By Andy Stapp
Guest Columnist

When I was asked to write a guest column for NSSN, a publication I have grown up (and old) reading, I was honored.              I’ve been asked how a sprint-car crash pilot who grew up traveling all around the Midwest racing as often as my dad’s budget would allow ends up in the Southeast making a career employed by three different premier NASCAR Cup teams in 14 years. 
Maybe they were desperate for help, or perhaps I just love to eat well. 
I realize more and more as my hair turns gray that I have had an awesome life. Fresh out of high school, the opportunity to drive my own sprint car, which had been driven by Brad Marvel and others, presented itself.  I took the opportunity.
We loaded my repaired and salvaged ex-Gary Irvin ’82 Stanton sprint car on the open trailer, left Brownsburg, Ind., and headed 45 minutes down the road to Paragon Speedway — a quarter-mile bullring in south-central Indiana.
Paragon was a great place for beginners because its only crash wall is along the front straightaway, protecting the grandstands. If you run out of talent in corners one, two or three, or along the backstretch, the runoff room is very accommodating. 
However, my talent quickly dried up coming off turn four just in time for that concrete wall to meet me, flipping what a few short moments before was my pride and joy down the frontstretch in front of the grandstands. 
Dazed and battered, we loaded what was now a junk pile and headed home. Dad was great. It wasn’t like he had never taken a racer home in a bucket before, but in a short time a new J&J was assembled and mom and dad’s bank account continued to dwindle. 
Some seven or eight years and a few injuries later, I decided maybe working on other race cars was a good career move. 
A “career move” would have been listening to mom and paying attention in college so that a real career could have been an option; however, in my youthful wisdom I went to work for an Indy Lights team and then Tony Bettenhausen’s Indy-car team. 
Then the great idea was formed to move to Charlotte, N.C., to try working on “taxi cabs.”  Having a CDL license and an ability to tig weld and fabricate landed me with Felix Sabates’s Team SABCO. Then I moved on to Hendrick Motorsports and now hang out at Dale Earnhardt, Incorporated’s No. 8 shop.
I have had great experiences in all the forms of racing I’ve tried, made unrivaled friendships and traveled from coast to coast, border to border and beyond. 
I would never trade these experiences for a career in an office or factory, and I’m proud to say I’ve never had a real job. But I have learned a few things along the way:
1. Parents, no matter how hard they are to raise, know so much more than we give them credit for.
2. All race teams are screwed up — from the biggest and best to my own. The only the big ones have more money to throw at their problems.
3. Talent will help even the most screwed-up team, but only when all the players gel together will they make it to the top.
4. Most importantly for me, paradise is found with my own family, going racing with my own kids and watching them do what they enjoy.
Thanks, mom and dad. Now I know why you spent so much for so long.