Episode 248 with John Williams, entrepreneur and off-road racer.

Serial entrepreneur, John Williams, owner of Impulse Off Road shares the journey to now, with all the twists and turns. John has had some interesting experiences and is sure to have many more. Be sure to listen on your favorite podcast app.

5:08 – our front yard corner was worn to dirt; that was our goal, was to wear through the grass every year on our motorcycle 

13:02 – when I got done with the Land Cruiser, I got 33 1250’s and I thought I was king of the world             

20:39 – I had my friend’s dad’s credit card and ordered a lift, I thought, this is the coolest thing ever, I tell people I work for Roberts Auto and I don’t have to pay full price.

27:19– we’ve just been compatible in that aspect; my strong points are not his and his are not mine.

34:03 – they gave me the opportunity to pitch a Raptor program to the higher-ups at Ford when they came out to the track; We created the Raptor Assault program together. 

43:34 – You realize you don’t win and lose races in the first 100 miles, it comes down to the last 2-3 miles – it’s how you manage, mitigate risk, and make sure the car is staying together

50:53 – the whole time you’re thinking, why am I here? Why am I doing this? But when you’re done, you can’t wait to do it all over again

Special thanks to 4low Magazine and Maxxis Tires for support and sponsorship of this podcast.

Be sure to listen on your favorite podcast app.

Transcript

[00:00:01.120] 

Welcome to Conversations with Big Rich. This is an interview-style podcast. Those interviewed are all involved in the off-road industry. Being involved, like all of my guests are, is a lifestyle, not just a job. I talk to past, present, and future legends, as well as business owners, employees, media, and land use warriors, men and women who have found their way into this exciting and addictive lifestyle we call off-road. We discuss their personal history, struggles, successes, and reboots. We dive into what drives them to stay active and off-road. We all hope to shed some light on how to find a path into this world that we live and love and call off-road.

[00:00:45.280] 

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[00:01:13.030] 

Have you seen 4Low magazine yet? 4Low magazine is a high-quality, well-written, four-wheel drive-focused magazine for the enthusiast market. If you still love the idea of a printed magazine, something to save and read at any time, 4Low is the magazine for you. 4Low cannot be found in stores, but you can have it delivered to your home or place of business. Visit 4Lowmagazine.com to order your subscription today.

[00:01:40.010] - Big Rich Klein

On this episode of Conversations with Big Rich, I'll be speaking with John Williams. John has been working in the off-road industry for most of his adult life. From building startups to building rigs to building rock crawlers and building racers to racing to teaching, John is always moving forward. Hello, John Williams. It's good to get you on here, finally. What has it been? About two years, at least? Yeah, since I first asked you to come and be a guest.

[00:02:13.910] - John Williams

Good morning. It's so good to be here. Yeah, it always seems like there's that next big mountain to climb or something big happening that would be so relevant to talk about. It's just, Just wait, just wait, just wait. Here we are two years later. But a lot of really good things have happened over the last two years.

[00:02:29.280] - Big Rich Klein

Okay, well, let's get started with the interview. First question, always the easiest one to answer, where were you born and raised?

[00:02:37.560] - John Williams

All right. I was born and raised in Logan, Utah. Born in 1977 and just grew up in the little old town of Logan.

[00:02:46.230] - Big Rich Klein

And John, you have a brother. Any other siblings?

[00:02:50.480] - John Williams

I have a brother, Nate, three years younger than me, and a sister, Amy, who's three years younger than him. And so we're all three years apart.

[00:03:00.510] - Big Rich Klein

So all three years apart. That's a pretty good timing.

[00:03:04.000] - John Williams

Yeah, they knew what they were doing. All birthdays in February, March, and April.

[00:03:09.650] - Big Rich Klein

So Logan, back in those days, was probably pretty rural. Is that correct? A lot of open space?

[00:03:16.020] - John Williams

I sure wish I could go back to those days. Logan was just an amazing... It was just a big little city. And I always think back to when I was a kid and my radius of where I could play without telling my parents where I was was probably five or in a circle. I don't even let my kids play outside without me sitting outside watching them these days. Just the greatest time to grow up. A little farming community where surrounding Logan. Logan was the big little city there. Great people, hardly any crime, no trouble, just a really good place to grow up and have a fantastic childhood.

[00:03:55.250] - Big Rich Klein

Did your mom and dad work in the area? I would assume, and What did they do for a living?

[00:04:02.840] - John Williams

My dad was a real estate appraiser, and my mom was his secretary, did all the bookkeeping and billing and things like that. It was an at-home work, so he did everything out of the house. We got to spend a lot of time together in those years and got to go out and do work with him and help him take pictures of houses and measure houses and just started really learning what hard work really is. He never let us be lazy. He always wanted us to be anxiously engaged in a good cause. That was his big thing every day. If we were sitting down, if we started playing Nintendo, it was game over. It's like, you need to go in the garage, you need to go do something other than sit in the house. So that's where our love for mechanics and everything stemmed from was playing out in the garage because that was really all we could do.

[00:04:52.550] - Big Rich Klein

What things did you guys do to entertain yourselves when you were kids? Did you Did you go on? Motorcycles, bicycles, fishing? What did you guys do?

[00:05:08.320] - John Williams

Obviously, riding bikes was a big deal. We rode bikes and scooters all the time. My dad got us motorcycles. I was seven, he was four, and I think he learned how to ride a bike when he was three. We rode motorcycles with my dad all the time. Our front yard corner was worn to dirt. That was our goal, was to wear us through the grass every year on our motorcycle so everybody knew where we were riding and driving. We built little jumps, put little four-inch diameter log with some plywood on it and jumped the motorcycles in the front yard. And of course, no helmets. Nobody wore helmets back then. And just playing around, being kids, building forts, and hanging out with my dad.

[00:05:52.140] - Big Rich Klein

When it came to school work or as a student, how were you? Were you one of those kids that was always looking out the windows or were you studious and a good student?

[00:06:04.150] - John Williams

I was a good student for fear of letting my parents down. They always had high expectations and they never... My dad would always make a deal. If there was something we wanted to do, he would make sure he found a way that we could do it, but he would never let us quit until it was done. When Nate and I were young, we saw a Bruce Lee movie and thought it'd be the coolest thing ever to be Bruce Lee. We wanted to get into karate, and so I talked to my dad about it. He's like, There's the deal. If you get in, you're not stopping until you're a black belt. However long that takes, you will not ask to quit or stop until you've met the goal. And so Nate and I both Ed, we're game on, we're doing it.

[00:06:47.330] - Big Rich Klein

All right. So you became black belt?

[00:06:50.480] - John Williams

Yup. I think it was midway through my seventh grade year. And then the same thing like with We loved camping, loved hiking, loved doing everything. I was an Eagle Scout in eighth grade. Just always doing everything my dad wanted me to do is what I just believed everything he said. Maybe be a little bit of a naive kid as I was growing up. I didn't really know a lot. I just trusted everything my parents said and did it.

