Shawne Merriman Talks With NASCAR Driver Jesse Iwuji

But just my involvement in NASCAR over the years. Um, I give a really funny story about how I got started in NASCAR, being invited out in two thousand and eight by the Richard Pettis Group and uh I was the Grand Marshall to the Fontana race. And I came up and I had no idea about NASCAR. Remember I'm from Maryland, Washington, d C. Area. I got no idea other than watching NASCAR and TV. It looks like a bunch of fast cars going to circles and Uh I

was in for a treat. Two thousand eighteen, Grand marshal of the Fontana Racist and I'll tell you if one of my most nerve wrecking days because I had no idea there was gonna be sixty plus thousand people there at the track. I had no idea that getting up there that close on the tract and filling those cars and the energy was gonna make me nervous where I almost dropped the damn flag. So bringing in Jesse Wilgi,

we almost Also, we're gonna talk to about the Dallas Cowboys. Man, that's his favorite team, and some of the things that coming out of the locker room and Mike McCarthy uh coming out interview today saying that guys should be talking to him direct if their men. So, um, we we jumped from NASCAR to football. It's gonna be a really good show, Jesse and Wulgi. Jesse, what's going on? Man? Nothing much, you know, just living life. You know, ain't nothing cooking over here but the chicken in the pot.

But the chicken would be cooking if the water wasn't hot. You know what, I knew he was gonna start something, saying saying something right because you look, because I know you've been up and you've been up since since five thirty already, and you probably accomplished fifteen thousand things already. So it's a few things and you can take off that trash, that trash Navy shirts. You want to go. Navy beat Army. And we almost be that one year two that five, I think you had just graduated, but

we almost. I was. I was still I hadn't gotten to nab kept me yet. I was still a year away. But we got close. We got closed, and then a corner that we had missed tackle with one of your running backs. Next, you know, you know that fourth down or whatever it was converted and then we lost the game. I remember that game, and the reason why is because that was kind of like the drop off of us. It was like we to Navy. But you know what teams like Navy was always tough, tough, Yeah, that was

that was always a problem. Like we had a we had we always had a problem with Temple, We had a problem you know, A beats any any one of the scrappy schools. I mean we used to sometime go and have problems with Duke. Yeah this is before they actually got good. It was just one of those scrappy teams.

That always give it a problem with Yes, to tell people a little bit about before we jump into all all your NASCAR stuff, but um, your football, yeah and playing you know when you know what years did you go to play football at Navy and how how did you get there? Yeah? So originally from Dallas, Texas, and

I grew up there. Both my parents came from Nigeria to the US, so we didn't have you know, football wasn't something in our family, um, you know, and not like my dad or my grandparents or anybody played football before. It was really us me and my two brothers and my sister. My sister probably could have played football, honestly, but both of my brothers and us, we we all played football in Dallas and you know, as you know,

high school football in Texas is huge. So um, I had a big goal to go off to college and play college football. So it worked really hard to put myself in position to get recruited UM, and finally by my junior senior year start getting recruited by a few schools and UM Naval Academy is the best of the bunch. So I just looked at it as a great opportunity

to go to really good school, get a great education. UM, played football for a team that was winning a lot of games, and UM be able to have a career UM as an officer and the Navy after after I graduated. So it was just a win in all different ways. UM. So once the Naval Academy got their two thousand six, UM started playing football there all four years. Also ran track while I was there. UM we played against a lot of great teams. We had winning seasons all four years,

went to bowl games all four years. Beat Missouri. UM our final bowl game, which is my senior year. UM, and that's when Blaine Gabbert played there as quarterback, and we we roasted Missouri. I mean we it was forty be forty something to like like they scored less than ten points, Like we killed them. So UM. And that's with our little Navy team that we have a whole bunch of undersized two star athletes. That's that's what I got.

I got a couple of a couple of three stars here and then it was one watching the Blue moon. Y'all catch a three star? But how was that? How was that? Bod Man? Because you know, I try to tell people all the time, like when I was when I was in school. You had obviously your classes football, Um, any kind of study hall workouts when it work out? How was that man? Because you also had to you had duties, right, I mean outside of football, you had

tracked what what was what was that schedule like? Because that had to been grueling. That had been crazy. Yeah, it was grueling. I mean you know every morning you're up at you know five something, six something. Um, you still have your military site type stuff that you have to do. You still have, you know, morning formation, you still have you you're wearing uniform every single day. Um. At the Naval Academy, you're not allowed to leave campus

throughout the week. So Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Um, you were stuck on campus. There's no going out, going and partying, going to Georgetown wherever during the week, none of that stuff. Um, you gotta stay on campus. Uh, we have other formations throughout the rest of the day. We have other things you have to do as far as this leadership stuff within your squads that you have at the academy. All that stuff you got to do outside of your regular classes.

