Rodney Wills may not have been born with a silver spoon
in his mouth but he was more than compensated for it by
being able to grow up behind the wheel. At eight years old
he started driving heavy equipment on his uncle’s
farm. Flouting child labor laws his uncle would put him
to work; he would get him started and jump off the tractor,
and have Rodney cut and plow fields. The uncle found Rodney
a willing employee. Now while he did not engage in any tractor
races, the seed had been planted (literally); the passion
for driving already raced through his veins.
Later
on in Alabama Rodney would drive his father’s old
pickup truck. As young teen-agers sometimes do, he would
sneak the truck out to splash in the mud on the local country
back roads. Rodney did not limit himself to four-wheel rides,
however. Motorcycles were always apart of family life and
Rodney had started riding at age five. Racing came at age
six on the dirt oval flat track at Talladega. Trail riding
was an everyday thing in the backyard woods and local mountains.
Magazines
would introduce Rodney to skateboarding and then BMX in
1977. Normal by today standards but then in rural Alabama,
Rodney was way ahead of his peers. Just like his hobbies,
his life went in the order of Art, Music, and Cars. His
passions led him to the California College of Arts and Crafts
after two years at the Atlanta College of Arts and Crafts.
After achieving a bachelors degree of art in graphic design,
Rodney went on to work ten years in the snow, skate and
surf industry through his art, working for the famous O’Neill
wetsuit company. Next came music as the art director for
the car audio speaker manufacturer Image Dynamics. That
led to Rodney starting the import car culture lifestyle
magazine, TMRm’zine. This magazine put the “lifestyle”
label on the import market that has now grown to enormous
proportions in the automotive industry.
At
the beginning of 1996 is when Rodney’s lifelong passion
for driving and racing focused on rally racing. TMRm’zine
in 1997 became one of the few U.S. magazines to cover the
rally scene. His enthusiasm soon would become more than
the editorial pursuit of rallying in 1998. Today he is the
editor of Car Audio and Electronics magazine with the Primedia
Publishing Group. Now his art, music and cars are his life-thread
combination, with rally fueling the passion.
After
a week long sabbatical at the 2001 WRC Rally of Great Britain
and upon the return home the formation of a seven car team
known as the Gravel Crew began. With the Gravel Crew motto
“convert to dirt” the Gravel Crew’s purpose
it to promote the sport of rally racing in the USA as the
next automotive movement for the extreme sport lifestyle
specifically geared to the now mainstream automotive youth
market as a way to stand out from the crowd and take a new
stance on driving. With 2002 as the starting point date
and a goal of 2007 to have the Gravel Crew name synonymous
with the sport of rally racing at a national level.
Photos:
|
