The Steering Committee

Ryan Bahrke and Doug Fogler - Podcasters for The Steering Committee Podcast

Contact: Ryan Bahrke and Doug Fogler at Visit Online!

          

•  Let’s talk about The who/what/where/when/how of Ryan & Doug – how did it all start?
• Coming from different parts of the US – How did you all meet? Is there a car story here?
• What is “The Steering Committee” all about? Where did you come up with the name?
• Lessons learned?
• ou mentioned a couple episodes already but If someone was tuning into the show for the first time… what are some “top hits” or “best of” playlist of episodes for people to check out?
• Denver / Rocky Mountain Car Culture – what’s it like?
• How many miles did you put on the Porsche this year? (Ryan)
• What’s next for Ryan & Doug? Any spoilers? Big events or bucket lists? 

and much, much more!

[00:00:00] Brake fix podcast is all about capturing the living history of people from all over the auto sphere. From wrench turners and racers to artists, authors, designers, and everything in between. Our goal is to inspire a new generation of petrol heads that wonder. How did they get that job or become that person?

The road to success is paved by all of us because everyone has a story.

From vintage treasures to cutting edge marvels of modern engineering, our guests take you on a captivating ride, sharing insights, experiences, and the unspoken camaraderie that unites enthusiasts worldwide. Whether you’re a seasoned gearhead or simply captivated by the allure of a well crafted automobile, their show invites you to buckle up and join a community that celebrates the timeless love affair between man and machine.

For over four years, the hum of engines and the allure of the open road have met in a thrilling conversation about [00:01:00] cars and car culture. Ryan Barkey and Doug Fogler are the automotive aficionados behind the Steering Committee podcast. On their show, they navigate the twists and turns of the automotive world, delving into the soul stirring stories behind classic cars, the latest innovations in automotive technology, and the vibrant tapestry of car culture.

And with that, let’s welcome Ryan and Doug to BreakFix. Welcome. Hey guys. It’s quite intro. Yeah, thanks for having us. Great intro. You guys like that? Eric knows how to read a bio. I like that. Next time in haiku form, please. Speaking of that, these are two big shows coming together. This is a bit of East meets West, and we really want to get the East Coast guys to better understand where you guys are coming from.

A Denver based automotive enthusiast podcast. So, like all good Break Fix stories, there’s a superhero origin story. Tell us about Ryan and Doug. How did you guys get started in cars? How did the love affair begin? How [00:02:00] did you guys get together? Who wants to go first? Ryan? Show started because of Doug’s wife.

We actually had a mutual friend, Doug’s wife is an architect. We had a neighbor who’s an architect. They had worked together at one time and they said, Hey, we have a new neighbor. Who’s a car guy. Just moved here from Chicago. You should meet our other friend. Who’s a car guy. We got the families together for lunch or dinner, whatever it was pretty quickly.

It was the two of us at the end of the table jabbering about cars. And it was your wife. It said, you guys sound like a car podcast. It was all downhill from there. And here we are. And we sat down one night with an iPhone, got loaded up on bourbon. Our original band name was Burples and Backfire. That’s what we thought we would start off with.

We just sat down though. We kind of did a test of concept of it. And as always, he and I always had a great conversation. Just talking about cars. We’re similar ages and we sort of have like a shared common sort of like. Tapestry, if you will, sort of car history and car culture. So it just kind of got going from there and hasn’t really stopped.

I don’t know if I’d go that far, Doug. You grew up with Peugeot’s and Mercure’s oddballs. Yeah. Yeah, that is true. We were a little more [00:03:00] mainstream in the Barkey house. That’s true. I guess you’d read about those cars, those exotic cars in your magazine. Two different back to back 505 Peugeot station wagons and a Mercor XR4 TI in my young driving career.

All right. So, okay. Mercor XR4 TI for everybody listening in Europe, that’s what we called the Ford Sierra over here. So that’s a cool car. Like hands down, I am super jealous. Every once in a while you see one of those, but the 505 Peugeot, what makes that car cool is that it’s a station wagon. I am a long roof society guy, if there ever was one.

So I got to give you. Massive points, even though it’s French. And really it’s my mom that deserves the points. She was the one that fell in love with it and bought two of them back to back. But you know, I agree. And it’s also just a very handsome looking car. I mean, if you go back and look at them, they stand up well today.

And a very practical car. It had a lot of interior space for the size footprint of the car. You could fit a lot of stuff inside of it. So. That was a good one. The AmeriCorps and the Peugeot were kind of my first two cars. I drove them both in high school as I got my license a little bit. Those are my first two [00:04:00] experiences.

Doug, didn’t you buy those at that same dealership that Jay Leno worked at in high school? Isn’t that the connection? Yeah, although you’re correct, we are like a Colorado based car podcast. I’m from Massachusetts originally, so I grew up outside of Boston. The dealership that we got the Peugeots from was called Foreign Motors West.

Cause there was a foreign motors East, but this was foreign motors West. It was in the suburbs, uh, West of Boston. I’ve listened to enough of Jay Leno’s interviews that I know he worked at that dealership when he was a young teenager before he came out and made a career in comedy at the time. We were going there.

It was Rolls Royce, Bentley. Range Rover and I think Jaguar and then Peugeot was their entry level cars. You know, as the car was being serviced, which it happened a lot, I was able to go over there and just sort of move through each brand had its own like separate sort of like small little building showrooms.

I can move through the different ones and see all the higher end, mostly British cars, which was awesome. I loved going out there. Well, since we’re talking about origins here and growing up in New England for you, Ryan, I heard that you’re a transplant to the Denver area too. You’re not [00:05:00] originally from there either.

Yeah, I’m a Midwestern guy, born in Madison, Wisconsin, bounced around a lot growing up. My dad was a college professor chasing tenure. So a lot of Midwestern college towns. Then lived in Chicago for about 20 years before we moved out here to Denver nine years ago. We were a little more mainstream growing up.

We were a Volkswagen family. I still own a Volkswagen to this day. My daily driver is a 2017 Tiguan. Somewhere along the line, you know, my dad got a BMW, an E30, a 325. And my first car was an E20, a 320i. It was all kind of downhill from there, turned into a Porsche. There’s a story behind that E30 though, isn’t there?

I heard it had something to do with the acquisition of that car. Oh, that’s right. Yeah. So we grew up, we had Volkswagens and Chrysler minivans, right? We lived in Indianapolis at the time and there was a chain of car washes called Mike’s Car Wash. Well, Mike was this like local celebrity, right? On TV and on all this and his personal ride was an 87, 325.

It was red with gold BBS wheels. And he would park that thing out in front of the car wash every day. [00:06:00] We drive past it. And I thought that thing was the coolest and eventually popped up with a for sale sign randomly. My dad just did to buy it. And it was, I thought it was the coolest thing. I took that car to prom a few years later and, uh, I eventually bought the 320 and always German cars though.

Somewhere along the line, got into Porsches. My dad drives a pretty nice Porsche now himself, but always German stuff, American stuff, never anything too weird like Peugeot. Is there even a Peugeot dealership in the state of? I don’t, I don’t think there was. So at the time we were in Indianapolis and Dreyer and Reinbold, they actually ran race teams for many years.

Their dealership was in Indianapolis. And, you know, you’re talking late eighties, early nineties, a BMW was a pretty exotic car. They weren’t the commodity cars that they are now. Right. They were still taxi cabs in Europe. I’m just saying, right. Guys, do you notice at least here locally in Denver, our mail is delivered in Mercedes Metris vans now, but they cover up the Mercedes star with an Eagle.

Have you noticed as not to dilute the [00:07:00] brand or whatever, right? Anyway, Pujol would have just been. Crazy talk, a little too heady rather for Indianapolis, I think, Doug. I think you’re confusing like headiness or whatever with just unusualness. It wasn’t like necessarily like a really nice car. I mean, they’re pretty standard cars in France, but they are exotic.

I will give you that. You don’t see them every day. And that actually sort of leads into my next thought, which is, Ryan, it sounded like The E30 got you excited about cars, like Volkswagens and Caravans, eh, whatever, you know, but that E30 started to make the blood pressure rise. And Doug, the Peugeot is, like you said, it’s not that exciting.

So was there a car that sort of invited you in to becoming an enthusiast? My dad is a big car enthusiast, and that’s really where it comes from. The first car I can remember him having was, it was something called a Dodge 0124, I think. It was one of those little front wheel drive, you know, sort of like two door kind of coupe things.

Would have been in the late 80s. He upgraded to a Dodge Daytona Shelby Z, which was sort of like the ultimate expression of that sort of front wheel drive two door personal luxury coupe things that Dodge and Chrysler groups were selling. [00:08:00] You know, he was a child of the sixties. So he was thrilled to find that there was a car that Shelby had officially worked on, or, you know, at least licensed out his name to that he could actually afford and get.

