Late to Grid - Grassroots Racing

From F1 Dreams to Automotive Aftermarket Guru

• Bill Snow

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Join Bill from Atomic Auto Sports as he chats with Andrew Markel, Technical Director of Content for Babcock's Media and a lifelong motorsports enthusiast. Andrew shares his incredible journey, from witnessing Formula 1 in Detroit as a child to his current work creating automotive content and his ongoing passion for grassroots racing. Hear about his experiences at the Indy 500, various driver's schools (including the unforgettable Bridgestone Ice Driving Academy!), and his hilarious adventures with old cars and pull-a-parts. Andrew’s story is an inspiration for anyone with a passion for cars and racing!

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Hey, it's Bill, and we are back in the Atomic Auto Sports studio for another episode of the Late to Grid podcast. This is where I share the inspiring stories, from folks just like you that get on track and the grassroots racing motorsports sort of environment. And today I'm joined by Andrew Markel, who has a great racing background, great motorsports background, and a great car background. So Andrew, thanks for being here. Thank you for having me. So you and I met because we were doing some podcasts for the automotive aftermarket. So tell listeners a little bit about what you do day to day. I am the technical director of content for the Automotive Service Group of Babcock's Media, which is import car braking, Front end and Underhood service magazine, along with tech shop. Oh gosh, an entire review has been thrown in there now, so I get to write a lot of content and then get that content into videos, webinars, training stuff and then also a lot of the industry issues that we have coming up here with the technician shortage and, also right to repair gauge on those big ones. I'm so glad there are paths to cross. And after we did, we got connected, we started figured out that, hey, there's this motorsports connection too. So I said, gotta have you on my podcast. And like many of my listeners, you got the racing bug from your father because he took you to an F1 race in Detroit in the early 80s, and you actually brought the ticket in. So what do you remember about that event? I remember it was a Saturday. It was the Saturday only ticket because my dad couldn't afford the, the Sunday only ticket. But, you know, even the price on here, I think it was $15 or maybe $10. And it was probably the best thing, to get ten bucks that ever could happen. Because I got a chance to walk around Detroit. So I got a chance to walk in the, garages that weren't hard floors at the time. I got to walk by the pits my dad was working in the Renaissance for, AC Delco at the time. Oh. So we got to watch the race up there. At least the qualifying for. We watched the Trans-Am race, the formula V, the formula mondial, which was Atlantic at the time when there was like some North American challenge thing going. And it was just a great experience. I mean, I got to see Senna, Mansell, all these drivers that you know, I probably, you know, I didn't I was a kid from Detroit. So yeah great experience. So I guess really quickly did, did the job bring you to Ohio? Yes. Job brought me to Ohio, with Babcock's. I, saw an ad in the Detroit News and, applied, and, I think on the job interview, I said, this job completes me because I realized what I would be doing, with, you know, because before that, I'd been working for magazines. I did automotive engineering stuff. So I've been writing about, you know, polyurethane foams and interiors and wiring and everything else. It was a fun job. But once I realized I get to write to a great audience of automotive technicians and shop owners, it just seemed to click. Because before that, I had worked as a service writer. Drove the shuttle bus. Did it stint as a technician? Sold tires at a Goodyear dealership, and that put me through college. Yeah, and it was great. But from there, it just, you know, sort of took off. I got that job, and, you know, it got me some exposure. But then, you know, that company went out of business, and Babcock's took me on. And it was a great experience, and it's constantly grown. Every year is different there. Oh, yeah. As our industry changes and our industry being, you know, the automotive aftermarket, there's always something new. There's a new technology, there's a new way to train, there's a new way to lead and manage a team. So you I mean, you're creating content crazy amounts and distributing it out. So we're we appreciate that. I think I have close to 400 videos on YouTube now. Oh my gosh. Between the different things and their short videos on something technical, so but it's been, just a changing career. Yeah. So let's go back to, getting to some races. So then you and your father attend a couple Indy 500, right? We did the spin to win 85 and then 86 when, Ray Hall won. And, you know, that's