F/M/K; Arizona Speed Law; RUFing Miami

What up everybody? Welcome to the Smoking Tire podcast. Today's episode, as always,

is brought to you by Off the Record. We love Off the Record so much and over the holidays,

I got three more emails of people whose backsides were saved by Off the Record. I love when you

get that text message. After you sign up for Off the Record, you send them your information,

you tell them what happened, when you got a ticket, you send them a copy of the ticket.

You don't hear from them for a while, but my favorite thing is when you get that text message,

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and fuzzy inside? Don't plead guilty. Get Off the Record. If you get pulled over and ticketed for

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We'll give you 10% off all legal services booked through Off the Record,

just for getting there through your boys at the Smoking Tire. One more time,

offtherecord.com slash tst. Do it. All right, our first show of 2026. We took last week off,

you see, and we're back in the studio. I was down in Miami, got to drive myself a roof

yellowbird. Yes, I did. Also did a little bit of vintage racing and murdered a lot of quail.

Also murdered some quail. We got shrink-flated on up here. Zach saw some cool stuff up in the

mountain. And boy, these rich people really have a lot to purchase, don't they? All that and more

on today's episode of the Smoking Tire. Let's go. What's fucking happening? What's going on? Hello.

My voice is a little bit shot today. There's a lot of loud talking in Miami this weekend.

Racetrack talking. Racetrack talking, nightclub talking, loud restaurant talking. Miami's

loud. It's a loud place. I'm right at home there. People are loud. But my voice is a little shot.

So hey, everybody, we're back. This is our first show of the new year. I didn't make an

announcement that we were just taking off the week of January 5th. We just did. I told the

Patreon members. I got a couple DMs that were like WTF. I got far fewer than I was expecting,

which I think highlighted how busy everyone is the first week of January, because we made content

basically through Christmas. And we had one question on Patreon today. Yes, we took the

first week of January off. I think a lot of people didn't notice because everyone was back at work

answering 800 emails that were kicked from December. But yeah, we took our holiday in January.

Yeah, basically, because mainly because I have to work at the shop all through the

holidays, so my staff can take off. So then I leave after that. And I went bird hunting with

my dad for a couple days, got some birds, as you do, ate some birds, didn't bring any birds back

this time. I always bring birds back, but I didn't really feel like it this time. Got a lot.

Went to a 28 gauge this year. Smaller gun. First time. Smaller. Yeah. Normally, in the past,

I would shoot birds with a 20. And my dad switched to a 28 in order to make it a little harder.

Right. Because you're shooting two birds. And you're shooting, you know, they charge you per

bird. Okay. You know, so like if you're good and you go shoot a lot of birds, like it's,

you know, it's really expensive. Are you making it harder so that it's less expensive? I mean,

that's, it's like, at a certain point, once you can kill all the birds. Yeah. You know what I mean?

And like playing the game, playing the video game on easy, but you know, once it's,

once you beat it on easy, you know, you ratchet up the skill level and try again. So,

so a 28 gauge is a smaller gun, but it's also lighter, which is nice. It did not seem to negatively

impact my ability to kill birds. I killed, we killed just as many birds with a smaller gun.

Well, the problem is like, if you're center shot, even with the, you know, the, the bigger

bore, if it's, you shrink it down, you're still hitting the middle. Well, there's a trade-off,

right? You could, you could do this to, to, to cars, right? Little less horsepower,

little more agility. Yeah. I can move the gun faster. I can draw the gun faster. Like I,

you can do stuff faster. You're the Miata now, racing the Camaros and SCCA, whatever. Something

like that. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So it was fun. And I found a new favorite hunting dog.

Shout out to Clover, my new favorite hunting little Cocker Spaniel. Love a Cocker Spaniel.

I didn't know they used this for hunting. They asked the flushing dog. So we use three dogs

when we hunt. We use two short hair pointers, either English or German short hair pointers,

and they just fucking run. They run these figure eight patterns all over whatever direction you

point. And then when they smell a bird, they, they freeze. Yeah. And then you walk up with the Cocker

and they go flush in there. And the Cocker like does like jumps around and scares a bunch of

birds. And then all three of them retrieve the birds. Pretty sweet stuff. Very impressive. But

the Cockers are like snuggly. Like the, the shorter pointers are like, they're friendly,

but they're like, they're pretty much all business. Yeah. They're sporting dogs. And

that's a working dog for sure. The Cocker is a working dog, but it's like pretty happy to be

there. And like, we'll sit on your lap for the, the truck ride back to the, you know, the lodge.

We saw one of those yesterday at the beach. And Sarah looked at it and she goes,

when I'm 70, like that's the dog I'm going to get. Or I do the King Charles. Never mind

different breed. Cavalier King Charles also very good dog size. Yeah. Yeah. But the move is to,

you know, you get yourself set up with one of these hunting lodges and you can either adopt

a retired hunting dog because they, you know, they retire them at like four.

The Cockers, because they have shorter legs. They have to work a little harder. The pointers

can go a little further. Each mile for a Cocker spaniel is like, you know, seven miles for the

other ones. Yeah. But then, you know, every litter of puppies, you know, even if it's the

offspring of, of hunting dogs, every once in a while, one of them just like doesn't like hunting.

And they just, they adopt them out once they like fail hunting school. So you can get one that's

never hunted or you can get a retired hunter. And they're, they're like, they're basically free.

I mean, they'd be so funny if you got a former hunting dog. And all it did all day was flush

your cats out of wherever they are, you know, because it has that in its brain. It needs to

find and frighten. Yeah. And that's just its job. Totally. Totally. Yeah. So a little of that.

And then Miami, the Concourse Club. The Concourse Club is really, it's a private club. So it's,

you know, you can argue whether or not private race track that those two center pictures are

both Concourse Club. You can, you can argue whether private racing facilities are good or

bad for, for humanity. But this one happens to be run just, I mean, the attention to detail

is extraordinary. These guys are fucking aces. Their staff over there is great. Aaron, the

guy who runs the joint is awesome. Yep. We were down there doing some stuff last year and they're

just as good. So they had a thing called Flat Six Fest. You can guess what that is.

It was basically a big Porsche show. Six, 700 people, heavy hit in metal. I have never seen

more roofs in one place. Whoa. Now granted, roof North America's headquarters is at the

Concourse Club. So there's going to be more than like normal and curated's there. And there's a

lot of local customers there. But there was probably like 30 roofs. Like that's, that's more

than I've ever seen in one place. And what was the, you know, build year for those like

where they mostly knew full spread. There was there was two or there was one true yellow bird,

meaning a narrow body. Then there was the one that I drove, which I will happily call a fucking

yellow bird, but it's an M 491 wide body. So like, there's some like winers like fucking Timmy

Pappas up there, wrong fenders. Now listen, if you want to talk shit in the comments about

whether or not a yellow bird has the right fenders, your best position of attack to make

that argument is to own a narrow fendered yellow bird. And Timmy Pappas does. So that guy is allowed

to talk shit and almost nobody else is allowed to talk shit. Okay. Wow. What year was that made

compared to the one you drove on by the Bruce Myers car and Timmy Pappas's cars are 87s. They're

the first year they did them. I think there's like 11 from that year. That's the narrow body car

super light. So this one, which is photos of my Instagram and I made a little video of it's the

production value is very low. I was limited on time and I was by myself. But this is a 91. So

it's the same mechanicals, but it's in an M 491 wide body, which was the customer's request.

He just wanted to look different, you know, whatever. I think it looks awesome. And this is

also according to John Tamarian, the only yellow bird ever made with a sunroof.

Interesting. This one does have a sunroof. So I've driven three of these now. This one was

the softest, you know what I mean? Of the of them. Okay. Like it was just set up more for like maybe

like road driving a little more. That doesn't mean it wasn't fucking sick. And also the 87s

that I drove have had this weird funky dog leg. It's a six speed. But instead of just being three

vertical lines and one horizontal one, it's a dog leg first, right? Imagine like a five speed

dog leg gearbox like a Ferrari and 80s, Ferrari or 80s Lamborghini. But then within a sixth gear

added upright. Got it. So it's right. Yeah. So it's a dog leg first. And then it feels almost

like a traditional five, five pattern. Well, that because after the war, the pattern, they wanted

to get away from the HH. So they add these two little N pieces. That is very weird. Essentially

because roof had modified a Porsche gearbox. And that was just like what they could do. Right.

By the time we got to this car, which is a 91, it's a it's a it's a six speed, but it's a regular

six speed. So actually, what a fucking delight. Yeah, I mean, it's one thing like I like a quirk.

And if and if if the quirk of having this weird shift pattern meant I get to drive a yellow bird,

yep, that's okay, no problem. But to drive one on track, like quickly, having weird gear patterns

is let's just say less optimal than having regular ones. Well, because you you're used to

traditional age pattern. Yeah. So I think because a lot of people make the argument that the dog

leg first is better for racing because you just get out of the pits and first and then it's just

two, three, three to four. But I think if you're used to the two to three being a diagonal three

to four being used more often, it can just trip you up. If you are driving one race car

for a whole season and looking for the best time possible, then yes, a dog leg first,

so you're not in that and it's just back forth back forth is the best. If you're testing a car

for 15 minutes, the best pattern is what is the fucking devil you know, right? Right. You know what

I mean? Folks got to take a quick break because support is coming in hot from delete me. You know

everything about delete me now because I've been talking about delete me for like at least a year.

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show. But I also drove this to the track from Curated. What a fucking... This is a gorgeous car.

What a street car. I mean, what a nice street car. Because for all the exceptional performance

that you get out of one of these things, and like this thing is fast, like this is a fucking,

this is a fast car. It's this, the build sheet says 469 horsepower. I bet that's at the wheels.

It's, if this car flies and it's got good brakes, and it like turns in nice, like it's just,

it's just so good. Like it's just so good. I mean, it's a 40 year old car. I pulled out of the show

room. I ran 10, 12 laps around the track, not pushing it, pushing it, but not slow. The car was

like, whoop the fucking do. No problem. You know, 40 year old car, everything's all right.

Is this basically the old version of the one we drove there last year, which was the new SCR?

