A Shelby GT 500 is a special, high-performance version of the Ford Mustang made by Shelby. Here it’s the car someone used to teach the guest how to drive a stick shift.
The Shelby GT500 is a very powerful sports car based on the Mustang. It’s designed for fast acceleration and more exciting driving than a typical car. The mention of a big Hurst shifter points to a manual-style driving setup.
A Hurst shifter is a performance-style gear shifter. It’s designed to make shifting feel more precise, and it’s what was on the car used to teach the manual driving lesson.
The McLaren F1 is a famous, very rare supercar made by McLaren. People remember it because it was built to be incredibly fast and driver-focused, and it even has a distinctive seating setup.
Car
Gary Cooper's Duesenberg
A Duesenberg is a very famous old luxury car brand from the early days of American car racing and prestige. “Gary Cooper’s Duesenberg” means a Duesenberg that belonged to the actor Gary Cooper.
The Porsche Carrera GT is a rare, high-end Porsche supercar. It’s the kind of car that’s so expensive and special that Porsche didn’t want just anyone driving it.
Mossport is a race track in Canada. The key point here is that it doesn’t have much “runoff” space, so if you make a mistake, there’s less room to recover safely.
A “minder” here means someone supervising you while you drive. They’re there to help keep things safe and under control, especially with a very expensive car.
Traction control helps keep the tires from spinning when you accelerate or turn on slippery or low-grip surfaces. If you turn it off, the car can break loose and slide more, which is exactly what they’re describing.
“Sideways” means the car isn’t pointing where it’s going—its rear is sliding out. In this story, they’re doing it on purpose (after turning off traction control) and correcting with steering.
When a car starts sliding sideways, the driver may turn the steering wheel the opposite way to the slide. That’s called opposite lock, and it helps the driver control the drift.
A hairpin is a super tight corner, like a near-U-turn. It’s the kind of turn where the car has to slow down a lot and can easily start sliding if grip is low.
Car
Norton Commando
The Norton Commando is a famous old British motorcycle. People talk about it because it has a distinctive engine and it was known for being a bit of a mixed bag back in its day.
Brand
British bike
They’re talking about motorcycles made in the UK. Back then, people sometimes expected them to have more quirks than newer designs.
A speed record attempt is when someone tries to set the fastest speed they can, following certain rules. It usually happens at tracks where cars can safely go extremely fast.
AMA Superbike is a high-level motorcycle racing class in the U.S. It’s for fast, race-prepped versions of street bikes, and being a champion there is a big deal.
A “bike test” is when reviewers ride a motorcycle and judge how it performs and feels. It’s more than just looking at specs—it’s about how the bike behaves.
“Lingo” means the special words and ways motorcycle reviewers talk about bikes. The idea is that motorcycle testing uses different terms than car testing, so it can be a different experience to follow.
The Toyota Corolla is a regular, everyday car made for commuting and errands. It’s popular because it’s practical and usually straightforward to own. It may be mentioned as a contrast to more expensive or high-performance cars.
ABS is a safety system that helps your brakes not lock up. When you brake hard, it automatically pulses the braking force so you can usually steer instead of sliding.
A “V twin” is a motorcycle engine with two cylinders. The cylinders are set up like a V, and that layout helps create a recognizable ride feel and sound.
“Restore” in this context means bringing an older motorcycle back to a usable or original-condition state, often by repairing worn parts and refreshing systems. It’s a common enthusiast activity that can range from light recommissioning to full teardown work.
A carburetor is a part that helps the engine get the right mix of fuel and air. If it’s not set up right, the car can run poorly or stall, which is why people often work on it when a car won’t behave.
Fuel injection is a modern way of getting gas into the engine using valves and sensors. Compared to older carburetors, it usually makes the car start and run more consistently.
Car
Honda CBR 600
The Honda CBR 600 is a sport motorcycle. The speaker likes it for track riding because it’s easier to handle and less intimidating than some faster, more demanding bikes.
A Peugeot 505 is a mid-size car made by Peugeot. Dave Durso says it was the first European car he ever drove, so it left a strong impression on him.
Car
Rambler American
The Rambler American is an older American car model. Dave brings it up to explain that his European-car experience felt different from what he already knew.
LIVE
Welcome to the podcast of Motor Week,
television's original automotive magazine.
Motor Week is made possible by auto value and bumper to bumper, entire rack.com.
Here's your Motor Week podcast host, John Davis.
And welcome to our Motor Week podcast. I am indeed your host, John Davis.
