37. Drifting PODIUM, How the ”SingleTurboNoggy” Audi Burned Down, w/ Trae Moua

Hello, ladies and gentlemen, welcome back to the Minnoxide Podcast. I am your host, Harris AK., Minnoxide photographer, videographer, man of many automotive aspirations. And I am here with my well-braided co-host. How did that Renaissance Festival treat you?

Hey, they treated me very well, so nothing to complain.

Bro was wearing a kilt, he really enjoyed the kilt.

Oh my gosh, I had to. You just see everybody else dressed up, and you're like, I wanna be part of it.

Yeah.

Have you ever been there?

I don't know.

No?

I have not. I've seen like videos, but I've never gone.

Okay, I'm kind of a nerd, so I'm into that s***. But my name is Sean. I'm your average car enthusiast. I love all things with four wheels and even two wheels. And this is the Minnoxide podcast, where we kind of introduced you to other car enthusiasts and people that make up the car community.

You really didn't wanna talk about your Hellcat or your 1M today. Guys, he has a Hellcat and a 1M. In case you didn't know from the last 36 episodes, he's got two very rare fantastic cars.

I totally forgot I had those.

Anyways, today we have Trae Beck. Trae is one of the OGs on this podcast. Episode number seven, 30 episodes later. A lot of things have happened since the last 30 episodes. But most recently, you had this kick-a** drift event. You did this last weekend. I know you talked a little bit about drifting in the last episode. So tell us a little bit how the drift event go. I know you guys got, what, second place?

Yeah, me personally, I got second place. My teammates, one of them didn't bring their car. The other one hit the wall, and the other one got beat out in their first battle. But I made it through top 32, top 16, top eight, top four. Then I went head to head for first, and I lost, sadly. After watching the tape back, though, he straightened, so I should have won. But I got second in that. So yeah, it was a lot of fun. That was my first competition event. I've never done a competition for drifting before.

Is that for money as well?

This one specifically, no. It was more so for experience on trying to learn how to battle. So it's teaching you like hitting zones, front clips, proximity, matching angles, stuff like that. So it's more for the experience, but it's still a lot of fun just to have that little bit of competition rather than just doing it for fun with your friends.

Yeah, pull this just a little bit closer as well, by the way.

Sorry.

And there you go, just a hair closer.

More?

Yeah, a little more. All right, so what's this event called?

This specific one I was at is called Drifting the Plains. This was the fourth one of the year. I think they do four every year, but they also do like grassroots events. They call like the 5K and 10K where you would compete for 5,000 or $10,000 or whatever. My car is nowhere near that level. They have like pro spec cars. They have like Austin Mata and like their Formula Drift drivers. So I'm not quite that level yet, but just competing for fun. It's still fun.

What speed do you enter in? Like, you know, I think the pros, they enter in at like maybe 100 miles.

Yeah, it all depends on the track really, the layout.

Oh yeah.

This specific track, we're not really going too fast. I'm at the top of second. So like 50, 60 miles an hour maybe.

Okay.

So what's your drift car again?

I have a E36 BMW. It's just a 328i.

That's right. Yeah, yeah. I remember the stories with that one.

Yeah.

From the last time.

Is it one of the pink ones?

Yeah.

Okay. And do you keep that up at Brainerd?

Yeah. So BIR is one of our main sponsors. So I get to store it there and drift there for free basically.

Oh, that's a pretty sweet setup.

Yeah, that's a really nice deal. And they have a bunch of other pink cars, so that's your team?

Yep, it's me and then Aiden, Joey and Cody. It's the four of us right now.

Are teams typically teams of four?

Kind of just who you want. I know like another big team that does like a lot of local events is No Alignment Drift, which they're pretty cool guys. They've supported us since the beginning. They have like freaking 10 now, I think. So it just kind of depends. We just do the four right now because we all kind of get along.

Right. So this is this event that you did. So this is just a regional event then?

Yeah, it's just in North Dakota.

Just North Dakota?

Yeah, it's just an event that Darren and Ethan, it's their event. So they do that, and then they have the 5K, 10K, and then they also do like Drift 101 events, but it's all at the same place. It's at Toppin Interstate, which is in technically Glendon, Minnesota, but it's on the border of Fargo.

So how far along in your journey of drifting are you right now? Like for example, the other 31 teams, or people, sorry, are they relative, like are they the same skillset that you are right now, or is it just like a varying skillset?

No, it just varies. So like the bracket that I competed in was the limited series, because I competed in the open series, but that's where you get like the fast, like 600 horsepower cars and stuff, and I'm in 150 horsepower stock BMW. So I got beat on my second battle on the open series. I was surprised to make it past the first, because I battled a LS swapped FC RX-7. I was surprised to beat him. He was a super cool guy, but limited series is, they tried to make it more fair for like lower horsepower guys like me. So it was like, I think the, you have to have a 245 wide tire or less, 300 tread wear or more, and then there's no engine swaps allowed. So it really like limits what's actually able to compete in that series. So I had way better, I guess, advantage in that. I wouldn't even say advantage, but just more so my class.

Right, like equal playing field.

Yeah, yeah, equal playing field. More like, even then though, I'm still slower, because there's like the 350Z guys, they still make like 250, 300 horsepower. So it's, yeah, it was a little bit harder, but.

What made you choose the E36? You know, because a lot of people like the 350 or 370, just because of how easy it is to throw it into the ring.

Yeah, I think, well, mainly because my dad had an E36, I believe that he sold to someone who put an LS in it, and then did a lot of local drifting, and we saw that guy a lot. So like at every event, he would give us rides in his cars and stuff. So my mom and my dad really liked the E36 platform for drifting, and my dad's actually the one that chose the car. He bought the car originally, I think I mentioned this in the first podcast we did, but he bought the car originally for my mom, for her to start drifting, and she was like, no, I don't wanna do it, just give it to Trae, have him start.

Wait, hold on, the conversation was to have your mom do drifting? How'd that even start?

My mom always liked drifting, but my dad was never good at it, and I never tried, so he was just kind of bought the car and was like, here, let's try to get you to do it. And she was just, she never, she was too nervous to do it. So she was like, let's just have Trae try. And then I tried and I, I don't know, I adapted really fast to it and got okay.

Man, you gotta respect the wives and the girlfriends of this community that can actually appreciate, like for example, like what your dad does, like not many people can handle like being around those fast cars all the time. Like for example, I went on a cruise last week and he's probably gonna be listening to this. He's like, yeah, I can't make it out to much of these, man. The wife just doesn't care for cars. And it's just like, that's freaking awesome. She even thought about getting into it.

Yeah, my mom is, I mean, I think my dad spoke on it last time. My mom's been there since he was wrenching on cars on the side.

Yeah, day one.

Yeah.

Yeah.

So she's kinda just been, she's been there through it all. And I think she just appreciates it just as much as we all do.

And it's pretty cool that she's like, yeah, just throw my son into drifting. He can do it.

My mom would have a heart attack.

Yeah, exactly. My mom would be like, I really don't appreciate this. I'd wish you'd rather not. But she's like, give him the keys. I don't wanna do this.

My mom's like, you're going five over, slow down.

Oh my gosh. She's like, break, break.

Yeah, but no, at the same time, I get it. But that's pretty freaking wild. So you ended up getting the keys then. When did you get the car then? Like when did you take over it?

Just last year. I don't remember specifically when. I think it was probably-

It wasn't like August 11th, 1059 PM or anything like that?

No, not that I'm aware of. It was sometime late or beginning fall last year. So I've technically only been driving for less than a year. But yeah.

Yeah, congrats on second, then. That seems pretty well deserved.

Did you have much drifting experience before you got that car, then?

Yeah, like street takeovers or like parking lot doughnuts, you know, wintertime.

I think I saw you in a Charger once.

Parking lot takeovers, definitely not, but maybe I can say like a little bit of parking lot drifting. My uncle has a S14 with a RB25 in it, and he was like a drifter before we were. So he, to this day, is still learning the ropes to it. Somehow I overpassed him really quick. I think I just got more seat time than him. But he, yeah, the first time I ever did doughnuts in a car was his car. The first time I ever drifted on the BIR track was with his car. And then, yeah, I just, I wouldn't say I had prior experience, but I learned the ropes, I guess. The first time I ever drifted a car was with his car, and I did it maybe two or three times before I had my own car. So I never drifted before I drifted, I guess.

Yeah, like officially. Yeah, I remember ripping my, like when I used to have to charge, I used to rip that thing into snow. I'd go to Canterbury over there. He was, oh man.

Yeah, I mean, I did that definitely. In high school, I'd seen a couple ditches before trying to learn how to do that. And I would say, honestly, I don't know if, have you seen the new Gran Turismo movie?

Not yet, I want to.

Okay, definitely sim driving helped me in learning how to drift. Like when you see that movie, you'll understand the importance of sim driving, I guess, when it comes from sim driving to real driving. Sim driving, I had a sim, I got a sim for Christmas when I was like 12 years old. So from like 12 to 16, and I would always play on the sim. And I think it really like, I actually literally, I sucked at drifting on the sim for like a year, and I practiced like every day after school. And then like I started to get good at it. And then the first time I got in the car to do donuts, I did like perfect donuts. So I think sim driving really helped me, I guess, learn the controlling aspect of it.

Yeah, to learn how like a car works.

Yeah.

