December 23, 2021 • 43 mins
This week Ken sits down with WoO great Paul McMahan. From his roots in racing to his violent crash at the Knoxville Nationals., we cover the awesome career of the 1995 Open Wheel Driver of the Year.
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
The Skinny with Riego and Kenna is a production of
I Heart Radio. I'm Paul McMahon and this is the
Skinny from the bath Heads I Wear Studios in Speedway, Indiana.
This is the Skinny brought to you by Toyota, Rhino, Classified,
General Tire and Dream Giveaway. This segment of The Skinny
(00:24):
is brought to you by Toyota. Welcome, ladies and gentlemen
to another exciting episode of the Skinny. This week, we're
gonna bring a longtime racer onto the show. Currently living
in Nashville, Tennessee. Welcome Paul McMahon. He's competed in World
of Outlaws for a number of years currently, I believe
(00:44):
competing in All Star Circuit of the Champions. Initially started
out on the West Coast where he's from Elk Grove, California.
Visited a lot of tracks out there, had some great
success along with his brother and Uh has also competed
with those wackos over there and Sylvania known as the Posse.
So it's great to have Paul McMahon on the show here.
Welcome my friend. Thanks guys, thanks for having me on
(01:06):
the Sugar Day. Yeah man um Hey, First of off,
before we go any further. Were you guys affected by
those tornadoes down there a week or so ago. No, Unfortunately,
we were not affected it with everything was just a
little bit farther north of us. We had some some
you know, our Christmas lives got blown off the roof
and stuff like that, but not no damage to our home.
(01:28):
So we're very fortunate. Yeah, that's uh, that's really good
to hear. And I don't remember exactly when that was,
but I do remember. I want to say it was
about a year ago. I think it was during the
pandemic time when you guys had that bombing down there
in Nashville. Uh. Pretty sketchy, pretty yeah, Christmas Day. It
was Christmas Day. Yes, so I was feeling like it
was about a year ago. But man, oh man, what
(01:50):
a sketchy deal because I had been down there just
a few weeks before that, staying in one of the
boutique hotels right down there and on the strip, and uh,
my wife and I both looked at it that I
was like, holy smokes, I mean that was really close
to where we were. Yeah, definitely we were. My whole
family was on an airplane heading to Mexico for our
(02:12):
family vacation for Christmas, and we left it. I think
our plane took off at six thirty five and the
bombing was like sixty eight. Um, it was crazy morning once.
When we finally got I think we landed in Houston,
I think it was, and and you know, everybody's grabs
their phones and um, you start hearing all about it.
The crazy story was I just gave my motor home away,
(02:35):
and uh, here I am. You know, we find out
that the guy used a motor home to blow up
the building, and I'm thinking, i just gave my motor
home away. I'm flying to another country. Please that Yeah,
that was a stunk a little bit for sure. Man.
Yeah wow, so um so man, You've had a very
(03:00):
successful career all along the way. And as I look
at you starting off on the West Coast, I'm guessing
you maybe even out there in San Jose was a
half mile. But whenever I look at you competing out
there with the N A. R. C UH and then
coming over and competing with the World of Outlaws, and
(03:21):
you competed with all stars obviously off and on. I
mean going back to oh I think it was oh
One maybe where you rookie of the Year or ninety
nine something like that, ninete Rookie of the Year for
All Stars, UM, and then and then obviously running a
bunch of Pennsylvania stuff. I mean, it's the mecca of
sprint car racing. Can you make a comparison to the
(03:43):
Maybe it's everything's the same, I don't know, But is
there is there a difference competing on the West Coast
versus the world of Outlaws where they go everywhere, the
All Stars staying somewhat regionalized versus Pennsylvania. Do you have
to bring something unique to each one of those elements? Well,
I mean, you know, growing up in California we have
(04:03):
on the West Coast, but we have all short tracks,
so we well we we always had very wet, sticky
and a lot of times rough race tracks, and um,
you know, the Outlaws they always complained, you know when
we when they came out back in you know, back
in the early nineties. Um, that was kind of my
forte was the short track stuff. And then we only
(04:24):
had one half mile in California with with Calistoga that
that the Northern Automation Club raced at. UM we had
another one down at you know, down South but it
was more non wing with Ascott and Paris. But um,
you know it's when you first, you know, when the
outlaws come to your your porch as they call it,
m p A. Um. I was able to run very
(04:47):
well with the outlaws, so I thought, oh hell, this
is easy. I can go round with these guys. And
when I finally got my opportunity, UM, I got out
on the road and down a serious eye opening, got
my got my butt kicked day in and day out,
and off the confidence way down. And um, you know,
racing is the same, but when you're racing with the
rural of outlaws, you gotta take it to the next level. Um.
(05:08):
You know p A Pennsylvanians the same way. You gotta
take it to the next level. Everywhere you go, you
just gotta take it to it next level. But the
World Outlaws is the tentacle of of the next level
and to run with him and be competitive is is
very tough. What if you had to pick out a
couple of things just to give the listeners an idea.
And let's say you know one of those sprint car
(05:30):
racers that has stayed locally to his or her area
and and they think to themselves like you said, I mean,
the World of Outlaws come to town, they enjoy some
success because they're at home and uh they know that
that particular track or two pretty good, and they think, hey, man,
I want to go on the tour with those guys.
I think I could hang much. Like you just said,
what were some of those lessons that you learned or
(05:50):
what is it that makes the World of Outlaws so difficult?
It's just you know, when you race, you know, you
race locally. You know, like when I raced in California,
I raced maybe thirty five to forty races all year long,
and we do thirty forty races by June most of
the time when the World Outlaws back back and then
times you know, we don't get as many now, but
(06:12):
you know, back in in the day, you know, they're
when I first started in the early nineties, was you know,
races was a lot in California. And then when you
come with the Outlaws and these guys are there are
races by June, and they just got so much more
seat time. They see every different type of racetrack conditions,
(06:33):
way race tracks. You know, they're able to read race
tracks better. Is what I think, um, you know, because
they see so many different variables across the country, so
they can always um attribute you know, things to what
you know. This track is sort of like this, This
track used to go this way, and I think they
just you just get a just so much. And it's
(06:54):
a daily job. It's your job day in and day out,
so you live and breathe that where you know when
you raised locally used absolute work mounday to Friday. Yeah,
I um, I remember when we started traveling on national
tour with my son in sports car racing, and you did.
You always had those locals that were good at those
race tracks. But a couple of years in to do
(07:16):
in that it uh, it suddenly is not intimidating that
you're in a new track any longer. It's just figuring
it out. And there's some turn on that track that
is similar to some other turn that you've already been
on another track or in your case, you know, reading
the dirt, anticipating what the dirt's gonna do. All of
those little elements that you guys become so good at.
(07:38):
And as you said, I mean I we all know
nothing replace the seat times, so you know it competing
against somebody that's in the seat two hundred times a
year versus somebody forty fifty times a year. Both of
those numbers huge by the way. Um, for sure, it
is going to give an advantage. But along along with that,
I think of the logistics that it takes to run
(07:59):
up and down the road and compete eighty two a
hundred times a year, getting the parts and pieces that
you need along the way, you're all of that travel.
My goodness, dude, I mean, I've never even come close
to a number like that that they that they run
with World of Outlaws. It's it's just unfathomable to me
(08:19):
how difficult that must be. Yeah, it's um, you know,
it's it's a different lifestyle. It's not for everybody. Um,
it's something that it's a passion you've got to have
and it's a mentality you gotta have to live, you know,
to live out of a suitcase or living at a
motor home and traveling up and down the road is
is it's it's hard. I mean, I raised two kids
(08:41):
in the thirty five ft motor home you know, for
until till the kids till my oldest started school. So um,
It's also that's a cool thing too, because you can
take your kids to around the country with you and
and basically take your kids to work every day. So
you know, you just got to have It's not for everybody, Suddy.
Some people can do it, some people can. I've had
(09:03):
kids that come out on the road with me that
I think that this is what they want to do,
and they get out there and they're out there for
two three months, and then they get homesick because, um,
you don't get home, and you know, the logistics of
getting your parts, you know, ups FedEx they all delivered
to the hotels and we uh we used, you know,
use that a lot to just ship things to whatever hotel.
(09:24):
You just gotta plan ahead of where you're gonna be staying.
But in the same sense, that's what you're doing with
your hotels all year long, is is making the logistics
of make sure you had hotels and what part of
the country. You know, me being from California, when I
first started, logistics, getting home was never very good. So um,
we moved to it, picked up and moved to Indiana,
(09:46):
Indiana area up in northern Indiana, and then uh finally
made our final rest home here in Nashville. Yeah. Why Uh,
certainly Indiana. We hear that all the time, the guys
coming from the West Coast going to Indiana and they're
gonna chase the dream and of the open wheel style format.
What what prompted you to move to Nashville. We have friends, Um,
(10:08):
my wife's best friend in high school is married to um,
a guy that was in the music business. And and
the two brothers there were the Marcy brothers out of Orville, California,
where my wife was from. So we came back and
visited all the time and really really enjoyed Nashville area.
