S03E20: #DoYouKnow Nick Ellis from The RPM Foundation

is put the battery in it. So, I don't know if that counts as working on it, but, yeah, it's the last thing I've had my hands

want. And within five seconds of my niece being in this one, I was like, Okay, let's play something else now, because she's grabbing the very delicate turn signal thing, and she's like, yanking it up and down. I'm

gun around the block. It purrs first.

and haven't ridden. Since, and so it's been sitting there, and I'm now going to cut it up and make a cafe bike out of it, since I damaged all the bodywork, but I thought I'd see if I could get it started first. And I just had to mess with the starter relay, and which I always have to mess with on that bike. But it came to life and it it idled after so many minutes and so so here we go.

Ford. And he's like, Okay, you need to get you need to get to work here. Just use that that the starter went bad on it. So anyway, this long, like, line of cars that just died because I touched them ended with my, one of my best friends had a BMW, K 75 and that was the thing that stopped. That's, that's what stopped the curse. Because that thing, just like I was able to ride that thing every it's a three cylinder, really cool bike,

it like? I got 82,000 on it. He said, Oh, I had a 314,000 on mine when I sold it. God, so I don't know if they're all that for that long, but they, they're so inherently smooth. You know,

We've done a really fun program that we're just launching now called the endangered skills program, where we try to capture skills that are disappearing across the country, great, you know, needed, you know, in order to work on these vehicles. But that's, that's my connection to motorsports from a professional stance. Well,

sell them. And I, you know, was throwing out resumes left and right, and, you know, couldn't get couldn't get arrested. So I just to pass time, would go to the shop and hang out with my dad, and I had a real knack for working on cars. I had worked on motorcycles and cars when I was in my 20s, and now I'm mid 30s, and so I, you know, I came out with my dad, and I started doing this with them, and eventually I stopped looking for a job and

just did this. So we did that together for about 10 years, and then when he retired, I really wanted something that would, you know, reconnect me to people again, because it was just the two of us. And so I actually went back into it for a year. I was the administrator of a SQL Server database, and absolutely hated that. And then I actually I went to a party and a birthday party, and I. I was talking to a woman at this birthday party, and I told her that what I did for a living, that I restored

cars on the side. And she says, Well, you must know of the RPM foundation. No, I don't. She said, Well, the President of the Foundation is a friend of mine. She lives nearby. I'm going to introduce her to you. And I met Diane Fitzgerald, who was the president of the RPM foundation at the time, and she was looking for somebody to manage the

grants program. And I had no experience in education, no experience in nonprofits, but knew a lot about cars and, you know, feel very passionately that we need to keep this industry and the culture behind it continuing. And so they took a chance on me and hired me on and that's how I ended up working for the foundation.

But as a thing you do every day, paired with, you know, this thing that you do in the evening, like those two are just, they weigh real different, yes, and so I just, I have a lot of admiration, and sort of, like, if nothing else, just sort of hope, if that's not too like, one can do a thing that they're, you know, passionate about, want to do, and arguably making a big difference. I mean, in in this little, small sphere, that of stuff that we think is important, yeah, yeah, that's awesome, like

degree. So, you know, it's a little bit of a misnomer to say it's right now, but historically, within the last, you know, 4050, years, that's been kind of frowned upon that, like, okay, maybe you're really good at this, but there's no way you could actually make a living in so I tell people, Look, you gotta look at my story. I was making more money as a database administrator than I ever made in any of my careers, and I

couldn't stand it. And then I took, you know, a 50% pay cut to take this job because I, you know, on paper, I had none of the qualifications for it, but I was very passionate about it. So, yeah, I guess it is possible, if you're willing to eat ramen soup for a while, but, you know, in the long run, it did work out great because, you know, I stuck with it and eventually became the executive director of the organization.

But it it. You know, I'm a big advocate of if there is something that you love doing, there's no reason why you can't pursue it as a career.

technologies to this car. In that case, it was designed. We built some stuff. And so Blaine and I took a friend of ours, who was a high school teacher, brought his class in, and we taught him how to do carbon fiber layup. We did some three design stuff. Mind you, the bare minimum of teaching them these these crafts, to sort of be able to call it. We taught them these crafts, right? But we, but we leveraged this as an opportunity to sort of bring in an old car and these new technologies and

marry the two. But then also, I mean, to the extent that we did pass along some knowledge, and they were super receptive to it. Like, I don't remember, if you remember, I've got pictures of you teaching these, these kids how to, like, sand down primer, or sand down Bondo before you prime. And like, that's not exciting at all. But they were into it, like, just as a process and a manual. Hands on process.

