On the intersection of racing and public health

Today certainly did not go as I thought it would.  Out of all the conflicting news reports and constant updates on sports leagues shutting down or schools closing their doors, I found myself at an odd crossroads of my racing life and my education---one that I did not anticipate intersecting.

For those who don’t know, I completed my master’s degree in Public Health a few years ago, specifically studying Community & Behavioral Health and Epidemiology, the latter of which studies how diseases move through populations.  I have worked in various parts of the public health field since I graduated, and it’s something I’m very passionate about.

Combining this with my love of racing, I felt it important that I put up some sort of blog post to add some perspective to this whole bizarre situation that unfolded today in Australia.  And to be honest, I’m still a bit confused and disappointed over how it devolved to this.

For those who hadn’t followed along, today’s roller coaster of a “Will they or won’t they” began earlier when a member of the public tested positive for COVID-19.  That person shared the same hotel as several Formula 1 team members, one of whom turned out to have contracted the virus.  This set off a chain reaction of fear and assumed responsibility which culminated in prolonged radio silence from F1, teams packing up and leaving, mixed media messages and frustrated racegoers.

Teams waited by the paddock, unsure whether their job would be to compete for a Grand Prix victory or pack everything up.  Fans at the track stood in queues at closed gates as the screaming V10 of the F1 two-seated lapped Albert Park. 

As I’m sure you know, the race was eventually canceled, and I imagine more Grands Prix will fall in the aftermath.  But from a public health perspective, what on Earth just happened?

Before we delve too deeply into this, I want to define a few things.  These are all questions I’ve been asked online and in-person, and it helps put this decision into perspective.

At its broadest, people around the world are getting very sick from a virus that is spreading quickly all over the place.  It has killed scores of people in China, the Middle East, Italy and elsewhere.  New cases are popping up constantly, and you’re seeing cancellations as a result.

Why this is such a big deal revolves around the culprit to all of this:  a novel coronavirus.  Coronaviruses aren’t new.  The name describes a known shape or type of virus, “haloed” by glycoproteins and attachment proteins (which help the virus grab onto cells).  But this particular one is new.  And that’s a problem.

When we follow diseases through populations, monitoring is good enough that we can track how these sicknesses evolve.  We can usually discern when one mutates and creates another dominant form.  It’s why and how we predict flu strains for the yearly flu shot (since influenza mutates like crazy, always changing its attachment proteins).  But this particular kind of coronavirus didn’t evolve from something else, it literally popped up.

Specifically, epidemiologists can trace it to a market in Wuhan, China, where the first cases arose.  Whether it jumped to humans from bats or from another animal, we know that this was not originally a human disease.  From there, the race began to try to identify it.

That’s where the next definition comes in.  Given the symptoms that accompanied infection with this virus, scientists classify this as a SARS virus, which stands for “Severe acute respiratory syndrome.”  Yes, that’s the same general SARS that made news a few years ago, but this time the thing that is causing it is a lot more potent.  Because this virus causes a form of SARS, it is classified as SARS-CoV-2 (COronaVirus).  This is only the second time a SARS-causing virus has arisen in modern times.

The disease that CoV-2 causes goes by the name COVID-19, or COronaVIrus Disease (first documented in) 2019, and its attack is a bit unique.

Unlike more common diseases, this new-to-science coronavirus is quite contagious.  Very small viral loads seem to be necessary to transmit it (in other words, you don’t need to be exposed to a lot of virus particles to get infected).  People spread it effectively, although we still don’t totally know how its transmitted (or if it’s different than the usual hitching a ride on droplets coughed out or sneezed).  It seems to be able to survive for long periods of time in the air and on surfaces.  And more worryingly, people seem to be contagious for a long time both before and after they show symptoms of the disease.

For those that do get sick, there are further concerning differences here.  More susceptible populations seem to get hit by COVID-19 really hard.  Their rates and lengths of hospitalizations are higher than the usual flu or colds, and of those hospitalizations, a higher percentage require placement in the Intensive Care Unit.  And a large number end up dying.

It’s an odd mixture of a disease that our body isn’t prepared to fight, that we don’t know a ton about, and that we aren’t ready to treat.  And because there’s still so much science doesn’t know, there’s palpable concern.  How long are we contagious before symptoms set in?  How much exposure do you need to get sick?  On and on.

It would be one thing if this were fairly localized, but COVID-19 spread rapidly.  Usually in an epidemiological setting we talk about a troubling disease doubling its number of cases every six days or so.  Start with 100 cases, then six days later you have 200, then 400, then 800, then 1600, then 3200, then 6400, then 12,800 and so on.  All in a month and a half.