We drove the CTR anniversary. Right. And actually, John had brought out a CTR anniversary also,

and I was gonna get to back to back them. But he took a few laps in it, and while nothing went

wrong, there was a smell, a vapor smell of some kind that was, it just made him not feel so good

about, about putting it back out on the track. It was all. Like that was like, he was about to sell

it and it might be, you know, he didn't, he didn't want there to be a problem. So fair. Yeah. He let

me, he let me drive this fucking thing all day. He let me, this was like, this was your car for the

day. That's wild. Like that's amazing. He's the nicest dude. It was, this was awesome. I did their

podcast too. You can, I don't know when it goes up, but wherever you get podcasts, you went to Miami

and you cheated on me. I cheated on him. Yeah. But, but it's, you know, because the, the yellow bird

with narrow bird, narrow body, whatever, the engine, the CTR engine, it's a 3.4-liter twin

turbo. Porsche's turbo was a single. The 959 was a sequential. Yeah. Porsche didn't even offer a

twin set up until the 993. So this is effectively the same kind of vibe as putting a 993 Turbo X51

engine into a G-body car. Like that's basically what you're doing here. And then you're reducing

weight and then you're adding rigidity and then you're shaving the rain gutters and then you're

doing all that other roofy stuff that they do. But it's like, because it's twins, you have, it

pulls much more evenly and from a much lower RPM. It's not that zingy, which like, you know,

as a quirk, as a vibe, a 930 zingy setup is like, can be fun. But when you're like on a track trying

to like actually go fast, a broad power band with like torque. Well, this track especially has a lot

of U-turns almost like a lot of really tight stuff that leads to a long straight and then it's really

tight stuff. So having that laggy, you know, 5000 RPM before the power, the power band kicks is not

optimal. Yeah, like, like at the Concours Club, there's like three hairpins where you're coming

out of the corner from like 3000 RPM in second gear. You want that torque shove right then. You

don't want to be going down to first, going to first stinks. I know there's cars that have

transmissions that are meant for it and they can handle it and Marko's car, the brown one, he was

like, it's built, you can do that, but it just feels so strange. Stinks, I hate it. So, so anyway,

there is a video, the car sounds unbelievable. It's, it's, I think this is perfect looking and I,

you know, I even, Tim Papas has like the narrow one and that was the first one I credit where it's

due. But I think aesthetically, this is better. And this is like, like Singer, you know, when they

redesigned their cars, they widen everything a bit. Everyone seems to like it. I mean, look,

if you already own a narrow yellowbird, then you can talk shit about whether or not this is or is

not a yellowbird. But this is a fucking roof CTR from the period. They made like 40 total.

This one happens to have wide fenders. So the top speed will be probably a little lower.

It's going to be a little heavier because it, because it doesn't have that different thing.

But like, I think they're the same. I think, I think we're really splitting hairs.

I feel like this is the same as someone has an SLS. Someone gets an SLS roadster and the other first

person goes, it's not a real SLS. Because I ticked an option box because it's the, it's the same

car, just different body. It is a little heavier. And the wider body would mean that your top speed

is probably a little lower, which is the same for convertibles, which is the same for other things.

Yeah. And, and whatever that sunroof weighs, which is probably something, you know, and okay,

it's not the absolute, but I'll tell you something. I pulled out the fucking cigarette lighter,

little, somebody, the first owner was ripping grits in this thing. Oh, the first owner.

How do you know? How do you know? You can fill with cigarette out.

You can tell if that one of those cigarette lighters, there's brand new, never used,

used a couple of times. And then like, that's your cigarette lighter. Those are the three

phases of that. And for at least three or four years, that was this guy's cigarette light.

Wow. Yeah. The first owner of this thing was ripping grits in this thing. And so like,

that tells me that this was like probably some rich dudes, like daily for this thing is like

80,000 kilometers on it. Like this was probably some rich guys fucking daily. Oh, probably get

on the auto. Oh, it's from Japan originally. Wow. Okay. Cool. Imagine. They like smoking.

Imagine fucking dude. Night tonight. He runs in Japan. Ripping grits in a fucking yellow bird.

I can feel how much you miss cigarettes right now. And that's half this equation. That's why

I got like a cigarette. You're like, imagine how great it would be to drive. You're like,

to smoke cigarettes. Cigarettes at 100 miles an hour down the freeway at night in Japan.

Yeah. That is an iconic moment. That's what's up. That's what cars are about, dude.

Before they had the weird electronic limiters on the highways there. Yeah. Yeah. That's

you and smoking together. So nice. But they also, you know, I also go back to that other photo,

that silver car, I drove that other thing. I drove this race car, a Cayman,

08 Cayman race car. Believe it or not, that's a vintage race car now. 08's a vintage 17 years,

right? I drove it. I drove in this vintage race with a bunch of like 993 cups and 964 cups. And

they put me in this and I was like, well, okay. Finish P3. Yeah. Not terrible. Finish P3,

P4 behind. Oh, no. So I thought it was P4, but it turns out someone that I thought was way ahead

of me broke and didn't finish. So it really was. It was P3. But the cars in the race were

very spread out. It was like 12 cars and they were pre-spread out in performance.

Like there was like a 69, 9, 11, a fucking, an IROC, AJ Foyts, like IROC won. And then like

a couple of like super hot rotted, like 993 cups that had like big bore motors. So that

what you were chasing is 993 cups with built engines. Yes. Okay. That's what I was chasing.

And members, like people who's like, track this is. Yeah. And I was driving a car I never drove

before, you know, but no, I'm not trying to make excuses, but like, I was able to

battle with those front couple of cars for about a lap and a half. And then they pulled away and

I just couldn't catch them anymore. And so for like, it was a half hour race, but I'd say for

like 25 minutes of it, I was mostly lapping by myself. Whoa. Yeah. I mean, I lapped seven or

eight of the slower cars. And so like there were some passes to make. But if I'm lapping people

in a half hour race, like that's not fast. So like getting making, sorry, getting around them

wasn't, you know, difficult or really a fight. Like I'm not, it was a, it was a fun time.

Having said that, I did two hours of 40 minutes in Texas straight. I did 30 minutes in Miami.

I was so much sweatier and more tired after 30 minutes than after doing

it. Now is that because of the climate there? Yeah, humidity is still humid.

Yeah. Oh, it was fucked up. It was, it was tough. Really tough. This track is tight. I feel like

Cody, you get some rest in a couple of places. So you, so you have that too. A, the car I was

racing was automatic. I mean, paddles, but, but, uh, but my left foot didn't have to do much. I

was left foot breaking, but this, this track, 1.5 miles, it's like 13 corners, I think. And it's

second, third, second, third, second, third, second, third, second, third, fourth, third,

second, third, it's a bunch of shifts. I'm going to say it's, it's like a carting track. I don't

mean that disrespectfully, but like in terms of, uh, how dense it is with activity, like you are

turning and breaking and there's the clover thing and you're popping out and then you're on the

straightaway, but the straightaway is only as long as the pits, the front straightaway. The

straightaway, you have just enough time to get to like the top, you go from second to the top of

fourth and then have to go right back to second again and it's a U-turn and it's a U-turn and

it's the fourth again and back to second again. And so in a, in a stick shift car, you're doing

a lot more work, a lot more work than you are at Kota. Even Kota, uh, you are a big track like

that. It's going to be like third and fourth gear most of the time. It's not second, third,

fourth, third, second, third, second, third, fourth, third, second, third, third, third, fourth.

Yeah. It's a, it was a, it was a lot of work. I, my fucking ass is so sore even today from that.

Just from all the left, the left, all the left footwork, the all the left footwork. Yeah. Yeah.

It was fun though. And then, uh, flip over. I drove this Rocks, R-O-C-S Rocks design. Folks,

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back to the show. You could call it like a Magnus style build. It has no paint on it.

It's a raw steel body. It's got Lexan rear windows. It's like, it's an old school race

car-y kind of vibe. It definitely has that vibe. Yeah, this is like your typical period-built

track rat type 9-11. Looks cool. It did look cool. It looked cool and had a great shifter,

very notchy and tight. So is this shadow, this meatball shadow on the door,

like a real sticker they peeled off a long time ago? Maybe. I don't know. The exterior is real

scruffy. There's a couple little bits of like rust here and there. Like it's,

it's meant to be super scruffy. And the interior is super scruffy too.

So here's the thing. If I didn't just get out of a yellow bird and get into that,

I'd have been all about that. You know what I mean? It's a beautiful vintage hot rod 9-11

experience. It's fucking loud. There's no sound insulation. You know, it's got that race car

mirror that goes across the entire top of the windshield. The steering is very sharp and

it's got all these old school bucket seats like they would have driven in the 70s where,

and I'm just going, God, if I have a crash in this, I am dead as a fucking doornail.

That's it from the other side. Yeah. But it's a great vibe. I mean, it would be a great car

to rip around LA in for sure. But after, after the yellow bird, I mean, just, this is a lovely car

and the guy who built it was really nice and it didn't have any like terrible vices. It turned

nice. It stopped pretty good. Like it was fine. It was a cool, sordid old 9-11. I ain't a fucking

yellow bird though. You know what I mean? Like you, the difference between something like this

and what year was this car, by the way? I haven't, I mean, it's got to be no idea. 70, 69, 70,

something like that. It's late 60s, early 70s. So that's, you know, a 20 year difference just in

the body, body construction. And then plus you add like roof being roof, 300 horsepower problem.

Turbo refinement. Yeah. I mean, just all of it. Yeah. This is, I think they have very different

intentions. Yeah. This feels like something Fatties would like just no, for someone who wants

old school, raw, rough. I mean, Magnus would love it, you know, and, and Jethro was there as well.

And he had a go at it and he thought it was great fun too. It is, it was really cool. It was nice

to get to, to get to try it. Like I like the, I like the no paint. I think that's a cool aesthetic.

It certainly ran well and, and sounded cool. And it was carbureted. So it did that little

spittily thing that happens when you come off the throttle that only the carbs do where it's

pops back out the carb a little bit. You know what I mean?

Cool. Fast. Quick, quick, quick. I mean, I mean, look, fast. I just got out of a yellow bird. So

like not fast. No, yellow bird is fast. This is, this is not fast. But it, but it was lovely. I

mean, look, in today's world, fast doesn't matter that much. Fun, fun beats fast. Sure.

So it, it was, it was certainly enough horsepower to have a good time in,

though it was not fast enough for me to be happy with it as my track car, you know.

But if you were racing a bunch of other cars that looked and sounded like it,

that would be a good time. That would be a very fun day. Yeah, cool. For sure. But I, you know,

fucking for six days a year, Miami's the best place on earth, you know, you hit the weather right,

you hit the, it's, and it's just you, you, the restaurants are vibing and I, and people in

Miami have a sort of optimism about despite reality. You know what I mean? They're having a

good time. Everything else is burning. There's like no laws there. They don't pay fucking taxes,

but they're about it. Like whatever else is happening in the rest of the world, like Miami's

fun. Yeah, it does have a fun vibe to it. Sure. Six days a year. I'm a hundred percent about it.