another thing. Those tickets were supplied to him by otk. Ottawa and Tool Company back in the day. And we were very lucky to sit, you know, right on the main street and watch some of the greatest racing. I mean, I was there for the last year, the old Gasoline Alley to see Mario and A.J. walking around and, you know, I'll never, ever forget that. But the seats were great. I was a short little guy, so I really didn't see too much of the race because we were on the main street. Best memory from that race was when, Mo, Emerson Fittipaldi comes in retiring about. Yeah, three quarters of a race through retiring because he just made this great run up like ten spots at the end there and just the crowd coming alive and cheering this guy on, it's like, yeah, okay, this is awesome. Yeah. It gives you goosebumps when you go any time you walk into the Indianapolis Motor Speedway. When was it that you realize that you got bit by the racing bug? But I think all throughout my youth, because, you know, I was just constantly consuming, magazines, road and track reading and, you know, that that's probably what really got me going is just reading all these great road and track the books. You know, you brought up, Mark Donny's book. That was a great book to learn about physics, inertia, role centers and everything else. So it was a great book. And, you know, that's kind of what got me through college was just learning and learning. Learning more. I think that's the beauty of racing, though. Yeah. So in 2002, you did your first driver's school at Nelson Ledges in a Datsun 610, 610 now. All right. What led to that? What what why did you sign up? How did you sign up? How did you even hear about it? A great guy, Bob Roberts. I work with him at Babcock's. At the time, he was a our head of our research department, and I was this, you know, horrible, associate editor there. And, I got to hang out at his, thing over in, that year that the spot is over in, Copley. But he had a garage there called the Mazda matic, and he rebuilt rotary engines. He was the only one to do this. I think he got, retired from Firestone, early retirement and then created this business because he saw no one was going to rebuild a rotary engine. So he set that up and, took off from there, and he was, you know, it was a nice crowd to get, introduced to. I mean, like Gary Martz from, he did production R-7, doc salesman. He was another guy who was, there, you know, he was building a Mazda Rx7. Mike was a GT. You, I did the brake lines in that, so that was fun. But then, you know, with this car, it was, it was an interesting vehicle because it had seen better days. It was built by a company in Pennsylvania called Datsun Dynamics. I had the full actually has two logbooks in it of the races that it ran. Wow. Do you still have the car? Still have the car? Looking to I've got to redo the cage. Goal is to get it on the track next year. Not as me as the driver. Okay, I'm kind of getting away from that. And maybe, you know, I'm going to be the team owner. I want to be the Colin Chapman, the, Carl Haas, or, you know, I think that there's a lot of fun in that, but still, you know, at the racetrack. Yeah. So I'm not the best driver, I'll be honest with you. I can do some good laps and I've done my laps. But, you know, there's guys out there who deserve a their chance behind the wheel to get them addicted. Like, I became addicted. So sort of the Bob Roberts effect. Yeah, I'll call it that. Well, in motorsports you have the entire journey of, you know, for you is going to an F1 race and then eventually getting on track, but at some point we no longer are behind the wheel because we find joy in other areas. And we love seeing the joy that other people maybe have behind the wheel. So that that's really cool. You're a car guy through and through. Yeah. I mean, you eat, sleep and breathe it literally each day. Does that make it easy for you to be have a hobby? And in motorsports, or does it make it more difficult? It does, in some ways make it more difficult, sometimes a little bit more easier, because you know all the ins and outs of where to buy cars and to just do different things. It is, it is sort of a burden knowing, you know, more than you should you I and I think early on and like a motorsports thing, you get kind of like stuck like, oh it's got to be perfect. The car's got to be perfect. It's got to show up on this type of trailer. At the racetrack. It's got to look this way, that way, that way. I got to have this brand of belts in there. I've got to have, you know, this brand of tire. I've got to have Hoosiers versus Toyotas versus, you know, a street tire. And I think that early on in your career, you try to make that perfect car and shop, you know, driving into the gates of Nelson Ledges and everything else. You know, you think you're just, you know, this is just the way to go. But the reality of it is, is once you get there, you know, there's a guy who has the U-Haul, a tow