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Watches, Cars, and Jonny Lieberman

Published on Mon, 28 Feb 2022 13:00:00 +0000

One of our favorite automotive writers on his love of watches, the shared passion for watches and cars, and the weirdest watch/car collaborations.

Synopsis

This episode features a wide-ranging conversation between host James Stacey, Hodinkee's Cole Pennington, and Motor Trend editor Johnny Lieberman. The discussion explores the fascinating intersection of automotive and watch enthusiasm, with Johnny sharing his journey from wearing G-Shocks to developing a serious watch collection that includes pieces from Sinn, Doxa, and IWC.

Johnny discusses his 17-year career covering cars for Motor Trend, including his work on shows like Ignition and Head to Head, as well as his current podcasts Spike's Car Radio and The Inevitable (focused on electric vehicles and the future of cars). The conversation touches on the culture of automotive journalism, memorable press trips, and encounters with notable figures in the car world who also happen to be watch enthusiasts.

A major focus of the episode is Johnny's upcoming participation in the Pikes Peak International Hill Climb, where he'll be driving a Porsche 718 Cayman GT4 Club Sport. He shares his preparation process and the honor of being selected by legendary photographer and racer Jeff Zwart. The trio also discusses the evolution of the automotive industry toward electric vehicles, with Johnny expressing cautious optimism about brands like Rivian and Lucid while acknowledging the emotional attachment many enthusiasts have to internal combustion engines.

The episode concludes with a playful game pairing specific cars with appropriate watches, revealing the panelists' deep knowledge of both worlds and the often-intuitive connections between automotive and horological design philosophies.

Transcript

Speaker
Johnny Lieberman Hey, it's me, James Stacey, and this week we've got a car heavy chat with Cole and our buddy Johnny Lieberman, who's an editor with Motor Trend that has spent more than a decade covering the world of cars, hosting an array of amazing videos, and more recently, a couple of pretty great automotive podcasts, including his own show, The Inevitable, and as a co-host on Spikes Car Radio. Johnny is a consummate car expert, a talented writer, a man of many opinions, and most certainly a watch nerd. I couldn't be more excited to have Johnny and Cole on this episode, so buckle up, cause we're taking a tour through the world of watches, cars, and more. Also, just a quick heads up, but this episode contains a bit of adult language, so if you're sensitive to such things, please consider yourself warned. Let's get to it. I'm good. I'm doing really well. I mean, lots of technical difficulties because apparently it's my first time podcasting in several hours. But uh aside from that, I'm really happy to be here. Johnny, I've been uh I've been a fan of yours for a long time. Uh, you know, I think you've been with uh Motor Trend for the better part of what eleven twelve years at this point? Getting on twelve. Yeah. Super impressive. And I remember when I I I remember just adoring, you know, ignition and head to head, which were kind of I think at one point your two most kind of forward facing because that was during the deal with Discovery. You were in a lot of homes. It was it was before Discovery. I mean, it was we were on YouTube and then we were on Netflix, and then uh we weren't. So yeah. But it it was was really we had nine seasons ahead to head. And as uh as uh Spike uh my my my friend on Spike Square Radio said, like well Seinfeld had 10, you know, so nine seasons was pretty good. Not a bad run. You know, I I also think you're one of my favorite Instagram follows. It's just uh it's a zero it's just you answer questions, and if the questions are dumb, they get a dumb answer. If it's a thoughtful question, they get a thoughtful answer, which I think is a better deal than most people get on the internet. That's a better deal than you get on Reddit. Yeah. Well, it's funny you say that because you know, obviously I spend way too much time reading comments, but you know, I tend to find the the ones that I can't stand is when everybody gets a nice response, like when when you know someone says something so mean, cruel, like just your typical gutter, you know, uh YouTube comment. And then I don't know, like what people are like, they try to be nice. If you ever see me say thank you, I'm not saying thank you, I'm saying something else that ends with the word you. My longstanding reply when it's something that I literally can't fathom how to actually type a thoughtful response. I just say okay. Okay, period, and I move on. And sometimes people think that as being literal and I'm that's fine. And other times people take it for what it is, which is I think exactly the same as a as a Lieberman thank you. I I sort of switch to go away because I I noticed that the the people that like are meanest to me also follow me, which I I think is very strange. You know, it's a strange mentality, the internet isn't as awful as always. It's like why do you follow me? Like it's like you know, it's it's so anyways. And I always like a good straw man argument when I'm trying to prepare my thoughts for the hodinky audience, right? And and they love to hear about watches. They're much less tolerant of hearing about cars typically. It depends on the tone and the delivery. And then on of course, you, your Instagram and Motorstrend and such all, of that's gonna be mostly cars, but occasionally you talk about watches, whether you share one on your Instagram or it comes up on uh Spikes Car Radio. Do you do you find that people are largely cool with it or they are you being told to stick to your lane? I would say this if I if I post a uh uh my thoughts about a car it's about like 80 of my audience is like great and 20 calls me a moron watches it's like a hundred percent like that's awesome. Like more more, more,, you know. And uh, so so I the the reception I've got on social media posting about watches has really uh kind of emboldened me to to do more and kind of become more of a known watch guy, whatever that means. Everyone knows this, dogs know this. There's this very strong connection between cars and watches. I don't really get it, but there is. I tried uh to like not avoid it, but I tried to like not be public about my fascination with watches for a long time because I don't know if it's like this, I imagine it's like when you actually buy a Rolex. It's like, you know, like I got into the car business and I never wanted to say anything good about a Porsche because everyone just praises Porsche, praises Porsche. Then I just eventually you come to the conclusion that 9-11, especially you know, the GT3 is the best goddamn thing there is. And you just eventually come around to it. And so, you know, I don't, I just was like, I don't want to be like another car guy that's also a watch guy like how boring predictable oh do you like bourbon yes i like bourbon you know so you like the guys but hey you know it's it's it's what makes life uh i don't know, fun, it is that kind of stuff. So so yeah, but anyways, but to your question, like super positive response to what much more so than cars, honestly. People people on my Instagram they love the watch content
Cole Pennington and I should do more of it. So you you said something kind of funny. You said uh I'm not sick of the engagement. Yeah. And and sometimes negative engagement. I would say after doing this, I've been at Hodinky three years collecting watches for in the teens. Yeah. The one thing that would drive me away from this hobby and profession is the engagement. That's the singular factor that can drive me away from it. The the the negative engagement. But I don't get a ton of negative. You
Johnny Lieberman know, I really, I really don't um and and and i've gotten so much good uh out of out of well instagram specifically like you know like what we're doing here probably is because you know uh we're talking to each other on Instagram, you know what I mean? So it, it's um the the engagement, it, it, it for me, it's not a negative, you know, and but again, I'm I'm a I'm a I'm an extrovert's extrovert, you know, like if it's ever quiet, I go crazy. I n you know, I it's it just uh it's not a problem for
Cole Pennington me. I I will share a little story here really quick. I was at Goodwood with Johnny, that's where we met. The revival, yeah. Yeah, Goodwood Revival. And um he's like, Oh yeah, some some artist uh messaged me on Instagram. And uh I'm like cool man, that that's pretty interesting. They're chatting, this and that. Turns out to be D Like Hodinki's kind of, you know, it's in that sphere and so forth. But it's just it it went to er for me, I was like, holy shit, this guy. Well, hang on, let me pause you because uh Sch
Johnny Lieberman aefer is is you know, we have to bring him into the uh our our photographer friend Schaefer, Mike Schaefer. Um he was like, we we were looking at something and he said, he said, oh, that looks like you know Daniel. Arsham And I was like, oh yeah, I know that name. I'm like, oh yeah, that guy was like messaging me and he wanted to do a project with me. And I never wrote back to him. And Schaefer's like, but then we we met him, we hung out, it was cool. He was nice yeah yeah yeah so we're actually we're we're supposed to uh him and me at some point do something with with uh his art and my car life i don't know it it would he's he's busy, I'm busy, but we've we've talked about it since the revival. You were saying uh Cole saying that you guys met at at uh Goodwood. I think uh I think Johnny uh we either met at um at the quail like in sixteen or seventeen. It was a year, this doesn' maytbe narrow it down that well. You're wearing like bright pink pants and a great hat. And I was dressed like a normal human being and didn't realize how I was supposed to show up to the quail. Yeah. We went briefly, I think briefly there, but but real I remember the first time I remember like really talking to you was and it's about my only memory from that night. I was in Munich at the T bar in the bottom of the whatever hotel. It was my I don't know if you remember, it was my birthday. It was, yeah. It was your birthday. You were trying to get me to order uh champagne and and I picked a bottle and I'll I I I don't know why I remember this, but I can remember it. But I picked a bottle and the the guy brought it over. This is after we left the tiki bar. We were in the lobby of this ridiculous hotel. Big lobby, yeah. That's huge. Yeah, yeah. Uh and and that the the trip that we ended up in Munich didn't start in Munich, it started in Kittsburg, yeah, yeah. And we took um the brand with the then just brand new W-12 uh Continental GT and we went up over uh Gross Glockner. I was gonna say Glockenspiel. Good memory. Yeah, Gross Glockner, that's right. Gross Glockner. I think it's the highest pass in Austria. I was blown away. It was my it was my first um like legit pass. There was still ice up there. I think that was like they they specially opened the pass just for us. There was like the or the or it was the first day was open. But yeah there was I remember there was that big Austrian woman like like you you had to you went to like a toll booth and the the gate went up. Um yeah that was that was fun. We I d I drove that rather quickly and then we went to that weird airport. Yeah, well we went to uh that which I think was in Soros, Italy, and then we stayed in Italy for lunch. And then after lunch, I made a mistake of attempting to chase you through a very incredible, incredibly tight piece of road that wasn't quite a mountain pass, but it was like a network that went across a few different valleys. We were kind of like shortcutting. And I very quickly realized not only can I not maybe drink with some of the best of them, I also I I I was behind you for I had you for maybe thirty seconds and then you disappeared. Yeah. Oh on that I remember on that trip I was I I this is gonna sound so horrible but you cut this part out but I remember thinking like man this is a this is a slow group like where is everybody because we got to the I was with Floyd who at the time was editor in chief of uh automobile and I I drove through the the uh gross Glockner and like we got to the airport like twenty-five minutes before anybody else and I was like what slow group, but that's o
