Alexander Koreiba on How To Become a Race Car Driver

Introduction [0:00]

Alexander: It always surprises people when I say that I coached Cody Jones of Dude Perfect and Keanu Reeves.... but that was one of the most stressful weekends of my life.

The hardest part about being a driver is the work outside of the race car that it takes - 95% of your job is finding the funds or finding the opportunity because you never know the next time you're going to get in a race car.

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Who is Alexander Koreiba? [0:31]

Greg: So welcome back to another episode of FanAmp Insider. This time we have a very special guest in a very special place. For those who don’t know, who is Alexander Koreiba?

Alexander: My name's Alexander Koreiba. I'm a racing driver competing in various forms of motorsports.

IMSA Prototype Challenge... IndyNXT stuff.... Just enjoying not having a real job and driving in circles. I always say I'll never have a midlife crisis because I've always been in one.

Greg: Yeah, that's a very good phrase.

Alexander: I don't have any college experience or anything like that, so any job outside of driving... I am literally screwed.

Kaitlin: You grew up in middle of nowhere. It's called Branson, Missouri. How many people are in that town?

Alexander: I think there's 10,000 people total. I will say it's a tourist capital and 8 million people a year visit because it's Christian family-friendly Vegas.

Kaitlin: Oh, wow.

Alexander: It's different. I grew up with family in the entertainment business. It's weird growing up with parents who held microphones for a living rather than have a nine to five, so maybe that's another reason why I want to avoid having a real job as well.

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Tanner Foust and why Alexander chose racing [1:42]

Kaitlin: So obviously, you grew up around music and not race cars. What was that first moment that made you decide, this is what I'm gonna do?

Alexander: I think the thing that led into getting into racing was just loving cars. I don't know where it came from, but my mom even said, when I was two years old, I was leaning out of my stroller to watch the wheels turn.

So, obviously, there was something in me from the very beginning that I loved cars and motorsports. Then when I was six years old, seven years old, my dad had a Corvette, and that was the thing where .... you're a little kid and this is the fastest thing on earth.

He'd gun it in third and fourth gear - that sort of thing. It was everything. This is in me... I can feel this amazing car... and I don't know what this is, but I really love it. From then on there was this love of cars and I got into racing more.

I started getting into it and just seeing, "how can you become a driver per se?" That part stemmed from as a kid watching Top Gear USA, specifically. I literally just wanted to be Tanner Faust. Once I saw Tanner Faust as a kid - I literally just wanted to be Tanner.

This is the coolest dude ever. He drifts. He's on tv. How do I become that guy? That's really what made all of this start, honestly.

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How to become a race car driver [3:07]

Greg: What was that first step like? What do you do?

Alexander: I remember googling how to become a race car driver. You're looking that up and, you find YouTube videos or forums back in the day.

I remember finding out about what karting was, and that sort of thing. Then, upon all my research, I started figuring out who the likes of Fernando Alonso were. Michael Schumacher... All of these famous drivers. That's when the drive for the IndyCar side of things happened, right.

Who doesn't want to do 240 miles an hour at Indianapolis?

So, I don't know how I did it. I will be honest with you... I don't know how I ever got to where I am now. I'm like the last person from, 'Bumble Crud, Missouri'. That should be anywhere near an IndyCar.

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Starting late in karting and “stupid, blind confidence” [3:52]

Kaitlin: So starting late...

Alexander: 14.

Kaitlin: 14. What was it like karting as a 14-year-old next to, I would assume, 8-year-olds?

Alexander: We did have classes for that, I will say. At the age I was starting, it was like these kids had been doing it for 10 years, since they were five years old. My whole career has been baptism by fire where it's like, "Hey, you want to come drive this car?"

It's a free opportunity where I know I'll figure it out. You just hope that you don't crash the car, number one, and that you have the natural talent to pull it off. I always say, I've always had this stupid blind confidence in that, "oh, I can do it. Yeah, just put me in the car. I can figure it out."

That's been my whole career.

First race ever, I had done 10 laps before we started the race and ended up in third place. In that moment you're like, "oh maybe there's something... a little bit to this."

Kaitlin: Where does the blind confidence come from? Is it because your parents are entertainers?

You have to be that way?

Alexander: Yeah, I'd say that kind of stems from it. Also, my dad preaching confidence into me since I was a young kid. He'd always call me a champion. "You're a champion. You can do anything you set your mind to." Really, all of those kinds of things. Evidently I believed him.

Greg: Was there a moment when you, maybe very early on, first stepped into the car and something happened? Maybe you took a turn in the kart, anything, and you were like, "oh, shit. I have that talent, I have that innate ability"?

Alexander: Yeah, I'd say the biggest 'aha' ever for me was my first time in a race car.

