Marvin Stammel Flex, Rocks, & Rollovers | Ep. 21

WEBVTT
00:00:01.280 --> 00:00:04.530
That is a different approach to that ledge.
00:00:04.559 --> 00:00:07.839
Congratulations, my friend.
00:00:07.879 --> 00:00:09.599
Oh.
00:00:11.919 --> 00:00:13.599
Oh, that was...
00:00:11.919 --> 00:00:30.039
Turn it off, turn it off, turn it off, turn it off, turn it off.
00:00:30.160 --> 00:00:32.140
Ladies and gentlemen, welcome back.
00:00:32.164 --> 00:00:36.179
This is Overland Weekly, episode number 21.
00:00:36.204 --> 00:00:38.780
My name is Davie.
00:00:36.204 --> 00:00:38.780
I am your host.
00:00:38.804 --> 00:00:57.119
And I am joined tonight by a gentleman that if you have spent any time watching the off-road YouTube YouTube scene you should recognize from 24 Hell and Back, from Rain of Rocks, and most recently, the Hell and Back Adventure series from the Flex Rocks and Rollover channel, Mr. Marvin Stamwell.
00:00:57.145 --> 00:00:58.740
Marvin, welcome to the show.
00:00:58.765 --> 00:01:00.320
Beautiful intro.
00:00:58.765 --> 00:01:00.320
Thankthank you.
00:01:00.344 --> 00:01:03.500
Thank you, sir.
00:01:00.344 --> 00:01:03.500
Thank you.
00:01:03.524 --> 00:01:10.930
Well, I had to start since you've got flex, rocks, and rollovers in the name, and this wasn't quite a rollover, it's a flop.
00:01:10.959 --> 00:01:23.959
But this was my buddy Mike, just a a couple of months back at Hawk Pride, he thought he was going to try a new line on this little ledge, and it didn't work out for him.
00:01:23.984 --> 00:01:26.959
Luckily, it looks like a pretty continuous info.
00:01:26.984 --> 00:01:28.920
Luckily, he stopped right there.
00:01:28.944 --> 00:01:40.974
Oh, Yeah, a little more momentum right there, and it could have gone end-to-end.
00:01:41.000 --> 00:01:42.209
Yeah, it could have gotten different.
00:01:42.239 --> 00:01:44.959
Well, I text him before we started recording.
00:01:44.984 --> 00:01:47.900
I said, Mike, do you want to issue a formal statement?
00:01:47.924 --> 00:01:50.019
Because I'm going to start the show with that.
00:01:50.045 --> 00:01:51.459
And he said, yes.
00:01:51.484 --> 00:01:53.620
He said, here is my statement.
00:01:53.644 --> 00:01:55.620
Bitch, I'm from Texas.
00:01:55.644 --> 00:01:56.780
End of statement.
00:01:56.805 --> 00:02:00.379
So there you go.
00:02:00.405 --> 00:02:04.140
When's the last time you flopped one, Marvin?
00:02:04.165 --> 00:02:15.240
Myself, honestly, I mean, I rolled my Jeep two years, it was almost two years ago when I put the Jeepster on its lid.
00:02:15.264 --> 00:02:20.615
Then my dad's Jeep shortly after, my dad's YJ, I rolled pretty heavily also.
00:02:20.639 --> 00:02:22.639
It should be, it's almost two years ago at this point.
00:02:22.664 --> 00:02:29.379
I had one year there where there was a lot of rollovers and it was my Jeep and my dad's Jeep back to back.
00:02:29.405 --> 00:02:33.169
But ever I think I've been pretty good.
00:02:33.199 --> 00:02:36.539
Not that I can remember, at least.
00:02:33.199 --> 00:02:36.539
No, nothing.
00:02:36.564 --> 00:02:40.199
If it happened, you don't remember it, so it doesn't count.
00:02:40.224 --> 00:02:41.800
No, yeah, exactly.
00:02:40.224 --> 00:02:41.800
No.
00:02:41.824 --> 00:02:45.599
I mean, in the Toyota or other vehicles, we don't even care.
00:02:45.625 --> 00:02:48.539
We just lay them over on the side and laugh about it.
00:02:48.564 --> 00:02:55.560
Well, before we jump into the interview here, I've got one more bit of housekeeping.
00:02:55.585 --> 00:03:00.939
I want to play this clip because we've got this event coming up here in a few months at Wind Rock.
00:03:00.965 --> 00:03:05.180
So let me queue this one up.
00:03:05.205 --> 00:03:10.599
34 years ago, a few trucks rolled into the Smoky Mountains, and a tradition was born.
00:03:10.625 --> 00:03:14.780
They said it wouldn't last.
00:03:14.805 --> 00:03:19.719
They said the club would fade, but year after year, we came back.
00:03:19.745 --> 00:03:24.159
More trails, more challenges, more memories.
00:03:24.185 --> 00:03:30.840
The rigs got bigger, the trails got wilder, and the G-Smitter family kept growing.
00:03:30.865 --> 00:03:33.280
Today, this isn't just an event.
00:03:33.305 --> 00:03:40.680
It's a legacy, a place where stories are told, friendships are forged, and off-road history is made.
00:03:40.705 --> 00:03:45.080
Now, in 2025, we're making history again.
00:03:45.104 --> 00:03:47.280
The biggest G-Smitter yet.
00:03:47.305 --> 00:03:51.460
More trucks, more trails, more adventure.
00:03:51.485 --> 00:03:53.960
Mark your calendars.
00:03:53.985 --> 00:03:58.120
Registration opens March first.
00:04:00.719 --> 00:04:12.060
All right, so I may be slightly biased because I did volunteer to chair the event this year.
00:04:12.085 --> 00:04:23.720
But as my buddy Kyle says, This is the best shit show this side of the Mississippi, and this will be the 34th year of it, and we hope to uphold that reputation.
00:04:23.745 --> 00:04:26.379
But on a serious note, it's a great event.
00:04:26.404 --> 00:04:32.100
We raise a lot of money for some veterans and some very important causes.
00:04:32.125 --> 00:04:34.379
We expect 300 plus trucks.
00:04:34.404 --> 00:04:38.660
It is a Toyota event, but all are welcome to register.
00:04:38.685 --> 00:04:42.639
So if you got friends with a Jeep or a Nissan, bring them on.
00:04:42.665 --> 00:04:45.860
What is it called again?
00:04:42.665 --> 00:04:45.860
Being heckled Say that again, Martin.
00:04:45.884 --> 00:04:47.939
What's the name of the event again?
00:04:47.964 --> 00:04:51.899
The event is called the Great Smoky Mountain Trail ride.
00:04:51.925 --> 00:04:56.459
That's what it is.
00:04:51.925 --> 00:05:00.240
But it's a brief as GSMTR, which has come to be known as G-Smitter.
00:05:00.264 --> 00:05:01.774
Trail ride.
00:05:01.800 --> 00:05:04.240
I'll make a note.
00:05:01.800 --> 00:05:04.240
I have somebody reach out to me already.
00:05:04.264 --> 00:05:05.680
It might have been you.
00:05:04.264 --> 00:05:05.680
I don't know.
00:05:05.704 --> 00:05:10.060
Somebody reach out to me about it on Instagram to bring the Toyota out for it.
00:05:10.084 --> 00:05:11.375
I think we did.
00:05:11.399 --> 00:05:12.560
Yeah, I messaged that before.
00:05:12.584 --> 00:05:17.295
I think that's something I have on my calendar I'm trying to make work.
00:05:17.319 --> 00:05:18.199
I would love to.
00:05:18.225 --> 00:05:25.480
Since I've had the Toyota, I didn't really have a chance to branch out and attend a couple of Toyota rides.
00:05:23.240 --> 00:05:25.480
I really want to.
00:05:25.504 --> 00:05:28.334
I want to see something new for us.
00:05:28.360 --> 00:05:34.839
At this point, it would be awesome to just to experience some new events, meet some new people, and be around in a new rig.
00:05:34.879 --> 00:05:35.600
Absolutely.
00:05:35.625 --> 00:05:41.839
Well, there's not much Toyota left in that truck, but we'll talk about that in a minute.
00:05:41.865 --> 00:05:45.279
I don't know what you mean.
00:05:46.000 --> 00:05:57.699
All right, Marvin, you have talked on your channel and elsewhere before about your journey to the States and getting the off-road bug once you got over here.
00:05:57.725 --> 00:06:02.000
But if I understand correctly, it started even earlier.
00:06:02.024 --> 00:06:09.920
Did you have a relative that had a Jeep shop when you were younger that you spent some time working at?
00:06:06.845 --> 00:06:09.920
Yes and no.
00:06:09.944 --> 00:06:12.639
But that's not where it started.
00:06:12.665 --> 00:06:15.759
The off-road passion started back in Germany with my dad.
00:06:15.785 --> 00:06:21.740
My dad bought a YJ when I was born, had land rovers before I was there.
00:06:21.764 --> 00:06:30.040
That's where it started off-road clubs in Germany and then branched over here once he moved over here when I was 12 years old or something.
00:06:30.064 --> 00:06:45.339
But then also on a separate note, we had a very dear family friend that was originally from Germany as well, but made the move to the United States in the early '90s at some point and opened a Jeep shop here, or a Jeep business, here or a Jeep business here in Atlanta.
00:06:45.365 --> 00:07:00.019
That's why Atlanta was our address and how we got, because we knew somebody here that a good friend that helped us back in the days to get established over here and to catch some roots.
00:07:00.045 --> 00:07:02.694
So definitely.
00:07:02.720 --> 00:07:04.879
And he had a Jeep, and now he still has a Jeep shop in Atlanta.
00:07:04.904 --> 00:07:07.500
A pretty successful Jeep shop.
00:07:04.904 --> 00:07:07.500
4tec Custom Jeeps.
00:07:07.524 --> 00:07:10.800
Big shout out to Andreas.
00:07:07.524 --> 00:07:10.800
Awesome.
00:07:11.360 --> 00:07:15.360
All right, that makes sense.
00:07:15.384 --> 00:07:18.839
So you made the journey over, and then...
00:07:18.959 --> 00:07:19.699
But you're...
00:07:19.725 --> 00:07:27.899
Let me make sure I've got the story right, because you were involved in a few different things before your ventures that we know today.
00:07:27.925 --> 00:07:36.920
So you had a You and your father had Axel Off-Road that I guess has now become Axel Helmets, and there was some changes.
00:07:36.944 --> 00:07:40.120
He still called Axel Off-Road, but he was focusing more on Helmets.
00:07:40.144 --> 00:07:48.759
Back when we did it together, Helmets were always the front runner, the main product, but I also put a lot of effort into apparel.
00:07:48.785 --> 00:07:51.720
So it was apparel and gear.
00:07:51.745 --> 00:07:57.055
Now, he has just boiled it down to mainly the helmets as of right now.
00:07:57.079 --> 00:07:59.120
He's doing great with it.
00:07:57.079 --> 00:07:59.120
But yeah, business is still around.
00:07:59.144 --> 00:08:20.699
In the meantime, in between there for about six years, we ran, operated a really big off-road show that traveled to the United States with the biggest events we had in Texas at the Texas Motor Speedway and in Louisville, Kentucky, at the Expo Center for several years in a row.
00:08:20.725 --> 00:08:31.699
Every year, we had a little show circus through the country, but those were the biggest stops we had every year was Texas and Kentucky, and almost 20,000 people in attendance on the weekends, sometimes even more.
00:08:31.725 --> 00:08:34.299
Crazy, crazy, even crazy times.
