13-year-old racer Elliot Cox, Dr Joe LaPlaca of Ares Elite Sports Vision and Elliot's father Justin Cox join Rico and Ken in the studio

Elliot Cox is a 13-year-old racer with a dream to become the youngest winner of the Indy 500. He is a Development Driver for Sarah Fisher Hartman Racing Development in their new F4 program. He is also am MPG Motorsports/Will Power Kart Team Driver. In 2018 Elliot founded Driving for Dyslexia, using motorsports as a platform to raise awareness and funds for people with Dyslexia. Dr Joe LaPlaca is the founder of Ares Elite Sports Vision, which combines traditional optometry methods with cutting edge technology in order to help athletes take their game to the elite level. Travis Cox is Elliot’s father and President of Ares Elite Sports Vision.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
The Skinny with Riego and Kenna is a production of
I Heart Radio. I'm Elliott Cox, I'm Dr Joe Loploca,
I'm Travis Cox a k A. Elliot's Dead And this
is the skinny from the Fatheads I Wear Studios in Speedway, Indiana.
This is the skinny brought to you by Toyota, Rhino

(00:21):
classifies General Tire and Dream Giveaway. This segment of the
skinny is brought to you by General Tire. It's more
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General Tire dot Com today. Welcome ladies and gentlemen to
the skinny. We have some great guests that will join myself.

(01:04):
Enrico Elmore here once again, a young gun making his
name coming up through the industry. He's sitting on one
side of the bench. His name is Elliott Cox. On
the far side of the bench is his father Travis.
His mother Amanda is also sitting here and the reason
we put him on opposite ends of the bench it's
clearly to separate father and son. We know what can

(01:25):
happen there. And sitting in the middle of the rows
between the two thorns, if you will, is Dr Joel Aploca.
Great to have you guys, thanks for having us. Look
forward to the conversation here because, um, this young man
has already been very very impressive coming up through the ranks,
of course, chasing the goal which so many young kids
are wanting to be an IndyCar. His goal is actually

(01:47):
pretty specific, wanting to be the youngest winner of the
Indianapolis five. Very impressive. You might as well if you're
gonna set a goal, set a big one, right. But
what he's done already in racing, winning the championships that
he's done is certainly very impressive, and we've seen that
happen along the way. But he's also very involved in
charitable activities, already raised a lot of money um and

(02:09):
has been picked up by Sarah Fisher, so clearly making
some waves here inside of the industry. So I applaud
you guys for the hard work already. So what's uh,
tell me how this guy going. We've got dad on
the far side, Travis. I've lived in your shoes. This
guy has come up through the ranks and in the industry,
and watch a lot of dads do what you do,
and you seem to be making all the right steps,

(02:30):
because it's really easy to make an incorrect one. Yeah,
it's uh, you know, I can you know, look back
and this has been eight nine years now, and this
was never the plan. And you know, people ask us
all the time, you know, did you have any background
in racing? Did you race? You know? How did you
get him into it? And quite frankly, I wanted nothing
to do with us. This was one of those things that, um,

(02:52):
it was meant to be, and I had to learn
as a dad and a mechanic along the way. Yeah.
I read one one of the articles where it said
I really had no idea what a carburetor or a
clutch even was. So yeah, I did you learn about those?
It was a baptism by fire, Yeah, because those clutches

(03:12):
are everything. You learned really quickly where to bring those
things in and uh and make those adjustments. It's it's
pretty cool. So how has the ride been. You know,
it's been incredible. It's uh. Um, it truly has been
a blessing. You know, we look back and at the
time we spend together as a family now, um is
just terrific. Um. We probably have more time together now

(03:33):
than we ever did before. And uh, you know, it's
just been a it's been a really cool journey to
be part of. So well, wait, um, tell me tell
me about your experience. So what what got you motivated?
Most kids would chase a stick and ball sport, you know, soccer, baseball,
whatever the case may be. It just tends to be

(03:54):
where we go first. But something about you clearly drew
you to to racing. Um. Since like I was five
years old, I've always been fascinated by speed. Um. Originally
I had actually wanted a dirt bike, and nobody wanted
me to have a dirt bike because it just didn't
seem like a good idea. UM. So we me and
my grandpa, um, my grandpap just took me to the

(04:16):
go kart store one day. There was a dirt bike
and he said, hey, look there's this little kid car.
Let's try this instead, because thats four wheels and it
looks a lot more safe. So we brought it home,
and even though it was more safe than a dirt bike,
my mom obviously freaked out and called him insane. I
didn't know what the heck we were doing, and learned
him to take it back immediately. Um. And he thought
it was a grass cart, so we said it in

(04:38):
the grass, and it doesn't go in the grass, obviously,
and my mom before that had said, you're never gonna
drive it anywhere but the grass. So it was like
a UM moment, and we said it on our pavement driveway,
and I just really fell in love with it. And
my mom was actually the one who took me to
the go kart track to get lessons in the first place.
So it's been quite a roller coast. We're already and

(05:00):
then yeah, here we are now, speaking of roller coaster.
I always loved the roller coaster of mom emotions. No,
you're not gonna do that, it's not safe, You're gonna
get hurt. And the second they get in the cart,
the first one you hear screaming when when when right? Right?
It is? It is crazy, the emotions that that this
sport will bring out of everybody. So I'm just curious

(05:23):
when Graham Pap when Graham Pa bought that go cart?
Was that before or after he jumped out of the
plane and broke his shoulder. That didn't happen, Mom, This
is why we don't tell stories like that. It was
a free story that we had heard from Mom a
little bit earlier in the day. So, well, that's great.
I mean, it's it's awesome, and you're exactly right. They

(05:44):
don't go very well in the grass. But what do
you think Dad, whenever he brought the go cart home?
You know, I was not a fan. Um going back,
I didn't know anything about him. Um. I thought it
was gonna be one of those, uh those phases that
lasted for a short period of time. And my goal
was after the wintertime, was to sell it and go
buy a fishing pole. And uh, my plane didn't work.

(06:06):
So so what time of year was it whenever you
actually bought it and brought it home. So it was
just after my fifth birthday? Uh we it was like fall,
like September ish, so we didn't really have any time
in that winter, So it was obviously what like you said, Um,
he wanted to sell it after the winter because he
thought I would fall apart from it, like during the

(06:26):
winter when I wouldn't get to drive it, and that
obviously didn't happen. So yeah, Ricos heard this story before.
Whenever we moved here from New Jersey. My son was
twelve years old, and I had promised him before wheel
or whenever we got here, we'll go riding in the woods,
and and followed through on that promise. And there was
a day you want to go ride in a four
wheel and it was again it was I was probably

(06:48):
close to wintertime, but late fall, spitting snow and rain.
It was really cold, you know. And uh, and we
had we had to go pick up the trailer with
the four wheelers in it. And I said, are you
sure you want to go riding today? It's pretty nasty out, Bud,
And he looked at me, he said nice. He said,
if we don't go, can we stop and look in
that go cart shop? And uh? And rapid racing was
over there, and and we had been driving by it

(07:10):
for a year picking up before wheelers. And I always said,
now there's not time, there's not time, and I'm like, sure,
we got Befo're not gonna go right, And we got
all day, you know. So we go in and of
course he lays his eyes on his first go cart.
And my dad had race cards, so I was in
a cart whenever I was really young. He was in
a cart when he was really young, So we had
this affection for it, you know, when I walk in
and I see goose bumps. Now I walk in and

(07:31):
I see the modern day go carts, and I'm like,
oh my god, that thing's awesome, you know. So he's
looking at it drooling. I'm looking at it drilling. And
we walked out of the shop and unbannounced to him,
I came back and bought the cart and gave it
to him for a Christmas present. So he had to
walk out in the garage and and see the go cart. Well,
good news. Bad news, I mean good news is you

(07:51):
get a go cart for Christmas. Bad news as you
live in Indiana and you get to stare at it
now for three more because you can't use it, you know.
So that's why I was asking what time of year
did you get there, drive it right away or did
you have to wait for a few months. I did
get to drive it. When we brought it home, we
got on somewhat nice day, um, and I was super excited.