I just remember him coming back. They went off to go buy the car. We stay with our grandparents and I just saw them coming down the road. And I couldn’t believe when the car that was in front of him turned out of the way and I was suddenly revealed with this bright red Dodge Daytona Shelby Z, which I, I mean, it might as well have been a Testa Rossa at that point.

I didn’t know anything about her, but like it was red. It has. Spoiler, it was a manual, it was turbocharged. I didn’t know things about like front wheel drive and torque steer and understeering, handling, that kind of thing. And between that and the fact that he had constantly until to this day, even has a subscription to road and track magazine, which, you know, I just voraciously ate up every time came in the house between that and hearing stories from him about going to formula one races at Watkins glens with all his college friends and just.

All these great sort of stories. I mean, the Ford V Ferrari story was told in my house, like, as if it was just the immaculate reception, just part of like normal pop culture. I just thought that’s what everyone learned [00:09:00] about. So that’s what got me going in that. I appreciate the Peugeot, but you’re right.

It’s not really like the, uh, Tabru car that, that you might think. Doug touched a little on magazines and I think that was a huge driver, no pun intended for both of us growing up. Doug was a road track guy. I was a car and driver guy. I lived for those magazines that show up in my mailbox, you know, once a month, Chabacheta and, and Brock Yates and John Phillips and all those guys just made such an impression on me.

And I was never a big sports kid growing up. So instead of baseball stats, it was me in that road test digest, you know, at the back, we all know and love, right. You know, this is when a fast car was anything under about 15 seconds in the quarter mile. Ryan can still to this day still pull up 0 60 times on some of these old cars.

You know, that we fondly remember and he’s usually right on it. It could be better, right? It was all about the 0 60 time. We didn’t realize that they were like sacrificing clutches to get to these times, right? All it meant was that it could do it once and that meant it could do it in less than a minute.

That’s right. Well, Brad, I think we should probably take a pit stop. And since we’re all, you know, Petrel heads of a certain age. I want [00:10:00] to dive into the children of the eighties questions that we like to throw at some of our guests. So I think we’ll start with poster on the wall. What was in your bedroom?

It could have been a pinup. I mean, I get that, but car that was on your wall as a kid. I’m going to tell you something very embarrassing. Before I got into cars, I was really into fire engines. So I literally had posters of fire engines on my wall until about 11 or 12, and then I got into, I think I was a Lamborghini guy at first, I had a neighbor who, uh, was a bit of a playboy and who had a 911 turbo and black with silver BBS wheels, and that turned me into a Porsche guy pretty early on.

Never a Ferrari guy, that was something I never had a poster of, there was just something about Porsche or Lamborghini that just seemed, the wings and all, just seemed a little, little extra. Yeah, that’s my secret. It was fire engines for a long time. Embarrassing. Along the same lines, I remember I had like one of those trapper keeper folders, like one of those like cardboard ones that you would put like in the notebook and it was all trucks, semi trucks.

You know, that’s what I was really into. I guess I didn’t know [00:11:00] that Doug, you know, like the ones with like the little sleeper cabs on the back, the big, like, you know, Peter belts and Mac trucks and things like that. Flat nose, like a cab over, like all of them. So yeah, that was sort of my summer story there, but like.

As far as the poster cars though, and I still actually have all three of these. Uh, there was a red Countach, a yellow Dino, and a silver 959 Porsche. I have those actually still at my garage. And then a little bit later, it’s not technically an eighties car, but then also the Viper GTS, the original one blue with the white stripes down the middle.

It was on my wall as well. So Brad, what was on your wall? I know one of them. What is one of them? The Fiero. Yeah, just because of the, um, the well endowed woman on the front, that’s why the Fiero is there. No, at least the woman was well endowed. Yeah. He hates Fieros by the way. Really? Do you remember how exotic those seemed though?

They were mid engine, they are, they were mid engine two seaters. What’s the zero to 60 time on that, Ryan? [00:12:00] Well, are we talking the GT or what was the two M four? What was it? Two M six, two M six. Right. Yeah. That’s that’s right. I think the GT was probably a smoke and 8. 7, but I I’ll have to check that one. I had a radio controlled Pontiac Fiero as a toy.

I remember that. That was probably faster than the real thing, Doug. Yeah. Right. More reliable too. Brad, what else was on your wall? I never really had a lot of posters on my wall. It was like all bands and like music and stuff like that. For me, the car stuff was the Hot Wheels. I had a A Kunta, I had a tester and a nine 11, and those were my favorite when I was a kid.

Right. On acquiring mines. Want to know what band posters were on you all? Van Halen, guns N Roses, A CDC. Right on. And all that good stuff. Yeah, yeah, yeah. To my Euro trash. It’s all heavy metal for Brad . We are yin and yang when it comes to music, that’s for sure. But you know, we both appreciate each other’s styles, so it’s all good.

Yeah, yeah. What were you into then? Oh, man. So right above my bed [00:13:00] was a black on triple black 930 turbo. Nice. It was gorgeous. I finally sold that picture not long ago. It was framed and everything, and I never had place for it in the house that we’re in now. I have a lot of vintage stuff in the house, like old Nurburgring, Raleigh.

I’m a big Group B fan, so that was huge for me. My room was adorned with 118 scale model cars, which I still have. You sniffed a lot of glue growing up, huh? These are all metals. So I have close to 70 of them right now, which is, which is not a huge collection, but it’s a lifelong collection. So those have always been important to me and they’ve survived moves and kids and everything else.

Yeah. The one big poster on my wall in my room was the nine 30 and downstairs we had sort of like a playroom study area for me and my sister. And the one poster that sort of survived and Brad’s going to laugh at me because I make fun of him relentlessly for this. I had a from the Porsche factory cutaway blueprint of the 924 up on the wall.

Yeah. That was given to me by one of the Porsche [00:14:00] training instructors for like the engines and stuff. And so to me, it wasn’t the coolest Porsche, but I was like, this is like a factory thing. This is super cool. And so I had that up on the wall and I would just kind of stare at it. And excellent. That’s fantastic.

I can also confirm, even though you say you hate this car, at some point in your life you had one of these on your wall, because I got it from your mom. Ah! Hahaha! That’s true, I forgot about that. Nice! I’m sorry. Did you say I got it from your mom? Yeah. Yeah. My mom, Eric and I went to high school together.

Yeah. We know each other a long time. We’ll get from his mom. I’m sorry if you’re listening to this, but yeah, no, my mom was never the type to like, throw my stuff away. So it’s like, she kept all this stuff. Ridiculous. And I forgot, I even had that at 50, whatever, which it’s in better hands now, because that’s where Brad and I differ on the Ferrari camp, which actually leads into our next question.

You guys are sitting at the boardroom [00:15:00] table and you guys are the ones that have to make the decision. Do you build the nine 59 or the F 40? That’s such a tough one, guys. I’ll answer quickly ’cause I know I mine, I had my answer. And then I’ll give Ryan some time to say F 40. Yeah, F 40 for me says the guy with the 9 59 poster.

Oh yeah, yeah. Well, what I was gonna say is that that came as like a set and like, so I put it up there, but like I didn’t get Porsches until I was older. I thought the nine 11 looked weird. Honestly, I never liked it. And right next to osa, Kunta, you know, Italian stuff, I mean, it looks kind of weird and funky at first.

I was wrong. I mean, I admit that now I’m, I’m, I’m okay. Saying that it’s like one of these things you grow into you. It’s like you grow to appreciate it. Like no one in my close circle, I didn’t see very many of them in real life. I didn’t really understand one until I heard an air cooled, you know, at full song driving by me at one point.

And then I sort of kind of light bulb kind of went off, but yeah, I mean, at that point, yeah, I mean, F40 to me is it’s a top three car, so that’s, I have to go ahead and say yes to that. I feel like it was like a, a moment in time where Ferrari was just [00:16:00] willing to try everything. They kind of threw out this interesting thing out there.

Most expensive car was Spartan on the inside. I mean, they were charging all this money for this, this car that was basically just like so harsh and, and unusable in so many ways, but such a pure expression of what they could do at that time. And I like that it has rally car roots in it as well, which is unusual for supercar.

As a fan of group B, I think you could probably verify that the roots of that started in group B. It, it was sort of an evolution of their. Program that was never really fully completed. But you know, that’s where it came from. So yeah, F40 for me all day long. And guys, you know, I’m a Porsche guy through and through there’s something about an F40 to me.

It’s, it’s probably the most desirable Ferrari ever. Yeah. The nine 59 is just sort of a fancy nine 11. Let’s be honest. Right. It’s a nine 11 with Quatro. I just wanna point that out. It’s true, true . I mean, it was way ahead of its time. Adjustable ride height. You know, you can go on and on. There’s something very special and, and maybe that’s what I would actually buy.