And um, you know, for me, I had to travel
(10:29):
no matter what with racing, so um, this is kind
of where my wife wanted to live. And and so
you know, we just picked up and came to Nashville.
Did It's only five hours too, you know, Indianapolis. I
can get to St. Louis area in five hours. Uh,
Williams Grove in seven, Eldre in six, So it's not
(10:49):
that you know, it's not that far out of the way.
And we got a nice big airport here in Nashville
that that I can fly out of. And like I said,
We're on Highway forty, Highwa sixty and Highway twenty four,
so I can go north southeast to rest. Uh really easy. Yeah,
and very rarely is the high eighteen degrees Yeah, very
(11:10):
very sing Do we get that? But we have had
some uh, we have had some cold winners, but not
very often. Roger that all right, We're gonna take a
quick break here. We have one of the true ambassadors
as a sport here for sprint car raising. On with us.
Paul McMahon will be right back, Stay with us. This
segment of the skinny has been brought to you by
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Rhino dot Com. Once again, welcome back to the Skinny.
We have Paul McMahon on with us this year. He's
been racing since the nineties. Uh, still chasing the dream
here today. Has finished as high as third in the
points in the World of Outlaws on a couple of
(12:41):
different occasions. In fact, inside of the top twenty five
on the all time win list with the World of Outlaws.
And I might throw in there, you're still a couple
ahead of Kyle Larson, So I mean, there there's something there,
you know, at twenty seven wins, and but Kyle did
his in two years. Of course, several I know he is, uh,
(13:03):
he has certainly been spectacular, and we all just knew
he was pretty talented all along the way, of course,
but man, the last couple of years, talk about lighting
the fire underneath somebody. It's been fun to watch for sure. Yeah,
you know, I mean, and me and Kyle were actually
from the same home town there in Elk Grove, California.
Always he gives me a bunch of crap because everybody says,
(13:24):
you know, when they announced everything, I'm from Nashville, Tennessee,
and he bust my ball is pretty good about being
you know, you're from Elk Grove, and um, you know,
I just keep telling him it's one thing anyone to
take away from him. Yeah, that's kind of your so.
Um so you will also spend a lot of time
(13:44):
with your son Brandon. Um do you see him getting
behind the wheel here anytime soon? Full time? You still
you're still gonna chase his dream full time going in.
By the way, I failed to mention the top of
the show, and I should have. How are you after
your incident at Knoxville. I'm I'm I'm better. I'm not
(14:05):
yet my head still, you know, I mean, standing up,
doing things, concentration, I'm I'm pretty good at I stutter
a little bit more than I did before. Um, I
just can't. I can't when I think I know what
I want to say, but I can't put it all
in words at the same time, so it takes me
a minute to do that. But pretty good. Uh. You know,
(14:27):
I just had surgery on my on my hand, um,
from when I got caught in the stairing wheel there
at Knoxville, and a few other little things that that
I need to fix. So I got it all fixed
in one one shot. But I'm doing okay. Um. You know,
I'm I'm fifty one. I banged my head a few times,
so I don't know if I'll ever be right, but
I'm doing all right. Yeah. Well, I mean I suffer
(14:50):
from everything you just mentioned right there, and I don't
remember banging my head anywhere in particular, so I really
struggle putting words together. It's not good in my my occupation.
M um. So so what is the dream going forward?
Do you see yourself back in the seat full time
or part time or are you gonna lay off a
little bit? What's the plan? Yeah, I haven't really, I mean,
(15:12):
I definitely not gonna be back in the seat full time.
That's something I tried to do away with last year
and it just didn't work out. And you know, we
we were going to do a two car team with
c JP Motorsports and Print Mark's was gonna run the
full All Star deal and I was gonna run about
forty to fifty races, and you know the Brent Brent
had his deal and went on to started back to
(15:34):
his own team, and that kind of propelled me into
run in they all start Circuit of Champions again last year,
and something that I really didn't want to do, something
my crew chief and Barry Jackson didn't really want to do.
The crew guys didn't want to do. Nobody wanted to
do it. But it was the right thing to do
for Chad Clemens and c JP Motorsports and because they
(15:57):
they they made it all the negation to the All
Star Circuit Champions and Tony Stewart so uh to have
a car out there. So it was the right thing
to do to put the put me back in the
five and go around the whole All Star deal. But
definitely not not something I want to do, you know,
full time again. I'm getting a little too old to
be up and down the road. I enjoy being at home,
(16:19):
so um, you know, I'd like to do you know,
some thirty races, but I also got to make sure
my health is correct, before I strapped back in to
do a whole lot of racing. Yeah, I read along
the way and you traveled or you chase that world
of Outlaw drained for a while, and we've we've talked
about how many shows that is a year, and you
(16:41):
admitted that you you were, uh, you were burnt out
on the process and it does grind you down and
at the point that it no longer becomes fun. Uh,
it must be h it must be difficult even to
accept that, to know that how excited you were. I'm
sure on day one when you were able to say, hey, man,
(17:02):
I'm gonna make this commitment. I'm gonna chase this all
year long and it's a it's a true dream come true.
And then to be in it and chase it for
a long enough that year burnt out to finally sit
back and look and say, man, this I just don't
know if this is what I want to do anymore.
That's that's got to be a big moment in your life. Yeah,
it was. It was definitely difficult, you know, finally came
(17:24):
to that. I finally had that mentality back in two
thousands seventeen. I just I wasn't having fun. We were
running on the world of Outlaws, and um, you know,
my owner was hurt for a little bit of money.
Um you know, it's kind of strapped for cash, and
um you know, it wasn't financially broke, it was just
not racing rich. So uh, in motorsports, you've got to
(17:45):
be racing rich to be out on the on the
outlaw deal. So I came to the conclusion about I
don't know, it's about September seventeen, and I wasn't having fun,
and the owners still wanted me to keep going. And
but if I kept going, the owner was going to
be out of business. And I didn't want to be
that guy to put an owner out of business. So
we worked some things out with some some younger kids
(18:08):
that had sponsorship behind him, and I was able to
keep the owner into the sport for a few more
years until he finally just his fun meter was pegged
and decided to sell everything. Also. But yeah, I mean
after a while, I just, you know, like I always
always told my wife, when this became a job, like
it felt like a job, like getting up and going
(18:29):
to work every day, I didn't want to do it
no more so, Um, that was I just I finally
said that was enough for me, and um, it became
a job. And so now now and I got a
normal job and get to race a little bit on
side and have a little bit of fun. I was
actually gonna ask you. You said, you're you're at work,
So what is the day job? I worked at Quick
(18:50):
Car Racing Products. Um, you know, this way it was
I could still be involved in racing. It's all I've
ever really known my whole life. So um, we you know,
we do a gauges and a lot of wiring and
wiring harnesses for late models and modifies and super late
models and drag cars and all sorts of different things
like that. So um, I get I'm getting an education here.
(19:11):
I'm opening my eyes to something other than sprint cars.
So uh, I love my job. I love coming to work.
I never thought I'd say working four hours a week
something I'd love to do. But I actually enjoy coming
to work and do things that are new to me. Yeah,
it's not bad to be able to go home on
a Friday and enjoy a glass of wine or something
(19:31):
with your wife either. That's uh, that's a pretty nice gig.
Once in a while so you've really enjoyed being at home.
So you said, you've been involved in racing all your life.
It's all you really know. Let's go back to the
beginning because uh, I know your mother was I believe
she was secretary of uh of N A r C
back in in the day, back in the nineties. But
(19:52):
even previous to that, what was your first exposure to racing?
What got you here? Well, my grandfather raised mid It's um,
I think he's got involved in it right after World
War Two. I think he started dabbling in in micro's
and midgets and and then he started building quarter midgets.
My mother raised, my uncle Jim raced and you know,
(20:14):
when I'm you know, then my brother turned five years old,
we got quarter midgets. I mean it was just something
we did. And then when I turned five, you know,
I was racing quarter midgets. So, um, like I said,
it was just something that was brought into our lives
that you know that It's just like you know, your
family is a baseball players and that's all you know,
that's all you do. Well, we were racers and that's
(20:36):
all we've ever done our whole lives. So my parents,
my mom is eight up with racing. She lives in
breezes is probably more than I do. But you know,
it's just something that we It was brought into our
lives and at an early age, and I had a
passion for it and I was fortunate enough to make
a living out of it. You just mentioned your brother.
(20:57):
I mentioned him also at the top of the show.
If I'm not mistaken, I think one silver Dollar championship
and oh nine? Uh is he still currently racing? Who's better?
You were your brother? We both have our knacks. Uh,
My brother was pretty good. I learned every you know,
I learned a lot from my brother. He's an older brother,
so I learned a lot from him, and he helped
me along the way when I was when I was young.
(21:19):
But Um, I had the passion to to want to
make it a living. And he had kids in an
earlier age than I did, and UM, so his focus
was more on the family and staying home in racing,
you know, racing, but raising the family at the same time.
And I took the gamble in in nineties six and um,
I just had one child at tom Braden was just born,
(21:40):
and UM took the leap of faith because it's something
I've always wanted to do since ninety eight when I
went to my first World of Outlaw race at West
Capital Race Way, was to run the World of Outlaw.