bar and everything else. And, you know, you know, just get to the track. Yeah. I think early on in your career, I think, you know, you overthink it. You know, I've been to Formula One races. Oh, this is what Max Verstappen uses in, you know, separate that go down to like Barberton Speedway or one of these, you know, Lake County Speedway and you know, buy that extra little pass on top of your ticket to go into the past and see what drivers really do. Yeah. And then you'll sort of change your whole thing and go to a race. Bob got me involved with, corner working. That is a low buck. I mean, I think you all you need is your SCCA membership. Correct? Actually, you can. You probably have just a weekend membership. Yeah, just to give it a try and, show up at the track and you get to see a lot and you really get to kind of feel, you know, what's going on. It's like, I didn't really understand the kink and Nelson lounges, like back in like early 2000, until I went out to that corner and talked to the corner worker. He says, okay, this is the most interesting corner out here. And this is before they repaved it and did some weird things to it. You had those drivers who would see the kink and lift and that would transfer weight on the front. The rear end would go out in, you're in those cattails off to the side. But then when you had that driver who kept it flat and planted all the way through, hit the apex, slid it out to the end, and then came back in for that. That was a drug that is the best drug you could ever have in the world because you learned that, okay, I it goes against your instincts to stay in it. And you go in there and you make it through, it slides out, catches that edge you make come back and you phenomenal feeling. I mean, nothing ever tops that. Yeah. I mean you know what? I have a I have a problem with the kink. Maybe I should go work a corner for a weekend and just watch it, you know that, I forget what station is. It's station 11 and Nelson, but work that corner and you will see the drivers who are truly quick through that corner. I mean, you can do a flat now. But like back in the day. It was the visual line and everything else. And then you're looking at the different stations and you know it was truly one of those things of like deciding on the gas. And you did so much better. Yeah. And trusting the car, that's a big thing. Just having that trust. Yeah. So you've been able to do nine different driver schools I think and get get on track. And those came the different ways. What's the most interesting way one of those came to you? A lot of it came about through sponsorships. So you'll have Timken. Course. They sponsor a lot of stuff over at the Mid-Ohio school, and they get a certain number of seats throughout the year that they can give to their executives or whoever. You know, I got in on I think I've been to that school four times, and I love that school because of the instructors. You know, you've got Tommy Byrne of ex-Formula one guy. Yeah. I mean, if you ever read his book, it's phenomenal. And there's like a the documentary on that, Calvin Fitch, a guy who, like, beat Senna in some of the F3 races back in the day. Brian Harrington and, you know, there's other, you know, Formula One drivers, that formula one but IndyCar drivers there that you can learn a lot from. And then I did the Bond Road School. Okay. That was in 2001. Got to meet Bob. Phenomenal experience out there in Arizona. I've done the road Atlanta school back in. That was like 99. So that was another press junket. Let's just call it that way. Yeah. I've done the Bridgestone Ice Driving Academy out in Steamboat Springs, which is probably the most fun school you can do. All right. Walk us through that school. What made it so fun? So what they do, it's only through about I want to say December through March. They had the school and it's in this prairie area. And what they do is they let the snow fall, and then they cut a track into it, and then they send water trucks out. They create this huge patch of ice. There's different turns that are off camber, you know, decreasing radius. And you learn how to drive on ice and, you know, that they had BlizzCon, the cars, but then you had this option to turn off ABS and, you know, really have some fun, had some fun because it taught you that car control, he taught you to be smooth because, you know, when you really start upsetting that car in a corner, you know, you lost it. You know, I've done this year schools. One of the most interesting ones was the Frank Holley, dragster experience. Wow. That's another. You took that down the track. I took that down the track. What's that like? We only did the eighth of a mile. Basically, you get in the car and they tell you, do not pedal the car, do not pedal to this car, because what you do upsets the chassis. And chances are you're going to lose it, so you got to stay in it. And it's a big block, Chevy motor on alcohol and just staying in it, doing your