The old Who would you marry? Who would you have date? You know, I, I think I’d date the F 40, but I’d probably marry the nine. [00:17:00] Five nine. There’s a reason I’ve owned a few Porsches, right? They’re safe. That f40 is a little dangerous maybe. And that’s what makes it exciting. Yeah. And I, so I think I’m going to have to go f42.

That’s surprising. Brad will never give me the satisfaction because he hates the f40. He prefers. Really? How do you hate it? No, no, no, no. Okay. So in this scenario, I’m at 40 all day long between f50. I prefer the f50. Interesting. Okay. So if the question was expanded to Anyone else here would take the F 50 over the F 40?

You’re just in between the F 40 and the 959 though, you go F 40. Yeah. The F 40 is just a visceral experience. It’s like the epitome of man and machine at its most simplest form. Yeah. Yeah. It’s a race car straight up. Yeah. But so, but so is the F 50. Yeah. You see that carbon fiber weave, you know, it’s, uh, yeah.

The F 50, they literally took the F 1 motor and put it into a street car. I mean, that’s a good point. Yeah. Yeah, but it’s, that’s not the argument we’re having right now. It’s [00:18:00] bloated and it’s soft and it just doesn’t sing to me in the same way, you know, it’s, it’s the nineties. Eric’s not a fan of the nineties bubble era.

He’s a fan of the marshmallows since we can take the nineties off the table as children of the eighties. If you could buy one car from the eighties. Alright, I’ll go all in and say Vector. Ooh! Just for shits and grins, right? I mean, I’m sure it’s a terrible thing to drive. I’ve never even seen one. Oh, I got to see one at Car Week in person.

It’s big. It’s bigger than you think. Shout out to our friends at The Peterson, who just did something with Car Wow on YouTube. I think they drag raced, was it a Vector versus a first gen Viper? Shockingly, the Viper broke into the high 12s. The Vector was like, I Something like close to high thirteens or something.

I think it all came down to that terrible three speed hydromatic GM transmission, the thing, but yeah, that’s what I sort of fantasize about buying. Right. Because that was vaporware back when we were kids. Right. Yeah. But F40, man, there’s [00:19:00] just something about an F40. There’s just something about an F40.

Doug, what do you think? If money was no object, a car from the eighties. Yeah, F40 would be up there, but if any car is on the table, it’s just as a promise to myself, it would be a Countach, and that’s, that’s just, that’s just the, uh, six year old self not knowing that those things, not understanding, like, the concept of money and how much more expensive those were than other cars, and just being able to, like, you know, give that gift to myself now, but I say those two, but, you know, I kind of also want to say RS 200 too sometimes, but that’s, and that’s one I was kind of onto a little bit earlier, I think than some people, but like, that was also another one that it just also would be so fun to have.

It’s like, that’s what hindsight now that would be fun to have. Now it would be so exotic. No one would know. Well, I shouldn’t say that no one would see very often here in the United States. Could take that to Radwood and you would basically win Radwood if you, if you had one of those, but it’s something of those things, but I didn’t want to be boring and just say a 40 again.

So that’s probably really what I would buy. When did the F40 actually come out? 1987. Okay. Yeah. I just want to make sure that was actually an 80s car. Yeah, it’s [00:20:00] legit 80s. And based on even older tech, when you’ve really brought it back, but I think it’s funny, some of the cars you pick and I too, I’m like, yeah, F40.

40 is the pinnacle. And then, you know, there’s a lot of really cool stuff in there. And then, you know, I’m a huge group B fan. So yes, any of those cars, whether it’s the Audi S1, Evo two, or you’re talking Lancia Deltas or even Renault R5 turbos, you know, something that I’m like, you know what? I had to have one car and that’s the only car I get.

And I have to just go all in CTR yellow bird. How can you go? All right. Yeah. All right. Good. Good choice. It’s a good choice too. You’re the fastest car on the, on the planet for a while there. So yeah, I think until McLaren or the EB 110 or Jaguar XJ 220, I think knocked it off officially, but yeah, there you go.

You got that for a while though. Got the chance to meet Aloysia Roof. At the Peterson the last time I was there. And also Bruce Meyer, who we recorded with about a year ago. Now, of course, very famously has the first customer roof. Yellowbird. It’s [00:21:00] just a thing. It has a presence like some cars do, right?

Doug talks often about the time. It was on the, it was a car and driver road and track. It was 87 world’s fastest car issue. It features that yellowbird as well as a lot of just all the other sort of 80s. Greatest hits in a big city that I’ve been to. Did you guys ever see the video that Roof put out?

It’s called Roof Fascination. You can probably still find it on YouTube. It’s the guy in the loafers. And he’s going around the neighborhood. Yes, yes, yes, yes. Oh yeah, yeah, yeah. I’ve seen that, yeah, yeah. I didn’t know it was called that. I’ve seen the video on, uh, on YouTube, I think. But yeah. Just absolutely just caning it right around the, around the ring.

Yeah, it was a different kind of driving. Wasn’t it like getting into a new GT three RS or something? That was a very different, that was a different animal. Well, I’ll never forget when I first saw that video, we were at a Porsche club meeting here in the DC area. And one of the, I think it was either president or vice president of the club shows up with this VHS from roof.

He’s like, I got to show you guys something. You’re never going to believe this. Puts it in tracking, you What [00:22:00] are we looking at? And it opens with the yellow bird just sideways, just torching the tires. You’re just like, what, what, you know, and I’m just like, my mind is exploding. Right. Something I don’t think maybe like younger enthusiasts may not understand.

Like it was so unusual to see a car like that in motion with sound and everything like that, but you didn’t. Like you said, there was like this bootleg VHS tape that I had to go around for that to see. I remember seeing like a tiny clip of an F40 sort of like power sliding around a corner just in time, and it had to end out and it pulled it back in just in time before it hit the oncoming traffic.

And I don’t even know where that was from, but I mean, it was like 20 years until I, you know, started to see this stuff on the regular, you know, with Top Gear and now YouTube and everything else. We grew up. I know you guys have had John Davis on John, but motor week was the only sort of like automotive video content that we had access to growing up.

First time I saw top gear blew my mind. You know, I can’t imagine, you know, [00:23:00] someone takes out this VHS thing. Like it’s a snuff video or something in your head. Amazing. It’s yeah. The other one was rendezvous. If you guys have ever seen that, I don’t know. Yeah. It’s the old black and white filmed in Paris and the middle of the morning.

And there’s all this speculation as to whether it’s a Ferrari or a Mercedes and he’s just rolling through all in one take and it ends with him parking at this park and then he meets his girlfriend or whatever. And then the movie just ends and it’s like 12 minutes of just absolute chaos and glory and just, Oh, it’s amazing.

It’s amazing. I didn’t know that’s what it was called, but yeah, you can find it. Yeah. It’s brilliant. Yeah. It’s absolutely brilliant. I used to have that on DVD. I don’t know. I don’t, we don’t have a DVD player anymore, so I don’t know. I think that I think I should still have the DVD, but I have no way of showing it.

But yeah, that’s an incredible, yeah. 12 minutes of just pure adrenaline. Yeah, exactly. Car, just adrenaline. Yeah. It’s all about the fantasy. Isn’t it way before Ronan, you know? So we got that one more question to establish your car credibility before we start talking about the steering committee, the show, the ugliest [00:24:00] car of all time.

Think that I said at one time it was the Aztec, I went with the flow. I realize now it was way ahead of its time. I think the first version of the Jeep Renegade is up there for me. Hmm. Hideous, hideous creature. That’s about as bad as it gets for me because there are cars that are ugly but are funky.

Right? Like they’re so bad. They’re good. That was a car that was just terrible. I mean, it was, it was a car created for the low credit interest sort of set. We’re talking about the, uh, the Aztec or the Renegade? No, the Renegade, the Jeep Renegade. That was just, it was, it wasn’t a Jeep and it wasn’t a Renegade.

You know, I don’t know my keeps as well. Are you talking about the one that had kind of like first one that had like square headlights and had those kinds of weird sort of like. Pieces of the trim on the bottom of it that were, no, maybe, maybe I have the name wrong. Sorry. So it was, it was the Liberty, but it was like the more street version.

Was that not the renegade? What was that? No, that was the compass. Oh, the compass. Sorry. Okay. Renegade is basically the Fiat Panda. Yeah. Sorry. Sorry. Sorry. Sorry. The Jeep compass. I’m going to go on record now. The recent [00:25:00] version that they do. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Sorry. Although that renegade was damn funky too, right?

Because it had the extra lights to Doug’s point in the fenders. Yeah. No, that Jeep Compass is the ugliest car. I’m going to go on record. I know there’s worse cars than this. I know it. I just can’t think of them right now, but what’s our catfish there, Ryan, that we talked about as well. Some of those newer Hyundai.