[00:07:20.980] - Big Rich Klein

Well, that doesn't happen much anymore at this time in life with all the social media and everything.

[00:07:29.290] - John Williams

Yes, nowadays for I sit back and think about stories that I'll tell people from my high school days. I was so naive and didn't just... Growing up in Logan, just a naive kid.

[00:07:42.530] - Big Rich Klein

Yeah, I truly believe social media is a two-edged sword. It's great to be able to have it to get information out to everybody and all. But it also just paints a picture that is so unrealistic and gives gives undue stress to the younger generation trying to keep up with those that they see on social media that may not be completely true about their life.

[00:08:14.420] - John Williams

Yeah, it's just crazy when you're just trying to keep up with your neighbors and everybody else on social media and everybody paints such a beautiful, perfect picture of what life is. We all know that the reality paint on social media usually isn't reality.

[00:08:34.160] - Big Rich Klein

As a family, what would you guys do for vacations or getaway on weekends or whenever you had the time to do something besides your parents working and you guys hanging out in the garage?

[00:08:48.410] - John Williams

My dad had horses, so vacations. We went and did the Buffalo Roundup Island on horses. We'd go mountain biking in Moab. Hunting was a big deal in our family. My dad loved guns and loved getting out hunting, and so we would go hunting quite a bit, whether it was for deer, jack rabbits, whatever it was. We had an old 1971 land cruiser that he had bought in probably in the early '80s. It was just our old beater hunting rig that just sat out in the corner of the driveway every year before hunting season. Or if we were going to go somewhere on a Sunday drive, he'd pull that thing out and spend a week trying to make it run and make it start and work and be good enough to be safe enough to leave. That was always a lot of fun. We had great time driving off road.

[00:09:40.370] - Big Rich Klein

So your house, did you guys have a shop built on or just a garage?

[00:09:45.090] - John Williams

Just a standard two-car garage with tools down every side of the garage, the bag stacked up everywhere, a shed outside with tools and stuff in it. My dad I always loved building stuff. You wish he would have been a contractor, so we had all the woodworking tools and metalworking tools and welding tools. My mom's dad was an inventor, and he created a machine that would freeze and thaw cement so that the cement mixture companies could test mixtures freezing and thawing and see how the cement would hold up. My dad would build the frames up in the garage after work for extra money for all the machines that he built and shipped all over the country.

[00:10:31.870] - Big Rich Klein

So it was your dad that taught you how to fabricate?

[00:10:35.640] - John Williams

Not so much me. My brother learned how to weld from him when he was seven. I was more of in the early days, a mom's boy, I'd rather been golfing, skateboarding, mountain biking, doing anything, but I'd had my time working in the garage, and Nate was the mechanical genius of the family that really picked up on that stuff early. I didn't start welding until I was a junior in high school.

[00:10:58.350] - Big Rich Klein

The first car that you had, was it one of your dad's or what did you get?

[00:11:06.330] - John Williams

The '71 Land Cruiser, that was the what led me into what I do today is I turned 16 and my dad Dad's. I was like, What am I going to drive? And he's like, That. He points at the Land Cruiser and I'm like, No way. No girls are going to cope on a ride with me and that thing. And he's like, Well, I'll make you deal with you. If you get in the I'll take it to tech school and go to night school, he's like, I'll pay for you for the class, your welding supplies, your body supplies, and I'll pay for the paint job when you get it done so you can have that car that you want to have and be proud of and drive around. And so I said, deal. And in my limited mind, I thought, Oh, I'll be done with this thing in 4-6 weeks. So it'll be perfect. I think it took about a year and a half.

[00:11:52.740] - Big Rich Klein

So pretty much a complete rebuild. Did you find that the girls in your school liked four wheel drives, or were they hot rod girls? I've heard a lot of guys that had hot rods turn around and say, Oh, the girls loved the four wheel drives, and that's why I got into them.

[00:12:12.250] - John Williams

I was very lucky to give some girls rides home from school. It was funny. I never understood why they did it because most old Land Cruisers have an exhaust. You get in that thing, start it up, and two blocks down the road, you smell like 20-year-old exhaust burning and worn out engine. But for some reason it worked.

[00:12:36.660] - Big Rich Klein

So the girls would continue riding with you with all those problems with the old Toyota?

[00:12:42.950] - John Williams

No, I got complaints every now and again, but I just had to make sure that I didn't lollygog on the way home. I had to make it quick.

[00:12:51.900] - Big Rich Klein

But it looked good. Fresh body panels, fresh paint. Was it lifted or What did you do beyond that?

[00:13:02.490] - John Williams

So it had 28-inch tires on it. And I remember sitting in class, probably when I was supposed to be learning what's for with her magazine and thinking, Oh, man, I wanted 30 by 950, 15 BF Goodrich All Trends. I was like, Oh, so cool if I can have those tires. Then I remember I wanted 31 1050s, and when I finally got it all done, I got 33 1250s, and I just thought I was the king of the world when I was able to do that. But we did all the bodywork. I think from my recollection, I had 22 panels I had to cut out of the Land Cruiser, remake new panels, and weld them in. It was funny when I'd be sitting in welding because Nate wasn't in high school at the time, and he couldn't go help me in the class. I think after a while, they led him. But I'd start welding, and I'd be like, Hey, I just learned today if you use the tip and you move it like this, that the weld works a lot better. He just looked at me and shook his head. I learned that when I was seven, dude.

[00:14:04.380] - John Williams

And just made fun of me a little bit for doing that. But I do recall that my dad was able to convince... It was Bridgilan, so it was a local tech school. He enrolled in an after-hours welding class, and he talked to the instructor to see if he could bring Nate. I think it was between 10:00 and 12:00. The guy was like, he can come in once and I'll watch him weld. If he can weld, he can stay in the class. I I think he was the youngest person ever allowed to go to that school. I don't think today they would follow the rules and laws and whatnot, they would allow that happen. But he was able to go to the tech school and do a welding class with my dad and get through that, which was pretty cool for him.

[00:14:45.010] - Big Rich Klein

What extracurricular activities did you do? Were you involved in any clubs or sports or anything?

[00:14:54.650] - John Williams

Snowboarding, golf, mountain biking, skateboarding, rollerblading, more of the extreme sports, climbing. I tried out for basketball, but I wasn't good enough, so I didn't get to do that. Never played football growing up and played baseball in our neighborhood, but was nowhere near good enough to play on the baseball team. My mom was the Utah amateur state champion at golfing, and so she had grown up for a whole life golfing, and I quite liked golfing. That was one of the things that I enjoyed doing.

[00:15:32.250] - Big Rich Klein

So golf, that's one sport that I never really got into. I went out and tried to hit buckets of balls for a couple of weeks and then realized that this sport wasn't for me because I was never going to master it to the point where I'd be comfortable and I'd be just breaking too many clubs, I think, in my life. But then again, I tried to start when I was older.

[00:16:00.330] - John Williams

If I hadn't started when I was younger, it was like today to pick up a golf club. When you watch golf names or anything on Instagram, you watch people swing. I was like, I would not even participate if I didn't learn at a young age how to do it. I lap at myself too much and embarrassed myself, so I wouldn't even pick up a golf club.

