AT 26, Megan Taylor has already become one of the most trusted creative voices in the performance and drag-and-drive world. As the younger sister of driver, builder, and TV personality Alex Taylor, Megan has spent the last decade documenting the story of her family’ s racing journey through a camera lens. Starting in the drag-and-drive world and expanding into the No Prep Kings scene and beyond, Taylor has used her talents to capture moments that few others even notice.

The Taylor sisters’ parents, Dennis and Debbie, originally built fiberglass-based show cars, but when Dennis traded one of his cars for the 2007 HOT ROD Drag Week – winning Camaro owned by Denny Terzich, the family started to dive deeper into drag racing. When Alex, a 2016 DI 30 Under 30 honoree, entered her first Drag Week, Megan tagged along with her father’ s camera in hand.

“ Everybody called me the paparazzi because I liked taking pictures of the cars, but I really liked taking pictures of the people in the staging lanes instead,” she says.“ I started posting my photos to Facebook and it exploded from there.”

Though she recently got to make passes down the dragstrip at a Radford Racing School event, Taylor decided early on that she’ d rather leave the driving to Alex.“ I used to think I wanted to drive when I was 10 or 11,” she says.“ But the closer I got, I decided I didn’ t like the attention that came with it. Alex ran with [ driving ] and I took my dad’ s old camera and realized I liked being behind the scenes.”

From that point forward, she had a camera in her hand at nearly every event the family attended. She documented Alex’ s rise from teenage drag-and-drive star to a fixture on YouTube, television, and major automotive stages like SEMA. The Taylors have amassed some incredible opportunities that led to hectic

schedules year after year, but they go through it all together.

“ I don’ t think I would like my job nearly as much if I didn’ t get to travel with them,” she says.“ People ask,‘ How can you stand the schedule?’ And it’ s really only the fact that I travel with them at least 80 % of the time. Even our dog comes along. We’ re away from home, but we’ re all together. None of us are missing out. It’ s important for us to all be there, whether it’ s going right or wrong. We’ re all suffering or celebrating together.”

Through one of Alex’ s sponsors, Isky Racing Cams, Megan connected with one of the most historic companies in the automotive industry. After graduating college with a graphic design degree, she helped Isky COO Nolan Jamora at the SEMA MPMC Media Trade Conference. He

immediately recognized the impact she could have on the brand founded by Ed Iskenderian in 1947 and hired her as the company’ s social media and marketing manager.

“ Nolan sat back and let me take over,” she says.“ Isky is a 76-year-old company, and a lot of things were stuck in the past. I took over modernizing pretty much everything: social media, marketing, price lists, sponsorships, trade shows.”

Her role at Isky opened another door: a spot as a member-at-large on SEMA’ s MPMC board. She also assists with SEMA’ s media needs at the many different events she attends.

Taylor puts in serious hours as a photographer, from traveling to and from events to shooting, editing, and posting photos. All of that effort is rewarded, though, when she sees her photos make an impact, whether that’ s an updated Facebook profile photo or a large-scale print gifted to the subject.“ I like looking for the moments that most people are missing and I like seeing people’ s reaction to that,” says Taylor, the photographer behind Alex’ s 2023 DI Women of Power cover.

Taylor’ s proudest accomplishment is building a life in car culture alongside her family, which includes her new brother-in-law, 2021 30 Under 30 honoree Nick Taylor.“ Alex and I have figured out a way to make both of our passions work together,” she says.“ We didn’ t know how we were going to do it, but we figured it out. My skills complement what my family is already doing and help us grow.”

The Taylor family’ s unpredictable lifestyle makes it hard for Megan to say what comes next for her, but she’ s passionate about continuing her work as a photographer, storyteller, and custodian of motorsports history.

“ I want to keep documenting moments with legends. I just want to keep saying yes to everything I can so I can keep growing,” says Taylor, who thanked her family, Jamora and the Isky team, Brian Bohlander of PEAK Auto, Jason Moulton at Mickey Thompson, and Alex Stivaletti at Holley for their encouragement and guidance.“ Alex and I are the new generation, but we really love the old-school stuff and not letting history die.”

– NATE VAN WAGNEN DI

PHOTOS: MEGAN TAYLOR