Be Differential

The 94th 24 Hours of Le Mans kicks off this Saturday, June 13th — and this year's race has more storylines than most. Ferrari arrives chasing a fourth consecutive overall win, something no manufacturer has done since Ferrari itself won six in a row in the 1960s. Genesis becomes the first Korean manufacturer ever to compete at the top level of endurance racing. And every single car on the 62-car grid is running on 100% renewable biofuel.

In this week's Thursday Pit Stop, Eva Gregory breaks down what actually makes Le Mans different from every other race on the calendar, why the Genesis entry matters beyond the result, and what the shift to renewable fuel tells us about where the automotive industry is genuinely heading — not just where it says it's heading.

Plus: the real reason the teams that win at Le Mans tend to be the ones that make the fewest mistakes — and what that principle looks like off the racetrack.

Be sure to join our newsletter to stay in the know! https://www.bedifferentialpodcast.com/

Motorsport has a belonging problem — and it's time we talked about it. This week on BeDifferential, we're kicking off a special crossover episode with Misha and Fatima, hosts of the Hold The Pass Podcast, who bring a sharp, fresh perspective from the broader world of sports culture. Together we tackle one of motorsport's most loaded questions: who actually gets to be a racing fan — and who decides?

We dig into the gatekeeping vs. access debate, the Drive to Survive effect and the fans it created, F1's massive expansion into Las Vegas and Miami, and whether the sport is evolving or trading its identity for a new audience. We talk social media's role in reshaping racing fandom, the tension between F1's traditional European base and its growing global audience, and whether American fans are truly being welcomed into Formula 1 — or just marketed to.

Plus — is grassroots motorsport being left behind while everyone chases F1 and NASCAR headlines? And what would it actually take for motorsport to build the kind of broad, diverse fandom that the NFL and basketball already have?

This is Part 1 of a two-part crossover — next up, I head over to Hold The Pass to keep the conversation going. Subscribe so you don't miss it.

Learn more about BeDifferential at https://www.bedifferentialpodcast.com/ and sign up for the newsletter to gain inside access and additional updates.

Pikes Peak International Raceway just announced that 2026 will be its final season of motorsports — and it's headed for mixed-use redevelopment. For a lot of people, that's a Colorado story. For Eva, it's something bigger.

In this week's Thursday Pit Stop, Eva Gregory draws on her years working inside motorsports facilities — from Atlanta Motorsports Park to Road Atlanta — to explain why track closures like this one aren't isolated incidents. They're a pattern. And they have real consequences for the grassroots racing community, for entry-level competitors, and for the long-term health of the sport we love.

What does it actually take to keep a racing facility alive? What do we lose when one closes? And what can enthusiasts do before it's too late?

This one's worth your time — whether you've ever set foot on a racetrack or just care about where the sport is headed.

Be sure to join our newsletter to stay in the know! https://www.bedifferentialpodcast.com/

Isla Mackenzie grew up on a dairy farm on the Isle of Lewis — and somehow found her way to the Formula 1 pit lane. In this episode, we trace every step of that journey, from stripping down project cars before she could legally drive, to running her own engine tuning business while still in school, to navigating a career path that looked nothing like the industry standard.

Isla walks us through the HNC-to-Honours Degree route she took into engineering, why it shaped her thinking in ways a traditional path might not have, and what it actually took — technically and personally — to move from Technician to Systems Engineer inside one of the most demanding technical environments in sport.

We get into what Dare to Be Different (now rebranded to FIA Women on Track) meant for her practically (not just symbolically), what it felt like to return to one of their events as a Williams employee, and the advice Susie Wolff gave her at a D2BD connect event in 2018 that she's never forgotten.

Isla also breaks down what systems engineering actually means in the context of an F1 car, what race week prep looks like from the operations view, and what she thinks is the single most misunderstood thing about technical motorsport work.

And she's honest — about whether the industry has genuinely changed since 2017, what diversity advocacy looks like from inside an F1 team, and what she wishes someone had told her before her first F1 job.

If you love cars, engineering, motorsport, or you're trying to find your entry point into an industry that can feel impossible to break into — this one's for you.

Be sure to join the newsletter to stay in the know!

https://www.bedifferentialpodcast.com/

In competitive industries like automotive and motorsport, there's a quiet pressure to say yes to everything. Every event, every introduction, every potential collaboration — because what if you miss the one that matters?

But in this week's Thursday Pit Stop, we're making the case that saying yes to everything might actually be pulling you further from what you're trying to build.

We get into:

• Why the scarcity mindset around opportunity leads to overcommitment and burnout
• The shift from chasing access to practicing discernment — and when that shift needs to happen
• Three questions to ask before you say yes to anything this week
• Why saying no to the wrong things is how the right things find you
• What intentionality actually looks like in a fast-moving industry

This one is for anyone who's stretched thin, showing up in too many places, and quietly wondering if any of it is moving the needle. It might not be a hustle problem. It might be an alignment one.

The BeDifferential Podcast helps people navigate automotive and motorsport on their own terms — building careers and communities with intention, not just momentum.

