The Fast Track to Life: Christian Blevins, Jr.

Tonight, we’re diving into the high-octane world of racing with a young driver who's redefining what it means to chase a dream. Meet Christian Blevins Jr - a rising star in the racing world who's leaving traditional classrooms in the dust to focus on one thing: becoming the best behind the wheel. Instead of textbooks and lockers, Christian's education happens at Speed U, an elite racing-focused program that’s built for athletes like him - drivers who live life in the fast lane, both on and off the track.

On this episode, we’ll follow Christian’s journey, from training sessions to race day, the challenges of balancing school and sport, and what it really takes to become a champion in the making. Whether you're a racing fan, an aspiring athlete, or just someone who loves a good underdog story—strap in, because this ride is just getting started!

And joining me tonight is returning guest David Middleton, our partner from MIE-racing.com along with him is Christian Blevins Sr. adding the parental perspective to this conversation. 

===== (Oo---x---oO) =====

00:00 Meet Christian Blevins Jr. 01:26 Christian's Early Racing Journey 08:25 The Decision to Pursue Racing Full-Time 15:43 Balancing Education and Racing 29:49 The Social Aspect of Racing Education 33:50 Reflecting on Parental Support in Racing 35:34 Educational Tools for Racing at SpeedU 37:50 Sim Training and Its Impact 41:06 Transitioning from Karting to Car Racing 45:36 The Business Side of Racing 51:02 Advice for Aspiring Young Racers 56:40 Shoutouts and Final Thoughts

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Episode Transcript

(00:00):
Grand Touring Motorsports started asa social group of car enthusiasts,
but we've expanded into all sortsof motorsports disciplines, and we
want to share our stories with you.
Years of racing, wrenching, andmotorsports experience brings
together a top notch collectionof knowledge and information
through our podcast, Brake Fix.

(00:22):
We're diving into the high octane worldof racing with a young driver who's
redefining what it means to chase a dream.
Meet Christian Blevins Jr., a risingstar in the racing world who's been
leaving traditional classrooms inthe dust to focus on one thing,
becoming the best behind the wheel.
Instead of textbooks and lockers,Christian's education happens at

(00:42):
SpeedU, an elite racing focusedprogram that's built for athletes
like him, drivers who live life in thefast lane both on and off the track.
On this episode, we'll followChristian's journey from
training sessions to race day.
The challenges of balancing schooland sport and what it really takes to
be a champion in the making, whetheryou're a racing fan, an aspiring

(01:03):
athlete, or just someone who loves agood underdog story strap in because
this ride is just getting started.
And joining me tonight is returningguest David Middleton, our partner
from MIE racing, who you might rememberfrom several break fix episodes.
So welcome back, David.
And along with him, we have ChristianBlevins Sr. adding the parental

(01:24):
perspective to this conversation as well.
So with that, let's welcome Christian Sr.
and Jr. to Break Fix.
Hey guys, thanks for having us on.
I appreciate the opportunityto talk with you this evening.
In Break Fix tradition, I usuallyalways start off by saying, you know,
there's always a superhero origin story.
But tonight we're literally atthe origin of the origin story.

(01:46):
So what I want to do is I want topass the baton to Dave for a moment
to sort of set the stage for us.
Why are we talking to the Blevinses?
Do you have a relationship with them?
So tell us how you guys met andhow we're getting started here.
I go up to Atlanta MotorsportsPark, which is out in Dawsonville.
And actually I'd been going outthere almost since that place opened.
So now it's been 12, 15 years.

(02:07):
It's been a, it's been a while anyway.
I'd been going back and forth when, whenI was living in Europe, I'd come back
to visit my in laws and go to the track.
But once we finally moved out here,and I'm, I'm within an, an hour from
my house, I, I go out there regularly.
And one day I popped out there, I wasactually looking for a helmet, and I go
into the shop and I meet Christian Sr.
and Christian Jr. And we kind ofjust struck up a small conversation

(02:30):
because I hadn't been on the trackin a while, and you guys were
actually about to do a session.
Yeah, that's right.
And Christian Jr. was much youngerat the time than he is today.
We struck up a conversation.
I told him I just moved back fromCalifornia and I'd been in Europe
and he was like, what do you do?
And I was like, well, Iwas kind of in industry.
And then we used to keep running into eachother because I would do so much carding.

(02:51):
And at the time, his son wasstill very, very new to carding.
And I remember he wasgetting a little frustrated.
And I remember telling ChristianJr. I was like, don't worry.
I said, in a few years, you'regoing to be much taller than me.
And you're going to bemuch faster than me.
And that's exactly what I told him.
And yeah, now it's true.
Unfortunately, on both ends, andhe's taller than me now, too.

(03:11):
So don't feel bad.
Yep.
Yeah.
So when I met him, hewas just starting out.
So explain where you guyswere at the time we met.
Cause he wasn't even in juniorcars yet, or had he just started?
I think he might've beenrunning L206, right?
Yeah, he was still in Cadet, L 206.
That was maybe even startof our second season.
You know, somewhere thereabouts,when we first ran into you up at AMP.

(03:34):
To Junior, what are you racing currently?
How did you make the decisionto actually get into karting?
Currently, I'm racing X30 Senior.
I got into karting partly from my dad,but I went to an indoor karting summer
camp at a place called Andretti's.
After that, my dad asked me if I wantedto do this more, and I was like, yeah.
Eventually, we went to AtlantaMotorsports Park, and I did

(03:58):
the karting class up there.
A little while after that, forChristmas, I got my first kart.
The Andretti camp, was it every singleday for many hours, or how did that work?
One of those.
About a week?
Yeah, it was a week long, aMonday through Friday day camp.
Drop your kid off in the morning, 8a. m. or something like that, and then

(04:18):
come back and pick them up at the endof the day at four or five o'clock.
I forget what the exact time was.
We actually kind ofstumbled on it by accident.
I think I had gone there one day to doa couple sessions of indoor karting.
And saw their advertisement forit up on the wall and thought,
Oh, hey, this sounds kind of cool.

(04:39):
I wonder if our kid wouldbe interested in this.
And so when I got home that dayor the next, I asked him summer
break was coming up for school.
And I said, Hey, what wouldyou be interested in doing?
This is.
part of your time over summer break andhe said yes and so we signed him up for
it and little did we think that wouldstart a long journey to where we are

(04:59):
now for frame of reference you're inelementary middle school at this point
like how old were you oh yeah he wouldhave been in elementary school or yeah
that sounds about right in the fourthgrade so like nine ten years old Which,
unfortunately, nowadays, like, that'sold for someone who gets into karting.
Right?
Yeah.
So, Junior, was your dad the biggestinfluence in getting you into racing?

(05:22):
Did you like racing previously?
Or was this program thespringboard into something that
you didn't really know about?
I kind of always liked cars.
Got that from my dad.
I really enjoyed Lightning McQueenwhen I was a kid, much younger.
That's kind of how I got into racingbecause after that I was like,
yeah, I really want to do this more.

