Larry Wilde-Hopps. Son of Nick and Judy Wilde-Hopps, the famous police officers. Legendary gray squirrel racer.

At least, the last part was what he had hoped. Larry was picked up quickly after he got his motor racing license by the Southpaw Laundry Detergent Company. This coincidentally suited Larry just fine, as he was left-handed. Through his first year or so of racing in the Tiny Racing League, Larry was barely average as a racer, despite his enthusiasm. He had begun to feel like he was only chosen to fill a slot, as Southpaw had representatives in the other major Racing Leagues, and seemed desperate for a new one. Larry was fearful that he might even lose his sponsorship after the first year.

However, Larry had to swallow his fears when he was called in by the company to do a photo shoot with some of his counterparts. Southpaw needed advertisement shots for their products. The other representatives were all, of course, much larger than him, some ridiculously so. Among them, the largest was George Rhinostone, a rhinoceros in the Huge Racing League, and a cheetah in the Speed Racing League who went by the impossibly-cool nickname "Trace Laser". Trace had been with Southpaw the longest, and was considered a veteran racer even though he was only in his mid-thirties. George was in his late twenties, but you'd never know that by his super deep and gravelly voice.

"Whoa," Larry marveled after George introduced himself. "Hey, haven't I heard you somewhere before? Were you a character in New Super Bash Bunnies?"

"I was!" George gave a hearty chuckle, and even that sounded like it had some malice behind it. "But I don't think I'll be his voice actor for the next one; it's too expensive for those guys for me to get into character." He gave a little chuckle. Larry was about to ask him what he meant, but the photo-shoot began. George often had to hold up Larry with one hand to be the right height for the shoots, and Larry felt a bit nervous to be the newbie alongside these other racing legends. They eventually broke for lunch, and the three sat together.

Trace was rather standoffish of the new, unpromising squirrel, but George seemed very interested in talking to him and getting to know what his life was like. Larry was surprised at how friendly and warm the rhino was, because his intimidating look and voice spoke only gruffness to him. He even tried to look intimidating in his photo-shoots, with malicious smirks and dangerous angles. George easily wrung out Larry of his story and upon doing so, Trace seemed to soften somewhat.

"I dunno if I'm going to make it here," Larry admitted, "I'm just not that good; not like you guys."

"Listen, kit," Trace said. Larry's eyes widened; he wasn't expecting an Outback Island accent from the cheetah. "You don't necessarily have to be good, ahroit? What you need is a gimmick, like George and I."

"What do you mean?" Larry inquired. Trace removed his deep-green tinted glasses to show his similarly-colored eyes underneath.

"It don't have to be anythin' too special," Trace went on. "I go by Trace Laser. In all of my press conferences I wear these green-tinted glasses, or somethin' loik 'em. My racing helmet has the same colored visor. The color of a green laser. Lasers are pretty fast, roit?"

"As fast as anything can be," Larry nodded. "How'd you come up with that?"

"Wasn't that hard," Trace laughed. "Just always liked the color. Had to wear glasses when I was a kitten, figured I'd try to look fetchin' as well. Then, before I started racing, I had laser eye surgery. All just koinda came together for me."

"Sorry if this is rude," Larry narrowed his eyes, "but how'd you get an Outback Island accent?"

"Well, we have one thing in common, little kit," Trace smirked, "we're both adopted. Was immediately dropped off at an adoption center when I was a newborn. Adopted by a great pair of wallabies. Legal name is Tracy Wallabean. Got the feelin' my birth mother wanted a girl, perhaps?" Larry absorbed this, his jaw dropping a bit in wonder. He then turned to George.

"What's your gimmick, then?"

"It's even simpler than Trace's!" George laughed. "I just get uh, really excited during the Huge Racing League. You know we get to crush junk cars while we're racing, right?" Larry nodded. "Well, I kind of really like breaking things. Always have. My sister's sandcastles, my brother's building block structures. Kind of an embarrassing habit for a rhino to have." He chuckled deeply. "But I can let it all out on the track, really get a good belly laugh going. Some people wanted to call me Wreck-It Rhino, but we obviously can't use that one for legal reasons." Larry gave a soft chuckle; he liked that movie.

"Yeah, all you need is somethin' to make you stand out from the pack," Trace agreed, "then you'll find yourself some fans. Hopefully that'll keep you around."

