Born and raised in Louisville, Kentucky, Steve Hulsman is a lifelong athlete, passionate competitor, and dedicated leader both in business and sport. Married to his wonderful wife Maggie and father to two amazing sons, Aaron and Noah, Steve is also a proud guardian of two spirited wiener dogs and a craft-beer aficionado.

Steve has spent 28 years as a commodities broker desk manager, specializing in electricity and natural gas within ERCOT’s Control Area. His professional life is marked by discipline, strategic thinking, and an instinct for coaching others to excel—qualities that mirror his athletic pursuits.

An athlete from a young age, Steve has competed at the highest levels across numerous disciplines including BMX, mountain biking and road cycling and snowboards in the Midwestern Series. He was a top finisher in the Leadville 100—widely regarded as the toughest one-day mountain-bike race in the world, earned multiple state criterium podiums, and is a multi-time state champion in track racing.

Steve’s competitive spirit extends beyond cycling. He raced in NASA’s Time Trial series behind the wheel of a C6 Corvette and is a certified Porsche Driver Education Instructor. He has also summited multiple 14,000-foot peaks in the Rocky Mountains.

After a back injury ended his cycling career, Steve discovered a new passion in slot car racing—and he dove in with the same intensity that has defined his athletic life. As member of the Cincyslots race club and team manager/ambassador for TD Slot_Sports, Steve has quickly become an accomplished and respected figure in the sport.

Slot Car Racing Accomplishments

• 2024 National 2nd Place – NSR Vintage

• 2025 NSR WRE Spirit of America Team

• 2025 MI24 Hour Winning Team & Car Builder

• 2025 Slot.it Nationals Participant

• 2025 National Champion – Scaleauto Hypercar Endurance Race (Winning team manager, driver, and car builder)

• 2025 NSR National 3rd Place – Vintage Class

• 2025 NSR National 3rd Pace  – GT Class

Steve’s passion runs deep. He thrives on competition, the emotions of high-level racing, and the joy of helping others grow. His latest mission is AMSCO—a vision to bring accessibility, fairness, and world-class organization to slot car racing at every level. Whether someone is new to the sport or competing nationally, Steve is committed to elevating the community and expanding the excitement of slot car racing to all.

Born in Greenville, Ohio, Greg Kessler is a lifelong craftsman and creator. Married to his far-better half, Jenny, he’s a proud dad to Emilie and Peyton. Greg owns and operates Refined Cabinetry, a custom woodworking and design company, and has spent his entire life honing his skills as a master carpenter. He’s always been fascinated by how things are built—whether it’s wood, machines, or anything mechanical he can take apart and improve it.

Greg’s passion for racing began early with an oversized HO slot car layout he raced with friends as a kid. Having a passion for all things racing, the spark reignited in adulthood which led him back to slot car racing in 2009 at the Hobby Shop in Dayton, Ohio. After a few years, he joined the traveling OVRSL series, competing across Ohio, Indiana, and Kentucky and finishing 3rd overall in the series in its final season.

In 2013, Greg joined Butch Dunaway to form a team for the Michigan 24, and he’s raced every year since. Their team has finished in nearly every position—sixth through first—culminating in a Michigan 24 championship win in 2025. Greg also led the introduction of brushless motor technology to the event and has expanded the program from one team to two for the 2026 race.

In 2023, Greg founded Velocity Slot Racing Parts, specializing in brushless kits, innovative components for 1/32 racing, and controllers

Slot Car Racing Experience

• Competed at Eastern NSR Nationals for 5 years 2017, 2018, 2019, 2023, 2024

• 2023 Sideways Nationals

• Winner of Orange Barrel Championship in 2018–19

• Michigan 24 competitor 2013 – 2024 with a 2nd and two 3rd Place finishes

• 2025 Michigan 24 championship victory 

• 2025 NSR WRE Spirit of America Team

• Greg’s Livery for The Spirit of America was Awarded Best Livery at 2025 NSR WRE in Italy.

• 2025 National Champion – Scaleauto Hypercar Endurance Race (2nd place team manager, driver, and car builder)

Greg, known among friends as “Penske,” helped launch the OKM (Ohio–Kentucky–Michigan) slot racing group, building a community centered on high-performance racing and shared passion. Widely recognized for his generosity, he brings multiple cars to events so others can race competitive equipment and fully enjoy the hobby.

Deeply immersed—some might say obsessively—in the world of 1/32 slot cars, Greg loves tuning, testing, experimenting with 3D-printed innovations, and designing unique paint schemes. After traveling with Steve Hulsman to the 2025 WRE in Italy, Greg became even more driven to help elevate slot car racing in the U.S. by bringing Unified Brand Centered - style rules, professionalism, and excitement to American events.

With relentless enthusiasm and a builder’s mind, Greg is dedicated to growing the sport, supporting racers, and pushing the performance of the 1/32 scene to new heights.

Born in Dayton, Ohio, Josh Reed is a longtime car enthusiast and mechanic. Josh works as a heavy equipment mechanic by trade, working on skidsteers, backhoes, wheel loaders, and excavators. He first became a mechanic out of necessity and the desire to save money by working on his own vehicles. Outside of work, Josh enjoys participating in racing events with either his personal car or by assisting a friend's car racing team as a crew member, riding one of his three motorcycles when the weather permits, and spending time with his friends and family. From a young age, Josh has been interested in anything that has an engine and moves.