(08:11):
I actually remember signing a couple of pieces of scratch
scratch paper. I just learned to write in cursive and
I was like, this is my awesome stuff. So, um,
it was a kid cart then I had a Briggs
motor on it. It was a kid cart with a U.
It was one of the Coma engines. Yes, I was
never happier to get rid of that Coma engine as well. Yeah,

(08:33):
when we when we kicked off, we were running because
he was a little bit older obviously than than Elliott was,
but we were running junior cancer. We had Yamaha one
hundreds whenever we kicked things off and then moved up
into TAG and I felt the same way. When we
left TAG, I was so glad to get rid of
those things because the starters always broken. You're just did
nothing but work on them, you know. Yeah, I don't
miss the commers or Yamaha's. So what were you doing

(08:55):
at the time when when the go cart came go
on the scene? What was your business? Or I was
in wealth management, so I was a wealth management advisor
for a long time, completely a bad one. If you're
buying go yeah, if you're buying racing stuff, that's a
horrible wealth Yeah. You know, the best piece of advice
I adn't give anybody is takes perfect since why I

(09:17):
said it was not part of the plan was never
investment strategies racing. No. Yeah, if you like money and
like to have more of it, like, do not go
into it? Right? Right? So now what do you do?
I'm a commercial roofing now, okay, so do commercial roofing
and then uh dr la plack and I've got sports
fission business together. Okay, so the commercial roofing. I saw

(09:39):
your truck out back, so all right, So I'm always
interested in what the parents do, right, because it's it's
nothing short of a a horrible investment. So I mean, I, I,
you and I think the same exact way. I walked
in and I wasn't I need to talk to him
for ten seconds? I said, so what do you do? Right?
So we do? We want to know, like where's the mindset?

(10:01):
You know? And and it being nosy, I guess, but
really more of a like you said, what's the mindset?
Who am I talking to here and how did he end?
How much time? How much time do you have to
do it? You know what I mean, because if you've
got like a nine to five, it's it's hard because
of all the travel and all the stuff that you
have that goes on with it and everything. So it's interesting,

(10:21):
always interesting to me. And I mean we had Marcus
Ericson in here, okay, him and uh rosen Quist both
were in here, and you know that's something that I
always asked the drivers, all right, how did it all start?
You know, because I want to know how it got started.
You know, Marcus Errickson's talking about how his dad was
a commercial you know, a painter. He would take all
the paint stuff out of his van and then he

(10:43):
would put the go card in there and they would
go race. You know. So, uh, I just had to
take the junk out of my van that I worked
for my dad and go raised by myself. And you know,
so but I get it. I mean, it's a it's
a great, great, great family deal to I love that
that you guys are well when you talk about, you know,
the investment in it, it's you know, there certainly is

(11:05):
a financial investment, but it's you know, there's there's the
family investment as well, and that's the cool part of it.
That's one of those things that it's just such a
specially it's hard to even described to somebody that's that's
not been in racing, doesn't have a family in racing.
Um it's it's just a really special thing. Talk to
us about the sports Vision deal, they'll tell us a
little bit about that. Yeah. So in well, I'll go

(11:29):
back to origin story. In optometry school, um, I always
thought that there is a connection between what the visual
system is doing and what athletes are doing. I played
high school soccer, wrestling. You know, I'm a first three
black belt in kikido, and um it played high school.

(11:50):
You know, I played uh soccer all growing up. So
every sport you could name, I probably played it. And
there was just such a connection between how you see
and how you how your brain works and sports and
so in optometry school there was just never really any
focus or emphasis on that, and it wasn't until probably
four or five years ago where the technology finally caught

(12:12):
up to being able to track this information and how
effective we can train these systems. And that's when I
put together UM area's lead sports vision and then UM
about a year and a half after that, Travis called
me up and said, hey, I want to start helping
you with this because of what it's done for Elliott

(12:33):
and UM. You know, we started out in nineteen working together,
like early early twenty nineteen working together because Elliott Amanda
actually contacted me and said, hey, Elliot's having some problems. Uh,
can we get him into see you? And so I
took a look at him and said, Okay, there's some
stuff going on here and we need to start working on.

(12:54):
It's that initial exam and yeah, we probably we would
get fired, Robin Tyler, we get fired before we're hired. Yeah, well,
you're a you're a spotter, so like to push a

(13:15):
button while I look and talk, you know, I don't
really have to steer around stuff. So but but realistically,
there's a lot more to spotting than just that piece, right,
Like you need to actually see who's coming down the corner,
see where all the multiple different pieces are communicate that
stuff really actually to your driving the closing the closing speed,
right Like if you have a group of cars doing

(13:36):
a photo shoot on the front stretch and clearly they're
not supposed to be, and the spotter for the guy
coming behind them should say something, say, hey, you've got
three guys doing their photo shoot on the front. Sight.
But even like your depth perception and like how you
judge that stuff is super important. And so if you're
vision isn't what it needs to be or what it

(13:59):
should be, then you're gonna struggle and you're gonna struggle
communicating that information there effectively. So go ahead, Sorry, do
you have so? Do you? I mean, is there others
doing similar stuff? Or uh? I mean, how revolutionary is
this what you're doing versus what they're doing? I mean,
I I and I ask you. And the reason I
ask you is because so so of course I'm in

(14:21):
the eyewear business, so I know about enough to be dangerous.
I really don't know much. So but you know, Jim Leo,
of course, does you know some reaction training and stuff
like that. So I'm sure there's some of that in there,
but it goes past that. Yes, I actually had the
pleasure of working with Jim for about a year and
a half when we first started UM. He was actually

(14:43):
one of the first people I actually reached out to
UM because one of my neighbors used to work out
with him, and he's like, hey, I think Jim might
actually be a good person to to to discuss the
stuff with. And so we started working together in November probably, um,
and we worked together for about a year and a half,

(15:03):
working with all of his drivers and working on all
of that stuff. Um. And then UM, you know, I
wanted to open up my own office and another opportunity
came up, and uh, then we started over at D
one Training over in Noblesville. And so when when COVID hit,
everything kind of just fell apart. And that's too. There's

