The Road to Endurance: NASA Great Lakes and the Team Racing Endurance Cup (TREC)

What happens when a nationally recognized motorsports organization partners with a local performance shop that lives and breathes track days, endurance racing, and driver development?

You get something bigger than an announcement.
You get momentum.

In this episode of the Late to Grid Podcast, we dive into the exciting partnership between NASA Great Lakes and Atomic Autosports. Bill, Jay Andrew and Glenn Robinson talk about what it means for drivers, teams, and the future of endurance racing in the Midwest.

From a random envelope in the mail… to autocross cones… to building a multi-state endurance racing program, this episode is about the motorsports journey. It’s about the ladder from first-time HPDE driver to team-based endurance racing competitor. And it’s about how the NASA TREC (Team Racing Endurance Cup) series is creating one of the most accessible and exciting formats in grassroots racing today.

This isn’t Formula 1.
This is real-world, grassroots racing.
Four-hour battles built on strategy, discipline, and trust.

TREC blends the thrill of endurance racing with accessibility. Whether you’re currently in HPDE, autocross, or thinking about building your first race car, this format creates a realistic entry point into competitive racing without needing a six-figure budget.

And with Atomic Autosports supporting drivers through car prep, performance consulting, and track support, the pathway into endurance racing has never been clearer.

🔥 Why This Partnership Matters

NASA Great Lakes has built one of the strongest regional programs in the country covering Michigan, Ohio, Indiana, Kentucky, Western Pennsylvania, and beyond.

Atomic Autosports exists to help drivers:

• Prepare cars properly
• Build safe and competitive endurance setups
• Develop as high-performance drivers
• Turn track-day passion into structured racing programs

Together, the goal is simple:

➡️ Grow grassroots endurance racing
➡️ Educate drivers
➡️ Lower the barrier to entry
➡️ Create sustainable racing careers

If you've ever thought:

• “Could I actually race wheel-to-wheel?”
• “Could my track day car become an endurance car?”
• “Could my friends and I start a racing team?”

This episode is your green flag.

Want faster laps and fewer headaches at the track? Atomic Autosports helps grassroots racers go from “I hope this works” to “I know this works.” 

From alignment and suspension tuning to track-day prep, Atomic Autosports is here to help you drive smarter, safer, and quicker. If you’re ready to stop guessing and start progressing, learn more at atomicautosports.http://www.atomicautosports.comcom

If you’re serious about getting faster, start at AtomicAutosports.com where you can find guides, information, and even connect with us to make sure that your motorsports journey stays on track. 

You know me as the host of Late To Grid, but my biggest shift wasn't on the track, it was leaving corporate life to own a Rad Air location. It gave me the freedom to turn my passion for cars into a career and actually get to the track more often. Ready to own your future? Visit radairfranchise.com and let’s get you living life in the fast lane.

Thanks for listening and taking an interest in growing grassroots racing.  The Late To Grid podcast shares the stories and inspiration that help listeners along their motorsports journey. 

Find all episodes on the Atomic Autosports website.

