Episode Transcript

Julia Landauer 0:04 Hello, everybody. And welcome back to another episode of if I'm honest with Julia Landauer. We are approaching episode 50, in a few weeks from now, how exciting is that? This is a really wonderful passion project. As I've mentioned a couple of different episodes, it's been very therapeutic to talk through some of the stuff that we've addressed. It's been really interesting to do more research into some topics that I find interesting and then share with you. It's been really cool to connect with a diversity of guests who have done different jobs and industries and actions that they've pursued. It's been really, really fun. And I'd obviously love to know what you think what has resonated with you what topics you really enjoy hearing about what maybe you don't like as much, which guests you found really great. So we'd love to hear from you either in comments and reviews. So feel free and let me know. Let's jump right into today's Ask me anything, because you guys sent in some great questions, I'm going to try to get to as many of them as I can. And if you have any more, please obviously reach out and I will try to include them in a future episode as well. The first question I want to answer is something that a lot of you asked in some variation of how much do you miss NASCAR? Does Julia miss being behind the wheel? Are you missing racing? The answer is yes, I do. Miss racing, I absolutely love racing, it's so exciting to be at the track. It's so fun to go fast, it's really satisfying to feel like you've mastered a perfect lap or to be able to win a race or even just be competitive in a way that you are judging yourself by. So I miss it a lot. But at the same time, I'm also really enjoying flexing new muscles, I'm really enjoying being able to learn more about business and corporate and to understand what goes on behind the scenes with NASCAR and to contribute to making the sport as great as possible. And to understand some of the things that have to be weighed for decision making. Whether it's on the competition side or the business side, I'm really pushing my brain and developing new skill sets and meeting a lot of cool people and being able to just push myself in a different way. And that's really cool. Episode 11 of if I'm honest with Julia Landauer addresses the more emotional side and it's called navigating identity shifts. And that's a definitely a huge significant thing that's been challenging. But overall I'm I'm content, I'm in a good place. I will say that there are little trigger moments that sometimes happen that make me feel really sad about not racing and not pursuing racing. Things like when Shane van gisbergen won his debut NASCAR cup series race in Chicago last year, the sheer elation that he felt and the happiness and the emotion and you could hear it in his voice. I had this pang of oh my god, I may never experienced that again. And that was really sad. And there are other moments where I see certain things that happened during a race or, you know, seeing things with f1 Academy, which I'm so happy for I'm so so happy that there is a real significant and financial push to encourage and support more women and girls getting into racing. Like I love that. I just kind of wish I could have been part of it too. And you know, seeing this huge surge of interest in women's sports and women in motorsports specifically, just kind of feel like my timing for being in racing was a little off, but that's okay. So besides that, you know, it is what it is. This is life, and I'm getting older. And there are other things that I'm looking forward to. But I do miss racing for sure. And I hope to do it for fun where I can. suchada, and I hope I pronounced that correctly. I'm sorry if I didn't, asked our next question, which is, is there any way to get into racing, maybe not driving but support later in life? I love this question. And I hadn't really thought about it a whole bunch until I saw it pop up. But there are a couple of ways that I want to tackle this question. So in general, there are a lot of racing clubs and track days and more like amateur style racing, whether that's SCCA or Skip Barber, or the radical race cars or different manufacturer clubs, like Porsche club Ferrari club, I'm sure there are others. But if you're looking to get involved in at track events later in life, I think that's a really cool way to either bring your own car or rent a car, just show up and watch a bunch of really cool amateur racers racing and competing and getting the camaraderie of being at the track. I think there's there's a lot there. And kind of related to that. I know that for a lot of those events and even some other higher level sanctioning bodies, you know, a lot of times tracks or racing sanctioning. bodies will look for volunteers or independent contractors to help work the race. Maybe that's officiating, or maybe that's more like flag work. Or maybe it's official work. Maybe it's go karting, maybe it's legend, cars, maybe it's these club track days, I think there's things that you can look into there. If you're thinking on more of a professional level, I can't speak to a lot of the other higher level motorsport series. But I know with NASCAR, especially on the truck level on the XFINITY level, there are a lot of smaller teams that are always looking for extra hands, or freelance people to help them out whether that's on a marketing PR side, maybe it's on the crew side. There, there is a need there. And so just putting feelers out there and reaching out to teams and trying to see if they need help, or if you can assist in any way. And then if you're thinking more like a full time job, there's opportunities on teams, there's opportunities in sanctioning bodies, there's opportunities at tracks and with facility management, and like the event management for specific events that go on. I think that's, that's what comes to mind off the top of my head, there's kind of the amateur approach and a more professional approach. But it really comes out to putting feelers out there reaching out to people leaning on your network, cold, emailing, cold calling, I'm a big fan of that. And once you get into an opportunity, you'll be able to see how much you like it if it's something you want to keep doing, or maybe pivot to another direction. The third question we got was from Corri, and she asked, at the end of the day, what does a good relationship boil down to one word or thing? And let me tell you guys, being succinct enough to describe what a relationship needs in one word is very