0:00
/
0:00
Ep.296 – DINNER BITES, Rising Stars: Henry Drury
Ep.296 – DINNER BITES, Rising Stars: Henry Drury
0:00
0:00
0:00
0:00
About this episode
Henry Drury shares his unique journey from aspiring Olympic figure skater to rising star in motorsport. After a severe back injury derailed his skating dreams, he found solace in sim racing, which ultimately led him to real-life racing opportunities. Drury discusses his experiences in the Toyota GR Cup, the challenges of transitioning to professional racing, and the importance of building relationships in the industry. His story highlights resilience, the significance of personality in racing, and the pursuit of a GT4 career while navigating the complexities of sponsorship and media presence.
Topics:
figure skating background
transition to racing
sim racing
Toyota GR Cup
fundraising for racing
mental health in sports
sponsorship challenges
media training
career development
resilience in sports
To kick off the “Rising Stars” series of Dinner Bites episodes, we take time with someone long familiar with the DwR and Continental family, Henry Drury. A recipient of the PT Autosport Young Driver scholarship, Henry was able to transform himself from a gamer with aspirations to one day drive, to a frequent contender in […]
Filter:
|
Technical
Too Afraid to Ask
Car
Mclaren F1
"...ah. I tried to do a Lewis Hamilton when I saw the McLaren F1 team principle in the car behind me when I was 13..."
Car
Porsche Boxster
"...ere at Watkins Glen, I was in a 1999 spec Porsche Boxster, neon turquoise, brightest car"
Select text to request an explanation
I tried to do a Lewis Hamilton when I saw the McLaren F1 team
principle in the car behind me when I was 13.
And I thought, I'm going to walk up to you,
and I'm going to tell you that I want to be a race car driver
and redesign your cars.
And you're going to go, cool, here's a bunch of money.
That didn't.
Did he even roll the window down?
Very, very hesitantly.
And now, Dinner Bites, a new spinoff of Dinner with Racers,
presented by Hot Nenil Tire with your hosts, Ryan Eversley
and Sean Heckman.
Hey, Dinner Bites, Ryan.
We're back with some more Dinner Bites.
One of them, Dinner Bites, the remote version of Dinner
with Racers.
We say it every time, but these are sort of the short form
remote recorded to put out a few more episodes
over the course of the year, because our good friends
at Continental Tire wanted to make sure that you, the fan,
had more and more stuff.
Stay tuned, by the way, because Thanksgiving,
Ryan, Thanksgiving is only a few weeks away.
Yeah, and we've been working hard all year
to make the regular Dinner with Racers podcast, which
we know is obviously the reason we're doing this.
So some great guests.
We just got back from a trip to Charlotte.
We did a trip to Indy.
And now we're going to bring you
a run of some young and up-and-coming racers
that we think deserve a little bit of a spotlight.
So this first episode is Henry Drury,
who I worked with last year in the Toyota GR Cup.
He is a recipient of the PT Autosport Young
Aspiring Driver Award.
And he's a face and a talent that I think
is going to be very, very popular with our guests.
If you get a chance to see this kid at the track
and you talk to him, he's really funny,
but he and Sean both share a background in figure skating.
And so that was something I knew Sean
would find interesting as well.
Exactly.
And like Ryan said, we're trying to do for this next run
of Bites, we were looking at ways
to sort of make Bites something different
from Dinner with Racers.
And we realized, you know what?
There's all this young, up-and-coming talent
in sports car, open wheel, stock cars, you name it.
So let's sort of grab some young folks
that have interesting stories.
And Henry, obviously, with your experience with them,
Ryan was a good fit.
So yeah, interesting young man.
Yeah, I'm a huge fan of his.
And also he ran on Continental Tires all last year.
And the cool thing about Continental
is not only are we still doing the normal podcast,
but they thought it'd be great if we did some up-and-comers
to kind of promote the talent that's coming through the sport
to pay it back.
So once again, another reason to be thankful to Continental
Tire and please support them as much as possible.
If you're posting about us on social media,
please use the hashtag dinner with Conti.
And also, keep in mind, we have a Patreon series
that we're doing a lot of behind the scenes stuff.
We're doing extra interviews.
We're giving you tidbits from the long format interview
that might not make the show.
So please check us out on Patreon.
It's been a lot of fun.
We're doing monthly updates.
We're doing race reports from our personal races as well.
So please check us out on Patreon if you haven't already.
And again, hashtag dinner with Conti on Instagram
and all them social medias.