Transcript

0:19

How does getting a random envelope in the mail, filling it out and returning it lead to autocrossing, which then leads to running an endurance racing program? Also, how does getting a Foxbody Mustang as a graduation present lead to running a five state racing program? Well, my next two guests tell those stories. Let's throw the green flag on this episode. Well, as I mentioned, I have Jay and Glenn from NASA Great Lakes. Gentlemen, it's great to have you here today. Thanks. Thanks for having us. Yeah, thanks very much, Bill. It's great to be here. We talked about this a couple months ago, and I've been looking forward to it ever since we did. It was much warmer back then and I think we were still racing. But yeah, we want to talk a lot about a lot of things because there's exciting stuff happening with NASA, Great Lakes, especially the Trek Endurance series that Glenn is going to talk about. But first, I want to remind the listeners. Season one, episode seven J. Andrew recorded his first ever podcast and it was with us. That's way before we had the Atomic Autosports studio. We were recording at home via zoom and all that kind of stuff, so it's great to have you back on again. It's great to be back. Yeah. And Glenn, we're going to learn a lot more about your racing background, including Porsches and why you like them so much. And, um, you're drawn to the nine forty four. We'll talk about that as well. But Jay, first, for those that don't know, what is NASA and why is it Great Lakes? Uh, I'll give you a little bit of background. Um, NASA is a national organization. It's a nationally sanctioned organization, National Auto Sport Association, NASA we race cars, we don't launch rockets. Um, started out in California in the nineties. I think we're at year thirty or thirty five as a national organization. We're up to, I think, fifteen regions. Wow. They just they have like a rallycross region in Hawaii. That's new a couple years ago. And, um, they're just starting um, they've tried to get it going in the past, but a region up in the Pacific Northwest, which is kind of cool. So, um, and NASA, Great Lakes, uh, I don't know, became the Great Lakes region technically. Well, it started out as the Ohio-indiana region. And then there was an additional region called the Midwest region. And when I acquired it, it was Ohio, and it was Great Lakes and Midwest. And then we combined it into one region of Great Lakes. It just made more sense. Instead of having two of everything and two websites and, and um, so we it's it's a pretty big region geographically. I mean, we get drivers that It often drive toe eight nine hours to events, which is pretty impressive. And it covers Michigan, Indiana, Ohio. What else? Illinois. Okay. Um, Wisconsin. We have people coming from, uh, Iowa. Uh, we're a lot of members in Kentucky, you know, eastern or, I'm sorry, Western Pennsylvania, West Virginia, it's pretty pretty big region, right? One of the things I really like about NASA, because I've been lucky enough to attend one of your weekends, is the focus on the people. And no matter what you want to do, you want your brand new. You've never been on track before. There's something for them, and there's something for that. Someone that's been racing for decades. So first, if you could just real high level go through the differences between Hpde one, two, three and four, okay, that's a really good question. Um, and there's another level in there too that I want to talk about that's important. which is Hpdi intro. And it is. Is that the old hyperdrive? Kind of. Okay. Yeah. Similar to hyperdrive only it's um, it's more detailed. It's it's, uh, it has its own run group, and it started based on this relationship that NASA and Toyota have. And, um, real quick, if you buy a Toyota GR product, you get a free NASA membership and a one one day track day. And so we created this, uh, intro, and it's a, it's a one day it's a lead follow format. And right now we've we sell it out with only the Toyota GR customers. Oh my gosh. And, um, we get about a thirty, thirty five percent return rate from those people coming back to our events. So we give our goal is to give them a really good time to experience their new car on track at a great event. And um, so from there then our beginner level hpdi is HPD, one is beginner, four is advanced HPD one. We have a really robust curriculum that that goes through the the full weekend that combines classroom instruction and in-car instruction with your own personal instructor. And, um, what is really special about that is the curriculum translates to what you learn in class. You practice on the track, and the instructors know what's going on in class. And so they they know what to teach on track, which I don't think that's real prevalent in the industry, but it's very important to learning. Uh, level two, you have to graduate from one. There's a test you take, um, we have a checkoff instructor that has specific criteria to graduate somebody from one to two and in two. you have an instructor in your car. One or two sessions, if you're lucky, per day during the weekend. All of our all of our registrations are full weekends. We don't really do single day because our curriculum is based on two days. And um, and two, uh, it's it's kind of solo but not quite. And the drivers are, you know, learned a lot of the basics and are starting to go faster. And then, um, we have criteria to graduate from two and to three, and in three is where you really learn to go fast. And Robin Burnett is our series leader there. He's a riot. Everybody in that group has a blast. Um, they do a lot of drills. Um, when people first hear about the drills, they're a little, sometimes a little put off. They're like, I don't want to waste my track time doing that. But then they realize, excuse me, what they learn in the drills and how to how to be comfortable side by side. So it it really expands into, um, kind of eliminating trains and learning to work together as a group on track instead of an individual driver. Yeah. And we do some like sort of we, we used to call them mock starts, but um, we do some sort of, uh, um, kind of start. It's a double wide, um, double wide start of session, something like that. Yeah. When we called it a mock start, people got a little too excited to start to beginning of session. Yeah, but it gives it gives people in in Hbd3, which are very advanced drivers, sort of the, the taste of, of racing a little bit. Sure. And a lot of times that hooks them. Um, and then Hbd4 is the group that a lot of our instructors drive in, um, people doing test and tune in their race cars. That's the pinnacle of our hpdi system. And, um, it's kind of the destination. Sure. Yeah. I have to tell you. So I've done Hpdi three, and when they said we're gonna do some drills, I was kind of like, just like you said, I was like, yeah, man, you know, I want to go out there and I want to lay down some fast laps, I want to we just talked about this. I'm gonna go out and apply that. I love the drills. They were so much fun, you know, because then you're like, you know, you come back, you take your helmet off, you go back to the garage. This was at Mid-Ohio. You go back to the garage and you're like, hey, you were in that white car, right? Yeah. Oh, how fun was that, man? I think you had another foot. When we go back out, let's try to get a little closer to one another. Yeah, it was a blast. You meet so many people and, um, you know, that's just one part of the NASA organization. Before we talk about anything else, we're going to jump over to Glenn and let's talk a little bit more about Glenn, because this is your first time on the podcast. And, um, let's start by your first car on track was a Porsche nine hundred eleven that you still owned. What made you want to take that on track? Yeah, that's we got to go back a bit, I have. I'm going to age myself here. Um, I was about seven years old when Mario Andretti won the Indy five hundred. Okay. I watched it on a black and white TV. I won't say what year that was. I know what year it was. Nineteen sixty nine. It was? Yeah. Yeah. Um. And I was hooked. Yeah. I thought I thought Mario Andretti was the greatest person in the whole world. And I still remember very vividly going out to recess after that, getting on the swings and Mario Andretti. I'm going real fast. Um, but yeah, so after that, I was really old wide World of Sports covering the F1 races. I would watch that whenever I could. Um, so then fast forward. Uh, just graduated high school. My girlfriend at the time, her, um, her mother won a radio call in contest. She just loved to do this. And got two tickets to what's now called the Rolex. Oh, yeah, she didn't want them, so she gave them to me. So we were in Florida at the time, not too far. So I went up to Daytona and I saw the Rolex. Um, it was the the twenty four hour Pepsi challenge at that time. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Um, and that totally blew me away. And that was it. Sports car endurance racing. That's that was when I got hooked. Back then, um, so I went off to college. Uh, Air Force came back home. Um, got a little card in the mail once that says we're having this class action lawsuit, blah, blah, blah, blah, and you've been identified as a potential client. I said, yeah, sure. Fine. I sign it and I throw it back in. Um, several months later, I get a big check. It's like, really? No way. Yeah. Um, and I had been just. I had been dreaming of getting an old nine over eleven. So I've been shopping and suddenly I had the funds. So I went out and I found a nineteen seventy eight nine over eleven SC um, it had appropriate upgrades, but it wasn't too pristine, so it was something I could drive. And I picked that up. Um, and this was. Let's see, late nineties. Um, and, uh, I drove it. It was my daily, um, I was living in Florida at the time, uh, and, uh, somebody told me about autocross, and so I started doing SCCA autocross and was having a blast. Um. Ended up, uh, leaving Florida and moving up to Pennsylvania, um, when the real estate bubble burst. And, uh, when I was up, uh, working in Pittsburgh, I started doing autocross up there. Um, at Pitt race. At Pitt race? Yeah. Okay. Uh, and then, uh, buddy, I worked with, uh, told me about Scca's track night in America. Yeah, I was like, really? So I took the nine eleven out. I did that, and I said, I'm not doing autocross anymore. I got to do the big track stuff. Yeah. Um, and this is before anything with NASA. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. Um, so I took the nine eleven to a few track night, uh, events and had a blast and knew I needed to learn more. I started doing stuff with, uh, the Porsche club and Chen and auto interests and a bunch of those other guys, and started working up and building my confidence. Then there, uh, there was a PCA event I went to, and I was ready to move into the advanced group, and, um, went out with my instructor on Saturday after a couple of sessions. You know, I told him I want to go into advanced group, and then I want to learn how to race because I need to race. Um, I should back up a little bit. I'm not doing this in the nine over eleven now. Okay. Yeah. So after a couple times on track with the nine over eleven, uh, and seeing a couple people go off track in their car, I thought, you know what that old adage, you know, never take a car to the track, you're not willing to leave at the track. Kind of struck me. So I went shopping and I found a nine forty four there. There's a nine forty four. All right. It was an eighty five. Nine forty four. It was street legal but prepped for the track, had all the suspension upgrades and stuff. So that's what I started really learning on. Um, so anyway, now back to where I was the, uh, the PCA event. My instructor said, I can't teach you anything. You're absolutely good enough to go to advance. I'm going to sign you off for advance. But and to tell you the truth, PCA can't teach you anything else. You need to go to NASA Great Lakes. Is it really? He said yep. I've instructed with them before they got a great program. Go! I had my whole summer planned out and, um, and so I looked and there was a NASA event coming up. It was May at Mid-Ohio. Uh, and I canceled all my other events, and I went to, went to this NASA event at Mid-Ohio, and they put me in a J put me in Hbd3 because of the background I had had. And, um, it was a crappy cold, rainy weekend in Ohio. Yeah. Before the repave. Right. So this is a while ago. Um, I learned more in that one weekend. Um, in that just those two days. Then I had learned in years before, and I was hooked. It's like it's been NASA ever since I went through three and four. Um, became an instructor, got my comp license. Uh, I was going to go. Nine forty four Spec racing. Thing. Um, the group that was racing at the time in Great Lakes. Wonderful people you mentioned earlier. It's the people. It's like, oh my gosh, the people in this group are incredible. Um, but the nine forty four guys tended to bump a little more than I was comfortable with. Not intentionally, of course, but close racing. Yeah. Um, and I'd always loved the endurance racing. And there was this Trek stuff that J was doing on Fridays. It's like, that's what I'm going to do. All right, so, uh, got a buddy and we started racing track. Um, and then the nine forty four in the nine forty four. Yeah. That's what we've been doing. Is that still what you're racing? That is still what I'm racing. Um, yeah. We've we had we lost a motor, um, the end of this season. And so I've decided to kind of upgrade. I'm working on an LZ swap for. Yeah, let's swap the world. Yeah. I was again during a race at Mid-Ohio. I'm driving down the backstretch and checking my gauges like I do. You know, whenever you hit a straight, check your gauges and I'm thinking, why did I put that gauge there? That should have been over there. And this one should have been over here. It's like, what was I thinking when I laid this whole thing out? Oh, I should brake. That's what I realized. I needed a faster car because I was starting to get bored with life. Yeah. Gauge. Gauge relocation. So lots of guys do that. And there's lots of kits and parts available. So going that going that route. Oh, cool. Yeah. All right. Well we learned a little bit more from Glenn and his track. Uh, the cars he's had on track. Let's go back to mom's foxbody. So why is Jay Andrew racing mom's mustang? Mom's foxbody. This is a good story. Um, it was in, uh, grassroots motorsports when it was a paper magazine. Yeah. Um, NASA had a section in there and it was highlighted in there and, um, a couple other magazines and stuff. But yeah, that's cool. My nine elevenths in an issue of Grassroots Motorsports when I was all across. Yeah. Well look those up. We'll put them in the show notes link to them. So, um. Yeah. So moms, moms. Foxbody. My mom, um, bought the car new in eighty six. Um, air conditioning, delete. No power windows. Um, she had the stripe removed off the center of the hood. And was that for economic reasons? Because I purchased the plane and her mom drove a mustang also. So it was kind of in the family. Yeah. So. And that thing was a hot rod in the day in eighty six. And, um, so she had that a few years, uh, in Ohio winters. That's not the best car to have. Um, and I graduated Ohio State from Ohio State, and that was kind of my graduation present. And so I took that car and started Autocrossing, of course. And first ever track day was at a BMW club event at Nelson's Ledges, which is northeast Ohio by us. And it just kept evolving. And, um, currently, uh, a few years ago, I did a coyote swap in it. So it's got the five liter, um, it's a really well set up race car. Now, there's not much coyote left in it, but it's, um, it's got all the good go fast stuff on it. And that's still what you're racing today. That's still what I'm racing today. I, um, had a hiatus for, I don't know, almost three years. We, um, did a little damage to it. Um, uh, my my son, there was some handling issues. I blame him, I blame the handling issues. He went off in turn one and, uh, hit that bump in the exit and, um, uh, ripped the splitter off, which damaged the radiator. And so it's at because it needed a little repair and I needed some funds to do the repair. And so I got it back together with a goal of championships this year at Ozarks. And, uh, did some races to qualify in that. And then, um, I currently had the track record in American iron at Ozarks and wanted to do better than that. And in qualifying or practice, I lost four seconds off that lap time. Um, and the competition was pretty tough. And, uh, buddy of mine, Bruce Bailey out of Florida, was hauling the mail and in qualifying, um, going into turn one, if you've ever been at Ozarks, turn one's a fast left hander. You have to be on your A game. I heard a boom looked in the rear view mirror, cloud of smoke pulled over, didn't put a drop of oil on the track, but had a rod sticking out the block so I didn't quite get to race at the championships. But I still had a fun journey there. Yeah. And so looking for a new engine, which may take a while but that's okay. Right. Yeah. It's always something with racing isn't it. Yeah. So let's talk a little bit more about NASA. And then we're going to do a deep dive in the track. So some of the things I want to share with listeners I really enjoy about NASA is Glenn shirt, for example. So you hear all these people talking about during the weekend, hey, go talk to Glenn. Go talk to Robin. Well, who who where when you see that name on there that gives that customer, that member, that person there. I know who I'm dealing with now. I can connect with them. I think that's great. You do that. The whole weekend is so organized. You got these nice, uh, schedules, you know, are printed out. They stay on track. There's always something going on. So if you're in between your sessions, you want to go watch some other stuff. There's plenty of stuff going on, but there's some fun things that happen in the evenings, too, like Friday night dinners. Tell us a little bit more about that. Yeah. Um, uh, we we generally do our our award ceremony trophies and, um, sort of a dinner, something simple barbecue sandwiches or something a Saturday night. Okay. And we do, um, we, you know, get together and have some beers and break bread and eat, eat, have a simple little meal with all our friends and do our, um, do our award ceremony where we give out, um, trophies to all the classes. And, um, it's just a good time for everybody to get together and hang out. And, I don't know, I think it brings everybody together. Everybody's welcome. Hpdi intro through one and four and time trial and racers. Everybody's welcome. We tend to attract more of