Kevin Harvick's Happy Hour presented by NASCAR on FOX - Interview with Zak Brown, CEO of McLaren Racing

Episode Date: September 19, 2024

In Episode 58 of Kevin Harvick's Happy Hour, NASCAR legend Kevin Harvick sits down with Zak Brown, CEO of McLaren Racing, for an engaging conversation. They dive into the influence of F1 on IndyCar, the dynamics of Manufacturer vs. Driver championships, and Zak's thoughts on Kyle Larson. Zak also opens up about his desire for more driver crossovers, McLaren's approach to scouting talent, and much more!  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

To me, the greatest drivers are those that we could kind of stick in anything, whether it was a NASCAR or an IndyCar, and they just figured it out. Welcome to Kevin Harvick's happy hour presented by NASCAR on Fox. And today we have a guess that we've been asking for for a while now, McLaren Racing CEO, Zach Brown, who has basically taken the McLaren F1 program and put it back on the map. And what a powerhouse program they have built, whether it's an F1 or Indy car, all right. around the world in different divisions of racing. And obviously for us in the NASCAR world, kind of hits home because of the fact that Kyle Arson also ran their IndyCar at the Indy 500.

And we'll do that again next year. So we've got a lot of questions that hopefully Zach will be willing to answer and have fun with. So hope you enjoy this interview with Zach Brown. Well, Zach, thank you for taking the time today. We've obviously been in the middle of this huge storm here with Kyle Arson and kind of going to Indycar and all the questions that we have.

But we don't want to start there. I want to start with your weekend because you guys won the F1 race, leading the IndyCar race until six or seven laps to go at the end. Tell me about your weekend, because from a McLaren standpoint, you've got to be pretty thrilled with the way that the weekend shook out. Yeah, it was pretty awesome. I have now missed both of Oscars wins because I've been in IndyCar races,

so he continues to tell me to go to IndyCar races. Landau tells me to come back to F1 because Oscar wins every time I'm not around. And then every time I'm at an IndyCar race, we finish second. So I'm not sure where I should be. But I love my racing, and I was in Nashville at the weekend. The race Oscar drove was insane to have LeClerc in his DRS for 32 laps, never a half a second off to not make a mistake. Was impressive. Lando going from 17th, obviously started 15th, by.

the time there was a few penalties was amazing and then Alex led for a bit and then I thought Patto might be able to hold on there but heard it was coming too fast so not a bad weekend a first and a second I'm still waiting for our weekend I'm getting greedy now of winning on both sides of the pawns so we've been close so you on the f1 side you you have the manufacturers championship obviously right in the middle of that with with everything that you have going on with the manufacturer's points lead and you look at the driver's points are a little bit further apart.

And I think for us on the NASCAR side, how does that work from an F1 team standpoint? Obviously, you want to win the manufacturers championship, but if you win the manufacturer's championship and you don't win the driver's championship, is that good, bad, or how is that looked at from your world? Yeah, it's interesting because obviously I've grown up in racing

and I think as a fan, we all pay attention to the driver's championship, right? I think that's the one that's the most popular amongst racing fans. And when you get into NASCAR and IndyCar, you don't have, you know, these, I mean, I guess you do have team championships. And that's actually in Formula One where the money payout comes from. But you've got different cars, different quantity of cars. Where in Formula One, it's real clean, right?

Everyone runs two cars. There's 10 teams. So it's interesting growing up around racing. it was all about the drivers, but then once you're in the team, you know, they're kind of both equally as important. Economically, the Constructors' Championship is more important because that's what kind of pays out. But none of us go racing for money.

We go racing because we want to go racing. And so both are critically important. I'm sure to the driver, the drivers is more important to the team. You know, I kind of now come into these race weekends. And when I'm thinking about the racing, I'm thinking about beating Ferrari. I'm thinking about beating Red Bull. It's kind of my mindset.

Those are the points that I'm kind of tallying in my mind on pit wall. Kind of secondary is the driver, but I'm sure the driver's thinking the other way around. So they're both, of course, equally as important. We're trying to do both because they do go hand in hand. The more points Lando and Oscar get in the drivers, the better off we're going to do in the constructors. And, you know, we're now leading the constructors the first time in a decade.

And Landau's got, you know, some work ahead of them. And Oscar's not that far behind. Just Max is so good that while we can, there's more points in play in the constructors, we're going to need a little bit of some good luck. And Max to have a little bit of bad luck to close the gap that's currently sitting there. Well, it's been fun to watch. We're obviously fans of F1 racing and continue to watch on a weekly basis. but the ground that you guys have made up has been very intriguing and fun to watch.

