Ep.308 – Matt Farah

so a car washing entrepreneur not Chris Harris and debatably the fastest

American journalist and I'm saying debatably by the way no I've not given

that to you and the son of the man who destroyed riches oh yeah Matt Woolworths

Matt Farrah if you could describe this lunch we just had one word what would it

be calming coming okay yeah yeah we gotta turn it up yeah that's a or at

start giving up bills all the hot ones they set the guys face on fire and now

for dinner with racers presented by continental tire with your hosts Ryan

ever's Lee and Shawn heckman welcome to dinner with racers I'm Shawn heckman I

can't stop eating bacon but the fork down yeah I'm Ryan ever's Lee and I'm

watching you eat chili cheese bacon fries at this Johnny Rockets in Hollywood

California where we are celebrating sure is this celebrating it was what was

available for us to be able to get this done but we are sitting here going over

the guests of this season here ten years in ten years in ten years into making

this podcast and it's been a cast of characters none other than the likes of a

guy like Matt Farrah who you and I have both known for a while you've known him a

long time I have so Matt Farrah is one of those names that you've probably heard

even if you're not super into car culture but you do like racing because

you've been around the industry whether it's on the racing side or the automotive

review side for a very long time but he's one of the first people to find a

real home on YouTube doing the car space where car reviews magazine reviews

things like that and he really grew that up when it comes to cars and what people

like especially on the performance side and if you listen to our episode with JF

Musil then you'll understand where a guy like Matt Farrah comes from and all

that is culminated into kind of his his mainstay project that he works on when

it comes to podcasting in YouTube a show called the smoking tire which is both a

podcast and a YouTube channel in which they talk about all kinds of car things

well beyond racing so hey Ryan what's something hey Ryan what are some of the

things we're gonna hear about well we actually recorded in his studio which is

nice because we got to basically be on an episode of the smoking tire and we

learned about things like who does test drives right and who doesn't wrong we

learned a lot about online hate and we learned about realizing who your dad

really is so we had lunch at a home state in Playa Vista California really cool

I would you call it like a taco place I mean it was it's yeah I think so and like

we ordered just a handful of every I mean we had like chips we had burritos

tacos you had a chicken chicken it looked like a bean and cheese taco but

it was really a chicken sandwich okay I I know what you're thinking yeah trust me

that was a chicken sandwich from home state but yeah we had a really nice time

sitting down with Matt you know what else is a real nice time huh our brand new

patreon a patreon that's right you go to patreon.com forward slash a DWR show

where we are doing a behind the scenes extra sort of content page where you

can join a couple different levels where we're doing background stories on the

show we're doing content that we haven't been able to put out in the past about

maybe more details on stories more details on guests as well as our inside

jokes that we've been carrying on for 10 years now we're also letting the fan

know who the guests are going to be ahead of time so they can add some

questions to the show which you'll probably hear if you listen throughout the

year but also we're doing a monthly review and preview of our personal

racing and just a catch-up session between you and I which has become one

of our favorite things to do exactly if you go to patreon.com forward slash DWR

show there's a few different tiers of membership but at dinner club is the one

that has the most access but speaking of access you know who makes this whole

thing free just to hear the show as it is now got that'll tire hashtag dinner

with Conti and again we say this with every episode but there's a reason we

have to say it with every episode because it really really matters so if you go to

Instagram and you want to post some some love of dinner with racers whether it's

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once again they have verifiable data that says hey this sponsorship works and

we're gonna keep doing this for 10 more years Ryan the only way I'm doing 10

more years of this is if we can get Shane Van Gisburg and to drive us every

year I'm Shane Van Gisburg and I'm totally driving this GM product of a

minivan oh okay thanks Shane all right should we should we give it to Matt

Farah I think we should take it away Matt Farah me

yo all right we're gonna start in five four three two

are these just on XLRs yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah you can just kick

back you can eat food that's why we do it yeah but don't you have a mic like is

that like part of the charm yeah yeah there's two answers you're used to

internet commentary it does make it real we do isolate it so the good news is

obviously it's multi-track recording so if somebody's chewing they they get

isolated right I'm sure unless it's a guess who

choose and talks at the same time and then yeah that's just what you got so

there's a sure an old gentleman driver named RJ Valentine I know the name and

we had just Daytona 500 winner Daytona 500 with RJ Valentine and we had just like

the day before gone through some of our internet hate and one of the big

complaints was like I can't stand the chewing noises and that's on a personal

level a very frustrating note because well no that's like someone you know

going this Mini Cooper is too goddamn small like it says it on the name it's

supposed to it says dinner the first word what did you think this was going to

listen to you are correct part two of that is it's you'll never get it out but

we actually go to a lot of effort yeah to minimize sure you're complaining on

the final yeah so if that's on the finals like you don't know yeah yeah yeah so

we're just going through that's you know who said that Steve Selene yeah so we

just gone through this and again we got a great effort sit to minimize it as

sure yeah and RJ is this like 80 year old guy she went into like South Boston

guy doesn't give a f*** yeah and he's just in the middle of his style like that

can't fix that yeah you know like you got to get room tone you know you can I

get a chew tone yeah yeah all right you have to you bleep out cursing I'll try

my friend dude I just I just Bloomberg just did an article about me and

there's like five curses in in like some really otherwise very basic things that

didn't require them right yeah I was like proud of me yet dad yeah exactly yeah

that's what I'm bringing on the table yeah have we been rolling yeah this is it

yeah this is the show I like no I love the drop-in I love the just the real

drop-in thank you guys for coming this is so nice of you to visit me thanks for

hosting us so to speak yeah and I think I mean you guys have a past history from

well before I knew I think either of you actually well I would have told all but

like kind of brief yeah we grazed each other 24 hours at Daytona right morning

star Tom morning yeah I work with me work with Sean a lot and yeah do you

know remember you worked for me for a week we did the night that was so bad not

you this the project I was I was a contract video group for like a agency

that was trying to they did a bunch of things but they did the melee melee in

North America yeah I actually enjoyed working with Alan the cadney you know

what it was actually kind of a fun gig you know for you we invented a piece of

equipment for that gig what did you invent we Tom morning star and I because

so basically I had three units and you guys were one of my yeah yeah we were

like yeah we were like you know capturing car-to-car footage of the the

participants on the road yeah and we all had rented Mustangs and it was actually

really funny Tom morning star who was my my former business partner at the

smoke and tire and one of my old friends had the job somehow of renting the

Mustangs physically going to get yeah he was yeah he picked it up yeah and one

of the Mustangs he got had like the valet key and he was limited to like 70

miles and he was like so annoyed it actually made it really hard to do the

job sure but we invented they were Mustang convertibles as you do and we

had a got a 13 inch suction cup like vacuum cup and mounted a piece of plywood

to it and put a tripod hi-hat on it with a proper ballhead tripod video head and

Tom's you know Sony whatever it was like shoulder camera and basically we

could do like really really good live-action car-to-car yeah need you'd

kneel backwards in the Mustang convertible and you'd have this camera

you know mounted on the on the deck and now it's like that's kind of laughable

what you use instead yeah right to do that same tactic this would have been

gimbal this is 2010 maybe 11 it was a long yeah yeah so we we invented not

invented excuse me we built really shanty versions of professional rigs work

for that before those types of rigs became affordably available yeah jf to

built like so many yeah that was the deal yeah I've do you guys you guys follow

shitty rigs on Instagram you know what yeah yeah yeah fabulous Instagram anyone

who's ever been in production should should be aware of that because you're

proud of what you're able to do with something that basic or they actually

bad ideas no it's a it's it's it's a double-edged sword it's like 50% people

doing a terrible job with professional grade gear and then 50% people building

like ingenious rigs with like you know using the shopping cart dolly and stuff

like that yeah yeah it's both it's satisfying from both sides okay okay yeah

yeah so you guys have a have a history in working on some production stuff but

our fan base is primarily and I know there'll be a lot of crossover we've had

requests have you on in the past but let's go down like the who the f**k is

Matt Farah and how are you in this world because again I'd say 90% of our

followers are road racing base yeah I mean myself included that I don't

consider myself a car guy consider myself a racing guy and so it is a little bit

of a disconnect yeah I mean most people don't know that I won the 24 hours with

Daytona in 1997 it's really not enough right it's not talked about enough you

don't bring it up and you know that's why they really need to talk about it

in 1997 what happened yeah I was there yeah we were there together you know I

was an alternate on the team but I'm there

no I'm an automotive journalist that's that's basically what I do and I have

like you know how people usually pick one medium like I have like a lot of them

yeah first it was YouTube because I wasn't a very good writer and then after

like years of doing YouTube I realized I could write like I talk and that is a

successful strategy so I started writing and wrote and track and and we also do

this mongantar podcast and so we've done a thousand and ten episodes of the

podcast 2,500 videos yeah and I've been writing for I don't know six years now

and now we and I also have this place that we are Westside collector car

storage and now with two locations yeah I keep myself pretty busy yeah so I've

met you on several different media events for Honda and Acura and I was

with them and you're you're kind of like in that group of like people you can

assume are going to be attending any sort of car thing that can be written

about or promoted or discussed when the car goes fast I can usually be that's

a bit odd to go there right where I miss the ridgeline launch unfortunately I

you poor thing yeah poor thing HRV I oh I don't have a ticket in a ridgeline

leaving that this versus that shoot I did I was like oh man the worst car here I

got the first beating ticket so where does the interesting car start from you

as a little kid little kid yeah yeah a little kid magazines followed by my dad

was a really good dad and you know first it was magazines and then it was

taking me to a couple races I dad my dad um you know is like has been in the

fashion business for his whole life and you know it's he's not been like a heavy

heavy hitter but he's known some people and been able to do a few things and

and when I was like a seven or it's would have been 1989 90 so like eight nine I got

to go in a helicopter to the Atlanta Journal 500 which was the NASCAR race

and I didn't know anything about like racing series or what was what it was

racetrack race cars we landed in the infield I found when we got there that

my dad was friends with the editor of the Atlanta Journal Constitution which was

the newspaper and for some reason and I have yet to maybe I need to ask him why

this happened but he he got up on stage and was the grand marshal of the race

your dad was yeah I said great gentlemen start no point does he tell you not till

