Social Spotlight with Jon Wood of Wood Brothers Racing

12 Questions with Kyle Busch: The 2017 version of the 12 Questions begins with 2015 Cup champion Kyle Busch. Starting with this interview, the 12 Questions are in both podcast form and written form (a transcript has been edited for clarity below). 1. How much of your success is based on natural ability and how much has come from working at it? You have to have some sort of natural ability to apply all the work and everything you do to the racetrack. There’s drivers out there I’ve tried to help along the way during the past few seasons that I give them all the work and everything possible I know what to do, and yet they can’t quite equate it to the racetrack. So there has to be a talent there. What is the real number there? I think you have to have 100% talent, but you also have to work at it 100% in order to be successful. You can’t just be a 50% talent and a 50% work ethic, because that’s half of both, right? 2. Jeff Gordon, Tony Stewart and Carl Edwards have all retired in the last c by The Teardown

16 min listen

Atlanta Post-Race Podcast: Nate Ryan from NBC Sports co-hosts this week’s post-race podcast from his rental car during the drive home from Atlanta Motor Speedway. Nate, who has a much more interesting and professional podcast than this one — the NASCAR on NBC Podcast (check it out!) — successfully navigated the highways surrounding Atlanta while recording this. And yes, we arrived safely. by The Teardown

40 min listen

Untitled Jeff Gluck Podcast: Episode 3: I convinced a reluctant Sarah Gluck to be this episode’s podcast guest so we could talk more about why we’re currently in Albuquerque and our recent trip to China. Also, the podcast now has intro music from a NASCAR fan/DJ named Enshrowd! by The Teardown

26 min listen

Fight! Las Vegas podcast with Jim Utter and Chris Knight: Jim Utter of Motorsport.com and Chris Knight of Catchfence.com join me in the Las Vegas Motor Speedway media center to help analyze the fight between Kyle Busch and Joey Logano. by The Teardown

20 min listen

Untitled Jeff Gluck Podcast: Episode 1: In the first-ever episode of my new podcast, Jordan Bianchi from SBNation.com joins me to help digest all the changes announced for the 2017 NASCAR season. (Warning: I didn’t know how to edit a podcast very well yet, so the volume is uneven at times — sorry!) by The Teardown

35 min listen

12 Questions with Ryan Newman: The 12 Questions interview series continues with Phoenix race winner Ryan Newman, who spoke with me earlier this month at Las Vegas Motor Speedway. 1. How much of your success is based on natural ability and how much has come from working at it? 50-50. I guess you want to me to elaborate. If you don’t mind. I think you have to have a natural ability, otherwise you just aren’t ever going to get it. It’s no different than any other sport or any other pastime or any other job. But at the same time, in order to be as good as other people, you have to work at it. And that all depends on how gifted you are from the beginning. So the most gifted don’t have to work at it as much. 2. Jeff Gordon, Tony Stewart and Carl Edwards have all retired in the last couple years — Carl didn’t retire. He has not said the ‘R’ word. He’s gone for now. He quit. He quit. When you quit, you stop. Which means you might come back. So he hasn’t retired. So let me rephrase this. Jeff G by The Teardown

12 min listen

12 Questions with Martin Truex Jr.: The 12 Questions interview continues this week with Martin Truex Jr. of Furniture Row Racing. It is available in podcast form and is also transcribed below. 1. How much of your success is based on natural ability and how much has come from working at it? I guess you kind of get to this level off natural ability. For me, building cars, growing up around racing and learning about it early before I even started driving is what helped get me to this level. But once you get here, you realize, “OK, everybody is pretty good.” You’ve got to try to find those little things that stick out of how to get better. Obviously, a big part of it is the team you’re with and the ideas they have and how you kind of work together. It’s definitely a combination of both. You’re always looking for something — that next little thing you can do better. After every weekend, we’re always looking at each other on our team and saying, “OK, what have we got to do to be better?” Whe by The Teardown

