The volume. Hi, everybody, Welcome in to the Wednesday Morning Heard Colin Coward podcast. So a bunch of different thoughts for about twelve minutes here. You know, when I was younger, and you'd have Thanksgiving or Christmas, but usually Thanksgiving you invite extended family. And maybe my family was different than yours. My guess is not. Really. There's always one weird uncle that shows up, and he's like the conspiracy theorist in the family. And it's not like, you know, he believes
in UFOs. You know, maybe he did see one, he just didn't know what it was. It was a government plane whatever. I'm not talking that, but you know, he's always like anti government and and I always had this sort of theory on conspiracy theorists that they're people that somehow feel slighted by life. They're not as successful as they believe they should be, so they've got to blame somebody. It's the government, it's a political figure, it's a boss.
The truth is when you used to bring them over for Thanksgiving or Christmas and they would leave, you were all like, yeah, we like uncle Phil, but he's batshit crazy. And I was watching the Trump indictment in Georgia and I woke up at like three in the morning and they couldn't go back to sleep for about forty five minutes, and I went online, what a mistake. I'm convinced now half the country is conspiracy theorists. It's the Alex Jonesing
of society. One of the reasons I love sports is that there's finish lines, and they're standings, and they're winners and they're losers. But as I looked at this indictment, I thought to myself, is the reality of paula Tics going forward that unless you win an election, conservative or Democrat, you're going to say it's fixed? Like, is that the door that's been opened? I mean, I always loved sports.
Years ago, I was offered a political show years and years and years ago from a general manager of an AM radio station that said, you know, I think you're kind of a moderate, lean left guy. There's too many conservatives on the air. And I said, well, if the audience listens to conservatives, that's what the audience wants. And I said to him, I'm not angry enough to be in politics. I like the finality of sports. Winners, losers go home, game over. But folks with that movie JFK
came out years ago by Oliver Stone. It was really entertaining, but when it was over, everybody sort of agreed it was out there. I think today, if it was released, it would be seen as a documentary. People would just buy all of it. And I don't know what happen is that the influence of social media. But politics has gotten so crazy I have to shut it off. Like, I don't care who's running for president, but if you think elections are fixed, I can't vote for you either
side it's over. That will be my definitive one topic election outcome provider. If you think the election is fixed, I can never vote for you. What the hell would that do to our democracy? Give me sports, give me standings, get me conclusive winners and losers. It's a more sane life. So one of the things that baseball pushed back on for years, and it's really going to cost them in the playoffs this year, is individuality. There's always been this
ridiculous there's a way to play the game. No, there's not, unwritten rules. Write them down. I think baseball is going to have its lowest postseason ratings ever, and the primary reason is the average sports fan not a fantasy baseball player. And the average sports fan will not be able to name a starter for most of the American League playoff teams Baltimore, Minnesota, the Cleveland Guardians, and the Tampa Rays.
And say what you want about the NBA, but all of you listening can name at least three starters for the Golden State Warriors, and a couple starters for the Celtics and a couple starters for the Milwaukee Bucks. You don't even have to be an NBA fan. You kind of know the top ten players in the league and you've heard of the next ten. That's because the NBA
has pushed wrapped their arms around and embraced individuality. I always thought one of the keys for college football during the USC days was that USC put their arms around Redge Bush and Matt Leinert and they really focused on individuality and team play, whereas Alabama is like Penn State. You know, numbers on the helmets, generic uniforms. It's all about the team over the individual. Well you're going to see in baseball this year the direct result of that.