Then when you get to your classes type of classes were taken, Um, you know, we're we're everybody. No matter what major you are, whether it's English history or whatever, everyone has to take Calculus one, Calculus two, Calculus three, thermodynamics, electrical engineering one, electrical engineering too, physics one, physics to chemistry one, chemistry to um uh, everyone has to take all those classes are just name no matter what your major are. So um, it's a it's a technical school

for a reason where everyone gets a technical type degree. Um. But uh, it's it was tough, It's not easy. And then throw up football on there, which is like a full time job itself. I can't I can't even imagine because I was looking at like our our study hall hours and classes and win to workouts and you know, depending on what kind of study halls you had out just like Jesus Man. Like, college to me was not fun. Everybody said they had so much fun in college. At me.

I love going to University of Maryland because the campus was was bar none. I mean it was a beautiful campus, but my memories of college was not fun. Like she's christ, I want to get to the league. I'm trying to get to the pros. And that's why you After my third year, man, I checked your duce. I was, yeah, yeah, I know it is. It's tough, but it wasn't easy

at all. A lot of people will say, you know, especially going to the naval cabin it's like a great place to be from not always at because you know, yeah, it's a college kid. You know, you're looking at all your friends having fun, party and all these other places your especially because you know, right when I was getting into college, that's when Facebook was becoming a thing, and it was the first time you got to really see

people's lives everywhere they were. Um and and you got and all these friends posting all these pictures of them doing all this stuff. I'm like, man, they look like they're having a great time, but I'm over here studying super hard, working super hard in football, studying super hard, just never having time for anything. Um. So it's tough. But you know, if you want to go do something big, like play college football on national TV, you know you

gotta you gotta make those sacrifices. So that so that was like our connection, right. So I want to explain to people how how we met. We met um at one of my lights out of events downtown in Los Angeles. Uh, through a mutual friend of ours ja yeah, yeah, yeah with Jay Mendoza. He was kind of a social media star, and so I'm having this event um downtown and he says,

this is my boy, Jesse Woolgi. You know, we played football at Navy, and I was like, okay, cool, So you got that that connection there, and he was telling me about a couple of things. But the last thing that he did was kind of I was like, you remember I had it was reporters, it was all these people I was talking to, and I remember him saying that he also it's in Nascar, and I was like, hold on, hold on, hold one time out he blacked though. That was the first thing that went in my head.

I was like, hold on, he's black dude the NASCAR. And I was like, the only person I knew of at the time was Bubba, but I didn't. I didn't know of any other black people in Nascar. I just didn't. So out of all these things that was going on at the event, I like stopped in my tracks and I with a cold on the time out and He's just saying Nascar and then we started, you know, he

introduced it and we started talking. You know, we talked a little bit about football, but I had no idea, um about some of the other circuits that was in NASCAR. Which is the which is the which is the can in So how how how did that start? You left so you left school, um, and you had your duties and things like that, But how did NASCAR come about? Because it was just so it caught me so off garde when we started first talking about it, I was like, wow, man,

this is crazy. Yeah. So you know, yeah, when I graduated from the Naval Academy, became a surface warfare officer, so you know, I was basically going off to the fleet. I was on ships my first four years. I was

on two different ships, went on two different deployments. Uh after and but during that time, like when I was back home in San Diego at that time, um, you know, I would come back to San Diego and I had two cars that were you know, performance sports cars, and I would take them to um drag strips and road course tracks in southern California. A lot of fun doing that.

And after a few years of that, I was like, man, you know, every time I go to the track, you know I do pretty well, you know, why not try to take this to the highest level, Like, why not try to become a pro driver something like that. That'd be a really cool goal to achieve. So I I wrote it on my whiteboard, UM as a goal, UM, become a professional race car driver. That was around two thousand and fourteen, and U from now I was like, Okay,

how do I make this happen? And I did a lot of research, did a lot of networking, and put a lot of pieces together to even get to a point where I could find my way into a racing series. The first racing series was UM a late model racing series at Irwindale's Speedway. So I was getting into circle track racing. Yeah, sort track yeah yeah. So UM I got there and I was like, hey, you know, maybe this is where I belong, Maybe this is where I can start. You know, there aren't black people really racing

and nascars. I'm a lot um There was Bubba Wallace at that time, and really that was all I knew who were in the National Series. So I was like, I need to get to the National Series level and race there too. So I began working my way up the ranks and started in late models. From late models, moved onto the NASCAR K and N Series which is now the ARCA West Series. Um, but uh yeah, started started running in there, and then a year into that,

