Everyone knows Kenny Wallace has a great sense of humor. The former NASCAR driver recently spoke about his older brother and NASCAR Hall of Famer Rusty Wallace, at one point even calling him “mean.”
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But Kenny didn’t quite mean it that way. In his eyes, “mean” was a term of endearment.
Wallace said on The Late Lap podcast, “When his (Rusty’s) dear friend Bobby Allison blew a tire going down the back straightaway at Pocono, Bobby spun out and got t-boned right in the door. Rusty taught me, ‘Herman (Kenny’s nickname), hope for the best, prepare for the worst.’ So when I got going in NASCAR, I realized that I’d better save all my money I make.
“Now, I buy things, but you’ll never see my last dollar. In racing, we are contracted labor. In other words, when I drove a NASCAR race car my whole life, I got my money given to me and then it was up to me to take out my taxes and to invest my money.
“So, I grew up very quick and I handled everything by myself. I got a great CPA, a great accountant… That was probably the best advice Rusty ever given me: hope for the best, prepare for the worst.”
Rusty may be “mean,” but a good part of the reason for that is he’s gone through adversity and tough times and wanted to prepare his kid brother for the same thing once his own racing career took off.
“He’s very mean, but Rusty calls it ‘tough love’,” Kenny said. “He chews my a** out. Not anymore. That quit about maybe eight years ago. I think it’s because I’m 62.
“But about two years ago, we got into a knockdown drag out argument at Bike Week in Daytona. I looked at him and I said, ‘I’m your biggest fan.’ That crushed him. And he went, ‘I’m your biggest fan, too.’
“So, the thing with Rusty is he loves me so much, he’s just going to tell me exactly what he feels and no sugarcoating because he loves me so much. See, when people really love you, they’ll tell you exactly what they think. It’s opposite of what you would think.”
At the same time, “mean Rusty” also has a heart of gold, Kenny said.
Kenny likes to tell the story of how he got a late start as a racer, at the age of 22. Before that, he worked as a mechanic and crew chief on their father Russ’ race cars as well as Rusty’s and Mike’s early cars.
When it was time for Kenny to start racing, he took like it like a duck to water and became very successful very quickly. While Kenny would have loved to follow Rusty to NASCAR, he had to face reality, only to see that very reality become a dream fulfilled, courtesy of his older brother.
“We had no money, but Rusty called me up and said, ‘Herm, I want to pay you back for everything you’ve done for me,’” Kenny recalled. “I’m going to move you south and put you in the Busch Grand National Series.
“November of ’88 (Kenny and his wife Kim), we move everything (to Charlotte)… I mean, I raced three years in the Midwest and then, boom, (Rusty) put me right in the big time. And before I knew it, I was in the Cup Series. I was like, ‘Holy, moly.’ So I went to the big time quick.”
All because of that “mean” brother.