Yeah. They look sort of like bottom feeders, right? Yeah. Ioniq 6. That’s the one I’m thinking of. Yeah. Yeah. I’m thinking even like the Elantra. The current Elantra is just. And the Sonata of recent with those wispy eyes. Yeah. Real weird. Well, what’s the sedan that’s out now that almost is Porsche like from the side.

It’s very funky. It’s very about, yeah, that’s the ionic six. Okay. Yeah. It looks like a sob. That’s what we keep saying. Yeah. Yeah. So I kind of hate it, but I kind of love it. Yeah. The Aztec has always been the go to answer followed by the multi plug. And there’s a couple other cars. Yeah, but that’s got character.

That’s got personality. There’s a vehicle now that takes the cake and Brad has an allotment on one, and he is willing to trade it for a bucket of chicken. And [00:26:00] what is that Brad? Oh, you mean the cyber truck? That is the new Aztec as far as I’m concerned. So you stepped up, you paid the a hundred dollars.

You got the t shirt. What t shirt? Wait, there’s a t shirt? I’m supposed to get a t shirt? I never got a t shirt. Goddammit Elon Musk, where is my t shirt? I paid 100 for a Cybertruck and all I got was no stupid t shirt. I’m writing this down because you’re getting grief on the next drive thru. Brad should have got a t shirt.

Yeah, you gotta read the fine print there. And then, uh, you know, then, but then there’s, I’m sure there’s a way that they backed out of that one. So getting the lot man, just to kind of for the story, or is that something you might you’re interested in getting? Or it was never interested in getting it. I put in a hundred, I put in a hundred dollars day one.

The plan was if the vehicle ever showed up, I was going to try and either buy it and flip it or sell my place in line. I was pretty high up and in line or whatever. At least I thought I was, but how’s that played out for you? There’s a whole [00:27:00] episode coming out about this. I’m out a hundred dollars. That’s how it’s played out for me.

Yeah. He’s out. Whatever the equivalent of a hundred dollars is in doge coin. I just want to pull this out. Okay. Elon Musk gave me a hundred dollars worth of hopes and dreams. Hey, that’s not nothing. Theoretically a year and a half from where we are right now, a year and a half ago, what would you have handicapped the chances of the truck actually overall just being produced?

I would have said one in three, maybe. Like, I think I would have been skeptical. Yeah, I was a little surprised when we saw the first one. I never thought it was coming. I thought Tesla was going to fold before it showed up. But there’s still hope for the Roadster. Don’t forget, a thousand people put money down for that.

So, you know. That’s right. Never. I mean, never accept any of the dates that they propose, but yeah, it’s like if we give them enough time, then yes, they will eventually produce a roadster, right? Like that’s sort of the way that works. Who would have ever thought that first, was it called the roadster the first time around that Tesla, that Lotus Elise based thing?

Lotus Elise, yeah. And now they’re going for a hundred grand and bring a trailer. Like what is [00:28:00] that? That’s. Yeah, collector. I mean, what comes out first, the Tesla roadster or the new DeLorean? Oh, that’s fighting words there, man. I know nothing about the funding behind a new DeLorean or anything like that. I don’t even know if it exists, but I would actually potentially say it might come out ahead of the Tesla roadster, but I just don’t have any faith in Tesla in terms of like meeting any goal that they set for themselves, so.

Tell us about this new DeLorean because I’ve heard about new DeLoreans coming out now for a few years. There was some guy who said he was John DeLorean’s illegitimate son. There’s a couple different versions of the new DeLorean. You did some work with Kat DeLorean on the show last year or something. We did a mini series with Kat.

That’s John’s only daughter. Okay. Basically, she’s designing her own car and it’s going to be a mid engine supercar. She actually got together with one of the designers that’s at Rimac and Bugatti and did a tribute. To the original DMC 12. So we had him on and they’re still working the bugs out, trying to figure out, you know, [00:29:00] how they’re going to develop the car, they want to build it here in the United States, actually back in Detroit, all that kind of stuff.

At the same time, there’s a bunch of guys that left Fisker and started what they called DeLorean re imagined, and they had a car that came out at. Car Week two years ago, which is actually based on the Jujaro inspired etal design DaVinci, which is a prototype, which has goal wings on sky like a thing. And then to make things muddier, Steve Wynn.

Bought the DeLorean motor company. I didn’t know that. Yeah. Steve Wynn is in the Vegas casino tycoon. He bought the DeLorean motor company, moved it to Humboldt, Texas, and they actually were talking about doing their own EV based on the old car and all this kind of stuff. Okay. There’s three DeLoreans in the mix.

I don’t know which the tortoise or the hare that’s going to come out. But wasn’t there some weird three wheeler or something in the mix? So that was some guy in like the Eastern block claiming job. Yeah. Yeah. Is the group that’s headed by John [00:30:00] DeLorean’s daughter. Is that planning to be an electric or an internal combustion engine?

Runs off water, Doug. Like a hybrid. Okay. Yeah, no, not like a hybrid. Having two options, having a V8 power plant and then having an electric power plant, and then you get the option of either in the same chassis rather than two different cars. And so that’s something that when we had Angel Guerrero on, he explained how he designed the car to accept different power plants.

And so that way, if they wanted to run big block Chevy, they could, you know, or an LS, or if they wanted to run a Ford or even a German motor, like a Mercedes AMG, it would fit all of it. And then there was enough room, the way he kind of stacked the chassis that he could still center balance the batteries and the EV system.

So it’d be rear wheel drive and all this kind of thing. So it’s really well crafted from a theoretical perspective, but now it’s How do we build this thing so we can do exactly what we said? That’d be an interesting design study. I mean, the shape and the way that an internal combustion engine works and the required drive train is really, that’s a [00:31:00] lot of what the sort of the hard points of the car have to be, you know?

I mean, it’s really dictated a lot by that. And to have something designed both ways, that sounds like an interesting challenge. And I think his experience at both Bugatti and at Rimac led him to that conclusion that he could do it because he had a hand in the designing. The Nivera and some of the other, not the Bugatti Devo, but one of the other ones that’s of like a similar design and shape.

And you kind of see his design language in those cars. And so he’s taking from his own imagination, but his own experience developed something like that. So it’s really cool. We don’t know how it’s going to pan out, but we’ll see. Right. Yeah, that’s exciting. Even though I just found out about all of these, I still have more faith in one of those companies getting to the finish line before, uh, well, when you don’t play by the rules, you can do whatever you want.

Pretty much. Well, plus the odds are in my favor. There’s three entities going for it. So I think I have a better chance. All right. Well, Brad, why don’t we switch gears? So let’s talk about the steering committee and your podcast. And so what is the steering committee all about? Where’d you come up with the name for it?

Like Doug said earlier, I think we were originally supposed to be [00:32:00] called Bourbon and Backfires or something. I’m so glad we didn’t go with that. The steering committee, I’m not even sure where that came up. It seemed clever at the time. We were texting back and forth about names and I threw something out there.

It wasn’t the steering committee, but Ryan thought that that’s what I texted or said or something. That’s, no, that’s right. Yeah, I remember that now. Yeah, he said steering committee. So that’s great. And I was like, oh, that is great. I didn’t come up with that, but that is great. Honestly, we still bounced around a few ideas, but I don’t think either of us came off of that one.

Yeah, no, I think like a lot of things, it was just a happy accident. You know, I think we spent a lot of time starting out trying to be like other people, right? I mean, of course, you know, there’s Matt Farah and the Smoking Tire and Zach and Spikes Car Radio. And I think from the get go, we knew we weren’t going to be car reviewers.

There are plenty of people doing car reviews. I think for us, it was always just sort of about the hang, right? Let’s hang out. Let’s talk cars, maybe smoke a cigar, have a little bourbon, you know, Denver’s got a pretty wonderful, robust car scene, right? So we never have any lack of guests or people. I think once we stopped trying to be someone else [00:33:00] is when we sort of found our voice and I think that’s what we are.

We’re a hang, you know, we, we have listeners that. Reach out to us and say, Hey, I live in Peoria, Illinois. We don’t have a car community in the same way that you guys do. So I like to go out in my garage on a Sunday, work on my car and listen to the steering committee and you’re sort of like my car pals.

Cause I don’t have any car pals like that locally. And I think once we embrace that again, we sort of found our way. No, absolutely. I mean, when that listener wrote that to us and explained what he did, that was one of the nicest things anyone’s ever said about it, just that you guys are my car friends, like I can put you on and listen, that’s what we want.

We want our guests to come on. We want them to relax. Many people don’t have the chance to talk to other car people in their day to day life. So that if we can provide that for our guests and then for our wider audience, I think that’s for me is what makes a really successful show, is just that great conversation that you get excited about.