Cole Pennington kay. It's it's uh you know, it's uh drive at your own pace. Drive at your own. Well we don't have to worry about this on watch press trips, thank God, you know. So there
Johnny Lieberman there are watch press trips? Oh yeah. And they're they're they're as they're as pumped the gas as the car ones. Oh. Or they were for a long time. Oh man. I gotta get on that gravy train. That sounds a
Cole Pennington wesome. The the GP Ice Race was was a watch press trip. Oh was it? That's where watches and cars come together. Like and Goodwood was a watch press trip, right? No, that's okay, that's fair. That
Johnny Lieberman 's fair. But so the the GP Ice Race is interesting because I um yeah we had Freddy on uh spikes car radio and uh he was like yeah let's do it and I talked to Portia. I'm like, give me like you know something with spikes on the tires, I want to go to this, and then for sure I heard it was canceled. So when I saw a call on your Instagram that you were there, I was like, oh,
Cole Pennington it's happening. I think it was like a weird, weird thing. There was a a watch launch there. So like on the car side, who knows what the logistics were, right? Like who knows? But this wasn't even a car th
Johnny Lieberman ing. I just said, I just said, I'm gonna land, yeah, I'm gonna land in Austria, give me a 9-11 on studs, and then I told them I'll forget about it because I heard it was canceled. Um just 'cause of COVID and
Cole Pennington Austria weirdness and all that. And i I will say the COVID thing it's it was a real thing. Everyday, uh entrance swab, all this stuff. Very, very stringent. Um but yeah, that was that was really a watch centric thing. But there are other watch press trips, right? Like when they when they release a watch, one memorable one that was recent, you're a plane guy too, sort of, yeah? Yeah, I mean I like yeah. You like a good plane I I I love planes I wish I knew more. Yeah. So Brightling released their uh newest collection and took us up on a DC three painted like a C47. Right. It wasn't actually a C47. It was actually a DC3. Yeah, we there there are those things all the time, and they come with much less hazardous things than being paired with a crazy driver. So just say Yeah,
Johnny Lieberman no, that's fair. Um I did I did a brightling thing years ago at Amelia Island. I think it was Bentley and Brightling, and uh they had a the best era of Brightling ever. Um but they they had
Cole Pennington some stunt plane. It was a German, I can't remember what it was called. They had a L thirty nine, which was uh an old Czech trainer.
Johnny Lieberman Czechoslovakian train that's what I've been in. Yeah. No, this was like a small training jet. It was like something 300. It was it was um but anyways, it was a great it was a little German stunt plane. And and uh it was great because the guy's like, that's the barf bag, and I'm like, bro, won't need it. And he's like, everyone says that, everyone needs it. And I just taken a couple uh flight lessons and you know, I was telling him that he's like, Well, if you want to grab the stick and fly a little bit, feel free. And you know, first thing he does, he like fully inverts the plane, and it's just awesome because you're in this bubble canopy and you're looking down so Millie Island's in like basically Jacksonville, Florida, but you know, you're looking down at like off the coast, and it was cool. He like did some amazing stunts, didn't puke. Um, but then he let me fly the plane like kind of over the hotel over the four seasons and made a slow turn. And I realized like, you know, this is like the Porsche 911 of the skies. Like it was actually like really easy to handle. And I I was I trained on uh uh Piper Cub, which is like wow Winnebago of the skies. Awful. Nice. Um but so it was it was really fun. So that was that's my my brightling experience. But it was I went on a press trip uh years ago to my first time to Pebble Beach with Parmigiani and at the time they had a deal with Bugatti. So uh I went from having driven you know may,be a couple low-power sports cars by today's standards to here's a 1200 horsepower grand sport uh Vitesse with uh with Andy in the right seat. Oh, yeah, who's like the nicest guy ever. Nicest guy ever. Yeah. As the best guy you could have right seat. Uh and we had a lovely drive. And that was also like the same trip where I met you know like Ted Gashu and and a bunch of people who have now like moved into the car space in a much more like uh like solidified sort of manner. But it's crazy because there are these weird overlaps. Some of the overlaps come from brands and some of them kind of just come from the people you that that have decided to try and overlap both of these spaces. And and it's tough because I think I think Johnny, you're a good testament to this that if you really want to be an automotive journalist, it's hard to do something else. It's almost impossible. Yeah. Yeah. It really it really is tough. I mean, just just the time commitment, like yeah, um, it it's it's just overwhelming. And and also to be, you know, to really become at least it what I would consider to be expert in a subject, it it's a lot of time. And you know, and I again I've been doing this professionally now for uh you know, oh 17 years um around there. And um, you know, I'm still I've still have a lot to learn about cars. And and now, you know, uh cars are, you know, changing rapidly. So my my base knowledge has to change and evolve with them, which is is really tough. You know, I mean we're in putting watch terms, we're entering the quartz era where like you know, it used to be you'd think about bleeding edge vehicles, right? And just it would say it was the Germans, right? Yeah, Audi and and Mercedes and BMW. Well, you know, Tesla, Lucy, and Rivian, they're all in California. So the whole balance of power is shifted across the globe. It's they're, you know, it's everything's now coming out of California. So it's it's it's uh and the Germans are not you know laying down dead they're they're you know I I'm I'm driving uh Mercedes uh EQ EQS five eighty right now uh name eh they just had to get all the EQs in there uh that's a whole other podcast. But yeah, so but you know, it's it's a pretty good effort, you know, the the the I I'd say compared to a lucid, you know, not not as good. But so it's just everything is just radically rapidly changing. And I have to I have to learn what ohms means, you know, for the right and and volts and and and stuff like that which which is we you know I've I'm still trying to figure out the difference between horsepower and torque now I have to totally change I I've I've been pretty into like Seiko's lately but like memorizing the six digit code for you know SX. What the fuck? Come on. Man, I I've I've I've been living and breathing Seiko's for you know at least as long as you've been with Motor Trend, and I still they they change it every six months, and you go like, wait, I thought SRP meant something, and now it's really the fourth digit that means something. The first three are just kind of like prospects. But I'd love to know kind of where you started. I I feel like when I started watching some of your videos you wore a G Shock. I want to say a red G Shock of some sort. And that evolved over time. But I w when did you kind of start more specifically down the watch path? I mean, I've I've always liked watches and and I'm actually Cole's having me write up a whole thing. It's almost dunk cold yeah and and the the watches are going to a photographer on sunday you're writing something for hoodinky doing uh watch of the week watch of the week oh i'm thrilled but but i i know nobody listens and reads the same thing so i can i can tell the whole story but you know, I've i've always loved watches. Um, I I never was really able to afford what I wanted, if that makes any sense. And I'm not sure that's true for a lot of people. It makes a lot of sense. But um absolutely. But what what I I weirdly, what kind of kick-started me was uh when I got married, my buddy, he's like, he's like, hey, you know, what are you wearing? And I'm like, I don't really have a nice watch. He's like, here, borrow my panorai. And I'm like, oh, sweet, you know, like that's that's so cool. Thank you and get married and you know it's like 20 minutes after the ceremony and i'm like hey bro here's your watch back and uh he's like oh no keep it and i'm like keep your panorry and he's like oh it's fake it's like, what? I'm like like, he's, yeah, I got it in Thailand or whatever. I'm like, what? Was your was your buddy Alex Roy? No. My buddy Damon. But um I was kind of like, I didn't want to get married in a fake watch, you know? So so I I I just started like, I don't know. And then the thing broke like like clockwork a few few weeks later. And uh but you know, I I started like really kind of lusting after that. And then I I have pretty big risks. So I've always kind of been attracted to and a pretty big risk. And I'm I'm I'm fairly, I don't know say clumsy, but I bang into stuff. And so the idea of like you know big tough tool watches really appealed to me. And then I was on a press trip in in Japan. And um I was like, I I I like G, I've always liked G Shocks ever since I was a kid. I've just thought G Shocks