[00:16:20.500] - Big Rich Klein

So do you still golf?

[00:16:22.620] - John Williams

No, I don't really have any time. It'd be fun. I haven't golfed. I still have clubs, but I've been eight or nine years since I've been golfing.

[00:16:34.300] - Big Rich Klein

So the tech school that you're talking about in tech classes, was that a separate school, like WIO Tech or something? Or what was all that?

[00:16:44.290] - John Williams

No, it was just an extra thing that you could sign up for and do. And it was predominantly the kids that were... So it was high school kids all the way up to adults. We had older guys that want... Back then, fixing up hot rods. Most every car in the class was an older Camaro, Mustang, Mylan Cruiser, old Jeep, or older pickup truck. It was like guys didn't have a place to do it, so you could leave your car parked out back. They had a gated area, and then at night, you'd pull it out of the gate there, you'd pull it in, and you had access to all their tools, all the space. Everything was there for you. You just had to buy your supplies. It really was a fantastic program.

[00:17:27.440] - Big Rich Klein

Okay. It was a high school Auto Shop program. What was your favorite class or subject in high school?

[00:17:45.260] - John Williams

I did pretty well in all the classes. I don't really think I had a favorite. I did not have a favorite. There was nothing favorite for me. Mostly, my favorite part was the after-school activities, whether it was going mountain biking with friends or rock climbing or something to that effect. That was what I really looked forward to. And school was just what you had to do to get to that point. And I just had to do a good job of school to keep my parents happy with me.

[00:18:13.560] - Big Rich Klein

So what about after high school, what did you do?

[00:18:18.350] - John Williams

When I was a senior, I just spent my life doing what my dad wish he would have done or what I did. He wish that he was an EMT, so he got me in an EMT class when I was a senior in high school, so I got my EMT certificate or badge or whatever you want to call it. Then he thought it'd be really cool if I fought forest fires. So I got a job fighting forest fires right after high school. And so I did that, then went to Utah State, thought like everybody, I wanted to be a rich doctor, got in my first biology class and realized this was a little bit harder than high school I wasn't driven enough. I was like, I got to fix this. I dropped out of the medical idea was no longer there, and I just floated through school. Then in 1996, I was involved in a car accident with my dad in that Land Cruiser, and he passed away. When I had a crushed five vertebrate ran my back and traumatic brain injuries, and they didn't know if I'd be able to go to school again or do anything.

[00:19:37.730] - John Williams

It took me a while to recover, but the Land Cruiser was totaled, and so it was time to build a new one. That's where my dad had a friend that was a mobile mechanic, and he had taken Nate and I around town and said, If we tell people we work for Robert's Auto, we'll get deals and we don't have to pay full price for anything. So I thought, Oh, that's really cool. Who wants to pay full price for anything? And so I remember we had learned working on the Land Cruiser when I was in that body class, Nate had gone out and bought two Broncos so he could build a Bronco while I was building the Land Cruiser. And then all my friends thought it was really cool, so they went and got Land Cruisers or had Jeeps. And so I remember grabbing a four-wheeler magazine, picking it up and calling. I remember which suspension manufacturer was. I think it might have been Skyjackers. I said, I need you. This is John from Roberts Auto. I need a two and a half inch lift for a 76 CJ5. And I saw what the magazine price was, and they sold it to me for $100 cheaper.

[00:20:39.850] - John Williams

I had my friend's dad's credit card and ordered it. And I was like, this is the coolest thing ever. But I can tell people I work at Roberts Auto and I don't have to pay full price. And so after that car wreck, technology had come about a little bit, and they started asking you to fax copies of business licenses and things like that. And I shared the same name as my dad, and his real estate business was professional services, home occupation. And so I just started being John from John R. Williams & Associates and started an off-road business and getting deals for my friends and buying all the parts for Nate's Bronco and buying stuff to rebuild a new land cruiser after I direct that one. And got to a point where I decided I'm going to take a year off of school and see if I can make an off-road shop work. And so in 1996, I got a business license for Mount Logan Off-Road and opened it in 1997. And that's what got me started on where I am today.

[00:21:45.390] - Big Rich Klein

So that wasn't a long time out of high school. You were just, what, 20, 21 years old?

[00:21:52.170] - John Williams

No, I was 20. I just figured at the time, I laugh every day to this day. So I'd worked at EK Accessories, making the cat straps with all my friends. I believe at the time we made 5:50 or 5:75 an hour. My mentality was when I started working on cars for people was, if I make 10 bucks an hour, I am twice as rich as all my friends. I was like, I will be happy being twice as rich as all my friends because I know I can do everything they want to go do, and I won't have to say I don't have any money or can't do it. I remember one of my first big jobs was a body a Audi lift and body bushings on a '76 CJ7. I think I bid $80 to install it, and it took 24 hours to do the job. I had to rebuild all the body mount, all the bolts broke. I had no idea what I was getting myself into. It was actually for a buddy in high school. It was his Jeep. I was like, I learned at that point on, you don't get a bill for 24 hours.

[00:22:57.690] - John Williams

When you tell them it's 80 bucks, you're doing the job for bucks. And I did it for 80 bucks. Then I was like, Man, now I'm half as rich as all my friends that work somewhere else after doing that job. So it was one of those things I had to learn. It took 15 to 20 years to realize when you're bidding jobs for people, there are some things you just have to make clauses in there so you don't get stuck being the bad guy or not informing them right away in time of a price that you know dang well, it's not going to be. I never wanted to be the person where you said you get someone in the door and tell them 300 bucks and they leave paying a thousand bucks, and then they'll never come back.

[00:23:38.790] - Big Rich Klein

Yeah, it can be really hard bidding a job by the hour. Exactly. You just never know what things you're going to run across with a build, whether it's lousy workmanship on previously, or rust, or whatever. You just You just can't always see everything.

[00:24:03.480] - John Williams

Every single day, I'm always making dollar adjustments. I don't know, I've always been my own worst enemy. When I first started out, I thought, you know what? I'd look and see what four wheel parts was selling Shox for in a magazine, and I was going to be two bucks cheaper than they were for everybody. It's just trying to learn how to make a living making $2 a shock. And figuring those things out, it was a lot of hard work.

[00:24:35.120] - Big Rich Klein

Everything that you did, work-wise, was under the Mount Logan to begin with?

[00:24:42.140] - John Williams

So I had Mount Logan. We opened for business in '97. In early 2000, I started realizing, as we make parts, and we had dry flange covers with Mount Logan and different things, worked with some of the machine, and had our logo put on stuff because when I built an Axel, I wanted it to be mine with my name on it where everybody saw and they knew right where that had come from. And then I realized that if I wanted to start selling parts to other people, I had to create a business or a name that was not like my shop, my store. We created Rockside Engineering in the early 2000s. We had a brand that we could sell to all the stores, all the stores could sell. It wasn't someone in Salt Lake selling a Mount Logan part. How many people think, Why don't I just go up to Mount Logan and get my work done? I wanted to have a brand that would be universal and sold at all shops. So we created Rockslide at that time.

