Women's Motorsports Network Podcast & Let's Talk Racing LIVE
Women's Motorsports Network Podcast shares the stories of women involved in motorsports from around the world. The first episode was in 2018 and new episodes are added each week. Feel free to suggest potential guests to Melinda at melinda@wmnnation.com.
Let's Talk Racing LIVE airs on Wednesdays at 7pm EASTERN TIME on the Women's Motorsports Network-A Media Company Facebook Page.
https://www.facebook.com/womensmotorsportsnetworkandpodcast
Melinda Russell
Women's Motorsports Network Podcast & Let's Talk Racing LIVE
Ink & Engines: Four Decades of Motorsports Storytelling with Deb Williams
From sleeping peacefully under loudspeakers at dirt tracks as a baby to witnessing Richard Petty's historic 200th victory with President Reagan in attendance, Deb Williams has lived and breathed motorsports her entire life. Now in her fourth decade as a motorsports journalist, Williams takes us on a captivating journey from her humble beginnings in a North Carolina mill town to becoming the first female to cover NASCAR for an international wire service.
The passion that drove a 13-year-old girl to declare she would become a motorsports writer after spotting statistical errors in her local newspaper's racing coverage has never diminished. Williams shares colorful anecdotes from an era when racing coverage was built on personal relationships – times when journalists, drivers, and team members would gather at local restaurants after races, forging bonds that transcended professional obligations. Her stories of interviewing legends like Richard Petty (first as a starstruck fan, later as a professional) and dining with Mario Andretti and the Italian ambassador offer a glimpse into racing's rich human tapestry.
As president of the National Motorsports Press Association and a contributing editor for AutoWeek.com, Williams continues to shape racing journalism while teaching the next generation at Appalachian State University. Her perspective on how the sport's coverage has evolved – from the days when "everybody knew somebody on every race team" to today's more structured media environment – highlights what's been gained and lost as racing has grown into a national phenomenon.
Williams' story isn't just about motorsports; it's about perseverance, breaking barriers, and the power of community. In a world increasingly dominated by digital interactions, her emphasis on human connection and the racing family where "you know who's got your back" resonates more powerfully than ever. Whether you're a die-hard racing fan or simply appreciate stories of passion pursued against all odds, Williams' journey reminds us that behind every headline are the people who make the sport what it is.
Join the conversation about how motorsports journalism has evolved by sharing your thoughts on what we've gained – and perhaps lost – in racing's transformation over these past four decades.
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Hello everyone. This is Melinda Russell with the Women's Motorsports Network podcast, and my guest today is Deb Williams. And Deb, I'm so glad you could be on the show with me today. So welcome to the podcast and if you would, would you start by just sharing a little bit about yourself?
Speaker 2:Okay, well, thank you for having me. It's a pleasure. It's been an interesting ride.
Speaker 2:Needless to say, I grew up in a paper mill town in western North Carolina, 18 miles west of Asheville, in the southern Appalachian Mountains mill for about 45 years, and my mother worked various jobs. She was a full-time homemaker and then, when I got into junior high, she got on with the town police force and worked as a school crossing guard. And I have an older sister, who's 11 years older than me, who is a retired history professor at North Carolina State University, as is my brother-in-law. They weren't in the same field she was US history and he was European history during the Enlightenment era. So we've had a lot of teachers in our family and I knew from the time I was 13 years old I wanted to be a motorsports writer. So I'm in my fourth decade now of covering motorsports and I'm currently a contributing editor for AutoWeekcom and the president of the National Motorsports Press Association and on the board of directors of the Kowicki Driver Development Program. So you're keeping busy Just a little bit. Oh yeah, and I teach motorsports communications during fall semester at Appalachian State University.
Speaker 1:Oh well, that's just. You know one more thing, right? Oh my goodness.
Speaker 2:It's variety. You know it keeps everything going variety?
Speaker 1:wise it does. And you know we have to stay busy, otherwise you know what are we going to do. We have to find things to keep us occupied.
Speaker 2:Otherwise, you know what are we going to do? We have to find things to keep us occupied. Exactly, my mother raised me One. There was two things I was never allowed to say. I was never allowed to say I'm bored and I have nothing to do, because mother always said if you don't find something to do, I will find you something to do. And I think what you can find to do you will enjoy a lot more than what I can find you to do yes, absolutely.
Speaker 1:I grew up on a farm and I was the youngest of three daughters. My, my poor dad didn't have any boys to take over the farm, and neither did my. My uncle and aunt didn't have any children, and so, um, you know, the things they found for us to do was brush corn and snap beans and all those things, and it's like there was a lot of things I would have rather been doing than some of that.
