(intense music)
- So for me, my love of cars started at a very young age.
I had that same rug that everybody had
when they were a little kid.
The one, I think, little Tikes or something like that
had the windy roads, cartoon looking houses all over that.
And I could have sat in my room for hours and hours
and hours and played with my hot wheels on that.
My parents probably could have literally left me in there
and I would have had absolutely no idea
like what time they left, what time they got back.
I just loved it.
So when I was a bit older and probably less annoying
to take out into public, my dad took me
to the Chicago auto show.
For anybody that hasn't been there,
it's like this crazy big venue.
I can't, for the life of me,
remember like all the makes and models
that were there of course,
but I'll be damned if I ever forget the way
that that made me feel.
Just the pure art of all the body lines
and all of the colors
that all the manufacturers had to offer there
was just something I had absolutely never seen before.
And then you add concept cars and awesome sounding engines
and that was it, I was hooked.
At about the same time,
I was just like every other car enthusiast my age,
playing "Need for Speed" way too much,
a little "Hot Pursuit 2", little "Most Wanted,"
watching "Fast and Furious" with my dad.
And there was just something about "Need for Speed:
"Most Wanted" that always had me
trying to build the ultimate car, so to speak,
to run the whole blacklist down and take out everybody.
(jazzy music)
Kinda surprising with cars being so prevalent
early on in my life,
but when it came time for me to get my license,
I really didn't have a plan for a vehicle.
I had some money saved up
from working a lot when I was younger.
And my mom really instilled teaching me
the value of a dollar from a young age.
So I worked my ass off when I was younger.
I had some money saved up,
but didn't really have a plan for a car.
So what I got was what my grandma had sitting in the garage
because she didn't really drive anymore.
It was a '92 Plymouth Colt three door hatch.
It was this baby blue that was just eye catching enough,
but still ugly, kind of like a bulldog.
Early on, I always remember my dad and my mom kinda talking
to me about if I really loved cars,
I would have to someday learn to drive manual.
So this was like a huge learning curve for me.
I had just about no patience.
So I was super, super thankful and super lucky
that my parents could sit with me
and teach me to drive manual
even though there was numerous times
where I just got out of the car
because I was so frustrated.
So then from there,
I ended up getting rid of that car
and we got my dad's old Saturn L 200,
which we dubbed "The Planet"
cause it was big green and also like ugly.
So (laughing), so after the Saturn came,
I guess, my first car purchase
and I was sick of front wheel drive
and sick of not having any buff horses.
I took to Craigslist cause as you know,
that's where everybody that knows stuff about cars,
buys cars.
And I bought myself a 2002 Lincoln LSE.
That, at the time, kind of checked all the boxes for me.
It was a V-8, it was rear wheel drive,
it had a stock Alpine sound system that sounded pretty good.
So this was like, I guess kind of like my first real car.
So I kinda began to like tinker and do the little things
that most people like turn their nose up at
or scoff at nowadays, like plasti-dipping the wheels,
chopping the mufflers off, like tinting the tail lights,
so on and so forth.
But I didn't really ever lose sight of what that car was.
And I didn't try to make it like something that it wasn't.
Like I knew I couldn't put racing seats or like a steering,
like quick release wheel in there,
like that would have made it weird and not like the cruiser
that it was intended to be.
Other main reasons really for not modifying it is like,
there was not a whole lot of aftermarket support
for that vehicle, like whatsoever.
And I was dailying it in high school.
So I kept, I kept the Lincoln
through my freshman year of college.
And that's when, like the lack of modification
and stuff really started to like eat away
at me a little bit.
Yeah, so the summer after my freshman year of college,
I went to the bank,
grabbed a little bit of cash and grabbed my homie,
Macaulay, and we went down to Chicago
to buy
a 2003 WRX.
(upbeat music and rapping)
- So, on the drive down,
actually, I had really no idea
what the vehicle history was on the WRX back here.
And I had finally gotten the VIN from the previous,
or soon to be previous, owner
and found out that the car was a Midwest car its whole life,
and had not one, two, three previous owners, but 11.
Nonetheless, I gotten into to test drive it.
And it was my first time driving manual in years.
And I just had to have it, man.
It pulled hard, shot flames.
It made all the right noises.
And the modding potential was relatively endless.
At age 19, money being a bottleneck, of course.
When I went off to college with the car,
I literally went and got a job at Jimmy John's
as a delivery driver, purely to get paid, to drive the WRX.
Like I just, I loved it that much.
So after quitting Jimmy John's,
realizing it was going to destroy something
I had worked so hard to get, I worked my fair share
of like average run of the mill jobs.
But I always caught myself thinking,
"When am I going to work a job
that doesn't feel so much like work?"
Because every day I got there,
I dreaded going and I couldn't wait to clock out
after I was there.
I had met and became close friends with a guy.
You guys might be familiar with Connor Timmons.
He did his "iDrive" episode with the red John Cooperworks
Mini Cooper S.
Through our old manager at Holiday Automotive and Detail,
I had heard that Connor was working at Fitment industries
as a graphic designer.
And so I reached out to him and he told me of an opening
for social media, for Fitment.
And I really didn't know what that meant
as far as the job would go,
but I applied.
And based on this video,
you can probably tell how that worked out.
(music and rapping)
- My car is nowhere near perfect.
It's rough around the edges.
But I'm damn proud to be sitting here today
with a job at Fitment Industries and a car
I always dreamed of owning.
Everyone has crazy dreams and aspirations,
but nobody really gets there without anyone helping them
along the way.
So check your ego,
work hard and have some fun with it.
(hip hop music and rapping)