NASCAR and Elk Hunting

On this episode of The Western Rookie Podcast, Brian Talks with Jeff Cordero about the fast paced life of being a NASCAR Pit Crew and Elk Hunter

Jeff is a full time NASCAR Tire Changer for the #24 car pit crew and also an avid elk hunter. Brian and Jeff talk about the intense training it takes to do both, and how being a NASCAR pit crew member only allows for a few days in the mountains at a time. Jeff shares his strategy for hunting elk with only a few days, from pre-scouting the unit to pre-made game plans for how to get an elk off the mountain and where he is going to take it on his way back to the airport for his next race. Check out the links below to follow Jeff’s journey and his YouTube Channel!

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Brian Krebbs: Welcome back to another episode of the Western Rookie Podcast. I'm your host, Brian Krebs, and today I have Jeff Cordero and I saw your Instagram. I don't know how I came across it, but I noticed two things about it. First, right off the bat, obviously I. You spend a lot of time on a NASCAR track 'cause you're on a NASCAR team and I've [00:01:00] never talked to anyone, I've never met anyone in my life that, that has that for a day job, which seems really cool.

And then you also clearly love archery and hunting. So I thought those two things together would make a really cool podcast. So I reached out and here we are. So how are you doing this morning, Jeff?

Jeff Cordero: Doing good. It was late night last night. We actually, speaking of the NASCAR thing, we won yesterday's race.

Heck yeah. That puts five on the season. Yeah, that's, it's good, man. So yeah, my full-time job, I'm the front tire changer on the number 24 car for William Byron in the Cup Series. This is my 14th year being in nascar pitting race cars and. Making a living from doing it? Not all of 'em have been with William.

I've been on some other teams, but yeah it's quite the day job I guess. It's it's a lot of fun.

Brian Krebbs: It's a lot of fun. It's interesting that you say you're a front tire changer on the team, so it's that dialed in where everyone's got one specific job.

Jeff Cordero: Yeah, especially when it comes to the pit crew side of it.

We have one front tire changer, which is me. I do both the right front and left front. We have [00:02:00] one rear tire changer. He does the right rear, left rear. We have one Jackman, one tire carrier, one gas man, and we all specialize in what we do. So there is no I'm not gonna carry tires one day or I'm not gonna jack the race car one day.

Like I am very specialized at what I do. And that's how it is in ra. The racing industry is, everyone has their job and that's what they. Hone and craft. It's yeah. It's like you're not gonna see, Tom Brady stepping up on the offensive line to throw some blocks, so it's it's very specialized.

Brian Krebbs: How do you get that job? Do you say Hey, I wanna work in nascar, and they're like how fast can you change tires?

Jeff Cordero: That's, yeah, that's way further down the line. So I got the job, I grew up in Connecticut. I grew up working, helping a buddy of mine out at his local short track, in high school.

Just kinda like working on race cars and helping more people out. And I got to a situation where I was going to college, but I was spending more time at the racetrack working on race cars, trying to like, pursue that dream and I needed to make a decision. So I quit school, moved from Connecticut to North [00:03:00] Carolina and just hustled for a year.

I did every tryout I could. I did. I knocked on doors, I talked to anyone that would listen to try to get a job and eventually got one. So once I got my foot in the door did everything I could to stay inside of that opening and just hustle and just continue to grow and learn new things, learned in the industry and got into the pit crew stuff because it just looked cool.

I was 21, I was athletic. I was like, let's go. This is, this looks like a ton of fun.

Brian Krebbs: It does look like a ton of fun, and I will admit I am not, I'm not the most knowledgeable guy when it comes to racing. I know that there's like a difference between NASCAR and IndyCar and, I know that there's some differences and I've watched a few races, but I am.

I don't watch all of them. I really don't know what the season looks like, if you will. And so that's, I guess what I was just gonna lead into is what is the, what does your race season look like compared to hunting season? Is it like pretty much a summer thing and then it wraps up pretty nicely for [00:04:00] fall?

Or is there a healthy overlap where you're like, oh man, I'd love to hit the woods, but we got race and I'm the front tire chain guy, I gotta be

Jeff Cordero: there. There's a healthy overlap. So we race from Valentine's Day weekend all the way until the first weekend in November. Every weekend. We're doing two races Saturday, Sunday, so we are busy.

So like during those September months, like the late August, September, October into early November, I'm at the racetrack and the further we get into the season, so starting the beginning of September is when we start our playoffs. So that's when everything's more important. That's when everything's more ramped up.

Everyone's trying to put in extra time, extra effort. It's a little harder to get days off, to go do whatever during the week. So it, yeah, it's like I got two things that are coming together at the same time in the fall and it's, it'd be great if NASCAR was over by September, but it's just not.

And it's been a learning experience and trial and error trying to figure out how to hunt around the NASCAR schedule because like you said, like [00:05:00] I have somewhere to be every weekend. It's not like I can just take a race off. I have to be there. So trying to coordinate everything and get into the western hunting and traveling and doing all that and being able to navigate that has been, I.

Kind of, I don't know. And I don't wanna say this where I I strive, but it's something that I have to pay attention to and I think I've got it ironed out pretty well now. Yeah,

Brian Krebbs: that sounds really challenging. 'cause the average person works probably the opposite like Monday through Friday and then they usually have some stuff going on the weekends where it could still be hard to pull away for a weekend.

But when you have every weekend like, it's blocked. So how does it work to get out like early season, September, October? 'cause I do, I mean I have, obviously I watched you get, you did some tack stuff or some Mountain three D courses and couple elk hunts. What does that look like then?

Do you have to get like a backup to cover a weekend so you can be gone a good stretch? Or are you just Hey, we can leave Monday morning, we gotta be back Friday evening.

Jeff Cordero: Yeah, it's the, it's, I have hard [00:06:00] in and hard out dates and it all bases around the NASCAR schedule, where we're at that weekend, where we're going.

So for me, like September at Rut Hunt that I like to do, go out west where I did Colorado, I've done Montana, I'm headed out to Montana again, we run Bristol Night Race, which is on a Saturday, which most of our races are on Sunday, but there's an occasional few that run on Saturday night. So it gives me an extra day in the lead, in the later in that next week.

So we run Bristol Night Race Saturday night September 16th. That is not too far from us. Bristol's not that far from North Carolina, so we'll fly right back. We'll land probably, I don't know, one, two o'clock in the morning and I have a flight outta Charlotte at five 40 on Sunday morning to fly out to Bozeman.

Now I have. If that for some reason, if the race gets rained out or whatever, I just have to adjust my flight schedule, like on the fly. Oh, okay. But so I'll fly out to Montana Hunt all week long and I have a hard out, like some people, oh, they killed something on the [00:07:00] last day. It's a great story.