But in the worst-hit parts of this outbreak, doctors saw a doubling every two to three days.  In the above example, your 100 cases turn into 12,800 in a little over two weeks.  Add in two more weeks, and you’re at nearly half a million.  Add in six more days, and you’re just shy of a million.  All in a month from just 100 cases (which, for example, could be a small close-knit group like the F1 paddock).

It can be easy at this point to think that everyone is freaking out and saying we’re going to die, but this is an important distinction to make, especially when you keep that quick, exponential increase in mind.

This disease is not massively lethal---at least in certain populations.  For most healthy and young people, this will seem like a bad flu, if that.  Then they’ll be done with it.  But the problem is, all the time they’re sick, and for quite a while before, they’re still contagious.  They’re still spreading this virus to others (and remember, it doesn’t take much).  But while those young people may be fine, older people are absolutely clobbered by COVID-19.

People who have weakened immune systems are sitting ducks for this disease.  People who have breathing difficulties may not survive a sickness that includes extremely severe breathing problems.  

When we talk about the lethality of this disease, it’s not for the average person, it’s for vulnerable populations.  In fact, the very nature of public health doesn’t deal with the individual patient, it deals with the public as a whole.  So this is not crying wolf, it’s recognizing that people may get this disease through no fault of their own, and it may kill them.

That’s where we start to get back to the racing bit.

Think about what a Grand Prix is from a human standpoint.  You have people from all around the world gathering in a central location.  You have a hundred thousand potential carriers, some of which may be actual carriers who are in the stage of the disease where they’re not showing symptoms, but they’re still a flamethrower of viral particles.  You have a finite number of bathrooms where people funnel through, cramming into high humidity environments and close quarters even for the briefest of times.  Then they all leave and go back to where they’re from, all over the globe.  Hopefully given what you now know about this virus, you can start to see the issues.

So when the decision had to be made, it wasn’t to protect the people in the stands, per se, it’s to look at the broader picture of what happens next.  Epidemiologists don’t think the entire crowd in Melbourne will get sick.  They don’t think they’re all going to die.  But they know that even if a tiny subset of attendees harbor this virus, it’s only a matter of time and math before you get a massive spread across loads of populations---some of which don’t have any cases of COVID-19 yet.

Others may point to the fact that this disease will spread regardless, but there is still a big benefit in actions like this.  Take a look at Italy right now as an example of what can happen in an unprepared population:  Cases are exploding, hospitals are well over capacity, triage doctors are losing patients who are fighting for extremely limited resources.  This isn’t a knock on Italy, but they’re a prime example of why preventive measures and “flattening the curve” are so important.

Imagine a classic bell curve, which is highest in the middle and tapers off at the edges.  Now imagine another curve that stretches much wider than that bell curve, but it’s not near as high.  Then imagine a dotted line that is just above the lower curve’s peak and well below the peak of the higher one.  This dotted line represents the total capacity of all of the hospitals and doctors in a given population.

Unabated, the disease swells quickly and has a tall peak, well above that dotted line.  As a result, there are far more who need care than the hospitals can accommodate, because all of these cases are happening at once.

If, however, you can flatten that curve, the peak always stays below that full capacity line.  Cases will still happen, but they’re so spread out, there are never overwhelming to the healthcare industry.

That’s what these types of delays and postponements do.  They stop those easy ways for the virus to spread.  They keep populations apart from each other for as long as possible, which lets the inevitable cases play out while the preventable ones are delayed.  Even so, some of those people may get the disease anyway, but if they do, it will be at a later date when the number of cases may not be as high.  Or it may happen at a time when we have better treatment options or possibly even a vaccine.

Public health can be frustrating in this way, since we so often deal with risk rather than concrete guarantees.  People want to know whether or not they’ll get it, not that their risk is lower or higher in certain situations.  They will point to exceptions to the rule, or they will outright not believe what they’re being told.  But actions like the cancellation of the Australian Grand Prix are the right thing to do from a public health standpoint.  And remember, public health isn’t about the individual, it’s about the bigger picture.  In other words, it isn’t about you.  Nor should it be.  The healthcare system is for “me,” but public health deals with “us.”  It deals with prevention instead of treatment.

Thankfully, and perhaps scarily, the world is perched on the edge of the transition between prevention and mitigation, from saying “We have to stop this” to saying “We’ll just have to manage the inevitable.”  And ideally, we want to keep it that way for as long as possible.  Seeing sports canceled can be frustrating and heartbreaking as a fan and a consumer, but we’re trying to do something now that will pay dividends later.  You, as a healthy fan, might have been fine either way.  But by delaying now and flattening the curve of cases, your older loved one might actually be around next season to watch your sport of choice with you.  A friend at work who may be immunocompromised because of a medication he or she is taking may not die unexpectedly in two or three months.