With the vote of confidence, Larry tried to make himself stand out on the track, but he really couldn't think of a good idea. He felt like just an average squirrel with a youthful face and a heaping load of inexperience. After his girlfriend Kara's first year of college, however, the two met up for a little while during her vacation, and during Larry's next race, he drove rather aggressively and riskily. He took corners around the serpentine curves of the tracks like he never had before, and he finally won his first race. The crowd went both figuratively and literally nuts, tossing peanuts, cashews, and pecans up in the air as the heretofore mediocre squirrel took away an upset over other favorites.

Without thinking, Larry did a sort of flippant almost-salute with his left hand as his right arm held his first trophy. This became a bit of a trademark with him, and Southpaw loved it as well because it tied in with their "left-pawed" branding. Larry's pit crew would give him this loose-fingered salute when they finished with his bright blue car, and he would salute when he edged into first place, won a race, or during his interviews. He'd finally gained a gimmick.

However, his capricious racing style wasn't something he could summon just at whim. He really needed visits with Kara to bring up his excitement level. His wildly varying performance actually got him a few fans, though, as it was exciting to them every time he pulled off a win. Larry would get interviewed more often, and the reporters were trying to give him a more marketable name.

"Angel in the interviews, demon in the driver's seat." That one didn't catch on, as it was too cumbersome.

"The Squealing Squeak." A bit generic; it was soon dropped, as well.

"The Detergent Daredevil." Southpaw themselves proposed this one, but it didn't get anywhere.

"Sinistral Squirrel." This one finally stuck. His cocky, left-handed salute when he snatched victory away from another rodent was becoming famous, and even his fans in the audience would perform it. He got the reputation as a bit of a "heel" racer, even though he was a nice guy, but Larry didn't mind. He was having a lot of fun.

As he found his groove and garnered more fans, he had a couple of scares. Not from driving accidents, though he did get into a few scrapes and a mild crash or two every now and again, but from females. One was from a charming fox squirrel on his pit crew. Larry had lunch with her at times before abruptly realizing the lunches could easily be seen as dates. She did look quite saddened when he told her the two should keep things professional, but she agreed with him and the two remained friendly.

Another incident happened with an unscrupulous gray squirrel reporter, whom Larry accepted a "private" interview from naively, not realizing she worked for an infamous tabloid. Her questions got uncomfortably probing, and when Larry started dodging most of them, she put the moves on him herself, which caused Larry to panic and flee. Angered, the reporter tried to cause a media backlash with Larry's uncertain relationship status.

"'The Sinistral Squirrel, into males'?" George read from a tabloid he brought into their next photo shoot.

"Huh?" Larry blinked. "Where did they get that from?"

"Something about you rejecting the advances of 'several' female squirrels," George chuckled. "Did you cheese off a reporter?"

"I don't think so..." Larry considered. "There was this crazy reporter who came onto me, but I got away from her."

"Ugh, that'd do it," Trace groaned. "And they've got skilled lawyers protectin' their tails from all sorts of allegations, so you probably couldn't even go after them for misinformation."

"To me, male or female doesn't even matter," George chuckled. "I just want a large mammal I can cuddle with." Larry gave an amused, impressed huff at this.

"You an' I are cursed with our boyish good looks," Trace gave a friendly nudge to the gray squirrel with the back of his hand. "I've had more than a few brainless cheetah girls throw themselves at me. But I think I'll meet the roit one sometime."

"To tell the truth, I'm in love with a ferret girl," Larry shrugged. Both George and Trace looked surprised.

"Well, don't let anyone know, ahroit?" Trace suggested. "Unless you want it all ovuh the news."

"Yeah, I intend to keep it from the media," Larry nodded. "My fox dad has inadvertently taught me all kinds of lessons about keeping your feelings secret." The squirrel chuckled.

Once Kara finished her schooling, she was able to spend a bit more time with Larry, which had a directly positive impact on his racing performance. He steadily became better until he was just an all-around good racer. Ironically, this made his popularity take a hit as his consistency rose. So, he had to channel his "character", the Sinistral Squirrel, to win his fans back, adding more daring moves and unpredictability to his racing, which ended up working well. Larry was quite happy with his how racing career was going, and his fellow Southpaw sponsors and his pit crew were making pretty good friends with him.

Though there were precious few who knew about Larry's relationship with Kara Pedshark, a small number actually did. A couple of small mammals in particular, one of whom had a vested interest in the seemingly random fortune he found early on in his racing career.