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Yeah, that's in the Lost Files. Yeah, he told me about that one. Yeah, we got off work at PC and then we went over to his place and then we started drinking a lot. And then we started naming too many names of like... And we went, okay, we got to get rid of this. It was funny because we looked at each other and we went, this has got to get deleted, right? And he said, yeah, yeah. Yeah, I'm not going to be able to use that. I've never heard it. That was probably still from like four or five years ago. That's when he lived in California, right? Yeah, yeah, that was when he lived in here. Yeah. One of the wilder couple days of my life was flying out to California and doing probably eight podcasts early on when we were doing them. And that was super fun. And that was the time that I got to meet you and your dad. We got to tour Jackson Racing. And that was that company that your dad started many, many, many years ago. It was like sort of one of the things that...
that was like one of the things that I aspired to, to like, I really wanted a Jackson blower so bad on my car, like in like 2000. Um, and so it was super cool to be there and talk about old school Hondas and wheel to wheel stuff and autocross stuff. But, uh, yeah. What, uh, what kind of stuff you guys work on right now? You're, you're dabbling all kinds of things. Yeah. Uh, I mean on the, on the sales side, I guess, you know, what keeps the lights on, um, you know, we have, uh, we have,
a turbo kit that we make for the honda talent side by side that's sold to uh honda dealers nationwide actually worldwide technically um so we send the we send these turbo kits or plug and play uh emissions legal right so they have to actually be emissions legal to be sold to be used on public land a little known fact i didn't know they have cats on them and stuff yes they do really yeah they have there's an emissions law and you have to to use it on public land it has to pass emissions so good for them is that that's like with every side by side That's what every side was said, yeah. Any really off-road motorcycles, they have to do that now. Like motocross bikes, they're considered like a closed-course vehicle. So technically, like a motocross bike, it's like buying a GT3 Cup car. That's supposed to be only for a racetrack. Really? Now, yeah, but in the U.S. it doesn't always get followed like that. Yeah, probably hard to enforce as like a DNR agent too. Yeah, but they've started to enforce that actually in some states. When you go to like into a power sports dealer, there's a...
area that all the bikes are marked as closed course competition vehicles and you're like why can't i go look at that crf 450 over there and it's like oh you can but just letting you know that's that's a race bike. Really? I didn't know anything about this. I, I, I would not have guessed that like side-by-side stuff was, I had like a mission standards, but that might make sense. Yeah. Yeah. So yeah, we, we, we did that. Um, and then what's cool is of course you do that part and then we get to do the racing part, right? So, um, the side-by-side racing stuff, uh, we developed some stuff for the hot off-road program for race. Go, um, you know, our parts won the ball 1000, right? So like, that's, it's been a pretty cool, totally different world. Uh, funny to compare.
Safety standards and rules for off-road compared to in like racing compared to, you know Grid life or SCCA or something like that Like you start comparing the rules. You're like, well, this one makes sense and I wish this was over here on SCCA But then you look at a rule in off-road and you're like that's dangerous There's there's random rules that you saw Really let this happen. Yeah, like fuel fuel is just like the wild like the wild west like I laughed because do you think it's because do you think it's because like they're not usually close cockpit vehicles?
I think it's... Or they just haven't burned each other apart like a bunch of 1960s triumphs like SECA did. I think when it starts to burn to the ground, they just all run away and leave it in the desert. They're just like, oh, okay. For example, at the Vegas Torino, when we raced that, I was doing fueling and I didn't have to have a race suit on. It was really weird.
The dry brakes were free for all. As quick as you can make it go down, go for it. Biggest dry brake you can get. We would pump them in real quick. What was the other thing? I did wear a suit. I can't remember if that was rules or just me going, I think I'm going to wear a suit. Burning sex. You've had a rough couple years. Seeing how the rules were, people would spill, but as long as it was on the mat, it didn't matter. I was like, this mat is the size of a pit area.
Fuel just went everywhere. You could just live in a pool of fuel. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. And just send it back out. It's all good. No big deal. Thanks on the mat. Every race series, the rules are written in two things. The priority of the original intent and the blood of the people that they didn't foresee. Or, obviously, that's the safety rules. But then there's obviously the parity rules, which are written in a much different way. Which there's another one, right? The parity rules of the vehicles. Some of the cars are like...
Like the rule set would be like, this is a production stock class. And you're like, oh, okay. So then you look, what we know is what a production stock class would be, which is like strong stock. And no, no, no, no, no. Like 99 civics with interior. Yeah. Yeah. But they're like, oh, well you can change the frame. Wait, what? And they're like, yeah, the frame, the frame has to be changed. Cause you know, like a Polaris or something like that has bolted together frames. So they're like, yeah, they're going to break apart. So yeah, you can, you can weld up and do a frame. It's gotta be like, yeah, yeah. But it's gotta have OE pick, you know, pickup points and stuff like that. Okay.
But the frame can be changed. Yeah, you can do full chrome. It doesn't matter. You're like, oh, so it's a $100,000 race vehicle all of a sudden. And you're in the stock.
Yeah, that's your Sunday Cup class. Yeah, yeah. You're like, what? What's the difference between this class? There's like production and then pro class, like turbo. Production and pro turbo. Production turbo, you have to run a production turbo. But pro, you can run a big turbo. But everything else can be built. It doesn't matter. So it's like $100,000 to $115,000. Yes. It was just a really funny line they drew. I was like, this is way out there. How did you guys get into side-by-side stuff?
Side-by-sides really came from us interacting with Honda on both sides. Personally, my dad and I and my family, we do off-road stuff for fun. I've ridden motorcycles since I was a kid. I've ridden motocross. I used to race Endurocross, the AMA Endurocross series, for a while. That's just a sufferfest for whatever reason we decided to do it. How long would the races be in?
Well, an Endurocross, it's done in an arena. Like a Supercross. Yeah, but it's in a small arena, and it's like Hard Enduro. So Hard Enduro is what it's really called nowadays, but Endurocross is a version of Hard Enduro in that it's put into an arena. Hard Enduro is like when they do the Red Bull events that the guy has to go ride up for four hours type of stuff. That's Hard Enduro. But Endurocross is in that little arena. But anyway, so I've grown up.
with motorcycles and low-cross and trail riding and stuff. So our background is in power sports in that sense. But really, that's how Senior got into Hondas. He was a Honda motorcycle mechanic, right? He was a Honda motorcycle mechanic in the early 70s. And when Civic came out, he thought in 1973, he was like, this is going to be a big deal, which my...
grandfather or world war ii veteran grandfather was like what you're gonna go work on japanese cars i think that's a great idea and uh so my dad started working at a honda dealer he bought a civic you know in 73 worked at a honda dealer uh you know he goes to the honda dealer he has all the paperwork to be a honda tech because he was a honda tech for motorcycles already and uh so then he goes in and uh starts as soon as he gets his car then he's like oh what if i do cams and what if i do you know header so he starts designing that stuff and you know that's how jacks racing started in the early 70s But, you know, so we're power source people. So, you know, Honda, the Talon was coming out and they wanted a performance. They wanted to see a higher performance version if it was possible. And so they talked to us about, hey, could you guys, you know, look at building a turbo for the race stuff? And so we built a turbo kit for the race stuff. And we're like, at the same time, you know, we can actually build this to be legal. And they're like, really? What's the motor size on the thing? Is that a thousand cc?