We can’t know the benefits of doing this now, but we can sure see the frustration and the immediate shock waves that these decisions sent through the sports world.  We can see the disappointment and the amount of money lost on tickets that won’t be refunded, and it can be easy to fixate on that.

But the public health professional in me is heartened by the fact that so many leagues and organizations worldwide stood united today and took sweeping, definitive, preventive action.  They saved lives today, and we don’t (and won’t) even know it.  They did what was right, no matter how much I was thrilled to get F1 and IndyCar back this weekend.  F1 may have had an awful time doing it, they may have dropped the ball on countless occasions today, and they were woefully unprepared, but in the end,  they made the right decision.

So while I may be some random person rambling on the internet, please take this disease seriously.  Do your research.  Ask me any questions you’d like.

It may be frustrating to you in the here-and-now, but those most at-risk for developing this disease will thank you later.  Whether it’s your grandparent, your aging neighbor, a friend fighting cancer, or in my case, my own mother, these are the medically vulnerable people we’re trying to help.  And believe it or not, delaying events like this helps us do that until SARS-CoV-2 passes (and it will pass eventually).  So let’s do our part now, and later we can watch all the races and games with them that we want.

Of Horses and Men

For those who are still riding the emotional wave of the Belmont Stakes, I figure now is as good a time as any to go on a horse racing kick, especially in lieu of the strong comments made by Triple Crown hopeful California Chrome's owner directly after the race.

His remarks on trainers sending horses to race specifically at Belmont (and thus to spoil any Triple Crown attempt) really got me thinking about which side was the best, and I'm honestly not sure.  The more I've thought about it, I can see both halves of the argument.  So, to make sense of it, I'll try to tie it into motor racing.

Steve Coburn, one of the co-owners of California Chrome, has had quite the year.  His little horse, who was purchased for just $10,000, was told that his thoroughbred was not of high enough quality to compete for the Triple Crown.  Many said he had no chance given his lack of prestigious lineage, and several weeks later he leaves Belmont Park just under two lengths away from being the first winner of the three majors in over a third of a century.

But his defeat did not sit well with Coburn.  Beaten by a few horses which were trained specifically for this event, the spurned owner pulled no punches in saying that entering horses with the sole purpose of spoiling a Triple Crown bid was "the coward's way out."  He said that it was "unfair" to the quality horses and to the millions across the country who wanted to see the drought end.  For horses to be sat out of the three legs of the Crown then go against horses who are trying to win it the 'proper' way is not right.

His wife tried to poke him in the back on camera to tell him to calm down, but he turned around to tell her that he would have none of that.  His assault on the owners of horses like (Belmont winner) Tonalist continued, and as it did, I began to wonder if he was actually right.

The cynic's argument would be that if your horse was truly the best, it shouldn't matter who it faces; it should still be able to win the race against whichever horses are tired, fresh or are Belmont specialists.  It should be able to win like the other 11 horses in history who have won all three.  But even this statistic makes me wonder:  Was the trend of sitting horses out of certain legs a commonality even before the 1980s (when the Triple Crown drought began)?

Look at the stretches of winners over time.  In the '30s and '40s, Triple Crowns weren't very uncommon.  Heck, sometimes it was only a year or two between the feat was accomplished, and I imagine it was almost an oversaturation back then.  Even in the seventies, when we had our last winners in Secretariat, Seattle Slew and Affirmed, they were four and one years apart, respectively.  Think about that, two Triple Crowns in two years.  Then something changed.  It wasn't anything in particular, mind you, it was more of an intangible.

Horse racing today is not horrendously different than it was back then.  Horses today are faster (although Secretariat's records from 1973 still stand at every Triple Crown track) but are far more fragile than days of old, partly due to specialized training methods, different nutrition and technology to assess the health of the equines.  But for 36 years, no horse has won the American version of the Triple Crown---capturing the Kentucky Derby, the Preakness Stakes and the Belmont Stakes in the same year.

The previous longest drought between champions was broken by Secretariat (another record he currently holds until a horse breaks through some year), becoming the first horse to do the feat in 25 years (Citation, who won in 1948, had a wonderful pedigree that included two brilliant European horses, one of which was undefeated in its career).  We're now sitting at 36 years and counting since Affirmed, and I start to wonder how many more we'll see.