They were super into it. So I guess my question was, like, have you ever tried to shoehorn in something that that was your own? Sort of like, Hey, I bet I can. Bet I can get, I bet I can get uncle, whomever to pay for this.

that already. And so our mission is very, very narrow, and we want to make sure that if we're going to support an automotive program, they're teaching vintage technology, they're they're teaching, you know, working on an English wheel, or of these concepts that are going to help young people at least get enlightened to a career in vehicle restoration or

preservation. So we would get schools that every now and then would have somebody donated them a 65 Mustang, and we don't know what to do with it, so they could apply to us for grant funding for arts to restore this car. So here's this situation where you've got, you know, classrooms full of young people who are going down one pathway to automotive technology, because they think maybe there's

nothing else. And then we give them the opportunity to, hey, wait a second, maybe I can work on this arborated mechanical timing, you know, old school technology, vehicle. And I like to think that that pathway that we've provided for young people has resulted in a lot of them going into a career that they normally wouldn't have considered.

more exclusive. If these skills to restore these cars start to go away, then only the very few shops remaining that can still hang on to young people and, you know, entice them to come into this and afford to pay for them. You know, if you've got something where there's only 10 crafts people left who can do something, you got to pay those 10s crafts people half a million dollars to do the job now, because they're now, they're going to work on dues and birds and cords instead of instead of

cords and things. So what happens is this becomes less accessible to the young person who had finally has a little bit of disposable income and wants to get into this as a hobby. So then the hobby starts to disappear. And what I keep coming back to is there's a genuine culture behind that hobby. So that culture disappears, that that way that

we all connect. I mean, you know, the three of us didn't know each other before this call, but we're going to have plenty to talk about, because we all have this shared interest. So that goes away if we don't have that skilled workforce to sustain the vehicles and make them accessible.

whatever? And then someone always says, Well, if you can't afford to buy the, you know, the remanufactured part or whatever, then you don't have any business being in this crowd. And and I hated that. And I remember, you know, trying to be a campaigner

against that. I used to belong to the Pierce arrow club when I had a Pierce arrow and you're so right about the it just gets pushed so upmarket, and it gets pushed in such an elite category, and all these guys would sit around and ridicule anybody for not being able to afford to, you know, do a museum restoration on their car. And the truth is, you know, I was always interested, you know, my heart just goes out to the guy.

And, in fact, I take anybody in in Arizona that's got a broken car on their way somewhere, and they can stay here, and I'll work. I will work for them, just because I think the adventure and the idea of doing it, you

know. And this is a guy's on the shoestring that that have my have my heart, you know, and not that I don't appreciate the, you know, the nature of doing something, you know, putting your money where your mouth is using the success of your life to, you know, I get that how that relates into a beautiful project. But on the other hand, I saw a young guy post in the

group one time. Hey, what would it cost me to get into a Pierce arrow, and, you know, and use it as a driver, and then, personally, Pierce arrows, not a driver. So, you know, and I won't tell you where it went from there. But the ridiculous assumption of what it would take, you know, the guys are just rattling off, you're 20,000 into paint. It'll be 15 to 20,000 in Chrome, you know, and all this kind of stuff that we throw around is if that's the

only way to do it. And I like the fact that you're saying that if the skills are more available in a younger set of people, that means that they're going to apply them to a wider set of

experiences and vehicles. And all of a sudden, this thing, we don't have to go to the one guy that knows how to make you know that one, that one piece for your you know that little bearing, the oddball cars like your Ford have, the little bearing in the water pump that you got to pack, you know, and you kind of just, there's always a little bit of fiddling with

that. But anyway, if all of a sudden that becomes a young person acquires that knowledge and is able to, you know, engage with that in a variety with different ways, with a variety of different people, all of a sudden, we're not all beholding to that one. It's always one mean guy that you have to beg to

get on the phone. You know that seems to he seems to hate his life and he hates his customers, but yet we just sit back and we beg him to pay attention to us, and we just throw money at him, hoping that sometime within the next two years, and don't ever call him, he'll call you, that he'll get your stuff back to you.