When I turned 18, I hopped in a race car for the first time. The moment I got in one at the Lucas Oil School of Racing - which is like a Formula style car, baby IndyCar if you will - No wings. No real big horsepower - just momentum style car. The moment I got into that car, it was like... this is what it's all about.

I immediately was on pace. I was - oh my gosh - like this is what it's about. The moment I got in a race car, it just clicked.

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Alexander’s earliest influences [5:47]

Kaitlin: So who were your early influences?

Alexander: My dad. It's crazy though, even you just bringing that up because he.... being an entertainer... he was a singer his whole life.

For him to become a racing dad was not normal. He didn't know anything about it, and I thank him to this day for it. Even that he just took me to the track. He brought me there in his pickup truck, and we unloaded the go-kart that he eventually bought me. It's incredible that he was able to do that.

There were several influences during those days. There was a one driver named Kenny Foster, who was the mega driver at that local track, who took me under his wing. Then he built me up and helped me. He's a big reason behind all the hard work and as to why I am where I am.

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Trading social media skills for drive time (what it really takes) [6:33]

Kaitlin: You were essentially - from what I read in your local newspaper that did a beautiful piece on you - working your butt off to be able to afford to race, including trading your skills in social media... To be in that car. To put it in context, how much time are you spending working versus being in the actual car?

Alexander: For any driver, 95% of your job is finding the funds, or finding the opportunity, or walking around paddocks, or talking to team owners, whatever it might be. The 5% of the other time is the most fun part... obviously the driving of the race car. It's the other stuff that is the hard part. The work outside of the race car that it takes. It's a haul to say the least.

Greg: To put that into more context for the people who watch... What does that feel like for you? How did that evolve as you got older in all of this?

Alexander: You start out as a kid and you're looking at it like, "I want to be an IndyCar driver. I want to be a NASCAR driver. I want to be an F1 driver."

It looks like they're just drivers - they just show up and they're heroes. They get to drive race cars and then you get to that funny moment like in the Wizard of Oz where you pull the curtain back and the wizard's just sitting right back there.

You're like, "oh, like that's not how this works."

It's not just about being fast or, that type of thing. There's so much more behind it.

It changes the way you perceive the industry and the way you look at the industry. Yeah...

At the end of the day, it's not just a sport where honestly the best make it or something like that, right? There's a million other things that factor into - number one, you getting in that race car, and number two, winning in that race car.

Greg: Speaking personally, I find that fundraising notion of it to be the hardest thing because you're convincing other people to bet on you to do any of it. It can be some of the most depressing days I've ever felt in my life, speaking very honestly.

I'm curious, how has that been for you? How do you push yourself through it?

Alexander: Yeah, you have your bad days, that's for sure. It's that another deal doesn't go through, or a ride didn't come together at the last minute and those are rough, right? You're questioning why you're still doing this and is this even possible?

Is this for me? All of that kind of stuff. Then, early on in your career when you're selling your heart out to these people, saying "please believe in me", and that kind of stuff - when you know nothing about sponsorship or anything like that and you're just hoping that you say the right thing and do the right things. You are a kid trying to make them believe in you, and it doesn't work out... those are tough.

It's easy to get bitter. Thinking, "I should be in that car and I should have that opportunity". It still is now. Sometimes you walk around and you're thinking, "I know I'm faster than the guy. These guys... I've been faster my whole career, but they're the ones in the seat."

That's a tough pill to swallow sometimes, but, I heard a driver recently say that, something that is a major career killer for a lot of drivers is being bitter. It's going to hurt your career more than it's going to help. Now, I've been in it long enough that it's okay, like I said, next one onto the next.

Now there still are tough days, right? Honestly, the thing that helps a lot with that is just getting back in a car and reigniting your love for the sport. Even if it's just going and training or something like that... you immediately snap out of it.

I'm thankful for the route that I've had as well. As much as it like sucks at times... believe me, it sucks. Everything about the networking of racing is that you're always on, right? You go to a Super Bowl party or you go to this interview, or you're sitting in the airport, or sitting on an airplane - you're always looking for opportunities. That goes all the way down to doing a speech at a dinner the night before a race.

When some guys are like, "I need my rest". I'm like, "not me. I have to go entertain the people who are helping pay for this thing."

Greg: ...OR, in a car warehouse or a car dealership talking to us.

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Sim racing as Alexander’s outlet [10:39]

Kaitlin: Do you have a designated space or time that you're like, "I'm off, I'm done. Don't talk to me. This is my moment to spend with myself"?

Alexander: I would say the only time I'm away from that side is when I'm on the simulator.

Alexander on the sim radio: Come on Chris.

Alexander: I'm just like having fun driving. That's a really fun aspect. I'm a jerk to the other sim racers online. I really am, because I view iRacing as my place where I try new moves.

