MotoManTV Podcast

What happens when a university engineering project completely upends the power dynamics of the world's most elite supercar manufacturers?

In this episode of the MotoMan Podcast, we meet Dr. Tim Woolmer, the CTO and Founder of YASA Motors. Long before the automotive establishment fully embraced electrification, Woolmer engineered a radical departure from traditional propulsion: the axial flux "pancake" motor.

By rewriting the core physics of electric motor topology, YASA managed to strip away 80% of necessary iron, delivering an astonishing three-to-one power-to-weight advantage over industry-standard radial machines. It is the exact breakthrough technology quietly weaponized inside the apex hyper-hybrids of Koenigsegg, Ferrari and Lamborghini—and it is now stepping directly into mainline production as the core architecture of the upcoming 2027 Mercedes-AMG GT 4-Door.

Filmed on-site at YASA’s Oxford headquarters, this episode is a technical & narrative deep-dive into the realities of automotive disruption. We trace the journey from a crude 2006 PhD prototype to navigating tight venture funding rounds, partnering with Jaguar on the legendary C-X75 concept, and eventually executing a full corporate acquisition by Mercedes-Benz.

Chapters
00:00:00 - The Future of Italian Exotics Started in Oxford
00:01:26 - A Quick Note on the Vault Episode
00:02:11 - The Pancake Motor That Stopped the Room
00:03:04 - Why YASA Had to Exist
00:03:48 - Radial Motors, Axial Motors, and the Big Difference
00:04:37 - The Tiny Stator With 250 Horsepower
00:05:38 - How a Smaller Motor Makes Way More Power
00:08:58 - Motor Number One: The Oxford PhD Prototype
00:10:04 - Building an EV Startup Before EVs Were Obvious
00:12:03 - The Jaguar C-X75 Moment That Proved It Could Work
00:13:16 - The Hard, Messy Reality of a University Startup
00:15:30 - From ‘I’ to ‘We’: Growing the YASA Team
00:16:17 - The Car Guy Who Was Really an Electric-Car Guy
00:19:04 - Batteries, Motors, Roads, and the Path He Chose
00:21:01 - Morgan, Hydrogen, and the Project That Forced Real Progress
00:23:59 - The Material Constraint That Sparked the Breakthrough
00:26:53 - The Grid Problem Nobody Can Ignore
00:29:28 - Help Grow the Motoman Podcast
00:30:13 - Yes, These Motors Are in Ferraris
00:32:25 - So Where Does Mercedes Fit In?
00:34:30 - Mercedes Didn’t Just Buy Today’s Motor
00:35:13 - Two Generations Ahead and Still Moving Fast
00:36:22 - Inside the Oxford Factory Making the Future
00:39:20 - Ferrari, Mercedes, and the Non-Compete Dance
00:40:47 - Why New Car Tech Has to Enter at the Top
00:43:32 - Aerospace, Patents, and the Moat Around YASA
00:46:10 - Patents Matter, but Speed Matters More
00:47:40 - The Next EV Leap: Moving the Motors
00:49:42 - Why EVs Need to Get More Interesting
00:52:43 - Could This Reach Everyday Mercedes Models?
00:53:59 - DNA, Team, Luck, and the Formula Behind YASA

#YASAMotors #MercedesAMG #Ferrari #AxialFlux #EVTech #AutomotiveEngineering #Koenigsegg #Lamborghini #MotoManPodcast

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What happens when you apply the brutal discipline of elite military training and the high-stakes pressure of a two-Michelin-star kitchen to the wild west of the modern digital algorithm?
In a total departure from our usual deep dives with the key people shaping the car, tech, racing or business worlds, this episode MotoMan sits down with digital creator Read Choi for a raw, unscripted peer-to-peer conversation. Far removed from horse-power metrics, standard car reviews, or corporate strategy, this discussion pulls back the curtain on the actual human cost of modern media execution, the reality of creative burnout, and the shared foundation of faith and friendship that keeps two creators grounded in a hyper-paced digital world.
Read details his staggering trajectory—navigating homelessness at age 17 to thriving within UC Berkeley’s honors program and Navy training—before quietly rewriting the playbook on audience attention metrics and short-form video architecture. This is an look inside the engine room of modern digital media, engineered for those who study execution and personal sovereignty.

