This week on the I Racing Down Shift, Greg's self reports, we continue
to be bad at our job, but it's okay. Kevin gets penalized worked
on a team where we got penalized for that because we didn't change the board
on anything. And Chris reveals his new spotter we call like Sasquatch out of
the woods and we have him, you know, in the hairpin, Like
yeah all that more so strap in welcome to that Racing downship. I'm me
he hou's Greg West, I'm back of the boys, Kevin bobb It and
Chris Leoni. Hey, we did it. It's like only been six weeks.
We've got another podcast. We have done pretty good for twenty twenty three
some statvoid. Does any even know how many episodes we did this year?
Anybody top of their head? We didn't talk about this in pre production,
but I'm just so immediately we off script off like you are welcome, audible
at the line, Yeah, you're welcome for that. There is no point
in having an outline. We continue to be bad at our jobs, but
it's okay. It's another episode of the iRacing down Shift. What have we
been up to? Chris, I'm throwing this to you because Twitter or x
or whatever it's called. This week you have been a troll, an absolute
troll, and I've loved every moment of it. Well, thank you,
Greg, I have. I have been cranking the new Blink one eighty two
album, and I have been going to war with race car drivers about the
fact that they don't own the racetrack. Actually, Parker does own the racetrack,
just he He has phrased it as I own a blade of grass somewhere
at Limerock Park. It's more than I Sorry, does that mean? Does
that mean I support Parker because I have the shirt? Yes, I mean,
I'm on. I bet he probably he probably got seven or eight cents
out of that, maybe not that much. Not about that's more than I
made when I used to do T shirts back in the day. But no
trek limits, friends. They exist for a reason. They exist for safety
reasons, and they exist so drivers have to actually show some skills and not
just UH if I fits, I sits with anything. Sorry, you're strong
opinions, right, So that's good, not at all, no note at
all. What do you think of skid plates? Uh? As somebody who
never did the uh never really did the engineering side on cars. My opinion
is the rule book exists for a reason. Operate within the freaking rule book.
If you can't do that, that's a you thing. Chris is fired
up. I've actually worked on a team where we got penalized for that because
we didn't change the board underneath. And it happens that it was not Lewis
Hamilton's team, by the way, just just to clarify, I was not
a crew member for that team, a slightly lower level team, but same
issue. And you know, you got to you gotta pay attention. Was
that a most part? Where was it it was at? I don't remember
what track it was. I don't think it was most poor, Maybe it
was I it was. I think it was most sporgs. We talked about
it because people talk about floor damage on I race. Maybe it was,
yeah, And I'm like, ah, I mean, I mean Canadian Entire
Motorports, Canadian Entire Motorsport Park, Yes, that one. But the floor
damage at that track, that is a feature, not a bug. That's
realism. Yes, yes, well it probably was there, but yeah,
yeah, it's the thing. So anyway, Yeah, it's I don't know,
I get it. People are competitive and It's always easier to blame the
rule book than reflect on your own mistakes. But maybe I should send Parker
a coloring book and some crayons for Christmas so we can practice who But the
time to argue about rules is before the season starts. Once the rules are
you've decided to compete, you got to follow them, whether you like them
or not. You can choose to race or not. But the rules are
the rules. Hey, But the outcome Logan Sergeant gets just American to score
points in thirty years. Yeah, Logan thirty years. That means the guys
producing this podcast have never seen an American points, right, Cisco. I
don't know how you turned this into a dig at me, but sure now
that was more of a dig on me because I'm old. You are old.
You are old? That is true. Can confirm what have you been
up to, Kevin? Well? Do you want to see a Taylor Smid
movie tonight? Oh my gosh, Greg's trying to get me to go to
see Taylor Swift. So more on that in the next podcast. But I've
been enjoying fall because it's my favorite season and my soccer team, yes it's
called soccer, is doing pretty well, sit second in the standings on our
way to the playoffs. So very excited about that. Six and two not
bad for old man soccer. How many promotions would you need to make League
two? I want to see you guys. Okay, So you're saying there's
a chance, there's a chance, there's a chance. There are some guys
in my league that think there's definitely a chance. They are a little bit
try hard, and those are the guys that end up with yellow and red
cards. Off we make fun of them. Yeah, but we're having a
good season. We're having fun, still fun to play great. Got a
game this weekend. Pretty excited, very cool. We go off last week.
I thought I beat him. I did not, coming up. I
just found out a week later that I did not beat Kevin, although I
played pretty well for myself. So I'm happy, and then you are.
So that's interesting that I want. I wasn't gonna take a dig on that.
It's a gentleman's game. I trust that you have kept all those drops,
were counting yourself if you cheating, right, that's right, That's why
I like playing with Kevin. All right, Well let's get an I racing.
