Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Intro.
[00:00:06] Mark Boudreau: You're listening to the Motorsport Prospects Podcast.
Hey, it's Mark from Motorsport Prospects and welcome to the Motorsport Prospects Podcast. This is where we dive into the world of motorsport with the people who live and breathe it. From driver coaches and sponsorship experts to team owners, pro drivers and more. You'll hear real stories, practical advice and insights you can actually use, whether you're just starting out or already chasing success on the track.
Now, I'm always asked why I started Motorsport Prospects and the reason is pretty simple. I founded Motorsport Prospects and the verified my Motorsports Prospects designation after hearing the same question time and again from drivers, aspiring drivers, their families and advisors. And that question was always, who can I trust? Who can we trust with our career?
Many struggle to find reliable guidance, so I created Motorsport Prospects basically to help them make informed decisions. Now, the professionals I feature on this podcast represent that trust. So if you work with drivers or racing teams, building trust is one of the most important things you can do. Over the years, I found that being clear about what you offer, following through on your promises, and genuinely caring about your clients goals makes all the difference.
With that, I've put together some practical advice and a free white paper called the Three Essentials for Motorsport Business Owners, which share simple ways to strengthen relationships, attract the right clients and grow your motorsport business. Naturally, you can find the link to the Three Essentials for Motorsport Business Owners in the podcast Show Notes and also on Motorsport Prospects.com so that's it with that, let's get started.
My guest today is Ed Holloran. Ed is the Chair of Motorsports Law at the law firm Quarles. Ed and Quarles specialize in representing series sanctioning bodies, race teams and sponsors in all phases of the ever changing complex world of motorsports legal challenges and opportunities.
His representations include the largest of the international players in motorsports, all the way down to grassroots organizations, teams and racing athletes. He lives in Speedway Indiana, mere feet from the racing capital of the world, the Indianapolis Speedway. He splits his time between Corll's offices in Indian Tampa when he's not in an airplane, around the paddock or in the pit lane.
Welcome to the Motorsport Prospects Podcast. Ed, thanks so much for taking time out to speak with me.
[00:02:44] Ed Holloran: Thank you so much, Mark. I'm delighted to be here. What an honor.
[00:02:48] Mark Boudreau: Great. And needless to say, as a fellow lawyer, it's always fun to speak with lawyers that deal with, as you said, the complex world of motorsport law. I mean sports law in general. I've always found to probably be one of the most complex types of law only because it encompasses so many different aspects of the legal profession, whether that be employment law, labor law, business law.
You know, it. It's, it's all in there. It's. It's all wrapped up in one big, messy bow.
[00:03:23] Ed Holloran: You really nailed it. My favorite question to answer is, what is a motorsports lawyer that people are confused? And I say, well, what do you think motorsports in the term, in the world of motorsports, what legal needs do you think that teams, drivers, series need? And they're like, oh, everything. And I'm like, bingo, Just like you said, Mark. So, yeah, I mean, any given day, it's, it's kind of interesting. It's. Any given day, I, I will deal with employment contracts, environmental litigation, international tax, things like that. Now, I obviously, I don't think any lawyer should do all of those things, and I certainly don't. And that's kind of the, I'd say, the unique aspect of being a big law lawyer in motorsports. There aren't a lot of us in big law, but it's kind of nice to have so many parts partners and a deep bench that can help my clients when the crazy world of motorsports legal needs arises. And it's something like, wow, never heard of that one, but I got a partner down the hall that does that.
[00:04:16] Mark Boudreau: Yeah, yeah, it is. It is definitely complex.
Now on the podcast, I ask one, like I said, it's a simple question and yet not that simple.
And this is based on your experience and expertise as a motorsport professional.
What would be the one most important piece of advice you could offer a current or aspiring race driver?
[00:04:43] Ed Holloran: Race drivers think their job is to drive fast.
That's natural. That is obvious. Realistically, your job is to own and run and develop and nurture a business.
You are a business entity. And a lot of the fastest race car drivers in the world are sitting on the sidelines not driving because they don't understand. Understand that.
And the more I think that a young driver can understand the complexities of you are a business.
Those are the ones that ultimately are successful.
Those are the ones that control their destiny rather than be controlled by teams.
Is, you know, some of the more talented drivers that don't have any business acumen. They may be very sought after because of their talent, but as we know, in the world of motorsports, it takes a lot more to aspire and achieve and ascend the ladders of racing than just talent. So I think that a young driver really, really should, you know, investigate the, the industry, develop business. How do I market myself? Take a speaking Class, learn how to remain calm under pressure. Understand this very clearly that your reputation is far, far more important than your fastest lap.
[00:05:58] Mark Boudreau: Right? Absolutely. That is, that is great advice. And one of the things I find in drivers, especially younger drivers, is the excitement of, for example, signing age. A contract with a team tends to overwhelm, I won't say common sense because, you know, legal contracts are not, it's not an issue of common sense, but they sometimes will overlook scenarios where they're actually at a disadvantage.
So when it comes to contracts, for example, how important is it to have to consult with a lawyer, particularly one that understands the complexities of motorsport?
