Julia Landauer, Former Professional NASCAR Driver and Motivational Speaker
For my next Tiny CEO interview, I interviewed Julia Landauer. She is a former American professional racecar driver, a motivational speaker, and an executive at NASCAR. She was also a contestant on the 26th season of Survivor!
When did you start racing cars?
I started racing in go-karts when I was 10 years old, and it was something that my parents wanted me and my sister to do so that we could all stay together as a family on the weekend. They liked that girls could compete against boys. Racing was so cool because I grew up in New York City, and usually you don't think of New Yorkers as drivers since we always take the subway or a cab. I loved that I was this little kid maneuvering a machine. I was working with adults. And I loved winning.
Why were you the only one who wanted to pursue racing among your siblings?
We all raced go-karts throughout our early teenage years, then my sister decided that she didn't love it as much as my brother and I did. She actually stopped racing go-karts and started rowing. She was still racing—she was just racing in a different type of vehicle. My brother continued to race for a long time, but by the time he got to college, it wasn’t possible anymore because racing is a very expensive sport. Both of us struggled to find sponsorships. My brother worked in the automotive industry right out of college and stayed connected to racing. But financially, it's a pretty tough sport, and that naturally affected how far we were able to pursue it.
What was it like working in an industry mostly dominated by men, being a young woman yourself?
I want to start by saying that there's no right way to be a woman in a male-dominated industry. Everyone's experience is unique. I always knew that I was a little different by being the minority as a woman, but I also really tried to focus people's attention on my accomplishments. I liked talking about winning. I liked trying to be friends with some of the guys. At the end of the day, my results spoke for themselves, and I was able to get respect because I was doing well.
But racing can be isolating. You can feel like you don't have friends at the racetrack, and that’s a really hard part of racing. I always had a very supportive family and very supportive coaches, and so I felt safe with my inner circle. It was just frustrating and different when people from the outside would make comments or think I didn't deserve to be there. Because my inner circle was so strong I always had confidence.
A big piece of advice that I have is to find the people who believe in you and support you no matter what, because the people you let closest to you should be your biggest cheerleaders. I really believe that as you get older, the friends that you surround yourself with, your romantic partners, and the teams that you build should be making you better. Obviously, we don't have control over which families we were born into, and we don't have control over some of the adults in our lives. But when we can start to have some of that control, that's what I like to focus on.
Can you tell me a little more about your experience as a contestant on Survivor? (I’ve never actually seen that show!)
Survivor is a reality TV show competition where you're trying to become the sole survivor of that season. The prize is a million dollars. You're on islands and you start off on 2 tribes. You're competing in challenges trying to kind of get immunity, which is where you stay safe, and you can't get voted out. My season was season 26, which was called Fans vs. Favorites; half of the people had played before, and half of the people had not played before. I hadn’t played before, and it was really challenging. It's very hard, mentally, to be out there with none of the comforts that we're used to with people that we don't know. I got really sunburnt. I was very hungry. It rained constantly at night, and then there's the possibility that it keeps raining during the day. The worst part is that you don't have any ability to dry off, so your skin gets really gross. You just want to feel dry and you just can't. It's a very challenging experience, but something that I'm so glad I got to do. I wish I could have done better, but I made it about halfway.
What is your favorite type of car to drive?
My favorite race car that I've ever driven would probably be the cars that I raced in Europe. They were the NASCAR European series, and people will say that they don't like those cars because they're not as new or technologically advanced. They're not as sophisticated, in a sense, but I thought they were so much fun to drive. I thought they really put an emphasis on the driver when it comes to street cars. I haven't driven a ton of street cars, but I have been able to drive a stick shift Ferrari, which was really cool, and my everyday driving car is a Volkswagen.
Can you tell me a little more about your partnership with Boss Beauties? I’ve actually interviewed Lisa Mayer, the CEO!
In 2022, I was racing in something called the NASCAR Xfinity series, which is the second highest level in NASCAR. I had also been involved in the Web 3 World and in NFTs, and I met Lisa Mayer through a mentor in that space. That was my introduction to Boss Beauties. It was not in a racing context, it was just something that I was interested in.
Boss Beauties was an NFT project where the company made a 10,000-piece NFT series about women doing really cool things. They actually had 106 race car-driving Boss Beauties! I thought it was so cool that they had race car drivers as NFTs. I got one of the race car driver NFTs, and a few months later, I just decided to pitch them. I said, “Hey, you guys have race car driver NFTs. I'm a female race car driver. I'm looking for sponsorship to go into this NASCAR series that gets a million viewers per race. Would you like to partner?” It took a little back and forth, a lot of negotiation, but we got there.
Boss Beauties helped design not only the car, but the suit for my debut race. There was a Boss Beauty on the hood of the car. I had this beautiful pink, blue and purple suit, which I loved. They were my first sponsors, and they became the first NFT sponsors in NASCAR. We were trendsetters because there were other NFT sponsors after that. It was a really great partnership.
What is your favorite part of your job?
Even though I’m not really racing anymore, I would say my favorite part about race car driving was when you get in the zone. You're so focused and things just happen on a subconscious level. You feel like you're one with the car, you hit the perfect marks, you're perfect on braking. It is the coolest feeling to just feel like the car is an extension of you. You’re going so fast, and it just feels so natural. So I missed that, which was by far the coolest feeling in my job.
Now I am doing a lot of motivational keynote speaking, and I also work at NASCAR on the strategy and innovation team. In my current job, I love being able to connect with audiences. I got to connect with you and your classmates. I also like brainstorming ideas about how things can be done better or more efficiently. That's a lot of what I'm doing at NASCAR now, and it's really cool to use my brain in a different way.
What is the hardest part of your job?
The hardest part about racing was when you didn't really jive with the team or you didn’t have the best relationship with them. You had to put in extra work just to get their respect. If we weren't having good races, everyone would be feeling a little down in the dumps, and getting everyone excited to try to get out of that rut was really hard.
I would say sometimes it's hard to see all the other racers who are still racing, because I miss racing. I felt like it was time to move on, but I still really miss it. You can love something and know that it's not the right thing to keep pursuing anymore. Sometimes it gets hard to see drivers in Victory Lane celebrating a win, and feeling like I might not feel that ever again.
Who is your woman role model?
I have a few different role models. There's one in the racing world, and her name is Lyn St. James. She was one of the pioneer women in racing. She got a lot of wins, and she spent so many years giving back and trying to help other women who are making it. I'm also a big Serena Williams fan. Her accomplishments on and off the court are so impressive, and I just admire her a lot. I love that she was one of the first athletes of my time to talk about how much she loved winning. That started to make it okay for girls and women to love winning.
Do you have any advice for young entrepreneurs like me, who are looking to start a business?
A really important thing to remember is just because someone says “no,” you should think of it as a “not right now,” not a “not ever.” You should try to find other ways to get a yes, or try to get a yes with other people. Just don’t let “no” stop your journey. As I said before, it's important to have a good team around you that believes in you. It's also important to remember that not everyone is going to understand your vision. And people are going to doubt you. That's on them. Never let them get in the way of your own ambition, or vision, or creativity, or goals.
The last bit of advice is: Never tell yourself “no.” If you're thinking of trying something, other people will try to tell you “no,” so do not be the one to tell yourself “no.” Believing in yourself and having the confidence that you'll figure it out—that is really empowering.