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Category: Motorsports

It was one of them racin' things

How many times have we seen this? The driver is cruising to a great finish. Just stay out of trouble and the podium is in sight. Suddenly, catastrophe strikes.

Now, I also know how that feels.

I was loudly wrestling with my frustration last weekend after the Rock Kart World Finals in South Bend, Ind., when another driver told me, "At least you have a story to tell."

It was excellent advice, but I got beaten again. It was Detroit Free Press motorsports writer Mike Brudenell who told my story first.

Two laps from the finish of the feature race at Michiana Raceway Park, the planets had aligned. The go kart and driver had become one with the rain-slicked track. Following a frustrating day of spinouts and mistakes in the heat races, in the feature I had discovered the dry lines and the resolve to tiptoe through those turns where I hadn't.

It's true that slower can be faster.

I had come from nearly last on the starting grid to first. I even managed to remain calm when a faster karter passed me after enjoying about five laps in the lead.

"Second is great," I said aloud inside my helmet. Just don't get tempted to keep pace.

"Learn from his line," the voice said. And I did.

Nearing the end, yet another fast kart passed and the temptation to catch up was harder to resist. "Third is still on the podium. Stay out of trouble," the voice said.

Through the rain smearing my helmet visor I saw the flagman signal two laps to go. Ahead of me, entering the fastest turn on the track, I was quickly closing on another kart. It was my old friend, my teammate, Lance Wynn.

Can you picture the nightmare scenario yet?

"No need to pass him here," the voice said. I got my braking done in a straight line before the turn. No problem. My entry and line was higher than his, but then it happened: Lance's kart snapped into a spin and I flew off the top of the turn into the gravel trap, nearly rolling into the barrier.

I jumped from the kart to try and pull it from deep in the gravel before realizing, no matter what I do, the podium and all those clean laps are wasted. I finish last today.

I walked away, trying not to look like Danica Patrick stomping down the pit lane at Michigan International Speedway, but I was feeling every bit of the heat she experienced that day when she ran out of fuel in the closing laps.

I thought, so this is how Elliott Sadler feels all the time. Stuff like this seems to happen to him every time he gets a good run.

Brudenell and I will argue forever about who punted who in the race last year. And, although the long drive home with my buddy Lance started kind of quiet, we were soon laughing. He had beaten me in the heat races, but the handling on his kart had somehow disappeared. He was having a terrible race and didn't even know I was behind him. He kept saying, "I didn't do it on purpose."

I know, but Lance also understands the rules. I'll never let him forget this. Not a chance.

I have to admit that Brudenell, my competitor on the race track and in print, captured with his story the essence of racing's allure: that even a tough day at the track is better than a day without racing.