But outside of this club, there ain't a fucking set of corners for 600 miles. I know. I mean,

seriously, like, how do you love cars and live in that town if you can't afford a membership

to this place? And frankly, even if you can, and they do, they do as good a job as can be done.

The community, the track, the amenities, the staff, this is, this is, this is as first rate

as fucking first rate gets. I'd be tired of the same racetrack. If that was all I had,

you know what I mean? If I didn't have the racetrack and canyons and some other racetracks once in a

while, if this was where I could go to drive and in Miami, that's it. I, it wouldn't, it wouldn't

satisfy me. So I couldn't live in Miami. Well, yeah, I mean, I think there's two things there.

Like if you were, if you were forced to live there, you might find ways to make, keep the track

fun. You just get really into the racing, really into shaving times. Well, they do that. They've

got this club series, the spec M twos, they're all racing apparently is a very good, very good

series. And the club does stuff. They do activations at the F one track and, and stuff like that. Oh,

I forgot the F one track, there is a way to join some kind of a club that gets you 30 or 40 days

a year at the F one track also. So, and there may be some type of reciprocal with concourse club.

So I don't want to say that this is the only place to turn corners in Miami. The F one track

is the other way. Well, also you have to be a certain economic bracket to experience either of

these. If you're a car fan in Miami, who's not in that bracket, I think it highlights though that

people can find a lot of ways to like cars. Like when I was reading magazines as a kid,

and reading this car goes this fast, or it handles better, you know, than this thing,

if you had handed me that car there, I wouldn't in Santa Cruz, I wouldn't have gone, oh, I can't go

any of these race tracks. Like even if you just drive around for a while, I think it's so exciting

because you're so excited about the car. That's true. They're just like, there isn't anywhere to,

I mean, imagine LA, but without of the mountains. No, I get it. I think because we live here,

we've become not like spoiled, but also this is the kind of driving we like. That's why we live here.

Yeah. In part. So for us to think of moving somewhere that doesn't have that would be,

you know, crippling. Well, yeah, no, it is, but it's just, it's too bad because I meet really

nice people there and like the food is great. The hospitality is great. You know, the vibe of

it's great. I like, I like, I like South Florida architecture. I think it's an interesting mix

of like Art Deco, Mid-Mod, Southern. Way more colorful, like architecture. Yeah, colorful.

People don't give a fuck. You know, here like, like here, it's like, you know, even in LA,

it's like a little douchey to be like too flash. Like there is no such thing down there as too

flash and it's like kind of hilarious. So anyway, it's a fun time as long as it's the right time

of year. How far is the firm from Miami? That's in Gainesville. That's, those are extreme ends of

Florida. It's far. Homestead. Oh, that's the NASCAR track. It's really far. Yeah. There might be

something to do with at Homestead. Do they have an infield road course there? There's Miami Exotic

Auto Racing. Like I think there's probably some more things. You got to find one of those,

those tracks we stumble upon. They're like out in the woods. You know, I'm sure there's a track

in the middle of the woods somewhere. I think like Jake Paul just bought some huge piece of land

in Georgia. I heard the best description for him, which was a hock to a for dudes. Yeah. That's about

right. Perfect. Yeah. They both scan people with crypto. Oh, wait. So I got a shrink flation.

This one's hilarious because it's my checks. Like I ordered new checks for Westside and it's the big,

the big binder of business checks. It's the sheet that's got three and then the ledger and you tear

them off, right? And it's, I just, I just click to reorder. Just reorder the same product I have.

It is my third time in five, six years reordering. Okay. The checks come. They are notably thinner.

The paper is thinner and I can't use my fountain pens on them anymore because it bleeds through.

They made my fucking checks and they're more expensive. They made them thinner and more expensive.

Thanks. Deluxe.com. That is, that sucks. They shrink flated the thing I use to pay bills with.

Isn't that crazy? Oh, and that dude, I read, I read a story this morning that's made, I mean,

it just, the story on Axios this morning saying that there should be a new class of people.

Like you've heard of the haves and the have nots. Sure. Well, now there's the haves,

the have nots and the have lots. And they've, there's a whole thing about the have nots is

basically like the 50% of this country that are like priced out of everything. The, the don't have,

don't have $1,000 for an emergency home ownership. You know, so that's the have nots.

The haves are like people that probably would have been considered rich like 10 or 15 years ago

that are like stable, fine. They own their own homes. They have some money for some retirement.

Just what, what, what today's version of middle class people is that probably would have been

upper middle class 10 years ago. And then you have the have lots, which is the .001% that's like

riding the fucking AI slash Trump boom, that it's like the list of people that it's like,

they list off 12 people that made like over. There were 19 families last year made like

$500 billion or something. Yeah. And you're like, what? And you just, and so anyway, that's

that's the new class of people that are outside governments. I mean, they live, they, when you

have enough resources, you don't need to be loyal to a city, a state, a country laws, like anything,

like nothing. And so anyway, yes, I think that's good to have a new descriptor definition. Yeah,

that makes sense. Language evolves. And yeah, there's a huge difference. So yeah, I mean, and,

and like it's, it's an incredible like privilege to be able to like own a house and not have to

think about the price of groceries too often. That's an incredible privilege. But like,

there's this just, there is this new class of people where it's like beyond the rule of law,

beyond the where it's like post power, like where you just, you just have the power, the

access and the influence to make markets to, you know, like you can insider trade, you can have

access to what the government's going to do before they do it. Like you've bought your way into a

club that just enshrines your power outside of. Yeah, you stop buying things and you've purchased

access and you purchase systems. Yeah, yeah. It's kind of fucked up. Yeah, it's going really well.

Really well. Would you say this is about 1930, where we're at? Yeah, 28. 28 to 30 is probably,

you know, we're getting there. We're getting there. Don't worry guys, it'll happen.

The, oh, let's talk about affordability for a second. We've got this Alfa,

we're made of spider on bring a trailer, affordable sports cars. We put, it's two days left in this

by the time you guys listen to this on Tuesday, it's not, there's a photo of it on the, on my

Instagram top photo. You can do this little red alpha spider. We sold it last month. And then

after the guy clicked bid, he got like a terminal health diagnosis and like,

and like I couldn't, yeah. So, so I'm very unfortunate. And so we're, we're running,

we're running it again. No fault of the car. So this, this is going to be like low five figures,

guys. Mint super well loved alpha spider. Get in the Italian car game. Just tag Tom Holland,

just tag him a bunch. Is he about that? Well, he already has an old,

he's got an old one, but he needs more. Yeah. It's a lovely front engine rear two liter,

four cam, five speed, limited slip diff, convertible, nice leather.

The cigarette lighter has not been ripped a thousand grits. It's a 95 alpha spider on

its 91 91. Oh, no, it's been owned since 1995. Okay. The little old lady that owned this has

owned it since 1995. Wow. Yeah. I want to see, I just want to see the interior and

different angles real quick. Oh, yeah. Oh, you spell it with a Y. That's why it's with an I.

You know, if Italy could just get some consistency on how, well, yeah, that's Lamborghini does it

with the, the Lamborghini and Porsche do it with a Y and alpha and Ferrari do it with, there it is

in the middle. Photos by fatties. And it's, this is one of the ones that's got the, you know,

like the shifters up on the dashboard. It's ever see that? See the interior one of these?

What a friendly little vehicle. So see where the shifter comes out of. Isn't that great?

They're fun to shift. It's a totally different thing. Pull down. Yeah. Yeah. Lift up. It's

like this. Yeah. It's funky. It's like you're operating a drawbridge. Dude, it's a, you know,

if you want like a different and unique driving experience, like really, really cool little car.

And if you want to drive around a car that doesn't make it look like you're an insecure idiot,

this is the car for that. And what you really want to do is get rid of that airbag steering wheel.

This is a 91 Gen 1 airbags. You probably don't even want that in your car. Like you're probably

more likely to get hurt by that airbag than have it save your life. Just get rid of that steering

wheel, little wood, nardy. Yeah. And then you're, then you're, now no one knows what year this thing

it is. Now it could be a 73 or a, but it's, I like the seats. Dude, does this look like a 133,000

mile car? This is mint. It looks like it's got like a third of the miles it actually has. Yeah.

It's been really, really well loved this car. I like the gauge pinnacle. Gauge pinnacle is cool.

All the controls are really cool. It's just, if you're really going to drive it needs a new set

of tires. Tires, the tires are old, but it is absolutely lovely. So go check it out and bring

a trailer and get in the game. Cheap, cheap Italian sports cars, people. What else did I have that

I wanted to talk about? It's pretty much, pretty much, I mean, I, we could talk about the Aston

Martin DBXS, but that seems like something that we should maybe save for next show. I feel like,

I think so. We're at 35. Yeah, we can. That's because that'll be 20 minutes. What did you do

while I was gone? Anything car related? I went to Good Vibes with David Tuig and his wonderful friends.

We had a great time. Him and his, uh, him and his buddy, uh, Zoil, they rented a V6, a red V6

Mustang from Vegas and they drove it here. They're at CES. Oh, okay. All right. And I was going to

rent such a shit one way, one way rentals as well. And they, and also it was CES. I think a lot of

people had more money than them rented cars first. Like it's like the biggest trade show,

second to FEMA. So they rented that thing, um, which was very funny to watch engineers go like,

it's just so slowly. Yeah. For those who don't know who David is, he was the, uh, I think,

I forget the title, but he basically ran program manager, program director. He basically ran the

entire Alpine A110 program. And before that, he ran the Nissan Kashkai program. We called it the

Rogue, one of their most successful crossovers. Our audience really cares about that.

No, what I'm saying, like he worked for huge companies. He's ran projects for three huge

companies. And then he wrote an amazing book you should read called Inside the Machine.

Super nice guy and engineer. So we hung out and went up to Good Vibes. It was frigid, sir.

Was there snow? There was ice. Oh, really? Yeah. In the shady part of the road? There was ice in

the shady part right when you approached Newcomps, which, uh, that was a really funny thing. So on

the way up, roads dry. I'm watching the temps though. Like it's chilly. Did you go up big to

hunger? Did you go up? Angels crest the whole way? Our normal way up. Oh, and it was open? Yeah. Oh,

good. Okay. So there was no snow like visible. There was one corner where I couldn't tell if it

was ice or water coming across. And then as I went over it, I felt the whole car like dressed

on it. That's nice. And it was a very short moment. I knew, okay. So after that, we all slowed

down. In the winter, uh, local, uh, little inside baseball, in the winter, there is a section of

road that never sees sun. That part was dry. Oh, shocking. 100% shock. Really? I was expecting

to go 12 miles, two miles per hour, really, with my tires. That was clear. I think they'd plowed it.