It means a lot if you're buying stuff
with any sort of Continental branding.
Let them know how much you support the show.
So on that note, Henry Jury.
Meow.
Meow.
All right, we're gonna start in five, four, three, two.
So we're doing a run of up and coming talent episodes
for Dinner Bites.
And you're obviously on that list for me,
but also what I thought would be a really good connection
is that you and Sean both have something very specific
and a little unique in common
is that you both were figure skaters.
Oh, that's right.
Yeah, sir.
Yeah.
And so I'm way more familiar with Sean's background
than yours in that regard,
but you were an Olympic hopeful and going for it.
And your career took a pretty drastic turn.
And I kind of wanted to get into that a little bit today
because the racing stuff I already know
and we'll go over that as well,
but I don't know that much detail
about your figure skating background,
but I just know that it was a big deal.
Yeah.
I mean, a bit of an unorthodox,
an unorthodox journey to racing,
if you will,
in that having wanted to be a race car driver for so long,
I was told not bluntly, very politely,
but without a doubt that my family simply couldn't afford
for me to be a race car driver
and it simply wasn't going to happen.
Right.
So yeah, I kind of fell into figure skating
when my sister started it.
Which is notoriously cheap.
Yeah, exactly.
Hello, a lot cheaper than racing though.
That's fair, I'll give you that.
Yeah, but my sister started doing that
and then I sat at the side playing Mario Kart for a year
because why would I do a girl's sport?
And then after a year of sitting at the side,
someone mentioned to me that actually,
if you go and play football,
you're in a locker room with all the boys, right?
If you go figure skating, you're with all the girls.
And suddenly I thought,
huh, this girl's sport thing isn't so bad.
Maybe I'll give this a try.
Yes, I agree.
I completely agree.
So yeah, I kind of fell into figure skating
and that became my life and my career goal, if you will,
which was the 2018 and 2022 Olympic cycles.
And that became every day.
Now my family moved to the US almost entirely for that,
for training ahead of 2018.
And yeah, that was my life.
That was my goal and that was every day.
And then yeah, it all came crashing down
and now I'm a race car driver.
Was your sister the same way?
Yeah, so she started before me.
We actually skated together.
So I skated both in singles and in pairs with my sister,
which any competitive partnership
where you're skating with a sibling
when you're teenagers is a bumpy, a bumpy road.
It seems like a recipe for disaster.
In pairs and also ice dances is not that uncommon
of an idea there have been brother, plenty of brother,
sister pairings that have happened through the years.
And yeah, it's notoriously fractious
because you're spending so much time
and because it's competitive, like every little thing
matters.
And so if one person doesn't do their end right,
especially in pairs where there's like,
I mean, yes, racing is a dangerous sport,
but there's some pretty serious that can happen
in pair skating as well.
And so yeah, that kind of matters quite a bit.
It's like, where'd you guys move?
So we moved to Florida at the time to Ellington, Florida,
which is where the US national champions were training,
the British national champions were training.
So it was actually a really, really cool experience to,
and obviously everybody works so hard
no matter which country in or you're in
or where you're training,
but to be skating every day and training
with Olympians, with world champions,
with national champions was incredibly eye-opening
and something that I learned a lot from
and people always ask me,
what does stuff from skating carry over to racing?
And I think any sports when you learn the mindset
and the discipline and what it truly takes
to compute at that level,
will carry over to another sport such as racing.
So yeah, it's super, super fascinating
to be a part of and to see.
Yeah.
And you were, as a young kid,
you were really fascinated by racing.
You really wanted to be a race car driver.
Your parents said no.
So even though you're doing the figure skating thing,
you'd switched to wanting to become an aerospace engineer
so you get into designing race cars.
Yeah.
So when I realized, I mean, racing was the pipe dream,
but realized that simply wasn't going to happen.
So sort of wanted to stay involved with that.
I thought, well, cool, I'll design race cars instead.
So, you know, went off down the academic pathway.
I tried to do a Lewis Hamilton
when I saw the McLaren F1 team principle
in the car behind me when I was 13
and I thought, I'm gonna walk up to you
and I'm gonna tell you that I want to be a race car driver
and redesign your cars.
And you're gonna go, cool, here's a bunch of money.
That didn't.
Did he even roll the window down?
Very, very hesitantly.
I think it's quite hard to look threatening
when you're 13, especially when I was about
three and a half feet tall.
So, you know, very, very hesitantly
because you're clearly not rolling it down to say,
hi, you know, just wanted to say I have a huge fat
and you're probably asking for something.
