Dan Wheldon

I'm gutted right now, far beyond what I ever have been while watching races. Ever since my life began to weave together with motor sport a few years ago I knew a day like today would happen. It's inevitable in our sport, regardless of what we believe to be leaps and bounds in safety measures, yet it's still impossible to accept.

I watched the start of the race today hopeful that there would be a fantastic battle between Dario Franchitti and Will Power to decide the championship. More than anything, though, I was really hoping Dan Wheldon would come all the way from last in the field to win the race and the $5 million that awaited a lucky fan and him. It was a ploy of GoDaddy to offer Wheldon this challenge because he still lacked a full-time ride this year or next, and he eagerly agreed.

He got a great start, already up a few positions when it happened. There was nothing he could do given his position on track and the punishingly fast speeds the cars traveled. Fifteen cars in all were collected, but Dan was in the most serious shape. The ominous yellow tarp draped over his car after they extracted him did not imply anything directly other than the severity of the accident.

As minutes turned to hours with no word on his condition, everyone feared for the worst. Pictures online showed the roll hoop on his car completely missing after he struck the catch fence. I've never seen anything like this, as that's often the strongest part of the car. The mood grew more somber, but as the shock of the accident was starting to subside, the anxiety of not knowing turned to inconsolable sorrow.

Randy Bernard, who dreamed up the idea of this season-ending 'world championship,' quickly got to the point and announced that we had lost Dan Wheldon. "Unsurvivable injuries" were cited, and the words slowly sunk in.

Since I've followed this fantastic sport of racing, many have died worldwide. It's undoubtedly a dangerous sport, but never before had I been apart of something like this. I've never seen a driver killed during a race live on TV. Moreover, I've never lost a driver of whom I was an enormous fan and respected greatly. Part of me knew that I would feel it someday, but I never dreamed that it would be today.

I watched Wheldon win at the Iowa Speedway years ago, and I cheered for him every year in the Indianapolis 500. I wanted to go watch him test next year's car, but I wasn't able to do so. I wanted to meet him when I went to a race this year. He was a close friend to another of my favorite drivers, Tony Kanaan, and it crushed me to watch him weep openly on the pit wall before the news had officially broken. I knew, but I certainly did not want to believe.

Even hearing Randy Bernard's words I still couldn't believe it. A painful twang hit me in that moment which I have only experienced a handful of times. Dan Wheldon is gone.

As we struggle to cope with this loss, we not only feel the pain of his passing but also the shocking realization of how real our sport is. We lose sight of the danger in it all, even though we acknowledge it in passing whenever the cars get close on track or brush the wall. "I'm glad he's okay," we say, or "That could have been a really bad one." Yet we never really grasp that the danger is so close. This comes from a sense of security we've come to know in the last decade. Racing drivers don't die in crashes. Dale Earnhardt's death in 2001 came as a freak accident resulting from a crash that didn't look that bad on the outside. People shook their heads in disbelief but knew that he liked open-faced helmets and loose belts. Should that have killed him? No. When Zanardi's legs were torn off and he didn't die, people felt that we dodged a bullet. Or when Kenny Brack looked like he was killed in Texas years ago (another race I watched live), people were astounded that he survived. Think about Robert Kubica in Canada when he limped away with a sprained ankle, or when Felipe Massa was literally centimeters from being killed in Hungary. There hasn't been a shortage of close calls.

For NASCAR, their safety measures and car designs have ensured that drivers have remained relatively safe since 2001, and I thank God for that. Indy hasn't been so lucky with their greatly increased speeds and open cockpits, but despite Paul Dana's death at Homestead Miami, even the most vicious wrecks were escaped. Will Power can attest to that, as he both came back from severe injuries to challenge for championships and lost a championship today in another horrendous crash.

Today we are reminded that life is short (in Dan's case, a mere 33 years) but that in such a brief time so much can be accomplished if we invest ourselves the way Dan Wheldon did in those dreams. He wanted nothing more than to have a full-time ride so he could do what he loved, and ultimately he died doing it. Some drivers say they want to go that way, and I honestly don't know if Dan was that type or not. Because of the love that he had for his wife and two sons, part of me says he would put their lives and well-being before his own. Who knows?

One thing is certain, though, and that is the fact that we were lucky to know Dan, to share in his successes and see the humor and genuineness of his personality. We were lucky to hear the

commentators speak to him before the race, to hear the joy in his voice at his opportunity to help Sam Schmidt, please his sponsors and help countless others with the $5 million he was trying to win. I had no idea that would be the last time we would ever hear his voice, but I'm thankful we got to be a part of that joy and hope as he faced the limitless possibilities before him. Dan was a great guy, and I'm so proud that every driver on the IndyCar circuit will benefit from his safety testing of next year's car. It's only fitting he generously helped the sport from which he had been shut out this year.

Our sport can be a painful one, accompanied by tragedy, death, glory and thrill. Days like today will happen, but I thank God they don't happen very often. Every race I watch I'm silently grateful that we can go through a season expecting that every driver starting the season will finish. I'm so glad that we no longer have to worry about each crash trapping a driver in a flame-engulfed car. But in the end we must realize that our sport will always be dangerous. The human body can only take so much no matter how strong the car is, and as long as our sport is open cockpit and open wheel, there is still the possibility of this happening. It's something the pioneers of racing knew very well, and it's through their sacrifices and triumphs, just like those of Dan Wheldon, that our sport will continue to grow and honor their memories. It will be tough when next season begins, but we'll get through it. Just like watching the movie "Senna", through tragedy and loss we learn to appreciate what we have and strive to retain it. Wheldon did that every year he raced, and he wore those emotions on his sleeve. God bless him. He will be missed.

Riding an antique motorcycle you resurrected with your own hands

As another blog post beckons, so too do the usual excuses I make for my absence on here. The school, the classes, the homework, the busyness. All of it seems to get in the way of what I think would be an ideal summer, yet I realize how important it all is in the long-run. Nevertheless, its persistence at distracting me worked, so I haven't been up in The Garage as much as I'd hoped recently.

Still, quite a great deal has happened since I last wrote on a slow day at work a month and a half ago. Granted I'm writing this at work (again), I have much more time and more pertinent updates. Where to begin, though...

I suppose the biggest success has been the Honda project. Almost surprisingly (to some), it's done! Well, the headlight bulb has not arrived yet, but when it does, and when it's installed, then the bike will be done!

This project has been a fascinating one for me. The prospect of a barn find ranks high in every gearhead's dreams in life, so to have a motorcycle-version of one tucked away in The Garage worked well. The perky little red bike had sat gathering dust for years in the back of The Garage in front of the old Woolworth's cabinets and Bruno's grave (where the Maxwell now sits) before we relocated it to the back corner, but after studying it and sitting on it secretly for quite some time I began to suspect that I could get the darn thing running. I knew my dad would be behind the idea (let's not even talk about what my mom thought), so a couple of years ago the two of us began our own Skunk Works, clandestinely sitting behind the old tractor and the dusty Model T. To a casual observer strolling into the garage, not too dissimilar from a curious mother, our activities would be impossible to discern before we relocated to the front of The Garage as if nothing had happened.

Before long I had replaced the points and spark plug and had re-timed the engine. I had cleaned it up, and we had bought a new Yuasa battery (also secretly from a local motorcycle shop). We poured new gas in the tank and tried to flush as much dirt and sediment from the bowl of the carburetor as we could. With the help of some starting fluid and a little Battery Tender, the old girl started for the first time since 1975. She sounded much quieter than I imagined, much more collected and healthy. She revved with a quick twist of the throttle yet seemed reluctant to idle. There was so much play in the throttle before it engaged, I wondered if it needed adjusting.

In the meantime my dad hopped on the bike a couple of times and was able to drive it without a problem---a fact he flaunts to this day. "I hadn't ridden that thing in 35 years! And I didn't kill it once! Just got right on and drove away. Damn, I'm good."

He had put 9,500 miles on the S90 since 1966, which was when he bought it new from a dealership 40 miles away. He was 16 at the time and rode it back and forth between home, school, and whatever sport he was in at any given time. He had dates on it. He raced it a bit faster than recommended (or so I can surmise). He may have also laid it over a couple of times, but he won't say. "You don't need to know everything I did when I was your age."

