Racing Ferrari's, Zappos and Game On! WPCP: 054
Yep.
I literally raced a Ferrari in Las Vegas a week and a half ago.
HOLY MOLY it was friggin OFF the charts fun! I knew I was going to enjoy it and was excited about doing it but had no idea how much fun it was really going to be. Once we got to Dream Racing we had to sign our lives away, watch a video, and then try out driving in the simulator. I have to say that driving the car felt easier than the simulator! It also made me a whole lot more nervous than I thought I would be.
Next, it was time to suit up, pose for pictures, and off to the race track.
We each had 5 laps around the track and just as they told us, it was by lap 5 that you started to feel like you were starting to get the hang of things and before you knew it you were done. I felt like a little kid who just had a brand new toy taken away from me!
What a RUSH though!
I ran up to one of my mentors and just said “THAT WAS AWESOME!” OMG!!! After that, I also decided that I want to bring my son back when he turns 16 and we’ll make a family trip out of it (bringing my kids, parents, siblings & their kids, aunt & uncle… the whole clan!).
My takeaways from Ferrari racing:
- I thrive when I try new things
- I’m capable of SO much more!
- Getting out of the office feeds my soul
- Nothing beats connecting & sharing in person
- Good systems are a priority (Dream Racing has it down to a fine science)
- Trust is key in everything you do
- Spending time with like-minded people never gets old
Here’s a group picture pre-racing (I’m in the back):
After racing, we had a great lunch and headed off to Zappos for a tour!
Which was also pretty awesome (although it’s hard to beat racing a Ferrari. Just sayin).
The Zappos tour was pretty amazing. The founder, Tony Hseih (who I bumped into and grabbed another selfie with.. see below) decided to move Zappos to downtown Vegas after the company took off so he could support the community better. Their offices are in the old City Hall building, which is downtown (old Vegas, not the strip).
Zappos has an amazing culture, people who are passionate about working there, and tons of perks for employees.
It was also validation that I could never work for anyone else again. Even a company as cool as Zappos (as our tour was winding down our guide asked how many of us wanted to work at Zappos? No one responded so I jumped in with “you’re talking to a group of entrepreneurs!”… to which he asked if we wanted our own companies to have cultures like Zappos. :- ) ).
I also prefer less ‘chaos’ when I work.
Zappos allows all their employees to decorate their cubes anyway they want, they’ve painted hallways, have unique artwork everywhere (and product), and even a small ball pit in the Human Resources department (and a cool rooftop deck, cafeteria, and ping pong table).
It was still a little too much for me (and most everyone else as well! You have to be somewhat organized to run a business, right?). Regardless, it was a great tour and a wonderful day!
And then there was the meeting.
EPIC.
Yes, I just used the word epic (I’m calling myself out more on that one than anything else).
Our Mastermind meeting days are always structured in a similar manner: the first day is more of the “big picture” thinking and the second meeting day is our strategy and implementation. What I love about this is that it helps me get out of my head. It’s so easy to get caught up in (and stay in) the day-to-day dealings of running a business that if I don’t step back once in a while I lose sight of the overall purpose and my ‘why’. Which, I can tell you that for most entrepreneurs that I’ve talked with part of their ‘why’ is always freedom.
Freedom is hard to attain if you’re stuck in the minutia of the tasks in your business and the basic daily operations.
And because I want you to listen to the episode I’m going to save the juicy details of the meeting for the show… but I promise it’s worth it!
The BIGGEST takeaway for me from the entire meeting was to step things up AS MYSELF!
It’s easy to get caught up in the tasks that are part of our business but sometimes the only way to get where you’re going and figure out exactly what you SHOULD be doing is to show up and do the work. For me, that means taking things in a little different direction (don’t worry, The WP Chick isn’t going anywhere) and step into some “new” ways I can #showup.
I couldn’t be more excited.
Links from this episode
Dream Racing in Las Vegas
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