[00:25:48.010] - Big Rich Klein

So you started Rockslide, and then you sold that separately, or how did all that work out?

[00:25:56.570] - John Williams

No. So I had been offered I heard an opportunity by Greg Miller to start an off-road shop working with him. I thought in my mind, I created this big wholesale distribution plan, being able to get parts direct into all the Miller companies, all the dealerships and things like that. I was like, Everybody set the bar of four parts. That's where that's success. That's where success was measured in what they were doing. I thought, Man, I could live a little bit of that or have some of that success if I to do that. In 2009, Greg wanted to start a business. So I put Mount Logan for sale. I actually gave Rockside away for free, not knowing that the guys that bought it, that's exactly what they wanted. They wanted Rockslide. So I gave Rockslide away for free in 2009, and that's when they really focused on growing Rockslide engineering. We created the shell design at our shop, but they brought the electronic step into our design at that time.

[00:27:02.430] - Big Rich Klein

So what did you build under the Rockslide name?

[00:27:06.510] - John Williams

We had bumpers, diff covers, and rocker bars. That's pretty much what we built.

[00:27:10.680] - Big Rich Klein

So you did all this on your own? Any partners or anything?

[00:27:15.270] - John Williams

By myself, yes.

[00:27:17.000] - Big Rich Klein

When did your brother step in?

[00:27:19.580] - John Williams

He was still in high school, and there was a lot of things that he did not… I could not take apart a locking hub and wheelbarries if my life depended on it. But I had somehow convinced Randy, the advanced four-wheel drive in Salt Lake to allow me to tow a Bronco down and spend a couple of days with the tech there who basically had read everything you could read about setting up Ring Opinions. I had just never done it. So he let me come down. I paid them their labor rate, and I helped do the work with one of the mechanics there. And he taught me the basics in and outs of doing Ring Opinions and setting gears That's where that became my specialty was doing gears. Nate would come over after school, disassemble the axial for me. I'd stay all night, do the gears, finish it up in the morning. He'd come back over after school and assemble the wheelings. I turned the job out the door. We've just been compatible in that aspect. My strong points are not his, and his are not mine. Together, we build a pretty amazing team from a knowledge and team.

[00:28:32.240] - Big Rich Klein

Well, it's great that you've been able to work with your brother that way, especially in those early years. How did you guys get into the competition scene?

[00:28:43.350] - John Williams

I had a friend to add a Bronco, and he had heard about that Farmington, New Mexico, competition in '99. He had a yellow Bronco, and he was like, We're going to build that Bronco. I basically closed the shop to the public for a month, and we spent that month building his Bronco to go to that first competition. And Nate had his orange Bronco, and we weren't committed. I really didn't know what it was going to be all about. So we went down there and did that competition, and we were hooked. The next year in 2000, we started competing with Nate's Orange Bronco. It was a very, very sad day. That thing was just an immaculate work of art, and it banging every panel But the competition bug is it takes over everything once you get started.

[00:29:36.790] - Big Rich Klein

That first event you went to, was that Cedar City, or did you get to the Farmington event that was before that?

[00:29:45.170] - John Williams

No, I think we only did… Well, that might have been our first one. I know we went to the Farmington one with the one Bronco, and the next event we went to had both the yellow and the orange Bronco there competing. And I don't remember if that was still in '99 or if it started out in 2000, but we were hooked at that point on. Basically, from then until today, every dollar we make is spent on competition.

[00:30:11.320] - Big Rich Klein

When you base your business around the competitions, I guess that's good for building your business, but it takes about every dollar you have, or it takes a lot of money to sustain that in time. And how many events and how long did you run?

[00:30:28.670] - John Williams

So we basically did everything, every event from that '99 to 2007. The last thing we finished up with the U-Rock Rock Cross series was when we decided that we were going to hang the hat up for competition for a little while. Right when the JK came out and I was like, We need to focus on making money, and this four-door Jeep is going to be a phenomenal platform. We just started going hard on that. Then we built a 2008 JK and ran that in the very first when King of the Hammers opened up to EMC. That's where we go to showcase what we can do building a normal car for a normal person. What our skillset is, that's where we try to go show the world where we're at, what we can do, and why you'd want to call us to talk about your Jeep build or your I'll go build or whatever it may be.

[00:31:32.620] - Big Rich Klein

So after Mount Logan and Rockslide, you're working with the Millers. How did all that get involved with getting out to Miller Motorsports Park?

[00:31:44.540] - John Williams

Well, we were getting started doing that, so it got a little bit off topic. In that time frame that I put the business for sale, that's when Larry got sick and passed away. And so Greg became the CEO of all the Miller companies, and I got pushed to the wayside. I ended up working out at the motor sports park two or three days a week as an off-road operations manager out there. I had signed a five-year 200-mile non-compet. I had to move to St. George to be able to keep doing off-road stuff. Basically, later that year, so I sold it in April or March of 2009. And by November of 2009, I had started Impulse Off-Road. But out of St. Coverage, so I could still build vehicles and still build stuff and then continued working at the track. We created a Get To Know Your Jeep program where it basically turned into dealer training, where we taught dealers how all the buttons work, how to use them, and how to be a more effective salesman. And then the program had coupons where the dealer could send the person that bought the Jeep out to the track so they could drive the...

[00:32:54.270] - John Williams

Our built Jeeps all had long arm kits, 37-inch tires, bumpers, winches, rocker guards, pretty well-built Jeeps. And so the goal was to allow people to come out and drive that built Jeep through the obstacles at Miller Motorsport Park and then realize if they went to get in the Jeep they just bought, they couldn't do anything. So my want was for the dealers to use it as a tool where they send someone out and then say, after you go to that class, come back and we'll build your Jeep how you want it. Knowing full well that after you did that class, you'd go back and you'd buy the bumpers, you'd buy the winch, you'd buy the rocker guards, the lift, the 37s, because it made you feel so confident, you knew the Jeep was capable of doing it, that you'd want to buy all those. I kept doing it, and it worked really, really well for me, except building vehicles and continuing on our growth and knowledge on building the Wrangler platform. But the dealers never really caught on to how to turn that into part sales. Then I figured, well, this is the Ford Performance Racing school, and Jeeps aren't Fords.

[00:34:03.180] - John Williams

And that was the time the raptor came out, and I was like, oh, man, I would really like to have a raptor. That would be pretty cool if I could have one. And so I worked with everybody at the Motorsport Park, Dan McKeever. They gave me the opportunity to pitch a raptor program to all the higher ups and executives from Ford when they came out to the track. And then we We created the RAPTAR Assault program together, which is still going strong today. We have RAPTAR Assault, Rancher RAPTAR Assault. I think the Bronco off rodeo is an extension, not through the Ford Racing School, but of a similar type event, but geared around the Broncos. That's how that program started. I don't know if I started it and started the idea in talking about it in 2011, and our first schools were in 2012.