out of it. Because, like, Okay, I was enthusiastic about this, but you're a jerk, so now I'm not going to get into this

culture. So the other thing that I see a lot on the forums, and I'm sure you guys have seen this too, even when somebody comes in wanting information, like when I first joined up with my father and I, and we were working on cars, I was getting into things that were beyond what I normally would not have known how to do so I'd go on an internet forum and I'd say, hey, how do you remove the, you know, steering

column out of the 68 Camaro? And somebody goes, well, if you gotta ask us how to do that, you shouldn't be drop the drop the wrench, walk away from it. You're just gonna, well, look, man, you didn't know something. At some point, somebody taught you how to do something, but

We taught somebody how to pour babbit bearings, you know, for these old pre war cars. You know, nobody does that anymore. Or we taught someone there, yeah, okay, all right,

of how des. Desperately they're needed. And so if something is scoring really low on the amount of people out there practicing, but really high on the amount of need out there, then that score is really high on our list of okay, we've got to do something to preserve and stabilize this skill. And babbit bearings is right up there. I mean, I can't I can think of one shop in the state of Illinois, where I live,

that still does it. And I'm sure, you know, if you go across the country, I'm sure it's less than than one per state. So what we'll do in that case is we'll find somebody who's really a master of this skill, and we'll pair them with an apprentice, and then we'll record the process of them the master teaching the apprentice how to

do this skill. So not only do we have a new young person who knows how to do this skill, we've got the process of instruction captured so we can share that with other learning institutions, or even just, you know, online, so people can look at this and see how this stuff is done. Now, granted, you know, babbitting isn't something you can you can just do in your, you know, in your garage, but there are other skills that we're hoping to impart upon as many people as to as we can gage.

Rebuilding is something that, oh yeah, yeah, there you go. Yeah. Again. Another one that you need. You know, more equipment than the shade tree mechanic can do. But glass shaping is another

apprenticeship program. So whereas previously, really the only outlets for you to go into vehicle restoration and preservation, where these post secondary programs, where there's less than 100 kids coming out of these programs every year, and if they're, you know, at times, very expensive to attend, you can now go from a really competent high school level Automotive Technology Program, or, you know, a change of a career from, you know, say, the military service into

directly into an apprenticeship in one of these shops, where you're actually making money while you're learning how to do this craft, rather than spending the money. So it manages expectations on both sides, and it's also, overall, a better situation for an apprentice and that they're not going into debt in order to learn this crap. Oh

know, what are you gonna do? You know, how you support yourself, how you paying back your student loans, you know, or whatever

you're gonna do. But what you're saying, if I understand this correctly, if the RPM foundation is able to continue on this trajectory that not by the time you save a skill like lens reproduction, then all of a sudden, if my son or daughter completes the lens reproduction program, I now have a community and almost a market already, right because now I can come to my all my RPM affiliates, and just let everybody know, Hey, there, there is a lens reproducer in on our in our

family or in our ecosystem, right? And so all of a sudden, now the RPM foundation, you know, kind of has a a real place to land for someone to operate what would start out as a side hustle in the garage, which is great, and who knows, maybe they could formalize that and take it further, or just leave it on the

sideline or whatever. But nonetheless, the world would have access to that teardrop lens that you need, that you that you knocked out, or that your granddaughter kicked out with a baseball or threw up, you know, or whatever, and now you don't have to hate your family anymore. So it's

the shop. You know, after that, the sky's the limit for them. They want to stay with that shop. Great. There's great. You know, career trajectories within a lot of these shops, but if they decide to go out on their own, then that's going to be an option to them as

the threads. And 1015, years ago, I would have, I mean, even now, arguably, I have to ship that to some guy in Wisconsin, because he's the only guy who has the die to chase those threads, unless I want to do it, you know. And so just thinking about that. But now I can order a I can order a piece, the the tool for 100 bucks, and I can do

it myself forever and ever. So just worried, wondering about, like, the trajectory of those skills, if they become ubiquitous enough, in terms of, I love that term, stabilizing that skill, yeah, because it's that, it is that, like you're you're making this skill in the world to a level that one can find it without having to know the guy who knows the guy's