we were there it's like not till we were there it was a surprise when we got there

where'd you go by the way this was in Atlanta this wasn't and then shortly

after I moved to New York Westchester County yeah I was living in Atlanta yeah

when I was a kid I was in New York yeah when I was a kid Atlanta and then we

left right uh right before sports teams got good right before the Olympics we

were we were out of there yeah the city's going to hell we were gone yeah we were out of there yeah

yeah not before my dad closed the like legendary Atlanta department store though

he did do that yeah uh was that the uh the sears robux store the big one it was called

riches okay yeah I remember it remember riches you know how it's gone now yeah you're welcome

yeah okay cool yeah we have the sign that hung over the entrance to the downtown Atlanta riches

in my dad's that's pretty cool it was a it was a losing a lot of money yeah it was absorbed by

like a fun thing no no it was absorbed by I don't know it Bloomingdale's or something it became

something else but like yeah my dad but that took like mad heat in the ATL where that happened it was

like they did like we've got to go kind of move yeah yeah yeah right here yeah yeah yeah they did uh

they were like the the Macy's of Atlanta yeah so they had the Thanksgiving parade in Atlanta

it was that it was so culturally it was a kind of like I mean I could be wronged it were they not

were they not because I knew riches but I just thought everybody had riches no it was just

it was just Atlanta oh no I don't think it was just Atlanta but like that was a big thing yeah

oh that's crazy I didn't know that yeah very cool yeah and your dad and your dad ruined it with

you ruined it with like the holding company that they got rid of him I'm sorry was he was he with

riches or was he with like a holding company uh he at the at the time he was he was the president

of riches or something of that division and then the they killed the brand and he big went to work

for whatever the bigger the bigger company was yeah yeah he also my dad this has nothing to do with

racing that's what this is the show but my dad my dad also killed Woolworth's what yeah man yeah

it was a kiss of death yeah let him come to IMSA Woolworth's was losing hundreds of millions of

dollars a year yeah okay and they owned other businesses they owned all the Footlocker brand

what's your dad's name which Roger Ferrer Roger okay and they were making money so if you want to

if you want to kill a business you call Roger Ferrer uh he was amazed he was and still is incredible

at restructuring restructuring businesses that are in trouble yeah usually they bring him in when

it's the wolf yeah yeah he's the wolf for like corporations yeah yeah yeah yeah so and it's

pretty well known that he I don't know is he still with Ralph Lauren no no he left in 2015

I'm into the board of CVS health now okay that's his like retirement job yeah he's trying to retire

like every five years for the last 30 years and failed at it so I mean earlier you said your dad's

not like this big deal because you were surprised that he was doing the grand marshal but I mean he

was the CEO at the time he at the time he wasn't that big of a deal I mean he ran the department

store it wasn't like you know yeah well but was this a deal or like was Rich's part of the sponsorship

of the track they might have been and so maybe it was like I was eight I was happy I met I met Dale

Earnhardt I met Richard Petty I met Rusty Wallace gave me his bush beer hat which I still have okay

yeah um I have a jacket like a little kid's jacket that's signed by like half the grid from 1990

that's awesome you know so so you know that's like that was like the first my first supposed to

racing but yeah my dad bought me a go-kart when I was nine yeah and so that was like like a yard

card or like an actual racing go-kart it wasn't a racing go-kart I've never heard the term yard

card yeah yeah but yes I believe that's that's what it was it was made of tubing exactly right but it

was from like a company okay yeah you know it wasn't like sharper image yeah right you know it was

like a Briggs and Stratton yeah it was like a racing but it was not it was a camp go-kart yeah yard

card is the right card actually I've never heard that yeah that's what I saw I'm gonna use that absolutely

man yeah yeah yeah it stemmed our careers but you know and I had I at some point asked for I did

ask for a racing go-kart and wanted and but I but we were like we went and asked somebody what was

involved in like it wasn't the cart it was the racing it was we were not going to do all that so

yeah but the but getting to drive was really the game changer more so than looking at or watching

you know anything yeah yeah yeah yeah driving was everything golf cart boat sit on dad's lap

yeah go you know go-kart you may well whatever if there was a wheel I need to try to drive that

and that that continues so was your dad into the car scene at all okay I mean he was a James Bond fan

sure so you know he always wanted a Nassan Martin and he did eventually get one um and uh and but

and and he he knew I was into it and so to whatever degree he could he got a sob turbo in the 80s I

think that was like kind of cool but it was not automatic so like not yeah don't look inside uh

no casual enthusiast but but uh but followed me around okay to his degree what what did your mom do

how I mean housewife mother just very involved mom yeah yeah yeah yeah it sounds like childhood

it was pretty fun pretty pretty enjoyable I mean it was I you know I was a white kid from basically

Greenwich Connecticut yeah I mean it was it would do it it was all pick your expensive hobby we

know yeah we got it was it sailing or yeah you know whatever sexy people they love it it was it was

fat people yeah major but it was it was great I used to I grew up sailing and like racing like

dingies like lasers and stuff like that's that stuff was was great love that uh and then when it was

you know my parents I you know although I clearly I'm talking about like you know privileged upbringing

my parents were very serious about my first car I had to go to work yeah and whatever I

saved they would match okay oh that's a similar deal which was good you know because at like 15

how much can you exactly really save yeah when you're like going to school full time so yeah

so I work you know my dad was uh when he was at Woolworth's I went to work at Footlocker okay so I

worked three days a week at Jersey hell yeah yes yes you know what yeah if you feel cool yeah

about 45 seconds in the jersey until you realize you're wearing it to work yeah at the mall yeah

yo I was really good at selling shoes though that's but working in the mall you're working

but in New York you'd like you go in and it's like a sunny day you come out and it's like

dark and raining it's like you just you feel like the world went by without you at all it's

bad bad news well also are you seeing your buddies come in and like or other kids no so the move if

you work at the mall I mean if you want to be a head you work in your local mall yeah right you

know if you actually want to like have a job you want to work in a different okay and I actually

some I don't know who figured that out but I worked in a mall that was like two malls from my

yeah right and it I worked in the Stanford Connecticut okay mall yeah which is a horrible

mall it was then and if it's open it must still be right it was bad yeah yeah but we sold a lot

of shoes so you're working at Footlocker you're saving money just to get your first car yeah what

would you get the first car it was there was a Subaru Legacy GT okay but in the pre-wrx era of

Subaru yeah you couldn't modify it and so I was over it very quickly right and I all my friends

have Foxbody Mustangs so I got a Mustang but my parents said no Foxbodies because I have to have

airbags oh yeah so they said they said I could basically buy whatever I wanted but it had to

have dual dual airbags that was it and so I got the 94 Mustang the rounded one yeah right right

so yeah then we all first of the plastic 94 yeah that was a 94 so underneath still a Foxbody

yeah right and you could do all the same stuff so we you know we started it was summit racing

absolutely dude for sure yeah um what was your so so my thing was I ended up working at a grocery

store and but even before that that's where I'd go get the magazines you know what I mean because

it's like pre internet internet's just starting for me how old are you you're I'm 43 yeah so we're

I'm like a year and a half younger than you so right before the internet starts the last thing

you could do to like really get involved with like car scene was magazine store Barnes and Noble or

something I had every car and driver in road and track from like 1985 until 2000 right yeah I still

have them my wife is like what are we doing here it's been it's been it's like three huge bins yeah

right and it's been shuffled from house to house yeah of course now I write for them yeah now I'm

keeping them for a different reason yeah for sure man which is a lovely sort of first full circle

thing but yeah road and track yeah uh and then and then it was go karting and driving stuff and

when we had the Mustangs we went drag racing yeah English town yeah oh bitch it right on English

yeah so on the weekends yeah drag racing slow as was this like a Friday night run like your

brung thing like yeah like bracket drag yeah exactly yeah yeah yeah so so you know my dial in

you know on a good day I'm pushing like a 14 do 14 14 trace hell yeah we're killing it 5500 rpm

you know like a monster chopper brah da da da da da da brah da cam yeah you know like slow maybe

I'm hitting 100 I don't know but we had a good race them yeah yeah we had a good time yeah we would

get regularly smoked yeah because it's you know do you do you guys do you guys ever talk about

drag racing do people know how bracket drags work I mean I'd say it's probably the least following

we had okay yeah but like we just had launched with Don Pernum yeah oh yeah he's probably not talking

about I'm sure you're like yeah you ever run with your brung down yeah yeah he's like yes against

John force right oh sorry sorry no it's like it's uh price is right rules drag racing but you set

your own thing so if you go to you practice first you do a couple runs you go today I think my car

can run a 14 oh and you write the number on your window 14 oh yeah and you try to get as close to

your own number as possible without beating it yeah and that way a slow car a fast car any car

can win yes it's drag racing BOP almost but in a more honest and sensible way yeah yeah it was

one where every participant goes okay that makes sense well yeah if you say it's gonna be a 14 oh and

you do a 13 9 yeah you're dq yeah right and so and so and they and they time the um you know they

still run two cars at a time but you're not racing the other car you're racing yourself yeah right

and so they time everyone's launch so you cross the finish line right at the same time I'm gonna

start a second before you know which is theory but but there was a guy uh who made his living

flying around the country renting Ford Tauruses and going showing up to bracket drags like dialing

in a 17 oh on the window right and just the thing was on the button yeah right he's eating an ice

cream cone going down one yeah right right that's just take it everybody's money yeah that's awesome

that's right yeah so yeah drag racing and then my dad when I was 18 sent me to skippy okay he did

