{"id":41743,"date":"2020-08-16T18:26:33","date_gmt":"2020-08-16T22:26:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.dodgegarage.com\/news-api\/?p=41743"},"modified":"2024-03-25T11:22:36","modified_gmt":"2024-03-25T15:22:36","slug":"passion-profession-intersect-at-bondurant","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/test.api.dodgegarage.com\/news\/showcase\/2020\/08\/passion-profession-intersect-at-bondurant.html","title":{"rendered":"Passion & Profession Intersect at Bondurant"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

MEET WILLIAM HAWKINS, RACING INSTRUCTOR  <\/strong><\/h4>\n\n\n\n

William Hawkins is a 22-year veteran racing instructor at Bondurant High Performance Driving School, and a kid who grew up shining the flashlight under the hood as his dad turned the wrench. Little did he know, that small task would light the path to his future.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A RACER FROM THE WORD\nGO (KART)<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cMy dad was a gearhead,\u201d recalled Hawkins. \u201cHe was a certified mechanic and we were always working on hotrods and minibikes at home. We were a motorhead kind of family.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cAdmittedly,\u201d\nsaid Hawkins, \u201cMy dad was into making things work. I was much more interested\nin making things go fast.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n

No surprise then, when Hawkins found a library book in elementary school about go-kart racing, he checked it out, read it cover-to-cover and talked to his parents about getting involved. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI am so lucky. My parents were \u2018all-in\u2019 on supporting go-kart racing and my dreams. They supported the build, and helped me in any way they could. We had our own team and we traveled all over to race.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

FROM KART TO CARS<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

As one might expect, when a 15-year-old Hawkins hit driver\u2019s ed age, he graduated from go-karts to cars that go fast. He and his dad built a few racecars themselves, and got into Formula One for a short time. He even made some income doing personal coaching.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cAs\nsponsorships ran low, I decided it was time to get more serious about making a\nliving on a regular basis. But I wanted to do it from behind the wheel of a\nfast car.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

That\u2019s\nwhen Hawkins decided to look into a career in performance driving. But not as a\nracer, as an instructor.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

DRIVER TURNED TEACHER<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI\nstarted working at a local performance driving school,\u201d said Hawkins. \u201cOne day,\nthe owner got a call from Bob Bondurant asking if he knew of any instructors\ninterested in coming to Arizona. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe owner was furious at Bob.\u201d Hawkins recalled. \u201cHe was really vocal about it. I overheard him talking about the call, and when I got home that night, I called Bob Bondurant and asked him if he was still looking for instructors.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI figured, hey, if I\u2019m going to work at a high performance driving school, I want to work for the best. And in my mind, that was Bob.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Bob\nasked Hawkins if they could talk in person. So Hawkins put everything he owned\nin the back of his truck and drove to Phoenix.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201c22\nyears later, I\u2019m still here,\u201d he said.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

THE FLAME OF PASSION\nSTILL BURNS STRONG<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI\nnever thought I would be able to make a living doing something I love so much,\u201d\nsaid Hawkins. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI\nappreciate it more every day. Especially since we had to take some time off \u2013\nit makes you realize how tough it is not to be able to do what you are good at\nand what you love.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Now,\nwith Bondurant open and running strong, Hawkins is especially grateful.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI\nam so lucky to be able to do what I do, and share it with the students. They\nmake my job possible.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Hawkins admits that the learning and transformation are the most exciting parts of the job. \u201cThey let me teach them and let me help them learn. And they learn more than they ever expected to.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI tell them, the car is the same as it was yesterday, it\u2019s you that gets modified, and now you can unlock what the vehicle can really do.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

TIME TO DRIVE<\/strong> <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Are you a new SRT\u00ae<\/sup> owner looking to redeem your VIN to take your free SRT Experience class at Bondurant?<\/a> Looking for other high performance driving classes? Check out Bondurant.com<\/a> and sign up for an unforgettable time!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

MEET WILLIAM HAWKINS, RACING INSTRUCTOR   William Hawkins is a 22-year veteran racing instructor at Bondurant High Performance Driving School, and a kid who grew up shining the flashlight under the hood as his dad turned the wrench. Little did he know, that small task would light the path to his future. A RACER FROM THE WORD GO (KART) \u201cMy dad was a gearhead,\u201d recalled Hawkins. \u201cHe was a certified mechanic and we were always working on hotrods and minibikes at home. We were a motorhead kind of family.\u201d \u201cAdmittedly,\u201d […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":27,"featured_media":41745,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[638],"tags":[625],"class_list":["post-41743","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-showcase","tag-bondurant"],"acf":[],"custom_fields":{"post_thumbnail_image":"https:\/\/test.api.dodgegarage.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/08\/passionmeetsprofession.jpg","icon_selection":"article","external_link":"","featured_article":[],"upload_background_image":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.api.dodgegarage.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41743"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.api.dodgegarage.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.api.dodgegarage.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.api.dodgegarage.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/27"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.api.dodgegarage.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=41743"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/test.api.dodgegarage.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41743\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":41757,"href":"https:\/\/test.api.dodgegarage.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41743\/revisions\/41757"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.api.dodgegarage.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/41745"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.api.dodgegarage.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=41743"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.api.dodgegarage.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=41743"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.api.dodgegarage.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=41743"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}