were cool. And I'm like, I'm gonna buy like a crazy G Shock in Japan. Like this is this is the best, right? So we're in a store and they had an aviator and it had like a orange strap and it was like just super cool, you know, atomic, solar, blah, blah. And I you know, it's like it was the equivalent of like 300 bucks, right? I buy it. And I'm just and everyone, and it's I was it was a pretty uh uh uh poor poor being uh the size of their wallet to press trip. If I was like, whoa, you're spending 300 bucks on whoa, yeah, motor train's really paying well, you know. And I buy it and I get back to my hotel room and I look it up on Amazon. It's 260 bucks shipped on Amazon. The same watch. There's nothing special in Japan. You bought it in Japan. That's I bought in Japan. Which is cooler. That's worth the premium. Although I lost it, sadly. I bought I replaced it with a similar one. But but but then yeah I just kind of really got into G Shocks and I had um my I actually had a GW that finally died but I bought about a better main japan GW okay GW5000. I still wear that I wore it actually skiing um this weekend. Fantastic watch. Great watch. Just absolutely nothing wrong with that watch in any way. Fantastic watch. And it's always, you know, accurate. It sets itself to an atomic clock every night. It's wonderful. And then my my first like kind of, I mean, I had a bunch of watches, like I nothing great, like you know, Victor Knox or whatever it is, the Swiss Army watch. Um, I work got me a Shinola for something. It was like, you know, like 50-inch or 50 millimeter shinola. It looked like 50 inches a ridiculous watch. But my first good watch was do you guys know James Tate? Yeah, of course. Yeah, of course I know James Tate. He's James Tate's the best, but friend of Schaefer. So we're sitting there and he's he's looking at my G Shock and we're in like um I don't even know, like Salerno or not Salerno, uh Sicily, some island. No, no, no, we're in Tenerife, Tenerife, Tenerife. Oh, of course. We're in Tenerife, yeah. So it's a Porsche Press trip. It was a Porsche Press trip. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And he's kind of like they did a real run in Tenerife for a while. Yeah, yeah. But he's like side-eyeing my G Shock. He's like, you know, if you like that, you would really like a sin. He he shows me, I remember it was a it was a U1B. And um, you know, and he starts telling, he's like, look at this, it's on chrono 24. And um, you know, blue dial was cool, but it's not it's not made of steel, it's made of submarine steel not sub German submarine steel and and it has this it's it's digimented or whatever that word is like what it's they electrify and it gets harder than a diamond and it can go three thousand feet under the water. I And'm just like, oh my God, like this is the coolest watch. And then um for uh our wedding anniversary one year, my my wife asked, uh and I and I've been I've been talking about this watch for years uh afterwards, right? It's really that stuck in my head, like I have to have this watch. Never seen one in person, mind you. Just had to have it. And my wife asked uh John Guzik, you know, what what watch does Johnny really want? And uh he told her that I wanted you know the U1B Tedmented bezel bracelet case everything and she got it for me and uh I I still have it and still love it and then you know, from there it was like, oh, okay, I can now I can kind of get the hang. This is what owning a four-figure watch feels like. Yeah. Plus, if you're friends with with Mr. Guzick, then you're going to be buying a dox at some point. Oh, I did buy a dox, yeah, yeah. Although unlike Gusick, and I think you, I didn't buy the fake uh uh uh 300 T, I bought the real 300. I have a 300 uh 50th anniversary. Okay, but is that realist of the of that's the real current crop? Okay, because Guzick, I think, has the T, which is like a T, which is some yeah, it's a little bit updated, a little thicker. It's not an exact replica of the Fin case. Yeah, terrible. The standard three hundred is the sweet spot, but you pay a weird premium. It's almost an identical watch. It's like eight hundred bucks more. Yeah, I paid it. I paid it. Yeah. And uh yeah. You went with a pro, right? Orange. I yeah, I did. I did. Fantastic. Yeah. Yeah. And I and that said, there's about four more of the exact same watch and slightly different colors that I want, of course. Yeah. Of course. Uh a buddy, a buddy of mine actually sent me the um the carbon bezel version of that watch. And it was it was carving with a yellow rubber bracelet. And it is fantastic because it weighs, if you take the bracelet off, it weighs about like 30 grams. It's like an incre the bracelet's actually twice as heavy as the watch. It's it's it's it's incredible. Yeah. Um the carbon thin case is an incr is a re is one of my most favorite watches that I haven't figured out just how I would buy one at yet, uh just yet. Yeah, it's about it's about four thousand. But it was funny. I I I went out to dinner. I was wearing it um I was borrowing it for my friend and and uh the guy I was having dinner with had a uh carbon uh restart mill on his wrist um that was like the you know the the the six millimeter thick uh mill. And we were like kind of like you know holding it, we didn't have scale, but we're sitting there at the bar at the restaurant, like, God, I think the docks is lighter. You know, like it was hard to tell with the strap, but it it really does seem featherweight. Um yeah, it's a great and and it's such it's I think it's really fun and we do get to see a little bit like there's something about that carbon Doxa that almost reminds me of the Gunther works, which is a car you you just recently wrote a really excellent review on for motor trend. I enjoyed it quite a bit. That's a c w car that seems to get weird opinions from a lot of people. Yeah. It's it's a strange car because I know like like well I'll I'll name him my friend Jethro Bobbington I was talking about. He just thinks like the speedster is the one you're talking about that I just reviewed. Yeah, yeah. He thinks it's the ugliest thing he's ever seen. And there is an angle. Uh like seen it in person. I understand it's quite a bit wider, right? It is wider.'s There something there is one angle that's not good. But if you if you if you go to Motor Trend and look at those photos of the gun to work speedster, like oh my god, it's absolutely the color kills me. The interior looks incredible. It's funny. The outsingered singer with the interior. The interior good for them is so good. But then a lot of people are like, Oh, it looks like a Lamborghini. It's not pure Porsche, but I I it is pure Porsche. It's just nice colors and like excellent materials. But there's something about that that format that reminds me of taking a uh the sh exact case dimensions and shape and everything of a watch from nineteen sixty seven and then making it in carbon. And to take something that's very nine like very nine nine three adjacent or even just nine eleven adjacent even if you don't know the generations. Sure. To see that and to know that well, it's not j that's not a normal sort of nine eleven thing where it's made out of more conventional uh materials and that's yeah. And they actually hired a guy and i i i i never know if i'm supposed to say the name or not but anyway it was a guy that designed the career gt uh really you can google him but to do the bodywork on that and the and the the car if you look at the front of it, it really does have a Craira GT, especially the lower kind of mouth of the thing, and the headlights have a Craira GT look to them. When you first got into automotive into covering the automotive world, did did you predict what happened with Singer and Gunther and Tuthill and these companies that are taking a known quantity vehicle they made so many of and turning them into million dollar, two, three million dollar cars? I'm shaking my head no. Uh uh uh no, no. I I mean the the I should have known. It's funny. Um so I'm I'm good friends with Jonathan Ward, who um you know. Jonathan Ward's been on Talking Watches? Great, yeah. So I come back. And he was on the most recent episode of Inevitable. Sorry to intro. Yeah, no, no, no. That's right. Yeah. We have our new podcast about the future of cars, the inevitable. Um, but but JW is a good friend. And you know, he uh has been doing these for lack of a better term, these resto mod Toyota FJs and Broncos And they're always uh, you know, they're amazing. And when I first met them, here's how long ago it was, they only cost like almost 200 grand. Now the FJ is over 300. But you know, like every other uh young reporter, I'm like, so why is this worth $200,000? You know? And I remember he had the best answer ever. He goes, Well, you know, we we um we thought about it for a long time, but like the latches that released the windshield, we said, what's the coolest latch ever made? It turns out it was a 1906 Sub-Zero refrigerator, has the coolest latches. So that's what we use. And that was like a light bulb moment for me. I was like, this guy really thought about everything. And and I think I think the market's finally caught up to Jonathan because now 300 grand for a car like that is kind of a good value, you know, especially when you consider this Gunther thing I just drove, which is nice and all, but it's you know it's $850,000. And that, you know, it's a lot. Um and and I would argue um that the FJA that he's doing is just as cool as the Gunther works. Um, but people get really um, I don't know, crazy for like hot rod and nine eleven. So I I get why. I mean they're rad. They're you know, we we keep bouncing between cars and watches and and you said kind of early on in the chat that you weren't quite sure what the overlap is. I I'd I'd love to think on that for a couple minutes between the three of us. Um, because some people say it's about uh mechanical interest, but I know a lot of people who know a lot about cars and couldn't tell you how their engine works, what their rear differential does. Yeah. Like they just they enjoy the car for the object that it is kind of a thing you can you can almost praise or think about even when you're not driving it or I guess in with a watch wearing it. What what do you think it is that that and it's not everybody because you you'll get people who love watches and think that cars, especially cars that burn gas are the devil. I and I I know I know guys again, I'll bring up Jethro who, you know, I don't I don't think he's ever put a watch on his wrist in his life at but like those as much about cars more about cars than most almost everybody um i don't know there there's an arch materialism to steal a line from dan neal to it um it's just like, you know uh, you just really appreciate, I hate to use the word craftsmanship, but like, you know, engineering, um, you know, and and and just just