(05:44):
All right, dad.
So if you're the influencer in this,what's your backstory in motorsport?
Did you race when you were younger?
Like, what's your affiliation?
I grew up going to the racetrack.
My dad was a motorsports Fan from earlyon as a kid, I can remember going to
road Atlanta in the mid to late 70s towatch anything and everything that we

(06:09):
could get up there to watch from, youknow, a local SCCA event all the way up
to back in the days of the IMSA GPT cars.
would watch them andeverything in between.
You know, that's kind of a lotof my earliest memories going to
the track and watching cars andhanging out at the racetrack.

(06:30):
And of course, when you're six,seven, eight year old boy, I can't
think of anything cooler that Iwould have wanted to do than to
go watch fast loud cars go by.
So yeah, that was.
Kind of my intro into it.
And then eventually my dad gotinto amateur racing and SCCA.
I think I was probably around 14 or15 at the time when he got into that.

(06:55):
Eventually I got into racingas well, again, and SCCA.
Once I kind of hung up my bicycleracing days, myself and another
friend of mine that I raced bicycleswith, we were, ironically enough, at
Road Atlanta watching Petit Le Mans.
He struck up a conversation with mydad who was up there watching with us

(07:19):
about getting into SCCA and getting intoracing and the Spec Miata class had just
really sort of gotten off the groundand my dad was doing that at the time.
So we pretty much decided at thatrace, that was something we should do.
The very next February, we're at SCCAdriver's school at Roebling road.
That started my timebehind the wheel in racing.

(07:42):
So we've got some intergenerational clubracers and motor sports enthusiasts here.
So we've got three generations ofBlevins is happening in this span
that we're talking about here.
As we're talking about Christianjr's story, what's interesting
about this is you hear about.
Kids that, you know, I started in a cardat 5 years old and I worked my way up and

(08:02):
then dirt track racing and sprint card.
I want to go to Xfinity and, youknow, they're working their way up
through the Carolina system, youknow, and all those kinds of things.
And, and the folks that they want torace in Formula 1, and it's a very
long and arduous road to get there.
But you guys are on this path right now.
You started in carting in the Georgiaarea and you're building up But you
had to make a decision at some point,we're going to focus on it full time.

(08:25):
And so to Christian senior, what was thatmoment that you said, all right, we're
going to pull them out of school andwe're going to go after this full bore.
That moment really happenedtowards the end of the school year.
really sort of preceded by, atsome point in that racing season,
Junior made the decision himself.

(08:45):
I guess just internally, I don't thinkwe've ever really talked about this.
At some point, the switch went fromjust about having fun to, I want to win.
And so we went from doing everythingon our own and dad turning the wrenches
and the cart set up and all of thatsort of stuff to starting to work

(09:06):
with a team, letting a pro mechanicand a coach and teammates and all
that sort of stuff fell into place.
We got towards the end of thatracing season, realized that, number
one, because of that and the amountthat we were starting to travel to
races and try to be on the nationalracing calendar in karting, that

(09:27):
we were missing school already.
As we got to the end of the school year,realized that we had missed enough days
of school at that point that Juniorwas going to have to take, I think
it was one or two of his classes, hewas going to have to take the finals.
For those classes versus beingable to exempt out of them because

(09:47):
of how many days he had missedand I couldn't miss anymore.
And we still had end of theyear race at track house to go.
And so, yeah, once we realizedall that and realized if this
is the direction that we really.
want to go, then we've got to finda different avenue where we're not
going to have to be concerned about,did I miss too many days of school?

(10:10):
Am I going to get in some sort oftrouble or possibly get held back
a grade or, you know, whateverthe end result might've been.
So at that point, we really just kindof by accident stumbled up on a Facebook
post that came across my wife's feedthat somebody had posted in the carting
group up at Atlanta Motorsports Park.

(10:31):
Hey, the school down in Griffin calledSkip Stone Academy was starting this
online school for kids who raced.
So we knew Skip Stone Academy already, atleast by name, private Christian school.
Their football team played thefootball team at our former school,
also a private Christian school.
So we, hey, we know thisschool already seems.
It's like, you know, agood reputable school.

(10:53):
If they're putting their resourcesinto doing this, then high likelihood
it's going to be a quality product.
My wife and I talked about it andtalked with junior about it and
decided, Hey, let's sign up for it.
So we did that part, then we had togo meet the people at the school, you
know, do a little interview with theadministrators at the school, talk with

(11:14):
them about what the program entailed andwhatnot, and kind of make sure this was
going to be a good fit for everybody.
We concluded all of that and walkedaway from it with, yeah, okay,
this, this is a really good fit.
Let's move forward with it.
That's interesting.
It is.
And so let's unpackthat for just a second.
So to Junior, Your dad mentioned, youguys didn't really discuss that moment.

(11:34):
He says you made the decision thatyou wanted to take on this full time.
What was it for you that justsnapped, that changed, that
light switch that went off?
What was that moment that you said,Okay, dad, I want to do this for real.
Like, let's figure outa way to get this done.
There wasn't really any particularmoment that I can point out that,
uh, It was like, I want to dothis even more and I want to win.

(11:57):
It was always, I really like this.
And then gradually it was, Iwant to start doing this more.
And then one day it was just, I wantto try and win all of this stuff.
Were you seeing things even on socialmedia or, or like professional races,
something like that, that was drawingyou in further into this world?
Like, Hey, I want to be like, so and so.
Is there somebody that you're looking upto in the professional motor sports world

(12:20):
that maybe you're modeling yourself after?
Or someone you competedagainst in karting.
One of the things in the car worldwas, uh, Wayne Taylor Racing.
I've always really liked the cars thatthey run, and I've always wanted to drive
one of their entries to whatever racingseries that they'll be competing in.
That's probably the mainone for my inspirations.
All right, so we got our eyes set on IMSA,so we're gonna unpack this as we go along.

(12:44):
That's right.
How was the transition of having yourdad work with you and prepare the cards
and everything to going into a team?
How was that first year?
How did you deal with giving feedback?
Because a lot of the younger generationgiving feedback to the engineers
is always an interesting thing.
Kids of course are differentacross the board, but we find that
there's a certain generation thatjust, they want the car prepared.

(13:06):
They don't really want togive feedback to the engineer.
And then when things aren't working,they don't always know how to be
eloquent and articulate what's going on.
You transitioning from dad doingeverything and you doing everything with
dad and having grease to you just kind ofbasically sitting back and being the pro.
You're paying for the service.
How did you deal with that?
How did you deal with feedback whenyou weren't happy when the cart was
maybe not set up in the right wayor was pushing in a certain corner?