Like that's why I like, I think Michael Peterson, he talked about this when he was on the podcast, episode 31 or whatever. Like, very, very few people ever get their car to the limit to get to break traction until it's too late. Like you get in an accident, you have to stomp on your brakes or whatever. It's like you almost never push your car to the limit. So, but that's like a good point. Like if you get on a sim, you can kind of learn how to do a donut or how car is gonna react. So when you actually do jump in, it's pretty sick. By the way, I suck at sims. I've been on a sim one time, like a legit sim. Alex Sajadi, who he's actually an instructor up at Brainerd now, but I jumped in and tried to drive the race car that he drives, but in the game. I couldn't control it. It was a club sport Porsche or whatever. He's like, take the F1 car, it'll be easier.

It's really crazy how realistic some sims are. Even now, I have a sim now, and before I went to the ND track, I was able to load up the North Dakota track on my PC, and I practiced the layout because they posted the picture of the layout that they were running, and I practiced the layout with a couple buddies. And when I got to the track, I already knew what was going on just because I had prior practice on the game. So it's pretty crazy. Sim does a lot, I think.

We've thought about doing a sim competition of some kind for our guests even, because right now, the only thing that we do at the end of an episode is basically, what's your favorite show car, track car, whatever the hell? But we've thought about making an actual competition, too. Getting a simulator in here or something.

That'd be cool.

Yeah, that'd be wild.

I have a Sim. It's just like a racing seat. It's got the steering wheel mount and the pedals. And it's just kind of sitting and not being used right now. So I was thinking, bring it up here and put it on this TV and it'd be super cool. Maybe before we even start the podcast, get a time and then we can make a top gear style list.

We would never be able to do it before a podcast, though, because if we show them, actually, I guess we could do it. No, no, no, actually, we could do it technically top gear style because they give you the time after the episode. Because the last thing I'd want to do is give you your time, and it's like you're at the bottom of the leaderboard. You're just going to be f****** angry the whole episode. It's like, I want to go again. Okay, so I'm curious a little bit more about the BMW as well. So, how much modifying have you done to the car? Have you done anything?

Mechanically, the only thing, like the engine is completely stock. It has what people call it a hot air intake. It's a cold air intake, but it's really just breathing in hot air. It's not really doing much. That's the only thing done to the engine. I wouldn't even consider that a mod. But besides that, it has a mini angle kit. Because we're on a budget here.

That's kind of what I was aiming for with that question too. So what's a mini angle kit?

Yeah, so my teammates have full FDF and Wyze Fab angle kits, which comes with extended tie rods and full control arms with 100 degrees of angle or whatever crazy stuff. Mine is literally just, it's like a cut and extended lower control arm basically and an extended tie rod and that's all it is. So I have a lot more angle than stock, but I don't have nearly as much angle as like pro drivers do or like the people on my team. But that's why a lot of people are quote unquote impressed with my driving because I don't have nearly as much as a lot of the other drifters do.

Yeah, I think when we were talking to Dylan, he even said, you know, like a lot of these guys are getting these, you know, crazy, wide turning kits, but it's like, you don't really need that because you haven't even figured out how to use your car regularly.

Yeah, when I first started drifting my car, I had no angle kit. I think kind of like what Dylan was saying, I listened to Dylan's a little bit. I started with no angle kit, just literally just a stock BMW with seats. And then I went and had the angle kit. And then I did the angle kit and the hydro. And now I kind of just use it all, so.

It's kind of like training wheels.

Yeah.

Like once you take off the training wheels, like you're gonna be like really good, like ideally.

I had a, his name I believe is Max Crocker. He is like a pretty OG in the drift scene for everywhere around here locally. But he's mainly in North Dakota now. He has a lot of, I think like, I think he's like one of the main sponsors at the track there. He told me when I got second, he was like, you basically, I think you're out driving the car now because you learned all the skills of driving. Now you need more car. Yeah. So now I'm thinking like, God damn it, now I need like an LS or something. So we'll see. I might change it up this winter cause I'm definitely, I feel like I'm at the point where I understand drifting pretty well. I know there's like obviously still a lot.

Always something to get better at.

Yeah, there's always something to get better at with anything in life, but I understand the basics behind proximity and controlling the car. And now I think I just need a little more power so I can keep up. Cause it really is like, when I'm drifting against a car that makes so much more power than me, I can't, I know I need to be closer, but I can't get there. Cause my car can't, it won't do it. So I'm working on, yeah, probably doing an LS swap on that car this winter.

What are you doing? So we talked a little bit about Tires with Dylan as well. I think he's a great reference point because that was a great podcast that we did with him.

We both learned a lot. Neither of us have really been into drifting or gotten to drifting events, so it was like 101 drifting.

We're kind of master of none here. It's like we know a little bit about everything, but not really. So that's why I love doing this podcast, cause I'm gonna be a genius in everything by episode 100.

Learn everything.

Yeah, it's a life hack. So what do you have for a tire set up? What are you currently running?

So right now, on the fronts, I run Keiser KR20A's. That's just what a lot of the drifters recommended. So that's what I run for up front for grip. For rear, I don't really run anything specific just because I'm not competing pro level. So I don't really care. I'll just buy whatever's cheap and I'm burning up anyways.

Right.

And I run it at a high pressure just because I have no power. So they're getting burned up really quick. I'm spinning them like a lot faster.

How high of a pressure?

Depends on the track. If I'm like on the BIR road course, I'll run them at like 70 PSI because I'm third gear and I'm really trying to like, I'm clutch kicking every fricking corner like 70 times because I can't make it around. But like the ND track, I was kind of experimenting with it, I usually run 55 to 50. But this weekend, I was really trying to dial in my driving for proximity and getting closer to people for battling. So I tried to air down a little bit to get more grip. So I was running 45, 40. But yeah, tires, I don't really, the rear, I don't do anything specific. But the fronts, I think Dillon explained, you always want more grip in the front just so you're not washing out.

Right. So okay, so that raises a good question then. So how do you determine PSI? Is that just basically how much grip you want on a certain track?

Basically, yeah. I mean, every car is different. Like I know like Mark Bellinger, I don't know if you know who that is. He has a 350Z that's not much more power than me. It's just a stock VQ, but he's running 30 PSI on his tires, but he makes enough power to spin that 30 PSI. Whereas I don't most of the time, so that's why I run a higher PSI. So I can air it down for more grip, but to an extent because I'm not making the power to back it up. To back it up.

Okay, so basically more power, you could get away with less PSI. So that's just kind of like a balancing equation.

Yeah, like Adam LZ, I think he runs like 15, 20 PSI and his tires on his 1000 horsepower Arctic Armada Mustang.

That's kind of wild, because you know a little bit about drag racing too. What kind of PSI are you guys running in like, for example, the RS3 when you're racing against people?

Like on the drag strip?

Yeah, for example.

I think with the Hoosiers, we run like 15 PSI or so.

That's kind of crazy when you think about it, like 15 PSI here and 15 there.

Yeah, it's different for sure, but I'm still learning a lot in the drift world too. The one thing that I try to emphasize is drifting is definitely not my main hobby. So that's why when I was saying I'm on a budget with the drifting, it's because it's not the thing that I take the most serious. I think I am now recently, just because I'm having so much fun with it, but obviously you guys know I was doing the B5 stuff and the EVO stuff and just drag racing. I was mainly over there before I went here, so I'm still learning over here. And then now I'm like, okay, I'm having a lot of fun here. Maybe I should put more money here rather than where I am over there.

Getting that second place was a good indicator. Hey, maybe I'm onto something here.

Yeah, so I'm kind of trying to balance it and figure out where I want to be because I'm having a lot of fun over here more than I was over here, I think.

Do you foresee yourself dumping a lot of time into this then going forward?

I mean, if he's going to throw an LS into it, do a whole engine swap, that's a lot of time. That's a lot of money.

Yeah, it's tough because, for example, I know you were asking on your story about building the EVO, that'd be another crazy thing. The world is kind of your oyster right now. You could do anything you want, and you could really enjoy yourself because you can get into roll racing, drag racing, drifting. I mean, the EVO is even at a perfect power where you could autocross if you wanted to get into that too.

Yeah, the thing I really like about drifting is, it sounds cliche, but not a lot of people can do it. So it weeds out kind of like the people that I don't like. Like, you know, you go to a regular street meet, you know, like we were talking kind of in the last one, and there's a lot of people that think they're street racers because anybody can press the gas pedal and go straight, really. And drifting takes a certain amount of skill before you are actually fitting in the scene. So it sounds kind of bad, but if you're not a good drifter, you don't really fit in with the drifting scene.

It's higher risk, too, I feel, because if you want to take your car drifting and you're s*** at it, you're going to end up in a wall, and guess what? You're done for the day, pretty much.

Yeah.

Depending how bad it is.

For sure, like I said, I'm still learning, and a lot of people are coming in to this sport learning, and I support it, obviously. If you're a good person, I want to help you learn how to drift, and I support you trying to learn how to drift. But the takeover people can't come to a drift event and act like they know how to drift. Like, it's a whole different ball game than what they think. They think they're drifters over here doing circles in the intersection, but if they were to try to come to a drift track, they're not gonna be drifters.

You're telling me that I cannot pour gasoline on a track, light it on fire, and say, bro, yesterday was a movie? Is that what you're telling me?

