January 18, 2024 • 45 mins
Sung and Emelia talk with Creative Director and Artist, Rod Chong. Rod shares his journey directing music videos and designing racing games to his current position as Race Service's Chief Creative Officer. They also talk about representation in the car community and what it takes to be successful.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:05):
Hello, friends and family, Welcome back to another episode of
Car Stories with Song Kang and Amelia Hartford. Today's guest
we have Rod Chong. Rod is the chief creative officer
over at the beloved Race Service and just an artiste.
Speaker 2 (00:23):
Yeah, well evolved human being. He shares a lot of
wisdom on his personal journey here.
Speaker 1 (00:29):
Yeah, and he's had a very full career outside of motorsports,
from also video games to music to fashion.
Speaker 2 (00:36):
Yeah, it was just a really pleasant conversation with a
person I've never met. But you've been friends with Rod
for a while.
Speaker 1 (00:42):
Yeah, I've known Rod for a very long time and
he is not afraid to ever go deep with the conversation,
which I appreciate the openness and willingness to go there.
All right, Well, enjoy Rod Chong everybody.
Speaker 2 (00:59):
So, for the listen out there that aren't familiar with
your history and your work, can you give us a
little history of Rod and where you are now and
where you came from.
Speaker 3 (01:12):
Yeah. Well, I'm one of those kids that grew up
racing go karts from an immigrant family in Vancouver, Canada.
And I think a lot of people, I'm sure you
find this from all the people that you talk to
in the car world that often a passion for cars
tends to come from childhood. Usually, I find nine times
(01:33):
out of ten, so I'm no different from that. My
father and his brothers were racing cars and go karts,
and my father had a shop where they would build
custom car stereos and they'd giant subwoofers and they'd enter
them in competition. So I grew up racing. But interestingly,
I never really liked the wheel the wheel sport that much.
(01:55):
It's maybe this very shy, quiet Asian kid and I
like drawing and painting cars more like the creative aspect
of being a kid that was into cars. I liked
being a racing driver more so I could, you know,
have something to help with, you know, being the experience
(02:15):
of racism and all that stuff as Asian kid in school.
It gave me a little bit of a leg up,
and I liked to have my leather jacket I could wear.
Maybe that's a Jamaican culture coming through. But fast forward on.
I went to art school too with a plan to
design cars because I was good at drawing and painting
and got distracted with cameras and running around with cameras,
(02:36):
so it seemed way more fun. So the first career
was directing music videos, so that I did that in
my native Vancouver, then came to Los Angeles and then
ended up in London doing that. That kind of fizzled out.
I was living in London and I heard about this
video game that you could download all suits of different
cars and you could change it and make your own
(02:57):
cars for it, in your own tracks. And this was
an e called sports Car GT, a PC simulation game,
And because I'd already had a career in media, I
put together a crew of people. We started making sports
car mods for f one games, so you would take
an EAPC game and make it into a sports car game.
And I love lamon and GT racing, so this is
(03:19):
what we focused on. And one of our mods became
very famous, and then suddenly we all got headhunted and
overnight I was given a job designing and producing racing games.
I turned that into a job at EA and went
back to my native Canada because I figured out in
my hometown they were making this very famous racing game,
Need for Speed, and this was at the height of
(03:42):
tuner cars and all that stuff. There was this big
street racing scenes. Drifting was just coming up, becoming more popular,
and You for Speed was tapping into this. And this
was about two thousand and five or so. Most Wanted
had just come out and I joined the team and
they put me in t charge of the cultural elements
that were going to be integrated into the games, and
(04:04):
they started sending me to La to go to drifting
events and I started meeting people and getting more involved
with the community, first in SoCal, even though I lived
in Vancouver, and then the bosses said to me, Hey,
we want to make a website about car culture. Thought
about it for a couple of weeks and then came
up with this idea of speed Hunting or speed Hunters,
(04:25):
which became a website that we launched in two thousand
and eight. And at the same time we launched another
program called Timney for Speed, which was a drifting team,
and we started building Carshusima. But we got to travel
the world and go to all the different scenes around
the world, and that was an incredible moment to go
to Japan, Australia and New Zealand, all across Europe, all
(04:47):
across the US and see what people are doing. And
then I left that in twenty fourteen, did a few
other projects within racing games, sim racing, even some atanas
motorsports stuff the company called Robo Race and then joined
the Race Service team. About five years ago moved to
LA and I had the dream of coming to SoCal
(05:09):
to be a participant in the car scene here. People
think I'm crazy, but I kind of moved to La
so I could drive cars. And I love big cities too,
because there's a great creative scene here. As both of
you know, there's people that are doing fashion, media, films,
graphic design, whatever it is art. But you can have
(05:31):
that here but still enjoy driving cars, and having lived
in Stockholm. In London, it's much harder to do that.
There's great creative scenes projects. You got a nice car
in London, it's very hard to enjoy it.
Speaker 2 (05:43):
Sure, and even in Canada because the weather is so
like it's gonna list out your cars.
Speaker 3 (05:51):
That's salt right, yeah yeah yeah.
Speaker 2 (05:53):
So So for the folks that don't know Race Service,
because we had one of your colleagues here Service Chames,
could you explain to the listening audience what you guys
do over there at Race Service.
Speaker 3 (06:03):
Well, Race Service, it's been interesting Race Service has been
around about five years or so, and for the first
few years people kept saying to us, what is race Service?
What do you guys do? It seems very cool, but
what is this thing? The way that we explain it
is that it's a creative agency. So we do different
types of projects, collaborations with different brands, usually in automotive
(06:26):
and motorsports, but we do work in video gaming. I
do some projects in fashion as well, and our thesis
is to connect the worlds of motorsports and automotive to
wider parts of contemporary or pop culture, streetwear, music, video games,
even some Web three materials, fashion, different organizations. Like we're
(06:50):
an agency for NASCAR. We do a lot of projects
with AMG and Porsche Hot Wheels, this one that I'm
quite involved with. We'll want us to do content and
strategy and sometimes events to connect all these worlds together.
We're also in the middle of launching a streetwear fashion
brand as well that's kind of focused around collaborations with
(07:12):
automotive brands. But we have our online as well. That's
a bit of a new project. And then the last
part of Race Service is that we are a car
culture hub. We wanted to have a place that's a destination.
And we have meetups once a month, the first Friday
of every month at our space. We occasionally curate events
(07:32):
and we have a pretty active community of people that
come out to our different programs on site.
Speaker 1 (07:38):
And can I invite anyone listening to go to a
Rise and Shine sometimes?
Speaker 3 (07:42):
Absolutely?
Speaker 4 (07:43):
Yeah, that's what it's called Rising.
Speaker 3 (07:45):
And Shine yea very first Friday of every month.
Speaker 1 (07:49):
Yeah, and it's a good turnout. And maybe if you're
not familiar cars, you want to get in the space,
you want to meet some cool people. I think it's
a great environment.
Speaker 2 (07:57):
So you know what I love about you guys over
Race Service is that a lot of times you meet
you know, car folks and they have no fashion sense.
They look like they show up like that because you know,
my wife always bags on me. He's like, you know,
why don't you like dress up? And then everybody over
at Race Service, you guys just have a great blend
(08:19):
of what is hip and fashion and pop culture. And
then you mailed that with you know, car culture, which
you know, I got some schwag from you guys, and
I took it over to my house and my wife
is like, that's what you should be right, because it's
a celebration of you know, our love affair for cars
in the community. But then it's you know, it's it's
a it's a wonderful blend, you know, so.
Speaker 3 (08:41):
Blends industry where and fashion install But we're quite focused
on curation. Whether we are designing an event, we'll think
of every single aspect of what someone experience is going
through that event, from the music to the posters and
every little detail and the singles. For any film project
that we do, the worst Senate Race service is to
(09:03):
do a project that has no style, or to take
a photograph that doesn't have visual aesthetic buy in to it.
It's something that's very important to us and I find
that that whole trajectory interesting. When I first started going
to automotive events, say you go to an event, say
drifting event in la even ten years ago, people had
(09:25):
some style, you know, ten years ago, ten years ago. Yeah,
And then i would go to an event in the
UK and I'm looking around and I'm thinking, what are
these people wearing? But the interesting thing is in the
past ten fifteen years that's changed, that has really changed,
and you see the intersection of street wear and modified
(09:48):
custom cars a lot more now in that people's personal
presentation is definitely linked in a lot of scenes anyway,
maybe not everywhere, to whatever customer car that they're building,
or how they express their personal style through a custom
car or a modified car.
Speaker 1 (10:05):
And you guys do a lot of cool collubs and
help companies bridge those gaps.
Speaker 4 (10:09):
Right.
Speaker 1 (10:09):
One huge project that you've had lately has been Hot Wheels.
Speaker 4 (10:13):
Yes, what would you guys do that? With Hot Wheels?
Speaker 3 (10:15):
We've I've been personally a collaborator of Hot Wheels for
a long time through many different programs from speed Hunters,
had different collabs we did when I was seeing the
Project Cars video game, we had a line of Hot
Wheels that we collabed with them. But Hot Wheels has
been a client and collaborator of Race Service since we
started for the past five years, so we're involved with
(10:37):
the Legend's Car Show. We have produced numerous content programs
with them that you see on their Instagram channel. Currently,
we are doing a documentary series for a car that's
been built for rent Sport Reunion. It's going to debut
in about a week and a half. So we're always
involved with all sorts of different programs with them. I'm
(10:57):
a bit of a Hot Wheels collector. I love the brand.
Those little cars are so much joy in each of them. Yeah,
well you've done projects with me. Yeah, I have your cars.
I mean it's it's like every car person's Bucke list.
Yeah your car is a hot wheel Yeah.
Speaker 4 (11:12):
Yeah, so cool.
Speaker 3 (11:13):
Yeah, for any automotive personality or car builder, I think
that's definitely a big checklist item. Right, you've arrived, you know.