Right, right.
So it was, you know, you could see and think about it
and look at the other people in the car
and then slowly move his hands
and hover over the window button.
So.
Yeah, but yes, I sort of threw myself
into that side of it and, you know,
went down that academic path,
which funnily enough was then also
impacted rather severely by being injured
and figure skating and that turns out
that when you have a super severe injury
and are effectively bed-bound, you know,
doesn't really help with motivation for school.
Yeah, yeah, weird.
So my academic career fell behind a bit as well.
But so what was the injury?
So I was doing a press lift with my partner one day
when I was 14 and simply lifting incorrectly
didn't have the proper form.
I was effectively too young to be doing it really.
I mean, your spine is still plasticine at 14 years old,
but I ruptured the L4, L5 and L5 S1 discs in my lumbar spine.
Oh God.
Is that it?
Yeah.
Just those.
Yeah, just those.
And just to spell this out,
a press lift is basically in one hand.
You basically one hand that have to do sort of an
over the shoulder pushup on your partner.
And yeah, so all the way.
All the way up above you.
So like arm locked, straight above you, you know.
And I mean, I probably, I probably weighed 80 pounds.
Right, exactly.
You know, I was not the prime physical specimen
to be lifting another human person over my head.
On scapes?
Yeah.
So you can see where it may have gone wrong.
Yeah.
How was she?
She's, I put her down.
Oh, okay.
So you didn't respond with this.
Okay, so you were still a polite Englishman.
You're like, oh, so sorry.
Sorry.
You just fall down and die now.
Yeah.
When this injury happens, like instantly in the moment,
like what, walk us through the next hour of your life.
The next hour is kind of difficult to say.
Cause I mean, like every athlete is accustomed to injuries.
Right?
You know, whether it's racing,
whether it's track and field,
whether it's casing, whatever it is, you know,
at some point you get hurt.
So, you know, for me, it was a pretty immediate,
you know, like a light switch, you know,
it felt a lot like being stabbed in the spine.
So it wasn't pleasant, but you know,
your mind immediately goes, right?
Okay. Well, that's not good,
but let's go lie down, put some ice on it
and I'll be back training tomorrow.
Oh.
You know?
Okay.
That's what I was curious about.
Like was this, was this like into the,
into the helicopter getting you out of there
to life flight or is like, just like,
oh, I don't feel good.
No. So I mean, it's actually
herniating or rupturing a disc is not an uncommon injury.
It's effectively just the severity of it.
So I mean, you or someone, you know,
has probably had a bulging disc.
It's effectively the same thing, just much more severe.
So, you know, I, I moved very, very slowly.
I effectively couldn't end my spine in either direction
or twist or move.
So, you know, sort of walking like you're a stiff wooden plank.
Yeah.
But you know, I remember I went home
and just sort of forced to lie down and not move.
And that's where I stayed.
And I think it was about two, two weeks later
after I'd had two MRIs and probably four or five
doctors appointments where they said,
well, they gave me the verdict really, which was,
yeah, so this is a two year minimum recovery time.
You're probably not going to skate for at least those two
which, you know, my mind when I hear that is,
right, well, if it 2014 now and 2018 is the Olympics
and to qualify 17.
So, yeah, that's not going to happen.
So, you know, it was again, pretty instantaneous
in that I knew my plans were sort of in the bin,
which was really interesting just because, again,
when that's your whole life, you know,
your routine effectively every minute of every day is,
well, I'm working towards this.
I know that I'm doing this.
This is my plan.
And then suddenly it's, well, what do I do now?
You know, lost the routine, lost the goal, what's next?
It was, I mean, karting, racing,
and I think that was completely out at this point.
Yeah, I mean, not even in the,
for the first time in my life,
probably I wasn't thinking about racing.
Yeah.
Throughout my skating career, you know,
racing's always been the pipe dream.
You know, it's always a thing I still wanted to do
that doesn't go away.
That's probably the first time where it's, yeah, you know,
I have something bigger than my career goals to think of,
in that I'd quite like to be able to walk.
And just to put this out there,
you're a two-time national champion at figure skating.
So it's not like it was like,
man, it'd be really cool if this worked out.
Like you are competitive and it is quite possible
that you have that ability to get to the big show.
Yeah.
I mean, it had effectively been communicated
that on the path we were on, there was a slot available.
Man.
Dude, that's crazy.
So you end up lying in bed for two years,
which I'm sure was really easy and not hard on you at all.
Yeah.