Dude, not at all. You know, I actually have a funny story about that. At the drift event this weekend, some god reason, a Hellcat came into the drift track, and he took, like, take it to the track way differently than I think, because he came to the track, paid to get into the track, but ended up doing a takeover in the track parking lot. So he just started, like, I have footage of it. It's on my last YouTube video I posted today, and he started doing donuts in the parking lot where we're doing tech for our drift cars, and then he just does like a giant, like, frickin 100 yard burnout through the drift track parking lot, and then these guys are like freaking out, and they're like, who the f*** is this guy? Like, get him out of here, kick him out. And obviously he got kicked out. I'm like, you seriously think that you can just come in here and do s*** like that?

Yeah, he was like, what's wrong? Everybody else is doing it over there. Why can't I do it here?

That's probably the logic that his 532 credit score as I was thinking, but.

Yeah, so I have no idea who that guy was. I don't think anybody really did, but it was like, Black Challenger, he came in there, thought he could do a takeover, and then got kicked out.

You know what sucks, man? Say what you want about those boats. I freaking love Hellcats. They're so fun.

Honestly, I like them too, but it's the scene behind them that makes it suck.

And I've talked about this before, I think, but the scene's kind of divided. It's either you get the takeover people, or you get these, it's usually old guys that want nothing to do with it. It's not often you see people about our age that have Hellcats, or even sub 35. It's usually older and above. I've noticed, at least. But it's just such a bummer, dude. It's like, cause they're fun cars, dude. I've driven a couple of them.

They're actually like super cool, too, to come from the factory with 707 horsepower, you know? Like not a lot of cars doing that.

Well, especially back in 2015. Like it was super cool. Like think about 2015, like what was that? We did not have the current Shelby. And then when they came out with 760 horsepower, it's like, all right, cool. Let's make 797 Dora. Like, oh, 840. It's like, whatever, buddy.

Yeah, there's, I don't think there's many people besides like, I don't know if you know Nick Shear.

Yeah, Nick Shear is pretty cool.

Yeah, he's like one of my good friends. Him and I think you heard Durango, and like I think there's a purple Hellcat challenger.

Yeah, heads up, by the way.

I think there's only like-

You can move the mic, too, by the way.

I think those are like the only three. Yeah, I think those are about the only three Hellcats that I know that I actually like enjoy seeing and support.

Yes. All right, I appreciate that. I love getting compliments like that, you know.

This is by far the coolest Durango I know.

Oh, thank you. I honestly really appreciate that because I am competing in a tough crowd where my peers are all, like you say, 532 credit score. And I'm like-

Sean, what is your credit score?

730 something.

I got a higher credit score than him.

I'm bringing that average up.

Dude, I just got mine back up. It was so bad, dude. It was so bad.

You doing some credit repair, or what was the trick?

No, I've just been paying my credit card off.

A moment from our sponsors, Capital One. No, I'm kidding.

Yeah, I got my credit card right when I was 18, and I was pretty stupid with it. So I dropped it pretty bad right away, but it's back in the 700s now, which is what I'd like to be proud of.

Yeah, as you should. That's one of the other things that I'm just so glad. Say what you want about the TikTok era and the Goldfish era, but there's so many people learning from TikTok and Reels and stuff. For example, credit and stuff. You just swipe up on something and be like, huh, f****** A. You can learn something. It's super cool in that regard. But, oh boy, that's a lot, that was a lot. That took a lot out of me. So that's drifting. I think we're mostly caught up there, unless there's something specific that you're kinda looking towards. I guess, what are you gonna be working on between now and your next drift event?

My next drift event is this weekend, so nothing.

Oh, you have another one this weekend?

Carmageddon, you're proving your own whatever you wanna call it. Yeah, I don't, the sad thing is, now that I, it sounds stupid, but now that I've competed in an event, I find competing much more entertaining than just sliding around for fun and entertainment, which sucks because like, the only thing I've been doing up until last weekend was just drifting around for fun. But dude, tires are expensive, even though I'm buying scrap tires and just tires that I'm burning off, they're expensive. Drifting sucks, dude, it's an expensive sport and it's so much fun, so it sucks at the same time.

But how many tires did you burn through last weekend?

Not much, because the ND Drift is, their track is all concrete, so it's much more forgiving on the tires. Whereas BIR is like, I think it's all asphalt. So it burns the tires like a m***********, dude. I probably go through probably like 10 tires an event at BIR, where at ND I was just, I think I went through two sets of tires, which sets like it's more pairs. So four tires total at ND, and then like 20 tires total at a BIR event. And that's with 150 horsepower. Now imagine I have a LS, my tires are spinning at 100 miles an hour rather than 60. I'm gonna be burning through a lot more tires.

Yeah, even Dylan brought that up last episode saying, he went from like three sets to like one or whatever, based on the event and the power and all that stuff. So yeah, it gets, I guess that's where you want sponsors, which I mean, again, like, there's something to be said about competition too though, cause like when you're just messing around yourself, like you might be like, oh, I'll try this. But like when you're competing, you're like, I want to do that. Like you're like, you're trying to see like what the guy that's better than you is doing. And you want like, I get what you're talking about. That competitive nature starts to come out.

Yeah, that's, yeah, that's another thing. When I'm practicing, I don't have like motivation to push me to drive to my full extent because I'm like just doing it for fun. I don't really like, I have been in like three drift crashes already. And that was like all just for fun. And it's so not worth it. So like, if I'm going to get in a drift crash, it better be for like competing for like 5k or something, dude, because it gets expensive. And I've had to fix that car many times while I'm just drifting for fun. So yeah, I don't plan to do anything from now to this weekend, besides drive it.

Sweet, that's pretty... I'm excited. It's going to be a fun one to get into.

Yeah, the thing that sucks too, I don't have a large drift audience. So when I post like drift videos and drift pictures and stuff like that, I don't... I kind of talk to you about this personally, but when I post stuff like that, I don't see as much traction. So I don't like posting it as much, but I enjoy doing it more, I think. So it sucks because it's more fun for me, but I don't get content out of it because I don't see the traction for it.

Yeah, I'm glad you bring that up actually, because this is something that I've been dealing with myself as well, because like, again, you have a much larger following to me, especially on TikTok. But one thing that I've noticed is the best way I can explain it, it's like trying to steer a ship. Because you have 300,000 followers on TikTok, and it's like, they're all used to seeing this content. Or like, did you stop posting for a while too, or anything like that?

I'm, on TikTok, I'm really inconsistent.

Right, so like, you combine that with, you know, people being used to a particular thing, it's like when you start posting a lot more again, but it's something completely different, it's like, you're gonna slowly get that new audience to trickle in. So like, that's something I'm dealing with right now, for example, on my TikTok, with all the podcast highlights, like, I was losing, losing, losing followers for a while, and now I'm actually trending up again. Like, it just suddenly exploded, like 300,000 views on the video with AJ or whatever. It's like, followers are coming in, the view time's starting to come in, and it took a month to get there, because like, I had a strategy going into it, because like, this is what I love doing. This is my favorite thing. Like, me and Sean look forward to doing the podcast every single week. I'm so happy we're doing it twice a week now, but the highlights and all that stuff, like, it's tricky, because we gotta bring in a new audience and form it, and yeah, it's a pain in the a**, but if that's what you like doing, just post about it, and the audience will come. It might take a month or two. And you also like, so, this is a free course, by the way. I should be getting paid for telling you all this. So one thing that I've adapted, about a week and a half ago, I had a theory that I've been cooking up for like a month and a half, and then I finally tried it. It was actually with your dad's episode. Your dad's episode, I experimented a lot of stuff. But what I did, it's like I kind of set up my stuff to be, like, I want people to be scrolling their TikTok and be like, oh, that's another Minnoxide video. Like my audience, my crowd. So basically how I set it up, it's like I do two short ones, like sub 15 second ones. So it's like jab, jab, and then uppercut or whatever the f***. I don't know, fighting. I might be like relatively big dude, but I can't fight for s***. And then I'll set it up for like, my ultimate goal is to get people to listen to the full episode.

Yeah.

The best part of these highlights, by the way, is when you take something out of context, and then all the comments just explode.

Yeah.

So, but anyways, that aside, you know.

I kinda can back off of that, where I've experienced with, I try to capitalize on having that many TikTok followers, because over all these platforms, you obviously have different following. So like, I may have 20 some thousand on Instagram, and 300,000 something on TikTok, but I only have 5,000 on YouTube, which to some is a lot, but for me, it's like, how do I get these 300,000 people from my TikTok? How could I even just get a quarter of these people over to my YouTube, right? Because I could double my numbers on YouTube, and YouTube is like when I'm really trying to get into.

That's what I really care about too, is YouTube, because it's like a more, it's like, it's a more legit view.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. They pay more attention to actually like what you're saying and what you're posting. Like they're an actual follower rather than, TikTok is such a short, like you're saying, short thing, you just scroll through it. Like, oh, that was funny, okay, next.

Yeah.

You know? It's like YouTube, they actually, they follow you for you, and they're expecting to see your videos every week.

It's a much more invested audience.

Yeah, very much so. So I kind of tried to, like you were saying, do the same thing where like I could post a 15 second clip from one of my YouTube videos on my TikTok, and maybe it'll blow up on TikTok, and I can get them to go to my YouTube and watch the full video. But I haven't really pushed it much, but I've definitely tried a couple of times.

Yeah, jab, jab, uppercut.

Yeah. It hasn't worked how I wanted it to, but it's, I mean, I had one get like 200,000, and I probably gained like 1,000 views on YouTube, or 1,000, yeah, views on YouTube.

