I'm sure everyone has had a day that was made complete by something. A moment that you think to yourself, "Yup, My day can end now, and I would be content." Whether it's from finishing a marathon, having the greatest night sleep(which in that case your day was over before it started), eating a record number of pickles in one sitting (which might force you to end your day), or in my case talking crap with my all time favourite driver, Randy Pobst.
For anyone who does not know who Randy Pobst is, be ashamed because he is one of the driver's for KPax Racing in the Pirelli World Challenge.
I've been following Randy for a very long time now. Before there was a Pirelli World Series, and before he was part of KPax Racing.
Randy started as an Autocrosser. He wasn't a young gun either. He started racing later in his life. This is exactly why I follow him. He started it all at a completely grassroots level, with not a tonne of money. He was just a guy who raced for the thrill of racing. He just so happened to be one kickin' racer. And what comes through when he speaks still is that he races for the shear thrill of it. Sure he's got to make money doing it, but really he is still enthusiastic about racing on all levels from autocrossing to pro driving in a GT car.
When I was talking to him, we barely touched on racing. Granted I was very nervous with him because let's be honest, this is Randy Pobst, the equivalent to my wife having dinner with Blue Rodeo. My wife adores Blue Rodeo a lot.
Our conversation was more about silly things, like how his girlfriend noticed the sign when they came into Toronto that said, "Welcome to Toronto where our mayor smokes crack". He asked, "What's up with that?" We never once touched on the KPax Racing Volvos, how could we when we had all the politics of Toronto to talk about..
What really was the DEFINING MOMENT, was how he was so vigourously and animatedly talking about some sort of midievel torture device (I'm not going to get in why we were talking about that) and his girlfriend leans into him, slowly puts her mouth closer to Randy's face and quietly said,"Randy, there are kid's over there, be quiet."
That one seemingly small moment really showed me that Randy, even though he may be a racing god to me, and the person who really defines what racing should be about, is after all, just like me. Saying stupid shit, rambling, and sometimes, doing stuff that may not be completely acceptable. He is, under all those layers of fire retardant clothing and sponsorship decals...a guy.
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| Randy Pobst's autograh. I can't say much about this that has not already been said. He did mention how much he liked the paint marker I gave him to write on the helmet though. |
And the cherry on top was when I walked into Mike Skeen's pit looking at the Nissan GTR that is currently in development. I noticed he was sitting right behind me, with his girlfriend. Mike is another one of those guys, I've been followin since the advent of Youtube. This guy knows how to drive, and a lot of what he drives, is crazy cool loud. CHECK THIS OUT!
We talked for a short time, about the series, and about how the development was going with the GTR, and about the Grassroots Motorsports Ultimate Street Car Challenge which is a no holds barred time trial event with cars that range from $500 Le Mons cars to ultra exotic Nascar engined Tube framed purpose built racers.
At the end of it all, I reached into my helmet bag and his girlfriend said,"I told you it was a helmet".
When I apologized that he was not the first to sign it, and Randy was the first, his girlfriend and him looked at me with a "How dare you!" kind of look. Jokingly of course, but there seemed to be a little bit of a beyond cempetitiveness aura that fell on the place and as Mike signed my helmet his girlfriend stated,"We have a love hate relationship with Randy." Hmmmm, what does that mean?
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| Mike Skeen's smudged autograph. I put the helmet into my bag before it was completely dry. DAMN! |
But really the experience was amazing, and as I walked around a little more waiting for my wife to join up with me, since she had to walk the dog, to watch the Touring Cars, and B-Spec Racers, I was thinking to myself that my day could end then, because, those two moments with Randy and Mike completed my day as everyday I wish could be concluded.
You know what? I no longer want to talk about my race too much since right now all I hear is race cars going around the CNE grounds for the Indy. Sounds like USF2000 cars right now, and the sound just reminds me of yesterday, the day that my day was fully complete.
But just to be fair, my last race was a nailbiter. It was a technical course, with a few very slow 90 degree turns. Nice for the Sentra's 2.5 engine with a lot of torque. Bad for the driver who did not have enough runs to work on all the areas that needed improvement.
It wasn't until the 3rd run of the day that I started to improve my times, and from then on I didn't clobber any cones either. I think my first and second run did enough killing of cones.
After my 4th run I jumped from 8th in class to 2nd, where I stayed until the very last run. I was not racing that run because I was out marshalling, picking up cones, and waving flags. So basically my day was done and I still had one competitor in my class that was hot on my heels. Well, to make a long story short, he eeked out a 0.015 second lead ahead of me to clinch 2nd in class. It was a fraction of a second but that's autocross for you.
Here is the video of my last run that improved my times by about a quarter of a second. I was still 2nd place at this time. I definitely did not the best line and I can see where I could have made up another second. Run#5 July62013
At the end of that rough day, in blistering heat, and dust blown surroundings, I held onto 3rd in class. The official results are still not up. I'm still getting good points for that so hopefully the next few races I can improve my position.
Until next time, try and have one of those days where it's concluded conclusively.
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