Written by Shift Up Now Athlete Brenna Schubert
At age 20, I was fed up. I had made virtually no progress in my racing career since beginning karting at age nine. I was still racing at the same 1/5th-mile road course track, often being the only competitor in my class.
On the bright side, at least I was able to practice race craft at my local indoor karting track every week. But who’s going to notice someone who’s just a “rental karter"? How was I supposed to accomplish my only goal in life of becoming a professional race car driver?
I knew the answer was money. That seems like it's always the case. But as a full-time college student with a side gig as a nanny, there wasn’t much hope. I knew I had to leverage every connection I had instead, and still spend every dime of my money. So that’s what I did.
I'm not exaggerating when I say that for more than three years, my bank account was never consistently over $0.99. I had worked out a deal with a national karting team—Team Ferris Racing—that was based at my local track, to be able to race a full national schedule for the first time ever. I will forever be grateful for them, because they are the reason I was able to get “noticed” in this sport.
It took about a year and a half of for me to pay off the go kart they lent me, along with the fees associated with the races. During that time, I was sending every paycheck I made directly to the team owner, and that's how I completed my first “real” racing season.
This gave me two things: a sense of hope and pride again after staying stagnant for so long, and more importantly, notability within the racing community. Immediately following my first national karting season, I had already been picked for two international driving shootouts to move up to racing cars. Less than a year later, I was recommended for a third as opportunities felt like they were really beginning to flow.
Even though I had successfully won two out of the three shootouts, something still felt like it was missing. The results of these shootouts had given me invaluable experience and testing opportunities, but I was missing that “full season” in a legitimized series that I yearned for back in my rental karting days. Testing in cars and doing one-off races wasn’t going to keep my notability growing.
That’s when I found the application for the AE Victory Racing Female Driver Shootout, where the winner would receive a full season in the Toyota Supra GT4 car in the World Racing League (WRL). I knew that this was the shot I needed to take. And just like when I sacrificed all those years with $0.99 in my bank account, I was going to put every ounce of myself into winning that shootout.
And that’s what I did.
Since then, the hard work hasn’t stopped. And neither has the gratitude I have for Erin Vogel and the AE Victory Racing team for giving me this next step in my career that I’ve strived to reach for so long. And even though the No. 119 car has already received multiple podiums thus far, you better believe that I will be channeling my 20-year-old self to help get us that first win.
Hopefully it happens this weekend at Daytona. And then every race after that!
Keep sacrificing, keep growing, stay grateful.
Thank you to AE Victory Racing and Shift Up Now for all you do to keep us pushing onward in accomplishing our goals!