Since Affirmed, 13 horses have won the first two majors before coming to Belmont and seeing their dreams disappear.  Sadly, I remember watching half of these.  Most of those horses were beaten by entrants who skipped one or both of the prior Triple Crown races, but I don't know the exact number (since I wasn't old enough to keep track of some of those things).

If we look back at the last four to accomplish the feat, some wonderful stories emerge.

In 1978, Affirmed essentially won the Triple Crown over another horse who would have won all three races were it not for Affirmed.  Alydar finished second in every event, but the talent of Alydar unfortunately happened to coincide with the brilliance of Affirmed.  Separate them by a year (let's push one of them to '79 since Seattle Slew took care of '77), and we would have one more Triple Crown winner.

When Slew had done it a year earlier, he faced some challenges throughout the three legs.  He won the first over Run Dusty Run before meeting Cormorant at Pimlico.  Some had challenged back then that Cormorant would be a quicker horse and would stop Slew's bid, but down the stretch Cormorant faded, and the race turned into Seattle Slew beating Iron Constitution by a length and a half.  By the time the Belmont came around, the horse faced several new challengers, but he still won by four lengths.

Secretariat's year is a bit of an oddball given the sheer dominance of this horse.  He is, undoubtedly, the strongest Triple Crown winner in history.  In his three major races, Secretariat's biggest competitor was a dark bay thoroughbred named Sham.  An anatomical oddity, Sham's heart was twice the size of an average horse's, and he found success wherever he went.  A Santa Anita winner, Sham finished second to Secretariat in both of the first two legs of the Triple Crown.  In fact, he was even leading at times until the stretch.  Two and a half lengths was as close as he would get to the legend in those events, so his trainers were eager to take him to Belmont to challenge again.  Here, though, at the scene of Secretariat's most crushing victory, Sham led early before finishing last.  The distance, and perhaps the great rivalry with the Triple Crown winner, was too much to make all three races.  He just couldn't do it, but he was still an incredibly successful horse.

The big difference in the ages is highlighted best, in my opinion, by the 1948 Triple Crown winner, Citation.  An unbelievable force in horse racing, he was the first equine to win one million dollars, and he once won 16 straight races---most horses today don't even race that many times in their entire careers.  After his strong victories in the Derby and the Preakness, Citation actually won the Jersey Stakes before winning at Belmont.  Think about that.  He ran a whole other race between the second and third legs and still became the eighth horse to win all three majors, doing so in record-tying time at Belmont Park.

So where do Coburn's statements fall in all of this?  Is there a history of horses losing their bids to Belmont Specialists?  And if so, what does that mean?  The answer to the former is "Yes," but the answer to the latter is tricky.

Part of the structure of horse racing is that there isn't a cumulative points championship with the goal of a world title at the end.  Skipping out on one Grand Prix would lose millions of dollars and a chance at the World Drivers Championship in Formula 1.  In horse racing, though, you're letting a living creature rest and eliminating the chance for injury in another race.  On that front, I don't mind letting them sit out sometimes.

But a Triple Crown bid is different.  It's one of the few things in the Sport of Kings that spans more than one event.  It's a long-term goal in a sport that deals with things one race at a time in the limited span of a thoroughbred's third year.  But in a way, a Triple Crown bid can also be a one-race thing.

Losing the Derby opens up a wide range of possibilities as a trainer, but if you leave Churchill Downs with a blanket of roses, you will have to head to Pimlico since you are expected to try for the Triple Crown.  As a result, you don't see horses win the Derby and then not try to make it two-for-two.  Even if you plan on coming back for the Belmont, no one skips out on the Preakness.

Also take into account that when a horse has lost the second leg, many choose not to enter it in the Belmont (which is why there has not been a single horse in 20 years that has won the Derby and the Belmont without winning the Preakness).  This is for preservation of the horses for obvious reasons.

But what about the first situation, where your horse doesn't win the Derby?  As an owner or trainer, who owns a horse to win and make money, you severely decrease your chances to win the Belmont (the longest race of the three) if you try to run the Preakness as well.  Especially if you think your horse tires easily, it doesn't make business sense to try to run all three when all you'll be left with is a tired horse and no wins.

This year's Belmont Stakes purse was $1.5 million, and that's a hell of a lot of money to be dangled in front of owners.  If you had a chance to win it, why wouldn't you do whatever you could to increase your chances?

But on the flip side to this, in Coburn's case, he's obliged to run all three because his horse could legitimately win all three.  The test schedule for California Chrome existed the moment he won at Churchill Downs, and while his owners could have sat him for the Preakness, the ridiculousness of doing so is extremely obvious.