And we're glad to have you with us for another special episode of our show,
where we continue to celebrate our 45th anniversary by talking to a special guest from our past.
And that means that this episode is also being video recorded and can be seen on our YouTube channel.
Now the visuals on our show are obviously very important since television is a visual medium.
But just as important to us at Motor Week are the words written to compliment that footage.
Today's guest spent over two decades on our staff, starting as a research writer and eventually becoming head writer.
Week after week, he was tasked with figuring out the most creative ways to both praise and critique the latest vehicles that we tested.
Welcome to the podcast, Dave Derso.
Thank you.
Yay!
And also joining us on the podcast today is our producer, Jessica Ray, our Motor Week digital producer.
Glad to have you with us as always.
Okay, Dave Derso, give us a little idea of your background.
You came to us in 1987. You left us sadly in 2009.
What about the days before you joined us? Give us a little backstory.
Before I joined it, I had gone to Kutztown University and got my degree in television production, like a lot of folks,
and moved down to the Maryland area looking for work, like so many folks that started working off and on here at Maryland Public Television as a production assistant.
I remember on like a children's show, We Wonders. I worked on the pilot for that, things like that, so in and out.
And then when a position at Motor Week came up, I applied for that.
Now you had no real car knowledge at that point.
I was not a car guy. I was a little bit of television, but fortunately you were willing to take a chance on me, which you did with a lot of people.
A lot of us got our starts because John said, we're going to give you a shot, and I'm very grateful for that.
And so yeah, and so you took me on and first day in there, put me in there with the head writer, Martin Peters, at the time.
He went, boom, here, have this done tomorrow.
Hey, we're on a deadline. We've got 52 shows a year to produce.
But the fact that you didn't, I'm curious about if you recall how you approached it, because I remember very, that you were very enthusiastic,
that you really wanted to come to work for us.
And it was very obvious that you had a great background, you had a great head for memories.
But not being a car person might have been a little intimidating, but how did you tackle that?
It was a steep learning curve, a lot of reading.
I recall you pointed me at all the press kits and go, there's your background information.
It was all on paper at the time.
Big binders.
Big binders, and I was like, OK, I got a lot of reading to do.
And of course, car magazines and all that.
So yeah, it was a lot to take in early on.
Unfortunately, everybody was really supportive.
And that's one thing about being on Motor Week staff was everybody was like, do you need help with anything?
Do you need to answer questions?
You know, I would really basic stuff like, I didn't know how to drive a stick when I got there.
And you learned?
I was going to ask, did you remember who taught you?
Craig Singas taught me in his Shelby GT 500 in the parking lot.
And with big hurst shifter and all.
And I was like, this man is very trusting to let me behind the wheel of this thing.
Wonderful guy.
He saw the same thing in you, I think that I did.
This guy's going to go places.
Yeah, so yeah.
But like I said, the fact that he trusted me with his transmission was amazing.
So when Martin, Martin Peters was your supervisor.
And can you remember any of the words of wisdom that he might have given you at the beginning to get you started?
Or did he just throw you in there?
He said detail is really important.
Martin was very, very good, excellent writer.
Great person to learn from because he really taught me, he really shaped me as a writer, a television writer,
because he wouldn't sit down and go, this is good, crap.
This is where you need to make improvements.
So that was very good.
And also we had a whole editing process.
Once it left us, you then would edit it and then you would come back with your feedback.
So that was really invaluable.
That really hasn't changed.
Yeah.
So yeah, so it was like going to writing school in a very compressed timeframe.
But you were with us for 20 years.
So can you give us an idea of how your job changed over all of that period?
I think it got a little more involved.
It went from just being a writer to then being a test driver,
and then having to travel and represent the show at press events.
And it really became, it expanded all my skills dealing with people,
which even carries over to what I do now.
I mean, dealing with people, I learned a lot of those people skills at motor week.
So I'm a mental health counselor now.
I would deal with people every day.
And a lot of that comes from that ease of meeting new people constantly.
You really have an incredible resume.
After you left us, you continued to do a little bit on the media writing side,
but you were basically in school to do an entirely different profession.
You want to talk about that?
Yeah.
When I left motor week, I wanted to get into the medical field.
So I was like, how do you get into the medical field?
So I became an emergency medical technician on an ambulance.
Moved from there, I was working as a nursing assistant in a trauma unit
in a hospital up in Allentown, Pennsylvania.
Oh, high pressure.
Yeah, jobs.
That was interesting.