They just, they call into work, they get an extra day of p t o, maybe they they test their wife's patience a little bit and hey, I'll be back whenever we get back, but for me it is like hard out, no matter what, you have to be on that plane. And then I'll fly on Saturday from Montana down to Texas and I'll be fly straight from hunting to the racetrack.

Yeah. All my gear.

Brian Krebbs: That's wild. So what does that look? So for anyone that isn't, hasn't shot an elk yet. A lot of people have gone elk hunting, but when you shoot an elk, That's when the real work starts. And a lot of times you shot 'em 'cause you were in some nasty hole where no one else was going into.

So you could, I mean you, especially if you're a one man crew, you could be looking at least a two day job to get it out. So what is the what is your end of the week strategy look like? So let's just assume your hard out is you have a Friday flight, right? Yep. 'cause you're racing Saturday.

Yep. And so what does like [00:08:00] Thursday evening look like for you? Are you eh, we'll go out, we'll keep her close to the road And if so, that way if we shoot something, it's like a two hour job instead of a two day job? Or are you doing the Hey, I know there's three different cowboys in this area where if I shoot one, I can be like, Hey, I shot one.

I'm a NASCAR driver. Can you go pick it up at this pin with your horses and bring it to this butcher shop? The butcher shop knows you're coming and I'll fly back next time and figure it out.

Jeff Cordero: Yeah. It kind, it's kinda like that. Early in the week is where I get a little further away from the road.

I do everything backwards. Yeah. I figure out like you said, Thursday I have to be within, a half mile, three quarters of a mile, maybe a mile max from the road. If it's a straight shot and there's not a lot of terrain. And then, Wednesday to Wednesday morning is that, where I start playing that game.

Everything up until maybe Tuesday night, Wednesday midday at lunch, I might get a little further away because I try to figure out however far it takes me to get where I'm going. I can do the math from [00:09:00] there. Okay. It took me, two hours to get into this, wherever I'm at, three hours to get in, to get over the two miles, two and a half miles, it took me to get in there with a full pack.

So you figure, you add a little time on the way back out, if you're bringing meat out and you start doing the math, how many shuttles it's gonna take, and you're like, okay, you figure the math out and you're like, If I were to kill something Wednesday morning, like right at daybreak, I'm shuttling meat, I'm shuttling stuff for 20 hours.

And then you try to figure out where you're gonna get those 20 hours. And it might be you're just shuttling meat and eating in between and you're not getting much, if any sleep because you have that hard out date. There's no right. I just, maybe if I just sit here and rest and get like a three, four hour nap, it'd be fine.

No, I just don't have that option. Also like you mentioned, finding people in the area that will do a packout. I haven't had to do that yet. 'cause everything, the one elk I did shoot, I was pretty close to the road, but it's. It's always an option. I always ahead of time plan like who my butcher shop's going to be.

I call [00:10:00] 'em, Hey, are you guys open 24 7? If I were to drop something off late at night, like if I get back to the trail head at two in the morning, right? Would you take something? Do you do rush jobs? Do you ship? Where can you ship to? How do you ship? Because for me, to kinda get that meat, I'm not just going straight from wherever I'm at home.

I'm going from wherever I'm at to a racetrack, which I'm gonna be there for two days. Now I have to find a cooler source there, and that gets complicated. So for me, it's just easier to ship anything I need back. Finding a taxi dermis, just having that plan ahead of time. So if when I do become successful I have a plan for it.

I'm not scrambling oh, what do I do now? I'm calling everyone up. No, I have, okay, they're open 24 7. They're open, they can do a rush job, they can ship, it's it's laid out ahead of time for me, so I. I don't have to worry about it because I'm already stressed out. Like I had this hard out time, hard out date, I have to be there.

Brian Krebbs: Yeah, no it's something where it's, like your situation, it's 100% like mandatory to have all of those plans in place because for you, [00:11:00] that's this is plan A, like Plan A is bringing this meat to a butcher shop because you're not flying with three Yeti coolers like that. Oh my gosh. The cost of that.

Whereas most people, we drive out like, we're going to Colorado in three weeks. We were in Montana last year. Our plan A is gonna be hang it. And if it's cool enough, we'll just keep it hung, put it in the shade, and then we'll drive it home with us. We got two trucks, two trailers. We'll be fine, but it never hurts to have that backup plan.

And like in our case, like even if we shot a bull last night, we still might be three miles off the road. And it's oh man. Do we, does everyone get delayed? Do we send eight guys to work late or do we call this cowboy and we each chip in 75 bucks and he's gonna bring in a team of horses and get it out for us so we can go back to camp and start breaking down camp?

And so all of those things you just talked about, taxidermy options, butcher shop options, pack out options, all of that I think is worthwhile [00:12:00] having in your toolbox, even if you don't plan on needing it, like you obviously do need it. But like the taxidermy thing, a lot of laws nowadays, you can't transport brain and nervous tissue across state lines.

So if you shoot something that you want to get taxidermy, like all of a sudden you're like, man, I don't have a plan. Like you said, maybe it's two o'clock in the morning and nobody's gonna be answering the phone at two o'clock in the morning. Whether or not they'll have a cooler outside to drop your stuff in or not.

They're not gonna answer the phone for you, so now you're scrambling or wasting a day anyway. So it sounds like what you're doing is like what everyone should have in their mind, even

Jeff Cordero: if you don't need it. Yeah. That's something I learned, through nascar. Like I said, I've done that for 14 years and there is not a situation, a, an outcome that we haven't already predicted or a situation that we haven't already planned for.

We do a lot of traveling all the time, so I'm constantly traveling. It's me packing a bag, going to the weekend. It's super simple. I can just, I visualize what I need in my head. I know what we're going [00:13:00] to do. I know where we're going. And then, as the race shows up, I know what the race is.

I know what the, even though I don't know exactly what our crew chief and our managers are deciding what the race strategy's gonna be, you've done enough of them where you're like, okay, we know about what to expect. I take that mentality with me to go hunting because I don't have, I wanna maximize the time I have in the field and, It's already stressful enough doing the hunting and trying to figure out what you're doing.

Especially the times I've been solo, like how many times I just beat my head up against the wall 'cause I don't know what I'm doing, so you're just trying to figure it out. If there's one thing I don't wanna worry about, it's what happens if I actually do kill something? What happens if I do get one on the ground?

What are, what am I gonna do? Like the worst thing that happen for me would be to kill something really late in the hunt, not have a plan to get it out. And then, I don't have that option to be, I'm gonna be scrambling trying to like drop pins and call people while I'm in Texas, like for the race, trying to figure that out.

And then I'm gonna take that stress and bring it to the [00:14:00] racetrack with me, which I need to perform there. So you wanna take as less stress with you as possible to the racetrack. So it's one of those things like the more options and plans you have ahead of time. The more stress free it is. It's like they tell you before you go leaving a hunt, make sure you have all your chores done at the house.