Again, and that's the thing really is, you know,
you know exactly what to expect with the physical side
in that everyone gets injured.
You take some time off, you do some physical therapy.
There's lots of ice packs involved, you know,
but I was in no way prepared for the mental effects
of losing my goals, my routine, my career, you know,
and the social life along with it.
So had some very miserable years, if you will,
which again, fell behind in school.
I mean, literally just laying in bed all day.
And funnily enough, racing ended up being,
racing ended up coming from that in a way,
in that with nothing to do and being super miserable,
I ended up meeting with a friend of my father's
who was a GT3 driver in the NLS,
went back when it was VLN.
Okay, who's that?
His name was George Richardson.
Yeah, he drove for Walkenhorst.
Yeah, I remember that too.
And NLS being the series that runs the Nürburgring.
Yes, yes.
And you know, talk to him and he said,
well, you know, if you did want to be a race car driver,
and he didn't really know about my back injury,
so you know, if he still wanted to,
I mean, here's a couple of ways you could get into it.
And effectively introduced me to sim racing.
It was a very helpful step
and that it gave me something to compete in again,
you know, to drive towards, to work on.
So I sort of threw myself at sim racing
and that became a very helpful step in recovery
and having something to do and work on and compete in
and drive towards, and also taught me
how to drive a little bit.
Yeah, that was a big part of it.
Yeah, I mean, and the way that I remember
he basically didn't let me leave Silverstone
in a Formula Ford until I'd worked out how to drive,
which without any input, by the way, it was just,
you'll work it out to drive this at some point.
Sure.
Yeah, you'll figure it out.
Yeah, so, you know, weight transfer
is an interesting thing.
Yeah, that's a real thing you feel in real life.
Yeah.
So yeah, that kind of was how I was introduced to racing.
What was the sim that you started out with?
Which game?
So I started out in R Factor 2, that was,
and that still is, I mean,
it doesn't really exist anymore,
but that was my baby and now it's dead
and I'm trying to learn how to drive iRacing
and I can't do it.
I have a lower iRacing than the commentators in SRO.
I have a lower iRacing than most of your viewers.
I can't do it.
Yeah, nice, nice.
But the sim racing stuff leads you to an opportunity
to get to drive a real race car.
Yeah, yeah.
So after a few years of sim racing
and you know, sort of working my way up through it,
just learning everything that I possibly could,
I'm scrolling through Instagram one night
and I see an advert for a driver shootout
and you know, it promises this $100,000 prize
and my immediate thought is right, well, I mean,
that's a scam, but you know, why not?
Swear to shot.
And that led me to the PT Autosport
aspiring driver shootout,
which turned out not to be a scam,
was actually a wonderful group of people
offering a pretty incredible opportunity
and I was lucky enough to win that shootout program
that year, so I went to New Jersey Motorsports Park
and we drove on track, we did media activities,
fitness activities, basically testing everything
that you need to do to, or everything that you would need
to become a professional race car driver
and was lucky enough to win that,
which overnight sort of took me from being
a wannabe race car driver with a sim at home
to being an actual race car driver
who was driving real race cars, you know?
So that kind of changed my life in an instant, if you will.
How did the first event go, the first real race?
The door fell off.
No joke, no joke, my first session on,
we were at Watkins Glen, I was in a 1999 spec Porsche Boxster,
neon turquoise, brightest car
you've ever seen in your life,
which I immediately hated and then slowly grew to love
because it did genuinely hurt the eyes at first.
It also had bright orange wheels, so it was hideous.
But first session, in what case, when going to the bus stop,
hit the first apex curve or jump the first apex curve,
everything's fine.
Hit the second apex curve,
starts at the left-hander, everything's fine.
Hit the third curve, everything's fine.
The car lands and the door just peels back
and disappears.
And you see, we were running a camera looking at me
from effectively the passenger door,
and you just see my head do a double take, like what?
Like what?
What?
And my crew guys will never let me forget this,
in that apparently I come on the radio
in a very stereotypical British accent
and say, the bloody door's fallen off.
So.
So.
So.
So.
But yeah, as expected.
But yeah, so not an ideal start to my racing career,
and then just spun in the first race,
did a right in the second,
and then lost the clutch in the third race.
So.
Sure, sure.
You know?
Yeah, not.
I then threw a hissy fit
because I'm a competitive person and was like,
right, well, I'm not here to finish last,
and in PCA, I don't want to be a professional.
So.
Yeah.
I was humbled, humbled very, very quickly,
and given a lesson by the team on mindset and attitude.