10 min listen

Social Spotlight with Samantha Busch: Each week, I ask a different member of the NASCAR community about their social media usage. This week: Samantha Busch — the wife of Kyle Busch and the owner of Murph Boutique. You have incredible restraint on social media. You must get a lot of hateful tweets, but yet I’ve never seen you lose your cool. What’s your secret? Well, usually I type it all out just to get it out there and vent, and then I delete it. But I just figure they’re looking for that negative reaction, that’s why they’re sending the mean tweets, so if you just ignore them, they’ll go away. You’ve been on Twitter for a long time now. Over the years have you had any incident where you did lose your cool and then you regretted it later? Wait, do you actually remember how we started Twitter? No, how did it start? I started Twitter because you were telling me about it and then I got engaged (in Feb. 2010). And then you came to interview me that day, and that’s how it got started. That by The Teardown

22 min listen

Social Spotlight: ‘Boris’ from Joe Gibbs Racing: This week’s Social Spotlight interview is with Bryan Cook, director of digital and social media for Joe Gibbs Racing. Cook is affectionately known as “Boris” and is the face of all things JGR social media. I spoke with him Thursday at the JGR shop. What are you doing with this under-construction space at Joe Gibbs Racing? We’re building a social media studio that’s going to center a lot around video, because those are the two big things that our partners and our fans are really enjoying. Social media is one of the top three things we hear from partners. Obviously for fans, it’s a continued way to get them connected to the drivers and our team. My goal is to make them feel like they’re a part of the team. The more we can do that, the more we can have a space that makes it easy to go live on a Facebook or an Instagram or even a Twitter is important. I think it’ll be important, too, because it’ll give us a chance to shoot more cars, it’ll g by The Teardown

24 min listen

Digesting the Clash with Jordan Bianchi and Three Dumb Questions with Courtney Force: In Episode 6 of the Untitled Jeff Gluck Podcast, SBNation.com’s Jordan Bianchi returns to help me break down the Clash and Daytona 500 qualifying. Plus, the debut of a new segment called “Three Dumb Questions” (around the 22-minute mark) featuring Courtney Force! by The Teardown

32 min listen

12 Questions with Garrett Smithley: The 12 Questions interviews continue this week with Garrett Smithley, driver of the No. 0 car for JD Motorsports in the Xfinity Series. This interview is available in both written and podcast form. 1. How much of your success is based on natural ability and how much has come from working at it? I think you have to have natural ability. I started racing very late compared to a lot of guys. I started at 15 in Bandoleros and Legend cars. When I started racing, I had no idea what I was doing. I didn’t have family that came from a racing background. I’m a first generation racer; my dad never raced. It’s a wonder we went to victory lane at all and won championships. So I think it has a ton to do with natural ability. I think now that I’m in NASCAR the last few years, racing some Truck races, last year running pretty much a full season with JD Motorsports and coming back for a second full season, I think that’s when I’m really going to have to put in the wo by The Teardown

21 min listen

Social Spotlight: Austin Dillon: This is the first edition of a new feature called the “Social Spotlight,” where I’ll spend some time asking people in the NASCAR industry about their social media usage. First up: Austin Dillon. You can hear the full interview in the podcast at the bottom of this page, but below is a transcript for those who would rather read it (the transcript has been condensed and edited for clarity). JG: Do you have any private social media accounts? AD: I’m all public on everything. No private stuff. I used to have a Facebook, but don’t have one anymore (except) for the one RCR runs and I do Facebook Live videos from. But as far as Instagram and Twitter, it’s all me. JG: Are you on Snapchat? AD: No. I deleted Snapchat when I got engaged — even before that, when I got a girlfriend. I just didn’t think Snapchat was really for me. Didn’t need it. (Chuckles) JG: So you associate Snapchat with the old days when it wasn’t as corporate. AD: Yeah, and it’s kind of repetiti by The Teardown