And that put me in touch with people who were struggling with mental health issues,
which led me to the mental health field.
And I went back to school, got my master's degree,
starting at Gulf Coast University down in Naples, Florida.
And then due to some family obligations, moved back and finished it at Kutztown.
But when you were in Florida, you had a chance to work with the Rev Institute,
which a lot of people don't know.
They really are.
It's one of the most remarkable automotive museums in the country.
They're really the holy grail if you're into competition and race cars.
You want to talk a little about Revs and what you did there?
That was one very cool job.
I worked in the library, the research library.
People don't realize the massive research library, the amount of information they have,
everything from old press materials to posters, vintage posters from Le Mans in 1929 or something like that.
So I was one of the people tasked with maintaining all that and sorting through it
because new collections would come in constantly.
A motorsports photographer would retire and they'd buy everything.
They'd go in and they'd go, well, buy your entire portfolio.
And then we'd have to sort through hundreds of thousands of images
and figure where they are, who it was, sometimes things weren't labeled.
But you actually, with your background, you helped them identify a lot of that?
Actually, the funny thing is sometimes I'd pull slides out and go, oh, I know who that is.
And they're like, how do you know who that is?
I know his helmet.
That detail orientation.
So that was the, it used to be called the Collier collection.
So people in Florida are probably more familiar with that.
But I've been there a couple of times.
And walking through those doors, it's like Disneyland for automotive enthusiasts.
It's amazing.
It is amazing.
And you would see cars you never thought you could stand next to.
And they all ran.
They had a full-time mechanical staff, kept everything running.
A lot of times they were very generous with it too.
The mechanics would come in the library sometime and go,
hey, we just fired up the McLaren F1.
You want to ride?
Maybe, yeah.
Twist my arm.
Gary Cooper's Duesenberg.
They were like, you want to ride in it?
I think so.
So to say that you've ridden in so many of these cars,
like I said, it was such a cool place to work for a little while.
But you, when you were with Motor Week,
you certainly expanded your horizons even then.
You must have traveled just about everywhere.
You met a lot of people.
Let's go back and talk about some of those incredible remembrances.
You and I talked quite a bit on the phone.
And you were always mentioning some faraway place and somebody,
that if you're into automotive at all, you remember the name.
So what are some of your most memorable trips
and some of the most memorable people that you met
while you were working with us?
Well, as you mentioned, we got to travel a lot.
Sometimes in a moment's notice.
Yeah, and a lot of these were functions.
They introduced a new car.
And one was when Porsche introduced the Carrera GT,
and it was up in Canada, I think, at Mossport, the track.
And the car was $400,000.
They were very hesitant to let a bunch of press people drive this thing.
There's no runoff at Mossport.
And so they were like, well, we'll put you in the car with a minder,
and you can have a couple of slow laps.
A quote-unquote professional?
Yeah.
Well, and then so we pot around, and they were like,
OK, you experienced the Carrera GT.
Now, if you want, you have an option to ride with a professional.
And I was like, who's the professional?
And they said Walter Rural.
Now, Walter Rural was two-time World Rally Champion.
And I was a big rally fan, so it was like asking a Catholic
if you want to have lunch with the Pope.
And so I get in with Walter Rural, this very reserved German gentleman,
with a very thick German accent.
And he took me out, and he took me off.
What I thought was a very fast lap.
And he was probably just poking around.
Yeah, and he was, because what turned out was,
after the first fast lap, we get on the front straight,
and again, his very German accent, he's like,
and now I'm going to turn off the traction control.
And we were sideways everywhere for the next couple of laps.
I mean, full opposite lock.
And my balls are about to pop out of your head.
And I was just holding on for dear life.
And the best part was, there's a very tight hairpin.
We went into it, and we had a camera crew along at the time.
The camera had, I think Ray Kawada, in fact, shot that.
And Rural goes into the corner, and he goes,
oh, look, there's your camera.
And full opposite lock, tires are pouring smoke off,
but he waves to the camera.
And one hand on the wheel, just waving to the camera,
casually like he's driving to 7-Eleven.
Right.
I mean, it was amazing to actually do that.
I have a little question.
Less of a memory, like of a trip or something.
But I do know that right now, Brian Robinson
does our two-wheeling reporting.
Which was a segment invented by Dave.
Can you talk a little bit about how,
because before this idea came about, we weren't testing bikes.
We really had not gotten into the two-wheeling at all.
So how did it come about?
How did it come into your mind?
Well, I'd always been interested in bikes anyway.