[00:06:44] Ed Holloran: I'll answer it this way, Mark. I think that it is such a reality that a bad contract at 17 years old can cost you millions, if not tens of millions of dollars at 27 years old. And I hope that sets in because we all understand, as you said, if I was a 17 year old driver offered a contract of a lifetime, I'm probably signing that thing at 17. Okay? But you have to slow down and think, what am I doing? I'm getting into a legal obligation where I have no leverage. I am the talent. There are a lot of talented drivers out there and this race team probably has a lot of options. I might think I'm the best or I might think I'm unique.
You're probably not.
You have to stop and say, you know, how is this going to affect me down the road? What if I am successful? What if I am lightning in a bottle and I ascend to the ranks of some of the tiers, tier one series across the globe, and then I have a bad contract and all my ip, which is intellectual property rights, are assigned to a team or driver, excuse me, a team or a league or a series or whatever it might be, or a manager or agent manager, any of these things. And I'm not speaking ill of any of those folks. As you said at the beginning, I really don't represent a lot of individual drivers. I typically am on the team side. And while I will not sit here and say that, we tend to take advantage of that. I have a job to advocate for my client and my client's interest. And my client's interests are to have great drivers that perform really well for their teams, leagues, series, whatever they may be, and earn money, earn sponsorship for that organization. So there's, they're not always perfectly aligned interests. We both want the same thing. We want success.
But we're looking at a team structure where you're looking at your career and you're 17 years old. We might be a 50 year old organization, very successful, that have a stable of drivers like you. So it's just different interest aligned. And as a young driver, if you're involved with your parents, hopefully you know, your parents, the sacrifices parents make in this industry to get their children where they are is we could talk all day, that'd be an entire series of podcasts to interview parents and the sacrifices they make. But parents also of young aspiring drivers, please get legal involved. I know it's expensive, but I tell you what, Mark, you'll probably agree with this. A little bit of upfront money in reviewing a contract can save you millions of millions of dollars of bad paper down the road.
[00:09:14] Mark Boudreau: Yeah, absolutely. And the other thing I always say when it comes to a contract is contract. When things are going great, contracts, you know, no issues. It's when things are not going great, when all of a sudden it becomes clear that this contract is, might be weighted towards the team more than for the driver. Which is why as you mentioned, you know, when you're working on the, on the team side, clearly your, you know, it is part of your job to advocate for the team, which is why it's so important that the driver has their advocate advocating for them.
And you know, contracts are not, you know, boilerplate contracts would always make me nervous, but contracts in motorsport are very different from your typical contract. Yeah, the overall idea is the same, but there are, there are nuances in there.
So I think it's really important that drivers honestly, no matter what the age, but as you said, clearly extremely important when they're younger that they get somebody who really understands that. And every service that you're going to pay for as a driver is an investment.
The whole point of motorsport prospects is to connect you with the professionals, that the investment will be worth it in the long run.
And yeah, sometimes the excitement and glamour tends to overrule, you know, getting somebody to actually look into this to make sure it's what it should be.
[00:10:50] Ed Holloran: Sense and reason. Right? Yeah, the excitement. And again, we all understand that, we're happy and excited for you and the team is too, but the team has interest and they often are quite different than yours. Off the track, specifically.
[00:11:06] Mark Boudreau: Yeah, absolutely. And what might not seem important now as a young driver, when it comes to your ip, as you said, intellectual property rights, even, you know, the, the big thing in, in, in athletics is name, image, likeness, these things might not seem important. You know, I'm a young driver, I'm racing in F2000 or whatever it is. But down the line, those could be critical factors, as you said, in your success off the track as well as on. I think some of the most successful drivers are also extremely successful in their business pursuits, in their off track business, actually. Athletes in general, you know, you'll see that they have the right advisors guiding them in what they should and shouldn't be doing.
And because, you know, unfortunately, that career will not last forever.
You have a finite amount of time as a driver.
You want to make sure that you have an ecosystem set up that helps you in the future to basically enjoy, you know, the life that you built from all that hard work.
[00:12:19] Ed Holloran: Absolutely.
We can look back and say, well, gee, why are so many former racers now managers and agents?
[00:12:26] Mark Boudreau: Yeah, yeah, yeah, exactly.
[00:12:28] Ed Holloran: Because it's a very, very profitable business and very smart thing to do. And you, you know, you bring the experience, you can relate to young drivers.
But there is, you know, there's a lot to that.
[00:12:38] Mark Boudreau: Yeah. Now you are working for your chair of motorsports law at law firm Quarles. Tell me a little bit about how people could get in touch with you, a little bit about what you do at the firm and.
Yeah, yeah.
[00:12:58] Ed Holloran: So Quarles is unique in that we're a big law firm. We're a big national law firm, Midwest based, but we have offices coast to coast. I have a very national and now international practice.
And what I say, when I say big law, we do everything. It's a little bit unique than a lot of my colleagues in motorsports who might be the best environmental lawyer or the best immigration visa lawyer or the contract person or lady.