18 min listen

12 Questions with James Hinchcliffe: The series of 12 Questions driver interviews continues this week with IndyCar’s James Hinchcliffe, who is currently 10th in the series standings after getting caught in a crash Sunday in the Indy 500. I spoke with Hinchcliffe in the Schmidt Peterson Motorsports garage at Indianapolis a few days before the race. 1. How much of your success is based on natural ability and how much has come from working at it? I would say 50/50. I’m definitely not one of those insanely naturally talented people. Let’s put it this way: My first go-kart race was horrendous. Like you didn’t put me in a go-kart and I was like instantly fast. I had to work at it. I had to figure out how to be fast. I think if you’re at this level, you have a certain degree of natural talent for sure, but no doubt I had to work pretty hard to kind of figure out how to do this well. What happened in the first go-kart race? I got lapped on the third lap of the race, and it was pretty horrendou by The Teardown

13 min listen

12 Questions with Daniel Suarez: The 12 Questions series of interviews continues this week with Daniel Suarez of Joe Gibbs Racing. I spoke with Suarez at Texas Motor Speedway. 1. How much of your success is based on natural ability and how much has come from working at it? I really feel like you need to have some natural ability, but at this point of the sport — in the Xfinity Series and the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series — I feel like most of the drivers have the same ability and it all depends on how hard the team and the driver work for every single race. 2. Jeff Gordon, Tony Stewart and Carl Edwards have all retired in the last couple years. What’s your pitch for fans of theirs to become fans of yours? It’s hard to answer that question. I’m just trying to make my way into the sport and trying to be successful. Those are great names of the sport and they’re actually names I grew up looking at. For me, it would be very good if, someday, fans of these guys started to support me. 3. by The Teardown

13 min listen

Daytona 500 Post-Race Podcast: Matt Weaver from Autoweek joins me to help sort through the Daytona 500, and we end up on a tangent to discuss the state of NASCAR fandom and what drivers could do better. by The Teardown

42 min listen

The Untitled Jeff Gluck Podcast: Episode 4: I’m riding solo in this edition of the podcast, but I’m not alone thanks to questions submitted in the patron Facebook group. Topics include Daytona Day, Danica’s sponsor situation and Dale Jr.’s strong Phoenix test. by The Teardown

40 min listen

Untitled Jeff Gluck Podcast: Episode 2: Jordan Bianchi from SBNation.com stops by again to help me break down the NASCAR Media Tour. by The Teardown

24 min listen

Post-Fontana podcast with Jordan Bianchi: SBNation.com’s Jordan Bianchi joins me via Skype to discuss all things Fontana — from Kyle Larson’s breakout season to complaints about commercials. by The Teardown

46 min listen

Social Spotlight with Landon Cassill: The “Social Spotlight” series continues this week with Landon Cassill, who drives the No. 34 car for Front Row Motorsports. This interview is available in both podcast and written form. How would you describe your social media philosophy? I’m a child of the internet, as we all are, for the most part. I’m your typical Millennial, I think. I grew up doing school work on the internet, playing video games on the internet. I feel like internet culture is part of my life, so I kind of just live it out that way. It’s kind of an extension of me. What was the first social media platform you used? Xanga was my first social media platform. What was Xanga? Xanga was a blog site. Me and my friends had Xanga pages and we’d just post daily content, I guess. (Laughs) It’s all pretty similar — everything has kind of moved from one to the other. Back then, you’d get home from school, log onto the internet on my computer at home — we had dial-up internet for the long by The Teardown