00:08:34.325 --> 00:08:44.740
But that was the biggest project I've ever had to handle over six years, pretty much up until COVID is pretty much as long as we pulled through with it.
00:08:44.764 --> 00:08:53.320
So were these like expos before expos and all the overlanding buzz was a thing or what?
00:08:51.105 --> 00:08:53.320
I don't know.
00:08:53.345 --> 00:08:55.120
I don't want to say it was before expo.
00:08:55.144 --> 00:09:01.960
It was, I don't know, in my eyes, still until today, the only true new off-road expo.
00:09:01.985 --> 00:09:03.139
I love that.
00:09:03.164 --> 00:09:06.519
They're truly about off-roading, especially the one in Kentucky, man.
00:09:06.544 --> 00:09:30.259
I'm telling you, we had ultra four race exhibitions outside rock bouncer, shootouts, and backflip musicians, and we build a really, really gnarly obstacle course in the back of the Expo Center that people could, A, ride on, but also see exhibitions from the top drivers in all kinds of different off-road categories, put on a show several times a day there.
00:09:30.284 --> 00:09:32.100
It was just a good time.
00:09:32.125 --> 00:09:37.575
Texas was obviously a little bit more truck-oriented, but still had that core element of off-roading.
00:09:37.600 --> 00:09:41.740
Then we had a couple of other smaller shows throughout the country with different focuses.
00:09:41.764 --> 00:09:45.279
But usually, it was all about off-roading.
00:09:41.764 --> 00:09:45.279
No I'm proud of.
00:09:45.304 --> 00:09:54.519
It was UTV, Rock Crawler, Rock Bouncer, Overlander, everybody with the same mindset and bug in their head attended those shows.
00:09:54.544 --> 00:09:55.820
They were freaking awesome.
00:09:55.845 --> 00:09:57.080
It was a big blast.
00:09:57.105 --> 00:09:58.980
You can still check it out on YouTube.
00:09:59.004 --> 00:10:05.840
If you type in Unlimited Off-Road Expo or Unlimited Off-Road Show, Kentucky or Off-Road.
00:10:05.865 --> 00:10:09.534
Probably if you type that in, you should already find everything you want to see.
00:10:09.559 --> 00:10:10.820
It's definitely action-packed.
00:10:10.845 --> 00:10:17.720
The videos, the highlight compilations we did every year after those shows were always well reviewed.
00:10:17.745 --> 00:10:19.919
They were always just always a blast to watch.
00:10:19.945 --> 00:10:23.294
There's some cool stuff, some cool off-road history for sure.
00:10:23.320 --> 00:10:24.000
Got you.
00:10:24.024 --> 00:10:27.580
I'm going to have to go back and check those out.
00:10:27.605 --> 00:10:36.299
You're doing those and obviously doing Matt, you're meeting a lot of people, you're meeting a lot of companies, a lot of manufacturers, all that thing.
00:10:36.325 --> 00:10:43.934
And is that what morphed into your media business to zero to 60 and all of that thing?
00:10:43.960 --> 00:10:45.600
You got that right Yeah, good research.
00:10:45.625 --> 00:10:47.139
That's pretty much...
00:10:47.164 --> 00:10:49.200
That was COVID hit.
00:10:49.225 --> 00:10:51.720
For me, I got burned out from the shows.
00:10:51.745 --> 00:10:57.460
We were a small team, put a lot of work on our plates, and were very weather dependent at the end of the day.
00:10:57.485 --> 00:11:02.059
At a certain point, I had to I go my own ways.
00:11:02.085 --> 00:11:04.179
My background is marketing.
00:11:04.205 --> 00:11:22.080
Then using the knowledge and the contacts that I got from the shows to do some side work for some of these companies and get into working on the other side of the table for the first time and working for these companies and marketing and media.
00:11:22.105 --> 00:11:23.539
I did that.
00:11:23.565 --> 00:11:26.320
It was fairly successful for a good while.
00:11:26.345 --> 00:11:35.740
That was actually what was ended appropriately one day or another when COVID really hit and big company starts spending marketing dollars.
00:11:35.764 --> 00:11:40.379
Then at that moment, I already had a YouTube channel, but really only for fun.
00:11:40.404 --> 00:11:45.000
There was no intention to ever make it a priority, really.
00:11:45.024 --> 00:11:47.200
I wanted to monetize it and make it sound.
00:11:47.225 --> 00:11:49.815
Well, I mean, monetize it from a true business.
00:11:49.840 --> 00:11:50.279
Correct.
00:11:50.304 --> 00:11:53.480
It wasn't supposed to be my main business for a long time.
00:11:53.504 --> 00:12:00.120
It was always a dream one day, but I had, what, 6,000 subscribers when I went full-time?
00:12:00.144 --> 00:12:10.659
I do not recommend this to anybody, but it was because of COVID and all of a sudden marketing budgets were gone and customers put everything on ice and I had to act.
00:12:10.684 --> 00:12:18.379
That was the only other thing that I had going on and I was passionate about It was just shooting.
00:12:18.404 --> 00:12:23.799
Dude, just putting everything on one card pretty much and had to make it work.
00:12:24.240 --> 00:12:27.455
You had a Facebook page for Flex Rocks and Rollovers.
00:12:27.480 --> 00:12:28.519
That always was, correct.
00:12:28.544 --> 00:12:43.059
Flex Rocks and Rollovers, for years already, it has been a Facebook and Instagram page where I shared viral off-road content, personal weekend adventure, stuff that I experienced, stuff from my friends.
00:12:43.085 --> 00:12:47.000
I don't know.
00:12:43.085 --> 00:12:47.000
I think The social media 1.
00:12:47.024 --> 00:12:58.440
0, the first iteration of social media, that was a normal thing on the internet that you had pages out there that would just share niche-specific content, not even original content for the most part.
00:12:58.465 --> 00:13:02.080
You grab everything from around the world and share it.
00:13:02.105 --> 00:13:09.460
That was a standard procedure for social media back in the days if you wanted to have content like that.
00:13:09.485 --> 00:13:14.840
Then eventually, I wanted to focus more on my own content, and that led into a YouTube channel.
00:13:14.865 --> 00:13:25.095
And then COVID forced me to take the YouTube series channel a lot more serious than I was planning on a lot sooner, which I'm thankful for.
00:13:25.120 --> 00:13:31.419
I mean, it was the best possible scenario at the end of the day, something that I really, really enjoy doing that I was doing.
00:13:31.445 --> 00:13:36.259
What I'm doing now is exactly what I was doing before that.
00:13:36.284 --> 00:13:38.039
I just now I'm filming it.
00:13:38.065 --> 00:13:43.799
The Jeep that I have that everybody knows, that was never a YouTube build.
00:13:43.825 --> 00:13:46.799
That was not something I built on or for YouTube.
00:13:46.825 --> 00:13:53.580
I had that Jeep before I started filming, and I was doing these adventures that I'm doing.
00:13:53.605 --> 00:13:55.399
That's the funniest thing, honestly.
00:13:55.424 --> 00:14:16.500
My latest favorite version of flex, rocks, and rollovers, which is what we have going on right now and the content we do right now with these multi-day adventures and wheeling, camping, wheeling, living out of your rig, depending on with the things that you bring, being dependent on that, and just that style of wheeling, that's how I started.
00:14:16.524 --> 00:14:26.059
Then I boiled it down for YouTube thinking, Oh, no, we just trailer our Jeeps to the hardest obstacles we can find and try to conquer them.
00:14:26.085 --> 00:14:31.259
If things hit the fan, then we just load up a broken Jeep and fix and go again next time.
00:14:31.284 --> 00:14:34.279
That honestly gets old after a while.
00:14:34.304 --> 00:14:56.659
Now returning back to my roots of camping and wheeling and living out on my Jeep and only going as hard as I feel comfortable with if I want to proceed for another three days, then that is where we're at right now and we're having the most fun with, and it seems to be what people seem to enjoy the most because the videos have been successful.
00:14:56.684 --> 00:15:07.419
I don't know, just for us, the vibe we have between Will and I and our camera guys and the guys that edit the videos behind the scenes, everybody just is loving what we're currently doing.
00:15:07.445 --> 00:15:09.100
So I'm pumped.
00:15:09.125 --> 00:15:18.039
Well, as a viewer, I'm loving it, and it's different in a good way than a lot of what is out there.
00:15:18.065 --> 00:15:19.899
There's a lot of...
00:15:19.924 --> 00:15:29.940
I mean, it's a business, and there's a lot of copy paste repeat that goes on on YouTube in any niche, whether it's off road or otherwise.
00:15:29.965 --> 00:15:38.620
But I believe you were talking about your marketing background, and you spent some time in the music business, I know as well.
00:15:38.644 --> 00:15:47.279
And so that's all about an artist trying to break through from the thousand other artists that are doing the same thing.
00:15:47.304 --> 00:15:52.240
Do you think you've found your sweet spot now?
00:15:52.264 --> 00:15:56.100
You've got your single going up the charts, if you will?
00:15:56.125 --> 00:15:57.279
I hope so.
00:15:57.304 --> 00:16:12.100
I just got off the phone talking one of my guys about that, that now for the first time, I feel like I can calculate and build the business in my head further because I have a baseline to work with.
00:16:12.125 --> 00:16:24.379
For years, I wasn't At least for myself, I didn't have that baseline because I was experimenting for such a long time with where's my home with videos?
00:16:24.404 --> 00:16:33.000
24 Hellenback is my dearest project, what I I put the most work in, but it is such a huge undertaking.
00:16:33.024 --> 00:16:37.134
I cannot produce 24 Helenbacks 12 months out of the year.
00:16:37.159 --> 00:16:37.960
That doesn't work.
00:16:37.985 --> 00:16:41.500
It would also kill the format, in my opinion.
00:16:41.524 --> 00:16:46.639
If you flood the market with that stuff, it eventually gets all too.
00:16:46.664 --> 00:16:49.179
So it's not sustainable.
00:16:49.205 --> 00:17:11.000
Talk about that, Marvin, about Helenbacks, specifically, and the behind the scenes, if you will, because not just the planning and the logistics, but are you personally traveling to to scout these locations ahead of time?
00:17:11.025 --> 00:17:19.420
And I would assume if that's the case, that you spend time and money to go to places and then say, it's not quite there.
00:17:19.444 --> 00:17:21.174
A hundred %.
00:17:19.444 --> 00:17:21.174
Yes.
00:17:21.200 --> 00:17:22.049
And I have.
00:17:22.079 --> 00:17:26.079
I luckily last year I had a short shot the year before that.
00:17:26.105 --> 00:17:29.700
The Utah one took me the longest to find.
00:17:29.724 --> 00:17:38.809
I I mean, I traveled into far remote areas and then had to say, sorry, but it's just not it, and then move on and go to the next place.
00:17:38.839 --> 00:17:43.480
So that one, and I mean, it was super worth it at the end.
00:17:43.505 --> 00:17:47.460
It was absolutely perfect, best possible, but sometimes it just takes a while.
00:17:47.484 --> 00:17:49.440
Every year I'm going through that.
00:17:49.464 --> 00:17:59.974
My own standards get higher and higher because for Helen back, dude, the scenery and the terrain and the obstacles set the stage for everything.
00:18:00.000 --> 00:18:00.359
Everything.
00:18:00.384 --> 00:18:11.319
If it's a lame trail or it looks like something you've seen before or something you've hit before as a driver, man, I don't know, it takes the craziness out of it.
00:18:11.345 --> 00:18:16.214
If you hit something and everybody is hysteric about Where are we?