What's been going on in the community. I'm looking at Chris's outline.
Now, I got to give Chris credit half credit because half of the outline
has appropriate bullets. They're probably maybe a link to the photo and a picture
of the outline in the description. Half of the the outline has bullets,
the other half has hyphens. I think your computer's messed up because I see
bullets on all of them. I will take a screen shot. I'm going
full Parker and I'm disputing the I'm disputing the what's out there? All right,
We're gonna have to have Doug put a tweet up. And apparently not
much is going on in I Racing if we're just debating bullet we're arguing bullets
and hyphens. Yeah. Well, we do continue to work on on rain.
A lot of a lot of rain happening on I Racing. So that's
about all we can say for December, isn't it. That's the full update
on that we're working on rain. That's it. We're working on rain.
We're doing well. Next bullet point, please, Hey, I can't talk
about that. Oh yeah, or what about that? Yeah, yeah,
we're having communication that allows us to do so so and yeah, that we
can't, can't do it. It's too soon. It's only week six,
it's early. Yeah, we need to get Tony on here. He'll just
tell you everything that's true. Christmas Present to Iras and we'll bring Tony on
next month. What's happening in twenty twenty four? Yeah, Tony, if
you're listening, what's up? All right? Special events up? Though?
We had We had a big October. We had Crandon. I know Chris
Hayes the racing, but we had Crandon. Yeah, and in Cisco you
were involved in Crandon in some capacity, right, Yeah. I ended up
my good friend Keenan Kusen, who is a streamer does a lot of eye
racing. He ended up making the top twenty. He was the twentieth driver,
and we barely snuck in. So where did you finish up? So
we top ten in the heat and then I think we got hurt in the
features, so somewhere in the thirteens or so. So, I mean it
was a that game because we came in this car twenty So yeah, did
you fail at your job or did he fail at the behind the wheel?
Well, we came in privateer, so we had no setup, help,
no nothing, versus every All the pro teams were there, the world champion
was there, so we'll take it that sounds like a really professional race organization.
Blame or quin. He didn't answer the question either. Now, look,
I just got to thank all the guys back at the shop. They
gave us fantastic a long career in racing system. I love it. True
or false, your driver would have been better off using the default spotter pack
we did. I was supplementary, sir, oh right, good times.
So he had two spotters, he had the default pack and he had you.
So that's about yeah, three more than they have in the real world.
Yeah, yeah, pretty much. Which if you've ever been around Crandon,
there are absolutely cases where you could use like five spotters at one time.
It's crazy out there. Yeah, sometimes we stick we call like Sasquatch
out of the woods and we have him, you know, in the hairpin,
like yeah, well dude lost, I'm lost. Yeah, hey,
Kevin, let's talk with the SECA runoffs. Run off happened the last year.
Yes, runoffs were great, one of the coolest broadcasts that I ended
up watching the whole thing. I tried to race specrate, so I didn't
make top split because I think so I had to work all day, sorry
Cisco, Yeah, six hours. It was great. I really enjoyed it.
I sat on the couch and watched racing and yeah, I really really
enjoyed that. So nice job broadcast on World Esports Stay too. Yeah,
but for those that don't know, we had six races back to back to
back to back whatever, with the car classes loosely representing what's available in the
SECA. It's not a one to one comparison. I do know there were
some some people that weren't happy that it wasn't directly one to one, but
for participation reasons, we do the best we can to emulate what happens,
and I think it was an excellent job. We saw a lot of new
names in the broadcast and I think that's my one of my favorite parts about
it. Even though we didn't use super sessions this year, if you're good
in the car, we probably can make the broadcast. And so there was.
We had six races. We had one person did win two events.
I forget the name. Sorry I'm failure, but just a fun broadcast.
Really enjoyed it all and looking forward to next year. We should get on
a call and talk about that sometime. Let's do it. Let's see coming
now and October November is pretty busy in a special event land. We've got
the NIS Finale at Phoenix. That'll be elbows out, lots of fun.
We've got the Fuji eight out now, that's a new one for us.