burnout, doing it. And when you let off that line, you actually see that tunnel vision come in, really. And the shaking. And I would never do it again. But it was a real experience just to be able to do that. And, why not do it again? I don't know, it was so violent. It really just like, I mean, I've tried drag racing before. I'm not a drag racing guy. I don't I don't understand the whole I've done the Dragway 42 test in two days. I did those with the Fiat and it, it was fun. But it you know it those schools are just I've been very, very blessed as far as being able to go to these schools at a very little money out of my pocket, so. Well, at least you had the opportunity to do it. Yeah, definitely. That's fun. So think about all those driving schools you did and your SCCA, competition license school. What's the best advice you received? Best advice I received got it was my driver, Joel, at, Bonner. And he says you're not a very good driver. No, but the best advice I ever received was from an instructor. I think it might have been at one of the, middle high schools. She says just concentrate on being smooth. There's far too many people out there being very violent with application of the gas application, the brake, turning the wheel, he says, look at some of the great drivers. They're smooth, Mark on you. You wouldn't even know he was going that fast compared to the other drivers out there. I mean, you had, you know, same way with like Jill's value. He look fast, but he really wasn't that fast because he wasn't that smooth. He was just more aggressive in some ways. But yeah, be smooth. That's the most important thing. All right. Yuri, somehow old cars find you, right? And I was on your Instagram the other day, and there's this 1982 New Yorker. Yes. So my parents had one of those. Okay, I can remember some family vacations, traveling in that big old car. Do you still have that New Yorker? Oh, this is a funny story about that car. I bought that from a tech ad. Kind of try. Remember van's tires? He was moving out to go to Arizona. This is back in February this year. Okay. And I saw a pop up on my Facebook marketplace. I'm like, okay, you know, it was one of those ones, you know, it was like 1500 bucks. And they're like these runs, you know, I got to talk to him. I'm assuming this is gonna be a great car. Bought it, and, drove it for about 4 or 5 months until the transmission blew up. So it was one of those, you know, the Chrysler 270, where it's like missing reverse. And then eventually I lost part of the pump and everything. But it all happened on I-77, so I'm going down that and, you know, I get to I was going down to Cannes for some reason. So I drove my car. I was like a second pull apart. Sells cars now. And at the time I, you know, I've got like four car, 4 or 5 cars, you know, in my stash. I said, I can't have another junk car that's going to die. I'm just going to drive it to pull apart, traded in and I bought it was the greatest deal ever. This Lexus, Jaguar, Cadillac dealerships cannot top this. We pull apart. I drove in with that 1982 Chrysler New Yorker. Parked it on the ramp. They waited, gave me a certain amount of money for it. And then I went over there, used car lot and by another car. I was off of that lot in 40 minutes with a. Yeah, 45 day plate on the back. Good to go. Drove up 77 and realized that the oil pan had a hole in it. Fix it. Okay. All right, so you're able to finish your drive. Yeah. And, you know, I'm driving that, you know, this Mitsubishi today? It's a 99 Mitsubishi, 167,000 miles. I see that it has Bluetooth strut tower strut towers on it because they're all rusted out. They, But it's probably, you know, I'm kind of think this should be a series. So, like, out of pocket was 400 bucks after I traded the car and got a new one and and the car has been great. Maybe this is like a race series where we race across from, like, Ohio to Florida, and you go pull apart the pull apart to see who can get the best deals. Yes, I like this. So when this Mitsubishi dies, I think you have to go back to pull apart. I, I may do that or I'm kind of looking at Corvette C4'S. I'm kind of going in this whole GM phase, kind of like Atlanta or Buick Riada. Okay. So. Wow, you're a glutton for punishment. I mean, I did the Fiero thing, so did you really? That was my period to ride. Oh my gosh. Yeah, yeah. But, you know, I figure let's have fun with it. Let's. Yeah, I think I may do the pull part thing. I just depends on what they have at the time. But this could be a pretty cool series. So unfortunately, you didn't have a video crew with you and the New Yorker trade. And maybe, as you know, the Mitsubishi starting to die. Maybe you always travel with a video crew just in case. An interesting. Yeah. Hey. Oh. I'm done. We got to find the nearest pull apart. Let's pull in. Let's bring to find out the next thing. You drive it. This could be something. It's probably the best thing. It's probably the best car guy. Litmus test. If you pull up to a light and they're looking at your car, what the hell's wrong with this guy? And then they see on the back it's that little two inch by four inch sticker on the back, their inventory tag. I've left my gun. Oh, beautiful. So you know, it's from pull apart. Yeah. That way when you go give it back and they don't have to create a new one. Yep. Put it right on the line. Oh that's great. What other old cars have come your way that, you kind of nursed along? I still have a 1967, Rambler American. 