How Kohr Motorsports Turns Engineering Savvy Into Race Wins

If you’ve ever bolted parts onto your Mustang and sworn it “felt faster,” this conversation is going to challenge you in the best way. We’re joined by Dean Martin, owner of Kohr Motorsports and a longtime force in Mustang road racing, plus Chandler Wheat from the Roush Performance team, who lives in both worlds as a portfolio manager by day and a GT4 tire engineer by night. What starts as two “I kind of fell into it” origin stories quickly turns into a masterclass on how real speed gets built, tested, and protected in pro racing. 

We dig into the relationship between driving and engineering: how a driver learns to describe what the car is doing, why that translation is gold to an engineer, and how the wrong change can waste a session if you’re not honest. Dean and Chandler also get specific about vehicle dynamics and suspension setup, including why “lower and stiffer” isn’t automatically better, how sway bars can be misunderstood, and why coilovers are about corner balance and crossweight, not just closing wheel gap. Dean shares one of the most overlooked steps after lowering a car: neutralizing suspension bushings so you don’t bake in preload that hurts ride, grip, and alignment. 

From there we zoom out to the part fans rarely see: motorsports logistics. Flights, hotels, tools, wraps, parts, prep, and the chaos of race weekends where a tiny failure can flip you from hero to zero. Dean walks through Kohr Motorsports’ recent plans, teething pains with new cars, A/B testing old vs new hardware ahead of Mid-Ohio, and the emotional swings that define IMSA and GT4 racing, from perfect races that still get stolen to wins you never forget. If you enjoy Mustang GT4, IMSA racing, race team management, tire testing, and practical performance engineering, hit subscribe, share this with a racing friend, and leave us a review.

Transcript

Welcome And Guest Introductions

Josh 0:00

Hey guys, welcome back to the You Don't Know Jack podcast. Today we have a couple very special guests, Dean Martin and Chandler Wheat. Dean Martin, owner of Kohr Motorsports and one of the most respected names in Mustang Racing and Performance Development, has a background that spans from working as a vehicle dynamics engineer at Ford SVT to competing at the highest levels of road racing. This includes IMSA, Perey World Challenge, and many more. Kohr Motorsports also partnered with Ford Racing and Multimatic on the development of the Mustang GT4 race car, and we're excited to dive into his experience in racing. Chandler, who's joining us from the Roush Performance Team, is a senior portfolio manager for our four vehicle line and will provide some pretty cool insights into some of those programs.

Jack 0:46

Well, I'm really excited about this podcast. Thank you guys for being here. Like Josh just said, you know, if you're into Mustangs and racing, road racing, you've heard the new name Dean Martin and Kohr Motorsports. I think it's going to be fun to dive into Dean's story, how he got involved in racing, and get some current uh updates on what's going on in IMSA. So, Dean, a lot of people probably don't know this, but you used to work at Roush a long time ago. And we we have a long history in road racing together, too. That's Dean is really was really the big opportunity. I had to go from karting growing up to being able to road race full-size cars. So why don't you walk the audience through a little bit of your history and how you got here? Yeah, it's funny.

Dean 1:40

A lot of people ask me, you know, how did how did you get here? And the the thing I always say is I I feel like

Dean Martin Falls Into Racing

Dean 1:45

I was just walking by the river and I tripped and fell in because I had no intention of ever being here. I grew up, you know, doing construction and I thought I was gonna get into construction management and and maybe even be an architect until I found out that architects are more like artists and not engineers. And so I ended up going to school to be a mechanical engineer. And and once I graduated from Rensler Polytech, I actually came out and got a job here at Rausch doing rapid prototyping and design work. And then from here I got contracted over to Ford and then got hired in direct at Ford and started working at SVT and uh was there for a number of years and and then started racing. Actually, back up for a minute, is I decided to volunteer for with Larry Rehagan on his I guess it's still IMSA, what a hundred years ago, I think it was called Motor Motorola Cup. And so I volunteered to to help him out and and my first weekend with them, we got them their first podium, and then the next race Larry's co-driver couldn't make it, and I had been doing some development work at Ford, and I said, you know, hey, could I drive? What what would it take if I wanted to drive? How much does it cost? And you know, back then it was cheap, it was you know five, six thousand bucks a weekend to for expenses, and and so there we went to Mossport and I got my credential and and and started driving, and it turned out I was pretty good at it, and it just kind of went from there and and just kind of just did it on and off and as a hobby, and and Larry and I were just messing around in 2002, and we uh built a a second car and showed up at at Daytona for the last race of the year and and won the race by two laps with our brand new car, which is one of the reasons the IMSA rules have changed. So we run won that race by by two laps, which is why they now close the pits when the full course caution comes out, because we were benefiting from that, getting a a lap and and we put the field laps down because of the rules. But so yeah, but it so it just kind of it started there and and just kind of snowballed into into this, you know. I like I said, I never had any intention of of doing this. I was pretty happy with my job at Ford, and I kind of just decided one day to take a leave of absence for a year and and try racing. And I did that in 2005 and and just I've been doing this ever since. Awesome.

Jack 4:21

You good? Sorry. I knew if I was gonna speak, I'd sound like this.

Josh 4:27

All right, that's cool. So we could obviously cut that out. Let's go over to Chandler. Yeah. Talk about your tie with Dean?