00:18:16.240 --> 00:18:18.680
What is this?
00:18:16.240 --> 00:18:18.680
We're never going to make it out of here.
00:18:18.704 --> 00:18:26.329
That atmosphere just brings the camaraderie out of it and just a good vibe.
00:18:23.384 --> 00:18:26.329
I don't know.
00:18:26.359 --> 00:18:29.049
It's in my own...
00:18:29.079 --> 00:18:33.295
It's just my standard for myself that I want to top every year in a certain way.
00:18:33.319 --> 00:18:35.319
I don't think we need to go any harder than what we've done.
00:18:35.345 --> 00:18:43.250
We definitely found our limits when it comes to how much harder can a trail be.
00:18:43.279 --> 00:18:52.920
But then the challenge is keeping that level up and finding a good contrast and scenery for next year that is just as exciting again.
00:18:52.944 --> 00:18:55.559
Or maybe changing something in the concept.
00:18:55.585 --> 00:18:56.720
Why standing still?
00:18:56.744 --> 00:19:13.359
On one side, I'm a huge fan of, Don't I'll fix it if it's not broken, but on the other side, I'm a fan of evolving, bringing a new element into it or just slight changes here and there to keep it interesting.
00:19:13.384 --> 00:19:15.119
We will see.
00:19:15.144 --> 00:19:18.660
But that is all connected with trial and error.
00:19:18.684 --> 00:19:20.055
It 100% is.
00:19:20.079 --> 00:19:28.220
We have some good ideas and we're listening to what everybody's saying in the comments, and there's a pretty clear trend of what people want to see.
00:19:28.244 --> 00:19:37.529
I just My experience have told me that it sounds really good on paper, but in practice, it's really hard to make entertaining.
00:19:37.559 --> 00:19:39.200
I see.
00:19:37.559 --> 00:19:39.200
That's my current.
00:19:39.224 --> 00:19:40.329
We can speak openly.
00:19:40.359 --> 00:19:55.769
A lot of people want to see a small tire, 37s max, or 35s max, 24 Helen Bank, budget beaters and whatnot, which I'm a huge fan of, especially now with the vehicles that we're currently driving and we've currently been creating content with.
00:19:55.799 --> 00:20:17.329
I'd love to go down that route, but also because I'm currently I've been doing it and I've been doing it for a long time before, even YouTube, I tell you, it'll be 24 hours of wrenching and standing still because those damn things break up absolutely everything, and it's just more of a wrench fest, and it's very painful.
00:20:17.359 --> 00:20:28.529
The massive obstacles you are used to from watching 24Helen back, they look crazy on camera, but let me tell you, they look a thousand times worse in person.
00:20:28.559 --> 00:20:41.000
Now, if you scale this to an obstacle that's somewhat doable on 37s, telling you for you guys on video, it will look like we're having a field trip on a, I don't know, dirt road behind the house.
00:20:41.025 --> 00:20:42.420
It doesn't look like anything.
00:20:42.444 --> 00:21:07.980
To make that look entertaining, to make medium obstacles look entertaining is hard, plus the problem of that small vehicles, if people have the same expectations to what they currently have to a 24 going back, and that is crazy driving and pushing the limits, you can't do that on a day not 30.
00:21:08.005 --> 00:21:10.200
That's just not happy.
00:21:08.005 --> 00:21:10.200
Well, sure.
00:21:10.224 --> 00:21:23.500
It's funny you say that because I literally I had a group message with some of the guys from Heart of the South, which is a Land Cruiser Club out of Huntsville, Alabama.
00:21:23.525 --> 00:21:42.480
Before I was filming this with you, and that's exactly what they said is we need this this every man's, this 37-inch, 24-hour style format, which that conversation evolved into, well, maybe we just need to go live at Hawk Pride for 24 hours and do it ourselves.
00:21:42.505 --> 00:21:43.769
And maybe that's...
00:21:43.799 --> 00:21:46.619
We didn't think about it from a production angle.
00:21:46.644 --> 00:21:53.319
You have to think about this business perspective, this production- You have to make it where people want to watch it.
00:21:53.345 --> 00:21:56.160
I want to make things that people want to watch.
00:21:56.184 --> 00:22:03.259
And is it entertaining to watch a bunch of rigs on 35, and break over blue trails.
00:22:03.285 --> 00:22:05.920
As mean as that sounds, I love them to death.
00:22:05.944 --> 00:22:08.134
I just don't know if that is...
00:22:05.944 --> 00:22:08.134
I don't know.
00:22:08.160 --> 00:22:10.380
But on the other side, you don't know if you don't try.
00:22:10.404 --> 00:22:28.809
Maybe there's the challenge for us to make that because there is certain terrain we learned in our recent adventures that are very extreme and you can really drive a small rig very hard on, as long as there's not a whole lot of dry rock involved.
00:22:28.839 --> 00:22:31.700
Dry rock is really breaks a small stark rig.
00:22:31.724 --> 00:22:50.940
If you keep the surface you're driving on slick and somewhat muddy and dirt hills and winding mud holes and whatnot stuff that is really challenging still, and you need a lot of technical driving and throttle at the right moment, but it's not as hard on your equipment than a rock crawling course.
00:22:50.964 --> 00:22:56.400
Either way, that's just all the things that go on in my brain about the future of 24 Halleemberg.
00:22:56.424 --> 00:22:57.559
You're very welcome.
00:22:57.585 --> 00:23:02.569
What else What do people not know?
00:23:02.599 --> 00:23:15.259
Are there aspects of the company, like you said, having to think about this production and what it looks like in person versus what it looks like on TV and if it's going to get clicks?
00:23:15.285 --> 00:23:19.279
Are there things that you have to think about that people don't realize?
00:23:43.250 --> 00:23:44.769
No, man.
00:23:44.795 --> 00:24:04.500
Honestly, this makes it honestly sound different than the reality is, because the reality is that there's things that we really want to do, and we're still going to do them, obviously, because we're now feeding several families of this business that we need to make sure that we're like, Hey, we have to keep the business in mind, what we're already doing.
00:24:04.529 --> 00:24:08.870
The 99 % of what we're doing are things that we just really want to do.
00:24:08.894 --> 00:24:15.904
And then we have to argument with ourselves so long until we can make it sound like a smart business move to the world.
00:24:15.930 --> 00:24:16.930
You know what I mean?
00:24:16.955 --> 00:24:18.330
That's where we're at.
00:24:18.355 --> 00:24:22.809
That's honestly a little bit more of the truth than it actually is.
00:24:22.835 --> 00:24:24.470
We do the things we to do.
00:24:24.495 --> 00:24:31.370
And if we can sweet talk ourselves into why this really makes sense for the business, then even better.
00:24:31.394 --> 00:24:33.110
Strategic planning.
00:24:31.394 --> 00:24:33.110
Okay.
00:24:33.134 --> 00:24:37.870
All right, let's talk about this year's event.
00:24:37.894 --> 00:24:43.090
I mean, You've said on multiple years, this is the most extreme yet.
00:24:43.115 --> 00:24:45.019
This is this is the craziest yet.
00:24:45.049 --> 00:24:53.670
But I'm telling you and and I'm biased, I'm East Coast biased, but this was the craziest shit you all have ever done.
00:24:53.695 --> 00:24:58.970
I agree in a different way than before.
00:24:58.995 --> 00:25:06.740
But it also being there and coming out of the events, after the 24 hours are over, the feeling you have every year is different.
00:25:06.769 --> 00:25:16.150
You have a complete different journey through these 24 hours, depending on the terrain, the group, how you vehicle performed or how you performed.
00:25:16.174 --> 00:25:23.650
There's so much that goes into this, and there's such a roller coaster of emotions and feelings and everything, man.
00:25:23.674 --> 00:25:24.825
It is 24.
00:25:24.850 --> 00:25:29.950
Halenbeck is, and I say that every time, but there's a trip of a lifetime every single time.
00:25:29.975 --> 00:25:32.130
It is so unique and so extreme.
00:25:32.154 --> 00:25:38.950
People don't realize that, and people always want to decredit it by, Oh, it's just a bunch of YouTubers.
00:25:38.975 --> 00:25:44.070
It's just a bunch of YouTubers up until they get to go on the trip.
00:25:44.095 --> 00:26:07.500
We've had some of the realest of the real participate in the 24Helen bag and be part of it, even sometimes just in the passenger seat, and I think everybody that has gone through it can vouch for it, that it is the most brutal thing out there, that there is nothing that even cuts a close second to what you're going through during those 24 hours, even though it is a media production.
00:26:07.529 --> 00:26:15.630
Which honestly feeds right into that because the media production makes everything so freaking slow.
00:26:15.654 --> 00:26:29.430
That time, sometimes you're either on the verge of a nervous breakdown because of so much adrenaline or you're just anxious because you're sitting there waiting because everything takes so freaking ever.
00:26:29.455 --> 00:26:32.769
That really, it adds to it.
00:26:32.795 --> 00:26:39.610
00 AM when you're just sitting there waiting, it totally adds to it.
00:26:39.634 --> 00:26:44.730
You can see that in some of the participants, especially as the night wears on, which is good.
00:26:44.755 --> 00:26:49.910
Like you said, it's real and it's raw.
00:26:44.755 --> 00:26:49.910
Correct.
00:26:49.934 --> 00:26:53.570
00 AM.
00:26:53.595 --> 00:27:03.090
People that have never done this and are around it for the first time, they definitely have a different tone on their voice when they talk to me or
00:27:03.115 --> 00:27:05.370
00 AM.
00:27:05.394 --> 00:27:10.345
00 AM rolls around, it's all gone and forgotten again.
00:27:10.370 --> 00:27:16.410
But there's always that couple of hours in the night where certain people are just like, Bro, what the hell?
00:27:16.434 --> 00:27:22.330
Hey, that happens amongst the best friends on trail rides, even when there's no cameras involved.
00:27:22.355 --> 00:27:23.650
It's great.
00:27:23.674 --> 00:27:25.650
It's the realest thing ever.
00:27:25.674 --> 00:27:28.769
We don't polish any of it.
00:27:28.795 --> 00:27:31.500
You see it the way it happens.
00:27:31.529 --> 00:27:41.549
Well, it's one thing to take a rig like yours, like your Jeep, and basically say, We're just going to go out and run buggy trails.
00:27:41.575 --> 00:27:43.730
That's a challenge in itself.
00:27:43.755 --> 00:27:46.910
Like you said, there's a lot of channels that do that.
00:27:46.934 --> 00:27:48.529
And you can do the same thing.
00:27:48.555 --> 00:27:59.670
You can take an IFS rig, something like mine on 35s, and say, hey, we're going to go put it on a trail that should only be solid axles and 38s, and it'll be a different challenge.
00:27:59.695 --> 00:28:05.470
But you have an obstacle in this year's event that is just a wall.
00:28:05.495 --> 00:28:12.049
It is a freaking wall It was an obstacle on the trail at the end of the day.
00:28:12.075 --> 00:28:15.150
I don't know, man.
00:28:15.174 --> 00:28:20.370
To finish you, sorry to interrupt you there.
00:28:20.394 --> 00:28:24.049
We had a winch challenge in this year's 20 for Helen come back.
00:28:24.075 --> 00:28:36.025
We had an obstacle that was 1,000% undrivable, and therefore, that made it a million times more appealing that you had to winch it because we weren't telling you to winch something.
00:28:36.049 --> 00:28:37.049
We were like, Hey, what's the point?