So I jumped at the opportunity and did it. Um.
But like I said, my brothers, my brother's prete damn
good race car driver just never never really be set
(22:00):
up on your echo dot sorry for help, WiFi isn't
set up on your on your deal there just yea
so um, welcome, welcome a live program. So yeah, my brother,
my brothers just didn't want to do. Um, I didn't
(22:20):
want you to travel. He just wanted to race. He
ran some musack and get some non wing husak um
champ carus. I believe it was back then that was
about his. You know that was only fifteen races or so,
so that was his as much as she really wanted
to travel. Keeping things in the family. How involved is
your son? My son is my um my internet social
(22:44):
media guy. I guess you'd call him. Um. He's he
loves racing, he's ate up with it as much as
the rest of us are. But um, he's actually going
to school to be a school teacher right now. He's
I think he's got a year left to get his
bachelor's degree in teaching for teaching, and he's, uh, he
(23:04):
would love to race. He got the race. I think
he ran about twenty races and sprint car two thousands,
sixteen and seventeen. I think it was I actually wanna
want a wing sprint car race at Antioch Speedway and
I would love to do it, but also understands that
he's probably passed that time to to where to where
(23:25):
he's gonna get the opportunity to do it. Well, that
had to be a special moment for him to win
at Antioch, knowing that that's one of your favorite tracks.
It definitely is. Uh. It was very cool and he
did it with my uncle and my brother was there too,
you know, expose out race and so my brother was
my brother kind of make sure everything was safe and
(23:46):
took care of him and helped him and and top
my hand, Top Branden, you know, everything he needed to
know about a race car. So it was very cool.
It was it was King's Royal Night two thousand seven sixteen.
I think it was I had a horrible Kings Royal.
I was walking from the infield of back up to
my motor home and I get a text from my
brother and says, Braden's leading eight laps to go, and
(24:10):
I I was kind of out of shape, you know,
I thought at the time. But I made it from
the infield to my motor home because at eld Or
you don't get very good. WIFEI signal down in the pit,
so I did a straight run, did my cardio up
the bleachers down to where my motor home was. I
was able to get my wife and my daughter all together,
and my sister in law was doing a FaceTime live,
(24:33):
so I got to watch the last eight laps and
very special moment for us. All that is super cool
as a father watches his son race, I know the
feeling that you're talking about arguably more important than a
win of your own most definitely. UM shut shut a
few tears at night, and every time I think about it,
(24:56):
I'm not shed some more tears. Because for a kid
that ever thought he was ever going to raise a
sprint card to get that opportunity and then uh to
go win a race, and he's a he's a very
he doesn't have a lot of confidence in himself, so
he always downplays everything he ever has done. And um,
you know he's I'm very proud of both my kids,
(25:19):
but Brandon to win a race was was very cool,
awesome stuff. Hey, we're gonna take a quick break here.
We'll be back on the other side with the third
and final segments. Stay with us. This segment of The Skinny.
It's brought to you by Dream Giveaway. Dream Giveaway has
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at dream giveaway dot com. Welcome back to the Skinny.
(26:03):
Paul McMahon on the show with us, and we've covered
a gamut of him starting racing way back in the
day and currently still after it. Unfortunately at Knoxville, I
believe it was it was it. It was hard Knox night.
Was that Friday night? I think it was our Thursday.
It was on a climinary night, so it was Thursday. Night.
(26:23):
Then I think I call you Thursday night, I qualified, So, yeah,
Thursday night I missed. I missed a few days in
between all that that I don't remember, but yeah, it
was Thursday night. There was a big hit with Carson Mausito,
as I recall, and you went. You went for a
bit of a ride, for sure. I'm sure. I'm sure
you've been on a couple throughout your career. You just
don't compete that long in this style of sport and
(26:44):
not do it. But this one, this one banged your
head pretty good. Yeah, I definitely did. Uh when I
don't remember a whole lot about the crash. You know,
they say I got out of the race car real fast.
I mean I've seen videos and everything, but I really
don't remember a lot about Knoxville that that weekend. I remember, um,
(27:05):
you know, talking to my wife a few weeks later
and she's, you know, I guess I was. You know,
I was talking about Tony Stewart. We were talking and
she says, well, you talked to him a Knoxville and
I'm like, yeah, I don't remember that part. You know,
I don't remember talking to him. Chad wise Zeb's dad
and I guess you know, we went for a two
hour drive one day and that's all blank to me also,
(27:29):
so um, yeah, it's it's a little weird, so weird
having those parts of your day's gone. I remember being there,
I remember, you know, being at the race track, but
I don't remember a lot about it. So might maybe
you had a moment this year to where, um, something
that happened on the front straight away and then you
ended up sailing off the front straight away into the
(27:51):
pits and and it hit a push vehicle. Yeah, it
was at the last race of race that that Fremont
track was rough. Everybody's kind of bounced around, and me
at the car, you know, I was trying to get
unerneath the guy he in a home and you know,
kind of shot left and I hit the home and
kind of bounced up and we met in the middle,
and it broke the left front steering arm bolts off.
(28:14):
And when it broke the bolts off, it ripped around
and ripped the brake line off at the same time.
So um, when it when it all gathered back up,
I I, you know, I kind of was heading and
pointing straight, so I got back in the throttle and
and then it turned hard left and um, you know,
no brakes, no steering. I was just kind of along
(28:35):
for the ride and kind of split the flagpoles and
low and behold there was a push cheap sitting right
on the other side of it. Only in the world
of racing, there's you just can't make this stuff up. Um,
you know, you talked about you talked about chasing all
this stuff on the road and how difficult it is.
(28:56):
And I remember my dad racing when I was when
I was a young kid, and I remember all the stories.
They would take the cars apart. He was in carts,
So they take cards apart, and they bring engines inside
the hotel room, and you know, transmissions were rebuilt in
the bathtub, and the stories go on and on and on,
and you guys kind of still live in that world.
And I bring it up because I think a lot
(29:17):
of people don't understand it. I mean, I live here
in Brownsburg and and it's not uncommon to see Casey
Kane's holler inside of the uh inside of the hotel
parking lot, and those guys with all the cars unloaded,
cleaning everything up, making whatever repairs it has to be,
and boom, loaded back up and and take off again.
I think a lot of people envisioning you guys having
this big, beautiful, fancy shop, but that's not the real world,
(29:39):
is it. No. I mean we you know some places,
you know, we have our night we have shops and
have our nice places to go to, but we just
don't get to it very often. Um so yeah, I
spent many days there on the corner at the Comfort
and Sweets there and Brownsbury right behind the Walmart at
making that our shop for for weeks at a time.
So U yeah, we do that everywhere. That's that's nice
(30:02):
thing about our sport is is we're very accessible to people,
so you know, they get see our race cars day
in and day out for the most part. In hotel
parking lots, I mean, we've used hotel parking lots, we've
used lallmart parking lots. If it's raining, we've used the
car washes as cover to to wash our car and
then do our maintenance there because no one's to be
washing the car in the rain. So yeah, we we
(30:24):
gotta we do. We do some odd stuff and uh,
we gotta do whatever we gotta do to make get
maintenance ready to get the cars ready for the next day. Yeah,
that's exactly what I was gonna says. You do whatever
it is you have to do, because, as they say,
the show goes on, and if you're chasing points, I mean,
there's no excuses, So it's just getting it done. And
(30:45):
I think it's such a valuable lesson. You said you
have some some kids that join you on the road.
I'm sure that's happened all along your your career, but
but to teach those young people those valuable lessons of
just how hard you guys work to achieve the goals
that you want to achieve. Is is a lesson that
they could not learn anywhere else now And most definitely
(31:05):
it's um you know, it's something that was I want
to do back when I was young. That's all I
want to do was work on my dad race cars.
And when my brother was race and I was not
able to do that, I wasn't I'm not that I
wouldn't made well, they just wouldn't let me do it
because my dad had a partner at the time, so
the partner did all the work himself. So when I
finally got the opportunity to start working, you know, other
(31:28):
people letting me do things at the races for them,
mount tires and whatnot. I took advantage of it and
and listened and learned and got to learn from some
great mechanics and like Dick Gillespie and Kenny Woodruff and um.
Then I finally one day, I just I said, I
gotta learn more. So I went out on the road
with Johnny Herrera to to run the World of Outlaws
(31:48):
back in uh quit my, I mean, I just got
my first ride that wasn't a family owned race car,
and um quit it to to go race to go
race with Johnny and probably the best thing ivery because
I've met a lot of great people. But I learned
so much from Johnny, from Dignes b from Kenny Woodruff,
(32:08):
Scott Gerkin, you know, just all these guys that I
got to hang out with Dane and day out and
listen and learn. Was it was priceless, great stuff man,
speaking of back in the nineties. Uh And with this
event just around the corner here in fact, I think
I just heard three hundred and sixty four entries for
(32:30):
the Chili Bowl already. I could easy see this being
a record year. And you have had some success here.
I think your first appearance is n but if I
have it down right, two thousand one, you made the
A and and nearly finished in the top five, finished six.