I came to find out later that my grandpa, the first Woodsie, drove it sometimes. My dad would doubt his ability to ride only to find that his dad took this bike to the store or across town for an errand he needed. And so the history of the bike broadened for me. With every story I can eke out of him I learn more about this little treasure I've come to love so much. For me it's not just having a motorcycle, it's having this motorcycle. It's having this wonderful little bike so cared for by my father as a child that he can pass on to me, that can be used and appreciated again as opposed to having rot away in the back of a garage somewhere. It's certainly better than having it sold to someone who knows nothing of the people who have ridden it and cared for it, who knows nothing of the stories surrounding it and the time put into saving each of the $413 it took to buy it in 1966.

So anyway, we got the bike running. I drove it around the yard a few times, but I had to mow over the tire tracks once and drive the golf cart over them another time under the guise of flattening molehills. I later took the throttle sleeve off and tried to adjust it as well as tightening the clutch cable, yet nothing seemed to help the idle issues and the momentary grinding I heard whenever I shifted into gear from neutral.

I sought help on the S90 forums online (of which there are many for the mid-'60s Hondas, believe it or not), and the people there were extremely helpful.

Over the past few years, as I've said before, we've been subtly working on my mom to get her to accept me riding the bike. For years it was "I will not have my only son die on a fiery crash on a motorcycle! We should have sold that thing years ago! He will not ride that thing" and so on. But over time mentions of the Honda merely elicited an eye roll or, after a while, no response at all. One morning we decided the time was right. The son was at the right attitude, the winds were coming from the ideal direction, the moon was in the seventh house, and we started the Honda with her in earshot.

We shut off the engine shortly before she burst into The Garage with a puzzled look. My dad smiled back. "What?"

"I thought I heard an engine. A small engine," she accused.

"Oh?"

"Was that the Honda?" Her eyes fell on the bike which now sat prominently in front of the old tractor. And with that, there was no turning back.

Interestingly, though, she quickly fell in love with the bike as well. Using her incredible sleuthing skills that served her so well when she and Dad would find parts for the '61 Corvette, she was able to track down a bevy of new old stock (NOS) parts as well as insanely discounted tires, tubes, foot pegs, a new clutch cable, front fork boots and lights. She tracked them down along with another old mirror (the S90 only had the left-side one) that exactly matched the original, all for very low prices. Soon I had the tires and tubes on, the mirror in and adjusted, and the wheels scrubbed (as you saw in a previous post, I believe). This was a tough task, as I had to systematically use green kitchen scrubbers and water to knock the initial layers of rust and dirt off, then I used a degreaser, more water, naval jelly and finally Mothers metal polish. What resulted were wheels I could hardly believe were our originals! There was a time when we contemplated getting new rims, but I declined and said that I wished to fix up the old ones. Boy am I glad I did.

Also, perhaps serendipitously, while going through a small box of jewelry at a garage sale I somehow came across an item that was vastly out of place: An old style metal valve stem cover like the one missing on the S90! It wasn't a perfect match for the rear one, but it was very close and vintage. Also thankfully the owners of the garage sale gave it to me for free.

In the meantime my dad somehow found a side plate that was missing from the bike, which was the one covering the frontmost part of the chain. I cleaned it up and had to go to the hardware store to get special metric bolts with Phillips heads, but I got the thing hooked on. I then removed the front wheel and unscrewed the fork uprights (below the springs). Inside was a special fluid that you have to make sure not to spill, but after those were off I was easily able to get the old fork boots off. They had dry-rotted and fallen apart over time. With some lubrication and gentle persuasion I got the new ones on, and they looked fantastic! I screwed the fork uprights back on, reattached and torqued the wheel, and it was just about ready to go.

Realizing at one point that the rest of the work may be beyond my means (I.e. taking the entire engine apart to address the aforementioned grinding), we took it to a shop to look at that and the idle adjustment.

News came back that the grinding seemed fine and normal on an old bike that hasn't been run in 35 years, but the idle issue was a bit different. The guy soon realized that, like my assessment had said a while ago, the throttle either seemed really on or really off. True to that the guy found that releasing the throttle effectively shut off the engine. When he went to adjust the throttle screw on the carb, he found it to be gone! Well that explains that, I guess.

After he ordered a new one and installed it, the bike was running like a dream again and we were allowed to bring it back. The hard work was over, right? Not so much.

When I went to take my written test, which I passed, they said in order to take the driving test I needed to have a valid license plate and proof of insurance. Well we didn't have the license plates updated, so I couldn't. Moreover, there was an increasing suspicion that my grandma had thrown away the old title and registration from long ago.

"Well you'll need this to get the plates."

"Can't you look it up in the system? My dad's been the only owner since 1966."

She looked it up and found nothing. She found the other cycle under my dad's name (he recently had to go to the state courthouse to get my grandpa's death certificate to transfer the Honda 350-Four into his name), but nothing on the '66. "We only keep the vehicles in here that have been registered in the last --- years."

Crap. This bike hadn't been registered since 1975. In fact, that's the license plate that was on there at that moment.

So I went home and told my (thrilled) father. He was determined, so we grabbed the old license plate and headed uptown. When we came back to the courthouse, he showed them the plate and asked if they could trace it.

"Wow! Look at that old license plate, Barb!" one woman exclaimed.

"Geeze, I haven't seen one that old in a long time!" another laughed.

Awesome.

"No we can't trace something that old. We don't keep registration records that long. Do you have any old registrations or insurance claims on it? Because if so we can trace it that way."

My dad wasn't too happy to hear that. "What the hell do you think, I'm stupid?!" he yelled to me later in response to the woman's question. "Shit, I must be. You don't think I've thought of that and tried it? I even said to her that we couldn't find anything!"

My father's musings went unheard. We went to the police department to see if they could trace the plates. They shook their heads saying that they don't keep records beyond a few years old, and that all the rest got thrown out. Maybe we could check with the courthouse? Dad loved hearing that, as you could imagine.

If we couldn't find any documentation, there was no way the law could verify my dad was the owner as opposed to someone who stole it. They couldn't just go off of his word or his stories, or his pictures or anything. Instead we would have to bond for it and pay upwards of $3,000 over a few years (which we may or may not have gotten back), have it inspected by the DOT and have it appraised for insurance.

And so we took it upon ourselves to find that title or else. We tore apart every level of our house from the downstairs to the attic. We looked in every old lockbox from my grandparents that we had (and found some amazingly cool stuff along the way) to no avail. I looked through The Garage. I thought I knew where some old leather folders were that contained papers from that era, but when I found them they were without the S90 title. Our final option was the fruit room in my grandma's old house.

Over the course of an hour we dug through it, finding countless toys from my father's youth as well as artifacts from my grandparents, great grandparents, and even great great grandparents. After quite some time I was digging through an old box when, way at the bottom, I found an old cigar box. Opening it, paper began to fall out. I grabbed one and found it to be a registration for the '66 instead of the 350! Moreover, as I flipped through the stack, going back in time through the years of its registration, at the bottom sat a humble yellow sheet proclaiming itself to be the title.

I rushed to the courthouse to prove the old women wrong. Again I was greeted with laughs. "Look at how old this title is!" "I haven't seen one like this in ages!" "This thing's as old as me!" "You ever seen a title this old, Barb?" Good Lord. At one point they told me earlier that I would need my dad to come with me if the title was to be transferred to my name. I laughed and told them he'd get a kick out of that, but that instead he just wanted to update the title and get plates. They shook their heads and said that I had a nickname with the women in that department, although she then laughed and claimed she was kidding. Hmm...

So they updated the title in their computers and issued me a new license plate for $10, and we were good to go. Finally. The bike runs, is fit in the eyes of the law and ready to go. Now all I need to do is find time to take that driving test and then figure out how to get it to school where I plan to ride it to class and back some days. As a result I have it cleaned up, but not too well. I don't want unnecessary attention on it, but just in case my mom took it upon herself to buy the biggest, sturdiest security chain out there. She also somehow found the only Buco rack for sale in the entire U.S. from a guy who bought it from a Honda dealership in 1966. It was a type of rack specially made for the S90 and fellow 90 models, and it was in fantastic shape.

"What do you want for it?" she asked after conversing with the gentleman about S90s.