(15:23):
a yeah, so there's a D one right over here,
which is owned by the tigs Te family, and then
there's a new D one over in Finch Creek Field House,
which is where my office is out of. And so
what Jim does is they incorporate all that stuff into
like their circuit training. Um, I do a little might
do something really different to what they're doing. Is I

(15:44):
take a look at the vision and uh focus on
neck up. Um, how fast you can see something, How
your eyes move, how they function, how they you know,
go in a pattern, how your brain makes decisions, how
that relate it's to your hands. Um, you know how
fast we can do that stuff, and how effective are
your choices, How when we're fatigued, how does that affect

(16:08):
our our systems and what does that go through? And
a whole bunch of stuff that Elliott can tell you
probably hates that we do, but it helps make him
a better driver. Right. I was just gonna say it
sounds like a lot of work to me, but well,
it's it's incredibly intriguing. I mean, we had Jim Leo
in here just just a week or so ago, and
everything you're talking about it's extremely intriguing to me. And

(16:28):
you should be thankful that that the technology is advanced
the way it has because otherwise, from what I read,
you were struggling there for a little bit and this
technology wasn't where it was, and you could continue to
struggle your entire career and not even know that there's
a fix. So it's it's amazing what you guys are doing.

(16:49):
Whenever I read a hundred improvement. First of all, it's
it's really cool that you that you have tools to
make it better. But then how can you quantify hunter better? Yeah,
so we take a look at what his baseline is
so when we first started working together, this is where
he was functioning on X, Y and Z set of

(17:09):
drills or vision skills and vision um uh, just how
he how he was functioning right, so we know exactly
where he's at. So concussion, baselining, all of those pieces
are a huge part of this because we want to
know where he's starting so that we know if there
is an improvement, how do we quantify that? Right? Like
what is that in a standard drill? How much faster

(17:32):
has he gotten? And now he's um, you know, on
one of our standard drills that we started on everybody
is he was functioning at maybe like six hundred or
seven hundred milliseconds and now he's in to what was
her to forty something, So he's probably even higher than
a hundred and thirty five. That's probably an old statistic,
but the the input from his visual system through his

(17:56):
brain to his hands is so much faster now than
when he originally started it. That's over two years of
work because he had to put in a lot of
work through the at home training which is our areas
academy stuff, and then the in office training, which is
the area's elite stuff. Where he comes in once a
week and we work on these things. But then there's
also things that he works on at home. So I
would say it's not for the the person who doesn't

(18:22):
want to put a whole bunch of effort into something.
We need. We want those athletes who are dedicated to
becoming the best in whatever that they're doing. Uh, and
you know, and then helping those people achieve what they
what they want out of their life. So because I've
never seen any of the exercises or or what you
actually put him through, this question might just be way off.
But um, is there a chance that his improvement is

(18:45):
because of its repetitiveness and he's doing the same exact
thing again and again? Or does do the drills or
the drills so mixed up that it forces him to
do something different every time but still give you the results.
I'm gonna answer that one. They're real mixed We got
a shot. There's rarely two weeks that you have one

(19:09):
of the same drills. It's just so mixed up. Be
so focused on every different piece of everything that he
can explain because I don't know of it. Um, it's
just crazy. So do you notice it? Do you physically
notice a difference in the car now. Yeah, when when
I'm in the car, when I'm driving, Like if there's
an incident ahead of me, I used to just like

(19:31):
just kind of drive into it and I would see
it happening. But I couldn't react quick enough to just
move out of the way and just not I just
drive into it, right. And now when I see something happening,
I see it and immediately I just know go around
and just I can react quicker. And it's been a
night and day difference. I have. Like before, I've broke

(19:54):
lots of parts. I've barely broken any of this last
season just because of him. So I really think fool
that we have made this connection. Yeah, this is this
is about wealth management. That's a good investment. C R
O I on this. Cr I is good on this.
You know, he says that. But but but from that standpoint,

(20:15):
you know, Aman and I we you know, we track
everything in the racing as a business, and you know,
before we met Joe scared by the way. Yeah, I
don't share the numbers with many people because they think
I'm absolutely crazy. Um uh, you know, we tracked this
stuff you every year and at the time before we
met Joe, Elliott was already a national champion go kart driver.

(20:36):
Was was quite accomplished. And after we started working with Joe,
it's a good six month or so. Afterwards, Travis didn't
want to do by the way, noon like I wanted
nothing to do with I thought it was a joke. Um,
this is like racing in general. You know, anything to do,
you gotta pult like good kicking and craving. He just

(21:02):
stick with you. I tell you, guys, like this was
not the plan. So you know, I we could look
back and you know, after you know, Elliott started to
really do this and understand it and make you know,
very noticeable progress. Um, looking back here over year, it
cost us tens of thousands of dollars less in new
carts and parts and damage. And that was a piece

(21:23):
that we hadn't even really thought through. It was you know,
performance and results in the track was what we were
looking at. We got that, but we also got back
you know, we're spending tens of thousands of dollars less.
That's a great I mean, that's that's very cool, very
with it. Well, it's it's cool that the way you
are tracking, because that is I mean again, your r

(21:44):
O I is seriously serious. So I mean, so, Elliott,
let's rewind here. Before you got the go cart, what
did you want to do? What? What was your what
was your dream? We're gonna be a fire amount of police.
But I really didn't know, to be completely honest, come,

(22:04):
I wanted to do something, but I didn't know what yet.
To be fair, Um, before I did racing, I played
some baseball. But the funny story behind that was like
the next summer, when I was just getting into go karting,
I was playing pitchers helper because we were a little
and we couldn't actually pitch right, and I had a
stomach ache. So I went to the bathroom and I

(22:25):
got off and I was like, I feel better now, Dad,
can we go to the race track? And the game
was like half not even half over yet he was like, no,
go back out there. I'm pretty sure I ended up
like grounded or something, because but yeah, I obviously didn't
want to do that anymore. Yeah, yeah, well that's that's
so so dad, what was your dream? He was going

(22:45):
to play baseball? We were gonna go bass fishing fishing
pole and we're gonna get a boat. We're gonna go
fishing together. It's hard. It's hard to tear that stuff. Five.
I will tell you Tony Stewart hides all of his
good fishing poles for m Rico because he destroys all
of them. So there is a way to mess that

(23:05):
stuff up. I'd have them all on the not there's
no doubt working them over. So absolutely, But and again,
so you know, it's kind of like what your dreams are?
You know what I mean. And you know I'm always interested,
especially if we have a young young man like this
in here, you know, and asking questions and uh and uh,
he's so, how many years has it been now that

(23:27):
you're running? What is this? What years this for you?
I'm coming up on almost ten years driving cards. That's crazy.
But yeah, well you're you're well spoken. I will say
that I probably couldn't put two sentence together. Sentences together,
I can't even announce. I don't even know why I'm saying.
I'm not going to touch that one. Go ahead, Carl,

(23:47):
you can say something in your life. Remember who's signs
to check Carl. This segment of the Skinny it's brought
to you by Dream Giveaway. Dream Giveaway has been giving
away high end American muscle cars to raise money for
charity since two thousand seven. Dream Giveaway is known for

(24:07):
giving away classic and new muscle and paying the federal
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the coolest cars on the planet. Check it out at
dream giveaway dot com. Certainly something we have to bring
up now that we've gotten this far into the conversation.

