Latest / BREAK/FIX the Motorsports & Vehicle Enthusiast Variety Show / The Sparky Life w/ Lia Lamela (Crossover)

Transcript

The Sparky Life w/ Lia Lamela (Crossover) · BREAK/FIX the Motorsports & Vehicle Enthusiast Variety Show

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Welcome back today's guest crew chief, Eric owner of grand touring motorsports
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and the motoring podcast network discusses racing wrenches and all kinds of rides.
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Welcome to the sparky life.
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I'm your host.
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I am here to create the sparks in your life.
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And here we discuss the builders of our civilization.
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All things construction career oriented every Thursday.
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I stumbled across Eric and his motoring podcast network and
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immediately thought, Oh my gosh.
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Freaking badass.
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My peeps are totally going to love this.
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I need everyone to know about Eric and his network.
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Forget the fact that he's great to listen to and knowledgeable about
0:48
his passion and is the pun Prince.
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You know, I love the cheese all about the cheese.
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There is so much about the skilled trades of motor sports
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that I didn't know existed.
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So many career opportunities.
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I was blown away.
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So welcome with me, Crew Chief Eric.
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Before we begin, a quick word from our sponsor, Supply House.
1:13
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1:17
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1:39
Now let's start our show.
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So I ran across Eric and his GTM network podcast saying like, amazing, incredible.
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And when I first started to hear.
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All that good info and check out the website.
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I immediately was like, Oh my God, my guys are going to love this.
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Trisha's a gear head shout out to Justin and Thomas.
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Love you.
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And they are going to literally go crazy for what you've got in store.
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So first, what the hell is.
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So Grand Touring Motorsports, that's what GTN stands for
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started many, many moons ago.
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There's a whole backstory there about my family.
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It really starts with my grandfather coming over after
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World War II, looking for work.
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And he got a gig as a chauffeur at the Belgian embassy.
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And so my dad grew up in that environment and then they would go back
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and forth between the U S and Italy.
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And then, uh, My dad eventually came over with my mom in the late 70s, and he
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was bitten by the bug, by the car bug.
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He grew up just outside of the Ferrari test track in Modena, and so he's
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like, I used to watch Niki Lauda, you know, testing the Formula One cars.
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He always wanted to be a race car driver.
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And so he turned wrenches and modify on anything that he could.
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And again, he grew up in the garages of the embassy.
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And so it was like, You know, in his blood to have the grease
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under his fingernails and stuff.
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And so when I came along, you know, some of my earliest memories, the same thing.
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It was like.
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Dad's swapping an engine on our Scirocco.
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And the girl's like, what is going on?
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I'm like two years old.
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Like, what are you guys doing?
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You know?
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So, but I started as a gopher and I learned, you know, doing things
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in the garage and things like that.
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And so at one point as my dad got older and further along in his career,
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and he wasn't a mechanic by trade.
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He was actually in the mainframe development programmer industry.
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Right.
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So.
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Cars were always his hobby.
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He was moonlighting.
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You know, he was racing.
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He was a national champion in autocross and other things like that.
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And so always working in the garage.
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That's where we spent all our time.
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That's where my dad and I bonded, you know, and I learned
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a ton of things that way.
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And so later he developed a business called Grand Touring Motorsports and
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he sold parts and consulting and, you know, helped tuned cars for racers.
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Predominantly European stuff.
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And then unfortunately, he was taken from us at a pretty early age.
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And so that all kind of came to a close.
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And several years later, friend of mine and I got into road racing and we were
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going together and doing all these track events and turn the wrenches on our cars.
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And I ended up being his mechanic and my mechanic, which was tough.
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We had very similar cars and you can see them on our website.
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I saw the Jetta.
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The golfs.
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Yes.
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Golf.
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Golfs the twin GTIs.
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There you go.
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. So can you tell I'm not, hook your head . You're gonna help me with this though.
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You're gonna help me.
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Absolutely.
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So we were sitting around one day and talking about, you know, how do
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we keep all of our guys together?
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You know, we're building a team, we wanna go endurance racing, we wanted
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time trials, all this kinda stuff.
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And so.
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He was like, Brad goes, why don't we create a club?
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I said, okay, well, what are we going to call it?
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Like I can do all the web work, you know, cause I too followed in
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my dad's footsteps as an it guy.
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And so he's like, why don't we just call it grand touring motorsports?
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And so 2013 ish, that was all reborn a couple of years after my dad died.
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And it has quickly evolved in the last almost 12 years now
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into a lot of different things.
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So if you kind of break it down, there's three big components.
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There's the clubhouse, which you can find from our primary website, which
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are Our main website turned into a digital magazine called Grand Touring.
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We're 30, almost 32 issues now.
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So 32 quarters of the magazine, it's a long time to be out
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there as a digital production.
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And then last year, as we grew our podcast, which was derived from our
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writing and our journalism and, you know, going to track days and all those
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kinds of things, we developed something called the Motoring Podcast Network.
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So our headliner show is called Break Fix.
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That's a specific.
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Grand Touring Motorsports production and then we brought on other creators that we
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were overlapping with that were struggling in the industry and we created this thing
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called the Motoring Podcast Network.
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So we feature them now not on a podcast but what we call a variety show.
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So every week something a little different.
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You might be hearing from William Ross from the exotic car
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marketplace talking about Ferraris.
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The other week you're hearing from Professor John Summers, the motoring
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historian, about something that's going on on the left coast of the country.
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Or screen to speech which is a all woman production about sim
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racers that are coming up and making their way into motorsports.
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We've got things like what should I buy, which are really fun panel episodes
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with guys from motor trend and analysts.
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And we talk in debate, we buy for fictitious, you know, customers and
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collectors and things like that.
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We've got our drive through news every month, you know, so we,
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there's a little bit of something for everybody and that makes it nice.
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Tune in when you want.
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Hey, there's five or six episodes I missed, but I really only care
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about, you know, the drive thru news, and those are guaranteed at
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the last Tuesday of every month.
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Well, um, after I had the opportunity of kind of like stumbling upon you, right,
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the universe works in mysterious ways.
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I was so intrigued about that.
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Motorsports and the mechanical aspect being in construction.
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And once I started listening to the episodes and I'm somebody
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with no motorsport, like it's like racing is I have.
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Baby eyes.
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Oh, just don't say that cars are an appliance because they're not.
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I know that much.
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I know that much.
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Okay.
