Patrick Dempsey on the Kevin Harvick’s Happy Hour Podcast

INTRO

Patrick Dempsey: I remember, like you said like I think that second day it all came back and I was like, “God, this is what I want to do. I want to get back in the car.” There’s a part of me that is alive again that was dormant, that I just didn’t feel the same.

SHORT OPENING TITLES

Kevin Harvick: Welcome to Kevin Harvick’s Happy Hour, presented by EchoPark Automotive and NASCAR on Fox. And today we have a very unique interview with Patrick Dempsey, who is an American actor and race car driver. A newly rejuvenated race car driver and he has a new documentary coming out on FS1, Destined to Drive: Patrick Dempsey’s Return to Racing which premieres Sunday, March 16th at 7pm Eastern on FS1.
Well Patrick, thanks for taking the time today to come on Happy Hour. And I got to tell you, when I went to Sonoma, well let me back up just for the audience. I went to Sonoma last year and you guys were running the Porsche and you had one of your race weekends, and you guys allowed me to come and kind of be a part of everything that you were doing that weekend as a part of the documentary that you guys were shooting to talk about your venture back into racing. So let’s just start with Sonoma. I know we spent some time walking around the racetrack, we spent some time talking. How did it go? Did any of the…did anything that we talked about even apply to what you were doing?

PD: Well it made a huge difference. I mean, it gave me, number one: it was great spending some time with you in person, getting your feedback, getting your coaching, getting to know you. I’ve always been a fan of your racing it was a real honour for me that you took the time to come and gave me some coaching, which was great. So, my real issue was entering into turn one, carrying the momentum, where to place the car, where was the grip and you really helped explain that to me. And we had a great weekend. A really good qualifying, built my confidence after that. Once I got the entry to the first corner, that whole first sector started to come to me and I started developing the rhythm and I could find the grip and qualifying was really good. We did three races that weekend or four races that weekend, qualified really well and then we ended wining one of the races so that was exciting and we were on the podium in the endurance race too. So yeah, it was tremendous. I wish we had more time to walk around the entire track, I think I could have picked up more time.

KH: Well, I’d love to, I’d love to come back. I really have been excited about being able to venture out to different forms of racing and meet different people. And the one intriguing part to me…Well, first, tell me, tell me first how you got into racing and how that started and then you kind of had a hiatus there for 8 or 9 years and now you’re back. So, kind of walk us through everything of how you got into racing and then why you stopped and then we can get into the piece of why you started again.

PD: Yeah so my father was a team owner. He had a little car that he ran, did some short track racing in Maryland, in that area. So I always grew up with a family that loved racing. So we were always watching the big races on TV, like Indy and certainly Daytona, Monaco Grand Prix, the stuff that was televised. I mean, at that time in the 70s, you didn’t get as much coverage other than the big races, and that’s where the passion for racing started. I also did a lot of ski racing. That was my real dream as a kid, was to be a ski racer and to eventually get to the Olympics. I ended up winning the Maine State Championship in slalom. So my real hero as a kid was Ingemar Stenmark and so racing was always something that I loved, I always would watch the races on the weekend. And one of my first gifts that my wife had given me was a Skip Barber three-day competition certificate to do the school up at Laguna Seca and that started it. And then I did, I went to a kids fundraising event at Road America with Don Panoz and the I ended up doing the Panoz Racing School, the their racing series and this is probably around 2003 or 4. And then that started to get the ball rolling, went into the KONI Challenge, raced with Ford in that and then started moving up. So that’s where it started with always the goal to get to Le Mans, but that’s how it began. I was always a fan and I think that my wife looks back now and goes “I wish I hadn’t given you that certificate” because that really opened the Pandora’s box. And then I raced pretty competitively up until about 2015, did a full season in the WEC with Porsche. I had a programme with Mazda for several years as well. But the goal was always to get on the podium at Le Mans. I remember the first time I went over there, I walked up and down, you know, pit lane and I was like “God I really want to race here someday.” And that was my goal and it took me about 8 years or 5 or 6, about 7 or 8 years to get to do the first race there, which was in 09, I think or something like that.

KH: So you had this dream to go to Le Mans, you live that out basically and you accomplish that and then you take some time off and you come back. So why come back? Why come back to race? Why come back and do what you kind of didn’t do for several years? Because that’s not easy. I know just from taking the several months off that I took and then getting back in Kyle Larson’s Cup car last year just for practice, it felt like things were going a million miles an hour; I felt completely out of place and it took pretty much the whole time just to be able to breathe correctly. So tell me, why come back? Where did that gap come from in your time off and what was the desire and the final reason to come back and get back in the car?