(24:29):
We've we've heard from Dr Joe uh and his vision
skills and his business, and we've heard that you've won championships.
We've learned that we've drug dad all along, kicking and
screaming and screaming. But what we haven't talked about is
a dyslexia. So you created a charity driving for dyslexia.
The first question I think everybody at home would like

(24:52):
to know is, Okay, that's a great charity. Um. You know,
it's cool that they're getting involved, but why dyslexia? Did
you actually have it? Do you have it? I? I I
actually am very dyslexic. Um, so is my dad? Actually
he was the one that recognized that I had dyslexia,
that I was having the same problems that he had
when he was a kid. He wasn't diagnosed until right

(25:13):
before I was, because he noticed I was having the
same issues like with reading and spelling as he was
when he was littler. So he got tested and he
had dyslexia. And at the time we didn't really know
what it was. But then we got me tested and
we were both very very positive. Um, and it was
just yeah, that's that's a yeah, that's a tough gag man. Yeah,

(25:37):
And there's gonna be people listening and are all familiar
with the word. But but for those that don't know
exactly what it is, explained to me what what dyslexia is. So,
dyslexia is a reading disability spelling reading basically, well, you're
reading a book or whatever, Um, you kind of the
senses go where they're not supposed to. It's weird to

(25:59):
exp blane, but the sentences kind of float around the pages.
Sometimes it will look like where there's spaces where there's
not supposed to be, and where they're supposed to be
spaces there's not. And sometimes it looks like a big
ocean of letters and that's really frustrating. Like you can
read to yourself, okay, but when you are asked to
read out loud to people, that's where it really like
gets you. And it's like before I hated reading, absolutely

(26:22):
hated it, and I got actual tutor I got tutoring
um after I was diagnosed by Ordon Gilling him uh
and now I read above grade level and I enjoy
reading a lot, and that stuff really doesn't happen to
me anymore, just because I've it was trained, just just
not happen anymore. It's been crazy how that works. And
it's the same thing with like you bes, D, s

(26:44):
PS and QUES. It's all the same letter, just a
different way. So like dog just be reading it is
like still it's just bog. It's like huh, so, so doc,
how did they turn? How did they get somebody reading properly?
So there's not really a fix for it from everything
that I've read and went through. Um, it's a neurological issue.

(27:08):
And the thing with Elliott is that we focus on choice,
like his his actual neurological processing times and how he
makes decisions. So there's a drill that I run the
red green, So he has to associate right hand or red,
left hand green, and that's hard for him. But we

(27:29):
work on that space a lot because it works on
his processing of information, which is what interrupt So we're
talking about letters being jumbled up and sentences. Why would
colors left and right hand be hard? He gets mixed
up just with things in general. Is that because of
the dyslexia or is that just so one thing that

(27:51):
I also didn't say left and right. I still makes
it up constantly. So that's one of the most hard
One of the hardest things he has me do, and
areas elite is we'll go in and he has fit lights. Um,
it's like reaction training and stuff he have won. Some
of them have read, some of them are green, and
you have to associate. Left hand goes to the green

(28:12):
and right hand goes to the red every time, and
we're trying to get the best reaction time as you
go on. While you do that, it gets incredibly difficult.
It doesn't sound as difficult while I'm saying it, but
it's quite frustrating in fact. And it's improved a ton
as well. And it's helped with my left and right
still don't know which ones which most of the time.
But um, yeah, I even have a labels on my

(28:36):
steering wheel which one is left and right in my
four car, So I mean, whatever works. My wife holds
your left hand up to this day because she knows
that her ring is on her left hand. I mean,
if you if you saw him doing this drill, you
have no idea. But when we first started it, I
mean more than half of the times he was making
the mistake because we hadn't made that connection or we

(28:58):
hadn't worked through that process a thing. And it's been
just amazing to see like how much growth he's had
in there. So it's not necessarily, Um, the neurological part
of it is not necessarily anything that we can correct,
but sometimes there are things layered on top of the
neurological part in the vision space that we can correct. Right, So,
some kids might have dyslexia plus an issue, which again

(29:23):
not only makes that part challenging, but it also makes
their dyslexia even more challenging. So they're gonna hate reading,
they're gonna have headaches, they're gonna not want to do
all of these things that a normal kid and I
shouldn't say normal that a kid who does not have
these problems wouldn't have. UM. And so that's what happened
with Elliott. He had dyslexia, but he also had some

(29:43):
vision stuff on top of layered on top of that.
So if we clean that up, it makes the dyslexia
maybe more manageable, or like, we eliminate that second third
layer of things that he's struggling with. So, Dad, how
did you recognize it? I mean, you've you've got it. Um.
It was one of those things that I never got
tested for anything. UM. And it is is Elliott was

(30:09):
growing up. Um, he was just always a bright child.
He could remember things, and there was he just he
had a gift that you know every parent thinks their
kids have gifts. Um. He just had something about him
that he couldn't It was very hard for a man
and I to articulate. And when he started getting into
kindergarten in first grade, we started getting reports back from

(30:31):
the teachers that you know, he's just not picking up
on things. Um, he didn't understand this. You know, he's
developing a little bit later and just completely seemed off
base from how we'd experienced him. And I started to
think back to, you know, me as a as a
child and going through like my teachers told me all
the same things, and I remember there were things that

(30:52):
I could do and and and process things that I
couldn't really explain. But I struggled mightily going through school.
And I saw him going through those things, and it
just it hit me like something's off here, Like I've
lived this before. I know exactly what he's going through.
I just couldn't explain it. So we started doing a
ton of research, and we came across the dyslexia and

(31:13):
I took a test online and every single question was
At the time, I had no idea the whole life.
And so I came across that and it like it
hit me like a train, and it was one of
those things like, oh my gosh, I gotta go get tested.
So you was an adult though, I mean, and I
was two years old when I got tested. Wealth of Management.
I mean, that's not really an easy gig. I mean,

(31:35):
that's that's a lot of us, lots of numbers. And
so what did I mean, what did you I mean,
did you just fight I mean, probably fight through the
piece of it. Yeah, I did, and So I got
tested on A thirty two and the group that I
went and it did, they thought I'd half crazy going

(31:55):
to getting tested. Um you had to fill out like
what do you do and all that stuff, and I'm
a level executive UM in doing what I'm doing. And
they came back like yours dyslexics could be. And it
was one of those things like a light bulb went
off for me, is everything made sense of what I
struggled with. And we went and got him tested. But
as soon as he was able to I think he
was six years old. And you know, one of the

(32:17):
things that came back is at six years old he
had a college level auditory memory recall and so when
he could visually see something and have it described to him,
he essentially had a photographic memory. And it seems I mean,
he struggled reading, and so we got him a lot
of those helps. But from a racing standpoint, we we
just started, you know, teaching all of his coaches like