Maybe sun had hit it at some point. There was ice right when you get to Newcomps. And it was

probably a 50 foot, maybe a hundred foot section of ice and slush. We all, and everybody who showed

up slows down, except for one guy in a E34 M5, I think, who kind of came in at like 25 and all

the sudden kicks left and slides into the oncoming. No one was there, but we're like, and then he just

pulled into the parking lot and didn't say anything. He said to himself, nobody saw that. Yeah. And

some of the folks that were there were looking up the hill to make sure no cars were coming,

like safety priority there. But that guy probably learned that you need momentum,

but you don't need that much momentum. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Very light showing of good vibes. It was

like 38 degrees. Well, yeah. Also, first week back at work, I think like 20 cars showed up. It was

really strange. Well, yeah, cold and it had been raining all week. The reason I asked is because

about, uh, not what you were doing, but which route you took, because right after the rains,

when I had to go, um, film, um, Big Tehunga was closed and I didn't know why I was hoping because

it was not damaged or in any way. I didn't see, I saw no signs of road work or anything. So maybe

it was just preventative. You know, maybe it was just closed in case something happened. They didn't

want people going up there. There were, I mean, there were sections, I think more in Angelus

Crest where there was like evidence of mud that had gone across that they plowed away or big rocks

and stuff that they'd cleared. Um, but there were just a couple of wild cards up here that I wanted

to show you. Um, Miata Safari. Miata Safari. I think stock engine just lifted huge tires. I mean,

this thing looks like it's on, I don't know, 32 inch tires. And they look, it looks like they've,

it's got longer control arms too. They, they look like they're outside the body of the car. They are

a little bit. Uh, I looked underneath and I mean, I saw suspension. I couldn't find the person that

built it. Um, but the back says like, Oh, what was it called? It was called like rough rides,

fabrication or something. Something that's kind of like we do shitty work, but I'm more of a

joke. Um, but this thing, this looked like a good time. How come? It does look like a good time.

There we go. You know, yeah, that looks fun. Yeah. Uh, and no lower, no front bumper,

no lower rear bumper. It was so tall. I did a profile shot. I don't think I put it up,

but it was next to a Ferrari 355, which had the nose was below the bumper of this thing.

You could drive this over, you know, a Corvette. That's sweet. Uh, just a good time that someone

probably had with the car they got for like $12. Yeah. Um, and by the way, that's great fun.

Yeah. Zero six. Sorry. So pretty tall. And then this, the only other car I wanted to show you

was this Lotus. Oh, I've seen this car before. There's a black exige with like white wheels,

like JDM style like track. It looks fantastic. It has good ground clearance. What a genius,

but it's got a turbo K 24. So I bet it rips and the guy that owns this thing, I think he's like 20.

If you're listening, you look 20, you probably are. He bought it from a guy he knows who's

like a racing engineer. So this dude drives it around right now with 270 wheel horsepower.

He says it's the lowest power setting possible before the thing just stumbles. And I was like,

that's a good place to start. You know, you can, you can live with this car for the rest of your

life and you could probably never outdrive it. You know, you can grow with this. Because the fastest

these cars ever got from the factory were 260 crank horsepower. If you're making 270 at the wheels,

that's some significantly more. He said the engine and the setup. I mean,

look at this external wastegate shit. Like it looks so rad. It sounds amazing. He said the

engine's good for like six to 800 horsepower, but the transmission will explode. That's, yeah, well,

because it's still stock gearbox, right? Yeah. Or is it the Honda gearbox or the, or the

Lotus gearbox and with the grenades, he can put something else in there. But for now,

he's just driving around like this, but it just, it looked like a DIY Hennessy Venom.

It sounded amazing. It's got this crazy lower splitter. I mean, it was just total race car.

And to drive it up on the day where there's like ice and snow on the road, just the brave aggressive.

Yeah. Those, but other than that, someone else in an exige. Yeah. I looked at it and went, man,

this seems like a great idea. And also very uncomfortable. So uncomfortable. So uncomfortable,

unfortunately. But, but fuck it. If you fit, God bless you. Yeah. But we had a good time.

It was a great, great drive. Good hang. But that's pretty much all. Have you,

have you changed the settings in your car since your track day? No. Okay. I have not. Okay.

I want to change the springs. I haven't done that either. I need to drive my car this weekend.

I have my spider. I haven't driven in, I think a month is not great. I need to drive it.

Dan McKinnis was there. And also one of David's friends has the gray spider. Remember Chris,

the gray spider. I know they both have, you got the gears done. Yes. I know that.

Short second through fifth. Yeah, I know that. It seems like the chalk one, right? Yeah. I see

that guy a lot. That's just, I think that's the move for so many people. Short or gearing.

It's expensive, but it's not as expensive as adding horsepower and it has a better return. And it,

it reduces stress off your engine. Yeah. And you keep the tall six gears. You can keep,

you keep your highway miles per gallon, which you wouldn't if you added horsepower. Yeah.

I just, I'm very excited about it. My, my engine is only like two miles per gallon,

less than stock. And even, even with that, I met a guy in Miami with a demand motor in his car.

I also met, ran into a shout out to Diego who bought my safari car, ran into him down in Miami.

He and his wife, I think she's his wife. She's very lovely. They're having a great time. They're

going on all these events. They're putting all these miles on the car. They're doing, they're,

really, they're enjoying that car for what it should be enjoyed for.

Was your car at? No, there was another one. It wasn't there. It was, it was not there. There

was a yellow cane safari there. Yeah. They're so rad. They are so good. They're awesome.

All right. We can go to the, the people's Patreon really kept us going that the wire from Patreon

came through this morning. It was a good month over there on the Patreon. So thank you guys

for, for keeping it going. Welcome to all the new people for, for 26. If you're, if you're new to

us and, and the way it works is if you sign up for us at the Patreon, which is patreon.com

slash the smoke entire podcast, you can watch the live stream. You can ask us questions for the

live stream. You can get the show before anybody else the same day it's recorded rather than waiting

Tuesday or Thursday. You can get extra show because there is a show at the pro driver tier

that's just a ninth show every month just for them. You can get the show without ads and you can

get access to exclusive collabs and stuff that we do with brands before anybody else such as the

next generation of notice watches. Yeah. Our Aaron down at concourse club asked me to reserve him

one of the pinks. He will be taking one of the pinks. So two canyons down there in Miami. Nice.

Big watch spotting. Yeah. Fucking heavies down there in Miami. I saw lots of Richard meal,

lots of protects, lots of gold APs. I was a guy sitting in fucking coach coming back from Miami

wearing a gold fume dial AP Royal Oak chrono. If it was real, it was about a quarter of a million

bucks. Wow. Yeah. Well, he spends his money on what he enjoys flying first class. Yeah. Okay.

Let's go to the people. PTS Angela White says, Oh, the, Oh, the car version of

fuck Mary kill is Turro finance crush. That's cute, but I'm just going to keep it fuck Mary kill.

So we're not plugging Turro on this. We don't need to turn into an advert Turro. All right,

gazu racing fuck Mary kill 86 Corolla Supra. I would, I would marry the GR 86.

I would fuck the Supra and I would kill the Corolla.

Hmm. Mary the Corolla.

Fuck the 86 and kill the Supra. Yeah. The Corolla would be the one that I'd want to have as my car

for for a while. The 86 I would like to beat the shit out of as hard as possible for like a day

and then just go like, thank you. See you later. And the Supra is fun, but doesn't interest me all

that much. I like the super straight line speed. I would just enjoy that for like a minute,

but then the Jerry six, I just love interacting with that in every way as much as possible.

Okay. Big Ben says mechanical watch question. I don't wear my watch daily. And when I take

my Breitling Navitimer out of the box to wear it, I just put it on and walk around for a few minutes.

And the motion of my wrist gets the movement going. And then I just set the time and continue

about my day. My question is, am I doing it wrong? Is winding the watch manually before putting it

on necessary or is this considered accepted practice? So I don't want to tell you that you're

doing it wrong because if the way you're doing it works, then it's not wrong. And it's certainly

not causing any damage. But if you don't manually wind that thing up, you just the natural motion

of your wrist, you are never going to get fully wind that barrel. The motion of your wrist is

really designed to maintain not to increase the level of windedness of your watch. And so I would

say that the way you should be doing it to get the most accuracy and the most power reserve out

of that watch is probably going to be to wind it manually, set the time, wind it manually,

and then go about your day. You don't have to spend that long doing it. It's 20, 30. 20, 30

spins will do it. And then you'll do it. It'll work. But I don't think you're getting a good

wind that way. I don't think your watch will be either as accurate or have as long a power reserve

as it could otherwise have. Listen and sometimes watch says, I love my EV as a daily but miss

having something with character even when driving around the city doing errands. If I had room for

only two cars plus Hannah's daily, would one of them still be an EV? Well, our one EV now is Hannah's

daily. So let's delete that part of the line and let's give you two cars. If I had two cars, one

would absolutely be an electric car. Yes. In my life, my life is full of other cars. But like,

yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. Why would I not have an EV? For here, that's, it's just so much

better. It's just so much better. And I'm about to go on a EV road trip next week, the new Lucid

Gravity. And I have to go to places that do not have a ton of, I have to drive across the desert.

I'm doing a big lap of the fucking desert to scout the Desert Run 600 Road and Track event. It's

about 60% sold out right now. You can come drive with me. We've got track time. We've got great

hotels. It's gonna be super fun. Super fucking fun. But I got scouted. So I'm doing the gravity

and I'm, the gravity can use Tesla superchargers now. So it'll be my first time using superchargers.

But I think we are, you know, obviously new cars are expensive and EVs if your goal is to save money

by not buying gas, that it may not work out for you. But I love the times when I have to sit

in traffic or light to light or whatever, I'd so much rather be in a fucking electric car.

So much rather. I'm so, I get, I get so much more relaxed and everything, you know? Would you?

Yeah. If you had, if you were gonna have two cars, would you have an EV and a sports car?

Absolutely. Yeah. I just, I like the way, I like the quiet, the lack of vibration, truly. I mean,

I, I now notice the difference when I get out of my car and get into any press car we have with a V

engine. The difference in vibration is totally noticeable. And then the difference from my car

to EV is so nice. And the instant torque, just not worrying about like the maintenance side of it,

all those things, totally. Yeah. Send preludes. That's a great name. I do World War Two reenacting

Allied side. Very important. Who does the other side? Is that, do you draw straws?