Sister, you know? And so I'm just interested in if there's any of these sort of skills that are lacking from common knowledge, because they're just not as accessible in terms of the tooling or, you know, if it's just a dumb little thing that's keeping me from doing this lens repair, or whatever it is. I mean, obviously there's

more to it than that. But I'm just interested because it could be that this person we talked about a woman who's in Detroit, I think you told me, who's doing like, what happens if she, you know, does her own thing, she she gets out of the apprenticeship programs, and she starts fabricating the tools needed for this thing, and being able to pass that on, and making that skill more ubiquitous, like that feels like A potential trajectory for these skills

you're trying to stabilize. Is there any, I guess it's less of a question than a thought in there. But,

getting shut down. So if you know, in other senses, you know, when we're not talking about external factors like that, it's an internal factor, like we don't have anybody left who knows how to run this machine, so now the entire operation is going to shut down because we don't have enough people to staff the machine shop. So that's our hope. With endangered skills and with the apprenticeship program, we want to make sure that we're creating a pipeline that is staffing

those key positions. The other thing that I think is kind of interesting about the scenario that you brought up, and in terms of you know that you would have had to send the engine out to a specialist. I think the I think the attitude is changing in terms of technology being a factor within reproducing these parts or performing functions on these parts. I think 3d printing and 3d modeling used to be really frowned upon in the recreation of this parts. And then you get to a point where

it's okay. Well, we're either going to do this or the car will be inoperable, or the bike will be inoperable. So there's, there's an interesting increase in acceptance, and in my in my observation around technology playing a wider role in the restoration of these vehicles. And that's very appealing to the young people who are out there, they're living in technology,

and they're immersed in it. So if we're able to bring them in by saying, Okay, we're going to teach you these old school hands on crafts, but we're also going to teach you how you can apply your existing knowledge of technology to creating parts that have never existed before, I think there's a lot of potential there.

right? And the powder coats and all the other coatings or whatever. So, you know, in a way, would the foundation be interested in promoting solving that problem? Say, Okay, listen, we're okay. We. Just pass the time in our life when we're going to have Chrome, you know, like you can't get a radiator boiled out anywhere. Nobody's got, nobody's ever going to do that. Get a permit for that ever again. So once these places go so we can keep the ones that are

there. But what about the embracing of the new processes? This is, oh, look at this. You know, here's a new process for creating a really credible chrome finish. How do those so would you guys be an advocate for, for a new technology like that? We

regulation. So we need to kind of protect these small shops in the niche that they have, but in terms of the philosophy of, you know, we need to do whatever we have to do to keep these vehicles on the road. I'll, I'll tell you that my personal philosophy is absolutely we need to. And, yeah, I'm speaking on behalf of rpm. I'm happy to say that, yeah,

me, and Andy. I don't know if Andy's a member or if we're just sort of advisors or observers, excuse me, but we both have aerial square for motorcycle projects. And so we, of course, we had to join, you know, the aerial square for groups, and figure out what we have and whatever. And now, what's nice about the clubs is that, in England or in Europe, they seem to take the club very seriously. I'll give you just two examples.

One of them's aerial square for the club produces its own conrods, you know, because everybody, everybody blows them out. So and So, what happens is matchless. Yeah

They there. I know they have like, 35,000 members, and then they have a lottery where two guys win the lottery, the club sends them to United States and Iran so that they can find old Mercedes parts laying in the desert and non rusty parts, and they and then those guys job is to take everybody's order and pick through yards and buy stuff or whatever, and put together containers and ship them back to Germany so that there's a steady

supply of restorable parts. So the club's gone from, oh, let's have, let's have pie together and talk about how much we love our cars, which is great, and get T shirts and stuff. But now they've said, Well, wait a second, we're going to cover we're going to step up and we're going to handle one of the problems. Because what we realize is that if the cars go and the parts go obsolete, that's a much more difficult thing to get somebody interested