(32:40):
here's how he learns. And if you can show him
visually what you want him to go do and how
to go do it and explain it to him, he'll
never forget it. And it's just It's been a huge
benefit for him and he understands it now and right,
wrong or different, you can somewhat exploit it. That's that's interesting,
that whole thing, because, um, I hate reading. I have

(33:02):
never been a good read. I've read one book in
my life and it was a struggle. And uh, my
memory is much of the same. I was just gonna say,
your memories actually extremely like I. I was called in
on a on a legal matter and and they were
talking about something that happened ten years ago, and I

(33:24):
could recall the whole transaction, and uh wow, I was
gonna ask doc here, because the brain is struggling in
one area, does it over excel in another area? And
possibly that is what's going on. So it actually is
super interesting, Um that Elliott is a really good race

(33:45):
driver because I think with dyslexia they see the world
differently than most other kids. Right, So most other kids
will focus on one thing at one time, and that's
where they're central focus is. But with dyslexia, they're able
to see the broad picture much better than just that
one point. And the way that he sees the track

(34:10):
and the way that he sees all these pieces, it's
almost like his superpower. And there's this huge correlation between
really good race car drivers and having dyslexia because they're
they're spatial awareness, They're spatial localization is so much better
than what most other kids who are driving are, So
they're seeing the track better. They're seeing Okay, I know

(34:32):
this is coming up because of that visual representation of
they've driven it, and they know what they should be
doing right there at the mark, and I get this
mark and yeah, and and as I get more and
more experience, you start anticipating what's going to happen in
these outside areas as well, which helps you so you're
able to even turn out the white noise because that
becomes so automated for you that you're like, Okay, I

(34:55):
know what's going on. I know exactly all of these
points along the path. Now I can focus on the driver,
I can focus on what this next piece is doing
to this next piece. And so again, they as they
become more experienced, they automate and white noise a majority
of that stuff. Like so he's not really focusing on
his hands and his driving, like he's focusing more on
out here, whereas when he was five or six, he's

(35:17):
focusing here because he's having to learn all those skills,
and so as that accumulates up, he's not having to
do those things anymore, which allows him to become better
than his other kids who are the same age. You know,
on that point. Um, we actually started doing a research
study with some of the researchers at Michigan State a
couple of years ago. And the interesting thing that they

(35:39):
that they are finding is it's estimated about one in
five people have some form of dyslexia. It's far more
common than what most most folks think. Uh So they
started doing a research study with among drivers and um,
it's still ongoing, but they estimate right now that approximately
one in three professional race car drivers has dyslexia. And

(36:00):
it's it's such a dramatic statistical abnormality that there's things
that they want to learn from that to be able
to take to the educational piece. I sorry, Carl, I
got so involved in this. I mean, it is unbelievably
intriguing to me. He told me to go to break
about tim minutes to go. So we're gonna pause here
for a quick second, take a break, and we'll be
right back. This segment of the skinny is brought to

(36:24):
you by Rhino Classified. Tired of all those ads and
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(36:47):
the trailer to move your baby around the country in
we got you at Rhino dot Co. Driving Vdoelexia was
a charity that I created in ross years old before
Justin Wilson passed away. I got to sit down and
talk to him about dyslexia because he also had dyslexia.

(37:09):
He just told me not to let it stopped me.
And even if you get made fun of because of
your slow reader or bullied either way, just don't let
it stop you. Always pushed through even if there's any complications.
And that was just what he did. His legacy was
just to raise awareness. And when he passed away in
the crash, I wanted to carry on his legacy and
this so I thought I would do it. Uh, since

(37:31):
I've started driving for dyslexia, I raise a hundred twenty
five thousand dollars for teacher scholarships. Um, hoping to get
to a hundred fifty thousand dollars this year. But yeah,
I'm really just want to raise awareness, help everybody know
that it doesn't have to stop you, even though if
you have a learning disability, doesn't mean you're really any
different from any other person. Just go be you. I

(37:53):
love it. Yeah, absolutely great story. Um, how again, amazing
was I doing at thirteen? I don't even remember that.
I was just thinking that it's like Carb Day, Carb Day.
You were selling lemonade and and donated ten thousand dollars
with the Province to Alex's Lemonade Stand, which supports childhood

(38:16):
cancer research. Is that yeah? Correct? Yeah, I think we've
raised about twelve thousand dollars for childhood for the Alex's
Lemonade Stand childhood cancer research as well. Yeah. It's just
I really like giving back to the community, and I've
there's are the two ways I've found to do it.
And that's that's the stuff that hits home for us.
My daughter had cancer when she was eight months old,

(38:39):
chance of long term survival. His daughter is fighting it
right this second. So uh yeah, I mean incredible stuff. Um,
I've got to look at mom and dad, and I mean,
as talented as he is, he's still pointed in the
right direction. And that comes back to home. Yeah, it's um.
As a family, we've always you know, I just felt

(39:01):
that it it was important to get back and help folks
that maybe haven't been as blessed as as we have been.
And and so we try to instill those those values
and our kids. And I can't remember how old he was.
He just started racing. Um, we were racing down mostly
at Whiteland Raceway Park at the time. And UM, I
mean he came from home from school, whether it was
first grade or something like that, he was pretty young.

(39:23):
And uh, he he asked his mom, he said, you
know what, can I give all the money in my
piggy bank to, you know, this little boy at school
he has cancer? And he said, you know, I'm pretty
sure he needs it more than I do. And that
was one of those things that it kind of hit us.
We're like, well, absolutely, and you know, I remember exactly

(39:46):
how it happened. But he he got connected with Graham
Ray Hall all the time, UM, and Graham invited him
out to do eliminated Stand at one of his golf outings,
and so we did that one year. Um, and uh,
it just started to grow from there and he kept
asking every single year. He's like, I want to do
another one. I want to do another one, want to
do another one? And then um, you know that kind

(40:06):
of morphed into the dyslexia stuff once he found out
he was dyslexic. But it's one of those things that
you know, we've always tried to empower our kids to
you know, pursue the things that are important to them.
And Uh, in all fairness, he's pushed us on this
more than we push him. So that's that's really incredible.
So we have the the initial desire. You clearly are
going to help him out in any way you possibly can.