Anyone's excited about that? It's problematic. I always wanted a jeep for events and putting

around town. What military vehicle of any era would you want to drive? I mean, a tank,

like a small tank, right? Yeah. I mean, that's the coolest thing. Yeah. You can just drive, and

there are, there are small tanks. That's what's funny. There's like, there's ones that are like the

size of, I don't know, like a Hummer EV. Yeah. Like little tanks. Yeah. Personally, big ones.

Willie's Jeeps are cool and friendly and everyone likes them. They are just nightmares to drive over

25 miles per hour. Yeah, that's trash. And those true transporter things, the ones like a six

wheel, whatever it's called, that just feels too cumbersome. Yeah. So, I mean, dude, tank,

hovercraft, I think I'd like to do a hovercraft maybe. That would be fun. Do they use those in

World War Two? Well, I guess they have them now. No, not World War Two. He said, military vehicle

of any era. Oh, that's true. I met a guy who, I met a guy who drives a hovercraft. Remember?

Yeah. Yeah. We talked about that. I'm gonna go back from San Diego. Yeah.

You know what? I still think the Hummer H1 is oddly fun. When I drove that one for cars and

bids, shocked at how easy it was to drive. It has its charms. Yeah. It has its charms. Most of them

are shit piles, but it does have it. The one I, that one, the drift Hummer I drove in Detroit,

that thing was awesome. Oh, wait, the amphibious vehicles. That was one of the vehicle that you

can drive in the water, but they're all small. That's what I would do. Those would be fun. Yeah.

Run GMC. That's pretty good. That's pretty good. More fuck, Mary kill, wagons, second gen CTSV

manual, E39 M5 Touring, C6 Audi RS6 Avant twin turbo V10. Oh, this is, this is kind of a tough one.

I mean, the M5 Touring doesn't exist. That's not a real car. Right. BMW never made that. Well,

same with E46 M3 Touring. They listed up there. Yeah. I chose to ignore that. Oh, well, except

you'd love it. You don't think you'd like M3 Touring wagon? I probably would, but like, I don't

know, I had an M3 and I didn't fall in love with it. That's a good point. I would marry the CTSV

manual, fuck the E39 M5 and kill the RS6 Avant. I would marry the CTSV manual. I would fuck the RS6

twin turbo V10 and then I would kill the BMW team because I have driven them enough.

William Ray wants to know if we've ever driven a TVR Tuscan. I have not. No. Downshift family says,

do you think YouTuber cars such as your NSX are generally less valuable in the market

because their exploits have been on full display? I don't understand what that means.

No, I actually think it goes the opposite direction for cars like yours. I think it depends on what

the YouTuber is using the car for and what has been documented. So in your case, you always buy a car,

you document and talk about, I got maintenance done here. This was on time. I improved this.

Here's why. Like you really lay out what you've changed in the justification and what things you

change or update or maintain are always like to the highest quality. Yeah. Very good reason.

I actually kind of resent the question or resented being compared to my NSX. First off,

what exploits have been on full display? Where is this video of me beating up this car or doing

something to it that would make it less valuable? I think that's also why the second part of their

sense, which I don't really want to read, is flawed because if you were taking your NSX and

turning it into a drift car or something, and then you try to put it back to stock to sell it,

like sure, then it's going to reduce the value because you've shown people that you don't give

a shit about it. But all I've done with this car is service it, add paint protection film,

and then I put different wheels on it, which I took off before I sold it. And then oh,

by the way, the guy who bought it bought the wheels. So I think every car I've ever sold

has sold at top of market. I've never put a car at auction that fully tanked. So

is there an example that this person has of a quote YouTuber car that did sell for less because

of that? I don't watch other people's auctions. I mean, we have friends that like, you know,

they'll buy a car, new a dealership, they then modify it, track it a lot, and then they put it

back to stock before they sell it. But they don't put it up for auction because they would probably

people would comment about it. And then they usually sell it to like another dealership or

something. Yeah, I think that's the example of someone kind of documenting their exploits and

then trying to pass that down to somebody, but you don't really do that. I mean, I could see it

like here's where I could see it like, and it's not a one to one. But like Cletus, sure, where he

does a car giveaway, and he like rips the fucking car and he's doing burnouts and donuts like,

if like, let's just say that for some reason, they don't do the giveaway after that. And instead,

he just sends puts the car on cars and bids. Sure. But like a giveaway car and selling a car at

auction are like not the same thing at all. Yeah, I think. Yeah, that that's a better example.

I doubt anybody wouldn't enter the giveaway that Cletus is having because he did a burnout on

Instagram in the car. You know what I mean? Like, you know, Vin Anachtra just gave away that M3.

If he had built that car because he put a lot of, you know, he had a lot of thought behind the parts,

tested it, whatnot, but he did track it. He did slide it. Would that reduce the

auction value compared to if Joe Schmo, who doesn't have a YouTube channel, built the car

the same way? I still think the YouTube thing would actually help it because you under because you

are presented with all the information of why someone made the changes they made instead of it

just being a forum post from a guy that you're supposed to trust. I think so. I think it can help.

Yeah. It I think it reflects the character of the YouTuber. Yeah. If that person is known for

taking care of their cars, then it can only help. If that person's known for being shady

or beating on their cars or whatever, then it can hurt. True. Queers, shifting gears.

I hope I said that in the right accent. I think you can say it in any accent.

Do you say it in a redneck accent or do you say it in like a fem, like drag queen accent?

Oh, like an ally or people in South can be allies. I don't know. This feels like a

better to say it as someone who looks like me with a southern accent. Queers. You got to say

like that. Sure. See anything from CES coverage that was notable. I did not pay that much attention

to CES. I find that CES really has a lot of stupid stuff in it. David Tug actually said we should

go next year. He said we it's probably pretty interesting and there's a lot of stuff that

we would be able to make content about like talk about on the show. Yeah. And he they were trying

to sell it to us now. I went a couple of years ago and like the AIification of everything like

doesn't make me want to go more. But I mean, you know, it's a thing to see, I guess we could,

if we could figure out a way to get something worthwhile out of it. I mean, I guess this year

the big thing were robot fights. So that's just terrifying. I mean, or robots moving car parts

to replace humans. I mean, here's the thing about robot fights. What year did battle bots come out?

Oh, 2002. Yeah. So I don't give a fuck anymore. And also saw that when I was in high school. Well,

now they look the robots look like us. That's what's interesting about it is it's the humanoid

robots that are like boxing or doing, you know, karate to each other, which I find actually very

scary. Robot wars. I was never like someone's going to use that to, you know, corral the populace

and to doing what they want. I was like, look at the things spinning and hitting the thing that

jumps. Well, if they're going to use, no, if they're going to use robots to corral the populace,

they're not going to look like humans. Well, they have like they're going to be drones.

And that's a good point. It'll be both. Yeah. Yeah. Just wait till next year. We won't need,

we won't need CES. Yes, pretty much wants you. All you got to do is put Steven Miller and Elon

Musk in a room together, and you will have some white supremacist promises that will never ever

get met. Great point. It'd be great if they use Tesla robots. Yeah, because they'll never happen

or they'll break. Yeah. That's true. We need to assign Elon Musk to every Steven Miller idea.

That's how we're going to save this fucking country. Make sure Elon Musk is in charge of

everything Steven Miller thinks of. And then it'll just never happen. This is like doubling down

in a casino on Blackjack, but you have two. They could go really wrong. Right. Nobody cares about

my G 70. What's a car that terrified you? I've heard a lot of guys say the Gen 1 Viper wants

to kill its driver, but I've never owned anything fast. The Gen 1 Viper does not want to kill its

driver. The Gen 1 Viper actually has very straightforward and standard driving dynamics.

It's front engine, rear drive. It has a lot of power for the time. But if you were to get

a Gen 1 Viper that has 20, 25 tires on it, it's not anything. It just has no traction control

or stability control. Do you think it just overwhelmed the tires of the time versus other

cars that didn't maybe? Probably. Yeah. And if you got in one of those now and tried to maybe

push it as fast as it would go, it might be a bit of a challenge. And you might not know where

the limit was. But at the time, it was really just a lot of power and no traction control

and the tires could not keep up with that. But if you put today's tires on it, it'd be a pussycat.

The car that terrified me that we drove was the Gildred Racing Red Mini. What, 500-ish horsepower

rear engine, strange dynamics. That was pretty scary and great. But man, you and I have never

been so alert. Yeah, that was a lot. I mean, when you put the engine from one side of the car to

the other and then double the horsepower, you really have some crazy shit going on. But terrified,

I don't know if I've ever been terrified by any production car. I mean, there just isn't a production

car in my lifetime career that's been that unsorted that I was literally scared of it.

Yeah, I think you have to go to the aftermath. You have to go to people's personal builds and

shit where people will put all this power in a car and then just have stock suspension and

brakes just because they're morons. That's the kind of stuff that's really scary, not what a

manufacturer. A manufacturer in general has some kind of responsibility to its customers to not

sell them full-on garbage. Although I had to say, just to circle around because I was in Miami with

the people I was with, I was with car people all the track and shit, but I also spent the night

with my friend Jeff from college and his buddies that are not car people at all. They're in real

estate and they all drive fucking Teslas. I told them not to. Jeff, my friend Jeff, is a horrible

driver, is actually a bad driver. He was telling me that he uses FSD all the time. I was like,

look, you really shouldn't. I don't think that non-car people are really understand.

I think they believe all of the hype and I don't think they hear any of the data about why this

isn't a half-baked product. They don't really know the differences between what Waymo is doing

and what Tesla is doing. They just go, well, it didn't crash today, so it must be safe.

They're reasonable people. They're not like yay Elon fans. They just literally are like,

I'm bad at driving and this is better than me at driving.

I was going to say, if it's better than him, that's a slippery slope. I know.

Well, is it better to have this thing driving than to have Jeff driving?

It would be better to have Jeff get better at driving. What would be better? There's a third

door here, and I tried to explain sensor redundancy and I tried to explain all that

kind of stuff and I don't think I got anywhere. His eyes glazed over.

We went home with, it didn't crash today. I go, Jeff, if it does crash, just so you know,

it's your fault. Legally, it's your fucking fault. He goes, I know, but I don't think it will.

He's gotten interested. He's swimming in the ocean. Someone's going to say, hey,

there's sharks in there. You go, all right, well, I've been swimming in the ocean for 25 years,

never even seen a shark, and I want to keep swimming in the ocean.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So nobody cares about my, oh wait, we already did one from them.

Nothing on that says living in the North rust kills cars faster than anything,

but you guys being in Southern California, what kills cars there? Not being able to pass smog,

mileage, potholes? Sun. Sun. The sun here is like truly whatever is mounted UV that comes

through the intensity, the frequency, all that stuff, like it will eat paint. Yeah.