So yeah, not the dream, you know,
sweet the weekend start that I'd maybe hoped for,
but a learning experience.
For sure.
Eventually you end up,
actually I'll go back to when I first met you.
So the first time I met you
was at New Jersey Motor Sports Park
for I think the second year of the shootout.
And you were kind of helping out with the event.
I was there as an instructor
and like to help coach and judge and all that stuff.
And, you know, our friend Jason Myers
who runs that program alongside Jeff,
they were like, that's Henry.
He won the championship last year.
And what I liked about you right away
was that you were helping with like media stuff.
You had a camera, you're walking around
just getting content and trying to help build stuff
so they can promote this program
that's effectively helping your career
get launched for the next generation.
And I thought, okay, that like he's showing value.
And that's something I always try to offer
to people I race with is like,
how can I be different than all the other drivers?
If we're all turning the wheel the same way,
what can I bring that'll give me a little bit of an advantage?
So I thought, okay, he's already got that part figured out.
And so eventually when Jeff and Jason
and I talked about what we could do
together with my team Precision Racing LA,
we kind of partnered with PT Autosport
and brought you into the GR Cup series.
Yeah, I mean, I think
I think in two parts of it, first of all,
I'm just not very good at not doing things.
So I mean, I was under strict instructions
to stand around and be last year's winner.
Right, yeah.
But you know, not very good at standing around
and being an active, I think like many,
or like anybody who, you know,
has high expectations for themselves.
But then also at the end of the day,
driving is one, maybe 2% of this career, you know?
You've got to be just as good at the off track stuff
as you do the on track stuff.
And a large part of that is learning to market yourself,
learning the media part of it.
So, you know, in my mind,
there's just as much learning
and learning and advancement to do
on that side of things as on track.
So I always try to get involved where I can.
But yeah, that led us to last year, 2024,
with GR Cup.
So that was kind of my first experience
of professional racing.
Got to work with everyone at Precision Racing LA.
They had this new up-and-coming coach
called Ryan Eversley.
So he was-
Watch your mouth.
He was all right to work with, you know,
Moses' stuff a little bit.
But yeah, that was sort of the start
of my professional career.
And I didn't quite expect
how quickly I would have to learn things
or just how much there was to.
Right.
You did, however, have a pretty good first season.
Your goal was the top 10.
And I think we cracked that pretty fast.
But you're actually able to come away
with a couple of podiums,
which I was really impressed by.
Yeah, no, I mean, the entire year
sort of definitely exceeded expectations in my mind.
I mean, very conservative,
just knowing how strong the field is in GR Cup,
just knowing that it was such a big leap up to,
you know, proper racing and proper spec racing.
And also, you know,
just the quality of the field in Toyota GR Cup, you know.
Now, a lot of guys who are very likely to be
IMSA champions within the next, you know, few years.
So top 10s were with a goal.
And yeah, I think we had a rough start,
but we cracked that fairly quickly.
And I think for me,
one of the biggest things was just having, you know,
a full season to be able to say,
right, well, this weekend I'm working on this.
Cool, you know, we've learned how to break now.
Now we're working on this.
Now we're working on this, you know.
So we could have quantifiable steps forward
at every race weekend.
And at the end of the year, I could go, wow, you know,
I'm so much more complete of a race car driver
than I was at the start of the year.
Right.
That was pretty awesome.
Yeah, our running joke on the team with you
because you're by far the least experienced
out of the co-drivers of yours that we had your teammates,
but also in the field,
but your pace was extremely good very quickly.
And also your technique when we were looking at data
and stuff, there was a lot of things
that I recognized that were very good.
So we all joke that you were like a junior McLaren test driver
that changed your name
because at that first test in California,
I was like, no, this kid's pretty good.
Like this isn't just some guy that's like,
he won an award and they're hoping for it.
Like there's a lot of talent there.
So you getting those podiums were not surprising to me,
but still impressive because as good as you are,
that series is stacked.
Yeah.
And it's been awesome to see this year,
especially as, you know,
it's very funny looking on from outside the series now
and now doing-
Yeah, cause now you're coaching PTAuto Sports current driver
if that won the next shoot out.
And so you're standing next to me at a bunch of these races
and pointing out mistakes
and seeing some hilarious driving.
Yeah, no, it's definitely eye-opening
looking on it from outside, you know,
just because again, it is so hectic.
I mean, I think I described it at one point last year
as like having a fist fight
while trying to keep your head above water.