Your honey do list is shored up. So that way when you go hunting, your family affairs, your house is in order, you're not stressing about is my wife gonna be mad at me because I didn't take the trash out? Or, so you have all that stuff in line. So when you go there you're hunting stress free.

The only thing you're stressed about is the actual hunt. So having a plan for, multiple contingencies when you get there, I've found, for me that's, it takes a lot of stress off my plate there, but it also, it gives me those options where I'm not scrambling trying to figure it out. I know exactly what to do if that plan doesn't work, I know, okay, this is other butcher shop, he's a little further away, they're, they have a cooler out there, so yeah, having options and knowing ahead of time what you're gonna do is gonna help a lot. Oh yeah,

Brian Krebbs: for sure. I did a solo elk [00:15:00] hunt and it was in the, it was in the high country in Colorado, even though it was a rifle hunt, so we were at above tree line. The whole hunt took place, basically 11 five and higher.

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Jeff Cordero: $150

Brian Krebbs: on your steelhead outdoors safe. And I was by myself and then it started to snow and I wasn't eating enough and I start and I wasn't drinking enough. And so then I started getting like cramps and I started having all kinds of like issues.

Like I'm dizzy [00:17:00] and, but I'm still hunting. And I, it's just kinda weird when you get up in the mountains, it's almost like your appetite just goes haywire and you like, you have to force yourself to eat sometimes. And I think that was the problem was like, I'm just not hungry and so I wasn't eating enough.

I got on I glass of milk and they were way up. I mean it was like a mile up and then two or three miles down a ridge in the snow and it was 12 inches of snow above the tree line. So you're postholing pretty much every step. I'm on my way to these elk and I'm like halfway there and I could see 'em with my naked eye.

They're over there, they're like a mile and a half over there. I can see them beded up in the sun and I'm like, I gotta turn around. 'cause like I, even if I shoot this thing, I'm not gonna be able to get it out here by myself. There's no just straight down the mountain option to the road.

Like both sides of the mountain are like cliffed out black timber nastiness. And I, so I just walked away 'cause I didn't make a plan ahead of time. That would work out for me. Looking back, I should have had that backup option of who could I call [00:18:00] to help, like a team of horses or something.

If there's, I mean imagine if it, it's a once in a lifetime bull and you gotta walk away from it 'cause you didn't make a plan to get it out of there.

Jeff Cordero: Yeah, and I think going into that too, like I plan, the back half of the hunt, what I'm gonna do when I'm successful. But a lot of it goes into planning the hunt at the beginning side of it with the ESC scouting and figuring out where I'm going to go, knowing how much time I have.

Like I don't want to get myself into a situation where, yeah, Wednesday I have to come out wherever I'm going, but I'm six miles away from the road, so I'd love to go, steep and deep, get out there away from people. For me that, that sounds awesome, but like in reality, if I'm by myself, I can't, not that I can't get out there physically or mentally, but it's like I just can't do it because I'm only gonna be in there for two days and I don't wanna spend, a whole day, a morning and an evening just trekking in somewhere to trek out.

So I try to do a lot of my ees scouting, stay closer to roads, or at least hey, if I can go through this one area, if I just keep going, maybe I'll poke [00:19:00] out on another road or like another main road, or maybe I can, hitch a ride with a cowboy or something on a flatbed just to get back to where, the road that I parked on, something where it gives me options where, I'm not too far away because I can't get too far away, but I'm also far enough off of that they call it that magic band around the road.

If you get like a mile off of it, most people stay in that band. So it's it's a balance. So I'm usually in that I don't know, mile to three miles off the road, but it's also not straight up vertical. I try to not take easier routes, but routes that are manageable, or if something does get down, I don't have to kill myself trying to get it out because again, I'm going somewhere that weekend to perform a duty, an athletic performance duty.

So I can't like, I'm already trashed myself enough throughout the week, there's, I don't want to absolutely murder myself 'cause I don't have 10 days to recover when I get back home.

Brian Krebbs: Yeah, no, that makes a lot of sense. Do you typically backpack hunt, set up you hunt all day, find a spot, set up your tent in the [00:20:00] morning, you break your tent down, put a back on your back and keep going?

Or are you doing like a spike camp slash base camp where you're returning to that same spot every night?

Jeff Cordero: A little of both. So when I did Colorado two years ago, I, that's what I did. I camp on my back, got in somewhere, camped got on elk the next day, was in there for two days and then for the rest of the week I'm pretty much sleeping out of the truck or right at the truck.

Last year in Montana, just the way things went, I went to a spot that I thought was gonna be really good and it would've been really good two weeks earlier, but at the time I got there, it wasn't. And I was I don't really want to spend all this time in here. It's like windy. I'm not seeing anything and they sign, I'm seeing it's really old.

So for me, I don't have the time to, if I'm not seeing elk or smelling elk or seeing sign like fresh, I don't have time to go in somewhere and hole up and try to glass and try to figure it out. So for me, if I get in there, even if it's a four or five mile hike [00:21:00] in and I'm not seeing anything, I'm gonna turn right back around and work my way out and go somewhere else because I'm, I don't have the luxury of just waiting for 'em to pass through back there.

Yeah, I, it's a little of both. It just depends. I have everything to Spike camp and that's also a lot easier to pack on planes and travel with. So yeah, it makes it where it's yeah, I have a base camp, like people have their base camp back at their truck, it might have luxuries of like real food grill, for me it's like I'm still eating freeze dried meals at the truck and I'm still, sleeping on my sleeping pad on the ground because I don't have, I don't have the luxury of bringing a lot of stuff like in a truck for a camp.

So it's, I dunno, it's like spike camping at the truck. It's not the most glamorous, but it's It's what I can fly with. It's still

Brian Krebbs: better than, it's still like nicer, more comfortable than than true spike. 'cause you can like, yeah, I can turn my truck on, listen to the radio ac better seat. I can sit on the tailgate.

I can get outta the shade or [00:22:00] out into the shade or whatever.

Jeff Cordero: Yeah, I'm not worried. I don't have to walk anywhere for water. I got it.

Brian Krebbs: Exactly. All that stuff. One thing that you might wanna keep in mind, it always depends on like where you want to hunt, but there's a ton of forest service cabins across the west and you can rent those suckers really cheap.

Comparatively. I'll have to look into that. They used to be like 25 bucks a night and they could sleep like five people usually. So it's, it would give you usually they have a Woodhouse, like the Rangers, chop wood, keep 'em stocked up. So you could have a wood fire if you get wet and dry out and then like you could cook some stuff on you still can't bring a lasagna 'cause you're flying.

It would just, incremental comfort. But. Yeah, those things go pretty well. But that was what I was gonna ask 'cause it does seem it seems like what you're doing is like default aggressive. It, I don't know if you listened to Jocko will and Coretta's books, but like how they operated in the seals was always default aggressive.