(13:30):
Like how did you transition from givingfeedback to dad to giving feedback
to somebody who's running a team?
With dad it was always like, hey dad,cart isn't turning or something like that.
When we moved over for that first,like, initial while, I never really
had much to complain about because themechanic who we have has been doing

(13:50):
it for a really, really long time.
Like, he mechaniced for LoganSargent when he was still in Karts.
So he knew what he was doing and I,at the time, I never really had much
of a complaint to say, but after awhile I've been able to give feedback.
Like I want more front grip orthe front has too much grip.

(14:10):
Let's give it a little less,really just small stuff.
Of course, the more you're in thecart, the more experience you have.
Did it become a challenge of like,man, these guys know so much.
This guy was a mechanic for a guy whowent into formula one and did formula two.
Were you able to assert yourselfor did you feel like, man, if I
say something, maybe I'm sayingsomething wrong and the guy's going
to be like, Hey, that's ridiculous.
The cart's not doing that.

(14:33):
It was really just, I never had much tosay, because if I'm being honest, the
car felt better than it ever had been.
That's pointing more fingers at dad.
Dad mechanic and pro, and I wouldsay too, one thing that I've noticed.
Over, especially this past year, to yourpoint, comes with experience in seat
time, as he's developed as a driver,and he's pushing the car harder, he's

(14:59):
giving more feedback now than I thinkhe did in the first two years that we
were with this whole team combined thisyear, I think he's given more feedback,
and I think he's developed enough asa driver to know what the cart's doing
and then come back in after a sessionon track and be able to communicate

(15:20):
that to the mechanic to say, hey,when I do this, the cart's doing this.
And then, you know, either that's goodor that's bad, or can we change it
to have more or less of whatever he'slooking for at that particular time.
Just to clarify forthose listening at home.
This is still sprint racing, right?
We're talking 20, 30 minute sessions.
We're not talkingendurance karting, right?

(15:42):
Correct.
Okay.
Well, getting back to the educationside and drawing that line, you know,
one thing about motor sports is you doreach a point where if your kid is good
enough, school becomes an issue, right?
It's not like.
He's playing travel baseball ortravel basketball where you're doing
it after school on the weekends.
Like, yeah, we're gone on the weekends.
We're gone.
Maybe sometimes like Thursday,Friday, Saturday, Sunday, because

(16:02):
we got to travel or even Monday.
That begins to take, Ithink, a toll on the family.
And how did having a child whodoes motorsports, how did you
guys balance that as a family?
If you could just talk also more abouthow SpeedU and Skipstone was able to
give you guys a sense of communityand education, because I'm sure that
was important to you and your wife.
Right.
You didn't want him justto be 100 percent driver.

(16:24):
And then down the line, like gotnothing out of his education.
Absolutely.
So yes, education isobviously very important.
And, you know, we place a bigemphasis on that A's and B's
keep you in the seat of the cart.
C's, we got to have a little conversation,which we've never had to have, and
we've never even approached, youknow, what happens if you have a D.

(16:46):
So we've been extremely as parents,we've been extremely fortunate
in that regard that he's alwaysdone well in school number one.
And then I think, secondly, youknow, as parents, we did have some
concern with going to speed you inthis online education environment
where the onus is on junior.

(17:07):
To make sure that he is completing therequired amount of work per class per
week, as well as if there's somethingthat he doesn't understand or is
struggling with to speak up and say,Hey, I need to get some additional
help on this or something like that.
So those were definitely someconcerns going in coming from a

(17:29):
traditional school type setting with.
kids in a classroom in a physical buildingand a teacher that's right there in the
room with you and you know all of thosethings that we don't have now so far
it's worked out extremely well he's alsothis school year started dual enrollment
so he's taking his college englishclass you know while he's in school it

(17:50):
is definitely a balancing act for surewith The travel involved now with what
we're doing going in the second yearthat we're doing this amount of travel.
Now, I like to think that wehave it a little smoother than we
did the first year, but I don'treally know that that's the case.
That's maybe just an illusion.
I'm telling myself because, youknow, there are definitely some

(18:10):
challenges with it to your point,but these national level races.
Oftentimes, we're leaving on aWednesday, and then we're not back
home until sometime late Sunday night.
For Junior, with his schoolwork, one ofthe great things about the SpeedU program
is that he can either know that, Hey,I've got this event coming up, so I need

(18:31):
to work ahead, so that when I'm out for afew days doing this, I don't have a whole
bunch of makeup work to do on my return.
Or, all right, hey, I've still gotthese X amount of things I need to get
done once we're back from the event,knowing that, all right, these next
couple of days I've got to put in someextra time to get caught back up in

(18:51):
these, you know, whatever classes,where, you know, maybe he didn't get
all the work completed before we left.
And then you wrap all of that upwith mom and dad still have full time
jobs, trying to balance that out.
With travel and taking time off ofwork and trying to juggle that my
wife and I both travel for work.
My wife travels extensively for her work.
There's a lot of times whereshe's not able to make it to

(19:14):
these big national level events.
You know, she's.
somewhere else in the country orsomewhere else in the world sometimes
and just can't get back in timeto, you know, when we leave, you
know, it just doesn't make sense.
You know, she's maybe not back untilsometime Friday night before she could
even consider coming to the race.
So it's definitely astruggle in that aspect.

(19:35):
Has that been the biggest challengethat you have faced having your son?
pursuing this?
Probably so, now that you say that.
The school piece now through SpeedUis, actually, that's kind of easy.
But, you know, it's not so easy formyself or my wife to just go, oh,
well, you know, we'll just work aheadbecause we've got to be out of the
office these next few days, right?

(19:57):
We, as adults, we all know it, youknow, doesn't necessarily work that way.
So, I think that's probably thebiggest challenge that we face
with all of the traveling is.
It's sort of, okay, who'sgoing to this event?
Can we both go to this event?
What happens at home while one or both ofus are gone to whatever the event may be?
And you know, trying to figure allof that out, I would say last year,

(20:21):
which was the first year that wereally hit the national schedule hard.
That was probably one of the biggestpieces to kind of try to figure
out how do we manage all of that.
If I'm being honest, I'm not sure that westill have that completely figured out.
How many other kids that junior is racingwith or against are in similar programs?

(20:43):
There are a large amount of the folks onthe national stage and national carding
that are doing the same sort of thing.
Are you guys part of the norm?
Are you still part of the exception?
My sense is, from the few parentsthat I've spoken to, especially
ones that know what we're doing,but they're not doing it, I think we
are a little bit of the exception.

(21:04):
Of course, you know, the primary one istheir kid is still in traditional school.
And they're missing school and takingtime off and all of that stuff.
The next group of kids are kids thatare in some sort of homeschool type
program, whatever that looks like.
They're still dealing with, ifmy kid needs help in a particular

(21:26):
Subject that they're not doinggood in or something like that.
They're trying to figure all that out ontheir own as a homeschool parent or, you
know, where do they go to get whateverresource they need or whatever homeschool
curriculum that they're following is, isit going to meet all the accreditation
standards and whatnot so that whentheir kid goes to apply to college?