1,000cc DCT. So it's a dual-clutch transmission, too. That's the cool thing about the Honda, is that it drives like a car, like a rally car. It has a real transmission. The problem with a typical side-by-side is it's a belt-driven CBT, right? So there's a reason why off-road guys call them golf carts as a way of being demeaning towards side-by-side guys. They call them golf carts. No, no, because it's a free wheel, right? So you're going down a hill, and you let off the gas in a...
Polaris or Cam and just like three wheels down the hill. And it's weird. It's a weird feeling when you're used to like automotive or even a motorcycle. And so when you drive a Honda, it actually feels very natural initially. And then what's cool is it's a DCT. So then, you know, the factory program is really good. And then on the turbo, we did all the programming. There's a lot of programming on the turbo that I had to do with our calibration engineers that made it so that it's just really good. And it's like driving a 911, you know, PDK.
It's so fun. My uncle bought one last year. He's got some property up in Michigan, and he looked at all the different side-by-sides, and he was like, man, it's my favorite because the transmission's not all sloppy and dumb. That's actually why he bought it, because it's got the DCT. Yeah, 100%. It's the only way to go with those. I hadn't thought about it until you mentioned that. I feel weird driving. We had a Polaris Pro Turbo, sorry, a Polaris Turbo S, and we drove it as competitive comparison when we were testing ours.
And it was like the penalty box. It was like, we didn't want to have to drive it. It drove well, but it was like, I didn't like the disconnection when you let off the gas. I liked the, I come into a corner and I chop the throttle and then the engine brake, you feel the engine brake and you feel the nose dive without having to hit the brakes. Exactly, exactly. It's probably one of those things you don't think about until you've driven every single one of them, and then you can really put your finger on, oh, there's that little piece of it, that 10% of the driving experience that's different than everything I'm used to, especially if you're somebody with a background of yours where you've done time attacking DE and coaching and wheel-to-wheel and all that stuff. Well, and there's a whole other side to that with the whole...
belts, if anyone has side-by-sides and has done the belt cars, they know that the belts will fly off. That's one of the things, actually, the Baja guys and off-road racers, they have, if you look at AIM data and stuff, they have belt temp sensor kits to watch the belt temp. Yeah, because the belt will overheat and then they kill belts. And then you have to go change the belt in the middle of the desert. And the average consumers out at Glamis and stuff like that, they burn up belts. And so it's a funny one when people come over and, you know, they come to a Sandsport show and the guy, there's like five dudes. I joke that there's like always these five, six dudes that come over. They've had a few beers and hang out with their buddies at the show. And they're all like got cans and Polaris's. And they're like, oh, what's the deal with this talent thing? Oh, my Can-Am will smoke it. My Polaris will smoke it. They say all this, right? And the one guy goes, wait, wait, wait, wait, it doesn't have a belt.
And the other guys go, oh, I don't care. At least I know one of my belt. I can change it there, you know, blah, blah, blah. And of the five guys, three run off, but two of them stay back. And they go, so tell me more about this transmission thing. And I'm like, well, let me tell you. And I explain it more. And he goes, yeah, I've changed three belts in Glamis already this season, and I'm done doing it. I'm done. So how do I get one of these? So it's definitely a slow process with people understanding that.
the downfalls of the belt and going over to DCT, but it's happening. People are realizing a real transmission is better. It's just like cars. It's the same progression. They're like, oh, I don't want to go to fuel injection. Yeah, it's exactly that. My father-in-law refuses to accept DCTs on Porsche or any performance cars. He goes, oh, it should be a manual. It should be a manual. Why'd they ruin this car? And I'm like, no, PDK, DCTs, if they're done correctly, they're pretty awesome. Yeah, they're pretty good if they're done right. And he's like, oh.
It's terrible. I can't believe they would do that. I remember being like an eight-year-old or a 10-year-old reading Hot Rod magazine. I would have been like, now this would have been like 96, like when OBD2 came out, right? Yeah. So I was probably 13. And reading like, oh, Hot Rodding's dead. There's nothing we can do anymore. They're monitoring everything. And there was like three years of people just griping and complaining and bucking against it. Now you can just tune it by plugging your phone into things. Yeah. Now I'm daily driving a 300 horsepower Civic. Yeah. Do you know how wild a 300 horsepower Civic would have been back in like?
96. Like that would have been the craziest thing. And now you can just get one with an intake and a header, you know? Yeah. And that's the cool thing. I mean, like the side-by-side is a talented. That's a thousand CC motor making at the crank. It makes 104. So really it's like 80, right? 80 to 90, depending on the dyno. Pretty good per CC. Yeah.
Oh yeah, it's still, it's a, it's a ripper. And then we add 60. Yeah. And then we do a 60% increase in power with the turbo. Oh wow. And yeah, it's a, you know, if we do crank numbers, 104, you add 60%. You know, we're 165, 170 range. Like thing rips. Yeah. How is, how is that in longevity? I didn't mean to talk about side by side so much. Oh yeah. I like how we accidentally start talking about side by side, but that's okay. We're at 29 minutes or 18 minutes in side by side. I know. Everyone's like, what are you guys talking about? What is a side by side? Yeah. Longevity. It runs fine. It's just a bolt onto a stock engine. That's wild.
If you maintain, yeah, it's pretty nuts. Like we have, there's customers that are putting, and this is the wild part is that it's not legal to put on the highway, but guys figure out how to put plates on them, you know? They're legal in Tennessee. Yeah, ask the federal government if that's legal. I mean, I was just in Tennessee on a vacation. Oh, I know, I know. And there's companies that rent them out, and then whole families are cramming into these things, and they're just ripping around. It's wild. They got street tires on them. They're going nuts. It's crazy. I know way too much about, unfortunately or unfortunately in my business, I know so much about all these different laws, and I'm just like, oh my God. If Department of Transportation found out that these things were getting on federal highways, they would lose their mind. I mean, I literally saw...
400 of them on the road. It was wild. Yeah. And, and the thing is, that's what, you know, customers are putting 20, 30,000 miles on them. And you're, because during COVID they had nothing to do. So they would bought up side by sides and then they just went and drove them every day. Yeah. And I'm like, cause they're fun. You put how many miles? How many miles? Yeah. Like that's gotta be like putting, I mean, these things are like built, they're like similar to car spec, but that's gotta be put like putting 200,000 miles on a car.
Yeah, they have cool car features in some senses, but they're built to not do that mile. I don't know what the official number is, but I would say they're probably built to do end of life after 20,000 miles or 25,000 miles on average, because that's a lot of off-road miles. Think of a Baja 1000. That's one of the jokes we have about it. These customers, they have them, they buy them, they put our product on, and then they drive them like they're in the Baja 1000 for thousands of miles and do no maintenance. And then you're like, yeah, they call and they're like, oh, my filter got plugged up. And I'm like, oh, how many miles you got? I got like 5,000 miles. I'm like, you did 5,000 miles in the dirt.
