June 15, 2023 • 39 mins
When you think of Nascar, you’re probably not thinking about how the sport can contribute to LGBTQ+ rights. But thanks to one young racecar driver, that’s changing for the better.
This week, we talk with NASCAR driver Zach Herrin. In love with racing since the age of 5, he sped towards his dreams and turned pro by 16. As a young person, his most authentic self was constantly challenged by the hypermasculine world of racing. So he opted for a pit stop and stepped away from the sport at just 17. Shifting gears allowed Zach to get in touch with his most authentic self as an out professional athlete. Now, he’s ready for a comeback.
So, buckle up and get ready for queer lap around the track.
Follow Zach on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/zach.herrin
Learn more about Racing Pride: https://racingpride.com/
Learn more about Lambda Legal: https://lambdalegal.org/
By Straw Hut Media.
This week, we talk with NASCAR driver Zach Herrin. In love with racing since the age of 5, he sped towards his dreams and turned pro by 16. As a young person, his most authentic self was constantly challenged by the hypermasculine world of racing. So he opted for a pit stop and stepped away from the sport at just 17. Shifting gears allowed Zach to get in touch with his most authentic self as an out professional athlete. Now, he’s ready for a comeback.
So, buckle up and get ready for queer lap around the track.
Follow Zach on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/zach.herrin
Learn more about Racing Pride: https://racingpride.com/
Learn more about Lambda Legal: https://lambdalegal.org/
By Straw Hut Media.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:01):
Straw media. Growing up, That'sthat's all I ever knew was racing.
Um. Just as I was born, we were at the racetracks. It's
something I grew up with those fallingasleep to the sounds of motorcycles and cars.
But reconnecting now with you know,a more feminine side to me is
(00:22):
important in my day to day Tryingto really be in touch with my feelings
and how to express that is moreimportant as I move on and you know,
continue to build into this person,this athlete but also a gay man.
In today's Americas, when you thinkof NASCAR, you're probably not thinking
about how the sport can contribute toLGBTQ plus rights, But thanks to one
(00:46):
young race car driver, that's changingfor the better. Today, we're joined
by NASCAR driver Zach Harrin. Inlove with racing since the age of five,
he sped towards his dreams and turnedpro by sixteen. As a young
person, his most authentic self wasconstantly challenged by the hypermasculine world of racing,
so he opted for a pit stopand stepped away from the sport at
(01:07):
just seventeen. Shifting gears allowed Zachto get in touch with his most authentic
self as an out professional athlete.Now he's ready for a comeback. So
buckle up and get ready for aqueer lap around the track. Hi,
this is Zak Karen, and thisis pride. You are a professional race
(01:37):
car driver. Like that is whatpeople say. They say, like,
oh, I want to be anastronaut or I want to be a race
car driver. I want to beI don't know, a Delphin trainer or
something extraordinary, and it is You'veraced amateur motorcycle right until you were sixteen,
and then you went pro. Yeah. So I actually started riding a
motorcycle whost two years old, sonot long after I learned to walk.
(01:59):
You know, my pants got meon a bike, and what got us
involved in this industry was a hobbyfor my dad. My dad and my
mom would go to the racetracks locallyin California where we were living, and
from there, you know, havean older brother who's five years old of
me now and he's gone on tohave a really successful career in racing superbikes
professionally. So through him, youknow, when I started to ride,
(02:21):
we really realized what it would taketo kind of prove to go on to
this track too, to make thisa career for us ourselves, and you
know, from there it started tostart racing when I was about five,
you know, throughout the state ofCalifornia. Not long after that, I
started racing um, you know,amateur national championships across the country, and
that quickly escalated to making my professionaldebut at sixteen at Daytona International speedway track
(02:46):
that we just left this past weekend. And that was a lot of work
and dedication and you know, financialstrain to not only have you know,
had my parents done that for onechild, but to have done that for
two children in a row. Sothe resources were really limited, but we
knew that this is what we wantedto do as a family and we were
going to do whatever it took toto ensure that dream came true. First,
(03:07):
when did you When did you comeout? When did you know that
you were queer? I guess,you know, my initial coming out was
to my family and friends, andthat wasn't till long after that, probably
about I was around eighteen. ButI always knew things were different. I
always knew that obviously I was attractedto something that wasn't the norm. For
(03:28):
me, But growing up in themotorsports industry, I never had the opportunity
to even focus on that because evenwhen I would give a fraction to that,
I would immediately get backlash and thecomments and the jokes from my peers
and my fellow competitors. It was, you know, you're supposed to be
dating these umbrella girls. Why aren'tyou getting their numbers? You know,
why aren't you dating so and so. So. I just always put that
(03:51):
to the side so I can focuson my job. And you know,
that's what drove me away from racingcompletely, was I was no longer having
fun at this and I know howmuch of a risk this sport of motorsports
can be. So it ultimately ledme towards the end of the race season
to tell my family and my partnersthen I just don't see it, you
(04:11):
know, being a viable future forme right now. So I need to
step away from things and focus onme and my mental health. Racing is
inherently masculine, right Like I feellike any kind of a motor sport is.
Like I have cousins in Idaho wholove to do motorize things, and
I was always like, it's soloud, it moves, it like has
like a vibration. I'm just notinto that, the dirt, all of
it. So it was that atany point, like I guess it returned
(04:38):
to even when you were getting intomotorcycle competitions or not necessarily NASCAR, all
of those sports are seemingly very masculine. Was that for me it would have
been like, oh gosh, Idon't have to really fake it. No.
I think for me, just growingup, that's that's all I ever
knew was racing. As you know, just as I was born, we
(04:59):
were at the race trucks. It'ssomething I grew up with that was falling
asleep to the sounds of motorcycles andcars. It's something that it's been part
of my entire life. But reconnectingnow with you know, a more feminine
side to me is important in myday to day trying to really be in
touch with my feelings and how toexpress that is more important as I move
on and you know, continue tobuild into this person, this out athlete,
(05:24):
but also a gay man in today'sAmerica. So that's that's also really
important for me. So when youcome out, I'm really curious how fans
reacted to you because it's I imagineanyone's following in that or fans that in
those sports there's a lot of veryhyper masculine Is that accurate? No,
(05:45):
yeah, totally, um, AndI think for me, I had issues.
I mean being that my brother stillis someone very well known in the
industry. Even though I had steppedaway from all my social platforms. I
kind of left it as a ghosttown, so I didn't have a life
digitally, was just my personal life. But from there, you know,
word of mouth spread and then whenI would go back to the track just
to kind of reconnect and see everyone, mainly to be their support my brother.
(06:08):
You know, quickly then I wasrealizing I was losing friends. Honestly,
they truly weren't friends at the endof the day of that's you know,
how they were going to treat me. But you know, I started
realizing pretty quickly. That has tomake it it just even more reason that
a lot of people who are inmotorsports would want would need to stay closeted
unless they could take that time tofocus on theirselves. So, Mike,
(06:29):
you said your mental health, didyou have good support from your family though
through that. Yeah, No,I honestly, I guess in a way,
I can be pretty selfish at times. I'm very driven with with my
personal surrounding, how I feel,you know, how my mental health is.
How am I going to respond tothis? So I actually I kind
(06:50):
of made a whole new friend groupof a bunch of gay girls, and
so I was able to kind ofjust live through them. And then ultimately
I was like, hey, youknow, I'm gay. I want you
to meet someone. I think I'mdating him, but you know, anyways,
and I didn't really introduce that personto family for a while, and
that kind of created a little barrierbetween us. They felt as if I
(07:11):
was moving on this completely whole newlife and I didn't want them to be
a part of that. And itwasn't you know that. It was just
I didn't really know how to navigatethis. And I felt instant love and
support there with my friends, andthat's how I wanted to introduce this part
of my life. And you know, from there introduced my family. But
you know, of course, allof my families has been you know,
nothing but love and support, andI'm really grateful for that because I know
(07:31):
that's not common coming up after thebreak, Zach and I talk about his
decision to leave the sport and hisreturn to the driver's seat. Stay tuned,
Welcome back. We're on with ZachHearn today. Listen in as he
(07:51):
walks us through his high octane comebackmore than ten years in the making.
When you just I did to leavethe sport ten years ago, can you
take me through that moment and kindof tell me about that the moment's right
leading up to you making the decisionto quit racing, and then also how
(08:13):
you found the courage to come back. It was a challenge. I mean,
this has been something to that momentwas ninety nine point nine percent of
my life. My daily consumption wastowards that, and to have gotten there
and achieved that goal was a bigcelebration. And then to say, whatever
(08:33):
is happening to me is stronger andbigger than what I'm currently doing in life.