Which is pretty legit, like.

Yeah, so. It works, but you kind of just have to.

It's a grind. It's a grind.

Dude, social media is so much more work than a lot of people think.

Well, I do this full-time now, too, so it's like, it's kind of, like.

No, I mean, you would know, for sure.

Yeah, because like, I'm trying, I've been growing really freaking fast these last few months, but again, this is like what I love to do. Like, I'm not like, if I go back and work a regular nine to five again, you know, like right now, I have a good opportunity to push this, and if, you know, if I flop on my face, whatever. But at least I know that like, I won't look back in 20 years and be like, damn, I wish I tried it. You know, like I really, if I could talk to people across the country doing this, yeah, that's the dream. Like just meeting cool people doing cool s***. And that, it's a grind. It's so, so much work, even with AI tools helping me. Like, it's ridiculous. But no, I'm glad that you're like, you kind of understand. Like, and this is the other thing. So I'm going on a little bit of a rant here. I promise I'll stop. But me and Sean even talked about this like the other day when I came over here. It's like, the people you surround yourself with, like that's gonna be a direct influence on how you end up being. So it's like you, like if you're trying to grow like your YouTube and your TikTok and you know, you wanna be around people that are also doing that. So like you and I are kind of in the same circle there. Then, you know, Alec, who was on episode, what, 18, 17, whatever the f***. Lux Detailing, it's like him and I share commonalities in another space. So like that's my, you know, the guy with my circle there. So yeah, that's my little rant. Sean, say something, try to say something.

When you said like you have a hard time, or social media is hard, right? It's hard for everybody. I, before like getting like super invested with Harris, like I never posted on anything. Like I didn't do like Facebook, I didn't do my Instagram. I literally just had it so I could like scroll and keep up with the Joneses and just make sure like, I'm not being left behind. And then like he's starting to tell me like, hey, like publish those photos. Like, you know, I just gave you a bunch of f****** fire to post. Like post them, post them, post them.

And I'm like, okay fine, I'll post it.

I'll post.

Well, I feel you when it comes to YouTube, because I did the same for my dad, because he doesn't give a s*** about social media, but I'm doing it because I want him to grow as a small business. So I do a lot of the social media for my dad, because I would like to say that I kind of know what I'm doing, at least more than he does. So I do it for him, and I think it's helped him grow a lot, but also he has to be a good business for it to work.

But she's got that covered, I'd say.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. So that's the thing where it's like, I'm proud to promote him, because I know he does good things, right? He does good work. People can take his car to him and then make a thousand horsepower, and I will proudly promote that, because who else is doing it, right? So he doesn't post that on social media, but I'll do it for him. And I'm trying to kind of do me and him at the same time grow us as a pair.

I think that's fair. Like, that's the word I'm looking for, symbiosis, whatever. I think that's the word. I don't know. This is me trying to be smarter than I am.

That's a big word for me.

The synergy or whatever. Somebody is gonna text me and be like, Harris, you should have used this word. Pull up a thesaurus. But basically, growing together. It makes sense, because you do a lot of stuff with Ratified, Ratified does a lot of stuff with Trae, and then it grows. So it's, I don't know, my brain's fizzling out. But yeah, you've got a good handle on social media. We did a big amount of your, because I don't even remember you being at 300K until I looked at your social like a couple weeks ago. Did a lot of that come from like when you posted the Nagi video? Or not really?

I would say half of it did, for sure. I think I was at 100K or close to 100K before that happened. But that video got like 30 something.

32 million views, yeah.

People love disaster.

Dude, it's this sad truth, honestly. Yeah, I was probably about half of that before. And then I posted that, and I gained a lot of support. But I got a lot of f****** hate for that, too.

That's a part of it. So a good bit of the listeners here might already know about this, but you basically had a, well, you tell the story.

Yeah, so basically, so a lot of my following came from my B5, which on our first podcast, we were talking about me finishing that car for Texas 2K. Which if people didn't know, I did finish that car, and I did take it to Texas 2K, and I did take it on the streets, and I did race it. But after Texas 2K, I brought the car back. It was still winter here, so I kind of just let the car chill out. I don't drive the car in the winter. And then once it started to warm up, I took the car back out. I wanted to dial it in more. I started tuning it, just doing some final revisions, turning up the boost. I never had that car as fast as it was then. So I was doing some revisions and stuff, and I had basically, long story short, I had an electrical short happen while I was doing some tuning. And I went out to do a log one morning, went to go do a pull, and then everything shut off on the car. And at that moment, I had a flashback to when, prior to, I blew up the engine that was in the car before that, which was back in 2021 or whatever. I dropped a valve on that engine, and the same thing happened. I took off to do a pull. Everything just shut off, and my crank seized, and I was like, f***, I just blew up my car or whatever. So when that happened, all my electronics turned off, and I was like, f***, not again. Like, this is my brand new setup. There's no way I just blew this engine up again. And that's really what I thought it was, because I was turning the car up more and more and more. I'm like, this car is... My tuner said the last log that we had, it was making well over 850 wheel. That's a lot. For that car was, yeah, it was a lot. So yeah, when I noticed that everything turned off, obviously I had nothing. I had no steering, I had no engine, I had nothing. I kind of wanted to coast to get off of the main road because I was kind of on a main road. So I was trying to let it coast until I could find somewhere to turn off. And while I was coasting, it started to smoke. And I was like, I don't like that. Because where it was smoking, I was like, I don't know why it would smoke there. That's nothing is there besides electrical components. So I'm like, f***. I kind of already had a feeling. And not to mention the night before, I had been trying to diagnose.

It was your alternator, right? Yeah, because we were talking about a bug kill, because we were supposed to shoot or whatever.

Yeah, yeah.

Yeah, like two days before it has happened.

Yeah, but we were talking. God, I wish we would have shot too, dude.

That's why I tell people, hire me. Jokes aside.

Yeah, seriously though. Yeah, my alternator was, my tuner, like I said, we were doing revisions. My tuner had mentioned to me that he noticed while I would go wide on the throttle, as soon as I would hit peak boost, my alternator would drop voltage below what they say is like safe, right? So I'm like, what the f***? I don't know. Maybe I'll throw a new alternator in it. So I threw a new alternator in it. I added another ground. Yeah, I just did a bunch of stuff trying to diagnose this the night before. And so this was the first poll I did after we tried to fix that. And it was the second poll. I did the first poll, and it was like, it's a little bit better, but it's still kind of dropping, but it's above where we think it should be. So I was like, all right, cool. So we're like, let's continue tuning. I do it, whatever. And yeah, then that happens. And I'm like, what the hell? So I see it smoking. And I'm like, if it's smoking from there, it's gotta be electrical. I already knew that it was a dropping voltage prior to. So I pulled over because I knew it was smoking. I was like, s***, it's not good. I popped the hood. And I'm like, yeah, it's definitely smoking from where it's not supposed to be smoking. So I'm looking at it, and I'm like, what the f***? And I feel like a dumb a** because I'm sitting there trying to blow the smoke with my f****** mouth. And I'm like blowing it, and I'm like, what's going on, dude? And I'm like looking around, and I follow. So the power cable from the battery goes up top from the firewall down to the alternator and the starter. I'm looking at it, I'm like chasing it down, and I look down at the alternator, and I see a flame. And I'm like, holy f***. I'm like, this is not good. So I go to the back of my car, I grab my fire extinguisher, I pull the pin, and I'm going to press it, and it's just not doing s***. And I'm freaking out. I'm like, what the f***, what the f***? What do I do right now? So I'm trying to bang the thing on the ground, trying to shake it up. I'm like, what's going on, dude? I need this to work right now. This is not happening. So I'm freaking out, and by the time that I look at this fire extinguisher and look back, there's like three more flames in the engine bay. It's up here above the firewall, it's here along this whole power cable, and it's down here now by the alternator as well. So I'm like, this fire is growing really fast. I'm like, I don't know what to do. I'm freaking out. I'm freaking out, like I have no idea what to do. So I immediately call 911. I'm like, my car's on f****** fire. I need someone here like now. And they got there pretty fast, but not fast enough, sadly. And yeah, so I started taking a video, and a lot of people in TikTok judge me on that.

But at this point, it was too late anyway.

I'm like, what do you want me to do, dude? I'm not gonna, a lot of people said like, oh, you could have grabbed dirt and threw it on the fire, or you could have used your sweatshirt and patted it out. And I'm like, dude, it's an electrical fire. Yeah, I'm like, you, I probably would say the same thing as you if I wasn't in the situation, but I was in the situation. And I know in that situation, that's not gonna f****** do anything. So yeah, I started taking the video, and I'm just like talking, and I'm like, I'm f*****. And obviously, this was like a moment of like, like a surreal moment for me.

Yeah, you couldn't believe it was f****** happening.

Yeah, I'm like, there's no f****** way this is happening, dude. Like, I've been building this car for years, and these people like have been watching me. So I'm like, if this is gonna be the last memory I'm gonna have with the car, I'm gonna f****** take this video, and I'm gonna have this memory. Obviously, I need to tell my f****** audience that's been watching me for five years about what the f*** happened.

Because a lot of people have been following your build over the years. A lot.