PD: Well the reason to stop was I reached my goals and I couldn’t justify the sacrifice that I needed to make, you know, with my family and you know and I know you know this and I know you look at the teams that are on the road so many months out of the year, it’s really damaging to your family, your family’s travelling with you. And I couldn’t justify the sacrifice anymore. I had an opportunity to continue on, but at the same time, I felt like, you know what, once we had won in Japan I could feel something internally snap going, you know, this is the end. You got to get back, you got to be a father, I’ve done what I wanted to do. I couldn’t justify the sacrifice anymore, which was the right choice, you know. I had achieved my goal, I didn’t have the same fire that I had before that was driving me and I was much happier being at home. I had been working simultaneously on a show that was very demanding and doing the racing programme and it was just nice to be home, to be a dad. And as you know, I see you at the track with your son, you know what it’s like. It’s like once you’ve accomplished things on a personal level to see your children and to be with your family and to help them, there’s so much more joy in that in many ways so that was the reason I stopped. And then my kids were getting older and my boys, one of my sons, Darby, is like “You know, you should get back into it Dad. You know, you really miss it.” And I think when I started on the Ferrari film with Michael Mann, they asked me to come in and to be a part of that and to do all the driving and then that reignited things. But to your point, I couldn’t believe how everything had slowed down for me, you know. Everything felt so fast. It took me a long time to get back up to speed. Number one, physically, just my neck, my body. I don’t think people realise the physical strength that you need in endurance, that you need in those muscles to get back up to speed. But once I had enough seat time, things sort of popped and opened up again where I was like “Okay now I’m getting back to the same feeling.” And then there was an opportunity to run the Carrera Panamericana with Porsche in the GT4 and TAG Heuer had a programme that they wanted to do and I started doing some testing with John Wright and his team at Road America. And I remember, like you said, like I think that second day it all came back and I was like “God this is what I want to do. I want to get back in the car.” There’s a part of me that is alive again that was dormant, that I just didn’t feel the same. The level, I think, of concentration, of consciousness, of just the camaraderie. And then just, you know, the competitive spirit is reawakened. And the we discussed “How can we put a programme together for 2024 and what would be the best place to go?” And we started to do the endurance challenge, which is a semi-cup with Porsche, the GT4s and the Cup cars and that’s how it started.

KH: So you talk about the physical side and for me racing over the last…especially on the Cup side, racing has changed so much from the data, simulators, simulation, all the things that you do. And I know sports car racing has had a little bit more of that than NASCAR probably did recognisably anyway for the last, you know, 15 years. But over the last 10 years, you know, it really has changed in Cup and it’s all data driven. And one of the interesting pieces that I gathered from you while I was there, I spent a ton of time in the simulator getting used to the new car, developing the simulator, developing the tires in my time in the Cup series and you can’t do that. You don’t, you don’t feel well on the simulator, correct?

PD: I get motion sickness in the simulator and it’s a real disadvantage because you have so many people that have the ability to work the simulator, they understand the line, the braking zones, I mean you don’t have the physicality but at least you have the visual and you have those references so you’re up to speed immediately. And you can see these kids and people that spend a lot of time on the sim and they get in the car they’re quick right away, as for me it’s going to take me at least one or two sessions to get back up to speed and then I really have to dive into the data and look at where I can go deeper in the brake zones, where am I, am I applying the throttle at the right time, all of that stuff. So it’s very challenging for me that’s why I need to be racing much more on a consistent level because I don’t have that tool to use. I’ve always had an issue, even as a little kid I would get motion sickness in the back of the station wagon when we would go for trips you know, I had to be…It was the worst, especially on those mountain roads. So yeah, but you see we had a couple of drivers that had very little experience racing competitively but they did a lot of sim work and they were quick, blindingly fast. I mean, the mistakes you make, you can’t push a reset, you feel the impact when you make a mistake in a real car but it’s a great tool. And you’re right, the technology is really beneficial. And working with Patrick Long, who is an incredible driver, and him coaching me and looking at his data and doing the overlay, and we would just chip away a little bit at a time, like when we had our session you and I and you were talking to me about what the entry level was and where I should be and where I should place my eyes, that track walk really helped tremendously and then you could see the improvement in the data in that first sector.

