Up next in 10
During the National Corvette Museum's Michelin Bash, your CORVETTE TODAY host, Steve Garrett along with Keith Cornett from CorvetteBlogger got a chance to talk with Sting Ray Robb from IndyCar.
Sting Ray (and yes, that is he real name) is a terrific 22 year old racing in the IndyCar Series and comes from a family of Corvette lovers!
Steve and Keith talk to him about IndyCar, how he got his name and much more.
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so Keith cornet Corvette blogger I've
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got Steve Garrett from Corvette Today
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podcast and Stingray Rob who is an indie
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car driver and he is at the National
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Corvette Museum and we'd love to hear
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what you did here today so why why don't
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you just kind of fill us in about your
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day here yeah so we got a tour of the
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museum and then we also had a little bit
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of a trivia my dad is a big Corvette guy
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and so he obviously had all the answers
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to all the questions but um he gave me a
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chance to answer first on some of them
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which is kind of funny just because all
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the information I know comes from him
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I'm just reg getting the answers that
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gotten over the years but um it was
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still really fun and it was cool to see
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the upgrades they've made to the museum
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as well the last few years because it's
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been a while since I've been here 2014 I
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think was a sinkhole 2016 was when I was
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here so they were still working on
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Renovations um but they had the exhibit
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with all the cars that had been in the
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sinkle still out at that time so seems
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like they're doing some good things kind
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of opening it up the stingr grill we
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went and ate lunch there today so that
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was good it got a stingray Burger a good
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you have to it was a requirement for me
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and I I I like I didn't know that I had
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so many things named after me this is
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great got to love it right yeah talk
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about your season so far how's it
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starting it's been a rough season so far
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A little bit but it's the way that
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Motorsports go we're in one of the most
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competitive Series in the world um I
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mean indie car racing is it's the top of
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entertainment as well as competitive
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natur so um last race was really good we
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just finished up at Long Beach Grand Pre
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and I finished 18th after starting I
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think it was 25th so moved up some spots
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um and it just matter building momentum
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the team I'm with this year is aj4
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racing and there's a lot of new guys on
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the team and so that's have to say that
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they're inexperienced they have a lot of
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experience but we need to come together
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as a team and so we're still learning
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the systems that we need to have inside
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our unit um of practices that we need to
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have and place systems we need to have
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in place and just how to build
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relationships one I mean I think that's
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an underestimated part of the successful
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team it's the relationship to connection
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you have because the way you communicate
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can affect how you perform I mean you
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can have the same tools as everyone else
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but if you're not working together
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you're not going to have a good you
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looking forward to the 500 I am always
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it's got to be great I just saw the
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series on Netflix I think called 100
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days to Indie to Indie yeah fabulous
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never seen it before that is kind of
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like the the Indie Car version of drive
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to survive isn't it it's a great way to
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show the personalities it was fantastic
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it was really really great I enjoyed it
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I just binge through the whole thing and
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that's why I asked about the 500 coming
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up it's a great thing yeah now you're in
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the number 41 car that's correct and AJ
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fyd obviously Legend at Indie and all
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over I think you got to start racing
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Corvettes back in the day he might have
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and uh your car I understand um uh
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you're very Christian you have a a
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livery on it it's about prayer would you
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tell us about that yeah so pray.com is
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my title sponsor this year and the cool
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thing about that is it's a unique
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opportunity where most drivers don't get
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because usually your on track Mission M
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Graces for whatever hear the startup
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back um I po this way I little bit um
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but you you see the opportunity of like
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a brand coming on board for the on track
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mission right but being with pr.com we
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have combined off track and OnTrack
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missions they believe in what I want to
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achieve that's cool as far as my life
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mission goes and they also support me in
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doing my success on the RAC trck so um
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it's a really cool thing I mean
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prayer.com is a great app that is trying
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to help people make prayer priority name
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of their game so what's the next race
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coming up next one is in Birmingham
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Alabama okay at Barber Motorsports Park
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nice yeah great track I love it there
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the first couple races have been Street
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courses right you raced at St Pete and
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then Long Beach is this the first track
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course you're now going to get on the
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season and then we did do the thermal
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race which was kind of an exhibition
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race a little bit um so non points but
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this is our first official points race
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at a permanent road course you like road
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courses or ovals better I like road
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courses I like turning right every once
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in a while turning right on oval
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something is
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not it's just feels weird doesn't it it
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does yeah that's cool that's cool now I
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read your bio your 24 right now but 22
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22 wow but you've been racing since five
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or six yep and uh tell us about starting
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like that obviously your dad is a
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Motorsports person and got you involved
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and yeah I uh it's kind of funny my name
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is a big teller of how I got my passion
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obviously they were big Corvette fans
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but when I was like three I had my pedal
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powered Corvette and I upgraded my
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battery powered Corvette which was a c6r
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and then um when I was about 4 I asked
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my parents for a go-kart and so so fifth
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birthday rolls around I see it sitting
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in the garage on the floor and I shout
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with as much energy as I could I've
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waited my whole life to be five um so
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you can see I had a passion from an
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early age that's really cool yeah
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because everybody in your profession
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started with carding at an early age too
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yeah how many years did you do the
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carding I did it from the time I was 5
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until I was about 14 wow and then I made
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that transition around 14 15 years old
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are you finding a lot of guys in indie
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car doing the same thing growing up
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through caring oh yeah really absolutely
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cuz I know that's Formula 1 style I
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didn't know if that was in the car as
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well yeah every once in a while you'll
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see a dirt track guy come in from like
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quarter M or Sprints something like that
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um that's less likely because we we have
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to have that road racing background yeah
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um the ovals they're good and you have
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to have experience in those but it's a
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lot easier to adapt from road racing to
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ovals than it is from ovals to road
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racing just a different technique
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different driving style um and if you do
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the road racing you you have more
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flexibility it seems like maybe not as
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nuanced maybe not as good as some of the
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ovals but you can you can kind of hold
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your own that's really cool well welcome
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back to the museum it's great to have
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you now did your dad grow up with
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Corvettes as well did he have Corvettes
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before he had you oh yeah he had them a
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long time before me I I was the Nam sake
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to came after all of the passion so um I
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know that he's restored quite a few c2s
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are kind of his bread and butter okay um
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which personally and that makes sense CU
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Stingray is started well he spells it
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Stingray not not Stingray two words two
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words so how was it growing up with a
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name like that it was fun was it I got
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plenty of nicknames to go along with it
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um it was what it was it's really cool
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there a conversation piece it is that's
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for sure now one of our friends uh Lance
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Miller he puts on these group of
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Corvette shows in Pennsylvania called
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Carlile and uh he his daughter's middle
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name is Corvette oh really I know that
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Ella Corvette it's actually kind of
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funny my mom always jokes if I had been
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a girl my name would be Corey vet so I'm
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thankful that I was not a girl that's
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funny yeah well thanks for being here
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yeah this is a great conversation and
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good luck for the season we're going to
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be watching and uh you know they do
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these things occasionally and I love
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covering them where they'll put like
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between races especially when um the
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Corvette is a pace car they'll put like
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an experience driver with a rookie and
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they do the course and they talk about
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it and stuff and it makes for a great
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video so you know try to get in on one
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of those we love to see you there love
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to and of course you know the pros
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trying to uh scare the the rookie a
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little bit so always always little shade
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yeah all right well thank you so much
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ding Ray thank you appreciate it thanks
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a lot that was fun
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