It's just so many cars,
so many young drivers with so much on the line,
you know, desperate to prove yourself.
So yeah, I mean, now coaching Max D'Alone
who won PT's last shoot out.
And yeah, it's an interesting perspective
to look back on it
or look on it from outside of the driver's seats.
Yeah, it's spec racing is confess.
Yeah, man, it's nuts.
And that series along with like
the MX five cup championship,
like you said, future IMSA champions
and SRO champions will come out of there,
but it's cutthroat and some of those guys
just don't have a choice but to push that hard
because this might be the last thing they ever get to drive.
Yeah, and that's part of what I love about it
in a sense in that you just have to figure it out.
You know, it's a bit sink or swim in that, you know,
people are watching, you're in the same paddock
as the GT4 teams and or the GT3 teams, you know,
those are the next steps you want to take.
So at some point you just have to work it out, you know,
get your head down, work out what you have to do
to learn to drive it or learn to do well in this series
and make it happen effectively.
Yeah, one of the things that stood out to me last year
is that we were able to bring in
another PT Autosport driver, Alex Sedgwick
to be your teammate at VIR and you never really,
well, you spend a little bit of time there
but like you're still figuring things out.
But in that race, Alex who's now currently winning
GT races in the SRO series teamed with Jan Halen
and showing the exact same pace as him,
you and Alex were like dead nuts even
in the GR cup cars at VIR.
And so effectively I look at that going,
Henry's got GT3 speed in a pro series
and I think that was a big weekend for you
because from that moment on,
you were able to really grow the rest of the season.
Yeah, and it was definitely great for my confidence
in a sense and it reminds me of a story
that I think you told at that weekend
about a similar weekend earlier in your career
where Alex is a very proven driver, like you said,
winning races and fighting for the title in GT World Challenge.
So for him to come in and I expected to be,
I didn't want to be 10 places behind him
but I assumed that I'd be a couple of 10s off him.
But to be, I think we were within hundreds
or within the space for like the entire weekend.
So the swapping places in each section.
So it was a huge confidence booster in going,
okay, I know that I can do that.
I know that I can find the pace or I have the pace
to compute at a level like that,
which is a great confidence booster.
It just gives you a little bit to fall back on
even when things go downhill.
So you do really good job for us in GR cup.
You're now coaching GR cup with PT AutoSport as well.
And then you're running in a Geneta North American series.
Yeah, so bit of an odd year
or an in-between year in a sense
and that obviously coming from GR cup,
the next step is GT4, that's the goal.
But with PT AutoSport and the way the program works,
having won that,
I had funding for effectively two years
and a set amount of funding.
They very generously extended that slightly
to allow me to continue in GR cup.
But effectively this year, it's my turn to flee the nest.
And effectively they've said,
we've given you the tools and the experience
to raise your own funding,
to build your own network and effectively find drives.
And now it's on me to flee the nest in a sense
and make it on my own.
So bit of an in-between year in raising money
for a GT4 season next year,
doing some coaching with PT and GR cup,
doing some other coaching in various different places.
And I've managed to fit a few races in here and there.
So I got to run in Geneta Challenge North America.
I just got back from VIR a day ago, two days ago.
Which is really cool because Geneta is such a,
such a well-known brand back home in the UK.
Right.
Place where, especially in Geneta Juniors,
which is effectively the go-to junior spec racing series
in the UK, it's the place where Lando Norris started,
where George Russell started,
all of these British Formula One drivers
effectively start there.
And Geneta just isn't known at all here in America.
Right.
So it's kind of cool for me to,
given that I never raced in the UK,
it's a cool way to do a little bit of that
and race the classic junior spec car
from the UK, because I started so late.
So that's been really cool
and also a really interesting introduction
to GT4 cars effectively
because it's the same chassis as a GT4 car
effectively just with less power and electronics.
So it's also been a nice step
between something like the GR cup
and also then a proper full-fledged GT4 car.
Yeah, and VIR just being this past weekend,
pretty strong results, I'd say.
I'd say it was an all right weekend.
So yeah, how'd it go?
Two poles, two wins.
So I can't complain with that.
Just had to get through the first day
where we had an incident on an in-lap.
I saw this, you got into it with a,
Sean, you'll appreciate this.
I believe it was like a 1996 NASCAR cup car
that you got into it with?
Yeah, so it was the 42 Havelin NASCAR,
which NASCAR is famously not light or small.
Genettas are known for being quite light and small.
So we had a little incident on an in-lap
where, you know, I think just didn't know I was there,
but that's so big that it was such a stupid shit.