You've got to maintain the filter. I can go 10,000 to 15,000 miles on my minivan on the street. Why on the side-by-side is it going to take only 5,000 miles? What the heck? They're trying to pretend it's just a farm implement, but they're also taking it over jumps. They're also driving 70 miles an hour across the desert. What the hell? What a crazy subculture.
Oh, it's, it's a funny, it's a funny one that, uh, we get, you know, the phone call and you, uh, you have, you know, that guy that calls in and it's, we have two different websites kind of for now we have our talent site and our Jackson racing site for the regular automotive stuff. And, uh, mainly because yeah, like the talent guy is very different. The talent owner is different and, uh, they have their own parts on there and you know, the turbo stuff. And then we have our automotive side as we've always had. Um, and yeah, we're still doing that. We do a lot of FRS, BRZ, 86, GR86, whatever you decide you want to call it today. Um, parts, um, we, we love those cars.
I obviously raced them in the SCCA and loved them. So, uh, I still have those cars and daily drive those cars. And my wife has a 1786 too. So, but yeah, I love those cars and we build, uh, oil coolers and super chargers and cooling race products and street products for those. So yeah, we're still doing all that stuff. And then we have some type R stuff that's coming along too. So that's, so type R, um, we have a bunch of cooling products. So we have our radiator, a fan shroud, a pretty gnarly fan.
mainly because, you know, FK8s are notorious for overheating on track. Yep. Yeah, they get hot. And so we wanted to, you know, look into that and see what we can solve, right? Like, how can we fix this with what we know about cooling? And, yeah, we've been working pretty hard on it, and we've got a plug-and-play solution for that. Is it going to solve everybody's issue? No, like a 500 horsepower Civic guy might.
Sorry, dude, you're going to have to bang your hood. We think it'll help solve a lot, especially in Silicon Valley. It's 100 degrees this weekend. Everyone needs some cooling on these things, so we're trying to work on that. That's been what we're doing on that side, and it's been pretty crazy around the shop. We've been busy. I probably didn't help this in the last couple years when I had to take a few months off. Yeah, what did you do? You injured yourself doing power sports things. Doing power sports things. Motorcycles are dangerous, everybody. They are.
Uh, no, so maybe that's a good thing. I preface like I've ridden motorcycles for a long time. So, uh, I, in March of 21, I was at the practice track, uh, near, near my house. Uh, Paula is a track note on the pro circuit, but it's a track near me about an hour away. I was out there riding, doing my normal thing. Uh, my wife, which at the time was my fiance, we were getting married in, uh, four months, three, three months from then, um, from when I got hurt. And, uh, yeah, I,
crashed off of one of the jumps i do all day like it was at the end of the day done all my motos and yeah i just i got it wrong i can't even tell you what exactly i did wrong i just know i got my body position off when i came off the jump and then when i landed When I fell, I fell directly onto my butt, right onto my spine. When I hit the ground, it burst fractured my L1 vertebrae. When it burst, it burst into my dura, which is what surrounds your spinal cord. I learned a lot about spinal cords in this process. It burst around my dura. I felt static from my waist down instantly. I couldn't move my legs. It felt like you sat on the toilet too long. I was just going to say, was it on the toilet? I remember talking to you about this. Was it last year or two years ago?
when you guys were at streets when you guys were at streets yeah but yeah it felt static you were walking at the time but it was like it was not that long after it was yeah it was only I guess it was a year after that but yeah you looked fine and I was because I remember texting you texting with you when it happened and like you're like I'll be fine well that's what I had to tell myself yeah cautiously optimistic well yeah so yeah I hit the ground and I I've had the static and man, I was, it was not a good, uh, that's not a good feeling. No, I can tell you that. So a guy, a guy was, uh, pulled off and he's right behind me and he's like, Hey man, are you okay? He's like, I'm a nurse practitioner. Like anything I can help you with. And I'm like, man, I can't, I can't move my legs. It was really bad. And, um, and I started getting a terrible pain in my back and it's just locking up on me. And I'm like, Oh, and he goes, well, can you, can you move your toes? Like move your feet? And I was like in my boots, but I could have like lift my leg, but I could like push like as if I'm pushing on pedals, right? Like with my feet, even in stiff boots.
And he's all, Hey man, that's a good sign. And I'm like, Oh yeah, but like, this doesn't feel like very, like a good sign right now, you know? And, uh, yeah, I got to rush the hospital and doctor comes in after all my scans and I'm sitting there just, I mean, horrible pain. And he goes, uh, all right, well this is what your back's supposed to look like. And it's like this perfect spine. And he goes, and this is what yours is. And like my L1 vertebrae is like just shattered pieces. Like you drop a coffee cup. And I'm like, Oh, and he goes, yeah. So, and then he had to test my feet and he goes, Oh, that's interesting. You have connection there. So he goes, so we gotta, we gotta get in there and see what's up. And I'm like,
All right. So my dad, my fiance at the time, are we doing this? You're getting the surgery and you're doing it right now. I'm like, okay. The doctor said this is what I freaking do. Trust me, I can do it. Like right now. Right now. We're getting this done. He's like, I'm a board certified, you know, spinal cord expert. I freaking hope so, Doc. I'm like, I hope so. No second opinion. No, that's the part that's weird, right? Luckily, I'm in a good area of the country for some doctors.
Four-hour surgery turned into a seven-hour, and I wake up, and he goes, he's jacked up on a Red Bull. He looks at me, and he's like, dude, you have the ability to have a full recovery. It was messed up in there, but you were pretty close to a bad day. I went, okay. He's like, if you have to take your mind to it, you can have a full recovery. I'm like, okay. Then it just turned into a grind. I lived in a rehab hospital for three weeks. Then add to it, I was in March of 21. I got married in July.
And, uh, so in rehab, I'm sitting there trying to learn to walk again. Cause I, I, even after the surgery, I couldn't stand and walk. Like, so I was in a harness, like learning to walk again and doing the robot thing. And, uh, yeah. And then, yeah. So then I asked the guy, I'm like, am I going to be able to walk in my wedding? Like PT guy, like the second day. And I still am in a harness, like them holding me up. He goes, eh, judging by your last two days. Yeah. You should be able to. I'm like, yeah, with a fricking cane or something. And he like this, this dude, he's like five foot two, uh, Asian dude. He looks, he looks at me, he goes.
if you walk with a cane at your wedding, I'll beat you with that cane. Okay. You got it, man. So yeah, I, uh, I, I was able to, you know, walk at my wedding, dance at my wedding, do all the things I was able to do. I was very, uh, very lucky, very lucky. And yeah, I was, it was a crazy, crazy ordeal. It was funny. It's like, at one point I'm sitting there like doing POs in the hospital, like the guys at the shop are like calling me like, uh, we're running out of this stuff.
So I'm like, bring me my computer. So I'm sending POs from the hospital bed. Work from home. Work from home. It was a wild couple of years, man. Yeah, well, I'm glad it didn't end worse.
It could have been a lot worse. Luckily, it compressed my spinal cord, but it didn't nick it or anything like that, so I didn't lose any spinal fluid. My right foot came back instantly. My right foot's normal. You saw me at the track, no one would know, but you said you look fine. I'm like, yeah, well, you don't know. My left foot is still tingly.