Chandler 4:38

Yeah. Yeah, another one

Chandler Wheat’s Accidental Path To IMSA

Chandler 4:40

of the another one of the fall in the river kind of moments, right? So growing up, same kind of deal as Dean, I had no intention of ending up an automotive at all. You know, my dad was worked for the federal government as an investigator, and I always felt that the FBI or something like that was kind of my calling. Uh, you know, went to school for that. And I I had had a Mustang, right? My dad was a Corvette guy. Started with Corvettes, realized that when it was time to buy my own first car that I couldn't afford a Corvette at that point. So my dad was like, you know, why don't you get a Mustang? And for a Corvette guy to be like, you know, go buy that. It was kind of a head scratcher, but looked at it and made a lot of sense. So took the plunge and and bought a 07 GT, drove that to and from college and fell in with the local Mustang group. That local Mustang group happened to be Lebanon Ford Performance, which is a now a pretty well-known name across the dealership space. They were certainly not the first people to put superchargers on lower trim cars, but they think they were the first to really gain national notoriety. So I hopped on that organization early on as a sales guy, just kind of as like a summer job. And we did really, really well with it. You know, we were the number one Roush dealer, we were the number one Whipple dealer, we were the number one Hellion dealer, we were doing special builds. So really just had a lot of a wealth of knowledge on the use case for forced induction on coyote engines. But despite the fact that I was building a lot of really high horsepower, straight line cars, and you know, 800 horsepower was really nothing to sneeze at. My personal taste was always road racing, right? Kind of back to that Corvette sports car hook and started autocrossing my personal car. Didn't take long to get bit by the bug, started building a street mod class car, and that turned into an X-prepared class car. And then one of my buddies was like, Why don't you try a track day? Right? That's good, that's just what you need. Well, did a track day, got hooked, bought a second car, air conditioning came out, you know, really started diving down that that motorsports road. And one of the local guys that was running uh Spec Iron down where I was, he's like, Hey, you know, let's go test my grand am vintage race car. Well, from there, I I've met Rick Reynolds of Cortex Racing, and he introduced me to Pro Racing, right? Going and actually doing IMSA. And my first gig was as a assistant tire guy on GT4 Mercedes in IMSA. Oh, gosh, probably, I don't know, five years ago. Since then, have done it ever since. It's just once you get it in your blood, it's it's really hard to shake it. Like I said, it was a pure accident. Have a conversation at dinner, and oh, you know. You know, pro racing. Dean had been in the paddock, right? I knew Dean through Roush, I knew Dean through through Mustang, back to what what Jack was saying. Like if you're into the Mustang road racing scene, everybody's heard of Dean Martin, right? But I'd always been on other teams, right? Always worked for other teams, kind of followed Cortex around. And then finally uh last year, Dean and I start struck up a conversation about what he had planned and decided to make the move over to Kohr as their tire engineer. So by by day I manage the Roush performance programs, and then by weekend slash night, I'm a tire engineer for Dean's GT4 team. And it's been a I'd say a match made in in heaven ever since, right? Something like that.

Josh 8:04

He's nodding his head, yes. Oh sorry. That's awesome. That's awesome. So how how would you say those two worlds interact

Translating Driver Feel Into Speed

Josh 8:15

for you?

Chandler 8:16

I I think on my end, it's it's kind of that uh drive and hunger for competition, right? You know, my goal is to to take what I learn about motorsports. I'm not a formally trained engineer, but with the support of Dean and with the kinds of conversations that we have about vehicle dynamics and sound engineering principles and how do you make things go fast and and you know, what separates a part that's gonna fail from a part that is going to survive a race in those super ultra highly competitive, you know, practices that is wheel-to-wheel racing? That allows me to take both the drive and the practical application back to Raush and come to our engineers and come to the sales and marketing team and things like that and really push the, you know, how do we be competitive, right? How do we, and especially kind of being new in this career of program management, how do we engineer the next generation of product that the folks that are listening to this channel haven't seen yet? Yep.

Josh 9:10

It's all about that innovation.

Jack 9:12

Absolutely. And you know, I think going back to one thing that you said, Dean, you brushed over it very quickly, but you know, you hopped in the car and you were instantly, you know, showed some speed, you know, the the way I interpret that is you were able to do that because of your engineering knowledge, you know, talent for driving, but those two combined together are really powerful because you really have a deep understanding of what's going on in the car. And not only that, not only does that help you drive, but also helps you engineer the car to be faster.

Dean 9:50

Yeah, and and that's one of the things that you know I kind of say that that's what separates an entry-level pro guy to uh a paid pro. One of the benefits that I brought and is, you know, like yes, I could drive the car fast, but to to be able to feel what the car is doing and you know, articulate that to an engineer is extremely valuable as a race car driver. Uh unfortunately, I was the race car driver, the engineer, the chassis, or the chassis guy, the team manager, you know. So you you're trying to do all this stuff while driving the car, but the but that's the thing that I think you know made me uh I'll say as successful as I was, was that I could drive the car fast, but I could also make the car faster by tuning. But yeah, understanding how the car works and and how the the chassis gonna react is is extremely critical. You know, realistically, you know, as as long as you can from a driving driver standpoint, as long as you can articulate what the car is doing, it's great to have an engineer on the other side of the radio who understands what knobs to turn to to make the car a little bit better. And that's one of the things that I enjoy most about the racing is interacting with the drivers and just getting feedback and saying, okay, let's you know let's make this adjustment. What do you think? And I'll say one of the one of the hardest things to do, especially when you're being when you're the driver who says this is the change we should make, uh, is when the car just isn't better when you make the change. Like everybody thinks, oh, we're gonna make this change, it's it's gonna be better. And sometimes you just go the wrong direction, you know, you've got to be honest with yourself and go, Nope, that was wrong. Let's go the other way, let's try something different. You know, so that's that's one of the things that I really enjoy most about the racing.