And as you go through the weekend, the end of the IndyCar season, and for us at Fox, that means that we're headed towards IndyCar season next year. And I think as you look at F1 having more of a presence in the United States, and you compare that to IndyCar, how does F1 help hurt IndyCar racing in general, does it just give it more notoriety just because people are looking at open wheel racing? Because I find that, you know, ever, ever since F1 has kind of taken a step back into America, I just want to see from somebody's standpoint, how much does that help IndyCar? I think it helps a ton. You know, I think people that are racing fans love IndyCar, Formula One,

NASCAR, etc. I don't think it's in either or no different than in stick and ball sports, right? you football might be your favorite sport, but you probably also like basketball and baseball. So generally, I think it's great for IndyCar because it just brings more awareness to open wheel racing. I think it's exciting that IndyCar is going to be on Fox next year. I think that's the big shot in the arm, all on network, longer programming. And then of course, the big boss Eric Shanks is passionate about IndyCar. So I'm excited about the new TV package. I think we at IndyCar, if I put my IndyCar ad on, can be doing a better job of drafting the success that Formula One's had in North America. I, you know, we put Patto Award in our car. I think we should talk about that more because I think IndyCar racing as a product is awesome.

So we should be, there's so many new fans that Formula One's created that I think we need to be tapping into those fans and saying, hey, if you like Formula One, come check out. Indy car. And then I think you'll have people that love both. I don't think they'll tune out of F1 and become IndyCar fans or Indycar fans tune out and become, I think you like both of them, two similar type of racing, but also different in different time zones. So I think the awareness that Formula One is created in North America is good for all motorsports. And I think we can do a better job of embrace it. Well, I think it's obviously, America is obviously important to what you guys do. You've got an extensive background on the sponsorship side from your agency and things that, and also the things that you guys do with sponsorship on your F1 cars and Indycars and

everything that you're so good at. How important is it to have an American driver in F1 and do we need more American drivers in IndyCar? Where do you see that balance? Yeah, I think it would help for sure. You know, I don't think we necessarily kind of need them in the sense of, you know, Formula One is now huge in America without a U.S. driver. But, sorry, I got my door ringing. But I think it would be very additive. But I think what's important is it needs to be a successful and ideally a famous American driver. So, you know, if I look back, had Michael Andretti kind of made it, if you I think that would have been wonderful in Formula One. I think if it's an American driver that's maybe lived in Europe, his whole life,

I think it's a little bit harder because they lack that U.S. knowledge. I mean, can you imagine someone like Kyle Larson coming over and doing F1? And I don't think that's, you know, realistic because the disciplines are so different where he's kind of grown up racing. But that would be massive. And I think any time we see these sports where you get, you know, There was a lot of nationalistic excitement around that. So I think it would be additive for sure, but I don't think it's necessary.

Where do you think, where do you think? So I'm just going to all explain Keelan's situation. My son, we went to Europe and raced over in the cart system for a year and a half. And I look at a kid like Connor Zillich. Connor Zillich is someone that I view could have made it, you know, up the path of F1 through F4, F3, F2. The problem that I see with, well, not only is it expensive, and I couldn't take the time to send Keelein over there to race for the next seven or eight years on his own without being there with him. But when you look at it, let's just use Zilich as an example. You know, he was in and won in the European carding system. How do we make our,

F4, F3 system here, the open wheel system, more competitive for these kids to have a shot to be able to say, hey, Zach Brown's calling me, because I've won F4F3 in America to get that development system where it needs to be to be recognized for a kid like Conor Zilich to be able to get into that system, to be really recognized without having to spend like Logan Sargent did over in Europe so many years in that carding system over there. Yeah, I think. coming up through IndyCar, right? You had a lot of success. The Villanayuv, because Zanardi was Formula One when Indycar went back, but Villanouv was massively successful. I think Michael, unfortunately, was the right place at the wrong time.

One of the challenges now, which is unfortunate, is we have so many testing restrictions in Formula One. We only do three preseason test days. So the risk of taking a driver who has a race that all the European circuits or the, you know, the global circuits is hard. Back when Villeneuve came over, he did 20,000 miles of testing. So you could take the driver that you knew had immense talent, but, and obviously, Billeneuve was Canadian, but, you know, came from U.S. racing. But you could, you know, pound around and go test at all these tracks, and you can't now. So the situation's a bit trickier.