[00:34:57.730] - Big Rich Klein

The Raptors are an incredible incredible platform that I enjoy having. I mean, I've got a 12, and I mean, I drive it everywhere. My Jeep now takes a second seat to everything and only is used on the trails and gets basically trailered everywhere.

[00:35:18.070] - John Williams

There's such amazing vehicles. If there was one vehicle, if you could only have one to do everything, that is hands down the vehicle to have.

[00:35:28.530] - Big Rich Klein

Being able to do the raptor assault class would probably be really good for all of those that don't understand the difference between the car trying to drive for you, and then you driving by the seat of your pants, being able to shut all those buttons off. It's like when I go off road or off pavement, it doesn't matter if it's dirt roads or whatever, the sand dunes, I start turning everything off. The only thing that goes on truly is the off road mode, just so that the shift pattern is better, especially in the sand dunes. But yeah, just an incredible vehicle and platform.

[00:36:10.580] - John Williams

Yeah, they're amazing. It's crazy. I always think back like the Gen 1 The RAPTR would tell you when you got to a point where it was unhappy or where it's like, Hey, don't keep going, or you're going to break something or hurt something or something not good is going to happen. And the Gen 2 added like 30 miles an hour to that. The Gen 3 is even more miles an hour. It That RAPTAR Assault program is a great way to get comfortable using all your buttons, looking at all the features that Ford Performance gave you and being able to manage and use that truck to its full capabilities. It's a phenomenal vehicle. It really is amazing how different the truck is in all the different modes and how you can really take advantage of it. But it makes a bad driver decent, a decent driver good, a good driver, phenomenal if you take advantage of the modes and learn how to use what you're given.

[00:36:59.540] - Big Rich Klein

So back to the rock crawling, rock racing. Your last event in the true rock crawling style was the U-Rock Rock Cross.

[00:37:14.430] - John Williams

Yeah, we finished. I think that was the last season, 2007. It ended after that as well.

[00:37:19.950] - Big Rich Klein

You know, Miller Motorsports Park, it was a pretty good location and a pretty great idea. They're just... You guys out in the office didn't really perform well, unfortunately. The guys at the track end of it did really well, but the accounting methods sure needed help. But it was a great place to compete at. We did four events there in two years. So, yeah, it was a great place.

[00:37:55.110] - John Williams

It was great times for sure. You had that fantastic park, and The conditions that you guys put out there really made it, gave it that extra element of hardcore and had the ability to really test some of those vehicles. Then when the short course came and sharing both those two courses together, that was just nothing short of amazing.

[00:38:15.150] - Big Rich Klein

What actually happened at Miller Motorsports Park with the transitions and everything going from where there seemed to be the Miller zoning it and everything seemed to be going smooth, and then all All of a sudden it was shut down and then reopened and court cases and all that stuff?

[00:38:36.910] - John Williams

Well, when the Miller family left the Motorsports Park, they gave it back to Touilla. They had a 99-year lease on it, and they walked away from the lease. It turned into Utah Motorsports campus. But Dan McKeever was given the opportunity to buy and take over all the assets for the Ford Performance Racing School. So he moved that off-site, but still in to Willa, and I remained involved with that ever since. We build the bed cages and light bar mountains for those trucks, help out with raptor rallies and events like that. And he's been an He's been an amazing partner and boss in being there, and I've got all sorts of ideas for the future, and hopefully those start coming to fruition for the Ford School. But it's been a phenomenal experience working with him and learning from him.

[00:39:30.790] - Big Rich Klein

That's awesome. I think that everybody that owns a Rapt or buys one, even if it's a used one, probably needs to get trained in what the vehicle can do. Let's talk about racing JOH. When did you start doing that?

[00:39:49.220] - John Williams

I think we raised the first two or three EMC years, and then we took some time off and we had the one JK We came back in with newer JKs, we went to 2014 and a 2016. So Nate and I built, I guess I should say Nate mostly built. We had identical JKs. We stretched the wheelbase and back half the frame on it, and we ran the 4,500 class. But one thing is when we've run hammers together, I think every time we've run together, we finish. When we run separate, we don't. And so it takes both of us and both our skillsets working together to finish hammers. And I know we ran two years, possibly three with those Jeeps. And I think the last... We got three years on the last year, we finished fifth place in the 4,500 class. And stock engine, stock transfer case, all it was was a stretch wheel base, basically stock class. Oil spring in the front still, JK. They worked phenomenal. Then after that, we started working with BF Goodrich in developing the Activeair central tire inflation system. We bought a 2021 JL and built that JL with the CTIs system under it and competed with that until we earned our way onto the Ford team.

[00:41:22.080] - John Williams

Now we're running Ford Bronco for Ford Performance.

[00:41:25.940] - Big Rich Klein

When did the Ford Performance part of that all Start and talk about that.

[00:41:33.800] - John Williams

So we got that. That happened. We got the Bronco last year. We got it last year, built it, and racing KOHA earlier this year was the first race without Bronco. We were trying to develop the central car inflation system for the Bronco, so we really didn't get started. In November, we found out we couldn't build it the way we needed to build it or couldn't get it done the we wanted. Basically, that Bronco was built in seven weeks and over 700 hours, and it turned out amazing.

[00:42:11.270] - Big Rich Klein

That's a pretty incredible turnaround and build time. When did the whole situation with Ford start?

[00:42:20.710] - John Williams

I'd raced Baha with the BF Goodrich performance team in the wide open classes. I think my first time doing that was in 2010. So I'd done that a few times. And so I'm not super well-versed, but I understood Baha and how to make Baha happen. Then in '23, before we started building the Bronco, Brad Lovewell asked us to be on the Ford performance team, and we ran the Raptor R in the 2023 Baha 1000. That was my first really big racing effort there. Not that the wide open program wasn't big. It was big and it was amazing. And I really look back, if we had never done... We'd gone to Baha' back in 2004. If you can't finish Baha, you never know how to do Baha. So being able to be on that 2010 wide open team and finish Baha and seeing all the elements it took to get from the start to the finish line, you gain a whole different perspective on what it takes to do that. And it really does go a long way in your ability to ever be competitive, you have to have a few things under your belt and finishing Baha is one of them.

[00:43:34.700] - John Williams

You realize you don't win and lose that race in the first 100 miles. It comes down to the last 2-3 miles, generally. It's how do you manage, mitigate risk, and make sure that car is staying together and doesn't have any issues to have a smooth race from start to finish to really be able to win.

[00:43:56.380] - Big Rich Klein

Running the wide open cars in Baja, you guys had your own chase crews, or that's a really good program for people to get a start in. What was all that about?