Josh was first introduced to slot cars in 2005 when he went to The Hobby Shop in Dayton, Ohio with his grandfather and saw the 4 lane Scalextric track set up and someone offered to let him try running a slot car. Since that point, Josh has been hooked. Starting young, he went to weekly club races with his father, who had never raced slot cars previously to Josh gaining interest in them. With his father learning small tips and tricks from other racers at The Hobby Shop, he helped improve Josh’s cars to assist him in succeeding in the sport.

From 2013 - 2018, Josh took a break from slot cars to focus on high school and growing up to become a young adult. He played tuba in his local high school band program. During this time, Josh obtained his driver’s license and also graduated from high school. In early 2019 on a Wednesday evening, Josh walked back into The Hobby Shop to see if they still had weekly slot car races. Josh bought a car that night in order to race. After that race night, he went home, blew the dust off of his old slot car stuff, and began racing on a weekly basis again. He also found out about CincySlots in Cincinnati, Ohio and began racing there.

In late 2019, Joe DeCola had invited Josh to run on his team for the 2020 Michigan 24. Josh had accepted the invite not knowing that the world would eventually shut down due to the global pandemic. He continued to race locally after the restrictions were lifted. In late 2022, Butch Dunaway reached out to Josh asking him to race in the 2023 Michigan 24, the first held since 2019, with Butch Dunaway, Greg Kessler, Rob Hall, Steve Howey and Andy Quatromani with Grizzly Racing. Josh was hooked on longer format endurance racing after his first Michigan 24. That year the team finished third overall with everyone hungry for more. In 2024, Josh assisted Greg with the development of the Velocity Slot brushless motor adapter to run in the 2024 Michigan 24. Most recently, Grizzly Racing has now won their first Michigan 24 in 2025.

Slot Car Racing Experience

• Competed in the NSR Eastern Nationals in 2023, 2024 and 2025

  • Finished 3rd in GT in 2024

• Michigan 24 competitor 2023 - 2025

  • Finished 3rd in 2023, 2nd in 2024 and 1st in 2025

• 2025 Scaleauto Hypercar 6hr competitor

  • Finished 4th

• 2025 Holiday 6 Hour Race Winner

When approached by Greg Kessler and Steve Hulsman about helping with AMSCO, Josh immediately accepted the offer as he also wanted to see world class racing happen here in the United States. Josh races with the OKM Slot Racing Group that Greg also recently launched. While Josh has always considered himself to be more of a driver than a tuner, he is beginning to dig deeper into the world of tuning in order to help others with setting up their cars, to help the racing be closer and more competitive, and to share his passion for the hobby with others.

Born in Houston, Texas, Daniel Ortiz relocated to Northeast Ohio in late 2020, bringing with him a lifelong passion for motorsports and competition. Competitive by nature and always striving to improve, Daniel thrives on collaboration, learning from those with greater experience and sharing knowledge gained along the way. For him, racing is as much about camaraderie and community as it is about performance.

Daniel’s love for racing began in childhood with AFX slot cars and toy RC vehicles. As an adult, that passion evolved into competitive RC racing after purchasing a 1/10-scale short course truck and discovering the vibrant racing community at Mike’s Hobby Shop in Porter, Texas. With its high-quality off-road and on-road tracks, Mike’s became the ideal environment to pursue his racing ambitions. Daniel competed extensively in Buggy and Truggy classes—both electric and nitro—throughout the greater Houston area, but it was RC on-road racing that truly captured his attention.

He primarily raced in the GT8 nitro class, while also exploring 1/8-scale Lola prototypes and 1/10-scale Formula 1 and Touring cars. His racing took him beyond Houston to events in Austin, Chicago, and Miami. During this time, he also rediscovered slot cars through a Carrera Evolution set purchased for home racing with his kids. While family racing was enjoyable, Daniel found himself especially drawn to building cars from the ground up and tuning them for optimal performance—an aspect he felt was limited at the time by the lack of a local slot car racing community.

As family commitments grew, Daniel stepped away from racing and packed away his slot car track. After moving to Akron, Ohio during the pandemic, he discovered a resurgence of slot car racing through online content such as Home Racing World and Two Lines Slot Car channels. This re-ignited his passion and led him to a local home racing group, where he quickly realized that modern slot cars offered far more depth than toys—providing real opportunities for chassis setup, tuning, and competitive racing.

Fully immersed in the online and local slot car community, Daniel’s momentum carried him to the 2024 NSR East Coast Nationals after just one year in the hobby. Still a rookie, he embraced the challenge of higher-level competition and was struck by the generosity of fellow racers—many of whom freely shared setup advice, controller tuning tips, and encouragement. That experience left a lasting impression and solidified his commitment to slot car racing, not only as a competitive pursuit but as a way to build lasting friendships within the community.

Slot Car Racing Experience

• Periodic home races with a Northeast Ohio home racing group

• Weekly racing at The Cave – Elyria, Ohio

• Competitor at the NSR Eastern Nationals (2024 & 2025)

• Scaleauto Hypercar 6 Hour Race (2025)

  • Team finished 2nd place

• Two Lines Holiday 6 Hour Race (2025)

  • Team finished 2nd place

Other Hobbies

Playing guitar, snowboarding, mountain biking, motorcycles, and shooting sports