Doesn't matter what company made it, whatever, like if you get a brand new car and it lives

outside here versus living outside in Oregon or somewhere else, it's going to get cooked real

quick. The other thing could be salt if you live near the ocean. That's very true. If you live,

you know, Zack's old place, Zack lived second row from the ocean and parked his car outside. So

combination of the salt air and the sun, that's problematic. Smog isn't that much of a problem.

Potholes will add up to requiring more maintenance over time, bushings, all that stuff.

I may be a snowflake, but Grand Seiko is too. That's pretty funny.

Let's see. The progression of sports cars has been more power, more tech, more acceleration,

more computers, more and more, more rinse and repeat, leading further and further away from

the simplify and add lightness ethos. Could there be a developing hole in the market for simplified

lightweight sports cars or those of us who wish there was doom to be represented by the

capitalistic enthusiasts who think more is always the answer? You're going to have to look outside

of mainstream OEMs. Mainstream OEMs will not have a business case for a product like that.

You're going to have to look at Katerhams. You're going to have to look at Morgans. You're going

to have to look at older cars that are rest-o-modded. I mean, across the board, rest-o-mod market.

There's that guy in England putting V6s and stuff into Miata's for like 100 grand. There's a company

rest-o-modding almost every type of enthusiast car out there. There's imported Japanese cars,

but there is no mass community that wants a simple lightweight sports car. It's always

going to be a niche product from here on out, so you're going to have to go to niche sources to get

it. I recently bought a studio underdog watch during their recent restock event. Their founder

is all over Instagram about banning people who resell their pieces. What a fucking loser. Problem

is, once it's on my wrist, I really just don't like it as much as I'd hoped. It's a bit on the

small side. Yes, they are. Studio Underdog makes a beautiful watch, all of which are 37 fucking

millimeter, so that's why I haven't bought one yet. But wait, what should they do? Do I take

the risk and sell it anyways, keep it and wear it sparingly, or wait some period of time and sell it

later? I mean, look, if you buy something from somebody, it's yours. Fucking sell it. And by the

way, if this guy's that upset about people reselling their pieces, A, he doesn't understand the market

because you need to have some kind of robust secondhand market for your piece to have any kind of

value. If it has no used value, unless they drop so fast, unless the used values are so low,

that they don't want to see that. Here's an option, offer to sell it back to them. Offer to return it.

I know you don't want to sell this. I know you don't want me to flip it. I'm not trying to flip it.

I like it. I like your company, but this isn't working for me. What can I do? Start there.

I mean, that's it. I mean, you should be able to either return it, have them buy it back,

have them connect you to another buyer. Maybe it was sold out. Somebody else wants it, whatever.

Try the friendly ways first. But like, after that, after you've tried the friendly way,

if they don't open the door, fuck them. Buy my PPI. If I could only have one

Grand Seiko in your collection, what would it be? Oh, this is so easy, the Kodo. The Grand Seiko

Kodo. It's $360,000. But yeah, sure. If I could have a Grand Seiko Kodo, fuck with that. It's only

$360,000. Sell half the Kuntas. Sell everything. Sell everything to buy all. I know you already

asked a question, but we should talk about this Arizona thing, because it's kind of the story

of the week. Nobody cares about my G70 says an Arizona rep has introduced legislation to create

unrestricted speed zones on certain highways during daylight hours. Do you think it's a good idea?

That's really it. Do you think it's a good idea? And will it catch up? Intended to speed up driving

times through less populated areas. Is that really something that is needed?

Hey, man, let's not look a gift horse in the mouth, okay?

Is it a good... I haven't seen the math on what the point is of this.

It seems a bit like the Montana thing. I think...

It's called the Reasonable and Prudent Interstate Driving Act. Rapid, focused on

limiting speed zones in rural sections of Arizona. Be pilot on a stretch of Interstate 8.

I mean, okay. I will add they say that additional roads will be chosen, but only after engineering

studies, safety records, and highly designed standards. So that's good. They're not just

going to say, hey, this road is empty. Go for it, even though the tarmac is fucked and there's a

lot of dangerous stuff in the middle of the road. So that is good. Sure. I mean,

I am not against this. I mean, I'm never going to say that getting rid of a speed limit on a

highway in the middle of nowhere is a bad idea. If I find myself out there, I'm going to do 200

miles an hour. Like, why not? If you say I can, let's fucking go. You know, the proposed highway

requirements for de-restricting speed limits include locations outside urbanized areas with

population of 50,000 or more residents, a crash rate below the statewide average over the last

five years, and existing infrastructure that meets or exceeds state standards. Strong need for

correct signage and annual safety audits of de-restricted segments as well as driver education

around passing. All right. If you are going to get rid of speed limits, you should also,

you should make it illegal to camp out in the left lane. Yeah. I mean, because if that's what's

going to happen, cars are going to be going triple digits. Yep. There needs to be an area where a

car can know that there isn't going to be someone doing 62 moving into the left lane. Yeah. I think

the biggest challenge will be educating the public because in Germany, when you get your license,

you are explained, it's explained to you how the autobahn works and how the lane discipline works.

We don't have that here. I mean, maybe they tell you in driver training, nobody gives a shit,

but they're going to have to give a shit or they're going to die. Yeah. So, getting that message

has the worst lane discipline of any country I've ever driven. Sure. Except for like maybe,

no, no, including places that would be considered like developing nations. And I think

another challenge is that you have people passing across different states on road trips and stuff.

So, does this person from California or Idaho or whatever, did they get the memo on how this

highway works? Where is Interstate 8 in Arizona? I don't even really know where that is. And

can I max out this lucid gravity? I mean, I'm sure it's big, but I don't know that road in particular.

Point it up. Highway 8 in Arizona is, zoom, zoom, zoom. Oh, wow. Okay. So, this is,

fuck me. Okay. So, this is really, it runs across the southern part of the state near the Mexico

border. And it's basically like if you were going from Phoenix to San Diego, that's what you would

take. That's pretty remote. I mean, that area, that section between Hila Bend and wherever,

there ain't shit out there, man. Yeah. Is this all, is this, that's Mexico. No, this is Mexico. Oh,

yeah. What is, I don't know. That's like military or do not, do not fuck around zone. Right. I don't

know. Zoom out. Let me see if it's labeled. Can you zoom out more? I don't know. All right.

Just the fucking desert death zone. I guess so. Yeah. So, that does seem like a good spot for

that. You know, this is very straight. I mean, you, there's very straight and there ain't nothing

there. So, like, if we do the, like, what is the distance? How do I do that? I'm just curious how

long the straightaway is to answer your question. Measure distance from there to here. That's 12

miles. Yeah. Just dead straight. Yeah. Yeah. That's enough. Yeah. But yeah. I don't, I don't

hate it. Education is the challenge. I don't hate it as long as you don't have people camping out in

the left lane. Yeah. And fucking it all up. Yeah. Two guys in the back of Alexis, Texas says,

I'm expecting a strong raise at the end of this year and I'm contemplating my first sports car.

Is it bad that I keep coming back to an older Viper? I like how they look and, yeah, 40K should

be good for a decent one. I'm in Northern California. Yeah. If you, you got to start somewhere.

First sports car. We were just talking about Vipers and what's good about Vipers is they're

straightforward. They're generally dependable. You know, the powertrains are robust. There's

a lot of stuff that I kept. And they do look cool. I'm not, I think I agree. They do look cool. And

they sound interesting. And if you keep coming back to that, this was like me in my first

collector car really was a DeLorean. It turned out that wasn't the fucking one. But the process of

finding it, you know, getting it worked on, driving it a bit and learning that, oh, actually,

it wasn't really what I thought. That's like part of the process. So like, you got to start

somewhere. And so like, why not a Viper? Sounds good to me. Quadrifoli O-face

had the lovely experience of opening the tailgate of my Lucid Gravity mid-car wash last week.

As I scrambled to turn off the wipers with the non-buttons on the left of the screen,

they're about a pixel apart when the tailgate one pops up. That sucks. Any wrong button mishaps,

you guys have had. Wrong button mishaps. Like I hit the wrong button. I mean, the Ferrari SF90,

you brushed the prompt thing for the voice command like so often. It's like so annoying. Oh, when we

had the M8 and the gesture control was turned on and I was like talking on the phone, all of a

sudden it started talking to me because I moved my hand in a certain way. Yeah, that was weird.

Gesture controls stink. I mean, wrong button mishaps. I've never opened a power door in the

middle of a car wash, if you know what I mean. I've definitely acts on a right-hand drive car.

I've accidentally hit the blinker instead or the wiper instead of the blinker. And if I have a camera

mounted on the windshield, remember in New Zealand, I had a camera mounted on the windshield. I

accidentally hit the wiper instead of the blinker. The wiper peeled off the rubber of the camera,

which sent it into the fucking woods. Yeah. And we had to spend half an hour finding this camera

in the woods. You almost did that in the DBX video. I almost did it. It was good. Almost did in the

DBX video as well. Yep. Tripping on ADAS. That's pretty funny. Have either of you ever owned cars

that were reliability anomalies? For example, a Honda or Toyota that always broke down or needed

work or et cetera, et cetera. I think that my 97 Jetta wasn't an anomaly because I drove it

hard for three years with terrible maintenance. I slid into a curb hard and I can't believe I didn't

like whatever, time machine the wheels. And it just worked. Had no issues. Got so lucky.

Never had a Honda or Toyota that constantly broke down. No. The Lexus that had power steering

fluid dripping on the alternator. That was a weird thing. Well, the million mile Lexus,

that was user error because people were filling the power steering fluid with power steering

fluid. Crazy. And in that car, it uses ATF. So if you do that, it then fucks up the gasket,

which then drips onto the alternator and then you have a big fucking problem.

No, no, no, all of the reliability of all my, I have had overwhelmingly

good reliability experiences with all of my cars. Overwhelmingly so. I've never had a car

that was just a fucking nightmare over and over it ever of any kind.

Let's see. The OU8, no, I mean, do we really want to answer that guy's question? It was really

the one you just deleted. I replied in the chat. Yeah.

But I just didn't like the tone of the question, actually. Oh, that's fine. Okay.

Bush did 997. What are your favorite gearboxes or shifters? I feel like we get asked this a lot.

I think we do. 0406 4GT, Honda S2000, Ferrari 430 manual. Gen 1 NSX. Gen 1 NSX.