in the in the project. It's like they are never going to be able to complete it, you know, or never be able to make a runner out of it. So anyway, I've been impressed how the clubs have changed. And I'm wondering if you see a movement for that, or a place for rpm in that kind of a in the ecosystem, you know, of what it takes to keep this whole thing going. Yeah, I

the hobby. And so we've got a program called the shop hop where we'll bring a group of students from a high school to several different restoration shops, so they can talk to the restoration shop employees and the owners and get a sense of

what the industry is like. And with our focus now on developing the apprenticeship program, we really can't run these programs as much as we used to, so I would love to partner with local car clubs that are looking for ways to engage next generation and come up to them and say, look, we've, we've been working on these programs. They resonate

a lot with the young people. And how can we work together where you guys are kind of our boots on the ground, and you run this program and and help us reach out and locate these young people who are really, uh. Interested in this. I mean, there's a lot of potential within the clubs to have kind of symbiotic relationship like that.

classics alive. How do you go into a high school where everybody's looking at their phone and, you know, involved in a completely different world, and throw this thing in front of them and have it catch,

connections. We have a volunteer Ambassador core across the country that, you know, reaches out to local high schools, asks them if they want to participate in the programs that we're doing. They'll go in and, you know, they'll bring their collector car to an automotive class and talk with them. We administer the student X cup division of The Great Race, if you're not familiar with that, that's a, you know, 2000 mile time speed distance rally, and they allow up to 10 student

teams. So we actively recruit schools and museums and other nonprofit organizations to stand up an X Cup team. And you know, have 4561, of the teams had eight kids on their one team experience car culture from the inside like that. I mean, that's an event that costs $6,500 to enter, and a student team gets in for free, and they get grant funding to help them with expenses, and there's scholarship opportunities for them, for the students who

participate. So we have to do these things that bring it in front of them, get it in front of them and make it easy to engage. You gotta break down the barriers to entry. You know, you were talking earlier about the attitude of, hey, I want to, I want to daily drive a piece of Pierce arrow. We've got to change attitude on the on the generation that kind of owns this right now, and make sure that they're welcoming of the

next generation. If you show up at a car show in your 96 Miata, and I, you know, I think that car is not that old, I'm not going to talk down on you. I'm not going to say that's not an old car got a 1933 I'm going to say, oh, man, that's a cool car. Yeah, even though, like, it was

did it. And if you stay there more than 30 seconds, or if you make eye contact with the guy, he's going to tell you the story, she's going to tell you exactly, here it comes. I started out with this, okay, so, so I stay for the stories, because I think it's, I'm just encouraged anytime somebody is doing that. And I guess it all comes around to why would we care that people spend their time on these things? And I'm just curious what you sort of

alluded to it already. But as you know, how does the world get better when people when, you keep your Ford alive and drive it and and somebody else gets to see it and gets to talk to you about it, I'll

different. Kind of confluence of events resulted in her drag racing, A, c4, Corvette, and Kinsey is at this point, she is 20 years old. She's a cheerleader in college, and she's this bright, bubbly, enthusiastic person. So the first night of the race, we sit down to dinner. They had a big banquet for all the teams, and we're at a table with another team, like not one of the X Cup teams, one of the one of the

adult teams. And the driver for that team was probably 75 years old, and he had had a terrible day and was fighting with the navigator, who probably think was his grandson. And they're, you know, they're snipping at each other. He's this, just this cranky guy, right? And just naturally, the conversation at the table turns to what was your first car? And this guy says, Well, my first car was a 67 Corvette. And Kinsey goes, my first car was a Corvette.

have been right? The only thing to connect these two people is cars.

Because going to a museum and seeing a car is fine, but like, until you have that sort of visceral experience, or, I don't know, anything short of an emotional connection, you you know it takes weight to sort of convince someone or or move that, especially a young person, yeah, to say, hey, here's something that you should invest in, or here's something that you should invest your time in anyway to learn more about, because here's the connection to, here's the here's here's why

it's awesome, not just because, if you show up in a roles, you're you've achieved it, right? It's, you know, there's more to it than that. And it's, you know, I'm looking at kenzie's little bio here, and you're right. It's like, it's fascinating story, but she's, you know, her goal is to work in