Barbara Lyme Rock okay and I had Bruce McKinnis hell yeah Bruce McKinnis was my first instructor

and Dean DeJocomo yeah I know Dean yeah I'm still friends with Dean I raced against Dean in the Lambo

series the first couple of years and he has the house like right across the street from the track

and everything yeah yeah he's a great dude and he Dean is now the the instructor for Lamborghini

that's right yeah for all the media events so now I see him he's a really good dude and all the launches

where there's track stuff yeah and he's the guy who now vouches for me for the Italians like hey

look this guy can drive if he says he needs to go do this just like let him do it you did the three

day school yeah was the idea to get your license or was it just uh like what was the plan I didn't

really know it was just like racing school and then I went and then when I finished it and realized

oh okay that was the the intro and right you know whatever the intermediate and I could do another

three day or two day and get a license you know I did and so I went back I actually had a crash

and at the second one yeah it was pissing rain oh man dude if you did a racing school in the rain

like that's like harder than most people realize in those you got the Andes in those like terrible

formula cars too I hate open-wheel cars so much people love you like open-wheel cars I mean I just

like race cars okay you don't care yeah just give me whatever I need it I need a body in a cage

okay look at me yeah you know you know what is actually I don't there's anyone this is not a

problem for you but no one's ever made an open-wheel car that fit me okay yeah I'm always getting

some tiny-ass terrible thing right can't move my arms can't steer yeah you know it's like claustrophobic

if I need opposite lock at any point during this like we're in deep okay yeah the arms don't go that

way right right so yeah at the exit at the exit of um Big Bend and Lime Rock I looped it on the inside

you know amateur garbage right but every track I raced at or did any track work out for the next

10 years after that it was like oh this is like turn two at Lime Rock this is like turn four at

that's like how it goes there first racing school so that was uh that was the big one was

actually turning turning corners and then it became that it became about something but

growing up like in you know in in Westchester County and in Greenwich Connecticut you know the

back roads are like beautiful like windy a level roads and that's that's all driving so right we

got to practice everywhere all the time we were very spoiled yeah and anytime you go to Lime Rock

and you drive from like Torrington or whatever to the track yeah those roads are like yeah group

b rally stages you know it's awesome that was everywhere yeah for sure and our my career you

know as doing youtube stuff started by putting on these drives um on those roads and then honestly

are you going to school yeah like honestly like not much car related happens for a couple years

because I go to college well how old are you at this year 18 that was before college okay I go to

college and I do all the road tripping in the world but frankly not much car related stuff

happens yeah that Mustang I had I sold because Philadelphia where I went to college was just

beating the absolute out of it and and then after after college I got back into cars and

and just worked my way from one car job to another yeah dealership right rental car company

eventually my friend Larry Casilla and I started a car wash together okay um and then when youtube

launched we made our first video promoting the car wash really which is when we hired Tom Morningstar

okay Tom Morningstar shot our second youtube video for us yeah yeah um B&H salesman Tom Morningstar

yeah at the time he was a B&H salesman and he was from my town I knew him uh because we had smoked

many together in high school and he or last week in addition to or last week in addition to um

to everything else he was a skater and he had a nice camera and was making skate videos and so

our early car videos looked like skateboarding videos but with cars and they were so old youtube

launched um I believe it was uh end of April 2006 my first youtube video was November 2006 so like

pretty early early pretty early and so it was pre DMCA and so music in other words how about it

with music dude they're still there our old videos have like Pearl Jam and they're still up you can't

240p forever dude you know but you can't get rid of them and uh yeah and then one day Tom came home

with like a microphone and was like here you know you're the host now and I and I became the host

to the video just cracking jokes and whatever and what were you calling yourselves then so that shop

and the driving club was called the New York Motor Club we thought it sounded very classy

it uh in hindsight was probably not all that classy but um but it worked you know we had we we

actually did pretty well and uh you know Larry when I left a couple years later full time to go

make youtube videos because I that was more fun than running a car wash um you know Larry went

on to become one of the best you know detailers on the planet best best known most most well known

talented uh and then I then taught him how to make youtube videos retroactively and he got more

followers than me dick people love them detailing videos yeah right you know it's that um for the

same reason they love like restoration shows on the history yeah exactly that's good to see somebody

do that's basically what you know I pull this car out of a barn yep you know and make it look like

you know and and not that this is Larry's job to mechanically restore these cars sure you know

they they you know they barely they're they're running on two cylinders when they pull out of

the shop yeah he's playing that soundtrack over them and they're so shiny even the chugga chugga

yeah right right straight to that flat bed so how early in this youtube process are you seeing

oh this could be a thing um pretty early I mean pretty early like

I I saw how many views we were getting because so so first we're making videos for this car club

slash car wash and then this dude I mean you remember Amel right Amel Rensing oh yeah I know

in the history of jf I do yes so Amel Rensing was this guy who was like a tech guy a tech bro

but like a New York Long Island tech bro like we didn't know about like real tech bros because

we were from New York we never been to California but like he was like a long a good a Jewish boy

from Long Island who was playing tech bro got it yeah and he had like some connections at google

and him and his friends were starting one of the earliest if not the earliest multi-channel

networks and so they hired me like I got in 2007 I got a salary and health insurance to make youtube

this is the first year youtube in the the first concept what we now call verticals yes started

to show up where it's one channel with lots of different prongs so we did that for like a year

and a half until the economy crashed and the company sold to google and we got fired but in that

time I experienced fans you know being stopped in the street this is garage 419 yeah it was garage

419 terrible name but fun show yeah and basically you know tom morningstar and I like learned the

business of youtube like on their dime and when we and we knew how much money the videos were making

like we they told us and like when they went under we were like you know if we get rid of

the overhead of like right all of this right you know all we need are a couple things like

we know how to make videos and put them on youtube now like we just need some money until we can sell

ads and we need to go to california because they don't have real winter oh yeah yeah because

a at the time you know this was this was in the middle of winter in new york and when we got fired

from our that that job we were on a filming trip in california oh and it was like cold and snowing

in new york and we're here in march here and it's like we're filming a convertible on you

know in malibu we're like yeah okay so we need to be here so we moved to california to start the

end of 08 and we put up our first video in 09 so an m podcast was 2011 yeah but we did some we so for

racing i do have like the tiniest amount of racing cred i've probably done like 20 or 25 endurance races

i'm a really good teammate i don't bend the car okay seriously i take a lot of starts

actually okay usually a team will trust me to start their car because i don't have the ego

to have a turn one incident right um and i and i'm usually like uh i'll be a half a second

to lap off your fastest guy in a slow car okay and in a fast car extend that to a second and a

half a lap so like yeah and when we race like an e30 or a civic i'm consistent and like a half

half a second off the very fastest guy yeah but they might bend the car and i won't

right and uh yeah so i'm okay i'm not good i'm a d i'm a good journalist or a bad pro

got you basically what what races have you done like i'm guessing like thunder hill i've done i did

24 hours of vir okay i've done uh a bunch of different champ races sonoma uh rhod america

walkins glenn i've done a bunch of aer in the midwest that taco has not survived the journey

very well this is not going to go well no yeah great track a lot a bunch of like mid ohio and

ncm and stuff like that yeah yeah um uh miata z 30s i like racing slow cars racing slow cars is a

good time especially because like i drive fast cars on the street and stuff for work and on track

but like not in a racing environment like in a solo environment i don't think i have the nerve

to to race a really fast car in terms of just hanging it out i just like

i've also never really had the opportunity to test one enough to really get comfortable like will

turner has always been really kind to me and lets me have a go in his cars because he knows i won't

break him and after like you know 20 30 laps i usually said like a pretty respectable gentleman

driver time but i've never like gone wheel to wheel in one of these cars and i've never

had that comfort level to just yeah and i have to like pretty much apply full focus to get to

that gentleman driver lap time and i'm not like the driving has become second nature so you can

focus on the right and in a slow car i can do that in a slow car i don't think but in a fast car

i'm not i'm not there yet i think it's probably just opportunity in the seat time sure so something

i'm hearing though is uh so right out of college when you were working at car dealerships what were

old stuff 22 years exactly i'm running cars around prior to for garage 419 how many businesses

did you started started yeah car wash with your buddy one i started so that you didn't have this

like cereal i'm gonna no no no i started we started the one i'm just wondering how much

of your dad's coming out at this point no no no we started one and i wasn't i wasn't a particularly

good businessman about any of that sure sure but uh the best thing i did for him and larry and me

was probably go off and make videos no it's not it wasn't it was not about being this serial

entrepreneur sure i the car wash at the time really did seem like a good idea because we

had plans to grow into a chain of car washes or bigger thing that just never really happened

and then once youtube i mean it was like whoa um i was just a regular employee at the rental

places and the dealerships whatever yeah no and and even starting this business this i need to

start this business because i car storage business the car storage sorry um i just

knew that i couldn't do the gig economy right forever i needed some kind of backstop or off

ramp what do you mean yeah right yeah well i was a little bit ahead of the curve on

recognizing that that would be a very necessary thing um but i'm glad i was because it ultimately

you know my youtube career is not going to be over when i choose it's over yeah we all understand

that i've already you know passed my video prime so parking cars baby let's go yeah we're back

we're parking cars it's a great business this business i love it i love it i think it's it's

fun business for me to be in i love i love keeping people's stuff safe i think also your

personality is good for it because you're very good in a room you know you can actually talk to

talk it's not like you're just some guy it's like yeah like your Ferrari like you understand the

differences and the intricacies of all of it with cars yeah so if you're going to give somebody

your car to store it do you want it to be some idiot that's just trying to do something to make

money or you want to be somebody that understands the value of it because they've also got cars they

care about or do you want to give it to someone who's trying to start a social club right and they

just need a pretty background yeah exactly yeah that's a different they need you more different

vibe yeah right for sure yeah a lot of people in this business that's what they're doing yeah

do you remember the first article you wrote for like a big publication oof i remember the first

time i got printed yeah that was that was a that was a real big one and it was the million mile

lexus story oh yeah i remember that yeah i got i bought a lexus with 900 000 miles on it and and

got it the rest of the way to a million yeah that was cool uh so that was printed in in rodent

track yeah that was my first time and that was that was important then it was like then my parents

understood what i did right they got paper it's not a it's not a like a fun thing anymore yeah i know

my dad understood what i did when he saw the magazines and when we got when he came to la