220, which we drove in the Big Apple to the Big Easy rally. So this was something in 2006, you started off on Staten Island, New York, and it was a $300 car. I paid a little bit more, so I kind of fudged the numbers there. And the more you broke down and the more sympathy you got from your other competitors, the more points you got. It kind of sprang from a European thing called, home to Rome. So they would go London to Rome, and in the UK you can buy some of those really like crappy cars. You have a cinnamon like Top Gear, you know, they buy like a Volvo for 300 bucks. This was the US version of it. Understood. So this, 67 Rambler bought it down in Navarre. I am the third owner. It just gorgeous car. I mean, actually pretty rusty, you know, for 600 bucks, I got my money's worth. So three on the tree, manual brakes. And we drove that thing. We first started off in Akron. We drove to New York City, and then we drove down to New Orleans, and it was quite the best experience. I mean, it was myself, my dad, and, one of our coworkers, Brendan Baker, he used to, he still in, passports business. He works for them. But he is sort of like another guy who got me into a lot of different motorsports, especially go karting. Sometimes I crew for him, sometimes over at that, Beaver Run. Oh, it's called Beaver Run. Yeah. Okay, so, we did that, and we did. I took that thing down the tail. The dragon. What? Yeah, I had him driving. And this is for, like, the team ownership thing. He is a great. He's an old Skip barber instructor, and he is a really good driver as far as weight transfer. He was doing this weird thing where he would, you know, let off the gas, suddenly load up the right front and then load up the rear and then just kick the tail out and around some of those corners. And it was just like, there's no way I could have done that. Yeah. And he had like full confidence over the steering and everything else. I was driving the tail of the Dragon, and I was just kind of like, even though I'm a mechanic and I know when something's mechanically wrong with the car. So this thing had like an either arm that was just a little off and, you know, it was just like white knuckling it the whole time, you know? Yeah. And he was just like, doing this weird shifting thing. And it was just like blazing it. So that car is I still in that car? It needs a clutch. So working on that too. Yeah. You have a lot of things you're working on. Oh, yeah. But you know that that story, you know, loose idle arm or a little bit of play, as we might say, in the industry, the what we do to cars and how they survive to me is amazing. I mean, I think about some of the endurance racing that you do. And, you know, we throw old neons on now, we've made sure all the bearings are good and everything's nice and tight. But to put a car through seven, eight, 14, 24 hours of racing and it's still good to go. To me, it's just it blows my mind how. And we're talking old cars. Imagine what today's cars could do. Yeah. If you if they don't have any problems with the modules, the ABS, you don't get them. You know, the automatic emergency braking. Yeah. I mean, modern cars, they're you're going to be able to go out there. I mean, I don't know why showroom stock isn't big. Again, as if these cars are pretty, pretty high performance, even for something that, you know, was considered a compact. Oh, for sure. So what project do you have in your garage right now that has you most excited? The, the Abarth. I have a Fiat 500 Abarth, redoing the multi-layer on that right now and also doing a little bit bigger turbocharger, which I'm still waiting in the mail for right now. That one will be my next project to get that going. That has been it's that was my covet project. That was, so it's got, you know, the Wilwood brake kit I tuned the engine was probably the biggest mistake I ever did in my life. So I'm going with the bigger turbo. Bigger injectors. I switched over to E85. Wow. And then, Yeah. Try to get through each heck. Impossible. So I've kind of, you know, worked on that car to get it through, but that's in my bay right now. Looking at Corvette C4. So there's a lot of I, but the Abarth is probably the top one on there. Oh, and also a fuel pump on my Jaguar x ray. What year? Actually, 2004. All right. Very nice. So the aluminum one, I was gonna say, actually, those are the aluminum ones. Yeah. Nice and light. So it's been, you know, I've, I just my project car's a real