19 min listen

12 Questions with Dale Earnhardt Jr.: Each week, I’ll ask the same 12 questions to a different NASCAR driver. Up next: Dale Earnhardt Jr. of Hendrick Motorsports. (Note: This interview was conducted at Atlanta, so the reference to punching a driver had nothing to do with the Las Vegas fight.) 1. How much of your success is based on natural ability and how much has come from working at it? For a long time, it was all ability, low effort. Now I think it’s 50-50. 2. Jeff Gordon, Tony Stewart and Carl Edwards have all retired in the last couple years. What’s your pitch for fans of theirs to become fans of yours? You know, I’ll be honest with you — I’d probably steer them toward the new guys. I’m on the backside of my deal, so for the health of the sport, I think it’d be awesome if they grabbed onto (Ryan) Blaney or Chase (Elliott) or somebody like that. They’re going to be successful and are going to be around a long time. That would probably be better for everybody. 3. What is the hardest by The Teardown

18 min listen

Post-Phoenix podcast with Bob Pockrass: On this week’s post-race podcast, I’m joined by ESPN.com’s Bob Pockrass to help me break down all things Phoenix. Plus, Bob weighs in on whether he’d punch me in the face. by The Teardown

22 min listen

Social Spotlight with Spencer Gallagher: This week’s Social Spotlight interview focuses on the always-entertaining Spencer Gallagher of GMS Racing. You can follow him on Twitter @23SpeedRacer. It seems like you choose your spots when you tweet. Sometimes, you only tweet every few days but try to unleash a gem. Is that your basic strategy? I’m all about quality over quantity, you know? Twitter is full of enough noise as it is, so I try not to add too much to that. If I’ve got something valuable to say, I’ll say it. But I just try not to let people know what my breakfast was every single morning. I find most people find that boring. So I’m the kind of guy that tries to focus on having a real thought. When I have something to contribute to the conversation, that’s when I speak up. So are you not on Twitter all the time? Or do you look at it and decide not to chime in? I check somewhat sporadically, but I will say I’ve gotten more frequent with its updates. It really is my source of NASCAR by The Teardown

18 min listen

Social Spotlight with Bubba Wallace: The third edition of the “Social Spotlight” focuses on the social media usage of Roush Fenway Racing’s Bubba Wallace. We spoke last week at Las Vegas Motor Speedway. First of all, I have to give you some credit because a few years ago, you told me about this amazing (photo editing app) called Snapseed. I don’t even use that anymore. You don’t even use it? What have you moved on to? They have Lightroom which is a really good photography app you can get on your computer, and is what a lot of professionals use — I think. But they have it for your phone, so I use that now. Well apparently I have to move onto that. Every time somebody is like, “I really like your Quiet Track picture,” I’m like, “Oh yeah, actually I totally enhanced that using Snapseed,” but I just don’t tell them. Really, I think the trick for photography when you post on social media is you have to make it look nice, but you can’t give it away that it looks too filtered. Right. Yes. Tha by The Teardown

18 min listen

12 Questions with Kurt Busch: The 12 Questions series of interviews continues this week with Daytona 500 winner Kurt Busch of Stewart-Haas Racing. I spoke with Busch at Dover International Speedway. 1. How much of your success is based on natural ability and how much has come from working at it? I would say that it’s a balance of both, but in all honesty, my dad, Tom, taught Kyle and I everything about the race car. First up was how to work on it, and that taught us how to respect it. And then (was) how to race it. He was always there helping us with our go-karts. You know what’s funny is that I always looked forward to watching the race with him on Sundays as a kid, because he would point out certain things that the veteran drivers were doing, like Dale Sr. was doing this or Bill Elliott did that, and it was really neat to digest that and then apply it to the little go-kart we had. Does he still give advice from time to time now? Oh yeah. He hasn’t slowed down one bit. (Laughs) He sti by The Teardown