So, which that's still changing. So it's kind of wild. They say after 18 months, you won't see much of a change, but I still feel changes. So, and I'm two and a half years in. Like getting better or just changes right now? Getting better. That's good. Getting better. The tingliness changes or gets less. Like, I would say July or August of after the injury, you know, I couldn't, like I would, I was able to drive by June. I was driving a manual. I can tell you that much. By June, I was driving a manual car. So March, April, May, June.
But I couldn't feel the clutch that well. Like, I know my foot was there. Yeah. But it was like wearing a thick, like a six-inch, like, boot, right? Like, you're just like, uh, the pedal's somewhere down there. So you had a cast on it, effectively. No. No, I mean, like, in the feel, yeah. Yeah, yeah, exactly. Weird. And it slowly came back, and when I actually was talking to my physical therapist, and also my neurosurgeon, he, every time I was talking about stuff, and I was like, hey, you know, on my race sim, I left foot brake, like.
do you think that would help when using it? He's like, anything using it. And I'm like, you just prescribed sim racing. So I, I already had a sim, but it was like, I really started trying to do that every night, like to force my left foot to get better. Sorry, babe. I can't watch Netflix. The doc says I have to. Oh yeah. She, she was all on board with it. It's not a problem. And she's got a background in driving too. So you might've picked that good one there.
Yes. Yeah. The fact that we met as coaches at the Porsche Experience Center doesn't hurt, right? Like being able to jump into car stuff. But yeah, like...
I started doing that a lot. Now I can left foot brake and have good feeling, which is awesome. Like I said, it's tingly, but I was funny. I was a left foot breaker before. I was pretty good at it. And I was like, dang it. That was a good skill I had that I kind of screwed up going motorcycle run. But now it's come back that I can feel again. So I'm like, okay, that works. How different before and after is your ability to pressure modulate and all that stuff with the brake pedal?
So what's good is, again, I'm good and lucky, is that I have finite control. A lot of guys with a lot of spinal cord injuries, you get what's dropped foot and this inability to pull your foot up. Yeah, you just get the major up, major down, but no finite kind of thing. Yeah, so I luckily have that finite control up and down. so no i have the modulation and you can see it on you know i check sim data and stuff like that and it's like yeah i have that like what i'm inputting is coming out in the data so it's like okay well that's good so no i'm i'm pretty pretty stoked on all that i just Yep. It's, it's been a little bit of a grind. I just can't say, you know, touch my toes, you know, uh, standing up, you know, reach down, touch my toes, but Hey, you know, I wasn't able to do that before. That's what happens when you're a big, tall guy. You can reach the things on top of the fridge, but you know, I have two titanium rods, two, one, two, I think it's two, two titanium rods and a fusion now on my back. So, you know, I got tie rods, just like an NSX, man. I got titanium rods. Nice.
Probably a little bit more expensive than the NSX rods. Probably not too much more. Oh, a lot more. A few NSXs for what that hospital bill was going to cost. But luckily, good insurance kept that under control.
Yeah. Cars are hard, but bikes are more painful. Yeah. Well, and I made a promise to myself when I was in the rehab hospital. I think my rehab doctor thought, one of my rehab doctors thought I was crazy. So I was going to ride on the anniversary of my injury. Right. And I did. And so on the same day at the same track, I went out and my dad and I, a bunch of friends, we went riding. And it was cool. I was glad I did it because it took some of that fear. It's like you see in cars, you know, people crash a car and they get worried. You're like, no, you got to get back out there. I struggled for like a full year at least.
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So it's that same thing. It's like, I had to get back out there to kind of get it out of my brain. And, uh, I did that two years ago or a year and a half ago. And then, uh, this year it was raining. So we didn't do that when my dad and I went trail riding. So two wheels on the anniversary is the thing. That's all right. That's all right. How, how deep into motocross stuff are you now or bike stuff? Uh, well, I mean, probably the same. I'm just more, uh, I wish I was more, but I got all these projects to, I got to finish a grid light car, dude. But I mean, you're not like a sworn off of anything.
No, no. I still have all my bikes. The bike I rode when I got hurt, it actually wasn't that badly damaged. We fixed it. That's what I rode on the day I went back riding. I rode the same bike. We're transitioning to cars. You bought a grid life ticket yesterday. My grid life ticket? I'm pretty stoked. I'm so nervous.
Laguna is, I don't know. It's just like a, it just feels like this, you know, we've done all these other big, crazy pro tracks. It's just like the last one left besides Indy, you know, like it's so far away. And then I did, I did not, Oh, give me a break. It's like 70 hours.
I did not expect it to sell out in a matter of a couple hours at all. Yeah, I told a bunch of people here that it was going to sell out in a couple hours. And I got a lot of text messages at like 6 p.m., 7 p.m. that night from people going, hey, whoa, it sold out. I'm like, I told you. I warned you. Yeah, I got a lot of those messages yesterday too. They're like, how come the tickets aren't unavailable? Well, we sold 90 time tickets already.
Yeah. What is the Gridlife Touring Cup cutoff? Right now we're at 42, 45, 42, I forget. I just looked about an hour ago. And I believe we're at 50. So I think it's almost sold out as well. I was going to say, is Laguna limiting you to 50 cars? No, we're typically 25 cars a mile. So that's right about 50. I forget exactly what the Laguna is. I looked there six months ago. Yeah, I'm just hoping for, oh man, how many East Coast boys are coming to find out how Laguna is? A whole bunch of them.
Oh man, go watch 2014 runoffs and everyone chill down. Yeah. So, so speaking to the Midwest and the East coast buddies, like what is, what's the thing to look out for at Laguna? Cause I've been there, but I've never driven it myself. What's the first mistake that people make when they go there? It's pretty narrow. Is it? Yeah. Like when they talk about taking any cars there, I'm like, Oh, I would never want to do that. It's a pretty small time. I mean, you can watch a video of the world super bike guys on there or anything. And you're like, Oh, it's like three guys wide and that's it. You know, type of thing. So it's narrow.
And so, you know, qualifying is important because there's not a lot of passing opportunity. And there's some untraditional lines because it's on the side of a hill, right? So there's some stuff. Yeah, it's built on the side of a mountain. And there's some lines that are just kind of, in a sense, untraditional in that when you pin it out flat on a piece of paper, that's not how it's going to go. Makes sense. Yeah. And yeah, I mean, you got to get to the apexes. You got to get to the pockets. Yeah, I don't know how it's going to be with the new pavement.
Obviously, the pavement just got done recently. Yeah, like four weeks ago. Yeah, and then an SCCA car burned to the ground and shut down it for the weekend. Is that what happened? Yeah, on the test day. I heard it was something like the pavement was coming apart, but the car burned down on top of it? Yeah, it burned down at the top of the course. Oh, jeez. Yeah, and then there was lifting. Yikes. It didn't look good. Yeah, they shut the whole weekend down, right? Yeah, and then there was like a Tesla weekend or Tesla day on July 3rd that they were like, you guys are out too. Really? So they just want that stuff to cure now?
They said – well, they waited until – but they had a Moto America race the following weekend. It was at 7, 8, 9. So then they raced that weekend, 7, 8, 9. So that was the first one. That was the first one, yeah.