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So, and I've got a lot of girlfriends who are mechanics and things
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like that and shout out to Trish.
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Total gearhead.
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She like loves this stuff.
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But I just never kind of gained a passion for it mainly
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because I just wasn't exposed.
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And as I was listening to your episodes, I was like, Oh my gosh,
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there's so many correlations.
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to the construction industry and skilled trades regarding this.
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So you can, you expand on that for me.
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Yeah.
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So, you know, checking all the stereotypes at the door, I suppose
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there are a lot of similarities between mechanics and construction workers.
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And so, you know, working with your hands, it is a skill, it is a skilled trade.
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You know, our tools of choice are wrenches, wrenches and spanners
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and ratchets, and instead of claw hammers and nail guns and power
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tools and things like that, so.
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The idea is still the same.
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You're building something or you're dem, you're demolishing
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some, you're taking it apart.
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Now, in our case, when we're dismantling something, it's to repair it, make it
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better, upgrade it, whatever, and then put it back together because we need
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to put it into service, especially in the motor sport world, it's under such.
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Strenuous conditions that the manufacturers were like, well, we
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didn't really intend it for that.
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So we get, you get a little bit more creative on the
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motorsport side of the world.
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But the same is true in construction.
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You're like, wow, that wall isn't necessarily straight.
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So we're going to have to do this, but by eye, it's going
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to look really good, you know?
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So there's a little magic, a little black magic there, if you will.
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But at the end of the day, your thing, you have to think on your feet.
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You have to be resourceful.
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You use a little bit of MacGyver tactics, you know, in the same way.
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There's also a community around.
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Let's say mechanics, wrench turners, and even in the motorsport world,
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in some ways, I often like to relate motorsports to the military because
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it's one of those situations where you do not succeed alone, right?
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You have all these specialists around you, whether they're programmers,
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they're race engineers, they're.
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Folks that specifically work on suspension or are knowledgeable about
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tires, all these different moving pieces because some people like maybe
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yourself, you look at a car and go, it takes me from point A to point B.
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But what you don't understand what we like to highlight on the
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show is there's so many different.
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Uh, careers that influence a car, right?
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Chemists, physics, designers, aerodynamicists, electrical engineers.
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I mean, the list goes on and on and on and on to build this thing that we take
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for granted that takes us, you know, to Dunkin Donuts every morning or takes
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it to the construction site, right?
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So, uh, When you put all that together, rising tides lift all ships.
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And so that is true of just general mechanics.
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Cause when you ever walk into a shop, whether it's a race shop or a minor
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key, the team has to work together.
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Not every one mechanic knows everything.
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There's a guy that's a specialist in alignments or exhaust or
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engine work or tires or whatever.
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But again, to, to get that final product, the team has to work together.
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To make the customer happy at the end of the day, but to get that car safely
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back on the road or back on track and be able to perform at its ultimate.
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Yeah, that's exactly the same with the infrastructure of construction
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and how that all operates and having key specialists from different areas.
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Um, it's a,
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I can't help but think about the term grease monkey and, you
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know, the thoughts that come to mind when I think of mechanic.
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I happen to know many mechanics being in the skilled trades, and none of them
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actually fit the stereotype description.
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Like in construction, there's many stereotypes.
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Do you come across that in more sport, motors, motorsports?
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So if you.
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If you take the obvious comparisons, like, Oh, mechanics are just
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a bunch of substance abusing degenerates, blah, blah, blah, blah.
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You probably hear the same thing about construction workers, right?
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Yeah.
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The difference is we've got grease under our fingernails, you know,
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instead of, you know, splinters in our hands kind of thing, right?
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Now, I make the joke all the time that I lived this duality in my life, right?
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Bruce Wayne by day in the IT industry, supporting the military and those kinds
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of things for many, many years now.
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And then at night.
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Right.
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I'm doing the podcast thing.
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I do journalism, but I'm also turning wrenches.
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I'm prepping the race car.
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I've got this championship.
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I'm working towards and I go into a meeting and they're like, Yeah, I
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work in computers, you know, and my fingernails aren't that great, you
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know, all chewed up and my hands are gnarled because you inevitably bust
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your hands when you're working on the car because there's never any space.
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I also joke, I live my life a quarter turn at a time, and that's
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not a quarter turn on the racetrack.
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It's a quarter turn on the wrench.
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So that being said, I think the same is true with the construction
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industry as it is for mechanics.
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But in, in the same way, even in my day job, It's hard to live it all the time.
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You have to find another outlet.
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So for me, turning wrenches was always a backup.
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It's like if the IT world collapses or that, you know, whole
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white collar sweatshop that is programming is not for me anymore.
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I can fall back on being a mechanic.
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And the interesting part is I can always go get my ASC certification and go work
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at any, you know, mom and pop garage.
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And for those that don't know.
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ASC stands for, what is this ASC certification or what is it all about?
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Uh, shoot, hang on.
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Googling moment.
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I don't want to get the acronym wrong.
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It's the automotive service excellence certification.
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So you'll see that on the side of a lot of garages.
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We have ASC certified mechanics, which basically means that they
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went to school to be a mechanic.
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They went to like Lincoln tech or they went somewhere else and
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they graduated with a degree.
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In automotive mechanics and diagnostics and all those kinds of things.
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So I don't have that that's additional schooling.
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It's additional cost.
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But what's interesting is in the motor sports world, I
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don't necessarily need that.
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I can bring my previous career experience and my own personal
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wrench turning experience with me to become part of a team.
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And there's different ways to get involved in race teams, whether it's through,
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let's say you're a disabled vet and you want to come in through something like
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operation motorsport, where they find you placement on a race and you can use the.
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The skills that you learned in the military on the team,
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you know, things like that.
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So the same is true for a layman like myself, where it's like, well,
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you've got a background in it.
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Do you, are you interested in analytics?
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Do you want to study, you know, the suspension geometry data that's coming
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back, you know, real time stuff, you know, how do you want to be involved?
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And so even for construction workers, where it's like,
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Hey, we need to build this.
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We need to do that.
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There's a lot of these other, other types of.
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Uh, skills that can be translated even into the world of motorsports
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if people are looking to cross over.
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So I joke sometimes if you can swing a hammer, you can turn a wrench.
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There's a lot of translation there as long as you kind of understand the
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principle as my dad used to say If you can take it apart without breaking
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it, you can put it back together.
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Yes
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Well, I mean, uh when you talk about not needing a license or degree to get into
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that career path that's so Absolutely correlates with construction because
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there are many different careers in skilled trades that you can do that.