We were replacing the ten Hours of Suzuka. So GT three is only at
Fuji and people are already talking about setups. I think that's actually gonna be
a really big event, first time we've run that one. And then brand
new, newly announced the FF sixteen hundred Festival, which is going to emulate
the Formula Ford Festival over in the UK. Let's put on by Motorsport UK
and b R SCC and a cool format. We're gonna use a couple of
heats. You're gonna have you know, two heats and then a last chance
qualifier and then the main loosely emulating what they do over multiple days in the
UK. Brands Hatch, that's it. Brands Hatch Indy, Uh, just
gonna be a cool broadcast. I think they run something that I would say
similar to like the Chili Bowl. You know, they have all these qualifying
races throughout the week and all that. So we're doing it in sort of
one session to get people involved, but we're trying to make it as similar
and is interesting because it's kind of a special format. So it should be
a great broadcast, should be cool race, you know. I think it's
pretty much up into what everybody dan above. Is that yep, everybody dan
above. There's a trivia. Do you know who won last year's Real World
event and what sponsor was on the side of the car. I'm thinking that
you've set us up to Saint Max Esterson's name you you are correct, I'm
guessing that it was not Well, I won't guess the sponsor, it was
I Racing, I know no. So Max is the reigning champion, so
really cool to have that to bring that real world tie. And also,
Kevin, are we're sponsoring the real world event this year too. Yeah,
we should be all over the real world broadcasts and whatnot, so that'll be
neat to get some exposure. You know, we're always trying to get the
name out there and get I Racing some new eyeballs. So it's a nice
tie in both to have the virtual version and then be connected in the real
world version. It kind of comes full circle, so neat opportunity there.
Very cool work continues on the twenty twenty four special Events calendar. It is
all over my desk right now. That is a fun puzzle to put together.
We're hoping to announce it right dot West at I racing dot com if
you have suggestions again, which automatically forwards to Kevin dot Bob at I racing
dot com if you would like his cell phone number. Oh gosh, here
we go. I'm not that mean, but yeah, we hope to have
that available publicly the end of November beginning of December, like we usually do.
Please please don't blow up support they it's the same questions every year.
It's coming hashtag soon. We promise we'll have it to you as soon as
we're able to announce it. Chris probably guess what the main events will be.
I mean, we're not you know, I bet it's really popular.
They're not going to go away, you know. I mean it's it'll be
similar, So I bet it kicks off with the roar. I'd go out
and what cars are in the roar might change, but yeah, roar and
in Daytona twenty four. I'm willing to bet those happen in January in close
proximity to the real world Daytona twenty and then Chris, we've got qualifying away
for NASCAR A College Series and they're at Dover. Yep, next one coming
to Dover. College Series has been really interesting this year with all of the
all the different races. Instead of running the spring and fall semesters separate,
it's turned into a big eight race kind of season and then points being tracked
and then a finale at the very end. But yeah, this time up
we're at Dover, so qualifying is going underway now that runs through Halloween,
so they're switching between the trucks and the X fin D cars. So definitely
one to circle your calendars depending upon which vehicle you're better in, but hopefully
if you're trying out for that one, you're pretty good at both. Absolutely
still in Chris's line, high word, we also have a new piece coming
out on Monday's tweek in I ra sing We're trying to do a better job
of saying what's going on this week? You know, is we have so
many special series and high profile series, and Chris and Kevin have done a
nice job along with Justin Malillo, who's going to be our special guest today,
putting that together. Kevin, Chris, you guys want to talk about
that a little bit. That's been your guys project. Sure, Chris,
take it away. Fun fact, this is basically how the back end of
this came about because Kevin hitched it as we were in the process. So
I think Greg started this conversation, well, yeah, that's the thing,
and you conveniently left that out and I didn't find that out until I found
it out from Greg on Monday evening. But uh, yeah, we've just
been trying to compile everything that's kind of going on in the service. There
were a lot of things going on. We're always talking internally about how can
we draw more attention to things, how can we do a better job of
getting this information out there. And if you're paying attention to the UI on
the website, you'll know that there's a call to action every Monday morning for
all the special events. You'll know that we've been really trying to get these
things out there. On stuff like the college series that we just talked about.
We do a ton of esports coverage, previews and recaps for the big
series, and we're even able to expand that a little bit with Justin having
come on board, but we wanted to have something that gets all of this
information as best as we can in one place. It's still a bit of
a work in progress. That was one of the things that the three of
us were kind of talking about as we were doing the pre show meeting is
we're still massaging it. We're still figuring out what goes where, trying to
keep those community events towards the top, but working some things so that if
you're not seeing all those other call to action, or if you're seeing all
those other call to actions and esports coverage and whatever, you'll know about some
of the other things that are going on. So, yeah, really cool
initiative. It's it really comes more from the other two guys that are the
host of the show than me. I'm just kind of trying to herd the
cats on all the events and give Justine some direction. Chris is doing the
work, I'm Justin's doing the work. I'm the shop foreman. I'm just
you know, nice written. No, really, what I am is I'm
Harry Hog and Dais of Thunder. I'm sitting in the pit box eating the
ice cream. You can drive through it. I know it in my heart.