that's when when we had linked up. Remember telling you, I'm like, I was just thinking at the time, because I was always about networking and trying to just figure out, you know, odd ball ways and continue to uh, you know, make this journey you know bigger. Um. So then when I when I linked up with you, I was like, man, I was like, what if we figured out a way to kind of make you part of everything that we

were doing. You know, at that time, the team I was running with, we were very um we had a very open type environment where we could just just do just do whatever we could, like whatever odd ball things that most people wouldn't think of doing. I was like, why don't we make you, you know, former NFL star all that stuff. Once you make you like a team owner basically like a car owner in the series, I was like, who's doing that? No one else is doing

Let's do it ourselves. And um, you know then that's basically where the relationship pretty much began. And it was cool doing that In twenty seventeen, I guess was the season we did it Ineen and um man uh fun times. A lot of a lot of ups and downs on the races, but we did what we could what we had and um, you know you had a lot of great contacts too and helped us with the sponsor that we had that year, and um, you know it always well so, um it was cool, cool way of doing things. No,

it was you know, it was different. I was just thinking outside the box and just my involvement to what happened. How I got in a NASCAR was in two thousand and eight when I was playing with the charges the Richard Petty group. They invited me out for the Richard Petty Experience and they came out and they made me the Grand Marshal of the Fontana Races. Um and I came out and at that time that from PG County and Watchington, DC area, we wasn't watching NASCAR. I mean,

if you did watching NASCAR, it was on TV. It wasn't that exciting. You didn't really understand what was going on. Just looked like a bunch of cars racing fast in the circle. You didn't know. And you know, like in the hood, like back where I'm from, you knew about the Dale earned hards and like, you know the bigger drivers, but you didn't know. You didn't know about the actual sports. So me being invited out for to be the Grand Marshal in two thousand and eight, they came and they

told me everything else gonna do. Mind you. I didn't know how big it was. I think it might have been thirty to fifty thou people that day at the track in two thousand and eight. It was. It was huge. I had no idea that I think at that time it was like probably it might have been eight. It was. It was massive. And they told me what I was gonna do. I got there to the track and they said, hey, we're gonna give you this flag. You're gonna walk up

on the ladder. We're gonna announce you, and you're gonna start to waive it, but don't drop the flag. And I'm looking at them like, what are you talking about? It's you know, it's a damn flag. You know, I mean, who can't swing a flag around and whatnot? Right, So I got there and I'm about to walk up the ladder and I looked back and they told me, they said, look, don't drop the flag with gonna announce your name. So

the announced my name, crowd goes crazy. They allowed and then I look back and I said, I got this. What are you talking about. It's a damn flag, right, So I walk out there and almost in the middle of the track, and I got the green flag in my hand and they start the cars up, and you know, you're that close in the track, and your adrenaline starts to go and you're like, holy shit, right and just oh my god, they started, so your adrenaline is going and my hands started to get wet. My hand start

to get wet. So I'm like, I'm like, please, I said, hold on. I look back again and I'm looking and I just remember them telling me don't drop the flag, and I go and I started to wave it. My hands are I mean, my hands are soaking. So I'm out there. I'm nervous as hell now, so I'm saying, please do not drop this flag. Now they start the cars up, and that I never forget that the energy that goes through you, like your body being that close

to the track. And that's why I tell people to get if you are in a NASCAR you ever thinking about it, get to the tracks, because it's totally different when you get there. So I'm standing in the middle of the track and they started engine up and they started to take their you know, the warm up laps around, you know, cleaning the tires off and doing all this stuff they're doing. And they said, okay, go and I started to wave the flag and not now I hear

and I'm thinking I'm gonna drop the band flags. I said, please, don't do that. There's gonna be the most embarrassing ship that happened me before in my life. And so anyway, but what that day is why I got into NASCAR, because going to the tracks, to me was it was a game change. It was way different than watching on TV. I got a chance of sitting the pitch for the first time. You got, you got, and I'm adrenaline junkie man.

I like energy, and I like, you know, stuffed, and it's there's no better adrenaling that he had being that closer to track right those thirty or sixty seconds however long it takes, or fifteen seconds however long it takes for them to coming to pit and leave out, that is a total a whole different adres rush. So that was that was my get into NASCAR type of type of deal. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, I know. It's uh, the rush is crazy. I mean yeah, we're

people who haven't been to the track before. Once you get there, um, you know, being able to just yeah feel like the engines, the sounds, just the energy around and there's so much going on even when they come in for the pit stops. I mean, I I tell people, like, that's one of the coolest parts to me is just coming into the pit stops, having these guys jump over the wall in front of these cars that are coming in at fifty sixty miles per hour into a box.