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And I am a big fan of this being somebody who is, uh,
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learning challenged, air quotes.
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Um, I don't like the idea that you have to get some sort of licensing or academic
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accreditation in order to do that.
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Do you, the career that you're looking to do now?
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I'm not saying that there shouldn't be standards or qualifications.
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I am saying that what we currently have is too exclusive and doesn't truly project
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someone's abilities in that career.
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Yeah.
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And I think for those of us, as I like to say, petrol heads of a certain age,
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we grew up under the fallacy that, you know, you had to go to college.
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to make it in life.
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And so that is applicable to Xenials like myself and, you know, elder millennials
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and millennials and things like that.
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So there's other ways to make it right.
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But again, I sort of had no choice because And I, and I say that, I know that's
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kind of strong, but I came, I came around as a first generation Italian American.
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And it wasn't like, Oh, you know, we came over and Ellis Island in the 1800s.
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It's like, no, my parents came over in the seventies, like really late.
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Right.
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And so they didn't, they didn't finish school.
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They wanted the best for us.
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They broke their backs doing the work that they could.
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And my dad was very fortunate.
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He was a smart guy and he got into the right place at the right time, you
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know, They wanted the best for me, but they're like, you need to go and do this
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it stuff, but I want to work on cars.
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No, no, no.
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You need to do this.
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So I was sort of stuck, but in a way it worked.
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It did allow me this weird Batman Bruce Wayne lifestyle that I have, but I also
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am not burnt out on being a mechanic where the last thing I want to see or hear
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about is, Hey, can you help me fix my car?
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It's like, I'll say yes, because for me it's cathartic to go out into the garage,
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but don't ask me to fix your computer.
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Don't ask me to diagnose, you know, your Mac.
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Write you down on the list for when I'm having more trouble.
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Construction worker, the last thing you want to hear is, hey,
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can you help me build a shed?
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No, leave me alone.
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You're dead on.
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Do you know how many times I get like, oh, so you're an electrician?
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Can you install this lighting, you know, for me?
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Can you like let my landlord see this?
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Freaking love it when I say I'm an electrician because they've
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always got projects and stuff.
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And you're right.
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The last thing I want to do is do electrical work on my off time.
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Yeah.
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I enjoy it during the day.
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I love what I do, but then I also need a break.
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Well, what also helps me love my hobby a little bit more is there's a lot
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of YouTube certified mechanics now.
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So
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I'm like, here's a video, have a nice day.
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I would feel irresponsible directing people to a YouTube for electrical work.
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But they're out there, which is a little scary.
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Um, I don't know how I feel about that exactly, but I love the overall idea,
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which is sharing knowledge, right?
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Absolutely.
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That's number one.
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So I did not know how much was involved in racing.
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I didn't have a clue.
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I haven't been exposed to it.
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Nobody in my family is like into NASCAR and coming across you in
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your show has gotten me into this.
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And I always like thought of myself as somebody who's not a daredevil.
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In fact, I'm afraid of heights.
17:35
Don't ask me how that works with being an electrician, but I, even though I
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will get up in the lift and climb and be whatever, I don't love heights.
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So I don't love, like, high adrenaline activities, which is the
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exact opposite of most of my peeps.
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Most of my people love, you know, high adrenaline, and I would say a
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lot of them are adrenaline addicts that use it in a healthy way when it
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comes to construction and building.
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Can you break down the racing aspect and what really goes into this?
18:04
Yeah.
18:05
I think it's exactly how you described it there too.
18:08
It's not for everybody either, because one of the things I realize as a coach,
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right, so I, I, I spend time helping what I call want to be race car drivers.
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Sometimes people that have more money than brains, right?
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I bought this super cool car and I want to go fast.
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And it's the whole Ricky Bobby moment.
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Right.
18:24
But it's like,
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but you know, it's amazing that you got here safely in the first place.
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And I'm not trying to be any sort of way, but it's like, okay, Great.
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You got 700 horsepower under the pedal and you have no idea how to use it.
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And I hate to say anybody can go fast in a straight line and that's not a knock
18:43
against other disciplines of racing like drag racing because drag racing
18:47
is extremely complicated and you are just going fast in a straight line.
18:50
But there's a whole science to that too.
18:52
But road racing specifically, the guys that come to the track with their brand
18:55
new ZL1 Camaros or their Corvettes or their Porsche or their Mustang,
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you know, whatever dream car that they've Waited this whole time to get
19:03
and they, they just want to go fast.
19:05
It's like, look, safety is paramount in racing, especially road racing.
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So one of the things that we work on, and I find it so shocking,
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the adrenaline junkies, right?
19:17
The guys that just want to go faster gals that want to go fast
19:20
is I put them in the right seat of.
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A complete shit box, like 200, 200 horsepower Toyota.
19:27
Right.
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And they're like, Oh, a hundred miles an hour is a struggle down the straightaway.
19:32
Yeah, but I'm going to go into this turn at a hundred and
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they're not going to lift.
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And they're like, excuse me, what?
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And we're already through it at that point.
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And you see them white knuckling and grabbing and freaking out.
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And then the there's that sphincter puckering moment, right?
19:45
Because they're, they're not used to going that fast.
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Fast in a turn.
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And that's where the beauty of driving comes from is being able to work
19:54
with the machinery, understanding your machinery, what the limits of
19:58
it are and how you can capitalize on it or maybe stretch it a little bit.
20:02
So when we're working with students, that's where we're trying
20:05
to get them to really go fast.
20:07
And I have this whole process where it's like speed is the last thing.
20:10
Like we need to work on orientation, memorization,
20:12
consistency, then we can go faster.
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But the speed actually comes naturally if you follow that method.
20:19
And so you get the rush and people will come away from what we call a
20:22
high performance driver's education weekend and be like, I thought I knew
20:26
how to drive when I got here and this has been an eye opening experience
20:30
and we can take it in different ways.
20:31
Do you want to learn about accident avoidance?
20:33
Do you want to do aggressive stuff?
20:35
You know, not, we're not going to do stunt driving at a track day, but you're going
20:38
to go home with a different appreciation for your car than what you came with.
20:42
And what you realize too, is you thought you could go fast on the
20:46
road and you realize how dumb it is to go fast on the road and your
20:49
speed starts to just decrease.
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And you're like, you know what?
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I'm more situationally aware now I'm looking up, I'm looking ahead.