asset, you know, just the amount of cars I have, and probably about 1 or 1 and a half is earning right now. So. Yeah, that's that's great. So let's go back to a little bit of motorsport stuff. So you don't necessarily have the desire to be behind the wheel necessarily. But as you look to the future maybe 2025 2026, what's Andrew's involvement in motorsports? What tracks or events do you want to get to? Want to do some more dragway 42 testing tunes? I think that that is, for the money, a lot of fun. And that's where they're using the infield roads and everything. No. Oh, just the drag strip, the dragster. Okay. I mean, you learn a lot. I mean, just the etiquette. You see different cars out there. That's a lot of fun. I would like to do a couple, attract a either at, Nelson Ledges or, it's not called pit race. I call it PR. Yeah, right. Yeah. So that that's there for that. Which car for those track days? I'm probably gonna do the baths at first. Yeah, get myself out there. But getting this starts and up and running, I got to do the cage. I should rebuild the engine because it's kind of all week right now. And there's a couple of modified parts that I couldn't run, an ATV that I can run in some of the series, like Champ Car, or I may even do LeMans with this car. And then, yeah, one endurance race. So, it's a little ambitious. But. Yeah. Put the team together. Yeah, it's been interesting. I come to realize, you know, I had a condition with my heart. AFib. Oh, and it's getting corrected in December, and it that kind of took me out from behind the wheel. Yeah, a little bit there. Okay. At least on some of the competitive stuff. So but that's getting corrected in December hopefully. And so I can get my full sign up from SCCA, with my doctor. So that's always been a, a tough thing. So but I want to get for out behind the wheel. I think it's more fun sometimes to manage a team. I mean, it's to put a car together, watch someone get excited about motorsports. I think there's more fun or joy in that than there is actually going out there and doing some of your own laps. Yeah. So in our we have a race team with Ray there and we do Champ Car. And to your point exactly. You know there'll be weekends I don't race and the team will be like, no, this is why we do this for you to race. I'm I'm really enjoying sitting on the pit box and calling strategy or watching the excitement of the drivers and seeing the competition. It. I had a guest on and I referred him often, seven kids who talked about finding the joy in motorsports because it's different for everybody. Someone might enjoy the engineering, might enjoy the leadership management side of it, or being behind the wheel. But as long as we find that joy, then we're going to be happy having a great time in the sport. Yeah, I mean, knowing the role, I mean, I'm not. This may sound like a kind of a little bit of a negative story, but, you know, back in the early 2000, you know, there were all these stories about SCCA driver dies at racetrack, and it was typically a guy who was over 65 or, you know, he was racing and he had a heart attack pulls off the side of the course and does his buckles and boom, they find him in the car dead. You know, I have to ask, you know what? If you had someone, a kid in that car, what if you gave someone a chance in that car? I'm mean, you know. Yeah. That's awesome. You died racing. Yeah, but you're going to be remembered more and in a better light. If you gave this guy a career, got this guy going, and you're going to make friends and that's sort of like, you know, with my heart condition. Yeah, I was thinking about that almost like, you know, I watch one guy. Nelson, just do it. You know, he ran into, who was the the one guy off the grid. He hit that little mound there before he pull in the pit lane. Oh, yeah. But. And then you heard the guy of Canada and everything else seems like. Okay, maybe I shouldn't have been behind the wheel, so. Right. So you work for an automotive focused company. Are you pulling any of those folks into your endurance race team? Now and then? Yeah. I mean, I have some nice relationships in the industry to get parts. But I think, you know, once you get into the whole marketing aspect of, like, a team that you're going out to have fun with, then you start to get, you know, lines crossed and you're more worried about, oh, do I have this Toyota sticker in the right position? Am I wearing the Toyo hat? Am I wearing the, the Toyo patch in the right area? That that's what this picture was for the Toyo folks to sponsor. Oh, no. I'll get them in there now and then. It's nice for the discounts. I mean, and it's great for the advice. That's probably been the greatest thing to, you know, call upon this, the Bosch engineers and say, hey, what about this and this and try this injector this way. That's been absolutely great. I would say the knowledge base that I'm able to access with my job is a lot more valuable than if I got free tires, a