00:28:37.075 --> 00:28:43.289
You were winching this, and it was safe, the most adrenaline you had all night, but you're hanging off a freaking winch cable.
00:28:43.315 --> 00:28:54.410
You just conquered some of the steepest hills that you've ever driven, eventually with a support by a winch that already felt awful.
00:28:54.434 --> 00:29:04.470
Then right after midnight, you pull up to this 40-something-foot waterfall that's 90 degrees, and the trail does not continue.
00:29:04.495 --> 00:29:10.980
But like I said, I went to this place many times before Helen back actually started.
00:29:11.009 --> 00:29:17.225
Eventually, the owner of the property told, We got to this point.
00:29:17.250 --> 00:29:18.610
I was like, Yeah, this is where it ends.
00:29:18.634 --> 00:29:21.309
This is where we turn around and drive back down it.
00:29:21.335 --> 00:29:26.210
I was like, What do you mean drive back down That's terrible for us.
00:29:26.235 --> 00:29:31.545
A, from a production side in a video, Sorry, guys, you just beat the snot out of your equipment.
00:29:31.570 --> 00:29:33.490
We're going to turn back around, drive this back down.
00:29:33.515 --> 00:29:36.890
What?
00:29:33.515 --> 00:29:36.890
That's super frustrating.
00:29:36.914 --> 00:29:40.970
If we wouldn't do this, we would cut out this epic Hot Dog Hill and all that stuff.
00:29:40.995 --> 00:29:43.590
We would lose all of these obstacles.
00:29:43.615 --> 00:29:45.170
What's ahead of?
00:29:45.195 --> 00:29:48.170
What is if you make it up there and winch up it?
00:29:48.195 --> 00:29:50.740
I don't know.
00:29:48.195 --> 00:29:50.740
Nobody has ever been up there.
00:29:50.769 --> 00:30:06.130
We met up a separate time to hike that entire upper section, and the property owner took a day with his buddies to come out with a chainsaw and clear it out just a little bit so we can ride it.
00:30:06.154 --> 00:30:11.170
Then the very first time we put tires on any of this was during filming of 24 Hormel.
00:30:11.195 --> 00:30:12.610
That was never pre-run.
00:30:12.634 --> 00:30:14.740
We never had a vehicle up there beforehand.
00:30:14.769 --> 00:30:18.930
We never winched a vehicle up the waterfall before the video started.
00:30:18.955 --> 00:30:21.740
None of that.
00:30:18.955 --> 00:30:21.740
So that was all a first.
00:30:21.769 --> 00:30:24.430
Now, did you pre-run to rig it?
00:30:24.455 --> 00:30:29.470
Did you have rigging up at the top already before the ride started?
00:30:29.495 --> 00:30:31.529
Not before the ride started.
00:30:29.495 --> 00:30:31.529
No.
00:30:31.555 --> 00:30:33.570
Okay.
00:30:31.555 --> 00:30:33.570
Because that was a lot of rigging, man.
00:30:33.595 --> 00:30:51.230
We had so many hardcore obstacles leading up walking distance to the hardcore winch walk that the guys from war and Sergio and Brad that were with us, they had plenty of time to go up there and break this up in the meantime by waiting for other things to move on.
00:30:51.255 --> 00:30:52.769
You can walk around.
00:30:52.795 --> 00:30:58.950
The The problem is that it was like a ball that the waterfall was in.
00:30:58.975 --> 00:31:01.769
But eventually, you can walk all the way around.
00:31:01.795 --> 00:31:08.850
You're literally on all fours climbing up dirt hills and holding onto trees to climb around it, but you can climb around it.
00:31:08.875 --> 00:31:12.259
Is what they ended up doing just to get to the top to put the rigging up.
00:31:12.289 --> 00:31:13.890
Even the rigging on that was...
00:31:13.914 --> 00:31:16.779
We're probably going to release a separate video at some point.
00:31:16.809 --> 00:31:18.690
I would love to see that.
00:31:18.715 --> 00:31:23.019
Going into that a little bit more detailed and how we set that up up there.
00:31:23.049 --> 00:31:36.630
Even Even the safety rigs, we had two different safety rigs up there that had to change in the middle of it because they were holding the rigs on the safety line and was just running winches all night long, burning alternators.
00:31:36.654 --> 00:31:38.769
That was a fun one, man.
00:31:38.795 --> 00:31:49.809
But it was, again, at the beginning, nobody really understood and was not really hating about it, but just thought it was unnecessary up until they were in it and they were like, Dude, this is the most epic thing I've ever done.
00:31:49.835 --> 00:31:50.930
I've never had that.
00:31:50.955 --> 00:31:53.549
You never feel like that.
00:31:53.575 --> 00:31:55.210
It was awesome.
00:31:55.235 --> 00:31:57.350
It had a meaning.
00:31:57.375 --> 00:32:02.490
We wanted to continue because the trail actually really unfolded afterwards and was really drivable.
00:32:02.515 --> 00:32:05.350
We just had this massive waterfall in our way.
00:32:05.375 --> 00:32:07.549
We all got winches in front of the rigs.
00:32:07.575 --> 00:32:10.690
Like Ricky B said, I spend way too much time overseas.
00:32:10.715 --> 00:32:18.470
I've seen what people do in race scenarios with winches, and we're not even touching the surface of what these winches are capable of.
00:32:18.495 --> 00:32:24.450
Let's use them how they are intended, and nobody needs to worry about anything ripping or breaking off.
00:32:24.475 --> 00:32:28.019
They can handle way more than what we throw at them.
00:32:28.049 --> 00:32:29.809
Well, it was fascinating.
00:32:29.835 --> 00:32:37.745
It reminded me of an old-school rope elevator as the vehicles were going out.
00:32:33.695 --> 00:32:37.745
It felt like it.
00:32:37.769 --> 00:32:39.450
You felt like a fish on a fishing pole.
00:32:39.475 --> 00:32:42.330
You were literally just dangling off the winged line.
00:32:42.355 --> 00:32:52.150
There was a few spots in that climb where the rear tires didn't have contact, and you can feel the whole thing swivel to one side.
00:32:52.174 --> 00:32:53.740
That's wild.
00:32:52.174 --> 00:32:53.740
Yeah.
00:32:53.769 --> 00:32:57.670
Marvin, talk to me about the...
00:32:57.695 --> 00:33:02.049
You've come up with this wild card entry system.
00:33:02.075 --> 00:33:09.350
Obviously, you've got sponsors, you've got some returning people, but you always have new faces in the mix as well.
00:33:05.835 --> 00:33:09.350
How does that work?
00:33:09.375 --> 00:33:14.019
What are you looking for when people submit to that wild card system?
00:33:14.049 --> 00:33:15.490
It really depends, man.
00:33:15.515 --> 00:33:34.230
Honestly, a good character is the most important thing, somebody that's good on camera in either way, you don't have to be the loudest, craziest guy in the group, but it's just somebody that is comfortable with the camera and is a good character and a unique vehicle of any kind, which that is not always...
00:33:34.255 --> 00:33:35.289
You never know.
00:33:35.315 --> 00:33:42.470
It might be a super just another Jeep, but the way they did it is really cool and it's really a good contrast to the rest.
00:33:42.495 --> 00:33:47.490
As stupid as it sounds, I even start looking at colors, colors of the vehicle.
00:33:47.515 --> 00:33:50.170
It's not a big breaking point.
00:33:50.195 --> 00:34:00.009
It's just another little factor because at the end of the day, I've learned, and I still do, I still invite people that have terrible colors for what we're doing.
00:34:00.035 --> 00:34:12.670
But when you think of a moment that's a thumbnail worthy, the absolute highlight moment of the day, and you are shooting in every and the rig that's doing something is tan, you can't make a good...
00:34:12.695 --> 00:34:14.090
It just doesn't work.
00:34:14.114 --> 00:34:15.210
Everything blends in.
00:34:15.235 --> 00:34:24.500
You can't make a good picture out of that because the vehicle blends in with its environment so well that it doesn't pop.
00:34:20.154 --> 00:34:24.500
Is That's interesting.
00:34:24.529 --> 00:34:26.505
Is it a make it or break it point?
00:34:24.529 --> 00:34:26.505
No.
00:34:26.529 --> 00:34:31.789
It's just something that I've had a few times now where I'm like, Dude, I would have a photo of a lifetime.
00:34:31.815 --> 00:34:41.309
If that freaking vehicle would just have any other color, then whatever it's got that blends in perfectly with the background, where you can't use an entire shot for that.
00:34:41.335 --> 00:34:43.210
Is it a make it or break it thing?
00:34:41.335 --> 00:34:43.210
No.
00:34:43.235 --> 00:34:46.650
It's just something that, like I said, there's a million different factors.
00:34:46.675 --> 00:34:51.409
Then obviously, the biggest factor is, who do I already have invited?
00:34:51.434 --> 00:34:55.030
Like you said, there are certain people that are always part of it.
00:34:55.054 --> 00:35:01.190
There's somebody like a wild card or people that just get invited to it.
00:35:01.215 --> 00:35:12.465
Once I have my must haves done, which I usually have pretty fast, I have a must have list done, then I see how I can fill it in to diversify it a little bit.
00:35:12.490 --> 00:35:12.889
Got you.
00:35:12.914 --> 00:35:17.530
90% of the time, it always comes different the week before.
00:35:17.554 --> 00:35:21.900
I never plan on having an exclusive Jeep-only Helen back.
00:35:21.929 --> 00:35:31.550
It usually happens that I had three other vehicles, but those are the three that canceled last minute, and the only people that could fill the spots happened to drive Jeeps.
00:35:31.575 --> 00:35:47.710
That happened probably more, at least two or three times already, where we went from a good diverse group to a almost exclusively Jeep because people canceled last minute in exactly the rigs that I was counting for for some diversity.
00:35:47.735 --> 00:35:51.545
Then you have a thousand comments about how you only had Jeeps in the event.
00:35:51.570 --> 00:35:51.849
Correct.
00:35:51.875 --> 00:35:56.380
But on the other side, you can You can have a thousand wild card entries.
00:35:56.409 --> 00:36:02.309
If somebody cancels on you three days before the event, trust me, those wild card, they have plans.
00:36:02.335 --> 00:36:12.900
And especially, not this year, but a lot of times we shoot from Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday because we need an empty park, depending on where we are.
00:36:12.929 --> 00:36:18.380
Then good luck finding a replacement to go real Monday morning to Wednesday morning.
00:36:18.409 --> 00:36:22.510
Yeah, people have work and life, and you can't just...
00:36:22.534 --> 00:36:26.769
Sometimes you I try to improvise last minute, and it is what it is.
00:36:26.795 --> 00:36:32.550
But I usually try to diversify as good as possible to get some...
00:36:32.575 --> 00:36:47.090
This year, at least, we had the majority of it was G, but you at least had a rock bouncer, a rock Crawler, a regular trail Jeep, down to an absolutely street legal vehicle on 37s and Dana 44 front Axel.
00:36:47.115 --> 00:36:52.230
You had that on the same trail with a 800 horsepower rock bouncer.
00:36:52.255 --> 00:36:53.329
Yeah, that was wow.
00:36:53.355 --> 00:36:58.369
I thought that That was my take for this year, if I could bring some...
00:36:58.394 --> 00:37:03.210
And then you had a real steer rock Crawler on red labels, and it was just...
00:37:03.235 --> 00:37:07.340
That was my nerdy way of diversifying it this year.
00:37:07.369 --> 00:37:18.130
For those first timers, first time doing a Helen back, is there a common mistake, if you will, that you see folks make?
