Fear not, dear friends, for this is not another alien from the Outer Limits TV series, but John Leonhardt at work in his Intel clean suit, making the world a better place! What's that you say? You don't recognize him without his helmet on? Well, well then, let's meet the man!
John was born in Shelby. Ohio. "It's a small farming community in north central Ohio. We lived in the middle of a 5-acre woods and our drive-way was a 1/2 mile long. I worked for neighboring farmers and saved up enough to buy a dirt bike when I was about 12 and raced in hair scrambles and motocross events when I could. When not racing I satisfied my need for speed by taking the one 45 degree corner in our driveway wide open, typically sliding sideways through it and challenging all the neighborhood kids to try and keep up!"
John says that both of his parents were sports car people. "My mom had an Austin Healey 'bug-eye' Sprite when she was in high school. My dad was into the beefy American cars, and raced several hill climbs using a '65 Shelby Mustang lent to him by his cousin. A close friend of ours had a 'B Modified' (I think that's what it was called) sports car that he raced at Mid Ohio in the '70's. I grew up with the smell and sounds of racing. When I was old enough, I worked at Mid-Ohio selling programs so I could then watch the races for free."
Like most teenagers, John had a need for speed. "This lead me to sneak out one day on my dad's Honda 750. The 1st time I ripped through the gears on the road up to triple digits with it, I was HOOKED!" John moved here his senior year of high school, and his first car was a 1974 Fiat Spyder 124. "It was a good car but parts were expensive and the need for them frequent." He ended up selling that and getting a Honda Interceptor 500. "I was in love with that bike. One day while at the local Honda dealer I saw a high school friend of mine. He told me about road racing his motorcycle and that I should come out and take a look." John got the roadracing bug pretty bad (or is that good!?) and bought a Yamaha RZ350 and started road-racing it, mostly at Firebird.
Since his motorcycle racing days, and prior to autocross, John has had to satisfy his need for speed by doing racing sims on his computer. "I have been doing that since about 1998, and have been in many different racing leagues and won several championships against some very tough competition." He uses a Logitech G25 controller: "It has a wheel with force feedback that rotates 900 degrees, all three pedals, and three different shifting options; paddles on the wheel, sequential shifter lever, or an "H" pattern shifter. I actually learned to left-foot brake by doing the racing sims. It's the only other competitive driving experience I've had."
"Mike Rogers and I had discussed racing and cars in general several times. He mentioned autocross to me several times, but I had no idea what it was." From the name, he thought it was some form of dirt-racing at first (Moto-cross/Auto-cross?), but "once he explained it to me I was interested, but didn't have anything that I considered to be worthy. (A 94 Honda accord EX automatic?) "I then decided it was time to get a new car.
"I was interested in several different cars; Miata, Mazdaspeed3, Volvo C30, Honda Civic Si (Like Ryan B's), and I test drove several of them. Then, I happend upon this article called "The Lightning Lap" in one of the motorsport rags. This magazine took 20 or so cars of a variety of cost/performance levels and ran them around Virginia International Raceway. Well, this little turbocharged Cobalt put the HURT on a lot of much more expensive cars, so naturally, I was intrigued!" While researching more about it, "I then saw that the same model of car had just set the front wheel drive 'stock' record at the famed Nurburgring. That was all it took for me."
John has a son Broc from his first marriage. He's currently 18 years old and a senior at Mesa Mountain View, and has shown a similar interest in autocrossing. "I also have a beautiful daughter that my second wife and I adopted from Korea. She's 5 years old and her name is Lily." The Leonhardts have been living in North Mesa for about 11 years. "I haven't really left Mesa since moving here in '83, except for a 2 year work assignment that took me back and forth from here to Albuquerque, NM."
One of John's dreams is to drive on the Nurburgring one day. "Another dream I've always had was to drive Route 66 across the U.S. I was able to fullfill that dream this last summer, as I had earned an 8-week paid sabbatical from work. My son and I took off for nearly 2 months travelling across the US. We spent a majority of that back in Ohio with my brother and his family. What great memories..."
John took the Novice 1 Fall Series win in 2009, and has jumped into the ranks of the HIGHLY competitive and smack-talkin'est ST1 class for 2010. He took fifth out of fourteen in his first outing. Not bad for a guy who has only been doing this since September of last year! The mighty Cobalt SS has proven a solid ride, and a competitive car, and John has jumped right into the thick of things. Our kinda guy !!!