the the competitors to that. Yeah. Um, uh, but we, we want our hpdi drivers to realize the fellowship portion of that too. But it's good we I don't know, we, um, we try really hard to put together a professional weekend. Um, and, um, our we have we're a pretty good sized region, so we have the luxury of having a lot of staff and a lot of good staff, and everybody kind of follows those clues to cues to. And, um, I think just everybody works very well together and very cohesive unit. And you all have fun. Well, we have fun too. That's always smiling. That's most important. Yeah. And, um, if you're not having fun at the track, then, then why be there? You know, and and that's my goal to I tell our staff that, you know, you're working hard, but at the end of the day, you should be having fun here. That's that's the goal. Yeah. So before we do a deep dive on track, let's go really quickly through what? What other wheel to wheel racing exists in the NASA world? Classes. As far as classes, there's, um. Yes, yes. For everything. We have a class for everything. Um, and, uh, with within our our weekend, our region breaks down all the classes into two run groups. Lightning is one run group and Thunder is the other. Um, we do mixed class racing. Um, initially, some people, they just want to have their own class in their own run group. But really, mixed class racing adds a whole other element to the race. I mean, it's a whole other strategy, and, um, it can be a disadvantage, but it can be an advantage too. So, um, but in the lightning group is generally the smaller displacement, um, cars, uh, and the thunders of the bigger, faster cars. Gotcha. And, um, as far as classes, we have lots of classes. Um, you want me to name all of them? It's almost too many to name, but we have a lot of spec classes that are NASA specific. Um, and, uh, Spec Miata is one of the biggest, um, nine hundred forty four. Uh, we have a newer one, spec three, which is a BMW class Becky, forty six spec iron. Um, American iron. Yeah. In in the American iron series, there's American iron. That's class. I generally run in American Iron Extreme, which is a faster class. Sort of a subbrand of that is CMC Camaro Mustang Challenge. That's some of the older, um, Camaro, Firebirds, Mustangs. Those guys put on a great show, a bunch of competitive racers. There's the BMW, the spec threes. Um, yeah. Spec spec three spec E46 has really grown as a spec class. Um, it's under thirty class. Yeah. E30. Yeah. Um, yeah, the spec three is the the E36, and that class is kind of growing. Uh, spec E30 used to be huge in our region. It's really big in the southeast Mid-Atlantic regions. It's a little bit smaller these days, but I found classes ebb and flow depending on the year and the size. Um, another popular class is Thunder Roadster GTR. It's not an open wheel car, but it's an open cockpit car based on, um, uh, tube chassis with motorcycle engine. Um, that class has grown like crazy. Those guys race really tight. You know that car? It's open cockpit, so you can see where your tire is in relation to the edge of your car and the car around you. So those guys race within inches of each other. It's crazy how tight they are. And, um, a couple, couple new classes in NASA that we started last year as the Corvette Cup, uh, C5, C6 cars, um, with all the Lsx varieties, there's, um, power to weight ratios that the classes are. The different cars run in with the different engine combinations. Um, and they just announced a two hundred treadwear tire for that class. I think that class is going to grow. Everybody loves their corvettes. Oh my gosh, these c5's. I mean that's what everyone's bringing to the track. Yeah, yeah. So, um, a lot of flexibility in that class. Um, um, um, uh, spec, I always confuse spec and cup. Mm. Five. Spec. Mm. Five. Um, was a group that ran with NASA. Um, NASA's really tight with Mazda and and lots of programs. We have the Mazda Challenge, which is sort of a subsegment of Spec Miata that's, um, really big with our young drivers, thirteen year, thirteen years and older, really kind of coming out of karts. Wow, those kids are fast. Yeah, yeah. And, um. But anyway, this year, uh, we have a rule set. Uh, that's that's within NASA. That's a spec MX five. So I, I expect to see more of those cars at the track. Um, the street classes that Bill you were asking about for your rx7 street will fit anything. It's a it's a builders class. It's not really a spec class. So you can. It's all power to weight. Um, online, there's this really neat calculator. You can anybody can just go in and start playing with it. You're like, oh, I have this car has this much horsepower. It weighs this much. I want to go in this street class, and you start clicking all the boxes to see where your power needs to be or what, where the weight of your car needs to be. There's a bunch of modifiers, like if I'm running this two hundred Treadwear tire. Yeah, tires are a big modifier. I'm glad to hear there's a tool, because I was looking at all the pluses and minuses. I'm like, it's a little overwhelming, it's a little overwhelming, but it's it's really simplified by that online calculator. It's kind of fun to go and play with it. You know, you can kind of do that what if stuff. Yeah. Yeah. Especially if you're building things or you're in the off season. You want to make some changes. Do I want to add this? Delete it. Yeah. So, um, the start, um, starts with, uh, st6. In our trek, rules are sort of based off of the street classes too. That's why the Trek classes are numbered that way. But St6 is, um, sort of the highest, um, weight to power ratio, the slowest class. And then it goes all the way up to ST1, which is the fastest, fastest class. And then we have sort of within that that umbrella is um, super unlimited. And those are more prototype cars, but it's unlimited power to weight. And um, and then last year they broke out the GT class, which are, um, unlimited power but production based vehicles as opposed to prototype. Yeah, specific. Then we we also have time trials to. Yeah. Oh yeah. And time trial, uh, fits within the street class rules as far as the power to weight. So the time trial is just competing against the clock. Uh, but the the rules for the car in the classing is the same as street for racing. All right, which is kind of cool. Yeah. So that is a good segue into track. Now, traditionally track has been a couple of hours on a Friday. Right. Putting it in the schedule, letting some folks I know a lot of folks have used it as a testing, you know, maybe they're running later in the weekend. Let's use this. But you have taken track and taken it from a Friday event of a couple hours to now a full weekend, right? Why the change? Why? Go big. Go big or go home. Really? It's the right thing to do. It's the right thing to do. Um, I, I love endurance racing. Personally, um, started in, I don't know, maybe two thousand and seven or eight when, when NASA had its, its, um, endurance racing rules where you had to have a full comp license and medical. It was your sprint racing license that allowed you to race NASA endurance. And it was really before any of the other, um, existing more simplified endurance series that we have now. And, um, and then I did, I did, um, some Grand-Am Street races, which were two or three hour races, driver change and so forth to and um, so that that format. I just like the team aspect of it. And um, so when when Trek Rule Set came around, it was a little goofy to start with, I must admit. But it started in two thousand. Um, right when, um, you know, Covid hit and it kind of threw everybody for a loop. Um, but we, we went into it, I think, with three, three events with Trek starting out and, um, with my passion for it, I'm like, we got to start this one way or another. And we just did Fridays, and I think we did a couple three hour events on Fridays. Um, and then I realized that that it was becoming more popular. We had a couple rough events. We had one at, um, gingerman, I think we had for three hours. We had five cars running around and but we made we made a commitment. And then the next year we, Um, I think we did, uh, a truck race at every every Friday that we had. Some were. I think we only had one three hour. They were all four hours. We found that that was a pretty good format. And, um, it was a great opportunity for racers to, um, test in a race environment, um, under under the truck format. And, um, and in in this year, twenty twenty six, it was a national initiative, um, to do full weekends. Okay. And, um, from the beginning, I always had a dream of doing a full weekend of, of truck racing. And, um, but it was really kind of based on to the, the NASA endurance rules, which is a bigger barrier of entry, you know, because you have to have a comp license and a medical. And that makes it real difficult for? It's a barrier. Yeah. It's a it's a big barrier. So the truck, um, makes it a lot easier. So because let's be clear, there's no comp license requirement. There's no comp license required. There's, um, no medical. So which is which makes it so much easier. We do have, um, a truck license. Um, there's a little twenty dollars fee. Um, there's a very simple online application to fill out, and we ask every new driver to take our CCR test. And it's just a simple online test, but it kind of sets the stage for a little bit of, um, formality and legitimacy