I think, so pretty spectacular run there at the Chili Bowl.
Talk to me about that event. Well, to be honest,
(32:53):
I I my first event was Chili Bowl. I did
not know they had practice on back then. It was
on Tuesday night. So my first midget experience, I drew
my pill, never said one, never started one, and ran
wings my whole life. So I got the green flag
for hot laps and turned one and I destroyed the
(33:17):
guy's race car and turned three. I didn't even get
a half a lap in. That was my first Chili
Bowl experience. Uh and then and then five years later
I was able to go back. Jerry Russell just built
some midgets. Um, Rusty Coon's was working on them. He
built it for Lesofski and and Tony Stewart, and Tony
(33:37):
couldn't race because it was the first year he did
qualified at the Chili Bowl. So um, Jerry kept hammering me,
and finally I was really didn't want to go back
because I mean I literally hurt myself and uh so
finally I told Jerry I'd come to do it, and
I didn't tell him the story about And by the
time I got there for the practice day, I think
(33:59):
about ten people already told Jerry that about my first
experience at Chili Bowl. So Garry was a little nervous,
very very nervous. But UH, and and nobody wanted to
work on the car. I mean, I you know, nobody.
We had all we had Beachler, Tracy Hy and Flasofsky
and me was the four car team. And I was
going on on Friday night, and nobody really worried about
(34:20):
me because during practice I was super slow and it
wasn't comfortable. And come qualifying not I was second quick,
ran fourth in the feature, and I was at the
come Saturday, I was the only guy lost in the
A main, and all of a sudden I had all
sorts of workers on my race car. You gotta earn it, right, Yeah,
(34:41):
that's one race I enjoy going to. UH. I would
like to do it one more time, but I just
don't think that's that's in the cards for me. Yeah. Um,
it's funny too, because you talked about your your uncles
and stuff, you know, starting off and UH, you know,
running midgets. So it's pretty cool because it seemed like
(35:01):
that was in your background, but yet you didn't get
in one right away. You went right to the sprint
car area. Yeah. Well, being in Northern California, the midgets
were more of a Southern California thing down in Ascott Irwindale,
down that way. That's that was, you know, six hours
from from where I grew up in Elk Grove. So um,
the only thing we had we had sprint cars on
(35:22):
the northern in Northern California, so and we didn't have
you know, you had quarter midgets and we had nothing
in between. You had midgets and then sprint cars. I
don't think we had like teach shoes were still Southern California.
The b c r A was kind of hit and miss.
It wasn't doing a whole lot of racing in in
Northern California, and then you had you sat down on
(35:44):
the southern side. So um, it was just basically a
no brainer to go sprint car racing because it was
really the only thing we really had that we could
be the race track within an hour hour and a
half from from home. Put you on the spot here.
I hate it when people ask me these questions, but
it's a it's more enjoyable when you get to ask
the question. Uh, if you could pick out one win
(36:07):
in your career, is there one that stands out more
than the rest? Yeah? Probably just my first outlaw win. Um,
you know, every win special, but to grow up wanting
to to be a World of allaw race car driver
and just because you're traveling up and down the road
with the outlaws doesn't make you, in my opinion, doesn't
(36:27):
make you a World of Outlaw driver until you actually
went a race. So, um, probably that the first one
I did at Sidelia, Missouri back in two tho one
was probably does very special to me. I mean there's
so many the Brad Duty Classic winning that one, um,
you know, my very first win, to my short track
Nationals wins. I mean everyone's special, but um, the one
(36:49):
at Sidelia, Missouri from my first outlaw when I felt
like that solidified myself into being a world Vali race
car driver. Yeah. Is there something that sticks out in
your mind where just the race itself was like so unbelievable.
Maybe slide job after slide job, or two or three
or four of you guys the biggest name in the business,
and you climb out of the car and and you're like,
(37:10):
oh my god, I can't believe we just did what
we did. Yeah, it was it was you know, myndea
was I mean, it was it was. I was very
fortunate that night things went just went my way. But
battling there markkins Are you know, back back then was
driving the mo Park car and probably the the fastest
(37:31):
car in the country at the time, and racing with him,
battling with him, you know, and and to hold him
off for for several laps to get that win was
was very special. And to beat to beat the mo
Park car because the year but two years before that,
I was the I go I would call myself to
(37:52):
test dummy for mo Paro before they actually got their
motors running the way they did from Mark, So that
was very special to me. Yeah, a little redemption there.
I certainly understand it. When you take a look at
your winning record with the World of out Laws. I
mean you certainly your wins far surpass that number of
twenty seven with the World of Outlaws, But when you
(38:14):
look at that, does it make you smile as an
accomplishment or you more along the lines because you guys
are so competitive, it seems like all of our brains
kind of work the same way. But when you see that, hey, man, okay,
twenty seven wins, that's that's pretty awesome. And and by
the way, it is extremely awesome. I mean, there isn't
a person on the planet in the world of racing
(38:35):
that wouldn't acknowledge you as a badass wheelman. You don't
win twenty seven World of Outlaw races and be a
fluke so uh certainly solid, solid driver, no question about it.
Not to mention the cars themselves are just monsters. But
when you look at that, are you do you feel
a sense of accomplishment or do you look at it
and say, man, compared to Kinser or some of these
(38:57):
other guys you know that have an incredible amount of wins.
I mean I I pail in comparison. I mean, I
look at it both ways. I look at it that
you know, I'm very fortunate that I had got the
opportunity to actually go try to win twenty seven races,
let alone win them. Um, But yeah, I mean I
didn't do you know you look back and you say, man,
(39:20):
I I I was a journeyman. I called myself like
I don't even know how to put like, you know,
Mark Martin, Mark Martin won a lot of races, but
Mark Martin never won a championship. Mark Martin never won
Dayton of five hundred. And you know, not that I'm
anywhere close to Mark Martin because he won hundreds and
hundreds of races. But I mean that's the way I
(39:41):
look at is is I've done pretty good in my
in my career, but I could always I'm still I'm
just the guy that was fortunate enough to got the
opportunity to go race because UM, like I tell all
these kids nowadays, don't ever get you better be humble
because there's someone standing standing at the back door wait
to take your job. And um, and there's people out
(40:02):
there that can do your job probably better, they just
have not got the opportunity to see you. Better be humble.
And UM that's just what I've always tried to be.
And that's why I you know, I've always wanted you
always want to do more, but um, sometimes it's just
not in cards. Well, your record certainly stands for itself.
More importantly, your reputation, UH is admirable in in the industry,
(40:25):
and I don't I think I've ever crossed run across
anybody that that didn't speak very highly of you. And
people use you as an example of an ambassador for
the sport. When they use those types of phrases and
those types of words, You've clearly done a great job,
not only inside of the car, but outside of the car.
I think it's a career you should be very proud of. Well,
(40:46):
thank you very much. I mean it means a lot
when people say those things. Uh, you know, I always
tried to I always try to put on a smile
on no matter how my night went, and and I
always looked to to try to better our sport is
I'm only gonna be here for for a small period
of time, and I'm only a small part of the sport,
(41:06):
and so I wanted to be where you know, my son,
my grandkids, you know, his grandkids. I want everybody to
be a part of this and I want to keep
it thriving and healthy for many, many years to come.
And so you know, my grandkids are as fortunate as
I am or I was growing up to get to
go to the races and maybe have the opportunity to
to drive a race car. So uh so, I know
(41:31):
that you'd like to get back on the car, at
least on a limited basis, but we wanted to take
care of yourself. Hopefully those those plants come to fruition
here and you can make that happen. We'd love to
see in you know, at some select events along the way. Yeah.
So I mean, you know, like I said, my health
is first, and and uh, like I've told many people,
(41:51):
if if, if this is the end of my career,
I'm pretty happy I I got to do I got
to race the way I wanted to race. I did
things the way I wanted to do them for myself. Um,
I probably did some dumb things, you know, quit some rides,
and did some things that I probably shouldn't know, but um,
I always did things my way. I didn't bound it.
(42:13):
I didn't you know, I didn't take I didn't take
the crap like you It's like some people have to
to do this and I did things my way. And um,
like I said, if it, if it ends today, I'm
pretty pretty fortunate to being able to do it for
thirty five years and make a living out of it
for seven. So very happy and very honored to be
(42:36):
a part of this sport. Very cool man. We want
to thank you for taking the time here, especially during
the holiday. It's kind of a holiday special here if
you will as when this show will drop. But thank
you for taking the time and sit with us and
talk about your career a little bit. Thank you for
the memories as well. It's it's been an incredible ride
for sure. Well. Thank you in Happy holidays to everybody
(42:56):
out there, and uh, everybody stay safe. See soon, ladies
and gentleman Paul McMahon another edition here of the Skinny.
Thanks for watching, Thanks for being with us here on
the Skinny. This episode has been brought to you by Toyota,
Rhino Classifies, Dream Giveaway and General Tire for the latest
(43:19):
and sunglasses, optical frames, accessories and apparel. Be sure to
check out bathheads dot com. That's bat Heads with a Z.
Production facilities provided by Fatheads I Wear Studios. All rights reserved.