Speaker 2 (11:21):
I'm sure you've seen a lot of people come and
go right trying to do what race Service does and
what do you think that sets you guys apart to
just be able to kind of help the listeners if
they have interest in doing what you guys do.
Speaker 3 (11:35):
It's also a wider question of how do you take
your passion or cars and make that into your career
and then have that continue, which is not for a
lot of people. That's not easy, and that that's a
big question. Right. I would say that it's a mix
of being driven by passion, taking that passion and having
(11:58):
that fuel you is really really good. That'll only get
you so far, though, because you know this concept of
the ten thousand hours, right, you have to be a
good craft you have to be to be an expert. Yeah,
you just have to look at the craft of what
you want to do. So if you take you know,
we look at the content creation side of what you do.
(12:18):
There's a lot of craft of that. How do you shoot,
how do you talk to the camera, how do you edit?
How do you build a storyline? I believe that people
that do the groundwork to become very good at what
they do. That's very important. And then lastly, it's being
able to work on your personality so that you can
talk about what you do, you can connect with people
(12:40):
and find those opportunities. So for me, those are the
magic three mixes of you work really hard so that
when the spotlight swings your way, that you're ready and
you don't fuck it up, then maybe it's going to fly.
Speaker 4 (12:54):
What do you think, Amelia?
Speaker 1 (12:56):
I lean more towards the ladder where I think you
can achieve anything that you want to on this earth,
so long as you work for it and don't give up.
I always think of this little image of this person
who's like digging underground trying to find a light or
whatever it is, and most times people will give up
before it just takes one more swing to get there.
In acting world, you may get one hundred or a
(13:18):
thousands no's before you get one yes. And I think
as long as you work towards anything, you're a good person,
you can achieve. You know, what you believe, where you've
found excites you, or what you set out to do.
Speaker 4 (13:29):
But there's so many fucked up people that achieve success.
Speaker 1 (13:32):
Right.
Speaker 2 (13:33):
But i'stell business they go that guys in the fuck
or so and so is it's such an asshole?
Speaker 4 (13:39):
What do you think?
Speaker 3 (13:39):
I tend to focus on creatives, being a creative minded
person myself, and there's a category of creative me and
my friends call them naturals, and they don't really spend
a lot of time thinking about it. Yeah, some people
would would say that if you're too smart or you
think too much, you might paralyze yourself thinking about all
the possible abilities and if I do that or should
(14:02):
I have that strategy? And then that will light to
that to that, and sometimes if your your brain isn't
clogged up with all this stuff, you just do stuff
and you go for it.
Speaker 2 (14:11):
Yah.
Speaker 3 (14:11):
I think that also relates to your culture. I'm not American,
I'm from Canada originally, and you know immigrant parents and
all that whole thing. But one thing have immigrant My
father is from Jamaica, Jamaican Chinese, my mother's from Columbia
and South American. But one thing, having moved here five
years ago, that I love about American culture is they
(14:37):
can do spirit. But also the way that people support
each other in the communities. I think that that's fantastic.
If you say I'm going to do this thing and
you have a good support network, people will generally say,
from my experience, anyway, Okay, we're going to support you.
Go for it, we're going to help you. We're going
to talk to that person do that. Whereas in other
(14:58):
cultures that may have tall pop syndrome, you say I'm
going to do this thing, and they're going to say,
who do you think you are?
Speaker 4 (15:04):
Tall poppies.
Speaker 3 (15:05):
Yeah, it's like a field of poppies and one tries
to grow taller, the other poppies are going to try
and gang up and cut that thing down. Really get
back in your place. Yeah, there's a lot of cultures
like that, and it's harder to get going.
Speaker 1 (15:17):
Right.
Speaker 2 (15:17):
Do you think that fueled your hunger or desire to
prove everybody wrong because people are trying to cut that poppy.
Speaker 3 (15:25):
Yeah, I would say, because I'm a little older and
you didn't have the Internet as a place to have
community to show what you could do. I used to
make these crazy videos and I would finish them, put
them on the tape, and put them in a drawer
because it was before YouTube launched. So now the world
(15:47):
is a lot flatter. So if you're from a smaller
city or a different place, you can still show what
you do. You put it on the internet, build fans,
figure out how you're gonna blaunch your career and great
content whatever it is. So things are very different now.
Speaker 2 (16:17):
You know what I what I really envy about you, Amelia,
is that you're driving the cars that you're building, right,
Like you always show up here with like some cool cars,
and you know, I get so frustrated with these cars
that I have because the notion of like driving a
vintage car and if you're like, yay, I'm James Deeney,
(16:39):
you know, Hollywood, and then like an hour later it
starts to overheat and then you're you're on the side
of the road. Man, I don't like that anymore. Like,
you know, it was cool like for the first like
three times that happened. But then always these old cars
have some problem and you know, the gauges don't work
like I think half the cars the gas fuel gauge,
(17:00):
I'm not sure if it.
Speaker 4 (17:01):
Sound empty or full, because this is going up.
Speaker 3 (17:04):
And that's a little bit of the argument for the
whole ev swap thing, right if it takes out that
you can just enjoy the thing. It probably doesn't drive
in the same way, but the thing runs and it's
probably ten times as fast. Also, yeah, that's really fair.
Speaker 1 (17:18):
When I build cars, I keep streetability in mind, like hardcore.
Like I just bought a sixty nine Camaro and I
already bought everything I need to put AC in it
because I never again will I take out a C
from a car build a car that ice'. There's just
so many layers. I wanted to be comfortable driving because
I don't want to end up on the side of
the road. And when I moved here with my two
(17:41):
forty SX that was constantly overheating, how to pull over
no AC, going to auditions with like my makeup running
and sweat driven down my back, spelling like gasoline because
it was run and rich. I just like I think
now I want to be able to enjoy the cars,
and it makes me so sad if they park for
too long that I maybe it's my OCD a little bit,
but I almost make them a little too perfect.
Speaker 3 (18:01):
It's a challenge of classic car ownership modified cars. I've
given up on dreaming of air conditioning in mine. I
bought a fan off Amazon, and I just just blows
a little bit of air.
Speaker 2 (18:15):
I've been thinking about liquidating all my cars and just
focusing on one and like making.
Speaker 3 (18:21):
That that's what I'm doing.
Speaker 2 (18:23):
I just have one because I love vintagch cars, but like,
get that thing like completely sorted out, where as they
see has everything that I need, all the creature comforts
where I can drive it across country to New York
and then.
Speaker 4 (18:36):
Drive it every day.
Speaker 2 (18:37):
Because I look at these cars and you know, I'm
getting older, and I go, when am I going to
actually enjoy this? When am I going to be able
to drive it into canyons? When am I going to
be able to take it to the track, Because I'm
always paranoid like it's going to break down?
Speaker 3 (18:52):
Yeah, right?
Speaker 2 (18:53):
And I think I shifted to like I love the
process of bringing these cars to life.
Speaker 4 (18:58):
But then that really fully alive kind of limping through.
Speaker 1 (19:02):
Yeah, it's hard. He like lose trust in a car
sometimes two when it breaks down one too many times.
Speaker 3 (19:08):
Yeah, I've done something a little crazy with my car.
Is I had a digital twin made, well, a digital
twin if I commissioned someone. No, it's an add on
for this PC simulation game, a set of corsa. So
I had this guy in Europe build it. We scan
the car and he built a three D model of it,
did all the physics and everything. So I can sit
(19:30):
in my living room because I'm in the PCSM racing
with a VR head set, and I've driven the car
across Tokyo for example, two hundred miles an hour in
virtual reality.
Speaker 1 (19:40):
You have your car on a set of corso, yeah.
Speaker 3 (19:42):
And I've driven it on the on the La Canyon.
I mean, that's stupid because I could do that in
real life because that's in LA. But still it's funny
that I can drive my car in my living room
around racetracks around the world. Way to enjoy it.
Speaker 1 (19:54):
A set of courso for those listening, think of not
to compare to Grand Trisma or I racing, but it's
a racing video game essentially. That I said, of course,
is specifically a lot of drifters like to use for
the realism of being able to get a car sideways
and get seat time without actually spending money on tires
and gas.
Speaker 3 (20:12):
That's so cool anyway, That's the way that I enjoy
my my classic car virtually, so much.
Speaker 2 (20:18):
Different than playing it in like Grand Turismo or so
because I have my car in Grand Turismo and.
Speaker 1 (20:23):
That's less street and more tracks into it.
Speaker 4 (20:26):
I was like, yawn, it's different than we are.
Speaker 3 (20:29):
If you have a full PC simrig, you're you're you're
able to trick your nervous system. It actually thinks you're driving. Yeah,
it's very different than a TV.
Speaker 4 (20:39):
I like that. Yeah, huh.
Speaker 1 (20:42):
I'm curious about what makes you tick, I guess, and
how you go into going.
Speaker 3 (20:47):
To get into it? Okay, yeah, let's go. Yeah, let's
steep dive. What would you like to know?
Speaker 1 (20:51):
Let's start with what makes you tick? What what makes
you choose the decisions that you do on a daily basis,
and where are you hoping to go with your career.
Speaker 3 (21:03):
It's an interesting question when you ask someone like why
are you here? What are you here to do? Or
what do you stand for? I find that very fascinating.
Whenever I meet people, I sometimes look in the mirror
and think, what must I do? Not what do I
want to do? What must I do in order to
(21:23):
not go crazy? And for me it comes down to
two things. One is I exist to imagine things and
bring those visions to life and through creative projects. That's
the thing I must do. And if I'm not doing that,
(21:43):
then there's sadness start going crazy. So that's a bit
of the hardwiring. For my personal philosophy. I define it
as I exist to grow and learn. That for me
is very important to continuously be a student and to
continuously try and look at where my blind spots are.