and i got stopped in the street by a fan yeah makes me sure yeah he's like you you're in you're in

los angeles and fans are stopping you and yeah that's what's up yeah i was worth every every bit of

the 50 bucks i paid that was this was this a thing prior where you didn't really have a real job

even though if you're say you're paid getting by youtube paid doing the youtube stuff if your parents

aren't seeing it is was this a i don't know if you'll struggle no no look my my parents were

always very supportive actually um and and i mean that's not to say that they just like gave me money

no because they didn't do that but but they you know i think like a lot of things i'm sure with

racing drivers this happens a bunch where it's not so much that their parents are paying their way

it's that they're able to act somewhat more recklessly with their money they don't have kids

they don't have college debt and if this all goes to hell you can make an embarrassing but necessary

phone call and it'll probably be okay right like so that's where the privilege comes from that so

and you recognize that which is yeah i think it's part of it but to be honest i didn't at the time

or i didn't i did but i didn't want to i lied to myself about it and it's it was very important

for the 26 year old version of me to go i earned every bit of this which was a whole s*** right

and that's what i'm saying is like because we see this with wealthy race car drivers all the time too

it's like it's not whether you earned it or not it's the willingness to be reckless sure like we

can't the fact that you say that yeah speaks volumes to me um so so it was it was great that i i got to

take those early risks and we didn't make very much money for a long time and and and you know

there's a reason tom was working for you yeah it wasn't because it wasn't because tom is like

a greedy person yeah yeah yeah yeah you know like in the beginning i'm awesome to work with

first yeah of course yes shut the f*** up right but for years we were taking side gigs yeah to

to support yeah keep the thing going yeah right you know we made a video every week for two years

with no money i mean you know i sold my car and rode a motorcycle and you know it was it was it was

a it was a grind um we were never starving we got it done it was fine you know ultimately and

eventually things happen you know you like anything else you stick around long enough you put yourself

in the right place never would have happened if we didn't move to LA by the way never would have

happened if we weren't regularly creating content and being places you know so well yeah is there is

at what point do you start to get hate from people because it it went i don't want to say it went

well early because you did have to like fight to get to it but we've experienced this with our show

and anytime you have a career in racing and it's going well like other guys who also have things

going well we'll still f*** it on you um yeah do you remember getting pushback from other people

because you're not a traditional journalist like you said you you write the way you talk

yeah i mean i wasn't getting hate for that oh okay so where was hey why do people hate you

i mean look you know in the in the beginning you know i'm i'm able to speak pretty authoritatively

on stuff and at most of the time i know what i talk about i'm talking about 43 year old me

knows better than 25 year old me to it's a hedge a little better when i don't know what i'm talking

about sure sure right so there's you know 20 something arrogance there's the insecurity that

it takes to want to be somebody who's in front of a camera in the first place yeah and the ability

and and you could tell yourself justification that you need to directly engage with those

commenters for one reason or another which of course is not true it's absolutely right yeah

but you could tell yourself it is absolutely yeah and that creates you know a spiral of self loathing

and yeah and just i mean just a terrible place mentally yeah so eventually i did learn to stop

reading the comments but it took years yeah yeah so but but in in terms of like haters or whatever

there's like there are some people that are actual haters they're like those that like in the

traditional sense right they're jealous of whatever you've done right okay and in the beginning maybe

they were but also there were people that were probably and i don't remember specifically but

i'm sure they were you know accurately calling me on some of my bull you know and so now right

yeah i mean you know like what am i gonna do like i was you know you understand like celebrities

or whatever who can get famous and they're under they're under scrutiny except all your interactions

are in writing and for the record yes oh my god yeah get me out of here like dude you just you

know you're you've you've got someone who's like not necessarily a role model but is like put on this

on a sort of a pedestal and there's expectations and everything you ever say before is used against

you and yeah right right you know eventually you learn that it's okay to learn lessons and it's okay

to go yeah that was wrong and i learned and you know i forget when exactly it was that i

did i decided to like put the ego aside and just be like hey man like you know growing up right

like what are you gonna do like you know and and actually it just makes more sense to own it yeah

clear conscience is really the weight of telling yourself that you earned everything and weren't

part of a support system or even luck yeah yeah timing that you had nothing to do 100%

random luck exactly yeah yeah yeah if you don't have that awareness then you're missing it so like

you know people are very nice and i'm mad at you know and i introduced myself as dude who owns

go pros yeah which is true that's like pretty much it there's not much more to it than that right

man with rolling black pelican case yeah yeah i relate to everyone who has a rolling black pelican

case yeah it's funny because prior to doing this stuff that was nothing to do with me at all you

know what i mean and i'll be at the airport like i don't know what that guy's making yeah yeah i had

a production company innocently take my pelican case from the baggage because they just assumed it was

there was yeah they hurled it onto a thing you know and and man i was able we were able to i was

able to get it back yeah like accident but i was it's tough man yeah that could be a bad day so on

the on the flip side of like early pushback yeah was there anybody that stands out from back then

that was supportive of you that you were surprised okay so like yeah i don't know if the if the answer

i gave was actually to the question no no it kind of gets to the point like how hard was it in the

beginning like what was really hard was like getting manufacturers to take us seriously sure

youtube pretty much like they probably were with tiktok like two years ago yeah yeah and there

will be another thing soon right it'll be like yeah yeah apple watch content yeah exactly no one

wants that whatever the new like toto like you know the it's gonna be ray bands in the videos

it's gonna be a vr bidet you know that i somehow now have to optimize yeah right now i gotta make

this in four by seven bidet yeah we need we need this on the toilet paper yeah yeah yeah uh so in the

beginning uh there's a guy named alan hall at ford who was the first person at a manufacturer to

invite us on a press launch okay and like take us seriously yeah and it was the gt 500 k r press

launch which is a you know special edition shall be with uh that i've never seen one on the road

since you know they're all in collections somewhere yeah it was a $90,000 mustang in 2009

and so yeah in the beginning getting getting people to take us seriously and then and then they

really really did for a while those press launches in the 2015 to 2020 you know you get that video

wave oh boy is that luxurious that's lovely especially you get that jfb roll package sometimes

yeah damn i see jf at the airport i'm like i get that jfb roll package for me buddy yeah i go what

color what color guards red okay let's go that b roll pack will make a break

yo can i do an airdrop right now yeah i don't want to download it i don't want to

download it i don't want to go to the newsroom right now give me give me a flash drive let's go

i just got a new flash drive the first time in five years i didn't realize how far behind i was

in flash drive into the size dude i think it's probably not size same size speed just how fast

my new flash drive is probably 8x faster than my old flash drive wow i was behind

you start doing actual car events like going to like ride and drives and launches and stuff like

that yeah um i would say it's probably more in my experience because i haven't done that many of them

but it's more now guys like you but probably when you guys first start showing up in the youtube

crowds just starting to merge into automotive content it was much more traditional journalists

so was there a bit of a clash at all or like where it was nah no it wasn't like that yeah it wasn't

like that yeah it was it here's where it sucks i you know for the first time ever here's what it

sucks making a video when you have to share a car with somebody that like legitimately sucks and so

for the fans at home no it'll be like two different journalists from two different publications you

guys are sharing this type article yeah like you're if you go on a press launch for a new car

sometimes you have to share a car with somebody right and they give you a route there's driver

changes yeah and if you're a print journalist or web writing yeah it's no big deal yeah it's fine

i mean it can be a big deal if they pair you up with somebody like who's like might actually kill

you yeah right yeah it doesn't have to experience there's about yeah there's about seven people

i'll ride with yeah you know but but if you have to make a video and someone else is trying to do

their job right yeah it's weird it's inconvenient just well they might represent something that

conflicts right so like so for anyway for many many years i i grin and bared it and i just went on

the asthen martin vantage launch last week and for the first time ever is that we're sharing cars

and i said okay look i can't make a video i just can't do it right and i'm not and i'm not gonna

inconvenience my drive partner yeah and you know but and they're like okay and i was like wait i could

have been saying okay this whole time yeah i'll take all the relief yeah and then i did this press

launch without making videos like oh my god this is like luxurious like i'm just chilling i've been

working this whole time just chilling and driving this asthen martin i'm not like crawling over the

engine right right mounts twelve different takes of oh my god yeah yeah yeah no it's it's and i'm

not trying to complain it's like i have a great job but like heck man you have crawled over enough

hot cars to know that like yeah that doesn't matter what the car is that's work yeah absolutely

yeah i would i would actually save more for ryan yeah like the kind of the wake up call what's

required when you start doing the videos yeah it's a different change yeah yeah i always think back

to this one time we were in jamaica and i'm standing in the field with uh what was our guy's name uh

peter no um oh oh eldo eldo thank you yeah eldorado um he and i are standing there filming this like

one corner and there's no one on track we're just getting like b-roll of it and it's 110 degrees

and we're just getting it over and over again over and over again just like yeah this sucks yeah you're

dying like i'm not driving a race car right now what am i doing here yeah if it was just people

like wait so you just drive the car yeah right yeah it's easy man yeah no yeah well we're back and

what's funny was we used to look at the podcast is like all this work yeah and then we started doing

videos oh my god yeah just the two of us is lazy yeah exactly yeah like today where it's like

our setup is five minutes yeah and we're ready and 90 of the effort that goes into our podcast

the smoking tire podcast by the way get it where you get podcasts or on youtube yeah is because of

no let me say let me rephrase a 65 of the effort is because it's on video yeah sure a further 30

percent of the effort is because it's live oh right yeah yeah so five percent of the effort

is sitting here and talking to my friends about sitting right yeah well for us the lack of live

does make it easier oh absolutely yeah we know we can fix it later yeah yeah absolutely um is there

is there a ride and drive or a launch that stands out in your mind is like the worst one you ever

went to here's what's worst to me what matters to me i'm going to dedicate my i'm leaving my office

and my wife and my cats to go to this thing i travel a lot recreationally i don't give a where it is

the the best case scenario you drop the car off in my driveway i don't go anywhere but but i'm

willing to go almost anywhere to drive the the right car what i hate is to have my time wasted

by having a by having it be a vacation i wasn't expecting rather than a trip where i get seat time

so i get i've i've had to go really really far really far to get like no seat time i traveled for