Jack 11:40

Very cool. Yeah, and it's you know, and Chandler, you too, and having that same passion for performance and you know, car setup, whether it's on this street or on the racetrack, you know, I think that that's something I think we all really relate to here. You know, it's part of our culture too. It's why we as Raush are an engineering company that offers something different. Yeah, it's it's a little hard to explain, you know, when you think of not to put down, you know, the standard engineer, but I've known a lot of engineers who are not necessarily into cars or performance racing. And then you get the the racing, you know, passionate automotive, you know, performance people, whole different world, whole different approach. It's a difference between, you know, solving, you know, simply solving problems to adding that competitive edge that really pushes you much further.

Chandler 12:44

I think something kind of relating on what what both of you guys have said is knowing

Suspension Myths Tires And Real Testing

Chandler 12:50

knowing what knobs to turn, right? And being able to discern, you know, are you engineering to solve a problem or are you simply engineering a product, right? In the streetcar world, where a lot of that relates to is lower and stiffer is automatically better, right? And uh, you know, I see seen Dean smiling and chuckling, but that's one of those advantages that I think is kind of uniquely, or I maybe not uniquely, but you know, very much Roush is we don't just engineer a product to solve a problem that was never there, right? The the vehicles looked at holistically between the the five axis shaker rigs and driver feedback, like like Dean putting drivers behind the wheels, you know, really measuring and figuring out what's going on versus slam the car on the ground, put a massive sway bar on it, and then suddenly wonder why the car skids across the ground and doesn't grip up.

Dean 13:40

So yeah, I actually got a kind of a funny story about that. And uh I don't know if I should really talk about it, but I will. Those are the last stories. So a guy by the name of Dave Royce, been a uh a friend of mine for a long time, is actually working with me currently as a consultant. Used to work at Rancho and at IBOC, and is a is a pretty good engineer himself, even though he's not a trained engineer. He told me a story about how he was at IBOC and they put suspension kit on uh a car and they wanted to take it to a shootout and and compare it to the the factory car compared to theirs. And he said, No, we're not gonna do that. And you know, his management was like, Why not? He said, Because our car isn't gonna be that car, you know. And they they're confused, they're like, What do you mean? We've just developed this great suspension, and you know, we've developed this great suspension in three months to to work on this on this car, and you know, and and Dave said no, but they worked for three years developing this suspension. It's you know, it's gonna it's all matched, and it was a performance car, right? So it wasn't like you know, we took a Honda Civic and and stiffened it up and and made it better. It was a you know high-level performance car. And you know, so it it goes back to you know what Chandler said, why I was laughing and smiling as I was thinking about that. Everybody thinks lower and stiffer is better, and it's not always the case, you know.

Chandler 15:15

So start messing with excuse me, you start messing with with control arm geometry, things like that. You know, it I I don't know if I'm allowed to share this secret, Dean, but at least on the race cars, we frequently run very, very little sway bar, at least on the Mustangs, you know. And that's that's more or less been true from the S-197 days, you know, all the way up until now is teeny tiny rear bars or rear bar completely disconnected. You have to let the weight of the car roll into the tire to uh you know create the maximum amount of of grip that you can out of the tire. So it it's not to say that there's not good performance parts that are out there, but what there is to say, what it is to say is that simply slamming your car on the ground and and stiffening it up, while it may feel better objectively, right? And I think that's a really, a really good thing to maybe talk about after this is the difference between seat-of-the-pants and you know, measurable objective, you know, data. Everybody loves to install parts and it's like, oh, it was great. You know, oh it felt so much faster. Oh, my car's so much stiffer, which automatically means it's so much better. And while you may feel a difference, from a data standpoint, what you did may have actually objectively made the car worse.

Dean 16:22

So yeah, I uh I always think about that when I read the the tire evaluations on that very popular tire website. Yeah, yeah. And you know, it's it's the it's just that mentality, you know, like everybody thinks, oh, I made a great decision buying these new tires. Well, you just you just came off of a set of tires that you probably put 40,000 miles on, and that was your last frame of reference to now you just put new tires on, and the car is so much quieter, it handles better, it's so much, you know, it rides better. Well, well, yeah, it's going to. You just put brand new stuff on, and like so so you're not doing a an an actual A to B, right? And uh, and that was one of the things that I loved about when I was at Ford doing tire testing. I mean, we would have six sets of tires, and it would be, you know, construction A, B, C, D, E, F, whatever. And they were all black, round, same tread, and just the construction was a little different different. And you could definitely tell the difference when you got in the car and started driving it around from a performance standpoint, ride quality, noise. It's just it's amazing what what you can do with a tire. And it's so I just always I always kind of think back to those times when I when when people start talking about you know how tires are so much better, and it's like it's like I yeah, it it's just there's so much going on in a tire, it's crazy.

Jack 17:48

Yeah, yeah. And actually the same thing with you know vehicle dynamics as well. I think obviously, you know, we're all very familiar with it, but you know, for those who haven't really tuned to suspension, it's extremely difficult. It's you have all these different variables and no set of instructions to tell you which way to go with it, and you have to figure it out.