it, you know, and and like, you know, I I always say this about writing about cars. I I say, look, it's it's like covering like a bait, you know, being a beat writer for for baseball, right? The the Yankees beat the Red Sox three to two. Now make it interesting, right? So you know I see the I see watches. I'm thinking about watches is kind of the same way. They all tell time and that's really all they do. And you know, and the ones we like don't even do that all that well. Um, but there's there's something like there's something that you know the the the the the people making them, they make them interesting. Yeah. Cole, do you think it's like a like a human interface thing? Like we interface with cars, we interface with watches. I there was a time when I guess we needed them. And now in many ways there's a lot of lot a lot of modes in our lives where people own cars that aren't transportation and they obviously own watches that don't keep them on time. Yeah. I yeah, I mean th I think collecting is a part of it. I I I think humans love stories. That's it. I I think think our brains have evolved, you know, like and I don't I don't want to say we've you know evolved to to need to talk about cars and watches, but we love a good story. We love lore, you know, Carol Shelby. Ah, he was wearing overalls on a chicken farm. And then he got the call. Come, oh, you know, Abraham was wandering around the desert and God called upon him. You know what I mean? It's just stories. And so, and and I'm sure, you know, um, uh what's his face from, you know, IWC, he uh, you know, Jones, he he had that he had to build a watch, but he couldn't do it in America. He had to go to Switzerland and and it leaves out a lot, you know, but but but we love these stories, you know, and so and and and i think when people ask me i hate the word automotive journalism because i'm not a journalist you know at all i don't i don't really investigate anything that that much you know i'll i'll send a text like hey what do you think eh maybe you know but i'm i i think of myself as a storyteller you know and and and that's what i i i i like to think i'm good at is is telling stories and it goes back to folklore and it it it it goes back to symbolism and uh with things that are signified. Um
Cole Pennington so I think that's the connection. Yeah, I think I think you you hit the nail on the head at the end there. You can't really assign stories to a bottle of Clorox or something like that. But well, actually, you probably could to be honest. There's one story though. That's it. Th
Johnny Lieberman ere's just there's just one where, like, you know, if you if you look at like again, Rolex, you know, lot of stories. And you can keep going on and on. And then, oh, and this person wore a role eggs and this person's grandfather had one he put in a
Cole Pennington box and he you know just yeah so how sticky how sticky is this thing to absorb or how how how easily can stories stick to this thing whether
Johnny Lieberman In in my mind, the the other thing that is a factor, and I don't think it changes the base of what you guys have described, but I think it's a catalyst for a lot more heat that came out in the market, say six, seven, eight years ago, both for watches and cars. It seemed like YouTube was right there when it needed to be for cars. Yeah. And Instagram was right there when it needed to be for watches. You know, this is something that Matt Farrow brings up where like you could take a picture of a house, you could take a picture of a car, but the watch is the same size and it's roughly the same size on a screen as it is on your wrist. It's just like Instagram kind of works for taking a picture of something that's not tiny, but also not even remotely large, right? Something somewhere in that space, which I think there's like a visual thing that works there. I think it helped, right? I think it helped. And we also moved out of the really siloed world of of deep niche forums and and suddenly people were doing all of their niche things in one place, whether that be Facebook or otherwise. Oh, and thank God we we got away from forms. I loved it. I don't watch forums I think are incredible. Uh they're full of some of the nicest people. I oh maybe uh they're full of pure experts. Car forms, yeah. I mean I I'm as a Jeep owner I experienced some of the weirdest car forms out there. Certainly to the Porsche fascination is right around the time that we started having Instagram and Facebook, the iPhone, uh, YouTube, there was also this explosion in interest in mid-century everything. Yep. Right. And the sweetest time, in my opinion, for watches was like almost unarguably nineteen fifty-three to nineteen sixty-nine, right? And that was also a pretty dang good era for cars. I could argue we're like, you know, really in this ami golden age of the automobile that's like unprecedented, and we'll look back on this time and be like, wait a second, you could get like a pickup truck with a Hellcat engine that could like climb a mountain. That's a fair point. You could just buy it, and it was wider than a Hummer, like you know, so it but um the uh the other thing though is is and and this is back to but to Cole's point about um the Clorox is the enthusiasm though. They're both things you can get really enthusiastic about. And I'm you know, as I'm becoming more and more of a watch person and kind of acquiring more pieces, I hadn't experienced this since I bought my first WRX about 20 years ago. I bought this Seiko Tuna, Emperor Tuna and i just had like i'm i'm actually i i'm like i'm still what what's that great watch and great card great watch oh dude uh we'll get to the tuna but like i was high for about five days where i just didn't have any other thoughts in my head other than I want to look at my tuna. You know, I just want to stare at this watch. And then I came down and I've kind of crashed. My serotonin hasn't returned. I'm sort of like, I need to find another high. And I know that means buying another watch but I'm not I'm not gonna do it right now. No, I'll just loan you something. Don't buy anything. Just uh just change the strap, Johnny, and see what happens
Cole Pennington . No, no, no, no, no. You would never change a tuna strap or you have a t
Johnny Lieberman una strap sure i change all the straps yeah but in general this will this will i i i change i change my straps trust me i i i got i got more straps than i got what it's insane how many straps well you'll see when my when my watch of the week article comes out, you'll understand it better. But like i just I deep so deeply love this stupid tuna. Yeah, I get it. I mean they're and if I had the wrist for it, I too would deeply love a tuna. They are they are incredible I assume you've seen the video of them stress testing them at depth yes yes on on an outside of a submarine yeah it went down to like fourteen thousand nine hundred ninety feet or whatever so far down yeah it was crazy yeah yeah I love hang on I I have it here's on I actually have that written down I'm just fine. Uh so it goes down to uh four thousand two hundred and ninety-nine meters for the automatic and the the quartz one failed at three thousand nine hundred some meters. So Johnny have you lost an evening with uh with a decent bottle of or a def decent glass of Willet uh to like pressure test YouTube. There's there's a handful of folks that have like they can take a watch way down in a little tube. Oh no, no, don't even tell me that. No. I I no I have This is how I learned that the biggest problem is generally the case back. Yeah, the tuna doesn't have a case back. So there's your solution. Yeah. Really clever. Yeah, no. Super, super fun. Uh and any other on your radar? Anything else? Like what like what what do you think might do the serotonin hit uh there's there's a there's a panorai there's there's i i really do want a panorai yeah if you got the risk for it uh for sure yeah and and and there's there's there's a couple that that i want. Um, but there's one, and it's just one of those things where this guy Schaefer, uh, we keep talking about, but like I sent it to him and he's like, I see no reason for you not to buy that, you know. And I'm like, Yeah, and then every every couple days he'll just send it to me again. He's like, did you buy it yet? Or he'll just send me like boy, this car would pair well with that panorama. You know, so it's uh This is a bad influence. Everybody's got a couple of those in their in their you know, in their Yeah, it's uh it's a it' its uh's a it's a it's from 2003 it's 44 mil titanium it's got a brown face um it is just absolutely exquisite it's luminore um i luminore is my the of the three main panoras. Uh one I really uh am attracted to. That's the fake one I got married, and it was a fake Luminar. So yeah, that uh I would love, I think I'd still love to get to get a deep sea. And actually, Cole, when we were at you remember I that that that deep sea the dude had at the revival, that like little tiny guy. Yep, I know exactly what you're talking about. And I don't know what I've seen pictures of deep seas. I just never actually seen one on someone's wrist and I just like it was like a light was shining down from the sky on it. I was like, oh my God, I gotta get that thing. What was this the the gradient, the the James? Jim Cameron deep seed or it's it put but yes it yes but it's the post 18 where they they changed the uh the lugs on it so it it it i don't know it looks a little more like the tuna it's a little bit like uh squared technically yeah, yeah. Yepah. Ye, those are rad for sure. Yeah. So there's that. Uh what else is on my uh the Unimatic uh the U4A, I think it's called Quadro U4A. Uh sort of they make really cool stuff. Yeah. And then I don't know. There's uh there's uh you know, Habring to I don't know that's how you pronounce it, but yeah, I mean uh horse legit watch making. Yeah talk and and a great story, nice people. Oh yeah, I I do nothing about it other than I I saw the Hay Ring 2 and I was like the the it's called the Double Felix split. Yeah for sure. I'm like I gotta get that. There's uh there's uh a Zenith I want. Uh I I mean I I mean I can go on and on. There's there's a zillion. Having gone through so many years of doing the automotive thing and and meeting people in the space and and it seems like you've known about watches for a while, anything stand out for someone who's just wearing a really incredible watch when you whether it was a driver or another writer or or something like that? Well it's ye yeah, I mean I can I we could uh we could waste the whole afternoon on that. But uh but I'm the one I'm wearing right now, this is actually this IWC uh it's a it's a fligger or whatever. So I was with uh Lucid and Eric Bach, who's their like vice president of technology or something like that. We're standing on Laguna Seca and he's wearing this watch and