American League ratings are going to be atrocious. Yankees out Red Sox out, Thank God. The Dodgers and the Braves in the National League, well known brands with star players have a good chance to get to the National League Championship Series. But the American League. I mean again, I'm not talking seamhead Baseball, Diehard, I'm not talking Bob Costas, Keith Oberman, guys who lived for the sport. Average fans, sports fan in America, I can't name a starter for
the Twins Orioles. Race guardians can't name one. I've said before twice that I've tried to invest in the MLS too rich for my blood. But I think the academy system of the smaller stadiums, I think it's well run. And I also think we have better players now in America than we've ever had. And I always feel like, if you're a really good high school football player, really really special, you will be offered by the SEC. You'll get an offer from Bama, LSU, Georgia, Florida, somebody that
kind of validates. Even if you live in California play in Washington State, you'll be offered by the SEC. That's where the best players go mostly. And I feel like, if you're really a legitimate soccer player in America, you will play overseas and not just make a roster, but you know, via viable starter or somebody that is gets
on the pitch right. The MLS still has a pretty low ceiling, and I think the example of that is thirty six year old loun A Messi literally has walked into the worst team in the MLS and is averaging a goal and a half a game, and I mean looks ridiculously effortlessly easy. Now, he was very good at the World Cup. He's not in Bappe at this point, and Bope is in his athletic prime, just surging into it. But I mean when you watch Messi in the ease in which he gets quality shots, it shows you how
far the MLS is from being a great league. Now we don't think it's a Laaliga. We don't think it's the English Premier League, the EPL. We don't. But it has sort of been noticeable to me that Messi is so profoundly skilled that it's almost like players are paying respect to him. They don't want to be humiliated. They give him these nice little cushions that I'm not sure they give American players. I think it's a great story. I think he's the most important player ever in the MLS.
I am a fan of the league. I try to catch on a fairly regular base. Fifteen minutes highlights YouTube it. I really do like it, and I am a huge kind of advocate for the United States men's and women's national teams. But it shouldn't be this easy for MESSI should it? I mean this easy. This was the worst
team in the league before he got there. The new movie Gran Tuismo is based on an unbelievable true story about a team of unlikely underdogs, a struggling working class gamer, a failed race car driver, and an idealistic motor sport executive. Together they risk it all to take on the most elite sport in the world. It's a great, compelling story. It's some of the most famous racing competitions in the world, and they are recreated through the use of actual Nissan
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My producers and I watched it. They sent us a link Grand Turismo. It is a hard story to believe is true, but it is actually true. We're a middle class gamer, an optimistic motorsport executive, and a failed race car driver team up in what is one of the more inspiring, unique sports stories in one of the most elite sports in the world. The movie August twenty fifth is when it opens up. Get your ticket. It's now. It's called Grand Turismo. It is a true story. And
I was told that I watched the movie. I had to google after. I'm like, give me a break. I never heard about this story and it's all true. August twenty fifth, and we bring in the actual gamer who pulled this off, Yan Martin Borough, joining us on the volume. When You're a Gamer, and there was parts in the movie and I understand it's Hollywood, so not everything in the movie is true about your dad, you know, like all dads is thinking to himself. My son's playing esports,
he's an e gamer. I want to get a real job. And I thought to myself, is this Hollywood? Or could you tell us? Was their doubts by your family? Your mom supported you, but your dad was like, you know, I understand, like I'm a dad. Was there conflict with your dad or was that a little bit of Hollywood?
Well it wasn't really.
Esports wasn't a thing back then in motorsport anyway, twelve years ago, twenty eleven.
I've had it all my life.
I guess any millennial born in the nineties has had the same thing with PlayStation all the games.
I've had it in school.
Coming up from school, you have to do two hours revision before that thing even gets turned on. Whatever, go outside, No, I want to play PlayStation instead. It's forever been a thing. So when I was talking to the producers and scriptwriters back in woll this was twenty nineteen, I mean it was I just told my experiences. It's like, yeah, my dad wanted to be to outside and have a childhood
like he did, but he didn't quite understand that. I'm also socializing online with my friends with my microphone and it's now it's kind of normal, whereas back then it's still you have different generation not really understanding the current generations. So no, it's not it's not Hollywood. It's that's how it was.
You know. Yeah, And it's interesting you say that, how old are you now? Because you sound like my sixteen year old son who says, Dad, I am socializing. I'm socializing on my computer.
I'm thirty one.
And even now it's it's another level because not only well, twelve years ago, I guess I don't know what if twitch was the thing. Back then YouTube was barely a thing, but certainly online streaming wasn't a thing, whereas now you can have i don't know, like millions of people, hundreds of thousands of people watch you play a game and also socialize in the chat. That's something which is again for me, I don't do that because I'm in my
thing is in real life. But when I look at these content streamers and it's like, yeah, they're so talking to so many people at the same time.
It's like a social event.