Basically imagine driving off of a highway, you know, at whatever highway speeds you are into your garage and stopping just in time without hitting anything. And by the way, five people are jumping out in front of your car to uh to to take off your tires and and replace them with the other ones and all that stuff.

So yeah, it's uh, it's pretty crazy. So yeah, So in two thousand and eight, I went to From two thousand and eight to the time that we kind of linked up in two thousand and seventeen, I've probably been to you know, ten to fifteen tracks or something like that. I will go to at least three or four tracks a year. And when we finally linked up, and and and my whole thing and why we kind of doing what we were doing is to get more acknowledgement in

the sport, you know, with minorities and blocks. Like to me, man, that was that was huge because when I went to the track, you didn't see it. You didn't you know, you didn't see car owners, you didn't see team owners, you didn't see really any black people or minnorities at the track. And I said, damn, you know, people are kind of missing out a little bit. And like, you know, maybe to me, maybe it was. And I was trying

to figure out why. I was like, maybe it's the not having access to be able to go to a track. I mean, growing up where I grew up, it was no attract nowhere near I think the closest track might have been over over over, yeah, you know the Marster Mouth so um, but that was still what a couple of hours away from from where I was, so we didn't we couldn't afford going there. We couldn't get to the track. So NASCAR was never really an interest going up.

But I was like, you know what, maybe if we you know what we don't want to say, we me and you and we link up and and and kind of bring more eyeball to the sport, uh and do something that hasn't been done here. Uh, maybe it might be different. Maybe you might have more people of color. That's going to be interesting in getting to the tracks

because it needs to it needs to happen. Yeah. Yeah, was definitely, yeah, exactly, Yeah, and um, you know it was cool, especially like you know, I think I can't remember which year that you did the thing where you brought all the kids to it was a twenty seventeen

or eighteen, um, yeah, so like things like that. I mean that was like really cool and something um I feel like was needed, Like I feel like right now with like again, I saw all the time, you know, what does nascarny to do to continue to build diversity. I'm like, well, obviously you know on the driver's side, um, crew side, and you know, um all that stuff. Um, you know, there's a pipeline and stuff that they're working on.

You know, they got the D for D program, all these other little things that they're doing to help build that side. But as far as the fan base, you know, doing things like you did in eighteen, just bringing a group of kids and and I know you brought a lot, but um, you didn't even have to be that much

as that. Maybe it's just twenty kids or something like that from you know, different inner city areas near the tracks and just bring them and have an exposure because like you said, getting them to the track is what's going to create that fan And then all of a Suddeny're gonna tell their friend, They're gonna tell their friend, they're gonna tell their parents. Makes you know, hopefully the next year of the family makes a trip to come out there, because a kid all years like I want

to go back. I want to go back. So um, you know, doing things like that I think is huge and and what the sport really needs to continue to build diversity at the youth level. Yeah, So one thing what Jesse's talking about is UH in two thousand and eighteen, I got the opportunity to bring about sixty kids from the inner city UH to the track and Delaware to

the Monster Mile. And you know, the whole cause behind that from the start to meet was is just get them there right, let them see, let them be there, because there's so many different opportunities in NASCAR, and it's not necessarily always being a driver, Like every one of those kids are not going to be a driver. You're not gonna have an opportunity to be a driver. But there's so many different jobs and opportunities working at this track. Maybe you can be a tract president or whatever that

turns out to be. That opportunities there. It's a lot of opportunity and nascars And what's crazy about that is, um, some of those kids from that day in two thousand and eighteen, they still reach out here that send me direct message on on Instagram. I get letters you know for at least about fifteen kids. And for me, if five of those if five of those kids that day, if they get a chance to go and one day working the NASCAR circuit wherever that might be, I'm like,

that's to me my job to win. It's a win big time. And what what do you what do you see? You know, because we obviously being there and it's certain diversity programs is set up, there's certain things that is going on a NASCAR, but I just and NASCAR is totally receptive and they're open to to open the doors

to more black people minorities. UM, but some just to me it's like that it's not enough, Like it's not enough that the that that bridge isn't built and how people get what do you what do you see as missing right now that whitneys to happen? Yeah, UM, I would say missing wise UM like like you said, like with what you did, like that particular type of program, I think it's huge. I feel like that should be happening at every single track um around the country. UM.