challenging. And there are so many things that I think about with my own relationship with Ben, my own relationship with my siblings, I don't know if this question was asked in a romantic sense, or just any kind of longer relationship. But there's a lot that goes into it. But if I had to summarize what a good relationship boils down to, I think I would have to say communication. And I know it sounds cliche, and maybe a little boring. But I feel like that touches on most areas of a relationship. So let's say let's think about the beginning of a relationship. You have to be comfortable articulating what your big life goals and dreams are to make sure that the person you're interested in is kind of compatible enough, right? discussions around kids where you want to live, what lifestyle you're going for how you view finances, that's later on, but like you need to eventually become comfortable articulating what it is that you not need and want and what you're going to prioritize to make sure that you work. So that's early level, then I think whenever it comes to having any kind of problems, or disagreements, or feeling weird, or getting a weird vibe from your partner, or whatever that might be being able to talk about it pretty quickly, prevents feelings of anxiety, it prevents having maybe a miscommunication or differences in opinions snowball into bigger, their resentment towards each other, you know, you need to be able to nip that stuff in the bud. And I think even when trying to figure out maybe what's bothering you, what's bothering your partner, to be able to empathetically understand how to have that conversation and to pick up on subtle cues and give yourself what you need and what your partner needs. Is that always rooted in communication. And then you also have, you know, on the physical intimacy side, being able to communicate what you want, and if something needs to be done differently, being able to identify and vocalize it so that the other person knows what's going on. Because I mean, none of us are mind readers right. None of us know just what someone else's wants and desires will be. So being able to communicate there. And then in terms of having fun and making jokes and intellectually stimulating each other. There's, it all just comes back to communication. I think. At the same time, if I had some backup words that I could use, I would say respect is a really big one. I think empathy and compassion is a huge one. But I don't, I don't think those are as much of a central need for a good relationship as communication is. And it's so hard and it's something that's always evolving and part of its learning communication styles and understanding when someone is emotionally reacting to something versus maybe less emotionally reacting and there's it's just so complex and it's so hard and each person has their own communication styles and each couple will have have their own communication styles, what works for one couple might not work for another. And so I think that's really the route. And it's again, so challenging. But I would have to say that communication is what is really needed for a good relationship. Tom asked our fourth question, and he said, What was a bigger challenge for you competing on survivor or several hours in the 150? degree race car? Great question. So I would say overall, survivor was a harder experience. Because I was so unfamiliar with it, it was so challenging physically, to be hungry to be out in the sun. To be in the weather, we had limited amounts of rain, but still, when it rains and just can't dry out. It's awful. The challenges were really fun. They were challenging. But I would say like, overall is an experience that was really hard. But in some ways, racing is harder, because one, the act of racing and winning is it's such a low percentage for any racecar driver, that it's constantly challenging. But also, I think a given race could be really hard, especially if your car is not handling. Well, if you had to start at the back or something like there can be really challenging races. And the career building associated with racecar driving is really challenging as well. And you know, funding is just so hard to come by. And I really struggled in that area. And so I would argue that the whole career of racing was a lot harder, especially because I was so emotionally attached to making racing work and wanting to be racecar driver. So there were higher stakes, I think with the whole racing career. When it comes to physically driving the car, I felt like in my prime, I was pretty pretty much in good shape and able to tolerate the heat able to tolerate the G forces definitely felt totally whipped at the end of some of these races, because it can just be heat is just no joke. And I remember, I think where I felt the absolute worst getting out of a car was racing at Sonoma in 2016. We were it was K&N West at the time was now ARCA West. And my my teammates decided to crash each other on the start of the race and blocked the entire front straightaway. So it was like 2pm in the middle of June, and we had to red flag the race. And we just had to sit in our cars in the beating California sun for like 45 minutes. And it was just so hot. And then we had to go run this whole race and Sonoma is a very physically demanding track, there's a lot of elevation change. There's a lot of Off Camber corners. And so physically, it was one of the hardest ones. And it'd be sitting in these ovens for 45 minutes. So that was really physically challenging. But I love that question. So thank you, Tom. Bryan asked our fifth question, which is what podcasts Do you listen to? And this is such a fun question. So I have a few in rotation. There are some I listen to a little more religiously than others. And I do dabble in a lot of different podcasts. And a lot of times there'll be a specific podcast episode that I'm interested for a certain show, but I might only listen to one or two episodes, but ones that are consistent for me are the morning brew, which is a business and finance podcast with two or one millennial one Gen Z host and it's about 30 minutes I really enjoy listening to that understanding what's going on in the world, different consumer trends all that I also really like the asked me anything's on the It's Me Tinx podcast, I really enjoy hearing people call in for asking her advice. She was the above me at Stanford, although I did not I don't think I ever saw her on campus. But I just really, I really admire what she's built with her brand and following. And I think her advice is usually pretty sound. So