The other thing that you have, and I don't. know how much of this happens in the States, but it happens all the time in Europe, which I don't like. I'm not a fan of. These kids are leaving school and being homeschooled from seven, eight years old, and living at cart tracks. And I've been an advocate, but I don't think I'll be successful, of kids should be in school during the school year and carding at the weekends or after they're done with school. And then, of course, you've got summer off. And so now what's happened is, is with these kids that eight years old are living at cart tracks, five days a week, getting homeschooled. It's raising the bar of the talent. And they're unbelievable talent. But, you know, for every, as you know,

10,000 kids that want to be the next Lando Norris or Oscar Piastri, most of them don't make it. Then you got these kids that kind of were brought up at cart tracks and weren't socialized in school. And so that's made the bar really high. And I think you have a little bit less of that in the state. So I think we got a little bit of imbalance of how much in the junior formulas kids are living at racetracks versus the states. And then you have these testing restrictions, which means it's higher risk taking someone who hasn't kind of lived in Europe, taking them cross border across the pond like we used to be able to do in the good old days. When you look at the development system in general, you know, it's pretty straightforward for F1 through the carding system. And I look at a kid like Kyle Larson that has come through everything that you can possibly drive on dirt, transferred over to asphalt immediately, had success.

You've got to be around Kyle, obviously a lot with the IndyCar program at the Indy 500. you've seen what Kyle can do and just he's fast, right? Like he's brave, he's fast. He picks things up really quickly. He's creative. And I think being creative, we saw that at indie this year with a lot of the things that he did in the Indy car in the cup race when he was able to maneuver through traffic. When you see a guy like Kyle Larson and you see that talent and you think to yourself,

okay, Kyle went and did dirt and he wound up with this, sometimes you just wonder, is it just that natural gift that you're talking about that that some of these guys have? But what did what was the thing about Kyle Arson that stuck out to you when he got in that Indy car that you were really surprised with or not surprised with, you know, from his time that you got to spend around him? He, he's as naturally talented as any racing driver I've ever seen. I think, and I saw this a lot out of Fernando when I brought him Alonzo to the Indy 500. So you see the kind of championship qualities of these guys.

He was very calm. Nothing seemed to be happening too fast for him. And they're able to compartmentalize. So, you know, both Kyle and Fernando, they knew where they needed to be on race day, but then they took it one day at a time. You know, they were never too hung up on the time sheets or they never got ahead of themselves. And that's where you get yourself in trouble, you know,

And that's kind of, that's some experience versus, you know, maybe some, you know, Antenelli, who's going to be a great talent at Mercedes. He went out and his first free practice won while he was unbelievably quick. He also crashed quickly. And he was, you know, I think that was not lack of talent. That was lack of experience. So you see someone like Kyle and Fernando, they've got an extreme amount of confidence in themselves. They study a lot.

They ask a lots of questions. and they creep up on it knowing, hey, I got 10 test days before I have to be on top of this. So they kind of use each session one at a time. They know exactly what they're trying to achieve. They experiment. And Kyle was just in total control the entire month of May, never put a foot wrong, was unbelievably quick, qualified fifth. And actually, you know, we finished second and fourth. he was running in front of Patto and Alex, you know, all race.

And then unfortunately had a pit lang speeding violation, which we had a bit of a long brake pedal. So I can't even say that was Kyle's fault. You know, I think he didn't have the brake pedal under him that he thought he would have because you get pad knockoff around Indy. So, I mean, Kyle, as a driver, he's as good as anyone I've ever seen. I think he'd give him enough time in a Formula One car. He'd be competitive. The problem is coming back to those testing restrictions. in the time, there isn't enough time that you could give them to learn all these circuits

and how competitive Formula One is, you only have to be off by a tenth to be the difference between pole and, you know, six, seventh and eighth right now, or to be from eighth to 15th. But, you know, Kyle is a racing driver? That guy's awesome. So is there ever a scenario that you think we could maybe get one of those older McLaren F1 cars and do the old driver swap at one of these racetracks where we could, We could see, I think everybody in an American racing fan wants to see Kyle Arson just do it one time as far as make laps and drive. Is that is that something that, you know, we think we could put together? Yeah, we've been chatting about it.

Kyle, as you can imagine, definitely wants to do it in between our schedule, which goes from February to December and NASCAR schedule, which I think is, you know, February to November, finding that window. We did that with Jimmy Johnson and Fernando in Bahrain with Hendrick Motorsport. That must have been about four or five years ago, and that was a lot of fun. So I'd love to see Kyle in an F-1 car. It is something that we've discussed and something that I think will happen down the road. So how did this all start? Kyle Larson, I think we're all really intrigued because I love when the drivers go to the 24 hours of Daytona. I love when they go back and forth from NASCAR to IndyCar.