he's you know he's telling me all these amazing things that Lucid are gonna do and just we're there because they're they're making a three motor air that's gonna be like, I don't know, you know, 1600 horsepower, something just absolutely insane. And they were running the prototype running the sake of it, he's wearing this thing. And it's like, it's just like burrowing into my brain the same way that stupid deepsea did it at it at Goodwood. And um I just can't stop looking at it. And at the time I was doing that thing with Crown and Caliber where they're just kind of sending like car guys in LA watches. And uh it was a little different. His is his doesn'.t It's just a window. But I I borrowed it. And then there was the one thing I told myself I would never do, which is like buy the watch that they sent me to review. And I bought it. I've been there. Yeah. Yeah. I I bought it. But they I will say it was like they gave me like the Black Friday discount. It was it was very good. Good. Um but I it was just one of those things. Like he was probably telling me something super important about the stupid lucid. And I'm just like, that's a really nice looking watch you have, you know. It's also rad that you know, you would expect uh somebody high up at a something like Lucy to be wearing an Apple Watch. No, no, they're all watched dude. And and to see it kinda helps me like even better contextualize that product if they're all watch people. Can I tell you lovely? Can I can I tell you that's what we're here for. So Angus McKenzie is a guy who hired me at Motor Trend. Good guy. Uh my mentor. Great guy. But I On the Urus launch with Angus was the last time I saw him. Oh yeah. Oh yeah. He he's the best. But but he he would do this thing. Um, you know, because one of our things is we we, you know, we like like we being me and Angus understand what a Mercedes means, right? But we we had this problem with the Japanese luxury brands where we we'd we'd we would want to like to get them to tell us like, you know, Lexus, we kind of understand, but like what is an infinity? What is an Acura? Like, you know, if you go, if you go to a dinner party you could say well there'll be a there'll be a jaguar driver at the dinner party he'll be he'll be you know this odd weird world traveler who's smoking and and and very drunk but yeah that that that's what the jaguar is and you know the Mercedes guy will you know be be the CEO and you know the Audi guy will be the architect and the BMW guy will have 14 MBAs. But what does the who's the accurate guy? Right? So Angus, we were talking with Shiro and I'm oh god, I'm blanking on his last name. He's used to be the head of design for for uh Infinity. Huge watch guy, and Angus says to him, he says, Shiro, you know, if a Mercedes-Benz is a Rolex, and I know they don't have a partnership, but we're just saying like you make a lot of money in life, you quickly buy a Mercedes in a Rolex. What kind of watch is an infinity? And like he just stopped him in his tracks and it's like, oh great question. Oh, you know so when i met peter rollinson from lucid i i i just threw and he's a huge huge watch guy like you should right get talk to him about watch we love the chechev for sure oh yeah yeah he's a i said, uh, you know what, what kind of a watch is or is elucid? And I remember he looks at me and he's just like, damn it, he's cussing at this point. He's like, freaking Apple watch. Really upset about it, you know. My my all-time favorite was and this was like back in 2005 i think it was like my third press trip but uh maserati launch and um but because i wasn't like real media yet. I went on one that was like a preview for like uh magazines to like if you are a Maserati customer, this is what you would experience, right? Oh yeah, an experience review, sure. Yeah. So they took us to Rhode Atlanta and there's a winery attached to Rhoded Atlanta. And they took us down in the basement. They give us a sales page. Like, here's why you want to buy the time as the new 2005 Quattro Porte. Blah, blah, blah. By the way, we're also making this MC12, which was that rebodied enzo that Maserati made. And it's it's 750 grand. Oh, and by the way, for 250,000, you can get the matching watch. And I turned to the guy next to me, who happened to be Rob Ross from the Rob Report, who I'd never seen before in my life. And I'm like, $250,000 for a bleeping watch. I didn't say bleeping. And he looks at me straight face. He goes, I don't know. This one's about half a mil. That was just here, you know. Yeah. Um I mean it's a crazy thing because 'cause like you you don't like you should, but you don't have to insure a watch to own it. It can sit in a drawer. Yeah. Uh even even the most ostentatious stuff can still be covered by a sleeve. I mean, maybe up until you get hit like a Jacob and Co. I don't have any sleeves that could do that, but but that sort of stuff, you know, he's a little aquarium for your wrist. But yeah. Because so much of this was cold a decade ago, twenty years ago, there's no telling where someone who's been in the game longer than you what they might have on their wrist that they didn't you know, if it could be worth half a mil today and they bought they bought it for a normal amount of money a few years ago, right? Or a decade ago or something like that. So it is it is a wild uh a wild space. Have you ever have you ever come across any example of the car watch, you know, co-product that that like actually spoke to you at a at an enthusiast watch level? That's that's a tough one. I mean it's you mentioned that Jacob and Co. where they have a sapphire with the Bugatti, yeah. W16 motor And that was after the Parmigiani stuff which I saw and it's all lovely watches, but I don't know if I would I would almost just rather have a Parmigiani and drive my Bugatti. I don't need my watch to say Bugatti on it, if that makes any sense. Yeah, except that I know guys with Bugattis who have those watches and I yeah. There you go. Then I I'm I wasn't the right buyer for either. I mean Porsche design. Yeah, that's a good one. Let's talk. Probably comes the closest. Um, you know, just there, just a black Porsche design, you know, chronometer, I think is like is pretty cool, especially if you can get one without the the PD on the dial i don't for i i don't like logos on dials i don't know why um but but i think those are pretty cool i you know and i'm i'm just learning about them. I didn't actually know very much about them uh until about about a year ago. But I remember, you know, you'd see uh kind of I guess I'm like the old guy now, but when I was a young buck, you'd see the old guys, they all had like you know a portion design watch. And it's like, ah, they just got that because they've been around forever you know and now I'm getting one so um I I did I did uh I did like an Instagram campaign with Porsche design to kind of like pimp their configurator and yeah you were talking about on on SCR. Yeah, and the the payoff is like I get a watch, I design myself. And uh so you know that'll be that'll be pretty cool. You know, I yeah, I like I said I that that IWC AMG uh that that tie up is is I think legit and and pretty cool. I think it's it's uh it's one of the hardest games in the watch world is to make a a watch car thing. And it just seem it just seems unnecessary like, oh I really want my I don't know uh you know my pen to look like a car. I don't know. Like I want my car to look like a car. My pen can look like a pen. My watch can look like a watch. I I say that uh having you know I'm getting this Porsche design watch and I'm pretty excited about it because it's it's actually a pretty cool titanium watch that's you know uh dlc coated and all that but i'll give you an example like the rotor i kept my rotor just a normal rotor but you can you know the idea is like he,y, I have a turbo S. I'm going to get a turbo S wheel as the rotor, which, you know, not cool. But you can't see it either. You have to like actually take it off and look at it. So it's not at least they didn't like the the wheel on the front of the watch on the face like 'cause they wouldn't if people weren't buying it, but I'm not sure that it speaks to it doesn't normal watch enthusiasts who might come across the ability to have the car. Doesn't speak to me. But then again I've seen guys like that own Porsches that like also own a Porsche vest and they flip out the little thing on their key that has the Porsche crest on it's hanging over their pocket. Yeah, that's cool. And they're super proud of it. That'
Cole Pennington s definitely not me. Never one. Like so under the portrait. Here's the thing. Well I was just gonna say like the the porch design watches and so forth are marketed towards the car guys. There are way more car guys, and I shouldn't just say guys, there are way more car people, yeah, yeah. Than there are watch folks. And and that's changing. I mean, now both are blowing up and going mainstream. However, if you're gonna make an enthusiast targeted watch, it's easier to market to the car crew than it is to to the watching thesis. So that's who's buying those watches. I saw this watch. Speaking of fun
Johnny Lieberman ny car things. So I was at a Pagani event. I I went I went to Texas to drive my dream my dream car. They're nice. Uh I I drove I drove the Wyra R. And apparently I'm the I'm only journalist who'll ever be allowed to drive the Wyra R. But that's the track only naturally aspirated V twelve that makes eight hundred and fifty horsepower successor to the Zonda R. Absolutely insane. Scary or not too bad? No, the opposite. Like total sweetheart of a car. Loved it. Loved it. Yeah, it was so good. But uh there was a gentleman there, but anyways, he had a he had a he had a he had a watch and he owned a couple of zondas and he had this solid gold watch that I would put it close to 60 millimeters. 60 millimeters. But it it had um the the zonda tailpipes is like part of the dial design. And then it had two zondas made of gold on the bracelet. Uh and Zonda exhaust it was the craziest thing. Yeah, wow. Who who made that? And he was, you know, I think I think it was maybe it was Jacob and Co made it. I don't know, somebody like that, but it was and it had uh it did something else where like it had uh i don't know uh oh it had like the the hood of the zonda inside the dial and it rotated or something i don't it was the whole thing was nut had a tourbion that also rotated and like you know the whole thing was insane. So yeah, that one was like it was either like the very, very worst watch of all time or like somehow like super cool. I don't know. But it was, it was not cheap. It was not cheap. Okay. I'd be happy enough with a you know 7.3S uh with the stick, I think would probably be the move. Uh and I I could just chill with one of my wearadox or a seiko or something. Exactly. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Cool. You get around the the car space even now like I've you know I I kind of backed out of it when um when I left Vancouver uh and I miss it uh dearly but you know one one time I was in a uh hotel lobby of uh a spot in in Monterey during uh Pebble and I I came across Hurley Haywood and and uh I I was with somebody who knew you know who had spoken to him recently and knew him uh on appearance alone and said oh Hurley just wait, this guy loves watches. Hurley didn't even say hi. He just took his Rolex Yachtmaster off and handed it to me. And he goes, You should check the back too. And then before I could ask, he's like, Yes, you can take a picture. And I was like, Oh my gosh, you've been bothered by so many people like me. Please carry on the night. What what was on the back? Uh it was uh uh two Hurley from Rolex. Okay, which is deeply cool. So it wasn't just for winning a race, it this was like for more of a personal sort of connection. So I'm I'm very good friends with uh and you know this from those those head to heads you watch with Randy Pope's too you know he's got a he's got uh a Rolex Daytona too that he's always like look at the back and it's like you know winner Daytona 500 you know uh 24 24 hours sorry not not the five hundred but you know like that's a pretty cool Rolex Daytona is uh you know winner is not a lot of those out there. But Cole you know what what's some of your experience coming across watches in this space because you see some