Lots, lots. Like, my whole social media was built off of this one car, and then everything else I did was just kind of just to add on. So yeah, I started my social media off this car. But yeah, so I'm like taking this video, whatever, I'm freaking out, I'm just like, I'm f*****, the car's done. After I take the video, I call my dad, and I'm like, dad, I'm like f****** freaking out, I'm crying like a b****. And I'm like, dude, I can't even talk right now, but my car's f***** up, it's done, it's on fire. He's like, dude, just don't worry about it, are you okay? And then whatever, I'm like, yeah, I'm good. I can't even talk at this time, because I'm still just breathing for air, like I'm freaking out. So then yeah, I stepped back basically, took some more videos, waited for the firetruck, firetruck came, that was that. So, long story short, it was an electrical short in a car that I've had for five years, that I built off of my social media, and yeah, car started on fire, and there wasn't much I could do with it.

Yeah, man, that's, I remember showing that to people at my former job, and they were like, oh man. Like, it just sucks, and that's the first thing, like I said, it just came to mind. We were just talking about you having the alternator, she was like two days before, so it's just like, oh man. And then, of course, all the internet experts came out, and you addressed a few of those too, but like you said, you were actually there. I'll as well get the video.

Yeah, it's like, I don't know, people are f****** a*******, dude. But I feel like I did a pretty good job at not paying attention to it, just because.

You did, I think you only did like one or two response videos.

Dude, there was like 500,000 comments, even if I wanted to, I had zero time or patience to even look at it all.

It's not possible, yeah.

I'm like, when it first started coming in, and it was like 10,000 comments or something, I'm like scrolling through them, and some of them are getting to me, and some of them I'm like, dude, you have no f****** idea.

But once the mask, so I had this happen when I posted the Corvette e-ray video last year. I have never in my life been called gay more than on that video. I pissed off, and a lot of people laughed by it. There were so many hilarious comments, but there were so many angry people, and it got to the point where I literally, I could not respond anymore. And that's why I did that Mustang video a few weeks ago too, and I got a similar response, not nearly as many views, but just a bunch of comments. I just can't respond to it.

Yeah, it's nearly impossible to respond to that many comments, let alone most of the comments that I saw that I was like, you're a f****** idiot, I would click on the profile, and it'd be like, private. Private, or it'd be just following 10,000 with zero followers. And I'm like, I don't even give a f*** what you say, dude. You're so irrelevant right now. It has zero say in anything that I do. That goes for a lot of the comments that were there. But yeah, I tried my best to not let it get to me, but it was kind of like an emotional thing for me, for sure. So sometimes I would read through them, and I'm like, they're f*****, dude.

It was a dark place for you. I remember talking to you, I can't remember how long after, but it's good to see that you're kind of happy again. But I can't remember when the switch flipped or whatever, but I could tell for a while, you were in a dark place. You put in a lot of f****** time. People were thinking about the money. I'm like, no, dude, that's a personal connection to that car.

Yeah, it wasn't even really about the money. I mean, the money obviously sucks, because like...

It was a lot. It was a lot.

And a lot of people have this theory that like my dad bought everything for me and pays for everything for me, and that's not the f****** case at all. But I'm not gonna sit there and try to prove myself to people. I tell people, if you believe that, go ahead and f****** ask my dad. He's gonna tell you, I don't f****** pay a single f****** dime of what he wants to do with this s***. That's his s***, not mine. So a lot of the things that bothered me was like, people would be like, oh, daddy's money, we'll fix it or whatever. I'm like, I wish that was the case, but it's not, sadly. So the money sucks for sure because it was literally every dollar I had into that car. I had a f****** personal loan out for the last build on that car because I couldn't afford doing it, but I was like, I'm going to Texas too, kid, dude. I will borrow money from the bank to finish this car.

What was the percentage on that?

I don't know, dude, it was pretty high. I think it was like 7% or some, 8%.

What would you put for the reasoning for the loan?

I think I said it was my only car, and I needed to pay someone to fix it or something like that.

Needs a whole new engine built.

Yeah, I was like, it doesn't drive, so I gotta fix it. But yeah, the money portion sucks for sure, but more or less, the personal connection I had with that car was for sure what damaged me the most. Just because I kinda explained this in my YouTube video too, but I don't know if a lot of people watched that video. I mean, actually, it has 20,000 views on that YouTube video, so I think it did catch a pretty large audience. But my dad had a Nagara Blue B5 S4 when I was like 10, 11 years old.

I think you shared that picture at one point.

Yeah, I did.

Yeah.

I did, yeah. That was a cool photo. It had an Evo as well, so it was like my father's day picture, I think I put us next to our cars. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, so he had a B5, and like I said on the first podcast, he got me into that car. So that was technically my first car. My dad bought me a B6 S4 that was basically like salvaged. It had a motor, but it needed timing chains, and it had like rusty paint job and s*** like that. It was like a car he got for like $1,500 or something. And he got it from me when I was 15, and he told me like, you're gonna work for me to make money to fix this car, and we're gonna fix it together. I'm gonna teach you what to do. My uncle, he did body work for Semi, so he had a paint booth and everything at the time. So my uncle helped me paint the car. So it was like, he helps me learn how to fix cars, and he started my addiction, basically. And at that time, after we finished that car, I was still 15, and I was like, this car is slow as s***. And I'm addicted to forced induction already because you've had me in turbo cars since I was 10 years old. So I don't want this slow V8. And it sounds like a spoiled child thing to say, but I worked for him to make the money to have this car running in the first place. So he told me, once we finish this car, it's your choice. It's your money. You can decide if you want to sell it, buy something else, if you want to keep it, drive it for your first car or whatever. So I traded the car for a B5S4, which was my first car. And that was my first car I had. And so, yeah, since I was 16 years old, I've had the car, and it's been through many different renovations. And all the cars went from 300 horsepower to 400 horsepower to 500, 600, 700, 800 horsepower. Like, I learned a lot off this car. And I had the car because of my dad. So like, just everything leading up to where I had it and like where I was with it, I was so content. Like it was like from when I was 16 to what I had it to now, it was like what I envisioned when I was 16. I was like, this is perfect. This is exactly how I wanted it. It had everything that I ever envisioned growing up trying to build that car. So losing it was like, f*** dude. This is s*****. Everything I ever put into that car is just gone.

Yeah, you just weren't ready to say goodbye.

No, not at all. And I like, everybody says like, oh, I would have died in that car. I'm not gonna do it. It's not worth my f****** life. Realistically, I'm not gonna f****** sit in that car and f****** burn to death, but.

Imagine, just imagine this. Just sitting there, get your hand on the steering wheel.

That's what I'm saying.

Captain goes down with the ship. Just f****** burning. And just sit there quiet, just a single tear. You know how there's Tibetan monks, they'll just walk into fire and they won't, they're just gonna walk silently and burn. Just do one of those, what the f***?

Yeah, I'm like, dude, you're not, let's be realistic here. You're not gonna f****** sit in there. Obviously, the car means a lot to me, but it's not f****** worth my life, dude. I'm not gonna kill myself over the car, you know? So it was definitely a dark place for me. But yeah, the car and just building the relationships I have with the car and-

Yeah, that's true.

The media and everything, it's cliche. It really is, it sounds cliche as s***, but a lot of my life was built off of this car. Like I would not be anywhere close to where I am if it wasn't for the car, for sure. I definitely wouldn't even be, I don't even think I'd be doing social media if it wasn't for that car.

The story that comes to mind here, well, we're gonna have him on the podcast in the near future, but like Lambo Dad, for example, right? Like he first got like a Maserati or whatever from a different dealership, not the one that basically wouldn't let him buy one because he looked like a bum because he came back from work or whatever. It's a funny story. We'll tell it in the future on here. And then eventually he upgraded to a Gallardo, and he made so many fricking friendships with that Gallardo. It's ridiculous like that. Say what you want, but it's like cars really connect people regardless of what you're in. But in his instance, it was the Gallardo. I don't really have that for me. It's like my camera. Like it's gotten me in so many rooms that I definitely would not have been. Like last week, I was at a breakfast with some guy who's between our age, like 23 or whatever. And it's like the dude has a multi-million dollar or several million dollar like real estate portfolio. And it's like I never would have talked to that dude unless I talked to this other dude because I met with my camera, you know?

Yeah, it's crazy to think.

My cars are just so good for like meeting people. It's crazy, man.

It is. It really is. And when I went to Texas 2K, dude, there was like, it blew my mind how many people recognized my car.

Yeah, that too.

Like I had people coming up to me like, dude, are you Trae Moua? I've seen your car on YouTube. I've seen your car on TikTok. I've seen blah, blah, blah. And I'm like, I am. Yeah, yeah, that's me. Yeah, I'm Trae from Minnesota. So it's just weird. I just, I don't know. That car had like the most loyal following, dude. It was crazy. I think the thing that I'm gonna miss most about it is that it was different than a lot of people did. Like, do you know anybody that had a fast B5 out here that was constantly on the streets f****** s*** up? That's what I'm saying. So it's like.

It was truly unique. That's the other thing. Like there's so much copy and paste in the car community, but like that car was truly unique.

Yeah, that's the sad part about it. Like at Texas 2K, only B5 I saw was mine. And everybody knew that, and it was my car. So like just to see how many people... Dude, I walked up to some dude in an F80 M3 who was a Texas native, so he lived there. And I walked up to him, because I saw him at the street races or whatever. And I walked up to him and I was like, hey, you wanna line up? And he was like, oh, what do you drive? And I was like, blue Audi with ratified sticker. And he was like, f*** no. And I was like, why? And he was like, dude, I know you. I'm not trying to get put on TikTok. I'm like, really? He was like, that thing's fast as hell. And I'm like, we should still do it for fun anyways. Cause he said he made like 700, and at the time in Texas 2K, I was only making like 750 or whatever. I'm like, dude, it'd be a good race. But he didn't believe me cause he thinks, you know, the car looks so much faster on TikTok. But yeah, just stuff like that. I'm like, it's so crazy that halfway across the country, these people like know this car. Yeah, so.