We’ll never claim to be car experts. We have a tagline. I think we stole it from Bob Lutz, which is Tell them right, but never in doubt. That’s our philosophies. Or credo. Yeah, you know, in all seriousness, it’s not always about being right. It’s just about being like really interested in cars and just wanting to talk [00:34:00] about it and just having the conversation go further.

I will never claim to be right about a lot of things, whatever metaphor you want to use, the campfire or just the hang or just the little club you get to come in and just sort of talk cars and really get it all out of your system. Doug and I both have day jobs. Doug’s an attorney. I am like a creative manager, creative director at a big consulting company.

You know, we don’t get to scratch this itch, you know, nine to five. And so it’s a great sort of counterbalance to that. I grew up wanting to be a car journalist again, car and driver. I got to meet Chubba Chetta here. You know, the name looks nothing like how it’s spelled. Right. Yeah. You know, from car and driver, he lives here locally, you know, it was a, it was a dream for me to meet him, but I grew up wanting to be a car.

Journalist. I knew I was never going to be an engineering major. I knew I was never going to be a journalism major. I mean, I barely scratched my way through art school. This is sort of that, that outlet. Finally, we get to do this. We get together once a week and talk cars. This has opened up so many doors for us.

We’ve met people. I never would never dreamt that I would have met. Met great people, seen great things, you know, had an opportunity to [00:35:00] participate in great events just as a result of this. So it’s, it’s been wonderful from that perspective. It’s a little escape from like reality, right? Like just from the nine to five from the daily grind, right?

Where we can just sit around. To my earlier point, I mean, we’ve had reoccurring guests. We have friends, we have friends of the show. And yeah, they look forward to it. They look forward to getting an invite back. They love to come back and hang out. You know, our audience, they get excited about a new episode.

They get disappointed when one isn’t released, for example. So, you know, we’re just happy to provide that for them. And that’s one of the probably more rewarding things about podcasting. It’s not the reviews, not even the letters. Sometimes it’s that. Dependency you’ve created where somebody is like, I want the next episode of the committee.

I can’t get enough of what you guys are doing and that’s what motivates you. Right. And so I like your goals. Brad and I, we talk about our show all the time. He’s quoted as saying what Brad who wants to listen to what we have to say. Exactly. Right. So we were sort of like never thinking about Matt Farah or the smoking tire Kameesa or any of those guys.

But to your point, every once in a while you get something that slides across your desk. [00:36:00] And somebody told us, you’re like, you guys are like a cross between motor week and NPR. And I’m like, you know what? I’m going to take that to the bank. That’s a good place to be. That’s good. Yeah, yeah. What we actually thought was Car Talk had just come off the air.

The older brother had just passed away. And we were like, there’s a hole here in the space. Like, who’s going to take over for them? Did they have anybody that was going to step up to the plate? Nobody can really replace Car Talk. But you’re sort of like a void was created in the autosphere. And COVID also helped that it’s like, let’s sort of jump in there and try to fill that space if we can.

I love what you guys are doing. I think it’s fun. And I think you’re adhering to the golden rule of any chat show, which is keeping it conversational. You’re making people feel like they’re there with you, sipping the bourbon and smoking the cigars and having a good time. So I commend you for it. Well, thanks.

You know, everyone has a story, right? And they don’t have to be a big name, a famous person to have the story. Sure. Bruce Meyer has got a great story, but so does Ted at our local shop, Axe and Allies, you know, He’s one of our favorite guests because he’s a wonderful [00:37:00] storyteller. He knows everything about everything.

He can tell you the difference between, you know, the 12 different kinds of wrenches he needs to use, you know, and the cars that come in his shop. I mean, that’s gold, right? That’s as good as anything. Right. And he’s a guy just up the street. Through this podcast, through this medium, we’ve had a chance to really discover these people to us.

I mean, just, you know, meet them and then introduce them to our audience. And that’s always, what’s fun. I think we’re also just lucky that we also have all these other great shows to listen to yours show included. But we have like just this wealth of just great stuff that I would have killed to have when I was younger.

You had to kind of wait that 30 days till the new magazine came out or something like that. Or, you know, motor week. If you have that, if you’re lucky, even though Massachusetts, I actually never listened to click and clack car talk at all. Yeah. And they were based on a WBUR. I’m familiar with it. I’ve listened to enough to know who the two guys are and recognize them when they were in the cars movies, but I’ve never really listened to that show.

Maybe that was a missed opportunity on my part. To that point where we have like a spoil of like automotive riches these days. It just shocks me every time that anyone listens to us. Yeah. I’m always [00:38:00] tickled when we see. We talked on this last show about apparently have a following in Andorra of all places.

Doug didn’t even know that was a country. I hardly knew it was a country. Right. But like, here we are, there are people in Andorra listening to our show. Like, and it’s amazing. We were number one in Senegal this week. That’s no kidding. Number one. Wow. That’s awesome. They go right up on the wall as a trophy.

Yeah. Makes you feel good. You know, yeah. There’s a deep and rich Volkswagen car culture in Senegal, apparently. I bet, yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So why don’t you guys talk about some of the lessons you’ve learned while doing the Steering Committee? If you want something, ask. And that’s just a good life lesson too.

You got to get past that fear of being said no to. And honest to God, like, I mean, it doesn’t even happen that often. I, there’s, I think the one interview or the one guest that we wanted that hasn’t worked out is Paul Zuckerman. And it’s not that he turned us down. It’s that. One question turned into 20 questions, right?

I mean, he’s the defense attorney, right? Gave you a direct examination, as we say. You’re like, wait, who’s [00:39:00] interviewing who here, right? Yeah. Yeah. It was very quickly that, and we’ll get him yet. We’ll have you on yet, Zuckerman. But you know, I mean, people are generally really receptive. You know, you’ve got to build up a little bit of a foundation, right?

I mean, you can’t go out, show one and expect, you know, Mr. X to be on. But, you know, after you’ve got a few shows in the hand, people want to talk, right? People want to, I think that’s my biggest takeaway. If you want something, ask. And people in the car world are generally very nice, very accommodating. God, when we got plugged in with our pal, Tom Horan and the Colorado grand, I mean, that was a real game changer for us because we just met so many people from that never in a million years did we think we’d be involved with a group like that.

If you want something to ask, if someone says no, you get over. Was there a guest who surprised you? Like something happened. You were like, wow, I didn’t know that. Or you gotta be kidding me. You know, like one of those moments where you’re just taken aback. I’m going to mention Bruce Meyer again, only because he told us his origin story, which was that he had this candle shop.

In Beverly [00:40:00] Hills, which turned into a candle warehouse, we’re reading between the lines. I think it was probably a head shop, right? Like it was the sixties. He was a surfer. He was like this cool guy or whatever. So he was someone who surprised me and he, he surprised me as well. And that he was just so kind.

So accommodating one hour turned into four or five hours. I think we put him up on this pedestal and it’s sort of this, you know, this celeb and, and when we got there, he just couldn’t have been nicer. So he surprised us in the best way, but Doug, maybe you have another great example, but my other example I was thinking of was we have a friend who asked us to basically interview his father.

So this is the Willeth Woods senior episode in his youth. He’d spent a summer as a photographer on the formula one circuit, sort of in the height of the seventies there. And that sort of time period. And you know, because his father’s getting up there in age and he really wanted to have this nice, uh, Sort of thing that he could get some of the memories out there into an audio format, where maybe they could be shared with other people before.

Maybe he couldn’t do that himself. We were happy to oblige. We were very excited about it, but man, I mean, not just the formula one stores, but he just sat back and just gave us all of these incredible stories, just these [00:41:00] interesting experiences, you know, from, uh, you know, how many cattle it takes to buy a Porsche to, you know, like being in a sleazy motel and, uh, you Here in Denver and having to shoot roaches off the wall with his six shooter.

And you know, that kind of thing, like just in no idea where the stories were going, but they were all amazing. And we just had the, we had the best time with that, I think, with that show. And the best part about that, the surprise really was, so Willis is actually a sponsor. He owns a company here in Denver called Rhino Signworks.

They do signage for like the coolest places, including here, did ours. Right above you there. He didn’t know that his dad had had this chapter in his life. He was going through some old stuff and found these old photos and he never knew that his dad had been an F1 photographer for a year or two back in the 70s.

Had all these wild stories. You never know who you’re talking to. Exactly. True. That was a great episode and a great surprise, so. Eric’s got a story similar to that where it’s the apple car, because everybody was telling you, you got to talk to this guy. Uh, who was it? It was Bob Garrison. Bob Garrison. Yeah.

And now we’re opening the kimono here a little bit. Nobody gave us [00:42:00] any information ahead of time. All we knew was that he was a racer like back in the seventies and a friend of ours, who’s in the GTM clubhouse, Sky Allen is like, you got to interview Bob. You got to interview Bob. He’s like, you know, 90 some years old.

