From Mine-Sweeping To NASCAR Driving: Navy's Jesse Iwuji Isn't Slowing Down

If you want to feel some motivation going into the weekend, fast-forward to 16:55 of today’s ZeroBlog30 podcast. When Chaps & I finished interviewing NASCAR’s Jesse Iwuji, we wanted to run through a wall, or at least write a goal down on our whiteboards & then maybe actually accomplish it.

I felt this guy’s sentiment after he listened, too:

Years ago, Iwuji saw a race from the stands & it got his heart racing. He wrote on his whiteboard that his next goal was to become a racer. And then he did it. This is especially impressive when you consider most driver start racing by the time they’re 10 years old, and that they usually have a dad or family member who also drove before them. He was in his late 20s when this driving endeavor began.

Iwuji’s parents came here from Nigeria in the 80s, and he’s been working on the American dream ever since. He played football at the Naval Academy (beating Army all 4 years), became an officer who deployed twice, including a stint on a mine-sweeper ship, and now he’s in the Naval reserves & the NASCAR truck series & working his way up quickly. He also just started a trucking company with his brothers, and runs his own races (The Red List Group) out in California that are starting to blow up.

The first race he ever did, he paid for everything with his own money. The second one, he crowd-funded with huge support from his Navy brothers & sisters. The third, he used his own credit card to put it all on the line. Now, through savvy networking & promotion, he’s out of the red & going with the green. Definitely give it a listen because there’s a lot of great nuggs of wisdom in there. One of my favorite interviews yet.