"I paid $20 for it in 1966, and I'd like to make my money back," he said simply. So with that the wonderful guy shipped us the rack and it is now affixed to the back of the bike. My dad loves it, saying that the only reason he wouldn't have bought one of those in '66 is because he spent the only $413 he had on the bike.

So, in all she's come a long way. Almost as long as this blog post is in length. Sorry about that, I just wanted to get it all down before I forgot any details and let any more of the bike's story slip into inaccessible memory. I'm proud to say, though, that the bike is done and is completely reborn, which, as any car guy or girl will tell you, is one of the most awesome feelings you could ever have. It's a proud moment, and there are few emotions that can match the ones you feel when you're riding down the road, wind in your face, riding an antique motorcycle you resurrected with your own hands. It's a feeling I'll never forget.

The Modern Teammate Dynamic

After qualifying for the British Grand Prix concluded today, I had a conversation with a friend of mine on the subject of teammates. It was an interesting reflection to have a year after Mark Webber drove one of the most determined races I have ever seen after his team nonchalantly threw him under the bus following Vettel's front wing mishap. To this day I still think the quip "Not bad for a number two driver" was one of my most favorite things a driver has ever said. It was succinct, pointed, curt and it said a ton about the situation. Props to the Aussie for saying it after his fabulous victory last year, and props to the team for sticking with him (this coming after recurrences of his ongoing feud with bicycles).

"I guess I always thought of teammates as getting along," my friend revealed in the car today.

I shook my head and proceeded to tell stories for a while (which probably sounded like babble. After all, a short time later we nearly rear-ended a vehicle), and it really got me thinking about Webber, Vettel and the teammate dynamic.

As I started to explain, when it comes to teammates in Formula 1, it's business first and friendship later. I'm sure Webber and Vettel can get along in a professional setting, but would they voluntarily visit each other or trade gifts at Christmas? Of course not. That's far from being detrimental, though, as we saw with Mark's drive at Silverstone last year. He hip-checked his hotshot teammate at the start, refused to look back, drove flawlessly and won the race at the exact time a profound statement like that was required. He wanted to send a message to his team that he is not washed up and not going to concede to a younger, quicker teammate despite Red Bull's best efforts. Good on ya, Mark, I thought that was fantastic.

If only all teammate rivalries could produce such results with so little drama (comparatively, I mean, to the incidents at McLaren in 2007, per se). Many still remember the seething hatred that ripped the Silver Arrows apart when a proud Fernando Alonso was suddenly upstaged on the year of his big McLaren break by a smiling, steely Brit named Lewis Hamilton. The on track battles said so much, yet it was accompanied by the complete disdain showcased whenever the drivers had to be in close proximity with one another. It was illustrated also by the pit stop which came to define the hatred the two shared for each other (with Alonso purposely pausing before leaving his shared pit stall so that Hamilton would not have a shot at pole position before time expired).

What many forget is the mammoth battle McLaren were having for the championship this year. They forget how much of a non-factor Alonso was that year, save for a handful of victories that failed to outshine the wondrous results wrought by young Lewis. They also seem to forget just how close McLaren came to winning the World Drivers Championship that year. That heated rivalry simultaneously brought McLaren's pilots to the brink of a championship, but it also lost them the world title given how evenly the points were distributed between them. This has been the scenario at Ferrari when Michael Schumacher was selected by his team over Rubens Barrichello, and it was similarly what Red Bull Racing faced last year with a talented squad in Vettel and Webber.

So yes, having the rivalries may prevent a team from having a driver win the championship, but honestly I would rather have natural performances and a lost title than manufactured points totals in the hopes of getting one driver on top (last year, Massa with Alonso, anyone?). Just like any sport, competition breeds better performances. F1 inherently knows that on an engineering level given how fast the technology and advancements progress, but this year many argue that since the sport has become The Vettel Show, the rest of the competition is just lacking. Ferrari have admitted that, depending on the results of the next couple of races, they may give up on this year's championship and focus on next year's. I have no doubt that other teams will follow suit, and rightfully so; remember the advantage the Brawn team enjoyed in 2008?

Even my usual group of race watchers admits that while we really like Vettel as a person, it would be neat to see him get beaten now and again. That pushes him to improve. That pushes his team to improve. It's good for the sport. I still remember the days not so long ago when Schumacher was dominating every year, and quite a few people stopped watching. Some tuned in just to see if he would lose. Of course, this brings me back to the teammate battles, as it is still debatable how many races Barrichello lost because his team told him to let Schumi by somehow. I respect the fact that eventually he couldn't take that anymore and began to speak about it before leaving Ferrari, but his countrymen still remember those days in the same breath with the Brazilian's name. It just shows how intense and deep-seeded these rivalries can go.

Today I talked quite a bit about another great example: Gilles Villeneuve. He was young, he was talented and his rivalry with his veteran Ferrari teammate Didier Pironi eventually ended under tragic circumstances.

Known as one of the greatest drivers never to win the Formula 1 World Championship, Villeneuve was loved by his fans worldwide and became Canada's patron saint of motor racing. His name became synonymous with Ferrari, driving both with Jody Sheckter and then with Pironi. Villeneuve was long considered one of the most purely talented drivers the sport has ever seen. In his brief stint in the sport his win percentage fantastic as was his finishing record (when he finished the race, that is). Come the 1982 San Marino Grand Prix, though, the already-present rivalry between the Canadian and Pironi came to the front.

The dominant Ferraris' only real competition in the race, the Renaults, dropped out of the race early, leaving Villeneuve leading Pironi for many laps. Their lead was enormous, and given the Ferrari's reliability issues (both mechanically and fuel-wise), the team instructed the drivers to slow down to make sure both cars finished the race. From here the story gets a bit mysterious, as we will never really know what happened for sure.

Supposedly Villeneuve heard the order and believed that meant the cars would both slow and finish the race. Pironi supposedly thought that meant they would slow but that he and Villeneuve were still free to race.

After the message the Canadian's lap times dropped by two to three seconds, but soon he was overtaken by his teammate. He was initially surprised and claimed that he thought Pironi was doing it to spice up an otherwise boring race, so he re-overtook and once again thought it would stay that way. His lap times dropped back to the slower times, but Pironi eventually ran a normal race speed lap and overtook him again. Villeneuve responded and re-overtook, beginning to wonder what was happening, but he slowed and maintained the lead for the next few laps. On the final lap of the race Villeneuve took a slower line through a corner and in doing so left it open. Pironi dove underneath of him and rocketed to the finish line in front of a stunned Villeneuve. Ferrari had maintained their one-two finish, but an overjoyed Pironi was overshadowed on the podium by an angry and confused Villeneuve who felt as though he had been betrayed.

Pironi shrugged off the incident, believing that is what the team intended, and because of his response Villeneuve, in part blinded by anger, swore never to talk to his teammate again. Two weeks later, during qualifying for the Belgian Grand Prix at the legendary Zolder circuit, Pironi chose not to talk to Villeneuve who was still fuming about the race a fortnight before. With the end of the qualifying session near, Pironi was 0.6 seconds ahead of Villeneuve with both drivers still in the top ten. The team believed Gilles was on an in-lap, but some believed he was trying to do one more lap to try to better his teammate.

Either way, a collision occurred with a couple of corners to go when a slowing car tried to move aside for the Ferrari, which at the time was traveling over 120mph. Villeneuve's helmet was torn from his head and his car launched skyward for over 100 meters. When it finally hit the ground the young Canadian was thrown from it and landed in the catch fence nearby. A neck fracture irreversibly put Villeneuve on life support for a period of time before his family chose to turn it off, and Pironi regretted the feud and his relationship with Gilles for the rest of his life.

While we may never know what happened in the final days of Gilles Villeneuve's life, it cannot be denied that this competition between teammates became tragically immortalized after the events at Zolder (where a corner is now named for the late Canadian). Whenever teammate rivalries are brought up, I believe this one ranks right up there in its legendary status.

