16 episodes
It's Not the Car Sam Smith, Ross Bentley, Jeff Braun
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- Leisure
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4.8 • 64 Ratings
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It’s Not the Car is a podcast about people, speed, and how we all work under pressure.
Short version: We tell racing stories and leave out the boring parts.
Ross Bentley is a former IndyCar driver and an internationally renowned performance coach. Jeff Braun is a championship-winning race engineer. Sam Smith is an award-winning journalist and a former executive editor of Road & Track magazine. Together, we unpack the emotion at the heart of the machine.
We don’t love motorsport for the nuts and bolts—we love it for what it asks of the bag of meat at the wheel.
New episodes on Tuesdays!
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The Dan Gurney Fan-Service Episode
The catch: We’re the fans. (Bet you didn’t see that coming.)
“If you have the chance to make something beautiful,” Dan Gurney once said, “and you don’t, well, what does that say about you?”
This show’s format rotates weekly, because squirrel. This episode’s format is called "How I Got Here." It’s a free-form dive into the people, places, moments, and machines that made us care about racing when we were young.
In this case, that means the one and only Daniel Sexton Gurney—the legendary American driver and team owner who changed how we view optimism and the art of the possible. (Gurney's resume is a mile long, but among so much else, he remains the only American to win an F1 race in a car of his own construction.)
Also: This one is just Sam and Jeff. Ross was busy doing something at tape time but didn’t tell us what. Because Ross is Canadian, I now get to type the words, “He was obviously writing his poutine manifesto.”
***CORRECTION ALERT: In this episode, Sam commits a verbal typo and transposes Dan's Spa F1 win to 1968. It was, of course, 1967. Sam is a moron. He has a poster from that race on the wall in his house and has known that fact since he was eight. Feel free to shame him publicly.***
Related Trivia: No trivia this week. Sam writes these episode descriptions and his wife is currently in bed with strep throat, so he’s a bit brain-dead from simultaneously working, taking care of a sick lady, and solo parenting two kids in grade school hold on a sec I THOUGHT I TOLD YOU, STOP EATING BEANS AND THEN SITTING ON YOUR SISTER’S HEAD, OKAY?
Sorry, where were we?
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EMBARRASSING CORRECTION ALERT: Embarrassing moment: Sam "verbal typo'd" the Gurney F1
This episode was produced by Mike Perlman.
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Support It’s Not the Car:
Contribute on Patreon www.patreon.com/notthecar/
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Topic suggestions, feedback, questions? Let us know what you think!
INTCPod@gmail.com
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Where to find us:
instagram.com/j.v.braun/
instagram.com/rossbentley/
instagram.com/thatsamsmith/
instagram.com/intcpod/
facebook.com/INTCPod/
rossbentley.substack.com/
speedsecrets.com/
facebook.com/Drivercoach/
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ABOUT THE SHOW:
It’s Not the Car is a podcast about people and speed. We tell racing stories and leave out the boring parts.
Ross Bentley is a former IndyCar driver and an internationally renowned performance coach and author. Jeff Braun is a championship-winning race engineer. Sam Smith is an award-winning journalist and a former executive editor of Road & Track magazine. Together, we explore the emotion at the heart of the machine.
We don’t love racing for the nuts and bolts—we love it for what it asks of the bag of meat at the wheel.
New episodes every Tuesday. -
The Ferrari Story You Didn’t Know You Needed
Once, in the 1990s, a fancy Italian carmaker hadn’t gone sports-car racing in 20 years. Maybe they were too busy figuring out new ways to make a 348 catch fire or something. Then some influential folks made a few particularly expressive hand gestures and the Italians agreed to do it—but just this once, and then you gotta vaffanculo, alright? The shrieking red funkbullet that resulted won much and made a noise to eat your brain.
Hold onto your butts: Today, we tell the story of the Ferrari 333 SP, the last purpose-built racing Ferrari before the Le Mans Hypercar they’re running now.
Ross raced one of these flying pasta-saucers in IMSA. Jeff engineered them in the same series. The 11,000-rpm V-12 sounded like a Formula 1 car because it came from—wait for it—a Formula 1 car. It’s a good story.
This show’s format rotates weekly, because squirrel. We call this format “It’s Not Not the Car.”
Related Trivia: Ross’s 333 came with a factory man named Renzo. Renzo was there to mind the engine. Jeff later engineered the same chassis, with the same Renzo, but Ross had found another ride by then. Sam was once driving a Ferrari 488 in a track test when a wheel came off at 100 mph, but that’s unrelated. (Joke maybe three people will get: “It’s-a me! Gnar-io!”)
This episode was produced by Mike Perlman.
**
Support It’s Not the Car:
Contribute on Patreon www.patreon.com/notthecar/
**
Topic suggestions, feedback, questions? Let us know what you think!