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I can see traffic patterns.
20:58
Like why is that guy doing that?
20:59
You know, accident avoidance, all that kind of stuff.
21:01
But it's, it's interesting how motorsport tampers some of that adrenaline.
21:07
And there's a really cool graph you can create that says, you know, when you
21:11
start out, you're all like, Oh, super anxious and I'm going to kill this.
21:14
We're going to light up all the tires and the car is completely erratic
21:18
and you're completely nervous.
21:20
And then it's like.
21:21
It starts to converge, and you become cool as a cucumber, and you can throw a
21:25
car around a corner completely sideways, and it doesn't even phase you, so that
21:29
adrenaline level Comes down as you start to master the skill, like any skill.
21:33
I mean, you're, you're doing electrical work.
21:36
It's dangerous, but after a while you get comfortable with it.
21:38
Now you don't want to become overconfident because that's
21:40
when you start making mistakes.
21:42
So same is true on our side.
21:44
Right.
21:44
Right.
21:44
Okay.
21:45
So first off, I want all the info on your class.
21:47
Because even though I don't have any desire to be a race car driver, I
21:52
would love to take a class like that.
21:54
Just the way you talked about it and learn how to become one with my vehicle.
21:59
Like that is so cool.
22:01
Not to mention how much I am in my vehicle.
22:04
Many construction peeps know this, like we are constantly
22:07
driving all over kingdom come.
22:09
And.
22:10
I have always thought of myself as that stereotypical girl can't drive,
22:15
like I suck at driving, and I don't know how accurate that actually is,
22:20
because I have no one to compare my skills to, and I just drive.
22:26
Cautious, I would say and slow and annoy people with that on the road, but I
22:33
would totally dig a course like yours where I could become more confident in
22:38
my vehicle and really assess my abilities to understand the mechanical aspect.
22:43
So not to knock the boys.
22:45
I get to instruct all sorts of different people, you know, different walks of life.
22:49
And what's really interesting, you can pick up on other hobbies by the
22:52
way they drive and stuff like that.
22:53
I, one guy, I could tell he was a pilot because the way
22:55
he held the steering wheel.
22:57
Oh, wow.
22:58
So when I have a lady in the car though, I always find it to be the
23:03
most satisfying experience because.
23:07
There's less resistance to learning.
23:15
I'm like, because on a construction level, like, okay, go ahead.
23:19
Go ahead.
23:19
I want to.
23:20
So there's this open channel to absorb the input and change is done.
23:26
Right away.
23:27
And it's nice to see it be iterative as well, because when you're teaching at
23:30
the track, you've got a corner by corner, then segment by segment, then you do
23:33
the whole lap and it all comes together.
23:35
Right?
23:36
So you got to start from the basics, but the ladies are always so much more
23:39
open and again, not to knock the guys.
23:41
Cause there's plenty of great guys that are receptive, but you got to
23:44
sort of check your ego at the door because you have to realize you're doing
23:47
something extremely dangerous, right?
23:50
And you're out there with 30 of your closest strangers.
23:54
Like, I, you don't know if you pass the other guy that's next to you on the way
23:58
there, you know, and you pissed him off doing your road rage thing or whatever,
24:01
but the point is, you've got all these other moving objects at speed, at high
24:06
speed that you need to be receptive.
24:08
It's not just, I want to go fast, right?
24:10
And so that's where it all comes together.
24:12
And people come away from a weekend experience like that.
24:15
And they're like, whoa.
24:17
But on the other side, the apple does not fall far from the tree.
24:19
My sister is also a certified coach and she gets the opposite.
24:23
What, what is this girl going to teach me?
24:26
Right.
24:28
What she teaches you is that when she blows by you in
24:31
her 200 horsepower shit box.
24:34
You got something to learn when you've got 700 horsepower under your foot.
24:38
Right.
24:38
And so she, she always feels the challenge that there's this resistance
24:42
with the guys that they don't want to learn, but I get that too,
24:44
because it's like, we're hard headed.
24:46
We think we know everything I've been driving since I was 16.
24:50
This ain't driving.
24:51
This is preparing you to go racing, right?
24:53
This is a whole different ball game.
24:54
If you want to go down that route.
24:56
Right.
24:56
So.
24:57
But there's a lot of fantastic ladies.
25:00
They're super fast.
25:01
They're very competitive in all the different disciplines of motorsport.
25:05
That's the other thing.
25:06
It's not just NASCAR, right?
25:08
There's formula cars, meaning open wheel cars.
25:10
There's rally, there's drag racing, there's autocross rally car.
25:13
I mean, it goes on and on and on and on, and you'll find women everywhere.
25:18
And so kind of open your eyes and pay attention to that, but, you know,
25:21
listen to their stories, figure out how they, they came up through the system.
25:24
But if you get a chance to ride with one of them.
25:27
Watch how they drive.
25:28
Very precise.
25:29
A lot of finesse.
25:30
And you're like, wow, that's, you know, it's not this brute force.
25:33
We're going to manhandle the car in the corner kind of stuff.
25:35
It's, it's, it's just been a beautiful experience to work with the ladies and
25:39
help get them up through the system.
25:41
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Now let's get back to the show.
26:47
Okay.
26:48
You hit on so many things there.
26:50
So in construction, it is the same with the guys.
26:54
They want to reach strength.
26:55
They don't.
26:56
necessarily want to be taught because, and this is something
27:02
I learned as an apprentice right away, you never ask a guy why.
27:06
And the reason is they view that as a challenge.
27:10
Like I'm challenging what they're telling me to do.
27:13
And I'm not, the why is because I want to learn why you are instructing
27:17
me to do this this way so that I can absorb it fully and really
27:22
understand what you're asking of me.
27:24
But when I would ask my journeymen why they would get furious, and the
27:28
number one thing is because I'm telling you, because I'm fucking telling you,
27:31
I've been in here for two decades.
27:33
You do it how I tell you to do it.
27:35
Well, that's good and gravy.
27:36
I'm not, I'm not challenging that and trying to understand it.
27:39
So I would have to learn ways of asking why without using the word why.
27:43
So what's interesting about the racing world is when you ask why be
27:48
prepared for a deluge of information, we are very happy to share.
27:52
It comes off as mansplaining a lot, but it's an, it's an interesting
27:57
environment where knowledge transfer.
28:00
is the norm, right?
28:02
So asking why in motorsport and racing, I'm just warning you, be prepared.
28:06
You're going to get more than you bargained for.
