Garage Heroes (In Training)

Learning as we go. Come along with us and Enjoy the Ride!

Guests & Interviews

EP 0020: Christian “Mental” Ward

From the Three Pedal Mafia and the Everyone Racers podcast (“Mental” Hours #1, 2, & 3, lol)

Christian "Mental" Ward
Mental is a great guy, a great racer and always willing to help in any way

Mental is one of our earliest friends from racing. We originally “met’ him online when we had been on one episode of the Everyone Racers Podcast. We finally met Mental in person at our first race at NJMP in May of 2018. Our race went exceptionally well. However, his was not one of his favorite races as we discussed in this episode.

Mental is a very accomplished and experienced driver who has competed in many types of racing series and disciplines as well as being an instructor. He is very skilled but self deprecating and extremely approachable. If you ever bump into him on the track, please say hello. But only if you have a few minutes to talk, lol.

Alan, Vicki and Bill talked with Mental for over three hours for this episode. Unfortunately, some of Alan’s audio was lost so his “English brother Alan” stepped in for him a few times. But, still we ended up with our longest episode by far at just under 3 hours. So if you want a podcast to listen to on the way to work, we may have covered your whole week’s commute with this one.

We covered a wide variety of topics and many, many stories, some of which even applied to racing. We hope you feel like you know him a little better after this episode and we are very happy to call him a friend.

EP 0020: Christian “Mental” Ward – Special Guest Racing Driver

EP 0019: Annika Carter

Our Special Guest Racing Driver

Annika with her MX-5 Mia
Annika with her Spec Miata MX-5 “Mia”

We first noticed Annika Carter on Instagram where her moniker is Not.My.Boyfriends.Car (The best Instagram name ever!)  We then noticed she was going to be racing with us at Road Atlanta for our last Lemons race of our 2018 calendar season.  She has quickly worked her way up and races as much as she possibly can.  She has already earned her racing license through NASA and we know she can drive as she passed us many, many times during our weekend together.  Alan, Vicki, and Bill discuss how things have been going as well as upcoming plans and goals.  Please welcome Annika to our podcast as this week’s special guest.   

  • We wish we drove half as well
    Annika Drives Hard with 4 or Three Wheels!

We also added in a brief discussion on the upgrades to our Capri/Camaro transplant oil system, going over oil cooling and the differences between a wet and dry sump system. 

Sterling
Annika’s Mustang “Sterling”

Finally, we also discussed whether or not to start a third project race car where we get a low dollar daily driver and convert it into a race car for use on multiple racing series that we are interested in. 

We’d love to hear from you if you would be interested in us starting this project and giving updates and progress summaries along the way on our website and of course the podcast. 

Mid-pack but not for long
Annika Mid-Pack, but not for very long

Thanks again for listening and please leave a rating and review on whatever your podcast application of choice is along with any questions or requests for guests, questions, or topics you may have.  

EP 0019: Annika Carter -Our Special Guest Racing Driver

Episode 0018: The Mom Rocket

The Garden State Goons Racing Team

This week Alan, Vicki and Bill were able to interview the Garden State Goons lemons racing team. We had met them at our race in Thompson Connecticut last August. That was their first race, but definitely not their last. Any team racing a Windstar with “Mom Rocket” proudly written across the side obviously gets it.

As with any rookie team at their first race, there was some growing pains and lessons learned. We covered many of those as well as a host of other topics during our episode.

While they are new to this style of racing, they are young and hungry to learn and we expect them to improve greatly in the coming season. We know they left a lot of room after Thompson, lol.

The weather at the race started off as very hot for Friday practice but made up for it with a ton of rain both Saturday and Sunday.

After fixing the Mom Rocket all weekend, they were able to get out racing on Sunday. We hope they and you enjoy this week’s episode. As always, we met on the track and found some new friends.

Thanks again for coming. 

Podcast Episode 0018:  The Garden State Goons and Their Mom Rocket Racing Minivan

Episode 0015: Chris LoCurto

Chris LoCurto National Champion Race Driver
Chris LoCurto National Champion Race Driver

Chris LoCurto has been a mentor to most of our team for many years.  It originally started when we first heard him hosting the Dave Ramsey “EntreLeadership” podcast and then when he started his own business and podcast “The Chris LoCurto Show“.  We never missed an episode. 

Vicki and Bill have also had personal coaching from Chris for several years and gained a tremendous amount of insight into ourselves and each other.  We highly recommend both his podcast and his coaching. 

What many may not know about Chris is that he is a true car guy and races several times a year, winning many races and championships.  I’m sure he’d race more if his schedule would allow, but his is too generous with his time instead giving it to help others

Chris is an accomplished entrepreneur, speaker, coach, and leader of leaders helping businesses and individuals realize and maximize their personal and professional potential.

He pours his great passion for people, along with decades of experience and perspective, into his daily work with business leaders, entrepreneurs, and individuals. It’s this passion and insight that has lead businesses to explode their revenue and help to realize their potential and live a strong life.

Today, Chris owns and leads the Poimen Group, LLC – a life, business, and leadership coaching business predicated on serving individuals and businesses in the US and around the world. Chris and his team employ coaching vehicles, which include strategic business planning, one-on-one leadership coaching, mastermind groups, life coaching, live events, and more.

If you ever feel like this would help you in your life or business, we would fully endorse Chris and his team as an excellent source to assist you or someone you know capitalize on their skills and talents and find their way to true success.

EP 0015: Chris LoCurto, Coach, Mentor, Racing Driver

Episode 0009: Everyone Racers, no, not really or is it?

Everyone Racers Podcast is a must listen 

With our favorite racing podcast taking a week off break, we took a chance to fill the gap.  It took a bot over 24 times to get something “presentable”.  In this episode of our podcast, Alan, Vicki, and Bill try to make a podcast similar to theirs.  As you can guess, their’s is usually much better, but we had a good time and we hope you do too.   Special thanks to getting us racing and podcast must go out to our friends over at the Everyone Racers podcast.  

You can find the Everyone Racers podcast at the link below.  Please subscribe, its well worth it.  

The Everyone Racers Podcast Hosts

Our intended episode for this week (well really last week since we are late) is still in editing.  Due to a few recording issues, it is still not close to ready after 9+ hours of editing.  It may show up soon or we will have to re-record it.  we shall see.  

If there is anything that you would like to know that we may have left out, please send us an email using the link below or even better would be to leave a review on iTunes for our podcast and in the comments section enter any questions or topics you may be interested in us finding an answer for you.  Thanks again for coming. 

Podcast Episode 0009:  Our Everyone Racers FanCast