(40:28):
And you end up helping him out or he ends
up creating his own connections. I mean a Graham Ray
Hall is a big is a big deal. And so
when you're out of the Gulf golf outing like that,
and I know Graham raises a lot of money outstanding individual. Um,
is that what leads to speaking at the Indiana House
of Representatives. Um, you know, I don't even remember how

(40:49):
that came about. Um, we were involved with driving for
dyslexia at the time, and he's been you know, just
blessed and unfortunate to meet a lot of you know,
racers and people from from that space some and um
we met one of our Yeah, going back, it's um.
There was a bill that was going through a couple
of years ago, and obviously we talked about it because

(41:10):
it was a way to get more kids screening at
at schools. And he came in and told his mom,
he said, you want, I want to write a letter
to my state senator and telling him what it's like
to be dyslexic and that that he should vote for
this bill. And again it wasn't us going to him.
He's like, I want to do this. So he wrote
a letter and we took it and delivered it to him,
and it hit um Senator Freeman so hard. He actually

(41:35):
read the letter that Elliott wrote live uh in session
and it was a powerful moment. And Elliott was getting
recognized actually for you know, winning or doing some different
things that he had done. And and they went in
in recess and gave him the mic and let him speak,

(41:56):
and at the end of the time he was addressed
in the House at the time, Um just told him
what it was like being dyslexic, what it was like
to be I mean, he was bullied, he struggled with
reading a number of things. He said, you know what,
nobody should ever have to go through what I did,
and you guys should vote for this bill because we
can help a lot of kids. And it was one
of those you know, getting bose leans right now thinking
about it, but every single person in the house stood

(42:18):
up and gave him a standing in round of applause,
and it was voted on later that day and it was,
you know, unanimously voted on. And how many things are
unanimously voted on with anything now anything, And it was
one of those things that's has been invited back a
number of times since then. That's incredible. I mean, I
promise you, when I was twenty five years old, I

(42:38):
don't even know a House representatives existed so much less
at his age speaking in front of all of those,
it's it's really incredible what all you've done to this point.
I mean, as I said at the very top of
the show, the racing accomplishments, and we haven't even really
touched on those, but it's uh it's clearly the program
is clearly much bigger and much rounder than than just racing.

(43:00):
UM can't can't say enough about you guys for for
what you've been able to do. Hey man, let's lighten
this thing up a little bit, because, uh, I mean,
this has all been great. But there's some funny stories
in here, and I know there is. I don't know
what they are, but I know you guys have them,
So I'm part of my job is trying to pull
some of that out. But uh, it's funny whenever you

(43:21):
talked about making memories and just just living in the moment,
you know, enjoying the ride, if you will, and and
the return on investment, and what a poor decision racing
can be. But for years I've told my wife as
as I've traveled around the country, and my son's twenty
nine years old now and he's starting in a thirteen
and and we've been going at it just about as

(43:43):
hard as as we possibly can go. I make my
living in this industry. And he's talented, he's he races
a lot, and he's done well. And you know, we
chase the dream as hard as we know how to
chase the dream. And I told my wife, I said,
we might end up living and under a bridge and
a ken Moore box. I'm not sure how many people

(44:03):
know what kN Moore is anymore, but uh, I mean
it might be in a kin Moore box, I said,
but we're gonna have a wealth of memories that that
nobody else will have. So, um, I understand where you're at.
Hopefully you're better with your finances. I'm sure you are
than I am. But um, you know, you throw it
all out there, and you go up and down the road,
and you find yourself spending all this time with your
kids and uh and there's there's a ton of funny

(44:25):
moments and and sometimes they're not funny when they're happening,
they're just funny when you look back. So I'm sure
you guys have them. I'm you know, let's hear some
of some of the fun some of the stories. I mean,
maybe you're cruising down the road and the trailer tire
blows out, and you know, whatever the case. Maybe my
son used to sit in the in the back of
the trailer and have this puss on his face because
he wanted to go race, and uh and and he

(44:46):
had to wait two hours for his class to pop up.
You know, well, yeah, a lot of those stories of
things that we tried to forget. Um and uh. I
remember the very first time the Elliott moved up into
a cadet cart out of out of kick carts and
we're down Whiteland Raceway Park and we'd hired somebody to
help put this thing together because I had no idea
what I was doing on those at the time, and

(45:07):
that we put him down and we send him out
and the first corner of the first lap, his right
rear tire wheel come off, and I mean he's just
going off the track and he keeps going. He's just
driving around. He does almost a half a lap one
three times, didn't you know what it felt like? So
I was just driving around and like, this feels real weird.
But I've never been in one of these before, so

(45:28):
it's like, I don't know if it's just this, but
the rear on feels really loose. So I'd go around.
I turned the corner, whoa okay, and was like stop,
what's wrong? Your tire fell off? Like back there, I'm
running around, wave of my arms and I'm like stop stop.
Like of course, at this point. You know, half of
the go carts, you know, flattened down on the bottom
and everything's worn off of it. But it was a

(45:50):
very very first time I ever in the Cadet cart
and drove around without a tire on. So so why
did the wheel come off? Elliott? There was a good
chance somebody to put tire. It was rerobably a really
good chance. So I've lived that as well. We were
running short course off road racing with Lucas Oil Series
and we're in Mexico, and Mexico had the most brutal

(46:13):
rhythm section of any track that we went to. It
was like that competition of straight rhythm where the where
the dirt bikes go through, and it was just a
car eater. It just destroyed cars even when everything was right.
And uh, we were gonna make a wheel and tire
change and uh and I remember starting on the right front.
I went around, loosened all the lugs, and I started

(46:34):
on the right front, went to put we were changing
wheel spacers. I think we're gonna make a little wider
changing wheel spaces, and I went to put the right
front back on and um, and it turns out the
wheel that we were changing too would not fit with
the space or on, and we kind of it stopped us.
You know, we're trying to figure out the issue, trying
to figure out the problem. We were running up against
the clock. We're about to run out of time, miss session,

(46:55):
and uh we decided, okay, listen, we're gonna bail on
this right now. Just put the old space or a
wheel back on it for now. We'll go out and
run the session and then we'll deal with it. Right So,
because we're running out of time, I do I put
the right front back on tight and everything back down
and say, there you go. Completely forgot that I'd loosen
to all the other three, you know. And sure enough

(47:15):
he comes around and makes the first couple of turns
and hits the rhythm section and man, I mean he
just gets in this wicked hucka buck and and it
just just you know, destroys everything on the car all
the way around. I was like, uh, yep, that's me.
That's that one's my fault. And you feel you can't
feel any worse right now. We it's similar thing. Probably

(47:39):
just even a month ago. We are going out and uh,
Eli came back and he's like, Dad, I don't know
what to tell you, but there is something wrong with
these tires. It's like it's just it doesn't feel good
at all. So I got back around and check everything.
I'm like, everything's fine, man, there's absolutely nothing wrong with
this go cart. So the next session, we're getting ready
to go back out and I go to set the tires,
just make sure that they're still there, and I put

(48:00):
the tire gage on. It's like forty pounds, and its
like I never set the tire pressures the last time.
I say, well, five pounds of pressure, Like you're driving
down in forty pounds, like, no, wonder didn't. It was
a rain race as well, like most of the time,
I'm okay at the rain, but it didn't feel anything
normal like I had driven before. So I'm turning in
a corner like I'm full steering lock and I'm going straight.

