108: Mike Lewin of Professional Awesome shares how they are transforming their racing hobby into a real business

Mike Lewin grew up in an environmentally friendly community and then went to Purdue for Engineering. During college, he met Dan O’Donnel through the car club and they became roommates. Dan introduced Mike to Redline Time Attack and they began working on Dan’s Evo 7 to make it faster and faster for each event. While they were building the car, Dan introduced Grant to the team to help build the Evo 7. At this point, they decided to begin calling themselves the Professional Awesome. After graduation, everybody got real jobs and worked for other companies. But they continued to develop and improve Dan’s Evo 7. Sadly, the car was totaled at Road Atlanta in 2013 and they were unable to salvage any of it. In the true spirit of motorsports, Doug Wind and Tony Szirka donated their winnings to the Professional Awesome. Then, multiple companies stepped up and offered to help them build another car. The team hadn’t really considered giving it another shot, but the encouragement and donations from friends led them to purchase an Evo 8 and start fresh. While building this car, they took it much more seriously and tried to design and build as many aspects of the car as possible. This has morphed their business into offering engineering support and design for other racers. They have developed several aerodynamic components and help other teams setup their suspension.