“When my older son Jeb was 9, he killed his first wild turkey. When I was 9, you didn’t see wild turkey. But having him bag his first turkey with the same gun that I was brought up on, watching that and just coming out and teaching him how to clean it and all that, that was a lot more endurable (memory) than if I’d have done it myself,” he said.

“I’ve always had two passions in life. One was racing. One was outdoors. Growing up racing go-karts as a child in the summer I did everything I could to get out of school and (that included) hunting, and playing in the woods in the winter,” he said.

“When I started having some success in racing, I started trying to figure out how to tie that into the responsibility I feel like we all have for the outdoors. We all have a responsibility to take care of the natural resources,” he said.

Burton is not involved in racing at the moment, but has not ruled out a return to the sport, even this season. He is also helping son Jeb, now 16, pursue a racing career.

Nevertheless, he will never forsake what he believes to be his duty to promote the care of the environment.

“I owe a lot to a lot of people for having success in racing and I may go back into racing sometime in the near future. But, I always held racing was a career and outdoors was a lifetime endeavor. (The outdoors) is not a career, it is a lifetime passion,” he said.

Burton said that if he had not had success in racing, he would probably be living in a log cabin somewhere. “I would be roughing it a little bit more than I do now. The wife and kids don’t like to rough it as much as I do,” he said with a laugh.

Even though the height of Burton’s success is, for the time being, behind him, he said that the foundation is solid and no longer depends on his success in motorsports.

“No endeavor can live depending on a personality or an individual. It has to be a cause,” he said.

Burton’s foundation has been responsible for taking numerous children, many of them with illnesses, into the outdoors.

Moreover, Burton has lent his time and expertise to other organizations with similar goals.

“Certainly mine is not the only one out there and it’s not the only one that’s got a good cause, so if we all work together, we can all be strong and make a difference,” he said.

Burton has had his conflicts with those who oppose his views, most notably People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals.

“They live in la la land. They live in concrete jungles and they don’t understand where their ancestors came from,” Burton said. “Their ancestors would not have made it if it had not been for fishing and using the natural resource.

“And to tell me that this black belt that I’ve got on is something wrong because it’s leather, I think they are definitely barking up a tree that I think most Americans don’t have any sympathy for.”