And I, it seems like that's how you're [00:23:00] hunting. Like you're like, I have to be really fast, I have to be really efficient. If there's not elk here, I don't have time to waste for them to come back in here. I have to move fast. I have to go in deep right off the beginning of the trip. Whereas I feel like our group and a lot of groups, they start out slow.

It's like, all right, let's check out here and then you start like expanding your circle and how aggressive you are towards the end of the hunt. 'cause you're like, we're running out of time now. Let's dive really in deep. We know there's gonna be elk there. When you talk to other elk hunters, do you feel like you're like doing better overall, whether it's not necessarily always tagging out, but you're like, They're like, yeah, we didn't get into elk until the last day.

And you're like, I was into elk like day one. I don't know, I just dove in and all of a sudden there's elk there. Do you feel like your system is like getting you closer

Jeff Cordero: right off the bat? Yeah, I do. I think that I am aggressive, a little more aggressive on my hunt strategy. And some of that comes from, being in racing.

We're, we live by the stopwatch, everything is fast, everything is [00:24:00] timed, so you have to be aggressive for it. I think I carry that into the elk hunting. 'cause like I said, I don't have time to piddle around and, go check this area out or go check that area out. I make these, when I'm my e scouting plan, I've done the mark liase treeline pursuit.

I have my plans where I'm going and I plan A is I'm going to, this is an aggressive one I'm gonna get in here. It's maybe gonna be the furthest one from the road. It's gonna be the hardest one to terrain traverse to get there. I'm going to check that out. And if I'm not seeing elk, I'm out. I'm already going to plan B.

Whether it's later that day, whether it's the next morning, whether it's, moving spots at night, it's, I just don't have the time to waste. I, it would be great if I had 10, 14 days to go out there and just kinda like chill and ease into it. But it's like right outta the truck.

It's loaded up, gone. No hanging out. If I have time during, if I have daylight hours to move, I'm gonna do it. And even at night, I'm gonna move, whether it's, [00:25:00] I've done the road bugling thing at night trying to listen for bugles. I've also, I think this is pretty underrated, but if you're driving in a unit, you can see where people are camping and then you can see where those people are camping are probably gonna be elk hunters, especially that time of year.

If you watch as you're driving, like maybe you're moving spots middle of the day, national forest roads, you might move and you might see this truck that was parked at this campsite two days ago, but now it's parked over here, down this national Forest road. They've probably gotten into elk or they're there for a reason.

So learning how to hunt off of the pressure, like where people are going. Yeah. I'm not saying just blow up their spot, parked next to 'em and walk in and be like, Hey, what's going on? But hey, if they're in this little condensed area, you see a few trucks parked off these National Forest Service roads, it's like maybe one person might be just going for a walk in the woods with their bow, but there's three trucks within a mile.

Maybe there's elk in here, and you start look at the map real quick and you're like, okay, there's a water source, there's feed, maybe they're not that deep. You just it's public man. You [00:26:00] just get in there and, yeah, it sucks. But I don't know. You mean you can on the

Brian Krebbs: fringes too?

Like you're just. Elker, like especially in the west they can be a little nomadic where it's hey, they might be in this drainage this year, but then especially cattle grazing rotations that can switch up like what side of a drainage the elk are on. If this is the summer range this year, so this other range is the winter range.

He probably hasn't grazed that. So that one's probably full of feed this year. And so sometimes you're just like, Hey, all the trucks are over here this year. The elk must be in this drainage. And obviously if there's four of 'em parked on this trailhead, I'm probably not gonna hit that trailhead.

I'm just gonna look at the map and be like, okay, they're going up this way right off the bat. They're probably pressuring this little area anyway, so I'm gonna come in around this, like this way, hunt this fringe and a hundred

Jeff Cordero: percent. Yeah. Yeah. It's like it's just me when I'm out there, or it's me, maybe me and a buddy, but if I had 20 people out there hunting, it kinda if we're all in the same area, that's, it's probably they're there for a reason. Yeah. Especially if they've drug a [00:27:00] camper out there, they've probably been there for a little bit. Maybe it's, yeah. One truck. If I've got, I've driven in, I've driven in really deep to somewhere down some really sketchy roads to this awesome spot that I thought was gonna be great.

And I get there and there's not a single truck. There's nothing, there's no old campsite. And I'm like, I'm either going to be smothered in elk or it's gonna be a ghost town. And I walked around for a whole day and it was the one in Montana where it was windy and I saw a ton of old elk beds, a lot of old sign, but it was old sign.

They had already moved up and gone outta there. And I'm like, yeah,

Brian Krebbs: dude. It's tough. Like the, it's not like white tails where, like we have the family farms back home and we just, I just, me and my wife just bought a farm that we live on now, and especially at the family farms back home I'm 20 years into hunting that property.

So I know I. I can look at the map and be like, all right, I'm gonna see 15 deer tonight if I sit in this one stand. And these are like seven, eight generation [00:28:00] dos from when we started hunting this farm. It's just, it happens every year the same way. But with elk, it's like the week to week. It can be different.

Like you said, like they were in this valley two weeks ago. There's all kinds of two week old sign. There's rubs on every tree, yet there's no bugles, there's no elk. All the wallows are cleared up. Like they're obviously not here today. And then two weeks from now they could be back in that, back in there hot and heavy.

And you never really know where Hey, there's Mount, there's elk in those mountains, right? Whatever. Yeah. Pick a mountain range in Montana. There's elk in the mountain range, but they might not like to pick the spot. They could be two miles to the left, two miles to the right. Up 3000 feet down 3000 feet.

And you can't like, Even if you have those 12, 10 to 14 days, it can be hard to dial in on them. And you're doing like, typically it sounds like four real days of hunting with two, what weird days on either end traveling, like maybe you're getting in at 2:00 PM so you can get a couple hours in on the slope that, that day you arrive [00:29:00] and maybe your flight's not till 6:00 PM on Friday night.

So you can hunt a little bit in the morning. Or basically at that point you're probably more so scouting for if you ever come back to this unit on your way out with the truck, like taking a couple new roads on the way back. But yeah, so it's four days you gotta make 'em count.

Jeff Cordero: Yeah, and I think I got into a situation a couple years ago probably, it was pre covid and it was one of those things where I'd seen people all cu, I'd followed it on Instagram, watch it on YouTube, and I'm like, man, that'd be really cool to do, but I just don't have the time to do it.

I don't have the time to invest in it. I can't drive out there. 'cause if me from North Carolina driving even to Colorado is 24 hours. Yeah. It's a whole day wasted driving. So I'm like flying with all that stuff. It just seemed like too far outta reach and I was just, I started thinking about it and I'm like, I can afford to fly out there so I'm just gonna fly out there.

I'd rather hunt for four hard days than not be able to do it for another five to eight years, so it was one of those, I was a [00:30:00] situation where I'm like, you can do it on, just like people can kill something on the last day. You can kill it on the first day. So you might as well put in the time, try to get out there, have fun, enjoy it.