Dean 18:13

Yeah. Yeah, and and a lot of it's subjective, right? You gotta you gotta number one, you know, from a you know, from a roush standpoint, right? You've got to what does your customer want, right? This was something that we always toiled with when I was at SVT. It's like, okay, what are the what are the metrics? Like what what do we want to be? What do we want this car to feel like? And it was very subjective. And then you'd have management drive it and say, no, it's too soft or it's too stiff, whatever, and then you know, we would drive it, and I know we gotta do this, and like there's that back and forth to try to figure out exactly where do we want to be. And and it's just it's it's it's a complete system, right? It's not just springs, it's not just bars, it's bushings, it's tires, it's it's ride heights, it's it's everything. And and I think a lot of people don't really understand that. Actually, and one of my I'll say it's one of my best kept secrets, and this goes to anybody who thinks, oh, I'm just gonna lower my car and make it better. And when when people come to me and say, you know, oh yeah, my I lowered my car and and it's doing this, and you know, it's starting to wander, and the first question I ask is, have you neutralized the suspension? And I get the blank stare because so many people just don't understand what that means. Even even guys that I know that have been doing chassis work for a long time don't understand what that means. And what it means is is to neutralize all the bushings, you've got a lot of rubber bushings in your suspension. So if you don't take those control arms loose and you put your your lowering springs in and you basically change your ride height and you you put preload into those bushings. So it makes the car very choppy and and and and rough and and does weird things to your alignment as well. And most people don't understand it. And I think it's one of the most critical things when you're lowering a car or doing a setup on a car. You've got to, once you've got your ride heights where you want, you've got to go back and neutralize your suspension so that the car actually rides how you want it to.

Chandler 20:09

I think on that note, another two two other fun points, Dean, are one sway bar in links, right? Same deal, neutralizing the sway bar. And I think that even bigger than that is the misconception that coil overs are actually for just adjustable lowering, right? The the the premise in the the aftermarket is you buy a coilover so you can dial in your ride height based on the look that you want, you know. Whereas in the motorsports world, we're using that to adjust the crossweight, we're do using that to adjust the corner balance of the car, the handling dynamics of the car, the which way the car pulls based on the orientation of the track, you know, et cetera. Whereas you you look at how how people on the street perceive it, and it's purely about can I get my wheel gap you know tightened up?

Dean 20:50

Yeah. So yeah, at that point, just put it on John's bumpers and send it.

Chandler 20:56

We are on Michigan roads. I mean, it's basically the same thing, right? Yeah.

Jack 21:01

So Dean, obviously you're still in racing. Uh you're are

Kohr Motorsports Plans Two-Car Season

Jack 21:07

you driving right now?

Dean 21:09

I'm trying not to, but I've I I drove at Daytona. Did I drive this year?

Chandler 21:16

Yeah.

Dean 21:17

I can't remember. Yeah, you were in the car.

Chandler 21:19

I think you broke the car, didn't you? No.

Dean 21:20

No, that was last year. That was last year. Oh, yeah, it was last year. Yeah. And and for some reason, you know, when I got in the car, I I, you know, I told the guys keep me keep me posted on how my times are. And my name ended up at the top of the the chart, and I got mad. Like you're supposed to tell me that I'm going too fast. But uh I and I I love Daytona. It's it's one of my favorite tracks. So, what's going on with your race team this year? So we've got uh we've got two cars. I I was only gonna do one car, but then I got a phone call from my good friend Ray Mason. And Ray said he wanted to go racing in IMSA, and he had a a new kid that was uh really quick that he'd been working. Working with it with his TA2 car named Evan Slater. And I and I knew Evan just from being in the Trans Ampadic and hearing his name, and I knew he was always he was a front-running guy. And so, you know, we started talking about it and started started talking about budget and you know what they wanted to get out of the year. And he's like, Yeah, I want to do it. I want to go for it. And I said, Okay, well, let's do it. So we added the second car. So we've been running two cars with Bob McKay and Billy Johnson that we've been running for a number of years now. And then so we added Ray and Evan to the to the fold. And it's been it's it's been fun. I I you you've I know you've been around Ray. He's oh yeah, he's such a great guy to be around and and and race with a lot of fun. And uh and Evan's actually very impressive. You know, kind of we talked a little bit about driver feedback and and being able to articulate what the car's doing to an engineer, and I think that's one of the things that that Evan excels in.

Jack 22:55

Yeah, especially at 19 years old. Yeah. So Ray was Ray was around and already racing when I first showed up on the team back in 2006. Yep. Yeah, he's been around a long time. It's great to see him out there. Yeah, he's on the 4th of July this year. He will be 80 years old. Wow, good for him.

Dean 23:16

That's impressive. It is. Yeah.

unknown 23:19

Very cool.

Dean 23:20

Yeah. So we're we're having we're having fun. We're we've had some struggles this year for different reasons. You know, it's it's a total package, so but we're everything's getting we're we're getting things more on track. We've had a little bit of new car teething pains. We bought two brand new cars for this year. So we've had just a few small issues, you know, ironing those out. But but so far we're we're doing okay. And it's it's it's gonna get better. It's getting it's been getting better every race. So my expectation is that it'll just keep getting better.

Jack 23:55

Awesome.

Chandler 23:59

I think um Dean, you know, maybe a good topic to to kind of cue the listeners in on is

The Hidden Logistics Of Pro Racing

Chandler 24:05

uh the production that is motorsports, right? And it having come from watching it on TV and then attending it as a spectator and then uh you know, now in the paddock working with the team, you know, as a tire engineer, the level of attention to detail and the production that is racing is sorely underestimated, right? From trying to sync up the arrival of 15 people to the same place in the country coming from all over the place, the logistics, getting the rigs there in one piece, getting the rigs there with all the right parts on them, getting the cars wrapped and completed, and then the race weekend, right? The chaos of making changes, the chaos of breakage, right? And I mean, what the listeners don't understand and appreciate short of actually doing it for a number of years is you can have your whole weekend ruined by a lug nut that's been rounded off. You know, you're spending lots of money, the the level of effort is absolutely massive, and the silliest little things can you know take you from hero to zero in the blink of an eye. So somehow you've managed to do this, I'd say arguably longer than most in the paddock, and I'm sure that you've seen it all. But uh I'm interested on how you've managed to deal with it and and how you've learned to optimize it over time.