I love when the F1 guys seeing Juan Pablo Montoya in the car this weekend in a NASCAR race again. I just think that that crossover really makes the – well, it really fuels the conversation that we have now because so few of these guys cross over back and forth. You know, we've seen Alonzo do it. We've seen Kyle Arson do it. But, you know, I think when you look at that, would you like to see more of these guys kind of come together? at the 24 hours of Daytona? Because for me, I always looked at the 24 hours of Daytona was where the world's racing drivers met. And they created these relationships. They had these conversations of,

you know, he's great, he's good, but he's a good person. And it was this, this free advertisement that we all got around the world about how great each division's drivers were. Is that something that you see as important as we go forward? Definitely. And I love it, right? I mean, that's the Mario Andretti, the Dan Gurney, the AJ Floyd, Jackie Stewart, the Graham Hills, you know, Jimmy Clark, these guys raced every weekend in different types of cars, whether it was Dirt, Formula One, LaMont, Daytona, and I think it's really cool. And I think that's where you see the best drivers, right? You can get unbelievable drivers that are great in their discipline,

but maybe have a bit more of a challenge to cross over. So to me, the greatest drivers are those that you could kind of stick in anything, whether it was a NASCAR or an IndyCar, and they just figured it out. And now you have, you know, such a big sport. You get into sponsor conflicts. You get into manufacturer conflicts, right? If we were running a Honda, then in IndyCar, then that wouldn't have made it possible for Kyle. But fortunately, we both share a great relationship with Chevrolet. You know, there's no sponsor conflicts. So, You know, we have to be respectful and understanding of that. But I'm a fan of, yeah, bringing Fernando over, bringing Kyle over. You know, Dale Jr. asked me even about would McLaren consider NASCAR. And it's, you know, it isn't something that we would do with such a big commitment. And I've got so much respect for all these different series.

I think people are fools to underestimate how difficult these championships are, right? you know, the Formula One drivers come over to NASCAR. Not so easy. And so, but it did get me thinking, doing something around the Daytona 500, kind of like we're doing with Hendrick Motorsport around the Indy 500, that'd be kind of cool seeing a papaya NASCAR going around Daytona. So it's got me thinking. And I do think it's really cool to see these crossover.

And I think that's coming back to what we started with, you know, it was Formula One or the series or way competitive. or complimentary, I think it's, I put it all in the bucket of it's racing. And anything that's good for racing is kind of good for all of us. Regardless of the actual discipline it takes place and it's just racing. So which one of your guys would be the most likely to, on the F1 side, to say, hey, I want to go run the Daytona 500 in that car? Oscar seems to be, I mean, they both love to drive everything.

but Oscar's kind of knocked on my door a little bit about his excitement around NASCAR. So I think if we were to do something with Kyle and one of our Formula One drivers, it's probably most likely the Oscar. Well, I want to talk about you. And, you know, I think for us, we were talking a little bit about our backgrounds before we came on the air. So you have a carding background. And little did I know that we carted in a lot of the same circles.

out west in California. So tell me how you got started and just with carting and just specifically where you started out west. Yeah, absolutely. And I miss carding. That was kind of my favorite memories. It was interesting when Senna was asked what was his favorite memories in racing. And he went all the way back to carting because it was so pure and it's what kind of got us started. So I'm originally from Southern California, the Valley Boy. And I'm kind of a strange way to get into racing. My first ever race was the 1981 Long Beach Grand Prix. I went to with my family, just, you know, kind of mom and dad took us there because the race was in town and I was 10 years old and just made a huge impression on me. I remember the grandstand we were in. It was a Williams 1-2. So I fell in love

with racing then. I used to then go to Riverside International Raceway for the Winston, I think was called the Winston Western 500 and the Warner Hodgton 400. So watching Bobby Allison and Daryl Waltrip and Richard Petty, you know, the famous last corner, you know, that real long right-hander, the EMS races. Then I would go to the drag races in Pomona with Tony Nancy and Don Perdom and John Force were racing. So I just loved racing. Then I went on Wheel of Four. Fortune Team Week that had nothing to do with racing and won at 13. Got some, won some watches that as a 13 year old, as much as I think Cartier watches are great. The 13, it's like, what are you going to do with Cartier watch?