Chapters:
00:00:00 - Intro to Read Choi and Turning Chaos Into a Playbook
00:01:17 - Why Read Is Here: Shorts, Friendship, and No Car Talk
00:02:40 - The Cigar Lounge Meeting That Started Everything
00:06:43 - Cigars, Faith, and Real Conversations
00:09:20 - Dream Meetings, Planning Meetings, and Life Structure
00:13:16 - Read Choi’s Story: Upbringing, Survival, and Urgency
00:17:44 - Community College, UC Berkeley, and Building Work Ethic
00:20:16 - Michelin-Star Kitchens and the Advantage of Hard Work
00:22:50 - Military, Brotherhood, and Finding Purpose
00:26:46 - Leaving the Military and Finding TikTok During Covid
00:29:20 - Modeling, Cooking, and Learning Skills Under Pressure
00:30:14 - Delta Wings, Pilot Cards, and Friendship Tangents
00:33:15 - How to Support the Show
00:34:06 - TikTok, Forrest Jones, and Seeing the Code Early
00:35:59 - Studying Viral Content and Posting Five Times a Day
00:37:24 - The Creator’s Dilemma and the Myth of Work-Life Balance
00:39:38 - Control, Freedom, and the Screw-You Mentality
00:42:20 - Boundaries, Clarity, and What It Means to Stay
00:45:39 - The Photo Coronation and Showing Up for Friends
00:50:49 - Short-Form Strategy and the Business of Content
00:53:34 - Acting, Networking, and What Comes Next
00:55:32 - Read’s Three Keys to Success
00:59:20 - Easter Sunday, Cigars, and the Friendship That Defines Them

#MotoManPodcast #ReadChoi #ContentStrategy #CreatorEconomy #Mindset #SOP #Faith #HangarChat #ShortFormVideo #PersonalSovereignty

For driving adventures & car reviews, before sure to visit us @
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What happens when you take the collective genius behind Tesla, Lucid, and BYD, and use it to build an EV that completely rejects Silicon Valley tech bloat?
In this episode of The MotoMan Podcast, we sit down with Mark Tapscott, co-founder of the radical new British automotive startup, Longbow. Mark shares his incredible journey through the EV revolution—from early days spent as Elon Musk's chauffeur and launching the Model S in the UK, to building out Lucid Europe from scratch and setting up operations for BYD in the Middle East.
Now, he’s putting all that insider knowledge into a vehicle that completely defies industry trends. Longbow’s debut vehicle is a raw, lightweight, 1,000-pound speedster with no roof, no screens, and a strict promise that the brand will never build an SUV.

Episode Chapters:
00:00:00 - Intro to Longbow and the Driver-First EV Mission
00:01:07 - What Longbow Means
00:02:32 - The Speedster: No Screen, No Roof, and Only 150 Cars
00:03:19 - Meet the Founders and the Startup Behind Longbow
00:05:11 - From Design Engineering to the Philips Lesson
00:08:51 - Leaving Lighting Design and Finding Cars Again
00:10:10 - Brands Hatch, Lotus Elise, and Learning Race Cars
00:13:28 - Race Components, Free Labor, and Starting a Team
00:16:03 - The Tesla Roadster Moment That Changed Everything
00:20:45 - Cars & Coffee, First Impressions, and the Longbow Prototype
00:23:50 - Designing the Coupe and Building Longbow Differently
00:26:01 - Launching Tesla Model S in the UK
00:28:19 - Elon, Early Tesla, and the Motorcycle Question
00:30:15 - Model 3, UK EV Incentives, and Leaving Tesla
00:33:15 - Wallbox, Hyundai, and the Pull of Early-Stage Startups
00:39:16 - Building Lucid Europe From Zero
00:45:45 - Lucid, Saudi Arabia, and Smart Money in the Middle East
00:47:50 - Tesla, BYD, and the Chinese EV Challenge
00:52:34 - Why Modern Cars Are Built Around Features Nobody Asked For
00:55:18 - Why Longbow Had to Exist
00:58:06 - Funding Longbow and Proving the First Lightweight Prototype
00:59:42 - The Step-by-Step Plan for Building a Car Company
01:00:53 - Longbow's Platform Strategy and the No-SUV Promise
01:03:04 - Going After Porsche, Corvette, and the Practical Sports Car
01:05:17 - Why Legacy Brands Struggle With Electric Sports Cars
01:06:58 - Listening to Customers and Keeping the Car Simple
01:09:25 - Chassis, Dynamics, and the Road-Car Philosophy
01:12:18 - The Spreadsheet Behind Longbow's Business Case
01:14:33 - Hand-Built in the UK and Assembling the Best Components
01:17:21 - Motors, Batteries, and the Lightweight EV Technology Stack
01:21:02 - The Decentralized Team and Working With the UK Government
01:23:40 - The Three Forces Behind Mark's Success
01:26:03 - Tesla Lessons, Fast Decisions, and Trust
01:28:07 - Neurodiversity, Co-Founders, and Driving Into the Smoke
01:29:07 - Final Thoughts and the Canyon Drive Challenge