30 hours each way to for six laps in the rain a lead follow six lead follow wet laps around the

circuit de monta blanco in spain to drive the r8 v10 r8 gt final edition whatever the last

special edition was six laps after flying to spain from Los Angeles like for the travel in the

fancy hotel and everything they could do to set you up isn't nearly as valuable dude we didn't even

drive them to the track we drove ttrs's from the hotel to the track yeah right yeah like what are

we doing here guys you know and then and then oh and then yeah the other thing that makes the

worst press launch was the same thing uh they then set the embargo for thanksgiving

huh when did you do this this was like i don't know it was like in the fall in october or something

it was in bar it was the embargo release date was thanksgiving day at three p.m when everyone's

that's how that works i like lost my mind i go so let me get this straight

you're going to buy me a business class ticket to europe put me up in a five star hotel rent a

racetrack give me no seat time in bad weather yeah no opportunity make a good video send me home and

tell me after spending i don't know 20 grand ahead to get me out there that you're gonna put this

video up on a day that no one's gonna watch it yeah right literally worst weekend you could put

Super Bowl was taken yeah right yeah but Tuesday's dinner was razor's launch right so like yeah again

you know i could be digging ditches or something and i'm not trying to complain but you asked what

the worst is like that's pretty much every element go really far have bad weather no seat time and an

embargo that ensures you make no money so you're getting paid per view yeah and that's happened

a couple of times like where it's been really really far yeah for either no seat time or

a version of seat time that it makes it virtually impossible to get work yeah who's doing it the

best then or is there one that stands out is like you won't manufacture yeah yeah it's trite but i very

rarely have a misstep at a Porsche event mm-hmm Aston Martin Bentley i mean these are all very high

and yeah so they know they have to in fairness like uh Hyundai did the ionic 5N launched Laguna

Seca yeah right you know you you get you they gave me full sessions yeah right 20 minute sessions

at Laguna yeah right yeah what's better than that yeah right the best one i've that we've that i've

ever done was like a terrible hotel yeah right it was like six people terrible hotel terrible food

and gingerman raceway open track seven cars open track for eight hours yeah like subway sandwiches

yeah right right i was like i was a pro by the end yeah i was doing numbers by the end right and and

man Cadillac yeah this that was not this one um that was Lotus actually oh cool that was a

Vora GT yeah uh but um Cadillac just did and this was brave at uh at amp you ever run amp

sure yeah that place a harry yeah motorsport park yeah motorsport yeah there's elevation on

elevate it's crazy it's a dude the news the black wing launch was just there oh wow and you know

they've well at least the slow car right and this is the five black wing not even the four this is

the six the zia the the the six hundred and sixty eight horsepower manual gear boxes and you know

it's got have you seen what the new ptm is doing yeah the before not ptm um a pdr the performance

data record right it's cause worth toolbox exactly into the car it's proper data yeah there are some

limit fun limitations i learned because i tried to do some things that i found out you can't do

with it sure and it was it drove me nuts because it was after the fact but i was i had a lot of fun

with the cause worth guys down there yeah and um jordan taylor so you know they have amp we've got

these 700 horsepower cars at jordan's there and he's like let me show you you know what the law i

actually i think i asked him to because i've never been there before sure and you know he he proceeds

to turn into a racing robot you know and he's he's fabulous the car is fabulous he's he's just you

know he's unbelievably talented but they want to show off the pdr and so they're timing like

they're letting us time ourselves oh no yeah terrible which if you've ever been to a press launch

like the number one rule yeah right no recording device i mean when you dealt us through the lap

full telemetry okay so i can just gain one second and this one

i couldn't i'm down three tenths i should push harder yeah they were only led they were only letting

people run five laps i think i think it was plenty of time i think it was a warm-up and four

flyers and i as i always do i that's not enough to get the video it's just not i don't understand

no but you gotta be detailed you go look i need two rounds per round amounts i need two round

amount then i need my in-car and then i need one last one for pure exhaust audio yeah and so

you know i had the pdr going and and and i uh jordan had driven we shared a car so you have a

data lap so i had a i had a ghost car and let me just tell you i was one lap from putting in the

wall yeah any minute and then and then we line up the data yeah and as it turns out i did pretty

good as it turns out i did pretty good i was i was one and a half off of jordan i would bet you

drive a lot more street cars on racetracks than he ever has maybe yeah there is something to be said

about that but riding with him yeah i i already knew this but the data that you know at a you

know you guys both know yeah okay so the um uh it's after turn one yeah the sharp left-hander's

turn one yeah that whole section that leads that leads into the banked carousel up top yeah

actually off camber carousel up top right he is the fullest of throttle through there and i

determined through my brain that that was not physically possible yeah it's not gonna happen

and then the big fourth gear yeah like coming over the hill yeah i think sketchy man they're

the line was like me big lift yeah him yeah it's just buried yeah and we determined that i

there was absolutely no way i was going to do that so yeah uh a fast car a racetrack and timing

yeah so Cadillac's pretty fun it sounds like yeah sounds like a good group yeah we went we went we

went through the telemetry and it was that was a lot of fun gm performance yeah in general gm

performance is a good ass time yeah i've been to the the v launches i've been to the camaro z l1

launch yeah these the corvette guys taj yeah taj was the he was the boss he didn't f*** around

yeah those guys these guys are serious yeah they're cool being critical and sort of giving

the the math fairer opinion that was part of the deal yeah and you were always independent of all

these folks who are letting you drive it yeah how was how was that oversight when you might s*** on a

car you do if you're really specific what are they gonna do yeah like yeah people have disagreed

i mean people have been like well here's why i made that choice and i go okay well it's not for me

yeah but if you're like real specific yeah you know the first of most of the time the people

getting you into the car they're not the people who design it right now here you criticize the car

it's not gonna affect your relationship with the manufacturer i love being on press launches

and feeling something in the car and oh there's the engineer let's go ask yeah right yeah i'm

getting that getting that why get the real if the why yeah yeah yeah because just sometimes

there's a why oh we had to compromise for your uh road noise yeah whatever yeah um and i'm not like

you know i have a lot of experience i'm an okay driver but like i don't know i'm nobody special

but if if i've i've talked to uh engineers who and then the car got better like oh s*** yeah car is

better hey and i'm sure other people said the same thing but but that's nice isn't it yeah absolutely

isn't it nice to give feedback to your crew chief whoever and the car gets better yeah it's great it's

kind of mandatory because the other way let me get a new guy to give feedback um it was different

with a street car yeah absolutely the requirements are for getting better are like so many different

so um it's pretty well reported that you are very active with promoting guys that have smaller

accounts or like newer content if it's good content uh okay if you look you up on reddit

i have friends yeah but no they're they're no no these are people that they're writing

that they're surprised you're commenting on their stuff or saying here's a good article or

or like things like that okay yeah so where does that is that a is that a paying it forward thing

or is that just you appreciate good stuff even if it's from somebody you have not no i mean like

it's it's i think a lot of people want would like to know if they're good at creating a piece of

content or not and they don't have anybody to critique it i went to art school i studied

photography so i sat through art critiques two three times a week for four years so i i'm used

to having my work busted up by professionals a lot of people aren't and consequently and you know

with self-publishing and whatever you know people write yeah yeah sometimes yeah right you know uh

more times than the not and so i very regularly like offered myself up where if someone goes i

want to be a car writer i'll say yeah send me something and i will critique it for you uh and

that could be a video if it's not 45 minutes long or it could be a piece of writing you know and the

key to doing it is doing it but if you you know you want to know at least hey am i do i have a

shot at doing this or not so yeah and i every once in a while you find someone who's doing

something interesting and you try to talk about what they're doing and yeah i just i mean it's

part of it is pay it forward and part of it is like it's not complicated it's just it's hard

because of the effort it takes continuously over months and years and but it's not complicated

like i could tell you how to do it right now but that won't make you good at it like it's like

you know if all of a sudden mcdonald's didn't have a patent on the big mac anymore and anybody

could make a big mac it's not really what makes mcdonald's mcdonald's unprofitable right so

i could give you the sauce i could tell you the exact formula for success and i'm happy to

most of you won't use it because you won't actually you won't like it like my good friend

his girl had a dream of being a barista and wanted to open a coffee cart i randomly because

he likes to race bmw's met one of the best baristas in the whole country and i was like oh my girl

might not my girl excuse me my friend's girl wants to be a bar give me like the give me like a 30

seconder he goes i'm at the top of this game i spent 60 of my day cleaning oh and i was like

that's it that's all i need yeah thank you very much and when i tell you this dream evaporated

so

no yeah and so you know the headline of i went to spain and drove a new super car on a race track

people would go oh yeah i want to do well yeah let me give you the detailed version of it and so um

you know there's and you know it's just it's uh and by the way if you've done that you've driven

the car on the track yeah best case scenario the bet that that car where i got nine hours of track

time when her best case yeah i've made a video no one has paid me for anything yet right yeah

let's let it go well yeah i haven't found anybody to watch it and i haven't found anyone to pay me

for it so you know that's that's the business of how this works has from when you started 06 to

here in 2025 it hasn't gone through one or two iterations it's gone through like a half dozen

uh well yes and no i mean fundamentally the business of it being ad supported is the same

sure it's always been yeah so and then some of those ads are still kind of the same but um

the introduction of the so-called algorithms to everything it's not so much how you make money

it's how the audience is delivered your content and therefore how the audience consumes your

content and and what what content the audience chooses to see and and not sure or not choose

what content the youtube software chooses to show people right but like garage 14 starts

effectively 07 yeah and the funding source yeah is what i have no idea right but it was

i guess it was vc money or something it's vc from guys who think this is going somewhere yes

and we can we can create a model that was literally like television like a tv station right and this

we would go to an office together and make videos and that's kind of my point about the funding