What Tonalist did today was not with dishonor.  He ran a wonderful race and could not be challenged.  Commentators spoke beforehand that he loved this track and had won here before.  He was, in every sense, a Belmont specialist.  And does that decrease the feat of what he did?  To some, like Coburn, absolutely.

Let's say that there was a team in Formula 1 that wanted nothing more than to win the Monaco Grand Prix.  They sat out the entire year, not traveling to the other races and not challenging for any other Grands Prix.  Instead, they spent their time running laps at Monaco and focusing only on it (never mind that it's in a city and you can't do that...just go with me here).

So when the Monaco Grand Prix came around and the teams that had been dominating F1 racing all season came to the principality, that's when this particular team showed up.  While some were fighting for the World Championship and the Constructors Championship, this team took pole position and won the race, celebrating madly afterward.  Should their win be accepted the same as a regular team like Mercedes winning the Grand Prix because they were only focused on this race while others were looking at the long-term?

That's a question I can't answer, but I imagine many of you will have different opinions.

To a purist in the sport, their win is rather shallow.  Like a golfer who only played the same course over and over, then won when the professional circuit came to town, should we be surprised by such a win?  Not really.  But to a businessman or businesswoman, this is smart.  This is the best way to increase one's chances for victory.  And as a result, in a business sense, the payouts from the win taste just as sweet as those you could collect by winning an otherwise unwinnable major.

From a fan's standpoint, they may not think about this.  The casual fan may only tune in for the Belmont Stakes upon hearing that a horse may win the Triple Crown, and that's it.

Is this an issue that needs to be addressed in some way?  Perhaps.  Will anything come of it?  I doubt it.  Splitting the fields (horses running all three versus standalones) or holding a longer-term championship may do it, but racing is steeped in tradition, and those changes may face some opposition.

Was Coburn justified in what he said?  Absolutely.  But was he right?  That's a whole other debate.

For the first time in ages, Mark Webber felt the wind blast into his face as he drove a race car

The end of a Formula 1 season is always a downer, but the promise of a new season and the inevitable joy that arrives with the next year's first practice session is often enough to get me through a long off-season.  But this year's campaign ends on a sad note with the departure of one of my favorite drivers, Mark Webber.

You know his story and his history, and you know that he's leaving the sport to become a proper number-one driver for Porsche in endurance racing.  But for one last time today, he was an F1 driver with a job to do, hurtling the most technologically advanced race cars on the planet around a soggy Interlagos circuit in the heart of Sao Paulo, Brazil.  Starting P4, Webber had one more outing to complete his time in single-seater Grand Prix racing, and he was brilliant.

He admitted on his slow approach to the starting grid that it would be tough for him getting in and out of the car before the race, but he assured his team that all would be fine once the visor was closed, when the world was shut out and the race had begun.

As the changeable conditions looked to shake up the grid, the foretold deluge of rain never came (the paddock got today's share yesterday when a monsoon delayed Q3 of qualifying by 47 minutes).  Mark dutifully put on a masterful charge, and even got a front row seat for the team actually making a mistake on one of Vettel's pit stops instead of his own.  Webber's car never burst into flames.  Its KERS never failed.  He didn't have to short-shift.  Yes, the delay on Vettel's stop delayed his own, but he exited the pits in relative reach of his teammate, securely chasing Sebastian from second place.

The team's assurances on the radio that everything was fine around him on the track meant that he could enjoy his last few laps in an F1 car, and Mark made the most of it.

Crossing the line for yet another podium in his lengthy career, Webber's time as a Grand Prix driver came to an end.  One cool-down lap, and that would be it.  He's not exactly sad to leave the sport, but he's sad to leave the challenge.

For so many years he plodded on with the hope that someday he would find himself on the top step of a podium, knowing he would have to endure long days in underpowered Minardis before he could live that dream.  He went from being mentored to being a role model, serving quite proudly as the head of the Grand Prix Drivers' Association.  As a senior member of an ever-changing sport, Webber's old school style and blunt honesty certainly won me over, especially as I watched him when he was a 20-something driving that gorgeous green Jaguar years ago.

He was a great driver, but like Jenson, he couldn't win.  Ever quick in a race car, Webber's talents were akin both to Nick Heidfeld's consistency and win rate.  Everyone loved him except the top step of the podium.

However, his ascent to Red Bull set him on a path that few could have ever dreamed.  A quiet, unassuming Aussie standing next to an equally respected, strong-chinned Scotsman in David Coulthard meant that Red Bull started the cogs in motion that would give them a dream team half a decade later.  But Coulthard's F1 swansong in Brazil saw him punted off the track on the first lap---something I vividly, sadly remember.  Webber's fate resulted in a much more beautiful, satisfying end.