Cole Pennington Yeah, there are a few. So speaking of the the weird Rolexes that no one wants turned into gifts, uh Sam Hancock, the guy who hosts the petrelicious series. He was the driver of the meeting at one of the the revivals a few years ago. That was the first issued watch from Rolex I got to see. And that was like a two-tone I don't even remember. It was like this is the an odd watch to do that with. But some of the more recent things that I've been interested in the car car watch crossover. This is a very cool watch. So you know, Johnny, you should know this one too, the Subaru three sixty. Oh yeah.. I've driven one I've driven a 360. James. I don't think I do. No
Johnny Lieberman . It it's like it's a good thing. like lost like you know half its weight just from like having a horrible condition. It it yeah I mean it was it was a Japanese very very early Subaru. Two cylinder it was the first Subaru two cylinder K-car, suicide doors. For for anyone wondering, Johnny's Johnny's description is dead on accurate. You don't even have to Google it. It looks like it looks like uh it looks like a beetle that's been skipping meals. Subaru 360 van. You will see one of the best looking uh things of all time and they made a little truck out of it oh it's tiny here's a normal a human being standing next to it it's itty bitty yes they're very small but they're very cool i actually once i was once offered this is. Is this this why poverty sucks, kids? I was offered two Subaru 360 vans that worked for 1500 bucks and I didn't have the money
Cole Pennington . Uh yeah, poverty sucks. I don't know what I do with two, but yeah. They they actually used them as like a they opened up a track and let people take laps in 'em because they failed as a as a vehicle. So they opened up a track in New Jersey. C consumer reports that was the first time consumer reports gave a rating of unacceptable was to the three sixty. Yeah. It's a little piece of lore about that. So anyway, long story short, in in looking at, you know, cars, watches, things like that, I just found that they that Orient launched a watch alongside the three cigarettes Orient. No. Swear to God. Just Google. Can you get two of them for less than fifteen hundred bucks?
Johnny Lieberman That's a great question. Probably. I mean I I own an Orient and I I you know the crazy. But anyways, that I would love to have that. Actually, I yeah, I know a guy that would love to have that. It
Cole Pennington 's corner of the market. We'll cut this out. The other one I found that was very cool, which I I was hoping there was a link, but there's not. So a Seiko Skyline. Did you know that there was a Seiko skyline? And I thought it had something to do with the car, but it doesn't. It's just a model of the watch and it actually says Skyline on the dial, but it's kind of a mystery on where it where it came from. So yeah, that those are two interesting car wash things I've come across recently. What about have you seen I think they're pretty bad looking, but those those Seiko land cruisers, the the the the like they have like armor plating on them? So is it made for in the spirit of the Toyota Land cruiser? No, it's like made for it's like the I don't know if it's like oh the land monster?
Johnny Lieberman No no it's called it literally has a like a land cruiser on the case back, and it has like it has like a stainless steel like like uh bezel around it and it the my my my friend who's like super into weird watches and and land cruiser bought one and i would he showed me pictures i'm like dude that's awful looking he's like oh it's a little bit like Cole. It's in the same vein as like that one that Leno wears, the Artura with the multiple dial. Yeah. But this has like a fold over Hunter style case, but the case covers the front and it says it has the Land Cruiser font right on it. Yes, the c the case cov
Cole Pennington ers the front. Such a weird decision. There's some weird decisions being made. That's a a World War One thing. That happened a lot in World War One. This uh as it evolved from pocket watches, the Hunter case. Yeah. So but it should have stayed back there. Johnny, I did not realize this existe
Johnny Lieberman d. Thank you so much. I'm learning a lot about um a Japanese like JDM car watch uh kind of crossovers here. This is exciting. Yeah, that's that well that's my my friend Rob, who who to be is like well but he's he's my literally my worst influence like he if if i even make the mistake of mentioning I like a watch it's a never ending series of texts. Our little secret symbol is a watermelon. Send me watermelons. Like, like egging me on to buy a watch. Like I bought, I bought this sin 103 titanium thing that was just because he sent me 50 watermelons a day, you know
Cole Pennington . Um and uh There there is another one I just thought of, by the way. 'Cause you mentioned Angus McKenzie. Yes. So have you ever seen his 'cause we're talking about Seiko's too. Have you seen his Honda Yes F one team seconds. Yes, yes, yes. He wore it to he wore it to Goodwood, yeah. He did, yeah. And that was given to him by some engineers from Honda back in like the eighties or something. Yes, it was I I just so Angus wrote
Johnny Lieberman that it's the current cover story for Road Rat, which by the way, if you like cars, uh check out Road Rat. But so the cover story is about the history of the first NSX, the original NSX, and Angus did a just an absolutely tremendous 5,000-word story with insane pictures, interviewing everybody involved. But one of the um the people in the story gave him that watch
Cole Pennington . Oh, that's what it is. Okay, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. That's a good good little connection there. So I think what we're learning there are some cool car wat
Johnny Lieberman ches out there. I think there's some d they're definitely interesting. You gotta look through. Yeah, there's a lot to kind of sift through, but they're there. I do want to get to Pike's Peak because uh I'm very excited for you running Pikes Peak. This is something I've all I've enjoyed for the last couple of years. And then the tangent vector film uh from last year I thought really brought me personally closer. I've never been in the mountain. Um and uh and I I found out, you know, recently from from you know, your stuff online and talking about an SCR and stuff that you're going to be running a car on Pike's Peak. You wanna give people kind of a rundown? 'Cause this kind of like the year to do it and it's something that won't last forever. Right. Pikes Peak is a mountain in Colorado. It goes up to like 14,000 and 29 feet or something like that. It's very high. And the bottom of it uh where you start the race is at 10,000 feet. So you're already like where there's no air and weather's really crazy, and you race up a mountain, it's like 156 corners in 12 miles. Um, there's lots of like 1800 foot sheer cliffs. There's um I don't know. And people race it every year. And if you're on a motorcycle, you tend to die. The cars don't do that, but they crash a lot. It's, it's dangerous, it's really, really is dangerous. And anyway, so there's a gentleman named Jeff Zwart, uh sort of a legend, not sort of a legend in the car world, and he's run uh Pikes Peak. I think this will be his 25th year. Um, used to be a road and track photographer and then became a very successful commercial photographer, filmmaker. But it was he approached me and it was crazy because it was like I'm meeting my hero, or you know, one of my heroes, and he's like, I think you'd be great for Pike's Peak. Now he runs a class. Uh it's it's the uh it's it's a bunch of Porsche um what are they called? They're called 718 Cayman GT4 Club Sports and he's had this class since 2018. And the cars are all the same. And for Pike's Peak, they're relatively underpowered cars. I mean, they are race cars, but they're factory race cars. And he's like, I think you'd be great for it. And we we talked about it. And basically, the first year they did it, they had Travis Pastrana was uh was a driver and he won. And then the second year, Travis Pastrana drove again and he won again. And then last year, Tanner Faust drove this car, the actual car that I'm driving was Tanner's car last year. And Tanner won the class. And so the people I think that are you know paying money to to be there, they don't want like a pro driver. Uh you know, they they they want someone who's gonna lose. So I think I think is it but who's still pretty well known will get some media attention. So they Jeff approached me about it. So yeah, I get to I get to run up Pike's Peak, um, which is which is nuts. Could you did you imagine like before this conversation with Jeff, that this was something that would ever kind of come to you as an option, an opportunity? Yeah, I've done some crazy stuff. And I've probably done some stuff that's approaching the danger of Pike's Peak. But it's funny when when when they started this class back in 18, there was somebody else who uh who shall remain nameless. I'm like, oh, that'd be fun. He's like, yeah, right, you're not gonna do this. Um so so you know, if if you ever want me to do something, tell me I can't do it. I'm I'm that person uh when jeff mentioned i mean i just like you know instantly uh said yes and it it's one of you know again i'm not i even though i was mentioning religion i'm not a very religious person but the only the only