And for me it's just a, that time of year and the nascar, our schedule, everything is really high stress, high strung, everyone's walking on eggshells a little bit because you're in the playoffs. A bad race in those 10 races could ruin championship hopes. Even if you come in, I. With a huge lead on everybody, one bad race can really put you behind.

And being able to go out there, enjoy nature, be by myself, or maybe be with one or two other people, it's just a good reset. When I come back, I'm like, okay, these are the things that really matter in life. Yeah. This, the NASCAR stuff matters. Doing well matters, but it's a job. It's something I love to do.

It's something that is fun. I'm not gonna put more stress on myself because of it. So even if I just go bow hiking for four days, it's still a great experience. Yeah. Do you,

Brian Krebbs: are you [00:31:00] just ate up with the elk and it's if I'm going out there, it's gonna be elk or do you dabble with some other stuff like an archery antelope hunt or a mule deer hunt, or any, anything else for that matter?

There's it. Nope. We're doing elk. If we're going out there, I'm chasing bugles.

Jeff Cordero: Montana, I have a combo tag again. So if I come across a mule deer, I'm going to shoot a mule deer. But it's not something that I'm, this is I'm not setting out to hunt mule deer every year. I think they're cool, but I think just, I really wanna shoot an elk bugle and, and even not even a huge bull.

Just a nice bull. Yeah. I've shot a cow I have shot elk, but not, I just wanna shoot a nice bull. I've had antelope tags in my pocket going out there. You pick it up like in case you're driving into the unit, you get into the unit, you get to a little piece of public and there's antelope in it.

Yeah, maybe I'll pull the truck off the side of the road and try to go after my blue jeans. But you have, I try to have as many tags in my pocket, but again, it's. If I cross that, I'm gonna do it. I'm not trying to, I'm not trying to hunt three different tags in one [00:32:00] week. But if I were to as I'm hunting in, as I'm going in for elk, if I were, like, last year I came across the mule deer, I popped in this field and he was on the other side of this meadow 61 yards away.

And I'm like, ah, okay, here we go. Shoot this mule deer. If he presents a good shot, he, the way he was angled, it was not a shot I wanted to take. And so I was like, if he presents it, I'll, yeah, I'll put an arrow through him. But I'm not hunting for the mule deer. I'm not like glassing a mule deer or Yeah.

Specifically hunting for him. Yeah. So you would never

Brian Krebbs: go out there with only a mule deer take I don't have an elk. I'm just hunting mule deer. You're like, ah, it's, I would rather do the

Jeff Cordero: elk than the Oh no I'm going out there during September 17th to 23rd next year, whether I have an elk tag or not.

I'll try to get a mule deer tag. I'll try to, I. Pick something up. But I could always over the counter it at Colorado, while that's still an option. I just, the, I feel like mule deer are not like whitetail, but they're like whitetail. They might take a little bit more time,[00:33:00] to find, to set up on they seem like a little more of a slow play than maybe elk.

Elk or everyone, I know people hate this saying, but elk are like turkeys when it's that time of year they're just making a whole bunch of noise and it's just fun to go, oh, they're over that way. Yeah, let's figure out how to get over

Brian Krebbs: there. When it's hot and heavy. It's it is like nothing else.

They're literally like mountain dragons with swords on their heads, and they're just like screaming. That's awesome. I've had it a few times where we've been close enough, but still like thick black timber, so you can't see it yet, but it's bugling so loud. Your chest is rattling and you're like, yeah, dang.

That's some loud I don't know, some bulls, they don't, they're not like, I've seen them bugle at 40 yards and they're not that loud still. But other bowls. And maybe it's just the way, like the black timber makes everything like echo and rever. But yeah, it would, it's, there's something special about it.

That's why every year we pretty much always are doing a, an archery elk hunt. Our group really doesn't, we've talked about it 'cause it's hard to get tags year after year [00:34:00] and it's hard to align schedules. Like our group is eight people, so it's hard to align schedules. It's hard to get everyone drawn. You can't apply as a true group almost anywhere because they all have group size restrictions.

And so we've talked about what if we did like a spot in stock mule deer hunt or a rifle elk hunt or a rifle mule deer hunt? And everyone's I don't know. That's not I'd say no, but if I have one week, I'm gonna, I wanna chase bugles.

Jeff Cordero: Yeah. I think too, for me, I'm not against doing, a later season hunt or a rifle hunt.

It's just when I get to that point in November when the season's over, I've traveled for 40 weeks. I gotta spend some time at home to come home right after the season's over and pick up and leave for, two weeks or drive somewhere out west. I, my wife would not be thrilled about it. And again, I want to be home.

I've spent time away yeah, I might do something like a white tail hunt around the area for a couple days, but yeah, it's tough.

Brian Krebbs: Are you, so what does the off season look like for a NASCAR team? Are you [00:35:00] practicing in the off season between basically it sounds like Halloween to Valentine's Day or is it just free time?

Jeff Cordero: It's a little of both. So we have a lot of the, a lot of the stuff that we use throughout the year, a lot of the equipment the pit boxes, all that kind of stuff that travels with us every weekend that we work out of. Those, that equipment comes back to the shop. We tear it all down, we get it repainted, reprep, powder coated, re-fixed, things that get broken.

'cause it just gets banged up throughout the year. You're just spending time freshening things up essentially through the month of, end of November, end of December. And then once January kicks around, once a new year starts, we're right back out there practicing. So we get about a month and a half, almost two months, where we're not doing pit stops, not practicing letting our bodies recuperate, heal, just taking some time away.

But we're still working, we're still trying to, get everything ready for the new year. 'cause you only have, it's dang, it's only three months from when the season's over about to when it starts again. Yeah. So you don't have a ton of time. [00:36:00] Yeah. It does

Brian Krebbs: sound like it's it sounds like it's year round, basically.

Yeah it's 40 week season, but it's year round. It's year round gig. It's a year round job. It sounds like it's kinda like farming. Yeah, we, the harvest is done, but then we got months of fixing everything We broke throughout the year, getting everything ready, making any tweaks we decided we wanted to make.

And yeah. That does sound like a lot of work.

Jeff Cordero: Yeah, you just during the season, everything is, there's not enough time to fix anything. It's just you bandaid it and you just figure wait until you figure it out at the end of the season and the end of the season's a little more low stress.

It's a little more laid back you know when the first race is gonna be. Yeah. And you know when they're coming to pick up the equipment to bring it to the racetrack. So as long as your stuff's done, the cover's on it and it's out back, ready to load for 'em, then just get it done at your own time.

Yeah. Who's

Brian Krebbs: the real boss on your, on a NASCAR team? Is it the driver or is there someone else that's making. The, all the decisions that the driver reports to. [00:37:00] Like how does that kind of work? I've always been curious.

Jeff Cordero: Yeah, so like the hierarchy on an NASCAR team, I guess would be you have your crew chief and your driver are pretty equal.

