"He was a heck of a driver": Dale Earnahrdt Jr. and Richard Childress discuss Kasey Kahne's NASCAR comeback

Kasey Kahne recently announced his NASCAR comeback after six years. During an appearance on the latest episode of the Dale Jr. Download, Richard Childress revealed how the 44-year-old's move came about.

Kahne will be racing in a series of races with Richard Childress Racing in the Xfinity Series at Rockingham in April.

The legendary NASCAR team owner revealed that Kahne's former crew chief, Keith Rodman, reached out to Childress. Rodman asked Childress that if they came up with some funding, whether he would consider running Kahne for RCR.

"I said, sure man. I love Kasey. He was a heck of a driver, just a great person. I just think that to have him there and having him in the car and seeing that smile on his face when he comes to the shop, I talked to him and you could just see how excited he was. I think he's going to go down and do really good," Childress described. [43:50]

This prompted Dale Earnhardt Jr. to remark that Kasey Kahne is one of his favorite people. And at one point, Kahne was also in the running for one of Dale Jr.'s late model cars.

Earnhardt said that fans will be really excited to see Kahne coming back to NASCAR as he revealed an anectode which summed up Kahne's personality.

"Apparently they went to test at Rockingham and he said to somebody I know, 'When did they repave this place?' He didn't know that they paved it till he got there. He thought he was going to run on old Rockingham. He got there and he was like, 'Holy sh*t! We're hauling a**,'" Earnhardt described.

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Kasey Kahne revealed the extent of his dehydration problems that forced him to retire from NASCAR

In 2018, Kasey Kahne announced his retirement from NASCAR in the middle of the season because of health issues. However, now that he's preparing for his comeback after seven years, Kahne has revealed why he made the decision to retire.

Kahne said that his dehydration issues were so bad that by the time he got to the middle of the 2018 season, it was as bad as he'd ever felt in his life.

"After the races for the next two or three days, even into the next race, we just couldn’t figure it out, couldn’t get it fixed. It was a mess. It wasn’t a very good way to end," he said via NASCAR.

He remarked that the end to his Cup run was short, quick and not what he expected or wanted.

Because of that, Kasey Kahne added that he's glad to be getting an opportunity to run in a national-level race again for NASCAR in April.