to that license, I think, which is, um, a benefit. It's not just somebody going to race. It's never driven before. Right? Yeah. But it's not a high barrier of entry. Sort of. We think that's a sweet spot. Yeah, I think so. So I've I'm talking too much, Glenn, Because this is this is all good background because, you know, I came in, started doing it four years ago, I think it was. And, you know, one of the things that, uh, not requiring a comp license does, it also lowers the experience level for those who want to come. We look for an hpde three level driver to start racing with us. Um, so it's somebody who's very comfortable on the track, um, very comfortable in traffic. Uh, can drive predictably. Uh, so there aren't any surprises out there. And for somebody who's working toward that comp license and wants to really start racing, the track time is just amazing. Oh, sure. You know, you're out there just lap after lap after lap in an endurance racing environment you're not worried about. I got to catch that guy this lap. You know, I got to get around him in the next corner. It's like, okay, I can I can work up to whoever I need to get by. But at the same time, I can start trying some things, you know? I think I can get faster through this corner. Let me try something different. So when I'm out there racing, I'm also learning. I'm improving myself. I'm not. I'm not trying to do the same thing over and over. I'm always looking for something new because I'm trying to get better. And it's a great opportunity for those people who are who've got to that point in their journey, um, and want to get a lot more track time. Yeah. So you, you went from, you know, spec nine forty four to track. What did you like about endurance racing other than the bumping? Um, I'm more of a, a planner, a strategist, and I really like the the preparation and planning and then trying to execute on that plan. Um, because a lot can happen. Yeah. I'm not the fastest driver. I don't have the fastest car. Um, I'm. I'm mid-pack in the class that we run. Uh, and my co-driver. Um, we're within a couple of seconds of each other. Uh, so it's really all about. How can we keep going, not make mistakes, minimise our time in the pit, you know, following the rules that, you know, with the required number of pit stops and things like that, which are what what are the required number of stops? So it's based on the length of the race. Um, and so if the race is published as a four hour race, then there would be two pit stops. So it's for every two hours of the published race duration. So, uh, for our race, two stops when we get into the full weekends where we're doing seven and eight hour races, it would be, you know, four or five stops. Uh, yeah. And required to get the driver out after two hours. Um, no, no. All right. No, but, uh, you have to make a stop every two hours, and in it's a five minute stop. So, yeah, you can run the same driver for more than two hours, but every two hours is going to come in and sit in the pits for five minutes. Okay. Just kind of hopefully to collect himself or herself right before going back, get a drink, fill up the vehicle, fuel. Yep. All right. Yeah. It's. I love it. It really is a strategy. And it's that that slowly reeling somebody in and worrying about. Did that other team do their pit stop yet or is it coming up and. Yeah. And even I even think about the psychological impacts. It's like okay, if we start with a full tank of gas, we can go, you know, for so long and at this point in the race, we're we may suddenly be ahead. And nobody's going to expect that. Or maybe we we pit early so that we're sitting behind knowing that we can go longer on this next stint, this next tank of gas and leapfrog. And then they come in and then boom, we're suddenly a lap ahead of them. They're like, where did those guys come from, you know? So it's it's all that planning and that strategy that really appeals to me. Yeah. For your nine forty four, what's how many hours can you get out of a tank? Um, I've got an earlier car, so it's seventeen point four gallons. We burn seven gallons an hour. Um, so I can go two hours. Easy. Oh, easy. Yeah. For sure. Yeah. And then when you've when you've done the events before, you and just one other driver. Yeah. Um, I have, uh, this is, this is another cool thing about about track is because there are multiple drivers, um, you can share the costs. Yes. Right. So that brings brings endurance racing into reach for a lot of folks. Um, I own the car. I worked up a spreadsheet of all the consumables and and wear and tear, and we figured out what it costs per race hour to to run the car. And so, you know, every weekend my co-driver writes me a check for his half and I cover the other half, and it's worked out really well. Um, and I forgot the original question, but. Oh, just the two drivers. Yeah. So. But then what do you bring for crew? Uh, volunteers? Usually we have a couple of folks that that'll help out if they're at the track. And it's it's really easy to find volunteers. Um, really, all you need is somebody who can. Somebody who's got the equivalent driver safety equipment, you know, the suit, the helmet, gloves and stuff, because they have to have that during fueling. So one person, um, appropriately equipped to hold a fire bottle, another person to dump the gas, and the drivers can be changing, um, at the same time. So, yeah, if volunteers are easy to find and if you can't find one, you can usually go to the teams in the pit next to you and say, hey, would you mind holding a fire bottle? And they're like, sure, yeah, who wouldn't want to help out? And then the classic, it's based on the street classing. It is. Yeah. So, um, we take the lap record for, for the street class, and then we basically add three seconds to it and then round it off, and that becomes the, the upper limit for, uh, the comparable track class. Um, we have to make some minor adjustments every now and then when there's a record that's, that's not as high as it should be, or maybe a little too high, but generally speaking, they're, you know, the classes end up to be two to three seconds apart. Um, and you pick, you know, when you enter the race, you pick which class you want to run based on the published limit, and then you're supposed to stay under it. You would know that St6 has this lap time that you've determined. And then if my car runs right around that, I'm going to be st6, right? Yeah. Okay. So we'll take an example. Um, Say the class record for street class at Mid-Ohio is is one hundred forty eight. We'd had three seconds to it. Forty nine fifty fifty one one fifty one um, would be the upper limit for that class. And as long as you're below that limit, you're okay. If you go above it, um, then you have to come in during the race. If you go above it, you come in, you change the class number on your car and you go back out. And you, you are now competing in the next higher class. Oh, wow. Yeah. So yeah, timing and scoring will flag it. No kidding. Yeah. It pops up automatically if, if any car sort of breaks out of that class time. Sure. Yeah. And that drivers are thinking, man, I got the seat time. I'm getting better, I'm getting faster. And oh, now I got a pit stop and change my class. Yeah. You got to think about that. I've, um, there have been some tracks where I have improved two seconds over the length of the race. Um, it's like. Wow. Fortunately, I'm still have a lot of time between where I get to in the class limit. Um, but yeah, you got to think about that. You will get better as you race. Sure. You don't get a lot of people that break out? Um, I would say probably eighty percent of of the cars are quite a bit slower than those times. And, um, you know, it's endurance racing. There's a lot more to it than lap time. Yeah. We one of our last for the seven. Was it the seven hour race at Gingerman? We did the, the the, uh, the Honda Fit. Was it the Honda Fit or maybe that was the four hour. Anyway, the slowest car in the whole field won overall. So you know you just don't sometimes you just endurance racing. That's endurance racing. Yeah. You've laid out a very robust schedule for twenty twenty six. Can we go through it? Do you know it? Off the top of your head? I brought notes. Numbers are terrible in my little brain, so I brought some notes. That has all the all the events and the dates. Um, but we're, uh, almost all of our events on on a Friday. Uh, we have a truck event where the three hour, four hour most or four hours and then three weekends in our region that are that are full, full weekend racing. Yeah, I think I think in our region I have to count, but I think it's for track. It's ten events and thirteen races is the way it works out. So yeah. Is that about right? Yeah ten. We have ten truck races this season. Okay. Including the Fridays. Yeah. So it's so every so listener knows every Friday there's going to be a truck race. That's part of your bigger weekend right. Let's talk about the standalone weekends for track because there's three of those. Yeah there's three of those. What's the first one? That's what we're kind of most excited about this year. Yeah. Um, and, and I think we've got some, some pretty cool tracks, um, to start with, to have them. They're not our marquee tracks, you know that. Not the pro tracks, but they're just awesome, fun tracks to drive. Um, uh, June first weekend in June is