NASCAR star Dale Earnhardt Jr. has revealed his final conversation with Kyle Busch the day before the racing pro’s unexpected death.

Earnhardt Jr. remembered his fellow driver, who died at 41 on May 21, on the latest episode of his podcast, Dale Jr. Download, recalling their last text exchange and Busch’s impact on him and the industry.

“I was texting with him the day before he passed away about getting together this Thursday to bring his seat for his late model over to my shop,” Earnhardt Jr. began, explaining that they had agreed that Busch would drive the vehicle in the CARS Tour and that they were deciding which number they would run in the race, which spotlights late-model cars.

“He’s texting me, and he’s like, ‘What scheme we going to run?’ And I was like, ‘You can run any scheme you want,’” Earnhardt Jr. said. “I was like, ‘What number do you want to run?’ He goes … he said it, literally, ‘The Dale Jr. 8.’ I was like, ‘You got it.’” Earnhardt Jr. had driven the car from 1999 until 2007, making Busch’s choice extra personal for him.

Busch responded to Earnhardt Jr.’s sign-off with the head-exploding emoji, Earnhardt Jr. said, referring to how race fans would react to seeing him behind the wheel of the vehicle.

Earnhardt Jr. became emotional while discussing Busch’s sudden death, saying he has a “hard time believing” that his friend and colleague is gone.

“What I’ve enjoyed, I guess, is learning more about Kyle the person,” Earnhardt Jr. said, referring to recent conversations he has had with fellow drivers about Busch.

“We know who he is on the racetrack. We know how he is on the racetrack and in the media and so forth — what he was like at the track with the suit on and in that environment,” he said. “I knew him on a personal level. But hearing how he interacted and how he was to others, the joke they may have shared in a text … I’ve really enjoyed learning who he was away from the track and how he interacted and engaged, or treated or talked to other people, and it’s been good.”

“When he passed away this past weekend, we heard a lot of drivers say, ‘He was my hero. I wanted to emulate him. I wanted to be like him,’” Earnhardt Jr. revealed, “and I know that that would have meant the world to him.”

NASCAR, the Busch family, and the Richard Childress Racing team announced that the driver had died in a statement to Entertainment Weekly last week. “We are devastated to announce the sudden and tragic passing of Kyle Busch,” the statement read. “Our entire NASCAR family is heartbroken … A future Hall of Famer, Kyle was a rare talent, one who comes along once in a generation. He was fierce, he was passionate, he was immensely skilled, and he cared deeply about the sport and fans.”

Busch was hospitalized on May 21 for a “severe illness” for which he was “undergoing treatment,” his family said. They announced his cause of death two days later. “The medical evaluation provided to the Busch Family concluded that severe pneumonia progressed into sepsis, resulting in rapid and overwhelming associated complications,” they said in a statement to the Associated Press.

Busch is survived by his wife, Samantha, and their children, Brexton and Lennix.

Source: Entertainment Weekly