[00:44:08.240] - John Williams

They had a Chase team, but BF Goodrich found soon enough that the chase teams were following the slower cars because they couldn't have to backtrack back to get them. So BFG actually had between two and three chase trucks that would chase that car down the peninsula or if we were doing a loop race, but we had everything covered. And it got a point, too, where we did all of our prep work. So we would show up early. We would go through and do all the CVs, check all the bolts, paint mark, so that the car, when it raced, it met all of our expectations. And that was an awesome thing that why Great Open allowed us to do. But again, it's learning. It's like, Okay, what type of things do you have to do and check on your vehicle to ensure that you have a car that's put together well enough to finish? It's been amazing watching the Husmans and Lovell put to get these vehicles and the work that they do. It's second to none. It's nothing short of amazing to be a part of that program and the durability testing. It speaks volume to Ford.

[00:45:11.080] - John Williams

When we go out, we have to durability test at a bare minimum the exact miles that the race is without issue before we're okay to race. I've gained so much respect for Ford and learned so much in how they go through and do that. It's just been an awesome experience to be involved in.

[00:45:31.220] - Big Rich Klein

Those wide open cars, what teams and who are the names that you got to compete with in the wide open class at Baja?

[00:45:39.580] - John Williams

So Brad and Roger Lovell, both did. Lance Clifford, Larry McRay, Kyle Tucker from Detroit Speed. We call him ACP, Andrew Comery-Picard, who does a whole lot of development testing, doing a lot of stuff with Arctic Trucks, doing some crazy explorations. He was on it. There was other guys earlier. They're a lot more varied. I remember the year I went down in 2010, I was not on the BFG team. I was just helping wide open team out. Casey Curry, a lot of good names have really done a lot of learning in Baja with the wide open program. It's pretty amazing the way they put that together.

[00:46:22.320] - Big Rich Klein

I'm going to put you on the spot with all those people that you've ridden with or drove with or teamed up with. Who would be probably, you say, the best driver?

[00:46:34.210] - John Williams

Oh, man. Everybody had their own, their strong suits. I learned a lot. I forgot to mention Brian Finch. He is an autocrosser. From our side of things in building stock class, you tend to be on the, I wouldn't say timid side, but the safer, conservative side. He really pushed me and got me going a whole lot faster. But I I think the last two or three times I did at Kyle Tucker was my navigator, and I really love being with him. But everybody always had their strong suits. Lance and Larry were always super competitive and did very, very well. Brad Lovewell, I mean, hands down, if you go ride with Brad in the desert, there are not many people that memorize dirt and know how to make that car do what it can do, whether it's a wide open car or a Ford vehicle like Brad Lovewell can. So if I was going to say, I would say he is the top So your races down in Baja, what was the one besides this last year?

[00:47:39.290] - Big Rich Klein

What was the one race that stood out the most?

[00:47:45.360] - John Williams

So my first win as driver of record with the BFG team was super memorable. All the emotional ups and downs. I would always been. Oftentimes, we were doing entire development testing for BF Goodrich, we had two teams, and I just kept getting unlucky and being on the team where there was an issue with the car. We didn't win, even though one of the cars won, it wasn't mine. And so finally, I hadn't gone and done wide open for a while. Then I'd come back after having kids, and Jeff Cummins put me as driver of record and be able to get win that year. So my first Baha win as driver of record is always going to go down. There was another time where Bud Brutsman was able to pick the team, and Bud picked us, and I out with Roger Lovelle, and we had this section where it had the tropical storms had come in, and we were specifically told, You have to follow the GPF line here. It was dark. We'd come up over the hill, the The GPS line was straight, and I was just staring. I knew where we were, and I was just staring at the GPS.

[00:48:51.680] - John Williams

We started veering off to the left. I'm like, Hey, Roger, you need to get back to the right. He's like, Look ahead. I look ahead, and our map wasn't corrected. We drove right out in the middle of a lake bed, and it was literally thousands and thousands of feet on any way you look, left, right, front or back, before we could get solid land, and we sunk that car. I remember him, Rogers, we're done. We can't get out. I was like, I am not telling Bud Brutsman we're done. He's waiting at that next pit. We are not done. Keep in mind, before that, I'd had a bolt strip out on the upper arm into the knuckle, so we had to We had to replace that part of the suspension. We had a transmission go out and had to replace the transmission. Then here we are, way late, and now we're stuck in the middle of a swampy Lake bed. I got out, got the jack out, pulled the tire off. I picked that car up, put the traction boards under it, and the car would literally drive one foot past the traction board and sink again.

[00:49:53.630] - John Williams

I kept doing that, and I was swimming in the stinkiest, nastiest Baha mud I've ever been in in my life. Then I started thinking, I was like, wait a minute. If I air down, I'm going to have a bigger contact patch, and we're going to float a little bit. I grabbed a tool. I just started airing the tires down and kicking it. I air them down on both sides, jacked it back up, put it on the boards, and we made it like eight feet. I was like, Oh, this is awesome. I did it like three times, and then finally, I was like, I air down. I was like, That's as soft as I... Because we still had 45 miles to go once we got unstuck. I was out there with traction boards, the tire, the jack, and I get him set up, get him on it. I put the jack back in the car, and he takes off, and he starts going. I'm like, Go, go, go. So I'm still out in the middle of the lake bed. I have to carry pushing the tire, carrying the traction boards, and just waiting through that nasty stuff.

[00:50:53.130] - John Williams

But we got unstuck and we were able to deliver the car back to Bud, and he was able to get it to the finish line. So it ended up being amazing. But the whole time that was going on, why do I subject myself to this? Why am I doing this? Why am I here? Ten minutes after you get to the pit, you're like, I can't wait for next year. I can't wait to come back and do this all over again. And so it's just one of those things that you get tortured. We were 18 hours in our section, and it's like, why would I do that to myself? But then when you're done, you can't wait to do it all over again.

[00:51:23.050] - Big Rich Klein

Those trials and tribulations are one of the allures to Baha. Did Bud know why you were so late?

[00:51:31.140] - John Williams

Oh, he was well aware. I mean, he heard the calls out for 3,000 feet of tow rope. I had literally walked to a stuck car, and I was like, Can you guys help get us out? He's like, No. He's like, There's no way. I was like, I'm barely able to get myself out. I can't drive around. I can't drive out to the middle. I can't get you out. And it was either just be stuck there and wait for hours for the wide open teams to catch up. They had Hummers and cars and things. But I still don't know how they would have got us out. It would have been just a bigger team effort of Aaron down and doing what we were doing to get out, but we made it.

[00:52:03.710] - Big Rich Klein

So you just had to keep going forward. There was no way to just back out of it?

[00:52:07.950] - John Williams

Yeah, we were veering off to the leg. Yeah, we couldn't back. Backtrack was not. We were so far out there. We didn't even think about going backwards, to be honest. That never registered. It was just go forward and get out of where we were. It was so bad. It just sunk right to the belly pan, just sat down right on it. I had to bury the tire, put the on the tire to pick the car up because it was the only thing big enough. It would sink quite a bit, and it would start picking the car up and get it tall enough to put the traction boards under. And I was like, I was not giving up. I was not going to be the one that didn't give Bud Brutsman his car.

[00:52:44.690] - Big Rich Klein

What What's your most memorable story from KOH?