So I had never heard of this story, and as I watched the movie, it's very compelling. I literally had to google Okay, is this real? So you're basically a gamer, You get invited to the GT Academy, you win it, and because of an aspirational you know, motorsport executive and a driver who has real doubts about you, did you have? You come across as very confident. But I mean, let's be honest. This story there's a reason Hollywood wanted to
make this story. It doesn't even sound true. Did you ever have a doubt gamer to getting in a car before that first race starts? Were you anxious? Were you nervous or did you have this sort of inner scoreboard? And believe not there's advantages that I have over these drivers.
Never still of that.
But I'm someone who's very headstrong, and I'm somebody who I think who has a good like building block psyche from my father telling me from a young age, you know, do something in life which brings you purpose and that you're passionate about, and that for me is cars. So I'm a headstrong person, so that is all I wanted to do. So when the opportunity presented itself of this is a chance of becoming a race and driver, I was all in and that I didn't think I could
win I didn't think I could lose. It was this weird frame of mind during the whole process of entering it at home on my PlayStation and also get into the finals of the academy, where I was like a blinked race horse, where I didn't want to think about winning or losing it.
It was just like, Okay, what's next.
Let's do the best I can learn from learn from my mistakes in the previous instructors' comments, and the next time in the car, don't make that mistake.
Again, or let's improve. It was this weird mindset.
I never thought that I had advantage over anybody else because I went in there with the understanding that I'm to be a sponge. That was another thing I remember thinking, like, it's like, all the information that that's going to be taught at me during this academy process at GT Academy is going to be good information because all the drivers, all the instructors are currently current racing drivers, all the ex professionals, so whatever they're telling me is going to
be correct. I have no preconceived ideas of how to race a racing right, so I was just absorbing all of it, and I never thought that I had an advantage over anybody else. Really, it's not. I was very much aware that I'm the first step of the ladder. Because there's people that were there at the academy who had had drifting experience of then track days, of then cart in. I was the least experienced person of everybody there.
And it was the same thing in entering motorsport after the Academy, I'm very much aware that I'm here to All I cared about is my progression.
I didn't care about anything else.
I want to make sure that my progression is experienced for as long as possible. So I never I was all I am is very headstrong and he's like, Okay, that's what I want to do, and I'll do it. I don't think if I'm no confidence in showing it egotistically, it's not really my scene. Even now, it's like I don't say what I've done. It's like the people that put I guess you know the school accomplishments, MBAs and
stuff in their bios. Is That'm just not that I have receipts of what I've done in the past, and the movie thing is fantastic. I never thought it'd be a thing because it's so random. So when it first got told to me, I didn't believe them and I thought, why me, I'm just racing my racing car.
That's what I've been doing.
So it's interesting. And you're a gamer and then you're a driver. Once you'd succeeded it driving, did you go back to gaming sometimes and think? Actually it helped you as a driver, So you transition from gamer to driver when you went back to gaming. Are there things gaming in gaming that actually are advantages that drivers probably could use?
Well?
The main reason why drivers and I still use simps is because of the limited time you have on circuits.
So in the off season, right.
From I don't know, November till March, you there's no real drive and it's cold here in the UK during those months, so you the next best sitting is being in assimulator. So yeah, it's just lapse, it's it's time in the seat. Yeah, it's that. That's what it's currently useful. That's what I still use the SIMP for.
So yeah, I've been in a race car twice now more of a stock car American version, which is not as slick as what you drove. My takeaway is Wow, it's really hot in here, and you better be in shape. So in the movie, the first time you were in that car, take me to the physical I mean, I mean, did you come out of that thing and wake up the next morning and you were a wreck? You were? Was it physically more daunting than you thought it would be?
It was an accluminative.