So to realize that and then compartmentalizeit and to just separate from it
was really challenging. It was kindof life altering, life ending in a
way. For me. It waslike this is going to happen, I'm
going to have to really commit toit. Or else. You know,
I don't know what my life couldhave been. I could have decided to
(08:54):
stay in the closet and just continuedafter this career path, but what have
that brought me personal joy? Orwould have just been chasing after this dream
that would have been eventually dying forme. So that was that was the
biggest challenge at that point. Wasthere any thought of like maybe I'll just
go back to racing motorcycles or wasracing cars at no? So I don't
(09:16):
know if it was always being inthe footsteps of my brother that I wanted
to venture into other various forms ofmotorsports. What kind of driven that.
But even looking back to when Iwas younger, I would always enjoy in
carting, which is something that youknow, before you move into full size
cars, kids grow up through thecarting links and that's something I always enjoyed
doing. And and during this youknow, this repath to get back out
(09:39):
on the track, I would tryother various forms of motorsports, and that's
when I started to get involved instock cars before I got to NASCAR.
But I wouldn't I wouldn't utilize media, I wouldn't utilize you know, partnerships.
I would keep it very quiet,and I would just I would just
go and race and just try andhave enjoyment in it before kind of putting
all of the noise to the noiseto it, before we move too much
(10:00):
further. I realized that our listenersprobably know maybe more than I do about
NASCAR. I know that cars goingto circle. That's kind of you drive
in a circle for a long time. Someone wins. I don't know,
how is there any way you couldjust give us like a quick crash course.
I didn't write that pun, butit's a good one. And how
(10:22):
NASCAR works and how you qualify whatYeah, so so NASCAR, you know,
we don't compete just on ovals.We have a wide variety of circuits
that the schedule brings us to.And that's road courses, so your standard
road course with left and right turns. Um, there's dirt tracks, so
it's a it's an oval, butalso on a dirt circuit. And they're
(10:43):
starting to incorporate street circuits into theNASCAR schedule, and all of this is
part of the bigger picture of gettingnew markets, new diverse groups to be
fans of the sport. So alittle bit more about you know how a
weekend kind of lays out for us. You know, we we fly to
the tracks and we typically have twosessions before we go out for the physical
(11:05):
race of a practice session, whichis just a good time to get out
there and kind of feel the trackand see what the initial car is feeling.
And then qualifying. Qualifying is it'ssuper political and tricky, and you
know at Daytona we kind of raninto some pretty big issues. Here it's
a lottery ball system, so theyliterally take a bingo ball roller and you
get rolled out into groups and thenthe amount of entries get split up into
(11:28):
these groups. Right, So forDaytona and particularly we got put into a
six car group and they wanted toteam owners wanted to politically argue, you
know, who thought, you know, should be placed in what order rolling
out into track out of the sixcars. So you know, as as
me, you know, being therookie in the series, I said,
I'll take this as a learning experience. Placed me where you'd like, and
(11:48):
we'll go from there. That bitme really bad, you know, had
someone blow up a tire right infront of me just as we're building speed.
So ultimately I fell off the draftpack, and a track like Daytona
Superspeedway is extremely important to be connectedto our draft. It's a track that
we are flat out one hundred percentof the time, so we don't utilize
breaks. We never released the throttle, so building momentum just got you just
(12:11):
go. So cars tap out rightaround one hundred and eighty miles an hour,
but you get a good group draft, you get six cars where the
wind can really kind of be one. You can push another seven eight miles
an hour out of the cars,and then you can drop a good half
second. So that's really important forqualifying times moving into your race. I'm
still thinking about this notion that thereare tracks that are not ovals. I
(12:33):
don't know how I didn't know that, and then also this idea of no
breaks, I don't I don't knowif you've seen Well and Grace, but
there's an episode when Karen learns todrive her limousine and she doesn't know how
to stop the car, so shejust goes and she literally crosses her arm
and goes, something will stop me. That's kind of like five I'm getting
from. It's something funny that youactually bring that up. So now I'm
(12:54):
going to kind of flip the scripton you a little bit and kind of
just change everything we just talked about. So when we go out there for
a race and we have forty carsin a draft back and we're all flat
out, there's a bubble in betweenthe front bumper and the rear of the
other car in front of you.When we're really tight, that bubble breaks.
And when the bubble breaks, thenwe actually have to use a lot
(13:18):
of double footwork. So we haveto ride the brakes while also riding full
throttle because we don't want the RPMsto drop because we'll slowly fall away from
the car in front. So throughthat period, we were riding our brakes
so hard I lost, you know, all breaks in my front at the
car. So through the race.You know, about halfway through we came
in and checked it. I hadzero brake fulid in my brake lines,
(13:39):
and I was like, you guys, I can't stop here. We're coming
up to cautions and everyone's checking out. I would have to dive off track
to avoid contact. And at onehundred and eighty five miles an hour,
no breaks is the absolute last feelingyou want to have. When you push
a pedal and it just goes allthe way down to the grounds. And
that doesn't sound fun at all.No, Yeah, yeah, that sounds
(14:01):
that sounds really I don't know,kind of terrifying. Can you describe to
me, like what that what itfeels like going that fast in that Yeah,
in that scenario. Um. Ialways I tell people and then you
know, I know what the responseis going to be. It's always funny
to see it. It actually feelsreally slow when you're that close in that
(14:24):
type together. Everything typically kind offor me falls into this slow motion aspect.
It's just the world kind of slowsdown. You're just focusing on your
breathing and hitting your marks to ensurethat you know you're you're you're excelling on
the track. But everything seriously slowsdown for me. It's wild. So,
I mean, I feel like eightyfive feels kind of quick on the
(14:45):
freeway. So at one hundred milesper hour and you're going really fast.
Yeah, so our pit road speedso when we pull into do our tire
changes our pit road speeds sixty milesan hour? I will say, when
we get off track and we're goingsixty, it does feel incredibly slow.
It's like it's gonna take me amile to get down to my pit box.
But it's wild to compare the youknow, the different feelings that quickly.
(15:09):
Okay, it's time for a quickpit stop. Stay tuned for more
with Zach following the break. Welcomeback. Now that we know a bit
more about Zach on the track,let's hear from him about life outside of
the car. Greenville, South Carolina'swire currently reside, so this will be
(15:35):
home now for the near future,but as my NASCAR career excels, we'll
be moving to Race City, USA, which is just just outside of Charlotte,
North Carolina. I have a friendthat lives in Charlotte. Shout out
to Tim. Awesome, Hi,Tim, there we go. Tim's gonna
love that. He's very mask hewatches all sorts of bowling. But do
you ever have the urge then whenyou're just like, you know what I'm
(15:56):
gonna go. I don't know toTaco Bell, do you have to talk?
I mean, is there any urgeto be like I want to just
go one hundred miles an hour.I need to get there. No,
when you're not on the racecar ona racecar. No, my friends make
fun of me all the time.They say I drive like an old person,
And I don't know if that's justI know the dangers of driving ridiculous
in the streets, or I'm justlike, I don't need to speed.
(16:18):
I'm fine, I'll get there whenI get there, that's fine. Have
you ever had a speeding ticket.I have had a few speeding tickets,
so not from one, but it'sbeen a few years. Maybe that's one
of those things, like you knowhow some people say like, well,
I have this emergency and that's whyI'm going this fast. You could be
like, I am a NASCAR driver, so maybe I should just go okay.
(16:41):
I'd love to learn a little bitabout friends and any kind of I
guess you'd say, like friendship thatyou've formed in NASCAR, which doesn't seem
like a super welcoming place. Soit's it's really interesting to me that there
are allies in NASCAR. Tell mea little bit about any of like the
special relationships you have, particularly withother NASCAR stars. Yeah, I think
(17:06):
you know, I'd be wrong tonot start with this one person. This
is someone I met actually at myfirst NASCAR race that I went to back
in twenty sixteen. That's justin allgare. Not only is he I feel like
a NASCAR celebrity, absolutely m He'sgone on to have an extremely successful career
for himself. But this is someonei'd met free coming out and to have
(17:27):
reached back out to him at thebeginning of last year to kind of help
just navigate me through NASCAR, theworld of Nascar, to to help,
you know, kickstart this dream.I have to know that he was there
to support me still, was youknow, something I was not expecting.