KH: Yeah, you mentioned Patrick Long and I raced go-karts, he was a few years younger than me, which I’ve noticed a lot of people are younger than me in today’s world. But, you know, I think as you go back and you look at the karting and the things that Patrick has done, that’s got to be a great asset for you to have had through the years, to be able to have a coach like that with his success and the things that he’s meant to you. Explain that relationship and how you got started with Pat and how that’s progressed through the years, because watching it, it just seems like that there’s a friendship there that has been made through the years as well.

PD: Yeah, I think that’s the thing I love the most about the racing is the camaraderie. I mean, you can be really competitive and aggressive on the track but once you’re out of the car there’s just this warm embrace. And you know sometimes it holds over depending on how the race goes but there’s a real strong connection, I’ve had some incredible coaches and teammates along the way, who are just great professional drivers and as an AM driver, a lot of you may or may not know this that there are different categories of bronze, silver and gold and things like that, and you work with a pro as a coach and they help you develop as a driver, they show you what you’re doing right or what you’re doing wrong. And it took me a while to get to that level to be able to work with Patrick Long. I had Joe Foster, who was the head instructor at the Panoz Racing School, I raced with him, Andrew Davis, Andy Lally, a lot of people that had been coaching me. And then once I got to the level to work with Patrick, he’s a factory driver with Porsche, it was a completely different mentality: the level of concentration, the level of professionalism and the attention to detail changed. And we, you know, travelled a lot around the world so we spent a lot of time together and really got to know each other on and off the track and you develop a very deep bond and a really deep friendship and it’s been really special and very meaningful to me, I mean, he’s a phenomenal person. He’s a great dad, great husband and he’s a great coach. And as an American driver going over to Europe and adapting to that mentality and the pressure within the German culture, he really kept his California cool but yet he understood, you know, what was needed to survive in Europe. And he left very early on, I think when he was like 17 or 18 and started karting in Italy and then slowly moved his way up racing. He was part of that Red Bull programme in open wheel. Eventually I think Scott Speed got that over him and then he went with Porsche and did a lot of endurance racing. And it’s just been an incredible experience, you know, being around and just watching him race and to see what he can get out of the car is phenomenal. It’s just there are people that just have a natural ability and it can be developed with seat time of course, but there’s just, there are true talents. And he, I think in motorsports, and certainly road racing, is at the very top of the field, he’s won Le Mans multiple times, Daytona, Sebring, Baja, you name it, he’s incredibly diverse in his driving experience, and even did some NASCAR races with you guys.

KH: That’s right, yeah and he came over and ran some of the road races here. You know, I believe he won some K&N races throughout his opportunities that he had. We actually tried to put Patrick in one of our KHR cars way back in the day and Porsche wouldn’t let it happen ultimately in the end. I would have loved to have seen him in just a top notch car to see that ability because you look at Patrick Long and then you look at a guy like, I always tell people, Marcos Ambrose would have been even better than he was if he would have been able to get into that top notch equipment. You know, I think as I was with you guys at Sonoma you could really see that bond. One of the things that stuck out to me while I was in Sonoma was a comment that you made about the marketing side of things. I left there thinking how intriguing it was because it sounds like you’re pretty involved in the marketing side of things. It’s no secret all this stuff is expensive no matter where you’re at, from a financial standpoint it’s expensive to go to the racetrack. Talk to me about your involvement with the sponsors that you have, the programmes that you have put together because I was a Mobil 1 guy for a long time and you see TAG on the car. Just talk to me about your involvement on the marketing side and the way that that has progressed through the years and the partners that you have.

PD: Yeah, it’s incredibly expensive and the more you do it the more…You know from when I started to where we are today, running those same programmes have tripled or quadrupled in price, so it’s very expensive. So you have to have a good sponsorship. At first I was self-funding, you know, I parlayed the success I had on the show that I was doing at the time, gave me the visibility so that was attractive to sponsorship because you could reach outside the motorsport, so what were the deliverables for us at the track. So my first real deal came together, I was self-funding the Ford deal for the most part and then Mazda came up to me and gave me a year, a number of years, so that helped with partial budget. I had the car and some parts but then I still had to raise enough money to keep the team going and then I ended up buying a team and putting the money into that. So if you don’t have the right partners it’s virtually impossible to do it. And I think that’s what stops a lot of really talented drivers that you see in some, like you do a Mazda Miata race or something like that, it’s so competitive and you know these drivers, if they had the right backing they could go a long way. I was fortunate enough to have the visibility and I capitalised on that as much as possible. And you know, TAG Heuer came on as a sponsor early on, I’ve had a number of sponsors from Supercuts to, you know, whoever you could get to help fund that. But last year we had Mobil 1 as one of our title sponsors and Hagerty and some other programmes along the way, and of course Porsche stepped up and helped with the car and some of our parts and that helped, and each driver that we would bring in they had their partners and their sponsors that they could add value to. And that’s how it works, and it’s a lot of work. That’s where the stress is because, you know, that’s where most of your time and your energy is going, is can you make the payments and don’t care if it’s grassroots or you’re at Formula One, you’re always struggling to get more money because the more money you have, the more testing you can do, the more development you can do, the more seat time you can do. And then, that gets you results at the track and during the race.