(48:22):
I'm like, what the heck is going on? Come on,
these tires are not okay, Like how old are they
that they're like brand new? Makes no sense. As we
go out and just like I know what the problem was.
What there pounds of pressure? I've heard of air in
him up, so you have gripped but he had plenty

(48:42):
of air in the tires. So how long did it
take you before you could actually feel the inside, uh,
inside rear tire lifting up and setting back down. Probably
around like ten tennis years old. Yeah, I I remember.
I think we had been racing carts. We ran out
there at Newcastle for a couple of years. We ran
full points in junior can and then he wanted to

(49:05):
go on the national tour and uh and we started.
But I remember because he had no clue, no clue,
no clue, and then all of a sudden when the
light bulb went off. It happened so quickly that I
didn't believe him. I was like what and and he
started saying stuff like it's slipped in the rear tire,
but it's set it down too soon, or the back,

(49:27):
the back is pushing the front. I think the front
is turning into good enough. I've just got too much
rear grips, so it's it's overpowering the front. And he
was starting really diagnosed it. But I mean this happened
in in the span I want to say, of like
a couple of months. So it went from nothing to
like everything made sense. Do you remember that he is

(49:48):
very very good feedback. And it's one of those things
that I don't remember who who encourages his back Um
probably eight nine years old, every single session we still
do this day. And when he comes off the track,
we debrief and what's the card doing on entry? What's
it doing the middle and through the exit? And he
just described it and you know, I remember that. You know,

(50:09):
I'll never forget the day we were we were out
of Newcastle and he came back and he's like, you know, Dad,
you know the backs starting to wash out of me
a little bit, but I don't think we had a
problem with the back end. He's like, I think you
gotta add some more castor and he's like, I'm pretty
sure that will drive through the corner and stop the
back from washing. Now he's like eight or nine years old,
and I'm like you huh like and just come from
I have no mechanical background at all. And we started

(50:31):
to work through those things and and he was able
to make He's won a lot of races for himself
based on the feedback that he can feel in the
car and tell us how to do it. Um, And uh,
I don't necessarily know how he learned it. Um certainly
wasn't for me. Um, but you know what he's able
to do and give us feedback is has been phenomenal

(50:53):
and it's it's kind of cool and he can talk
to us. But um, how he's able to get feedback
on the four car now as well without having much experience,
and it's been pretty cool to see in and you
know how to do that with the team. Well, it's
those those are those initial amounts of learning, you know,
whenever whenever it whenever the light bulb finally went off

(51:13):
for him and go carting, that will all transition the
rest of his career whatever whatever cars in because it
happens so much quicker in a cart than it's going
to happen in any other car that he's in. So
it's it's all gonna make sense. Um. I was fortunate
that when we were out at Newcastle, while I wasn't
really mechanical. I was in the industry, but I wasn't

(51:34):
really mechanical about anything. So to go out there and
try to take care of the cart for him, um,
I was wasn't very good at it, and he had
no real feedback. We went with a guy named Mike
Oddie was very very good. But I also knew Derek daily,
so we were running with Connor and Joseph Newgarten were
at Newcastle at the same time we were. And uh,
I remember Derek telling me he said, I asked these

(51:56):
same three questions every single time. What they to do?
You know, entry, mid corner, exit, every single time? And
he said, Folks, he said, I tell him to focus
on one corner, forget about the whole rest of the track,
because you have to remember one corner before you can
remember too. And uh and and I try to explain
to people that have never been part of what you

(52:19):
guys are living right now, what what you understand is
it's milliseconds, right, I mean, they're only in the turn
from entry to exit, you know, for a second, you know,
maybe two seconds or something. So and you're asking somebody,
a young kid to process what happened entry, middle and exit.
We're talking about fractions of a second. And then in

(52:40):
the midst of hanging onto a cart that if they're
driving it hard, is on the edge retain it, you know,
I mean, and this is not a simple thing to
do now, and it's it's it's the point now where
we go to two tracks, and he makes it really
easy for me. Um, you know, we'll go out the
first session, he'll come back and he's like, a right, dad,
you know, we need a little bit more pastor wide
in the front five mill and drop the tire pressure

(53:02):
two pounds and we got the next time it's it's
pretty darn good. Isn't that amazing? I mean, and how
cool is it to hear your son tell you that
you're you're you're swell up with pride. But the confidence
that it gives you that he's going to hop inside
of that car and go get maximum out of it
is incredible. I used to argue with him quite a
bit about what we're gonna do, and finally it's like

(53:23):
he proved me wrong enough, that's what you want to do.
Let's let's go do it. Mindy, come back. I can't
tell you how many times. A matter of fact, it
turned into a game with his crew guys. He would say,
I think the left rears out three mill and uh.
He was raising a front wheel drive cars at the time,
so if if the if the rears were out a
little bit, you know, you really really affected the steering.

(53:44):
And he would he would come back and say, I
think the left ears out like three million, and they
would say, there's no way you feel three mill. It's impossible,
And constantly they would check. It would be three mill,
five mill, whatever, whatever the case was. And I mean,
it's it's pretty impressive. The guys that are switched on,
clearly he is. They it's amazing what they feel. So
the funny thing about just that what he was saying

(54:06):
about how I can get feedback about that four car.
Before I had started driving in that, UM, I would
always like, for overseer, I would say, the car just
turns in too fast, or for understeer, it doesn't turn enough,
and I just get pushed and and the four car
just just just I explain. It's a lot easier to
explain just oversteer in the rear and stepping out or understeer.

(54:27):
And we were on the car the other day, UM,
and my dad gets on the gas in his truck
because it was raining and whatever, and the rear and
stepped out. I got understeering. No, Dad, no you didn't.
You corrected me really quickly. That's awesome, he said, I
got understeering, No, you got oversteered. Works it's loose, Yeah,

(54:53):
he keeps being keeping on point. We'll be right back
after this. This Men of the Skinny is brought to
you by Toyota. Doc. What's the aspirations? Where are you
going with the business? Uh? Now that you're I know
you're involved in a lot of stick and ball sports,
you know, helping out kids of of all um ages

(55:15):
and disciplines and clearly involved on the racing side of things.
Do you see this thing exploding? You're into the business,
You're into the world. That's the goal. Um. Yeah, I
mean I hope so. Um. You know, right now, I
think the last last few years has really been creating
the product more than anything, because right now it's the
wild West. I would say, like people are in this

(55:37):
space who probably shouldn't be in this space, meaning like
chiropractors are doing sports vision or you know, pt and
and those kind of people are are doing some of
this stuff. Um. Ultimately I think that it will be
optometry because that's what we do. UM. But I think
from the business side of it, I think, yeah, I
think we're we're expanding. We actually have our meeting tonight

(56:00):
with our our three new sales team, and you know
we're gonna start figuring out how do we continue to
to to spread the message because that's the biggest pieces
educational of of this exists. This is going to help
your kid. This is going to help not even just
their sport, but school and how they affected, you know,

(56:21):
how everyday life and how they feel. Uh. And so
that's really our why is how do we help bring
this to a broader base and how do we help
those kids achieve their dreams and even if we get
to be a small part in their journey, that's what
we're after is is how do we help them just
become a little bit better, make things a little bit
easier for them, and so um, you know, realistically, the

(56:44):
the athlete population, this is gonna sound weird, but is
underserved in the in the space of vision because they think, okay,
I'm seeing really well okay, but they might not be
right there like oh, I got two D one and
you know I'm hitting the ball well okay, but there
you could be better. Let's let's work in that space

(57:05):
and Mike correct and understand that you two are partners
in this. Yes, building this out over the you know,
the last year or so. Um. One of the hardest
challenges we've got is people just like me. You know,
it's too good to be true. Um. The ironic piece
of this is the you know, the overwhelmed majority of
our clients are professional or college level n C double
A athletes because they get it and just being able