To be honest, I wasn't.But to now still have him as a
friend in an ally and he's seeing, you know, the challenges that I'm
(17:51):
facing, and he's educating himself onyou know, these topics. It's just
wild. I'm you know, superthankful for our friendship and to add into
kind of the rest of the worldyou know, of Nascar, and you
know, I think our day today lives, we always kind of tend
to pick people that we want tosee each other and celebrate each other to
be successful. And I think that'swhat I'm doing really well so far as
(18:11):
finding the right people who want tosee me succeed. And I'm meeting fans
all across the country who unfortunately,you know, have gone to NASCAR races
maybe in the past and they hadterrible experiences, and through me, they're
kind of rebuilding this love of thesport and they're coming back to the track.
And there's a Facebook group I thinkit's like LGBTQ plus NASCAR Fans and
(18:33):
it's like one hundred and two peoplein it, and there are some of
the greatest people on there, andthey talk about me all the time,
and every once in a while geton there and I can like just see
what they're doing, and it's justit's it's cool to see that we have
a small group, but it's growingand it's it's it's wild to see the
impact. Oh, I'm sure theyjust get into a frenzy when you pop
in and say, hey, couldyou can you reflect on any like specific
(19:03):
things that or moments that you've hadwith justin where you really felt like he
had helped you find a place inthe sport or a memorable moment. Yeah.
I was selected to be part ofPeople's LGBTQ plus Out Celebrities IF for
their June issue for last year,and I had justin be a part of
(19:23):
that issue with me because I wantedto express the importance of ally ship and
the importance of you know, thepeople are what make our sport and to
have had him, you know,openly and publicly. It was people magazines.
So I guess he probably would havebeen a little idiotic to decline that
opportunity. But still, you know, he he put his career in the
(19:44):
line. He could have had abad backlashroote, but I think he saw,
you know, this is the rightthing to do. This is how
we helped build you know, zackscareer and how we helped build our sport
together. Yeah, definitely great exposurefor everybody involved. Has there been has
there been anyone else in in racingor even you know, adjacent to motorsports
that has really helped you carve outyour space? I suppose with the motorsports
(20:06):
in general. Um no, Imean not really not yet. I haven't
you know, really been able toconnect with someone that they can either look
up to or gone through certain certainsituations. Meeting a lot of people that
are very part of my team thataren't out um, you know, so
we're building these relationships. I'm hopingto continue building these relationships to evolve into
(20:32):
something bigger and better. I'm surethere are lots of like young closeted gay
boys in the South who are bigNASCAR fans, and you are like the
one, the pop star of Nascar. Zach is not only the pop star
of Nascar, but he's also apartner to several organizations that focus on the
(20:55):
LGBTQ plus community. He tells usabout the organizations he partners with to promote
inclusion in motorsports and why sponsorships areso important in NASCAR. Recent Pride is
founded and based out of the UK. It was a group that started to
you know, with the initial ideaof how do we make motorsports more inclusive
for everyone? How do we makeit more welcoming and accepting, And they
(21:18):
saw success by partnering with you know, large Formula One teams and then from
there it was okay, well,motorsports is beyond just the UK. How
do we reach something bigger? What'swhat's the bigger message in the point here?
So last year they founded their NorthAmerican ambassadorship team and I was lucky
to be a part of that.And we're still trying to navigate. You
know, how do we completely utilizethis opportunity to build something bigger here in
(21:42):
the States. But I know wehave a lot of plans for us this
coming season, but we're just overalljust trying to to put the messaging there
that motorsports is an inclusive sport forall and we want it to be better.
But there's a lot of work thatneeds to be done. So through
the partnership with Racing Pride is we'regoing to push these envelopes. We're going
(22:03):
to push the message, push thetopic that this is something we always need
to put it at the forefront.Then, you know, to make it
a place that you know everyone wantsto be a part of. Well,
I definitely think that a branch ofthe country that does want to be a
part of it is sponsorships. Ithink you're probably getting a lot more attention
now from sponsors, advertisers, productplacements. I'd love to know a little
(22:30):
bit about your sponsorship and why doyou feel like they're important in NASCAR in
general? Not necessarily along Illegal whichI think most of our listeners probably know,
but for those who don't, it'sa nonprofit advocacy organization based here in
the United States, and it's prettymuch dedicated to advancing the civil rights of
LGBTQ plus people and people living withHIV. They provide legal representation, policy
(22:53):
advocacy, public public education, andsupport of LGBTQ rights. And there were
expands a huge range of issues includingmarriage equality and employment discrimination, healthcare access,
but we'll get to that in aminute. I'd like to talk kind
of broadly about why sponsorships are soimportant in NASCAR. I'm assuming it's really
(23:15):
expensive to race a race car.Unfortunately it is. You know, our
brain partnerships literally fuel our on trackefforts. Without them, the car's not
on track. So that goes forme and my season. Without my brain
partnerships and sponsorships to publicly support meand my racing efforts, my car sits
in the race shop, and youknow, and that's kind of what the
(23:37):
rest of our schedules looking like forthis season. The biggest challenge that I've
I've faced is I have these meetingswith all of these companies and they happen
all the time weekly. In theconversation ends that we support you, but
our marketing dollars, you know,specifically for what you're trying to do is
getting compartmental license to this little box. And they're saying, that's our diverse
(24:00):
marketing budget or LGBTQ plus marketing budget, and that's just a fraction of their
multimillion dollar marketing budget that they useannually. But they only want to utilize
this company or i mean, ourcommunity when it's trendy, and that's through
the month of June, when theycan either sell a limited line of product
or merged to then celebrate the factthat it sells out because it was a
(24:22):
small run to begin with, oryou know, to just you know,
use the branding aspect of rainbow washingand call it a day and say we
support you, or make a smalldonation just within the month, and then
put the community back in the closetfor the rest of the year. You
know, we're seeing larger numbers,you know, compassing from youth that are
coming out into the community. Theyneed to be realizing that the bigger message
(24:45):
here is we need to be marketingfor the generations coming after us, ones
that are part of this community atyou know, much younger ages than our
current generation. And that's you know, a generation that that's not going to
put up with us. They're goingto fight for acceptance no matter what.
And what plays a big part herefor me and LAMBD illegal as for having
(25:06):
felt silenced in a sport while Iwas chasing my dream was devastating to walk
away from it. So if Ihave the opportunity now to go somewhere,
specifically to a state that is completelyagainst the LGBTQ plus community and the LGBTQ
plus youth, and to show themthat they can chase for their dreams no
matter what, and there's people outthere fighting for them, I'm going to
(25:29):
do it all day long, nomatter what. Even if it, you
know, may hurt me a littlebit, I know what the big the
bigger picture is here and we're justtrying to create an accepting place for everyone.
Could you talk a little bit abouthow the LAMBDO legal sponsorship even happened.
Yeah, so obviously through my processof a brand partnership, identification of
(25:53):
my daily process with my team andwhat we're trying to do, I also
saw a big opportunity to talk aboutsomething that I felt a lot of out
athletes didn't do when the bill wasannounced. When I was passed, I
feel like there was a little bitof media and you know, no one
really taking action on it. Sowhen I reached out to LAMB I Legal
(26:15):
to explore this and pitch this ideato them, they jumped on immediately because
they saw that there was massive valueand potential and what we can do here.
And that's that you know, mypartnership with them too. It's going
to go off throughout the year andhopefully years to come. Let maybe part
of events across the country and pridesto continue delivering this message and really kind
of pushed the bigger picture here.Did you have obviously very grateful for LAMB
(26:41):
to Legal sponsoring you and making theLGBTQ plus community a part of NASCAR in
a very public way, But doyou have a wish list of future sponsorships?
Like for me, I think Iwould want Taco Bell and my car
would be the Cruntrap car. Ifeel like that's fun, right, that's
a good item. But what wouldwhat would yours be? Oh man,
(27:04):
that's a really good question. Um. But now, any any brand who's
willing to publicly support out athletes,Um, they're the ones I'm driving after.
They're the ones that I want tosupport them as they support me.
Um So, it's it's it's justopen anyone. Honestly, you've gotta have
a good design on the car.I mean some of the cars are a
little they look like energy drinks.That's the that's the vibe, right You're
(27:30):
like, oh, yep, okay, that's what it looks like. Well
yours? Yours? Really doesn't?I feel like it embodies Pride in a
very sleek and fast way. Yeah. No, I think for me it's
a way for me to express myidentity, my personality and is who I
am as a person as I'm tuckedhinting inside the car to really express that
on the outside. Um So,to to have had that car that we
(27:53):
just designed for lamb Illegal to bethe first true Pride car on track for
a NASCAR weekend was you know,a moment that we all celebrated together.