free engine or stuff like that. I think that that car, I would say it ruins the purity of racing, but I try to keep my business and pleasure and two different areas. Yeah. Are going to be at Sema. You're going to be in the next week. All right. On Thursday, wandering around mostly apex, doing a lot of Joe's garage stuff, down on that first floor. It's kind of neat, just, you know, that's going to be. We've got ten days with air exhaust extraction lifts. Yeah. So it's going to be a nice, nice week of training for me. Awesome. When you need to go and learn something on the motorsport side. So you're talking about doing this work to the Fiat and you got to do the work on the Jag. Where are you going to learn about that or research that? Yeah, there are forums and groups out there, but not so good. I like reading, yeah, I still have Fred Boone's book. You know how to make your car handle? That is, you know, still a good resource for me. I like old car manuals. The Haynes and the Chilton's shortened the old ones. That 82 Chrysler like. One of the first things I ordered when I picked it up was a factory service manual. Thing is gorgeous. It's, you know, it's got illustrations. You know, all the fluid diagrams for the transmission are in there and they're in color and all the illustrations are well done. So that's, you know, always service manuals. Look it up. Engineering wise. There are a couple resources like race car engineering. I like to do the, look at even the back issues. I saved up those, yeah. I just, I don't know, it's tough to I, I mainly work on production stuff, but some of the motorsport stuff, I'll read some of the articles and figure out, you know, a lot of the stuff that's going wrong. But yeah, it's all chassis set up. That's always been fun. So a lot of my listeners are just getting started in the sport. They're dipping their toe in. Maybe they're doing nothing. The autocross. Autocross to track days. What advice would you give to someone that wanted to get started in grassroots racing? Just get out there. Don't be afraid. Don't think the people are judging you by your equipment, your car or anything else because chances are they're facing the same struggles you are. I think a lot of, people out there, they sort of they're afraid to go to the racetrack, you know, they're afraid that their equipment may not be. You know, up to snuff if they don't have the right, you know, exhaust system on the car, just get out there and have fun. It doesn't matter if you have the stickiest tires, you know, just it's. I was just thinking about this. There's no such thing as the perfect car, the perfect driver. There's just the perfect lap. And the only way you're going to get the perfect lap. It's not with the perfect car or the perfect driver. It's like going out there and getting that experience and making sure that you complete that lap. Because when you get like three laps and five laps and you get this rhythm. I mean, that's why I love Nelson Lunges. It's it's a good rhythm. Course. Just get out there and you know, people aren't going to judge you, on your equipment. And then and those people, chances are they're not going to be there the next weekend. No. But yeah, don't. And the people who see your equipment, you know, they, they're in the same boat and they're probably even going to help you. Yeah. I mean, it was funny. I was sitting in the, the, the paddock of Beaver Run, and, you know, I had my set up and everything else. I had my boxes of parts, and I, you know, this guy with a, Atlantic cart comes up to me and says, hey, do you got this? And fitting that goes from this, back to this, this and this, like, I track. Yeah. And like I did and I helped the guy out and it's like, that's the fun part of it. And like, they helped me out with some of the tire stuff and but it is the the paddock is a great community because and we're having this conversation at Nelson Ledges this past weekend, everybody wants to help one another because it's no fun to go out and race with just 1 or 2 cars. The more people we get in, the more people we help. The bigger the sport grows, the more fun we're going to have. People will give away their secrets. Hey, what gear ratio you run and what tire pressures you're running. Hey, what fluids do you run in this? Or, you know, we're all willing to help one another? I heard something, actually, today I was listening to a podcast I'm going to butcher with the, the podcast I was talking about, but it was basically, there's never going to be a perfect time if you're waiting for the perfect time when the kids are done with the sports, or I'm done with this big project, or let me wait until this happens, never going to happen. And to your point, Andrew, you just gotta sign up and go out and do it. And I think on some drivers test there should be a sense of humor section, the ability to laugh at yourself and do some self-deprecating humor, you know, things that have, you know, happening. Laugh