Not just you know that one time at Dover. You know it's great and all for that time, but we should be doing that every because we do it for the military and we don't bring fifty sixty people to every track, but um, each track for the most part that they go to, they have a program where they do troops to the track where they have you know, usually anywhere between you know, ten the twenty people that they bring military service members who are from the bases nearby.

And it's a cool program because it provides that um, that experience of these guys who sometimes have never been to a track before, providing that same opportunity I think to minorities, who who who just don't have the opportunity to come to the track because of maybe lack of money or lack of whatever, or just you know, parents

are working super hard. I mean, you know, I mean you know, I mean you go to a lot of these families and it might just only be a mother who's taking care of the whole household and she's working every single day, hours and hours and hours. I mean she just doesn't have time, you know. Or maybe it's a single dad who's just working hard to support the family. UM, they just don't have the time to take their their kids to you know, things like NASCAR or even any

other sports. UM. So if if if NASCAR could kind of be that bridge to help bring these people in, um, to to give them that opportunity they just don't have, that would be huge. UM. You know. As far as uh, past the ARCA level, there really isn't. UM. I would say, like another driver diversity type program that's um really I guess UM continue to push people into like uh, you know, truck's affinity and cup you know, right now, it just

really ends at the ARCA level. UM. Not that you know, there are people who do go from defer D too, you know, and eventually into the National Series and stuff. You have Daniel Suarez, I believe Kyle Larson was part

of the group before Bubba Wallace obviously. Um. And then on the crew side, there's been people who've done the Deeper D program who've moved on to be on Cruise like Brianna, Um, Brianna Daniels, she's she's doing really well and Cup awesome, She's doing a really really good, really cool, cool person. So, um, you know, but as far as the driver's side, UM, I feel like there's not really I guess a drive for diversity program in the National Series. Um.

Now it's tough because it just costs money. At the end of the day, no matter what we all do. Tires aren't free, UM, vehicles, all this stuff isn't free just cause money. So you know, at the the the companies that make all this stuff, they gotta be their families too. So UM, there's a so just breaking just break it down to people, what what what does the average cost so they so they know, let's started a decent team that's on the Cup Series. What does it

cost to race pro you a decent team? Image when she say what you mean by decent um, I mean that's that's called that's called a mid tiers. Okay, we can break it into three tiers. Like let's say I just say a lower budget team, mid budget team, and high bud of team. The lower budget teams in the Cup Series would say each race, you know, depending on what they're doing and how they're making their money work, they could be spending anywhere from fifty two hundred fifty

thousand dollars per race um uh. And then mid budget teams they're probably in that two hundred two four hundred grand type uh per race budget and the higher budget teams I've heard of cost up to eight hundred thousand per race um and the hurdy give you more actually, um so uh it's could it could be really high and it's pricey and um yeah, I mean you gotta think about it, like on you know, right now, COVID time has kind of um really um changed a lot

of different things. But prior to COVID, I mean, you know, for a full lot men of tires in the Cup Series for a full weekend, I believe it's like forty grand or something depending on what track with like forty grand or forty five something like that. Um, I mean that's a lot that's just on tires for the weekend, you know. I mean that's not including um, all the travel. I mean, think of all the hollers, the race cars, getting two of them ready for that weekend. Could gotta

have the backup car. UM, all the people that you're bringing. And you've got all these people that gotta come to attract to work on these cars, all the hotels, the flights, UM, the food, all their all all their cruger that they're wearing, their equipment, the pit boxes, and mean those things cost as much as the house. You know, so all this stuff that's going on. It just that's why it costs

so much money to race. And the funny thing is as much as it cost to race, you know in NASCAR here, it's nothing compared to what Formula one is around the world. And Formula one there's their budgets are like ten times the amount. Oh, it's it's ridiculous. And that's that's my reason for being in m m A. Now it's it's pricey, but it's fun and then and you know there there are good to have money. I

don't think it's being thrown away. I mean as much as you know I just named listed a lot of kind of what things cost, it's not being thrown away. A lot of good is being done. Um, and and companies who are sponsoring are seeing great marketing benefits out of it. So um, there's a reason why I cost him.

I mean, you can you can go spend a ton of money to have a thirty second commercial on whatever you know, TV channel, or you can spend you know that kind of money on you know, sponsoring a car in a race and having a you know, three four hour rolling commercial for the race. So you know, it just depends on you know, what you want to do. What's your uh, what your marketing initiatives are? You know what I would surprised me what would kind of being

a NASCAR uh for the time that I was. It's not just the lack of diversity part of it and people not being in there, but also these these companies, these black owned companies, these big black owned companies like the like you just talked about the opportunities in NASCAR and them not being in it. I'm like, man, do you understand like if you have a for example, if you had a product you were trying to sell, if you're trying to have a product placement or whatever it is.