words i actually live by usually come from the dao de jing. And there's two. You know, one is, you know, when the student is ready, the master appears. And I think that if I had tried to do Pikes Peak in 2018, I wouldn't have been in the place I'm at now. I'm really trying to take it very seriously. I have a bunch of coaches, people I didn't know back in 2018 who are really helping me now. I've already started like simulator training and I'm gonna be doing a lot more of that. I'm gonna be working with Jeff and hopefully with Patrick Long and some other people, uh Jamie Morrow, who's who's now the, he's the right seat if you drive a Bugatti, you typically have Jamie sitting there. I think I met him on my Chiron drive. Yeah, exactly right. Exactly right. Uh great guy. Um I'm working with this guy, Michael Johnson and then the other thing is there's something in the DAO where it's like you know if it's a big decision like don't spend any time just just do it if it's a little decision sweat the details so I just you know basically said yes, instantly, because why wouldn't you? And now I'm finding out all the crazy details, and there's a lot of them. It's very involved. And it's a nutty thing. But yeah, I'm I'm really I don't want to say excited, but I'm taking it very seriously. And I know what an honor and what a privilege it is to be able to do this and have Portia Motorsports North America owns the car and they're supporting me and they're going to transport the car and they're going to um uh find a place for the car to live. It'll probably be at Porsche Colorado Springs and there'll be mechanics there that can work on the car and there's a ton of practice sessions that go into it. Um but I'm I'm I'm going to really uh make an effort to do well. That sounds incredible. I I uh you know that''ss yeah, it gonna be it's just gonna be fun. It's what a cool we're rooting for you. Thank you. Yeah, absolutely. I'll be I'll be watching if you know if if Cole and I can weasel our way to the bottom of the mountain, we'll be there too. Go go do some podcasts from uh from you know pit row or whatever but you gotta do it oh my god it's it's the best it I will say this too about it it is like so grassroots meaning that like there's no other the just like the locals that live near Colorado Springs, they put it on. There's no FIA, there's none of that nonsense. Um, and it's just its own event. Like, and it's I mean, last year, like they had to close down part of the paddock because there was a bear in a tree with her cubs and like they didn't you know bears with cubs are dangerous and so we're Colorado welcome yeah and we're like literally sitting there looking at a bear we're like man like this is this is the why this is the wild west, you know. If you're wanting if you're wanting to track this, you can do they do a really nice web coverage where you can see the classes uh and and watch selected pieces of video that are are produced throughout this thing. This is gonna run the weekend of June 26th, 2022. Uh I'll certainly be watching. Better yet, I'll I'll do my very best to be there if that's something that that can we we can make happen. I'm I'm hoping I'm gonna have a cool watch to wear. I'm hoping um I have this friend Sean Lee, who runs this thing called the Pur'sist Group. And it like again, it's a car club. Um, but they do a lot of cool charity stuff with kids, is is really I think what they're known for. But they they're doing a special uh Omega Speedmaster uh Purist Group edition, and there's forty seven of them being made total and I talked to Sean and just to kind of represent my friends back in LA I'm gonna hopefully wear that when I go up Pike's Peak. Yeah. So that'll be speedy's the right watch to wear when you're venturing into the unknown, right? Yeah. I like it. Yeah, exactly. And then yeah, before before I let you go, and we've got a little car uh watch game that Cole's devised, which I'm excited about. I want to make sure we at least cover the podcast that you show up on because if people are enjoying you on this, they'll love you on Spikes Car Radio and the inevitable. I I've been a Spikes Car Radio fan since before you were on the show, and then they added Matt Fair as well, who I'm a huge fan of with the smoking tire. And of course, occasionally this guy Jerry Seinfeld shows up on the show and he's fine. Yeah. Uh he's we get Jerry, we get Leno. Yeah, Leno shows up occasionally, you know. Yeah. It's the craziest thing in the world. I mean, I was I get a great show. I you know uh life of Riley over here, but I was having breakfast with you know Spike and Zuckerman and Jerry and Farah and this guy Tony who happens to run uh you know Sony Pictures, but anyways, long story. And these kids came up, you know, they're like to me and Farrah, they're like, Can we get your picture? You know, can we get a picture with you? And we're like, okay. But like, you know, that's Jerry Seinfeld. And they're like, yeah, my parents watched that. Anyways, can we get a picture with you and Matt? You know, like it was, it was really just a bizarre, a bizarre moment. Yeah. It it's a funny show because you know, I I've known I've I've met Spike before and I've met uh Paul Zuckerman, who's the other kind of the original host. Zuckerman. Yeah, and and they have these they they have these personas on the show, and in person they're very lovely and affable and and everything you'd expect and then they turn the mics on and they start ripping each other and you apart and yeah it's a but if you really get to know 'em they're exactly like the hair on the show. So I'm not getting real spike? No, no. Real Spike is is is on the show. Like That's great. And then the other one, which is uh I'll be very straightforward. I I just got through the first episode with Reggie Watts, is uh finally you have a podcast, and I think this makes perfect sense with uh Motor Trend and it's podcast one uh is the studio you guys are working with and it's all it's called inevitable with the E V part kind of the inevitable. Yes. Oh sorry sorry, I cut you off. But yes, it's the inevitable with EV in big capital letters. And and my my boss Ed, uh he's not my boss, but he's he's on the podcast with me. He used to be my boss. Um, but uh you know, he said I thought of a name because I was like, let's call it the future of cars. And he's like, no, he's like, I thought of a great name. It's the inevitable with the E and the V big. And I was like, that's terrible. And then of course. So it's a podcast about uh the future of cars, uh, electric cars, cars that talk to each other, cars that talk to your house, cars that don't have steering wheels, uh, as I like to say. Um, you know, where are we going and how will we get there? It's it's it's been a really good podcast. I made it uh I'm I'm through the first episode with Reggie Watts, but I like that you guys start with a conversation between you and Ed. Yeah. If you haven't followed car podcasts in the last couple months, you wouldn't realize that Reggie Watts is like a totally legit huge car nerd. You'd think of him as the comedy side, the music side, the late late show, the rest of it. And he's just like he sat down and I was like, Oh is this guy also quietly an automotive writer? Like Well can I tell you the funniest thing? Yeah well that that's funny you picked up on the writer because when it ended Ed looked at me, he's like, we could hire him. I'm like, yeah, we actually could. He knows that much. But but he called me after that. So we did, we did the inevitable. We recorded the Reggie Watch one back in 2021. Um and just because motor trend is is a slow thing. We record a podcast and it goes up months later, whereas like you know, Ferrer records a podcast, it goes up that day. Right. Or whatever it is. We were like, I don't want to, I'm taking credit for something to set up an anecdote, but we were the ones who like got him out of his shell and he called me because like Reggie and I've become pretty good friends since then and he's like I just want to thank you because I just I like I've always loved cars but I thought in Hollywood if I mentioned it like I'd be laughed out of town and like now I,'m like, I'm out of the closet. L Iike'm a car guy. And and so he's really been enjoying it. And actually, there's a I'm not gonna give any details, but there's a project with Porsche. Uh, they got in touch with me. They're like, we want Reggie involved, you know. And I was, I was telling him, I'm like, this industry is starved for car celebrities, you know. For sure. But yeah, so but I would say the the the one that dropped this week and uh is uh Jonathan Ward from icon. Um, and like it is such a good episode. He's an incredible conversation in general. I've only spoken to him one time, and he just like if he as soon as he realizes that you have a an interest that also he shares, he just dives headfirst into so deep. Yeah, he's great. And I'll also say we had Spike come in because Spike's kind of become this like Tesla convert. You know, here's a guy who you know drives around in a you know 1958 Zagato bodied Porsche 356 who's like super into Teslas. So we had him come in just to talk about like that. And Spike was an incredible guest like he's uh you know he's he's horrible as a podcast host but as a as a guest on my podcast he was incredible so yeah I mean you you look at the list so like it's it's some it's some people that already are have have had their their their space with Hodinky. Like we've got I've not Reggie Watts or Sunk Kang. Sun Kang's incredible. Don't skip that episode. He's a lovely guy and a great personality. But like James Marsden, Spike Fairison, Jonathan Ward. We'd like there's again we there's just more watch and and car kind of overlap, but yeah. And Marzon's another one. He's like he's lovely. He gets he he's a great guy. He gets too tied up with like being the face of IWC to like, you know, talk on the record about stuff. He's like huge watch enthusiast, you know which car guy so it's it's it's great that you know give these guys some space and and talk about you know the future of cars it's it's it's it's we're in a really weird uh moment where everything is changing uh you know underneath us so yeah I think I think if people are interested I think it's a very interesting topic th although, you know, my love of cars, you know, is very much based on manual transmissions and d gas motors, but I know that like those things aren't gonna last. We have enough of them to last, but there won't always be new ones, right? Yeah, I mean look, with electric cars, with electric cars, they don't have transmissions. They got one speed. What change what gear? It's just one gear. You don't need it, you know. And and yeah, I mean, I could, I could, I could go on a whole I have a whole podcast about this subject. So Yeah. So I that and that was literally where I was going with with