550. Yeah, the Ferrari gated, any of the Ferrari 6 speed gated. Okay.

I think basically the temp wheel and the BMW also aims things at the floor, but I thought that

turned the heat up in the whole car. Oh, yeah. Single barrel V8 engine wants to go back to what

we were asked. We were asked before the break about climate control that can do the upper and

the lower separately. I mean, you would have cool air on the top and warm air on the bottom or vice

versa. And they're suggesting that BMW has the scrolling wheel on the dash with the digital for

the feet and dash. Now, I've never learned how to properly use that wheel. I don't think anybody

knows how to use that wheel. I mean, I could read the manual for my car and learn how to use

the wheel. But instead, I don't know, when I went up to good vibes and it was cold, I turned the

wheel up to hot, the car seemed to heat up quicker inside. I forget what it bypasses. And someone's

going to yell at me because I should know this. But I have not noticed it only changing the

temperature aimed at my feet. It seems to heat the entire vehicle. This is a good question.

Shelby GT Tri-Fitty, at what percentage price point relation to the car's value

does a wrap not make sense? For example, I have a $60,000 car. And if I spend 10K on a wrap,

that's 16% of the car's value. That makes me want to cry even if I can afford it. But if I had a

$200,000 car, spending the 10K is a no brainer. Am I crazy? Well, here's another question.

Your $60,000 car, by the time you're done with it, is it going to be a $60,000 car or is it going to

be a $40,000 car? Same question for your $200,000 car. Is that going to be going up in value? And

your money is going to come out in the wash or possibly add a little bit of value on the other

end? Or are you just protecting a car that is going to depreciate no matter what?

Second is like, if you had to repaint the front end from Rockchips, what is the price

point of that relative to a wrap? So if you had to get bodywork done on a paint to sample Ferrari

or a Tritone or a very metallic color that could be expensive or a Mysticrome,

you know, then you, now it's a question of how is the paint now? Are you buying a brand new car

and it's perfect? Are you buying a used car and it's maybe less than perfect? Or are you buying

a used car where it is perfect and you want to drive it? So like, to me, it's not necessarily a

pers, I don't, I don't do the math relative to the car's purchase price, basically. It's what is

the condition of this car today. And how important is it to me to freeze the car in this condition?

And I'm talking about clear paint protection film. If you're talking about color change wrap,

that's a different thing. You also have a question of, do you actually want to change the color?

I'm assuming clear protective film. And 10K is high, by the way. Like, that's high, like.

Usually like seven to wrap a full car in clear, right?

A fairly normal sports car, let's call it a 911 or my NSX, 7,508 grand. You get to GT3RS or

something with a bunch of disjointed panels that evolve a lot of custom work. Now, 10, 11. You'd

be hard pressed to find a $60,000 car that'll crack 10. Unless it's like your car, where they've got a

They had to cut a lot of little pieces. Well, even if your car had bodywork, even though it wasn't.

Oh, totally. But I think, let's say my car was brand new, made the way it was. One of the things

they pointed out is that the shapes of cars have changed. So new cars have a lot more large panels

that they can cover in one sheet. My car, the bumper, they had to cut 10 individual pieces.

So it's kind of like, if you bought a new McLaren for 300 grand, I bet it would be harder to cover

all those little pieces that move versus a Bentley 300 grand. A lot of big, large pieces.

Big sheets, Rolls Royces are like easy as hell to wrap, you know. So like, you're not wrong to

do the math, and you're not crazy that, yeah, putting a full, there's, and also there's a

third door here. If you have your 60k car, you could just do impact zone PPF, which will be the

nose and the mirror caps. And that'll offer you a lot more protection than nothing. And it'll be

a third or a half of the price as, as a full, a full one. So like the Coontosh, I'm not putting

film on its original paint. It's nicked up all over the place. It's thin paint. So I would almost

certainly damage it removing this stuff later. That's a big thing. So there's, there's no point.

The NSX, I got it and it was so mint. And I was like, well, I want to drive it and not have to

worry about it. And it's probably going up in value. And so if I do this PPF, I'll protect it.

And if I go to sell it, it'll be a value add. And in the meantime, I can seal in this mint.

And it fucking worked because I found myself in a, in a windstorm with sticks and shit getting

blown all over the car. Like the first week I had the car, I guarantee you that the 7500 PPF saved

me 50,000 guaranteed. I would have had to repaint the whole car. And so. And also paint matching

can be very difficult. Like on the respray thing, a friend of ours is buying a silver car and called

me about wrap stuff the other day. And the front bumper has nicks in it, but to repaint that and

then make sure it matches because if the car is used, even if the paints in good condition,

they might have faded, they don't really know, fade over 10, 15 years. Now, can you match the

faded color? Because they're going to order the OEM color, but it's not going to be the same.

Correct. So it's, it's, there's the math problem. And obviously your budget is going to, is going

to be affected by the math problem. Okay. But there's also, what's the condition of the car

today? And do you want to freeze that condition for the next 10 years? That's what you're doing. So

so there's other factors. Good question. To go back to the wheel real quick, that is called the

stratification wheel according to BMW. And it does allow you to change the temperature of the

vents directly next to that wheel versus what the climate is set to. So if your climate is set to

cold everywhere, aimed at your feet, but you changed the stratification wheel that's on the

dash, it will blow hot air towards your face. Okay. The three shells game. If you live somewhere

rural with good offerings, but a lack of enthusiast options, I'm not sure what offerings means.

How do you start a local enthusiast group? I don't know, I've never started a local enthusiast group.

I mean, some are good. This mean like, do you mean like good, good roads? You know, are you,

are you not near a city, but there's good roads and there's not a lot of like car groups.

Best place to begin, if I want to meet, if you want to meet an easy thing is food. Say, hey,

like, when I go to, if I want to meet, that's about driving our cars instead of standing around

in a parking lot. I mean, how do you start a group like the internet? Like you, you, you,

that's, that's how you do it. I mean, I've never had to do this before. So you're asking me to come

up with a guess of something I've never tried to do. When Larry and I were, had the driving club,

which is what this is, how did we start it? Well, we had our customers, right? We called our, emailed

existing car wash customers and said, we're doing a thing. So like, you know, you're starting from

zero, put on an event, put on a something. I mean, you got, you know, find it, you got to find at

least a couple of people manually. What I'm going to say, what's funny is if it's rural, you might

actually have to go old school with like, flyers or get some stickers made and like, I don't know,

go to like the auto like O'Reilly's, go to where you've seen cool cars, like seriously drive by

someone's house. And if you see a cool car, go, Hey, I'm starting a driving group, car group,

whatever, you know, we're going to meet at this time. And once you get five people, like they

start sharing on Facebook, blah, blah, blah, like it will spread. Yeah. But you know, rookie

mistakes to avoid, I mean, here's the problem. If you start a driving group, you're then responsible

for what those people are doing. Someone kills somebody who organized this, that guy.

So my advice is to never start a driving group. You are assuming responsibility for what other

people are going to do in their cars, as you are simultaneously, simultaneously encouraging them to

drive their cars in a way that may not be legal. Yeah. So there might be a way to make it less

official where you're like, we're going to meet here for pizza. And then when pizza's over,

you're like, all right, well, I'm going to go drive up this hill thing. Anybody else want to go? I

don't know. In court, who knows what's going to happen, but that is something to be aware of.

Yeah. That's, I mean, you gotta be really careful. Also setting rules up front, like,

and you can usually tell if you have some people show up there are going to be risky,

they're usually going to be under 25 years old, that you can start there. But if you're like

the lead driver, setting the speed low and responsible, because you don't want to get in

trouble, if someone kills somebody is a very good way to start. Yeah. You gotta be really

careful. Yeah. I mean, I balance these risks all the time because I lead drives for road and track.

I mean, I lead drives that are put on by a corporation. And my customers expect to have

a good time and drive at a decent pace. And so I, after doing this for 20 years, have found a pace

that I can lead a group that's safe, attentive, people don't get lost. But also the drivers feel

like they're having a good time and the passengers aren't terrified. And I really,

I mean, I make it seem really uncool to drive like a shithead. I set that up from day one.

And if you're trying to start a driving group with people you don't know, and that may be

from all different backgrounds and whatever, that's risky, very risky. You're responsible

for that. You can get sued for the shit like that, you know. Two cats, one car, thinking of

selling my Audi RS3 because the seats kill my back on long drives. I'm doing 3,000 highway miles a

month. That's a lot. What are some of the best seats you've experienced? Acura, pretty much any

for the price point, Acura. Yeah, MDX or Audi X. Very, very good. For just, I think Volvo is

absolutely fabulous. Their seats are fabulous. I agree. Porsche's 18 ways, you know, or 14 ways,

but really the 18 ways are kick ass in either, you know, the Panamera, the Cayenne. Even at

going back to like the fundamental, the more adjustability, the better. Because you can litter

my seats are 25 years old, but they're very adjustable and I can lift my back the way I need

to. And if I get in a seat from a more expensive car now that's a four way, it's oftentimes worse

because it doesn't support me very well. Yeah. I mean, I was just talking in the video for that,

that'll be out, you know, this week for the Ferrari 12C. Dude, that car is 600 grand. It

doesn't have adjustable lumbar. That's insane. Like, what are we doing? I feel like Ferrari seats

routinely disappoint us. Either it's not optioned to the gills. And even if, even when it is, those

like, I think Sabelt makes them, you got it, like the foam is kind of thin. And so it's a little bit

hard and like, yeah, it's kind of racy bucket, but in a car of that cost and that big, like it's

meant for crossing long distance. You know who I just met at the Concourse Club is the CEO of

Sabelt who was there. And I, and I said to him, you know, I like your products, I like your safety

products. I gotta tell you, I just drove this $600,000 Ferrari and you made their seats. And it

does not have adjustable lumbar support. And he said, well, we make like four seats for that car.

And it just, it depends which one, you know, the base seat does not have an adjustable lumbar

support. And I said, I said, is it, is that weird that, and he said, well, I mean, you know,

Ferrari people or, you know, whatever. And I go, I go, but this car came equipped with like

special contrast stitching and, and I was like, do you, do you normally see like

someone who would order like a highly optioned car with the base seat and goes, yeah, you see that.