But really I've seen it come togetherreally nicely. It's been amazing. So
we're pushing to hopefully turn that carinto a die cast, so maybe we
can send it back out into thetweet universe so and get a bunch of
(28:14):
people wanting to order them. Yes, that would be very fun. It
is like I like the way,like the number plays into the flag kind
of behind it. It just hasa very subtly queer, but very classy
look. I couldn't completely just gogay on the NASCAR world because I knew
I was already making a big splashfor them. So I'm just gonna kind
(28:37):
of tiptoe it into them because nextthing, you know, I'm not gonna
have umbrella girls. I'm gonna havedrag queens holding umbrellas. So that would
be really fun. Yes, Orlike the pit crew from Drag Race,
that's what you need. We needthe RuPaul's room. If you're listening,
this is a huge opportunity. RuPaul'sdrag race car that makes a statement,
and then you bring the pit crew, everyone's in speedos. It's really a
(28:59):
vibe. So during my process ofyou know, am I gonna go racing
again? Am I going to chasethis dream? I was just lost in
a way. So I started hostingdrag shows in Greenville because I saw there
was a lack of There was nocommunity aspect for drag entertainers to have a
place for the community to go.So I did that for a whole year
(29:19):
and I've made some great friends andI learned so much so it's all part
of my journey. That's really fun. Plus, there's usually good brunch at
drag shows, well if you doit a brunch. But how else can
NASCAR and other motorsports in general,what else can they do to support the
LGBTQ plus community beyond letting you usedrag queens, Maybe it should be drag
(29:41):
like the pit crew should be dragqueens. That's fun, like running around
and heels, changing tires, fillingbreak fluids. That probably do it better
than most of them too. There'sa lot of room for growth for everyone.
NASCARS is doing a good job asa brand to continue reaching these these
new markets, these new core fanbases. They just need to stop taking
the one step forward and two stepsbackwards. But NASCAR is doing things like
(30:07):
I found out through a partnership Idid with Phoenix Pride. As you know,
I did my NASCAR debut last Novemberand Phoenix, I really wanted to
impact local communities and that's my missionmoving forward too, because I know how
important it is to have those smallcommunities receive the attention in the dollars and
they go a lot further for them. So through that process, I learned
that NASCAR actually donates towards Phoenix Pride, and I've never even heard of this,
(30:30):
you know, there's been no mentionof this, and they donate to
Charlotte Pride. So they're donating thePride's all across the country. They just
need to embrace it and learn itis something that what they're doing is great,
and I think they're gonna have alot of people come into the support
to support what they're doing. TheirPride merch was you know, obviously my
touched on that it's not my favoritething to have someone do, but to
(30:52):
I've seen NASCAR do it this year. It was it was wild, and
it was unexpected and you know,of course it sold out because it was
a limited run, but they celebratedit. And I think it's part of
their journey to go on the rightdirection that I'm along for the ride.
We're all along for the ride.Also, NASCAR, if you want to
collab or just send us pride merch, please do. We're going to take
(31:15):
a quick break and we'll be rightback with more from Zach. If you're
like me, you know very littleabout NASCAR. I grew up on a
ranch in Arizona and NASCAR just wasn'ta big sport in my town. Maybe
(31:37):
had I grown up in Florida,I'd have more knowledge about the sport and
be one of those NASCAR gays,you know, the kind that also watched
WWE wrestling. They probably had adirt bike or something growing up. So,
assuming you're a non motorsports queer personlike me, NASCAR is probably a
bit of a mystery. So Iask Zach to address the misconceptions that I
have that I assume whom you nonmotor sports loving queer people have to.
(32:07):
Are there any misconceptions about NASCAR racingthat you'd want to clear up for the
LGBTQ plus community. I mean,I think I was surprised to know to
learn just now that NASCAR sponsored PhoenixPride. Are there any misconceptions because I
do think that by and large,a lot of people think of it probably
(32:27):
in like the same realm as likethe WWE in terms of who can be
a ban of Nascar. I'll sayI've been guilty of the same, you
know, opinion of what I thoughtNASCAR was and what it meant to be
a part of the sport. Butas I immersed myself more into it.
I'm learning how it was completely wrong. It was just all of the bad
(32:51):
media that was kind of put infront of us to tell us this is
what the sport of NASCAR is.But I'm meeting the true people who actually
are there in the ones who aresupporting it and then want it, to
see it succeed and go into thesenew markets and tap into these these new
demographics. That's those are the peoplethat make up NASCAR, and it's a
really great place. My race thispast weekend, it was the first time
(33:12):
in history there were not only fivefemales racing. There was myself the first
openly out gathlet to eBrace at Daytonaduring the NASCAR the five hundred weekend,
there were two people of color.I mean, where in what other sport
can you go watch a professional sportthat has that much diversity competing within just
one series and then there's there's threeother series competing throughout that same weekend too,
(33:35):
offering you know, some of thesame things. So NASCAR it is
changing. There's there's so much,you know that that's exciting about it that
if you haven't seen it, youshould give it a try. Go experience
it. I always say if youcan go, go see it in person,
to hear the cars, to justhave your ears almost blown out where
ear protection we have to hear withoutthe ear protection first, and to feel
(33:58):
the speed and they eat and theenvironment and how happy everyone is there.
I promise you'll have your mind changedon what NASCAR is. So what's next
for you? UM? Right now, we're solely focusing on improving and increasing
my on track efforts. I needsee time right now. I need experience
coming from from two wheels to youknow, four and racing and a sport
(34:22):
where though everyone's going in a circle, the fastest people in the world to
go in a circle. So it'sextremely challenging. UM. But to continue
building these partnerships and to make NASCARa more welcoming place and to hit my
goals in my five year goal ofmaking it to the NASCAR Cup Series.
Like, there's all of these littlepieces that are building into you know,
(34:45):
hopefully a multi year career in NASCAR. And what's next for you personally,
because I think there's some exciting thingsgoing on in your personal life. My
partner and I we've been together goingon six years now, so that's been
amazing to have him also part ofthis, this whole world. He's never
been involved in motorsports. He usedto hate NASCAR. Now Nascar is probably
(35:07):
something he talks about almost as much, if not more, than I do.
So I haven't seen him growing intoa NASCAR fan. But for us,
it's just continuing to grow together,plan a wedding one day, and
just live this life of chasing aftera dream together. Wait, did you
already propose or is this like Imean, we've been engaged I guess for
(35:31):
about three years now, but wetook that as the next step for us
personally to ensure that we're going downthe right path that we both want to
be on. We didn't want toget engaged and then for us personally play
a wedding without actually, you know, growing in that process of moving closer
together. So yeah, hopefully hopefullyout wedding coming up soon. Awesome,
(35:52):
we'll congratulations on that. Thank you? And where else can everyone follow you?
Yeah? I'm across all socials.I'm trying to become more young than
hip and get on the TikTok scene. But right now the party's happening on
Instagram for me, so well,we'll stay there for a little bit.
How's that going for you? TheTikTok thing? Oh, the TikTok thing.
(36:15):
I can't dance. I'm not likesuper great when it comes to content
creativity, so it's really hard.So are there any inserns anyone who wants
to help create content for me?I would love to do it, all
right, So before we wrap upeverything and take a buye and all those
things, I actually think this isa really fun idea. And this is
(36:35):
the first time that we've ever Ithink this is the first time that we've
ever played a game. Hi,Chris, I'm kind of excited. I'm
stressed. I'm sweating now. Allright, y'all, So for this word
association, you're gonna just say thefirst thing that comes to mind. Okay,
Okay, oh boy, okay,are you ready? I guess so?
Okay, yeah, right right,you got this? You got this
(36:59):
brief drag queen queen okay, bothmy queen race car like it? Okay,
Pitt smell crew. I was thinkingthat bottom Pitt may his pit hair
(37:19):
pit hair Okay. Alright, alright, I got it. I'm getting it
all right. Fast tracked fast,tracked fast, car, quarter pounder,
quarter mile, we're here, We'rehere, Yes, I mean pounder could
be something else too, but Iwas going for McDonald's spoiler alert alert.
Oh yes, yes, lap dancetime, lap time, bracing stuff,
(37:52):
power, bottom trip, all right, two more all you're ready, Yeah,
drive way burning, We'll take it. I was thinking maybe if it
was a NASCAR would be burnout,you know, like a burnout. Yeah,
(38:14):
that's a good one. That's agood one. That was fun,
that was funny. Usually cringe itstuff like this, but that was better.
Thank you, Thank you did great. All right, queer racers,
We hope you had fun with uson the track with Zach Karen today.
Let us know if you enjoyed thegames or have any games you'd like us
to play with upcoming guests. Remember, as long as you enjoy the ride,
(38:35):
you'll always win the race. Prideto the production of straw Hut Media.