(21:48):
that they can get in.
We had this unfortunately happen to afriend of ours that we know very well that
they did the homeschool thing, got to theend of it, and realized that one of the
subjects that we took, I don't rememberall the details on, but they either
didn't do enough hours in that subjector, you know, there was something there
that was lacking that they were goingto have to go back and redo some work in

(22:11):
that one subject area where we don't haveto worry about that with this program.
So it takes a lot of worry off the platewhen we first looked into doing this
program was one of our big concerns like,okay, this all sounds well and good, but,
you know, at the end of the day, doesthis get us what we need, what junior

(22:32):
needs to go from high school student tocollege world at the end of it, or, you
know, are we going to get to the endof this and find out, oh, we don't have
this, this or this, or, you know, this wasjust a colossal waste of time and money.
So, so, yeah, I think that's been a bigadvantage for us in that aspect of we
don't have to try to figure all this out.

(22:52):
Somebody has already done that.
I'm sure there's a lot of parentslistening right now, trying to run
the numbers and figure things out.
So let's unpack this a little bit more.
You mentioned the curriculum and it'spart of an existing private school.
The speed you sort of is a,let's say subset of that.
Mm hmm.
Is it completely self taught?
There's no instructor led anything, oris it more like the COVID times where

(23:15):
you're working remote, there's a teacherthat checks in every so many days,
and then you've got assignments, yougotta, like, how does it work exactly?
So they do have a, what theycall a, what do they call it?
Your weekly check in?
Yeah, it's a weekly check in.
So they do a weekly checkin, I think it's on Tuesdays.
Where the whole class gets togetherall the grade levels of the kids that

(23:37):
are in this program, they get togetherwith one of the administrators from the
school all on a zoom call that usuallylast somewhere around 30 minutes.
They kind of talk about what's going on.
What have you been doing?
You know, what's going on in your world?
What's coming up?
What do you have on your radar?
And then they'll intersperse that alot with having a guest speaker will

(23:59):
come on and talk about some topic tothe kids, making sure everybody's sort
of corralled and staying on task forthe week and the month and whatnot.
The actual classes themselves, Juniorsits down in front of a laptop.
How would you describe it?
Like a video you watch?
Yeah, a video, and then there's somequestions based on the topics that were

(24:23):
in that video, and you answer those, andthen you move on to the next lesson, which
is another video, and then questions.
So computer based training, I'vegot this scenario in my head of this
virtual one room schoolhouse, right?
You mentioned all the kids from all thegrades get together for these check ins.
It's all grade levels, which isfrom elementary to high school.

(24:44):
Oh, wow.
Are they all from the same geographicalarea, or are there kids from all over
the United States in the SpeedU program?
Pretty much all over the U. S. Okay.
There's some people in Florida.
Georgia, I think it mightstill be California.
So kind of all over.
Okay.

(25:04):
Thinking about tuition, are youpaying the normal rate to the school?
Are you paying a, you know, a lower rate?
Is it a rider on top of the standard?
Like, how does it work from adollars and cents perspective?
Their fee is to do thisparticular program.
So it's not like you're paying thefee to the traditional school and then
paying some sort of additional feeon top of it to be in this program.

(25:28):
You're just paying for just this program.
Nothing additional.
Personally, we found the cost tobe actually a good bit less than
what we were paying at our previousprivate brick and mortar school.
So that was a nice surprise tofind out that, you know, this was
going to hit the pocket, but less.
I mean, that buys some tires andgas at the end of the year, right?

(25:49):
It does.
Yes, absolutely.
So yeah, that helped out a lot.
I'm sure a question for the parentsout there that they're thinking about.
When I talk with other people whosekids aren't even in motor sports, and
I tell them, you know, what my kiddoes and where he goes to school, I
think they kind of automatically assumethe curriculum is somehow different.

(26:11):
Junior is taking thesame high school classes.
That any other kid in high schoolwould take as far as, you know,
the English, the science, the math.
All of that's the same.
You could walk into any schooland find the same subjects being
taught where things differ alittle bit, especially like with
the weekly check ins that they do.
Those will oftentimes have a verytilted slant towards the motor sports.

(26:34):
World and the guest speakers thatthey have are typically somebody
from the motor sports world.
And then our field trips with theschool are very different than
traditional school field trips.
So, all of our field trips revolvearound motor sports for the most part.
Case in point, our first year with theprogram, was it October, I think it

(26:56):
was, when we went to North Carolina?
The school put together a field trip,and it just happened to work out
perfectly with a national level racethat was at Track House in Mooresville.
The school did a field trip up to theMooresville and surrounding area that,
you know, home of NASCAR and whatnot.
We went up the week before.
To do some practice at the track tostayed up there that whole next week

(27:19):
because the field trip encompassed likethree days of that week, we went around,
saw various race teams and spoke withteam owners and program directors and
engineers and all that sort of aspectof the motor sports world that a lot of
people probably don't even realize exists.
And then at the end of that week, wewere back at the track again, getting
ready for this national level event.

(27:42):
In between all of that, Junior wasable to sit in our hotel room on his
laptop and get his schoolwork done.
That worked out really well.
And the field trips are super cool.
Who did we get to meet?
Hold on, I know this.
I don't know why Ican't remember the name.
Sunglasses, big hat.
Richard Petty!
There you go!
The king!
The king.
The king!

(28:02):
I don't know why I couldn'tremember that there.
Guys, they're lucky I haven'teven got to interview him yet.
Man, alright.
One more piece of this, justfrom the parental side, right?
Cause you're at that age, dad,you mentioned before, you got
to start thinking about college.
Has the academy, the brick andmortar school, assigned a college
counselor to you guys yet?
Have you been talking aboutwhat the next steps are?

(28:23):
Have you identified programsthat will accept the Speed U
and all that kind of stuff?
Are you thinking very localin the sense of like, maybe
something like Belmont Abbey?
Which has a motor sports program,you know, stuff like that.
What's the next step?
And what are those conversationslike now that you're in this
program in its second year?
Honestly, I think we're probably a littlebehind getting some of those conversations

(28:43):
going with the school coupled with junior.
I don't think has really decidedwhich direction he wants to
go after high school as well.
So we're still feeling that out,looking at options, if it was up to me.
If it was up to dad, you mentionedBelmont Abbey, which I didn't
realize had a great program.
I might need to talk withyou some more offline.

(29:04):
Of course, I know Clemson hasa great program, you know,
knowing my kid's passion andlove for the motorsports world.
I'm trying to push him to look thatdirection at some of these programs.
One of the things that is a big sort ofsaying at SpeedU with the people that run
that program is it's great that you wantto pursue this route and try to make it
in this world of motorsports as a driver.

