83-year-old Jack Roush has been a champion at life as an engineer, a racer, and an entrepreneur. Long before the winds of NASCAR came calling to him, he was a college-educated engineer looking for the next thing that would get his heart racing. There were two options in front of him. One, which he ultimately took, led him to the factories of Ford. The other was not so grounded.
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After graduating from college, he had explored the prospect of enrolling in the Air Force. The recruiters had wanted him to kickstart his career by starting off as the navigator and the armament guy who operates all the systems in an F-4. This meant sitting in the back seat of the plane. But Roush had been hoping to do something far more thrilling and adventurous.
He told Tom Jensen in a 2020 interview, “I wanted to be the guy up front with his hair on fire. They said, “Well, with your background in mathematics and physics, you’d be of more use to us in the back seat than up front.” And so, we wound up at loggerheads over that.” In the meantime, he had a second interview with Ford and ended up choosing them over the backseat of the F-4.
It was at this time that he gifted himself his first-ever car as well. To not a lot of surprise, it was a 1964 Ford Mustang. Roush had worked his way through college and saved up enough money to buy the car. Less than a month after it went to the showrooms, he had one ordered through a used car dealer he knew at Berea, Kentucky, and took delivery of it soon after joining Ford.
What Roush is most proud of about his career
Over his decades of experience and involvement with NASCAR, Roush has developed the careers of countless young drivers. The fact that he has been able to build a platform on which they have been able to realize their dreams is what makes him happy now as an old team owner.
Asked what made him proud of his career, he said, “That I’ve had over 50 drivers drive for me and I’ve had 19 of them win races with me. And of that number, most of them won their first race with me. The fact that I’ve been able to bring young folks along, help them realize their potential, and satisfy their ambitions by putting them in a format that allows them to practice their trade.”
Today, he has largely handed the reins of his team to Brad Keselowski. The former Cup Series champion is ably carrying the legacy that he built and taking the organization back to the top, where it belongs.