I wouldn't say either one's higher than the other, but the crew chief is going to be the one he is. If you look at a flow chart, he'd be at the very top of it. Okay. He's the one that everyone he has then under him, he's got his engineers that are figuring out race strategy, car set up, doing all that.

They feed him the information and the driver's over here, feeling how the car is, how it's reacting at the racetrack, what he needs to make the car faster, and then that group engineers, crew, chief driver, all kind of work together and the crew chief's the one who actually makes those decisions.

This is the setup we're gonna run. These are the laps we're gonna pit on. This is one we're gonna take for, this is one we're gonna take two. This is how much gas we're gonna need. He's the one that is, ultimately the head coach of that individual team. Now, like Hendrick Motorsports, we have four [00:38:00] teams inside of, so we, Hendrick Motorsports is the five car, the nine car, the 24, and the 48.

And then individually, each one of those car numbers, that's each one has a crew, chief driver, engineers. Okay. So as an organization we have four teams, but individually on the weekend we operate as, our little facet, our one team.

Brian Krebbs: Yeah. So is that where like the drivers, they say, hey, they're on the same team, so like those two drivers could be working together because two cars are faster than one, right?

Is that

Jeff Cordero: true? Some places we go to, yeah, that's definitely true. Okay. You wanna work, you're definitely not gonna do something that is like detrimental to you. Not going to help your teammate out intentionally, because that's an awkward conversation on Monday or Tuesday in the competition meeting.

So you're going to try to help your teammates win? Because if we can't win, I want one of our other three cars to win. 'cause it's good for the organization. Okay. So yeah, you try to help each other out as much as you can, but at the end of the day when you're, when it's Sunday and you're fighting for a win [00:39:00] you're your own team.

You bring your own friends to the racetrack and you want to go out there and do that. Yeah.

Brian Krebbs: So that was, I guess you answered my next question is like, who owns the operation? 'cause there's like a lot of employees, a lot of expensive gear, obviously an expensive car, like there's gotta be some money at place.

So is it common where the driver owns the operation or is it more common that the, like I, I think of like big name drivers. I don't know a lot of 'em, but like real big name drivers. Are they usually the owner of the operation or is it typically, like what You said Hendricks Motor, is it Hendricks Motor?

Jeff Cordero: Yeah. Hendrick. Motorsport.

Brian Krebbs: Motorsports. They have four teams and that's. Is like one of the drivers of the four cars a Hendrick? That's I guess

Jeff Cordero: what I'm asking. No. Okay. No. Rick Hendrick owns all four of those cars. He also owns all the Hendrick dealerships across, the country. So he is very tied into the car world.

I would say there's really only two teams right now where a driver [00:40:00] is co-owner on a team. Typically that's not how it works. You have a car owner that owns the whole operation and they, the drivers are contracted through them. There's really only, like I said, two drivers in our sport right now that are affiliated or have ownership stake in a team.

So it's not as common, but it is, it's not unheard of. It happens. Yeah. Yeah. It's not unheard of. There's always been. One at some point, that has ownership in a team. And maybe the ownership stake is part of the way that they, negotiated their contract to get the salary.

Hey, instead of maybe paying me x million dollars to drive, give me, 10% ownership in the company. I don't know. But, so it does seem like that can be a, a negotiating or bargaining tool for them, but that also sets them up when they're done driving. They have something Yeah.

Else to be a part of. Yeah. I

Brian Krebbs: got you. I, yeah, 'cause I was just curious of like, how, so the, then the race car drivers probably obviously hired position, [00:41:00] whether he is contract or an employee, but he has to probably go through a lot of vetting and performance and tryouts and show that he's the one you want driving your car.

'cause at that point it's a pretty big investment

Jeff Cordero: I assume. Yeah, we have the NASCAR Cup series is the peak in, racing in America motorsports in America. So there's a lot of feeder series that kind of, start at the very bottom and feed all the way up to that. You have, your local shorter track stuff on the weekend where, just your average Joe is out there with his race guard trying to have fun, compete.

Maybe some young kids got aspirations of getting to the Cup series one day and then, you move up that ladder. From the local short track stuff to maybe some regional stuff to the truck series, then the Xfinity series, and then you get all the way to the top of the Cup series. So for a driver to be in the Cup series you have to prove yourself at each level on your way up there.

And owners take note of that. They pay attention to people that are coming up. But it's another [00:42:00] thing where it's a performance based sport. If you're not performing when you get to the Cup Series, you might only get a couple years or a year or two to prove yourself or prove your worth and then they'll move you to get somebody else in.

Because it's all about winning races. It's all about running in the front. And if you're not doing it, they'll find somebody else that can. Yeah.

Brian Krebbs: So that leads to a good point when you said it's like a performance sport and obviously that goes for you on the crew, it goes for the driver, it goes for the crew chief, everyone obviously it has to be performing.

And so I was just gonna ask like when you go to the gym, 'cause obviously you know. Post a lot of stuff from the gym. Are you thinking Hey, I'm training for nascar, or are you thinking I'm training for the mountain?

Jeff Cordero: Most of the training I do is training for the sport I play, which is nascar.

Okay. It's not, there are things now, there are points in the year where I might ramp up certain parts, like I've been doing a lot of lower body, a lot of lunges, a lot of, walking on the incline, treadmill, [00:43:00] running step mill, doing that kind of stuff to, build up leg strength and endurance for this.

But I have to be careful because I spend, if anyone's ever watching NASCAR race and you've watched pit stops, I'm the guy that runs around and is jumping, landing on my knees, spending, sitting in front of the wheel. So my knees are a valuable asset to me. I can't do too much to make my legs wobbly under the weekend, for the weekend and doing everything I can to maintain as much strength, but not overload those joints because on the weekends I'm.

Overloading 'em, running and jumping on 'em. So it's, I have to play like a really fine balance of what's really important and I have enough fitness where I know I can go into the backcountry where I want to go and be okay. Yeah. I might not be the fastest one in there. I might have to take a few more breaks.

But at the end of the day, pitting race cars is the thing that, that pays the bills, that pays the mortgage. So that's the thing I need to prioritize. But just generally being in shape throughout the [00:44:00] year is important. Yeah. For what I do. So it's, it just leads into the elk hunting thing where it's, yeah, I might do a few things to tailor it, getting ready for the season, but I don't overhaul what I do.

Just to go elk hunting. Yeah,

Brian Krebbs: that's, it's interesting 'cause most people that we talk to, the fitness is 100% for the mountain. That's, I would love to be in shape all the time anyway. But without elk hunting, I probably wouldn't really do it. I probably wouldn't really go to the gym. Or if I did go to the gym, it would just be like, bodybuilding style, don't even break a sweat type workouts where, because I elk hunt, now I'm pushing myself, I'm like a puddle of sweat after every time I'm at the gym.