(22:09):
It's kind of hard to do because of they're blind spots,
but try and keep learning and keep never become too solid,
never say okay, this is me. I'm not going to
grow anymore. But the thing that I exist for maybe
my mission, which has maybe only come together in the
past few years, is you can ask a question, how
(22:32):
are you going to contribute to the world? What are
you going to do? And for me, it comes down
to trying to fight for a bit of equality, whether
that's in the creative projects or the people that I'm
giving opportunities to, or if I'm putting a creative team together,
who are those people? Can I try and hire some
women in the automotive scene into the projects that I'm
(22:54):
involved with. Can I try and give opportunities to people
of color? Or if I see a young kid that's
just starting who comes from maybe a lack of a
better term, disadvantaged background, but they're really passionate, can I
help them? Can I give them advice about how to
develop their careers? So those that's the main mission. I'm
(23:15):
still working through the best ways to actualize that, but
I'm trying to live by that and to affect change
around me.
Speaker 4 (23:21):
That's a great answer.
Speaker 1 (23:22):
Yeah, very well thought out, and I know you take
a Yeah, I know. Have you had many mentors in
your life?
Speaker 3 (23:29):
Yes? I don't know where I figured that out. Somewhere
along the line, I figured out that it's helpful to
have people to learn from, and from the very beginning
of my career, even when I was in art school,
I would hang out with the teachers. I'd go for
lunch with them, and I just try and learn, and
wherever I went in the different stages of my career,
(23:50):
I've always had people that were much further along than
me who took an interest in what I was doing
and gave me advice. Sometimes might criticize me for the
way I was going about things and give support, maybe
make some introductions, and I try and do that as well.
Now with when I'm going about my business, I'm having
a bit of a strange year in that I'm for
(24:11):
the first time since I can remember, I have a
little bit of spare time. And I found that very
disconcerting for me, having a to do list that's you know,
crazy long, intense deadlines. That friction creates a sense of order.
Maybe I became addicted to having that friction and just
(24:35):
being busy. Now that just for the past four months,
I'm coming off a four year project. I have a
little bit of time to think about things and just
to focus on myself, and for the first few months
I was kind of disturbing. I have to build internal
motivation versus external motivation from a deadline or just having
(25:01):
people calling you or having things that you have to
get done it a project on fire?
Speaker 1 (25:05):
Is that not setting goals, though, setting deadlines for.
Speaker 3 (25:10):
Yourself creating friction.
Speaker 1 (25:12):
Sure, I mean friction can be defined as many things, right,
I mean anyone would say setting a goals creating friction
because you have to do something about it.
Speaker 3 (25:20):
Yeah, I've been changing my methodology to be maybe more
about having a way of approaching every day or having
things that I focus on, but less about saying we're
going to have that done by then, I need to
earn that amount of money by this point in time,
or this has to be done then, because I find
(25:42):
that that creates stress and I don't always feel that happy.
So I've been trying to focus more on the art
of making every day count in different aspects of life,
whether it's physical health, being inspired, updating my skill set,
my personal projects like my car, or looking at what
(26:04):
how to steer my career, and new goals that I'm
setting for myself. So I've been trying to be slightly
less goal oriented and more about having a very good process.
That's a better way to say it. That's a new
thing that I've been working through just this year. You know,
the whole chop would carry water business that I think
(26:28):
that might come from the karate kid the saying is,
before enlightenment, chop wood carry water. After enlightenment, chop wood
carry water, and that you focus on making everyday count
and it's the art of doing simple tasks or just
(26:48):
taking care of business and projects for the sake of
doing a good job of that and having a balanced life.
That is the way forward. At least I'm working with this.
I'll get back to you to see if this is
all bunch of nonsense or.
Speaker 1 (27:01):
Not that reminds me of I'm not going to do
the story justice. But there is an old story about
a fisherman who's on a boat and some rich billionaire
comes to go fish with him because whatever's on vacation
or whatever it is.
Speaker 3 (27:16):
I've heard this story.
Speaker 1 (27:17):
Have you heard this one song? It's ad one And
I'm not going to do a justice. So this billionaire
goes fishing with this fisherman's small town and he's just fishing,
and the billionaires like, oh, well, if you have three
fishing rods set up, you can catch three times as
much and then you can grow your business here to
do this, to then catch more fish, to sell more fish,
(27:38):
to make more money. Have employees, yeah, have employees, and
then the Fisherman's like, well, why would I do that.
He's like, well, so then you can.
Speaker 3 (27:46):
Retire and then you could come back here and you know,
be with your boat and fish. It's a simple retirement.
Speaker 1 (27:52):
He's like, but I'm doing that now. Have you been
able to find happiness in that shift from going from
being gold driven to focus more on the moment.
Speaker 3 (28:01):
Yeah, definitely. I've had moments in my life where I've
been very much about the goal. When I first started
at EA, I was very obsessed with getting to a
point where I made one hundred thousand dollars a year.
I was just focused on that, and every time I
saw my paycheck, I wasn't making one hundred thousand dollars
a year. And then I became very focused, I need
(28:21):
to be a sea level executive, and I would present
myself like that when I said, EA, it's very casual.
All these programmers with their the T shirt that they've
been wearing all week.
Speaker 4 (28:33):
That's what sea level stands for. Casual.
Speaker 3 (28:35):
No no, no, like C suite, like CEO, oh an executive.
I would wear like colored shirts sports jack be I'm
a decision maker and all of you will think of
me as a decision maker. This is the thirties where
I was felt like I was behind. I went for
years just thinking about my not sea level life, and
(28:58):
even more recently, I had this goal. I needed to
have a supercar and I wanted I've done a lot
of projects with McLaren and they occasionally give me cars
to drive, and you know, the amazing machines. And my
daily is a twenty nineteen Cayman S. It's an amazing car,
but for the longest time it was a not McLaren. Right,
(29:21):
So I'm getting in this beautiful, incredibly engineered, well handling
sports car and I'm driving around my not McLaren. And
that's what I mean by external goals, and I'm not
appreciating this incredible car that my life has taken me
to drive, right, And it's fabulous to be an LA traffic,
Canyon track day, just the best, well rounded machine, good
(29:43):
fuel economy, turbo four cylinder. I've been working to get
rid of those external checklist items so that you can
appreciate the life that you have now. If we get
back to what we're talking about earlier, imagine someone that
love shooting cars, right, They've got their camera, they're going
(30:04):
to car meets. They've got friends that have some cool cars,
they're getting together to do shoots. But they might still
have a day job, and someone might become so focused
on the fact that they're not making a living as
a professional automotive media creator that they become miserable. But
the point I'm making is that just the moment where
you have good friends, just looking at this case study
(30:27):
shooting cars, you're in a position where you have your
health and your camera and you're out doing some fun stuff.
You should just have fun with that and be able
to be in the moment a little bit more.
Speaker 1 (30:36):
So.
Speaker 3 (30:37):
That's that's what I'm working through.
Speaker 2 (30:38):
I completely understand. I completely understand. You know, the Sienna.
There was a time where I would not ever be
seen driving this car, right, And the reason I love
this car so much is because not only does it
have eighteen cup holders smiles again.
Speaker 1 (30:55):
And non sponsor.
Speaker 4 (30:57):
Yeah, it's not like I have no association to tellya that, right.
Speaker 2 (31:00):
I think they're very They're very especially the minivan departments,
like really happy that I talk about the Siana.
Speaker 4 (31:07):
Because they get no love.
Speaker 3 (31:11):
Nice.
Speaker 2 (31:11):
Yeah, but this is this is like a gift to mankind.
But anyway, when I drive this car, and when I
look at this car, I get so happy or there's
a feeling of contentment because this is a representation of
I don't give a fuck what you think about me.
Speaker 4 (31:30):
And it took so many years to get to that place.
Speaker 2 (31:33):
And once somehow, and it's actually because of this car, right,
I met the mentors. Like when I was in Hawaii,
I would see all of these you know, older gentlemen
driving this or Toyota Tacoma, like pieces of junk that
are being rusted up because of the salt water in Hawaii,
(31:54):
and then I would like get to know them, and
friends would introduce me and they go, yeah, that guy's like,
you know, almost a billionaire, or he owns half of this,
or he's this or he's that, And I'm like, but
he drives a Sienna. He's like yeah, because he doesn't
care what people think. And I was like, man, that
was my north star. I was like, I need to
get to that place where whatever is on the externals
(32:17):
not for others, and like, look, we should love the
finer things in life if it's sincere and if it's
not for somebody else, Like even the way like I
dressed today.
Speaker 4 (32:27):
It was like when I was younger.
Speaker 2 (32:29):
It was like I dressed because I was like, oh, hey,
I need that person to think that I'm something, that
I'm cool.
Speaker 4 (32:36):
And now I wear what I look as like. I
like that.
Speaker 2 (32:40):
I like the ethos behind that. And this the Toyota CNA.
The engineers of this car, they created a masterpiece. Yeah,
well I fix it when it's not broken, right.
Speaker 3 (32:52):
I find myself appreciating cameras. Sometimes I look at the
corner of my eye, see this wide loasedan. I think,
what is that? Oh, it's a camera.
Speaker 1 (33:00):
Is this what I have to look forward to? As
I get older?
Speaker 3 (33:03):
I find as I get older, I become more extreme
extreme extreme. It's an interesting one. As you get older,
there's different directions that you can go. I like looking
at archetypes, and there's several art types that I feel
myself heading in the direction of. One is the the outlaw.
(33:24):
Sometimes I go to lowrider events in detail. I live
in the arts district in downtown LA and I go
to these little rider events and I see I see
these older like Mexican gentlemen, you know, with their shaved
heads and their tattoos, and I think, damn, this is
they look so amazing and they're like sixty. And then
the other the other arch type that I love is
(33:47):
the avant garde artist or artiste that people that get
older become more out there visually. So I think by
the time I'm like eighty, I'm gonna have like tattoos over.
I don't know, it's just it's the direction I'm heading in.
Speaker 1 (34:17):
You know.
Speaker 2 (34:17):
Speaking of the low writer community, I don't know if
this urban legend is true, but it has been told
that the person that actually sparked or created the lowriters
is actually a Japanese American.