(29:26):
But what's your plan B?
And so you got to have a plan B. Andas you and David well know from your
experience, there's so many avenues andso many roads in the world of motorsports,
so many different things you can do andstill be involved in this arena, even
if you're not the guy behind the wheel.
We call that the autosphere.
The autosphere.

(29:47):
I like it.
There's one more piece of this before wetransition into some other topics that
Dave wants to talk about it's really forjunior You're not in a traditional school
your high school experience when you lookback on it You're gonna be telling people
man I did this thing and I was on theroad with my dad and we're racing but I
didn't have The same emotional connection.

(30:07):
You don't have the samekind of classmates.
And as you said, there's varying inage, maybe some of them you race with.
Some of them you onlyget to see at the races.
And again, in this day and age,we're all connected through social
media and discord and this and that.
So I'm sure you've got friendsthat you're connecting with, but
emotionally, how is this affecting you?
Like not being in a brick and mortarschool, have you given it any thought?

(30:29):
At first it was pretty difficultbecause I had a lot of friends and
the school that I used to go to.
Because I've been there since first grade,all the way up until, uh, ninth grade.
I got the idea of what high schoolis like since I had one year in it.
I was able to get used to notbeing able to see my friends
in person nearly as much.

(30:51):
But, like, we still talk every nowand then, and I see a lot of my, uh,
friends from racing nearly every weekend.
So do you think, in a way, it adds a levelof clarity and focus to what you're doing?
Because you don't have all thedistractions, whether it's the pubescent
ones, the dramatic ones, you know, thegirlfriends, all the other stuff that

(31:12):
sort of comes along with high school.
With all that distraction out ofthe way, do you think it's going
to make you a better driver?
I feel like it never really had an impact.
I was just able to kind of justput it aside when I was racing.
Yeah, and I would say that was onething I was going to say too, that
social aspect for the parents thatare out there, because that was a

(31:33):
concern of, you know, my wife and I's.
Going into this program and sort oflosing that connection with the kids that
he knew and, you know, that aspect ofhigh school and that socialization and
peer group and all that sort of stuffthat we, and a lot of aspects don't
have, in fact, we just got an emailnot long ago from the actual brick and

(31:56):
mortar school that runs this program.
They have prom coming up.
Uh, right.
And so we really hadn't eventhought about, at least I hadn't,
until that email hit my inbox.
Oh, prom is coming up pretty soon.
What do we do?
We don't know anybody at the school.
The kids that are in this programare really sort of apart from

(32:18):
the whole rest of the school.
I don't know that if we walked on campus.
Somebody at that school would go, Oh,that's Christian jr. He's in the speed.
You program.
He does.
I don't think anybody there wouldknow who we were, why we were there.
Well, the fact that he's inhis racing suit, because that's
the only suit he has that,
that might, yeah, that might,yeah, that might give it away.

(32:42):
Yeah, you know, that was a concern ofours going into this, but like you said.
People, especially kids nowadays,are so connected with each other
through this social media universe.
I have my own thoughts on that,for better or worse, but you know,
we were at Track House last year.
I keep seeing this kid coming over towhere Junior's at on Grid before he's

(33:07):
going out for his sessions on track.
And I didn't think much about it at first.
Until I keep seeing this kid overand over again, and then I'm like,
Wait a minute, I don't know that kid.
Who is this?
Finally I asked him, I was like, Hey,who's this kid that keeps hanging around?
Do you know him?
Like, I had no idea.
And he's like, Oh yeah, that's my friend.

(33:28):
And I'm like, Well, how did you meet him?
Oh, we met on Discord.
Discord?
What's that?
Right?
And then I'm like, Well, where is he from?
Wisconsin.
What?
I need somebody from Wisconsinon this thing called Discord.
That's what kids do these days.

(33:49):
Yeah, right.
So, Dad, to kind of close out thisthought on the parental side of things.
If you could go back in time andthis program was available when
you were juniors age, do youthink you would have done it?
Knowing what you know now?
Oh yeah, absolutely.
I'm that personality type that whenI'm going at something, I'm all in.

(34:10):
It wouldn't have matteredto me, that social aspect.
Like, oh, I don't have anyfriends other than the people I
see when I'm at the racetrack.
Okay, that's fine because I'm doingthis thing right here that I'm really
passionate about and I'm chasing after it.
That's all that matters.
Like, that's my sort ofmentality for better or worse.
If this program had been availablewhen I was growing up as a kid and

(34:32):
if we'd had the financial means, myparents to do for me what we're able
to do, my wife and I, for our son.
Yeah.
Sign me up.
Well, Christian, I got news for you.
All four of us sitting in thisroom are exactly the same.
Right.
You know, we wouldn't be inthis room if we were different.
That's the way all four of us are,where you're going to basically put

(34:54):
everything aside to chase your dreams andto chase what you're passionate about.
I know for sure, Eric and Italk about this all the time.
And there's just a certain setof people that we are this way.
We don't care about everything else.
It's like, this is a goal I set.
And this is what I want to do and Idon't know how much time you've been
on track recently, Christian, but youknow, Eric spends a lot of time on
track and I still try to get out there.
I'd like to get more, but my momjoked and she said, every time I

(35:16):
see you on track, you seem at peace.
And I say, yeah, I findpeace at the racetrack.
That is where I'm most at peace.
I'm not thinking about my kids.
I'm not thinking aboutparents, job, anything.
I'm really focused on myself and howI could be faster and what I got to
do to be faster than the next person.
Right.
So there's this piece that you get outthere and not everybody's built that way.
Yeah.
You're in a good group, but to you,junior, I've got a question about speed.

(35:37):
You.
So you're at a, you'reat a place called speed.
You, what do they do from an educationalstandpoint for your race craft?
Do they use any tools to make you faster?
Do they talk about physical trainingto prepare for being a driver or.
What kind of things like that areyou getting out of this program?
Or is it strictly educational and are theyteaching any kind of engineering stuff?
It's mainly, uh, educational speed.

(36:00):
You is like its own thing.
And then there's another thing thatis affiliated with the school of the
synergy, synergy speed lab is like theiractual racing shop and team, which they
do like legends car racing, band ofarrows, late models, and things like that.
Like whenever I go to one of the events,like PRI, they'll be there and they'll

(36:24):
have like some of their sims there.
We'll be there representing theactual education part of it.
Do they use sim trainingin your curriculum?
How does that work?
We did see the sim, buthow do they utilize that?
Or do you have to go down toSkipstone and use the sim?
Do they have certain days where, like,all of you can come down and do training

(36:44):
in that way, whether on the sim or offthe sim, or anything, working on your
racecraft or the mental side of driving?
They don't, but from what I know,you can pretty much just go down
there since you're with the school.
They'll most likely let youdo some laps on the sim.
Okay.
I haven't really gotten achance to do that though.
They do have the sims,which you guys saw at PRI.

