How a Bet Built Three Balls Racing | Ken Grulich’s Track Day Journey

How does a bet between friends turn into one of the Midwest’s best-known track day organizations?

In this episode of Late To Grid, Bill sits down in the Atomic Autosports studio with Ken Grulich of Three Balls Racing to talk about his motorsports journey, the origin of Three Balls Racing, and what drivers can do to make their next track day smoother, safer, and a whole lot more fun.

Ken shares how his love for speed started with his dad, sand dunes, motorcycles, quads, and three-wheelers before eventually leading him to road course driving. What started as a challenge between friends involving a 1989 Porsche 911 Turbo, a 1969 big block Corvette, and a track rental at Gingerman Raceway  grew into a grassroots track day organization that now hosts events at tracks like Gingerman Raceway, Grattan Raceway, Waterford Hills, and Mid-Ohio.

This conversation is packed with advice for new and experienced drivers, including why you should talk to people in the paddock, why video can make you faster, why showing up late to a track day can ruin more than your schedule, and what tools and spares you should bring before your next HPDE or track day.

Ken also shares one of the wildest bucket-list stories from a Three Balls Racing event and explains why comfort, confidence, seat position, preparation, and community matter just as much as horsepower.

If you’re interested in motorsports, track days, HPDE, grassroots racing, autocross, endurance racing, racing teams, or building your own motorsports journey, this episode is for you

Want faster laps and fewer headaches at the track? Atomic Autosports helps grassroots racers go from “I hope this works” to “I know this works.” 

From alignment and suspension tuning to track-day prep, Atomic Autosports is here to help you drive smarter, safer, and quicker. If you’re ready to stop guessing and start progressing, learn more at atomicautosports.http://www.atomicautosports.comcom

If you’re serious about getting faster, start at AtomicAutosports.com where you can find guides, information, and even connect with us to make sure that your motorsports journey stays on track. 

You know me as the host of Late To Grid, but my biggest shift wasn't on the track, it was leaving corporate life to own a Rad Air location. It gave me the freedom to turn my passion for cars into a career and actually get to the track more often. Ready to own your future? Visit radairfranchise.com and let’s get you living life in the fast lane.

Thanks for listening and taking an interest in growing grassroots racing.  The Late To Grid podcast shares the stories and inspiration that help listeners along their motorsports journey. 

Find all episodes on the Atomic Autosports website.