#MotoManTV #MotoManTVPodcast #MotoMan #Longbow #LongbowSpeedster #ElectricSportsCar #DriverFocused #Tesla #LucidMotors #BYD #ElonMusk #SiliconValley #EVRevolution #CarPodcast #SportsCars #PureDriving #TeslaRoadster

For driving adventures & car reviews, before sure to visit us @
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In this exclusive vault episode of the MotoMan Podcast, MotoMan goes behind the scenes at Toyota’s North American R&D center with legendary former Chief Engineer Mike Sweers. Before his recent retirement, Sweers was the driving force responsible for the engineering DNA of Toyota’s entire body-on-frame lineup. But it almost didn’t happen.
In this career-spanning deep dive, Sweers uncovers the hidden corporate battles required to keep the Tundra and Sequoia alive when leadership in Japan was ready to pull the plug. From his gritty beginnings on a Michigan farm to surviving the collapsing "graveyard" era of 1980s Detroit manufacturing at GM and Chrysler, Sweers shares raw, unvetted lessons on leadership, cost-cutting, and institutional friction.
He also issues a sharp warning about the modern automotive industry: the traditional 15-year pace of change has completely collapsed into chaos, and rushing unvetted technology to customers is a dangerous game.
If you want to understand how modern trucks are actually built, how multi-billion-dollar platform strategies are executed, and why Toyota engineers take every single part personally, this is a masterclass you cannot afford to miss.

Chapters:
00:00:00 - The Guy Behind Toyota's Truck Decisions
00:01:11 - Why This Old Episode Still Matters
00:02:46 - Farm Kid, Truck Guy, Japanese Pickup Legend
00:04:29 - The Award That Turned Problem-Solving Into a Career
00:07:17 - Picking the School That Could Get Him the Job
00:09:21 - AMC Obsession and a Fake Detroit Cop Matador
00:13:02 - Oldsmobile, 92 Cars an Hour, and the Factory Floor
00:17:13 - The Worst Job That Taught the Best Lesson
00:20:43 - When GM Swung the Pendulum Too Far
00:24:48 - Quad Fours, Chassis Work, and a Messy GM Exit
00:28:06 - How Boring Seats Became His Best Engineering Class
00:31:46 - Chrysler Chaos, Big Egos, and AMC's Secret Weapon
00:35:56 - Iacocca, Cigars, and the Imperial That Never Happened
00:40:03 - Trying to Build Sports Cars Out of K-Cars
00:42:57 - The Toyota Phone Call That Changed Everything
00:46:46 - Toyota R&D Before It Had Structure
00:50:04 - The Camry-to-Tacoma Path Begins
00:51:15 - Why American Trucks Had to Be Designed in America
00:52:54 - The Mud Test That Created an Off Switch
00:54:47 - Go Where Truck People Actually Use the Truc
00:55:52 - How Complaining About Tundra Became His Job
00:58:29 - The Business Case That Saved Tundra and Sequoia
01:02:57 - The Chess Move: Three Platforms Into One
01:04:10 - Why Toyota Engineers Take Every Part Personally
01:07:52 - Teams, Longevity, and Always Learning
01:10:59 - Technology Is Moving Faster Than Customers Can Pay For
01:12:27 - Marty McFly's Tacoma and the Perfect Ending
#ToyotaTundra #ChiefEngineer #TruckEngineering #AutomotiveHistory #ToyotaTacoma #DetroitMuscle #CarDesign #ToyotaSequoia #InsideTheIndustry #MotoManPodcast

