Don’t trust me with your life, trust me with your vision

How does a mechanical engineer from the east coast end up an ophthalmologist in Wasilla, Alaska, 45 minutes north of Anchorage? And then a member of Apex Motor Club in the opposite climate of Phoenix, Arizona? That’s Evan Wolf’s story and he’s sticking to it.

“I graduated from college and I wanted to design engines. There were no jobs and I really didn’t want to move to Germany where it was all happening,” said Wolf. “Later on I was doing hernia repairs as a medical student and there was a room next door that had opera coming out of it, and I was like ‘wait a minute’, there’s something more interesting going on in there.”

That was retinal surgery, and today Wolf is the only eye surgeon in an area of Alaska that is the size of West Virginia. He picked Alaska because of the lack of competition. That choice helped create the Wolf Eye Center and the means to incorporate his passion for cars back into his life.

“We were empty nesters with three kids finally out of the house. I think I found my people in the motorsports world. They are a little edgy. They’re fun. They don’t take much seriously,” said Wolf, who like many Apex members has a second home in the Phoenix area and enjoys chunks of the  winter in the beautiful Arizona climate.

Wolf races his Porsche Cayman GT4 and Radical SR3 1340 at the monthly Apex Motor Club races from October through April and that averaged 37 entries during the 2023-24 season. He hadn’t raced prior to joining the club and now occasionally competes in the Radical North America Cup, his first race happening at Circuit of the Americas.

“Radical has been fantastic. It’s a class above whatever type of car I thought I would drive. When I tried my 911 right out of the showroom, it wasn’t what I expected on track. I needed more feel to really learn this sport,” explained Wolf. “If you’ve got the time, the interest, to learn the car, to get some coaching, it’s really not that intimidating to get started.”