INTCPod@gmail.com
**
Where to find us:
instagram.com/j.v.braun/
instagram.com/rossbentley/
instagram.com/thatsamsmith/
instagram.com/intcpod/
facebook.com/INTCPod/
rossbentley.substack.com/
speedsecrets.com/
facebook.com/Drivercoach/
**
ABOUT THE SHOW:
It’s Not the Car is a podcast about people and speed. We tell racing stories and leave out the boring parts.
Ross Bentley is a former IndyCar driver and an internationally renowned performance coach and author. Jeff Braun is a championship-winning race engineer. Sam Smith is an award-winning journalist and a former executive editor of Road & Track magazine. Together, we explore the emotion at the heart of the machine.
We don’t love racing for the nuts and bolts—we love it for what it asks of the bag of meat at the wheel.
New episodes every Tuesday. -
How to Be a Rookie at the Indy 500
Step one: Know you might die trying.
In 1993, at the tender age of 36, a host of this show tried to qualify for one of the greatest races on earth. He didn’t make it in, but he did lap a 900-hp car at more than 220 mph, suffer third-degree burns on his face, and meet a hospital.
Other than that, Mrs. Lincoln, how was your month of May?
(No, really: That’s what we asked Ross to talk about—the Indy 500 rookie experience. The flames that nearly killed him were just part of the story.)
This show’s format rotates weekly, because squirrel. We call this format “Ross Teaches Sam About a Thing.”
Related Trivia: Jeff calls himself a bus driver as a joke in this episode, but he really does own a bus. Ross occasionally calls himself a “bear of very little brain,” but he’s actually quite smart. Sam calls himself an adult, but then, he occasionally eats Haribo before breakfast as his kids cheer him on, so we all know how that one shakes out.
This episode was produced by Mike Perlman.
**
Support It’s Not the Car:
Contribute on Patreon www.patreon.com/notthecar/
**
Topic suggestions, feedback, questions? Let us know what you think!
INTCPod@gmail.com
**
Where to find us:
instagram.com/j.v.braun/
instagram.com/rossbentley/
instagram.com/thatsamsmith/
instagram.com/intcpod/
facebook.com/INTCPod/
rossbentley.substack.com/
speedsecrets.com/
facebook.com/Drivercoach/
**
ABOUT THE SHOW:
It’s Not the Car is a podcast about people and speed. We tell racing stories and leave out the boring parts.
Ross Bentley is a former IndyCar driver and an internationally renowned performance coach and author. Jeff Braun is a championship-winning race engineer. Sam Smith is an award-winning journalist and a former executive editor of Road & Track magazine. Together, we explore the emotion at the heart of the machine.
We don’t love racing for the nuts and bolts—we love it for what it asks of the bag of meat at the wheel.
New episodes every Tuesday. -
For Love of the Game — (Villeneuve 1979 US GP Wet Quali)
“He was the craziest devil I ever came across in Formula 1.” —Niki Lauda
Gilles Villeneuve got his start racing snowmobiles, crashing on sheet ice at 100 mph. Enzo Ferrari loved him; Ronnie Peterson said he was a menace. And in upstate New York in the fall of 1979, in blinding rain, an entire F1 paddock stopped what it was doing to watch him do what no one else could.
This show’s format rotates weekly, because squirrel. This episode is our monthly deep dive into an epic moment from racing history—in this case, Villeneuve’s absolutely epic qualifying session at the muddy, rain-drenched ’79 U.S. Grand Prix.
(Spoiler: He went nearly 10 seconds faster than his teammate—who had just locked the championship—in conditions so awful that most drivers never left the pits.)
Related Trivia: Like Gilles, Ross is Canadian. Like Enzo, Jeff looks great in sunglasses. Sam knows every word to the Canadian sea-shanty folk anthem “Barrett’s Privateers” and has loved that song since childhood but will only sing it in public on G.V.’s birthday—oh hell, who am I kidding, I sing that ridiculous thing any chance I get OH THE YEAR WAS 1778 / HOW I WISH I WAS IN SHERBROOKE NOWWWWWWWWW
This episode was produced by Mike Perlman.
**
Support It’s Not the Car:
Contribute on Patreon www.patreon.com/notthecar/
**
Topic suggestions, feedback, questions? Let us know what you think!
INTCPod@gmail.com
**
Where to find us:
instagram.com/j.v.braun/
instagram.com/rossbentley/
instagram.com/thatsamsmith/
instagram.com/intcpod/
facebook.com/INTCPod/
rossbentley.substack.com/
speedsecrets.com/
facebook.com/Drivercoach/
**
ABOUT THE SHOW:
It’s Not the Car is a podcast about people and speed. We tell racing stories and leave out the boring parts.
Ross Bentley is a former IndyCar driver and an internationally renowned performance coach and author. Jeff Braun is a championship-winning race engineer. Sam Smith is an award-winning journalist and a former executive editor of Road & Track magazine. Together, we explore the emotion at the heart of the machine.