KH: So, where do you see it all going from here? You know, I talk, you know you talked earlier about your father being a team owner, you talked about buying the team here and you know, you came back this year and obviously you had a successful year back. Do you want to keep owing the teams and eventually put somebody else in your car and different series? Do you want to keep driving a car, owning a car or do you want to do all of that? Where do you see it going as you go forward over the next few years?

PD: I just want to have fun and do selected events. I know Patrick and I have been talking about stuff that we haven’t done in the past, certain events around the world that we’d like to do and find a balance if that’s possible. Just enough testing so you keep your skills and your physical fitness up so you can jump into a car and be prepared to do it. There’s a number of things that we’re working on this year, we’ll do some races internationally and some Cup races here in America and still putting that programme together. I’ll work with Porsche on coming up on 5O years with the Turbo so we’ll do some programmes with that on the ambassador side and then TAG Heuer, it helps my partnership with them if I’m racing, it’s authentic and true to the brand so we’ll do some events there. So we’re still putting that program together for this year.

KH: So, when you look at racing in general, what’s left on your bucket list? You talk about having fun and you talk about being kind of able to pick and choose and I’ve noticed for myself, you know, taking that pressure off and being able to pick races, and I’m fortunate I get to race with my son this year as we go through the season in the car and that’s something I never really expected to do. But what’s the, is there a bucket list left of things that you want to do or are you just kind of just seeing how it comes as it develops? Or is there a specific item or place that you want to go?

PD: I would have liked to have done some Cup racing. You know, in NASCAR I’ve never really had an opportunity. I did, you know, the Richard Petty experience, it’s not quite the same thing but, you know, it’d be fun to test those cars and to do some oval races or just at least test it, you know. I know Frankie Muniz has got a programme with Ford this year and I’m happy to see him doing really well. I mean the truck races would be appealing if I could do some testing there. You know, I’m 59 years old so my skills and my visibility at night, it’s very hard doing the endurance races. Bathurst is a race I really regret not having an opportunity to do. That was something I wanted to do. The Nürburgring, absolutely terrifying. I wish I had done that at least once. But now I don’t know. I mean it’s a young man’s sport, a young woman’s sport. I mean you got to be physically fit and have the right skills. And I need to be smart about it so I can balance out my other career. But we’ll see what opportunities come up and if I have a chance to do those things, I’d like to do that, you know, and just be an ambassador for the sport.

KH: Yeah.

PD: Yeah, and as a team owner it would be, you know, it was fun to, as an owner, win Le Mans. That was a great experience, to be able to stand up there and then as a driver to be on the podium as well. So I’ve done that. So I don’t know what I would do next. I mean, I love off-road racing, I really enjoy that. I did the Baja 1000 and the Mint and we had great success there. So, it’s a little rougher on the body but I certainly love that stuff. So I don’t know what I would do next. And it’s a lot of work to put a team together and to be constantly hustling for the money to be able to be competitive and to have the right budget so that you’re not worrying week to week if you’re going to make payroll.

KH: What’s your favourite form of motorsports to follow? I mean, I know this is a NASCAR show but that doesn’t matter. I mean, what do you follow? We all, I like to follow F1, I like to follow Supercross. What’s your favourite form of motor racing to follow?