Well, we'll use that as a segue. I'm going to read this
directly off the Islands segued this into introducing Justin, who has our special guest
today. Justin Little, longtime community member, a huge advocate for I Racing
and SIM Racing as a whole. My intro is not nearly as good as
Chris is, and Chris can talk about all his accolades, including a Simmy,
got a Simmy, He's got National Motorsports Press Awards. Justin. Yes,
most of the people who are listening to this show are probably familiar with
Justin's work in some way, shape or form. He's run a ton of
different leagues on the service, He's worked for some other sites in the community
where he's done a lot of I Racing coverage. The opportunity came up to
bring him on board. I was basically beating down Kevin's door for months on
this one, saying, please get me some help, Please get me some
help. I think in those exact words, you've probably seen Justin start working
into our coverage, doing some race recaps for some of our bigger series over
the course of the season. But now we've got him on board full time
and he's serving a lot of different roles for us. Takes amazing screenshots,
writes, incredible rec caps, just does a fantastic job. He's he's a
Swiss Army knife at everything basically that he can do within the SIM and so
we're thrilled to have him. Yeah, you won't find a guy that's more
in touch with the SIM community in terms of who the players are, what
series are interesting and important, and generally just what's going on. Like he's
my go to guy if I have a question about any of our esports series
and he doesn't look it up. He just knows so great. All right,
Well, without further ado, let's bring in Justin Milillo. All right,
Kevin and I are back with our next guest, who's also a new
new employee at IRA, saying, Justin Milillo joins us all the way from
Long Island. Thanks for coming on the show, Welcome to the team,
welcome to the staff, and welcome to the podcast. And yeah, thanks
for coming when you were all and told to do it right. So much
easier to get guests that are employees because they have to do it. Yeah,
other duties as a sign surely. I mean that's part of it,
right, I mean, I'm just happy to be here, really excited to
be here. Thanks for having me. Well, let's talk about what you're
doing at iras you know, I introduce yourself and seeing maybe a job title
in there somewhere, you know, let's start with that. Sure, I'm
justin Mlilo. I am marketing and communications specialist here at irasing dot com as
of a week ago. Yeah, a week and a day ago. Yeah,
just about. It's it's been a whirlwind a couple of months for me,
just out of a previous job that I was working with previously at Traction
dot gig as a golly, what was I I was a junior editor and
communications over at Traction for about two and a half years and now I'm here
and yeah that that that's about it on that. But I was I was
doing all that in the middle of a move at the same time, which
was crazy. So it was like, you know, trying to figure out
what I'm going to do next, and luckily I managed to to get on
board with you guys here. Well, we're excited to have you and you
know, your reputation proceeds itself. You've been part of the community for a
long time. And you're an interesting story though, because you really you made
your own luck in this in this industry by just showing up and being persistent.
Let's talk about how you kind of got started, because I think a
lot of people that are trying to get in esports may find your story pretty
interesting. So yeah, let's talk about how you got involved and you know,
the yeah, your start, Yeah, it's it's it's It really goes
back to you know, when I was a kid, I just grew up
as as a huge NASCAR fan. My my grandfather and my uncle were big,
huge Nascar fans, and uh, one day, my grandfather had brought
home what was like an old macuitosh computer that was already outdated for the time,
but it had Bill Elliott's NASCAR Challenge on it, which was a popular
game in the nineties. I guess maybe it wasn't that popular, but it
was popular to me, and that kind of led into my love for racing
games. And I eventually got on board with the NASCAR Racing bi Papyrus series
and I fell in love with that and I was playing that through my childhood,
through middle school, high school, college, even and R two thousand
and three was my mainstay and I absolutely loved it. And at the same
time, I was trying to figure out what I'm going to do with my
life and ended up getting accepted to Hot Street University. Didn't know what I
wanted to do, settled on a degree in journalism in print journalism, which
was a dying breed at the time in two thousand and eight twenty twelve,
but you know, I've kind of turned that into what it is now.
I ended up with the racing experts Dominic Atagan took me on in twenty fourteen,
and I started writing about real NASCAR races, the actual events. I
went to places like Dover, Pocaono, New Hampshire every year and would I
would go to those races. I'd report on those races. And at the
same time, I'm running a league on still on NR two thousand and three
a decade later, and at the same time as that, the the NASCAR
Series is going on, the Driver's World Championship it was at the time,
and I'm watching some of my friends that I grew up racing with competing for
you know, what was ten thousand dollars at the time. Eventually, in
twenty nineteen, I got the good idea to start writing about it. I
wanted to start writing about what was happening in DwC, which then was Peak.