And it's solely because of that. I drive a desk for a living, so I don't need to be in the same shape you need to be in to perform. And so I just, I always think it's interesting yeah, I'm a race car driver or I'm a pick crew guy and I need to be fit. But the real reason I work out, like when I'm in the gym, I, my mind is on those six

Jeff Cordero: point bowls.[00:45:00]

Yeah. I think there's people that do what I do in NASCAR that are not as, I think I have an advantage with the, athleticism and the shape that I keep myself in and the rest of the guys on our team. So there are people that definitely don't prioritize the health and fitness side of it as from a performance standpoint.

So that separates me there and it's just, yeah, I just don't know if it's great if like you said, if you weren't going elk hunting, you might not be putting the time in the gym. I think it's great for people to have something to look forward to, to be able to put that time in. For us it's just like a, if I can be 1% better than you before we show up to the racetrack, it's gonna put me ahead of you.

If you see me in the gym and you're not in the gym, it's in your head. If we come out there on the weekend and we absolutely smash you guys on pit road, it's not because we just got lucky that day. It's 'cause we put in the time, we put in the effort, it, they know it. So it's yeah.

What's the,

Brian Krebbs: what's like the slowest job [00:46:00] on a pit stop and like how long does it take? So it's there're a number where you're like, I know this job's gonna take those guys 30 seconds. So as long as both my tires are changed under 30 seconds, I'm fine.

Jeff Cordero: Yeah. We're way faster than 30 seconds.

We're doing four tires and fuel. If we just do four tires and we're not waiting on fuel, it's as fast as we can put four tires on. We've done it as fast as eight and a half seconds at the racetrack, all the way up into the, our average is like a low nine. It's like a 9 38 is our season average for the year.

For all the stops we've done this year, on average, we're gonna do a 9 38 for four tires. So the only thing that takes time on a pit stop, which can kill your pit stop is fuel. We only can flow fuel so fast, right? And the rate that the gas cans flow compared to the rate that we can do pit stops like four tires in.

If you're taking anything more than 15, 14, 15 gallons of gas in that pit stop, you're gonna have to [00:47:00] wait on the gas man to get it full. And it's not that the gas man's slow, it's just the fuel only flows so fast and you have to put so much of it in there. You're just We can do four tires and nine flat, but it's gonna take him 12 seconds to get 19 gallons in.

So you just, those are the stops where maybe you don't, maybe you don't push as hard, it's like I'm not gonna push as hard early in the elk, like with marginal wind as maybe I would on Wednesday afternoon or Thursday morning. 'cause I'm like later in the week. I'm not worried about blowing those elk out because I'm not gonna be there next week.

But so the pit stop is the same way when you're gonna wait on fuel, maybe you don't push as hard, you don't take as many risks. You just back down 10% and just, yeah, make sure your job's done before his. As long as that's the case, then success. You've done everything correctly and car rolls on.

But when we get into a situation where we're not gonna take, we're gonna take nine gallons of gas, he's gonna be done before us. Those are the times when you might take a few [00:48:00] risks, push the pace, try to close up the gaps really tight, and try to gain that two, three-tenths on that pit stop. Because two, three-tenths in the pit box could be the difference of one or two positions leaving pit road.

One or two positions could get you the lead. Maintain the lead, you win the race. So we live in dial by tens of seconds. Yeah. And it's very important. So it's understanding the situation you're in. But yeah, if there's one thing that can take time intentionally, it's fuel. Anything else that adds over that nine, nine and a half second mark is usually some kind of, mistake or situation we got put in where we just have to adjust or react.

Yeah. All

Brian Krebbs: right. That, that, that is fast. Obviously, like the engineering, like your tires aren't a six lug tire anymore, isn't it? One big lug where you just like, yeah, you put it on, you seed it, drive it home, it'll seed itself, align itself and we're off

Jeff Cordero: again. Yeah. We've changed. We used to be five lug nuts.

Last year was the [00:49:00] first year 2022 where we were the big one. Lug nut. Yeah. Which kind of every other mainstream, F one sports, car racing, IndyCar, everyone else's one lug nut. It was only a matter of time before we got there from someone who was, I was really good at changing the five lug nut.

'cause I had really fast hands. I could hit five lug nuts just as fast, if not faster than everybody else on pit road. So that's where I made my money or my stamp was, I was really fast at doing that. So going to the one lug nut, I had the hesitation of, is this going to be something I'm gonna be good at?

Because everyone has to start over. At the end of the day, you're still changing tires, whether it's one lug or five lug. Everything that I did that made me good at five lugs is still the stuff that's gonna make me good at one lug. So it changed it, it made our pit stops. We were doing 11 and a half second pit stops now.

Like I said, we're doing eight and a half second pit stops, so we're faster. So we're more important, we're more valuable to the team. We can be a bigger asset when needed. And it just, [00:50:00] we're in racing, man. We want to go fast. So anything that makes you faster, we

Brian Krebbs: we're gonna do it. It's crazy when you say that though, because what I heard was it only took you three extra seconds to do four lug nuts, which is flying.

Yeah. Like beep be beep.

Jeff Cordero: Done. Yeah. No, it's like back in the heyday when we were five lug nut and everyone was at their prime, we were building our own pit guns. Like it was the wild west of changing tires. It was amazing. Before NASCAR put a bunch of restrictions and rules on us.

You could hit five lug nuts at six tenths of a second. That's five off. The guy puts the wheel on and let, just over a half second, I've hit five lug nuts on and I'm already gone leaving. And a lot of people, when they watch that in real time or you watch a video of it, you're like that. I don't know how you even, you don't know how, you don't do the star method though either, do you?

No. You just go around in a circle.

Brian Krebbs: Is that so like my dad will tell me every time we change a tire that you have to go on a star, which is probably right.

Jeff Cordero: I do that on my [00:51:00] pickups. But street cars, yeah. So your

Brian Krebbs: tires are different or they're like aligned or he's got it on there straight so you don't have to worry about that.

Or is it just we're gonna take this tire off in 45 minutes anyway, so it doesn't really matter how straight

Jeff Cordero: it's. It's like in your car, you wanna make sure it's completely seated against the wheel. Yeah. You're the one who, you're the one who's putting the lug nuts on, you're also trying to hold the wheel up against the hub.

I have someone who would hold the wheel up against the hub. And actually the way the hubs are the wheels are built for the nascar. Like when we used to use steel wheels, they were actually sprung. So the center of the wheel, where the lug nuts are, was actually had a little bit of spring to it.

There was two bands, an outer band and an TER band. Oh. And they were at different planes, so they were sprung like a washer, if you ever got a sprung washer. Yeah. Yeah, as long as you got the first one tight or close to tight, you were gonna get the other four tight and. I don't recommend this for someone driving down the road, but you don't need all five lug nuts for the wheel to be tight.