You got to interview him. Bye bye. And we’re like, okay, who’s Bob? You know? What about Bob? I felt like Richard Dreyfuss the whole time. I’m like, I don’t care. So I’m like calling up people I know and museums and stuff. Like, who is this guy? Like I’m, I’m reaching into the archives, trying to find his racing records.

And it’s not a whole lot of information. One of our co hosts who drops in for these types of episodes, Mike Carr, he’s like a guru. Like he grew up with Al Holbert and he followed them around and all this kind of stuff. And so he knew Randy Lanier and he’s been fabulous. Even Mike was like, I don’t know who this guy is.

So as he’s talking, he’s on the phone. He can’t see us. If you watch the behind the scenes, it’s hilarious. Cause we’re like, I don’t know where to take this. You know, and he just keeps talking and telling stories and we’re sort of pulling and we’re hearing names like Ray Hall and blah, blah, blah. And then he starts talking about Wozniak and I’m like, [00:43:00] Continues to digress.

And I asked this question all of a sudden about, tell me about Gerritsen enterprises. Cause I found that little piece of information. He goes, Oh yeah, blah, blah, blah. And he used to service so and so’s cars. And the marketing guy from Apple came over and then, you know, Steve Jobs brought over his piece of junk.

And one day I was sitting down and I said, you know, I got to get your name on the side of one of my cars and Mike’s. Head exploded and we’re texting each other. Like, do you know who this is? I know who this is now. Like we figured it out. So it was unbelievable because he’s like the best kept secret in racing.

And he won the championship that year. And he’s the guy that owned the apple nine 35. And so he tells the story and it’s hilarious. Like I go to car week or I go to petite Lamonts and I see all these cars with the apple computer livery on it from the nine 35. And I’m like, do you know the story? And they’re like, nah, man, I just think it’s cool.

And I’m like, yeah, the story is amazing. And here’s where you can download it. Right. That is so cool. Yeah. You never know who you’re talking with, you know, and who might show up or who you might refer to, you know, we got to [00:44:00] be friends with a guy by the name of William Taylor. And William Taylor was just a guy who lived in Denver.

He ran something called the auto archives, which was this automotive library. Well, come to find out William has this long and storied history. It is currently. He runs a classic team Lotus back in the UK. It’s the guy that was just here in Littleton, Colorado. He walked in the first time, Doug, and he’s got all these signs, you know, helmets from all the greats, you know, personal stories, but everyone, he knew everyone in formula one.

I mean, we saw the collection, but we just figured he was kind of a fan and he had this library, but no, he had worked on several books. He had interviewed pretty much every world championship. Formula one driver that raced for McLaren and for some other teams, he put together these beautiful books. I mean, the list of people that he was on a first name basis with was stunning.

Phil Hill to James Garner, all the way up to Emerson Fittipaldi, Bruce McLaren, and later on, like the head of the McLaren racing now or head of McLaren. Now. So, I mean, he knew all these people, he had them all in his contacts, you know, he was in our backyard. We call that [00:45:00] the golden Rolodex. Yeah, exactly. No, I mean, he’s like, Oh yeah.

And he had a great story on any of them. And if we ping pong into any of these guys in our conversation, he would have something. Again, Ryan, this is making me think too, when we had that Porsche draft episode way back when, just sort of a brain fart of an idea I came up with. And we had the last second, had a guest drop out, just kind of unexpectedly ghosted us.

We pulled in a, who are now I consider a good friend, Justin Underwood at Porsche of Colorado Springs. I mean, we were talking about Porsche’s drafting on these fantasy cars. We’ve never driven them, but he had a story for every single one. He could come in there and just give us color commentary. Just like he was, you know, like an ex quarterback in a football game.

Like, yeah, let me tell you about the clutch on that. Let me tell you about how the startup procedure goes on that. Cars that were, you know, fantasy cars for us. And he’s become a good friend. He runs, yeah, the classic center down at Porsche Colorado Springs. Shout out to him and John Deisty who do the first dibs podcast down there.

Good, happy accidents. And, you know, you talked about things you’ve learned and another thing, not only do you need to ask what you need to put yourself in these situations, right? I mean, it’s all [00:46:00] wonderful to throw darts, but I mean, if you aim the darts, right? Like it, you know, things generally come out in your favor.

So you guys have already mentioned a couple episodes that, you know, stick out in your minds, but I’m a new listener. Coming to the steering committee for the first time, where do you point me to? What are some top hits? Or do you have a best of playlist of episodes that are, are your favorites or that are fan friendly?

You do a good way to gateway into becoming a steering committee fan. And we all apologize for our first season, right? I mean, that’s just, I’m sorry. I’m sorry. In episode one. Oh my God. Yeah. That cringe is my 11 year old daughter would say. Yeah. I feel like Apple did something recently where they like change the order.

If you don’t default it to, and it’s just, I can’t think of, you know, who might be listening to that early stuff. But Doug, I think you probably would agree. Bruce Meyer’s a great place to start. Terry Kargis, the executive director at the Peterson museum is one that I’m very proud of. Yeah, absolutely. Mike Koons, who’s not done a lot of podcasts and media.

He’s the gentleman who runs the Mercedes Benz Classic [00:47:00] Center in Long Beach, California. That’s another one. I think the ones we did at the Colorado grand where it was bourbon and cigar night. So we’ve got all these participants and you get everyone in the Colorado grand. That was a rare reappearance of the original band.

Again, we brought that out for that show, the bourbons and backfire. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, to talk to people, you know, whose names, you know, having a great time at the grand. So for example, this year, I mean, even to make it easier, we put together around the holidays when things get a little tight with recording schedule, we did put together bundles of.

What we think are some of our best episodes kind of is one big long episode to listen to. We’re thinking along road trip lines, cause that’s what a lot of people will be doing around Thanksgiving and Christmas. Those are good ones to check out. And I think those include many of the episodes we’re talking about is we didn’t put Ted Axe in there, right?

Cause we hadn’t recorded that one yet, but that’s another one. Anything with Ted Axe, he is just a fun hang to listen to that. That’s some of our best representation of just sort of the way we can be kind of a casual, funny sort of hang. Well, I’m going to start listening to all those then. After I get through your first season.[00:48:00]

You can listen to the first season if you want. So we did pick out one. We did it about a year ago where we went back and re listened to our first episode and then basically gave like audio commentary over it. Mystery Science Theater 2000s. Oh my God, Eric, we gotta do that. Yeah, we should. That’s how we’ll celebrate 300, I guess.

You guys have 300 episodes. Oh yeah. That’s impressive guys. Yeah. Where are you guys at? 177 I think is where we are now. Yeah. Early on. It was kind of like whenever we felt like it, then it became weekly and going back to when you asked about like, what have we learned? I mean, you know, I think you guys know this with podcasts.

It has to be part of a habit. It’s best to do it. On a regular schedule and have it upload on the same day. You don’t want it, you know, popping up all over the place. You’re not always in the mood. Yeah, no, it’s true. What do you guys do when you’re not in the mood, right? Like, I mean, you know, it’s just, you just The secret is called a backlog.

Yeah, see, and you guys are good. Yeah, yeah. Good for that, yeah. Well, we’re from Colorado. We’re much like South Park. We’re putting this together every week, you know, like on the fly. I don’t know if people understand that reference, but yeah, those guys like [00:49:00] Put that show together every single week live, basically.

Eric, who’s a huge fan of history. I mean, he really gets into all this. I mean, this is right in his wheelhouse, you know, and just hearing all these stories and going back in time and just listening to everybody, it’s not work for him, you know, to be able to do this, the labor of love. That’s why it’s so easy for him.

Yeah. I can’t say I’m super pumped every single week, but I would say almost every week though, I don’t have many days where I don’t want to sit down and talk cars. So that does make it easier. Cause I know that was another question people asked me right off the bat. When I started telling him about this podcast, I was like, well, what do you talk about?

How do you come up with stuff to talk about? And I’m like. I don’t know how to answer that question. I just always, I always have something to talk about. I don’t know. I’m just always willing to go into something. I’m always willing to learn something, listen to someone, or just put my own two cents out there.

Well, we know that the job of a podcaster is never over. And Eric likes to talk about the Mount Rushmore of guests. Mount Everest, Mount Everest. Yes. The Mount Everest of guests that we’re trying to reach the top of that summit. But for you guys, what are some bucket list [00:50:00] guests or what’s your Mount Everest of guests that you’re trying to get to?

That’s a great question, because I feel like so many of our best shows have been with like regular people and so many of the big names you’ve heard them before. What about you Doug? Do you have, is there someone who. Yeah, there’s one off the top of the head that I could think of. That’d be great for us.