It was the Peak series. I started writing about that. I watched
all the races that season, covered every race for the racing experts, saw
Novak win. That was the same year that I was really getting hard into
my NASCAR coverage and I ended up getting the the annual credential that year,
which was really big for me that the NASCAR gave me one of those,
and I ended up going to I think ten races that year. So that
year I was I had my computer in my car. I was bringing my
computer with me to the racetrack covering the races, and then on Tuesday nights
covering what was going on in Coke or Peak any freeze at the time,
and it was pretty insane. And then y'all had the Media Days in twenty
twenty and things kind of just blew up from there, right. I think
that's when I met you. It was at the twenty twenty Media Days at
the NASCAR Hall of Fame and NASCAR productions, So you were the one guy
in a suit, and it was it was like, all right, this
guy's here to he's serious about this, He's not just showing up, and
you were and your covers has been great, so you know, we obviously
noticed what you were doing a long time ago, and yeah, glad that
it worked into something permanent here. Yeah, for sure. I mean the
I feel like twenty twenty was really the the catalyst for everything that's happened to
you know, kind of get everybody to this point. Right, we had
the pandemic that year and everything that happened with that, I jumped right on
it, right. I just wanted to get right involved. When when the
e NASCAR Provitational Series happened, I wanted to. I wanted to make sure
that that got what was the proper coverage that deserved because it felt like maybe
the traditional media didn't really care too much for it. But I was already
in and I really wanted to make sure that, you know, we we
were getting this covered like it was supposed to be. And it really took
off. And I'm really glad because it kind of got my name out there
and it's just been it's been clockwork ever since. You know, every it
feels like every day I'm on the sim there's there's always a new race to
watch to be in. I liked racing myself, you know. I got
a whole expensive rig to the left of me that that I like, you
know, jumping in from time to time and participating in myself. I still
run a league over at FtF. It's now on I Racing. We finally
got off of vn R in twenty twenty, so gotriam mighty's worth out of
that box product or sure for sure, but it's it's been an incredible journey.
Didn't you run the Firecracker form under this year? No, I didn't
make the field. I tried. You attempted to qualify, attempted to qualify
for it, missed it by by that much to get into the top eighty
eight. It was so close, so close. I was there. They
knew I was there. But maybe next year for sure, for sure.
Well, let's go back to what you said. You said a number that
that gets people's attention, especially in the SAM racing world. You said twenty
twenty in your timing and persistence couldn't have been better because when the world shut
down everybody's focus turned toward SIM racing and I Racing specifically, and everybody looking.
We already had coverage, we had who's this justin Lowell guy? And
it seems like that was a big explosion for you as well for opportunities.
You want to talk a little bit about how that blossomed. Not because you
were you were not in an I Racing employee that time. You were,
you know, an accessory. But I think a lot of people thought you
were serious. That's an interesting but I think a lot of people thought you
were involved with us on official capacity, but you were just the guy that
just did it. You're passionate. Then you covered it because you wanted to
and you felt like it deserve coverage, which was super cool for us because
to your point, mainstream media kind of got, okay, now we're going
virtual racing. They didn't really know what to do with that. There are
differences. We all know that we live in this space, so we know
there are differences between sim racing and real world racing. We're not trying to
be exactly the same, but we're trying to be similar. But there are
things that happened differently and some that were new to the space struggled with coverage.
They didn't know is this real? Is it a joke? Like what's
going on? But to have somebody like you who understood both sides of it
was super helpful for a company like us to get the coverage we needed.
Yeah, and I think, like just I just wanted to be there.
I just wanted I thought it was so cool that we were going to see
I racing on our TVs on Fox on Sunday. I thought that was pretty
cool too, by the way, Yeah, I was a fan for sure.
I mean the year before the championship was on NBC Sports for the for
the coch Series finale, and I thought that was super cool. I remember
being in my friend Matt's house at I think it was Talladega weekend. It
was Talladega weekend and I was in Nashville. We were going to drive down
the next day. I was watching it. He had it on TV,
and I had my computer set up on his on his like dining room table,
just so I could take pictures to the event. And that the picture
taking, I think is what caught people's attention. I wanted people to catch
the writing part of it because I felt like I was an okay writer,
but the picture taking is what people really kind of took notice too. And
that was why when the twenty twenty, the pandemic and everything happened, people
were, you know, messaging me, hey, we know you take you
know, good pictures. Can you take pictures of our cars? Like I
got Boris from j g R and my DMS asking me if I could take
pictures for uh, you know, Kyle Busch, Martin Church or it wasn't
Martin Church. I think it was Bobby Labonie at the time, filling in
for for trueex for Denny Hamlin, for Christopher Bell all in there all then
their stuff, and then Boris was kind of liaisoning with the other teams and
they were you know, I ended up sending pictures over to Hendrick as well,
and I think I got Penske as well, and you know, it
was just I was just taking pictures the entire time. It felt like it,
but it was, yeah, I just I really did enjoy doing it.