00:37:18.155 --> 00:37:21.304
Do they come out too strong out of the gate trying to show off?
00:37:21.329 --> 00:37:21.860
No.
00:37:21.889 --> 00:37:38.670
I mean, the The wild card, the two wild cards we've had so far, last year's and the year before, were absolutely top runners, absolutely the underdogs, basically, of the Helen backs every single time, did a phenomenal job.
00:37:38.695 --> 00:37:40.820
But no, honestly, first time are mistakes.
00:37:40.849 --> 00:37:44.144
The biggest mistake is to sit down when you're tired.
00:37:44.170 --> 00:37:44.550
There you go.
00:37:44.575 --> 00:37:54.860
Even seasoned Helen back veterans do that mistake at a certain point when you're really tired and you want to just sit down for a second, sit in your seat and lay back.
00:37:54.889 --> 00:37:58.570
It's not even about getting a pink helmet because you're falling asleep.
00:37:58.595 --> 00:38:02.650
The problem is once you fell asleep once, dude, you just want to sleep.
00:38:02.675 --> 00:38:06.230
Then you broke the seal of being miserable.
00:38:06.255 --> 00:38:14.889
You have to fight that being When you get tired, fight it by helping out the media team or spotting somebody, running winch cable.
00:38:14.914 --> 00:38:16.670
There's always something to do.
00:38:16.695 --> 00:38:23.590
Just got to work through that for a minute and force yourself to not sit down and you'll be just fine.
00:38:23.615 --> 00:38:36.340
In my experience, once you start slowing down, sitting down, calming down, and closing your eyes for a second, after that, you're ruining it for your sofa the next couple of hours because you'll be miserable.
00:38:36.369 --> 00:38:38.070
I can see that.
00:38:38.095 --> 00:38:39.170
All right.
00:38:39.195 --> 00:38:48.769
You talked a few minutes ago that you cannot, physically, if you wanted to, you can't produce a 24 Helen back every month.
00:38:48.795 --> 00:38:50.789
It's not possible.
00:38:50.815 --> 00:38:54.010
I'm assuming that- Maybe, but I don't want to burn it out either.
00:38:54.034 --> 00:39:05.530
For me, what I'm doing now with Helen back adventures and a new format we're about to launch and the international travels, that is for me a perfect round package at the end.
00:39:05.554 --> 00:39:15.369
Once a year, you get your 24-hour hardest trails we can mind throughout the year, you get entertained with same video quality, same storyline quality.
00:39:15.394 --> 00:39:26.380
But we tame it down one notch from the trail craziness, but then add the craziness of having to in about a year rig for three or five days.
00:39:26.409 --> 00:39:33.340
Helen back adventures is just as crazy as 2024 Helen back, but in different ways.
00:39:33.369 --> 00:39:34.769
It's a different crazy.
00:39:34.795 --> 00:39:37.030
That's what I was going to say.
00:39:37.054 --> 00:39:41.250
Man, your boy Will always seems to get himself in the middle of it.
00:39:41.275 --> 00:39:44.380
Always something.
00:39:41.275 --> 00:39:44.380
Yeah.
00:39:44.409 --> 00:39:45.889
He is great.
00:39:45.914 --> 00:39:52.340
It's been so much fun for me also to share all this with a really dear friend that I've had for a long time.
00:39:50.034 --> 00:39:52.340
That's awesome.
00:39:52.369 --> 00:39:55.425
Doing these trips with together is an absolute blast.
00:39:55.450 --> 00:39:56.769
We're having a really good time.
00:39:56.795 --> 00:40:00.750
We have a lot of things in the pipeline right now that are getting edited.
00:40:00.775 --> 00:40:07.820
We have a little bit of some rearrangements to do within the company right now, getting some new help with editing and whatnot.
00:40:07.849 --> 00:40:10.170
Things are a little bit on the back burner right now.
00:40:10.195 --> 00:40:16.889
We are sitting on a lot of really good content that is just waiting to get out of the editing room, which we're working on it.
00:40:16.914 --> 00:40:19.230
Everything is under control.
00:40:16.914 --> 00:40:19.230
We all got it.
00:40:19.255 --> 00:40:22.769
But I can just tell you guys, we have some really cool stuff coming.
00:40:22.795 --> 00:40:26.929
I'm super excited to launch and even better plans for the future.
00:40:26.954 --> 00:40:29.340
So this year is going to be nuts.
00:40:29.369 --> 00:40:36.380
We definitely want to make it our goal this year to double up on content from what we had last year.
00:40:36.409 --> 00:40:46.750
We've been going through a phase of reinventing ourselves to a certain extent from weekly releases and rushing that next 20-minute video.
00:40:46.775 --> 00:40:48.769
Oh, man, it's Wednesday already.
00:40:48.795 --> 00:40:50.210
We need a video for Sunday.
00:40:50.235 --> 00:40:52.470
Better go shoot something.
00:40:52.494 --> 00:40:53.570
We've done that.
00:40:53.595 --> 00:40:56.130
We did that for four years and killed ourselves over it.
00:40:56.155 --> 00:40:57.450
It was an awesome time.
00:40:57.474 --> 00:41:00.950
I think we had to go to that school to get where we are now.
00:41:00.974 --> 00:41:08.010
But now I think we learned so much that we know what we want to do and what people want to see from us.
00:41:08.034 --> 00:41:12.550
I think the content we are now putting out is exactly what we want to do.
00:41:12.575 --> 00:41:15.789
Now we just got to figure out how to do more of it.
00:41:15.815 --> 00:41:17.570
That's really where we are right now.
00:41:17.595 --> 00:41:25.750
We finally found the things we want to do, the formats that we're pumped to produce and that that we feel 100 %.
00:41:25.775 --> 00:41:29.950
Now we just need to, okay, how do we duplicate this and bring on more?
00:41:29.974 --> 00:41:36.090
That's where we're currently at, and we're very close to having a solution to all of it.
00:41:36.849 --> 00:41:43.070
We've talked about the Jeep, and I think most people are familiar with your Jeepster.
00:41:43.095 --> 00:41:57.110
But tell me the story, if you don't mind, I'm sure you've told it a few times on sushi, on this trip, this wild trip from Seattle to Atlanta in this first-gen Toyota pickup.
00:41:57.135 --> 00:42:02.250
You had several adventures along the way with that.
00:42:02.275 --> 00:42:04.900
What was the worst part of that trip?
00:42:04.929 --> 00:42:07.309
Oh, man, the worst part of the trip?
00:42:07.335 --> 00:42:35.690
Dude, there was so much Being in the middle of nowhere in Oregon, in the high desert, in a snow blizzard, where my my windshield vipers quit working, so I had to pull over in a rest barrier to pour fluid on my windshield and a Ranex, trying to keep things from sticking to my windshield because I had no more windshield vipers.
00:42:35.715 --> 00:42:44.769
It was snowing super hard and it was in the middle of nowhere and then got back on the ramp and it was barely accelerating.
00:42:44.795 --> 00:43:00.570
As soon as I got onto the interstate, I spun out into the 360 in the middle of the lane and caught myself again driving in the same direction I needed to but just had a whole 360 driving out of it right after having a shock because I couldn't see and my winged papers wouldn't work.
00:43:00.595 --> 00:43:03.789
It was just like one thing after another, all in this freaking blizzard.
00:43:03.815 --> 00:43:09.010
Was there a point right there that you were like, did you ever think, no, this isn't worth it.
00:43:09.034 --> 00:43:10.990
It's not worth the content.
00:43:11.014 --> 00:43:12.570
It wasn't even on camera.
00:43:12.595 --> 00:43:24.090
The big lesson I learned from that trip, which is really dumb if you ask me, that also shows how we make our videos because I wanted to do this and then try to make it work for a video.
00:43:22.130 --> 00:43:24.090
You know what I mean?
00:43:24.115 --> 00:43:28.030
I learned right there doing this by yourself.
00:43:28.054 --> 00:43:29.825
I didn't have anybody with me.
00:43:29.849 --> 00:43:31.380
There was nobody in the passenger seat.
00:43:31.409 --> 00:43:34.304
I can't film when things are happening.
00:43:34.329 --> 00:43:35.809
I can only film the boring parts.
00:43:35.835 --> 00:43:38.090
When things are happening, I'm usually busy.
00:43:38.115 --> 00:43:39.380
Yeah, right.
00:43:39.409 --> 00:43:40.590
Them.
00:43:40.615 --> 00:43:48.264
I learned that the hard way on that trip, that a lot of good story was lost because I was busy executing.
00:43:48.289 --> 00:43:53.789
I couldn't film and execute at the same time if you're driving on public roads or whatever.
00:43:53.815 --> 00:44:00.030
That was the one thing that I regreted, was like, Man, I went through all these awesome...
00:44:00.054 --> 00:44:04.630
I had so much more cool story that I couldn't tell because of a lack of footage.
00:44:04.655 --> 00:44:06.425
It is what it is.
00:44:06.450 --> 00:44:07.450
But it was a wild trip.
00:44:07.474 --> 00:44:09.690
I learned a lot about carburetors.
00:44:07.474 --> 00:44:09.690
Let me tell you.
00:44:09.715 --> 00:44:13.224
A lot.
00:44:13.250 --> 00:44:14.070
Well, all right.
00:44:14.095 --> 00:44:23.470
Speaking of that carburetor, for those that haven't followed on your channel, the old 20R didn't stay in there long.
00:44:23.494 --> 00:44:31.650
And you made a rather unorthodox choice to replace it.
00:44:31.675 --> 00:44:40.710
And the Toyota purist of the world, they had some choice comments on that, as they always do.
00:44:40.735 --> 00:44:44.990
But even the Jeep guys were probably scratching their head on this choice.
00:44:45.014 --> 00:44:49.409
Honestly, I had way less bad feedback than I thought.
00:44:49.434 --> 00:44:55.990
I thought world is going to end, and it's either going to go viral or people are hate me forever, and it didn't do either of them.
00:44:56.014 --> 00:44:58.704
So it's really not...
00:44:56.014 --> 00:44:58.704
I don't think...
00:44:58.730 --> 00:44:59.409
I don't know.
00:44:59.434 --> 00:45:03.090
I thought it was just a good swap, honestly.
00:45:03.115 --> 00:45:11.550
Long story short, what we ended up doing is we threw out the 20R, the the operated 20-hour motor that was in it.
00:45:11.575 --> 00:45:18.429
It had a completely worn out four-speed transmission and then a stock transfer case.
00:45:18.454 --> 00:45:21.269
No doubler, no gears done, nothing stopped.
00:45:21.295 --> 00:45:25.929
We took all of that out and replaced it with a 3.
00:45:25.954 --> 00:45:30.670
8 V6 out of a 2007 Jeep JK.
00:45:30.695 --> 00:45:32.450
So it has a 3.
00:45:32.474 --> 00:45:47.309
8 out of a JK in it now with a six-speed manual transmission, which that's where the spicy sauce happens on that motor, with a south bend clutch, a little bit like the right upgrades done to it, and a Rubicon 4: 1 transfer case behind it.
00:45:47.335 --> 00:45:49.470
So it has a full Jeep drivetrain in it.
00:45:49.494 --> 00:45:57.349
Then because it's driver drop, had a different front accel, now have a Trailgear front accel housing that brings everything to the driver's side.
00:45:57.375 --> 00:45:59.070
That's it.
00:45:59.095 --> 00:46:04.849
Hotwire harness makes a full harness and ECU kit, plug and play, stand-alone.