Formula One, yeah, right. So you don't that's not the first thing that comes to mind when you think skills training for restoration, but being able to connect that those threads of being in a garage working on a stupid carbureted motor all the way through to, you know, Charles Leclerc winning Monaco. Did I tell you went to Monaco earlier

plugs on your car anymore. You don't change transmission fluid on your car anymore. It's, it's gotten to be, you know, so difficult to dispose of used oil that, you know, like you don't change your oil anymore. So people are increasingly doing less at home by themselves. So we don't have that opportunity for a parent to pass this love for working with your hands onto a child. So this is, in my opinion, where you know, we can, we could be doing more with

clubs. Clubs have tech nights where, you know, a bunch of them will get together and say, like, Okay, I'm having this problem. Can, you know, eight or nine of the members come in and tell me how I should fix this problem. Invite some young people to join in on that and and let them ask questions, and let them get their hands on an old model a and let them experience what it's like to actually fix a problem on a car and then have the car start again. I mean, to come back to the great race

again. When we had that all girl team, we raced a 66 Mustang, and we were having fuel delivery problems, and so. At one point I said, You know what? We're going to take a stab at rebuilding the carburetor. And we did it in the parking lot. And I, anytime there's any problems on the car, I have the the students work on it. I don't, I'm not, you know, I'm not doing it for them. So they, I talked them through, taking the carburetor off,

taking it apart. We actually got the the solvent, and we soaked in the solvent, reassembled it right there in the parking lot. It was 10 o'clock at night. All the lights went off. We were using cell phone cam, cell phones and headlight. They get the thing back on the car, and they started up and it it revved, and it was like the greatest thing that it ever experienced, because nothing that visceral had ever happened to them with a car before? Well,

difference. But it's not nearly as big as when he made his BMW run last week and he sent me a video. And you can tell that at that that really, that really, yeah, that was way, way bigger than all of a sudden. You know that whatever happened in the corporate world last week from you watching somebody else's show you slides and read them to you, right? Well, you're

it. You've gotta. And I think that's a gift to be able to give somebody to be put in this adverse situation and a safe enough way that they have to use their skills to overcome it

ever pay attention to me. He only pays attention to himself and his and his and his outfit, that's what he mostly pays attention to, but what he's used,

cannonball was coming in. And so these are the guys that left Boston 28 days ahead of time, all on pre 1936 motorcycles, and they're going to come riding in, and this is going to be going to finish the race, and I'm just expecting to see some cool little bikes. But what I did not expect to see was the power of that experience and the families. And, I mean, here are these guys when, I mean, all they did is ride an abnormally expensive, unreliable motorcycle

across the nation. Okay, so what's, what's the accomplishment? But it's a big accomplishment, because the families had so much hope, and they knew how important it was to each one of these guys, you know, and so, of course, the difference is, the guy that wins it is on a 36 BMW. He comes riding in, in a, you know, in a gore tex suit, got a titanium mud that he's drinking out of absolutely clean his bike never

broke down, right? And here comes a guy on a Henderson or an old Harley, or an old Indian, and there's oil, you know, covered his sand, you know, he, yeah, they, you know, they changed rod journals in a barn in Iowa, you know, and, and have that story or whatever. But just the fact that these guys went out and put themselves into the wind for 28 days and found value in that, and then, you know, and

again. So of course, I was inspired, but I think I'm going to do that well, I'm not going to buy a $40,000 motorcycle and then ruin it on one trip across the nation. So it's not quite right for me. But nonetheless. Um, the the value of the experience was what it was. And for me, you know, this whole thing centered around motorsports. I love working on I love learning about it, whatever, but, and even owning

it. But to me, where it just becomes transcendental experiences when you travel with it, you know, and so like, if you decide to take your Ford back to the Ford museum, you know, for and for whatever. And it's a multi day trip. And along the way, you realize, you know, the things that you should have checked before you left, and you're doing it on the side of the road, you know, you're calling guys from the Ford club, hey, you know you got room for

me, whatever. But anyway, just embracing that challenge, right? And then even the, you know, the horrific idea of having the car get in the rain, you know, and you just, you know, the car leaks, you know, everybody's car in 1933 nobody arrived dry. All right, that's not how it worked, you know. So you just kind of got most of the wheel. But anyway, just embracing the experience of living with it.