I was a kid.
My dream bike was a Norton Commando.
So it was like, which, being a British bike of the time,
probably didn't run very well, but I still wanted one.
So when we came into this, I was getting kind of more into it myself.
And I thought, let's give it a try.
Did you have a bike at that time?
Actually, I didn't have a bike at the time.
Did you have your license?
I had my license.
OK.
But I went to John and said, can we do bikes?
And John, of course, went, well, can you make it interesting?
Right.
Because this show...
Because you were going to have to be the host for it.
Yeah.
There was basically, this was going to be your baby.
Yeah.
Because John doesn't do bikes.
I don't do bikes.
Yeah, but he said, we have a standard to maintain.
So you better keep it interesting.
And so I started out doing really basic bikes.
I think our first was Suzuki GS500.
I mean, the quintessential beginner bike.
Sure.
When and did just...
Which was perfect for me.
And we worked our way up through more interesting motorcycles and getting a chance to do things
like we did an entire show on Harley-Davidson one day.
Yes, we did.
We got to do a trip with the Harley-Ones group.
We rode from Milwaukee, Wisconsin to Sturgeon, South Dakota.
Very cool.
Like 300 other people.
Wow.
That's the pilgrimage.
Yeah.
That is.
And in fact, at the time, Maria Purdom was doing, was a segment producer with us.
And she had never ridden a motorcycle in her life.
And we said, do you want to do a segment?
And she's like...
Really?
And she went and took the Motorcycle Safety Foundation course.
Her first long ride was from Milwaukee to Sturgeon, South Dakota.
That was her first ride.
Her first ride other than a putt around the neighborhood.
And she pulled it off with...
Not a problem.
Fearless.
Another great name from the past.
Oh yeah.
She was amazing.
And she just was like, put me on the bike.
We're ready to go.
And she did the whole trip.
No problems.
But you basically, what you brought to motorcycles for us was the same kind of attention to detail
that you brought to cars.
And we weren't sure whether or not our audience would like it or not.
Because it's primarily a four-wheeled audience.
But they embraced you very quickly.
And very quickly, people were saying, more bikes, please.
And you sort of set the path that Brian Robinson continues to follow.
Yeah.
He's done a great job with it, too.
He's taken it to the next level from what I did.
So it's nice to see something we started is still going.
And Brian's doing a fabulous job with it.
And I remember when you decided to leave us, I said, now, who's going to do the bike?
Who's going to do the bike?
And I do miss that some days.
Because we got to ride some bikes that I can't afford.
Sure.
Oh yeah.
Oh yeah.
And you also had a very scary situation with a bike at Roebling Road as well, too.
That was quite a crash.
I don't think I heard about this.
Well, we were doing a track test with, and I forgot to move the bike.
Which we don't typically do bike track tests.
Certainly not now.
And that was what happened is Dave was doing a track test and we had done some others.
And we had an accident.
So no other way to put it.
Stuffed it into the tire wall.
And Roebling has a lot of tire walls.
I remember taking Dave to the hospital.
Because for some reason there was not an ambulance there that day.
Now there's always an ambulance.
We always have an ambulance there.
And basically we took him to one of the Savannah hospitals that was the nearest.
And they got you back up and got you mobile.
So you didn't have to stay overnight or anything.
I don't recall.
I was moving slow the next time.
Yeah.
You were moving slow.
And there wasn't much left of that bike.
We decided, well, I don't think we're going to do any more track tests.
Unless we hire a professional rider, which we did after that a couple of times.
A guy named Jeff Atwell, who was a regional racer and semi pro guy, fabulous rider.
Very professional.
He took it.
He's great.
And we got some great footage working with Jeff.
So you can't say we didn't learn from the experience.
Unfortunately it was at your expense a little bit.
The funny thing is after that, doing track days became my hobby.
There you go.
I can't do a fork anymore, but I'll get another bike.
I just went and did it for fun.
I'm glad to see that you're still ride.
So really love riding.
Yeah.
And actually I want to get back into track days again soon.
I need a track bike.
My street bike will not do that.
So I need to get something for the racetrack.
So that's my next goal.
Let's bring you back to the car side.
Can you recall, again, I want to hear some of the places you went.
And some other of the, you've met a lot of very famous people in some of those trips.
When people ask you, who are the most memorable people you ever met?
You mentioned one.
There must be others.
Oh yeah.
Well, I have to say, got to meet Jay Leno, who asked actually at a function, Porsche function
again.