PD: Well certainly Formula One right now I think certainly is, it really broke through with Drive to Survive, it changed the game completely. It’s going to be fascinating to see the growth of that sport, hopefully they don’t grow too rapidly. But I really enjoy that, if it’s a good race, the rain races are usually the most exciting because you never know what’s going to happen. And certainly Brazil last year was, I think, the best race of the year in many ways because you didn’t know what was going to happen and that was exciting. And you’re seeing more teams, it was nice to see McLaren come back, the struggle with Red Bull, and now we’ve got, you know, Ferrari is going to be interesting to watch this year with Lewis Hamilton being over there, I think it’s great for the sport. And you know, we’ve got Daytona coming up in a couple of weeks, I always love watching that race. You know, the endurance racing, WEC, motorcycle, everything, I love watching it. I know a lot of the drivers so you root for them. And I think you were talking about this in one of the podcasts, it’s great when you see the Formula One drivers come over and do different disciplines like Fernando Alonso is just a real passionate driver and you look back at the generation of Dan Gurney, AJ Foyt, those guys were racing everything. Mario Andretti, those guys were in so many different types of cars and unfortunately now because of contractual obligations, things like that, we don’t get to see that crossover, and that’s what makes the Daytona 24 so interesting because you see such a diversity of drivers from different series around the world come together and compete, and that’s exciting. And certainly at Indy, it’s nice to see when the drivers come over and do that. I mean, it’s a frightening race but it was nice to see Fernando Alonso. I think that really won over a lot of fans here for him doing that race.

KH: When you look at F1, do you have a favourite driver?

PD: You know, I know a lot of the guys, it’s hard to have a favourite but I think the older you get, the more respect you have for Fernando Alonso that he’s competing at that level. He’s got a good designer now with that car so we’ll see what happens there. But each one of them I’ve gotten to through my relationship with TAG Heuer, even with Max Verstappen watching him, you know, as he started at Red Bull to move his way up to become champion. Pierre Gasly, a lot of the guys are just really wonderful human beings, incredibly bright, well-rounded people that you enjoy being with, so it’s hard to pick any one driver. And then you go through history, you know, like Fangio and Jim Clark, all of these guys, the history of the sport I really love. Dario Moreno, all of those guys are good friends. When it was in with, I had the Indy programme that was fun to be around those guys at the height of that period.

KH: So when I look at F1, I love F1, my son and I we love to follow F1 as well and I’m so intrigued by the whole Lewis Hamilton in a Ferrari this year. How do you think that’s going to go?

PD: It’s going to be a different mentality than what he had at Mercedes, right? It’s going to be a different culture. Although he’s back with an engineer that he’d work with early on in his career, I think that’s going to be good. It will be interesting to see how he adapts. I know he just had his first test and he had a little bit of an incident but that means he was pushing so that’s a good sign. I think it’s going to be great for the sport, it’s great already financially for Ferrari so it was a smart move on their part. And I think was it Jacques Villeneuve’s comment about it the other day was really quite fascinating; And I think he’s right, it was a good play for them to do that and I hope he does well. Charles Leclerc, I think he’s got, that dynamic will be quite interesting to see, how it unfolds and who will be the faster of those two drivers. That’s going to be, I think, the most exciting thing to watch this year, it’s that dynamic within the team.

KH: Yeah, we’ve had some pretty good debates on here about the best driver in the world and you know as well as I do, it’s really difficult to have this conversation. We’ve been taking Max Verstappen and Kyle Larson and we’ve seen Kyle Larson obviously go to Indy, we’ve seen, you know, we’ve seen him go and do sprint car races and we haven’t seen Max do much outside of F1 but it’s been a very fascinating conversation to have. And to me, that’s really where the 24 hours of Daytona ties all of these different people together to be able to say “Okay, we’ve raced against that guy, you’ve raced against this guy”, but to have them on the same racetrack together is important for the motorsports world. But when I talk about Kyle Larson on the NASCAR side, do you have a favourite NASCAR driver that you follow on this side? Who’s your guy in this world?

PD: It’s a different generation now for me because, you know, when we had Dale Earnhardt Jr, that generation is when I was, you know, that was really at the height of NASCAR, it’s a different thing now but Kyle Larson to me is really a fascinating guy because of his ability to adapt from the downforce cars and then getting back into, you know, a NASCAR, that’s a big change. The dynamic is, it would be nice to see him get into a Formula One car and do some testing. So, you know, you really like all of them once you get to know them, you know, and the team owners and things like that. So it’s hard for me to say who I have, I was certainly a big fan of yours when you were driving, what you did and what you’ve achieved. So I like everybody, I just love the world so much and I just want to see a good race.

KH: Yeah and I think when, the old guys have to stick together too, right? Like, it’s just, it is such a different generation and I think that the way that race drivers are presented today is much different because of the camaraderie and things that happen seem to happen less in the driver paddock and motorhome lot and all the different things that they’re required to do but the pressure of a race driver in today’s world, to me, is at a different level than it was when I started because you’re so, you’re just so out there with social media and all the things that come with that.