And to me, that's where the things that I think will can bring young people into it and have them, I mean, adopted as a value when they say, that great race experience, you know, or the great road trip, or we put together a dune buggy and took it to Baja. Or, you know, whatever it is, whatever it is that they did, if it involves that magic, the it's got to be several ingredients. It can't be just one, a cool classic car.

It's got to be a cool classic car, a few problems, you know, maybe a little bit of friction. You don't have to have that. But certainly the vision and the willingness to work together and because you just want to come, I want to have every Saturday of my life be like I rode my Henderson four across the nation and spent the night in a barn, in four barns. And I want, because I want to ride in i that experience. And the thing is, in my my life is so protected and

so tame and so insulated. You hardly ever get to put the burden of your own success on your own shoulders. And that's what motorsport was. You know, to me, motorsport was a sport, and that, you know, when these guys crossed the nation in 1914 on motorcycles, or the first guys to drive across and had to make the roads, or whatever it is, whatever it is you do, but when you take on that burden, that just seems that the potential for it to be

absolutely life changing. And the other thing is that it just knocks all the ass holiness out of you, because you can't be that big of an asshole. Or isn't it? It is, it does. And it just, you know, I wrote a whole article one time about how I wanted my daughter to marry bikers. I'm not, not trashy bikers, but real motorcyclists, you know, because real motorcycles would, I would never leave somebody on the side of the road. Everybody that you ride with is part of your team,

you know, and you will. And I want her to be with someone like that. So there are some things that happen for humanity that I think are actually quite high minded experience of motorsport,

And, yeah, you know, you talked about that experience, that kind of you're going to get wet if you're driving in the car. It's not a stable, secure thing anymore. The question that I always get from every new student that we bring on to our great race team is, is the car air conditioned? Yeah, at the beginning of it, beginning of it, they want to know how comfortable they're going to be throughout this. And by the end of it, they are just so happy to have finished the race every

day. You know, they that that moment of coming over the finish line. And you know, when you come over the finish line, entire towns come out to cheer you on. It's like, yes, celebrity for a day. So that kind of experience, I wish you could take that and rubber stamp that experience across the country, because then we'd see so many more young people getting engaged in this. Yes,

There's hope for humanity, you know, because, like you said at the end of your race. If so, if a young person no longer says, Oh, I don't care how warm it is, it's like, can we go to can we drive it to Alaska and go, Well, it's going to get a little cold. I don't care the time someone says that you have really done something unique for a person and and their perspective, and that person's got something to contribute to this world.

this stuff. I made it. Yeah, and I think that that got co opted by a lot of I mean, I'd say, for lack of a better word, sort of hipster movementy Cafe bike type stuff. But I think there's another side of it where I think that's the important piece for, at least for me and anyone that I've sort of had any progress with teaching them a thing in this is that the barrier to this as a pastime, as a passion, or whatever. Is that? Nine times out of 10, it's always been that

I can't afford it. I would love to have this thing, and maybe that's why we shit on Harley's a little bit. Is that the for me, that's why I shit on Harley's a little bit. Is that? Well, yeah, if I would, if I just wanted a big, shiny bike that went across the country with couches and, you know, a wardrobe built onto

it. I could spend 50 grand and that I would have that, and then I would be a biker, I mean, but we, we say the same thing about BMWs, where they have their titanium sippy cup and they've got their, you know, their bibs and all. They just threw a bunch of money at it, and that's great. Like, that's how people

get into that. But there is something, I think, much stronger, much more lasting to, you know, do the thing yourself, build the thing, understand how it works, because then you can go out with the confidence to go across the country, or to have that connection to the thing that you're riding or driving, and it's just a very different experience, obviously fulfilling,

level. But I will say, if there's a way to enjoy it, it's, it's, you know, having that hands on connection with your vehicle, even if you don't actually do it, at least understanding it. At least understand how the how the machine works. And so like when it does break down, you at least have an idea of what's going on.