Speaker 4 (34:34):
That's true, Pazo. I think his name is Tazzo.
Speaker 3 (34:36):
I saw the story recently that the first car that's
considered the prototype lowriter there was a Asian American gentleman.
But it was the same with Have you heard of
Bob hiro Hata No In the nineteen fifties, he worked
with Sam barrass and they created the hiro Hata Mercury.
(34:57):
It's a fifty one Mercury, the most famous custom car
in the world and dead Japanese American. This is a
whole other subject, but yeah, certainly the stories of Asian
Americans in the history of hot rotting, drag, racing, custom cars.
It's a there's so many stories and people that have
(35:19):
contributed along the way.
Speaker 2 (35:21):
That have been invisible, I guess because of media. Yeah,
to control that.
Speaker 3 (35:26):
It's a program I did with Hot Wheels two years
ago and one year ago to tell more of these
stories during AAPI month.
Speaker 4 (35:35):
What did they say?
Speaker 3 (35:36):
Well, we we They came to us and said, hey,
let's celebrate API Asian American Pacific Islanders and their contributions
to the automobile and car culture. So we did several
articles that were on Hot Wheels Instagram channel, and we
looked at who are the people that have done some
crazy stuff like Larry Shinoda he worked on the Stingray
(36:02):
Corvette and the really Mustang. But there's numerous people that
have designed iconic cars, motorsports legends and Yeah, often these
stories are not told. And it's also fun to try
and find new people that are coming up to see
if we can help them.
Speaker 4 (36:23):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (36:24):
One thing that when you talk about Asian Americans and
Asian Americans in car culture that I find a little
maybe worrying to look at is when I look at
Formula D right now, there's not many Asian Americans competing anymore.
Speaker 4 (36:39):
And there used to be tons. Why do you think
that is.
Speaker 3 (36:42):
I've talked to Jim Law about this, and Jim Law.
Speaker 2 (36:45):
Used to be the head of FD now so he's
no longer. There is of Asian he said. He said
that it's hard for people to find sponsorship because they're Asian.
Speaker 3 (36:55):
That's one thing he said, yeah, and I don't know,
but it's it's definitely something we've noted. The challenges.
Speaker 1 (37:02):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (37:02):
I mean, we had Hurt here formerly from Hoon again
and we were asking him like, how come there're very
few pro African American drivers? Yea, if any, like I
never saw any. And then last FT even I went to,
I think there was Die was still racing, and there
was Ken Gucci and that's.
Speaker 3 (37:22):
There from the beginning, right old school.
Speaker 2 (37:24):
But they also were saying I remember kenn Or Die
was telling me. He's like, yeah, we can't, we can't
compete with you know, the dudes like h On. He's like,
I can't, I can't compete with him because he has
He was look at their like you know, their their pits,
like you know, it's like it's millions of dollars where
(37:44):
he was saying like I can bear it. We have
he had to tow the cars himself, like Ken he
was saying, right, and like his whole crew are staying
in a motel six, right, So it's all about sponsorship.
So I mean, I I don't know, man, it's like
a challenge. Or you look at women in motorsports, right,
same thing. It's at least good that there's dialogue about
(38:06):
these things and there's still people that break through, thankfully,
and there's still marker moments that happen if we look
at you know, through the lens of people of color
and women and their progression and automotive. But I think
one has to keep pushing and keep trying to help,
or you can to find opportunities for people, keep encouraging
(38:27):
others and share what you've learned along the way hopefully.
Speaker 1 (38:30):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (38:31):
I mean, look, it's it's important to talk about this,
but it's also it's I think it's important also to
not be delusional. Of course, talk about it realistically, right,
I mean, I mean you brought up the fact like, yeah,
why are there are very few Asian like you know
drifters and the pro league. That's a question that I
(38:51):
would like to answer you know, and is it because
they're inferior drivers or is it that because their face
does not sell the product?
Speaker 4 (39:00):
Is that even true? I mean I deal with that.
Speaker 2 (39:02):
It's like like when I deal with like corporate like America,
They're like, yeah, your face doesn't work in America, and
then I go outside and Asia and Europe, it's like
I'm appreciated. Is like, you know, there's value there, but here,
being American and growing up here is like has its
pros and its cons. But I always feel like, you know,
(39:24):
I'm in the backseat.
Speaker 3 (39:26):
Yeah, I agree with you. I definitely have experienced that.
In my first career music video directing, I was working
with industrial metal bands like Marilyn Manson and Nine Inch
Nails and this kind of stuff. But I think when
I was up for music videos, if I was going
to be invited to write on and they saw this
name Rod Chong, I don't believe that that necessarily helped
(39:47):
me in my progression. This is in the nineties, but
I'd like to think that maybe now it wouldn't be
quite as much friction as it was back then.
Speaker 4 (39:58):
I don't think so.
Speaker 2 (39:59):
Yeah, I don't think it's you know, it's at bad
as the nineties. I think it's getting better and better
and better, but I think the dialogue and not to
complain about it, like I'm not a soapbox guy, and
like I don't not like to talk about, Oh, the
world is racist and I'm the victim, Like it's not that.
But it's also like again, ignore truth, Like how is
drifting this sport that so supposedly it was inspired by Japan?
Speaker 3 (40:24):
Yeah?
Speaker 2 (40:24):
Right, and there's nobody from Japan participating in the sport
in America. But Hurt actually brought up a good point
when we spoke to him. He said, what did you say, Mail?
He said that the Japanese cars were where there's this
American sensibility or the American version of Japanese car culture.
Speaker 1 (40:45):
Right. I think he was talking, if I remember correctly,
about the different drifting styles, and what he liked about
Final Bout was it had more Japanese influence where FD
today has more American influence of form over function, function
over form.
Speaker 3 (40:59):
Yeah. Finally, I remember talking to some of the OG
Japanese drifters. I went to Japan for a tour in
two thousand and eight and we spent a lot of
time with Team Orange back then they were talking about
how the style of drifting that was coming up was
more like sideways power sliding, which kind of makes sense.
Whereas if you look at those early drifting events where
(41:21):
they I remember I went to a D one GP
event in two thousand and six at Arndale and they
had different rules for cars below three hundred horsepower, So
the eighty six is that were drifting back then. They
didn't have to drift the bank at Arundel because they
couldn't have enough power, and there was a bit more
of a playing field that was designed for those low
(41:43):
horsepower cars and all that. But that's a bit more
of the traditional JDM drifting thing, which it's a bit
more like final about I'd say, is more of a
throwback to the original spirit of what drifting was like
in late nineties, early to mid two thousands. It's kind
of gone in a different direction now. Yeah, and I
still am a big fan. I go I try and
(42:05):
go to the Long Beach and Rundel every year, So
I still love drifting.
Speaker 1 (42:09):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (42:10):
And also you know, when I step back and look
at you know, the landscape, but you know professional drifting. Yeah,
the positives is that you know this thing that came
from Asian culture is now accepted and embraced by people
that are not Asian. And it's not this like you know,
this like exotic foreign thing. It's like, oh, it's you know,
(42:33):
it's part of American culture now, right, which is awesome.
Speaker 3 (42:37):
European culture too. The biggest drifting event in the world
just happened in Poland. Really there were six thousand people
there was in a stadium, I mean fifty six thousand.
Speaker 4 (42:48):
Wow.
Speaker 3 (42:48):
Yeah, So there. It's it's moving around the world. It's
kind of become it's its own thing. Yes, the roots
are in Japan, but.
Speaker 4 (42:55):
What do you think that is.
Speaker 2 (42:56):
You think it's because it's a car event or something
that is accessible to just the layman.
Speaker 3 (43:03):
Think about skiing and mountains, right, Skiing is being around
a long time. You know, people go on mountains, and
it was there for a long time, and then suddenly
this new group of people came snowboarders, right, they dressed differently,
this in different mus Totally it was a culture and
all the traditional skiers were looking at going what is
this thing?
Speaker 1 (43:22):
Right?
Speaker 3 (43:22):
Who are these people? Snowboarding has you know gone and
it's its own thing now totally international sport and pastime,
but it still is happening on ski slopes, right, And
you could think of traditional motorsports happening on racetracks, et cetera,
and then suddenly these drifters come out and they're different.
Speaker 4 (43:43):
Right.
Speaker 3 (43:43):
It's a lifestyle more comparable to snowboarders and skaters, i'd say,
if you wanted to draw a parallel, But it's also
just fun to watch. And I believe it's the last
new motorsport that's happened in an age. I think rallycross
was invented in the early seventies, but aside from that,
there's not really anything you maybe maybe monster trucks or
(44:06):
the other new sport if you want.
Speaker 1 (44:08):
To call it that that's trippy to think about that,
drifting or maybe monst trucks. I don't know which came first,
but to think that that's one of the newer forms
and maybe the last form of motorsport, Yeah, racing.
Speaker 3 (44:21):
And it's just it's it's entertaining.
Speaker 1 (44:23):
Right.
Speaker 3 (44:23):
You've got the crazy, out of control action that you
might seem rallying. You've got the side by side door
banging you might get in NASCAR, the smoke pomp and
circumstance you get in drag racing, you know, big power cars,
and but then you've got this knockout timeline, whereas regular motorsports, Right,
you're going around in circles and you get to sit
(44:44):
in the grand stand as a fan and room room right,
the cars are going left right, and then someone wins
and then it's over. And yeah, it's usually not that
exciting as much as I love motorsports. So I think
that that's why drifting has developed in the way that
it has. You know, there was a while there in
the US that rally cross came in and took all
(45:06):
the oxygen out of the room, and all the factory
programs left. Formula D went to rally cross, and then
there's new forms of electric rally cross coming in, etc.
But it stayed that often it keeps going. The fan
engagements there still fun. We love drifting.
Speaker 4 (45:22):
Well, thank you, Ron, this was a great conversation.
Speaker 1 (45:24):
This has been a really deep and lovely conversation.