at NCM down in Bowling Green. Love that track. And if, uh, what do you love about that track? It's it's not a track. You learn corner by corner. It's got distinct sections. Groups of corners. This way. So. You know, I thought a while ago, it's almost like a piece of classical music. It's got these little pieces that that feel and sound a little different. You know, you've got smooth flowing parts, you've got some real high speed parts, you've got some tight stuff. And it's. I had to learn it as sequences of corners. Okay. Um, yeah. So it's it's long, it's complicated. It's challenging all the time. Yeah. And so that's going to be a eight plus seven format. Yeah. We're doing um, we'll, we'll have Fridays as well, um, for practice and um, uh, then we do eight on Saturday, eight hours on Saturday and seven hours on Sunday. Yeah. And um, followed by that and also first weekend in June at NCM is like prime weather weekend in that track because it's a little bit farther south you get into July and it's a little hot. Yeah. But um, I don't know, just awesome facility. We love the staff there. They love us and we just really get along. We love that track. Um, first weekend in August, um, up north at Nelson Ledges. Um, NASA hasn't been there in a long time. When was the last time do you remember? Uh, it was before I was involved. Uh, I think they did a maybe a single day HPD or something. I don't recall the details. Um, it's a it's a shorter track, smaller facility. It doesn't really fit, um, the size of events we put on very well normally. So, um, so a standalone weekend. Ideal for. Yeah, it's great for a standalone endurance racing. Yeah. And, you know, it's it's kind of an iconic historic track, uh, especially for endurance racing. And, um, it's a simple, simple track. Super fast. Um, I learned to drive there. We used to go rent that track. Um, I remember that story. Yeah. It's. Yeah. It's not yours. No, it wasn't my choice, but I think it was a green Taurus. It looked like a turtle on its. On its shell, you know, we had to roll it over, but we shouldn't talk about that. Let's talk. Before we move on to the third event, let's talk about Nelson Ledges a little bit, because, um, if we were recording this originally so listener doesn't know, we were trying, I think, to get this done in October or November, you would have been the only endurance race at Nelson Ledges for twenty six. Now. Lucky dog snuck in a weekend. Um, and SCCA is thinking about one of their shorter format ones, but I mean marquee NASA and Endurance Weekend. I think it's going to be a huge weekend. I wouldn't be surprised if it sells out. Yeah, because air is not coming. Champ's not coming, right? Yeah, we we hope so. Obviously. Let's make it happen. We, uh, you know, this is this season is new to us. We're we're taking on some risk here. So we really, uh, greatly appreciate everybody that comes to support it. And, um, I don't know, that's just that's just a really good track for, for this format of racing, I think. And, um. Yeah, we hope, we hope we sell it out. I don't even know what sell out numbers are yet. We have to look at the length of the track and determination set, uh, set some sell out limits, but, um, that would be ideal. Oh heck yeah. Yeah. Fun, fun track. Easy to easy to learn, hard to master. You know, there's just some sections of it that you know, you want to over break and over break and, but you can just roll so much speed through some of those corners, you just let the car go and it's it's fun. Yeah. It is, it's we were lucky, you know. All all well you're you live by pit race. Um, so you're not terribly far from the track from Nelson. You know, you and I are a lot closer. It's it's we're lucky to have something like that we can just get over to. And you were just fifteen minutes from pit race when it was open. It was easy to car. Hardly even warmed up before you got there. Yep. Um, and then what's the third race on the schedule? Third one is this fall, uh, first weekend in, um, October. Uh, back up in Michigan at gingerman. And, um, for those who haven't raced gingerman, it's a it's one of the best little club tracks there is. Um, it's just so much fun. Really challenging. Um, uh, but not hard to learn at the same time. Uh, it's wide open. There's it's a good it's a good track to, um, practice rolling. Uh, maximum speed through the apex. Your consequences on your on missing, uh, an exit going off is, um, low consequences. We don't encourage that. However, should it happen? Should it happen? Um, there's very little to hit there. And, um, I don't know, just really nice people at the track up there. Uh, beautiful part of the state. Uh, real close to Lake Michigan. A lot of people will take an extra couple days to go hang out at the lake, and, um, the weather should be incredible. Yeah, that time of year, October absolutely should be sunny. And I don't know what's neat from north northeast Ohio. Person is, um, it almost feels we always usually call it a beach party at our other events up there, because it feels like you're at the beach. Yeah, I know the ground's a little sandy, and it just has a nice, a nice atmosphere at that track. So I didn't realize this about Gingerman until a couple months ago. So how that track got built is a gentleman. Owned a bar where the Color of Money movie was filmed. Right. And he took that money and built Gingerman Raceway. Yeah, I had no idea. I've only been there once. I didn't get a whole lot of seat time because we were having neon problems. Go figure. Right, right. Um, but if I had known that, I think I would have paid more attention to, you know, because I guess there's some stuff around in the one of the buildings there that, you know, has some pictures and stuff. Yeah. Uh, Jillian, our our registrar. Um, she's been doing a knockout job with our social media this year. She's been having fun with it, and, um, she talked to the track owner, and and, uh, he filled her in on some of those details. I didn't know a lot of those details. She did a Facebook post, um, with some of those details, and I didn't. I didn't know the whole story either, but they have sort of the classroom or the main building there. The Dolce Vita is the name of it, and they have some murals and some things and some paraphernalia from the restaurant that the owner had in Chicago. Um, which is kind of neat. It is. Yeah. And since you mentioned social media, yes, I have noticed that NASA, Great Lakes social media is blowing up. It's awesome. It's good to see because that's how a lot of people get their information. Not all people, but there's a good number of people that's that's how they're getting it. Yeah. She's been she's been doing a great job and having a lot of fun. I, I struggle with it. You know, I'm I whatever I try seems to fail, but she just knocks it out of the park. And a lot of fun stuff she's been doing. Really, um, bringing people in a lot of interviews. Um, just a lot of diverse interviews and looking at all aspects of what we do. Really fun. And the website looks new or refreshed? Yes. The website's brand new. Um, it's, uh, it's it's reformatted. Uh, we we had to change, uh, the company that that hosted the website, and it has a whole new, um, it's a WordPress now, and J me is a little behind the eight ball, getting it up to speed. Um, so I just have to start building, um, the event pages with the details of the events in there and so forth. But you can go there and find where to go for registrations. All of NASA's unique because we have our own, um, registration system and, uh, it's through the national website drive NASCAR.com, but that's on our website. It's linked to the national website that does all the registrations. So it's all all in-house. Gotcha. Let's jump back to Glenn a little bit more talk on track. So listener is eating all this up and they want to go endurance racing. They've never done it. And they said all right I'm going to do it with NASA. We talked about kind of how to set the team up in terms of a couple of drivers, get some volunteers to help, but what else would someone need to make sure the weekend's going to be successful? So we'll start with minimum requirements. Um, Jay mentioned earlier the the track license, if, you know, if you have the appropriate level of experience, go to the the NASA site, make sure you get a membership. Um, fill out your profile with all your experience, your car information, all of that, um, purchase a track license due to the little CCR test. And then you are you're in the position as far as membership and um, you know, certifications wherever you want to call it. And that license is pretty easy. And and me as a regional director, I'm the one that approves those licenses. So, um, we Venmo you some, uh. Yeah. Make sure this goes through. No, you don't need it. People pretty much know what the expectations are, and it's not it's not a beginner driver series. And, um, I, I do my due diligence and check on everybody's resume, um, because I think all the drivers deserve that, and I there may be one over the past five years, one license I didn't approve. And they quickly got got the requirements. And so anyway, it's it's a pretty simple process. Gotcha. Yeah. So and you know, anybody who's going to drive of course will need to go through that process as well. The next thing is the car. Um, it's got to be a race prepped car. It has to pass a NASA annual