14 min listen

12 Questions with Clint Bowyer: The 12 Questions interview series continues this week with Clint Bowyer of Stewart-Haas Racing. The interview was conducted Sunday morning prior to the Martinsville race. Here is the archive of other 12 Questions from this season. 1. How much of your success is based on natural ability and how much has come from working at it? I would say with me, I don’t know why, but natural ability seems to be the case. This has always come relatively easy for me. The hardest part of our game anymore isn’t the fact you can drive better than the next guy; everybody at this sport, at this level, can drive and is capable of winning these races. It’s how well you work with your team, how well you communicate to your guys to get the most out of your race car. 2. Jeff Gordon, Tony Stewart and Carl Edwards have all retired in the last couple years. What’s your pitch for fans of theirs to become fans of yours? (Note: I know the following answer makes no sense, but it’s Bowyer by The Teardown

14 min listen

Social Spotlight with Mike Joy: This is the latest in a series of interviews where I ask people in the racing industry about their social media usage. The interviews are also available in podcast form. This week: Mike Joy, the longtime NASCAR broadcaster from FOX Sports. Joy is on Twitter at @mikejoy500. First of all, I see you a lot on Twitter. Are there any other platforms that you are active on? I’m on Facebook, but it’s mainly as a member of groups: One for the road race car — the BMW my son races — two for vintage MGs and there’s even a group on there for cars that I used to race back in the 70s in IMSA. So, it’s mainly for the group aspects why I’m on Facebook. FOX introduced us to Twitter. When Twitter was fairly new, they thought that it would be a good idea for us to have an online presence, and when we saw that a lot of the teams and drivers and crew people and families were on there too — and especially when we found at Daytona that we could sometimes get quicker updates of by The Teardown

17 min listen

12 Questions with Kasey Kahne: The 12 Questions series of interviews continues this week with Kasey Kahne of Hendrick Motorsports. I spoke to Kahne at Texas Motor Speedway. 1. How much of your success is based on natural ability and how much has come from working at it? When I was younger, it was both, because my dad always was on me to learn about the cars and work on the cars. But from the first time I got on a four-wheeler, a car or whatever, I felt like I knew what I was doing — and that was nice. So I’d say I had a little bit of ability driving, but I’ve always had to work at it. Today, I’d say I work way harder than (use) ability, it feel likes at times, so it’s just tough. Racing’s tough. It’s always changing, so you can’t just drive. You have to be aware of a lot of other things if you want to go fast. 2. Jeff Gordon, Tony Stewart and Carl Edwards have all retired in the last couple years. What’s your pitch for fans of theirs to become fans of yours? Carl may come back; you’ll by The Teardown

14 min listen

Social Spotlight with Jon Wood of Wood Brothers Racing: Each week, I’m asking someone from the racing industry about their social media use in a feature called the Social Spotlight. Up next: Jon Wood, who is the man behind the @woodbrothers21 Twitter account. Let’s first talk about how you first came to be the one who was in charge of the team account. The way our race team works — it’s a family business. So we all kind of chip in, whether it’s my dad (Eddie) or me or my sister (Jordan), whoever. We aren’t specifically tasked with any individual responsibilities; we just all kind of do whatever needs to be done. A couple of years ago, maybe five years ago now, my sister was doing the social media because she (is) the director of marketing, so to speak. She was handling the social media and she had to go to a wedding or something, I can’t remember what it was — it was some obligation. So she had me do the social media that weekend at Talladega. I had never done it; I didn’t even have a by The Teardown

19 min listen

Post-Kansas podcast with Sarah Gluck: After technical difficulties trying to podcast Saturday night, I turn to backup co-host Sarah Gluck for help breaking down the Kansas race. Plus an update on our current life situation and thoughts on why people would live in a famous house if they don’t want visitors. by The Teardown

26 min listen

Off-weekend NASCAR podcast with Mom and Dad: With no race this week, I enlisted my mom and dad — Susan and Mike Gluck — to join the podcast and give their thoughts on the NASCAR season so far. by The Teardown

19 min listen

Discover this podcast and so much more

Social Spotlight with Jon Wood of Wood Brothers Racing

Social Spotlight with Jon Wood of Wood Brothers Racing

Description

Titles in the series (100)

More Episodes from The Teardown

Related podcast episodes