Speaker 3 (45:27):
My pleasure. Yeah, we went pretty deep. I feel very
close to both of you now, and so do we
Hello, friends and family, Welcome back to another episode of
Car Stories with Song Kang and Amelia Hartford. Today's guest
we have Rod Chong. Rod is the chief creative officer
over at the beloved Race Service and just an artiste.
Speaker 2 (00:23):
Yeah, well evolved human being. He shares a lot of
wisdom on his personal journey here.
Speaker 1 (00:29):
Yeah, and he's had a very full career outside of motorsports,
from also video games to music to fashion.
Speaker 2 (00:36):
Yeah, it was just a really pleasant conversation with a
person I've never met. But you've been friends with Rod
for a while.
Speaker 1 (00:42):
Yeah, I've known Rod for a very long time and
he is not afraid to ever go deep with the conversation,
which I appreciate the openness and willingness to go there.
All right, Well, enjoy Rod Chong everybody.
Speaker 2 (00:59):
So, for the listen out there that aren't familiar with
your history and your work, can you give us a
little history of Rod and where you are now and
where you came from.
Speaker 3 (01:12):
Yeah. Well, I'm one of those kids that grew up
racing go karts from an immigrant family in Vancouver, Canada.
And I think a lot of people, I'm sure you
find this from all the people that you talk to
in the car world that often a passion for cars
tends to come from childhood. Usually, I find nine times
(01:33):
out of ten, so I'm no different from that. My
father and his brothers were racing cars and go karts,
and my father had a shop where they would build
custom car stereos and they'd giant subwoofers and they'd enter
them in competition. So I grew up racing. But interestingly,
I never really liked the wheel the wheel sport that much.
(01:55):
It's maybe this very shy, quiet Asian kid and I
like drawing and painting cars more like the creative aspect
of being a kid that was into cars. I liked
being a racing driver more so I could, you know,
have something to help with, you know, being the experience
(02:15):
of racism and all that stuff as Asian kid in school.
It gave me a little bit of a leg up,
and I liked to have my leather jacket I could wear.
Maybe that's a Jamaican culture coming through. But fast forward on.
I went to art school too with a plan to
design cars because I was good at drawing and painting
and got distracted with cameras and running around with cameras,
(02:36):
so it seemed way more fun. So the first career
was directing music videos, so that I did that in
my native Vancouver, then came to Los Angeles and then
ended up in London doing that. That kind of fizzled out.
I was living in London and I heard about this
video game that you could download all suits of different
cars and you could change it and make your own
(02:57):
cars for it, in your own tracks. And this was
an e called sports Car GT, a PC simulation game,
And because I'd already had a career in media, I
put together a crew of people. We started making sports
car mods for f one games, so you would take
an EAPC game and make it into a sports car game.
And I love lamon and GT racing, so this is
(03:19):
what we focused on. And one of our mods became
very famous, and then suddenly we all got headhunted and
overnight I was given a job designing and producing racing games.
I turned that into a job at EA and went
back to my native Canada because I figured out in
my hometown they were making this very famous racing game,
Need for Speed, and this was at the height of
(03:42):
tuner cars and all that stuff. There was this big
street racing scenes. Drifting was just coming up, becoming more popular,
and You for Speed was tapping into this. And this
was about two thousand and five or so. Most Wanted
had just come out and I joined the team and
they put me in t charge of the cultural elements
that were going to be integrated into the games, and
(04:04):
they started sending me to La to go to drifting
events and I started meeting people and getting more involved
with the community, first in SoCal, even though I lived
in Vancouver, and then the bosses said to me, Hey,
we want to make a website about car culture. Thought
about it for a couple of weeks and then came
up with this idea of speed Hunting or speed Hunters,
(04:25):
which became a website that we launched in two thousand
and eight. And at the same time we launched another
program called Timney for Speed, which was a drifting team,
and we started building Carshusima. But we got to travel
the world and go to all the different scenes around
the world, and that was an incredible moment to go
to Japan, Australia and New Zealand, all across Europe, all
(04:47):
across the US and see what people are doing. And
then I left that in twenty fourteen, did a few
other projects within racing games, sim racing, even some atanas
motorsports stuff the company called Robo Race and then joined
the Race Service team. About five years ago moved to
LA and I had the dream of coming to SoCal
(05:09):
to be a participant in the car scene here. People
think I'm crazy, but I kind of moved to La
so I could drive cars. And I love big cities too,
because there's a great creative scene here. As both of
you know, there's people that are doing fashion, media, films,
graphic design, whatever it is art. But you can have
(05:31):
that here but still enjoy driving cars, and having lived
in Stockholm. In London, it's much harder to do that.
There's great creative scenes projects. You got a nice car
in London, it's very hard to enjoy it.
Speaker 2 (05:43):
Sure, and even in Canada because the weather is so
like it's gonna list out your cars.
Speaker 3 (05:51):
That's salt right, yeah yeah yeah.
Speaker 2 (05:53):
So So for the folks that don't know Race Service,
because we had one of your colleagues here Service Chames,
could you explain to the listening audience what you guys
do over there at Race Service.
Speaker 3 (06:03):
Well, Race Service, it's been interesting Race Service has been
around about five years or so, and for the first
few years people kept saying to us, what is race Service?
What do you guys do? It seems very cool, but
what is this thing? The way that we explain it
is that it's a creative agency. So we do different
types of projects, collaborations with different brands, usually in automotive
(06:26):
and motorsports, but we do work in video gaming. I
do some projects in fashion as well, and our thesis
is to connect the worlds of motorsports and automotive to
wider parts of contemporary or pop culture, streetwear, music, video games,
even some Web three materials, fashion, different organizations. Like we're
(06:50):
an agency for NASCAR. We do a lot of projects
with AMG and Porsche Hot Wheels, this one that I'm
quite involved with. We'll want us to do content and
strategy and sometimes events to connect all these worlds together.
We're also in the middle of launching a streetwear fashion
brand as well that's kind of focused around collaborations with
(07:12):
automotive brands. But we have our online as well. That's
a bit of a new project. And then the last
part of Race Service is that we are a car
culture hub. We wanted to have a place that's a destination.
And we have meetups once a month, the first Friday
of every month at our space. We occasionally curate events
(07:32):
and we have a pretty active community of people that
come out to our different programs on site.
Speaker 1 (07:38):
And can I invite anyone listening to go to a
Rise and Shine sometimes?
Speaker 3 (07:42):
Absolutely?
Speaker 4 (07:43):
Yeah, that's what it's called Rising.
Speaker 3 (07:45):
And Shine yea very first Friday of every month.
Speaker 1 (07:49):
Yeah, and it's a good turnout. And maybe if you're
not familiar cars, you want to get in the space,
you want to meet some cool people. I think it's
a great environment.
Speaker 2 (07:57):
So you know what I love about you guys over
Race Service is that a lot of times you meet
you know, car folks and they have no fashion sense.
They look like they show up like that because you know,
my wife always bags on me. He's like, you know,
why don't you like dress up? And then everybody over
at Race Service, you guys just have a great blend
(08:19):
of what is hip and fashion and pop culture. And
then you mailed that with you know, car culture, which
you know, I got some schwag from you guys, and
I took it over to my house and my wife
is like, that's what you should be right, because it's
a celebration of you know, our love affair for cars
in the community. But then it's you know, it's it's
a it's a wonderful blend, you know, so.
Speaker 3 (08:41):
Blends industry where and fashion install But we're quite focused
on curation. Whether we are designing an event, we'll think
of every single aspect of what someone experience is going
through that event, from the music to the posters and
every little detail and the singles. For any film project
that we do, the worst Senate Race service is to
(09:03):
do a project that has no style, or to take
a photograph that doesn't have visual aesthetic buy in to it.
It's something that's very important to us and I find
that that whole trajectory interesting. When I first started going
to automotive events, say you go to an event, say
drifting event in la even ten years ago, people had
(09:25):
some style, you know, ten years ago, ten years ago. Yeah,
And then i would go to an event in the
UK and I'm looking around and I'm thinking, what are
these people wearing? But the interesting thing is in the
past ten fifteen years that's changed, that has really changed,
and you see the intersection of street wear and modified
(09:48):
custom cars a lot more now in that people's personal
presentation is definitely linked in a lot of scenes anyway,
maybe not everywhere, to whatever customer car that they're building,
or how they express their personal style through a custom
car or a modified car.
Speaker 1 (10:05):
And you guys do a lot of cool collubs and
help companies bridge those gaps.
Speaker 4 (10:09):
Right.
Speaker 1 (10:09):
One huge project that you've had lately has been Hot Wheels.
Speaker 4 (10:13):
Yes, what would you guys do that? With Hot Wheels?
Speaker 3 (10:15):
We've I've been personally a collaborator of Hot Wheels for
a long time through many different programs from speed Hunters,
had different collabs we did when I was seeing the
Project Cars video game, we had a line of Hot
Wheels that we collabed with them. But Hot Wheels has
been a client and collaborator of Race Service since we
started for the past five years, so we're involved with
(10:37):
the Legend's Car Show. We have produced numerous content programs
with them that you see on their Instagram channel. Currently,
we are doing a documentary series for a car that's
been built for rent Sport Reunion. It's going to debut
in about a week and a half. So we're always
involved with all sorts of different programs with them. I'm
(10:57):
a bit of a Hot Wheels collector. I love the brand.
Those little cars are so much joy in each of them. Yeah,
well you've done projects with me. Yeah, I have your cars.
I mean it's it's like every car person's Bucke list.
Yeah your car is a hot wheel Yeah.
Speaker 4 (11:12):
Yeah, so cool.
Speaker 3 (11:13):
Yeah, for any automotive personality or car builder, I think
that's definitely a big checklist item. Right, you've arrived, you know.
Speaker 2 (11:21):
I'm sure you've seen a lot of people come and
go right trying to do what race Service does and
what do you think that sets you guys apart to
just be able to kind of help the listeners if
they have interest in doing what you guys do.