We don’t love racing for the nuts and bolts—we love it for what it asks of the bag of meat at the wheel.
New episodes every Tuesday. -
The World’s Most Charming Race Track
What makes a special place special? Wonderful people? Beautiful scenery? How you keep going back for more in the face of terrible odds? Some tracks are more than just tracks, and Wisconsin's Elkhart Lake—Road America—is far more than meets the eye.
This show’s format rotates every episode, because squirrel. We call this format "Sam Rambles About a Thing."
Related Trivia: Ross has opinions about track limits. You might get to hear them, you might not. Jeff recalls a time when his uncle Boom Boom was in a police chase. Sam, despite terrible weather conditions and a myriad of cheese issues, has never had a bad weekend in Wisconsin.
INTC's producer, Mike, wrote this episode description because Sam fell asleep at his keyboard while dreaming about never-ending bratwurst and being 24 again.
This episode was produced by Mike Perlman.
**
Support It’s Not the Car:
Contribute on Patreon www.patreon.com/notthecar/
**
Topic suggestions, feedback, questions? Let us know what you think!
INTCPod@gmail.com
**
Where to find us:
instagram.com/j.v.braun/
instagram.com/rossbentley/
instagram.com/thatsamsmith/
instagram.com/intcpod/
facebook.com/INTCPod/
rossbentley.substack.com/
speedsecrets.com/
facebook.com/Drivercoach/
**
ABOUT THE SHOW:
It’s Not the Car is a podcast about people, motorsport, and how we all work under pressure. In other words, we tell racing stories and leave out the boring parts.
Ross Bentley is a former IndyCar driver and an internationally renowned performance coach and author. Jeff Braun is a championship-winning race engineer. Sam Smith is an award-winning journalist and a former executive editor of Road & Track magazine. Together, we explore the emotion at the heart of the machine.
We don’t love racing for the nuts and bolts—we love it for what it asks of the bag of meat at the wheel.
New episodes every Tuesday. -
How Do Wind Tunnels Work?
Answer: The blowy thing goes WHOOSH and the invisible gas that keeps us all alive goes WHEEE and the racey thing stays put. And later, if you have done the math right, you maybe drive around in circles better than everyone!
Alternate, more grown-up answer: physics and stuff.
This show’s format rotates weekly, because squirrel. This week's approach is called “Jeff Teaches Sam a Thing.” Jeff knows a lot about a subject—in this case, how race teams use indoor wind to develop aerodynamic downforce—and Sam asks questions.
Warning: We get lightly tech-nerdy here.
Related Trivia: Every host of this show is a father. And so I ask you fine people, in the name of Bernoulli and Pocahontas and all that is holy, tell me, what color is the wind?
Blew!
Get it?
DAD JOKE!
(If any of you actually read these episode descriptions, please email INTCpod@gmail.com and let Sam know. It gets lonely at this keyboard.)
Ross is off this week. We miss him.
This episode was produced by Mike Perlman.
**
Support It’s Not the Car:
Contribute on Patreon
www.patreon.com/notthecar/
**
Topic suggestions, feedback, questions? Let us know what you think!
INTCPod@gmail.com
**
Where to find us:
instagram.com/j.v.braun/
instagram.com/rossbentley/
instagram.com/thatsamsmith/
instagram.com/intcpod/
facebook.com/INTCPod/
rossbentley.substack.com/
speedsecrets.com/
facebook.com/Drivercoach/
**
ABOUT THE SHOW:
It’s Not the Car is a podcast about people, motorsport, and how we all work under pressure. In other words, we tell racing stories and leave out the boring parts.
Ross Bentley is a former IndyCar driver and an internationally renowned performance coach and author. Jeff Braun is a championship-winning race engineer. Sam Smith is an award-winning journalist and a former executive editor of Road & Track magazine. Together, we explore the emotion at the heart of the machine.
We don’t love racing for the nuts and bolts—we love it for what it asks of the bag of meat at the wheel.
New episodes every Tuesday.
Customer Reviews
Great pod with excellent hosts
The depth of knowledge the three hosts have is unparalleled. I could listen to these guys talk race cars all day.
Great new car podcast
Even though the title says otherwise, this is a great new car podcast. Every week a different story about cars or driving, and about aspects most of us have not thought about or experienced. I’m always excited for the new episode, and after it’s done it leaves me thinking about new perspectives, experiences or ideas (each revolving around cars , even if it’s not about that!).
Love it - keep up the great work!
Tendency to be the Sam Show
I love the show, what a fun evolution from speed secrets! Sam, while you’re an incredible complement to Jeff and Ross you have a tendency to make it the Sam show. Give your words room to breath (slow down) and please let others talk before going down a diatribe of adjectives. The constant interruptions are distracting. I’m excited to see this show mature.