Yeah, we got some images from the staff there when they shut the SCCA weekend down. And it was more like, that was just more, that added to the intimidation pile of this big, expensive, crazy, scary track. Not necessarily scary, but big, expensive, crazy. And then the other hard thing about this track is that I guess you're dealing with multiple organizations that operate the same facility. They're all in charge of each other. And so getting anything to happen is just three times as hard. But so far, the new team has been great to deal with, actually.
Yeah, so I haven't been there since a new team has really taken over because it took over a year or two ago. Yeah, about a year and a half, two years ago. I went during COVID. I went up for a weekend during COVID that was like, oh, it was supposed to be Monterey Car Week, but they canceled it. So it was supposed to be 2020. They canceled it because then we went up there for, I drove the unplugged Model 3 and stuff like that up there. Yeah, I mean.
Laguna's thing is, at the bottom of the hill, turns two, three, four are just super flat. The corners are just dead flat. Yeah, the rest of the going up the hill and stuff like that, it's carry speed. But the biggest thing is patience, man. People will make mistakes. You don't have to make the pass on the first lap. The biggest problem that the SCCA runoffs had in 2014 was everyone tried to get their passes done on the first lap. And it's just, it was chaos. Yeah, I watched that runoff. I was actually racing at Mid-Ohio when that runoff was happening. And we were watching it on the live stream. That was kind of early smartphone days. Yeah, I got caught from a Miata turned one of the factory Hondas in STL. Just smack them. And right on the front straight.
And then I'm against the pit wall on the front straight driving, and then a Civic is just like whacking the wall in front of me. I think I remember that. Were you racing in one of the Hasbro cars? No, I was in a Miata. That was a year we did a 1.6 Miata. So we did like a super light STL car. Yeah, the 1.6 was in like 2050 or something back then. Yeah, it was maybe a little bit more, but it was a fun car to drive. Yeah, we had super low final drive. I think I was in fifth gear on the front straight, which is shifting like crazy.
Then what killed me was we had problems with the valve train going soft. The lifters are going soft in the first two qualifiers, and we were trying to fix that. So I get it working for the final qualifying. So I worked for the final qualifying, and I finally get it. We were on track. STL and T3 were sharing the track, which was a nightmare because a big V6 Mustang does not carry speed like a 2,000-pound STL Miata through some of the corners. Everything in STL is 2 liter and under, so it's typically lower weight-ish.
Yeah. And then you had like 3,500 pounds. Yeah. 3,500 pounds, you know, 350 Zs and stuff like that. Um, but yeah, I finally get a run. I go into two. I can, you know, I get my clean lap going as I'm accelerating out of two and I do my three. Cause I was in, I was in third gear through two. Like that's how low the final drive was. I third, fourth shift. And when I did the shift, it felt like, like I just paid attention enough to hear the engine go. And I went, when I did the fourth gear shift, I'm like, that's weird. That sounded like I didn't lift.
Enough that when I braked for three and the throttle was stuck open, I was like, oh. Stuck down. Yeah, I had a stuck throttle going into a tight right-hander. And I'm like, oh. And I luckily clutch in, neutral, and then just shut her off instantly. But that killed my qualifying. I think I was qualified.
7th or something like that. I think so because Joe Jordan was like, I was 7th? No, I don't remember. Yeah, I think it was 7th or something like that. Yeah, I was 7th from VIR. Yeah, I think that's what he said to me. But anyway, so I got the throttle body fixed. It was a weird ordeal. We don't even know how it happened. It was a Jesse Brather, you know, throttle body. He took care of him. He was there at the track, obviously, for runoff. So he's like...
Uh, let me see that. Cause I've never seen that before, you know, swaps it out for me. And, uh, yeah, then we started the race and it was going pretty good until everyone just started carnage across. It happens sometimes. It'd be like that sometimes. So yeah. And then if you watch the T1 race.
A T1 race has a carnage at the start, too. There's always a couple of races at runoffs every year. There's, like, what, 20-some races? Because there's 20-some classes or whatever. And there's a couple of races where you just feel bad for most of the people. Because it's like, you know the effort that they put in to get there. And just, like, the wrong place, wrong time happens. And that happens to, like, five people. And they take out five more. And it's just like, oh, that sucks. High-pressure amateur racing doesn't always end well. We've seen that several times in GLTC, too. Yeah.
Everybody's got to be in the right headspace. They've got to have the right outcome in mind. Sometimes it's hard to just wrangle personalities. Yeah, I get it. I'm looking forward to it. It'll be fun. What are you building? You're building a first-gen BRZ? First-gen. I'll do as an FRS, if that matters bumper-wise. Same thing. I'm doing an FRS with a K-Power swap. When Sadie announced that, I was like, I need to build one of those.
So we got a car and, you know, I'm a racer at heart. So I sent it over to the paint shop and got to paint a champ white because it's going to have a Honda motor in it. We already have a champ white K24 powered BRZ. I hope you know that. I've heard. I've heard. I've talked to David. I've talked to David. Dude, it's really nice. He's out of Texas, I think, and he drives to most departments. Oh, yeah. David told me about it. I was like, dang it. I'm like, hey, if I'm putting a Honda motor in it, it's like when I ordered the valve cover from David, he asked me what color. I said, I'm sorry, man. It has to be red. It's got to be wrinkle red. It's got to be wrinkle red. I'm trying to wonder what Tyler Starr's engine configuration looks like. I don't remember what his valve cover looks like. You might have him beat there on the wrinkle red.
Oh, well, he's out there driving it. That's it. He's already ahead of me. Spend it like three minutes. Come on, let's go, dude. Yeah, I know, I know. Well, it was chaos of building.
so many projects going and it's, it's a, it's a problem because we, we, my dad and I, we want to help people with different projects and stuff. And so a random, you know, racer that races, you know, a talent calls us and I shouldn't say random. It's one of our local guys and he goes, Hey, can you help us with this? And we're like, yeah, we dive into it. Right. And then we go, wait, what were we doing a week ago? God dang it. Okay. We got to get back to doing that. So, so we, we, we make the mistake of doing that quite a bit. But anyway, we, and then also it's just like building regular parts, you know, that whole thing of, oh yeah, business has to run. I can't just build cool cars. You know, it's probably, it's probably fun to this somehow. Right.
There's some guys that I watch that I'm just like, you guys are just building cool cars. How do I just do that? I just want to do that. You watch a little bit of YouTube, like some of the big YouTubers, and you're like, if you're getting crazy sponsorship money, I still don't know how you're making the money to build these cars. How many quarter million dollar builds can you do every year? Some of them come from those YouTubers, especially. They sometimes come from a family of money or something like that. I can't hate. I can only be jealous. I can't hate either, but I'm just like, dude, you could just build cars. That's so cool. I just want to do that. Can someone just...
Hey, anybody out there, you want me to build your car, send it over to me. I'll build the car. It sounds fun. This race car, is this one of your previous race cars or no? No, those cars all got sold. Because you had a T4 car and you had an SDU car. Yeah, so SDU car got sold beginning of 2017. And then 2018, we sold the T4 car. And that car is actually still being raced. Izzy Sanchez races that one on the West Coast. So it looks very similar still. Still red with similar graphics. That's the one you won at Mid-Ohio, right?