(37:04):
You know, they take certain ones aroundto different events that they're going
to, to provoke the school program itself.
You know, if we wanted to drive down tothe Griffin, Georgia area where they're
located at to go in their shop andhop on a sim, we, we certainly could.
But, you know, for us where we live onthe west side of Atlanta, just kind of

(37:25):
logistically doesn't really make a lotof sense to make that trip down there.
Plus, finding the time to do it as well.
It's something we could takemore advantage of than we
do, but at the same time.
Logistically, I don't really know thatdoes it make a lot of sense to try to
fight through all that traffic to getthere, spend whatever amount of time

(37:46):
where they're doing that, and then fightour way through traffic to get back home.
So then as an alternative to that,are you doing SIM at home on your own?
Yeah.
Are you strictly iRacing?
Are you mixing it up?
What are you using to practice,and what are you practicing with?
iRacing is the main one, butI also use Assetto Corsa for
when I just want to drive.

(38:06):
iRacing is the gold standardfor most professional drivers.
I don't think there's ever going to bea Well, I don't think in the next few
years there's going to be a major shift.
But a lot of professional drivers are alsousing Assetto, which is used in industry.
And yeah, LMU is getting a lotof positive feedback right now,
now that they're tweaking thegame and getting it up to par.
Yeah, I've been wanting totry that random R factor.

(38:28):
And if I think back when we first metyears ago, I told you guys I was in
the middle of developing a sim programbecause my program was still fairly new.
How has sim helped your driving?
And what are you learningfrom it going forward?
Because one thing I talked to yourdad about, and I told him, there's so
much you can do in the sim with, andthis is why it's such a great teaching
utility, whether you're going to be adriver or engineer or things like that.

(38:50):
So how are you using the sim differentfrom maybe when you started years
ago to what you're doing now thatyou're more of an experienced driver?
Mainly it's, to me, it's still about justkeeping the reflexes sharp, kind of a
substitute for being in the seat, althoughit really isn't a full substitute.
It just complements to it, ifanything, but that's mainly what

(39:10):
I've gotten out of it so far.
Do you use setup shops or areyou tweaking setups at all?
Have you started messing around with that?
I prefer to do fixed setup.
Okay.
The only thing that I even somewhatbother with for setup is another
software called Kart Racing Pro.
It isn't compatible with thePC that we use for The Sim.

(39:31):
I use it on my gaming PC, and Ican still connect it to The Sim.
I just don't really feel like picking upmy PC and going into a different room.
Connecting all that up, and thenwhen I'm done, unconnecting it,
moving it back, and all of that.
That makes sense.
When you guys get your new hardware,I'll get you hooked into some software
where you can basically start tweaking,go faster, and just play around with it.

(39:55):
Because I think that'svery vital going forward.
It's not exactly one to one,but there's so much you can do
that will help to teach you.
More vehicle dynamics and carryit forward as you step into
the next stage of your career.
And I think, you know, that's going tobe something I'm kind of interested to
see as we start to transition out of thecart and into the car utilizing the sim,

(40:17):
because, you know, let's face it, thecarting world, especially our proximity
to AMP, even though we're not super close,we get up in the morning, we drive up
there, we do what we do and drive backhome and we're home in time for dinner.
Right.
That's real easy to do in the kart.
Not so easy to do in the race kart.
I do see the day coming where the simis going to start becoming a more vital

(40:38):
aspect of what we're doing to honethose skills and keep the reflexes and
practice techniques and all of thosethings because we simply, we won't
have the ability like we do now withthe kart to go, Oh, it's Saturday.
Let's go spend two hoursdriving around the kart track.
Unless mom and dad win the lottery,that ability is going to go away.

(41:01):
So yeah, I'm very eager to see howthe Sim is going to fill that gap.
Christian Sr., you brought up areally good point, the next steps.
And Junior, you're right atalmost legal driving age.
So the question becomes, what is the nextstep when you step away from karting?
Are you gonna go do some autocross?
Are you gonna go straight into club racingand dust off the patina off a dad's Miata?

(41:24):
Like, what is that next step there?
Do you want to start that outor should I start that out?
I guess I'll start it.
Okay.
I don't really know whatwe would do for cars.
But I'm pretty sure they'dprobably be going to club racing.
I don't know if it'd be oval and likelegends cars, road course and legends
cars, or like radicals for road course.

(41:44):
It's kind of whatever we end upfeeling gives the best option.
You guys are going fora test though, right?
Aren't you going?
We're a radical test.
Yeah.
Yes, we are.
So yeah, junior mentioned the legends car.
So we did a test in a legendscar back last November with the
help of some folks at speed.
You that do some peoplein the legends car world.
We were able to set that up.

(42:06):
So we spent a day in the legends car.
I think you had a blast.
You liked it.
Yeah.
Yeah.
And, uh, you know, now we're set up todo a test day in a radical up at amp.
Yeah.
You know, and I think from there, we'llkind of look at between the two and sort
of look to make some sort of a decisionbetween which path do we go down, you
know, one of those two roads, whichare very different from each other.

(42:32):
But there's going to be a lotthat goes into that decision.
What are we comfortable with?
Also, a big part of that decisionis what opportunities present
themselves with which one of theseroads that we might pick to go down.
The Legends car is, of course, inthat ladder up into the NASCAR world.
And one of the great things aboutSpeedU is that really all of the kids

(42:54):
that are in this program That's thedirection all of them want to go.
They're all in eitherBandoleros or Legends cars.
We're really, I think the only people inthe Speed U program that are in karting
and in the road course world full time,you know, we kind of see where the
Legends car road sort of goes and we know.

(43:15):
people in that sort of worldalready versus the radical.
We don't really know anybody in thatworld, but it also looks like there
are some exciting things happeningin that world, especially up at AMP
with the primal school that's upthere in the, in the program that
they're running and some of the thingsthey're doing with a race series.

(43:36):
That's.
kind of merging some of thatgamer sim world and bringing
that over into the car world.
And so, you know, if that's theroute that we go, he may get out of
the radical at the end of the dayand say, dad, I hate this thing.
I kind of doubt it.
You won't, you won't.
I've been in a radical.
Nope.
Nope.
You definitely won't.
But yeah, so that's kind of whatat the moment, what the world

(43:58):
sort of looks like for us as we.
Transition out of the cartingand into the car world.
Speck Miata was also a discussionof maybe that's a path as well.
Junior wasn't super excited about that.
I don't want to rely only on draft.
Of course I'd love Speck Miata.
It's what I did.
It's a great class for a lot ofdifferent reasons, but the last few

(44:21):
races that I did in Speck Miata,I looked around and started to
realize unless something changes.
These are all cars that wereat best 15 years old or older.
It's a spec class.
And so if you need a new wiringharness for your injectors,
where do you get that from?