Speaker 3 (11:35):
It's also a wider question of how do you take
your passion or cars and make that into your career
and then have that continue, which is not for a
lot of people. That's not easy, and that that's a
big question. Right. I would say that it's a mix
of being driven by passion, taking that passion and having
(11:58):
that fuel you is really really good. That'll only get
you so far, though, because you know this concept of
the ten thousand hours, right, you have to be a
good craft you have to be to be an expert. Yeah,
you just have to look at the craft of what
you want to do. So if you take you know,
we look at the content creation side of what you do.
(12:18):
There's a lot of craft of that. How do you shoot,
how do you talk to the camera, how do you edit?
How do you build a storyline? I believe that people
that do the groundwork to become very good at what
they do. That's very important. And then lastly, it's being
able to work on your personality so that you can
talk about what you do, you can connect with people
(12:40):
and find those opportunities. So for me, those are the
magic three mixes of you work really hard so that
when the spotlight swings your way, that you're ready and
you don't fuck it up, then maybe it's going to fly.
Speaker 4 (12:54):
What do you think, Amelia?
Speaker 1 (12:56):
I lean more towards the ladder where I think you
can achieve anything that you want to on this earth,
so long as you work for it and don't give up.
I always think of this little image of this person
who's like digging underground trying to find a light or
whatever it is, and most times people will give up
before it just takes one more swing to get there.
In acting world, you may get one hundred or a
(13:18):
thousands no's before you get one yes. And I think
as long as you work towards anything, you're a good person,
you can achieve. You know, what you believe, where you've
found excites you, or what you set out to do.
Speaker 4 (13:29):
But there's so many fucked up people that achieve success.
Speaker 1 (13:32):
Right.
Speaker 2 (13:33):
But i'stell business they go that guys in the fuck
or so and so is it's such an asshole?
Speaker 4 (13:39):
What do you think?
Speaker 3 (13:39):
I tend to focus on creatives, being a creative minded
person myself, and there's a category of creative me and
my friends call them naturals, and they don't really spend
a lot of time thinking about it. Yeah, some people
would would say that if you're too smart or you
think too much, you might paralyze yourself thinking about all
the possible abilities and if I do that or should
(14:02):
I have that strategy? And then that will light to
that to that, and sometimes if your your brain isn't
clogged up with all this stuff, you just do stuff
and you go for it.
Speaker 2 (14:11):
Yah.
Speaker 3 (14:11):
I think that also relates to your culture. I'm not American,
I'm from Canada originally, and you know immigrant parents and
all that whole thing. But one thing have immigrant My
father is from Jamaica, Jamaican Chinese, my mother's from Columbia
and South American. But one thing, having moved here five
years ago, that I love about American culture is they
(14:37):
can do spirit. But also the way that people support
each other in the communities. I think that that's fantastic.
If you say I'm going to do this thing and
you have a good support network, people will generally say,
from my experience, anyway, Okay, we're going to support you.
Go for it, we're going to help you. We're going
to talk to that person do that. Whereas in other
(14:58):
cultures that may have tall pop syndrome, you say I'm
going to do this thing, and they're going to say,
who do you think you are?
Speaker 4 (15:04):
Tall poppies.
Speaker 3 (15:05):
Yeah, it's like a field of poppies and one tries
to grow taller, the other poppies are going to try
and gang up and cut that thing down. Really get
back in your place. Yeah, there's a lot of cultures
like that, and it's harder to get going.
Speaker 1 (15:17):
Right.
Speaker 2 (15:17):
Do you think that fueled your hunger or desire to
prove everybody wrong because people are trying to cut that poppy.
Speaker 3 (15:25):
Yeah, I would say, because I'm a little older and
you didn't have the Internet as a place to have
community to show what you could do. I used to
make these crazy videos and I would finish them, put
them on the tape, and put them in a drawer
because it was before YouTube launched. So now the world
(15:47):
is a lot flatter. So if you're from a smaller
city or a different place, you can still show what
you do. You put it on the internet, build fans,
figure out how you're gonna blaunch your career and great
content whatever it is. So things are very different now.
Speaker 2 (16:17):
You know what I what I really envy about you, Amelia,
is that you're driving the cars that you're building, right,
Like you always show up here with like some cool cars,
and you know, I get so frustrated with these cars
that I have because the notion of like driving a
vintage car and if you're like, yay, I'm James Deeney,
(16:39):
you know, Hollywood, and then like an hour later it
starts to overheat and then you're you're on the side
of the road. Man, I don't like that anymore. Like,
you know, it was cool like for the first like
three times that happened. But then always these old cars
have some problem and you know, the gauges don't work
like I think half the cars the gas fuel gauge,
(17:00):
I'm not sure if it.
Speaker 4 (17:01):
Sound empty or full, because this is going up.
Speaker 3 (17:04):
And that's a little bit of the argument for the
whole ev swap thing, right if it takes out that
you can just enjoy the thing. It probably doesn't drive
in the same way, but the thing runs and it's
probably ten times as fast. Also, yeah, that's really fair.
Speaker 1 (17:18):
When I build cars, I keep streetability in mind, like hardcore.
Like I just bought a sixty nine Camaro and I
already bought everything I need to put AC in it
because I never again will I take out a C
from a car build a car that ice'. There's just
so many layers. I wanted to be comfortable driving because
I don't want to end up on the side of
the road. And when I moved here with my two
(17:41):
forty SX that was constantly overheating, how to pull over
no AC, going to auditions with like my makeup running
and sweat driven down my back, spelling like gasoline because
it was run and rich. I just like I think
now I want to be able to enjoy the cars,
and it makes me so sad if they park for
too long that I maybe it's my OCD a little bit,
but I almost make them a little too perfect.
Speaker 3 (18:01):
It's a challenge of classic car ownership modified cars. I've
given up on dreaming of air conditioning in mine. I
bought a fan off Amazon, and I just just blows
a little bit of air.
Speaker 2 (18:15):
I've been thinking about liquidating all my cars and just
focusing on one and like making.
Speaker 3 (18:21):
That that's what I'm doing.
Speaker 2 (18:23):
I just have one because I love vintagch cars, but like,
get that thing like completely sorted out, where as they
see has everything that I need, all the creature comforts
where I can drive it across country to New York
and then.
Speaker 4 (18:36):
Drive it every day.
Speaker 2 (18:37):
Because I look at these cars and you know, I'm
getting older, and I go, when am I going to
actually enjoy this? When am I going to be able
to drive it into canyons? When am I going to
be able to take it to the track, Because I'm
always paranoid like it's going to break down?
Speaker 3 (18:52):
Yeah, right?
Speaker 2 (18:53):
And I think I shifted to like I love the
process of bringing these cars to life.
Speaker 4 (18:58):
But then that really fully alive kind of limping through.
Speaker 1 (19:02):
Yeah, it's hard. He like lose trust in a car
sometimes two when it breaks down one too many times.
Speaker 3 (19:08):
Yeah, I've done something a little crazy with my car.
Is I had a digital twin made, well, a digital
twin if I commissioned someone. No, it's an add on
for this PC simulation game, a set of corsa. So
I had this guy in Europe build it. We scan
the car and he built a three D model of it,
did all the physics and everything. So I can sit
(19:30):
in my living room because I'm in the PCSM racing
with a VR head set, and I've driven the car
across Tokyo for example, two hundred miles an hour in
virtual reality.
Speaker 1 (19:40):
You have your car on a set of corso, yeah.
Speaker 3 (19:42):
And I've driven it on the on the La Canyon.
I mean, that's stupid because I could do that in
real life because that's in LA. But still it's funny
that I can drive my car in my living room
around racetracks around the world. Way to enjoy it.
Speaker 1 (19:54):
A set of courso for those listening, think of not
to compare to Grand Trisma or I racing, but it's
a racing video game essentially. That I said, of course,
is specifically a lot of drifters like to use for
the realism of being able to get a car sideways
and get seat time without actually spending money on tires
and gas.
Speaker 3 (20:12):
That's so cool anyway, That's the way that I enjoy
my my classic car virtually, so much.
Speaker 2 (20:18):
Different than playing it in like Grand Turismo or so
because I have my car in Grand Turismo and.
Speaker 1 (20:23):
That's less street and more tracks into it.
Speaker 4 (20:26):
I was like, yawn, it's different than we are.
Speaker 3 (20:29):
If you have a full PC simrig, you're you're you're
able to trick your nervous system. It actually thinks you're driving. Yeah,
it's very different than a TV.
Speaker 4 (20:39):
I like that. Yeah, huh.
Speaker 1 (20:42):
I'm curious about what makes you tick, I guess, and
how you go into going.
Speaker 3 (20:47):
To get into it? Okay, yeah, let's go. Yeah, let's
steep dive. What would you like to know?
Speaker 1 (20:51):
Let's start with what makes you tick? What what makes
you choose the decisions that you do on a daily basis,
and where are you hoping to go with your career.
Speaker 3 (21:03):
It's an interesting question when you ask someone like why
are you here? What are you here to do? Or
what do you stand for? I find that very fascinating.
Whenever I meet people, I sometimes look in the mirror
and think, what must I do? Not what do I
want to do? What must I do in order to
(21:23):
not go crazy? And for me it comes down to
two things. One is I exist to imagine things and
bring those visions to life and through creative projects. That's
the thing I must do. And if I'm not doing that,
(21:43):
then there's sadness start going crazy. So that's a bit
of the hardwiring. For my personal philosophy. I define it
as I exist to grow and learn. That for me
is very important to continuously be a student and to
continuously try and look at where my blind spots are.