00:46:04.875 --> 00:46:09.889
You can buy and just plug it up like you would with your LS or a Hemi or whatever.
00:46:09.914 --> 00:46:12.110
I have the exact same kit in my Jeep for my Hemi.
00:46:12.135 --> 00:46:16.545
So lucky enough that that same company makes a full stand-along kit for the 3.
00:46:16.570 --> 00:46:17.230
8.
00:46:17.255 --> 00:46:18.710
It works great.
00:46:18.735 --> 00:46:19.849
And honestly, that's it.
00:46:19.875 --> 00:46:25.570
Some Tomwoods drive shafts and South Bend clutch we threw in That's it, man.
00:46:25.595 --> 00:46:31.889
Now, we just did our first four-day adventure in it that you guys are going to see on YouTube soon.
00:46:31.914 --> 00:46:33.690
Okay, well, there's the spoiler.
00:46:33.715 --> 00:46:38.190
Because last, you left us in limbo.
00:46:38.215 --> 00:46:42.670
I The sushi was sitting in the shop and you had to go somewhere.
00:46:42.695 --> 00:46:44.610
We had a bunch of...
00:46:44.635 --> 00:46:50.010
I mean, the swap itself was done rather quickly to a point where she was running and driving.
00:46:50.034 --> 00:46:53.349
I did it with Ian Johnson at his big tire garage.
00:46:53.375 --> 00:46:59.050
So all the credit to him for coming up with the swap and doing most of the work on it.
00:46:59.075 --> 00:47:06.450
But as always, there's going to be little shitty things that you need to figure out afterwards.
00:47:06.474 --> 00:47:08.970
We had fuel issues.
00:47:08.994 --> 00:47:12.349
We didn't want to swap a JK fuel tank into this thing.
00:47:12.375 --> 00:47:15.970
We wanted to make it work with the Toyota fuel tank.
00:47:16.210 --> 00:47:19.289
The fuel pump overheated, the fuel filter just clocked up.
00:47:19.315 --> 00:47:22.570
We had nothing but problems with the fuel system over many visits.
00:47:22.595 --> 00:47:24.010
Ian is four hours away from me.
00:47:24.034 --> 00:47:33.610
It was always me driving out there, staying for a couple of days, seeing how much progress we can make until I run out of time and I get busy with something else and I have to drive back.
00:47:33.635 --> 00:47:38.530
Then we have to find another appointment when we're both free to work on this thing again.
00:47:38.554 --> 00:47:42.329
That's why it just dragged on because we're both busy with other things.
00:47:42.355 --> 00:47:45.230
It's not our only priority to work.
00:47:45.255 --> 00:47:48.730
Obviously, I'm a little bit under Ian's mercy as well.
00:47:48.755 --> 00:47:52.869
It's also his baby, plus I want him to be involved in it.
00:47:52.894 --> 00:47:58.309
He's He's a very busy man, so we need to figure out whenever we can find time to do it.
00:47:58.335 --> 00:48:00.130
Now we finally got it figured out.
00:48:00.155 --> 00:48:08.230
We've had many visits and many test-in-tune sessions, and we had to have it figured out, and we just took her on our first four-day adventure.
00:48:08.255 --> 00:48:11.900
It You definitely, well, I don't want to say too much.
00:48:11.929 --> 00:48:13.329
You're in for a treat.
00:48:13.355 --> 00:48:15.690
You definitely guys got to watch that.
00:48:15.715 --> 00:48:20.900
There's a lot of consequences that come out of this video in that regard.
00:48:20.929 --> 00:48:22.369
But you got to watch for that.
00:48:22.394 --> 00:48:24.190
There's your It's easier.
00:48:24.215 --> 00:48:26.510
But yeah, super.
00:48:26.534 --> 00:48:29.950
The swap itself is badass.
00:48:29.974 --> 00:48:31.130
That's all I can say.
00:48:31.155 --> 00:48:40.090
A little something I can say is coming out of a trail with it, now in our recent adventure, on a dirt road, Most gravel dirt road.
00:48:40.115 --> 00:48:43.929
It was a Monday morning, so we didn't really have to fear too much traffic.
00:48:43.954 --> 00:48:46.590
We were going a little bit faster.
00:48:46.615 --> 00:48:49.530
Fourth gear, foot down, things still come sideways.
00:48:49.554 --> 00:48:52.269
I mean, it is massively overpowered.
00:48:52.295 --> 00:48:56.409
I like how you had to put a disclaimer before you describe that little episode.
00:48:56.434 --> 00:49:00.269
Yeah.
00:48:56.434 --> 00:49:00.269
Dude, it's violent.
00:49:00.295 --> 00:49:02.389
It is very, very, very fast.
00:49:02.414 --> 00:49:13.650
A motor drivetrain that is extremely underpowered in a 6,000-pound UK is the wildest setup ever in that little Toyota.
00:49:13.675 --> 00:49:18.889
It's violent and it's so great because they are everywhere.
00:49:18.914 --> 00:49:20.409
Nobody wants these motors.
00:49:20.434 --> 00:49:23.789
People will pay you to pick them up.
00:49:23.815 --> 00:49:32.809
Jeep shops that do engine conversions, they will give you money to finally pick them up and get them out of their hands because they don't know what to do with them.
00:49:32.835 --> 00:49:35.929
You can pick them up for a decent deal.
00:49:35.954 --> 00:49:43.230
It seems to be once we have it all figured out, I think I'm pretty pumped about it, man.
00:49:40.450 --> 00:49:43.230
I'm pretty freaking excited about it.
00:49:43.255 --> 00:49:52.409
Yeah, because I know Ian had to basically make an oil pan, but all the accessories and everything on the front, you didn't have any issues, correct?
00:49:52.434 --> 00:49:55.610
No, even transmission cross member lined up.
00:49:55.635 --> 00:50:03.110
I mean, transmission like the shifter goes to the same hole as the Toyota shifter when everything seemed to light up way too well.
00:50:03.135 --> 00:50:16.750
But yeah, we had to massively customize the oil pan, which that is still something we're going to tweak on now afterwards a little bit more, but that's just part of the trial and error thing, honestly.
00:50:16.775 --> 00:50:19.210
It's a really cool truck.
00:50:19.235 --> 00:50:21.329
I can't wait to show you guys more about it.
00:50:21.355 --> 00:50:26.170
It's a really, I don't know, their dog.
00:50:26.690 --> 00:50:33.190
Marvin, one question on switching back to the Jeepster because I wanted to make sure I got this in.
00:50:33.215 --> 00:50:36.309
I know you love that Jeep.
00:50:36.335 --> 00:50:43.150
There seems to be, Maybe I'm wrong, but there seems to be a love-hate relationship with that Hemi.
00:50:43.175 --> 00:50:45.625
Dude, everybody isn't just always...
00:50:45.650 --> 00:50:49.289
As soon as I have problems with that Jeep, everybody is blaming the motor for it.
00:50:49.315 --> 00:50:51.090
That is something I've been noticing.
00:50:51.115 --> 00:51:08.429
I can have I clearly had fuel issues during Helen back, and I mentioned that we changed the fuel filter, we changed the fuel pump, we cleaned the fuel filter, we did all these fuel-related things, and everybody in the comments blames the Hemi for a poor performance on this trip.
00:51:08.454 --> 00:51:09.610
It was never the motor.
00:51:09.635 --> 00:51:11.550
The motor is 100% fine.
00:51:11.575 --> 00:51:13.150
I had fuel problems.
00:51:13.175 --> 00:51:17.510
No matter what motor I have in there, I would have had the same issue.
00:51:17.534 --> 00:51:20.470
The problems that I had-Was fuel delivery.
00:51:20.494 --> 00:51:21.849
Was all fuel-related.
00:51:21.875 --> 00:51:33.369
It was first a clocked-up fuel filter, then later on, the fuel pump itself was bad, even though it still had the right amperage and it had in idle the fuel pressure we needed.
00:51:33.394 --> 00:51:40.369
That's why we never changed it until very late in the Helen bag, because I have a fuel pressure regulator with a gage on it.
00:51:40.394 --> 00:51:43.829
I could see my fuel pressure, but obviously only when we're idling.
00:51:43.855 --> 00:51:46.269
We only checked idle.
00:51:46.295 --> 00:51:48.849
My mistake, I guess, learned from that one.
00:51:48.875 --> 00:51:55.450
But it was cutting out as soon as you were putting RPMs to it, and that was obviously what you saw on the video.
00:51:55.474 --> 00:51:59.789
As soon as you crossed the 3,000 RPM mark, it was just bogging down.
00:51:59.815 --> 00:52:03.570
Once we replaced the fuel pump, all the issues went away.
00:52:03.595 --> 00:52:08.849
It ran like a champ, and then it immediately broke elsewhere.
00:52:08.875 --> 00:52:12.010
Then I lost a freaking front...
00:52:12.034 --> 00:52:26.900
I broke a limit strap from the front suspension, which caused the side to droop down too much, too much axer wrap in the front suspension, broke the yoke, broke the broke the front drive shaft.
00:52:26.929 --> 00:52:36.030
Didn't immediately realize it because it was 5: 00 AM or 4: 00 AM and no sleep and dark, but then later on realized why I broke the drive shaft and was all that.
00:52:36.054 --> 00:52:38.664
I love my G-Man, but she's getting old.
00:52:38.690 --> 00:52:39.985
That's the only thing I can say.
00:52:40.010 --> 00:52:41.010
I can't even be mad at it.
00:52:41.034 --> 00:52:45.829
This thing has gone through hell and back many times.
00:52:45.855 --> 00:52:48.110
It's eight years old now.
00:52:48.135 --> 00:52:53.550
Since we built her, it's eight years, eight years of a very rough life.
00:52:53.575 --> 00:52:56.289
At a certain point, things are just getting tired.
00:52:56.315 --> 00:52:59.170
I'm even aware, dude, limit straps have an expiration date.
00:52:59.195 --> 00:53:03.269
You limit straps you have on your suspension, they're not buy once, cry once.
00:53:03.295 --> 00:53:05.065
They have an expiration date.
00:53:05.090 --> 00:53:07.329
I always thought, dude, it's a freaking trail, Rick.
00:53:07.355 --> 00:53:10.025
It's a wheeler.
00:53:07.355 --> 00:53:10.025
We're not racing this thing.
00:53:10.050 --> 00:53:10.829
It'll be fine.
00:53:10.855 --> 00:53:16.900
But sure enough, eight years on the same limit straps, eventually they will break, and they did.
00:53:16.929 --> 00:53:20.369
Well, you were not the first person to do that.
00:53:20.394 --> 00:53:26.664
I don't know if anyone that is checking the expiration dates on their limit straps.
00:53:23.275 --> 00:53:26.664
To your point, yeah, it happens.
00:53:26.690 --> 00:53:27.409
Yeah.
00:53:27.434 --> 00:53:31.929
Obviously, the front suspension, just the way it was said, it was never perfect.
00:53:31.954 --> 00:53:39.130
It's not supposed to lean so much into the limit straps where the whole geometry gets thrown off once the limit straps broken.
00:53:39.155 --> 00:53:45.889
It's supposed to limit your travel, but not be an essential part of the geometry of your suspension, so to say.
00:53:45.914 --> 00:53:47.349
Something that has a...
00:53:47.375 --> 00:53:51.349
Once a limit strap breaks, your suspension shouldn't collapse, so to say.
00:53:51.375 --> 00:53:58.250
If that makes But yeah, anyways, it's at Carnage Motorsports right now.