Dean 25:27

It's a difficult question because it's you know, it's I don't know, a sickness thing. You know, it's it's just just a a drive to, you know, just not fail. Yeah. You know, and and so every time, you know, something doesn't get done or somebody forgets something or you know, they they're not available, I've just I've had to step up and and and and get it done. But yeah, I I and I don't think anybody really understands how much work it really is, you know, booking all the flights, booking all the hotels, figuring out who's gonna have what meal and where we're gonna eat and and making sure the cars are prepped and ready, you know, livery design, you know. We've outsourced some of that, but a lot of it I still do have a lot of input. And wrapping cars when we can't get the car, you know, when we can't get the rap guys in, I gotta change, change my hat to the rap guy. He's a professional rapper on the weekends.

Chandler 26:30

Yeah, I've seen the gold chain.

Dean 26:32

But yeah, it you know, it's just it it's so much that I like I you know, I could sit here and start talking about it, and it's just it's silly, it's silly things. It's like you go, you've got to go through all the toolboxes and make sure all the tools are there, you know. Did somebody lose a socket or a wrench? Because usually if they've lost a socket or a wrench, it's one that you really need, you know. You know, so it's and it's it's just down to you know, do we have enough rags and break clean and and such, you know? And you know, ultimately I find myself checking every single thing. And so yeah, it just it's uh it's a lot of work and it's it's it's stuff something that I don't think anybody really understands, and and you can't even appreciate it until you actually, like you've done, get into it and and see what it's like. I've had you know I've had people come on and you know, after one weekend, they're like, I I can't do this. And I'm like, yeah, imagine if you had to do all this pre-work and then all the stuff that we've got to do when we get back. You know, it's it's a lot of work, and it's and and a lot of people just don't realize how much work it really is.

Chandler 27:38

Yeah, I I think that's uh that's part of the fun. I'm I'm a cog in the machine, right, in the operation. And it's it's cool to take the Roush frame of reference as a program manager and and watch racing, right, as a program unfold over the weekend. How do you deal with the twists and turns? How do you how do you manage the personalities? How do you manage the mechanical failures? You know, how do you source the part that somehow didn't make it on the truck that needs to end up on the car in an hour to make a qualifying? You know, watching all of it and sitting back and observing is really fun. But it also, in my opinion, that's back to that practical, you know, lesson learning that I can bring back to Roush as we run a program. How do we deal with the twists and turns? How do we deal with a change of request from the sales team, right? How do we respond to a competitor, right? How do we deal with a supplier shortage to make sure that our line is running and our dealers are fed? So it's it's nice to just be the cog on the racing side, but I I feel like you know it's all about the song and the dance of what is racing and how does that relate back to what we do here every day, you know, in the walls of Michigan.

Dean 28:42

So yeah, it's like you can have the best laid plans and you know, you can have your path walking forward. Ultimately, something is gonna derail it, and you've got to react and and and in racing, it's gotta be you've got to react now because your deadline is 20 minutes or two hours from now, not you know, we you can't kick the can down the road. And so it's just uh, you know, that's one of the again, one of the exciting things about about racing is is you've got to get it done. And you know, there's very little margin for error, right? When when something goes wrong, you've got to you've got one opportunity to fix it and get it right because that car is probably not going to come back until the end of the race. And it's also very unforgiving, too, if you get it wrong. Yes.

Chandler 29:28

Yeah, the the adaptability is huge, right? The level of flexibility that you have to have. The I think the old saying is what, no, no plan survives first contact with the enemy. And that's especially true in the racing environment when you you do have contact and the car comes back with something hanging off of it. And the question is, how quickly can I assess, do I tape this back on? Do I cut it off? Is it to the point where the car can't run anymore and we have to sideline the car? You know, how do we react to damage? How do we react to changing weather, right? As a tire guy, uh changing weather drives me nuts. And you know, we can go into that later on if we want, but you know, things that small strategy, you know, changes that you're making on the box, it it's all about adaptability.

Dean 30:11

So yeah, like I said, you go in with a with a war plan, and then you know, you've got it, you've got to change. You've got to change battle plans as you go along because it's it's just an ever and an ever-evolving thing, you know, from a strategy standpoint as the race is unfolding.

Jack 30:28

Absolutely. I I remember early on when I first started with the team, I had just

VIR Rain Lessons And Early Nerves

Jack 30:35

raced go-karts, like I mentioned, then I had the chance to race with you. Are we going to VIR right now? Yeah, going back to VIR. And I was in way over my head, you know, the dynamics of driving a car, you know, there's so much more to it. And it's, you know, not to say there isn't a lot to go-karting, because there is, but very different world. And hopped, you know, into the seat against some of the best in the world. And I was trying to figure everything out, you know, study data, you know, think everything through, including, you know, how is the race gonna start? And you know, where do I need to be? That never works. You can't predict it. You can maybe have a few ideas, but if you get stuck on it, it actually just slows down your reaction to what's going on around you. Yeah. But yeah, it's it's kind of interesting that way.