Cause I think it would be a good conversation and I also think it would be great promotion for us. Jack Shepard. He is a huge podcaster and he is a huge bonafide car guy. He’s got the chops for that. And I think it would be funny. I think it’d be a fun guest to have on the shows. I actually saw one of his shows live here in Denver when they came out here.

Armchair expert, I think is the name of his show. It’s a big one. So yeah, that would be one. I’d love to chat with him. I always thought he was funny. I thought, I think he’s a cool guy. I think it would be fun to hang out with. So that’s up there for me. I think for me, and I mentioned Chabacheta before a long time, you know, editor in chief of car and driver.

He’s someone who I met locally. He’s kind of my white whale because he’s a PCA guy. He’s very involved. I reached out to him. I didn’t hear back. I’m not quite sure if maybe he didn’t get the message. I would love to have him on because I think he was at [00:51:00] the helm. I think in my eyes, the best period in time for car and driver.

And he also very famously was one who introduced a redesign. Being a graphic designer. And this was a redesign that really fell flat and he stuck with it. And I have a million questions for him. He’s, I think a principled guy. I think he had some of the best writers were under him when he was entered and he’s a local, so he’s like, he’s right there, but haven’t quite made that happen yet.

So Chabacheta, if you’re listening. I’ll dab you on the steering committee sometime. You gotta speak it to manifest it, you know? You gotta put it out there. That’s right. He’s listening in Senegal. Yeah. Maybe he knows someone in Senegal, yeah. We’ll get the word out to him. Not Chubba necessarily, but so many of these guys, they’re getting up in years.

We need to have them on. We need to get their stories down. That can be around forever, right? None of us will, right? True. to one of Brad’s. I’m curious. Yeah. Who is this for you guys? So on Brad’s side of Mount Everest, right? So there’s two sides to the peak. Obviously we got really, really close to [00:52:00] heartthrob played McDreamy on television.

We’re talking Patrick Dempsey. He’d be a great guest. Patrick’s a pal of one of our friends, JJ Collier. That’s another great episode. You should check out. He’s actually been on a couple of times. If this really is your, I don’t know, your white whale, let us know. Maybe we can try to connect you. Yes, I think so.

Yeah, for sure. He wants to talk to McDreamy. That might be the one episode my wife listens to. That makes me feel better. Cause I don’t think my wife has listened to one of our episodes. It’s just not in her wheelhouse. Doug, what about Kathleen? Avid listener. He’s a big consumer podcast in general. She’s not into cars, but my daughter listens more than my wife.

Yeah. Yeah. Oh, that’s cool. That’s actually even cooler, honestly. So it’s harder to get your kids to think what you’re doing. How old is she? 10. Perfect. Yeah. Yeah. I joke all the time. She’s got a crush on Andy Lee from flying lizard. Like she’s into the racing. I took her to Watkins Glen. She was all of a sudden, she’s like, dad, we got to go to road America.

I took her to last year. She wanted to go to Lamont’s with me [00:53:00] last year for the hundredth. But I was like, honey, it’s like a week long. You’re not going to be able to do it. You know, whatever. So we took her to petite jokingly saying, well, you’re small and it’s the small Lamont’s right. But she, she loved it.

It was a lot of fun. And even this year, she’s like, dad, what race are we going to? She’s hoping that flying lizard is going to be there with the Lamborghini and all that kind of stuff. So, and even at petite, she was all excited thinking the iron dames car was. Andy’s Lamborghini and it was like, no, no, honey, that’s the all girl team.

And then she’s like, Oh my God, she’ll sneak down and like Rolex. She’ll come and watch the race with me and stuff like that. That’s cool. That’s amazing. Well done. Good parenting. So I have an 11 year old and she’s not into racing yet, but I took her to Denver racing sim here. Oh, nice. They’ve got this 120, 000 simulator, full motion and all this.

And I couldn’t peel her off the thing. There’s hope yet. Excellent. Well done. So the other two, we joked, there’s a couple of them that are, fortunately they’ve left us, so we’ll never be able to interview them, but, you know, maybe unless it’s archive footage. But [00:54:00] the other two, at least for me, and it’s a little bit of, probably more difficult than getting Dempsey, is going to be Jujaro, the designer.

Oh, yeah. And Shkel Mouton, the queen of WRC. Right on. But for us, we’ve always approached it just like Mount Everest. You can never go straight to the top, you know, even if you have technology to help you get there, you know, money, resources, you’ve gotta go from base camp and work your way up. Yeah. Yeah. So it’s a little bit of a Kevin Bacon game to make that happen.

Step over a few dead bodies along the way. Right. A hundred percent. Those are the other podcasts that aren’t on the air. That’s right. That’s right. Which is most of them. Right. So just the fact that you’ve done 300 episodes that we’ve done 177, I mean. That’s something right there, right? Yeah. It’s a good analogy too.

Cause I think even people who are very good at mountain climbing and who are well funded and well resources, I mean, they sometimes don’t make it up at first, but you try again, you keep going and it’ll be that much sweeter when you get up there. So I like that analogy. I just finished reading into thin air.

So I’m all up on a Mount Everest trivia right now. And I’m glad we’re talking about the mountains because it’s now time that [00:55:00] we drop it into fourth gear and talk about the Rocky Mountain car culture. And I’m really fascinated by this because I used to work for a company that was based out of Boulder, so I would fly in and out all the time.

And so like you were saying about the guy in Peoria, Illinois, kind of going, you know, I didn’t know there was car culture in Denver. We’re used to the left coast, which is big into car shows and the museum. And here I’d like to say on the East Coast, it’s very much grounded in motorsport. We’ve got more tracks than you can shake a stick at legacy tracks.

Exactly. Built on natural terrain and things like that. Just these classic venues, Rhode, Atlanta, Watkins, Glenn, BIR, Lime Rock, and so on down the line. But when you think about car culture, you don’t just go to Denver. I mean, for me as a racer, you got High Plains and Pikes Beach. Right. Right. You gotta go to cars.

You gotta go to cars. It’s funny because I, one of the reasons I moved to Colorado is for the roads. And I think that’s the differentiator here. You know, back in Chicago, there was a lot of money. People had wonderful cars, but we didn’t have wonderful roads. You would have to take those cars two or [00:56:00] three hours away to Southwest Wisconsin.

They call it the driftless zone where the glaciers didn’t scrape and you actually had hills and great roads. I think that’s the difference here. People in Colorado and Doug, maybe you can fervently deny this, but I think people here are drivers. I think that’s the difference. It’s All about the drive. We have these wonderful roads.

We don’t have a full season like, you know, people in Southern California do, but our roads are as good as anything in the world. I truly believe that, you know, we have roads 30 minutes outside of town here that are amazing. So people here drive, they drive their cars. We have a pal Dan McGinnis, very famously has 70 some thousand miles on his.

2022 Porsche Spyder. I think that’s what makes it unique. And you know, you, you worked out of here. There is a quite a bit of money here. There is a car scene through Pike’s Peak. I think that’s brought a lot of people here. We have a wonderful Porsche dealership in Porsche, Colorado Springs. So we get all the good cars here.

Right. We’re big enough where we have a Ferrari dealership, you know, I mean, we, you can buy the cars. I think for a city at size, there’s a real outsized [00:57:00] car community. And to me, I think it comes down to the roads. We just have wonderful roads and, and people drive them. What’s the ratio of Subarus to Porsches these days?

Is it 10 to one still? I was gonna say Jeeps, my kids, we all have a game about, you know, you pick one of these car brands and you, whoever hits the most by the time we get to the ski mountain wins and yeah, I would say Subaru and and Toyota. You just do Toyota Four Runner. You don’t even have to do the whole brand.

Just four runner . That’s gonna be your big winner there. Yeah. State car, Colorado, I think. Yeah, that’s, yeah. Is that like the punch buggy game? Does somebody get hurt at the end of this or? Yeah, they haven’t turned it into that yet. They will at some point, but, uh, no, right now it’s just counting it off, but yeah, I mean, I’m not convinced that there’s not a, a non TRD pro version of the 4Runner, that’s all we see out here is, yeah, but a lot of Subarus, I’ve had a few Subarus in my lifetime.

And in fact, I think I’ve done a disservice to my girls. Cause I did WRX 2014 and then I had a 2004 legacy GT manual station wagon. You know, my girls, they assume that Subaru is on the same footing as a Porsche or a Lotus or a [00:58:00] Ferrari. I hate to break it to them that they’re, you know, there’s such a pedestrian company in so many ways.

That’s what they think is the fastest car you should get. So Ryan, you talked about the long driving season in the Rocky Mountain area and all that. So I got to ask, and this comes straight out of your show, how many miles you put on the Porsche this year? Well, yeah, the GT4 gets about 3000 miles a year.