You know, we only bumped into each other,
but it knocked the V-box off of the trans tunnel,
it knocked the drinks off of it out.
Everything out of the inside.
But we had a rough first day,
so we had an incident on the in-lap
and then a wheel fell off a little bit later.
Once we got through that, we camp was great.
Two poles, two wins, lights to flag.
So yeah, I mean, maybe if I have more, you know,
more awful Thursdays,
I'll have great Friday, Saturday, Sundays.
Another thing you could do for future media training
is not mention the thing no one knows about
that makes you look bad,
and just mention the poles and the wins.
Yeah, that's not funny or relatable, is it?
Well, it depends on what you're looking to be,
paid or funny.
So we've had a lesson learning this year with Rutledge
where he's been like, did you guys see when I spun back there
to like a group of GR cup drivers?
I'm like, no, no one knows, but now they do.
Stop helping them know.
Yeah, they did show it on TV, Rutledge.
Yeah.
So really strong results right now in the Geneta series.
What's the goal moving forward? Where do you want to end up?
Yeah, so I mean, like I said, GT4 is sort of the next logical,
logical step coming from GR cup.
So that's very much the goal for next year
and working hard on that
and raising the funds for it.
Obviously it's another very big step,
both in car and in funding.
So like I said, you've got to be just as good
at the off track stuff as you do the on track.
But hopefully running a GT4 America season next year
either in Pro-Am or Silver Silver.
This whole series is about up-and-coming drivers.
So the PT Auto Sport funding is effectively cut off here.
You're on your own to figure it out.
So at this phase in your career,
what does that mean when you're trying to raise the funds
or find your way in?
I was going to map out your next six months of what you have to do.
What are those steps?
Yeah, so I mean, and this was,
it's interesting now being in this position,
having learned so much in the last sort of two years
in that when I first got into racing,
I sort of had the naivete of an F1 fan
where it's like, cool, logo's on the side of a car,
is exposure, so therefore you get money for it, right?
And you know, as anyone who has spent time in racing
will learn that's not really how it works.
There's so much more behind the scenes
in the business side of it and who you're connecting
and generating ROI.
So for me, the next six months is continuing
relationships that I have with people
that have contributed funding before
and also tapping into a lot of what I'm trying to do
with my back injury.
A big part of raising funds for me comes from
the medical side of that
and the surgery or the recovery that I had
involved a procedure which is very rarely talked about.
And it's funny in that there's many, many athletes
and in fact, many race car drivers who've had this operation
but no one will talk about it
because I mean, at the end of the day
we all want to be professionals.
Nobody hires a footballer with a torn hamstring, right?
So no one will talk about an operation that they've had.
So a big part of raising funds for me is
how can I be an ambassador for that operation
and effectively increase the profile of that
so that people are more willing to consider it?
And that's been a very helpful avenue for me so far
in trying to raise funding.
But so much of it is just connecting people
and sort of seeing where I can generate revenue
for people over the next few months
throughout 2026 adjacent to what we're actually doing on track.
Are you an ambassador for the National Spine Health Foundation?
Yes.
What does that entail?
So like I said with having had an operation
I had an artificial disc replacement in my Lombar Spine,
the L4 L5 disc effectively replaced
with a polyurethane artificial disc.
That is an operation which while it has been done
for a very long time, especially outside of the US
it's still quite difficult to have in the US.
So a huge part of working with the National Spine Health Foundation
is talking about my story and sort of sharing that
the artificial disc replacement is a feasible and safe option
and especially an alternative to a spinal fusion
which can allow you to continue to compete in sports
or have an active lifestyle.
So I've been working with the National Spine Health Foundation
for just started fairly recently this year
both in sharing the word about spine health
and alternatives to Lombar fusion
and also just helping them grow and get the word out
about what they're doing and educating as many people
as possible.
Spine health or back pain is the number one cause
of doctors visits in the US.
I think it's something like two thirds of the population
will suffer from back pain at some point in their lives
and it's something which if you educate on it
and start to teach people about it very early
you can prevent a large majority of the issues that people have
but typically we only start to talk about it
when it starts hurting.
So trying to do what I can there to spread the message
and talk about my story
and the options that you have
especially as a young person with back pain.
Cool.
Why is it...
Probably may not make the edit
but why is it so difficult in the US?
Is it reputation?
Is it a legal thing?
It's insurance.
So Lombar fusion is a very common thing
which a lot of people have.
Technically officially lower risk.