sources is that part has changed to me a little bit and so you know as we look at the future who

knows but you know at first you're playing to vc you sort of think that this is going to be just

like tv and then they realize that shifts and then you know like with drive and what you guys were

doing with jf yeah that was youtube money on a weird lending basis ping pong's back and forth

right so when we me and tom first started the smoking tire yeah the intent we're talking about 0809

the intent was to have a rolling audition reel for television for cable television but that

and this is what i'm talking about the business did change that so that yeah so you and tom were

like we can effectively sell fun and pay for it through other little side games and the gig stuff

and then if we if a tv opportunity comes up we always have something current and new to show

right and we can build some sort of following that we can sell to something bigger than ourselves

obviously you know cable tv was on the way down right we ended up do we did do three or four different

cable tv shows in a variety of aspects and we learned that we didn't like it so much and then

you know youtube was on its way up and then netflix went to streaming and youtube said i wanted on

some of that action started the premium content initiative drive network jf and we went to work

there to supplement the smoke right and that's my point is now the funding source is effectively

youtube loaned to jf yeah and and that's what i'm talking about how the business actually to me has

changed quite a quite a few times because yeah that's true because in terms of being ad supported

the mechanism has changed so youtube thinks this is going to work and then they realize

oh the kind of money we're putting in for the volume you guys are putting out versus

a person with a single lock-off camera doing makeup it's probably a little more efficient

in terms of how we're getting the views right so it's it's not so much how the creator is making

money as as like the bigger picture money situation the logic of the money is coming from so on a

channel level i'm a creator i have a channel i make money by selling ads and i more or less

always have going back to 2009 yeah yeah um and sometimes i have an agency sometimes those

ads are the ones that are already in youtube yeah those are the ones that really get squeezed

yeah oh yeah oh yeah dude they know they know everything they have all the data they know

everything so if you're a brand new creator right your first new channel your first video

they could put you in front of everybody give you a big hit yeah holy 300 000 views i just made

two grand yeah right i'm gonna be a youtuber yeah i'm in locked up i'm in whereas me they go okay

here's this guy he's uploaded 2,500 videos over 17 years yeah he's he's committed he's not going

anywhere right we can squeeze that guy to one dollar over where he quits and by the way because

people have done it we know where the line is where they quit yeah so we keep it just here

keep it let it ride and that's what happens yeah yeah and there's there's not really a way to

turn that around right yeah so and i mean and look i'm not i'm not complaining i'm not saying

i'm not saying the algorithm's out to get me like i've made my own mistakes and made my own choices

that resulted in maybe not being bigger sure it's not out but but that is a diff a major major

difference because people used to subscribe to things and then watch things they were subscribed to

right no more yeah no more now with a youtube app on their phone people scroll like tiktok

with youtube on a desktop they go to youtube.com because they're gonna feed them recommendations

that's it yeah subscribers don't mean but for a plaque on the wall cool right yeah yeah yeah

interesting so we do a pestle on question and last night we had dinner with steve hallam

who was with mclaren f1 lotus f1 wow in what capacity he was the at the end of at the end of

his time at mclaren he was the lead engineer for their engineering department kick ass so everything

so you've been to esterel i have been his first f1 win as an engineer was at esterel in the rain

uh for lotus he was a brazilian driver that drove the car talk about him please i would not want to

drive in the wet yeah the guy that did the guy who did was irton senate yeah that was his driver

oh it was that one yeah yeah he was the engineer on that car yeah right so steve works currently he's

basically in charge of engineering for for the motorsport side of toyota racing okay i mean he

lives nearby in newport beach so uh he admittedly never heard of you before uh i imagine i've never

heard of him before well there's that you just this up because he went i love this guy he apparently

because he's a engineer he was like well i gotta do my research for a pass on question so he ended

up watching a bunch of your stuff and he's like i'm really curious about his urban activist stuff

and like his thoughts on trying oh no he wants to hear about urban he was like deep diving into

stuff we're like we don't know what you're talking about dude we just he's our buddy oh yes this guy

may be talking about urbanism yeah is that really what he wanted to hear about well no so his question

is okay how do you stick to your guns on your opinions when you're speaking to someone of great

influence for example like joe rogan or somebody that you obviously want to do a good job for

but you might have a completely different opinion from i uh thanks for that question um

i mean look uh i uh how do you stick to your gun i don't know how not to i'm i i would be a bad

employee i don't know when to not give my opinion i've been told uh by someone at rodentrack to

give a little less of my opinions around certain people right right um and and that was actually

a totally fair criticism of what i had done at that time so i'm not mad at it at all um

but like it's i think that's just like like you know doing this gig a bunch of it is is repetition

and commitment and over time building an experience in a roledex and blah blah blah and all those things

but like i do have like a little bit of natural ability and one of those things is i am not the

least bit bothered by the presence of cameras or microphones same person same thing right you're

one speed no difference you know a lot of people i'm sure you talk to particularly folks that aren't

broadcasters are are not the same person correct yeah and so i'm the same person so is that yeah

and then and then the so that's a natural talent i don't know where it came from yeah don't know how

to do it don't know how to tell you how to do it yeah and and then the other one is the inability to

not be honest about certain things and there's certainly times that that's probably a bad thing

and i end up in some awkward moments and that's life yeah but like um you know

i try to not have an opinion about something without trying to learn about it i try humans or

human what do you do and and if people present me with information i try to learn from it i try to

not be too proud to change or listen yeah you know get fact checked right you know you'll

regularly hear me start podcasts with a fact check okay from the previous show that someone

someone called me out like where you might have a mistake and yeah i got something wrong and someone

to hey hey check this out oh i'm wrong okay fine right like being wrong is like okay you know um

2025 this huh 2025 2025 it can be wrong yeah it's not i'll tell you what it's not how you like

grow an audience well i mean dude so you know we have a we have a sidebar sidebar we have a youtube

analyst every year analyze our channel okay that's great and in addition to preparing a report of

like here's what did well here's what didn't do well here's what keywords and what the and it's

little stuff i mean it's stuff that like you don't really think about something that has by the way

never has anything to do with what's happening inside of the video i believe we're talking about

use yellow not white okay we're talking about yeah but also no more motorcycles no more off-roading

we're big ones um but um wait wait where's that going with this we have channel uh um things that

are things that are popular in 2025 yeah here he goes because we were trying to think we're like oh

man like do we need to like change our content he goes i would tell you what to do but like you're

not gonna like it and you're not gonna do it and i was like okay he's like in 2025 the way to drive

engagement is to talk drama like or to react to other people's drama yeah or talk about money

right i made this much i lost this much this buys ourselves okay yeah and i was like wow

that all sounds terrible and he was like doesn't it yeah right right right right yeah he was like

you know yeah this is where we are yeah and so yeah that's so so so you know stick to your guns like

turn around look in this window behind yeah why can i stick to my guns because if my youtube channel

goes away tomorrow right my parking business will support you're gonna be okay i don't need you know

and there's people who create content and who i love as people right and who create content that i

consider to be totally unwatchable okay and that are like just full-on influencer you know personality

on personality off like yeah but like i won't knock their hustle yeah old me might knock their

hustle new me whatever you gotta do to pay your bills but like and it sucks that the audience

doesn't necessarily know the difference anymore between journalists and influencer right and

has indicated that they don't really care right i call myself a journalist not because i have a

degree in journalism but because i don't take money from manufacturers and i and i and i don't you

can't buy my opinion and it's just not possible right so that's why i call myself that and like

maybe you're maybe your barometer for where the use of journalists is different than mine but like

i think mine's reasonable you know um so anyway because like no one opinion or gig is going to

wreck my life yeah and i'm not gonna accidentally drop like an n-bomb so no one of me no one opinion

yeah if i do no accidents yeah every so yeah i i i don't find it to be that hard and you know

if all else fails i got a rich daddy yeah right so the floor the floor is still pretty yeah

yeah tomorrow we're gonna have lunch with kori cruzman who is a very well known midget and

sprint car racer is a two-time chili i thought you were just gonna stop after that yeah tomorrow's

lunch with kori cruzman what do you got very well known yeah yeah oh jesus christ man yeah okay yeah

oh midget driver yeah midget driver he's won the chili bowl twice he's won a ton of usac

nationals and things like that he has a sprint car school that's in ventura oh and that's where

like a lot of people have gone to learn how to do it i think they've offered to set me up probably

yeah they do a lot of stuff like that so um we'll be having lunch with him tomorrow if there's any

question you could think for us to ask him through you man first off i'd like to have a go okay i would

like to have a go that's not a question sprint car can i have a go can i have a go there we go

can i have a go is a question um ooh a question about sprint cars uh how many times would you

have to see a sprint car roll before being worried about the driver there you go you know like you

see one on its roof and you're like ah i got my all right but you see one roll seven or eight times

and you go should i run out there yeah should i help yeah you know yeah where where does that line

or describe the the scale of panic as pertains to number of rolls yeah i like that yeah how does

yeah all right yeah i don't have i don't i've never rolled never rolled oh you did that

next race yeah yeah yeah me it's my time that's how you just did it you just called it yeah i just

called it called your shot yeah well hopefully how long does that karma last is it all the way

until your next race that's it yeah my next race we were racing for like six months yeah what are

you doing i'm doing an endurance race at kota in an e92 m3 when is that november this was probably

coming out like a week before oh yeah it's an e92 m3 and so i've just i've just been practicing

at kota with a mclaren 750 so to me it's like swinging a weighted bat yeah right you know i'm

going a minus 300 horsepower you're gonna be just fine yeah oh what a great place to drive a car

that's what's your favorite track uh to drive probably vir um it's it's a real i mean it's like

vir in rhoda america i can't really split the two anymore because they're just so good in so many

ways you know but the tracks that if you make a mistake you really pay for it yeah you know like

we were talking earlier about like cookie cutter tracks for some of these newer places that are

built in parking lots you know or like country clubs and some of them are pretty tough but they're

often that you know anyone can figure out pretty quickly yeah well i mean country club tracks aren't

for you yeah they're for amateurs so i learned uh i went down to the concourse club in miami which