28:08
I love it.
28:09
I love it.
28:09
I think that's fantastic.
28:11
And as a female in a male dominant space, I would get exactly what your sister got,
28:16
where like, who the fuck is this chick trying to tell me what to do basically.
28:20
And I would have to learn that.
28:22
So in the construction, um, hierarchy, Because that's kind of how it's built.
28:30
It's, it's very archaic in how they perform team and team building and what
28:37
they consider leadership is one of our downfalls and something that Spurgy
28:41
Life is passionate about changing.
28:43
You know, you talk about teams and the importance of teams and it sounds like on.
28:48
Your end of the spectrum, it's more collaborative.
28:51
It's less gatekeeping.
28:52
It's more embrace embracing and wanting to build together, which
28:56
brings the most successful teams, like a hundred percent, right?
29:00
The stats are there.
29:01
So when we're talking about the hierarchy and the structure, what you typically
29:08
see is a foreman who comes in, I call them, um, table flippers, tool tossers.
29:15
Okay.
29:15
Like Just this is how it's going to be done.
29:18
No one challenged me, you know, being on the chest kind of deal, right.
29:23
Which isn't very effective.
29:25
And when, you know, I'm emulating all that I'm seeing when, so when I got into
29:30
a position of leadership, I tried that approach and as a female doesn't work,
29:35
doesn't work at all, like really bad.
29:41
I don't approach, I do not approach the leadership aspect when I'm working
29:45
with my teams in that fashion at all.
29:48
Uh, forget the fact that I'm a female trying to come in on an aggressive
29:53
as opposed to assertive aspect.
29:56
Um, but it's, it's a particularly powerful.
29:59
Poor dynamic when a man does it and it's worse when a female does it.
30:03
And it's interesting you bring that up.
30:05
So I'll share a story from my sister's playbook.
30:08
And so we were at Virginia international raceway for an event.
30:10
We were called in during the day to do a special exercise with a group
30:16
of Folks from the Cadillac club.
30:17
And so you've got these really nice CTS V black wings, you know, again,
30:22
five, six, 700 horsepower vehicles that you're like, wow, that's pretty cool.
30:27
And she got put in one of those cars and she's, she's uncomfortable with really,
30:32
really high horsepower, especially if it's modified beyond factory.
30:36
Cause she's like, look, you start bolting on parts.
30:39
You don't know where the ceiling is anymore, and it's outside of factory spec.
30:42
So it's sort of hard to gauge like how far we can go.
30:46
And her student wasn't resistant.
30:49
Me, I'll call him a little stubborn and she, she was talking to me and
30:52
consoling me at one of the lunch breaks.
30:53
And she's like, I'm having a hard time, like getting this guy
30:56
to just back off a little bit.
30:58
We can go faster if he goes slower, but he just jams the throttle.
31:01
We're coming out of the turn sideways.
31:03
And he goes, we're going to end up in the wall if he doesn't stop.
31:06
Right.
31:06
So, and she's trying to tell him and he's just, it's not going in.
31:09
And at one point I just told her, I said, look, let him screw up.
31:13
Let him eat, eat the, you know, not eat the guardrail, but it's like, go
31:17
have an off, do it in a spot where you know, there's enough runoff room.
31:21
And then he realizes, Oh, I'm going to break my car.
31:23
We're going to hit something.
31:24
He's going to suddenly panic now.
31:26
Okay, coach, what do I do now?
31:27
Right.
31:28
So she had one of those moments and that was the switching point.
31:31
It was like, you had to run head first into the wall, you know, figuratively
31:35
speaking before he would listen.
31:38
And then he got better.
31:39
And then he got faster.
31:40
So it was funny, you know, slow in fast out is the is the methodology.
31:45
And so that's what she was trying to get him to do.
31:46
And as he started to slow down, his average lap speed went up, which
31:50
means his lap times were going down.
31:52
But to realize that you're wasting time hooning around the track, he
31:57
just he wasn't getting it until he had that what we call code brown moment.
32:03
Code brown moment.
32:04
Okay, you've got to elaborate on that for me.
32:07
Where does that come from?
32:08
You get like an oh s moment, right?
32:12
There's code red and there's code brown.
32:15
It's brilliant.
32:17
I, um, I am obviously parshful to, I resonate with females in,
32:24
in those types of spaces because I, there's just so much crossover
32:27
and correlation and relatability.
32:31
And uh, being a podcaster, I love podcasts.
32:35
And I'm definitely a Joe Rogan fan.
32:37
And when I deep dived into your podcast and all of the goodies in
32:43
store there, I actually had Joe Rogan's podcast pop up with Danica
32:48
Patrick on being a woman in racing.
32:51
And I, you know, of course was like, Oh, wow.
32:55
Okay.
32:56
Here's a female in a male dominant space, uh, totally was interested in what she
33:01
had to say and then was shocked when during the interview she said that, um,
33:07
you know, a lot of the guys don't like it when, uh, don't want a female to pass.
33:12
Right.
33:12
So, cause he was asking her like, what's her experience.
33:15
She was like, I don't know.
33:17
I'm not a guy.
33:17
I'm just gal.
33:18
And.
33:18
And.
33:18
And.
33:19
This is my perspective, and a lot of the guys don't want a female to pass them.
33:23
But I get that because I wouldn't want a female to pass me either.
33:26
And then Joe Rogan was like, wait, wait a minute.
33:28
Um, so are you saying you wouldn't care if a guy passed you?
33:33
And she's like, well, It wouldn't be that bad, but it would be
33:36
worse to have a female pastor.
33:38
So she, I respected that she was openly talking about her cultural bias that like
33:43
women are shitty drivers or that they, you know, it'd be somehow worse to have a
33:48
woman, uh, pass her as opposed to a male.
33:52
Now, that being said, I had no idea how many women were actually in this world.
33:59
And I.
34:02
Being somebody who, you know, we talked about those two types of
34:04
women and male dominant spaces where one is like me, where I'm
34:08
like, ah, other girl, yeah, instant friends, like so much to talk about.
34:14
And then the other female is going to be, you know, kind of
34:18
very standoffish and look at it in a negative competitive light.
34:23
And during that interview, something that I noticed about Danica in particular,
34:27
which by the way, I did reach out to her to see if she'd come on the show, um,
34:31
was that she didn't seem really open or wanting to embrace other women in the
34:39
industry, which I'm like, bump, like, dude, like, what are you doing, man?