It was an accluminative like sensation, really, because during those academy days, day one, day two, day three, you know, kind of feel fine. But then in the later days I was aware that my hands were starting to get quite sore, my forearms, my even my my neck to a little bit to a point. And then certainly when I transitioned to really quick racing cars after the academy, I'm actually racing. Then it's it became a thing. It
became a real thing. Like there's muscles behind your ears, which you don't really work in normal day to day life. But when you've done two days testing in a Formula three car at a track where seven five of the corners out of seven a full throttle, and you wake up the next morning, you get lift your head up the pillow and your neck is just it's it's in bits and you've got another day test and it's yeah,
it's a thing. It's really GT cars. They get very hot, it's quite hot in You have to be lean, you have to be aerobically fit. I train it every day, and not only because of my job, because I actually enjoy training. It's it's part of my lifestyle. But yeah, you know, i've recently. I never did it before because I never would the technology. But I had a recent
main at Fuji in Japan. It was a twenty four hour race and I have like this finished tracker, it's my wrist and I left it on during the race and over two hours, I think I burnt eight hundred and seventy calories.
It was average one hundred.
And fifty deep some minutes got a peaked at aroune hundred and seventy five.
I think.
So it's like it's your your stress for a long time. It's maybe the heat and a GT card. The heat really makes your body work.
Yeah, I was going to say a twenty four hour race like Lamon's how I'm just a novice. How do you get Obviously there are probably mechanisms to keep you hydrated, but you're burning through eight hundred calories every two hours.
How do you eat?
I mean, are you do you go into a race? No? You you don't want to go into a race like heavy and tired, so you want to go in fairly lean. How do you eat in a twenty four hour race when you're burning those kind of calories?
I think for me, I've always ate it all times, so I still stick to my during just before the race and during I still stick to my normal plan. I'll eat when I'm hungry. I eat my three meals a day. But it's not so much when I get out of the car, you know I need to grab food immediately. It's more when you wake up in the middle of the night and then you know you're in
the car, like I don't know, four am. And then it's planning your times of eating in really unusual hours because then you bought your body like I'm hungry for it's four o'clock in the morning. This isn't normal, It's it's an interesting experience because you're hungry at weird times. All I felt, all I've done really is whenever I'm hung just make sure I'm not hungry, and I get in the car and then I'm fine.
So you dominate a game like Grand Turismo, right, and that gets you on a track. Are there other games? As a gamer? Are there other games? Does it transition in esports that you're just good on almost any gaming platform you?
Well, it's I think now.
I would never put in the hours required to be at a level where I'm the best because I don't find that enjoyable. But also, whatever I do on a sim now is for my real life performance in the car, so I never go into that detail anymore. But I can jump on another They all have their nuances, they're all slightly different, but I can jump on another SIM, whether that be on PC or another title on PlayStation, and be quick.
It's like the racing game.
It's what I've been doing since I was eight, so come kind of alright at doing them.
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the summer in style, comedy, baseball concerts. It's the Game Time app, Last minute deals, lowest prices, guaranteed twenty dollars off your first purchase twenty bucks. Terms apply. How did you view? Because I thought the movie was very compelling. I thought you're The actor that played you was very realistic.
What is it like?
And this will never happen to me to watch yourself being played by somebody else in a movie? What is that like?
The two weird points that are very strange is firstly, when somebody has your race suit and it has j Dot Martinborough on it. That's weird to see. But the weirdest is somebody having wearing your helmet, wearing your colors. Because the motorsports, our helmets are the only thing as a race in Drive we get to customize by ourself. Everything else is due to the team or manufacturer sponsor that we have. The race helmet is fair game for us.
We can design it however we want so to see somebody wear my colors, because it's very My helmet doesn't have my name on it for a reason because when I designed the helmets, I designed it myself and I didn't want my name on the helmet because I said this at a time where I was kind of again maybe second step with the ladder, but I said to myself, look, people are going to know the colors of my helmet. Just because they're going to know the colors of my helmet,
I don't want. I don't need my name on it. I don't need anything else. There's those are my colors, and I'll be recognized from that. That's what helmet's for. So to see somebody else the Archie way the helmet is, it's very weird for me.
So David Arbor is the ex failed race car driver, and he's very cynical of your mission. You're a gamer, you get to be a racer. Did you feel animosity from drivers in the industry where you could kind of sense it at the temperature in the room. You felt like people sort of rolled their eyes at what you were trying to accomplish.
Well, you know, this isn't all racing drivers.
That's It's not like every single race and drive I've had a negative experience.
It's only been a very few. Most drivers have been very welcoming.