Speaker 2:But well, I've been thinking a lot recently about the fresh garden we always had in the summer. All of us had a garden and I was thinking how nice it was to be able to just go out and get fresh strawberries and cucumbers and green beans and squash and corn, you know, for dinner, and then you put it up. We had grape vines, so we had the grapes and mother'd make jelly. But that was just a way of life and it was. You know everybody. I mean I had a pony, I had a dog and then later I had a horse. So you know, my uncle had cattle and I'd help them gather up hay and everything. So you didn't have your. This is your job and this is your job. It's whatever needed to be done. Everybody pitched in and did it.
Speaker 1:Absolutely so. We have a lot of similarities. I also had a pony growing up and a dog and and and so that was that was fun to do those things. And then the neighbor girl lived about two miles away and she also had a pony, so we'd meet halfway and ride our ponies and that was. That was a lot of good memories from back in those days. Yeah, so 40 years as a about 40 years or so as a motor sports writer how, at the age of 13, did you know that's what you wanted to do?
Speaker 2:Well, where I grew up in the Southern Appalachian mountains, there were two things that were really big where I grew up and that was football and cars. And my dad was really into cars and loved cars. He had me sitting on the car helping him wax it by the time that I was old enough to carry a rag. And I had a cousin who was in show cars and actually got top rod in the nation in 1992. And he was in high school with my sister who. They were in high school with Bosco Lowe who raced in the old Busch series. And you know we had the third mile track in Asheville, the weekly track, where Jack Ingram and Harry Gant and Bob Presley and all those guys raced every Friday night. And then we had Asheville Weaverville where they actually had the Southern Motorcycle Championships or Southeastern Motorcycle Championships before it was paved. And then, once it was paved, we had the cup cars race there twice a year up until I want to say 1970, probably, and so you know I was.
Speaker 2:I loved racing. Mother and daddy were going to races when mother was pregnant with me. The only place they could get me to quit crying and sleep until I was a year old was in the infield at ashford weaverville under the loudspeaker when it was dirt and then a cup. Excuse me, a couple who were in high school with my parents, frank and hilda presley. They actually filled in a car for ralph earnhardt in like 58 and 59 and I was down there at the garage one day with daddy. I grew up around car garages and ball fields and horse shows and so Frank Presley had pushed Ralph Earnhardt's car out front of Presley's garage so that he could work on the cars you know he and his son needed to work on. And that's the first race car I ever got to really touch and see. I put my hands on the passenger side and pulled myself up on my tiptoes. I guess I was about five years old and looked inside. Man, I was hooked.
Speaker 2:You know I loved racing and our extensions of our family loved racing. I had a cousin that was a big Fireball Roberts fan and daddy was always taking vacation every February to go to Daytona for the Daytona 500. And I still have a program that he brought me back from the 64 Daytona 500. Invariably I always got the flu and messed up his vacation, but I was raised that if you don't like something, don't sit around and grumble about it, get up and do something about it and do something about it. And so I was constantly finding statistical errors in the racing articles that were published in the Asheville Citizen, which was the daily newspaper I grew up on.
Speaker 2:And so at 13 years old I just decided well, I can do just as good or better. So I thought that would be a cool deal, would be to be a motor sports rider. Now I kind of had to alter it a little bit because I found I couldn't get a job necessarily if I limited myself that much. But so I said be a sports rider, preferably a motorsports rider, and I wouldn't trade the years that I covered everything for United Press International, from ACC football and basketball, the hostage situations to tornadoes, to hurricanes, I mean you name it. And that was when I got to cover Richard Petty's 200th victory at Daytona when President Reagan was there. So I've been very, very blessed. Not many people get to do what they want to do or their dream job, and I've been very, very blessed. Not many people get to do what they want to do or their dream job, and I've been fortunate to do it for over 40 years now.
Speaker 1:Wow, what a story. You need to write a book, deb. I've had a lot of people tell me that lately. Yeah, because you probably have met so many interesting people and told their stories that you could share those. Yeah, that's really cool. So I was a big Reagan fan, so I would have been tickled to death had I been there when. Reagan was at the race, yeah very, very cool.
Speaker 2:That was an interesting day because you know that was before they rebuilt Daytona into the palace that it is now and the press box had a line straight like sight line to the broadcast booth where President Reagan was with Ned Jarrett and they actually had a Secret Service agent stationed in the press box with us and they checked everybody going in through the gates. That morning we had the TRS Model 100s or the Trash 80s that Radio Shack sold and they looked to see if it had been taken apart and put back together. But the really cool thing that day that you would never see happen now because you don't have really the paper handouts, but back in 1984, you know they had the pit notes and the rundowns and the cumulative statistics and everything was printed out and passed out to all the media and so all of the media there that day that wanted Richard Petty to sign their rundown, richard sat in that press box and signed everybody's rundown. Until everybody had their rundown signed. That wanted them signed.