right? It's, you know, if they're looking for their their universal joint in their socket set, and you know, they've been in it 20 times that day, that that means it's probably on the side of the road 30 miles back, or whatever. You know, it never made it, you know. And you see them struggle with that, and there's something you can do about it. When you have had that own experience yourself, you figure, well, I can't, I can't afford to see them lose, you know, and so I'm going to go get

my stuff. And so is it your job to bring tools for the other team? No. But the most fulfilling things I've ever done in my life was when I used to plan trips, you know, to go into Baja or whatever. And I always stuff my bag full of stuff because I wanted my goal to be is that there's nothing you're going to need on this trip that I didn't think of, you know, and I would have all the oddball stuff to make repairs and fix things or whatever. And that was, but that was my that was my

contribution to it. But, you know, other guys can contribute other things to the trip, but, you know, that's a but mine was, mine was fixed, yeah, but anyway,

out completely. And one of the X Cup teams, the team from Auburn, Indiana, the early Ford v8 Museum, had a team. And of course, this is a Ford museum. They had Ford parts, and they had a Ford transmission that that was compatible. So those kids were up until three o'clock in the morning, swapping out the transmission in not even one of the other x cup cars. This is one of the professional teams, and got them back on the road. Now, that alone, I think, is

just a spectacular story. But the the, the real touching part of it was the driver of that car had been diagnosed with cancer years before, and the cancer had been in remission for years, and then it had returned. And so this was, this was going to be his last race, he wanted to race one more time. And if it hadn't been for that group of kids, he would have ended on day one. So

think about the heroes. They're heroes those kids, yeah, and, and that's that spirit that we're talking about right here, like you get to walk away from that. They didn't, they didn't know the background of that. They were just trying to get another car on the road. But then the realization of what you did, the impact to those people's lives, just by virtue of being willing to stay all night and fix their car, that's just absolutely spectacular to me.

it in a young person. And a young person now owns that skill and is now going to be able to pay that forward. And someday they stop by at a truck stop and look underneath the hood of somebody else, and they rescue the day for somebody that's on a way to a family reunion with people that are, you know, limited time, where they have a chance to play that role, and they can do that in a way and be just confident and confident and

humble about it. That's just a beautiful thing for the world to have in its list of experiences. So okay, here's the deal. We're going to end and we're going to throw out any any suggestions you have to save the world of motorsports. And I thought of these things while we're talking. You guys jump in with yours. All right, should we just go 1111, to go around that way? Let's do that. Yeah, let's just take what is alright. I'm gonna throw out some. I'll just give the answer. Then you'll see what

the question was. All right, here's, here's a way to solve the motorsport culture problem of the future. Car museums should become car libraries. You can check them out. Okay, go check

automobile. Or, you know, like, that thing's going to be around longer than we will potentially. So what if you were able to just sort of be a steward and be assigned, you know, caretake of this thing, and that's just your deal? Like, rather like, I wonder what that would impact to the the automotive financing industry. Like, like, like, you don't need to buy a new car anymore, because you would just check out this thing and that's just your car, your vehicle. You

could always swap it out. But I think that there's something there, there. There's,

that. You are in that apprenticeship program, you are responsible for this car, and it goes both ways. You get to take it out and, you know, enjoy it, but you are also responsible for it if

truck. You know that you just drive, and that the status all of a sudden, when you pull up in the parking lot at the RPM foundation, it says director and board, director and most important person ever. And you look down there, and they're all patina daily cars. They got bird shit on them. And some guys, you know, they all, you know, one guy's always got the jumper cables, right? So, but anyway, if they were really usable daily driver cars that we told the world company

here. My last one is, I think that it ought to be mandatory that every family would gain status, not by going on a cruise or not by showing off their fancy vacation, but that it would be by having a road map that is populated with the routes from the road trips that they take with their family. I just think you should drive around with people as the primary way to preserve how lovely and how amazing it is to see this world like I have a

thing for politicians. I think wherever you, wherever it is, you're elected, you must drive your car to Washington. Oh, god, yeah, alright, because you would see the empty Main Streets, you'd see the backyards of America, and you would realize that there's something way more important going on, and there's a little so much different level of potential in this world. And the world lives on such a real

level. If you had to drive your car from where it is, you were elected before you could start to do any sort of legislation, and, like, once a year you had to do it, you know, and eat it would just bring and for families, if you just if the idea was that the status, like when you got together on Instagram or Tiktok and showed how awesome your family is, it would include that map that says this was 2024 we did this in 2026 and we did This, and all we did is just drive around with