it's fun to have that little girl talk moment with her and her followers. And the third one of the that I got into more recently was Think fast talk smart from the Stanford Business School sponsors that one and it's with Matt Abrahams. And it's really interesting. It's communication based, and both guests are really smart. And so just being able to think about communication in a different light is really cool. Belinda asked our sixth question, and she said, what are the metrics and measures it will take to build a racer and a team in NASCAR? Whoo, that is a loaded question. So for some high level answers to that, I think the key things that you need for a team are a talented racer key personnel, which would be crew chief team owner mechanics, maybe some logistics folks. You need money, and that's funding for payroll upstart costs crash damage, travel and lodging if you're paying your racer, which doesn't happen a lot, but hopefully more people will get paid as racecar drivers in the future. And you know, the shop space that you need all that stuff. So you need that At and then you need all of the assets and the data and like the car and the parts and the engines and, and the machines that you need to do the different pull downs and assessments of the of the car. So it's really, it's a heavy lift to start a team. It's a big energy time and resource commitment. And I think some people who have done it really well you see Sam Hunt Racing in the XFINITY series. You see Alpha Prime Racing, which was my team when I ran my two races. And they're really great examples of younger team owners or former racers starting up teams, obviously intimately knowing what needs to be done on the competition side and then also bringing new blood into the, into the arena for the business ownership side with with NASCAR, there's a lot of basically like, really long standing legacy teams, the Hendricks the Gibbs, the Stewart Haas racing, just a lot of teams that kind of have been here for decades. And then you've got some newer big teams, which are track house racing 2311. And they do incredible jobs. They have co owners that are celebrities with Michael Jordan and Pitbull, and there's just so much and I'm definitely not the expert in how to build a NASCAR team. But you need probably a lot of patience, a little bit of crazy and a lot of money to go do it. And I hope that we do see more and more team owners, new team owners in the sport. A different Cory asked what made you get into racing. So I got kind of lucky because racing fell into my lap a little bit. My parents were looking for an activity where my siblings and I would be able to do something together on the weekends and where they could help out and one way or another. They discovered Oakland Valley race park up in upstate New York and start racing go karts there and I absolutely loved it. I loved going fast. I love winning. I love working with adults. And yes, it started go karts. And then I went to Formula cars and I want to Skip Barber championship when I was 14. And then when I was 16, I switched to more oval style racing with Ford Focus midgets and then did some late models and then legends cars and then back to late models one championship, climbed the minor league NASCAR ladder with the K&N West series, the Canadian series, the Euro series, and then ran my two nascar xfinity series races. That is the long story short in my racing career. Kylie asked what was your favorite K&N track? Ooh, this is a good one. So I did really well on the short tracks. The orange shows, all-American, meridian, you know, quarter mile basically or maybe a little bigger than a quarter mile. In terms of ones that were really fun to drive. I really liked Kern in Bakersfield. It was a half mile pretty wide, and just had a really nice flow to it. I really liked Iowa once I learned that I had to turn in under full throttle, which was absolutely terrifying. But I figured it out. I want to love Sonoma, but I really don't don't love that track. And oh, I had so much fun at Bristol. I got to do K&N East race at Bristol in April 2017. Started like 21st because we got qualifying rained out and I wasn't racing in that series full time. So I started 21st. And we only got half the race because it rained. But I asked my way from 21st up to like seven I think by the halfway point. And have we not had the rain, shortened race. I think I probably could have gotten in the top three. In that race. It was just so much fun. It was so exhilarating. You can't see very much because it's so banked. And it's so small and you have to trust your spotter and you get a little lucky that no one crashes right in front of you. And oh, it was absolutely amazing. It was my all time favorite oval track, I think after all that. Our last question for today is from Jessica and she asked what is your favorite song on The Tortured Poets Department? girl Let me tell you, Episode 44 of if I'm honest with Julia Landauer was my initial thoughts of the album three or four days after it came out. And I stand by what I said. But it has also evolved my opinion of the album has evolved and like so many people I realized that there are so many bangers on that album and it's really great. In terms of a favorite song right now I continue to be obsessed with I can do it with a broken heart. I also really love so high school. That one who is really, really striking a chord with me now. And I still really like But daddy I love him. So those are my top three tortured poets department song tongues. And I am definitely in that cohort of people who are watching all of the cell phone recorded videos of the arrows tour from Paris because let me tell you, I enjoy seeing all the different angles seeing the choreography, and I'm one of those Swifties that will just get down the rabbit hole of watching these videos. I'm really happy that she's on tour. really grateful I got to see the tour in the US but I'm also so jealous of this leg of tour attendees who get to see torture pose department cuz I think a lot of those songs are just really well choreographed. And she picked some good ones to bring on to the stage. So yeah, friends, that is our show. Thank you for submitting your questions. If you have any other questions, leave them in a review, leave a comment on social media post. Please, please, please, please do please help your girl out and leave a rating for the for the podcast. You can subscribe to the podcast. That'd be amazing. leave a review. And as always, thank you for letting me be honest with you and I look forward to seeing you next week.