Landon Cassill on his NASCAR future, losing his sponsor, ChatGPT and more: 12

Each week, The Athletic asks the same 12 questions to a different race car driver. For the 12th straight year, the final interview of the season goes to Landon Cassill, who sat out this season after losing his sponsorship. This interview has been edited for clarity and length. The full version is available on the 12 Questions podcast.

1. You must pick one chore or obligation to do every day for a year. But if you make it the entire year doing this, you never have to do it again for the rest of your life. So what would you like to knock out forever?

Is it horrible to say feeding the dogs? It was either that or just hauling trash down. We have outside dogs, so it’s just a little grody going out and refilling their dish. I need to be a little bit better about that process.

2. Can you describe how you are as a passenger in a street car?

It’s a pretty rare instance. I’m usually doing the driving. It’s tough with my wife driving; she doesn’t really use cruise control, so that bothers me. But I’m pretty chill.

Now, I have zero interest in being a passenger in a race car. I’ve done that before. Not fun. I don’t really care for that. That’s an unnecessary risk.

I’ve done those and found it comforting because I think, “This person knows what they’re doing.”

They don’t know. Nobody knows what they’re doing. (Laughs) Count me out.

3. What’s an app on your phone you love using and think more people should know about?

The Notes app is really coming into its own. I’m serious. Taking good notes is just way underrated, and the Apple Notes app has had some really good improvements with the way it ties in with the rest of Apple’s apps. When something surprises you, just open up a new note and write it down.

4. What do you do to make yourself feel better when you’re having a crappy day?

Eat bad food. Make yourself feel crappier.

Are you still maintaining the vegan lifestyle?

I haven’t been full-on vegan in quite some time, but my wife does pretty good at it. And I was cooking a lot this year; it was fun to cook for the family and stuff on Saturdays.

5. I asked readers to submit “Dear Abby”-style life advice questions and I’m mixing them up for each driver. This person said: “This is my first semester teaching at the local university. I just posted midterm grades and one young man has an F. It should not have been a surprise to him given his poor test score and his inability to make it to this 11 a.m. class. However, he just found out he won’t be able to play football with an F and he wants to know what he can do to get it up to a D. I’m fairly certain the only reason he’s going to college is so he can play football. Should I go out of my way to create some sort of extra credit for him so he can play football? Or should I be that professor who kills his dream?”

The way that was written, it makes it seem like a first shot. It should go without saying the kid needs to pass his classes to be able to…