34:44
Like, that ain't the way.
34:46
Yeah.
34:48
Yeah.
34:48
So to not.
34:50
You know, spread vile gossip or stories or whatever.
34:52
But I've heard from several people that she is very much about
34:56
self promoting herself, right?
34:58
And not about empowering other women.
35:01
She's that competitive, right?
35:03
Where she's like, no, it's me or nothing.
35:04
Now what I don't want to do.
35:06
As part of that conversation is misrepresent motor sports as a whole,
35:10
because NASCAR nation has its own attitudes towards, you know, women
35:14
drivers and, you know, being mixed in with the boys and, you know,
35:17
the evolution of NASCAR itself.
35:18
Now, it doesn't speak for the FIA, which is the governing body behind World Rally
35:23
and Formula One and a bunch of others.
35:25
And then drag racing, the NHRA, there's all these different
35:27
sanctioning bodies, but.
35:29
The consensus is we need more women, we need more diversity in general
35:34
in racing, but Danica is not a great representation for women that are
35:40
getting excited about motorsport.
35:42
The people you want to look up to are working and we've had the privilege
35:46
of working with them for many years now is the folks over at like
35:49
WMNA, which was started by Lynn St.
35:51
James.
35:51
She was at Indy seven times, you know, and rookie of the
35:54
year, all this kind of stuff.
35:55
She's had a really long racing career as a.
35:57
Successful professional racer.
35:59
You've got people like Michelle Mouton, who is a world rally champion.
36:03
You've got Steffi Bao, who's the female goat of motocross, right?
36:08
And Cindy Lux.
36:10
I mean, there's so many women over at WMNA and their goal is to bring
36:13
more women up through the system.
36:15
How do we help them?
36:16
How do we get them on the right teams?
36:17
How do we get them the right corporate sponsorship, the
36:19
right notoriety, the exposure?
36:22
Not just get them a seat.
36:24
How do we make them faster?
36:25
Right?
36:26
How do we get them to a point where they are beating the boys, you
36:29
know, and those kinds of things.
36:30
And what's interesting about motorsport is that it really is a level playing
36:34
field because the meat behind the steering wheel, it doesn't matter
36:38
the gender, the car is the car.
36:41
Right.
36:41
And the team, like I mentioned before, has to work together.
36:45
The driver is not successful by themselves.
36:47
If the car is a piece of junk now, granted budgets get in the way and
36:51
you know, more money, better teams, better cars, that sort of stuff
36:54
still happens despite cheating and other regulation bending and whatnot.
36:58
But the point is in NASCAR, where it's basically spec racing, where all
37:02
the cars are supposed to be equal.
37:05
Then it comes down to the drivers.
37:07
And if you're just not that good, if you're a back
37:09
marker, you're a back marker.
37:10
It doesn't matter.
37:10
There's men who start 40th and they end 40th, right?
37:14
And so it doesn't matter, you know, what does it take to get up and
37:18
run with the guys at the front guys or gals at the front of the pack?
37:22
So NASCAR is a little bit different.
37:25
Then a lot of the other motor sports and you know, there's all
37:27
sorts of stereotypes and stigmas that go along with NASCAR nation.
37:31
But again, Danica doesn't represent all of motorsport, but what she's failing
37:35
at is representing women in motorsport.
37:37
And you'll also notice that she's not associated with WMNA or
37:41
shift up now or any of the other organizations that are helping to
37:44
bring women up through the system.
37:46
And so that's where I sort of look at it and go, you know, yeah, you're a role
37:51
model for somebody just not my girls.
37:55
Yeah.
37:55
Yeah.
37:55
So that, that's the message that I got when I was watching that interview.
38:00
I was shocked.
38:01
I was like, Oh no, she's like one of those girls that view
38:05
all other women as competition, but not a healthy competition.
38:09
It's competition by exclusion.
38:11
So it's, you know, who's the top racer?
38:13
It ain't her.
38:14
She has, she's, she's the only female at that level, but you're
38:17
not competing with other females.
38:19
So are you not competing with other females because you like the status?
38:24
of being the only female and want to keep it that way because that gives
38:28
you some sort of prestige, or is it that you want to be a great racer?
38:33
And there's that.
38:33
And the other thing is, she sort of falls down the scale when
38:38
you're comparing everything.
38:39
Now, I mentioned these organizations that are helping women come out.
38:42
But then there's two, two, uh, Bodies of racing that are even more important.
38:45
You got Beth Perretta with her all female indie car team, right?
38:49
from Theri.
38:49
I brought her on the show from, from the drivers all the way down
38:53
to the engineers ev, and she's done that multiple years in a row.
38:56
Now they've had technical issues with the car and this and that,
38:59
but they're working together and we actually were able to interview the
39:02
aerodynamicist that was on that team.
39:04
We've interviewed other people that have been part of that.
39:07
And then the other side of the world and the another discipline of racing endurance
39:10
racing, you've got folks like the Iron Dames and all female endurance team that's
39:15
gone to Le Mans multiple times a year and competed in a 24 hour race along with
39:20
the rest of the IMSA and WEC seasons.
39:24
So there's, there's not a lack.
39:27
There's not an overwhelming majority, but the thing is, you never saw Danica plug
39:31
herself into, well, I'm going to leave NASCAR and I'm going to go hook up with
39:35
Beth Perretta and her team, or I'm going to go run with the Iron Dames and help
39:39
support them because I am a fast driver.
39:42
And what's interesting about endurance racing is.
39:44
It's really team based.
39:46
It's like a rally race, right?
39:47
Rally in the sense of like rally running where you're passing the baton.
39:51
So every driver has to be consistently fast.
39:54
They have to turn, uh, lap times that are within a margin of each other.
39:58
And then every, every couple hours they have to switch and the car keeps
40:01
running for six, 12, 24 hours nonstop.
40:05
And it's like, why didn't you insert yourself into those organizations?
40:10
Right?
40:10
Because she's about whatever it is that she's about.
40:13
If it's alien conspiracy theories now, or, you know, self promoting
40:18
her racing career, that's fine.
40:19
But there are ways for women to get engaged.
40:22
In every discipline of motor sport and for construction workers who might be
40:26
closer to what we call, you know, the roundy round racing, not just NASCAR, but
40:31
sprint car, dirt track, things like that.
40:33
I was shocked.
40:34
I went to an expo in Philadelphia last year.
40:36
There are so many women drivers in USAC, which is the governing body of like
40:40
sprint car racing and things like that.