[00:52:49.330] - John Williams

Oh, man, KOH is full of stories. First story in, I had the... First time we raced, I had this weld. When the axel was built I welded the C on, the weld cracked. I was like, five miles in, I couldn't steer anymore, and the driver tire was turning left to right, and the knuckle had rolled forward. So when the passenger side was steering, it was falling over on itself. And we stuck had jack handle onto the tie rod and spun that thing around and pulled the onboard welder out and got weld on there well enough that we got to the rough stuff pit, and they welded that thing like nobody's business. And we still were able to finish that first DMC hammers. And that was a phenomenal year. Memorable years this past year, running the Bronco for the first time after seven weeks of nearly killing yourself and all the efforts the Fort engineers put in. We were in a solid third place in the last two rock trails. We didn't ever have time to pre-run. And I had left-right options in the last two trails, and I went left on both of them. And the way we were supposed to go was right.

[00:54:01.580] - John Williams

And I watched vehicles that ended up being third and fourth past me in those sections. And I know when we got out of the last rock trail, the one car that got fourth was 10 minutes ahead of us. And I drove that thing like I wasn't given up. We ended up beating them to the finish line after they were that far ahead of us. And it's not that far. I don't know if it's 10 miles or what it is when you come on those trails, run down the backside of the desert, and then down the trail and in. And I just gave it all that thing I had, but I still came up two and a half minutes or so short from getting fourth place. But that was memorable just being part of the Ford performance team and being the first Bronco that was of the privateer Broncos, not the first three that Ford built to finish hammers. So that was an awesome experience. Hoping for even better ones this next hammer. Hopefully, we'll have everything a lot more dialed in and be ready to go and really compete.

[00:54:59.790] - Big Rich Klein

And You raced Baha this last year as well, too, right? With Ford?

[00:55:03.840] - John Williams

Mm-hmm. A month ago. Last year, we had the long run, Peninsula run from the bottom back to the top. So our section was like 465 miles or something. And that was amazing. But it took like 12 hours all through the night and into the next morning. And this year, we were driving the Ranger Raptor and with Bayly Campbell and Lauren Healey. We drove all night in that, but it took me... That course was so rough. It was dang near 10 hours to go 200 of the 283 miles that we had to go. It was everything I could. It was nonstop. Left foot on the break, right foot on the gas, both hands on the wheel. The only time I got to relax or not worry about getting stuck or having an issue was we had 60 miles of pavement and everything else, tractor trail, Matomi We had a fight for everything we had in that. But it was amazing nonetheless. The way Ford puts a car together, Husman and Loevels work and dedication to making sure those cars are right. I mean, it was just crazy. He taking stock cars. I always figured that you'd push the rules a little bit, and Ford holds true to everything.

[00:56:22.490] - John Williams

We run stock cars, and there's no cheating, there's no putting this in instead of that. It's really a testament to the heritage of Raptor, what it is and its ability to perform in the most extreme environments.

[00:56:38.450] - Big Rich Klein

On a team like that, do you get a chance to pick what section you want to drive, or is it assigned mind? What's the deal with that?

[00:56:47.950] - John Williams

I think it was the top guys, Brian Novak at Ford Performance, Brad Lovel and Lauren. I think they all talk and know everybody's strong suits and put people where they're going to serve the race the best. It works out. I really actually love driving at night. It's my favorite. I love being focused on what you can see in front of you. You don't get lost in the beauty of Baja, which isn't good or bad. But driving at night, you're zoned in, and I love driving at night. It's one of my favorites.

[00:57:25.650] - Big Rich Klein

Being able to drive at night would be nice. I know I couldn't do it because of wearing contacts or glasses, and my vision wouldn't be good at night. But what strategy goes into getting your race laid out and ready to run?

[00:57:50.190] - John Williams

So we really, with the four group, that's one thing we did. We break up in our individual groups. We're able to set with the time frame that we have, where we want to run, what terrain runs there. We look at where all the silt is. We try to plan extra time to really strategize in the silt to make sure that you're not getting stuck. You're not going to be one of the cars that stay stuck there or doesn't finish the race because they couldn't get out. So we really put a lot of effort into knowing where to go, where to be, what to do. And so that's amazing. We always will run at night. And you see everything looks a little bit different at night. So you want to be like master Make sure what you can in the day, make sure you can run it in the night so you recognize whether it's formations and features that help dictate where you are, when there's big turns coming or things that... There's a lot of things you want to read ahead of the GPS. And so We're trying to identify those and pick out features in the land that signify that you're getting close to that.

[00:58:51.160] - John Williams

You're not relying solely on the navigator to tell you. You're just able to make decisions a lot faster. The ability to decide fast and fast at the end of the day is what makes you go from a normal driver to a fast driver, is that ability to process information.

[00:59:08.470] - Big Rich Klein

Basically, if you're always running at night, are you pre-running at night as well, or just memorizing through the day and then racing at night?

[00:59:18.610] - John Williams

Yeah.

[00:59:20.510] - Big Rich Klein

Let's talk a little bit about what you got going on with your own business and how that all works into with the Ford program and Jeeps and that stuff. Big stuff?

[00:59:30.820] - John Williams

Big things that we have is we've been fortunate to get involved with POS Performance, which is Post Malone's dad and him. And we build a lot of Ford vehicles for them, and we're building a raptor R to race the Mint 400 as a collaboration with Ford Performance, POS Performance, and us. So we just took delivery of that truck yesterday, so we'll get started working on that next week. Hammers Prep. So Hammers is a big deal, mint 400. Is a big deal. Then the Ultra 4 West Series, having some events back in Moab, a lot of great events for that this coming year. Then the Nevada 600 with unlimited off-road racing. A lot of really good races coming up and a lot of great things to be involved in. Being able to run a Bronco and a Raptr R is going to be a phenomenal opportunity for us.

[01:00:21.450] - Big Rich Klein

All your racing now is wrapped around the Ford performance and the Ford brand. So talk a little bit about Post Malone and what you got going with him, if you can, a little more deeply.

[01:00:38.020] - John Williams

Awesome guy, loves vehicles. First truck we did for him was a Dually with with Kelderman suspension and delivered it to his house, taught him how all the buttons work so he could use everything that he had on it. Then I really started to become really good friends with his dad, and we redid the 6x6 for eBay for SEMA a few years ago. Then pretty much ever since that, we've always got two projects in the shop. For him, we work a lot with Kamberg and Magnaflow. We've built him two super duties, two-door Soco, Ford or Bronco, four-door Bronco, Bronco-Raptor. And the next projects we have coming back is the final, the extra stuff on the Bronco, RAPTOR, and its Raptor R. And so he's a Ford fanatic, and we get just built some pretty awesome machines for him.

[01:01:33.130] - Big Rich Klein

It's pretty awesome to have a client like that, that you get to do whatever needs to be done.

[01:01:41.250] - John Williams

It is. It's a good feeling to know when there's people that seemingly have everything, that you're able to do something that they care about, that's what they want to do when they come home and have time off. And his dad is just an outstanding, just an awesome guy. There's not many people out there better than Well, that's cool.