Speaker 1:Wow that's amazing. Those are the stories you don't really hear about.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah and they invited us all to the picnic that they had for the racing community down in the garage. But it was kind of like, well, you know, we are riding on deadline, I don't think we can come down there. But yeah, it was nice that they invited us, right.
Speaker 1:Do you have a favorite person that you've interviewed? Oh gee, that's a tough one. Yeah, or a few who would be maybe some of your favorites.
Speaker 2:Well, it was interesting. You know, richard Petty's got to be at the top of the list because growing up I was a Richard Petty fan. And it was interesting in that the first time I went to the garage twice in Randleman at Petty Enterprises to interview Richard, and the second time, as we were leaving, I was still with UPI then and I looked at the photo editor and I said you know, I think that interview went a lot better than the first one. And he looked at me and he said you know, why don't you? And I said no, why? And he said because the first time that you came here, you came here as a fan and it was something you had always dreamed of doing, which was coming to petty enterprises and sitting down and interviewing richard petty. And he said this time you came as a reporter and that's why it was better. Yeah, so, um, but you know I've uh, gee, it's it. Oh, I enjoyed the interview and burt Bart Reynolds, that was fun.
Speaker 1:Oh, why was that what? How did you interview?
Speaker 2:him. Well, that's when they were filming Stroker Ace, and they were filming Stroker Ace at Charlotte Motor Speedway and because I was with United Press International, they allowed me to come in on set and I got 30 minutes withurt Reynolds during a lunch break. So that was cool. Yeah, that is cool, very cool. Gee, it's hard to think right off the top of my head. Yeah, one thing that was really neat was the year that Mario Andretti was inducted into the International Motorsports Hall of Fame. Bill Broderick had handled the seating assignments at the tables and I was seated at the table with Mario Andretti and the Italian ambassador to the United States, who they had invited to be there for Mario Andretti, and he and Mario sat there and spoke Italian to each other through the entire dinner. I had no idea what they said, but I was just absolutely enthralled.
Speaker 2:You know who would have ever thought that a mill town girl from the southern Appalachian mountains would be sitting here at the dinner table with Mario Andretti and the ambassador from Italy to the United States. I mean, that was just a cool night.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it almost seemed unreal, didn't it? I mean when you stop to think yeah, yeah it did.
Speaker 2:And you know, so many times you're in the midst of just doing things and covering it, particularly if you're on deadline and you really don't think that you're actually getting to witness history and be a part of history until you reflect back on it and then it's like, wow, that's pretty cool. I wish I'd paid more attention. But you know, the friendship that I developed with the Petty family, particularly Linda Petty, was like my second mom when I was at the racetrack and I miss her tremendously and she had always wanted me to go out and spend a week with her and Richard at their ranch in Wyoming and unfortunately the time just never worked out before she got sick. But she it was funny because I was the editor of Winston NASCAR Winston cup scene then and Linda said I just hate that old paper because it takes so much of your time. She said we just can't. We can't go to Wyoming.
Speaker 1:Yeah, oh, that's. That makes you feel good, though, Doesn't it? It does, it does.
Speaker 2:Yeah, oh, that's that makes you feel good, though, doesn't it it?
Speaker 1:does it does.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and I know when I had Kyle Petty induct me into the National Motorsports Press Association Hall of Fame Kelly Crandall was the president then and Kelly asked me. She said, why did you ask Kyle to induct you? And I said because he's always been the brother I always wanted. I never had.
Speaker 1:Yeah, very, very cool. What's your favorite kind of story to write? You know, like cover an event or more of a human interest story. Do you have a favorite kind that you like to write Early in my?
Speaker 2:career. I was always much better at hard news and investigative reporting, but as I've gotten older now I find myself more attracted to the human interest side of the business, and I think it goes back to the first managing editor that I ever had told me. He said your job, he said there's a story in everybody out there. Your job is to find it, and that's what I enjoy doing is is finding out the the interesting side of of people and and finding out what their story is.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you know, I love that. He's that. He said you know it's your job to find the story. Everybody has a story. That's right and it's it's if you're, if you're able to pull it out of them. Sometimes people are shy or they don't want to share, but if, if you can pull, pull it out of them and get them to talking about you know how they got where they are, or things they've learned along the way and people that help them, or mentors and just all those kinds of things, those are my favorite kind you know when, when I watch a football or racing or whatever, and they have the stories football or racing or whatever and they have the stories before the game or before the race where they, you know, interview a driver or someone. Those are my favorite. I love those kinds of stories.
Speaker 2:Oh, yes, most definitely, and it's funny how you find yourself getting into that vibe, if you will. A few months ago my brother-in-law and sister are now in an assisted living place because my brother-in-law has Parkinson's and I had gone to dinner with them in the establishment's restaurant and I kept asking this one woman who all these questions? And she finally looked at me and she said why are you asking me so many questions? I said, well, I'm a reporter, that's just what I do. But yeah, it was funny in my younger days.