is a lovely little place and uh they said that 80 percent of their members had never been on a track

before at the time they signed up i'm like oh this is like a club club track yeah yeah so like okay

great like more race tracks is good yeah no absolutely just went to the one in charlotte

i mean i saw that i saw that launch yeah look pretty cool it's cool big elevation yeah it's

actually really close to a lot of stuff so that's that's good it's a little tight i'm not sure how

much i'd like to go wheel to wheel there but i i actually hit up the smiths to see if maybe we

use it for a performance car of the year oh there you go that'd be smart that'd be fun for that

and they probably want to get the notoriety so yeah yeah that's cool yeah it's like right next to

hen or right next to charlotte motor speed yeah it's cross street it's pretty damn cool yeah okay so

you have recently become known for this urban activism thing i i wouldn't call it activism but

okay sure yeah okay i believe in walkable cities crazy yeah i'm crazy yeah i mean that's borderline

terrorist so it's unamerican how does a guy who is so entranced in the car world want to promote

walkable cities i mean look you you know this it's this seems like it's i don't i without insulting

anybody else it seems like something that to me should be pretty obvious like our entire 100% of

our entire world shouldn't be set up around how many cars can we get through this as fast as possible

right like and i'm not saying everywhere i'm not talking about everywhere i'm talking about if we

take some of our most already densely populated places places that are already very desirable

to live and in which there are many limitations on the use of space that exist for cars at the

expense of humans who cycle or walk or need to live somewhere um all i'm saying is there are some

places most of which are in major cities in which space could be reallocated more effectively

to center around human life as opposed to being centered around how many cars can we get in and

get out as fast as possible and so that's i suppose what urbanism is but like the reason i the reason

i got going down that is because la in particular has mandatory parking minimums okay and these are

some of the dumbest laws imaginable because they basically if you're going to redevelop a site or

open a restaurant or open a commercial property of any kind you need to have two parking spaces

per thousand square feet of real estate now that is too many for most people right and if you have

something like a big grocery store or a big Costco even on the busiest day possible maybe on one day

a year will you fill this lot but most of the time you'll have a huge empty area in the middle of a

huge empty lot right right yeah and and and and there's a anyway there's wasted space all over

okay and and there's wasted space because there are rules that prioritize cars and and and and we

don't have to have that okay you would and i'm not saying that we need to eliminate parking

but if the developers of properties were allowed to build the amount of parking that they actually

needed based on research and their use case and not this city standard you'd have a much more

effective use of urban space in la which is sprawled out this is visible all the time here's

where it's really visible you're in you're in where it's really visible yeah you were in my

underground level here yeah okay i didn't want to build an underground level i had to build an

underground part of the deal i had to build a parking lot for my parking lot yeah because even

though i was building a parking lot the mandatory parking minimums don't include quads the the lifts

don't include that the shelves basically no and the city said well if one day if you sell this

building to someone else and it's not car storage you need to have parking i said well why wouldn't

it be that person's responsibility yeah to create parking for his use case i have to build provide

for the next guy so so so the result of that is over 50 percent of the cost of building the

building went to the basement right doubled the cost of my building almost which of course i have to

pass on to my customers makes my makes my customers have to pay a lot more for something i didn't

want and don't need right okay and that serves nobody and so and so you can that's one example

and it's particularly stupid because picture going to the city and going i'd like to build a parking

lot and they go yeah but you're gonna need a parking lot yeah that's the dumbest thing imaginable

but that's what the law said i have to do sure so like would we still and by the way that little

parking lot up front where you actually parked your car yeah that's the only parking lot we actually

need for this business yes yeah yeah so take that so you have that and then you also have there's a

great book the guy just died like a month ago by a guy named donald shoup called the high cost of

free parking the way we price out parking forget not from like my like lefty socialist views i'm

talking about capitalism right the way that pricing is parked is 180 out okay the meters in front of

the store yeah should be 20 bucks right the parking garage seven blocks away yeah should be a quarter

got it yeah it's reverse yeah that causes traffic it causes people to camp out in spots more than

they want it causes all kinds of problems it's literally 180 out so those are two examples of

why what many people would call urbanism or progressivism right reorienting cities around people

even if you are a true capitalist the way we're doing it is wrong

so pick an angle right it's bad from all of them you don't have to live like this and by the way

if you live by walmart and you want walmart i'm not talking about that right keep your

walmart yeah but they would have a use case and that's your point yeah so i'm talking about

venice beach miami beach yeah we know some parts of new york city yeah right places where people

would prefer to walk if it was safe and possible yeah right yeah yeah so anyway yeah copy okay yeah

interesting that's urbanism yeah yay read the if you honestly if you want to go nuts the high cost

of free parking by donald shoup yeah and if you don't want to read the 350 page version of like a

textbook um there's a book called paved paradise that eloquently uh it's paved paradise how parking

explains the world and it very eloquently sums up all that and uses great examples but being in

the parking business i was like i should really study how we ended up in a place where they made

me build a parking lot for my parking lot we get criticism from time to time from fans that

will listen to an episode that don't really understand budget concerns or transportation

concerns or whatever it is because we have to do this a certain way to make it happen

what's a common criticism that you get from your reviews or interviews that fans don't understand

um that's actually that's funny i think uh i think people don't understand how hard it is to

remember everything and regurgitate it while driving at speed right now i'm not crashing

how hard it is to capture audio in a gt2 race car right through a helmet and a fire suit i think

that's it they don't really get that um i think they don't understand that i like a lot of it like

i shoot the whole thing myself very oh yeah that uh i think they don't understand the unpaid travel

time there's so much yeah so much unpaid travel time right um yeah and i mean i think the actual

driving of the sports cars is like 10 of it i mean it's emails and selling ads right and running a

business and all that kind of stuff i mean so you know not to complain what a great way to make a

living for sure but i think um i think there are still people that don't think it's like a serious

business yeah right right i have a philosophy which is somebody wants somebody wants a quote as you

know uh if you love what you do you never work a day in your life and i think that person was an

asshole so my wife got me this framed thing yeah and it says if you do what you love you'll never

and no and it's and it's crossed out yeah thank you it's crossed out and underneath it in blue yeah

it says work extremely hard with no separation or boundaries all day every day and also take

everything extremely personally yeah and that hangs in my kitchen there we go that's i want that yeah

yeah i want that i want that i want because that is that is me yeah we've done that a lot yeah we

really hard to do what we love yeah well there's just i mean you know i have i have two businesses

right the media business which exists out on the internet right in space yeah and then my stores

which are there's two of them and they're both open seven days a week yeah so when i talk when you

would you say it never stops i mean it doesn't right there is always something to do yeah and i

always manage to find it so for me to like relax i literally have to leave yeah yeah like right

leave the city yeah you know or even if i'm here like thank god there's no service on the mountain

you know i go i go drive up the mountain to review a car or to have some fun there's a

great car meet up there on fridays i go to thank god there's no service up there right because

that's that's so yeah and man the worst the worst five minutes of my week is when i get

service because now it's just ding ding ding ding that is landing on a plane and i'm in and i'm in

a heavy clutch ass car about to go into traffic across it all yeah all right we do have a patreon

now which is new to us it's fairly new so uh we have a group called dinner club and uh we allow

those folks to ask the occasional questions so we got a couple from them let's go we've got a guy

charles hull uh and he and i don't know anything about this he wanted us to ask about the ferrari

scuderia scam oh okay yeah so there's layers to this but but basically there was a company in texas

called eag and the company still exists and they're doing manual swaps on ferrari 360s and

430s and 599s and there's now a couple companies doing it there was a guy the guy who started that

company and who was running it up until recently and i mean this that story goes back almost 10 years

but this is recent not as six seven years maybe but like a long time ago basically the guy running

the company was was running it almost like a ponzi like he was just it was it was robbing from

peter to pay paul and he was always just spending and taking customer deposits to fund his own stuff

and and and it was just a really it was a mess and a lot of people contacted me

to the point where it was like i and i tried working on a story on it and and i submitted the story

and they actually paid a kill fee because the lawyers didn't want to go to fight with this guy

about this okay and it was just it was a it was just a shady situation the guy wouldn't go away

and he kept as scammers do he kept coming out with more and more bold scams like yeah like oh he's

gonna do it he's gonna do a manual swap on a hurricane to do a manual swap on an event to door

he's gonna do a manual swap on this other car and with the 430 and the 360 and the 599 they came

as manuals so you could either get factory parts or reverse engineer the kit but we're talking

that we're not we're not developing a manual for a new car and okay and so he just kept coming

up like more and more scammy things and i had my friend one of my friends do like a like a call

like call a call about doing a manual and you know over a period of like 20 minutes it went

from like this is a stranger calling about doing a manual swap to like he's trying to get him to

be a partner in the business oh it's spiral that's spiral yeah no i want to talk to him it was just

insane talk about and eventually a year or so ago you know i dropped it because the investors

forced this guy out and put in somebody new and and that wasn't worth it look and i don't know if i

don't know what's going on with the company i mean they still exist and i'm certainly i'm not

accusing them of anything like everything bad that happened was this guy who's gone sure from what i

know but that's that's what it was it was this company doing manual swaps and like yeah they could

do a manual swap but they would also probably steal your money understood yeah it's gonna hurt

no matter what yeah no matter what you're not gonna like yeah and you know because because manual

swaps in a 360 and a 430 are so desirable yeah the delta between a paddle car is such and a

stick is so big yeah people were buying cars just to ship them down there right it wasn't like oh i've

already got this car let's do a manual like they're going on bring a trailer yeah blowing 120 grand

just to ship it down there for it to collect dust for eight months yeah right yeah one other

question patrick linsey wants to know the jankiest car you've ever driven for your channel and it

sounds like was this part of choosing not to drive people's personal cars any longer well um

it was it was one of several reasons not to not drive people's personal cars any longer

not the biggest one not even close okay not the biggest one jankiest car though so there's a couple

that come to mind one there was a literally like a 1981 the it was the very last year of the second