Yes. Yeah. In Ohio. And it depends on who you talk to at Indy, but you know. What was the Indy story? I forget. Oh, I think this is when we had to cut off that last broadcast when I talked with Austin. Oh, man. No, I'm kidding. No, I'm kidding. I'm kidding. I'm kidding. No, we had finished first in the race. Yeah. And it wasn't an infraction in tech. It was on track driving that they didn't agree with. I showed data. I showed data that showed that I was off throttle.
Um, you know, on camera, you can see I was off throttle. I had a car bumping me from behind, you know, it's the classic spec me on a, you know, like train type of thing, but I wasn't expecting it. And the FRS in front of me went offline and then comes across the front of me. And like, does the NASCAR like turn themselves across the front of me? Well, because I was the guy that pit maneuvered him. It was like, well then, you know, the old SCCA guy goes, we crashed him.
No, I was off throttle. There's literally 25 T4 cars right up me on the first lap. What was I supposed to do? What would you have liked me to do? Yeah, yeah. That's a hard one. They told me to slam on the brakes. I was legitimately told from a guy, he's like, well, you should just hit the brakes. I said, I did. Wouldn't have mattered a whole lot if somebody's pushing on you. Yeah. What was I supposed to do? Because I was about to get smashed then. And at the same time, the same cars, they had pushed me off the track in turn one.
So I was like, what about that? I'm remembering watching this now. Yeah, I got pushed off the track, completely off the track. I left plenty of room, but then I got told, go to the grass. And I was like, oh, okay, this is nice. And so I was like, well, okay, we'll get through this first lap. And then the car in front of me as we were going through the S's, he got loose, got out wide. And then, you know, when you get loose, you lose that forward momentum, right? So the fact that he had, let's say, half a car, not even half a car, you know, I should say a couple feet in front of me. Once he got loose and went wide and then cuts across the front.
What am I supposed to do? I didn't stick a nose in. I was just online. He came from offline online. And he got turned. He even said it was a racing incident. But then SCCA said, well, we got to review it. He went back out and drove around. He went back out and drove around and then pulled in because he's like, I haven't last. Well, SCCA comes to me and says, well, this is what I was told. I was like, well, because he didn't finish the race, because of you, we have to toss you. I'm like, what?
I was like, but he was driving afterwards. Yeah. Those races are long and hard. That's got to be a tough one. That's got to be like the worst place to be like a steward. It's got to be the worst. Yeah. Well, and then it was, we were one of the last races on Sunday. Right. So they, they wanted out. They're like, well, we don't want to review this anymore. Yeah. We've been here for seven days volunteering. And I'm like, I understand that, but like, dude, you're trying to toss me for something that I don't know. Like, no.
Anyway. And it is what it is. It is what it is. So that's why my joke was, I'm like, it depends on who you talk to. Now that you say that, I'm remembering that. I remember your car being turned down at Tekken at Mid-Ohio. Yes. Because there was a rumor that I had a 2.5 liter. Oh, really? Yes. And I'm like, no, I don't. And I remember it was one of the...
Who was it? Oh, it was Lindrum came up. I think it was Lindrum's dad came over to the tech guy as they're tearing my car down. He goes, you know, we're in like fifth or I don't know where it was. They were fourth or fifth. And he goes, we want to drive back home, but you haven't started tearing this car down yet. Do you think there's a chance? What do you think of the chances? This thing's illegal. Like they're going to know they're going to get bumped. Yeah.
And the tech guy looks and sees like the 50,000 miles worth of grime that's on the side of the engine because it was legit a street car. It was a friend of mine. It was a street car. It was a friend of mine's car that he crashed. Yeah. And didn't you swap the front end like you made it a BRZ from an FRS or vice versa? Oh, no, don't say that. They're going to toss me again. That was another dramatic thing. You can't do that. I got told from SCCA guys, you can't do that. You have to run it as a Subaru. And I was like, well, no, I want to run it as a Toyota. Toyota's got money, though. Toyota's got money, and I want to run it as a Toyota. And it's the same car, and you don't do a VIN check in any other group.
But I was told that you can't do that. But then I talked to someone else that's on the board, and I was like, do you want this to happen? They're like, oh, I don't know. I'm like, don't you have an FRS that you made of BRZ? Isn't that going to cause a problem? They're like, uh, yeah, maybe I should tell everyone to chill out. National clubs are fun. They do a good job for the many problems they're dealt, I think. Trust me.
I'm probably hated by a lot of SCCA guys just because I am such a troll in the Facebook groups. Yeah, from my previous life on Facebook, I remember you being active. Well, it's like actually my cousin messaged me and he goes, you know, I don't turn on Facebook except for me once a week. And I turn it on and then I just see a bunch of your comments blowing up SCCA groups with sarcastic comments. And I'm like, it's because it's the only place I feel safe to be, you know, sarcastic like that because I can't really do it to my customers. A member of like a prominent person in national office definitely has not remarked to me about your comments. Definitely has never happened. Never? I mean, it's never happened and I'm definitely not crossing my fingers right now.
Oh, geez. Yeah. The future GLTC build, what else will this be used for? What are you going to do with this car? So, yeah, we're going to build this car. I mean, it's kind of a GLTC car as an NA car. And then we're developing a K rural drive package. So like a K, you know, S2000, a K FRS, K Miata, you know, K. Well, now you got those K Miata.
even showed an NC on their page. So I don't think that's much of a secret. E30, they've got all kinds of stuff. E30, right. So like any of these cars that you do, like how K's fit in there, not all the same, but have similar locations. So that was kind of our thing. I was like, well, let's build some stuff for that. So we're building a K-roll drive kit. So we're going to plug in there. For like a turbo setup? Supercharger. We do supercharger, you know, kits still for the FRSBRZ and stuff like that. Will this be a Rotrex kit?
Yeah. So we use a Rotrex plugs right in. We've been working on it for a while. So we'll use that as a development tool for that. So we'll basically when DLTC is not here, we'll run it in, you know, unlimited, you know, time attack kind of stuff or whatever, you know, stuff like that. So, and then we want to run it as an NA car endurance racing. You know, that was what I got excited for super, super grid. And we could kind of use it in both type of thing. Yeah. I'm still trying. I'm still trying super good. I have not found my audience yet, but we're trying.
Well, they're all trying to figure out. The endurance thing is a funny one right now. I think there's a lot of choices. I think there's too many. The big organizations, I think, are trying to cater too much to the champ car guy. Yeah, the champ car or Cayman guy, depending on which org you are, it feels like.
Yeah. And they're trying to do it. And I'm like, you don't, you don't have to do that. Like I had hoped we'd find more B spec inspect me out of success. But I also think that we've only really given it one shot. So I think it needs like a whole season of promotion before we do an event versus like a few months here and there. Cause I really don't think like, like that market, like they, they're, they have too many options. They have too many choices. So there's so many.
You guys have tons on the East Coast. On the West, we actually only have the Work Series. And you've also got Lucky Dog up North. Lucky Dog's big in the Pacific Northwest. It's big. Yeah, they even have their own championship in the Pacific Northwest. That's where they start. You know SCCA is going out and giving licenses to people in Lucky Dog up in the Pacific Northwest. Atlanta region has been doing that with Enduro stuff for about a decade, actually.