Dean 31:25

Yeah. I I it's funny because I remember part of that race very well, of the end of the race when and to put this in context, this is Jack's first pro race, and it was a, I believe, six-hour race. It was at VIR. We ran into the night, into the darkness. Nobody was prepared for it, and then it started raining, and Jack's in the car, and Jack didn't want to be in the car anymore. And he's on the radio, and I'm on the radio, and we're like, I'm sitting there and I'm looking at his lap times and everybody's lap times around him, and I'm like, all right, Jack, I I know you're uncomfortable. I said you can slow down about a half second of lap. You're you're because by this point, like the the field had spread out, and you know, he was probably five, six seconds behind the guy in front of him, and probably eight to ten seconds behind, pad of the guy behind him. And I and if I remember correctly, we were running seventh or eighth. We were in a really good spot. His pace was good, and but he was not comfortable, and I just said, just do what you can. You're doing, you know, just just focus and stay on track. We're gonna, you know, you've got I think it was probably 30 minutes to go. I'm like, just tough it out for another you know, 30 minutes and and and we're gonna have a good finish. And and we did. So I just but I do I'll I'll never forget the that that that interaction that you and I had because you know, I could tell like and I knew well, I knew how bad it was out there because there were cars going off left and right, and and that's after I think the night before I crashed in practice because I I didn't know the track and I I couldn't see very well.

Jack 33:05

And a VIR for anyone who hasn't been on the grass when it's wet, I mean it is ice. Yeah, I think your car actually accelerates on the yeah, I was gonna leave that part out. Yeah, I think I slid for about 10 seconds before I found some tire, a tire wall.

Dean 33:23

Yeah, the lower S's got up, got up on the paint, on the painted curb, and that was it.

Jack 33:27

Yeah, oh man. Yeah. Yeah, I've learned actually to like the rain later in my racing career, not for any healthy reason, but just knowing that everyone else feels uncomfortable. And you know, if they feel uncomfortable, that makes me happy. Yeah.

unknown 33:45

Yeah.

Dean 33:45

I used to like the rain, not so much anymore.

Josh 33:49

All right. So Dean Corps Motorsports has been involved in everything from club racing to IMSA. And I'm

Turning Points Championships And Switching Brands

Josh 33:56

curious, what what were some of the biggest turning points in the team over the years?

Dean 34:03

Uh uh probably I'll say the most pivotal, and this is going back, was when Larry and I were kind of just doing this as a hobby. Sorry, when Larry Rehagen and I were doing this as a hobby when we were running under Rehagen Racing, we got a phone call from Jesse Cox, who was one of our mechanics on the team. Things had gotten slow at his work, and he said, Hey, you know, do you think you guys could employ me full time? And, you know, at the time, you know, we didn't know. We were like, Yeah, let's, you know, but let's let's try this, you know? And so, because we this was just after we had started renting cars. So we're like, well, we're gonna need to prep the cars, so you know, let's let's let's have Jesse work for work on the cars full time and and then we'll just go to the track. And it just it worked out. That was probably the probably the the tipping point for what drove us in this direction was was having somebody as talented as Jesse working on our cars and and preparing them because you know I say a lot, uh more races are won back in the shop than they are on the racetrack.

Jack 35:06

And just to back that up, Jesse is absolutely a brilliant mechanic.

Dean 35:10

Yeah, absolutely.

Chandler 35:12

And to add, he also uh is also a Roush employee. So he works over You're welcome. Yeah, yeah. Hey, yeah. So he he uh he works over on the uh the wrenching on the vehicle for the vehicle development stuff that we do with the OEMs. So it's it's funny how he backed Dean to the the conversation earlier of vehicle dynamics and being able to correlate what the the development driver says and turn that into changes on the vehicle. Jesse's just an incredibly talented wrench when it comes to to prepping those cars and and took what he learned from you. I mean, he still does it, right? He's still on the team today, you know, but he also works inside of the Raush org on the the OE development side.

Dean 35:48

Yep. Yep, yeah. I I'll say that's probably the the biggest you know tipping point for for how we got here, how I how I got tripped into the river. And and and we just it just started going well. And like I said, things got better and better. And in 2005, I decided to take a leave of absence and and try it full time. So it was, you know, at that point it was Jesse and I in the shop, you know, full time, and and it just started to progress and and kind of turned into what it's become. You know, so I I think a lot of that's you know, like I I I I say this a lot. I I even just the other day I was talking to Larry while I was here in town. I said, I still think back to the you know when it was just me, you and Jesse and all the things that we managed to accomplish. And you know, I just I I I feel good about the the the things that we did with just the three of us. And so yeah, so that was probably the the the biggest you know kick down the to to where we're going. And then it's just it it's been it's been up and down ever since, you know. It's you it's racing, right? You have your good years and then you have your bad, you know, and you know, one of the one of the worst years I had was when Jack and and company were racing with us and then left to do their own thing. And you know, I was just well, what am I gonna do now? Because I had kind of changed to the direction of the the team to only focus on that program, and then that program went away, and so we had to figure it out. So we just pulled some money and and Kenny Wilden and I decided to drive, and that was that was oh nine, right?

Jack 37:37

Yeah, yeah.

Dean 37:38

And and like we showed up at Daytona with two cars, and just it was I think it was me, Kenny, Larry, and Jesse. And just went out and and you know, we're like, well, if we show some speed, maybe you know we can we can get some customers, and ended up getting a customer to help fund the deal, and and ended up winning the championship in 2009. So, you know, talk about the highs and lows. I mean, like probably the lowest of lows to start the season to the highest of highs at the end.

Jack 38:09

And you guys were very dominant that season. I think you won like every other race pretty much.