But let's bring this babble back to Webber and Vettel. (I hope in the meantime I didn't cause any car accidents or missed appointments.) Contrasting them with the semi-healthy relationship Jenson Button and Lewis Hamilton have, I can't help but feel that this balance is exactly what is needed for Red Bull right now. Webber's hand-me-down situations have inspired him, but like Zorro always preached, he has never thus attacked out of anger. It has always been a quiet determination with him that normally leads to consistent and strong finishes. These, in turn, keep him within striking distance of Vettel's heels, and that temptation alone is enough to keep him going.

Inevitably there will be days like today when the Aussie is able to get the best of the dominant German (the younger one, not the one with the red helmet), and I would like to think that so long as Webber can pull one out from under Vettel's nose every once in a while that he will still be deemed an asset to RBR. It would be a shame to see retirement come early for this seasoned vet merely because his younger teammate not only beats him consistently but because the team helps perpetuate that finishing order. Don't get me wrong, I'm not insinuating that Vettel's fantastic string of wins would not have happened without unequal treatment by Red Bull. I'm more referring to the few instances where favoritism has occurred like with the front wing. It's situations like those when a guy like Webber (who could use some reassurance from his team now and again) might feel a bit slighted, and you know, I would not blame him for a minute.

'The Modern Teammate Dynamic' can either be a blessing or a curse. The key is to finding the right balance, and to do this the team needs to make sure things don't get out of hand. Where will we someday view the animosity that may or may not be present between Seb and Mark? At this point it's tough to tell, but I have a feeling that the events of tomorrow morning's race, in a season where the young German is hot on his way to a second World Drivers Championship, may be extremely telling.

Just as fake as the headlights on her stock car

It seems so often that I think of great blog topics, but as the day goes on I realize I won't have any time to get them written. This is a bit disappointing, although I try to keep as many of them as possible stored away inside my head. When I do get a chance, I often have to pick and choose what to write based on my time frame, and I think that's what I will try to do tonight.

A while back I got a chance to meet Danica Patrick. While this may cause some to weaken at the knees and become giddy as schoolgirls, it got a healthy eye roll from me when I found out. Hooray? I was going to have to travel and go to the skybox of a man I've never met, but supposedly she would arrive and be on hand for something. I began to think of questions and clever little ways I could ask her things. Most importantly, though, I wanted to see if she was truly as unpleasant in real life as she appeared on television. Little did I know how clear an answer I would get.

She arrived a few minutes after she was supposed to be in the skybox (not a surprise). The agent lady with her authoritatively announced that she would be on hand shortly and would only be taking pictures. Line up against the wall, don't talk to her too much, don't ask her to sign anything (we would be getting pre-signed pictures anyway), and they will have a photographer there to take pictures. Sure enough, she arrived as unhappily as she could, never taking her eyes off the diecast cars she was to sign. Her steely, serious look never changed as she kept her head down signing the little cars, moving silently down the line as people called out to her to say hello. When she was done she gave a half smile to no one in particular and moved to the end of the room where the pictures would commence.

My dad and I were toward the front of the line, randomly, and he kept egging me on to take out my little notepad and get her autograph, but I was hesitant. While we waited I glanced at her feet and saw Converse shoes---the same brand I was wearing, although hers were gray and mine were Ferrari red with Corsa on the sides. When it was finally my turn, just as she had done with everyone else, she frowned up until the point that the camera clicked. I stood next to her, towering over her petite frame that could only manage to dwarf my chest.

"Hi," I smiled sheepishly, seeing if I could get a reaction out of her before the picture.

She only partially turned her head my way, expressionlessly saying "Hey."

"I like your shoes," I grinned, pointing down to her Converses. "Great minds think alike!"

She looked down, her mouth back into her usual pout after faking a half-smile for the picture. "Oh. Yeah," she said matter-of-factly.

I pulled out my notepad and asked if she could sign it, and she literally reached out and tried to shut it. "No, there's a picture over there," she said pushing it away, "That's bigger than a little sheet of paper."

I paused for a moment before walking away, her (probably) autopenned picture burning my fingers out of a Go Daddy-induced blasphemy. I looked at my dad, who had seen and heard our entire conversation. I could tell the pressure in him was building, yet he also put on a fake smile and had his picture taken before walking away. "See ya later," he quietly said through gritted teeth.

As soon as he reached me, though, the smile faded.

"Let's get the hell out of here," he said staring at the door.

I agreed and we left quickly, telling Jim (the man whose company owned the skybox) thanks for having us and giving us pit/garage passes. We exited swiftly, and upon the door's closing my dad blurted out, "Holy shit, she is the biggest turd of misery I've ever seen! Who the hell does she think she is?!"

I laughed and agreed, "I didn't know whether to laugh or be mad when I was in there! She's exactly like I imagined!"

"She didn't smile, she didn't talk to anyone. Why anyone would think she was worth a damn I don't know!" my dad continued as we walked into an elevator. The female attendant shot us a curious look thinking we were talking about her.

"Danica," my dad clarified. "We just met her; we weren't impressed."

"You should have seen her the first few times she came here," she lady rolled her eyes. "She was followed by tons of bodyguards, used disguises, on and on."

It made for an interesting rest of the day as we walked around the track. Every Danica merchandise-clad fan that passed I just wanted to shake them and say "How can you like such an unpleasant person?! Doesn't personality or class mean anything to you? It must not, but then again you certainly couldn't like her for her driving..."

Just today my dad saw Jim again who asked him what he thought of Danica at the race. He said that he wasn't too happy.

"Wasn't she a piece of crap?" Jim asked. "The whole time she didn't laugh or smile or do anything! That was a mistake getting her to come, wasn't it?"

He proceeded to act out an alternative scene of Danica's arrival, instead having her apologize for not being able to sign autographs but thanking everyone for coming out to see her and support her. She was smiling, flipping her hair, waving to people and genuinely smiling.

Unfortunately this scene was all acted out by a 6'3 200+ lbs man with a deep voice instead of Danica herself. He told my dad that the pictures we took were being printed, framed and would be sent to us. Yippee.

It just perplexes me that people could still cheer for her without caring one bit about what kind of person she is toward her fans or even her fellow drivers. A relatively new Indy fan once asked me if any of the drivers had huge rivalries, and as I began to name them, I realized that 90% of them involved Danica and someone else.

"So basically it's Danica versus everyone else?" he asked. I thought that summed it up well.

The only one she didn't outwardly hate at the time was the much-maligned Milka Duno, but that was only because she had stood up to the prima donna by throwing her gloves at her (I gave her props to that, since only a woman could retaliate without fear of backlash by the public).

Later that day I walked through the garages and pits, and every time I would see a driver I would wave and yell "Good luck today!" Of all the drivers I contacted, every one of them smiled and waved back. Some, like Tony Kanaan and Helio Castroneves gave thumbs up, too. I even had a very pleasant conversation with Kevin Kalkhoven who generously gave his time to talk to me. I watched carefully as fans tried to interact with Danica, and rarely did she ever even make eye contact back with them, let alone wave or acknowledge them. I couldn't believe it. I just knew that the crowd would go crazy when they announced her in the driver parade (I gave a small boo), but they obviously didn't know her or didn't care. Men can't see past the body (whose appeal is naturally boosted by being around nearly all males), and both genders can't get over the fact that she's a woman in IndyCar. That, alone, is enough for them to root for her. But why shouldn't that same thing be happening to Simona de Silvestro? Or Ana Beatriz? To me they should be a hell of a lot more attractive than Danica, both in looks and personality.

Thankfully I think that as more interviews occur, more and more people are starting to see that Danica pales in comparison to Simona and Ana and Pippa Mann and the other women climbing through the ranks. I already thought it was a no-contest between Sarah Fisher and her back before SF became a car owner. But oh well. Should Danica jump ship and fly away to the fairyland that is NASCAR, good riddance. Let her find more money there and a whole new demographic. Let her smash into other cars to her heart's desire and pick fights with people who may just fight back. Let her lay on the hood of her car in her sponsor-covered bikini touting an "Official" something "of NASCAR." Her affection toward the camera will be just as fake as the headlights on her stock car, but she'll be all the better for it. Give her ride to someone who deserves to race in Indy. Give it to someone who knows that he or she will actually have to win more than once in 140+ starts to keep the drive. Give it to someone who will care about the fans. I certainly won't miss her.