(57:26):
to get the message out that you know, you can
absolutely have a eleven, twelve, thirteen year old kid, you know,
middle school, high schools athletes, they can have amazing improvements
in their reaction time. UM, like all sports like Canyon again,
like there, I mean I got a text message from
one one kid uh the other day and his his

(57:47):
dad like he's crushing, Like he hit two home runs
in the game and he hit three Hope Barns of
the weekend before and like his o BP is off
the charts, and like he's like statistically like double what
everybody else is because he's training in our space and
like he like just was like I want to tell
everybody about this, um. And so like those those those

(58:08):
pieces are super validating for me as I as I
you know, as we create things going forward and as
I do the in office stuff and um, you know,
it's it's really cool to see those to hear those
stories that hey, I wouldn't have been able to do
this if I wasn't training with you, like that could
have caused me serious damage or going seventy miles into

(58:29):
a turn like that's scary probably as a parent as well,
but even as somebody who marginally likes Elliott. You know,
we could listen to listen to him talk about that
that moment and then going back to when you were
talking about right hand is right left handed? Screen or
which are where you had it? Um. I remember when
you were telling me the drill and him struggling with it.

(58:52):
I remember thinking, Okay, well he can do it wrong
or it's gonna take him a fair amount of time
to process grain is left and and reach out and
hit it. So that amount of time, as he gets
better and better, becomes more reactive rather than a thought process.
So he's in a situation where he has no breaks
and he his reactive is taking over hand eye coordination,

(59:14):
everything is doing what it needs to do with that
high level moment, and consequently come he makes a potentially
disastrous situation, you know, acceptable and a chance to drive
again it. I get it. That's one of the things
as well, Like that's very frustrating at first is you're
you're gonna want to go so fast you make tons

(59:34):
of mistakes, but you still feel fast until they tell
you how many mistakes you made, and then it's like okay,
so you try to fix it, but you go do
the same thing and until they tell you you have
to slow down. You're gonna feel slow. You're gonna hate
it until you get fast. And it was grueling until
I actually I'm still not to like super fast in
it yet, but I'm getting there and it feels a

(59:57):
lot better than it did then, and I'm just yeah,
it's easy for us to sit here, Elliott. Um. You
know myself, if I went, I would look at the
results and say I was a little bit better today,
I was a little bit worse, and and go about
my business. But for you, you you have you must you
must go home and think, there's so many variables here.

(01:00:17):
What did this guy eat? How how much sleep did
this guy get? Did he drink coffee today and now
he's suddenly faster? Did he did he? Does he have
wings because he did a red bull in vodka? Whatever
the deal may be, right, I mean, there's so many
variables again that could influence how somebody performs that particular
day that keeps me up at night more than you know,

(01:00:40):
because it's it's an ever change it's an ever changing
thought process for me specifically, because I have to address
so many different things. Is how is this skill gonna
affect this thing? How does this thing integrate with this thing?
How is this piece of technology? Now we're going to
use this US and what does that whole system look like?

(01:01:02):
And that's completely separate from the in office stuff that
I have to build these progressions, So like they start
here and then I'm going to add this, and I'm
gonna make it more difficult, and now we're going to
have them running and now we're gonna have, you know,
do testing after they're fatigued. Then we're going to do X,
Y or Z. So it's building out all these progressions
to challenge them in office, but using different tools. Like

(01:01:23):
Elliot said, every session seems different or there's a difference,
there's a different feel to it because they've done really
well on a task and now they're ready to move forward.
And so I think that the variability is something that
a lot of people don't want to do in this field,
which is what I really have enjoyed doing is is

(01:01:45):
figuring out how do how do we make this a
viable um, a viable thing for people. So we'll wrap
things up here. You've been here long time, guys, and
I appreciate the time and the effort. As we close
things up, talk to me about the F four program.
That's what you have come on this year, and and
I went on, and I got a little confused, and
I was looking at the schedule. I saw four races
a matter of fact, Uh, I want to say midd

(01:02:06):
Ohio at the end of the month, end of June. UM.
But I also saw where somebody had run it Road
America already this year. I don't. I was a little confused.
When does the season actually start? So the reason you
are a confused about that, I think is I'm actually
too young to be running the US F four season.

(01:02:27):
I'm only thirteen and the age limits fifteen. But it's
just gonna be. It's I've been testing a lot, and
the goal is to be when I'm fifteen. Uh. The
team wants me to be ready so we can go
out and win the championship the first year and then
from there on do the same thing. In F three
Indy lights in IndyCar and hopefully be an indiecar by

(01:02:47):
when I'm eighteen. Uh And surface harm and racing has
helped me already so much. I've increased my racecraft and
everything and just learned how to feel the car a
lot better. Uh. And I've already even done like or
races and just that has increased how I drive so much.
It's really on I can't really even tell you. So

(01:03:11):
if if you're not old enough to run the US
f F for what race did you compete in? So?
I I did some unsanctioned academy races um this winter,
uh for just yeah, just for practice and stuff. Any
uh any thoughts of going to Europe at all? Now

(01:03:31):
at this point, Um, you know you're looking at the
feeder series they've got here between the road to Indian
F four F three. The plane is to stay here
right now. It's it's it's better for the pocketbook as well. UM.
So what is the plan this year obviously the next
two years that you just indicated you're going to be

(01:03:52):
continue your development in the F four? Um, what's what's
on the docket? What's on the schedule for this season? Uh? Well,
I actually have a regional race that Stars of Carding
this weekend at Newcastle. I'm gonna be in road America
the next two weeks. Uh after this doing regional and
national races. We're still doing a lot of krding just

(01:04:14):
to give me in shape and everything. We're doing lots
of testing in the F four car. We've already had
I think fourteen days just driving. Uh and yeah, just
really busy, just same thing, cardings every weekend. So you're
chasing points and Stars of Carding, w k A Man Cup.
I'm actually not chasing any points right now. We're just
doing like events that come to us some some events

(01:04:36):
whenever we have time. I've missed out on a lot
of just the bigger series is like the starting races
of the season. Just taking a break because we've been
so busy, giving the parents a break because they want one.
Then at want a race every weekend as bad as
I want to. Uh and yeah, it's just what we can. Yeah.
We decided the beginning of the year. UM at that point,

(01:04:59):
I think do have fourteen or fifteen days of traveling
all over the place, um in the car, So we
decided to do the car at the beginning of the
here instead of some of the go karting um. But
it's every single weekend he's he's running awesome. Yeah, sounds
like a very exciting future for sure. And I can't
thank you guys enough for coming on here. Dr Joe,
best of luck, man, Thank you for what you do.

(01:05:22):
It's it's super exciting, very intriguing. Travis, thanks for for
finally joining in and and help supporting him and yeah,
I got him into this. And Elliott, best of luck
to you. Thanks for dragging your dad in, kicking and screaming,
you know, and get him on the program. You know. Yeah,
thank you, Thank you for having us so. I hope

(01:05:43):
you enjoyed this addition up to Skinny great stuff and
keep checking us out. We'll have more wonderful stories coming
your way soon. Thanks for being with us here on
the Skinny. This episode has been brought to you by Toyota,
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(01:06:05):
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