Transcript

0:19

How does a bat turn into one of the Midwest's best track day organizations? You're going to find out. Let's throw the green flag on this episode. Well, I'm back in the Atomic Auto sports studio with Ken Grulich, who is from Three Balls Racing. We're going to find out where that name came from. But Ken, thanks for squeezing in the opportunity to talk to you today. Yeah, absolutely. Happy to be here. Thank you. Yeah. As we were getting ready to hit record, Ken was telling us about the fact that, uh, they have a bunch of products that they're going to market with. He works for Tremec, really cool transmission company. So he gets the career side of automobiles and then the play side of automobiles. Uh, Ken, as we were preparing for this episode, I asked you how you got involved with motorsports. You tied it back to your dad, your early days. It was some sand dunes. It was some motorcycle racing. You guys had quads, three wheelers and bikes. What was it about? Something that goes fast that got your interest? I it's funny, I mean, I just it's always been that way. Uh, I mentioned my dad, but him and his buddies always were building stuff and I was the test mule for them, uh, before they put their kids in them. But I, I, I don't know, it's always fun. I guess the thing that comes back to it, and I even mentioned it today in our driver's beans or things is you did something that quite honestly, is a little bit dangerous and you survived it. And that's, you know, at the end you're like, wow, yeah, that was, uh, that was on the edge. And we survived and it was fun. Uh, there's something about that. Right? And when can we do it again? Right. Exactly. Yeah. When are we going again? When's the next one? And we always typically left with, oh, that was the best one yet. And then looking forward to the next one, I love it. How did you make the transition from a spectator and being put on these things that that your dad and his friends were building to? I think it was a bet that, uh, said, hey, let's let's get on track. How did that all come about? To get behind the wheel of a car on a road course. That was interesting. I mean, as a as a senior in college, we had a vehicle design project. We had to literally design something from the ground up. But it was all theoretical. It was all on paper. I always wanted to do it. Um, you know, I wanted to make it real. I was working at Federal-mogul at the time. There were a couple other guys about my age, and actually I took one of them out to Maryland to buy a nineteen eighty nine Porsche nine hundred eleven turbo, which is a single year kind of Halo car. And he bought that over a couple other choices. Uh, he had been looking at a factory five kit car and, but he settled on that. We drove out to Maryland. We bought it, you know, my truck and trailer. We brought it home for him and his wife. Uh, maybe she gets all the credit. She took him out to Gingerman Raceway for a track day for his birthday. Oh, wow. And. And he came back to work, and he was ecstatic. He's like, this was so much fun. But as happens then, he turned it into a bit of a taunting session and said, oh, if you guys were out there, uh, I'd lap you. Oh, and that conversation happened for a little while. Um, in context, I was driving in nineteen sixty nine Corvette big block. So, you know, while a nice muscle car, not exactly what people picture when they think of going to the racetrack. Right. But it only took a few times for him to suggest, right, that he was that much better of a driver for us to realize we were going to have to settle this. That's right. And, uh, unfortunately, the time two thousand and five time frame, it was hard. We found out to get into track days. You know, most of them were, I don't know, I wouldn't say club based, but they were a lot of word of mouth. You kind of had to know somebody. And we really got hung up on the technical rules, like you call them, hey, I want to bring my nineteen sixty nine, whatever. And yeah, it has lap belts in it. And, um, that's about it. Nobody wanted to take that on. And so we finally just said, well, what happens if we call the track and just rent the track and we call Gingerman? And at the time they'd been around for about ten years and they're like, yeah, sure, come on out. So that's how it got started. We published it on a little website that one of the guys brothers managed called Kazoo Rice. We said, whoever shows up, we're just going to split the cost. And that's what we did so we could settle the bet. And what car did you take for that event? I brought the sixty nine Corvette. And how did it do? And, uh, uh, terribly, absolutely, terribly. I mean, in the fact that it's not fast, it's not safe. And, uh, but great in the fact that I got it there and I ran the day, um, it made it through the day. I was up till two in the morning getting it ready so I could wake up at four in the morning to get out to the track. Yeah. Had an absolute blast and realized, wow, this is something we should probably do again. And then how soon was it that you scheduled the next one? Uh, so I think we actually only did the one event there in two thousand and five, and then in two thousand and six we did another, but then we did multiple events. And actually some of the people that showed up said, well, what about this racetrack? And we ended up at Grattan Raceway because of that. And then it kind of grew from there. Um, so yeah, it was we were hooked immediately. Yeah. And where did the name come from? Three balls racing. There were three of us. I mean, there were three young guys, you know, at the time we were all probably in our mid twenties