If you like the show, pleaseleave us a rating and review on
Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or whereveryou listen to podcasts. Then follow us
on TikTok, Instagram, Facebook,Twitter, and snapchat at Pride and tune
(38:55):
in weekly for more episodes. Besure to share this episode with your friend
and subscribe for more stories from amazingqueer people. If you'd like to connect
with me, you can follow meeverywhere at Levi Chambers. Pride is produced
by me Levi Chambers, Naggie Bowls, Chris Reeves, Andrews, Ryan Tillotson,
and Brandon Marlowe. Edited by ChrisReeves, Andrews and Daniel Ferrara.
(39:22):
M I like that, I wasgoing to add another pun, and I'm
like, there's too many puns inthis thing. What did she say,
Oh, you're here,
Straw media. Growing up, That'sthat's all I ever knew was racing.
Um. Just as I was born, we were at the racetracks. It's
something I grew up with those fallingasleep to the sounds of motorcycles and cars.
But reconnecting now with you know,a more feminine side to me is
(00:22):
important in my day to day Tryingto really be in touch with my feelings
and how to express that is moreimportant as I move on and you know,
continue to build into this person,this athlete but also a gay man.
In today's Americas, when you thinkof NASCAR, you're probably not thinking
about how the sport can contribute toLGBTQ plus rights, But thanks to one
(00:46):
young race car driver, that's changingfor the better. Today, we're joined
by NASCAR driver Zach Harrin. Inlove with racing since the age of five,
he sped towards his dreams and turnedpro by sixteen. As a young
person, his most authentic self wasconstantly challenged by the hypermasculine world of racing,
so he opted for a pit stopand stepped away from the sport at
(01:07):
just seventeen. Shifting gears allowed Zachto get in touch with his most authentic
self as an out professional athlete.Now he's ready for a comeback. So
buckle up and get ready for aqueer lap around the track. Hi,
this is Zak Karen, and thisis pride. You are a professional race
(01:37):
car driver. Like that is whatpeople say. They say, like,
oh, I want to be anastronaut or I want to be a race
car driver. I want to beI don't know, a Delphin trainer or
something extraordinary, and it is You'veraced amateur motorcycle right until you were sixteen,
and then you went pro. Yeah. So I actually started riding a
motorcycle whost two years old, sonot long after I learned to walk.
(01:59):
You know, my pants got meon a bike, and what got us
involved in this industry was a hobbyfor my dad. My dad and my
mom would go to the racetracks locallyin California where we were living, and
from there, you know, havean older brother who's five years old of
me now and he's gone on tohave a really successful career in racing superbikes
professionally. So through him, youknow, when I started to ride,
(02:21):
we really realized what it would taketo kind of prove to go on to
this track too, to make thisa career for us ourselves, and you
know, from there it started tostart racing when I was about five,
you know, throughout the state ofCalifornia. Not long after that, I
started racing um, you know,amateur national championships across the country, and
that quickly escalated to making my professionaldebut at sixteen at Daytona International speedway track
(02:46):
that we just left this past weekend. And that was a lot of work
and dedication and you know, financialstrain to not only have you know,
had my parents done that for onechild, but to have done that for
two children in a row. Sothe resources were really limited, but we
knew that this is what we wantedto do as a family and we were
going to do whatever it took toto ensure that dream came true. First,
(03:07):
when did you When did you comeout? When did you know that
you were queer? I guess,you know, my initial coming out was
to my family and friends, andthat wasn't till long after that, probably
about I was around eighteen. ButI always knew things were different. I
always knew that obviously I was attractedto something that wasn't the norm. For
(03:28):
me, But growing up in themotorsports industry, I never had the opportunity
to even focus on that because evenwhen I would give a fraction to that,
I would immediately get backlash and thecomments and the jokes from my peers
and my fellow competitors. It was, you know, you're supposed to be
dating these umbrella girls. Why aren'tyou getting their numbers? You know,
why aren't you dating so and so. So. I just always put that
(03:51):
to the side so I can focuson my job. And you know,
that's what drove me away from racingcompletely, was I was no longer having
fun at this and I know howmuch of a risk this sport of motorsports
can be. So it ultimately ledme towards the end of the race season
to tell my family and my partnersthen I just don't see it, you
(04:11):
know, being a viable future forme right now. So I need to
step away from things and focus onme and my mental health. Racing is
inherently masculine, right Like I feellike any kind of a motor sport is.
Like I have cousins in Idaho wholove to do motorize things, and
I was always like, it's soloud, it moves, it like has
like a vibration. I'm just notinto that, the dirt, all of
it. So it was that atany point, like I guess it returned
(04:38):
to even when you were getting intomotorcycle competitions or not necessarily NASCAR, all
of those sports are seemingly very masculine. Was that for me it would have
been like, oh gosh, Idon't have to really fake it. No.
I think for me, just growingup, that's that's all I ever
knew was racing. As you know, just as I was born, we
(04:59):
were at the race trucks. It'ssomething I grew up with that was falling
asleep to the sounds of motorcycles andcars. It's something that it's been part
of my entire life. But reconnectingnow with you know, a more feminine
side to me is important in myday to day trying to really be in
touch with my feelings and how toexpress that is more important as I move
on and you know, continue tobuild into this person, this out athlete,
(05:24):
but also a gay man in today'sAmerica. So that's that's also really
important for me. So when youcome out, I'm really curious how fans
reacted to you because it's I imagineanyone's following in that or fans that in
those sports there's a lot of veryhyper masculine Is that accurate? No,
(05:45):
yeah, totally, um, AndI think for me, I had issues.
I mean being that my brother stillis someone very well known in the
industry. Even though I had steppedaway from all my social platforms. I
kind of left it as a ghosttown, so I didn't have a life
digitally, was just my personal life. But from there, you know,
word of mouth spread and then whenI would go back to the track just
to kind of reconnect and see everyone, mainly to be their support my brother.
(06:08):
You know, quickly then I wasrealizing I was losing friends. Honestly,
they truly weren't friends at the endof the day of that's you know,
how they were going to treat me. But you know, I started
realizing pretty quickly. That has tomake it it just even more reason that
a lot of people who are inmotorsports would want would need to stay closeted
unless they could take that time tofocus on theirselves. So, Mike,
(06:29):
you said your mental health, didyou have good support from your family though
through that. Yeah, No,I honestly, I guess in a way,
I can be pretty selfish at times. I'm very driven with with my
personal surrounding, how I feel,you know, how my mental health is.
How am I going to respond tothis? So I actually I kind
(06:50):
of made a whole new friend groupof a bunch of gay girls, and
so I was able to kind ofjust live through them. And then ultimately
I was like, hey, youknow, I'm gay. I want you
to meet someone. I think I'mdating him, but you know, anyways,
and I didn't really introduce that personto family for a while, and
that kind of created a little barrierbetween us. They felt as if I
(07:11):
was moving on this completely whole newlife and I didn't want them to be
a part of that. And itwasn't you know that. It was just
I didn't really know how to navigatethis. And I felt instant love and
support there with my friends, andthat's how I wanted to introduce this part
of my life. And you know, from there introduced my family. But
you know, of course, allof my families has been you know,
nothing but love and support, andI'm really grateful for that because I know
(07:31):
that's not common coming up after thebreak, Zach and I talk about his
decision to leave the sport and hisreturn to the driver's seat. Stay tuned,
Welcome back. We're on with ZachHearn today. Listen in as he
(07:51):
walks us through his high octane comebackmore than ten years in the making.
When you just I did to leavethe sport ten years ago, can you
take me through that moment and kindof tell me about that the moment's right
leading up to you making the decisionto quit racing, and then also how
(08:13):
you found the courage to come back. It was a challenge. I mean,
this has been something to that momentwas ninety nine point nine percent of
my life. My daily consumption wastowards that, and to have gotten there
and achieved that goal was a bigcelebration. And then to say, whatever
(08:33):
is happening to me is stronger andbigger than what I'm currently doing in life.
So to realize that and then compartmentalizeit and to just separate from it
was really challenging. It was kindof life altering, life ending in a
way. For me. It waslike this is going to happen, I'm
going to have to really commit toit. Or else. You know,
I don't know what my life couldhave been. I could have decided to
(08:54):
stay in the closet and just continuedafter this career path, but what have
that brought me personal joy? Orwould have just been chasing after this dream
that would have been eventually dying forme. So that was that was the
biggest challenge at that point. Wasthere any thought of like maybe I'll just
go back to racing motorcycles or wasracing cars at no? So I don't
(09:16):
know if it was always being inthe footsteps of my brother that I wanted
to venture into other various forms ofmotorsports. What kind of driven that.