What does it actually take to own a Top Fuel dragster in 2025 — without a large budget, without a factory sponsor, and without taking the easy road? Joe Barszcz has spent his entire life in drag racing. He's built chassis, run a machine shop, wrenched on funny cars, and shared pits with legends like John Force, JR Todd, and Jerry Toliver. And after decades of being that close to the thing he wanted most, he finally did it — bought Jim Maroney's Top Fuel car with small increments at a time and is heading into the 2026 IHRA 10-race national tour as a team owner. He calls it a blue collar Top Fuel team. This episode is the story of what that actually means. 

 The BeDifferential Podcast is bringing more people into automotive and motorsport — one story at a time. Learn more at https://www.bedifferentialpodcast.com/

Learn more about JBR Nitro at https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=61587245738321

Most people are waiting. Waiting to feel more confident, more experienced, more qualified. Waiting for some signal that finally tells them it's okay to step in.

But that signal doesn't come. And in this week's Thursday Pit Stop, we're talking about why.

Confidence isn't something you earn before you act — it's something you build because you did. And the people who seem like they have it all figured out? They started exactly where you are. They just didn't wait.

We get into:

• Why the "feel ready first" mindset quietly keeps capable people on the sidelines
• How confidence actually works — and why action has to come before it, not after
• Why this shows up so strongly in spaces like automotive and motorsport
• One practical challenge to take into your week right now
• What it actually means to take up space — and why you're already allowed to

This one is for anyone who's been holding back, second-guessing themselves, or quietly wondering if they belong. You do. And you don't have to wait until you're sure of that to act like it.

The BeDifferential Podcast is built for people finding their way into automotive and motorsport — wherever they're starting from.

What does it look like to be born into motorsport — and then actually earn your place in it anyway?

Madelyn Tabor attended her first rally at four weeks old. She grew as a 3rd-generation rally driver, got behind the wheel of a Quarter Midget at 13, and by 18 had made the leap to stage rally. She's competed in the ARA national championship 3 years in a row, a WRC Beyond Rally Women's Program alumna, and someone who's stood on the podium alongside Travis Pastrana and Rhiannon Gelsomino. On paper, it sounds like a straight line. In conversation, it's anything but.

In this episode of The BeDifferential Podcast, Madelyn breaks down what it's actually like to grow up inside a racing family. She explains the co-driver relationship, what real race prep looks like behind the scenes, and how her approach shifts when she moves from gravel to snow to ice to pavement. She talks candidly about being the only North American woman selected for the WRC Beyond program, what she took from that experience, and what it's been like navigating the sport as a young woman in a discipline that doesn't always make it easy.

But this episode isn't just for the gearheads. Madelyn spends real time on the doors-open side of rally — the co-drivers, the navigators, the service crews, the volunteers — and where someone who's never been to a stage rally can actually start if something about this world is calling to them. If you've ever wondered whether there's a place for you in motorsport, this conversation is the answer.

Learn more about Madelyn at https://www.madelyntaborracing.com/

There's a narrative that gets repeated constantly in automotive and motorsport: we have a pipeline problem. Not enough people coming in. Not enough diversity in the talent pool.

But what if the pipeline isn't the real issue?

In this week's Thursday Pit Stop, we're making the case that the industries don't lack talent — they lack visibility into what they actually are. And that perception gap is causing incredibly capable people to self-select out before they ever raise their hand.

We get into:

• Why the "pipeline problem" framing misses a more important question
• How perception shapes participation — and who ends up in the room
• The roles that exist beyond engineering and racing that most outsiders never see
• Why people who'd thrive here are already deciding it's not for them
• What those of us already in this space can actually do about it — starting this week

This one is for the people already in automotive and motorsport just as much as it's for the people on the outside looking in. Because changing perception isn't a marketing problem — it's a culture one.

The BeDifferential Podcast exists to close exactly this gap: showing people the many ways in to automotive and motorsport, so fewer brilliant people leave before they ever arrive.

Julia Landauer won her first racing championship at 14 years old — and she hasn't slowed down since. A Stanford graduate, NASCAR driver, keynote speaker, entrepreneur, and NASCAR Strategy & Innovation team member, Julia has spent her career moving through rooms she was never supposed to be in and making the case that motorsport has something to teach everyone.

In this episode of The BeDifferential Podcast, Julia and Eva dig into what it actually takes to build a racing career from scratch — the funding realities, the sponsorship grind, and what most people completely misunderstand about how drivers get seats. They talk about what it was like growing up in New York City with no obvious path to a racetrack, what her family thought when this became serious, and the moment she knew she could actually compete at a high level.

They also get into the harder stuff: what it feels like when "first woman to" becomes complicated, the things that pushed back hardest that rarely get talked about publicly, and how Julia learned to own being the person who never quite fit the obvious mold — not in New York, not at Stanford, not in NASCAR.

Julia breaks down what NASCAR's Strategy & Innovation team is actually working on, how she translates racing principles into leadership strategy for Fortune 500 companies, and what her platform FrontRunner is built to do for storytelling and community building. She also shares exactly what she'd tell a young woman who wants to get into racing but has no idea where to start.

If you've ever had to figure out how to belong somewhere that wasn't built for you — this one's for you.

Learn more about Julia at https://julialandauer.com