and, uh, balls out racing was already been taken, quite honestly. And, uh, so we came up with three balls racing. We just kind of put it together. We were young and silly. We never envisioned this lasting this long or, you know, going where it went. So, um, it was just us kicking around probably after a beer or two. And you know, that's how it goes, right? Uh, we're going to jump around a little bit here, but, uh, tell the listeners what tracks you run at and what the, what your current season looks like in terms of the calendar. So our schedule is always pretty much the same over the last few years, we start the year at gingerman, so we just came from that event about two weeks ago. Uh, then we do five weekend events at Graton. So those are typically all Saturday Sundays. We also go to Waterford Hills, which is a local track to us. We typically do a single day event there. It's one of our charity events. We go to Mid-Ohio for a two day event in August. That's a Monday, Tuesday, just, you know, based on pricing. And that makes up our schedule. Uh, in the past, we've gone up to Calabogie in Ontario, one of the best tracks in North America that many people in the US haven't heard of. Um, and we did do a couple of events at Pitt Race before that facility got closed down. But so our schedule now largely is Gingerman, Grattan, Waterford, Mid-Ohio. Yeah, those are all great tracks. And who who can attend those novices, experts race cars. What, what's the makeup of, uh, of the groups? Yeah. We're open. We're open to all. I mean, we split ours up into run groups based on experience. So we go from first timers to people that are out practicing for test days racing. Uh, a lot of our long time group one, which is our most experienced group, people are just serious track day people. So we accept and look forward to all of them. A typical event, when I ask, you know, who is it their first time? Uh, maybe about forty percent of the people, it's their first time at a three balls racing event and total. I'd say every event we get, you know, four to seven people that have never been on track before at all out of a group of sixty. So somewhere around ten percent of our drivers are brand new for the first time ever. Oh, wow. That's great. And how do you see them all come back? No, no no, I mean, what I would say is I think most people are hooked. They like it. But we get a lot of people that just went out and bought some cool new car, you know, hey, I bought a, I just bought a new Mustang Gt350. I just bought my, you know, dream Corvette. I just bought this BMW and I want to try it. I want to see what it's like. And they come out and they do it for a day and they say, yeah, that was that was really a lot of fun. I really enjoyed it. I got to see what the car would do. But I don't see myself doing this a lot. Like I don't see myself beating on the car, you know, I don't see myself turning my beautiful PPF coated, ceramic coated, you know, uh, show car into a track car. And that's fine because those people come out, they do it once they have a great time, they confirm that it's a good time, but they're not going to be people that show up five, six times a year. Um, quite honestly, I have the exact opposite. I have people that are there every single time and they look forward to everyone and they live for the next event. Oh yeah. No, that's great. And I guess I never really thought about that, uh, that, you know, hey, I just want to do it once or maybe it's once a year. And, uh, you know, they kind of scratches the itch for a little while and they go back to life and daily driving the car. What I love to see is I get a lot of people that buy gift certificates for their spouse, you know, or, hey, I get a lot of these. I get a somebody call me up. It's typically a woman called me up and said, hey, my husband just bought this car. He wants to take it on track. You know, how can we get him to do that? And they buy him a gift certificate for his birthday or something like that. I get that a lot several times a year. And I love those because it's, um, they recognize it. It's usually somebody that's very excited. They come out, they try it, they go, yep, this is why I bought this car. And then they have a blast. That's awesome. I want to talk about some of the things that happen at events, both funny as well as advice that you have for folks because as you observe them. But in getting ready for the show, you shared a story with me about somebody who was legally blind with their oxygen bottle in the tank, who made it on track. Um, and he fulfilled a dream, a bucket list item. And, uh, I'm gonna guess he's not at the track anymore, but what did the instructor say after that happened? So I start off by saying this was a. There were a lot of lessons learned in this right. There were a lot of a lot of soul thought searching after this because admittedly, it's a situation we probably wouldn't want to duplicate on purpose. Uh, but we had a guy, you know, show up and when you register, we don't ask you your age other than are you legally allowed to drive, you know, sixteen and over. Um, because we're not, we're not discriminatory about anything like that. We love seeing everybody do it. And this guy showed up and, um, he asked for an instructor and it was one of my long term instructors that's comfortable getting in a right hand seat because not all of them are anymore. And he got in with the guy and, um, you know, afterwards he mentioned how they got around the track. Fine. There were no issues, right? Like the guy wasn't being aggressive. He, he just wanted to try it. He was a good student, meaning he was, he was listening