And I hope that you know what I was able to contribute to help
with you know, everything that that you know stem from that for sure,
well, working in parallel with us and once again you and I can't reiterate
this enough. You you were not part of the Irising team at that time,
but you were part of the Irising ecosystem, and you were one of
the any cogs during that time that really helped promote the brand and promote the
product. And uh you know, definitely we're a key player in promoting the
explosion that it really was our membership during that time. Uh so, and
that was just really cool to see. But like I said, you made
your own luck. You know. That's It's something I think that a lot
of people, you know, I just got back from the same racing expo
a couple of weeks ago. A lot of people you know, commotes me.
How do I get involved? What can I do? How can I
get on a How do I get you know, a job in esports?
Persistency and it takes time and if if you the cream will will rise if
you're persistent. Whether it's you know, trying to get in and working for
a publisher like I Racing or any you know, any of the other publishers,
or whether you want to be a streamer, or whether you want to
be in in media and marketing. I think you've talked to most people in
those roles, you know, persistency and doing it not just because you're looking
for a job, but because you thoroughly enjoy the subject matter and you want
to get involved. Uh And and those people that are persistent and are also
you know, have to have the talent that you obviously bring the table.
Those opportunities will come, and when you get those opportunities, you make the
most of it. You know, Kevin talks about the first time he saw
you at the media day. You showed up in a suit, you represented
yourself well, and I think that is something that you stood out right then
and there before he even walked up to you and introduced himself. Because that
kind of stuff makes you want to walk up and introduce yourself. Who's this
person? And you know, when you get the opportunity to represent yourself,
represent yourself well and stand out in a positive fashion, and you've done just
that, you know, And I just think that that is incredibly admirable and
admirable. But I also think it's a template that a lot of people.
If you want to get in the industry, this the way Justin did it
is is a great way, a great way to conduct yourself and it.
It probably holds true in whatever industry you want to get into, whether it's
you want to be in esports, you want to be in real sports,
you want to be in I don't know, pick it, but you kind
of got to You got to go out and do it. You know,
you can't just kind of wait and hope somebody offers you your job. You
got to do it and prove yourself. So thanks for wrote to say.
Chad Canawshen we were talking to him during the MS event. Think he started
sweeping floors, like actually started sweeping floors. And now you know, one
of the most successful crew chiefs crew chiefs and NASCAR history, if not the
most successful crew chief and NASCAR history, and you know, not humbling yourself
to just do whatever it takes to get in the door. So yeah,
Justin's it's a great story. And you know, one of the reasons when
we were looking for guests, I think the three of us collectively also it
sprown Justin. That's a great a great story for this podcast. So we're
happy to have you on the team. It's not just happy, ecstatic to
have you on the team. Looking forward to all the stuff that you're going
to do and uh, yeah, thanks for taking the time with us today.
Thanks for having me guys. Yeah, it was just one last point.
I mean, you just with with trying to get into the industry.
It is really a never give up attitude with it. You just got to
keep going. You can't get discouraged with it. You know, if you're
not getting reckonized, go make yourself get recognized. I mean, you just
got to keep going with it. In twenty twenty, when I was doing
all that stuff, I was also working two other jobs at the time.
I was working at Spring full time. I was working at FedEx as a
package handler, and you know, it was trying to keep my hobby and
with I racing and everything with the SIM racing sphere, trying to keep that
up to date. It takes a lot, it does. It's not like
like you said, it's not like anybody just hands you a job or anything
like that. I felt like I had to work many, many years and
get my name really out there to be able to be in the position I'm
in. I mean, I was lucky enough to get the call from Traction
in twenty twenty one to finally shift my career full time to being a media
personality, and just if anybody is listening to one of the three or four
listeners of the podcast, like me, we have five fans now, thank
you very much, five whole fans. I'm glad to hear it. Five
hole there everyone, I'm still one of them six, but you work here,
so it's still five. Okay, that's fair. But everybody who's listening,
just just know that you just got to keep being persistent with it and
and reach out, you know, reach out to the people who are finding
success. My dms are always open. I've had people ask me about you
know, I wrote a whole guide on taking pictures and I hope people can
still find that guide over over on my old website. But you know,
just I'm always willing to help with with anybody who wants to, you know,
get into this space. And you know, just just keep doing what
you're doing, and you know, keep making e sports and sim racing and
you know, this virtual space is as amazing as it can be. Well
well said, but well, once again, thanks for taking the time today,
even though you were voluntold to take the time. And on that note,
let's get back to the show, all right. Great to sit down
with justin super stoked to have him on the team. I think you're going