That's the dream, man. That's kind of like my next step. I mean, I really want that in the car community. Like I, that's kind of why I was itching for a Supra for a long time, but like, I don't know what will be the next thing for me, but it's like, I desperately want some, not desperately, but yeah, desperately. I'll say it. I want a car that that's kind of like related to me, like what the Nagi was to you. So like people across the country would be like, oh dude, you're that guy. Like it's kind of, it's a cool feeling.

Yeah, that's what sucks now is I just like, I have the B9 now, but it's not like the Trae car, you know what I mean? It's just the kind of my car that I got just to drive. I plan to build the Evo, but even then it's like, you can find built Evos. You're gonna go to Texas, you're gonna see like five, six, seven built Evos. You're not gonna see another built B5S for it. That's what sucks. But I don't know what I'm gonna do to kind of fill in that unique portion. I know a lot of people wanted me to build another B5, but I stressed the fact that as hard as it was, I didn't think building another B5 was the right move, just because I felt like I did everything that I could with a B5 already. So doing it over again was basically just replicating what I had. And at that point, it's not the same car. So.

Yeah, I could see that.

Yeah, that's why I just like, I don't know. I don't know what I'm gonna do. For now, I'm gonna get myself a nice new car and see what the future holds.

You can always get rid of that. You know, like if you ever want, like find something that you'd want more. I mean, if you really wanna be unique with the Evo, you could always do like a grinder wrap or something. You know, like you'd be the grinder Evo, I don't know. You got options. Wraps have an infinite option.

I can make it look unique on the outside, I guess, but.

But there's like a million Evos that are whatever, 800 wheel, especially like, again, when you go to Texas.

Yeah.

Again, because we, you and your dad share so many similarities in the things that you are passionate about. We talked about this in the last podcast. Like, you never know what that Evo's doing. It could be 300 horsepower, it could be a thousand. Like you'd.

You know why my dad says that?

Why?

Because he got gapped by like five Evos. And he loves Evos, but like, he just like, hates the fact that he loses the Evos. I want to build my Evo to the point where I can beat my dad, but my dad always says, you're never going to beat me kid. Like, I'm never going to let you beat me, which in the B5, I was goddamn close, dude. There was races and I'm like, f***, I almost had them, but almost just isn't enough.

Always chasing it, dude. I think it's like, I think those are the best like father son relationships, by the way, like where the dad's just like, you're not going to beat me. Like regardless of what it is, like it just, it does make you like better, faster, stronger, I don't know.

Yeah, there was a point where my dad wasn't like, obviously he was still into cars, but he didn't have any cars. And so technically I was faster than him then, but.

We don't play technical over here. Sorry, man, you don't get that. You don't get that one. Oh, technically I was faster because daddy had a Jeep Wrangler. It's like, yeah, you smoked his Wrangler or whatever the f*** you had.

No, but yeah, I, my dad had, he got beat by a couple of Evos locally, so.

The way you said that had me nervous here, like, cause like, I didn't know you were going to talk about Evos again. You're like, he says all sad, like my dad got beat, I was like, who did he get beat by?

Yeah, he got beat specifically by one Evo. He got beat by a lot. So I think it motivated him to get a little faster. And I don't think they've raced since he's gotten two, 300 horsepower more, but yeah, that car is no slouch now.

Yeah, I saw a video, who posted, I think it was SMR visuals, maybe. And then there was people in the backseat of the RS3 and then just floors it on the straight up Brainer or a power cruise, and it's just like, the car's just squatting so much.

That car is so weirdly fast. Have you ever been in it?

No.

I'm gonna have to take you in it one day, you too.

Yeah, it's got four seats.

It's got four seats, yeah.

No, dude, that car is so weirdly fast. Like, I've tried to explain it where that car is so front wheel drive biased, where when you're doing a fricking pull, it's like pulling you, it's not pushing you. So it's weird, it's like, whoa, s***. Like, it's like torque steer as f***, but I, yeah, that car is just different.

It just throws you off by, like, how much power actually gets sent to the front wheels?

No, it just throws me off by how you're getting, like, pulled. You're not getting pushed, you're getting pulled. So the feeling is completely different. It's hard to explain, but like, I took, I don't know if you know Jake Sherbrooke. He's a local YouTuber. He's from, he was in...

Is that the BMW? Oh, what's he got?

He's got a Mustang. Anyways, he was at Power Cruiser, and I took him for a ride in both the Supra and the RS3. And he, I told him the same thing. I was like, you're gonna notice a difference where the RS3 is gonna kind of pull you, and the Supra is gonna kind of push you. And right when I did the pull, he was like, I totally know what you mean. Like, that is a completely different feeling than it would be in a 1,000 horsepower Mustang or something like that, you know? So yeah, the RS3 is weird, dude. It's so crazy how that car is just what it is. Like, you hop in the Supra and you think it's fast, and then the RS3 just flies past it. I don't know if you've ever seen that video.

I don't know if I have.

It was at Power Cruiser, and the Supra, you know, it's flying down the drag strip, and all of a sudden the RS3 is just like, whoosh, and it makes the Supra look like it's 300 horsepower, but that's 1,100 horsepower compared to 800 horsepower. The difference is just surreal.

Yeah.

So.

Is that the fastest car you've been in, then?

No, I've been in my buddy Koi Christmas.

Oh, yeah.

Yeah, I've been in his, I think it was 1,700 horsepower at the time, Twin Turbo Huracan.

Is that the one that burned down? No, it was the one after.

The orange Vader. Yeah, that car is probably the fastest car I've been in, I think.

Yeah, that makes sense. Yeah, he just came through town as well, too, because he had some stuff done to his RS3, right?

Yeah, he came, visited me, and then at the same time, he had it at Ratify for a couple days and had a bunch of stuff done.

Just like some simple stuff, nothing crazy, I think.

Just a bunch of bolt-ons. I can't really do much with it yet, but once we can.

Yeah, so that was one thing. I think you or him, I think he told me, actually, like you can't do much stuff with that platform, or what's that about?

Just the ECUs, they're not unlocked yet.

Oh, okay.

So we can't tune it yet, but we were like, all we really did was like a turbo inlet, intake, coilovers, wheels, just...

It's a good-looking car.

Yeah, I'm not a big fan of black wheels, but a murdered-out car is probably the only car that I would run black wheels on.

There's a place and time for it. I could see, there's so many people that are like, eww, black wheels, I'm not a part of that crowd. I could see why, like on certain cars, like they just don't look right. But there's a place and time for it. Same thing with polished wheels, like, I don't know.

I agree. I'm just...

I think we talked about this with Trae the last time, too. I'm pretty sure... I think it was you that we talked about this.

I don't remember this, but I'm definitely part of that, like, you black wheels camp now.

I just think... I don't mind black wheels, but I feel like when you have black wheels, all of the wheels look the same.

Wow, that is the single most racist thing I've heard.

But seriously, it's like... I don't know. When you see black wheels, it just looks like black wheels to me. But when you have, like, a set of f****** black wheels with a polished lip, then it's a completely different wheel.

Yeah, a lot of people gave Eric s*** for that on the McLaren, because I suggested he do the polished lip on the McLaren. I can't remember if it was because of me he listened, or I gave him the idea or whatever, but it tore a lot of people. They're like, oh, it should be all black.

The polished lip looks so good. It's like the welds on the Durango. Yeah, that looks f****** sick. I'm a sucker for polished lips.

No, I understand, because I've made this huge flip from having black wheels on most of my cars, because they go with everything. You could have any color of car. It's going to look great, but it's too easy now. So it's like, all right, you can make it a little bit more difficult by like, okay, could I throw in an accent color? Could I change the color of the lip and maybe have some black accents or anything just to change it up? But yeah, like you said, the black weld and then having the polished lip is such an amazing look. It's classic, it'll never die.

You know whose wheels are hot? Katie's Supra, because they're black wheels, and she subscribes to the black wheels camp. And she has like purple accents. It's so clean. It looks so good.

Yeah, I don't mind it.

Black wheels matter. Y'all have wrong, but...

Yeah, I don't know, man. If I were to have black wheels, it'd have to be in a black car. And if that was the case, then I'd do it.

A murdered-out Evo would be sick.

Dude, I already got a blue Evo. I can't do it.

No, you can't. I'm just saying. Race car Evo. I saw one on TikTok that was murdered out. It looked really sweet. Oh, man. I'm kind of running out of steam, unless you wanted to talk about anything in particular. It's a late night over here today, and somebody forgot my Jocko. I'll use code Minnoxide to save 10%, because somebody forgot it.

Hey, you got that referral. You're doing okay.

Yeah, we talked about drifting, we talked about your Evo, about the Nagi, unfortunately. But yeah, have you thought about expanding to any other platforms?

Like, Threads? Bet?

Threads? Have you thought about joining Threads?

No, absolutely not, Sean. We are not talking about Instagram.

Oh, it's not social media platforms. You mean like other vehicle platforms? He was saying he doesn't know what he wants to do now, because the B5 was so special and unique, and it's going to be really hard to top that. And finding something that can make that same power and beat your dad. You are making it really difficult for yourself.