And like you said, we're gonna come back in 20, 30 minutes, 40 laps. Anyways, we're [00:52:00] gonna take it off. You just need as many lug nuts as gonna get, keep that wheel tight as possible. So some racetracks, that's three, some racetracks, that's four. Some racetracks you want all five. But there was a game we used to play there too, where you know you have five on the wheel, you don't need five to get the wheel tight, you only really need four.

So if you can not hit that fifth one, it shaves a little time off, you start playing those games.

Brian Krebbs: Doesn't that at their speeds though? Wouldn't that cause a major vibration? 'cause there's not. No. Nope. Wow. I don't know. I'm an engineer so I would, I was, my first thought was like, man, yeah, if you didn't do it, but if they're not balanced, then you're just gonna have a huge vibration.

But.

Jeff Cordero: The wheel's bad. It's all the, so think about, you'd understand it though, like all of that weight that the one lug nut that's missing, we're not talking about a ton of weight. Yeah, no, it's wheel weight. But you're putting like little one ounce wheel weights all the way on the outside of the wheel.

'cause you're further from the center. Yeah. So like that lug nut is really close to the center. It's still on the hub. Yeah.

Brian Krebbs: No, I, it's, I see what you're saying. I just figured the speed would start to yeah, if you [00:53:00] going 35 miles an hour, you would never know. But if at 200 miles an hour, I feel like that would've been like me.

Jeff Cordero: You'd be surprised. Like you'd hit the other four. Yeah. You'd leave one on the end of the stud. It's just being held on by a little bit of weather strip adhesive and you're like, there's no way When this car comes back, that lug nut is going to be on the end of that stud because it's gonna get slung off with the G-force and everything that's going on.

There's no way it's gonna be there. You come in the next pit stop, that thing is sitting right on the end of the stud, just like you left it. No way. Oh yeah. It's like the first time you do it, you're like, that's gonna be gone by the time we come back, you come back and it's still there and you're like, okay.

I don't know how that happened, but, oh, so they, then you start doing it, you start realizing, you're like, oh, that's so when he carries

Brian Krebbs: the tire out, all the lugs are in the tire and they must be like adhesive to the tire rim. And then when he puts it on, they'd hit the stud and then they'd be stuck to that instead.

So that way they're ready for you to just hit 'em with the gun.

Jeff Cordero: Yeah. So we used to glue 'em onto the wheel. Yeah. With like a weather strip adhesive, so it was pliable. Yeah. And [00:54:00] then when he puts the new tire on, which has got the lug nuts on it, like the stud isn't, it's not threaded all the way to the end, it's got a little bit of a shank on it.

Yeah. So when it'd go on, those lug nuts would sit on the shank. And then alls I had to do was hit the lug nuts that were sitting there to tighten 'em up. Yeah. So that one was just being held on the end of that shank with a little bit of glue just holding on for dear life. That's crazy.

Brian Krebbs: I gotta ask, how does your tire carrier.

Get the tire on the five like back more when you were doing five stud. How does he get it on the five stud? Like first try every time? 'cause when I change my truck tires, you're like, ah, you're like rotating it this way and that way and you're trying to get it on and it takes me a heck of a lot longer than nine and a half seconds just to mount one tire than to

Jeff Cordero: seat all of them.

It's there's a little bit that goes into it. The way that the lug nuts are, like the holes are on the rim and you know they're spokes on your rim. Yeah. Only one spoke lined up with one lug nut hole that was, they're designed that way. So that way [00:55:00] if you grab this one spoke all the time, it's like grabbing your bow in the same spot all the time.

You know where your hand is. Okay. You know where things are gonna be. Like you, the way he's grabbing the wheel, he knows where his, the lug nut holes are gonna be. He can see the pattern or the, where the hub is on the car and as he's throwing it in there, he can, just align it. It's like someone who can hit a golf ball really well.

It's like, how do you do that? You have the same setup every single time. You go through the same process every time. Yeah. And you can hit the golf ball the same way every time someone can. I can't. But there is a process to it. And then it's also why we're professionals. It's literally what we practice.

It's what we do. It's how we make a living. So yeah, you're gonna figure out how to be good at it. Yeah,

Brian Krebbs: that is true. And if you're not like me, that's why I'm not a NASCAR team. I'm not on a NASCAR team. But yeah, man. Just like that. Jeff we're getting close to an hour and I don't want to cut us off, but I do have another, you have another podcast right after this too.

So I want to [00:56:00] give you a chance to share any of your channels, social media, or anything you got going on, whether it's NASCAR or Western hunting with the audience before we wrap up and give them a chance to connect with you and follow your journeys.

Jeff Cordero: Yeah you can find me on Instagram at Jeff Cordero underscore same place on YouTube.

The Instagram is a little bit more, you'll get more of the NASCAR stuff NASCAR archery, what I have going on throughout the season. And then the YouTube stuff. If you're into archery hunting archery in general hunting, that's where you're gonna get most of that. But yeah, if you guys haven't watched a NASCAR race, I encourage you to watch it.

There's a lot more that goes into it. And just turning left, it's it's a lot of fun. It's what I've dedicated and devoted my life to 'cause it's the profession I chose and it's a lot of fun. So I check it out.

Brian Krebbs: I would want, I wanna watch the nascar if NASCAR's on E S P N or I don't even know, I'd wanna watch e S PN two, where the cameras are all reversed and they're pointed at you guys.

I wanna watch that part of the show, like what you guys are doing, like the lap before they're coming in quick girl, let's go. [00:57:00] He's coming in 30 seconds and then all that stuff. And then all of a sudden it's done. And you're like, holy shit, that was fast. I wanna watch that side of it.

Jeff Cordero: There's, they do a pretty good job on the broadcast, showing pit stops, replaying pit stops good things, bad things. But they probably follow the

Brian Krebbs: car like once the car leaves. They're not looking at the pit anymore, maybe.

Jeff Cordero: I don't know. Yeah, not, probably not. I want

Brian Krebbs: to like, put that stuff, so it would be really cool too, as you're getting the next set of tires out and the next set of everything and Yeah, I think that obviously you don't just like work for nine seconds and then take

Jeff Cordero: 30 minutes off.

Yeah. You get into the, I'm not gonna get too far, but you get into the thing where it's, people see the racing but they don't see what happens behind the scenes. And usually what happens behind the scenes is way more interesting than what's actually going on the racetrack under caution laps.

Yeah, that's what I would

Brian Krebbs: that's exactly what I was saying is I don't wanna watch that stuff behind the scenes. But yeah, thanks for being here, Jeff, sharing some your day job, sharing some of your western hunting experiences and good luck. Good luck on both really. Good luck this fall out elk hunting.

We'll have to [00:58:00] stay in touch and see those pictures of your four day successful elk hunt. And then good luck obviously on the racetracks on the weekends too,

Jeff Cordero: man. I appreciate it. Yeah, thanks. Good

Brian Krebbs: luck to you as well. And thank you for listening folks.

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