Quote:
Originally Posted by MKSixer
I am smiling ear-to-ear now!!
You truly understand this sickness!! Meeting Nigel in those days must have been amazing. He was my brother's favorite driver! Speaking of, I forgot to mention Nelson Piquet, Sr. Loved him too.
TP is Team Principle.
Speaking of broadcasters, I met Leigh Diffey and Steve Matchett at a private museum event in Raleigh, NC years ago. Great and knowledgable guys...real fans of motorsport. We discussed Senna to great length. What a loss for all of us.
I was at quali for Indy in 2017 for ALOs first outing, as well. I was 100 meters away from the Bourdais crash. We could feel the heat from the fireball which resulted from the impact. My then-gf almost started crying on the spot.
Looking forward to returning to attending races next year.
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MKSixer -
Since you are the creator/originator of this thread, here's another racing story that you'll love
I've followed professional level drag racing for 50+ yrs; I've always dreamed of what it would be like to actually stand at the start line when the fastest accelerating vehicles on earth....LAUNCH; i was given this opportunity at the 2018 Pacific Northwest Nationals when the NHRA CRAZIES came to town....when I was allowed to be a guest on one of the Top Fuel Dragster teams for the entire weekend....as the dragster completed it's burnout to warm the tires and lay down a fresh patch of rubber (they back up and place the car in the tracks they just laid)....and the competitor's car did the same, my eyes were burning from the massive amounts of unburned nitromethane billowing out of the zoomie headers....I was wearing full-blown hearing protection...I was standing directly behind the beast and about 20 feet back....looking at the two packed parachutes and a rear wing that creates over 4,000 lbs of downforce when they achieve terminial velocity of appx 330 MPH....when the burnout to warm the tires occurred, i was hit by large amounts of micro-small rubber pellets that were being thrown off of the tires....and then, both beasts slowly rolled forward until the front bicycle-type wheels touched a light beam that brings on one blue light on the starting light "tree"....this is a pre-staged condition....and then the driver slowly rolls forward again (about 12 inches) until a second blue light is lit on the tree....at this point, the beast is perfectly staged....at this point, the NHRA Chief Starter pushes a button and the the appx 5 yellow lights on the tree turn on all at one time and it is exaclty 4/10's of a second until the green "go" light turns on....when the driver releases the hand brake lever and smashes the throttle and the beast moves, this breaks the light beam at the front wheels and the elapsed time count begins on how long it takes for the beast to break the light beam at the finish line, which provides the total Elapsed Time to cover the 1,000 ft; if the driver leaves before the green light turns on, a red light turns on on the tree which states you moved the car before the green light turned on and you are disqualified....back to my story of standing behind these beasts....I knew the sound and visceral excitement would be unbelievable, but I was not prepared for the massive NOISE and the massive CONCUSSION that occurred when both beasts launched....it was one of those nano-second moments in life when an explosion has occurred and your mlnd says you should run for your life in the opposite direction from where you are standing....the noise concussion and the massive amount of air concussion coming from the beast; it's impossible to explain how unreal it is to see a vehicle move that quickly from a starting line....it doesn't seem possible; the story gets more adrenalin-insane when the car I was with that weekend got to the finish line at appx 320 MPH AND BOTH PARACHUTES DID NOT OPEN....you really can't see the deceleration area and wasn't sure if the driver got the beast slowed down before running off into the last-chance sand trap....the carbon/carbon rear brakes (no brakes on the front wheels) got the beast stopped before disaster at the deceleration end of the track....I'll never forget this experience.