~{Profile photo provided by John Leonhardt. Other photos taken by Dave Lahey and Kim Chenoweth.}~
Fear not, dear friends, for this is not another alien from the Outer Limits TV series, but John Leonhardt at work in his Intel clean suit, making the world a better place! What's that you say? You don't recognize him without his helmet on? Well, well then, let's meet the man!
John was born in Shelby. Ohio. "It's a small farming community in north central Ohio. We lived in the middle of a 5-acre woods and our drive-way was a 1/2 mile long. I worked for neighboring farmers and saved up enough to buy a dirt bike when I was about 12 and raced in hair scrambles and motocross events when I could. When not racing I satisfied my need for speed by taking the one 45 degree corner in our driveway wide open, typically sliding sideways through it and challenging all the neighborhood kids to try and keep up!"
John says that both of his parents were sports car people. "My mom had an Austin Healey 'bug-eye' Sprite when she was in high school. My dad was into the beefy American cars, and raced several hill climbs using a '65 Shelby Mustang lent to him by his cousin. A close friend of ours had a 'B Modified' (I think that's what it was called) sports car that he raced at Mid Ohio in the '70's. I grew up with the smell and sounds of racing. When I was old enough, I worked at Mid-Ohio selling programs so I could then watch the races for free."
Like most teenagers, John had a need for speed. "This lead me to sneak out one day on my dad's Honda 750. The 1st time I ripped through the gears on the road up to triple digits with it, I was HOOKED!" John moved here his senior year of high school, and his first car was a 1974 Fiat Spyder 124. "It was a good car but parts were expensive and the need for them frequent." He ended up selling that and getting a Honda Interceptor 500. "I was in love with that bike. One day while at the local Honda dealer I saw a high school friend of mine. He told me about road racing his motorcycle and that I should come out and take a look." John got the roadracing bug pretty bad (or is that good!?) and bought a Yamaha RZ350 and started road-racing it, mostly at Firebird.
Since his motorcycle racing days, and prior to autocross, John has had to satisfy his need for speed by doing racing sims on his computer. "I have been doing that since about 1998, and have been in many different racing leagues and won several championships against some very tough competition." He uses a Logitech G25 controller: "It has a wheel with force feedback that rotates 900 degrees, all three pedals, and three different shifting options; paddles on the wheel, sequential shifter lever, or an "H" pattern shifter. I actually learned to left-foot brake by doing the racing sims. It's the only other competitive driving experience I've had."
"Mike Rogers and I had discussed racing and cars in general several times. He mentioned autocross to me several times, but I had no idea what it was." From the name, he thought it was some form of dirt-racing at first (Moto-cross/Auto-cross?), but "once he explained it to me I was interested, but didn't have anything that I considered to be worthy. (A 94 Honda accord EX automatic?) "I then decided it was time to get a new car.
"I was interested in several different cars; Miata, Mazdaspeed3, Volvo C30, Honda Civic Si (Like Ryan B's), and I test drove several of them. Then, I happend upon this article called "The Lightning Lap" in one of the motorsport rags. This magazine took 20 or so cars of a variety of cost/performance levels and ran them around Virginia International Raceway. Well, this little turbocharged Cobalt put the HURT on a lot of much more expensive cars, so naturally, I was intrigued!" While researching more about it, "I then saw that the same model of car had just set the front wheel drive 'stock' record at the famed Nurburgring. That was all it took for me."
John has a son Broc from his first marriage. He's currently 18 years old and a senior at Mesa Mountain View, and has shown a similar interest in autocrossing. "I also have a beautiful daughter that my second wife and I adopted from Korea. She's 5 years old and her name is Lily." The Leonhardts have been living in North Mesa for about 11 years. "I haven't really left Mesa since moving here in '83, except for a 2 year work assignment that took me back and forth from here to Albuquerque, NM."
One of John's dreams is to drive on the Nurburgring one day. "Another dream I've always had was to drive Route 66 across the U.S. I was able to fullfill that dream this last summer, as I had earned an 8-week paid sabbatical from work. My son and I took off for nearly 2 months travelling across the US. We spent a majority of that back in Ohio with my brother and his family. What great memories..."
John took the Novice 1 Fall Series win in 2009, and has jumped into the ranks of the HIGHLY competitive and smack-talkin'est ST1 class for 2010. He took fifth out of fourteen in his first outing. Not bad for a guy who has only been doing this since September of last year! The mighty Cobalt SS has proven a solid ride, and a competitive car, and John has jumped right into the thick of things. Our kinda guy !!!
~{Profile photo provided by John Leonhardt. Other photos taken by Dave Lahey and Kim Chenoweth.}~