When they did the 2005, Talladega speed record attempt.
And Jay was one of the drivers.
And it was, I forget who's, who originally, it was, we're working with another.
You're doing great, Dave.
Don't worry about it.
Jay was involved with that.
And he was a great driver and the nicest person you've ever met in your life.
Amazing.
People would, people who swept the floors of Talladega would be coming up for autographs
and he would be nice.
And the best, the best thing Jay would do would be someone would be standing in the pits on
their cell phone talking to a family member going, I'm standing right next to Jay Leno
and Jay will, who are you talking to?
My mom, give me the phone.
Hey mom, it's Jay Leno.
He must have done that a half a dozen times, made people's day.
And he, he just did it naturally.
He was just so kind to everyone.
Well, I've only met him a couple of times, but you meet him and it's like he's known
you all his life.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Just nicest guy.
And I met one of my personal heroes.
Motorcycle racer named Scott Russell.
He was AMA Superbike Race or AMA Superbike Champion, World Superbike Champion.
And we were at a Kawasaki function at Laguna Seca.
And at the time I was still learning how to ride on a race track.
So I was kind of putting around.
So, you know, Laguna Seca turned five is the left-hander up the hill.
And I was out by myself up the hill, got to turn six at the top of the left-hander at
the top of the hill, looked in my mirrors.
Nobody there.
It's clear.
We're fine.
There's the apex.
Russell's inside me.
He went from that hole, that long straightaway was empty to in the space of a couple seconds.
He was in, we're talking 12 inches between my bike and the curb.
He went up the inside.
Scared the living damage.
I was going to say, you look up and he's there and you didn't even know it.
I stood the bike up.
I rode off the track.
I wobbled back to the pits.
I'm pulling off my helmet.
Here comes Scott Russell walking towards me in a very purposeful manner.
And I'm thinking, I'm about to get the riot act read to me by the World Superbike Champion
in front of the entire motorcycle press.
And he comes up and he says in that kind of thick Georgia accent of his, are you okay?
I'm real sorry.
I scared you.
Again, it turned out to be the nicest guy in the world.
A real Southern gentleman.
But to have the World Superbike Champion apologize for running you off the track.
Like forgot where it was for a second.
Like what he was doing, you know what I mean?
He was just doing his thing.
He was probably chilling out.
He saw a gap.
Yeah.
And it was like, oh, I got 12 inches there to get through.
He was, you know, he didn't think twice about it.
Your bike test though really hit home with a lot of people I think that probably weren't
even watching motorway at that time.
I seem to recall that you got a lot of feedback from the bike community.
We did actually seem to pick up some, like an extra audience that who had not really
cared about cars.
Yeah, they weren't really car people, but we got that.
And we did get a lot of good feedback.
So it was fun to hear from people saying, hey, thank you for, we tested the Ducati 916,
which most of us will never afford anything like that.
And the people going, that was really cool.
We got to see that.
Even local riders would even say, hey, can I come by?
And can I stand next to it?
That bike scared the hell out of me, but I did admit.
But that was a very challenging bike to ride.
Well, the thing that the bike tests too is like, it's like very hard to like, I think
find other publications that are doing it like more often.
Because it's really something that it just seems like larger publications seem to do,
like the car and driver, the road and track, the motor trends.
And it takes someone that's an aficionado, that's someone that really wants to do bikes
because it's a different lingo.
It's a different way of testing.
Yeah, evaluating.
Valuating.
So, you know, the very fact that I remember when you walked in the office and with the
idea, to me, it's like, you know, I'm a producer.
I'm saying, wow, that means something we haven't done before, something new.
And when you're doing 52 weeks a year, you're always looking for something new to spark up
the audience.
And the two wheeling segments did just that.
And also, it gave you a break.
Yeah, I get out of the office.
Also, I don't think people really understand what it's like to be in the position you are
in, where every week, you're either riding or supervising two or three scripts about
the cars that are going to be on a show, say, four weeks from now.
And it is an assembly line.
Can you talk about that?
How did you keep the vehicle straight from one show to the next?
And more importantly, how did you train yourself to be able to evaluate, well, a Lamborghini
one week and a Corolla the next?
Again, I had to learn a lot of organization and keep track of the different vehicles we
were working on.
And fortunately, also, the rest of the crew is also keeping track of those vehicles.
So it was very much a team effort in that case.
And, yeah, admittedly, there were times when my desk looked like a disaster area.
And I was like, there's the crew.
Mine still does.
And everything is all piled together.