Parting ways with an old friend

Last summer I felt as though I never got to work in The Garage because of my summer class. I was rarely in town and got abbreviated Garage visits whenever I was. I was hoping that this summer would be different, and boy was I right. So much has happened since my last post that it's going to be difficult to get things caught up in order.

First off, the reason my blogs have been few and far between is not like last summer where I didn't have news to report. Instead it's because of all that I've been doing, the swiftness with which things have been happening, and a death in the family. There were days recently where I spent six or more hours up there working, and that actually felt great (and tiring). The reason for these days in particular was because my family and I decided to sell my Pontiac. This was a hard decision given my history with it (it being my first ever car that was solely mine, the summer I painted the whole thing from bare metal and primer, the first Small Town Adventure spent in it, etc.), but it was the right decision after getting the TT. The car had served me extremely well, and it was time to let someone else enjoy it. We didn't need another car sitting around, and because of my parents' preferences for all-wheel drive cars, they don't really have a need for a designated snow car (a fate that had already befallen the 1987 Oldsmobile Eighty Eight).

Before we could sell it, though, there was work to be done. So for those fervent few days I was toiling over the Grand Prix tending to its pealing paint and its encroaching rust. The first part of the procedure involved scrubbing the roughest spots of rust off of the underside of the car in front of the rear tires. This was very tricky in places because it was almost rusted through, but between multiple applications of naval jelly and a very rough sanding block, I had it mostly smoothed off. Using a plastic matrix I made patches with body filler to negate the holes in the sheet metal. Through applications of more filler and tons of sanding I smoothed out the rust spots and primed them so that they looked just like the body.

After this (spent squatting on the floor, lying on old blankets and listening to the Oldies), my mom helped me go around the car and knock off peeling bits of paint before painting over them with some touch-up spray paint my dad bought from Napa. It took him a while to find it, but thankfully Napa was able to get a match. Unfortunately when we painted it on it was visibly darker than the regular Silvermist Metallic the car needed. I took it back to Napa only to hear them say "Well it's 'cause you brushed it on and it's spray paint."

I knew that could contribute a little bit given its metallic nature, but it shouldn't be that dark. So we took it back and I taped up the areas we'd done and sprayed the paint on myself. It looked better when it was drying, but when the tackiness had gone, it was still visibly much darker than the paint around it. I suppose this was a little better than the rust and peeling paint it had, but I still wasn't too thrilled with the result. Nonetheless, my dad said that I needed to drive it to his place of work the next day to show it to a coworker.

So early that morning I headed there and showed it to a dad's coworker and her husband. He took it for a quick drive while I talked to Janet Mae, his wife. She said that they had never owned a car with a big trunk before, nor had they ever had a roomy backseat. When her husband returned, he commented how he had asked his wife when she first proposed the car to him "if [the trunk] was big enough to put a deer in." It definitely was, and it sounded like the Pontiac would be a big step up from the 1989 Cavalier he bought for $100 134,000 miles ago. He said he'd only ever put oil in it once, which worried me (Janet Mae assured me she puts the oil in for him), but this car was going to be their main family car, so I knew they would take wonderful care of it.

In the end they decided to take it, but not for a few days, so it was my job to finish cleaning the

car before they assumed ownership. It was a little bit sad to clean it up and put wax on my paint job from a couple of summers ago. I took the small paper crane from the dash that had been given to me nearly five years ago. I took my water blade from under the seat and my CDs from the player and glove compartment. By the time I was done, my silver Pontiac was clean and fresh, yet it retained its personality and the touches I had given to it over the years. It was my car. I had painted it. I had replaced the brakes myself. I had replaced the headlights myself. I had done a slew of things to this car over the years, but unfortunately it was the multitude of things we've needed the shop to do that ultimately pushed us to selling it. We had spent two or three times what the car was worth just due to major repairs (heads, transmission, pumps, belts, balancers, etc.), and at that point my father said enough was enough. I can't blame him I suppose.

I drove the car to my dad's workplace amidst a long line of tractors on the freeway that inevitably made me late (much to my father's dismay, as is expected from a 35-year engineer). I took the plates off in the parking lot, grabbed my car mat and tools and said goodbye to my car. My dad's grumbles at my lateness disappeared as he got in the waiting car to take us both home, so hurriedly I had to bid my Pontiac adieu. I knew the moment was going to be sad anyway, but to be rushed in parting ways with an old friend seemed unexpected. Perhaps the quickness of it all helped, but with a pat on the roof and a few softly spoken words, I was off.

I kept my eyes on the car from the Audi's window until it disappeared behind unkempt, rusty automobiles of faceless and nameless factory workers I will never meet. Just like that, she was gone. I can still imagine how the paint feels when I run my hand across it, and I still recall the texture of the steering wheel's leather. My dad has given me updates now and then, and it sounds like they are excited to have the car. I do hope they enjoy it and love it like I did.

To get close to it, to touch its cold, grimy skin

Ah the sweet smells of summer. The wind, the sun, the grass getting greener everyday. Having been enclosed in the snowglobe that was my university all year, I've been trying to engross myself in as many summer activities as I can as fast as I can.

It's not that I don't enjoy summer to its fullest, it's just that there have been years where it takes me a while to feel summery, and that's quite sad. That's also what I've been trying to combat for the past few days, and I'm happy to report that all has been going well.

I graduated from college on Saturday with my degree in Neuroscience, which is probably deserving of a blog entry in itself. I could go on and on about my travails at university, but for now I'll focus on more pressing (and seasonal) issues. This blog may be a bit random, I'll warn you.

In two and a half weeks I'll be getting my car, and I'm pretty excited about that. My current car in the meantime has been very good to me, so I'm currently feeling a bit guilty. She's been a great car overall, and I know I'll be sad to part with her. The TT is a thrilling prospect, though, and I must say that I've had quite a few visions over the past four weeks of me driving it in various locations---me in the TT going to the store, me in the TT cruising to the capitol to visit friends, me in the TT with the windows down listening to the oldies on a warm Saturday night with its windows down. The Czech man from whom I'm buying it has emailed a couple of times to let me know how the car is doing, much like a homesick mother calling to check on her child. He assures me that the car is fine, and now that his time is limited with it, he's really come to appreciate it. I know exactly what he means, honestly.

On my first two weekdays of break, as I said, I've tried to do as many summery things as I could. Both days I've gone up to The Garage to work. The first day was spent mainly cleaning so that I could get to working on the cars, but that was fun in itself. The longest task of the day, perhaps, was fiddling with the radio to get my oldies station back. I used to listen to the oldies station from our capitol, but I have since abandoned it. When I was a kid they used to play '50s and '60s music generously, and it was quite highbrow when they'd spin one from the early '70s. Nowadays they have designated periods of time every day for tunes from the 1970s and now sprinkle in as many songs from the '60s as they now play from the '80s. It's not that I don't like that music, it's the principle of the thing that gets me. As a result, I've abandoned them and am now a follower of Scott Shannon on the local True Oldies Channel affiliate. I love the mix of the songs that have always echoed through the Garage as well as the local commercials sprinkled in. It's that combination that never fails to make me feel nostalgic; its predictability is a comfort to mark the passing of time (I know when on the hour their commercial breaks fall as well as some bumper music they use before the Voice Track rolls over).

Once I played with the finnicky radio and found the TOC, I got to work sweeping, putting tools away, moving things, cleaning windows, and clearing out a workspace behind the Maxwell. When all of this was said and done, I was finally able to tackle all of the projects that used to run through my head late at night while fervently typing out papers.

My first project was to pull the soft top bows out from the side of the work bench and try to put them together. We had found the small bow that stretches across the frame directly above the car's occupants' heads, and I needed to hook it on. Without C clips, though, I won't be able to, which is fine because we're still working on that metal bracket we had to make that hooks behind the seats in the car. Without that, we won't be able to hook the frame to the car in the first place. I also noticed that it got chipped pretty hard sometime over the winter, so that would require some touch-up work.