There's grocery stores, there's convenience stores, there's all these you know, different companies there's in NASCAR, and there's one or two pits away from you, then one or two sweets away from you. I can't tell you how many meetings I've had, you know, when the race before racis startus obviously, you know, I'll be there for the drivers and the team owner meetings and things like that. But right after that, it

is meeting after beating for me. And you know, I was just always surprised that there wasn't more big companies, black owned companies that got in a NASCAR because of the opportunity there is just on another level, Yeah, yeah, yeah, I feel like there's a lot of black owned companies

that probably could get involved. Um, you know, and and you know, we're still obviously working on diversity side of you know, having more diverse drivers and things like that, so maybe they weren't getting involved before because they didn't see that diversity um right now, I mean, we obviously are trying to change it. It's still not where it needs to be yet. Um. You know right now in

the National Series, you got me, you have Bubba Wallace. Uh. You know, Kyle Larson is gonna be really reinstated, um here at the beginning of next year. UM. And then uh Daniel Suarez, uh you know Hispanic driver. UM. And then you know there's females coming up to by the way, So you know when I said milorities, don't just talk about color. It's about females too. So females are are coming up the ranks too. So UM, a lot of

different uh diversity initiatives are happening. We still need more, you know, we need we need a lot more color, a lot of different variants and genders, UM, all that stuff just to continue to to to represent what America is. You know, America isn't just one race. America is a lot of races. So UM, let's represent what the country looks like in our sport and UM, you know, obviously give opportunities to people who who can excel and being great ambassadors as a sport and UM, you know that's

gonna help out. But yeah, I feel like you know, black owned businesses, UM. You know time is now jump in, you know, support UM, everyone's talking about wanting to support diversity initiatives and things like that, we'll want to support in Nascar. I mean, NASCAR is making a huge push, I think, bigger than any other sport out there. They're taking hard stands um more than any other sport out there,

and earlier than any other sport. A lot of other sports are taking a while to make decisions on Okay, what are we gonna do here, We're gonna do the NASCAR just stood up and was like, look, we're to band the Confederate flag. We're gonna do this. We're gonna do that, and and and they did it like that. Was it like thereone's no red tape. It was just we're gonna do it. Um and and and I love that NASCAR's gonna to take the nice, the good stands that they've taken to to help make it more inclusive.

And I'm sure that wasn't easy for them either, to make those decisions. I mean, you know, the the years that we were working together, and I was flying to short tracks, the big tracks wherever it was, you know, whether it was Iowa speedwaye it was the track in Monroe. And you know, I'll never forget, you know, coming there and now flying into town wherever you were racing and kind of meet you there and going to get my rental card and drive into the track and going through

somebody else neighborhoods depending on where the track was. Well, you, it was one time, and I don't know if I never told you or not, but uh, it was one time. I think I was one of the tracks. I can't remember the track it was. I landed there and I was using ways to get to the track and it just took me through some weird neighborhoods and I got it. I said. It was Confederate flags everywhere. It was everywhere, and I was like, I was like, I gotta go back on I gotta go back on the Google man,

I kind of gotta stay in the main road. That crazy, uh, but you know I was. I was proud and I was happy the way that you know, when the whole bubble wall this thing happened, and how NASCAR came out

and it wasn't like an indecisive thing. It was like, this is what we're gonna do, and whoever don't like it, deal with it, period, and how everybody came together because that was a big step, especially in his a sport like Nascar and kind of from the outside looking in and how some people may perceive the sport and the fan base. So when they took that stands, I was like, right on, that was that was dope for me. Yeah, it was. It was great. You know, Um, with the

Confederate flag, even the military. It's funny a lot people got upset with it, but even the military, the thing that everyone supports. We also banned that flag too. I mean we we, we really did a long time ago, but no one really pushed it enough. Um, and now it was like official, like, hey, that light does not belong anywhere on any base because you know, yeah, it's part of history, but it's not a nation like the the Confederate flag represence and in the nation that no

longer exists. The US beat them in a war. It's done. Um, We the United States of America owns all this. Now we're not split anymore. So let's let's get rid of the flag with keep it in the history books. And that's it. You know, speaking of history books. Your your Dallas cowboys over there, and they're making a lot of history. They're they're going through. It's it's tough. I I you know, obviously Dak Prescott is hurt right now and and hopefully

gets better soon. Um and can you know come back stronger. Um it really there's injuries. It sucks. I mean that that's not a great place to break anything. Um but uh um you know besides that though, but prior to that, yeah, I don't know what was going on. I felt like we had a strong team again coming in the year. We have all talent in the world. I mean, the offense was producing numbers. I mean, if you look at the number, I mean, Dak was out there slinging four

hundred plus yards a game. Um, you know, touchdowns, being scored, all this stuff is happening. I just I don't know what the defense was really doing. And we were just lating up too many points. We're making too many mistakes. Um, I don't I don't don't know. Man. It's the Cowboys. Every year. It's just like they gave you a lot of hope. That's the thing like this, There's some teams out there who just gave you zero hope to even start the year. The Cowboys give you a ton of hope.