As his seething hot RB9 coasted around the Autodromo Jose Carlos Pace one last time, he furiously clawed at his gloves, yanking them off one at a time.  Then he lifted his iconic helmet---a symbol of one's existence as a driver---from his head and placed it in his lap.  For the first time in ages, Mark Webber felt the wind blast into his face as he drove a race car, providing an uninhibited view of the emotions unfolding before him.

He wanted to take it all in, and he wanted the fans to see his appreciation not through a common wave or a nod.  He wanted them to see him, to see on his face the passion that drove this steely Australian for so many years (and will continue to drive him toward that elusive victory at Le Mans).

He wanted to feel the wind and hear the engine, and he wanted to do so in his own, personal style.  There's no way he could have done that still buttoned up in his fire suit and helmet.  When the visor goes down, the world is gone.  But even when he's been in sole control of his car, it's never been just him out there.

Riding along in spirit have been all of his supporters over the years, all of his family and friends and those who respected him.  It's been all of his fans, many of whom have probably never seen him compete in person.  It's an entire world of racing that he never hears over the roar of his phenomenal engine.

Except for this time.  The helmet, and the symbol it represents, were removed, thus Mark Webber the human---not the race car driver---piloted his machine.  He could hear the cheers and see the crowd's strong, sincere farewell to a driver so revered and respected in F1 today.  The visor wasn't closed.  The world wasn't shut out.

Webber leaves Formula 1 on his own terms at the height of his career:  Two Monaco Grand Prix victories, nine wins, 13 poles and 42 podiums in 215 starts.  He leaves with a legion of fans thrilled to have witnessed a driver earn the success he had deserved for so long, and he'll be missed in our sport, especially by me.

Thanks for a great career, mate, and best of luck leading your team to Le Mans.

This was my realm. This was my sport.

It's been three months since I last wrote on this blog, but certainly not for lack of want.  If I had the time to devote to writing my thoughts and experiences, I would, but instead medical school has consumed my life even more so than last year.  And I didn't think that would be possible.

What started inauspiciously enough soon turned into the most relentless semester I have ever had in any form of schooling, and to complicate that, countless out-of-school things have been seriously affecting me as well.  Unfortunately there hasn't been a ton of good in my life lately, but I can't despair too much since I'm still alive and my family is also alive and healthy, too (the latter being rather pertinent in the last couple of months).

Still, the combination of school and life has made my existence pretty exhausting and lonely.  And as one thing builds upon another, I find myself spiraling downward into getting busier and busier, getting more and more determined to dig myself out of the hole of a setback that I'm in.  With that determination, though, comes worry.  For the first time in my life I find myself unable to get the worries of school out of my head.

I went to a football game on Saturday, yet all I could think about was school.  When I hang out with others (which doesn't happen terribly often given my schedule), my mind rarely wanders away from school for very long at all.  It's been awful and not something I can see myself shaking until this semester is over.  I hate it, and I hate that med school doesn't allow me the time to deal with things, so I just have to keep going, which really sucks.  But this blog post isn't supposed to be a complain-fest of sad stories and worried parlance.

One of the few bright spots in the past few months, as foolish as it may sound, has been racing.  I've mentioned before that it's one of the only things I have allowed myself to enjoy in school, and as problems and concerns have mounted this season, and as I've whittled more and more things away from my life, F1 has remained.

Nowhere was this more evident than the epic trip we took to Austin last weekend for my birthday to go to the US Grand Prix.  The journey and our stay in the Lone Star State was incredible, and so many times it seemed that the stars aligned for us to make for an even better, more unbelievable weekend.

We got tons of free stuff; we met wonderful people from all over the world; we stood next to Niki Lauda, Damon Hill and Johnny Herbert; we were personally shown an actual helmet worn by Ayrton Senna the year we were born (1988); I met one of my Twitter followers for the first time after he had been working on a vintage racecar; we got interviewed by the track entertainment personnel and were broadcast on the big screens in front of 113,000 people; we got to invade the track and made friends with some members of the Lotus F1 team (who gave us some brilliant team hats); and so much more.  I couldn't believe it.

I also couldn't believe that for over two days, I almost never thought of med school.  Heck, when we were at the track, it never crossed my mind.  Only in passing after we left the track each day did it ever enter my mind, and it was wonderful.  I felt like a person again.  I felt like an actual human being who could have passions and had a hobby to which I could devote time.  For once people were asking ME questions, and I was the only one who could answer them.  This was my realm.  This was my sport.