Greg: Do you get on the headset like you're on Xbox Live and curse people out?

Alexander: I don't curse them out because it's my real name on iRacing, so I don't want them seeing that. I've legit had people message me on my Instagram before - DMing me saying, "bro, you took me out in last night's race at Petite".

Greg: You're like, "sorry, I'm testing".

Alexander: Yeah. I'm like, sorry bro. That's all you get. It's not real.

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Teaching Dude Perfect’s Cody Jones to race Keanu Reeves [11:36]

Greg: So you also teach people to race.

Alexander: Yeah. It always surprises people when I say that I coach, and I instruct in driving.

I bet 90% of drivers, when they're not racing, our day job is instructing, teaching other people how to race. That's what we do as professional drivers. I got to coach two people this past year that stood out. One was Cody Jones of Dude Perfect. He was my driver during the full experience, six months of training to get him ready for the Toyota GR Cup, and it was our job to train him up to become a race car driver.

Greg: How was he?

Alexander: He was fantastic, honestly, because he really took it seriously. It's a difficult thing to train somebody for, right? When you haven't done it your whole life - it is not just about being fast, right? It's not just about your outright speed or anything like that. It's how do you race people on the track?

What is your race craft like? How do you handle the highs and lows of a race weekend? How do you condition yourself, as well? What does training look like and all those kinds of things... And he took it like an absolute pro.

Then the other guy that was along with Cody Jones was a guy... I don't know if you've heard of him.

He's called Keanu Reeves. You ever heard of him?

Greg: No. I know John Wick.

Alexander: Yeah, John. Yeah. I think they're related. So, that was a crazy one. It was one of the most stressful weekends of my life, though, because you're trying to keep these celebrities safe.

You have all these media everywhere. Every time we'd come back to the transporter, there were 150 people, not just fans, but people inside our tent as well, because it was media people, Toyota execs, this group of people, and this posse. It's... dear Lord... what is happening right now? It was mayhem the whole weekend.

So much fun. I don't know that I want to do that again though.

Greg: Who's faster? Of the two of them.

Alexander: Oh, it's not fair to say which one, but I will say... By the end of Keanu's fourth day, he was within a second of Cody... who trained for six months. He was very impressive. I would love to see him do more in motorsports. That'd be cool.

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The first big break with IMSA’s Prototype Challenge [13:47]

Greg: Going back in your career and thinking of that first big break… What was that first moment? What did that feel like?

Alexander: I've had some cool ones. I'd say that the biggest break that I've had was the opportunity to go run IMSA prototype Challenge in 2022. That was an important deal for me because my entire junior career, junior formula career, leading up to that opportunity in 2022 was one-offs or partial schedule or doing some testing. It was never full-time.

I never did anything full-time from the time I was in the Lucas Cars in 2017 to 2022... nothing full time. It was all wining and dining - trying to figure out something and just taking an opportunity, or putting this together here. 2022 was that moment where, "okay, we have a full-time ride. We can actually go run for a championship, and we can give it our all, essentially."

This whole season - jumping around and jumping through hoops just to put one race on the schedule... That was an incredible year for many reasons, but that was the big break for my career, I'd say.

Greg: Did you feel like you could finally breathe?

Alexander: I don't know about breathe per se. As far as the funding, yes. As far as putting together the ride, yes. I knew I'd signed the contract. I am in this car until Petit Le Mans. I am in this car, we're good to go. I'd say the pressure really kicked in then, because now it's "okay, now you've got a full-time ride... Now you better perform."

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Racing with Memo Gidley [15:29]

Kaitlin: You were parted up with Memo Gidley, who you referred to as one of your mentors. So did you know him at all before that ride, or did it just develop?

Alexander: Yeah. During that ride. I didn't know Memo at all before that ride. Long story short of that ride - it was a last minute deal to put Memo in the car with me because in that series, you had to run a silver driver and a bronze driver.

Bronze driver - didn't work out with the one that was supposed to be in the car. I'm thinking...

We're two weeks before Daytona and the original bronze... Who's the car owner might I add? He can't race the car anymore, so it's "oh my God, the guy who bought the race car to go and compete is not allowed to go drive his car now."

I'm thinking - career's in the toilet. This is all going downhill. I'm going to have to go work at Burger King, something like that, but the car owner calls me. He says, "Hey, I just want to let you know that, just because I can't race doesn't mean this program still isn't gonna happen."

Then we call our team manager and my personal manager at the time, Chris Wheeler. We said, Chris, we need a driver. He said, "I'm already on it. I'm getting you the fastest freaking bronze I can possibly find." We went and got a former IndyCar driver, podium finisher out of Memo Gidley.

I met him on grid, here in Daytona, Thursday of the ROAR. So, Thursday - the car unloads. "Hi Mamo. Great to meet you. I'm your teammate."

