after getting released, he got involved again.

Thus, Dale Jr. questioned Balough about what made him smuggle drugs again. Balough replied, outlining the dire situation, forcing him to do illegal activities despite law enforcement’s previous reprimand.

“My knees were bleeding, I couldn’t get a sponsorship, I couldn’t make no money, (I was) at the bottom, at the very very bottom,” Balough told Dale Jr. (1:16.58).

The former Cup Series driver shed light on how making one smuggling trip was sufficient for his societal cause of gifting Christmas presents to the kids.

“I made Christmas for all them kids, I load my truck with $30-$40000 worth of toys, they take it over there and we’d have Christmas. They needed bikes and they needed this they needed that whatever they needed, we figured out how to get it…so you do one trip.”

Another notable player in the smuggling ring was Gary Balough’s car owner Billie Harvey.

Gary Balough tells Dale Jr. about the early morning hours of his arrest

Gary Balough was in a dire situation when he saw police boats patrolling the waters on which one of their boats, a 58-foot Chris Craft, was loaded with 15000 pounds of marijuana. Moreover, the structure was sinking as water seeped. But the former NASCAR driver brought a mudsucker along, which worked wonders to drain excess water.

However, Balough later realized the cops weren’t after them. Nonetheless, law enforcement was already on his tail, tracked his move for nearly four years, and collected rock-solid evidence. They made the final move a few days after the season-opener 1982 Daytona 500, arresting him from his home at 5 AM.

"They come at 5 O'clock in the morning and the first thing they said to me was, 'You got a better career in future than anybody we're arresting and we're arresting 70 people this morning," Balough told Dale Jr. (1:04.55).

If Gary Balough had not been involved in the saga, he would’ve potentially fielded a ride with Harry Rainer’s organization, along with a lucrative $750,000 sponsorship from Domino’s for 25 races.