00:53:58.275 --> 00:54:03.510
Will took the Jeepster under his umbrella after 24 hour on back and he's getting a rebuild.
00:54:03.534 --> 00:54:06.970
We're currently throwing an RPM suspension under it.
00:54:06.994 --> 00:54:16.900
The same suspension that Will has under his JK is going into the Jeepster because for those that don't know, the Jeepster has a TJ frame under it, at least up until the seats.
00:54:16.929 --> 00:54:23.670
The rest has a custom back half, but the majority of it is a TJ frame, and RPM offers TJ suspension.
00:54:23.695 --> 00:54:31.030
So Will is just tweaking it enough to make it work with the Jeepster, which really isn't that much, it seems.
00:54:31.054 --> 00:54:34.289
Then we're going to throw a bunch of big 2.
00:54:34.315 --> 00:54:35.470
5 callovers.
00:54:35.494 --> 00:54:40.470
We're working with Bilstein on a full new call over and bump stop set up.
00:54:40.494 --> 00:54:51.510
And Will really wants the front half it and cut the whole front of the frame off and put a new front half on it to basically raise the front up higher to have more up travel.
00:54:51.534 --> 00:54:57.869
So he is working on all You guys should check out Carnage Motorsports on Instagram or Mr. Carnage.
00:54:57.894 --> 00:55:00.250
Yeah, he's a great follow on there.
00:55:00.275 --> 00:55:01.650
He's definitely a good follow.
00:55:01.675 --> 00:55:03.304
Definitely one I can recommend.
00:55:03.329 --> 00:55:22.470
Hilarious, really knowledgeable Jeep guy, has an off-road shop in Miami for Carnage Motorsports, and he's currently reworking the Jeepster, and we'll hope to have it back, but he's a Jeep Safari with all new suspension, and eventually, slightly different look because the front definitely, bumper will be gone.
00:55:22.494 --> 00:55:27.869
A lot of things that dress up the face of the Jeep will be slightly different.
00:55:27.894 --> 00:55:30.970
It'll get a little makeover.
00:55:27.894 --> 00:55:30.970
Yeah.
00:55:30.994 --> 00:55:33.570
Will's Jeep were handled so well, I have to say.
00:55:33.595 --> 00:55:42.990
Wheeling with him now for as consistent as I have been on so much hard stuff, and it was just us next to each other where I can see how his stuff performed versus my stuff.
00:55:43.014 --> 00:55:51.110
The RPM suspension, dude, the way he sets them up and just the way they are designed are just a really, really, really solid product.
00:55:51.135 --> 00:55:54.369
Dude, his Jeep is so freaking stable.
00:55:54.394 --> 00:55:57.929
It has gone through trails that it really shouldn't have gone through.
00:55:57.954 --> 00:56:00.730
And yeah, it's a really good setup.
00:56:00.755 --> 00:56:04.470
I'm pumped to get that performance into my Jeep.
00:56:04.494 --> 00:56:06.309
That'll be cool.
00:56:06.335 --> 00:56:10.769
It is in good hands down there Absolutely.
00:56:10.970 --> 00:56:17.990
Marvin, let's talk briefly about some of these global adventures.
00:56:18.014 --> 00:56:22.630
So you went the Rainforest challenge.
00:56:22.655 --> 00:56:30.889
Folks, if you If you're not familiar with the channel, just go start with one of these Rainforest challenge videos.
00:56:30.914 --> 00:56:33.450
You talk about wild stuff.
00:56:33.809 --> 00:56:38.889
I started to say it's unlike anything you'll see here, and that's not an exaggeration.
00:56:38.914 --> 00:56:42.170
It's a totally different experience.
00:56:42.195 --> 00:56:48.389
You guys went over there, basically, I believe on media passes for the event.
00:56:48.414 --> 00:56:54.990
Are you serious about going back and either building or renting or You're driving a car?
00:56:55.014 --> 00:56:57.730
I'm working almost every day on that for two years.
00:56:57.755 --> 00:57:00.650
Since we went, dude, I have no idea.
00:57:00.675 --> 00:57:07.630
I'm dedicating way too much time on that because it's another one of those things that I really want to do.
00:57:07.655 --> 00:57:10.110
Hopefully, the content works out.
00:57:10.135 --> 00:57:14.389
That's just something I'm pressing on doing.
00:57:14.414 --> 00:57:21.409
I don't make it a freaking secret that I'm not a builder.
00:57:21.434 --> 00:57:25.429
I know my way around as as I have to, but I'm not a builder.
00:57:25.454 --> 00:57:29.230
For me to build a rainforest car is a big undertaking.
00:57:29.255 --> 00:57:34.230
It requires a partnership with somebody like Will or somebody that know how to build a vehicle.
00:57:34.255 --> 00:57:49.090
With my input, I know the substance and what this vehicle needs to be, and I have enough knowledge about the subject to have a big influence on the car, but the executing manpower behind it to actually build it, I need a partner for that.
00:57:49.115 --> 00:57:58.269
I don't think I'm in a point or position right now or yet where I can build a car for one race out of the year on the other side of the world.
00:57:58.295 --> 00:58:02.269
It's just as much as I want to do it, it's extremely...
00:58:02.295 --> 00:58:04.264
And I've gone down so many routes.
00:58:04.289 --> 00:58:08.970
We've gone down from trying to build one here and ship it over there to building a car there.
00:58:08.994 --> 00:58:22.190
I was very close to signing something that made us pick up an existing project from somebody in Malaysia that is trying to get out of it, and we would basically take, buy the project and finish it in Malaysia.
00:58:22.215 --> 00:58:27.429
Now we're back to renting a car in Malaysia for next year or for this year.
00:58:27.454 --> 00:58:35.570
We are back and forth with, we just need to weigh our options because every option is expensive and has a rat's tail of responsibilities and expenses.
00:58:35.595 --> 00:58:38.510
So it will happen in one way or another.
00:58:38.534 --> 00:58:48.289
This goes back to what you said earlier about when you have your strategic planning meetings and we're going to find a way to make this thing work as a business idea.
00:58:48.315 --> 00:58:50.570
There's no point of me having to race this.
00:58:50.595 --> 00:58:57.349
The video was wildly successful and we were They're there on media passes, like you said, we weren't actually racing.
00:58:57.375 --> 00:59:02.309
What we did there was obviously right and people felt entertained by it.
00:59:02.335 --> 00:59:04.670
There's really no need for us to race it.
00:59:04.695 --> 00:59:07.900
Plus, if we're driving in the car, we can't film.
00:59:07.929 --> 00:59:15.289
That has a huge rat's tail of making this work out for a video is going to be expensive.
00:59:15.315 --> 00:59:18.190
I need another camera man outside the truck.
00:59:18.215 --> 00:59:22.425
Good luck finding somebody that wants to live through this for 10 days.
00:59:22.450 --> 00:59:26.769
There is no, Oh, I'm going to I'm going to do three days and I'm going to go to the hotel and then I come back.
00:59:26.795 --> 00:59:28.730
No, bro, you want to be into this?
00:59:28.755 --> 00:59:32.230
You're going to suffer through the same things that you saw in our video.
00:59:32.255 --> 00:59:38.670
No matter if you're the video guy or the water boy or whatever, that is your experience.
00:59:38.695 --> 00:59:46.329
Finding somebody that's crazy enough to do this, even from just a media perspective to film us is crazy.
00:59:43.195 --> 00:59:46.329
Oh, yeah.
00:59:46.355 --> 00:59:49.970
When he says suffer, folks, it is suffrage.
00:59:49.994 --> 00:59:57.550
The media does not go back to the Marriott at night and then come back in the morning.
00:59:57.575 --> 01:00:17.990
Slept in the jungle on cots for 10 days under tarps that were held up by whinch lines and in the rainforest, like elephants walking through our camp at night and taking a shower in an infested river that when you come out, you have freaking leaches the size of your thumb, of your body, that stuff.
01:00:18.014 --> 01:00:21.570
But dude, I crave nothing more.
01:00:21.595 --> 01:00:23.010
I want to go back so bad.
01:00:23.034 --> 01:00:25.329
We had epic time there.
01:00:25.355 --> 01:00:37.130
Again, long story short, I'm currently, after all these iterations of building a car here, building a car there, renting a car, now we're back to maybe renting a car to compete in this year.
01:00:37.155 --> 01:00:53.769
Then I'm hoping to be able to build a new vehicle for the channel for myself within the next year or two, like the next iteration of the Jeepster, start something in that ballpark.
01:00:53.809 --> 01:01:20.670
When I do that, I will keep the rainforest challenge in the back of my head and plan certain things where I'm like, Dude, if I want to ship this thing across the ocean, across the world, and have a car, it might not be made for it, but certain things are maybe set up where I can run either or, where I make sure that if I build a new car that I can pack it with winches that would be compatible with what they have over there.
01:01:20.695 --> 01:01:23.289
Dude, you are passionate about making this work.
01:01:23.315 --> 01:01:26.369
I can I am.
01:01:23.315 --> 01:01:26.369
I want to do it.
01:01:26.394 --> 01:01:28.950
The whole rainforest challenge itself.
01:01:28.974 --> 01:01:35.010
What I can also spoiler here is we went back to another one, but we didn't go to Malaysia.
01:01:35.034 --> 01:01:37.369
We went to Colombia the next time.
01:01:37.394 --> 01:01:40.050
Last year, that's the next video that will come out.
01:01:40.075 --> 01:01:44.230
It's a little bit in the delay with it.
01:01:44.255 --> 01:01:53.190
William and I went to Colombia and did Rainforest Challenge Colombia in the jungle of South America for five days.
01:01:53.215 --> 01:01:58.110
That one was five days versus 10 days, but still absolutely nuts.
01:01:58.135 --> 01:02:00.490
That is the next video that's coming out.
01:02:00.514 --> 01:02:08.150
But therefore, we were also just on a media pass, but we had friends this time that were racing that we knew had to mix us with over Instagram.
01:02:08.175 --> 01:02:11.630
Sergio and Brad from 24 Hellenback were also there.
01:02:11.655 --> 01:02:13.650
We all went together.
01:02:13.675 --> 01:02:15.950
It was freaking a wild trip.
01:02:15.974 --> 01:02:17.389
That's coming out next.
01:02:17.414 --> 01:02:20.010
But I want to continue this on.
01:02:20.034 --> 01:02:23.170
Way & Force Challenge is my favorite style of racing so far.
01:02:23.195 --> 01:02:32.985
I've I've been around Southern Rock Racing, Rock Balancing, I've been around Ultra 4, Megatruck Racing, Side-by- Side Racing, We Rock, Rock Crawling.
01:02:33.010 --> 01:02:34.010
I've seen it all.
01:02:34.034 --> 01:02:42.889
The one thing that really got my blood pumping and where I had FOMO that I want to participate was Rainforest Challenge.
01:02:42.914 --> 01:02:52.889
I want to make it work one way or the other, and even shipping my own rig over there, essentially, or hopefully making it work with a rental car beforehand.
01:02:53.010 --> 01:03:01.590
Rental car Hard, just to say that on top of it, is just also really hard because I'm 6'3, and the guys over there are 5'8.
01:02:56.974 --> 01:03:01.590
They're a little bit.
01:03:01.615 --> 01:03:02.750
That's the problem.
01:03:02.775 --> 01:03:10.309
The cars that are up for rent, dude, I don't fit.
01:03:10.335 --> 01:03:13.429
That's another issue, honestly.
01:03:13.454 --> 01:03:15.289
That's what I'm currently dealing with.
