What Is Your Favorite Racing Quote?
Spend any amount of time, in any corner of the car scene, and you’re bound to discuss motorsports at some point. And one of the first conversation starters might be a quote from a famous person associated with the sport. Or maybe an overtly dramatic fictionalization of racing?
Cheesy though it might be, this famous quote from The Fast And The Furious likely inspired countless enthusiasts of a certain era, as it has the right combination of drama, reality, and passion.
So the question is now in your court: Tell us your favorite quote in racing. Are you a Dale Earnhardt “Second place is just the first loser,” or an Ayrton Senna’s “Going for gap“? Perhaps you take quotes from automotive manufacturing moguls, like Enzo Ferrari’s “Aerodynamics are for people who can’t build engines” or Henry Ford when he said, “Auto racing began five minutes after the second car was built.”
No matter who said it, we want to know your favorite racing quote in the comments section below!
“How do you make a small fortune racing? Start with a large fortune.”
I believe it was NASCAR legend Junior Johnson who said that.
“If you ain’t first you’re last”!
Honorable Mention: “The fastest get paid-and the fastest get laid” RRowww!
Love Talladega Nights!
the last American hero, to whom speed means freedom of the soul
You WIn some, Lose Some and Wreck Some. Dale Earnhardt
He crashed be and I crashed him back. Dale Earnhardt
“I saw Elvis at 1000 FT” after catching fire at Memphis.. John Force
You don’t race a cars you race the rule book! Smokey Yunick
There are two types of racers, Cheaters and Losers. Smokey Yunick
Moonshiners put more time, energy, thought, and love into their cars than any racer ever will. Lose on the track, and you go home. Lose with a load of whiskey, and you go to jail. Junior Johnson
Not a racing quote but appropreate.
We have a long way to go but a short time to get there. Jerry Reed The Snowman.
How come we’s doin’ this? Bandit: Why d’you ask? Cledus Snow: Well they said it ain’t never been done before Bandit: W’hell thats the reason, son. Bandit Bo Darville
Un named IMSA team owner. How do you win a Million Dollars racing You start with Ten Million dollars.
In defense of Smokey Yunick, he didn’t hold to blatant cheating. However, he could find loopholes in the rule book better than any Philadelphia lawyer. To paraphrase Smokey, “If it don’t say you can’t do it, it’s legal!”
Smokey was the absolute best at figuring out what the rules DIDN’T say…
“You wanna go for pink slips?” – about 80 million unnamed street racers
And I used to say back, “Sorry, I don’t wear pink slips!”
“It is better to go into a corner slow and come out fast, than to go in fast and come out dead.”
“In order to finish first, you first have to finish.”
Both by Sir Stirling Moss
Win on Sunday sell on Monday. Bob Tasca Sr.
When you’re racing, it’s life. Anything that happens before or after is just waiting. Steve McQueen
Exactly the one I’d pick! Found yours first.
Of course that’s it. I like how McQueen implies that that observation includes the starlet he is talking to…
Aerodynamics is for those who cannot manufacture good engines. -Enzo Ferrari
Nobody remembers who finished second except the guy who finished second. -Bobby Unser
Speed costs money. How fast do you want to go? -Unknown
My recollection thinks it was “Speed costs money – how fast can you afford to go?”
Understeer is when you see the wall before you hit, oversteer is when you don’t see the wall but feel it.
Many racers said this in various forms. This was Buddy Baker stock car driver. Walter Rohl rally driver stated you see the tree before you hit it.
The saying varies per series.
You don’t go to the start line because you’re ready, you go because it’s time. -Unknown
“Driving fast on the track does not scare me. What scares me is when I drive on the highway and I get passed by some idiot who thinks he is Fangio.”
JM Fangio
“I could beat that kiddie-car going backwards.” – Friend of the Steve McQueen character in “The Blob”.
Wow, I remember seeing “The Blob” on it’s first run in the movie theater but missed that line. Of course I was 8 years old at the time. And at the time few people knew who Steve McQueen was because he hadn’t become Josh Randall in the TV show “Wanted, Dead or Alive” yet. And definitely few people knew who Anita Corsaut was who played McQueen’s girlfriend and later became Miss. Crump.
“Second place is first loser.” Chip Ganassi
“If you ain’t cheatin’, you ain’t tryin’” – Unknown, attributed to NASCAR
“If you’re not cheating, you’re not trying.” Wrestler Eddie Guerrero
“If you get caught, then you ain’t trying hard enough.
I’ll have enough power when I can spin the tires at the far end of a long straight. – Mark Donahue
The version of this one I heard was something like “I will have enough power when I can see a set of black stripes from the exit of the last turn all the way up to the start of the next turn”