You do see that. Really? Yeah. Weird. Yeah, weird. I wonder if that's someone who goes,

if I get these options on the day, if I get the contrast stitching with carbon fiber,

people will see that. Well, they won't see the special seat. Press car. Press car. I mean,

if you're speccing a press car, all the options on that you can see. Yeah. And you know, when the

reviewer complains about lack of lumbar, you just go, well, it's available. You do what we

just did. We're like, you can option. Yeah. Yeah. Weird. You know, you know, it sucks about

that. I'm telling this to like the PR people that order the car is then we can't tell anybody if

the seat's good or not, which maybe you want, but we want to be able to tell people the optioned

eight way is great. Because what do we talk about with Porsche all the time? Get the good ones,

because we've experienced them. They're good. And that probably inspires people to buy the better

seat. Yeah. Live axle rose for 100 to 200 K. What is the best driving experience if I want a gated

manual gearbox car that's mid engine and has 10 or 12 cylinders are eight v 10 or Ferrari

Testarosa. These are enormously different. Different. I love this question. These are huge

different cars. How often you want to use this vehicle? Yeah. I mean, like, so the R eight v 10

is only going to feel not like a brand new car really, because the UI, the screen and

shit will be older. But like, the way you use that car with like fully automatic climate control

and like all the things that like a modern Audi would have, it's not going to feel like an old

car. A Testarosa is an old car. 40 years old. It's going to feel old. Now it's a wonderful thing.

And Testarosa are very well made. In my opinion, they're not that exciting to drive. I don't think

the flat 12 is that exciting of an engine compared to some other engines. The Testarosa is a lovely

touring car. Like I said, they're built really solidly. And if you do the major services and the

maintenance is they are reasonably reliable cars, people who drive them a lot, they do tend to work

properly, actually. But it's going to feel like an old car. It's not going to feel like a new car,

like a modern car. It's not going to have like good air conditioning. You know, it's going to be

clunky. They're it's going to be heavy controls and stuff like that. The ergonomics aren't going to

your feet are going to be like offset to the right and you know, things like that.

I think you're also, and I was trying to look up, Brian Scott just had this amazing woman on his

show, Victoria Bruno. She's like a 25 year old Ferrari tech. She works on vintage stuff. Oh yeah,

yeah, I know that is. She has a Testarosa that she drove from the Bay Area down to San Diego for

this show. And she's like trying to highlight that yes, you can use these cars, but she can work on

the car herself. Yeah. So this person has to be ready to incur the cost that will come with driving

it a lot. So it'll work better if you drive it a lot. Yeah, you're going to have to service it

more, but it will be more reliable. Like those 80s Ferraris, if you just start using them as a car,

like they work really good actually, they're very happy to be driven every day and they don't like

sitting. So like that's pretty cool. And like they are nice, but it's a heavy feeling car. It

doesn't have power steering. The shifter linkage is pretty tight. The clutch pedal is going to be

kind of heavy. AC might work, might not work. Yeah, I mean, it's incredibly analog. So it's just,

it's very hard to say there. One isn't better than the other. That's the problem. The problem with

asking a question. And I don't, I'm not trying to, but like a lot of people start a question with

what's the best. And they're, unless one of your two choices is like a horrible piece of junk or

something, like it's very rare that you come upon best. It's like, well, this delivers this and

this delivers this. And they're not the same. So like, which do you want? Well, like if you want

speed and more modern driving in terms of like braking performance, steering feel and performance,

convenience, comfort, RE. And when you roll into a parking lot, it's still going to have a presence.

It's still going to draw. Look, I think they're amazing. They're cool. The Tesla Rosa, it has

mystique about it. It will draw more people in a parking lot and it will deliver a different

type of driving experience. But so you have to decide, do you want the whole like vintage thing

and the classic sound and the whole like roll into the parking lot and win, but sometimes get a flat

bed home or do you want to go at R8? Yeah, I mean, you might still know about a flat, but it's just,

they're very different experiences. A 40 year old driving experience versus a seven year old,

eight year old driving experiences. These are worlds apart. A Tesla Rosa is not a regular car.

An R8 can be a regular car. A Tesla Rosa cannot be a regular car. It will never be a regular car.

It's a good question, but it's hard. There is no best. My cat's name is Bethany says,

Polestar has recently discontinued the two, at least in the US, and undergone a reverse stock

split recently, which doesn't look good for its future as a standalone brand. I've had a Polestar

too for the last two years. How fucked am I if Polestar closes down its US operations?

I've seen service delays on parts even before last year. My guess is Volvo dealers will continue

to service Polstars. I mean, Polestar is not that removed from Volvo at this point that it couldn't

be, right? Yeah. They could pick up the pieces if they wanted to. I think they either feel an

obligation. I don't know if there's a legal obligation, but I'm sure they will keep maintaining

those cars because they know how to service them. They might have some parts inventory.

Let's say Polestar closes or whatever. I wouldn't want to own a Polestar to 10 years from now,

where parts supply dwindles or they have to, oh, we got to change because the power unit

uses this old cable, but no one uses that anymore. You don't want to deal with that kind of stuff.

But for the short term, you'll probably be all right. There's only three left.

Granny shifted not double clutching like you should. How much of a factor do you think your

driving skills played or didn't play in your success? As in if you weren't as good of a driver,

would that have impeded your ability to reach the place that you've reached or not at all? What

are the top factors into overall success you've had in your career? It's definitely played a part.

For sure. If you're known for somebody who can go quick enough without bending the car,

you're in the pocket. That's the sweet spot. Everybody is willing to give you keys to their

cars knowing they're going to get that car back in the same condition. Not everybody gets to do

that. And if you fuck up a couple of times big enough, it's gone forever. Well, and you,

especially with the one take stuff, you're putting your resume on YouTube. Fans can see it. They go,

oh, that looks like it'll be a fun day, but my car will come back and it just kind of feeds itself.

And I think for me, like, I joined because I wanted to drive the cars, but I didn't, you know,

I was like behind camera for the first whatever amount of time. But the fact that you guys trusted

me to drive a camera car was like instrumental to my career. Otherwise, I would have been relegated

to, I don't know, whatever else position and I wouldn't have gotten the other jobs I got. Like,

all of that was kind of like, people who get to drive and people who don't get to drive.

Yeah, exactly. Yeah. No, but it's not, it's driving skills come from a lifetime of giving a

shit and practicing. So it's not, nobody wakes up being a good driver. Some people, and like,

by the way, I'm not the authority on this, there's a million fucking drivers better than me. But like,

I really did care about it. I really still do care about it. Something's very important to me

continuing to get better at driving and practicing and always taking every opportunity to like learn

and get better. It's really, really important. And if that isn't a passion, or if that wasn't a

passion for me, I don't think I would have been as successful. For sure. It is incredibly important.

Other top factors just make just keeping going. Yeah. I mean, keeping going when you don't want

to keep going, keeping going when the money sucks, keeping go like, like Eddie Vedder said,

the main reason we're still here is because we didn't break up.

And also, lots of patience. And look, straight up, luck. And at least in the beginning,

the resources of my parents, I didn't tap into them all that much. But the children of rich

parents can make risks. In the backstop. Yeah, that other people, most people, you fuck up a

business, you don't get another crack at it so easily. If I fucked up a business, I would have

been able to make this sheepish call like, hey, I need some money and I wouldn't have been in a

cardboard box. That is an incredible privilege and benefit that like most people don't get.

And dude, so much right place, right time. Yeah, so much like luck, like just fucking luck.

I think some luck, but I think both you and I and Tom, we moved to LA at the same time.

We didn't know each other. But we all were in, I think having the passion for cars is very important

because it will keep you going when there's no money. It will keep you going when you,

like that motivated us for a long time, still does. And it motivated us to go,

where do they make media with automobiles? Los Angeles, I guess. So like we put ourselves there

and then there's a lot of luck with that timing. But I think we also just started saying yes to

things that made sense for where we wanted to end up. Yeah, I mean, you know, my first, I got in

the door, not because I woke up one day and said, I'm going to start a YouTube channel and make fucking

100 video. I got in the door because a guy said, I made like five videos with Larry.

Right, that's right. Like five videos to promote our business with Larry. And this, and a guy

said, do you want a job, a full time job making videos? Like that doesn't happen. That's never

going to happen again. Nobody's ever going to make five videos and then a corporation's going to hire

them to make videos full time. That doesn't happen. So like if that didn't happen, none of this happens.

I'd be running a car wash with Larry still probably, you know, so luck, you know, and then when the

luck strikes be ready, you know, like when you get the opportunity, take it, don't fuck it up.

You know, keep going through the bad times and continue to develop whatever your skills are

that will make you, I mean, when I couldn't afford Tom anymore to edit, I'd learn to edit.

You can't afford to do this thing. Well, I'd better learn to do it. Can't afford to own,

gotta better learn to get this, do this myself. Like, you know, just fucking keep going, you know.

Panic at my disco. What was the rationale behind setting a reserve on the NSX versus going no

reserve? I was literally just hedging against the possibility that because it was between Christmas

and New Year's, that the traffic just might be horrible, and it just potentially could tank.

The reserve was low. The reserve was 153 or something. I would have broke even,

but like, if it didn't hit reserve, it would have been a big fucking, it would have been a

major tank. So like, I didn't want to take a huge bath on that car.

You could also, if it peaked at 140, you can keep the car stored. You can wait till people kind

of get their money after the tax returns in April. If it tanked, I could have relisted it later

elsewhere and it wouldn't have been a huge deal. I think some people, when they go reserve off,

they just need to get it out because it's costing them more money to sit on it or whatever.

Yeah, this car, yeah, it was just because I wanted to sell it before the end of the year,

but if it wasn't going to get at least above a certain threshold that I strongly believed it

would get to no matter what, and it did, that I did not want to have to take a low number just

because. Whereas in the past, Fox Body or whatever, like, you know, I wasn't into that car for that

much money. A lot of people donated their time or donated products or a lot of sponsored stuff,

and so no reserve, yeah, fuck it, send it, because it's fine. If this thing makes 25 grand,

like no big deal, and it was charity, it was fun, and I do love a no reserve auction under

the right circumstances. This one, though, it was really that end of year timing where I go,

I think it'll be fine, but like just in case, I'm not literally going to bet $150,000,

right, that it'll be fine, you know. Last one, Chris Souya says, happy 10-year anniversary

of the supercharged Huracan video. All right, I almost threw that video away.

Because of the log. Because of the log, this is fucked, guy was dragging a log,

and I almost threw that away. Instead, we did four million views or something in 24 hours.

That's crazy. Yep, best. That's the other, you know, look, virality half the time is just luck,

you know. Yeah. Crazy. Well, if you feel like you were shortchanged this month because you didn't

get a podcast the first week, just think about last year where we took off the entire first month

and people stuck around. So, we gave you three more weeks of podcasts, plus we put up the Perot

show. The Pro Patrons Got podcast last week. It was a long show, too. And they got it early in

January. They got it early in January. It was a long show, and they got it while other people

weren't. There is value in the Patreon, folks. Get in the game while you can. Thanks, everybody,

for listening. We will see you next time. Bye.

F/M/K; Arizona Speed Law; RUFing Miami

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