The Skinny with Rico and Kenna is a production of
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(43:40):
visit the i Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever
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The Skinny with Riego and Kenna is a production of
I Heart Radio. I'm Paul McMahon and this is the
Skinny from the bath Heads I Wear Studios in Speedway, Indiana.
This is the Skinny brought to you by Toyota, Rhino, Classified,
General Tire and Dream Giveaway. This segment of The Skinny
(00:24):
is brought to you by Toyota. Welcome, ladies and gentlemen
to another exciting episode of the Skinny. This week, we're
gonna bring a longtime racer onto the show. Currently living
in Nashville, Tennessee. Welcome Paul McMahon. He's competed in World
of Outlaws for a number of years currently, I believe
(00:44):
competing in All Star Circuit of the Champions. Initially started
out on the West Coast where he's from Elk Grove, California.
Visited a lot of tracks out there, had some great
success along with his brother and Uh has also competed
with those wackos over there and Sylvania known as the Posse.
So it's great to have Paul McMahon on the show here.
Welcome my friend. Thanks guys, thanks for having me on
(01:06):
the Sugar Day. Yeah man um Hey, First of off,
before we go any further. Were you guys affected by
those tornadoes down there a week or so ago. No, Unfortunately,
we were not affected it with everything was just a
little bit farther north of us. We had some some
you know, our Christmas lives got blown off the roof
and stuff like that, but not no damage to our home.
(01:28):
So we're very fortunate. Yeah, that's uh, that's really good
to hear. And I don't remember exactly when that was,
but I do remember. I want to say it was
about a year ago. I think it was during the
pandemic time when you guys had that bombing down there
in Nashville. Uh. Pretty sketchy, pretty yeah, Christmas Day. It
was Christmas Day. Yes, so I was feeling like it
was about a year ago. But man, oh man, what
(01:50):
a sketchy deal because I had been down there just
a few weeks before that, staying in one of the
boutique hotels right down there and on the strip, and uh,
my wife and I both looked at it that I
was like, holy smokes, I mean that was really close
to where we were. Yeah, definitely we were. My whole
family was on an airplane heading to Mexico for our
(02:12):
family vacation for Christmas, and we left it. I think
our plane took off at six thirty five and the
bombing was like sixty eight. Um, it was crazy morning once.
When we finally got I think we landed in Houston,
I think it was, and and you know, everybody's grabs
their phones and um, you start hearing all about it.
The crazy story was I just gave my motor home away,
(02:35):
and uh, here I am. You know, we find out
that the guy used a motor home to blow up
the building, and I'm thinking, i just gave my motor
home away. I'm flying to another country. Please that Yeah,
that was a stunk a little bit for sure. Man.
Yeah wow, so um so man, You've had a very
(03:00):
successful career all along the way. And as I look
at you starting off on the West Coast, I'm guessing
you maybe even out there in San Jose was a
half mile. But whenever I look at you competing out
there with the N A. R. C UH and then
coming over and competing with the World of Outlaws, and
(03:21):
you competed with all stars obviously off and on. I
mean going back to oh I think it was oh
One maybe where you rookie of the Year or ninety
nine something like that, ninete Rookie of the Year for
All Stars, UM, and then and then obviously running a
bunch of Pennsylvania stuff. I mean, it's the mecca of
sprint car racing. Can you make a comparison to the
(03:43):
Maybe it's everything's the same, I don't know, But is
there is there a difference competing on the West Coast
versus the world of Outlaws where they go everywhere, the
All Stars staying somewhat regionalized versus Pennsylvania. Do you have
to bring something unique to each one of those elements? Well,
I mean, you know, growing up in California we have
(04:03):
on the West Coast, but we have all short tracks,
so we well we we always had very wet, sticky
and a lot of times rough race tracks, and um,
you know, the Outlaws they always complained, you know when
we when they came out back in you know, back
in the early nineties. Um, that was kind of my
forte was the short track stuff. And then we only
(04:24):
had one half mile in California with with Calistoga that
that the Northern Automation Club raced at. UM we had
another one down at you know, down South but it
was more non wing with Ascott and Paris. But um,
you know it's when you first, you know, when the
outlaws come to your your porch as they call it,
m p A. Um. I was able to run very
(04:47):
well with the outlaws, so I thought, oh hell, this
is easy. I can go round with these guys. And
when I finally got my opportunity, UM, I got out
on the road and down a serious eye opening, got
my got my butt kicked day in and day out,
and off the confidence way down. And um, you know,
racing is the same, but when you're racing with the
rural of outlaws, you gotta take it to the next level. Um.
(05:08):
You know p A Pennsylvanians the same way. You gotta
take it to the next level. Everywhere you go, you
just gotta take it to it next level. But the
World Outlaws is the tentacle of of the next level
and to run with him and be competitive is is
very tough. What if you had to pick out a
couple of things just to give the listeners an idea.
And let's say you know one of those sprint car
(05:30):
racers that has stayed locally to his or her area
and and they think to themselves like you said, I mean,
the World of Outlaws come to town, they enjoy some
success because they're at home and uh they know that
that particular track or two pretty good, and they think, hey, man,
I want to go on the tour with those guys.
I think I could hang much. Like you just said,
what were some of those lessons that you learned or
(05:50):
what is it that makes the World of Outlaws so difficult?
It's just you know, when you race, you know, you
race locally. You know, like when I raced in California,
I raced maybe thirty five to forty races all year long,
and we do thirty forty races by June most of
the time when the World Outlaws back back and then
times you know, we don't get as many now, but
(06:12):
you know, back in in the day, you know, they're
when I first started in the early nineties, was you know,
races was a lot in California. And then when you
come with the Outlaws and these guys are there are
races by June, and they just got so much more
seat time. They see every different type of racetrack conditions,
(06:33):
way race tracks. You know, they're able to read race
tracks better. Is what I think, um, you know, because
they see so many different variables across the country, so
they can always um attribute you know, things to what
you know. This track is sort of like this, This
track used to go this way, and I think they
just you just get a just so much. And it's
(06:54):
a daily job. It's your job day in and day out,
so you live and breathe that where you know when
you raised locally used absolute work mounday to Friday. Yeah,
I um, I remember when we started traveling on national
tour with my son in sports car racing, and you did.
You always had those locals that were good at those
race tracks. But a couple of years in to do
(07:16):
in that it uh, it suddenly is not intimidating that
you're in a new track any longer. It's just figuring
it out. And there's some turn on that track that
is similar to some other turn that you've already been
on another track or in your case, you know, reading
the dirt, anticipating what the dirt's gonna do. All of
those little elements that you guys become so good at.
(07:38):
And as you said, I mean I we all know
nothing replace the seat times, so you know it competing
against somebody that's in the seat two hundred times a
year versus somebody forty fifty times a year. Both of
those numbers huge by the way. Um, for sure, it
is going to give an advantage. But along along with that,
I think of the logistics that it takes to run
(07:59):
up and down the road and compete eighty two a
hundred times a year, getting the parts and pieces that
you need along the way, you're all of that travel.
My goodness, dude, I mean, I've never even come close
to a number like that that they that they run
with World of Outlaws. It's it's just unfathomable to me
(08:19):
how difficult that must be. Yeah, it's um, you know,
it's it's a different lifestyle. It's not for everybody. Um,
it's something that it's a passion you've got to have
and it's a mentality you gotta have to live, you know,
to live out of a suitcase or living at a
motor home and traveling up and down the road is
is it's it's hard. I mean, I raised two kids
(08:41):
in the thirty five ft motor home you know, for
until till the kids till my oldest started school. So um,
It's also that's a cool thing too, because you can
take your kids to around the country with you and
and basically take your kids to work every day. So
you know, you just got to have It's not for everybody, Suddy.
Some people can do it, some people can. I've had
(09:03):
kids that come out on the road with me that
I think that this is what they want to do,
and they get out there and they're out there for
two three months, and then they get homesick because, um,
you don't get home, and you know, the logistics of
getting your parts, you know, ups FedEx they all delivered
to the hotels and we uh we used, you know,
use that a lot to just ship things to whatever hotel.
(09:24):
You just gotta plan ahead of where you're gonna be staying.
But in the same sense, that's what you're doing with
your hotels all year long, is is making the logistics
of make sure you had hotels and what part of
the country. You know, me being from California, when I
first started, logistics, getting home was never very good. So um,
we moved to it, picked up and moved to Indiana,
(09:46):
Indiana area up in northern Indiana, and then uh finally
made our final rest home here in Nashville. Yeah. Why Uh,
certainly Indiana. We hear that all the time, the guys
coming from the West Coast going to Indiana and they're
gonna chase the dream and of the open wheel style format.
What what prompted you to move to Nashville. We have friends, Um,
(10:08):
my wife's best friend in high school is married to um,
a guy that was in the music business. And and
the two brothers there were the Marcy brothers out of Orville, California,
where my wife was from. So we came back and
visited all the time and really really enjoyed Nashville area.
And um, you know, for me, I had to travel
(10:29):
no matter what with racing, so um, this is kind
of where my wife wanted to live. And and so
you know, we just picked up and came to Nashville.