Went back to the Long Beach Grand Prix in 87 with a buddy in high school whose family was into racing, met Mario Andretti, was very intimidated and just asked them, how do you get started in racing? He said, carting. And there happened to be an ad in there for Jim Hall Cart Racing School. which was out at, you know, Oxnard. So my parents didn't want me to do it. And I went and sold the watches at a pawn shop in Van Nuys and then paid to go to the cart racing school, then went to the advanced course,

then went to the racing school at the racing school, had success. And then went and bought a goat cart from Pitts Performance, who was also in the valley. Never was a big fan of schools. So kind of decided, let's try this racing stuff. Instead of being at school, I'd be at a cart racing shop.

And I just started racing all the time. And it was kind of lived it, breathed it, would stick the cart in the back of my Volkswagen jetta. I'd have to take the wheels off and move the axle around and kind of wedge it in the trunk or the boot, as we call it in England now. And lived at, you know, Bakersfield, you know, Rick Mears' son, Clint Mears. I remember you and Richie Hearn and Buddy Rice who went on to win the Indy 500. and really cool stuff, Scott Pruitt and Ron Emmett were kind of the legends of Southern Cal. They were out of carting by them, but on to bigger things, especially Scott Pruitt. And so what was cool is at Monterey Astorix this year, the Adams family came up to me,

and they had no idea, you know, kind of where I was from and their son races, and they wanted to introduce them. And they're like, yeah, we're from Riverside. I'm like, Adam's cart track. Like the cart track, they were blown away. They had no idea. I know it's like, I've raced her a thousand times. So that was one of the best cart tracks.

So that was really cool. So I enjoy reminiscing about the carding days. And then from there went to Europe to go race. And that's how I got into the sponsorship business. I didn't have any family resources. So I had to learn how to do sponsorship. And then race professionally for 10 years, started my motorsports agency, sold that after 20 years and then got an awesome opportunity to either go to Formula One or McLaren

and chose McLaren because I wanted to be not only in the commercial side of the sport, which I love, but I wanted to be in the race. And so chose McLaren. And it's been now in my eight season and absolutely loving it. Yeah. It's been a remarkable turnaround to see everything that you guys have been able to accomplish with McLaren. As you look at the carding system and how,

How does McLaren, how do you guys scout talent? Do you have a team, a carding team? What is the process for you guys to scout talent? Because you have so many rides to fill and so many seats to keep after. Who's the hot prospect? And where is that avenue for McLaren and how you guys go about finding talent? Yeah, we have a driver development team. It's about a half a dozen people.

We have drivers, everything from Formula 2, you know, which is one step away from Formula One. We look after Gabriel who's actually leading the Formula 2 championship. We then have a couple drivers in Formula 3, a couple drivers in Formula 3, a couple drivers in Formula 4, and then in carting. So we're trying to kind of make sure that, you know, we can't quite predict when we might have a gap in our Formula 1 seed or IndyCar seed or Formula E. So we kind of have a half a dozen drivers that are always under contract that are at various stages of their career

that we're helping financially, helping, of course, technically, mental performance that we hope to be able to deploy. We've got reserve drivers, a lot of simulation. So we have a lot of seats to fill. And then, of course, while you have your driver development, we're always kind of paying attention to the marketplace and, you know, where there might be a gap. So Oscar, we found actually out of a competitor's driver development program. They weren't quite ready to move on him. And we were and knew he was a massive talent. And then, of course, while you're always trying to find your own talent,

you're sometimes signing people from other teams like we did with Christian Lungard. But, you know, I much prefer to kind of bring talent up through the ranks because then you build a long-term relationship with them. We had some driver drama, of course, an Indy car here the last 18 months, which is now. settled, but you know, you've got to have the best drivers in the business and any discipline you're in because the competition is so good, you've got to have the best driver lineup is a very important ingredient in success and winning races. So you've been through the boom. You sold sponsorship during the time of NASCAR being in this just out of control growth. Prices were through the roof. Now we've kind of gone through this

transition where that's all stabilized and kind of found its ground here. But I think that the development landscape of drivers in today's world, the most common question that is asked now is about money and how much money can you bring. From a team standpoint, how do you balance the financial side of the driver and the talent side of the driver? Because it's almost, it's kind of flopped, right? The guy that can bring the most money gets the best ride. Where do you think that is and how do you think we can make that better for the kids that are talented but just don't have the dollars? Yeah, it's a unique part of our sport, which is not a great part of the sport, right?