Of course, the movie focuses on the relationship with one in particular that was quite negative, and it's the main part rival of the story. But this person is based off a real person that I was teammates with in twenty thirteen, and it was, like you say, there was a lack of respect was that I was given. I was very much aware back then as well that I'm
still cutting my teeth, I'm still hurting my reputation. I wasn't expecting people to be very friendly and open and race as if you know you're on their level because of I haven't done anything. I've been racing that but maybe two years and now. I was aware that if I was racing against me coming up the conventional route, I would hate me, so I cannot had some sympathy.
I had some sympathy because my ego is quite big, especially in my world of motorsport, So to be racing against somebody who's barrier to entry to the sport is five hundred pounds, and then maybe my you know what, my sponsor or family or you know, private minis. They've spent hundreds of thousands, maybe millions to get me to this level, and I've competing against me. So I would be like, I'm going to make sure I beat this guy because I'm going to look silly. I would hate
to lose against me. Back then it would be so I have some sympathy, really, But there was some some people, some drivers.
Yeah, kind of when you're.
Strapped to a car, which can do damage to people, do damage to humans, and whereas it's a it's a missile at some point, and then when that's used in a way that life can be threatened, then it's then I will talk about it.
So when I was talking to producers and.
Scriptwriters about rivals, there was a person in mind about that and the experience that I had with this person because there was a lack of respect on circuit. Face to face, you know, it is what it is, but on circuit there was very clear that there was nothing there. One more kind of example, which is still funny to this day because I've mentioned it so many times. I
woonder if the guy would ever contact me. But my first ever race after the Academy was in a place called Pembury, my local Welsh circuit, and I was having a conversation with somebody and this guy interjected and he introduced himself as the Welsh sports Car and saloon Car Champion of twenty ten. I thought it was very strange for somebody to introduce themselves as a champion, but anyway,
I kind of let him talk. And this was the first time our experienced a verbal to my face where he thought he was here, I was here.
And he said to me, if you see me in your mirrors, don't fight me, just let me go. I mean, I've been racing.
I had done my first race out the academy at that point, and I was like, oh, I've got a man next to me who's given me the yeah, playing the big man.
And it just lit a fire.
I already I was already kind of psyched up, but this guy kind of threw logs and gasoline on my soul. Yeah, it's needless to say he stayed in my mirrors. But that was the first kind of experience of.
You know, egos.
Hierarchy, yeherarchy, yeah yeah, yeah.
Did.
By the way, the first time you faced this person and you can mention him, did you beat him.
Oh yes, yeah that weekend. I mean this was grassroots level. This wasn't high competition at all. This was getting my race license. However, the who Kappa is based off. This was during Formula three, so twenty thirteen. This was so I've been racing a couple of years. Still very new, but yeah, the level quite high from the three.
That had to feel great, That had to feel great.
Yeah, stuff like that.
I had an experience in broadcasting like that. I still remember everybody's name. I still remember it well. Or an older broadcaster, and my first broadcast ever said kind of the same thing. I never let it go. It was jet fuel and you know, I mean, the truth is, when you're young, I think people think they can intimidate younger people, and what they're doing is get doing a favor for you. Because young people, I mean, when you're young, you've got a mind like a trap, and you're influence.
I was influenced much more when I was young than when I'm older. And so the truth is that had such a positive impact on you, probably because it just laser focus. Not that you weren't a focused kid, but the fact that you remember that story, you probably remember the colors, the people, the moment, the time of day. It's probably very clear to you. I would guess it's clear because it was.
The first time somebody saying it to my face.
I mean I had a chip off my shoulder anyway for another reason after the Academy, but I won't go so much into that.
So I was already I had this this fire to prove.
Others but also to myself, and then this guy just kind of added some more fuel to what was currently going on and just kind of I just remember it, and then later on with other people. For the most for the general, since I've been racing twelve years, the interaction now, it's fine. I have I've earned my stripes, I've got receipts, and you know with racing drivers where I've earned the respect, that's all sort of good bris Back.
Then where the movie portrays it was those early years. Yes, it was more more difficult. Show that it was interesting, interesting times.
Grand Turismo is the movie. Congratulations on the story, the movie, your success. It's a really fun watch and I appreciate you joining us.
Thank you. Pleasure.
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