After that, I headed back to do some work on the back of the Maxwell. My plan is still to work from back to front on the mechanics of it, so I'm continuing the process of sorting out the rear differential. As it is I'm still a bit nervous at opening it up, so in the meantime I've tilted it rearward and am inspecting the outside parts. I've loosened every bolt on the outside of the case (but haven't taken them off), and I've also found the drain plug for the fluid in the diff. Because it's tilted, no fluid came out, but sometime I'll tilt it forward and collect it (initial drops that got on my fingers seem to indicate that it's just oil inside, but I'm not sure). Today I figured out how to disconnect the driveshaft from the rear axle, which involves taking off little metal rings that are held on with screws. These allow the huge bolts that go into the pivoting mechanism (I'm bad with names of parts on these cars as of right now) on the driveshaft to come out. These will have to be greased before I put them back in. Before then I'll take the entire driveshaft out, run it under the wire brush, prime it, and set it back under the car. I still need the U-bolts that hook the T-shaped front of the driveshaft to the transmission, but I may be able to make those if I can't find them.

After getting the driveshaft off, I'll probably scoot the axle out from under the car (the tires are still attached, as my attempts to get them off failed for some reason) and attack it with degreaser. I'd rather do that than scratch it off with a screwdriver since when I used the latter method I started seeing some swaths of blue paint amidst the gunk. I'm hoping that if I clean it off with degreaser I can save some of the paint (not likely). This is valuable because it tells me that even the axle was blue instead of a heavy-duty black underbody. All of this is helpful.

After I attack it with degreaser I'd like to split the axle and inspect the gears, clean them and put the proper lubrication inside. I've cleaned all of the greasing points (the little metal spring caps that lift to allow you to put lubricant on the diff), so that won't be a problem. The next step after that will be priming the rest of the frame and leaf springs on the rear end before reaffixing the axle to the car. To do this I'll have to get or make more of the U-bolts that hold the two together (since a couple of the 100-year-old ones snapped when removing them for the first time in a century). I'll hook the driveshaft back up, and the rear end will be in good shape. Then I'll move to the transmission, knowing that I'll have to return and do the rear brakes eventually.

So that was a good bit of accomplishments on the old car the past couple of days. I feel like I'll be able to make actual progress in the coming weeks, and that's a fantastic feeling.

I also recently joined a Model T forum, asking the people on there how I might go about getting our 1913 running. They were very generous in their responses and gave me a very good list of things to check, plus some places nearby to get parts if I need them (which I will).

Today I spent some time uncovering the T and dusting it off in order to take some pictures (which I'll post soon), and it was pretty interesting to get close to it, to touch its cold, grimy skin and uncover the shine that was buried beneath. I've never really been close to that car except for when I was a small child and was entranced by the thought of climbing into it as if it were a mysterious cave and wondrous, dilapidated time machine all at once. Donning a painting mask and the oldest clothes I had, I was allowed to climb into it and sit behind the wheel for a few moments, even though I had no notion of what the car meant as a classic automobile or as a future project. I haven't climbed inside since then, although today I opened the right side doors (the left side is against the wall) and lifted the engine cover. I also cranked the engine over a couple of times, which thankfully spun freely. It invigorated me thinking that someday I'll turn that crank and the four cylinder engine that powers my own Tin Lizzie will fire to life for the first time in half a century.

Come tomorrow morning I'll be back up in the garage, my scratched and bloodied arms set to delve further into the numerous projects I have. I'll have more updates tomorrow (hopefully in blog form) and also some pictures of my updates on the Maxwell and Model T. Until then, thanks for reading!

The State of Formula 1

Oh my goodness.

It's been quite a while since I've written in this blog (nearly a month, in fact), and today I can definitely say that the fantastic Formula 1 race has moved me to add another piece.

It's kind of ironic, actually. When I first started this blog I (erroneously) thought I'd have enough time and opportunities to write both what happens in The Garage and what happens in the racing world. Thus far I've done a little of the former and none of the latter. I feel it would be a travesty, though, to let such a brilliant race slip by unnoticed in the annals of this collection; for what we saw today was the culmination of quite a bit of work aimed at changing the face of the sport. Today, we saw the fruits of that labor.

I'm not going to say that the state of F1 is perfect the way it is right now. No, no. It's far from it. When Jenson and Lewis will be paid a combined $175 million for their efforts at McLaren, or when the teams at the back of the grid are undergoing a rabid trial by fire to make it to the green flag each race, F1 is still not fixed. Saying it like that makes it seem as though I'm accusing it of being broken, which I also don't think is the truth. I've loved the sport since I first saw it, even when its harshest critics walked away in droves after the USGP in 2005 or when lack of on-track passing prompted many to label the races as boring. While I can see their points, I've never felt this way. But apparently in the past few years the head brass of the FIA have, and thus the tweaking began.

Every year they've tried to snatch downforce from these brilliant aerodynamicists (who are always able to claw it back). They've changed the tyres. They've changed the engines. They've changed the qualifying. On and on and on. But now that most of those changes seem old hat to fans now, the newest changes come to the forefront: The return of KERS, the new Pirelli tyres and the DRS.

Addressing them in order, I've been mixed about the Kinetic Energy Recovery System. While I can see how some would argue that it's road-car-relevant, at this point it's become an overtaking device both for the act and for preventing it. Yes some cars are investigating and even starting to employ similar systems, but in the world of cost cutting and budget issues, investing loads of cash into this was a bit much to me. But what does it do to the racing? As we've seen this season (now that nearly everyone has it), it hasn't been half bad. True there's still the chance of severe electrocution or noxious fumes like the ones that poured out of Kimi's Ferrari a while back, but overall it's made a difference. Red Bull claims it's 0.3 seconds per lap for these six seconds of 80 extra horsepower. The weight of the system is what prevents that number from being more advantageous, but in a world where millions are poured into tenths, that 0.3 doesn't look too shabby.

Pirelli have also been under the criticizing eye of the public since the start of the season, and for them it's been a mixed bag. No one expected them to jump right into the pinnacle of motor sports and deliver cracking tyres that are on the level with Bridgestone, but through the help of vets like Nick Heidfeld and Pedro de la Rosa, the Italians have done a good job. The glaring issue that's plagued them so far this season was exemplified off the racing line in Shanghai: These tyres wear heavily. You'll be hard pressed in most races this year to run a two-stopper, and the thought of a one-stop race is basically out of the question. To me, though, I love this. Now it goes back to the skill of the driver. Can he command the most out of his car while protecting most of his rubber? In pressure situations, can he keep his cool and not scrub off their speed or flat spot them into oblivion? It definitely spices things up.

Gnawing at the back of my mind, though, is the fact that one Bernard Ecclestone said something very similar long ago. I rarely submit and say that the man was 100% correct, but whether you agree with his brash nature, his scathing and often cutthroat comments or not, Ecclestone knows what's right more often than not. (Don't even get me started on his ridiculous ideas of artificial rain.) He had said that it will be good to have tyres that aren't very good because then you'll get chaos. You'll have scrambling and strategy adjustment. You'll have three-, four- or five-stop races. Orders will be mixed and the racing will be more exciting. And damnit, I'm afraid he's dead right on this one. That said, I'd be fine if Pirelli never change their compounds from here on out. So what if the drivers complain? Like I've said before, they're supposed to be the best in the world. They're paid to drive the cars. Heading into this season some said pushing a few extra buttons would be tough for them. Then it's tough! Let them prove themselves, and let the best ones win. I think Pirelli are doing that in more ways than one.

The other day someone asked me what I thought of the Drag Reduction System, and the first thought that came to my head was "It's gimmicky." I still hold to that statement, but that doesn't mean I don't like it. Technologically it's phenomenal: A system that can instantaneously remove 100 lbs of downforce from the cars that can only be used if you're the trailing car and are within one second of another car on a certain part of the track? A system that, once deployed, snaps back to its normal configuration within 0.05 seconds of when you press the brake? Wow. Just the engineering to make that work makes my head spin. But the more important thing to think about, especially if you're a critic of the DRS, is that fans are getting their wish.

How many times have you heard people gripe for the past ten years (heck, the past 20!) about how the cars have too much downforce. The aero is disrupted when you're too close to the car in front of you, and the cars stick to the ground so much easier now. The days of the 1971 Monza-type races are gone. Blah blah blah. By slipping the DRS into the rules this year, Formula 1 has given the fans back the days of close following and slipstreaming while not giving so much that the spectacle decays into a Talladega-like draft-fest. Watching Hamilton hunt Vettel today was something of beauty, but part of the tension came from the fact that you knew he was close enough to use both the KERS and DRS when they hit that backstretch. From there it would be Hamilton's slingshot versus Vettel's KERS and an impossibly fast Adrian Newey masterpiece. The on-screen graphics showed the speed differentials when Webber was slicing and dicing his way through the field, and his speeds would be 10 or 15 kph higher than the other car's. You knew he had the speed, and from there it's down to the skill of the driver to use it accordingly. To me that's fascinating and enthralling.