But I muddled through somehow.
So it was challenging at times.
But I enjoyed it, actually.
It was a lot of fun to just learn all this new stuff and learning the history along the
way of these vehicles as well.
Because we had to include a lot of history in our road test.
Especially in the beginning, right?
Because when you started, there probably were models that we were driving that it was the
first time we were ever testing that car.
Many times.
Many times with that.
And there wasn't a lot of background on...
Nobody else was doing what we were doing.
Yeah.
And we were constantly on the phone calling the car company going, what about this?
What about this?
This wasn't in the press kit.
What about this detail?
And they'd be like, why do you keep calling us?
Well, they were used to dealing with the written press.
And their needs were simply different.
Because we were looking for things that visually would be interesting and also help tell the
story of the automobile.
You were fortunate that you came from a radio TV background in school.
So you actually had a leg up over some of the writers that followed you that had really
no TV background at all.
Because it is different writing for television versus print.
Very different.
Yeah.
And that's it.
We had to think about the visual side all the time.
And whether it was...
And it was different between doing the cars and the bikes.
Because the camera crew then had to adapt.
The videographers had to adapt to a very different vehicle with dynamics.
It goes through a corner in a completely different line.
And fortunately, Ray Kawada, Pat Stallionis, they were great cameramen.
And they would...
Marlene Rodman, all these great videographers, they had adapted.
They took them a couple of tries and they were like, I got this.
And they were good then.
So that was really interesting to kind of work in.
How do we work in the visual stuff?
Sometimes we'd be digging, finding...
Calling the car company going, do you have any slides?
Do you have any photographs?
We need to cover a lot of information.
And we can't just leave the car up on screen for 30 seconds.
Yeah, people don't realize if there's one thing that changed the way we do video production...
Actually, there's been a couple.
Easily could say drones have played a big issue today.
But many cameras, GoPro's, they came along.
They enabled us to get all these little detail shots very quickly.
Where before with Ray, it would sometimes take a half an hour to set up to get whatever.
A little shot of the wheel going through a corner or something.
He's in there with a 30 pound camera inside the car trying to get a shot of a gauge.
Which is now so much easier, I'm sure.
But credit to them, all the videographers, they were like, we'll get the shot one way or another.
And they would just...
If they had to be here late, they'd get the shot.
And they were very creative.
Because I would come up with...
I'm not sure what to cover this with.
Ray would look at the script and go, I can get you something.
They were such an important part of the creative process.
And I don't think videographers get the credit sometimes.
So we were so lucky to have so many good ones.
And we still are, I have to say.
There's something about working for us.
I think that a lot of videographers...
I won't say that they do the same things.
But even though we do a basic shot list for every car, every car is different.
So there's always some challenge there to kind of keep everybody's blood rushing a little bit.
Including the writers and the editor.
And every shot list always had like another 42 things penciled in at the moment.
Yeah, often I go through a car and you go...
I was responsible for some of that.
Can you get that shot of whatever?
But also we'd find things.
We'd look at a car, because sometimes the car would roll into the lot
and we'd always go out and do our walk around.
And go through the car and go, what the heck is that?
Then we'd look in the press kit, that's not in the press kit.
What is that? We'd have to call them and they'd...
Oh, we didn't mention that?
Yeah, so we'd add it on.
So every car was an exploration of what is this function?
I think especially at that, like I would say in the late 80s and early 90s
is more and more technology is making its way into cars
and you're sort of having to go through the minutia of like ABS
and all these different new...
I'm trying to think of like features that would be showing up.
Maybe like heated seats.
Well, any of the electronics when we first started seeing navigation systems in cars
they were pretty regimented.
Digital dashboards.
Digital dashboards and they go back a long way.
Yes, Buick I think very famously had some digital...
And they also did in the Riata one of the first big screens.
I remember that one, that car.
I went on the press trip for that in fact, that was interesting.
CRT, the CRTs in there.
And we all looked at it and said, what happens when that dies?
How do you replace that?
I'm still kind of asking that question today.
Forty years later.
Give us an idea of what led you up to when you decided to leave us
and pursue a profession where basically I think your help to individuals
was a little more direct.
What kind of led you to that?
Was it something we did?
Something we said?
I think I just wanted a change in life.
I guess you can call it a midlife crisis, but in my case instead of buying a sports car
I couldn't afford.
I decided to move to a different, you know, explore a different profession
and I wasn't sure what I was going to do.
I was interested in the medical field, but I was, you know, how do I get that?