Dude, okay, beating my dad is just a cherry on the top. I don't need to beat my dad, but it would be really cool to beat my dad.

He wants to beat his dad.

You are so competitive where he is not really.

I know, and I know he talked about that too. I hate the fact that he is not competitive. I am competitive, but I am not like... I don't know how to explain it.

Okay, so here is basically how it is. You ever see the movies or whatever where there is a big person, there is a little person, a little person is trying to swing on the big person, but the big person is just holding their head, and the little person just can't swing because you are at arm's length. That's what your dad is doing to you. He is like, you can't swing on me, son.

Yeah, well, okay. My dad is just, he is just not competitive at all, and it grinds my gears, dude. It's just like, care a little bit, because at the end of the day, the way I look at it is like a business perspective, right? And he doesn't, I mean, at the end of the day, it doesn't really matter. He is still going to get business, but if his car is out here gapping crazy cars, his car is going to look way faster, and people are going to be like, all right, he is doing something good with this car, right? So that's why I look at it that way. I'm like, dude, if you are out here losing the 700 horsepower Evos, your car looks slow. Nobody wants a slow car. If they want to get their RS3 built by you, they want to see it beat f****** a twin turbo Lambo or something like that, right? So that's the way I look at it. But also, in a friendly competitive, he just doesn't care at all. Like, we will go out to the street races, and he'll let the person get the jump, and they'll beat him. And I'm like, why did you do that? You could have totally beat him if you just went when I said go.

Yeah, he's not about that puppy kicking either though, because there's a lot of social media stuff where they'll just go beat up on cars or just get the jump. There was a, I won't say who, there was a video that started going around a few months ago, and it's like, the guy jumped on one, not even two, like a grown a** man. Like, jumped on one, or did one of these where it's just like, one, two, just a ridiculously fast one. It's like, one, two, go. It's like, I get it. Like, jumping on two, I get it. That one I understand, to a degree. You know, especially if you're on Turbos and all that, whatever. I'm all for it. But it just annoys me when I see a video where somebody's obviously just being a dick.

Yeah, the only time I jump, honestly, the only time I jump is when I know that the car makes way more power than me. And I either do it as a joke or I do it because I'm actually trying to win. So I'll be like, f*** you, I'm going on too. If you line up with me and your 1,000 horsepower and I only make 500 horsepower, I might even go on one.

Yeah, they're not going to notice.

Yeah, I'm like, I don't know what you want me to do. You make way more power than me, so if you want a fair race, I'm going to get the jump. Yeah.

You should have clarified, no jumping.

Yeah, I'm definitely more competitive than my dad.

But you kind of need that. I think it's good that you're managing the social media aspect of it, because that's, again, like you said, it's going to help the brand grow. It's like he's doing the, like he should focus on what he's best at, making fast shift fast.

Yeah.

Because like when, if he were to get bogged down into the social media world, especially like, I doubt comments would bother him or whatever just based off his personality, but it's like, you know, his time is better spent on the car itself.

I wouldn't say comments bother him, but I will say, I think he pays a lot of attention to them. So kind of like how you were, how we were talking about earlier, where there's so many comments that we couldn't even reply to them. There was this one video he posted with that BMW that he raced or whatever, and there's a whole backstory to it, but a lot of the, I don't think he expected the video to get as many views as he did. And he's the one that actually posted that video, but big backstory, whatever. It got a bunch of views, but nobody personally knows the story behind the video, so there was a lot of comments that were kind of dogging on my dad.

Like speculation.

And I think he paid a lot of attention to those comments, because he wasn't used to seeing comments like that. So he was replying to every single comment, and I'm like, dude, don't even worry about it. These people don't know you, they're not going to be back tomorrow. They just scrolled through Instagram, they saw this video, and they had to say something just like every other f****** keyboard warrior.

Yeah, and that's kind of one of the things that I'm dealing with one of my clients right now that I'm doing some marketing with. They feel defenseless, especially if it's a local business. They feel defenseless when they can't respond to a comment or correct that person in person. So for a lot of people, that could be difficult, but at the end of the day, you forget the goldfish brain. Most of those people will comment something, move on, never think of it again. Like ever again. So it's like this person has moved on, and now you're going to spend the rest of your day. For some people, it ruins their day. I don't know, maybe since you and I are in the content creation space, we're just used to it.

I'm for sure used to it by now. I definitely in the beginning, I was not used to it at all. But especially after the B5 stuff, I've gotten really used to being s*** like that. I don't give a f***. Feel how you want to feel. I'm still going to go on with my day. It's not like anything you have to say really affects me.

I purposely rile people up. Again, that's why I did the Mustang video. Now, I try to be a positive, happy person most of the time, but every once in a while, I get this wild hair up my a** to just stir the pot. And then if you look at the comments on that Mustang video, please, I urge everybody to go take a look at this. And if you want to, get into some beef if you'd like. But it's just ridiculous. Especially when people start going at each other, you're just like, oh yeah, this is great engagement.

To back off that a little bit, when I first started doing my TikTok, the first video that I did that got over a million views was me calling out every car on TikTok or whatever. Because to me, it's obviously a joke. I obviously know that there's cars way faster than my 700 horsepower Audi, but I was just doing it for views and clicks. And a lot of people take it the wrong way.

They can't tell you're obviously joking, too.

Yeah, which is so stupid, because I'm like, dude, it's obviously a f****** joke. But some people don't get that. And then that's like how my TikTok kind of started. And I was kind of being looked down on as like a cocky kid with a daddy's money Audi or whatever. But then I kind of tried to switch it to kind of humble myself and not talk like that anymore and make it more just about my builds and stuff like that. Because I was getting so much f****** hate being that cocky kid. It brought in a lot of views, but I didn't really want to be looked at like that because that's not truly how I am.

You don't want that to be your rep.

Yeah, that's not how I am really in real life. And I didn't want people to think.

Like you pissed somebody off in Texas and then they see you at Texas 2K.

Yeah, I'm not trying to get punched in the face. I've tried to be better on that and not do that. And I've definitely kind of, with the comments, I've kind of just let them go.

Yeah, you have to.

I don't even care anymore. I'm just doing me at this point.

Well, it's going to follow you around. That's why I'm trying to be positive. I think I only responded to one comment negatively on that last one. This guy was like a total absolute s*** for brains. It's just like...

If it's someone that's completely freaking stupid, I'm like, all right, just shut the f*** up for one second.

Sometimes I'll just let him have it. Like this guy had a private profile or whatever, and he's like... So I can't even remember how it started, but I remember at one point I made a point, like the Ford GT is a glorified EcoBoost, like the new Ford GT. It's a million dollar car. It's an EcoBoost. And the guy's like, it doesn't have the Focus engine in there. I'm like, I didn't say it has the Focus engine in there. It's an EcoBoost. He's like, so you're saying any car with a turbo is an EcoBoost? I'm like, what the f***? So it's like, these are the kinds of like... And that's why I let most comments go, because I could tell it's a bad rabbit hole, because most people are smart enough to just keep scrolling. You either get the positive people or the scrollers.

People are just so dumb. They jump to so many assumptions. It's insane. I'm like, how did you even think of that? That was nowhere near what I was thinking in my head when you said that.

You ever see that meme of the guy that has the board or whatever and it's scattered with all the red strings or whatever, and he's just trying to find the riddle or whatever? I have that in my head when I try to figure out how this person came to that conclusion.

Yeah, I had this guy try to argue with me the other day, saying that takeovers were the start of drifting or something. Saying like... I don't even remember. He was just saying takeovers are so cool and that all the skilled drivers do takeovers. He was saying NASCAR started off takeovers or something. I'm like, what the f*** are you talking about, dude?

At that point, I would have just dismissed that as them literally being either some sort of troll or just... They went past the point where it's like, oh, this is so dumb, it's funny. It's just dumb.

No, literally. I was like, are you serious right now? I'm so confused because he was like, you're a stupid b****, you don't know s*** about this and that. I went on his profile and I saw all the takeovers and I was like, you're proud of takeovers, question mark? And then he was freaking out and he was like, NASCAR is a star from takeovers. And then I'm like, what the f***, dude? Calm down.

This is exactly why I hate doing social media stuff. Why? Because if I ever got to this point where I just had a bunch of d******** commenting on my stuff, I would literally just turn off my phone. I really just could not deal with it. I don't have the time of day or patience to do any of that.

Yeah, the guy who takes four hours to respond to my text. He's like, he's so worried about his comments.

People would be so pissed, waiting, commenting, like, oh, I got him. And then I never will respond to them.

I will never, never get them on. I notice this is turning into a common b******* session, which I'm sure we could do a seven-hour podcast on this, but that's my favorite thing to do, is to get someone riled up and disappear. Because you know they're going to be seething in it for a while.

Sometimes they come back with a second comment and expecting you to be back.

I almost got back at someone the other day. Because they got back at me, and I hit them back or whatever. And I had no response, because I got them good. And a day or two went by, and for whatever reason, it's showing at the top of my comments. I kept wanting to respond, like, hey, you don't want your lunch break yet? Let's keep going. But we should do the usual three. Let's see if it's changed.

Yeah. I don't even remember. Do you remember?

No, but it's not reminded. Let's just do it.

Oh, I know. He wouldn't have ever got this question.

Oh, I never got this question.