at yourself. People who take it too seriously. Yeah. They don't stay around too long. I mean, if you see someone like angry yelling at their kids, if the kid's racing or something in the pits, that shouldn't be like that. Laugh, right? Fun. Yeah, I mean, I, I sit there, I laugh every day that I'm driving a $400 car I bought out of a junkyard. And it's like, every day is like a Top Gear episode for me. That's awesome. You know, laugh at yourself. I mean, if you ever want to see, like, a funny guy, like, back from the the 60s, was Oscar Kozlowski. He was a Polish guy, and he used to have fun at these races. Races. He did Can-Am. He was a Porsche dealer too at the time. From what I understand. But you go in there and you say you claim the pole because his Porsche, that's what he was always on pole position. Oh, that's funny, but he, you know, he knew how to laugh at it. And that's probably the best people I've ever run into the track that, you know, they laugh, that you know, that they love to lug nuts off for three lug nuts. Oh, he I was like, I learn something from that. Because if you can laugh at yourself, you can learn from it too. But people who take it a little too seriously. Yeah, yeah. No, it takes the fun out of it. Oh, yeah. Think back to those racing days. What was something you always forgot to take with you to the track? Water. Oh, yeah. That's probably the most important thing. And then you're stuck buying it for, the, the that the the trailer that's selling water or you're drinking it out of a hose in the shed? Yes. And you hope it's water? Yeah. Especially Nelson lunches. So thanks. So close to the bathrooms. But, yeah, that's probably the most important thing. Is water. Food, gallons of gas to make sure that, you know, you're not stuck between that session, like. Oh, crap. I only have two gallons left, you know? And then you're, like, running to that gas station. That may be like 5 or 6 miles away and then back. So I've been there, done that. I have just a couple more questions before we get to those. Is there anything we didn't talk about that you're hoping we would have? No. I'm good. All right. This is fun. So if somebody wants to learn more about you and what you're doing and your projects and and the upcoming racing, how do they connect with you? Breaking front end.com and, go to Babcock's. I'll just say it that way. But there's breaking front end.com and the social medias for those or down at the bottom of the page you can follow through there. So on some of the projects we have coming up, I also view the videos. I'm also going to, you know, mention this podcast in there. Today, but, you know, that's probably the best way to get Ahold of me, is through my social medias. And the other thing I kind of believe in, you know, this is I be working at a shop. Yeah, I always pick up the phone. So if you call(330) 670-1234, extension 296, you know, if I'm sleeping. Yeah, I probably won't pick up the phone. But if it's during the workday, I was always educated to pick up the phone. So young, old, whoever. Just, (330) 670-1234 extension 296. And I was talking to my shop owner. I don't even look at the who was, on the other end of the line. Just answer it. Yeah. You never know who's going to be there. What opportunity could be there. Yeah, it could be Canarsie calling and saying, hey, I heard you want to do a team. Let's not compete. Come on, join me. Yeah, okay. That would be nice. Can ask money. It's not Penske money, but it's Ganassi money, right? All right, so we've come to the final question. Yeah. Have you ever been late to grid? Yes. All right. Is there a story you can share? There's a story I can share. It's actually this picture right here. Okay, so we were actually getting hassled. This is a national race, and this is the Friday practice day. And I pull up, you know, the marshals are there and everything else. It says you can't have a regional car and a national race. I mean, you know, this does not know I have the entry form. Everything else, I bet it I said, okay, let me go back. So I went over the, I had to go back to my pad. I found my electrical tape. So instead of ITP, I put it pride on the side of it to just to get me on the track. And it was it was a fun, fun day. I mean, that's Friday. Another tip is, you know, do that Friday or Saturday practice session at a national or something to track that you want to go to. Chances are the organizers are going to let you race for just that one day practice as a track day. But yeah, that was being late to grid when I had to turn an ITP car into an upright car and all you change was the lettering on the side. Yeah. Was red electrical tape. Yeah, I did see the little X out there ITV. So yeah, that was my late to grid view. And I was driving a regional car at a national race. Well at least you were there. That's the most important thing. Yeah. Well Andrew was great having you on the podcast. Remy. Bill. Yeah. Thanks for sharing your story. Cool. Thanks.