(44:42):
The junkyard.
What's going to happenthere in another five years?
And so that gave me a little pauseabout going down that particular
pathway for as good as it is.
I think there are going to besome things that need to change
with that category because Thosecars aren't getting any younger.
Parts are becoming increasingly harderto find for these cars if they're not

(45:02):
gonna make some provision for, okay, werealize some of these parts that fail
on these cars because they came from astreet car and now we're asking them to
live in a race car environment but therearen't any new parts of these parts.
Something's gonna haveto give at some point.
I really do worry about what'sgonna happen with that class.
Ultimately, so yeah, we talked aboutspec Miata, maybe that's something

(45:25):
we still dabble in at some point,but I don't really know you alluded
to something earlier as you moveup, things get more expensive.
That's the punch lineof motor sport, right?
Pay to play.
So that said, depending on the pathyou choose, every one of them has some
sort of financial burden and it takesus into a conversation about what we

(45:45):
talk a lot about with pro drivers,which is the business side of racing.
And it seems to be theconsensus among drivers.
One of the things they.
Is begging for money from sponsorsand then the sponsorship commitments
and, you know, got to go here andpublic speaking and show the car,
you know, all these obligations.
Suddenly they become part of this mediamachine and there's less focus on them

(46:07):
winning so much as being a commodity tothe businesses that they're representing.
And so, as a parent.
How are you setting thestage for sponsorships?
Have you started to reach out?
How are you building a business planfor your son as he is now starting
to choose where he's going to go oncehe's graduated away, not only from

(46:27):
speed you, but from carting itself.
Yeah.
So a project that he has.
That is not completed yet.
I will point out Jr. It was too, I wantedhim to work on my initial thought was just
kind of a simple one page flyer that hecould go around to businesses with or hand
out to people kind of, this is who I am.

(46:49):
This is what I'm doing in exchange forthese different levels of sponsorship.
Here's what you're going to getback out of this, which I think is.
Super important.
Drivers hate going and looking forsponsors, but I think maybe the next thing
they hate probably the most or hate evenmore is then the obligations that come
after that and standing in front of a roomof people to talk about what it's like to

(47:10):
be a race car driver or show up somewherewith your car, whatever that looks like.
But I think in this day and agewhere there's so many different
things that are vying for.
Businesses, attention, anddollars, at least in the world of
motorsports, it's no longer aboutwhat happens on Sunday between the

(47:34):
green flag and the checker flag.
Yes, that still ultimately does playa part, but I think the bigger thing
now is what happens from after thechecker flag on Sunday until the next.
Green flag on Friday or Saturday becauseif you can't show yourself as a individual
and a driver to be somebody to thatbusiness owner that you're asking to hand

(47:58):
over money, if you can't show them thatyou've got a good head on your shoulders.
You're not going to go out anddo some boneheaded thing that's
going to ultimately reflect backon that business owner's business.
They're quickly not going to careabout what you did on Sunday, and
they're going to go find somebody else.
And that's a big topic of discussionin the program at SpeedU, that they

(48:22):
really harp on with all the studentsthere is, Yes, we want you to be
whatever level you can be as a driverand hope you succeed in this world and
in all of those things, but we wantyou to be a quality, upstanding person.
That's number one.
You see this at the track,even in the karting world.
For better or worse, I can lookat how somebody's kid acts.

(48:45):
At the kart track, I can bepretty assured, I can tell you
what their upbringing's like.
The parent's reflection comes out inthat environment, maybe unlike any other.
There's all this emotion at the race.
Your adrenaline's pumping,and you're going after it, and
somebody sends you off in a corner.
Watch what that kid does after that.

(49:06):
And that will tell you a wholelot about that kid's parents and
how they're raising that kid.
I thought you were going totell me there's the equivalent
to dance moms and carting.
There's like cart dads.
There's cart parents.
There are cart parents.
I think dance moms areprobably worse, but.
You know, you guys are really takinga non traditional path in the world

(49:31):
of sports, whether it's motorsportor sports in general, right?
Like, this is a really interestingparadigm that you guys have going on here.
The speed bumps in the roadaren't clearly visible yet, and
there's challenges to be overcome.
If I pull any lesson back fromthe pros, sponsorship is it.
Coming up with the funding to race.
As your job, because remember, you'regoing to become a professional driver.

(49:53):
That is your career.
What you do for a living is drive cars.
So again, to the point of earlier, what'syour plan B, you know, if it doesn't
work out and I don't want to pass anyshadows or clouds on things, but it's a
really serious discussion that I think alot of people get excited about the wins
and the trophies we're moving forward.
forward and then you get tothis point where you're like,
money don't grow on trees.

(50:14):
There's a lot of sacrifice,a lot of compromise in there.
And so my best advice in thiscase is finish that project.
Your dad set out for you there, junior,and come up with a business plan,
come up with an executive summary,come up with a way to sell yourself.
Self as an asset to thesebusinesses, whatever they are.
And the one thing I've heard from alot of folks is they were afraid to
knock on the door of that companybecause they were like, well, why

(50:36):
would they be interested in racing?
Why?
Why would they beinterested in sponsoring me?
And if the lesson there was theworst they can say is no, but if
you don't ask, you'll never know.
So that's also important is.
Just try different things and see whocan rally behind you because you don't
know where it's going to take you next.
There's a lot of things to think aboutthere and we could probably talk on
sponsorship for a whole nother episode.

(50:57):
But I do want to move on a little bithere as we sort of wrap out this episode.
Dad, if you could give a piece of advice.
To other parents, knowing what you knownow and going back to my point about
not knowing all the speed bumps thatare yet to come, what would you say to
another parent that was in your shoes acouple years back looking at this going?

(51:17):
Is this the right thingfor my son or daughter?
I'm just going to throw this into.
Eric and I have girls who really lovemotorsports and they're really young.
And we're always like, Hmm, I really wantmy daughters to get into motorsports.
And they, they know what we both do,but there's also the hesitation of
like, we know what's going to happenif they start going down this path.
I know enough people in industry.
I can make phone calls.

(51:38):
I could say, Hey, if my girls getgood enough, I can make phone calls.
I can do this.
But at the end of the day,sometimes there's this
hesitation because I'm like, man.
That is a sacrifice.
You know, it's such a sacrifice toget your kid to that next level.
So, you know, you're not justtalking to the main audience.
You're kind of talking to ustoo, who have kids who aren't
that age, who like motorsport.
Yeah.
Yeah.
I forgot about that.

(51:58):
The main things I would say, looking backfrom where we started to where we are now.
Take small steps in the beginning,because you ultimately don't know
until you get to a certain point, kindof where we're at, is this something
they're really going to stick with?
You know, right, we've all seen, youcould pick the sport even, it's not
just motorsports, but you could pick thesport where you see the parent with the

(52:18):
kid that has all the latest, greatestequipment, everything's top dollar,
and it's their first time doing this.
So you could go down that road.
I would say don't.
Start out small, take baby steps,make sure this is really going
somewhere, whatever that looks like.
Enjoy the journey as well.