I'm not going to medical school.
I don't have hundreds of thousands of dollars to do that with.
So that led me to, like I said, trying things.
What's the easiest thing to get into?
I can become an EMT, you know, and learn what that is about.
Go on 911 calls, things like that.
And then what's the next step?
But that took quite a bit of schooling.
I remember when you were in school for that.
Yeah, that was, and it was really interesting work, but then it became,
can I make a living doing this?
This is a tough, that's a tough field to make a living at.
It's very tough.
So the next level of training I could go to the hospital and they would train me
as a, as what they call the tech and which is really a nursing assistant.
And, but you could do things like suddenly I could do blood draws.
I could do EKGs and that my next step up.
And I did, I stayed in the trauma unit for a couple of years and which was night shift
in a trauma unit.
So that was always an adventure.
You never knew what was rolling in the door.
But then you made another big change.
So how did that happen?
Well, as I said, in the trauma unit, you run into a lot of people who unfortunately
mental health crises and physical injury frequently go together.
And we would, apparently I'm calm.
And you are.
Come to me and say, sometimes you would scare me.
You are so calm.
But sometimes the staff, when you go talk to her 19, he's agitated.
You see milk a with them.
So I would go and I would, you know, talk to them.
And I after a while I kept happening and I was like, maybe this is my field.
Maybe you're calling like people seem to see that in you that you when I had some very
successful encounters with people who are really struggling with mental health.
And I thought, let's look into this.
And fortunately, I was able to quickly find out what was involved.
I could become a counselor and I get a master's degree.
So that was the big jump was to now I'm committed.
I'm going to go into the mental health field and I got my master's in clinical mental
health counseling and then moved on to licensure and all that.
And that's been what I've been doing ever since.
And it's it's very rewarding.
I'm very I really love my job.
Do you see any link between that calmness that you obviously put to excellent use during
counseling and also you were very calm as a writer on motor week.
I mean, sometimes it would be like his Dave in there.
Honestly, I don't recall ever seeing you lose your cool around the office.
If you did, I wasn't there.
So but do you see any link there that one somehow lets you know you might be able to
be successful in the other or was it just natural?
I think I think it's just natural.
I don't I'm not I don't think you mentioned losing my temper.
I can't remember the last time.
I can either.
So I guess that's the way.
So but in fact, my boss refers to me as the calm one.
So but it's it's you know, I'm fortunate that it's worked out really well in the fact that
I've been able to take this step from this really rewarding first career to this really
rewarding second career.
So I'm very grateful for that.
But you haven't completely forgotten your first career.
I mean, you're yeah, I wouldn't say well, you're still an automotive enthusiast, but
you're still very much a bike enthusiast.
So what do you own?
What do you write?
How long have you had it?
Believe it or not, I when was at motor week, my main bike initially was a
Honda Hawk GT in 1989 Honda Hawk GT little 650 V twin love that bike.
But I'm fairly tall and it was this little small for me.
So I moved to a ZR Kawasaki ZR 1100 big bike.
But then when I got into all my moving around for school and stuff, I gave up bikes for
a couple of years because I couldn't car one to Florida for school.
So just recently, a friend of mine contacted me and said, Hey, I was wanted to do a little
project with my son.
We wanted to restore a bike.
So we found this 89 Honda Hawk GT in a barn and we got a run again.
And he said, I'm not into biking anymore.
Do you want it?
I was like, Yeah, how much he's like, you can have it.
So got it back.
This is my first bike back.
Is it in the middle of your living room?
It is actually in a friend's garage near here in Ellicott City because I can't get the
carburetor straight down.
Oh, you can't drive it home yet.
I've ridden it once.
It stalled like 42 times.
Oh, no.
And I made it back to my garage and then I called my friend Tom and said, he's a much
better mechanic than I am.
So we're that's our summer project is to get the Hawk running again and then determine
if I'm going to keep that or I'm going to get something with fuel injection.
I was going to say, you can't get the gasoline out of your veins, Dave.
So and also, as I said, I want to get back on the racetrack.
So that means my old track bike was a Honda CBR 600.
I'd like to get another one, roughly that same lineage around 2000 because that was
a very forgiving motorcycle on the racetrack.
Summit Point racetrack, as you know, is a challenging track.
And but it's my favorite track.
And that bike was tremendous fun around that track.
So we'll see.
That's my goal in the next couple of years.
I have too many hobbies that cost too much money.