Speaker 2:You know, you get used to looking at your watch for deadlines and I was out on a date one time and the fellow that I was on the date with looked at me. Said do you have to be somewhere at a certain time? I said why, what? And he said you keep looking at your watch and I said oh no, I'm sorry, that's just habit. You're used to looking at it for deadlines. But yeah, and I think that's one thing that we're missing today, people are missing that human connection. They tend to make themselves the story rather than being the person telling the story, and I think that's bad. We're losing the human connection and how to connect with people because we're on our phones so much. I get a report every weekend about how much I've averaged on my phone that week. I can always tell when I've been on it checking for certain emails and I'm watching for press releases or whatever, because my hours on the phone are up.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, so true. And you know, even like the younger generations, younger than us, they don't really even a lot of them have good communication skills one to one, because they're so used to doing this and they don't capitalize and they don't spell right, and that just drives me crazy. But um, they don't, you know, when it's one to one it's almost like you have to kind of train them. If they're, you know, if they're a race car driver, they've got to be able to interact one to one with the press or whatever. But a lot of them are not able to do that unless somebody's taking them aside and giving them some training, and that's really a shame it is, it is and um.
Speaker 2:That's why they have all the media training and everything. And you know, I think if you go watch the first two episodes of the Earnhardt documentary on Prime Video, you see how Dale was shy and withdrawn and all early in his career in those championships with Richard Childress and RJ Reynolds Tobacco Company started sending him and Richard Childress to media training schools.
Speaker 2:Every year they won the championship. I mean, the man that you see in the 1990s is the intimidator, is nothing like the man that we saw in the early 1980s. Right, and it was because he was not self-confident. He was embarrassed at not having finished high school. He had just, you know, lost his father at an early age and he had had to just plug and scrape and work as hard as he could to get everything and he felt uncomfortable in a lot of social situations. So I think that's a good example of how you can come out of your shell and make it very beneficial to you yeah, very true, and you know, dale Jr is the same way.
Speaker 1:He was very shy, yes, and now look at all the things that he's. You know, dale Jr is the same way he was very shy.
Speaker 1:And now look at all the things that he's doing. You know he does a podcast three days a week and he's an announcer on television. Those are things that as a younger man he would have never dreamed of doing. He hated doing interviews, he you know, and and it's just practice, it's the more more you do it, the easier it gets and all those things. And sometimes when you're forced into that situation, you have to learn how to handle it.
Speaker 2:And when there are winners, and when you're Dale Earnhardt Jr, you've got to learn how to do it very, very true, and he even stepped out of his comfort zone earlier this year and to do the Red Bull soapbox races and that's totally opposite from anything he would have ever done. But you know, it's interesting. You bring that up about the social connection and that's one big thing I have noticed about the young reporters coming along now and a lot of it has to do with the fact that we have so many night races. You just don't have the schedule that's conducive to socializing anymore like we did when I first started out. But when I first started covering the sport now I was covering the weekly short track races at Asheville before I went with United Press International and started covering NASCAR Cup racing, which made me the first female to cover NASCAR on a regular basis for an international wire service.
Speaker 2:But we had all types of social events. We had all types of social events. I mean RJ Reynolds and Unical Unical had the 600 winners dinner. Darlington had the Unical Darlington Record Club. Unical sponsored what was the? They had a panel of experts with a dinner in Daytona all the time.
Speaker 2:The garage closed at 5, and I mean there was just PR people. You know, back then the teams didn't have PR people. The only driver that had a PR person was Richard Petty and that was Harvey Duck with STP. But you had Pontiac had a PR person, and Ford and Oldsmobile and Chevrolet and they would take different groups of media out and then when Felix Sabatis came along he would take out certain media people and you'd all wind up at the chart house in Daytona Beach, you know, picking on each other and everything. And there were certain restaurants in certain areas, certain towns and all where people would take out media, like Bob Kelly when he was with Ford would take three or four media people out to the Blue Coat Inn in Dover, delaware, to the Blue Coat Inn in Dover, delaware.
Speaker 2:And then there was a place in Delaware where it was a favorite place for everybody to go, teams and media and broadcasters to. It was the name of it Sambo's, and they just bring steamed crab legs out in huge trays and that you sit there with a mallet and break it right on the table and you know it was old newspapers rolled out was what covered the table, and when one table got done they rolled up the newspapers and put out fresh newspapers. So everybody had their favorite places to go eat on the circuit then. But you don't have that uh socialization anymore because of the schedule you know. Now you're at the racetrack 12 and 14 hours a day, and I know the day of the 600 and I live live nine miles from Charlotte Motor Speedway and I was at the track by 2 o'clock that afternoon and we didn't even get Ross Chastain for his post-race interview until 1 am and it was 3 am Monday before I got in bed.