Looking back, I'm amazed at the transformation in me as I got nearer to Formula 1 last weekend.  Even on the way back, in the middle of the night several hours into our 14-hour drive, I was feeling so tired.  I was around 110 miles into my first or second stint, and I wasn't sure I'd be able to go much longer before switching with my friend.  While he slept in the backseat, the only other person awake in the car started asking me about F1.  We talked about "Rush", we talked about Bernie and his legacy, we discussed the recent history of some of the sport's luminaries, and we speculated on the future of Grand Prix racing.  In no time at all, I had taken us over 220 miles and was feeling rather refreshed.  For the first time in recent memory I could speak about something with confidence and excellent recall, and there wasn't a question I couldn't answer.

Over the course of the weekend I ended up driving over 1,100 miles, and I was beyond exhausted.  But it was worth it.  For one weekend I felt alive again, so strikingly refreshed that I could breathe in the sport's nuances and feel them in my blood.  I was no longer lonely, for once being completely surrounded by people who shared a common love with me that every other day of the year draws confused looks and erroneous comparisons.  It was one of the most memorable birthdays I've ever had.

Fast-forward one week later, though, and the teams are celebrating tonight in Sao Paulo, Brazil, capping off a long season whose twists and turns reach back to a warm March day in Australia.  They bid adieu to V8 engines, another year of Red Bull/Sebastian Vettel domination, Ross Brawn at Mercedes, and one of my favorite drivers.  Mark Webber's surprisingly emotional end to his Formula 1 career went by far too quickly, although he tried to prolong it as best he could.  But that's a whole other blog post.

Tonight I'm wondering what the next few months will be like for me, and it saddens me to know that something that was such a big part of what little life I had left is going to be absent for a third of a year.  I would be lying if I said that worries of the coming finals for med school aren't creeping into my head tonight as a result, but I'll live.  I always have.  The end of seasons always make me a little sad, but with everything else that has gone on this year, it's difficult not to take that loss a little harder.  Still, I can reflect on a brilliant season, and I can look forward to the changes that will hopefully shake up the sport for the better.  While I remain skeptical on some of them, others I think will only do good things for Formula 1.  Only time will tell.

So tonight I join hundreds of millions of F1 fans around the world to say goodbye to the 2013 season, hoping that my life next March will be accommodating enough to let it back into my everyday enjoyment.  But for two and a half more hours tonight it's still race day, and earlier this morning a Grand Prix was run in front of some of the most storied and passionate F1 fans in the world.  Life was good.  Let the offseason begin tomorrow.

Forty-five years on, why Jim Clark's death still matters to Formula 1

Forty-five years ago yesterday, the world of Formula 1 changed forever.  Shockwaves rang all around the globe.  The racing community entered a state of shocked mourning.  Jim Clark was dead.

His fatal injuries delivered amidst the dense forests of the Hockenheimring, no one saw the crash that took his life.  Yet as his crumpled F2 Lotus lay smoldering in the trees, some of the greatest drivers of the day began to reassess their participation in the sport.

“If Jim Clark could die at the hands of a race car, what are our chances?” they began to ask.  Formula 1 was inherently dangerous, of course, but for it to have taken the life of the greatest driver of all time, especially in such a nondescript, mysterious way in a junior series, something was wrong.

In that day, it was not an easy task to upset F1 drivers.  They knew how deadly their sport was.  All of them grew up watching and participating in local competitions, the informality of which lent itself to terrifying and often fatal accidents.  They were not so far removed from the board track days of commentators yelling ‘The fearless racers are coming into town tonight, risking life at every turn for your entertainment!’  They knew that from the beginning of the season until the end, at least one of their fellow drivers would not make it, and that was that.

But Clark’s death shook the drivers in such a way that had not been felt in ages.  Graham Hill, Jackie Stewart, Jack Brabham, John Surtees and Chris Amon---all friends and competitors of Clark---were deeply troubled by his loss.  Ask any driver today who raced with Clark in that time period, and they’ll tell you that crash resonates as strongly today as it did 45 years ago.

So why does this matter?  Nearly half a century has passed.  The old Hockenheim is gone, swallowed by the trees that took many lives over the years, and somewhere in the middle of it is a small, humble memorial set up for the two time World Champion Jim Clark.  So we lost an incredible driver.  That’s happened again since then, so why does this anniversary matter to Formula 1 today?