[01:02:02.020] - Big Rich Klein

You just never know with celebrities how they're really going to be until you hear a story like yours and the Malones. That's pretty cool. So coming up, what do you got going on? And What places do you like racing?

[01:02:19.430] - John Williams

Yeah, the Mint 400 is, when you look at all the facets of making an off-road event more than just the raced, the Mint really does that. I really love working with them Martellies, and being able to go down Fremont Street and talk to customers and have vendor displays, and then the VIP area, the short course, all the activation stuff they're doing, they really got that figured out. You just look at all the other promoters and they need to capture on that. And I love what the Martellies are doing with paying back to the drivers. One of the simplest things that really is big for me is when they do a so and so is coming, and they put your picture up, and they're giving back to you saying, This person's committed to come run our race. We're letting everybody know he's coming. It's just simple things like that that really go the extra mile for me to go out and say, Hey, everybody, look, we're going to go race to the 400. They care enough about it. They collaborate with us on post. They do things, and they're telling the world that we're coming to race their race, and nobody else does that.

[01:03:21.710] - John Williams

That's something that I really, really appreciate from them.

[01:03:24.620] - Big Rich Klein

Besides those that you've gotten to work with, what is it that has really kept you going in off-road?

[01:03:30.840] - John Williams

I don't know. I'm just so grateful to have had so many years in the off-road industry to have been able to be part of, I call it the revolution of rock crawling. In the late '99 and early 2000s, when Moon Buggies came about and John Nelson and everybody's idea. I'm grateful for John Gillland for giving us a chance to build the K2 for him and what we learned doing that, and really the great friendships and relationships that we've made over the years. It's really a family, not just a regular community. We're all family. We're all out to do a good job, friends off the course, really good friends, still competitors on course, but always willing to help out. I look at every other facet of my life that isn't I've been with off-road racing, and I want to bring it in. I'm bringing a group of guys that bought my old race Jeep. They started a race team, and I'm coaching them and pushing them along. I've got all my other customers. I tell them about, When you're sitting in the middle of Baja, and it's you and your navigator, and in my case, Nate and I sitting out there, there's nobody around to help us.

[01:04:36.770] - John Williams

It's on him to give me the information. I take the information. I make the right decisions. If we have an issue, it's on us to get that car back on the road and get going. It's like from a team building or bonding experience, desert racing, there's nothing quite like that out there. I love sharing that with people and trying to bring more people in to the racing community because it's something that I I don't see anywhere else. I don't see guys out playing basketball that have that type of real camaraderie because they never had to fight for something together. We're relied on all they had to make or break something. It's just awesome. Every bit of off-road racing, whether it's rock crawling, whether it's short course racing, you get that. It's a team effort on everybody's heart, and you win and lose as a team. It's just an awesome place to be.

[01:05:29.100] - Big Rich Klein

What would your advice What advice be to somebody that wants to get started in off-road, whether it be rock crawling or racing or whatever? What would your advice to them be?

[01:05:41.260] - John Williams

I think the biggest thing is to start small and to going with... It's not that stock class cars are cheap to build, and if you find an older one, they can be cheap, but it's managing your skillset with the vehicle. I have so many people and friends, they decided the trophy trucks are where everybody wants to or the 6100 spec trucks. And I said, they buy one and they realize, I don't have the skillset to do what that truck can do and what's asked of me. They jump in and they don't perform or they break or they think they're going to die. And it's looking at a stock class. And I look at the Ford platform. One of the things that we're working on, we haven't got it underway yet, but we're building stock class Range RAPTors, and we're going to start there. I'm going to try to get five people committed where we build K stage, ready to race Range of Raptors. They go out and race, they get comfortable, they learn the skills they have to have, they learn how to manage less suspension travel. Then from that, I want to graduate people into those cars, then have them move to V6 Raptors, get comfortable doing that, and then maybe move to RAPTOR R's when they finally have and can manage the horsepower with their...

[01:06:50.790] - John Williams

Have enough driving skill to keep the car where it needs to go. But really bringing back the stock class build, taking an OE manufacturer that builds a phenomenal platform, which is doing the modifications and then being... So every shop in the country could take a Range of RAPTAR, do an internal cage, put the safety equipment in, and you go out and you race and you learn to have fun and let the Range of to take place in the VW. And so that's something that I would coach someone because there's that old name, the quickest way to become a millionaire, off-road racing and start out as a billionaire. And that is true. If you don't You do things right and you don't have the right people lined up, you're just dishing out money right and left. You don't know who's fleecing you, who's taking advantage of you. You didn't build it, you didn't figure it out. And then you're not going to be competitive because those other guys are in that class were either born and bred and grew up racing, or there are guys that have put a whole lot more time and effort. And money can't buy skill, money can't buy time, money can't buy effort.

[01:07:54.180] - John Williams

And those are the things that you've got to be willing to do, is you've got to be willing to go above and beyond what everybody else is. And running, doing a stock class platform like that is really the best way to get into it.

[01:08:07.950] - Big Rich Klein

Well, John, I really want to say that I'm glad that we were finally able to get this episode recorded and talk about what you've been able to do. I know you got to have a lot more stuff coming up here in the future, but I'm glad we were able to get this part of it done.

[01:08:26.960] - John Williams

I'm glad, too. I kept wondering at what point you were going to write me off and then tell me that I don't deserve it anymore for all the effort you put in that hasn't come to fruition. So I'm glad you stuck in there with me and gave me the chance to tell our story and a little bit about us and what we have going on. And I thank you for everything you do and participating with Off-Road Motorsports Hall of Fame. That's a goal I for sure have one day is to hopefully be able to make it there and do the things I need to do now to be a legacy in Off-Road for everybody and especially for my son.

[01:09:00.300] - Big Rich Klein

Well, one of the things that you have to remember about the Off-Road Motorsports Hall of Fame is that you can get there on wins, but it's what you give back to the community has a strong influence on who that person is that gets into the hall. And I just want to say, work toward that and you'll get there. Well, John, thank you. It's for all the good words and thank you for the stories. I wish you the best of luck coming up in the future. I know we'll keep in touch, and I'm always watching what you're doing. So have a good one and thank you.

[01:09:44.290] - John Williams

That's great. And so thank you again for everything you do. Thank you to Ford Performance and BF Goodrich tires for believing in me and letting Nate and I go out and represent those brands and try to do the best that we can. And so it's a great place to be. But thank you, thank you for everything.

[01:10:00.680] - Big Rich Klein

Bye-bye now.

[01:10:02.400] - John Williams

Thank you.

[01:10:04.240] - Big Rich Klein

Well, that's another episode of Conversations with Big Rich. I'd like to thank you all for listening. If you could do us a favor and leave us a review on any podcast service that you happen to be listening on, or send us an email or a text message or a Facebook message, and let me know any ideas that you have, or if there's anybody that you have that you think would be a great guest, please forward the contact information to me so that we can try to get them on. And always remember, live life to the fullest. Enjoying life is a must. Follow your dreams and live life with all the gusto you can. Thank you.