But even looking back to when Iwas younger, I would always enjoy in
carting, which is something that youknow, before you move into full size
cars, kids grow up through thecarting links and that's something I always enjoyed
doing. And and during this youknow, this repath to get back out
(09:39):
on the track, I would tryother various forms of motorsports, and that's
when I started to get involved instock cars before I got to NASCAR.
But I wouldn't I wouldn't utilize media, I wouldn't utilize you know, partnerships.
I would keep it very quiet,and I would just I would just
go and race and just try andhave enjoyment in it before kind of putting
all of the noise to the noiseto it, before we move too much
(10:00):
further. I realized that our listenersprobably know maybe more than I do about
NASCAR. I know that cars goingto circle. That's kind of you drive
in a circle for a long time. Someone wins. I don't know,
how is there any way you couldjust give us like a quick crash course.
I didn't write that pun, butit's a good one. And how
(10:22):
NASCAR works and how you qualify whatYeah, so so NASCAR, you know,
we don't compete just on ovals.We have a wide variety of circuits
that the schedule brings us to.And that's road courses, so your standard
road course with left and right turns. Um, there's dirt tracks, so
it's a it's an oval, butalso on a dirt circuit. And they're
(10:43):
starting to incorporate street circuits into theNASCAR schedule, and all of this is
part of the bigger picture of gettingnew markets, new diverse groups to be
fans of the sport. So alittle bit more about you know how a
weekend kind of lays out for us. You know, we we fly to
the tracks and we typically have twosessions before we go out for the physical
(11:05):
race of a practice session, whichis just a good time to get out
there and kind of feel the trackand see what the initial car is feeling.
And then qualifying. Qualifying is it'ssuper political and tricky, and you
know at Daytona we kind of raninto some pretty big issues. Here it's
a lottery ball system, so theyliterally take a bingo ball roller and you
get rolled out into groups and thenthe amount of entries get split up into
(11:28):
these groups. Right, So forDaytona and particularly we got put into a
six car group and they wanted toteam owners wanted to politically argue, you
know, who thought, you know, should be placed in what order rolling
out into track out of the sixcars. So you know, as as
me, you know, being therookie in the series, I said,
I'll take this as a learning experience. Placed me where you'd like, and
(11:48):
we'll go from there. That bitme really bad, you know, had
someone blow up a tire right infront of me just as we're building speed.
So ultimately I fell off the draftpack, and a track like Daytona
Superspeedway is extremely important to be connectedto our draft. It's a track that
we are flat out one hundred percentof the time, so we don't utilize
breaks. We never released the throttle, so building momentum just got you just
(12:11):
go. So cars tap out rightaround one hundred and eighty miles an hour,
but you get a good group draft, you get six cars where the
wind can really kind of be one. You can push another seven eight miles
an hour out of the cars,and then you can drop a good half
second. So that's really important forqualifying times moving into your race. I'm
still thinking about this notion that thereare tracks that are not ovals. I
(12:33):
don't know how I didn't know that, and then also this idea of no
breaks, I don't I don't knowif you've seen Well and Grace, but
there's an episode when Karen learns todrive her limousine and she doesn't know how
to stop the car, so shejust goes and she literally crosses her arm
and goes, something will stop me. That's kind of like five I'm getting
from. It's something funny that youactually bring that up. So now I'm
(12:54):
going to kind of flip the scripton you a little bit and kind of
just change everything we just talked about. So when we go out there for
a race and we have forty carsin a draft back and we're all flat
out, there's a bubble in betweenthe front bumper and the rear of the
other car in front of you.When we're really tight, that bubble breaks.
And when the bubble breaks, thenwe actually have to use a lot
(13:18):
of double footwork. So we haveto ride the brakes while also riding full
throttle because we don't want the RPMsto drop because we'll slowly fall away from
the car in front. So throughthat period, we were riding our brakes
so hard I lost, you know, all breaks in my front at the
car. So through the race.You know, about halfway through we came
in and checked it. I hadzero brake fulid in my brake lines,
(13:39):
and I was like, you guys, I can't stop here. We're coming
up to cautions and everyone's checking out. I would have to dive off track
to avoid contact. And at onehundred and eighty five miles an hour,
no breaks is the absolute last feelingyou want to have. When you push
a pedal and it just goes allthe way down to the grounds. And
that doesn't sound fun at all.No, Yeah, yeah, that sounds
(14:01):
that sounds really I don't know,kind of terrifying. Can you describe to
me, like what that what itfeels like going that fast in that Yeah,
in that scenario. Um. Ialways I tell people and then you
know, I know what the responseis going to be. It's always funny
to see it. It actually feelsreally slow when you're that close in that
(14:24):
type together. Everything typically kind offor me falls into this slow motion aspect.
It's just the world kind of slowsdown. You're just focusing on your
breathing and hitting your marks to ensurethat you know you're you're you're excelling on
the track. But everything seriously slowsdown for me. It's wild. So,
I mean, I feel like eightyfive feels kind of quick on the
(14:45):
freeway. So at one hundred milesper hour and you're going really fast.
Yeah, so our pit road speedso when we pull into do our tire
changes our pit road speeds sixty milesan hour? I will say, when
we get off track and we're goingsixty, it does feel incredibly slow.
It's like it's gonna take me amile to get down to my pit box.
But it's wild to compare the youknow, the different feelings that quickly.
(15:09):
Okay, it's time for a quickpit stop. Stay tuned for more
with Zach following the break. Welcomeback. Now that we know a bit
more about Zach on the track,let's hear from him about life outside of
the car. Greenville, South Carolina'swire currently reside, so this will be
(15:35):
home now for the near future,but as my NASCAR career excels, we'll
be moving to Race City, USA, which is just just outside of Charlotte,
North Carolina. I have a friendthat lives in Charlotte. Shout out
to Tim. Awesome, Hi,Tim, there we go. Tim's gonna
love that. He's very mask hewatches all sorts of bowling. But do
you ever have the urge then whenyou're just like, you know what I'm
(15:56):
gonna go. I don't know toTaco Bell, do you have to talk?
I mean, is there any urgeto be like I want to just
go one hundred miles an hour.I need to get there. No,
when you're not on the racecar ona racecar. No, my friends make
fun of me all the time.They say I drive like an old person,
And I don't know if that's justI know the dangers of driving ridiculous
in the streets, or I'm justlike, I don't need to speed.
(16:18):
I'm fine, I'll get there whenI get there, that's fine. Have
you ever had a speeding ticket.I have had a few speeding tickets,
so not from one, but it'sbeen a few years. Maybe that's one
of those things, like you knowhow some people say like, well,
I have this emergency and that's whyI'm going this fast. You could be
like, I am a NASCAR driver, so maybe I should just go okay.
(16:41):
I'd love to learn a little bitabout friends and any kind of I
guess you'd say, like friendship thatyou've formed in NASCAR, which doesn't seem
like a super welcoming place. Soit's it's really interesting to me that there
are allies in NASCAR. Tell mea little bit about any of like the
special relationships you have, particularly withother NASCAR stars. Yeah, I think
(17:06):
you know, I'd be wrong tonot start with this one person. This
is someone I met actually at myfirst NASCAR race that I went to back
in twenty sixteen. That's justin allgare. Not only is he I feel like
a NASCAR celebrity, absolutely m He'sgone on to have an extremely successful career
for himself. But this is someonei'd met free coming out and to have
(17:27):
reached back out to him at thebeginning of last year to kind of help
just navigate me through NASCAR, theworld of Nascar, to to help,
you know, kickstart this dream.I have to know that he was there
to support me still, was youknow, something I was not expecting.
To be honest, I wasn't.But to now still have him as a
friend in an ally and he's seeing, you know, the challenges that I'm
(17:51):
facing, and he's educating himself onyou know, these topics. It's just
wild. I'm you know, superthankful for our friendship and to add into
kind of the rest of the worldyou know, of Nascar, and you
know, I think our day today lives, we always kind of tend
to pick people that we want tosee each other and celebrate each other to
be successful. And I think that'swhat I'm doing really well so far as
(18:11):
finding the right people who want tosee me succeed. And I'm meeting fans
all across the country who unfortunately,you know, have gone to NASCAR races
maybe in the past and they hadterrible experiences, and through me, they're
kind of rebuilding this love of thesport and they're coming back to the track.