But I will say this. I’m a busy guy. And when I get in that car, I want to make those miles count. It’s not a car that I’m going to take to the grocery store, right? It’s a car that I’m going to, you know, put two or 300 miles on in a drive. Plus, you know, I’m not a wealthy guy. I’ve got to pay attention to these things, right?

I do have to pay attention to resale, right? Got to make every mile count, right? So we’re at about, uh, 8, 900 miles and it is a 20, about 3000 miles a year. I wish it were more, like I said, every, every one of those miles has been memorable. It’s been rallies. It’s been wonderful drives with friends on weekends, but that was part of the equation when I bought the damn thing.

Right? Like, I mean, it was a stretch admittedly for me to buy a car like that. And so I kind of had to go in with a plan and [00:59:00] as long as I’m not underwater. Right. Come out on top, especially in today’s used car market though. Right. So on the motorsport side of things, like I said, sort of jokingly, you know, in your area, you have high plains racetrack and then Pikes peak.

So have either of you done any track time? Have you gone to any of the races? Or been to Pikes Peak . Yeah, we were there together with Brian. Probably has a unique experience with that, uh, actually being there. But yeah, that was the day I came down with Covid. So I spent most of the day in Doug’s truck. I went last year and, uh, for practice.

It was the one day in the history of Pikes Peak that the thing was rained out. So I’m hoping third time’s the charm. Uh, and we’ll make it back again this year. You know, I’ve driven a couple of local tracks. I’m not a track rat. I just, I don’t know. It’s, the roads are so good here. I don’t have a need for the tracks like I did when I lived in Chicago and we do Ginger Man or Autobahn.

Not that I wouldn’t love to. Doug’s more the motorsport guy between the two of us. I’m more the canyon rat, I guess. Yeah, and I haven’t done, I actually don’t think [01:00:00] I’ve literally ever done it. I’ve been to more races over my years. I, in my youth, I was really into IndyCar, Formula One. I’ve gotten away with it.

I’ve kind of dipped back in and in, in and out at times. Back in Massachusetts, we used to have an IndyCar race up in Loudon, New Hampshire, just right up to the next state up, which is not very far. So I used to go to the IndyCar races. There, and then, uh, I went to the formula one race up in Montreal a number of times when I was in high school and college, uh, with my dad and all his friends.

And we, we had a little tradition, a little group, a little reunion every year up there at the circuit there. And I’ve never done any track days. I’ve never done a lot of even carting or anything like that. So I haven’t even made it over to Denver racing simulator yet. So we got to get that changed. Hey, we’ve got to give Doug a break because he’s got three young girls.

Yeah, it’s tough. Eats up a lot of the, uh, free time as well as also the disposable income. For sure. So you guys. Are a bit of a traveling road show when it comes to the steering committee, you’re on site in a lot of places, you’re meeting up, you’re going to big events and things like that. And so you get to see a lot of the country you’re bouncing around from the left coast to the right coast.

Compare and [01:01:00] contrast car culture, not just left to right, but compared to Denver. What do you like? What don’t you like? What have you seen that’s different? You’re like, man, I wish we had that here. I mean, I think it all comes back to the mothership, which is California, right? And LA and it’s in the air. I mean, there are.

Car themed breweries, and you know, there’s the Good Vibes Breakfast Club, and there’s the Peterson. There are any number of wonderful car museums. I don’t think anything can touch California. We have a lot of followers down in Florida. There’s a great scene down there, right? I mean, they have great weather, if not great roads.

You know, Denver, like I said, is unique, I think, because we’re drivers here, right? It’s not about the cars and coffee so much. It’s not about showing off. It’s just about going out with friends and just driving hard on some wonderful roads. You know? Shout out to our friend, Danny P, you know, up in Seattle. I know they’ve got a great car scene.

I have yet to get up there, but I know that they have something wonderful up there. Avance is, you know, of course up there and everything else. I don’t know what the car scene is out east too much. And you’ve got those great legacy tracks. I grew up going to Road America and [01:02:00] Elkhart Lake. I’ll put that up there with any track.

It’s a wonderful, a wonderful place. But I think for me, I mean, nothing really beats California. There are always multiple things going on. It’s just a wonderful place to be if you’re a car person. I echo that. I mean, with California specifically and Los Angeles really specifically, and you see some exotic hardware, but like, honestly, I get in some ways just more tickled when you see not an exotic car, but just an old one that’s been well preserved, something kind of ordinary that’s just still being driven around.

It’s in perfect shape, whether it’s an old muscle car, you know, or an old van or something like that, like an old, you know, Volkswagen van or something like that. And it’s all just perfect because it’s cars all seem to be just well preserved out there. Sort of a little compare and contrast growing up in New England, you’d see a fair amount of interesting stuff there.

It’s a short driving season. They’re shorter than it is here in Colorado. It all goes away for a while. A lot of stuff has gotten rusted out and sort of like lost the salt of time, if you will. But one thing about New England is I think like, you know, when it’s the fall and it’s still warm out and you have these really tight, small winding roads, I mean, it’s kind of like the perfect sort of [01:03:00] setting for one of these little like underpowered English roadsters that I love.

You know, you kind of see something like that and you can picture driving around in a little MGA or a triumph or something like that, and you just would have so much fun with it. That’s kind of what I like. I like kind of like the old, I guess, sort of a, you know, classic sense that you get out there. So what’s next for you guys in the show?

What’s next, any spoilers or big events you got coming up? It’s a great question and we’re headed out to LA here in a few weeks. We’ve got some really cool people lined up to talk with. Don’t want to give any spoilers now, but definitely check in. LA is something obviously we’ve kind of made that an annual trip.

That’s kind of a good recharge for us. It’s kind of like our spring break, if you will, to kind of get out there. California can really recharge us. And we’ve met so many great people and we always have a great time. Very much looking forward to this year’s Colorado Grand. We got involved over the last couple of years, Doug and I volunteered last year, we’re officially or unofficially the official podcast of the Colorado Grand now.

So we’ll be embedded. We don’t have to drive the luggage truck this year. We just found this out. We’re very excited. That was our big volunteer [01:04:00] commitment last year was you drove this luggage truck. The best smelling luggage though, you’ll ever, you can imagine the people that are there. And then I wrote the, uh, the car descriptions for the route book for the grand last year, and I’m looking forward to doing that again this year, but hopefully we just do more podcasting, drive more of the cars or riding more of the cars.

That’s really become, at least for me, the highlight of my year. So it’s something that we’ll build up to throughout the year. Well, guys, we’ve reached that part of the episode where we like to invite our guests to tell us about any shout outs, promotions, or anything else that we haven’t covered thus far.

Doug, I’ll give shout outs to our sponsors and you can back me up here. We just had Ryan Evans from Brewsbeers. Brewsbeers is a wonderful Belgian style brewery here in Denver. He was our very first sponsor. He’s still with us today. Rhino Signworks, who mentioned before Willis Wood. Darryl Vaughn, Realtor, local guy, big enthusiast who’s wonderful.

And the rounded out Jackson watches, Jackson, S L O A N E. com and makers of [01:05:00] fine watches that are proudly produced in the United States of America. Check them out as well. And a shout out to, to our friend, Tom Horan, who I mentioned earlier, who’s the chair of the Colorado Grand. He’s done so much for us.

He’s become a dear friend and also our friend, Dan Pilling, Danny P on cars. He’s the one that brought us together. He’s sort of the great connector, the glue for so many of us who do what we do, a gentleman through and through. So shout out to Danny. And if you’re curious about more Colorado car culture, check out our friends at First Dibs, a podcast right out of Portia, Colorado Springs.

You’ll be blown away with what kind of stuff they get through that shop on a regular basis. Join host Ryan and Doug in the garage as they convene the steering committee, a laid back take on all things cars and driving straight out of Colorado. Tune into the show everywhere you download, stream, or listen to your favorite podcasts or follow them on social media at the steering committee podcasts on Instagram.

Ryan and Doug, I can’t thank you guys enough for coming on break fix and sharing your story, helping us in this East meets West episode here. And you know, what’s great about this is we are all sort of brothers and arms in [01:06:00] the automotive and vehicle and motor sports community together. I like cars. You like cars.

We all love cars. We get along if it’s got four wheels and a motor. Let’s do this, right? So I appreciate what you guys are doing to continue to spread enthusiasm for car culture because that’s important. You know, as things are changing with the evolution, I’m sure we could have a whole nother episode on that as well.

I have to applaud you for what you’re doing and keep fighting the good fight. Keep putting those episodes out there. We look forward to listening to whoever’s gonna be on the steering committee next. Well, thank you guys. And we can’t wait to have you guys on the steering committee. Appreciate the opportunity.

Thank you guys. And I think I speak for Ryan on this too. You guys do incredible stuff and excited to dig into your catalog as well. So thank you for getting another great podcast for me to listen to. Yeah. Thank you guys. Thank you.

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