Did It's only five hours too, you know, Indianapolis. I
can get to St. Louis area in five hours. Uh,
Williams Grove in seven, Eldre in six, So it's not
(10:49):
that you know, it's not that far out of the way.
And we got a nice big airport here in Nashville
that that I can fly out of. And like I said,
We're on Highway forty, Highwa sixty and Highway twenty four,
so I can go north southeast to rest. Uh really easy. Yeah,
and very rarely is the high eighteen degrees Yeah, very
(11:10):
very sing Do we get that? But we have had
some uh, we have had some cold winners, but not
very often. Roger that all right, We're gonna take a
quick break here. We have one of the true ambassadors
as a sport here for sprint car raising. On with us.
Paul McMahon will be right back, Stay with us. This
segment of the skinny has been brought to you by
General Tire. It's more than just a slogan anywhere as
(11:32):
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(11:58):
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Rhino dot Com. Once again, welcome back to the Skinny.
We have Paul McMahon on with us this year. He's
been racing since the nineties. Uh, still chasing the dream
here today. Has finished as high as third in the
points in the World of Outlaws on a couple of
(12:41):
different occasions. In fact, inside of the top twenty five
on the all time win list with the World of Outlaws.
And I might throw in there, you're still a couple
ahead of Kyle Larson, So I mean, there there's something there,
you know, at twenty seven wins, and but Kyle did
his in two years. Of course, several I know he is, uh,
(13:03):
he has certainly been spectacular, and we all just knew
he was pretty talented all along the way, of course,
but man, the last couple of years, talk about lighting
the fire underneath somebody. It's been fun to watch for sure. Yeah,
you know, I mean, and me and Kyle were actually
from the same home town there in Elk Grove, California.
Always he gives me a bunch of crap because everybody says,
(13:24):
you know, when they announced everything, I'm from Nashville, Tennessee,
and he bust my ball is pretty good about being
you know, you're from Elk Grove, and um, you know,
I just keep telling him it's one thing anyone to
take away from him. Yeah, that's kind of your so.
Um so you will also spend a lot of time
(13:44):
with your son Brandon. Um do you see him getting
behind the wheel here anytime soon? Full time? You still
you're still gonna chase his dream full time going in.
By the way, I failed to mention the top of
the show, and I should have. How are you after
your incident at Knoxville. I'm I'm I'm better. I'm not
(14:05):
yet my head still, you know, I mean, standing up,
doing things, concentration, I'm I'm pretty good at I stutter
a little bit more than I did before. Um, I
just can't. I can't when I think I know what
I want to say, but I can't put it all
in words at the same time, so it takes me
a minute to do that. But pretty good. Uh. You know,
(14:27):
I just had surgery on my on my hand, um,
from when I got caught in the stairing wheel there
at Knoxville, and a few other little things that that
I need to fix. So I got it all fixed
in one one shot. But I'm doing okay. Um. You know,
I'm I'm fifty one. I banged my head a few times,
so I don't know if I'll ever be right, but
I'm doing all right. Yeah. Well, I mean I suffer
(14:50):
from everything you just mentioned right there, and I don't
remember banging my head anywhere in particular, so I really
struggle putting words together. It's not good in my my occupation.
M um. So so what is the dream going forward?
Do you see yourself back in the seat full time
or part time or are you gonna lay off a
little bit? What's the plan? Yeah, I haven't really, I mean,
(15:12):
I definitely not gonna be back in the seat full time.
That's something I tried to do away with last year
and it just didn't work out. And you know, we
we were going to do a two car team with
c JP Motorsports and Print Mark's was gonna run the
full All Star deal and I was gonna run about
forty to fifty races, and you know the Brent Brent
had his deal and went on to started back to
(15:34):
his own team, and that kind of propelled me into
run in they all start Circuit of Champions again last year,
and something that I really didn't want to do, something
my crew chief and Barry Jackson didn't really want to do.
The crew guys didn't want to do. Nobody wanted to
do it. But it was the right thing to do
for Chad Clemens and c JP Motorsports and because they
(15:57):
they they made it all the negation to the All
Star Circuit Champions and Tony Stewart so uh to have
a car out there. So it was the right thing
to do to put the put me back in the
five and go around the whole All Star deal. But
definitely not not something I want to do, you know,
full time again. I'm getting a little too old to
be up and down the road. I enjoy being at home,
(16:19):
so um, you know, I'd like to do you know,
some thirty races, but I also got to make sure
my health is correct, before I strapped back in to
do a whole lot of racing. Yeah, I read along
the way and you traveled or you chase that world
of Outlaw drained for a while, and we've we've talked
about how many shows that is a year, and you
(16:41):
admitted that you you were, uh, you were burnt out
on the process and it does grind you down and
at the point that it no longer becomes fun. Uh,
it must be h it must be difficult even to
accept that, to know that how excited you were. I'm
sure on day one when you were able to say, hey, man,
(17:02):
I'm gonna make this commitment. I'm gonna chase this all
year long and it's a it's a true dream come true.
And then to be in it and chase it for
a long enough that year burnt out to finally sit
back and look and say, man, this I just don't
know if this is what I want to do anymore.
That's that's got to be a big moment in your life. Yeah,
it was. It was definitely difficult, you know, finally came
(17:24):
to that. I finally had that mentality back in two
thousands seventeen. I just I wasn't having fun. We were
running on the world of Outlaws, and um, you know,
my owner was hurt for a little bit of money.
Um you know, it's kind of strapped for cash, and
um you know, it wasn't financially broke, it was just
not racing rich. So uh, in motorsports, you've got to
(17:45):
be racing rich to be out on the on the
outlaw deal. So I came to the conclusion about I
don't know, it's about September seventeen, and I wasn't having fun,
and the owners still wanted me to keep going. And
but if I kept going, the owner was going to
be out of business. And I didn't want to be
that guy to put an owner out of business. So
we worked some things out with some some younger kids
(18:08):
that had sponsorship behind him, and I was able to
keep the owner into the sport for a few more
years until he finally just his fun meter was pegged
and decided to sell everything. Also. But yeah, I mean
after a while, I just, you know, like I always
always told my wife, when this became a job, like
it felt like a job, like getting up and going
(18:29):
to work every day, I didn't want to do it
no more so, Um, that was I just I finally
said that was enough for me, and um, it became
a job. And so now now and I got a
normal job and get to race a little bit on
side and have a little bit of fun. I was
actually gonna ask you. You said, you're you're at work,
So what is the day job? I worked at Quick
(18:50):
Car Racing Products. Um, you know, this way it was
I could still be involved in racing. It's all I've
ever really known my whole life. So um, we you know,
we do a gauges and a lot of wiring and
wiring harnesses for late models and modifies and super late
models and drag cars and all sorts of different things
like that. So um, I get I'm getting an education here.
(19:11):
I'm opening my eyes to something other than sprint cars.
So uh, I love my job. I love coming to work.
I never thought I'd say working four hours a week
something I'd love to do. But I actually enjoy coming
to work and do things that are new to me. Yeah,
it's not bad to be able to go home on
a Friday and enjoy a glass of wine or something
(19:31):
with your wife either. That's uh, that's a pretty nice gig.
Once in a while so you've really enjoyed being at home.
So you said, you've been involved in racing all your life.
It's all you really know. Let's go back to the
beginning because uh, I know your mother was I believe
she was secretary of uh of N A r C
back in in the day, back in the nineties. But
(19:52):
even previous to that, what was your first exposure to racing?
What got you here? Well, my grandfather raised mid It's um,
I think he's got involved in it right after World
War Two. I think he started dabbling in in micro's
and midgets and and then he started building quarter midgets.
My mother raised, my uncle Jim raced and you know,
(20:14):
when I'm you know, then my brother turned five years old,
we got quarter midgets. I mean it was just something
we did. And then when I turned five, you know,
I was racing quarter midgets. So, um, like I said,
it was just something that was brought into our lives
that you know that It's just like you know, your
family is a baseball players and that's all you know,
that's all you do. Well, we were racers and that's
(20:36):
all we've ever done our whole lives. So my parents,
my mom is eight up with racing. She lives in
breezes is probably more than I do. But you know,
it's just something that we It was brought into our
lives and at an early age, and I had a
passion for it and I was fortunate enough to make
a living out of it. You just mentioned your brother.
(20:57):
I mentioned him also at the top of the show.
If I'm not mistaken, I think one silver Dollar championship
and oh nine? Uh is he still currently racing? Who's better?
You were your brother? We both have our knacks. Uh,
My brother was pretty good. I learned every you know,
I learned a lot from my brother. He's an older brother,
so I learned a lot from him, and he helped
me along the way when I was when I was young.
(21:19):
But Um, I had the passion to to want to
make it a living. And he had kids in an
earlier age than I did, and UM, so his focus
was more on the family and staying home in racing,
you know, racing, but raising the family at the same time.
And I took the gamble in in nineties six and um,
I just had one child at tom Braden was just born,
(21:40):
and UM took the leap of faith because it's something
I've always wanted to do since ninety eight when I
went to my first World of Outlaw race at West
Capital Race Way, was to run the World of Outlaw.
So I jumped at the opportunity and did it. Um.