Speaker 1:So there's just no time for that camaraderie that there used to be time for that camaraderie that there used to be, and that's really a shame because to me that's that's where you build those lifelong relationships and friendships and and you know you're kind of a cohesive. You might be writing for different news organizations and whatever, but yet you're all there to do the same thing and that's cover the sport the best it can be covered and tell the stories. And the fact that you don't have time to really spend with each other is kind of sad.
Speaker 2:Well it is. And you know, the interesting thing was when you had so many media covering it, you actually had your little clicks that would develop. You'd have one click and another click and you'd have another one that tried to kind of keep up with the other two, you know. But you also, you know the drivers didn't have motorhomes and they didn't have lounges in the front of the transporters. The front of the transporters was where they carried the engines. Front of the transporters, the front of the transporters, was where they carried the engines.
Speaker 2:So you build up, whether or not you got the stories depended on how you built your relationship with the team owners and the crew chiefs and the different crew people. I mean, I used to know at least one person on every race team and that's not the case now. But, um, you know that actually started kind of going away when race teams started getting pr people and you had pr people for drivers that some of them were very good and others were gatekeepers. Yeah and um, which is what led to the media availabilities that we have now. But but I was fortunate I had some really good mentors who took me under their wing and guided and coached me, and you know, for example, bob Latford, who a lot of people may not remember, but he was actually the one that created the point system that was used up until 2001. And Bob would tell me little things, like the first time I went to Daytona for my first speed weeks and he told me he said you need to make you a name tag that identifies you as the UPI person. Because he said, yes, the people in the Carolinas know you're with UPI, but when you get to Daytona there will be a lot of people who do not and you just need to have your name tag on. So if they're looking for the UPI person, they know who to find.
Speaker 2:And you know, back then too, you didn't have I mean, talladega had no infield media center. Charlotte didn't have an infield media center and you would go in the garage and get your, do your interviews and then go in the press box and write. And they always brought the driver the winning driver was always brought to the press box. So everybody worked out of the press box and now it's reversed. But you also don't have a lot of the people anymore that would pull jokes, like Tom Higgins and Steve Wade. And you know, there was one time Labor Day weekend, really hot in Darlington, south Carolina typical Labor Day weekend in South Carolina and we had a little bitty media center where you might could fit 12 people in it. And it was when Country Time, lemonade was in the sport and they had a lemonade machine, one of those things that you know where the beverage keeps kind of going like a drink machine.
Speaker 2:Well, while everybody was out in the garage interviewing the people they needed to interview, steve Wade took a bottle of vodka and poured it in the lemonade machine. That's funny. That's funny, you just. And I told one reporter. I said you know, I might not want to drink too much of that to get your story written. And he said why? I said because Wade put a bottle of vodka in the machine.
Speaker 1:He said I knew I wondered why it tasted better oh, but those are the things that made things fun and gave you good memories too.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, yeah, that's true, that's true. Unfortunately, you know, I still find myself thinking, oh, I need to call so-and-so and ask them such-and-such and they're not with us anymore. Yeah, so I'm thankful that I came in and started covering the sport when I did, because I was here when it exploded into a national sport. So it was wonderful being here through the 1980s and 90s when everything was it was growing like a runaway train.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, what's your. What's been the thing about writing that's stuck with you all this time? Why have you done it for so long? It's fun.
Speaker 2:I enjoy writing and I enjoy telling other people's stories. I like informing people and I think if I can help them understand somebody a little bit better, then I've done my job. But it's fun to just put it together and then look at it and go, wow, that came out of my brain. But writing's always been fun to me. When I was in the fourth grade I would sit around and write short stories for the fun of it. So it's something that I've always enjoyed and I loved books.
Speaker 2:I remember the first time that I went to the Biltmore Estate and saw the Biltmore House the beautiful library in the Biltmore House is what caught my attention and I promised myself that I would have a library in my house. And you know that was one place that my mother would always take me, or my sister if my sister had to go look up something at the public library. And I was kind of know. I had one central location, which was the horse books. But uh, I wasn't too, uh, too much of a variety until I got into the nancy drew mystery stories and then I was, I was. I would read one in a week and go back to kmart and buy another one for like a dollar and a quarter and then I remember they went up to a dollar seventy five.
Speaker 2:But you know it was mysteries and horses and and racing, and I just love to write and love books. I still love books. I want, I want that hard book in my hand and I love to smell a new book.
Speaker 1:We're so much alike, Deb. I read all the Hardy Boys.
Speaker 2:I read some of them.