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What does it take to become the ultimate authority on classic car values? In this special vault episode, MotoMan sits down with Dave Kinney—the founder and the publisher of the Hagerty Price Guide.
From a fateful, unfiltered conversation at a New York City Shake Shack in 2006 that completely altered MotoMan's career path, to Dave’s own wild journey of turning a 2.3 GPA and severe dyslexia into a prolific writing career for The New York Times, Octane, and Automobile magazine, this episode goes far beyond simple market numbers.
Whether you want to understand market arbitrage, the real difference between fair market value and forced liquidation value, or simply need bulletproof advice on how to navigate the business world without being an a$$hole, Dave Kinney delivers decades of raw, unfiltered automotive & life wisdom.
Chapters:
00:00:00 - Intro to Dave Kinney and the Man Who Writes the Book on Classic Car Values
00:01:04 - Vault Episode Context and the 15-Year Conversation
00:01:49 - The Shake Shack Conversation That Changed MotoMan’s Path
00:04:36 - Growing Up in Arlington and Learning to Listen
00:06:17 - Codebreaker Father, Lincoln Memories, and Winning the Parent Lottery
00:08:24 - The Car Wash Lesson Dave Never Forgot
00:10:16 - His Mother’s Lessons and a Teenage Cross-Country Van Trip
00:15:48 - Becoming a Car Kid Through Magazines, Models, and Family Cars
00:18:30 - What Dave Learned from His Father’s Entrepreneurial Side
00:20:41 - Working Around Exotic Cars at 16
00:23:35 - Five Plymouth Valiants and Dave’s First Car-Flipping Lesson
00:25:11 - Avantis, Early Profits, and Finding Value in Weird Cars
00:29:14 - Taking Trains to New York with Cash to Buy Cars
00:33:31 - College, Unusual Cars, and Early Market Instincts
00:41:59 - Coming Home, Real Estate Lessons, and the Parking Lot Business
00:45:56 - Contemporary Classic Automobiles and the $25,000 Move-Out Deal
00:50:46 - Why Dave Needed to Get Back Into the Car World
00:53:39 - How One Appraisal Question Turned Into a Career
00:56:09 - Keith Martin, Auction Seminars, and the Start of Automotive Journalism
01:01:12 - Auction Writing, Humor, and Making Car Stories Stick
01:03:54 - Writing for The New York Times, Octane, and Automobile
01:05:35 - Dave Kinney’s Three Rules for Writers
01:07:20 - How Cars That Matter Became the Hagerty Price Guide
01:10:29 - Monterey, Jay Leno, Michael Hagerty, and the Right Timing
01:13:23 - Building the Guide, Taking the Risk, and Stella’s Support
01:17:03 - What Hagerty Added: Data, Scale, and a Bigger Team
01:19:06 - What Dave Brought: Dealer Instincts and Real Market Conversations
01:21:20 - Fair Market Value, Liquidation Value, and Why Every Car Has Many Prices
01:23:51 - Bloomberg Terminals, Finance Companies, and the Future of Hagerty Data
01:26:42 - Why Price Guides Are a Tool, Not a Crutch
01:27:16 - Buying Too Early, Top-Quality Cars, and the Truth About Value
01:29:22 - Dave Kinney’s Three Keys to Success and Final Thanks

#DaveKinney #HagertyPriceGuide #ClassicCarValues #MotoManPodcast #CarCollecting #AutomotiveJournalism #MarketArbitrage
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