to commands that the instructors was giving. He wasn't driving above his level. He wasn't doing anything like that. You know, the instructor was instructors like, well, you know, I wasn't quite sure how we would handle the oxygen tank thing, but we got it in the car and strapped in and held in. So it wasn't a physical thing. And then it was later that we, that the guy mentioned to us that it was his bucket list thing and that, hey, I'm legally blind. And that, um, yeah, admittedly, the instructor's eyes got a little wide open. Um, but if from an instructor perspective, he hadn't noticed anything on track, um, you know, and he kept him under control, he went out in a, you know, in our beginner group, went out at a decent pace, made it through and it was, you could tell hopefully by the way I'm relaying the story. It was, it was mixed feelings, right? It was absolutely amazing that the guy got there. He couldn't he couldn't believe it. He, he knew that he was pushing the limits to do it because he knew nobody was would let him if he just told the whole story. Uh, so he was, you know, he was he planned it. Mhm. Uh, and yet, I think if you've seen like movies, I think if you think back to the movie, the, uh, the fastest Indian you've seen that movie, like to me, it was exactly like that. If you haven't seen a great movie and about how the guy gets himself on to, uh, the salt flats, racing a motorcycle that didn't have all the latest safety equipment and guys like, hey, I thought this was about racing. Mhm. And so it kind of reminded me of that. And, and sorry, you shaking your head, but if you haven't seen the movie, great movie. And it's the similar situation, you know, this guy finds himself out on the salt flats, which was literally started by people that went out and found a place in the middle of nowhere to go as fast as they could, and they're telling him about all the rules. He's like rules to go fast. So it was it was kind of a situation like that. And in the end, I remember it fondly. I mean, it keeps our eyes open now to look for things when people show up. Um, makes us think about some of the things you have to ask. But in the end, it was a kind of a no harm, no foul situation. And that guy, I think he probably remembers it more than we do. Right? Yeah. You know, as you're telling the story. My grandmother, when she was declared legally blind by the doctor, drove herself home. So maybe there's something that folks don't want to give up their independence when when things like this happen. But no, thanks for sharing that. I mean, being open to but I'm sure, you know, you've tightened up a lot of things and maybe a little bit more aware of some of the people registering for the events. Yeah. It's hard, right? I mean, you can't you really can't put it in your sheet like, hey, how old are you? Um, you know, you can't say, I'm sorry, you're, you're too old to do it because I mean, I have, I have some of my drivers that are very up there in their age and they're some of the best, most experienced drivers we have. You can't discriminate on things like that. And yet you still have to kind of find a way to evaluate it. Right? I want to talk a bit about the events themselves and mistakes you see people making, because these mistakes can help people have a smoother day. If they're aware that they're making them, they can have a more successful day, and they're probably going to enjoy it a lot better. Um, so one of the things that you shared with me was that people don't take advantage of all of the knowledge and all of the people that are there at the track. What did you mean by that? Well, first off, I would say that this is probably common for a lot of us and many of the hobbies that we do, you know, whatever you're doing. But when people come to the track for us in an event, I typically have about sixty registered drivers and maybe another ten to fifteen people that are kind of serving, helping me out as staff, experience guides, instructors, that kind of stuff. So you're sitting in a paddock where somewhere between sixty to eighty people, and out of those, if you're a brand new person, seventy of them have way more experience than you do, and they're all there to hang out with people that are doing the same things, and they're more than willing to talk to you. And yet so many people that show up, they're there for the first time for whatever reason, they don't go talk to these people. They don't go ask. They don't even go. They don't even really go watch. But back to that, I mean, they show up to these events and there's people all over the place, literally, and you're jammed in an area and you're not leaving and people are there, but they're so busy with what they're doing, right? They don't recognize like, hey, there's a lot of people around here that I could be talking to that could really help me out. Even just going and watching at Grattan is one of the racetracks we spend the most time at, and we we literally are panicked in the middle of the track. So that means you can just walk over to the edge and watch what's happening. And I've started going through this in our driver's meeting. Like if you go out onto Grattan and you can watch people coming onto the front straight, there's four distinct lines of traffic in there. You know, that's how wide the track is. And I can tell you exactly where people are going to be based on their run group group for the beginners. They're going to be hugging the inside of this. And, you know, each group moves another lane out. It's like if you were to just go watch that, like just pay attention. You could learn a lot without anybody saying anything