inspection. Um, so does it get a logbook? It gets a logbook. Um, so there's there's no special, unique technical requirements for a Trek car. It's just the standard NASA requirements for competition car. So, um, you get that inspection, you're good to go. We don't do inspections every event, you know. So you have the annual. It's up to you to make sure your car is maintained in good order. We're not going to check on you unless you give us a reason to. Right. Um, um, so you've got the car, you've got your drivers set up. Um, you need some basic pit equipment. You need, uh, an approved five gallon fuel jug in order. We only allow five gallons at a time. And there's a limited number of drugs that you can use, so we keep it fair. Um, you need a fire bottle. You need some water. You need some oil. Dry. You need a catch pan. And I think that's it. Really. And then as far as equipment goes, that's all you need. And it's just register. Register for the race. Um, pick your class based on the times and come and have some fun. And there you go. So no practice, no qualifying. Just. Hey, my car. Generally run this and take the green flag. So qualifying is practice. There is practice. Uh, qualifying. We do based on class and registration. So we're going to put the fastest classes up front and work our way back. Um, and then if you register first in your class, you're going to be sitting first at the start of the race, so. Oh how fun. Register early. Right. Um, so it makes it super simple. Um, and we have the ability to change that up. We may in the future, but in the past, it's just been an easy way to set grid, and it's just pretty straightforward. But we do a true start. We do a true race start. Yeah, yeah, it's endurance racing. You're not going to win it in the first turn, right? No. But yeah. Um, and if you do, there's something seriously wrong with everybody else. Yes. Um. But yeah. So we do, we do normal race start pace car goes out, we do, uh, double file starts and, uh, drop the green flag and off you go. Um, if we have to do a restart. Single file restarts just like any other racing. Okay. Yeah. I want to hear about a funny story. I want a funny story or endurance racing funny story. And then a NASA, like something that came up in a weekend. So, Glenn, we're gonna give you a second to think about it, because Jay may have more to choose from. So, Jay, something funny that came up running a NASA weekend. You put me on the spot. Oh, there's got to be something. Somebody forgot something. Somebody threw a tantrum and stormed off and their transporter. Um, I don't know. This is more of a story than something funny, but, um, it's from a different perspective. And it was during a Trek race. But, um, uh, Janet, our chief of control, who communicates with all the corner workers and everything, you know, the the corner workers are key to what we do, right? They're they're, um. They keep us safe. They let us know what's around the next corner. But anyway, they're there all day, and they find, uh, great entertainment in the names of the, um, of the the endurance racing teams. Oh. All right. And so, uh, Janet will share a lot of those names with the corner workers just to let them know who's out there, and they really appreciate that. And, um, I don't know, I, I can't, I can't tell you, but we, we started coming up with, um, you know, hypothetical names and team names. So we the the nursery rhyme, the nursery rhyme team we came up with car number one. Two. Buckle my shoe. Three, four. Shut the door. Five, six. Pick up sticks. So some team has to go with that name theme or something goofy that, uh, that entertains the corner workers. Oh, that's funny. That keep us in line. Yeah, well, I would just say really quickly it's funny. Um, well, through the SCCA, we'll be talking with people that normally work the corners and flagging, and we'll be talking about someone by name, and they're like, I don't know who you're talking about. Please tell me their car and car number. Then I'll know who you mean. So yeah, they speak a different language. They do in the corners. Yeah. It's interesting and it's it's part they're they're so integral. All the, all the support staff of an event is so integral to what we do. Um, I had a corner worker tell me one time how they loved their job. And and as a racer, you know, your whole goal. You're so focused on winning and that optimum lap time and all that stuff. And, um, the corner workers are there, but they're more in your periphery, you know, and this, this one corner worker was telling me how, you know, they can't believe how these racers spend all this money and all this time racing, and they get to enjoy the sport, make a couple bucks, maybe, but they're not spending money. But they get to enjoy the sport, too. But I don't know. It's just a perspective, different perspective for all the different people at an event and what makes it all go, and who finds pleasure in what portion of it? Yes, as long as they find that right. That's awesome. Absolutely. Glenn. Funny story. Um. As you were talking about, um, control and corner workers, I was thinking. Dancing? Yeah, yeah. Um. I was, uh, said Gingerman when we did our, um, our seven hour this, this last season. Um, and I was up in the tower and people were looking in down and pointing over to pit road, and I look over and there's a car that's in refueling, um, and the guy with the fire bottle and the guy fueling are just kind of dancing in sync, going back and forth. They had one of the the standard fuel bottles, um, with the little one inch hose, and it takes a little while. So they're just sitting there waiting and just moving back and forth totally in sync. Um, synchronized refueling. Yeah. Um, and then I also found out later that, uh, I guess there's a new tradition, um, up in the control tower at every hour point, uh, through the race, um, They get up and do a little dance and sit down. The timing of scoring and control, folks, whatever makes them interesting. So dancing is included. Apparently dancing at NASA. Let's talk about advice. Glenn, can you think of the best racing advice you've ever received? Um, I'm not going to call it advice, but an experience that hit home with me. Um, and it has to do with Rx7. And I know you're an Rx7 guy. Um, at one of the the early IMSA races that I went to. Um, it was a twenty four hour at Daytona. The Mazda factory team brought Rx7. They were all white, and they had the Mazda name painted in blue from from nose to tail across it. It was great when they went up on high banks, it just said Mazda. That team started the race Ran non-stop. No problems, no issues. No. No maintenance. They were so freaking fast. Um, it was a flawless race. It was all preparation. Um, it was all preparation. So, um, that hit me early on. Endurance racing is not about just showing up and going fast for a long time. It's about being able to go fast for a long time. Um, so yeah, it's make sure the car is capable of it. Take your time. Think about what could go wrong. Even things that are. You know, I don't like the wires to have any movement. You know, when I'm wiring it up, I make sure everything is tight and it's not going to be able to bounce around. You know what's going to flex? What's going to move what could wear out and if so how are you going to handle that. So it's all in the prep. That's that's where we're at. That's a that's a great reference to that Jake, can you think about the best racing advice you've received. Best racing advice. There's so many different, uh, different things that come to mind. I'm I'm a driver at heart, I guess. And, um, an instructor, I get the opportunity to instruct our hbd2 students, which I love doing. It's so satisfying, so gratifying. And, um, so I think about, you know, driving advice and, um, one of the simple things I that I heard and learned from Brian Till, who, um, he currently announces, um, he'll be announcing twenty four hours of Daytona race, and he was an instructor with me at the Mid-Ohio school, and he taught the class and In his. His thing was the line is the line is a line. And, um, it's it's so important to just to to break down your driving and your learning to that basic point. And I'll add to that to keep your eyes up and look as far forward as you can, um, so that you anticipate rather than react. We've all heard this. This is kind of nothing new, but, um, I think along with the line is a line is a line is consistency. And it's your turning point. It's your apex, it's your exit. And, um, with my hbd2 students, we're they're just they're like sponges. They're just soaking it all up. So they're in, like, the middle of the biggest part of the learning curve. And, um, a lot of them are just trying. Trying too hard, you know, and they're almost over driving and and I try to convince them, like, pull the reins a little bit back a little bit and just focus on the basics. The line, the line is the line is the line. If you can be consistent on every corner of every lap, you're turn in your apex, your exit, and just focus on that. The speed will come before you know it. You're consistent in your consistency. Develop speed right. Relax. So is that the advice that you would then give somebody? I do. Okay. Perfect. Glenn, what about you? What advice would you give to someone that might approach you at an event and say, I want to do more. I want to get a little bit