01:03:15.315 --> 01:03:21.409
We can have a really good car, but the bro, the dude that drives it, that owns it, is like five foot on a good day.
01:03:21.434 --> 01:03:27.309
It's Yeah, I get it.
01:03:27.335 --> 01:03:32.429
Also, speaking of international, you went to that event in Honduras.
01:03:32.454 --> 01:03:34.730
Yeah, that was really fun.
01:03:32.454 --> 01:03:34.730
It was right after.
01:03:34.755 --> 01:03:36.849
It was crazy.
01:03:34.755 --> 01:03:36.849
It was right after Malaysia.
01:03:36.875 --> 01:03:41.465
Malaysia, I wasn't even I didn't even arrive really back home yet.
01:03:41.490 --> 01:03:42.690
I already went to that one.
01:03:42.715 --> 01:03:47.490
I wish I could have spaced that out a little better for it to stand more.
01:03:47.514 --> 01:03:56.769
I feel like it fell into the shadow of Malaysia a little bit because it was right in the same time frame, but it was so so cool and so unique and so different from Malaysia.
01:03:56.795 --> 01:03:58.990
So also a really good video.
01:03:59.014 --> 01:04:14.470
Well, what it was to me, it reminded me of the old Four Wheeler Top Truck Challenge videos, but Instead of a bunch of separate events like the tank trap and the mud pit and these separate...
01:04:14.494 --> 01:04:20.990
It's one giant course that you run in one shot with all these different obstacles.
01:04:21.014 --> 01:04:28.905
Do you think there's a market or a place for us to see things like that here in the States?
01:04:28.929 --> 01:04:30.050
I really would love to, man.
01:04:30.075 --> 01:04:35.030
If I have the opportunity one day to own some land or something to do something like that, I would love to.
01:04:35.054 --> 01:04:43.789
What they told me is that a couple of guys that were there that are familiar with the US are just saying, Dude, it's just an insurance thing.
01:04:43.815 --> 01:04:45.329
You know what I mean?
01:04:45.355 --> 01:04:49.970
A, with the crowd being there, but you can even eliminate the crowd and just do it for YouTube.
01:04:49.994 --> 01:04:52.110
It's always an insurance thing.
01:04:52.135 --> 01:05:00.769
I can get around certain stuff like that by doing it for YouTube and making it where you're not paying an entry fee and you're not winning anything.
01:05:00.795 --> 01:05:11.389
At that point, you're 100% voluntarily participating, but you're taking away the whole competition sense at that point because it is just if there's nothing on the line, it's different.
01:05:11.414 --> 01:05:13.065
I don't know.
01:05:13.090 --> 01:05:14.650
I would love to make something like that work.
01:05:14.675 --> 01:05:17.869
The energy there was out of this world.
01:05:17.894 --> 01:05:20.929
Cheering somebody on, you see everything.
01:05:20.954 --> 01:05:25.090
Like you said, you had big rock mud pit, off center.
01:05:25.115 --> 01:05:30.809
You had all these different disciplines and obstacles right in a row from each other.
01:05:30.835 --> 01:05:32.670
It was a lot of fun.
01:05:32.695 --> 01:05:35.050
I could get behind that.
01:05:35.075 --> 01:05:43.110
I would love to see an event like that that anybody could register for multiple different classes and just a multi-day.
01:05:43.135 --> 01:05:45.369
Was it over several days?
01:05:43.135 --> 01:05:45.369
I assume.
01:05:45.394 --> 01:05:47.349
A multi-day party?
01:05:47.375 --> 01:05:49.905
Yeah, it was a Friday through Sunday thing, I think.
01:05:49.929 --> 01:05:50.829
It was a week.
01:05:50.855 --> 01:05:55.730
We obviously cut it a little short by showing it on video.
01:05:56.210 --> 01:06:06.409
Well, hey, listen, Marvin, before I let you go, we've got five rapid fire questions that I want to run through here.
01:06:06.809 --> 01:06:09.829
Number one, we ask everybody this one.
01:06:09.855 --> 01:06:13.050
Favorite off-road trail snack?
01:06:13.809 --> 01:06:16.900
Oh my God, Lunchables.
01:06:16.929 --> 01:06:21.289
Okay.
01:06:16.929 --> 01:06:21.289
Is there a particular lunchable combo?
01:06:21.315 --> 01:06:23.784
Or you'll just- The ham cheese one, the very standard.
01:06:23.809 --> 01:06:24.710
Okay.
01:06:23.809 --> 01:06:24.710
All right.
01:06:24.735 --> 01:06:27.409
So you're old-school lunchable.
01:06:24.735 --> 01:06:27.409
Got it.
01:06:27.434 --> 01:06:28.950
Old-school lunchables, yeah.
01:06:28.974 --> 01:06:39.144
If you could only listen to one artist or one album while you're out on the trail for the day, what are you putting on?
01:06:39.170 --> 01:06:41.010
I don't listen to music on the trail, man.
01:06:41.034 --> 01:06:43.730
It's really engine sounds and everything.
01:06:43.755 --> 01:06:49.050
Any cracking or anything that sounds suspicious is what I'm listening to when I'm on the trail.
01:06:49.075 --> 01:06:53.150
I'm not listening to music as much of a music nerd I am, but on the trail, dude.
01:06:53.175 --> 01:06:56.190
I had I have speakers on my Jeep for a short period of time.
01:06:56.215 --> 01:06:57.470
Never used them.
01:06:57.494 --> 01:07:01.425
Didn't even notice that they blew at a certain point that...
01:07:01.450 --> 01:07:01.849
You just took them off?
01:07:01.875 --> 01:07:07.750
Just took them off again because I'm listening to what the car is doing and not what...
01:07:07.775 --> 01:07:10.230
I can't focus to some music.
01:07:10.255 --> 01:07:14.590
Fair enough.
01:07:10.255 --> 01:07:14.590
All right, very important question here.
01:07:14.615 --> 01:07:17.190
Dewalt or Milwaukee?
01:07:17.215 --> 01:07:19.110
Milwaukee?
01:07:19.135 --> 01:07:21.210
I'm disavoyed.
01:07:21.235 --> 01:07:24.970
Honestly, for home tools, I have all the wall for home tools.
01:07:24.994 --> 01:07:30.369
But for trail stuff, the Milwaukee stuff is just like, I don't know what has gathered more.
01:07:30.394 --> 01:07:32.409
But dude, whatever I could find.
01:07:32.434 --> 01:07:34.900
Whatever you can use at the time.
01:07:34.929 --> 01:07:35.900
Exactly.
01:07:35.929 --> 01:07:38.889
All right.
01:07:35.929 --> 01:07:38.889
So here's a good one for you, especially.
01:07:38.914 --> 01:07:42.829
Manual or automatic for off-road?
01:07:42.855 --> 01:07:44.369
For off-road, automatic.
01:07:44.394 --> 01:07:48.990
I love manual for road driving, but for off-road, I prefer automatic.
01:07:49.014 --> 01:07:50.409
Okay.
01:07:51.170 --> 01:07:58.970
I can focus more on what's important, more on the wheeling and it's less hard on your drive train with clutching in and whatnot.
01:07:58.994 --> 01:08:01.825
Everything is a little bit smoother.
01:08:01.849 --> 01:08:03.690
You can drive a little bit more technical.
01:08:03.715 --> 01:08:05.230
You don't have a little...
01:08:05.255 --> 01:08:06.409
It has its perks.
01:08:06.434 --> 01:08:15.329
Will swears of running manual off-road, but dude, there's a reason why comp buggies and race cars in off-road, none of them run manuals.
01:08:15.355 --> 01:08:18.569
It's not that great.
01:08:18.595 --> 01:08:21.369
You're definitely not putting yourself in favor over it.
01:08:21.394 --> 01:08:25.069
You definitely have a harder Is it more fun?
01:08:25.095 --> 01:08:26.389
Probably, maybe.
01:08:26.414 --> 01:08:28.369
Sushi is manual.
01:08:28.394 --> 01:08:30.250
I have your Sushi wheel manual.
01:08:30.274 --> 01:08:39.529
It's not that I can do it, but it's definitely a lot more to do, a lot more distraction from what you're actually needing to do, and it's a lot harder on your You have to have a life train every time.
01:08:39.554 --> 01:08:46.929
Then you get on that hill in that off-camber situation and you're like a kid learning to drive again.
01:08:44.094 --> 01:08:46.929
Yeah, exactly.
01:08:46.954 --> 01:08:51.229
You need to finesse something or you're at a tipping point and you need to like the clutch.
01:08:51.254 --> 01:08:55.549
If you clutch in too hard, then you're done.
01:08:55.574 --> 01:08:58.789
You shake up everything.
01:08:58.814 --> 01:09:03.609
You're not doing yourself a favor with manual.
01:09:03.634 --> 01:09:08.089
But whatever you prefer, whatever is more fun to you.
01:09:08.449 --> 01:09:09.589
All right.
01:09:09.614 --> 01:09:13.304
So, Marvin, you're from Germany, but you've lived in the South.
01:09:13.329 --> 01:09:15.189
You've lived in Georgia for a long time now.
01:09:15.214 --> 01:09:18.750
So I think this question is valid.
01:09:18.774 --> 01:09:23.429
Bigfoot, real or mythical?
01:09:18.774 --> 01:09:23.429
Mystical.
01:09:23.454 --> 01:09:24.710
I I would say.
01:09:24.734 --> 01:09:27.264
Bigfoot, I don't know, man.
01:09:24.734 --> 01:09:27.264
I don't know.
01:09:27.289 --> 01:09:29.129
I'm not feeling it, dude.
01:09:27.289 --> 01:09:29.129
I'm not feeling it.
01:09:29.154 --> 01:09:33.169
I hope you run into him out there on the trail.
01:09:33.194 --> 01:09:34.449
I hope so, dude.
01:09:34.474 --> 01:09:35.710
Hey, I'm totally down.
01:09:35.734 --> 01:09:37.089
Prove me wrong, dude.
01:09:37.114 --> 01:09:48.250
I'm down from here for It proved me wrong, but I have the Yeti in the snow and the Bigfoot in the mountains and whatever.
01:09:48.569 --> 01:09:52.169
Awesome.
01:09:48.569 --> 01:09:52.169
Well, listen, man, I appreciate it.
01:09:52.194 --> 01:09:59.109
I hope we'll see you out on the trails at some point, potentially get Sushi up to G-Smitter.
01:09:59.134 --> 01:10:02.069
Dude, I'm hoping to make that happen.
01:10:02.094 --> 01:10:04.189
That'd be really cool.
01:10:04.214 --> 01:10:05.224
Awesome.
01:10:04.214 --> 01:10:05.224
Thank you.
01:10:05.250 --> 01:10:06.149
Good.
01:10:05.250 --> 01:10:06.149
All right.
01:10:06.174 --> 01:10:07.509
Fun.
01:10:06.174 --> 01:10:07.509
This was great.
01:10:07.534 --> 01:10:08.789
Good times.
01:10:08.814 --> 01:10:11.264
Awesome.
01:10:08.814 --> 01:10:11.264
For having me, guys.
01:10:11.289 --> 01:10:12.429
Definitely appreciate it.
01:10:12.454 --> 01:10:19.104
Check us out from YouTube, flexrocksrollovers, Instagram, all that good stuff.
01:10:16.474 --> 01:10:19.104
So, yeah.
01:10:19.129 --> 01:10:20.344
All right.
01:10:19.129 --> 01:10:20.344
Thanks for having me.
01:10:20.369 --> 01:10:20.609
See you now..