CONCORD, N.C. – This weekend, the NASCAR Cup Series is taking Hendrick Motorsports traveling network administrator Brian Walsh back to his home state.
Walsh, a Sebastian River, Florida, native, grew up about 100 miles south of Daytona International Speedway, and he’s already had some family members make the trip up north to see him.
Before joining the organization’s IT department, Walsh served in the United States Marine Corps, which included deployments to Iraq in 2005 and 2008.
He planned on potentially pursuing a career in law enforcement after the military, but neck injuries from his service withheld him from continuing in that direction.
“I didn’t necessarily know where my life was going at that point in time,” he said.
It was then that Walsh sought out a career in IT.
He started working in IT in a physician’s office, and this year he began his career with Hendrick Motorsports.
“I guess God wanted me this way, so he put Hendrick Motorsports in my life,” he said.
Walsh always had some interest in NASCAR, but now, he’s enjoyed learning the ins and outs of the sport and having some new coworkers to root for on race days.
“It was new to me,” he said. “My first race I ever watched the entire thing was Daytona, and I was amazed.”
Walsh travels with the team nearly every weekend and is responsible for setting up all IT network systems. He and the rest of the team prepare the IT networks for all haulers, tool boxes, cars, pit boxes and various other IT networks.
In the fast-paced world of NASCAR, Walsh and his team are always on their feet.
“If things go down, if somebody around here or if one of the other teams trips over something, knocks down a wire, pulls one of our cords down, we’ve got to quickly fix that,” he said. “We’re pretty busy.”
Walsh admits the job can be stressful and grueling, but the Marine Corps taught him how to handle the demands of the Cup Series schedule.
“A lot of military personnel are used to the traveling, and this is less traveling,” he explained. “I can still see my family, I can still FaceTime my family for the most part if I need to throughout the day. In the military, I was deployed to places I didn’t necessarily want to be. Now, I get travel to places I like.”
“This stress is nothing compared to my old job,” he smiled.