without you do. But that's just one little example. But so many people show up to the track. I've been offering them now for the last couple years. I'm like, hey, I have my laptop, let's pull up YouTube, let's do whatever you want. I'm really trying to push people to get cameras in their cars, because everybody now has one of these just sitting there that some of the best cameras that have ever been made. If you can just find a way to mount it in your car, I can help you so much. And yet I'm actually amazed how few people do it. Um, especially when I compare that to the couple of people that do love it. Yeah. You know, we had somebody last year, he came over, showed me the video from his car before he even turned the key on. We had saved him a couple seconds a lap just by the way he was positioned in his car, and I could just see that from where his hands were grabbing the steering wheel. You could see him all reached out and he couldn't, you know, reach his controls. And we're like, hey, let's just change how you are in the car. The guy came back. He's like, that was amazing. He's like, that helped me out a bunch. So it's things like that. And I mean, I understand it because people are there. It's their first time. There's a lot going on. They like to look at the pretty cars and do that. But man, I just try and I would love to if people could pick up anything. It's like you're there, go talk to them. Like people are willing to tell you anything. Um, you just have to, you just have to ask. So that's what I want to know. What is the one question? I know there's many, but if you could pick one question that a novice could go and ask an experienced person that would open up that dialogue, what question do you recommend? I haven't thought of that. But if I think about it right on the fly, I think one of it would be, hey, what makes you the most comfortable as a driver? Because comfort is what builds confidence. Comfort is what builds speed, comforts what builds a lot, you know, because I think most people are like, well, what brake pad should I use? You know, what's the great tire to use? What's this? What's that? And if they spent time talking to a lot of the more experienced people, people that are doing this for years, they're going to say things like, well, what makes me most comfortable is having a car that fits my budget. That's probably an answer people don't want to hear, but is really they're like, hey, I'm I started off tracking my beautiful, brand new, you know, very expensive car. And then I went and bought a stripped out caged Mazda Miata or neon or Honda Civic or name a similar car. And like, now I'm a lot more comfortable. I don't care what happens to it. So I can drive it, I can push it. I can try different lines. Admittedly, that's a that's a big, big one. But they might also hear things like, um, I bought a better helmet. I bought a helmet that actually has better, um, hardware on it. Right. Like if you take the strap on a bell helmet, compare it to an entry level G-Force helmet, you're like, oh, this one doesn't get all crusty after sweating. And it it's easier to get off when I get out of the car. Um, you know, I, I bought a seat, I try to tell people all the time, the number one thing that will make you faster is a good seat. And if they start hearing that from other people and then can go watch them on the track and go, wait a minute, that guy actually is driving better, maybe they'll start picking up on those things. Unfortunately, like many hobbies, the things you hear from the experts or the advanced people isn't what you want to hear all the time. It's not just go buy a fancy new something. It's go get this other thing that's under the radar, or that might be a little bit more complex, right? Like buying a seat is more complex than buying a new set of tires. Mhm. Yeah. That's great advice. Um, the next mistake that you see, uh, and I'm going to start it off this way. I am late to everything. Hence the name late to grid where I will not be late to is a track day. I love to be the first person. So why is it a mistake for people to show up to attract a or a track event late? What are they missing? Well, literally. So we just came from Gingerman. You know, I wake up, I, uh, due to some personal circumstances, I didn't camp at the track. I was at a hotel, but just right down the street. And I wake up to a phone call, hey, uh, just hit a deer on the way up there. Um, so I'm not going to miss half the day. My buddies who are coming with me are helping me get there, so they're also going to miss half the day. So literally right off the bat, you get I'm missing half of a day that I paid a lot of money for entry fees, travel fees, get in the car ready and already I'm in a bad mood, right? I'm upset. And if I had done that the night before, yeah, I still would have hit the deer. But I'd be there, right? Because they still made the event. So you get that. You get the of course, rushing to get there. Just your adrenaline is pumping. You start forgetting stuff. You see people trying to hurry to get their cars out on track. They miss stuff, you know, whether that's air pressures, tightening, lug nuts, getting stuff out of the car, missing some of the rules of the driver's meeting. Whatever it is, it's just you always see people in a hurry and they miss a lot of stuff, uh, including having fun. Mhm. And it just, you know, for me, I, I can't stand it. I've, I've come to the track the day of in twenty years, probably two times. And it was due to work circumstances I could not avoid. Um, but it, the, the stress level goes so much higher. Um, you start getting mad on the way to the