Speaker 1:I had all the Hardy Boys books when I was a kid and oh to have them now, but who knows what happened to those. Nancy Drew, I read all those. I'm the same as you I have Audible and that, but I do not read books on my phone. If I'm going to read a book, I want the book in my hands and I've loved to read. I can remember in fourth grade I had a teacher who we did some kind of not really a contest, but we kept track of all the books we read through the year and I read almost 400 books during the school year and I got some kind of special prize.
Speaker 1:I don't even remember now what it was, but I just read all the time and I still love to read, you know, magazine articles or whatever it might be. That's just something I love to do and that's kind of a lost art too.
Speaker 2:Well, yeah, but you know, thankfully Eric Jones is getting children interested in reading again. But my dad was always a ferocious reader and I actually found some of his Mickey's Flame books the original ones and I'm thinking, oh, I got to read these and find out why I was never allowed to look at one. Yeah, but my dad read right up. He was always reading and learning right up until his death at age 91.
Speaker 1:Wow.
Speaker 2:And you know, I just think that you can never read too much and you're constantly learning. Yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's true for sure. Deb is there anyone that you would love to interview that you've never had the opportunity?
Speaker 2:Sorry, the only interview that I've never been able to get that I've tried and tried was Lee Petty, and it was interesting because even Maurice Petty tried to get Lee to sit down with me and Lee never would would do it.
Speaker 2:he was, um, that's the only interview that I've ever gone after that I never got okay um, I'm sure that there are others if I thought about it, but right off the top of my head I can't, can't think of one. But, um, when you're talking about reading, I got to tell a funny story when you were talking about you read 400 books. When I was in the ninth grade my English teacher had us do our book reports as a to tell the truth TV version of that show. And what she would do? She would have three people come up to the front of the room and then she would pick one of the rows in the class and they would ask questions about the book of the three fellow classmates and then decide who had actually read the book. So I can't lie. My punishment was always worse for lying than for telling the truth.
Speaker 2:So Mrs Cody pulls me up front on this book called Stop Then Go. Well, I never read romantic books. So I turned it into a drag racing book and they're asking me questions about drag racing and all that. Well, everybody in the school knew how I was about racing because I'd wear my Plymouth Racing jacket to school and everything. So they picked me as having read the book, which I had not. I had read the Johnny Unina story for that book report and when the real person, the real reader of the book, stood up before we progressed. Mrs Cody said I just want everybody in this class to know that Debbie has taken probably the most beautiful love story in the library and ruined it.
Speaker 1:Oh goodness, that's too funny. So, deb, you're the president of the National Motorsports Press Association. Do you want to talk a little bit about that group and share you know what they do and why a press association?
Speaker 2:Well, it was actually when it was created in the early seventies, maybe even late sixties. It was actually the Southeastern Motorsports Press Association and then it converted to the National Motorsports Press Association in the early 1980s. And you know we work with tracks and sanctioning bodies on credential issues, press box issues, making sure everyone has what they need. Sanctioning bodies on credential issues, press box issues, making sure everyone has what they need. Our big thing is our Hall of Fame, which is housed in Darlington, south Carolina, and we're currently in the process of determining who's going to go on the ballot for the 2026 induction. We've now got 23 names that have been nominated, so we got to reduce that to five, but it's. We have a convention. We have our annual award ceremony for broadcast and print and we've been bringing drivers in the last two years. We've had seminars the last two years. It's promoting to become better. Journalists is what it is. You can go on the NMPA website and read all about our bylaws, see who's in the hall of fame, see the officers and, um, it's I know.
Speaker 2:Last year, when I was teaching at App State and I told my class on the first day, I said whoever has the highest average is going to be invited to the uh, our awards luncheon, the NMPA awards luncheon. Well, the young woman was able to attend and it just so happened that Lynn St James had been inducted into the NMPA Hall of Fame the night before our awards luncheon and when this young woman showed up for the awards luncheon, lynn had come up to me to say her goodbyes and everything. And I said wait, just a minute, there's someone I want you to meet. And I called the young woman over and I said do you remember in class when I talked to you about the first woman that won rookie honors in the Indianapolis 500, lynn St James? And she said, yes, she was kind of shy and I said well, I would like for you to meet her.
Speaker 2:This is Lynn St James and Lynn was great with her. I walked away and let those two talk, but Lynn gave her advice about her profession and what she needed to do to prepare for it and the documents she needed to have. And you know it was, it was just wonderful. And she sat with me at the table and our table we had Greg Biffle and we had Wayne Alton who was leaving as the Xfinity series director. So yeah, I think it. It was an educational experience for her.
Speaker 1:Yeah, absolutely. She'll never forget, that I know for sure.
Speaker 2:No, and she said one thing that that caught her attention was how much we are really like a family, how everybody truly cares about each other and takes care of each other.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's so true. You know, when I do interviews, I ask almost always ask you know, what's your favorite thing about motorsports? Why do you keep going back to the track every week instead of doing other things? And it's always the people.