Dean 38:14

It was I I actually I I think to date it was still the best average position of any GST car. Our we averaged, I think, uh 4.6 was our average finishing position. When I think our worst finish was eighth, and that was at VIR because I told Kenny not to crash the car because we had to win the championship. That's fair. So but yeah, it was that was a it was a good season. It was very much a character building season, and then uh, you know, uh kind of kind of a similar story, and I kind of really don't want to talk about it, but it happened, so I will. We're at the end of 2019 went to afford looking for some support, and uh, and we were told that there wasn't any support, financial support, sorry. And and which was which was fine. We were still kind of going, and two weeks later they announced a driver development program for a female driver, and my customer got pretty upset because it was very close to a topic that we had been talking to we had been trying to try trying to make work, and just it it it didn't happen, and and he got very upset and just said, you know, give me one reason why we shouldn't just go by an Aston Martin and you know, and and I just said, Whatever you want to do, I'm pretty unhappy about the situation myself. And so we got an Aston Martin. Well, we called Aston Martin. One of one of the guys on the team called Aston Martin to see if there was a car available because I didn't want my name associated with trying to find a car. In case this didn't work out, you know. And and so one of the guys called and they're like, Yeah, no, we won't have a car until March. And and I said, Well, all right, well, I guess maybe we better tell them who it's for. So I called, I had him call back. I said, you know, just tell him it's for us and that we want to run it in IMSA next year, and this is our driver lineup, blah blah blah. Twenty minutes later, I got the call back. Aston said though they'll be Aston Martin said they'll they'll have a car in Orlando in six days.

Chandler 40:34

So that's the Dean Martin effect right there.

Dean 40:37

Well, it's not not so much uh we look, we had we'd had a lot of success, right? And uh it's it's we weren't just some new kid on the block looking for an Aston Martin, right? Like we had a good reputation in in the series, and it it so it helped, right? But I'll just I'll never forget like we we got that car a week before the the Saturday before we were going to the Roar and we rented Homestead, ran the car, took it to the shop in Daytona. Actually, took it to my friend's shop in Daytona because I didn't I hadn't moved yet and worked out of his tile shop and and got the car prepped and ready and took it to Daytona and and we had a very successful season. So again, the the lows to the highs and and then you know, then just back. So it's just been you know, it's just up and down every year. Yeah, for sure. That's racing, right?

Chandler 41:33

Yeah, yeah, it's every race. Yeah, and that's the other thing too, is it you're leading one second, and then you know you have a mechanical breakage, you're out, right? You're leading one second, you know, you have a good gap, and you've got somebody behind you closing. Lap after lap, you're watching the the time tick down, you're watching the gap close. You know, Dean, I think we had this, we had this at Indy.

Dean 41:53

You mean when we called a perfect race, ran a perfect race, and then a car that completely blew turn one had to come back, and then also got a penalty, somehow ended up winning the race? Yeah, that one. The one that was like uh 1.2 seconds a lap faster than the lead car that was We never said the BOP was perfect.

Chandler 42:13

We never said the BOP was perfect.

Dean 42:14

We never said we never said that word either. Oh yeah.

Chandler 42:17

But yeah, it it that's you know that was It's frustrating. I I remember that was my wife's first first time going to an MSA race. First time, you know, we're we're leading, right? We're leading comfortably. And, you know, to watch her experience the same thing that we experience every weekend, where it's just the nail biter and you see the car coming and you see them coming and you see them coming, and and you're you're watching, you know, you're watching your guy drive the tires off of it, doing everything he can to stay ahead. And that I think the worst part for me was when the camera crew came down at the end of the race to catch our our celebration, and you were on the last lap, and the the other competitor got on the inside and drove around and what to watch the camera crew pick their stuff up and walk down to the other box. It's like that that just sinking feeling. We still ended up on the podium, but yeah, man, it hurt.

Dean 43:06

Yeah. Yeah. That's you know, and that's when I said, you know, you can you can have a perfect race, and sometimes, you know, the way the rules are, you you're just you're not gonna win that one. Yeah, you're just there. So yeah. So, but you know, I say the the pendulum, the pendulum swings both ways. And I mean, pretty sure there's a lot of guys that would be sitting in other cars talking about us at Road America last year, right? I mean, the the the Mustang was a huge overdog. Yeah. And and we everybody knew it. And we're like, okay, this is our race. You know, I guess they're gonna give us this one. And you know it was. And and I I still question the decision that was made, but it it was made and and it cost us a race.

unknown 43:48

Yeah.

Jack 43:49

So I don't know if you've ever had this experience, but you know, I think one cool part

Big Wins Hard Losses And Comebacks

Jack 43:55

of our partnership, you know, I'd like to talk about too is like you mentioned. About 2009, I went off in a different direction in racing for five years and a little bit with my own team. And I for part of a year I was driving with someone else. I'm not even gonna say who it was, but had a really hard time with you know finding speed in the car. You know, one of those it was one of those moments where you you really wonder, you know, what am I doing? You know, is it is it me? Am I not driving correctly or what? And you invited me, I think you believed more in me at that time than I did. You invited me back onto the team to do world challenge, and that run was some of the best years of racing I've had ever. You know, we we got back-to-back wins at St. Pete. Yep, just it was nine and day difference. You know, I I just I wanna guess I want to give you guys give you credit. You know, you really know what you're doing in racing and tuning cars. I appreciate it. And that was pretty fun also when we got to team up again, yeah, in IMSA with the GT4.

Dean 45:10

Yeah, in 2017. We won a lot. We either again teething problems, right? We we either were winning or on the podium or parked on the side of the side of the track, right? With silly little gremlins or issues. But yeah, that was that was a great year. That was a it was a good car. Yeah, I I always think back to to Watkins Glen and we just had a great year. Well, and and also Road America when you dominated the the first the first the whole first half of the race, it was it was it was I think it was dry into wet, back into dry, and then back, well, you got out as it started raining again. We did the well, we did the driver change, and and I inherited the lead that you uh you had gotten us, and and then they called the race after after a lap, and and everybody was congratulating me, and you know, and I'm like, why are you congratulating me? Did you just see what Jack did? Right? And he just drove around everybody in the in the wet, you know. So it was uh probably my two highlights from that year were were Road America and uh and Watkins Glenn. So Watkins Glenn more because I put the trophy halfway through my hand on the podium.