better? I always hate getting faster. I want to get a little bit better. What advice do you give them? Yeah, that's a good distinction. You know better versus faster because faster doesn't necessarily mean better, but better usually means faster, right? Um. I think it starts with being humble, um, Realizing that as a driver we all suck and we can all suck less. But when you start thinking that you've got it nailed, that's you're probably leaving some time on the table. Um, so always it's it's always looking for where can I make a small difference in the way I'm driving to improve the overall outcome? Um, and focus on one thing at a time. Don't don't go out there and say, okay, I want to reduce my lap time by two tenths. And that's your goal. Take it a step back. How are you going to do that? Where are you going to find that and then work on just that spot until you get it and then work on something else. How does someone determine where to start with that? Two tenths. It might vary a little bit by driver, but um. Two places you have that gut feeling, it's like, ah, I think I can go faster through there. Okay. Um. Or watching somebody else pull away from you because they went faster through that particular section. What's that person doing different than what I'm doing? If that car can get through there like that, then I should be able to do that too. So, um, it's a lot of comparing to what other people do, plus your gut feeling. All right. We're getting towards the end of the podcast. I want to make sure. Is there anything we didn't talk about that you wanted to talk about, whether it be track, NASA, life Racing, a couple more points on track. Yes. Rule set, super simple, real easy. It's not complicated. Um, makes it easy to come and go racing with us. We have a great bunch of people that are already racing track. Um, and we're everybody helps everybody else. It's a wonderful community. Um, and it's a lot of fun. It really is a lot of fun. Um, and that's what Trek is really all about. It's it's about teamwork. It's about fun. Um, and we try to do it in a very safe manner. So rule set, if they went and they looked at the general, I'm going to guess you have the general competition rules. Yeah. It's kind of a baseline for everything. Right. What the rules are CCR, which is all of NASA, mostly the safety. That's mostly the safety equipment side and the and the etiquette on track. Um, what etiquette on track. What's that about? Yeah, it's, you know, be a good sportsman. Um, yeah. And there's some specific, specific rules on how to do that. You know, as far as having the right to line and, you know, when when you've got to give up your line to somebody who's coming around you that those kinds of things. Um, but then there's also the Trek rule set, and you can find it on the NASA site, um, which has lays out the trek rules and it's not very long. Um, it covers pit stops, it covers classing. Um, you know, how we, uh, how qualifying can be done? Um, it talks about some penalties for things if you, if you mess up. Um, but it's really pretty straightforward. Um, and if anybody goes out and they got any questions, uh, you know, we can be reached easily, uh, via email. We also have a Facebook page. Um, and this season, we're standing up a discord server, um, for, for Trek. Uh, so that'll be coming up very, very shortly. So there's lots of ways of getting information. If you got any questions, we'd love to have people come and join us. We're having so much fun. Oh I bet. Yeah. Anything else? Uh, one thing we didn't talk about on the subject of Trek. Um, Trek, um, team team racing, endurance challenge. Trek and the team portion of it, I think is important. You know, you have your crew. Everybody works together as a team. It's a it's a it's a team sport. It's it's not a sprint race. Um, we did skip over what trucks stand for. And as we were going. Yeah. Team racing endurance challenge. It's a bit of a mouthful. We, um, we were weren't sure if we loved the name of it, but it's kind of stuck now, so we we stuck with it. We we did this whole, I don't know, last year, this whole rebranding thought process. And we're like, this is it, we've got it. We're just going to stick with it. Um, but it is um, twenty twenty six is a NASA national initiative to, uh, to have full weekend track events, um, within every region at many tracks around the country. Um. It's very difficult to find Slots for open weekends at a lot of tracks, and some regions had trouble doing that. And, um. Uh, and going into twenty twenty seven, I believe there will be an even broader range of truck races around the country at at all the regions we talked about seasons, points, I think I think next year there will probably be a national championship for points within track and then within our region. Um, we'll have a points championship series too. That will will end the season at NCM the end of October. And um, we were talking about points where we're looking at doing the short Fridays is a single points. And then each day on the weekend is a double points event. Oh all right. That you can accumulate seasons points for championship. Exciting. Get the big trophy. That's right. And the sticker right. Lots of winner stickers. Lots of winner stickers if somebody wants to learn more about NASA Great Lakes. We talked about social, so we got Facebook and Instagram website. What is the website NASA Great Lakes? Com is our regional. We'll link to that and then drive NASA.gov. Drive NASA.gov a national site. That's where all the registrations happen. You can go on to the events section and sort it by region, by track, uh, different ways by date. Find out what what events you want to go to. Okay. And we will be uh, I was just on a regional directors meeting Wednesday, and, uh, they're going to be putting together specific Trek schedule, uh, within the next couple weeks. Very good. Between now and the first event of the season, do you have any, any webinars, any events where people could come and learn more about NASA? I mentioned our discord server will be, uh, will Once we're ready to launch that, we'll we'll put that out on, uh, on Facebook. Um. Facebook is kind of our main big blast way of reaching folks. Uh, I keep a mailing list, um, for emails. So if somebody wants to get on our mailing list, they can shoot me an email at. Com. Um, and I'll get you. I didn't mention Glenn is one of our two Truck series leaders. Uh, Tim and Glenn are our Truck Series leaders, right? So if you got truck questions. Yeah. You go to Glenn. Yeah. Or. Tim. How'd you get roped into that? I think I volunteered. Yeah, I did, I did, yeah, that's awesome. I really like the progression from, you know, the Porsche autocross. And then you get you do the track night in America. Like, I really like this. Let's get a different car. And then here you are overseeing endurance racing with NASA. I think that's an awesome journey. I love it. I'm really excited for the future of Trek, I think. I think it's going to be a really strong series, and a lot of people are going to have fun doing it. Oh, absolutely. I can't wait to be be at some of those events might not be racing track, but I'll be at the event. We'll see. Can't hold a fire bottle. I will hold a fire bottle. It's usually I like doing that rather than the heavy jugs and doing that. Uh, before we wrap up, I have to know if either of you have ever been late to grid. So, Glenn, we're going to start with you. Have you ever been late to grid? Um. Yeah, I have. What's the story? Uh. Honestly, um, it's it's come from trying to be, uh, a co series leader and race at the same time. Uh, it's Usually scrambling and sometimes it's like, okay, we were supposed to be in Grid Spot thirteen, but I guess we'll have to settle for thirty. Oh boy. But endurance racing, it's fine. That's right. Yeah. Um, it's usually something like that. Or, you know, when I'm instructing, uh, you know, taking extra time with the student puts me a little behind. Sure. And I get into your car, helmeted up and out. Yep. All right. Jay. Any any updated latest grid stories relate to grid stories. I kind of cheated a little bit. And, you know, listening to your your podcasts, which I just have to compliment you on doing this. Um, uh, Joe Rogan doesn't have anything on you. You want to hear about the driving and racing community? Come and listen to Bill. Uh, really appreciate everything you do. Thank you. Um, late to grid. That's one of my pet peeves. I really try not. Not to, um. I have in the past. I try to block those out of my memory. Usually it's like getting in the car. Suited up and realized I forgot to talk the lug nuts. You know, that's usually one of the last things that goes through my mind. And, you know, you got to unbuckle and get out and get in. And you were already cutting it close. Yes. At that time. And they were loose. So it was worth it. It was worth it. But I, uh, I make it a point to get the grid on early. I'm usually one of the first ones there. I like to not be buckled in. I just drive up, and then I get out of my car, and I come and talk to my fellow racers and see who's around me. Just take my time, put my helmet on, start the car at three minutes and go race. Beautiful. Well, gentlemen, thanks for being on the podcast. Thanks for sharing more about NASA and Trek, and best wishes for a great twenty twenty six. Yeah. Thanks, Bill. Thanks, Bill. Appreciate it.