PD: Oh, that’s without question, right? So every mistake you make now is amplified and you have so many voices coming at you that are either negative or positive, a lot more negative people that are sitting on a couch and criticising someone not knowing what the actual dynamic is and it depends on what the car is like. If you’re really struggling with the handling and the setup of the car, especially in Formula One, if you don’t have the money you’re not going to be quick. No way. And we see that, but it’s nice to see that more teams now are competing for a potential win. So you don’t know who’s going to get the pole this weekend and that’s exciting.

KH: Alright, so we got a couple of, I got a couple more questions but our consistent question that we always have on this show: what was your first car? Where did it go?

PD: My first car I bought it was diesel Mercedes and I bought it from a neighbour of mine. And this is, of course, I grew up in Maine, so to have a diesel and it had the glow plug to get it started so you had to plug it in to keep it warm and I had that for a little while, and then I sold that. And then the first proper car that I bought was after I had finished my first really big movie, which was Can’t Buy Me Love. I bought a 1963 356 cabriolet and I still have that car today.

KH: Wow, you still have it.

PD: I still have it. Yeah, it’s at the mechanic now because, thank God I had it out of the garage when we had to evacuate because that was the one thing that if, I didn’t mind anything else I lost, I was like if I lose that car I’ll be really devastated. But yeah that was my dream car growing up, it was Porsche. I remember staying at a friend’s house race weekend and he had the picture of the whale tail of the Turbo in his room and I just remember looking at that car all night long going “God, that’s such a beautiful car, I hope to, one day, own one of those”. And that’s where it came and then the bathtub. I was driving, I was living in Santa Monica at the time and I kept driving by this car that had a “for sale” sign on it and it was the 356. So I ended up calling and it was the woman who was doing sound engineering for Top Gun at the time and it was the car that they used for the sound of that car because the car in the movie was a kit car and I bought that car for under 10 grand many years ago. That was over 35 years ago now. It was great.

KH: Well, you’re such a, you’re so involved on the car side and understanding cars, what’s the favourite car that you’ve ever driven? Race car, street car, what’s your favourite car that you’ve ever driven?

PD: Well, that’s really a hard one. You know, the vintage cars and the 356, there’s a joy in that car when you drive it. It always puts a smile on my face. When you drive down the road, people embrace you. Certain brands or certain types of cars, that’s not necessarily true. But I’m currently driving right now as a Porsche driver and an ambassador, you kind of get to go through the fleet so that if someone comes up to you and asks you “What do you like?”, you can recommend “Okay, what do you want to achieve in the driving experience?”. And at the moment I’m driving the Turbo and I really love it. I think it’s great supercar that’s a really perfect daily driver. And then if you’re up in the mountains, the Dakar is really fun to drive. When I was over shooting Ferrari, every time I had an opportunity to go to do a test drive, I never, I got called to set so I never got a chance to do that so I missed out on that. But I would say currently my favourite car right now is the Turbo.

KH: Well, Patrick, I appreciate you taking the time today. I enjoyed spending some time with you in Sonoma and getting to know you a little bit better and I truly appreciate your passion for racing. You know, when you’re in this racing world and you have people around you that just love motorsports that’s why we all walk into those garages and do what we do, it’s for not only the love of the car and the race but it’s also for the people and, you know, my time with you and Patrick and your whole team was a lot of fun and we appreciate you taking the time today to talk to us.

PD: Well, thank you for having me on the show. And thanks for your coaching, it made a big difference and I hope we get a chance to race together at some point. I know Patrick and I talked about that after you left and if we could something together; and certainly the programme that you’re running with your son looks like it, that’s a lot of fun too and for you to be able to run with him I think will be great to see. And certainly as a father, it’s going to be really touching and thanks for having me on the show. I really love this sport because of the camaraderie and the fellowship; there is, number one, we’re very lucky and fortunate to be able to do this and you can feel the joy when you get to the track, people love being there and it’s just, it’s a wonderful experience that’s changed my life profoundly and I’m grateful that I’ve had an opportunity to live out some of my dreams through this sport.

KH: Well, I don’t know what my license would be but we can definitely figure that out, I’d love to experience something different with a couple of great guys so…

PD: Let’s do that. We should find out a programme we can do it all together. I’d love that.

KH: Let’s do it, yeah, that would be fun. Well, thank you and I appreciate it and have a great day.

PD: Thanks, you too. Thanks for having me on.