If you're great at baseball, you're going to make the MLB because you're great at baseball. You don't need equipment around you. You don't need resources. You know, you need a glove and a bat. if you're great, you're going to make the team. In racing, I can't imagine how many world champions are out there, NASCAR champions that are out there, that never got the chance, we'll never get the chance because they didn't have the equipment under them or the resources.

From our standpoint, the healthier the sport can be to where teams can find sponsorship on their own so they can hire drivers, which is where we are, but not everyone is purely based on talent would be the healthiest situation. situation. Unfortunately, some teams are really good at finding sponsorship. Some aren't. Some can find some sponsorship, so they need some subsidy. So an ideal scenario would be all these teams have enough sponsorship that they can just go get Kevin Harvitt, because he's the best racing driver available. Today, you know, not every team's in that situation. So it's like, well, we'd rather have Kevin, but he doesn't have a dollar, but Bob over here is, you know, pretty good,

but he's got some money. And that's, you know, that's unfortunate. Fortunately, the Hendrick Motorsport, the McLaren's, Richard Childress of the world, usually have the resources that they don't need to find that balance. But that's not the case with all forms of motor racing. So we all just need to be really good at finding sponsorship because someone's got to pay for it, whether you come from family resources, friend, or a sponsor. But it's a tricky part of the business, because racing's very expensive, more so than other sports. And so someone's got to be writing the check. So who's the best one we don't know about from a driver's perspective right now? That's a good question. I've seen a lot of talent over the years back when I was racing of

drivers that were pretty awesome that didn't get there. I do think. the best of the best of the best do get there because people will figure out a way to do it. But for sure, there's been some that have slipped through the cracks. And then there's been some that have been amazing pedigrees that, for whatever reason, didn't quite get to be the best, the wrong place, wrong time. You know, someone like Jan Magnuson, unbelievable driver, dominated Formula 3. Everything says should have been a Formula One World Champion. in, but he got in the McLaren, and the McLaren wasn't that competitive at the time.

And then he was in Jackie Stewart's team, which was a great team, but not a big team. But like someone like John Magnuson, I think, you know, could have been Tommy Byrne, who I'm sure you're aware of, you know, massive talent. You know, he might have had his mouth got a little bit in the way from time to time. But yeah, you know, and then drivers in carts that were amazing. But, you know, you got to have the great equipment underneath. you as well. So I got two more questions. And based upon everything that we've talked about, I have to imagine, I think that we've

had a couple of pretty good stories. But what was your first car? What was the first car that you drove on the street? And then I want to know what that was. And then I want to know a car that you want to own. So it was a Volkswagen jetta, 16 valve diesel. It was my dad's car. So he passed it down to me.

That was my first car. And the car I always wanted then, because it was always a little bit sportier, it was the Volkswagen Chiraco. So that was kind of growing up. And a Mazda RX-7, I always thought the rotaries were pretty cool. And today, I'd love to have a Mercedes Gold Wing. I'm a car collector. So hopefully I'll get one one of these days.

But I always thought those were very iconic. But I much prefer racing cars. So I've got a racing car collection that's quite eclectic of NASCAR, the Indy cars, the Formula One cars, the Group C cars. Because I'm such a fan of the sport. I've gone from collecting the 124th to got a little bit more cash. So I moved up to the 118th. And then fortunately, when I sold my business, was able to get some full-scale models that I can drive. So I love racing.

I consider myself to be a massive fan of the sport. And the historic stuff kind of brings back my youth. So I really enjoy historic racing. And I get more goosebumps when I meet, you know, Emerson Pitipaldi than I do, you know, today's racing driver. Because, you know, now I'm in the business growing up. It was like, oh, my God, that's Emerson Pitopoldy or Danny Sullivan or Rick Mears. And so I enjoy meeting the guys that I grew up racing who are the ones that kind of got me involved in the sport, Mario Andretti's.

These guys are legends. And I know we're racing today with the current legends. You're a legend of your sport. And I think it's cool. I love it. Well, Zach, we don't have many bigger race fans on this show than you. And you've been a great part of the racing landscape on really all sides of the racing world. And I appreciate the fact that you took the time today to come talk racing with us because we love talking

racing and we wish you nothing but the best in all the different racing divisions. And we also look forward to to have an IndyCar on Fox next year. So thanks for taking the time today. It's good to be awesome. Great to be on. Thanks for having me. We want to thank Zach for taking the time to talk to us today. Hope you guys enjoyed the conversation. We encourage you to follow us on YouTube or anywhere else on social media. We'll see you next week.