40:42
I was like, hell yeah, we need to figure out your formula and get you
40:46
guys to come over to road racing and endurance because you're doing it right.
40:50
So.
40:50
I think those folks, if you're into that, you're, you probably see a
40:54
lot more Amy's and Kaylee's and Caitlin's and, you know, running
40:58
around those circuits every weekend.
41:00
Very cool.
41:01
Very, very classy.
41:02
I didn't even know that existed.
41:04
So it's, it's a trillion dollar niche industry.
41:07
I'll put it that way.
41:10
I love it.
41:10
I love it.
41:12
I love it.
41:12
But I, I think that is really important that you pointed
41:18
out that the playing field.
41:21
is really even when it comes to this specific discipline,
41:25
because there are very few disciplines where that is the case.
41:29
Um, and, and you get that argument about basketball as an example.
41:34
Why can't basketball be co ed, right?
41:36
But the women will get chounced by the men.
41:38
Like, I'd like to see it play out and see how it goes.
41:42
Motorsport doesn't have those walls.
41:45
Yeah, look, it is.
41:46
Look, on average, in general, men physically are built to be more
41:56
athletic, more fierce in certain aspects.
41:59
You're literally biologically built that way.
42:02
Like the environment needs you that way for a reason, right?
42:04
And I'm not saying that women can't do these sports.
42:07
I'm saying that it is clear that when you try to Marry female and male sports.
42:15
Uh, it's just too much of an unfair advantage, which is ridiculous.
42:18
Well, and it's interesting because there's two schools of thought
42:21
when it comes to driving as well.
42:22
You can drive by data, which a lot of Formula One drivers do, where it's all
42:26
about the data, the data, the data.
42:27
And it's almost like they're inside of a remote control car.
42:31
But in the old days, if you go back and look at, uh, James Hunt and
42:35
Nikki Lauda and Ayrton Senna, Michael Schumacher, they drove by feel.
42:38
What do I mean they drove by feel?
42:40
If you watch the latest Senna mockumentary on Netflix, there's a whole, there's
42:44
several scenes where it's like, tighten the belts harder, harder.
42:47
I need to be able to feel the car.
42:48
They drove by intuition.
42:50
And what's interesting is going back to teaching Women drivers at the
42:54
racetrack is you guys are, it's a gross generalization, more sensitive.
43:00
You feel more than the guys do because we're wrapped up in the adrenaline and
43:03
the excitement and the physical exertion.
43:05
I mean, I had one guy, I thought he was going to rip the steering wheel off the
43:08
car, like he was Donkey Kong, right?
43:10
I'm like, relax, but the lady drivers are more in tune with all
43:14
their senses and what's going on.
43:16
And they have more.
43:17
Finesse and finesse is super important in learning how to go fast.
43:21
If you can't feel the car and understand how it's communicating
43:25
to you, what's happening, even at the level of adhesion of the tires,
43:29
which seems so like benign, right?
43:31
You, you, if you can't feel all that, you're never going to go fast.
43:35
That's why I find it an absolute treat when I get a woman that wants to go
43:39
racing and learn how to go racing because it's like, this is going to be great.
43:42
It's all going to gel.
43:43
It's all going to work.
43:44
And I don't have this barrier to learning.
43:47
Um, so again, drive by feel.
43:50
That's super important.
43:51
I love that.
43:53
I f ing love that.
43:54
I think that's brilliant.
43:56
What a wonderful opportunity for women to get to explore this, just
44:01
the way that you talk about it.
44:02
You're so passionate and you get me excited.
44:05
Somebody who has no comprehension on, on, like, What this really is brand
44:12
new to to it, although I have had tons of friends, tons of coworkers
44:18
that this is their thing, and I never.
44:21
connected.
44:22
But the way that you talk about it and listening to your episodes,
44:25
um, and your podcast, I'm like, dude, I want to learn how to drive.
44:31
Yes, absolutely.
44:32
I want to try this.
44:35
It's just really fun and exciting.
44:38
A quiz for the listeners.
44:39
If you remember back in the eighties, the famous Volkswagen campaign, Farfig Nugent.
44:44
That's a word.
44:45
No, it's like, what does that mean?
44:46
This looks dumb.
44:47
You know what the guy, Stick figure with his hair being blown back.
44:50
What that meant translating to English is the joy of driving.
44:55
That was their big thing is again, going back to 200 horsepower ship boxes.
44:59
You can have a lot of fun in a car.
45:01
If you're willing to take that next step and learn how to use
45:05
this tool that you've been given.
45:06
I absolutely love it.
45:08
I love this.
45:09
You have totally changed my perspective on driving and given me a brand
45:15
new outlook on what I want to do with this thing that I do often.
45:22
I do it every single day and I will complain, gosh, I hate driving.
45:25
I hate driving.
45:27
I am now embracing this idea.
45:28
You know what?
45:29
I could love this.
45:30
I could learn to love this.
45:32
So I'll say this because I'm sure a lot of the listeners and I'm not trying to.
45:36
You know, stereotype, probably drive big trucks, you know, Ford, Chevy, Dodges.
45:40
And that's fine.
45:42
There's a place for that.
45:43
There's a craftsman truck series, by the way.
45:46
But, you know, you're going, well, I got to buy a race car, trailer, and
45:49
I don't have the money to invest.
45:50
Look, go to a track event to your local track, especially look on the calendars.
45:55
There's a website that we use all the time called H.
45:57
P.
45:57
D.
45:58
E.
45:58
So that's high performance drivers, education, junkie, H.
46:02
P.
46:02
D.
46:02
E.
46:02
Junkie dot com.
46:03
You can look all across the United States and Canada at all the tracks and it
46:07
will show you who's going to be there.
46:09
Go check it out.
46:09
Go talk to people in the paddock if you have the time and you're
46:11
not working on the weekend.
46:13
But you always have an opportunity to get into a race car and rent one for a weekend
46:18
or become buddies, become part of a crew, become part of like a AR or a chump series
46:23
where you're, you're helping out, you're using your skills and then you get the
46:27
opportunity to drive somebody else's car, you know, and they'll help you get through
46:30
the schools and all those kinds of things.
46:32
So now you're not laying out your cash and you can kind of try before you buy.
46:36
And if you get bitten by the bug, then you go to a website like racing
46:39
junk and you buy somebody else's race car and then you're done.
46:41
Right.
46:42
So there's, there's reasons and seasons, but check it out, get a feel for it.