(22:09):
It's kind of hard to do because of they're blind spots,
but try and keep learning and keep never become too solid,
never say okay, this is me. I'm not going to
grow anymore. But the thing that I exist for maybe
my mission, which has maybe only come together in the
past few years, is you can ask a question, how
(22:32):
are you going to contribute to the world? What are
you going to do? And for me, it comes down
to trying to fight for a bit of equality, whether
that's in the creative projects or the people that I'm
giving opportunities to, or if I'm putting a creative team together,
who are those people? Can I try and hire some
women in the automotive scene into the projects that I'm
(22:54):
involved with. Can I try and give opportunities to people
of color? Or if I see a young kid that's
just starting who comes from maybe a lack of a
better term, disadvantaged background, but they're really passionate, can I
help them? Can I give them advice about how to
develop their careers? So those that's the main mission. I'm
(23:15):
still working through the best ways to actualize that, but
I'm trying to live by that and to affect change
around me.
Speaker 4 (23:21):
That's a great answer.
Speaker 1 (23:22):
Yeah, very well thought out, and I know you take
a Yeah, I know. Have you had many mentors in
your life?
Speaker 3 (23:29):
Yes? I don't know where I figured that out. Somewhere
along the line, I figured out that it's helpful to
have people to learn from, and from the very beginning
of my career, even when I was in art school,
I would hang out with the teachers. I'd go for
lunch with them, and I just try and learn, and
wherever I went in the different stages of my career,
(23:50):
I've always had people that were much further along than
me who took an interest in what I was doing
and gave me advice. Sometimes might criticize me for the
way I was going about things and give support, maybe
make some introductions, and I try and do that as well.
Now with when I'm going about my business, I'm having
a bit of a strange year in that I'm for
(24:11):
the first time since I can remember, I have a
little bit of spare time. And I found that very
disconcerting for me, having a to do list that's you know,
crazy long, intense deadlines. That friction creates a sense of order.
Maybe I became addicted to having that friction and just
(24:35):
being busy. Now that just for the past four months,
I'm coming off a four year project. I have a
little bit of time to think about things and just
to focus on myself, and for the first few months
I was kind of disturbing. I have to build internal
motivation versus external motivation from a deadline or just having
(25:01):
people calling you or having things that you have to
get done it a project on fire?
Speaker 1 (25:05):
Is that not setting goals, though, setting deadlines for.
Speaker 3 (25:10):
Yourself creating friction.
Speaker 1 (25:12):
Sure, I mean friction can be defined as many things, right,
I mean anyone would say setting a goals creating friction
because you have to do something about it.
Speaker 3 (25:20):
Yeah, I've been changing my methodology to be maybe more
about having a way of approaching every day or having
things that I focus on, but less about saying we're
going to have that done by then, I need to
earn that amount of money by this point in time,
or this has to be done then, because I find
(25:42):
that that creates stress and I don't always feel that happy.
So I've been trying to focus more on the art
of making every day count in different aspects of life,
whether it's physical health, being inspired, updating my skill set,
my personal projects like my car, or looking at what
(26:04):
how to steer my career, and new goals that I'm
setting for myself. So I've been trying to be slightly
less goal oriented and more about having a very good process.
That's a better way to say it. That's a new
thing that I've been working through just this year. You know,
the whole chop would carry water business that I think
(26:28):
that might come from the karate kid the saying is,
before enlightenment, chop wood carry water. After enlightenment, chop wood
carry water, and that you focus on making everyday count
and it's the art of doing simple tasks or just
(26:48):
taking care of business and projects for the sake of
doing a good job of that and having a balanced life.
That is the way forward. At least I'm working with this.
I'll get back to you to see if this is
all bunch of nonsense or.
Speaker 1 (27:01):
Not that reminds me of I'm not going to do
the story justice. But there is an old story about
a fisherman who's on a boat and some rich billionaire
comes to go fish with him because whatever's on vacation
or whatever it is.
Speaker 3 (27:16):
I've heard this story.
Speaker 1 (27:17):
Have you heard this one song? It's ad one And
I'm not going to do a justice. So this billionaire
goes fishing with this fisherman's small town and he's just fishing,
and the billionaires like, oh, well, if you have three
fishing rods set up, you can catch three times as
much and then you can grow your business here to
do this, to then catch more fish, to sell more fish,
(27:38):
to make more money. Have employees, yeah, have employees, and
then the Fisherman's like, well, why would I do that.
He's like, well, so then you can.
Speaker 3 (27:46):
Retire and then you could come back here and you know,
be with your boat and fish. It's a simple retirement.
Speaker 1 (27:52):
He's like, but I'm doing that now. Have you been
able to find happiness in that shift from going from
being gold driven to focus more on the moment.
Speaker 3 (28:01):
Yeah, definitely. I've had moments in my life where I've
been very much about the goal. When I first started
at EA, I was very obsessed with getting to a
point where I made one hundred thousand dollars a year.
I was just focused on that, and every time I
saw my paycheck, I wasn't making one hundred thousand dollars
a year. And then I became very focused, I need
(28:21):
to be a sea level executive, and I would present
myself like that when I said, EA, it's very casual.
All these programmers with their the T shirt that they've
been wearing all week.
Speaker 4 (28:33):
That's what sea level stands for. Casual.
Speaker 3 (28:35):
No no, no, like C suite, like CEO, oh an executive.
I would wear like colored shirts sports jack be I'm
a decision maker and all of you will think of
me as a decision maker. This is the thirties where
I was felt like I was behind. I went for
years just thinking about my not sea level life, and
(28:58):
even more recently, I had this goal. I needed to
have a supercar and I wanted I've done a lot
of projects with McLaren and they occasionally give me cars
to drive, and you know, the amazing machines. And my
daily is a twenty nineteen Cayman S. It's an amazing car,
but for the longest time it was a not McLaren. Right,
(29:21):
So I'm getting in this beautiful, incredibly engineered, well handling
sports car and I'm driving around my not McLaren. And
that's what I mean by external goals, and I'm not
appreciating this incredible car that my life has taken me
to drive, right, And it's fabulous to be an LA traffic,
Canyon track day, just the best, well rounded machine, good
(29:43):
fuel economy, turbo four cylinder. I've been working to get
rid of those external checklist items so that you can
appreciate the life that you have now. If we get
back to what we're talking about earlier, imagine someone that
love shooting cars, right, They've got their camera, they're going
(30:04):
to car meets. They've got friends that have some cool cars,
they're getting together to do shoots. But they might still
have a day job, and someone might become so focused
on the fact that they're not making a living as
a professional automotive media creator that they become miserable. But
the point I'm making is that just the moment where
you have good friends, just looking at this case study
(30:27):
shooting cars, you're in a position where you have your
health and your camera and you're out doing some fun stuff.
You should just have fun with that and be able
to be in the moment a little bit more.
Speaker 1 (30:36):
So.
Speaker 3 (30:37):
That's that's what I'm working through.
Speaker 2 (30:38):
I completely understand. I completely understand. You know, the Sienna.
There was a time where I would not ever be
seen driving this car, right, And the reason I love
this car so much is because not only does it
have eighteen cup holders smiles again.
Speaker 1 (30:55):
And non sponsor.
Speaker 4 (30:57):
Yeah, it's not like I have no association to tellya that, right.
Speaker 2 (31:00):
I think they're very They're very especially the minivan departments,
like really happy that I talk about the Siana.
Speaker 4 (31:07):
Because they get no love.
Speaker 3 (31:11):
Nice.
Speaker 2 (31:11):
Yeah, but this is this is like a gift to mankind.
But anyway, when I drive this car, and when I
look at this car, I get so happy or there's
a feeling of contentment because this is a representation of
I don't give a fuck what you think about me.
Speaker 4 (31:30):
And it took so many years to get to that place.
Speaker 2 (31:33):
And once somehow, and it's actually because of this car, right,
I met the mentors. Like when I was in Hawaii,
I would see all of these you know, older gentlemen
driving this or Toyota Tacoma, like pieces of junk that
are being rusted up because of the salt water in Hawaii,
(31:54):
and then I would like get to know them, and
friends would introduce me and they go, yeah, that guy's like,
you know, almost a billionaire, or he owns half of this,
or he's this or he's that, And I'm like, but
he drives a Sienna. He's like yeah, because he doesn't
care what people think. And I was like, man, that
was my north star. I was like, I need to
get to that place where whatever is on the externals
(32:17):
not for others, and like, look, we should love the
finer things in life if it's sincere and if it's
not for somebody else, Like even the way like I
dressed today.
Speaker 4 (32:27):
It was like when I was younger.
Speaker 2 (32:29):
It was like I dressed because I was like, oh, hey,
I need that person to think that I'm something, that
I'm cool.
Speaker 4 (32:36):
And now I wear what I look as like. I
like that.
Speaker 2 (32:40):
I like the ethos behind that. And this the Toyota CNA.
The engineers of this car, they created a masterpiece. Yeah,
well I fix it when it's not broken, right.
Speaker 3 (32:52):
I find myself appreciating cameras. Sometimes I look at the
corner of my eye, see this wide loasedan. I think,
what is that? Oh, it's a camera.
Speaker 1 (33:00):
Is this what I have to look forward to? As
I get older?
Speaker 3 (33:03):
I find as I get older, I become more extreme
extreme extreme. It's an interesting one. As you get older,
there's different directions that you can go. I like looking
at archetypes, and there's several art types that I feel
myself heading in the direction of. One is the the outlaw.
(33:24):
Sometimes I go to lowrider events in detail. I live
in the arts district in downtown LA and I go
to these little rider events and I see I see
these older like Mexican gentlemen, you know, with their shaved
heads and their tattoos, and I think, damn, this is
they look so amazing and they're like sixty. And then
the other the other arch type that I love is
(33:47):
the avant garde artist or artiste that people that get
older become more out there visually. So I think by
the time I'm like eighty, I'm gonna have like tattoos over.
I don't know, it's just it's the direction I'm heading in.
Speaker 1 (34:17):
You know.
Speaker 2 (34:17):
Speaking of the low writer community, I don't know if
this urban legend is true, but it has been told
that the person that actually sparked or created the lowriters
is actually a Japanese American.
Speaker 4 (34:34):
That's true, Pazo. I think his name is Tazzo.