That ly, so you leusally start on a high before you start coming down. You don't just start down. Tricks tricks, tricks on paper, on paper. Everybody hyped up all year, and they trick you. That's what they do. And then you know, from being from Maryland, either a res Cans or a Cowboys fan back if you rank as a cow But that was it. It was in one of the two, and so I got to hear it either way.

And I'm looking man, and the first thing cume in my mind is they kept Jason Garrett two years too long, and they brought the coaching Mike McCarthy to hand over the keys to a Ferrari that was kind of like damaged already. You know, offense line is beat up, and and you know Jeeke had with three fumbals the other day and they're just not playing well across the board. And on top of that, you know you got players in the locker room to speaking to the media behind

closed doors. Now I don't know if you've seen that, but they came out and said how unprepared the coaches are. And this is coming from the players. And you can you can tell by watching the game when you play ball, like you know, when you're starting to lose the locker room, that's exactly what guys do, like start talking to the media, start going to do stuff behind your back, and it's just it's just it symbolizes a very bad team, and that's what they are right now. They're a bad team.

So it's just it's it's fun from me because I get a chance to talk track and some of my family who are cowboys fans still. Um, but yeah, you know, how does how does that work? Man in the locker room? And or just even with NASCAR? Right, Um, how does that have? Because people always thinking of the drivers. They don't understand like how much of a team Nascar? It's like everybody around if you don't if somebody is not spotting the race correctly, and and and I spotted a

race before, which is kind of crazy. You know, Yeah, tell people with spotting the race if they don't already. Yeah, for it to be a spotter in a race, you basically when the drivers on the track, you only have a certain field division. You can only see you know, like this much. You can't really see anything behind. It's not like in a regular car where you can look behind you and all that stuff. You can't do all that because you're just stuck in the seat and the

full containments say, you just can't see. So um, you need somebody who's on the radio with you, um, looking around you and behind you to let you know that, hey, someone's right behind you there on your right rear, left rear, you name it. So um uh that person is called the spotter and they're sitting high up in the stands where they can kind of, you know, give you that information and yeah, you're spotted for. I think it's a Colorado or something like that. Um, it's funny, but yeah, yeah,

and I was. I was nervous as hell too. Yeah whatever that, Yeah you got. You know, you just spied you you you the eyes and the ears for for the driver who can't see in certain blind spot. So you know, I just kind of going out saying do it.

But no. But back to my point, I was saying that, you know, people understand how much of a team NASCAR is, and you have sometimes the same type of thing happening where you know, stuff gets out of people talking behind closed doors or what's going on with the team like that is not accepted either. I mean, that's that's really frowned upon. Yeah, I mean that can happen. Um. You know with NASCAR, a lot of stuff is media. Um, you do a lot of stuff with the media period.

And you know you can you can tell when certain teams are having issues throughout the year. Um, you know the uh driver isn't getting them out of you know, results that they want. What are winds or whatever it is? Um, And you know they might say something they needia like, hey, you know it's they could blame it on themselves, they could blame it on the team, pick, crew, crew chief, whatever. Um. You know, people throw blame all over the place. Um.

You know, I think the day it's a team sport. Um, it doesn't take just one person to go win a race. It doesn't just take two, It takes like the whole entire team. The crew chief could be phenomenal, the driver could be phenomenal, but if the crew screws up there pickers gives up, all of a sudden, you know you can't win the race. The picker could be phenomenal driver, it could be not having a great day and crew chief make the best calls and then you know, all

of a sudden you don't win. So you know, a lot of stuff can happen. So um, yeah, I think everyone being on the same page, everyone always communicating, and that's what keeps the team together, that's what allows people to progress because you're not gonna win every single race but as well, but but you can't make progress and you can't be doing the right things to set yourself eventually up for a win or or a string of wins eventually. So, um, it's tough. Nascar is very different

than any of the sport. Every other sport is just one one group versus the other and just one one of them's gonna win. And Nascar you got Ford cars out there, so you compete against forty different people to try to forty different people to try to get one win. It's it's insane, man. So so tell what what's next. I've seen you've got some stuff going on with the Exfinity Series now right yeah um yeah yeah, so yeah, so what's so what's I'll do now? And I wanted that.