And there's a Facebook group I thinkit's like LGBTQ plus NASCAR Fans and
(18:33):
it's like one hundred and two peoplein it, and there are some of
the greatest people on there, andthey talk about me all the time,
and every once in a while geton there and I can like just see
what they're doing, and it's justit's it's cool to see that we have
a small group, but it's growingand it's it's it's wild to see the
impact. Oh, I'm sure theyjust get into a frenzy when you pop
in and say, hey, couldyou can you reflect on any like specific
(19:03):
things that or moments that you've hadwith justin where you really felt like he
had helped you find a place inthe sport or a memorable moment. Yeah.
I was selected to be part ofPeople's LGBTQ plus Out Celebrities IF for
their June issue for last year,and I had justin be a part of
(19:23):
that issue with me because I wantedto express the importance of ally ship and
the importance of you know, thepeople are what make our sport and to
have had him, you know,openly and publicly. It was people magazines.
So I guess he probably would havebeen a little idiotic to decline that
opportunity. But still, you know, he he put his career in the
(19:44):
line. He could have had abad backlashroote, but I think he saw,
you know, this is the rightthing to do. This is how
we helped build you know, zackscareer and how we helped build our sport
together. Yeah, definitely great exposurefor everybody involved. Has there been has
there been anyone else in in racingor even you know, adjacent to motorsports
that has really helped you carve outyour space? I suppose with the motorsports
(20:06):
in general. Um no, Imean not really not yet. I haven't
you know, really been able toconnect with someone that they can either look
up to or gone through certain certainsituations. Meeting a lot of people that
are very part of my team thataren't out um, you know, so
we're building these relationships. I'm hopingto continue building these relationships to evolve into
(20:32):
something bigger and better. I'm surethere are lots of like young closeted gay
boys in the South who are bigNASCAR fans, and you are like the
one, the pop star of Nascar. Zach is not only the pop star
of Nascar, but he's also apartner to several organizations that focus on the
(20:55):
LGBTQ plus community. He tells usabout the organizations he partners with to promote
inclusion in motorsports and why sponsorships areso important in NASCAR. Recent Pride is
founded and based out of the UK. It was a group that started to
you know, with the initial ideaof how do we make motorsports more inclusive
for everyone? How do we makeit more welcoming and accepting, And they
(21:18):
saw success by partnering with you know, large Formula One teams and then from
there it was okay, well,motorsports is beyond just the UK. How
do we reach something bigger? What'swhat's the bigger message in the point here?
So last year they founded their NorthAmerican ambassadorship team and I was lucky
to be a part of that.And we're still trying to navigate. You
know, how do we completely utilizethis opportunity to build something bigger here in
(21:42):
the States. But I know wehave a lot of plans for us this
coming season, but we're just overalljust trying to to put the messaging there
that motorsports is an inclusive sport forall and we want it to be better.
But there's a lot of work thatneeds to be done. So through
the partnership with Racing Pride is we'regoing to push these envelopes. We're going
(22:03):
to push the message, push thetopic that this is something we always need
to put it at the forefront.Then, you know, to make it
a place that you know everyone wantsto be a part of. Well,
I definitely think that a branch ofthe country that does want to be a
part of it is sponsorships. Ithink you're probably getting a lot more attention
now from sponsors, advertisers, productplacements. I'd love to know a little
(22:30):
bit about your sponsorship and why doyou feel like they're important in NASCAR in
general? Not necessarily along Illegal whichI think most of our listeners probably know,
but for those who don't, it'sa nonprofit advocacy organization based here in
the United States, and it's prettymuch dedicated to advancing the civil rights of
LGBTQ plus people and people living withHIV. They provide legal representation, policy
(22:53):
advocacy, public public education, andsupport of LGBTQ rights. And there were
expands a huge range of issues includingmarriage equality and employment discrimination, healthcare access,
but we'll get to that in aminute. I'd like to talk kind
of broadly about why sponsorships are soimportant in NASCAR. I'm assuming it's really
(23:15):
expensive to race a race car.Unfortunately it is. You know, our
brain partnerships literally fuel our on trackefforts. Without them, the car's not
on track. So that goes forme and my season. Without my brain
partnerships and sponsorships to publicly support meand my racing efforts, my car sits
in the race shop, and youknow, and that's kind of what the
(23:37):
rest of our schedules looking like forthis season. The biggest challenge that I've
I've faced is I have these meetingswith all of these companies and they happen
all the time weekly. In theconversation ends that we support you, but
our marketing dollars, you know,specifically for what you're trying to do is
getting compartmental license to this little box. And they're saying, that's our diverse
(24:00):
marketing budget or LGBTQ plus marketing budget, and that's just a fraction of their
multimillion dollar marketing budget that they useannually. But they only want to utilize
this company or i mean, ourcommunity when it's trendy, and that's through
the month of June, when theycan either sell a limited line of product
or merged to then celebrate the factthat it sells out because it was a
(24:22):
small run to begin with, oryou know, to just you know,
use the branding aspect of rainbow washingand call it a day and say we
support you, or make a smalldonation just within the month, and then
put the community back in the closetfor the rest of the year. You
know, we're seeing larger numbers,you know, compassing from youth that are
coming out into the community. Theyneed to be realizing that the bigger message
(24:45):
here is we need to be marketingfor the generations coming after us, ones
that are part of this community atyou know, much younger ages than our
current generation. And that's you know, a generation that that's not going to
put up with us. They're goingto fight for acceptance no matter what.
And what plays a big part herefor me and LAMBD illegal as for having
(25:06):
felt silenced in a sport while Iwas chasing my dream was devastating to walk
away from it. So if Ihave the opportunity now to go somewhere,
specifically to a state that is completelyagainst the LGBTQ plus community and the LGBTQ
plus youth, and to show themthat they can chase for their dreams no
matter what, and there's people outthere fighting for them, I'm going to
(25:29):
do it all day long, nomatter what. Even if it, you
know, may hurt me a littlebit, I know what the big the
bigger picture is here and we're justtrying to create an accepting place for everyone.
Could you talk a little bit abouthow the LAMBDO legal sponsorship even happened.
Yeah, so obviously through my processof a brand partnership, identification of
(25:53):
my daily process with my team andwhat we're trying to do, I also
saw a big opportunity to talk aboutsomething that I felt a lot of out
athletes didn't do when the bill wasannounced. When I was passed, I
feel like there was a little bitof media and you know, no one
really taking action on it. Sowhen I reached out to LAMB I Legal
(26:15):
to explore this and pitch this ideato them, they jumped on immediately because
they saw that there was massive valueand potential and what we can do here.
And that's that you know, mypartnership with them too. It's going
to go off throughout the year andhopefully years to come. Let maybe part
of events across the country and pridesto continue delivering this message and really kind
of pushed the bigger picture here.Did you have obviously very grateful for LAMB
(26:41):
to Legal sponsoring you and making theLGBTQ plus community a part of NASCAR in
a very public way, But doyou have a wish list of future sponsorships?
Like for me, I think Iwould want Taco Bell and my car
would be the Cruntrap car. Ifeel like that's fun, right, that's
a good item. But what wouldwhat would yours be? Oh man,
(27:04):
that's a really good question. Um. But now, any any brand who's
willing to publicly support out athletes,Um, they're the ones I'm driving after.
They're the ones that I want tosupport them as they support me.
Um So, it's it's it's justopen anyone. Honestly, you've gotta have
a good design on the car.I mean some of the cars are a
little they look like energy drinks.That's the that's the vibe, right You're
(27:30):
like, oh, yep, okay, that's what it looks like. Well
yours? Yours? Really doesn't?I feel like it embodies Pride in a
very sleek and fast way. Yeah. No, I think for me it's
a way for me to express myidentity, my personality and is who I
am as a person as I'm tuckedhinting inside the car to really express that
on the outside. Um So,to to have had that car that we
(27:53):
just designed for lamb Illegal to bethe first true Pride car on track for
a NASCAR weekend was you know,a moment that we all celebrated together.
But really I've seen it come togetherreally nicely. It's been amazing. So
we're pushing to hopefully turn that carinto a die cast, so maybe we
can send it back out into thetweet universe so and get a bunch of
(28:14):
people wanting to order them. Yes, that would be very fun. It
is like I like the way,like the number plays into the flag kind
of behind it. It just hasa very subtly queer, but very classy
look. I couldn't completely just gogay on the NASCAR world because I knew
I was already making a big splashfor them. So I'm just gonna kind
(28:37):
of tiptoe it into them because nextthing, you know, I'm not gonna
have umbrella girls. I'm gonna havedrag queens holding umbrellas. So that would
be really fun. Yes, Orlike the pit crew from Drag Race,
that's what you need. We needthe RuPaul's room. If you're listening,
this is a huge opportunity. RuPaul'sdrag race car that makes a statement,
and then you bring the pit crew, everyone's in speedos. It's really a
(28:59):
vibe. So during my process ofyou know, am I gonna go racing
again? Am I going to chasethis dream? I was just lost in
a way. So I started hostingdrag shows in Greenville because I saw there
was a lack of There was nocommunity aspect for drag entertainers to have a
place for the community to go.So I did that for a whole year
(29:19):
and I've made some great friends andI learned so much so it's all part
of my journey. That's really fun. Plus, there's usually good brunch at
drag shows, well if you doit a brunch. But how else can
NASCAR and other motorsports in general,what else can they do to support the
LGBTQ plus community beyond letting you usedrag queens, Maybe it should be drag
(29:41):
like the pit crew should be dragqueens. That's fun, like running around
and heels, changing tires, fillingbreak fluids. That probably do it better
than most of them too. There'sa lot of room for growth for everyone.