Speaker 3 (34:36):
I saw the story recently that the first car that's
considered the prototype lowriter there was a Asian American gentleman.
But it was the same with Have you heard of
Bob hiro Hata No In the nineteen fifties, he worked
with Sam barrass and they created the hiro Hata Mercury.
(34:57):
It's a fifty one Mercury, the most famous custom car
in the world and dead Japanese American. This is a
whole other subject, but yeah, certainly the stories of Asian
Americans in the history of hot rotting, drag, racing, custom cars.
It's a there's so many stories and people that have
(35:19):
contributed along the way.
Speaker 2 (35:21):
That have been invisible, I guess because of media. Yeah,
to control that.
Speaker 3 (35:26):
It's a program I did with Hot Wheels two years
ago and one year ago to tell more of these
stories during AAPI month.
Speaker 4 (35:35):
What did they say?
Speaker 3 (35:36):
Well, we we They came to us and said, hey,
let's celebrate API Asian American Pacific Islanders and their contributions
to the automobile and car culture. So we did several
articles that were on Hot Wheels Instagram channel, and we
looked at who are the people that have done some
crazy stuff like Larry Shinoda he worked on the Stingray
(36:02):
Corvette and the really Mustang. But there's numerous people that
have designed iconic cars, motorsports legends and Yeah, often these
stories are not told. And it's also fun to try
and find new people that are coming up to see
if we can help them.
Speaker 4 (36:23):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (36:24):
One thing that when you talk about Asian Americans and
Asian Americans in car culture that I find a little
maybe worrying to look at is when I look at
Formula D right now, there's not many Asian Americans competing anymore.
Speaker 4 (36:39):
And there used to be tons. Why do you think
that is.
Speaker 3 (36:42):
I've talked to Jim Law about this, and Jim Law.
Speaker 2 (36:45):
Used to be the head of FD now so he's
no longer. There is of Asian he said. He said
that it's hard for people to find sponsorship because they're Asian.
Speaker 3 (36:55):
That's one thing he said, yeah, and I don't know,
but it's it's definitely something we've noted. The challenges.
Speaker 1 (37:02):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (37:02):
I mean, we had Hurt here formerly from Hoon again
and we were asking him like, how come there're very
few pro African American drivers? Yea, if any, like I
never saw any. And then last FT even I went to,
I think there was Die was still racing, and there
was Ken Gucci and that's.
Speaker 3 (37:22):
There from the beginning, right old school.
Speaker 2 (37:24):
But they also were saying I remember kenn Or Die
was telling me. He's like, yeah, we can't, we can't
compete with you know, the dudes like h On. He's like,
I can't, I can't compete with him because he has
He was look at their like you know, their their pits,
like you know, it's like it's millions of dollars where
(37:44):
he was saying like I can bear it. We have
he had to tow the cars himself, like Ken he
was saying, right, and like his whole crew are staying
in a motel six, right, So it's all about sponsorship.
So I mean, I I don't know, man, it's like
a challenge. Or you look at women in motorsports, right,
same thing. It's at least good that there's dialogue about
(38:06):
these things and there's still people that break through, thankfully,
and there's still marker moments that happen if we look
at you know, through the lens of people of color
and women and their progression and automotive. But I think
one has to keep pushing and keep trying to help,
or you can to find opportunities for people, keep encouraging
(38:27):
others and share what you've learned along the way hopefully.
Speaker 1 (38:30):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (38:31):
I mean, look, it's it's important to talk about this,
but it's also it's I think it's important also to
not be delusional. Of course, talk about it realistically, right,
I mean, I mean you brought up the fact like, yeah,
why are there are very few Asian like you know
drifters and the pro league. That's a question that I
(38:51):
would like to answer you know, and is it because
they're inferior drivers or is it that because their face
does not sell the product?
Speaker 4 (39:00):
Is that even true? I mean I deal with that.
Speaker 2 (39:02):
It's like like when I deal with like corporate like America,
They're like, yeah, your face doesn't work in America, and
then I go outside and Asia and Europe, it's like
I'm appreciated. Is like, you know, there's value there, but here,
being American and growing up here is like has its
pros and its cons. But I always feel like, you know,
(39:24):
I'm in the backseat.
Speaker 3 (39:26):
Yeah, I agree with you. I definitely have experienced that.
In my first career music video directing, I was working
with industrial metal bands like Marilyn Manson and Nine Inch
Nails and this kind of stuff. But I think when
I was up for music videos, if I was going
to be invited to write on and they saw this
name Rod Chong, I don't believe that that necessarily helped
(39:47):
me in my progression. This is in the nineties, but
I'd like to think that maybe now it wouldn't be
quite as much friction as it was back then.
Speaker 4 (39:58):
I don't think so.
Speaker 2 (39:59):
Yeah, I don't think it's you know, it's at bad
as the nineties. I think it's getting better and better
and better, but I think the dialogue and not to
complain about it, like I'm not a soapbox guy, and
like I don't not like to talk about, Oh, the
world is racist and I'm the victim, Like it's not that.
But it's also like again, ignore truth, Like how is
drifting this sport that so supposedly it was inspired by Japan?
Speaker 3 (40:24):
Yeah?
Speaker 2 (40:24):
Right, and there's nobody from Japan participating in the sport
in America. But Hurt actually brought up a good point
when we spoke to him. He said, what did you say, Mail?
He said that the Japanese cars were where there's this
American sensibility or the American version of Japanese car culture.
Speaker 1 (40:45):
Right. I think he was talking, if I remember correctly,
about the different drifting styles, and what he liked about
Final Bout was it had more Japanese influence where FD
today has more American influence of form over function, function
over form.
Speaker 3 (40:59):
Yeah. Finally, I remember talking to some of the OG
Japanese drifters. I went to Japan for a tour in
two thousand and eight and we spent a lot of
time with Team Orange back then they were talking about
how the style of drifting that was coming up was
more like sideways power sliding, which kind of makes sense.
Whereas if you look at those early drifting events where
(41:21):
they I remember I went to a D one GP
event in two thousand and six at Arndale and they
had different rules for cars below three hundred horsepower, So
the eighty six is that were drifting back then. They
didn't have to drift the bank at Arundel because they
couldn't have enough power, and there was a bit more
of a playing field that was designed for those low
(41:43):
horsepower cars and all that. But that's a bit more
of the traditional JDM drifting thing, which it's a bit
more like final about I'd say, is more of a
throwback to the original spirit of what drifting was like
in late nineties, early to mid two thousands. It's kind
of gone in a different direction now. Yeah, and I
still am a big fan. I go I try and
(42:05):
go to the Long Beach and Rundel every year, So
I still love drifting.
Speaker 1 (42:09):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (42:10):
And also you know, when I step back and look
at you know, the landscape, but you know professional drifting. Yeah,
the positives is that you know this thing that came
from Asian culture is now accepted and embraced by people
that are not Asian. And it's not this like you know,
this like exotic foreign thing. It's like, oh, it's you know,
(42:33):
it's part of American culture now, right, which is awesome.
Speaker 3 (42:37):
European culture too. The biggest drifting event in the world
just happened in Poland. Really there were six thousand people
there was in a stadium, I mean fifty six thousand.
Speaker 4 (42:48):
Wow.
Speaker 3 (42:48):
Yeah, So there. It's it's moving around the world. It's
kind of become it's its own thing. Yes, the roots
are in Japan, but.
Speaker 4 (42:55):
What do you think that is.
Speaker 2 (42:56):
You think it's because it's a car event or something
that is accessible to just the layman.
Speaker 3 (43:03):
Think about skiing and mountains, right, Skiing is being around
a long time. You know, people go on mountains, and
it was there for a long time, and then suddenly
this new group of people came snowboarders, right, they dressed differently,
this in different mus Totally it was a culture and
all the traditional skiers were looking at going what is
this thing?
Speaker 1 (43:22):
Right?
Speaker 3 (43:22):
Who are these people? Snowboarding has you know gone and
it's its own thing now totally international sport and pastime,
but it still is happening on ski slopes, right, And
you could think of traditional motorsports happening on racetracks, et cetera,
and then suddenly these drifters come out and they're different.
Speaker 4 (43:43):
Right.
Speaker 3 (43:43):
It's a lifestyle more comparable to snowboarders and skaters, i'd say,
if you wanted to draw a parallel, But it's also
just fun to watch. And I believe it's the last
new motorsport that's happened in an age. I think rallycross
was invented in the early seventies, but aside from that,
there's not really anything you maybe maybe monster trucks or
(44:06):
the other new sport if you want.
Speaker 1 (44:08):
To call it that that's trippy to think about that,
drifting or maybe monst trucks. I don't know which came first,
but to think that that's one of the newer forms
and maybe the last form of motorsport, Yeah, racing.
Speaker 3 (44:21):
And it's just it's it's entertaining.
Speaker 1 (44:23):
Right.
Speaker 3 (44:23):
You've got the crazy, out of control action that you
might seem rallying. You've got the side by side door
banging you might get in NASCAR, the smoke pomp and
circumstance you get in drag racing, you know, big power cars,
and but then you've got this knockout timeline, whereas regular motorsports, Right,
you're going around in circles and you get to sit
(44:44):
in the grand stand as a fan and room room right,
the cars are going left right, and then someone wins
and then it's over. And yeah, it's usually not that
exciting as much as I love motorsports. So I think
that that's why drifting has developed in the way that
it has. You know, there was a while there in
the US that rally cross came in and took all
(45:06):
the oxygen out of the room, and all the factory
programs left. Formula D went to rally cross, and then
there's new forms of electric rally cross coming in, etc.
But it stayed that often it keeps going. The fan
engagements there still fun. We love drifting.
Speaker 4 (45:22):
Well, thank you, Ron, this was a great conversation.
Speaker 1 (45:24):
This has been a really deep and lovely conversation.
Speaker 3 (45:27):
My pleasure. Yeah, we went pretty deep. I feel very
close to both of you now, and so do we
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