track. Oh there's a traffic incident I didn't think about. And I get those calls every single event. An event does not go by without somebody calling me go. Oh, there was an accident on the freeway. I got a flat tire. I didn't wake up on time. And, you know, for me as the organizer, it's a bit annoying. But for them, as a participant, it's money literally leaving their pocket for an event. They paid for that. Now they're not attending. Yeah. Oh my gosh. And the last bit of advice that you gave was that people don't bring the right stuff, the right tools, the right spares. Um, what advice do you have with somebody who's newer to the sport? What should they be bringing to track days? Again, it's tough because it starts pulling you down the rabbit hole. But I'd say the thing people leave track days for the most is a flat tire. Mhm. Um, and the flat tires either. Hey, I got a flat tire on the way to the track. I spun, I got some gravel into my bead. That's in the tire. Hey, where's the local tire shop? Where's. And so a lot of times they just need one. They just need one spare tire. And they're like, well, I drove my car here. I don't have it. Um, one of my interns, she packs spare tires and trash bags and puts them in the back seat of her Subaru and brings her with her. You know, just so I have a spare tire. I've loaned out spare tires and wheels for people to drive their car home more times than I can count. You know, so now somebody's driving home on an R compound because that's all we had to fit their vehicle, hoping they make it. Then they got to come meet up with me again to return the tire and wheel. So, I mean, I would love to see people be able to bring a spare tire. I know people are gonna say, oh, that's a lot. You I need a spare room. I need I bring a donut if you need to just so you can get the car home. Um, or so you can put it on and then drive to the local tire shop to get your tire fixed and get back. Yeah. Um, whatever that is. But I know that's one people probably don't think of and they probably don't want to, but a spare tire because most people starting out don't come with a nice track alignment, which means they're going to be courting the outsides of their tires. And if they have a great time and they make it to the mid-afternoon and now the tires literally destroyed, uh, that puts them in a bad position even to get home, let alone finish the day driving. Um, brake pads are probably the other one. Most people starting out, they're using daily driver track pad or daily driver, not track pad, sorry, daily driver brake pads. And they're like, well, it's a high performance car. The patch should last. And if they're a decent driver pushing it, they're going to make it till about two in the afternoon. Right. And then hope they make it home and then hope they make it home. And that's when people start making some some bad decisions sometimes, right. Like, well, I could probably make it home. So I mean, these are things people don't think of. And, um, you know, for a first event, probably people aren't going to do that. But if you're already to your second, third, fourth event, you got to start planning for these things tool wise people will help you. Uh, I still, I like to be self-sufficient. Uh, I'm more than happy to loan stuff out, but I also personally like to be self-sufficient. So, you know, to be able to have a jack and a jack stand to get the car up in the air and actually see some stuff. We started preaching in the last couple of years. You have to actually be active in the maintenance of your car at the track, meaning we never see brake failures in the morning. We always see them in the afternoon because people aren't paying attention to him throughout the day. And that means physically putting your eyes onto that inside rear brake pad to make sure it's still there. So a jack and a jack stand would would really be helpful. And that's the stuff people can put in their trunk right on top of their spare tire. Yeah. Well, unfortunately, we have to wrap it up, folks, because we had a small window to grab Ken today, and we're going to have him back on to talk even more. But when I did some research on three balls racing the events they put on their philosophies and you heard some of that come out today, I knew I wanted to have Ken on to at least talk a little bit more about his organization, his events, in the hopes that we can get more people there and grow the sport. So, Ken, we are going to reach out to you again. We're going to have you back on to dive a little bit deeper into not only the sport, but your background and behind the wheel. But I do have one question to wrap it up. Have you ever been late to grid? Um, yeah, I would say that I have. I have been before, and when I'm late to grid, it's typically because I just got done, like swapping the transmission on the car in the paddock. Uh, I've swapped a, um, a steering rack in the paddock, you know, on that Corvette. So yeah, I've, I've been late to grid and the people that are there with, you know, so when I'm late to grid, I'm going to be covered in grease and coming out there and, you know, have just fixed something that, uh, of mine that failed. Oh, boy. Well that's great. Well, we really appreciate you spending some time with us today and sharing a little bit more about your background, but especially about how you approach track days. And I know the listeners took away a couple of different ideas that's going to make their track day even better. Well thank you. It was great talking with you and appreciate you guys dealing with the time constraints today. But yeah, I'd love to be back on. I'd love to keep talking.