Speaker 2:That's right it is. It's a community and it's just a microcosm of a lot much larger society and it's just a microcosm of a much larger society. But it's a society where you feel like you know who's got your back, you feel safe, you travel together, you see each other, you may fight like brothers and sisters, but in other words, no one outside that unit should take on the other one.
Speaker 2:Exactly yeah, and no matter where you travel, it seems like no matter where I would go in the United States at this point.
Speaker 2:I know somebody that if I needed help or something, there's somebody that I could contact, because I've just made friends all over the country.
Speaker 2:You're right and you know, just for an example of how everybody takes care of each other, I don't know if you know the motorsports writer from Germany, wolfgang and OK, well, it got out somehow on social media last year that Wolfgang had died, which was not true, and so Jerry Jordan of kicking the tiresnet was determined to show everyone that Wolfgang was still very much alive, and he flew to Germany on his own dime and met up with Wolfgang, wow, took a selfie of him with Wolfgang and put it out all over social media with Wolfgang, took a selfie of him with Wolfgang and put it out all over social media. Now, wolfgang had had some health issues, which might have been where it got started, but he put it out all over social media saying you know, this person is alive, he's well, I'm here. And when I got to Atlanta for the July race or June, whichever it was this summer Wolfgang was there and he had come over to cover the Atlanta race and he had.
Speaker 2:Actually I had connected him with my sister and brother in law when they used to go to Germany before the pandemic six months a year to study, and so when I saw him in Atlanta he asked about my sister and brother-in-law and he said well, you know, if they're ever in Germany again, tell them to get up with me. So yeah, it's an international. It actually is an international family, yeah it really is for sure.
Speaker 1:Family yeah, it really is for sure. Well, deb, what have we not talked about?
Speaker 2:about your life, your stories that we should share. Oh gee, you have so much I do. It's um. You know, I was just trying to think um. One thing that I will say that I considered a really high compliment is um, we have. We have renamed the Henry T McLemore award now to the American American media motor sports award of excellence, alce. To get upset about me getting it incorrect, but we renamed it and um. But when I got it it was the henry t mclemore and I was the first woman to get it. And the head of chevrolet motorsports at that particular time told me after the event that when his date asked him who I was, he said I told her you're the Loretta Lynn of stock car racing. Oh, and I thought that was a really high compliment.
Speaker 1:No.
Speaker 2:Loretta Lynn did in country music and with her I said you know, I may not be a coal miners daughter, but I'm a mill workers daughter, right and um. You know, I was fortunate. Both of my parents were really big on education and they always encouraged my sister and me to get our education because, as they said, it's something that no one can take from you. And you know, I think too many young people now don't understand the benefits of an education and how important an education is and apparently they don't teach grammar in school anymore because I've never heard so much incorrect grammar in my life.
Speaker 2:I agree I mean stuff that we were taught in the second grade. Yeah, I mean stuff that we were taught in the second grade. Yeah and uh, you know I can remember having trouble with it in the conjugating verbs and everything in the second grade. Of course they don't diagram sentences anymore either and no, we had to do that all the time. I remember doing that, yeah, and when I found that out was I had a cousin a few, well a few decades ago now in high school and she had a paper. She was a junior, I guess, in high school, and she wanted me to evaluate her paper and I told her that she had her adverb in the wrong place and she needed something to do with her prepositional phrase and she told me. She said I don't know what you're talking about.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:I can believe it.
Speaker 1:Uh-oh, I can believe it yeah you know, I owned a weekly newspaper for 10 years when I lived in Illinois. Oh, wow, and I covered basically a couple small towns that had a lot of things in common, covered lots of school and sports and and that kind of thing I it was. It was called the good the tagline was the good newspaper, because we didn't cover we didn't cover the court cases or any of that. All the other papers you know around did all that and we did more lots of school and sports. And then we did or I did human interest, lots of human interest stories, and I think that's where I found my love for for telling stories.
Speaker 1:You know, I did the online magazine for five years here with the motor sports. But there's, I love the podcasts because I can see you, I can talk to you, we can interact as if we are in the same room, and I love that you tell your story in your words instead of me telling it in my words, and so I've I've become a huge podcast fan, not only doing one, but listening to them as well. Well, but nothing will ever take away that book in my hands.
Speaker 2:That's true and you know when you were talking about running the newspaper, when I was sports editor for the paper in Waynesville, north Carolina, where I actually started my newspaper career, I covered prep sports for seven years and little league baseball and t-ball and all that and in we had to do our own photography me too, with our stories, and I said if there's one thing I learned in those seven years, it was how not to be a parent. Oh, isn't that the truth. Yes, got along great with the kids, but man, the parents.