to see more and more of his fingerprints all over our marketing materials as we
move forward. And Yeah, Soun's a fun, great guy. It was
cool to have him in the office the other day. And let's let's move
on. We're gonna talk about esports and let's get into the NASCAR finale because
we've not broadcast done a podcast since then. Chris yep E NASCAR Coca Cola
I Racing Series, Sorry the belt. Yeah, brought it back to the
NASCAR Hall of Fame at Charlotte last month, another big event. It was
really interesting, as I think we talked about in the last show, all
four drivers that were there had momentum from different sources. You had the big
race winner in Tucker Minner. You had Garrett Lowe who kind of that additional
just motivation from you know, facing some recks during the season. Steven Wilson,
though the only driver out of the four who had been there before,
had struggled in the previous year's finale in Phoenix, just didn't hit it just
right, but goes to Homestead and just did what he needed to do and
locked up that first championship of his one hundred thousand dollars, big win for
Stuart hawse Esports, so congrats to him. Everybody else is now in the
Contender Series that bottom twenty and some of the top Road to Pro drivers are
fighting to try to knock him off next year right now, so going to
be really exciting to see who makes it up. It really was a great
live event in Charlotte two years in a row. Great to see Stephen Wilson
get the win. He also, I think has the largest fan base that
travels with him. I think he's from Iowa if I remember right, and
he brings you know, a dozen or more people to come support him,
which is awesome to see. The broadcast crew, Cisco Drew, the whole
team did a great job. It's incredibly complicated to do that sort of event
where we've got live stuff going on there, We've got racers all around the
US, Canada, wherever everybody is. It's it's quite an endeavor. So
who goes to the broadcast team for putting that together? Auto on our side,
who manages kind of the NASCAR relationship Ray from NASCAR, who helps organize
everything on that side? I mean, really is all hands on deck.
Pretty cool. We even did a little demo of Exocross, which is pretty
neat, so people could could do a little get a little demo and see
how that's coming along. And this is a fun event. The e NASCAR
series is incredibly cool and you know, partners like Coca Cola as well and
NASCAR, as you mentioned, allow it to be. I believe this is
and somebody can correct me, but I'm going to go off script here.
This is the largest person for a reoccurring series, and you know it's not
a one off. We come back with three hundred grand. I think this
is what the third year in a row, fourth year, multiple years in
a row with a prize perse for one series over three hundred thousand dollars.
The winner every year gets to go home with a cold one hundred grand.
That is something incredibly special to be a part of. And as if you
guys have not been paying attention to our social media recently, our relationship with
NASCAR just grew a whole lot and we're looking forward to bringing the console title
in twenty twenty five. Huge responsibility and a huge privilege to be entrusted with
that, and I know Steve Myers and that whole team is incredibly excited to
get back to our roots and do something special with that, So I cannot
wait until that day, all right. Moving on to the next thing,
We've got the Turn Grand Prix Series Chris carries on Wednesday's afternoons and the closest
road racing series you will see as these cars are glued together like they're on
a super speedway. So I'm gonna follow my sword here, Greg, because
it's actually Thursday after Thursdays. Yeah, I was gonna call you out on
that. Okay, I'm falling. I watch it in the evenings because you
can watch it whatever, you can see it. It does, it does,
it does? Yeah, yeh, user error on my part. They
had a bullet to get the previews out the day before instead of the day
of now, and so that preview actually went out about forty five minutes ago
this morning. But yeah, ground pre Turn Racing Eye Racing series has been
incredibly competitive. Up to this point in the recording. We've only had a
single repeat winner all year, and he's not even in the top ten points
right now, which just illustrates how chaotic the championship has been. Across the
board. The Dallara iroh one still one of my favorite cars on I racing.
The collaboration that we did with Delara in twenty twenty produces some really exciting
racing. You never really know what to expect with it now that it's gotten
oval package that allows it to that allows you to really turn up the wick
on some of the big speedways and uh and we actually did that for the
first time earlier in the season at Texas, so that was pretty neat.
It's it's one of those open wheel cars that could really do it all and
as a result, it becomes a driver's car, but it also becomes a
who has it on any given day kind of car. And we've really been
seeing that in that championship with all the different winners, all the different podium
finishers. I couldn't pick a champion right now. It's you may as well
just go to Las Vegas and just pick a number. Don't don't pick a
color on the roulette. Will pick a number because that's that's that's how interesting
it is. It feels we're about halfway through the season. It feels like
anybody can still win. Yeah, it's it's one of the you know,
the best shows in you know, open wheel racing you can find that's the
as far as the broadcast and the pageantry of it. Like you said,
flip a coin, throw a dart on dartboard, you know, go to
go to Vegas and play some roulette. Doesn't really matter. Anybody can win
any week. It's a It's about the person driving the car. It's not
necessarily about the best setup or whatnot, and that is what makes it exciting.