What the KERS and DRS do is, ultimately, spice up the show. Their gimmicky-ness aside, I almost hate to admit, but they're doing their jobs. China was fantastic. Even some of the F1 drivers like Lotus tester Karun Chandhok said that this was the best dry race they've seen in a long time, not just for the fact that we actually saw the wunderkind Vettel get passed on track for the lead (in an incident that wasn't at the start of the race or due to an accident/mechanical failure). Watching the race today we said that to catch Vettel Hamilton would have to drive the car, not just drive it. He would have to utilize his tools, mind his tyres and attack the once-untouchable German. And by God, he did. We said the same about Webber if he hoped to climb up from the depths of the grid, and even though he didn't have KERS, Webber drove what was probably the drive of the entire race. Unbelievable.

It's not that before this race I hadn't noticed how the changes of recent years have affected the sport, it's just that today it was most purely exemplified in a spectacle that basically defined why I love Formula 1. The racing was pure, there weren't accidents galore like the ones that have come to define IndyCar this year. There weren't competition, debris or full-course cautions today to bunch up the field to create a false fantastic finish like at Talladega. This was a race that was uninterrupted. This was a race that featured the most technologically-advanced cars on the planet racing within seconds of each other despite being made completely different from every other car. This was a race that had action, suspense, seething talent and a worldwide television audience in the hundreds of millions to watch. This is the sport I love. This is what Formula 1 should always be.

This was the genesis of "The Intimidator"

Ten years ago yesterday I was a younger boy, still a preteen, passively watching the Daytona 500 with my dad. At this point in my life I was a big sports fan, but I had not yet fostered/discovered my love for open wheeled motor sport. My mom was in the corner bedroom. When the crash happened, it looked like any other typical Daytona restrictor plate crash with cars sliding, hitting the wall, hitting each other, etc. I halfway remember the long pause in resuming the race, but I didn't know it was because of the medical team needing to take extra time in the infield. A short time later, both my dad and I were shocked to learn that Dale Earnhardt was dead.

I remember running into the bedroom to tell my mom, as the ESPN ticker was already scrolling constant updates about Earnhardt's death. Outside of that, though, I don't remember much more of that day. Later Dale's son would address the media by stoically saying that he'd cried for his father, but only to help himself feel better. People said Dale would have preferred to die on the track instead of in a road car or anywhere else, and I suppose they were right.

As young as I was, I don't think I fully grasped the importance of what just happened. At this point in my life I wasn't familiar with NASCAR or Earnhardt, and I certainly had even less knowledge of death in motor sports. As far as deaths in mainstream motor sport, NASCAR is still up there in terms of being dangerous. Earnhardt was its last death on the track in a Sprint Cup/Winston Cup race. In the U.S., only the IndyCar series has had more frequent deaths (namely in the lead up to the Indy 500). This is, of course, discounting the still very vulnerable drivers in Sprint Cars.

What I also didn't wholly understand was the legendary status that Earnhardt had carved for himself and would continue to develop posthumously, even today. It was fascinating to see NASCAR go through the same sort of safety revelation that Formula 1 went through after its last (to date) death in 1994, when the even more legendary (and no less controversial) Ayrton Senna was killed at Imola on the sport's darkest weekend in modern times. Suddenly open-faced helmets were gone. HANS devices became mandatory, the cabin size changed (especially with the Car of Tomorrow) to accommodate the driver better and give him/her more padding, and more anti-roll flaps appeared on the cars. SAFER barriers began to be installed, and arguably the face of the sport did too.

When Dale Jr. won at Daytona later that year (something I also vaguely recall watching), he simultaneously carved out a bit of a legend for himself as well. He won legions of his father's fans over to him, and many fans who were new to the sport jumped on his sentimental bandwagon. Most of his father's crew joined him for the next couple of years, but after they were left/were fired, Dale Jr.'s winning percentage plummeted.

Even today Earnhardt Sr.'s son remains NASCAR's most popular driver (through fan polls) despite only winning a single-digit number of times in the past few years. Some of his fans were given glimmers of hope when he won the pole for the Daytona 500 tomorrow, but a practice crash means he's now relegated to start at the back of the pack. This isn't to say his chances are over, though. Especially with the draft-fest that Daytona always is, it's possible to move through the field relatively easily compared to other tracks. In order to do that, though, he'll have to slice his way by 42 other cars while simultaneously avoiding the inevitable crashes that ridiculous restrictor plate racing always causes. He'll probably have to employ some of his father's dubious tactics of pushing people out of the way to get to the front too.

And as an aside, that's something I'd like to address. It's an aspect of Earnhardt Sr.'s life that too many people simplify or forget altogether. For the duration of his career, Dale Earnhardt was a dirty racer. He was a cheat. He certainly wasn't the type whose car fails inspection after the race (only to get to keep the victory but have his crew chief suspended for the next race...). He was, even by his own admission, the kind of guy with whom you could get wheel-to-wheel only to find yourself in the wall the next second. I can't even count the number of times this happened, and everyone from Richard Petty to Darryl Waltrip will reaffirm this. Many times it was blatant, but sometimes he made it look very accidental. Either way, the post-crash or post-race interview was the same: A coy response coupled with a sly smile. This was partially why people loved him. This was the genesis of "The Intimidator."

A few people exacted their revenge on him, but his reaction was the same as described above. It is perhaps a touch of irony, then, that in his final race he was actually driving defensively, as the two cars leading the race ahead of him were cars that he owned (including the one of his son). He was settling in, driving as clean a race as he could to avoid cautions, and yet a freak accident took his life.

Much like Senna's death in '94, mystery surrounded (and still partially does surround) Earnhardt's death. A fracture at the base of his skull was the official cause at the hands of a broken safety belt (something the belt manufacturer disputed). Either way, there's no doubt in my mind that his refusal to wear both a closed-face helmet and a HANS device contributed in some way to his death (especially the lack of a Head and Neck Support device). After all, at first glance the crash doesn't look that bad. Look at some of the crashes from the years before, some of the rollovers and some of the monster pileups. Guys walked away from those. Some just got bruises. Yet this seemingly tame crash killed Dale Earnhardt, the seemingly invincible driver.

What also bothers me these days is the uneducated fan support, especially in the run-up to tomorrow's Daytona 500. Quite a few people nowadays (especially with NASCAR's current, weirdly unique demographic) never saw Earnhardt Sr. in his prime. They only know him toward the end of his career, and they know his son from when he used to win a few races. Yet they elevate him to demigod status and praise what a great driver he was and would have been. And that's fine to speculate. His seven Winston Cup championships lend credence to that, too. But what I think many confuse is their love of him and their love of his legacy.

Earnhardt the man was very different from Earnhardt the legend. The truth about the confidential Dale was that he was serious as can be about the racing aspect of his life, but he loved to be on the farm and some of his more demure hobbies. Perhaps it's more fitting that this legend, as all good legends do, has some mythos involved alongside some smudged memories. In the eyes of his faithful, he was a strong-willed driver who refused to be pushed aside. He was larger than life and was not above getting revenge unabashedly. I suppose in that respect it's fine to ignore the drama, the feuds, the potentially life-threatening moves he pulled on people, and only focus on what he did for his fans. For no matter what anyone says, no matter how right they may be, Dale Earnhardt was NASCAR for many people, and he always will be. Classy or not, he brought an excitement that is rarely matched on the tedious Sprint Cup calendar, one that probably won't be seen again given the league's penchant for safety and dispelling personal grudges between drivers. And honestly, I'm fine with that.