I mean, you're moving right now. I mean that from the from the plan we first started talking and starting on the Cannons series which is now the ARCA ARCA West. Um, but and now moving up to what what you know, you went to the truck series and now yeah so yeah, so um, you know, went from you can and stuff, UM, and then ran a little bit of ARCA, UM, moved up to trucks. Ran trucks really since the end of UM and then uh, I've still run trucks this year.

I've been running trucks this year, but I started running Axfinity stuff as well, and I will finish off the rest of this year running Xfinity. UM. This weekend, we're running racing at Texas Motor Speedway, so I'll be racing there. I'm actually flying out today to go to Texas and uh and then I'll be racing also at Phoenix International Raceway.

So um yeah yeah, Phoenix is awesome. UM. You know, being able to add the opportunity to racing community series has been you know, something I've been looking forward to for a while. Uh and uh, you know my end goal is eventually raising the Cup series. UM. You know, just it takes time, takes a lot of money, a lot of networking, a lot of partnerships, a lot of that stuff to get there, but UM, working on getting there and eventually we'll get there. Just is it takes time.

So yeah, working on that and then um, you know, working on a lot of other big things too. That's in the works for you know, next year hopefully god willing. UM you know, really trying to boost up the E sports component of UM racing and as far you know in and we're in the middle of putting together E sports tournament UM called Yeah, so it's called Eracing Association

and it's gonna be right now. Like there's there's other you know, like eye racing type UM tournaments that people are putting on eye racing that will um, you know, they give away money and stuff. The tournaments that we're gonna be putting on on eye Racing will be giving away big money. M we're looking at giving way ten thou dollars for the prize school, um for the tournament. So um, there's not a lot of tournaments in the

past we have done that kind of money. UM there's some, but not a lot, and we want to be that one to do it and create a series of events where people can go compete when money and this December hopefully someone's gonna have a lot of Christmas money. So so basically what you're saying is when you get up to the Cup Series. I gotta come back on board because we need to put together some money. If you got some stuff you can bring over, let me know, let us know. Yeah, No, it's uh, you know, it

just it it takes time and money. I mean, it's just you know, like I mentioned earlier, you know, nothing's free. You know, the tires aren't free. You know, equipment isn't free. The times it's just cost money. There's no way around it. So putting together the right partnerships are what it takes to continue to move forward. Or just having a really big business empire outside of it and just funding it yourself. You know that works too. All right man, Well, look,

appreciate you for coming on. Good luck this weekend. Wish I didn't have to fly out for business because I damn sure. I love the Texas Speedway out there. So yeah, are you? Are you right in Arizona? Right after that, we'll be raised. Phoenix is November seven, So we skip one, skip one weekend, and then skip one weekend just following one week right, Okay, maybe maybe I'll meet you out there in the Phoenix. Now I like that that uh that track, Yeah, it's cool track especially since they since

they've redone it. Oh yeah, yeah, they they in the infield. Well, the thing is with with the way COVID stuff is, they're not really letting anyone on the infield but um, which kind of sucks because that's where like all the fun is down there now. I mean, they really revamped the whole place. It's really really nice. It sucks. I can't really use it this year. But hopefully next year

things will be back to normal. We'll see, okay, cool man, Well, good luck this weekend, We'll well, we'll figure it out. I'll get out there in the small tracks maybe four the years out. All right, cool, thank you. I appreciate you guys for listening in to another episode of the Lights Out podcast with me Sean Merriman. One think about

jesse Man. He's one of the most hardest working guys I know, seriously, and he talked about um, you know, him being in college playing football, but also being having his duties being in the military, and his transition into NASCAR, which was crazy. We got a chance to meet in two thousand seventeen and trying to bring really programs and

more diversity to the sport. We feel like it was more opportunity that can be done and more things that can be done in NASCAR, not just necessarily being a driver, but also UM having you know, inner city kids being able to go to tracks and see what NASCAR's about. Um also talked a little bit about this his terrible Dallas Cowboys and what they're playing like this year and the things that going on in the locker room. But

always always great talking to Jesse. Wishing a lot of luck this weekend at the Texas Speedway and in a few more weeks at the Phoenix Race tracks down there, which I'll be going. So thank you guys for listening in to another episode of Lights Out with me Shawn Mariman, and make sure you keep on and end subscribe, rate us do all those great things. We're getting some great reviews all because of you guys, So I appreciate you for listening to it. H