However, if you have a fusion
you're going to have another one
and then another one.
Exactly.
Exactly.
So the artificial disk is technically
and scientifically proven to be a much better alternative.
We just don't have 80-year case studies on it yet.
We have 20 or 25 years of experience with it.
I know PT Auto Sports obviously the biggest proponent
on getting you into the professional side of racing
and continues to support you wherever they can.
Is there anybody else that's been helping you out?
Any sponsors you want to plug?
Yeah.
So I mean over the past two years
Wine Country Motorsports have been a huge supporter.
When I made the step up to GRCUP
I desperately needed a new helmet
as mine wasn't up to SRO spec or specifications
and also I literally couldn't fit a radio into it.
And you know the first people that came to mind
were Wine Country just as they've always gone
so far out of their way to help.
I mean even if you're just walking in
or walking into buying my first race suit
and they spent probably an hour trying to find me a discount.
So literally the first people that I reached out to
and were super super supportive
and were lucky enough to
and generous enough to provide a bell helmet for me.
So they've been super supportive over the last two years
and then that in part led to the relationship that I now have
with OMP Racing who also a partner of the Toyota GRCUP series
who have also been incredibly generous
and incredibly helpful in supporting my racing with gear along the way.
And again something where it's such a...
I don't know why I didn't expect this coming into racing
but both of those relationships have come purely from
personal relationships and people just going out of their way to help.
It's something where now anything I can do to support them
I do just because they were so good to me
which for some reason I didn't expect coming into racing.
I was thinking more exposure on the side of race cars
and our...
Well the one biggest takeaway that we've gained from the show
is that almost all the successful people in racing that we've interviewed
they have that common trait of being likable
and you ooze that.
In fact when you moved on from our program last year
we were all talking about it like
man I hope Henry finds something great
like we really want to see you do well
and we don't say that about every previous driver that's been on our program
I don't know that anybody does.
It's just you got to be likable also the talent matters
but when people are picking you for things like that PT AutoSport shootout
the driving was only one part of it.
There's a long Q&A thing that I was a part of
you know when I did my year of helping them out
and a lot of that came down to personality
and also wanting to give someone an opportunity
so as long as you have those personality traits
you're going to find that kind of vibe and you've got it in spades.
I appreciate that.
We say this a lot and I know we're winding down
but you could be the fastest driver in the world
but in sports car racing you're often times paired up with an AM
and if that AM's partner doesn't want to go to dinner with you
or they don't want to go to dinner with you
you could be the fastest person on the planet
you're probably not keeping that ride.
You know there's a lot of fast people
but are you going to want to hang out with a fast prick for 10 races
or a fast guy that's a nice person to get dinner with for 10 races
you know and that does make a difference.
Yeah exactly I mean again driving is what
2% of the job.
It's a lot less than people think so yeah
Sean you got anything?
Don't f*** it up.
Henry where can fans follow you
and keep up with what you've got going on?
I'm on social media at It's Henry Drury
good luck spelling my last name.
You want to help that Henry?
It's Henry Drury which is D-R-U-R-Y
yeah everything everything's on there
so I'll be driving something again soon hopefully.
One of the components with PT was
media and likeability coaching?
I want to be clear that I was not there the year he got picked.
Yeah then I definitely wouldn't have been picked.
Yeah I'd be gone right away.
The last compliment I'm going to give you is
I guarantee you Rutledge Wood
and Carl Forman are sick of me saying your name
because I've been using your data
all year from last year
until we get the series data from that particular weekend
and I wouldn't do that if I didn't think
you were good at what you do.
So as much as they're probably sick of hearing it
I appreciate everything you did with us
because it gave me a great platform to build on
for our next customers.
Well thank you very much and thank you
for all of your coaching last year.
Thank you for having me.
I've been a long time listener of Dinner with Races
it's very cool to actually be here.
I still have some episodes to catch up on
on my next flight.
Thank you both this has been awesome
and I'll see you in the Paddock at some point soon.
Yeah I'm like a week.
you
Request an explanation for:
2 cars
2 cars featured
Request an Explanation
Heard something you'd like explained? We'll add it to this episode.
Sign in to request explanations for terms you heard.
Want to learn more?
Browse our glossary for plain-English explanations of automotive terms, jargon, and concepts.
Help improve this episode
See something that's not quite right? Our annotations are AI-generated and can sometimes miss the mark. Click the flag icon on any annotation to suggest a correction.
Report incorrect info
Suggest better explanations
Flag missing cars