Jack 46:22

Oh yeah, I remember that. I'm holding the trophy up and there's just blood's just pouring down my arm. Well, that was an exciting finish. That was you passed, yeah. You passed on the last slap, wasn't it?

Dean 46:33

Yeah, yeah. Rusty was I think it was in Aston Martin, maybe. And I had played peekaboo with him going down into turn one, and and I I I got I got him distracted enough. He completely missed the apex, and I started driving under him, and I got right underneath him as we hit the apex to two. And and he like I he put me up on the curb, and I just we just made enough contact that it spun him, and I was like, oh no. You know, I was like, I hope he doesn't hope he doesn't get hurt. And I managed to just spin and not hit anything and then go. And we ended up winning. But yeah, he did punch me after that, by the way.

Jack 47:08

Did he?

Dean 47:10

I didn't think I caught that one. Yeah, yeah. He came, he he was walking over, and I'm like, uh man, I apologize. I'm sure if you watch the video, you'll you'll you'll see, you know, that I was well inside when when you turned down and he and he's like, Yeah, I've seen the video, and just still punched me anyways. Well, he must not be too hard of a puncher. Well, he you know, he it was a it was a just a chest punch like a message. Uh yeah. So which I was okay with.

Jack 47:40

Right.

Dean 47:43

So what's I gotta ask what's what's coming up or what's so we're getting ready to go to mid-ohio, and we're actually gonna go do the NASA weekend two weeks before the IMSA weekend just to get a little bit more track time, and we're actually gonna we're gonna get last year's car out and we're gonna try to A to B the new car to the old car because there's a you know some grumblings that the old car was better. So we're gonna we're gonna see which car the the guys like better and and maybe run that for for the for mid-ohio IMSA race. And then and then we've just we're then we're up north for a little while. So I'm actually looking for a small space to to park the rig and and work on the cars in between session in between races up north here so that we can cut down on the fuel costs. Because I'm not sure if you guys have seen the price of diesel lately. We're trying to we're gonna see if we can stay up here a bit and and save a little bit of money. And I think we can work something out. Yeah.

Jack 48:45

I heard rumors that you guys might be fielding v6 Mustang.

Dean 48:49

Yeah, yeah. I I heard that too. But not not in uh IMSA. We're gonna we're gonna do some some WRL, maybe some AER, uh champ car, some some you know, back when it was fun, we're gonna go have some fun with that V6 car. Sounds good.

Jack 49:04

So any where can people find you on social media?

Mid-Ohio A-B Testing And Hiring

Dean 49:10

Well, my me personally, I've just got face. Well, I've got face Instagram, but my Facebook mostly, and I probably should have been more prepared for this. We've got our Instagram is core motorsports. Instagram and Facebook are just core motorsports. With a K. Yeah, K-O-H-H. K-O-H-R, yeah. I I I keep forgetting because it just comes so naturally to me. So, but yeah, so Instagram, core motorsports with a K, K-O-H-R, and also Facebook is Kohr Motorsports.

Josh 49:42

Awesome. And I heard you guys might be looking for some people.

Dean 49:45

Yeah, always looking for talented guys, you know, looking for full-time mechanics in the shop, you know, really looking for some guys with some experience and passion. And but also, you know, our our fly-in guys always looking for for good talent. So if there's anybody out there that's that's got a lot of experience and is looking for a good place, good home, and we're we're looking for people. And you can actually reach out. We've got an email address at careers at core motorsports.com and again, k o h r motorsports.com, and you can shoot a resume to to that email address, and and we've got somebody looking at those all the time.

Josh 50:26

Cool. All right, I'm gonna end it with this last question. Most memorable win for you.

Dean 50:35

Well, Jack just put the memory in

Most Memorable Wins And Why

Dean 50:37

my head, so um because that is the well, the the Watkins Glenn one is is one for a bunch of reasons. God, I it's pretty bad when you're like, yeah, I've had uh I've had quite a few. But that one, you know, for me that one that one was pretty good. And uh and just thinking back to to Jack's win at St. Pete, I kind of felt like that was an accomplishment for me as well. It's it's part of the reason I uh, you know, when people ask me, do you miss driving? I don't miss it as much when the team does really well, you know, because I get a lot of a lot of satisfaction when the when the team performs. So I I look back, I look at those a lot as well. But most memorable I'd have yeah, I'd have to say Watkins Glen, because it was a that was a it was a battle all the way through this through the stint. You know, I I had I had a great win at Toronto, a lot of great wins at Bell Isle. So that's why Bell Isle will always be near and dear to my heart. And and St. Pete. I've had a lot of win, I had a lot of wins there too, but the Watkins Glenn one really stands out, but also Jack's drive at at St. Pete was was pretty epic as well. Awesome. So I'm gonna take a little bit of credit for that one too. Oh, absolutely.

Josh 52:07

There you go. All right. Well, Dean Chandler, thank you for joining us. Thanks for having us. Yeah, thank you for having us. This was a blast.

Where To Follow And Wrap Up

Josh 52:14

If you guys heard it from Dean, if you want to check out Kohr Motorsports, make sure to give him a follow on social. And if you're interested in getting into the the track side stuff, make sure to reach out to them about open spots. Until then, we'll see you for the next episode. Thank you.