Well, as we come to sort of the end of this podcast, how about is there anything that
you'd like to pass on to everyone watching in and listening today about what it was
like working with us for those 20 years?
What do you remember most about it?
You've talked about some of the people you met.
Anything else, just something that you wake up in the middle of the night and say, geez,
that was fun.
I think there was always a discovery that I got to try, meet different people, try different
things, new experiences, just learning the first time you drive a European car.
Peugeot 505.
Never forget that car.
Oh, 505.
Yeah.
I mean, but that was the first European car I ever drove.
I dropped driving a Rambler American.
You know, I dodged Dart.
Those are my cars.
And I drove this and I was like, this is different.
This is not like I knew.
I know cars.
So things like that were great, great fun.
That experience of like, this is what a European car feels like that.
And like I said, the people, that was the best part was the people.
We had such a cool crew of people who were so much fun to work with.
You could enjoy going to work.
It wasn't like, oh, God, I've got to go to work.
It's like, you know, what are we going to do today?
We're going on a trip to see a new Porsche or we're going to shoot a bike test or we're
going to, you know, I can't believe we got a Lamborghini.
And you get paid for doing this.
And you get paid.
And I should say, throughout my 22 years at motor work, I cannot tell you how many people
you would meet and what do you do for a living?
I tell them they go, that's the coolest job in the world.
And you realize how lucky you are because everybody envy you, even on your worst day
when we're swamped and we're stressed and all that, somebody would come up to you and
go, you're the luckiest guy in the world.
That is so true.
It's the easiest like piece of small talk.
You know, if you ever find yourself in an awkward situation, you just, well, what do you do?
What do you do for a living?
I do this thing where I drive and evaluate new cars and they're like, wait, that's a
job?
I still hear it from people today.
Really?
You meet somebody, you talk about your history and you mention that and they're like, that
was your job.
Yeah, we sometimes take it for granted, especially when, you know, deadlines approach and everything
else are all the normal stresses that you have in any workplace.
But we really have been very, very lucky to have this chance to work in my case for 45
years.
But the 20 years you had with us are just wonderful years.
And I hope you understand what an enormous contribution you gave to this broadcast.
And your legacy is pretty much there for everybody to see.
Well, thank you.
All the retro road test.
Yeah, and it was just like great part of my growth as a person and as a, you know, and
led me to work.
If it hadn't had the career and motivation, I wouldn't be where I am now.
Well, thank you, Dave Durso, 1987 to 2009.
It's been an absolute delight to have you as our guest today.
Thanks for coming down and giving us your time.
Thank you for the fun.
Okay, everybody.
Well, as they say, we need to pay the piper.
So really quick, I want to thank the sponsors of this podcast and everything.
Motor week, auto value and bumper to bumper.
And the good folks over at tire rack.com.
We know our viewers and our listeners appreciate your dedication to motor week.
I also want to remind everyone listening that all of our motor week information in our videos
are also available on our free motor week app.
Be sure to download it today.
And on that app, you'll find a unique power tab that allows you to quickly search the specs
of every clean fuel vehicle on sale, both new and used.
You know what they say?
You can take it with you so you make sure you never miss a mile of motor week.
And thank you for listening to our podcast today.
If you're wondering what time motor week can be seen on your local public television station,
hop over to our website motor week.org.
Click on the tab, watch motor week, enter your zip code for the days and times in your area.
You can also watch current episodes on the free PBS app along with all the other great PBS programming.
And our individual road test and features are also available 24 seven at youtube.com slash motor week.
If you've got a screen, you can watch motor week.
Today's podcast would not have been possible without our podcast producer.
And she's sitting right here, Jessica Ray, our audio engineer, Nicole Phillips,
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I'm John Davis.
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About this episode
MotorWeek marks its 45th-anniversary with a conversation featuring Dave Durso, head writer. He looks back on decades at the show—learning to drive a stick in a Shelby GT 500—and explains how writing evolved into test driving, with supervisors stressing “detail.” Durso then traces his path into emergency medical work, trauma-unit shifts, and eventually clinical mental health counseling. The discussion also touches motorsports archives, rare-car access, and how MotorWeek’s production and filming workflows keep up with changing tech.
Once again, we are celebrating our 45th season with a guest from the past! Today we are joined by Dave Durso, who was a writer on MotorWeek from 1987 to 2009. He eventually rose to the title of Head Writer and started the segment known as “Two Wheelin'”, in which he would review motorcycles. He and John discuss all of his favorite memories and also how he completely changed lanes to a brand new career when he left!