generation camaro okay i think it was 81 whatever and it was just it was a it had some mods and

whatever and it wasn't until i was halfway into the drive and i mentioned that it had a very strange

behavior that the owner told me that only three of the four brakes work what yeah nice okay nice i

said something like you know it's pulling to the right on an 81 camaro and he's like that's because

of the left that's because the front there's no front left brake yeah yeah now is a good time to

tell me that yeah so that that was one and there was a couple other like um remember when um right

after the aerial atom came out in like 05 maybe right then it was on top gear it was like the

change the game right and then the exoset came yeah right and the exoset you know i'm sure people

know what an exoset is well but for those you know it's it's almost like an exposed frame rail

looking car yes you start with a miata yeah take it apart they send you this chassis yeah exoskeleton

chassis you reassemble the mechanicals around this thing yeah and i'm not talking about that

but that sort of quote cheaper exo car yeah inspired a bunch of other i know cheap exo cars

up to and including multiple like front wheel drive base like integral and hondas where they

would just cut the body off we've seen this video and leave the engine in the pan yeah and like

that's it like a windshield and tubes yeah yeah what'd you call it a yard cart yeah honestly

pretty close yeah and so it was it was right then that we learned that there's a little more to an

aerial atom than just removing almost all of an integra yeah right yeah but you know on the flip

side of that it's a it's a fair question and everyone wants to hear about like sketchiness yeah

but um on the flip side of that there's a bunch of people that i did work with who had

with basically no exposure to what good is you're right they never driven a Ferrari or an NSX or

anything good from the factory and they managed to build something that drove really good yeah

with no basis of comparison or experience that was really impressive that's the flip side of

like the garbage sure right yeah i mean there was a kid there was a kid up in the valley

who straight up turned a fiero into a better accurate nsx no way yeah he got he took a fiero

and he got the four cam v6 from the lumina z34 okay and a manual gearbox and a corvette zr1

steering rack right right and like sticky tires and like some over fenders and some

some carefully and yo this thing i drove it a button willow yeah this thing turned in like a

mother it was great like it was with a fiero like he was there you know and there was a guy who was

who who managed to make like four cars into one car and like yeah actually drove good like wow yeah

so it happens both ways yeah yeah that's crazy good friend of mine jeremy erin uh he's a big fan

of yours listens to the show all the time and is always talking about it um he said that you have

talked about having body image issues over time like on the show and he said that you seem to be

doing really well with it lately what's changed or what are you doing to kind of help yourself

very well man very observant uh a couple things one uh not reading the comments okay that goes back

like five years probably um two is actually being at so um you know it body image is like a very

fragile thing for me like the doctors think that i should be like probably like 250 pounds that to

me would i would look pretty thin at 250 actually uh i once one time as an adult saw my weight in

the 240s but it took a lot a lot to get there and it was not sustainable so like if i if i weigh

under like 265 i don't have to think about it if i weigh over 265 it's all i can think about

i understand this and if and if i weigh if i get over like 270 and my clothes start to fit weird

i go into an extremely deep depression uh and so uh like how did you let yourself get here kind of

yeah yeah yeah like failure yeah not like yeah yeah not like this cycle is a regular thing people

you know and combined with the fact that when i the first 10 or 15 years of my career

when i was reading the comments i mean if you already think you're fat

you know and and you get old fat yeah like hundreds of times a day yeah even your therapist

is like i don't know what to tell you i you know yeah you know like yeah i i don't know what to

say about this you know so most people don't have to go through that type of struggle in public

what if you filmed yourself eating yeah during the process and then edited it that's this this is

a big step for me yeah um but i mean look i i i actually try really hard i work out seven days

a week you look great now i i i love food and i so i'm not going to torture myself but like

i try really hard you know it's like it accepts right accept that i was wrong about things in my

20s accept that all i can do is try really hard you know and fortunately if you can actually get

yourself to not read the comments nobody's that mean in person right yeah you said you stopped

five years ago that sounds like you have a very specific time you did was there an equivalent

of a rock bottom you're like that's it probably yeah probably where i just said no but there was no

you can't recall the like i don't recall last comment i closed my laptop for the last time

yeah no i no i i think i had a i had a real social media cleansing for a while yeah uh i found

twitter was incredibly unhealthy i deleted my twitter yeah yeah oh yeah twitter was incredibly

unhealthy um yeah i mean i i social media made me very very depressed and so i don't have any

social media on my phone that's great i use instagram desktop a lot of people don't even know

about instagram dot com use instagram dot com you guys don't even know about instagram dot com so

yeah no social media on the phone that's great no facebook no twitter at all yeah um and and i try to

read more books yeah that's it yeah it's try try like phones dude like the internet is just so bad

for you like yeah i think the internet getting worse like has made me want to use it less

i'll get time you know like the way i use the internet in like oh nine was like pretty much fine

absolutely yeah i completely understand this yeah yeah yeah as we uh as we wind up here um

if there was a legacy you would hope that this episode would leave behind about you what would

you what would you want that to be the legacy of this episode this specific episode of our fans

listen this ten years from now all of our fans aren't necessarily street car folks or people that

would know all about smoking tires so soapbox this is the soapbox here it is how do we remember you

what's it what's the thing that's in ten seconds or less learn the difference between car enthusiasm

and car dependency car enthusiasm is i love sports cars i love racing and i want the freedom

to enjoy those things car dependency is our entire need world needs to be built around

getting cars through it as fast as possible these are not the same thing yeah so when you

talk about pro urbanization that is pro car enthusiasm pro car enthusiasm now i can drive

25% of the people who keep their cars here are walking distance they live over they live right

there in those apartments and those condos and this allows them to to to practice car enthusiasm

without taking up more space so that's that's kind of what we're looking for that's my there's my

when i run for office yeah yeah yeah and also here's my other one we don't need autonomous cars

we need to paint lines better and and care about driving yeah the number of times i have seen

incredibly dangerous places fixed with paint right like it happens all the time it happens every

day yeah they fix dangerous roads with paint and lives are saved yeah yeah when you run for office

can we run a political ad site unseen yeah okay sounds good right there you can cut anything for

this this is probably way too open ended in vague and so it's fine if we just decide it's not worth

but in the car space you've done the thing that most people aspire to in terms of you've got a

following you've made it work income wise but very specifically you've built a following you've built

kind of your own car culture in a way this is a racing show i would say racing's been in a real

upswing the last few years but there's still i would argue i would still say you touch more people

than most forms of motorsport do what is motorsport doing wrong and it's it's probably too general

but in terms of if you were to look at what indica or imsa or nas car any of these folks are doing

is there something where you're like guys it's obvious it's right here um that that is a very

difficult question yeah i don't have an answer for i mean i can i can tell you like i love driving

a race car i don't care that much about watching other people drive a race car um and and so um

for me i'd rather watch a documentary about racing than an actual race most of the time

my best bits my favorite bits of racing media are in fact documentaries like senna or um the number

one the movie one one is i probably my favorite i think f*** it worst seo good luck searching for

that search the number one yeah right yeah good luck yeah that's the first one the best movie with

the worst seo um so yeah i mean i mean obviously you know drive to survive did a lot for f1 and

everyone else tried to copy it with varying degrees of success correct so i mean i'm varying

it's not that i think racing needs to do that but um i do i i i don't have an answer to what will

make you don't have to i'm just curious if you did yeah yeah i don't i mean some of my favorite

race types of racing are some of the hardest to watch i mean rally right you know and and stuff

like that i think uh some of the fpv stuff we've seen with the drone the drone work has really

been really cool some of the digital overlays of the stats that we've seen in recent years are very

dynamic and cool yeah um but it's interesting when you say the documentary is what's most compelling

for you sure yeah yeah because there's a story a properly crafted story it's a properly crafted

story yeah yeah there's a problem and and you know obviously like drive to survive is like

dramatized yeah no it is uh it is and i like i like documentaries better than i like drive

originally i like drive to survive because it gave me a reason to think about seventh place

exactly yeah in a way i never ever ever had before there's a storytelling yeah yeah and it

actually over as it gone through the season i don't really care anymore because they don't have a

lot of new compelling characters right um i'm not sure what these other seasons could do i mean it's

tough i driving an indie car at 230 miles an hour should be pretty exciting you know i don't

know why that's not a bigger right bigger hit what i can tell you is like when i create content

like track videos and racing videos do not work for my audience and we've heard that a lot yeah

yeah racing videos work for our audience yeah well it's hard to make race it's hard to make

things look fast it is that's why they slide cars on tv going slowly because like that looks faster

than actually yeah well drifting is so much easier to shoot yeah it looks great everything is awesome

well like even when i'm up in the canyons like you should see how fast i have to drive to make

it look a little fast you know it's like it's not good but that's what the audience you know

you said the audience 366 days ago yeah right yeah right we're recording this

may 5th 2024 oh yeah yeah and clear yeah right no yeah we do it we keep it safe we do all like

actually i care about two things one that we understand the difference in car enthusiast

and also i'd like to be the quickest automotive journalist working today i don't really care

if you like my writing but i think i'm probably not james well that doesn't you know i can't

turn your journalist it doesn't count it doesn't count if you can if you started as an indie

car driver i didn't start as an indie car driver i i'm also gonna say and and and i'm sure you

met him uh the catna is pretty fast they have to be alive i can't contest alon

no harris is faster than me oh harris is about jethro's faster than me too okay a couple of the

british guys are the british guys they're they're they're different that's a that's a it's great

on a curve i'll take fastest american and with that you just thought like all of europe

um let's say with that continental's got the check

oh

I need it right now

Guess you want your back, I know you love to

Even for the little girl I want you

Hunters in my phone, girl, I call to

Girl, I know it's late, but

Okay, you're not going, I'm always alone

You runnin' through my mind, I know where this game called

My homies gettin' coughed, been stuck here all along

You know I'm scrollin' through the grammy

You pop up in my phone, we ain't good, no

I'ma hit you on the late start, we don't gotta waste no

Now what's this paper and it's gonna be a secret

Ep.308 – Matt Farah

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