(52:39):
I think we all know here that there'sdays at the track that are just Fantastic.
You get the win or you clenchpole or whatever that is.
And it's just the best day ever.
But those days are rare in the sport.
There's a lot of days where itdidn't go right at the track.
You leave the track not feeling goodand you feel dejected and you question,

(53:02):
what the heck are we doing here?
I would just say enjoy the processand enjoy the journey because You
said earlier we met however manyyears ago up at AMP and now we're
at where we're at and it seems likeit's gone by in the blink of an eye.
That is so true.
Take time and enjoy the journey.
And then the other thing I would say isremember that, you know, motorsports.

(53:23):
It's the long game.
Yes, when you first get intoit, at some point, you start
making these big strides, right?
You go out one day and you find,you knock off three seconds
off of your personal best.
And then the next time you go back to thetrack, you knock another two seconds off.
But then you get to that point whereyou get to the track and, wait a

(53:44):
minute, I didn't find any time today.
Wait, I lost two tenths today.
Or, you know, you're stuck in one spot fortwo months before you find another tenth.
To get any faster, it's a long game.
I think it's real easy, especially intoday's society and world, to lose focus
on that with The younger generationwhere it's all, we want instant results.

(54:06):
We want it right now.
And we want to see immediateimprovement and all of those things.
If you want that, go drag racing.
You're right.
Yeah.
And by and large, motorsportsdoesn't work that way.
Right.
And so it's easy to get discouraged.
You know, you just gotto keep your eye fixed.
Way down the road and take littlebaby steps to get there and junior.
Do you feel the same way?
Like what advice would you give tosomeone like our daughters who our

(54:29):
kids are almost same age, right?
Like 10 and 8 and they'rewatching emza with me.
Well, you've seen him at amp, you knowYou've seen my kids at amp and you
know, we go up to petite every yearAnd at least my eldest keeps asking
and because of the situation our familyis in like I can't put them in carding
right now, but she keeps asking, youknow, she's like, I want to do this.
I want to do this.
So what would you say junior tolike a young person who's 1011

(54:51):
maybe has done a few things?
What advice would you givethem as they're starting out?
Don't give up.
It's gonna be a long road either way.
So just keep getting out it.
That's really the best thing you can do.
Remember why you got into this?
To begin with, right?
Good advice.
But we still do this some now wherewe'll have a day where we'll go to
the track, especially up at AMP.
We're just there to have fun.

(55:12):
We may go there that whole day.
We're not working onanything in particular.
We're just making laps and having fun.
I think as you get down this road,obviously things do get very serious,
and they should because of where you'retrying to get to, and they have to be.
But if you could take a momentto step back once in a while, and
just go to the track and remember.
Why you fell in love with this andwhy it's fun and just go do that not

(55:33):
worry about oh today I'm showing upto the track to work on these three
things or this one thing or whateverjust go drive Make time to do that
once in a while, you know to kind ofkeep a perspective of hey We're here
because we like this because It's fun.
So yeah, I guess biggest question is,what is Junior your final goal or dream?
How do you see five to ten years out?

(55:53):
I know you mentioned WayneTaylor, but is that the end goal?
What would be your dream scenarioto dream big for a second?
Probably prototypes.
Or like IndyCar or something like that.
Super Formula.
I think those are really cool.
Or if like GT3 or Super GT, thoseare also really, really cool.
Just somewhere in cars, really anywhere.

(56:16):
Now, would you be a factory driver?
Or have you ever thought about that?
Like being a factory driveror are you going to be more
like a gold platinum driver?
Honestly, whatever iseasiest for me to do.
Whatever can get me the farthest.
That's.
Kind of how I always think.
It's like, if this can take mesomewhere that's worth it, I'm gonna go.
Keep your options open.
And your eyes up and besituationally aware, right?

(56:37):
Well, we've reached that part of theepisode, gentlemen, where I like to
extend the opportunity for our guests.
To give any shout outs, thank yous,promotions, or talk about anything
else we haven't covered this far.
For all the folks out there,obviously, that might be interested
in the school program that we'redoing, please check them out online.

(56:58):
Coincidentally, along with that, theschool is running a sim racing based
contest that you can sign up for.
I believe it's a 25 fee tosign up for it, like an online
racing league using iRacing.
You know, a number of events scheduledthroughout the year, the grand prize at
the end of it is a fully funded legendsrace for the winner of that competition.

(57:21):
So, for any aspiring young driversout there that have a SIM and you're
looking to get yourself into a car couldbe a great avenue for you to do that.
I'd like to thank thechassis manufacturer, SOTY.
I'd like to thank theirUS department, SOTY USA.
I'd like to thank our local shop, DCT.
They've helped us pretty muchour entire karting careers.

(57:43):
Leo, who's the owner of DCT.
He's been a great coach,been a great friend too.
And then Miguel, he's my mechanic.
He's really good at what he does.
I'd like to thank D2 Motors,they're our engine builder.
They make really good motorsand we're going to be running
with them a lot this year.
So looking forward to that.

(58:03):
My mom and dad, I'd like tothank them for my sponsors.
Both of them are my sponsors.
Really quick, Christian Jr.
Where can we find you on social media?
Are you on social media?
I know you're using Discord and hopefullyyou've taught your dad what Discord is.
But can we find you on social media,whether on Instagram or TikTok or
Facebook or anything like that?

(58:24):
Is there any way to follow youand you follow your journey?
Last Turn Racing on Instagram.
Search up Last Turn Racing andthat should give you the account.
Okay.
I want to try and get a YouTubechannel one of these days.
I want to get a GoPro that way Ican post them on boards because
that would be pretty nice.
I think the Facebook accountis also Last Turn Racing.

(58:45):
It is.
Well, anyway, fellas, from thetwist and turns of racing to the
challenges of balancing educationand competition, Christian Jr. is
proving that sometimes the road lesstraveled is the fastest one to success.
If you are an expiring driver andyou want to learn more about SpeedU's
program, be sure to visit www.

(59:06):
skipstoneacademy.
org.
for more details.
And if you want to keep up withChristian Jr's journey, you've heard
his social media and definitely staytuned for more behind the scenes action.
And with that, gentlemen, I can'tthank you enough for coming on break
fix and sharing the beginnings ofyour journey of your story with us.
So Christian Jr, I can't applaudyou enough for what you're doing.

(59:29):
We're rooting for you.
Keep pushing those limits,keep chasing those dreams.
And remember, there's alwaysanother green flag ahead of you.
So we hope to see you back.
You have an open invitationto touch base with us.
Tell us more sections of your story.
Keep us up to date on your progress.
And again, the best of luck.
Absolutely.
Thanks so much, guys.
We really appreciate the opportunityand get to hang out with you guys.

(59:50):
Yeah.
Thank you.
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org.
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