Friday we're practicing.

Kaitlin: How was that? Was it like smooth sailing or rough beginning?

Alexander: I mean, it was pretty awesome. I will say, he is such a wealth of knowledge and like I said, he's a big mentor of mine to this day. He is just the most awesome, encouraging guy who took me under his wing right from the beginning.

We were a team from the jump.

Kaitlin: And you guys went to finish second in the entire championship.

Yeah. It was pretty fantastic. No, that, that's pretty great. First practice we were P4. Second practice, we were P2. Then, he goes and throws it on the pole during night qualifying.

Then the race, we led the entire field, which was pretty incredible. We were the first team to go to slicks, which is a big strategy call that even Chris Wheeler made during that time. Another story for another time, but ended up taking third because of some strategy in the way the yellows fell.

It just didn't go our way, but still third in our first race ever together. That was the moment right there, where you get out of the car and you've proven, "okay, I got my full-time ride. Finally I got the opportunity and we performed and it really went amazingly".

It was like that relief of "okay, I've proven I can be a race car driver."

Greg: You can breathe.

Alexander: Yeah, I can breathe for a second right now. We have to get a little smile. That was the moment right there.

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Signing with his manager, Chris Wheeler [18:21]

Kaitlin: Tell me about Wheeler. How'd you get connected with him and what kind of influence has he had?

Alexander: Chris Wheeler was my manager from the time I was getting out of the Lucas stuff and into Formula 4 and some USF stuff that I was doing at the time.

Chris became my manager by accident. He was the Director of Bell Helmets at the time, and I needed a helmet. I went to him and I said, "Hey, I need, I need a Bell, whatever", I can't remember. He helped get me set up with it. Then he started asking, "what are you doing? What are you working on with this and how's this?"

I was upfront with him. I'm like, "Buddy, I don't have any money if that's what you're looking for."

He said, "No. That's not what I'm asking". At the time, he was starting up his driver management company, and I was one of the guys that he brought under his wing as well as Zach Veach, Oliver Askew, and a couple of other drivers here and there. I've always said that there's nobody that I owe my entire career to more than Chris Wheeler.

The amount of phone calls that 18/19-year-old Alexander made to Chris, annoying him every single time. He always makes fun of me because my go-to line was always, "hey, I've got an idea", or, "hey, what do you think about this?" I annoyed him so bad for many years, but his tutelage and getting me to the places that I needed to and introducing me to the right people - going on sponsorship meetings and having dinners and that kind of stuff, was so important.

Also, he was teaching me the business side of racing. There's nobody that has been more helpful for my entire career than that guy right there.

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Overcoming his biggest fear to achieve success [20:07]

Greg: With professionals like Chris backing him, Alexander has continued to fight for more opportunities behind the wheel, including an Indy NXT test with Juncos Hollinger Racing. But just like he said, drivers can never really take a breath because they always need to be thinking about the next opportunity.

There's a huge amount of unknown in racing. What's your biggest fear about all this stuff? And what's to come in your career?

Alexander: Honestly, my biggest fear is the... I don't wanna say fear of failure, but it's the lack in success, if that makes sense?

I've worked since I was 14 years old, right? I'm 27 now, and worked since that time for that one goal of the Indy 500. To be, at that point... Biggest fear is not getting there, right? It's something that I think about before I go to sleep. As soon as my feet hit the floor in the morning... it's all I think about all day.

It's why I spend hours and hours making marketing decks or calling people on the phone. I'd say that's my biggest fear - just not getting to the point that you've always dreamed of as a kid.

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Seeing Alexander’s hustle at the Rolex 24 [21:22]

Greg: What I appreciate about my time with Alexander was how candid he was explaining the challenges of being a racing driver. To make clear how much he wants it, we filmed this interview around the Rolex 24, a 24 hour endurance race in Daytona, Florida.

At midnight on race day - when all but the drivers and essential personnel were asleep - I saw Alexander leaving partner meetings. He stayed late at the track to meet people and create opportunity. And he did so despite the fact that he still had a 2-hour drive home.

That’s what it takes to make the dream come true.

Thank you very much for the time.

Alexander: Thank you.

Greg: I think anyone who's watching is going to take a lot away from this. Both the people who are aspiring, trying to get into this profession and people who have been in it for a long time. I'm sure a lot of it, especially the difficulty of working through it is something that'll resonate, so thank you.

Kaitlin: If somebody wants to sponsor him, do that.

Greg: Please do. Hit him up on Instagram. Unless you wreck their car in iRacing,

Alexander: Yeah, don't message me when I take you out on iRacing. Don't take offense to that.

Greg: Then thank you to Hanksters Hot Rods down here in Daytona, Florida for giving us the space to be able to film this in.

Alexander: I'm taking one home.

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