We do it all. And it's very nice that I can just go down the hallway or make a virtual call to one of my colleagues in another office that might be a top five industry practitioner in a specific niche area of law.
And as we talked, motorsports law is so unique and complex that we understand those complexities. I think that motorsports industry knowledge and insight is so important when you're dealing with this business because you need to understand, as you said, name, engine, name, image, likeness, those are unique contracts to sports. And in motorsports, they're even more unique because it's just, it's very different appearances and responsibilities and obligations of an athlete.
So we understand that there's nothing in the motorsports world that you're going to encounter that corals can't help you with.
I'm typically the point person. I'm happy to talk with anyone free of charge. Give me a call to reach out. I can try to direct you if it's something that I would recommend another practitioner do.
One thing about us in motorsports law is we're all pretty, pretty darn friendly even when we're on the other side of the table. And I think that works well because we get a lot of things done. I think we all have mutual. We have obligations to zealously advocate for our clients. But we also know the end goal is to win races.
Please sponsors obtain business sponsor opportunities and things like that. So we're aligned in that and we get along and we understand that those common interests. So happy to recommend people and I know many of my other colleagues, different firms would do the exact same thing for young aspiring drivers saying, yep, here's my recommendation.
Proceed and happy to do that.
[00:15:07] Mark Boudreau: Perfect. And I will put all the contact information, the website address in the show notes so there will be. So that you know, you could reach out to Ed. You know, you mentioned one thing specifically that always, well, not, I shouldn't say always often causes issues and that's visas.
I think a lot of people don't understand the importance of visas, especially if you're racing internationally or you're coming to race in North America.
That is an area. And this same issue occurs in the music industry where people don't understand the importance of getting the right guidance on visa requirements wherever you're racing.
Can you speak to that just a little bit?
[00:15:55] Ed Holloran: Absolutely. Treat it as your key, the whole key to your life in this industry.
You cannot and should not engage in employment activity, be it racing or anything in a foreign country without understanding what requirements you have to comply with visa or international trade, whatever the specific country or region's requirements are. They're often not expensive, they're time intensive.
But it's something that every driver and this is an international sport probably more than anything in the world. So you are going to interact internationally, hopefully, especially if you're successful and there's nuances to everywhere.
So a little bit of legal legwork up front.
One thing, biggest piece of advice I can give drivers to save money. Everybody's going to listen now because we're going to save money is obtain what I call kind of your portfolio file of your winnings, of your achievements, of your accomplishments that you have at the ready to give lawyers because typically one of the things that we would recommend is that like you know, professional athlete style visas that you can attach mechanics and physios and other people to. At times you can save so much money in the visa process if you have all of that stuff organized ready that your Lawyer doesn't have to go get for you. You do not need to pay a lawyer to develop your portfolio of professional accomplishments. And many times we'll have that sent to us. Sometimes we have to start from scratch and boy, that gets expensive, needlessly expensive. Whereas the, the, the business savvy young lawyer racers have that at the ready and say, sure Ed, here's my portfolio and I open it and there's, you know, saved PDFs of articles and you know, awards and things like that. It's like, great. Wow, this just made, you know, that saved four, six, seven hours of time at several hundred dollars an hour.
[00:17:50] Mark Boudreau: Yeah, everybody wants to save money and you know, you've heard this probably as much as I have, but you know, everybody hates lawyers until they need them.
[00:18:02] Ed Holloran: The best us and mechanics.
[00:18:04] Mark Boudreau: Yeah, yeah, exactly.
Well, you know, this is valuable advice, Ed. Really appreciate you being on the podcast. I do have one final question, which I think I'll. I know the answer, but I'm going to ask it anyways.
Please tell me, what is your favorite racetrack, Current or historical?
[00:18:24] Ed Holloran: Man Mark, it's the Internet. Indianapolis Motor Speedway. I wish you guys it was a little bit less foggy today, but it's 468ft right behind me. I happen to live right on Main street in speedway in Speedway, Indiana, so the International Motor Speedway is my home. I think if you Google me, you'll probably come up with an article where I say I want my ashes spread there at some point in my life. So it means everything in the world.
So it's probably best for say, other than IMs, what is it for me right now it's Road America. I just absolutely love the national park of speed and I've never not had just a glorious day up there in the middle of Wisconsin Dairyland and just really, really enjoy Road America.
[00:19:06] Mark Boudreau: Great, great choices. Like I said, I had a funny feeling the indie would be, would be one of your choices right there.
Really great speaking with you and really appreciate, I think for the listeners, you know, again, we, you know, we are lawyers and we're not trying to, you know, ring our bell or anything, but it's really, really critical that you engage with a proper legal representation to review those contracts to make sure that you are in fact protected in your career, especially early on.
So like, again, if you have questions, Ed would be a great guy to reach out to and get some, get some feedback.
So, yeah, great. Thanks, Ed. So that's it for this week. This is Mark from Motorsport Prospects reminding you to stay fast, stay focused and keep chasing that checkered flag.
Thanks for listening to the Motorsport Prospects podcast. For insights, advice and the latest news racers can use, visit Motorsport Prospects.com.