I love parody. I don't like seeing repeat winners over and over and
over and over. Sorry, Jimmy Johnson fans or you know, Max for
stapping or you know whatever, he's gonna call you after this. If Jimmy
Johnson calls me after this, I'm gonna be proud that he's listening to our
podcast. I met him, Max oh Maxwell condominance continues. But yeah,
that it's it's a lot of fun. If you've got a chance tune into
it. You can catch the recap. You can watch the previous races on
YouTube. It's some of the best he said, openable racing you can find
in SIM racing. Moving on, we've got the Porscha tag Hoyer Esports Super
Cup, and we're gonna throw it over to Cisco, who's been involved in
the production of those broadcasts and knows everything about it, and he's got the
hat. Yeah, I've got the hat, so I have to talk about
it. But now the Porsche Tag Hoyer Esports Contender Series in full swing.
So similar to how we have the feeder series for free NASCAR to talk to
see who gets to the top level h this is our road version of that.
So we have a six race championship and that's getting ready to uh finish
up here. Gosh, We're we're races away now, right, Kevin.
I think at this point between Long Beach and Urber Green yep. So yeah,
last two races coming up when this comes out, Uh Nurber or Long
Beach will be tomorrow on the day this releases. But nonetheless, really it's
my go to when I've been testing in the rain. What what You're gonna
bleep that out, Cisco in post it? Don't do it. I mean,
I'm not going to be said it, so I may have just put
them back up. Yeah, Long Beach is uh gonna be something I don't
really know what's expect because I said, oh, the NASCAR Contender race from
yesterday. When we recorded this on Tuesday, I thought that was gonna be
tame because, oh, they just have to be within this points threshold to
make it to the top. And then they kept crashing, so I don't
know. I it's Long Beach, someone's gonna be in the fountain. I
think that's always a risk when you go to long beaches, you're gonna end
up in the fountain. It makes for an entertaining broadcast, so everybody should
tune in. Yes, it does. And like I said, two races
to go Long Beach and then nerber Ring, and then we'll know our fifteen
drivers were taken up to twenty twenty four and all the fun that awaits us
for the twenty twenty four Porscha Tack Hoyer e Sports Supercup ding. For those
that are new to the show, anytime you get the name of a series
correct with the sponsors correctly, you get to ring a bell. But we
can't ring a bell because Kevin's dog freaks out. I'm giving go half credit
there. He did stumble on a Hoyer. But my voice in my ear
and it's that's a little bit of yourself and Dan somebody else. Yeah,
you can't give your Yeah, Maverick, can't. Can't call yourself Maverick.
You're not allowed to do that. I'm calling you Maverick. Oh okay,
then that's fine. Yeah, Kevin, let's talk about MC sports and this.
Uh this is a really cool series from the Sports Global Championship. Is
that what you're talking about in the Sports Global Championship. Yeah, So this
is going on in conjunction with IMSA directly. Uh v c O is involved
in a lot of the back end of it, organizing and getting things going.
Obviously we're broadcasting it. So pretty exciting. Uh Mini Championship. There's
four races coming up and runs in November and December. Multi class all the
GTP cars, the m GT three cars or GTD cars however you like to
call them, with some top teams that you'll recognize from the esports scene.
So should make for some great racing. I think you're going to see a
lot of promotion of it. You know, we've got manufacturers involved, teams
involved, ims IS involved, they're super excited about it. So we ran
a version of it last year. This is bigger and better. I think
we brought the broadcast in house, so Cisco, Drew, Sean and Corey
and everybody else involved will be busy on most of them runs. I think
three are on Sundays and ones on a Saturday if I remember the schedule correctly.
But it kicks off on November fifth. Check out our website for the
full details and whatnot. But I'm excited for it, so it should be
cool. No, it's it's going to be a lot of fun. Anything
we do with them, this is a lot of fun. We've we've had
some really cool programs with them over the last few years, and sure looking
forward to it. Shout out to Max there on the Socide, who's instrumental
in making this happen so real, MVP. He just kind of goes with
it. Yeah, we have some and we'll have some uh probably some Imus
special event news by the time we record our next podcast. Maybe maybe format
update right maybe sure? Okay, oh yeah, oh yeah, yeah,
oh yeah yeah that thing, oh yeah thing. Yeah. You've been like
I've been prodding you to have meetings and things. Yeah okay, yeah,
yeah, this guy, which way is he's over here? This guy,
I need more coffee. Sorry, I'm almost out, and yeah, good
times all right, Well, uh, that was the last bullet, wasn't
it. That was the last bullet. I don't know what to do now.
It says wrap up, but there's no bullets. I don't know.
Well, thanks for listening to this edition of the I Racing down Shift.
Don't forget to rate, review, and subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Spotify,
and anywhere else. Chris has put this thing for Kevin Bobbitt. Chris Leoni,
I am Greg West. We'll see you on the track, probably unless
we crash, in which case we'll see you in Sadly, there it is.