46:47
When you go to some of those events, you have so much.
46:50
Immediate access that you don't have when you're paying for a grandstand seat at
46:56
a NASCAR race, even if you get paddock passes, or if you go to your local, you
46:59
know, dirt track, you're not getting down there with the guys at an HPD.
47:04
You can talk to the drivers and they're regular guys.
47:06
And some of them are pros and they come and they practice and do those kinds
47:08
of things and, and they come and teach.
47:11
So it's a whole different experience.
47:13
It'll change your attitude towards driving, and then you
47:15
can work your way into it.
47:16
But the fun part is you'll start to realize around the paddock,
47:19
guys that have trucks or gals too, that have trucks just like yours.
47:24
The most fun I've ever had is we take out what we call the tow pigs,
47:28
especially on a rainy day for like rained out and the instructors are bored.
47:32
We'll go out with our trucks and run them on track and they are absolute blast to
47:39
just hoon around and get them sideways and just see what the trucks can do.
47:42
Cause you never get to drive them in those conditions.
47:44
We like, you know, What is the limit of my F 150?
47:47
When is it going to start understeering?
47:49
You know, what are the, with the other thing, what are the nannies do?
47:52
Like all these electronic controls to keep me safe is what happens if
47:56
I turn off that traction control?
47:58
Right?
47:58
So we get to play around even with our pedestrian vehicles sometimes,
48:02
but all that comes from the training.
48:05
I had an F 150.
48:06
I fucking love that.
48:07
I love to give that a roll.
48:09
Um, okay.
48:10
Eric, you are what many would say is the American dream.
48:15
You're very successful.
48:17
You got this duality in life where you really get to explore your passion.
48:21
You bring people together, successful podcasts.
48:24
Um, I know this is a little bit of a loaded question, but work with me here.
48:28
Work with me here.
48:30
What would you.
48:32
say has helped you get to this point in your life?
48:36
A mixture of ADD and tenacity.
48:39
That is the recipe for success.
48:43
Now, to be honest, again, growing up as a first generation Italian
48:47
American, you know, my parents coming over in the seventies, we,
48:50
we didn't have any family here.
48:52
We had no other choice but to roll up our sleeves and get it done.
48:56
So whether it was working on the house or working on the cars or,
48:59
you know, whatever it was that.
49:01
That stick to itiveness, right?
49:05
To always like achieve the goal.
49:07
Don't have lingering projects.
49:08
You can get it done, get it done, get it done.
49:10
Um, you know, I joke all the time.
49:12
My dad used to say if I wasn't doing something, you know, your idle hands
49:15
are the devil's workshop, right?
49:16
But he'd be like, don't you have something you should be working on right now?
49:18
Go find something to do.
49:19
Right.
49:20
And so that helped my ADD as a kid too, cause it kept me busy.
49:23
So I, I.
49:25
Carried that through my entire life.
49:27
I never have like sort of a dull moment.
49:29
And my wife jokes all the time.
49:30
Even when you're stationary, your brain is working.
49:33
You're thinking about the next project or the next article or the next.
49:36
You got to go here.
49:36
You got to do this.
49:37
So you got to prep the car, you know, all these kinds of things.
49:39
And so that helps me, you know, let's say being not neuro neuro divergent,
49:44
I guess is the new term for it, right?
49:46
But, uh, realistically, it comes down to you get out what you put in and sometimes.
49:54
100 percent isn't enough and folks that know me really well know I run it 200
49:59
percent most of the time and they're like, I don't know how you do it.
50:02
When do you sleep?
50:03
Whatever.
50:04
So a lot of the secret to that is time management, right?
50:07
That's the other thing is a moment.
50:10
You're wasting time.
50:12
And however you qualify that, what else could you be doing?
50:16
So for me, it's always been work, work, work, work, work.
50:19
And unfortunately it's two types of work, right?
50:21
And balancing that out and quality of life.
50:24
And I know it sounds like I'm running on the hamster wheel constantly,
50:26
but I've found ways, leveraging my day job to automate things.
50:31
That's the big deal.
50:33
And I, and that's the secret for me, probably not so much for
50:36
construction workers, but maybe.
50:38
You know, the use of some technology, or I don't want to say AI, because
50:42
it doesn't apply here, but there are ways to make processes better.
50:46
And if you think in that engineering way of like, how do we iterate this?
50:51
How do we make it better?
50:52
How do we not just do the same thing over and over again?
50:55
How can we, you know, How can we modify and evolve the process?
50:59
That's where you gain time back.
51:01
And when you can share that with other people, you become more efficient.
51:04
So bringing it back to motor sport and bring you back to construction,
51:06
working, if you're working as a unit.
51:08
Rather than as an individual contributor.
51:11
Now we all have more time to get more things done or to hang around
51:15
the haddock and crack open a beer and BS and tell stories, right?
51:19
So that's what it, that's what it really comes down to.
51:23
Wow.
51:23
Okay.
51:24
So you would be actually shocked at how much technology plays
51:27
into construction and how you.
51:29
Can create systems within the construction, you hit the nail on
51:34
the head when you talked about, you know, working symbiotically as
51:38
team and as one unit and then how that brings more time for everyone.
51:43
Right?
51:43
So one of my favorite things with my crew is that, you know, We start early, and
51:50
if we start early, we get to leave early.
51:52
So we work like as one, bang it out.
51:56
It's not about how long it takes to do it.
51:58
It's about getting it done.
52:00
Quickly and getting it done.
52:02
So, and one of the other things is the three C's of humanity.
52:06
The things that we don't do well, that we really need to exercise and
52:10
practice and refine is communication, collaboration, and cooperation.
52:14
If you could figure out how to master those three things in
52:17
concert, you are unstoppable.
52:20
So as a team, you need to think about those three C's.
52:23
How do we communicate better?
52:24
How do we cooperate and how do we collaborate?
52:26
And to your point.
52:28
Get start early, get done early, but it's that working as a unit,
52:32
like a military unit to get things done, you know, you will succeed.
52:37
And you achieved more than you ever thought you could.
52:39
Yeah, for sure.
52:40
For sure.
52:40
I love it.
52:41
Thank you, Eric.
52:42
Thank you so much for coming on the Sparky Life.
52:44
You are a pleasure.
52:45
I knew this was going to be awesome.
52:47
for having me.
52:47
This has been an absolute treat.
52:50
The Sparky Life.
52:53
Don't forget to subscribe.
52:55
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