In 2020, a young man from Saint-Joseph-de-Beauce, Québec, became the talk of the town. Of the province. Even of the country. At the tender age of 19, he became the first Quebecer and the youngest Canadian to win a race in one of the three main NASCAR series, the Gander Camping World pickup series. It happened at the Talladega Superspeedway, in Alabama.

At that point, his season was already going quite well;, but things got even better from that point on. In fact, the win changed everything. Radio-Canada’s "Tout le monde en parle" talk show even decided to invite the young driver on to talk about his feat, recognizing that something special had happened. It must have been for a network that normally pays no heed to NASCAR to perk its ears up.

Yes, Raphaël started to get a lot of attention.

Last December, we took some time to meet the young man, and headed to Saint-Joseph-de-Beauce in Quebec to do so. This week, we feature a 5-part series on his life and accomplishments. If you didn’t know him then, you will get to know him this week. Today, the first years.

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