my next sentence is I don't wanna I don't wanna steamroll the inevitable. It's it's a great podcast. It's nicely produced. They're about an hour long. You guys are doing everything that you need to do. But I I would like just your kind of top level opinion, 'cause we have so many watch enthusiasts and so f kind of few car enthusiasts, I think, maybe on the on the podcast. We'll find out. But what do you think the next ten to twenty years looks like for people who like cars or are interested in in cars? They're gonna be so cars are gonna be so much better than they've ever been. It'll it'll blow you away. And and if you get a chance, get just go get into a Rivian. Figure out how to get into a Rivian. I'm so yeah. I I was I was so uh kind of bleh on Rivian and I followed their their and then I finally you had this amazing story where you went off-road for how far? 7,700 miles from North Carolina to Oregon. Yeah. Yeah. Under electric power. And you had like almost nothing bad to say about that. And so it must be an incredible product. How much are they paying you, Johnny? I I'm paying them. I I placed them over I gave them a thousand bucks. I'm paying that those those pricks. Um excuse my language. Um, but but no, it's incredible. And again, at the end of the day, it's 835 horsepower, yeah. Uh for like 70 some thousand dollars. Like please go go ahead and name me a better performance bargain in the history of the automobile. And they're just getting started. That's their first product. Like, you know, the lucid uh again I like the lucid looks incredible. The the the the one I drove to to H uh Q Milton um or HP Milton excuse me was uh 930 horsepower and it has a 520-mile range. Now, if you get the 1111 horsepower one, it only goes 465 miles. But I mean, cars are gonna become like just stuff we've dreamed of, you know. Yeah, okay, like, you know, is it gonna be, you know, an air-cooled manual transmission lightweight thing? Like, no, it's gonna be something else. But I don't know I just think it's really limiting to be like I only like this one thing because you run the risk of becoming those old dudes sitting on beer coolers bitching about computers, you know, and it's just like it is all changing. And you know, and and that's again, I don't really like the name. That's why the name inevitable works is like I think it's the inevitable billions of research dollars are going into these new types of cars. Billions and billions and billions. And soon it'll be all the money spent to develop cars will be on this. So it's happening despite your feelings. It's it it is inevitable. And look, if you if you hear that and that sounds even a little bit interesting, and I think there's something here, I think we have a moment. I think there's a moment just ahead of us in the car world to bring in a lot more people into car enthusias Yeah. Because the the the guilt, if if you ever felt any environmental guilt of running an ice, you know, an internal combustion engine or the rest of it, some of that will be waylaid where we're moving in the future, especially as we start to move into processes that require less problematic uh sort of extraction of resources from the earth. So I and I I think that podcasts like the inevitable and uh yeah, I I'd highly recommend anyone check it out. You know, this has been a nice long episode, longer than we normally go, which I'm I'm thrilled to do. But uh I do want to hand it over to Cole because he's he's we've got a game to kind of end end the uh end the episode. Cole, you wanna dig into this? Uh we're gonna
Cole Pennington end this on a high note. So the the game goes as such. Basically we always talk about these theoretical like what watch would you wear if you're driving X, Y, and Z, right? So we're gonna actually play that game. We're gonna do some car and watch pairings and go around in a circle. I'm gonna give you a car and you have to respond with a watch, but I don't want to hear you know some you know novel about why. It's just more like bing bang boom. Yeah, and then you''rere g gonnaonna we each give one to each other. So I'm gonna ask James and you, and then you're gonna ask us, and then and then we're and you know, we'll let folks decide if they agree or not on on these uh these picks. So I love it. I love it. So alright. I'm gonna be the uh host here for the first round. James, you're up first. The car is a da da da da da Jeep CJ five. Ooh. Um
Johnny Lieberman I think like one of the dirty dozen. Ooh, good deep. Oh hang on. What's the dirty dozen? They were like the the original like World War II issued watches. Okay. Just like small. They're made by well, twelve different brands that all kind of followed the same spec. So you can buy one. You can buy an expensive one these days from Share Le Colte, or you can buy a less expensive one from Got it. All right
Cole Pennington . So this is this is quite the pick. Love it. Oh. Um Johnny. Well, you know
Johnny Lieberman , when you first said CJ, I was just gonna say my my old G Shock would be really good, but um the military thing is smart. I'll I'll go with that that uh that unomatic uh modello quattro thing I was talking about before. I think that would the field watch sort of one? Yeah. Yep. You're actually gonna get a differ
Cole Pennington ent card though. Well, I thought we were both weighing in on the same car. Well, the problem is now Johnny's had way more time to think about it. I'm sorry, I screwed this all up. Go ahead, go ahead. So you wouldn't want this game to be unfair. So CJ5, one of the dirty dozen johnny your pick is the g wagon but the pooch or pooch g wagon okay well you know the unimatic
Johnny Lieberman would would work really well for that no question yeah so so just so everyone knows like uh uh pooch I think is how it's pronounced but uh because it's the G Wagon's actually not made by Mercedes it's made by Magnus there and Graz Austria and uh they make pooches there and so they were badged as both you know what i'm gonna do all right there's a thing it's called it's called the u1000b have you ever seen this not in person it's a chronograph version of the U one. Um and it's it's got uh left hand uh uh crown and controls uh left side I should say. That's true, yeah. Yeah. This is the Easy M six, if you're if you're more of a a Zen nerd, yeah. Super rad. Yeah. So I'd say that 'cause that's like that's like Ger
Cole Pennington man military. The pooch is German military. So I I see that kinship. I see I that kinship is a little more uh apparent than the Jeep and the dirty dozen, but I see it both. So now I'm passing it to you. You give one to me and one to James. And it
Johnny Lieberman 's gonna be quick. Okay, uh Rolls Royce Phantom. James. If I could get a matched uh piece of artwork for my dashboard, I would do a Gerbal forzy. Really high-end, handmade, cutting edge, still very technical forward, but like traditional handcraft from a what we'll call a small group, hard to come by. You've got to get in line and you can customize it. So I think that kind of works for the the fan. I've dri I've I've been fortunate enough to drive some rules for it. I've never driven a phantom, which feels like a real hole in my in my life. Phantoms are like it they're good. Yeah. They're really good. That's what I'd say about like a yeah, like a a Group of 4Z Sig one or something like that. Very good. Okay, very good. Uh Cole, you're in a Corvette convertible, a new one
Cole Pennington . Mmm, Choogie. I'm gonna go with uh Hugh Blow. Okay. The Big Bang. A modern Big Bang, but the gold. Not the gold one. The uh the Hublot Classic Fusion in gold. Okay. Gold. Oh, gold. The new Corvette. Interesting. All right. All right. Yep. All
Johnny Lieberman right.. James All right. Uh Johnny Alpha Romeo 4C. Oh, a four I mean, I I you're gonna you're gonna okay, you know what popped into my head say a Daytona, but I'll say which I I I don't I don't even know that this is totally wrong, but uh a platona. Um that that that that platinum daytona I don't know why. Uh yeah, I'm gonna go with that. All right. Yeah, yeah. Oh, so that's the um that's the I think it's twenty sixteen, twenty seventeen platinum with the brown bezel and the kind of ice blue uh dial. It's yeah. It's uh that watch weighs about as much as the carbon tub before the four COVID has it's the opposite effect of the carbon. It w weighs ten pounds. I I tried one on and I was like, I gotta get this watch. And then I'm like, it's a hundred and sixty thousand dollars. Fantastic. Uh all right, cool. We're gonna pull back on uh a call back to who knows, a piece of audio we may not even have used from this fantastic conversation. Uh Maserati MC twelve. We'll go with the Corso, which I believe is the slightly shorter one if that matters
Cole Pennington . Okay. Maserati MC twelve. Gotta make this quick. That was like my high school era. Watches that I liked in high school that were big. I'm gonna go, yeah, Panerai to keep to go back. MC twelve. I'm gonna go, yeah. Okay. Hey MC twelve and panor. Italian. I love it. Yeah. Yeah. That makes sense to me. And the the one we'll put out there for whoever has made it to the end of this episode. I'm gonna give them three cars. We each give them one car. You ready? For the audience for them to to comment on. I'm gonna say an uh BMW Z eight. Okay
Johnny Lieberman . Johnny. Uh I will go with how about an electric car? We'll go with that Rivian, which is which is kind of this like weird, you know, French anime looking 835 horsepower pickup truck. So what watch pairs of the Rivian. Okay. And I'm gonna round it out with a uh we'll do a Ferrari GTC 4 Lusso. Um good point. Pick pick that at better and if you say Hublow, I won't read the comment. All right, guys. Uh I I can't take up more of your time. I've literally enjoyed this more than maybe most conversations I've had in the last six months. This has been really nice. I've had a lovely time. We should do this maybe a little bit more often. We don't have to record it if you don't want to. No, record it. That's the best part. Yeah, I mean I'm used to they they don't even bother telling me anymore. They just assume I know it. Right. Right, right, right. Johnny, best of luck at Pike's Peak, of course I'm sure we'll speak before then, but best of luck and uh we'll all be listening on SCR and the inevitable. Uh it's been an absolute treat to have you on and to catch up a bit and to chit-chat watches and cars, and let's do it again soon once there's another crossover we can kind of peg an episode to Cole every time I get to talk to you, which is sometimes several several times a day, it's always a delight. Guys, thanks so much for being on the show. This has been really fun. Thank you. Pleasure. All right. And if you're listening and you have any feedback, you can let us know in the comments. Otherwise, we'll chat to you about in a week's time, and we really appreciate you listening.