Yeah, so they go up and they're trying to get... There's actually two guys that came over from Lucky Dog that were at the Super Tour event up there. Yeah, it's actually... The SCCA for like 15 years, I think, has had what they call the alternative licensing path. And many regions chose not to use it, but several have. And basically, it's like you get two members to vouch for you, at least when I did it. This is how I did my license in 2012. You get two members in good standing to vouch for you that they have ran wheel-to-wheel with you in a different series. And they write a paragraph, and then the person does a phone interview with you, and you get a license.
That's kind of how I got my license. It's not the worst idea. In 2006, I did my school at the now defunct Phoenix International Raceway Road Course. I did that school, and I started my novice permit, and then I didn't finish it. Then I went off and did time attacks. I went and raced other things. I did the 25-hour. I'm doing other things, and then it was like, oh, yeah.
Can I get my SCCA license back? And they did that, basically. They were like, okay. And I had to call a guy and talk to him. And, oh, okay, yeah, we'll sign you off. And realistically, like, especially with a national level org, you almost have to have some flexibility still in the amateur world because there's not that many comp schools. You just, like, you can't go to comp schools. And the comp schools, the comp schools are not... They're a giant barrier to entry, regardless of, like, there's very few of them that are affordable and, like, at a decent time of year. Like, it's just hard. Yeah, I mean, there's people getting their comp licenses out of...
the amg school right but the mercedes amg school you can get an scca comp license out of it right and um they're not doing a friend of mine did and literally a friend of mine got his comp license out of the amg school because he's like hey i want to drive your one of your race cars so after i went to runoffs in the red um frs that's 2017 he's like hey can i drive it i'm like hey i actually don't have to drive to qualify so yeah you can drive it at the local race so we went out to california speedway and he signed up you know this is he's got a full national license and he's never turned a race lap right and he's in my t4 car like That's how it works. Don't get me wrong, my buddy's a decent driver. We do karting and stuff like that, but he'd never done full-size car, wheel-to-wheel, real wheel-to-wheel. I was like, well, what'd they do? I started coaching him. I'm like, so what did they do for you at the AMG school? How many starts did you do? He goes, we did three or four. I'm like, what?
I remember at my SCCA school, I think that's all we did for like two hours. You did a race start, and you did a formation again, and then you did a race start, and then you did a formation, and you did a race start. And then they threw a random red flag, and they threw a random black flag. So you went to one of the very few real schools. I went to a very serious SCCA Arizona school.
They were pretty serious about like we had to follow the work. That was another thing I think that is lost now is that we had to follow at the school a worker around at the regional. Right. So then we had to work one of the volunteers. Oh, wow. Interesting.
So I worked with tech, right? Other people did flags. They didn't actually do the flagging, but they were having to go out and help support it. So they understood what it took. That's a great idea. I think it's great. And that's why I'm always thankful for all the volunteers and SCCA stuff, right? They're out there because they want to have fun. It is actually hard to believe you can get that many volunteers nowadays. It's crazy. It's crazy. Although I've seen their parties. I've seen their parties in mid-Ohio, man. Now I know the runoffs. That's a good party.
I was told from somebody, yeah, I don't recommend you go over there. That's a real party. There's some stuff that goes down over there in the trees that you just let that happen. Even at regionals and majors in Mid-Ohio, they have a permanent campground there. It's like a whole different world. Yeah. I bet, dude. When I did that school, we learned that stuff.
that's where i think they struggle with these other school and i mean as a coach it helps i guess it helps because these people come out of these driving schools and get their licenses and then they find out oh i got some work to do you know like i gotta figure out some stuff so like my buddy and this is but then here's the other thing a great example my buddy did it he did the race start california speedway is notoriously a scary start because everyone's like 130 mile an hour across the banking and then they slam on the brakes just imagine like it's a it's like um daytona but instead of turning in for turn one road course at daytona just imagine you just drive all the way down around to the bus stop oh yeah like that. And then the first corner that you really break for is like the bus stop. Like that's how it is. And it's also at 45 mile an hour. Like it's a tight bus stop. Yeah. Uh, so that's the Daytona bus. No, no. So yeah, like he, he went out and did it and he came in and his eyes were like, that was not what he was expecting. And he's like, cause he qualified. Okay. And then he just went backwards at the start, like in like chaos. And he goes, yeah.
I don't want to do that. He's like, I just want to do track days, like, and just mess around my friends and track days. And I'm like, ah, there's an example of what, you know, some of these racing organizations are not able to harness right there. I can see his point too. Like it ain't for everybody. Yeah. My wife said that my wife always thought she wanted to go, you know, race cars. And then she went, she went to runoffs. I mean, she went to races with me, but like when she went to runoffs and saw what it takes at runoffs, like to be at the sharp end, like.
like what you have to do and stuff and what guys I'm helping with. And she just went, Hmm, it's hard. I like driving cars fast, you know, but she's like, but I don't know if I want to like outbreak people and like risk car damage. And look at data that much and like play with camber that much and like all the things to get the last 10th out of it. Yeah.
Yeah. She just went, I have fun driving cars fast. I'll just stick to doing that. Like, and she, she has a blast on that. Like the racing is not like necessarily her thing. And I think it's the competition side is not necessarily her thing either. Like she wants to go out and have fun. And that's, that's where, I mean, uh, my mom and dad met getting their racing licenses, um, SEC licenses. That's how they met too. Yeah. So, uh, they had the same, cause you know, they do two people to a coach. And so, uh, my dad's coach, well, he had built a car for him and, uh, he's like, Hey, pair me up with her.
And that's how my parents got to meet each other. But my mom will say to this day, she goes, she raced regionals, right? She had fun. And she goes, honestly, she would have been a track day person if track days existed in the 80s. Yeah, they just didn't exist.
They just didn't exist. The only way to go fast on track was you had to put a cage in a car and you committed to racing. Or you had to rent the track yourself. One or the other. Yeah. Yeah. And she's like, so her family raced. And she says to this day, she's like, I would have just loved track days. Those seem like fun. So I keep joking. I got to go do it. Maybe when I test the, during the week at Budwell sometime, the race car that we're building for GLTC, I'll have to bring out a street car and go, okay, mom, there you go. Yep. Gotta get out there for mom. Or bring mom to Laguna. She can run on Sunday with us. There's two beginner spots left and that's it.
I wonder if she's ever ran Laguna. I think she only ran Riverside and Big Willow. Man, Big Willow, one of my favorite tracks. Holy cow, that place is cool. Dude, Big Willow is... It's rowdy, dude. I love Big Willow. That was literally my first experience. California's afraid of Big Willow. We never have been able to sell Big Willow spots. I know, I know. Dude, it's so cool.
The track is so cool. It's on iRacing now. Everyone can experience Big Willow now. It just got joined this season. It's funny to take cars on there that are so not supposed to be at Big Willow. I took one of the new GTP Cadillacs on there.