NASCARS is doing a good job asa brand to continue reaching these these
new markets, these new core fanbases. They just need to stop taking
the one step forward and two stepsbackwards. But NASCAR is doing things like
(30:07):
I found out through a partnership Idid with Phoenix Pride. As you know,
I did my NASCAR debut last Novemberand Phoenix, I really wanted to
impact local communities and that's my missionmoving forward too, because I know how
important it is to have those smallcommunities receive the attention in the dollars and
they go a lot further for them. So through that process, I learned
that NASCAR actually donates towards Phoenix Pride, and I've never even heard of this,
(30:30):
you know, there's been no mentionof this, and they donate to
Charlotte Pride. So they're donating thePride's all across the country. They just
need to embrace it and learn itis something that what they're doing is great,
and I think they're gonna have alot of people come into the support
to support what they're doing. TheirPride merch was you know, obviously my
touched on that it's not my favoritething to have someone do, but to
(30:52):
I've seen NASCAR do it this year. It was it was wild, and
it was unexpected and you know,of course it sold out because it was
a limited run, but they celebratedit. And I think it's part of
their journey to go on the rightdirection that I'm along for the ride.
We're all along for the ride.Also, NASCAR, if you want to
collab or just send us pride merch, please do. We're going to take
(31:15):
a quick break and we'll be rightback with more from Zach. If you're
like me, you know very littleabout NASCAR. I grew up on a
ranch in Arizona and NASCAR just wasn'ta big sport in my town. Maybe
(31:37):
had I grown up in Florida,I'd have more knowledge about the sport and
be one of those NASCAR gays,you know, the kind that also watched
WWE wrestling. They probably had adirt bike or something growing up. So,
assuming you're a non motorsports queer personlike me, NASCAR is probably a
bit of a mystery. So Iask Zach to address the misconceptions that I
have that I assume whom you nonmotor sports loving queer people have to.
(32:07):
Are there any misconceptions about NASCAR racingthat you'd want to clear up for the
LGBTQ plus community. I mean,I think I was surprised to know to
learn just now that NASCAR sponsored PhoenixPride. Are there any misconceptions because I
do think that by and large,a lot of people think of it probably
(32:27):
in like the same realm as likethe WWE in terms of who can be
a ban of Nascar. I'll sayI've been guilty of the same, you
know, opinion of what I thoughtNASCAR was and what it meant to be
a part of the sport. Butas I immersed myself more into it.
I'm learning how it was completely wrong. It was just all of the bad
(32:51):
media that was kind of put infront of us to tell us this is
what the sport of NASCAR is.But I'm meeting the true people who actually
are there in the ones who aresupporting it and then want it, to
see it succeed and go into thesenew markets and tap into these these new
demographics. That's those are the peoplethat make up NASCAR, and it's a
really great place. My race thispast weekend, it was the first time
(33:12):
in history there were not only fivefemales racing. There was myself the first
openly out gathlet to eBrace at Daytonaduring the NASCAR the five hundred weekend,
there were two people of color.I mean, where in what other sport
can you go watch a professional sportthat has that much diversity competing within just
one series and then there's there's threeother series competing throughout that same weekend too,
(33:35):
offering you know, some of thesame things. So NASCAR it is
changing. There's there's so much,you know that that's exciting about it that
if you haven't seen it, youshould give it a try. Go experience
it. I always say if youcan go, go see it in person,
to hear the cars, to justhave your ears almost blown out where
ear protection we have to hear withoutthe ear protection first, and to feel
(33:58):
the speed and they eat and theenvironment and how happy everyone is there.
I promise you'll have your mind changedon what NASCAR is. So what's next
for you? UM? Right now, we're solely focusing on improving and increasing
my on track efforts. I needsee time right now. I need experience
coming from from two wheels to youknow, four and racing and a sport
(34:22):
where though everyone's going in a circle, the fastest people in the world to
go in a circle. So it'sextremely challenging. UM. But to continue
building these partnerships and to make NASCARa more welcoming place and to hit my
goals in my five year goal ofmaking it to the NASCAR Cup Series.
Like, there's all of these littlepieces that are building into you know,
(34:45):
hopefully a multi year career in NASCAR. And what's next for you personally,
because I think there's some exciting thingsgoing on in your personal life. My
partner and I we've been together goingon six years now, so that's been
amazing to have him also part ofthis, this whole world. He's never
been involved in motorsports. He usedto hate NASCAR. Now Nascar is probably
(35:07):
something he talks about almost as much, if not more, than I do.
So I haven't seen him growing intoa NASCAR fan. But for us,
it's just continuing to grow together,plan a wedding one day, and
just live this life of chasing aftera dream together. Wait, did you
already propose or is this like Imean, we've been engaged I guess for
(35:31):
about three years now, but wetook that as the next step for us
personally to ensure that we're going downthe right path that we both want to
be on. We didn't want toget engaged and then for us personally play
a wedding without actually, you know, growing in that process of moving closer
together. So yeah, hopefully hopefullyout wedding coming up soon. Awesome,
(35:52):
we'll congratulations on that. Thank you? And where else can everyone follow you?
Yeah? I'm across all socials.I'm trying to become more young than
hip and get on the TikTok scene. But right now the party's happening on
Instagram for me, so well,we'll stay there for a little bit.
How's that going for you? TheTikTok thing? Oh, the TikTok thing.
(36:15):
I can't dance. I'm not likesuper great when it comes to content
creativity, so it's really hard.So are there any inserns anyone who wants
to help create content for me?I would love to do it, all
right, So before we wrap upeverything and take a buye and all those
things, I actually think this isa really fun idea. And this is
(36:35):
the first time that we've ever Ithink this is the first time that we've
ever played a game. Hi,Chris, I'm kind of excited. I'm
stressed. I'm sweating now. Allright, y'all, So for this word
association, you're gonna just say thefirst thing that comes to mind. Okay,
Okay, oh boy, okay,are you ready? I guess so?
Okay, yeah, right right,you got this? You got this
(36:59):
brief drag queen queen okay, bothmy queen race car like it? Okay,
Pitt smell crew. I was thinkingthat bottom Pitt may his pit hair
(37:19):
pit hair Okay. Alright, alright, I got it. I'm getting it
all right. Fast tracked fast,tracked fast, car, quarter pounder,
quarter mile, we're here, We'rehere, Yes, I mean pounder could
be something else too, but Iwas going for McDonald's spoiler alert alert.
Oh yes, yes, lap dancetime, lap time, bracing stuff,
(37:52):
power, bottom trip, all right, two more all you're ready, Yeah,
drive way burning, We'll take it. I was thinking maybe if it
was a NASCAR would be burnout,you know, like a burnout. Yeah,
(38:14):
that's a good one. That's agood one. That was fun,
that was funny. Usually cringe itstuff like this, but that was better.
Thank you, Thank you did great. All right, queer racers,
We hope you had fun with uson the track with Zach Karen today.
Let us know if you enjoyed thegames or have any games you'd like us
to play with upcoming guests. Remember, as long as you enjoy the ride,
(38:35):
you'll always win the race. Prideto the production of straw Hut Media.
If you like the show, pleaseleave us a rating and review on
Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or whereveryou listen to podcasts. Then follow us
on TikTok, Instagram, Facebook,Twitter, and snapchat at Pride and tune
(38:55):
in weekly for more episodes. Besure to share this episode with your friend
and subscribe for more stories from amazingqueer people. If you'd like to connect
with me, you can follow meeverywhere at Levi Chambers. Pride is produced
by me Levi Chambers, Naggie Bowls, Chris Reeves, Andrews, Ryan Tillotson,
and Brandon Marlowe. Edited by ChrisReeves, Andrews and Daniel Ferrara.
(39:22):
M I like that, I wasgoing to add another pun, and I'm
like, there's too many puns inthis thing. What did she say,
Oh, you're here,
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