But like I said, my brothers, my brother's prete damn
good race car driver just never never really be set
(22:00):
up on your echo dot sorry for help, WiFi isn't
set up on your on your deal there just yea
so um, welcome, welcome a live program. So yeah, my brother,
my brothers just didn't want to do. Um, I didn't
(22:20):
want you to travel. He just wanted to race. He
ran some musack and get some non wing husak um
champ carus. I believe it was back then that was
about his. You know that was only fifteen races or so,
so that was his as much as she really wanted
to travel. Keeping things in the family. How involved is
your son? My son is my um my internet social
(22:44):
media guy. I guess you'd call him. Um. He's he
loves racing, he's ate up with it as much as
the rest of us are. But um, he's actually going
to school to be a school teacher right now. He's
I think he's got a year left to get his
bachelor's degree in teaching for teaching, and he's, uh, he
(23:04):
would love to race. He got the race. I think
he ran about twenty races and sprint car two thousands,
sixteen and seventeen. I think it was I actually wanna
want a wing sprint car race at Antioch Speedway and
I would love to do it, but also understands that
he's probably passed that time to to where to where
(23:25):
he's gonna get the opportunity to do it. Well, that
had to be a special moment for him to win
at Antioch, knowing that that's one of your favorite tracks.
It definitely is. Uh. It was very cool and he
did it with my uncle and my brother was there too,
you know, expose out race and so my brother was
my brother kind of make sure everything was safe and
(23:46):
took care of him and helped him and and top
my hand, Top Branden, you know, everything he needed to
know about a race car. So it was very cool.
It was it was King's Royal Night two thousand seven sixteen.
I think it was I had a horrible Kings Royal.
I was walking from the infield of back up to
my motor home and I get a text from my
brother and says, Braden's leading eight laps to go, and
(24:10):
I I was kind of out of shape, you know,
I thought at the time. But I made it from
the infield to my motor home because at eld Or
you don't get very good. WIFEI signal down in the pit,
so I did a straight run, did my cardio up
the bleachers down to where my motor home was. I
was able to get my wife and my daughter all together,
and my sister in law was doing a FaceTime live,
(24:33):
so I got to watch the last eight laps and
very special moment for us. All that is super cool
as a father watches his son race, I know the
feeling that you're talking about arguably more important than a
win of your own most definitely. UM shut shut a
few tears at night, and every time I think about it,
(24:56):
I'm not shed some more tears. Because for a kid
that ever thought he was ever going to raise a
sprint card to get that opportunity and then uh to
go win a race, and he's a he's a very
he doesn't have a lot of confidence in himself, so
he always downplays everything he ever has done. And um,
you know he's I'm very proud of both my kids,
(25:19):
but Brandon to win a race was was very cool,
awesome stuff. Hey, we're gonna take a quick break here.
We'll be back on the other side with the third
and final segments. Stay with us. This segment of The Skinny.
It's brought to you by Dream Giveaway. Dream Giveaway has
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(25:39):
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at dream giveaway dot com. Welcome back to the Skinny.
(26:03):
Paul McMahon on the show with us, and we've covered
a gamut of him starting racing way back in the
day and currently still after it. Unfortunately at Knoxville, I
believe it was it was it. It was hard Knox night.
Was that Friday night? I think it was our Thursday.
It was on a climinary night, so it was Thursday. Night.
(26:23):
Then I think I call you Thursday night, I qualified, So, yeah,
Thursday night I missed. I missed a few days in
between all that that I don't remember, but yeah, it
was Thursday night. There was a big hit with Carson Mausito,
as I recall, and you went. You went for a
bit of a ride, for sure. I'm sure. I'm sure
you've been on a couple throughout your career. You just
don't compete that long in this style of sport and
(26:44):
not do it. But this one, this one banged your
head pretty good. Yeah, I definitely did. Uh when I
don't remember a whole lot about the crash. You know,
they say I got out of the race car real fast.
I mean I've seen videos and everything, but I really
don't remember a lot about Knoxville that that weekend. I remember, um,
(27:05):
you know, talking to my wife a few weeks later
and she's, you know, I guess I was. You know,
I was talking about Tony Stewart. We were talking and
she says, well, you talked to him a Knoxville and
I'm like, yeah, I don't remember that part. You know,
I don't remember talking to him. Chad wise Zeb's dad
and I guess you know, we went for a two
hour drive one day and that's all blank to me also,
(27:29):
so um, yeah, it's it's a little weird, so weird
having those parts of your day's gone. I remember being there,
I remember, you know, being at the race track, but
I don't remember a lot about it. So might maybe
you had a moment this year to where, um, something
that happened on the front straight away and then you
ended up sailing off the front straight away into the
(27:51):
pits and and it hit a push vehicle. Yeah, it
was at the last race of race that that Fremont
track was rough. Everybody's kind of bounced around, and me
at the car, you know, I was trying to get
unerneath the guy he in a home and you know,
kind of shot left and I hit the home and
kind of bounced up and we met in the middle,
and it broke the left front steering arm bolts off.
(28:14):
And when it broke the bolts off, it ripped around
and ripped the brake line off at the same time.
So um, when it when it all gathered back up,
I I, you know, I kind of was heading and
pointing straight, so I got back in the throttle and
and then it turned hard left and um, you know,
no brakes, no steering. I was just kind of along
(28:35):
for the ride and kind of split the flagpoles and
low and behold there was a push cheap sitting right
on the other side of it. Only in the world
of racing, there's you just can't make this stuff up. Um,
you know, you talked about you talked about chasing all
this stuff on the road and how difficult it is.
(28:56):
And I remember my dad racing when I was when
I was a young kid, and I remember all the stories.
They would take the cars apart. He was in carts,
So they take cards apart, and they bring engines inside
the hotel room, and you know, transmissions were rebuilt in
the bathtub, and the stories go on and on and on,
and you guys kind of still live in that world.
And I bring it up because I think a lot
(29:17):
of people don't understand it. I mean, I live here
in Brownsburg and and it's not uncommon to see Casey
Kane's holler inside of the uh inside of the hotel
parking lot, and those guys with all the cars unloaded,
cleaning everything up, making whatever repairs it has to be,
and boom, loaded back up and and take off again.
I think a lot of people envisioning you guys having
this big, beautiful, fancy shop, but that's not the real world,
(29:39):
is it. No. I mean we you know some places,
you know, we have our night we have shops and
have our nice places to go to, but we just
don't get to it very often. Um so yeah, I
spent many days there on the corner at the Comfort
and Sweets there and Brownsbury right behind the Walmart at
making that our shop for for weeks at a time.
So U yeah, we do that everywhere. That's that's nice
(30:02):
thing about our sport is is we're very accessible to people,
so you know, they get see our race cars day
in and day out for the most part. In hotel
parking lots, I mean, we've used hotel parking lots, we've
used lallmart parking lots. If it's raining, we've used the
car washes as cover to to wash our car and
then do our maintenance there because no one's to be
washing the car in the rain. So yeah, we we
(30:24):
gotta we do. We do some odd stuff and uh,
we gotta do whatever we gotta do to make get
maintenance ready to get the cars ready for the next day. Yeah,
that's exactly what I was gonna says. You do whatever
it is you have to do, because, as they say,
the show goes on, and if you're chasing points, I mean,
there's no excuses, So it's just getting it done. And
(30:45):
I think it's such a valuable lesson. You said you
have some some kids that join you on the road.
I'm sure that's happened all along your your career, but
but to teach those young people those valuable lessons of
just how hard you guys work to achieve the goals
that you want to achieve. Is is a lesson that
they could not learn anywhere else now And most definitely
(31:05):
it's um you know, it's something that was I want
to do back when I was young. That's all I
want to do was work on my dad race cars.
And when my brother was race and I was not
able to do that, I wasn't I'm not that I
wouldn't made well, they just wouldn't let me do it
because my dad had a partner at the time, so
the partner did all the work himself. So when I
finally got the opportunity to start working, you know, other
(31:28):
people letting me do things at the races for them,
mount tires and whatnot. I took advantage of it and
and listened and learned and got to learn from some
great mechanics and like Dick Gillespie and Kenny Woodruff and um.
Then I finally one day, I just I said, I
gotta learn more. So I went out on the road
with Johnny Herrera to to run the World of Outlaws
(31:48):
back in uh quit my, I mean, I just got
my first ride that wasn't a family owned race car,
and um quit it to to go race to go
race with Johnny and probably the best thing ivery because
I've met a lot of great people. But I learned
so much from Johnny, from Dignes b from Kenny Woodruff,
(32:08):
Scott Gerkin, you know, just all these guys that I
got to hang out with Dane and day out and
listen and learn. Was it was priceless, great stuff man,
speaking of back in the nineties. Uh And with this
event just around the corner here in fact, I think
I just heard three hundred and sixty four entries for
(32:30):
the Chili Bowl already. I could easy see this being
a record year. And you have had some success here.
I think your first appearance is n but if I
have it down right, two thousand one, you made the
A and and nearly finished in the top five, finished six.
I think, so pretty spectacular run there at the Chili Bowl.