This was his episode before, Texas 2K. So this is perfect. We finally get to ask you this question. So if you don't know, we like to ask our guests a question. It kind of shows off a little bit about their personality, characters of what they look for in a car. And all you have to do is choose a daily, a track car, and a show car.

Unlimited budget.

I know that you had this question for my dad, and he was very quick to answer.

He cut me off. He's like, yeah, I'm a simple man. Just give me a f****** truck.

Dude, he loves his Duramax. I don't know what's so special about that thing, but he just...

He's a simple man, man. He's a stoic.

Dude, he chooses that car over anything every day. Track car, show car daily.

You can do them in any order, too.

Track car, I would probably say... I don't know if my dad had this same answer, but I think it's a pretty similar answer to a lot of people. Maybe not, but I think a good track car for everybody is the GT3 RS.

I just drove my first GT3 today.

Yeah, I saw that.

It was a fun car. Yeah. I'm still Team Viper, but I'd have to try RS just to see.

Yeah.

It was a fun car.

Maybe I would do a GT2, but I've never driven a GT2.

I heard that's a scary car.

Yeah, but they're cool. But I think GT3, just because I feel like it's the ultimate... Like a Porsche is the ultimate track car. I feel like I hear about them handling crazy everywhere.

There's such perfection. I got into that car today. It was an older Porsche. I think it was a 2015, 16, whatever.

So old.

It is. Seriously. I'm just saying. It's 2023, Sean. Come on, get with it, boomer. I got in that car. It was just so well-refined. It's two years older than my car. It literally felt like a Golf, by the way. The steering wheel is literally the same, just Alcantara. I liked it a lot. It felt like it was not scary to drive at all. Because it also wasn't really all that fast. It's only 500-something horsepower, I think.

Yeah, but it weighs, what, 3500?

Well, for perspective, I'm 380 wheel in my car, so it wasn't a ton faster than my car. Obviously, it was faster, and it was an A, but I felt so comfortable in it. That would be such a fun track car. I loved it, but Team Viper.

Yeah, so that was your dad's answer on that episode. He did say a GT3.

Yeah, just what I could do.

No, he said either one.

With cheese, Mr. Squidward.

He said either one. He was in picky.

Track car, GT3 RS. A daily?

It's a tough one.

My, what was it? Show car or track car daily, right? Okay, my type of daily is so bad, dude, because I daily my S4, which I think is a great daily, but it's still a modified car. At the end of the day, it's on E85.

Yeah, that's what works for you.

Yeah, okay, so my daily would probably be like a twin turbo Huracan or something.

Dude, you can't get groceries in that, dog.

No, dude, you gotta frunk. Trust me, I've done this with Koi. We've done it before. We got groceries. That's my kind of daily.

That's fair.

He's not getting soccer moms full of groceries. He doesn't have four kids at home to feed after practice. It's literally just him.

Yeah, for me, it'd probably be that. But if I were to be realistic and maybe be like...

No, that is realistic for you. Dude, freaking Minneapolis Mopar, he literally takes his 2,000 horsepower Viper to go get milk. He's got trunk space in that thing.

Yeah, so I'd probably do a Twitter work on for a daily. And a show car.

My favorite answer was freaking AJ's. He's like, I'll do a Euro sword ever. That's kind of what I was thinking. Yeah, and then I was like, you want to do an RS6? Because everybody on this podcast has said RS6. He's like, yeah, I got an RS6. It's like, god damn it.

Dude, I don't know. I've never been in the show car life.

Which is so funny because Sam, who was on the thing, he's like, yeah, I was initially meant to be a show car. Like his S4.

I think if we want to talk about show car, I would say the only reason I would consider it a show car is because the only place I would probably drive it is two shows. My ultimate dream car to this day would still be an R34 GTR.

Oh, yeah.

A midnight purple one to be exact.

We know somebody that can get you one.

I can't afford it right now.

Hey, just a personal loan. You need a new car until yours gets out of the shop.

Yeah, right, bro. Yeah, I think that would probably be my show car, but I would consider it more of a dream car for me.

I think that's where a lot of people with show cars are. You know, a lot of guys that go to Cars and Coffee or Cars and Caves, they only bring them out for these events. And if you talk to them, they're like, oh yeah, this is a car that I've always wanted since I was a kid, and I finally just said f*** it, bought it, and now it just sits in my garage, and I only take it out 100 miles every month or something to go back and forth from these shows. So I see that being very, how people look at a show car.

I think I would still probably, if I had an unlimited budget, I would still probably make it fast, though.

Oh yeah, that's part of it being a show car, is you pop the hood and you show off all the fancy billet.

Dude, you know who my favorite person on social media is? Or one of my favorites is 458Destroyer. I don't know if you follow him, but I think he has the GTR you're talking about, but he has an amazing collection. He had a Cavill, he had an Enth Moto Viper, again, me and my Vipers, but he has freaking every Ferrari. He drives Ferrari Cup Sport cars or whatever. It's just ridiculous. He just posted a crazy hit. The reason he's at the top of my mind is because he posted a video of him doing a hit in his twin-turbo Viper.

I saw that.

Dude, that was the rawest video I've ever seen. Nobody's done a video like that yet of one of those, so it was really sweet.

What, inside the cockpit?

Yeah, but whatever he had for his audio setup, it just made it like six times more raw than what the car actually is. So it was like, it took me back. That was some memories. But again, I wouldn't say on limited budget, but he has a large budget. He's basically making everybody's dream garage. He has everything anybody would ever want, I feel.

This dude's so spoiled. He got a ride in his... He's ridden in so many Vipers, and just the last weekend, was it? You ridden in your first naturally aspirated Viper.

No, I've ridden in a Viper so many times, not so many Vipers. And to be fair, like I said, my first naturally aspirated one was a Gen 4 ACR.

Gen 4 doesn't count? Gen 5?

Well, it's basically the same thing, but we just weren't ripping it. We were literally just doing cruising rollers, so I was just there for fun. And then the next time I was in a Viper was Adam's Twin Turbo 1. I think I've probably experienced eight or nine hits in that car, two or three towards max power. But again, this weekend I got to go in an NA1, and I was like, dude, this is my future car. I will do whatever I have to to get to that. I'm going to skip the Supra and the GT500 at this point, because that car was so ridiculously... I always had this plan, like, okay, after the Golf I'm going to get a Supra, and then a GT500, because I love those cars. But yeah, that car is perfection. But I am rambling again. Stop making me ramble, Sean.

Hey, that's okay. This is content. We're good on content.

I've never been in a twin turbo Viper.

You've been to what?

In a twin turbo Viper. Never been.

Actually aspirated?

Have you not heard of Turo? Nobody puts those on Turo.

Nobody's a twin turbo Viper on Turo.

Dude, listen, I know a great guy. He works for Uber. Got a four-dose turbo somehow.

Yeah, I've never been. I mean, I've been around him. I've seen him racing.

Yeah.

Never been in it.

I would love to experience the Zenith kit from Enthomoto, the 2,600-horsepower ones. That's a rowdy car. I got scared at 1,800-ish. That's where I was just like, ooh, this is... I was making noises, and they were not coherent, but just like that, something along those lines. It sounded like my puppy. But where can people find you, man? Please don't drop your address. We're talking about Instagram.

Oh, yeah, my dad said the same thing. He's like, oh, my address. Social media, a lot of it is just my name, so it's just Trae Moua, T-R-A-E-M-O-U-A. Otherwise, my Instagram, I haven't switched yet, and I honestly don't plan to switch, just because a lot of people still walk up to me and, are you Single Turbo Nagi?

Yeah, Dr. Nagi.

That's your name now.

Yeah, I know. So I think I'm just going to keep it that for as long as I can. But my Instagram is Single Turbo Nagi. And yeah, everything else, I think, is just my name.

Mr. Sean.

Sweet. Everybody, you can find me on Instagram at 1mnmopar. And it's spelled S-E-A-N, not S-H-A-W-N. On the last episode, we kind of got into it. And I feel like everybody that listens to the podcast now needs to know how to spell it. It's not the S-H-A-U-N. None of those extra letters are required.

Just breathe. It's okay. It's okay, Sean. Just breathe. It's Sean, S-H-A-W-N.

No, no, no. S-E-A-N.

Anywho. You're on the Minnoxide podcast. One thing I wanted to tell everybody, make sure that you are just rating. It takes two seconds to rate it on Spotify as five stars or four stars if you're really not liking this episode. But obviously, if you made it this far in the episode, please share the show. It helps us grow. And it's been growing a lot. It's awesome to showcase our local community here. And, you know, we will be doing a number of trips. We're going to get a few Chicago guests on the car community rally. This is the plug part of the episode. If you want to save, what is it, $100 on car community, use code Minnoxide. I hope to see you guys rally with us. I love doing car rallies. It's not like a cruise. I've been on cruises. I've been on rallies. I've run both. There's nothing like a rally. So, sign up for that. What else, what else is there? Make sure you're on the newsletter. Get all the notifications for podcasts, social media stuff, free wallpapers. I still need to figure out my giveaways on there. I'm about to do my limited prints here soon. I don't know, I'm ranting. There's so much stuff going on, dude. Like, I love doing this, and if I could do this forever, all day, every day, I totally would. So, thanks for tuning in, guys. Trae, thanks for coming back.

Absolutely.

We're going to get you back here. Keep doing wild s***. There's very few people out there like you, so keep doing them. I'll do my best. See you all next time.