Speaker 1:And that I think a lot of shoot. I think it's just as bad or worse nowadays, but I can. I can totally agree with that. I I got to be really friends with a lot of kids in school.
Speaker 2:You know I covered a couple.
Speaker 1:I covered two state basketball championships and things and you just really get connected with the kids and a lot of the parents too nice parents, but there's always one that you just think he or she just needs to stay home. They shouldn't even be coming.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, there was one time I was covering a little league game and it was so cute because the father and or not the father, but the coach and the umpire got into an argument and the second second base player just sat down on the base and started playing in the dirt and drawing things in the dirt. And when the coach and the umpire got through arguing, the second baseman just stood up, brushed his pants off and put his glove back up. He was ready to play. You know again, but that's the thing I like about racing is it's, you know, generational.
Speaker 2:You look at high school sports, college sports, pro, I mean you don't cover an athlete but maybe three years in high school and then you cover another athlete four years in college and then pro maybe 10 years. You know you're not going to have people like Tom Brady. That stays as long as he did, no, but when you get into racing you're going to be covering people for 20 and 30 years. Yeah, and that's what I tell my students is that's why it's so critical for them to learn the sports history. Critical for them to learn the sports history is because they have to know what happened, say in 1987 between Dale Earnhardt and Jeffrey Bodine and Bill Elliott in the All-Star Race.
Speaker 2:To know why some incident in today's all-star race is relevant, particularly if it involves Chase Elliott, you know. And so they've got to understand. That's why it's honestly to me more important to know the history of motor sports or auto racing than it is other sports is. Because of that connection there and the relevancy and, um, you know, it's like Joy Logano is making his 600th start at Dover and the other day in a Zoom conference we were discussing it with Joy and how he's changed and he says I grew up in the public eye.
Speaker 2:You know I was only. I was a teenager when I first entered the sport and he said it's tough growing up in the public eye.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and it is, yeah and so and you know everybody's critical, everybody's got an opinion and social media has only made that worse. You know for them as well. For growing up, you know I'm a huge fan of Carson Hosovar. I'm not afraid to say it. He's from my town. I've watched him race since he was racing quarter midgets. My granddaughters used to race against him and. But you know he gets a lot. He gets a lot of criticism, some deserve, some not deserve. But um, it's a growing. It's a growing thing to be that age and be where he's at.
Speaker 2:You know that's very true and so yeah, I know the p, his pr person, and I have talked a lot and she's telling me, keeping me up on how they're working with Carson to help him grow up, so to speak, or mature and handle certain situations. But Carson reminds me of something Ricky Rudd told me one time. Ricky Rudd told me he said, if you'll notice, the really successful drivers wrecked a lot when they first started out because they didn't know how to control their aggressiveness. He said once a driver learns how to control that aggressiveness when to use it, when not to use it that's when they start winning. And he said if they don't ever learn to control it, it then all they continue to do is just wreck cars. And he just needs to grow up.
Speaker 2:And the other thing about social media. It's like I've told people social media is what used to be letters to the editor. Oh true. Only difference is when it was letters to the editor. You had an editor editing the letters, looking, knowing what was libelous, what was slanderous, you know, throwing out the ones that didn't put a name and address on theirs. And you had someone that knew communications law editing those letters and going through them and deciding which ones were printable and which not, whereas there's no, no one there on social media and people.
Speaker 2:Just that it reminds me of a story in the fifth grade, um, where you know they used fables a lot to teach lessons. And this person had said something and the teacher was telling us this. And the teacher was trying to emphasize how you got to be careful what you say and where you say it. And this man had gone out and said some things and he went to the elder of the town and said you know, I'm really sorry about this. How do I, what do I need to do to make good on this?
Speaker 2:And the elder said well, go get you a bag of feathers and go put a feather in each person's yard and then come back yard and then come back. And so the person did this and he went back to the elder and he said okay, I've gone and put a feather in each person's yard in the town. Now, what do I need to do? And the elder said go back and pick them up. And he said but I can't, the wind's blown them everywhere. He said exactly, and that's what you have to remember the way your words are Once you put them out there, you can never take them back and you never know how they're going to affect people or the repercussions that will have.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's so true. So so true. Well, deb, we could sit and talk for hours.
Speaker 2:Yeah, we'll have to do it sometime when we're not on a podcast. Yeah, let's do that for sure, well.
Speaker 1:I know we'll see each other somewhere along the line for sure, but I've really enjoyed listening to your stories. I know I could, like I said, I could just sit and listen more and more for sure. So I really appreciate you taking time. I know you're busy. You got a lot of things going on well. Thank you for having me. I deeply appreciate it taking time. I know you're busy. You've got a lot of things going on Well thank you for having me.
Speaker 2:I deeply appreciate it and I hope you have a good week.
Speaker 1:I hope you do too, Thank you Thank you.