Talk to me about that event. Well, to be honest,
(32:53):
I I my first event was Chili Bowl. I did
not know they had practice on back then. It was
on Tuesday night. So my first midget experience, I drew
my pill, never said one, never started one, and ran
wings my whole life. So I got the green flag
for hot laps and turned one and I destroyed the
(33:17):
guy's race car and turned three. I didn't even get
a half a lap in. That was my first Chili
Bowl experience. Uh and then and then five years later
I was able to go back. Jerry Russell just built
some midgets. Um, Rusty Coon's was working on them. He
built it for Lesofski and and Tony Stewart, and Tony
(33:37):
couldn't race because it was the first year he did
qualified at the Chili Bowl. So um, Jerry kept hammering me,
and finally I was really didn't want to go back
because I mean I literally hurt myself and uh so
finally I told Jerry I'd come to do it, and
I didn't tell him the story about And by the
time I got there for the practice day, I think
(33:59):
about ten people already told Jerry that about my first
experience at Chili Bowl. So Garry was a little nervous,
very very nervous. But UH, and and nobody wanted to
work on the car. I mean, I you know, nobody.
We had all we had Beachler, Tracy Hy and Flasofsky
and me was the four car team. And I was
going on on Friday night, and nobody really worried about
(34:20):
me because during practice I was super slow and it
wasn't comfortable. And come qualifying not I was second quick,
ran fourth in the feature, and I was at the
come Saturday, I was the only guy lost in the
A main, and all of a sudden I had all
sorts of workers on my race car. You gotta earn it, right, Yeah,
(34:41):
that's one race I enjoy going to. UH. I would
like to do it one more time, but I just
don't think that's that's in the cards for me. Yeah. Um,
it's funny too, because you talked about your your uncles
and stuff, you know, starting off and UH, you know,
running midgets. So it's pretty cool because it seemed like
(35:01):
that was in your background, but yet you didn't get
in one right away. You went right to the sprint
car area. Yeah. Well, being in Northern California, the midgets
were more of a Southern California thing down in Ascott Irwindale,
down that way. That's that was, you know, six hours
from from where I grew up in Elk Grove. So um,
the only thing we had we had sprint cars on
(35:22):
the northern in Northern California, so and we didn't have
you know, you had quarter midgets and we had nothing
in between. You had midgets and then sprint cars. I
don't think we had like teach shoes were still Southern California.
The b c r A was kind of hit and miss.
It wasn't doing a whole lot of racing in in
Northern California, and then you had you sat down on
(35:44):
the southern side. So um, it was just basically a
no brainer to go sprint car racing because it was
really the only thing we really had that we could
be the race track within an hour hour and a
half from from home. Put you on the spot here.
I hate it when people ask me these questions, but
it's a it's more enjoyable when you get to ask
the question. Uh, if you could pick out one win
(36:07):
in your career, is there one that stands out more
than the rest? Yeah? Probably just my first outlaw win. Um,
you know, every win special, but to grow up wanting
to to be a World of allaw race car driver
and just because you're traveling up and down the road
with the outlaws doesn't make you, in my opinion, doesn't
(36:27):
make you a World of Outlaw driver until you actually
went a race. So, um, probably that the first one
I did at Sidelia, Missouri back in two tho one
was probably does very special to me. I mean there's
so many the Brad Duty Classic winning that one, um,
you know, my very first win, to my short track
Nationals wins. I mean everyone's special, but um, the one
(36:49):
at Sidelia, Missouri from my first outlaw when I felt
like that solidified myself into being a world Vali race
car driver. Yeah. Is there something that sticks out in
your mind where just the race itself was like so unbelievable.
Maybe slide job after slide job, or two or three
or four of you guys the biggest name in the business,
and you climb out of the car and and you're like,
(37:10):
oh my god, I can't believe we just did what
we did. Yeah, it was it was you know, myndea
was I mean, it was it was. I was very
fortunate that night things went just went my way. But
battling there markkins Are you know, back back then was
driving the mo Park car and probably the the fastest
(37:31):
car in the country at the time, and racing with him,
battling with him, you know, and and to hold him
off for for several laps to get that win was
was very special. And to beat to beat the mo
Park car because the year but two years before that,
I was the I go I would call myself to
(37:52):
test dummy for mo Paro before they actually got their
motors running the way they did from Mark, So that
was very special to me. Yeah, a little redemption there.
I certainly understand it. When you take a look at
your winning record with the World of out Laws. I
mean you certainly your wins far surpass that number of
twenty seven with the World of Outlaws, But when you
(38:14):
look at that, does it make you smile as an
accomplishment or you more along the lines because you guys
are so competitive, it seems like all of our brains
kind of work the same way. But when you see that, hey, man, okay,
twenty seven wins, that's that's pretty awesome. And and by
the way, it is extremely awesome. I mean, there isn't
a person on the planet in the world of racing
(38:35):
that wouldn't acknowledge you as a badass wheelman. You don't
win twenty seven World of Outlaw races and be a
fluke so uh certainly solid, solid driver, no question about it.
Not to mention the cars themselves are just monsters. But
when you look at that, are you do you feel
a sense of accomplishment or do you look at it
and say, man, compared to Kinser or some of these
(38:57):
other guys you know that have an incredible amount of wins.
I mean I I pail in comparison. I mean, I
look at it both ways. I look at it that
you know, I'm very fortunate that I had got the
opportunity to actually go try to win twenty seven races,
let alone win them. Um, But yeah, I mean I
didn't do you know you look back and you say, man,
(39:20):
I I I was a journeyman. I called myself like
I don't even know how to put like, you know,
Mark Martin, Mark Martin won a lot of races, but
Mark Martin never won a championship. Mark Martin never won
Dayton of five hundred. And you know, not that I'm
anywhere close to Mark Martin because he won hundreds and
hundreds of races. But I mean that's the way I
(39:41):
look at is is I've done pretty good in my
in my career, but I could always I'm still I'm
just the guy that was fortunate enough to got the
opportunity to go race because UM, like I tell all
these kids nowadays, don't ever get you better be humble
because there's someone standing standing at the back door wait
to take your job. And um, and there's people out
(40:02):
there that can do your job probably better, they just
have not got the opportunity to see you. Better be humble.
And UM that's just what I've always tried to be.
And that's why I you know, I've always wanted you
always want to do more, but um, sometimes it's just
not in cards. Well, your record certainly stands for itself.
More importantly, your reputation, UH is admirable in in the industry,
(40:25):
and I don't I think I've ever crossed run across
anybody that that didn't speak very highly of you. And
people use you as an example of an ambassador for
the sport. When they use those types of phrases and
those types of words, You've clearly done a great job,
not only inside of the car, but outside of the car.
I think it's a career you should be very proud of. Well,
(40:46):
thank you very much. I mean it means a lot
when people say those things. Uh, you know, I always
tried to I always try to put on a smile
on no matter how my night went, and and I
always looked to to try to better our sport is
I'm only gonna be here for for a small period
of time, and I'm only a small part of the sport,
(41:06):
and so I wanted to be where you know, my son,
my grandkids, you know, his grandkids. I want everybody to
be a part of this and I want to keep
it thriving and healthy for many, many years to come.
And so you know, my grandkids are as fortunate as
I am or I was growing up to get to
go to the races and maybe have the opportunity to
to drive a race car. So uh so, I know
(41:31):
that you'd like to get back on the car, at
least on a limited basis, but we wanted to take
care of yourself. Hopefully those those plants come to fruition
here and you can make that happen. We'd love to
see in you know, at some select events along the way. Yeah.
So I mean, you know, like I said, my health
is first, and and uh, like I've told many people,
(41:51):
if if, if this is the end of my career,
I'm pretty happy I I got to do I got
to race the way I wanted to race. I did
things the way I wanted to do them for myself. Um,
I probably did some dumb things, you know, quit some rides,
and did some things that I probably shouldn't know, but um,
I always did things my way. I didn't bound it.
(42:13):
I didn't you know, I didn't take I didn't take
the crap like you It's like some people have to
to do this and I did things my way. And um,
like I said, if it, if it ends today, I'm
pretty pretty fortunate to being able to do it for
thirty five years and make a living out of it
for seven. So very happy and very honored to be
(42:36):
a part of this sport. Very cool man. We want
to thank you for taking the time here, especially during
the holiday. It's kind of a holiday special here if
you will as when this show will drop. But thank
you for taking the time and sit with us and
talk about your career a little bit. Thank you for
the memories as well. It's it's been an incredible ride
for sure. Well. Thank you in Happy holidays to everybody
(42:56):
out there, and uh, everybody stay safe. See soon, ladies
and gentleman Paul McMahon another edition here of the Skinny.
Thanks for watching, Thanks for being with us here on
the Skinny. This episode has been brought to you by Toyota,
Rhino Classifies, Dream Giveaway and General Tire for the latest
(43:19):
and sunglasses, optical frames, accessories and apparel. Be sure to
check out bathheads dot com. That's bat Heads with a Z.
Production facilities provided by Fatheads I Wear Studios. All rights reserved.
The Skinny with Rico and Kenna is a production of
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(43:40):
visit the i Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever
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