I respect the man for his records and the fanbase he built, but I do not respect how he did it in all cases, and I certainly don't condone his driving style. While the intimidating revenge-seeker is appealing to some, for me it's far too NASCAR "trading paint" "rubbin' is racin'"-esque. It's one thing to win a race, but it's entirely another to push the guy out of the way and get by him. Perhaps that's why I only watch the Daytona 500 out of respect for motor sport and curious fascination with the event that some erroneously claim is the biggest race in the United States. Yes, being able to draft is a skill, but is a race where 40+ cars follow each other nose to tail around such a large oval that you never have to use the brake exciting to me? No. The Daytona 500 is a strategy race where no single person can win it alone. He has to have a drafting partner or else he plummets in the order, regardless of whether his solo laps were faster than any person's out there. Regardless of whether his team masterfully set up his car better than anyone else. And I think that's a little sad.

That's not to say that the ending won't be exciting. NASCAR has more cautions than you can shake a stick at, so of course the cars are bound to be bunched up at the finish. How many debris cautions will there be tomorrow? You can bet at least one or two. But if you're refuting this, then ask yourself, when that caution does come out, why does it take more than one lap of a 2.5 mile track for one person to sprint to the piece of debris, pick it up, and sprint back? I've never understood this.

But I digress. Tomorrow is sure to be a touching day, one driven by emotions and tributes. Honestly, I wouldn't mind seeing Dale Jr. do well. He's not a consistent race winner anyway, and if there was ever a race to win, this planets-aligned event would be a good one. No doubt his father and grandfather's spirits will be there pushing him on. No matter what happens, though, let's hope for a clean race and a safe one, as well.

Problem solved, right? Not so much.

I've finally been gifted a rather uneventful weekend, and I'm trying to take the most advantage of it that I can. And what a weekend it's already been. I may have to break this into two readable posts, as there's a multitude of automobile news as well as racing news to address. Honestly, I'm just glad to post anything at this point given my lack of posting recently. I assure you, though, there have been good reasons.

I'll start with my car, the Pontiac Grand Prix. It's been an interesting car over the years, bought shortly after my sophomore year of high school. Within a few months we had to replace the transmission for a cool $2,500. Since then we've had to replace some tires, hubcaps (they're cheap plastic, so that's not a big deal), the brakes and pads, I had to repaint it because the paint had cancer and was falling off, the headlights (both bulbs and fixtures), the fog lamps (but they're still out), and I still have water that collects inside my headlamps from time to time. That's not quite as bad as the water that sometimes collects in the passenger side footwell, but that's another story.

More recently, though, I've been going through quite a bit of antifreeze. The light came on pretty frequently for low coolant, but I would keep adding more. Eventually pools of the green stuff began collecting under my car when I'd leave it outside for a while, and as the weather got colder I'd notice that I didn't have heat. I took the car to Kevin at the local garage. He's a great guy who always gives us an honest opinion. He went to kindergarten with my mom, and he's known my dad for decades. He looked for the coolant leak and found it in a little hose coming off the engine. He replaced it, but warned me that my intake manifold was bad and that some coolant has been leaking into my engine. I should keep track of any green streaks in my oil in the future.

So I kept driving it, but I kept losing antifreeze. We took the car back to Kevin who replaced the intake manifold for around $550. The cheap gaskets that Pontiac has been notorious for using in those cars were giving up the ghosts as well. When I drove the car back to college, I had a powerful heating system finally flex its muscle and an absence of a "Low Coolant" light. I thought we were in good shape.

In two days, I went outside to drive my car to the hospital where I volunteer. Lo and behold, the light was on again. I drove it a couple of miles and it went off, but I was still cautious. A couple of days later there was a pool under my car again, but thankfully that's the last time it did that. I turned the car on to open the thermostat, but when I went to add the antifreeze, I was somehow getting sprayed every once in a while. Upon closer inspection, the serpentine belt had been doused with coolant from somewhere, and as it reached the highest point in its path around the engine's side, it was throwing droplets at me, almost as a defense mechanism. This was not a good sign.

I kept adding some more antifreeze, but a few days ago I was mystified when I heard a fast-paced clicking coming from the engine when I revved around 2,000 RPM. When I stuck my head under the hood and had the engine revved, the click sounded like a squeak up close, and it was coming from the right side of the engine (around the belt). At first I thought it may have been a lose belt, but it sounded more like something that the belt was turning instead.

When I drove the car the next day, the squeak was gone as I drove to the hospital. On the way back, though, it returned a bit louder and at 1,500 RPM this time. This was not a good sign either. The light wasn't on, and the clicking increased in speed the more I revved. It was not gear-dependent or speed-dependent, but it was certainly rev-dependent.

Complicating issues was that we were having a warm spell in the weather (something I certainly wasn't complaining about), so I never had to turn on the heat to see if it worked. By the time it cooled down, though, the squeak was active at 1,000 RPM and even appeared occasionally at idle. And I didn't have heat.

So this weekend I've come back to my hometown and I took my car back to Kevin. It took him all of two hours to call me back and let me know that my suspicions had been absolutely correct: It was the water pump. The good news is that it's a pretty quick fix. The bad news is, it cost another $120. He completed it yesterday and got it back to me this morning. Problem solved, right?

Not so much.

When I got in the car this morning, I turned it on to see the "Low Coolant" light (which doesn't bother me. It was just taken apart; there's probably air in the lines) and the "ABS" and "Trac Off" lights on. The combination of the latter two, according to the manual, says I need to "service the brakes," but that light came on last year shortly before my dad and I replaced the brakes and pads, so I knew that couldn't be it. Kevin came out and hooked his computer up to it, but it didn't show an error. So he went back inside and got his giant computer, hooked it up and we drove down the block. Cycling through his options he learned that my right front wheel speed sensor was inactive. In other words, at 10 mph, three wheel sensors are telling the car's computer that the wheels are turning at 10 mph. My right front read 0 mph. It's not a detrimental thing, but it automatically turns off my ABS and traction control.

"The good thing is, winter's over, so you shouldn't be needing traction control again," Kevin smiled. Never mind the fact that ABS may be used at any moment of any day in any weather, but oh well. He told me that sometime we could get it replaced, but there was good and bad news here, too. The good news for him is that replacing it involves an easy replacement of the whole hub of the wheel, bearing and sensors. The bad news? It'll cost $200.

So this presents a conundrum to me. At best, my car is worth $2,000, yet at the time when it was worth $3,000, we put $2,500 in for the transmission. In the last month alone we've put in $700, and at this point my mom is saying that we just need to fix the car, sell it and buy a new one. For those who know me, this is not an easy thing to do, as I've grown quite attached to my car (especially after painting it like I did). But honestly, I'm afraid that I'm starting to agree with my mom. The car's been great for me, and I love it to death when it works, but eventually I have to ask when pumping more money into it will stop making more sense than buying a more reliable car and being done with it.

Given my family's recent propensity for all-wheel-drive cars (for my dad driving 35 miles to work at 4:00am every day in the winter), my mom is leaning toward getting an AWD replacement for the Grand Prix. And after having spectacular headlights in both the Jaguar and (especially) the Audi, she wants to make sure I have good headlights, too.

I'm in favor of being able to see and being safe, but it's a bit sad that my car can't do that for me. In terms of which car will? That's another question. The leading candidate in my mom's eye (mainly for its coolness value and relatively cheap price for an old one) is the Audi TT. I must confess that I love Audi's build quality, and it's definitely a sporty looking car. Don't let looks define it, though. It's a monstrously heavy vehicle, partially because of its AWD. It also has a relatively lightweight sub-250hp engine, so it's not the fastest or most nimble (many complain of its understeer). The boys of Top Gear lambasted it for how its owners use the car as a status symbol and must get gussied up before driving it, similar to how a young boy nervously prepares for his first date. I take their assessment with a grain of salt, though, as Jeremy Clarkson has always had a humorous thing against Audis, their owners, and Germans.

I do like the car, even though its backseat is almost nonexistent. The good news is, the seats fold down, and because of its hatchback-like tail, you can probably fit more people comfortably in the trunk than into the backseat. But anyway, this post is long enough. That's where I am right now. My dad seems quite opposed to buying a new car (partially citing the fact that "We've already replaced just about every Goddamn thing on that car!" and the fact that I don't know for sure where I'll be next year in terms of school), but my mom and I might try to work on him. We'll see. For now I'm just hoping that my car keeps chugging along and that we don't have to pour any more money into it. As I've found over time with cars, though, it's anyone's guess as to whether or not that will happen.