Just I'm like, I want to know how fast it'll go. And dude, it is so dumb around that track. And I'm like, it's so dangerous. It can never happen. This can never happen. If it launched off at like turn eight, you'd just like hit the wall off to the left like a thousand feet out. Yeah. Like I touched, I went two off on the exit of nine and I like spun all the way up to turn one. I was just spinning all the way up. I was like, oh my God. It was like 150 mile an hour. The place is so old school. I really adored that track.
It's a great track. I grew up going to it. That's when I tell stories about learning how to drive race cars. It's from my dad taking me on track at MotorPress Guild days. They let him on track with me. I was 10, 11 years old. He's like...
And we're in our supercharged civics, you know, in the nineties or whatever like that. And he's just like, okay, when we get to, you know, you get to one, you break, turn in, you do all this. And then coming down, my favorite one, I always say is like coming down off of the Omega, the top of the hill, there's a curb on the right hand side, right before you turn into five, like into the bottom. And he always says, don't hit that right side curb. Don't do it. If you clip that right side curb, the car is going to go up in the air to the right. And the track goes to the left and you're off in the dirt. Do not clip that curb. Okay. Okay. I won't clip the curb. And I'm thinking to myself, I got like five years before I'm ever going to be on track.
There's a Motopress Guild guy and a supercharged Pontiac behind us, and he's trying to chase us down in the Civic. And I'll never forget, we come to that spot. I'm sorry, he was in front of us. And we're watching him in front of us. And he sees my dad chasing down a supercharged Civic in this Pontiac. And this Pontiac's in front of us. And that dude clips that right side curb. Car goes airborne and then slides right off the track on the other side. And my dad turns into five. And he just goes, see, that's what I told you. Don't do that. There's a bunch of big rocks out there, too. He might have damaged that car. Well, I didn't know. As a kid, I found this out. Motorpress Guild days, those guys always totaled the Vipers. They always totaled the Vipers every day. Oh, I can see that. And they would say at the beginning of the driver's meeting, it was the classic.
When you guys drive the Viper, please do not crash it. We want Chrysler to still come out here. Please do not do that. They always wrecked exiting three. Going up three, they go up the hill. They lose it back in, and then they hit the wall on the left side. I can see that.
That's a really cool track. Probably a hard track. Can you imagine in the 60s racing a Cobra on 1960s Goodyear tires? Back in the day, a 427. Oh, I know. It's got to be like a Viper on steroids back then. With no grip. And the same pavement as today. Yeah, the pavement. Oh my god. The last time they slurry-coated it, if you look it up on YouTube, it's when Tom Cruise drove a Red Bull F1 car there. He did? Yes, he drove a Red Bull F1 car there and they filmed it.
They slurry-coated it for the video shoot. The track looks amazing in this video shoot with this F1 car on it, but that slurry-coat disappeared very quickly. It's got potholes. It's pretty sketchy right now. SCCA is actually boycotting them right now, I think, at the Cow Club. They're not going there. It really needs a grind and melt and repave. It doesn't need a full tear-up. It just needs to be ground up, melted, and laid back down.
Yeah, I love that track. It's like I said, I have early memories. I think of, you know, things my dad told me. And I think about like my dad road racing there. My dad would race motorcycles like street bikes. Yeah. Yeah. So I've had I've had big offs. I've been off an eight. I hit a Fox one time and turning and in a street S2000, I hit a Fox and it just sent me right off the track instantly. It was like I hit a pothole. What about the Fox though? Oh, that Fox.
You know what? That Fox probably had a similar situation to me at the motocross track. Probably not a good day. His feet were tingling, dude. Yeah, feet were tingling, shit. It's a great track, man. I really do love it. Whenever SCCA goes there and stuff like that, I'm like, ooh, I can't let go there. The first time I ever drove there was in a Spec Miata. A friend of ours had a Spec Miata when I was 18 when I drove there. He would get RE1s off of Craigslist. That was his thing.
and you get re ones that were done they were so done like barely yeah well you could see cord on the shoulder but he's like i has enough camera that's my kind of guy that's how i did it for 10 so that's how i learned to drive that track was in a spec me auto with you know bald tires which is the best re ones were good until they until they until the air leaked out they were like pretty okay though Yes, they were. And they really were. And we would joke that he'd get them. He's like, oh, these will be good for a session. I changed tires at a track day. At a track day where you only go out five times, maybe. We were changing tires so often. Wasn't that tire Joe Jordan's tire? It was. He brought the first hot street tire to market with Toyota.
Yeah. Yeah. He told me that in Ohio, like the first time I met him, he was, we were talking about tires. He's like, Oh, the RE1. I was the one who muscled that through with Toyo. Yeah. Yeah. It's super cool. I love Joe, Joe, you know, uh, full circle on the conversation. Joe actually was at the track the day I got hurt too. Dude, that dude is everywhere. He's everywhere. He, he, well, the tracks near his house and he knew I was going down there every weekend and he's like, Hey, text me next time you go. So I was like, we're down here. So he came out and he was hanging out and yeah, he, he, uh, I think he left like right before I got hurt. He was just like, Oh, okay, I gotta go. Yeah. So.
Yeah, I miss Joe. He's a good dude. He's such a good dude. I think we did a podcast. We should probably do one more before we go to Laguna. Dude, we should. I like that idea. Where do people find out about Jackson Racing and all the Eagle Talon, Honda Talon, Chrysler Talon, whatever Talons you're working on? Every time you say Talon, I know you're talking about a side-by-side. You're like, DSMs, bro? I would just picture a DSM. Oh, man.
You know what's funny is that they pop up on the hashtags, like when you like hashtag talent, right? And all of a sudden you see like an eagle talent and you're like, dude, okay. There's such a, they're so rare nowadays. Talons. Like I think I've seen one. No, yeah. One talent in the past five years.
Yeah, you really don't see them. Especially in SoCal, we don't see them. I think those guys would struggle to get them to pass a mission. And they all run out by us. Yeah, they're all designed around no cats out here. The guys are finally like, I can't get this through Smog anymore. That's a track only ride nowadays. Yeah, yeah. But no, you can check us out on jacksonracing.com. You can check our social medias, all of it. If you search Jackson Racing, Instagram, all that. My personal one's Oscar Jackson Jr., Oscar Jackson Jr., on Instagram and stuff.
I post F1 memes, I think, in my Instagram story is the most I do. I'll post it off, so better than me. Oh, I know. I just text you and bug you about grid-like things just to annoy you. And we're finally bringing one to you. Or almost. Seven hours away, you're still complaining.
I'm not complaining. Well, the biggest problem I have at this point is that our race trailer got stolen in January, and now I've got to figure out. That's actually my biggest worry is how – December, actually. How do I get my race car after it's built there? The race car part is the easy part at this point. They rent race trailers. You can go to Tolos. Rent one on Tolos. Oh, yeah. You guys talked about that a few months ago. Hopefully, they have a California presence because that's our biggest audience.
I hope so. I've got to look around. I think I saw it right after you guys first announced it. It was pretty new, and I think there's only three or four trailers, but maybe there's more now. It was brand new then, so hopefully it's built now. We'll see where it goes. It's getting late here, and I'm probably going to hit the hay. I appreciate your time, buddy. No problem. Thanks. Have a good one.