After Clark’s death, drivers like Jackie Stewart began to see the errors of their sport.  What is now runoff and gravel traps at modern circuits used to be fences and trees to the world of 1960s Grand Prix racing.  This was still four years removed from F1 making seat belts mandatory.  Drivers died just as often of fire from the metal fuel tanks on which they sat as they did from the actual crashes.

“We thought hay bales were enough to protect the crowds,” legendary motor sport journalist Chris Economaki told me years ago.  It was a nonchalant feeling that if you wanted to go watch a race, you were willing to sit in the path of a 180mph metal rocket full of a flammable cocktail of fluids.  After Jim Clark, and reinforced by the horror at Monza in 1961 (a crash of which Clark had been a part), this began to change.

Stewart’s now-famous march toward greater F1 safety started after a harrowing and terrifying crash at Spa-Francorchamps, but his resolve was further strengthened 45 years ago yesterday when his friend and on-track rival Clark was killed.  The feelings and ensuing changes were not unlike what modern racing went through when Ayrton Senna lost his life at Imola 19 years ago:  A World Drivers Champion killed in his car after setting the racing world on fire and breaking F1’s longstanding records.  People were shocked.  People demanded change, and they got it.  From Senna’s death, Formula 1 is a safer place, forced to reassess its mentality and thoroughness in driver care.

But F1 would not have been in such a position and arguably may not have had as much success were it not already shocked several times in the past by such losses.  Not to overlook or downplay the role that losing Gilles Villeneuve, Jochen Rindt, Ronnie Peterson or countless others had in the previous 30 years before Imola, but losing the Flying Scotsman was different at that time.

He was not just a World Champion, he was everywhere.  In 1965 alone he competed in 59 different events, ranging from the Tasman Series, to the Indianapolis 500, to Formula 1, to F2 and sports cars.  He won the Indy 500 once (and came close several other times were it not for mechanical issues).  He dabbled in NASCAR (something few remember, but he had relative success were it not for mechanical problems there, too).  He won more Tasman championships in Australia and New Zealand than F1 championships, all the while winning more Grands Prix and capturing more pole positions than any Grand Prix driver in history.  And he only finished second in one race in his entire 71-race F1 career.

His attention to even the minutest details made him a perfectionist both in and out of the car---and in racing that’s not always a bad thing.  But people criticized him, saying he could only win from pole position and that he couldn’t fight his way through the field.  His choice to race the Indy 500 instead of the Monaco Grand Prix drew ire from some.  But Clark was not interested in this.

He would fire back at the critics through carefully written newspaper columns, but he would leave it at that.  His gentle schoolboy-like demeanor would disappear when he stepped into a racecar and tightened his dark blue Bell Magnum helmet onto his head.  And that’s how many remember him.  The rather demure personality and finger biting Jim Clark disappeared in the race car, where he instead entered a state of zen, never driving out of anger or aggression.  He was on another level, both with his competition and his car handling.

But when Clark’s funeral was attended by racing legends from all over the globe, the sport collectively took a step back and wondered what could be done.  The result was a slow and steady march toward the safety of Grand Prix racing as we know it today.  It also forced the fans to grapple with the mortality of even the best drivers out there---something that the crowd, even today, tend to forget or set aside. 

One thing they don’t forget is the brilliance of a youngster named Jim Clark.  Ask any racing driver out there, and they will hold Clark in high regard.  Ask IndyCar champion Dario Franchitti, who has an enormous collection of Clark memorabilia filling rooms of his house, and he’s incredibly quick to tell you that his countryman was the greatest racing driver who ever lived.  Will we see another Jim Clark in our era?  Perhaps not.  There has never been anyone quite like him, and although he was only in the international racing spotlight for under a decade, tales of his skill and accomplishments are known worldwide and are still discussed in Formula 1 circles today.  His loss changed Grand Prix racing, but so did his driving and charisma while he was alive.  That’s why the anniversary matters.  That’s why he matters.

Romain's Renaissance

In his first lap of testing earlier this week Romain Grosjean’s car went spinning into the gravel in Barcelona, and the cynics of the F1 world let out a chuckle.  Could they expect anything less from the man branded the “First-lap nutcase” by Mark Webber last season?  But maybe that mentality will change in the media this season partially because of Grosjean’s admittance of using a psychologist last season.

Speaking to reporters at the test, the Frenchman revealed that he started seeing a sports psychologist last September in the midst of an F1 season marred by a string of incidents that eventually led to a one-race ban.

“It's not a secret that I started work with a psychologist in September last year and it went very well during the winter,” Grosjean said.  “I had a lot of discussion with Genii [the financial and investment firm that sponsors the Lotus Team] to try to help them understand and take the right decision. And when they called me to say, 'Okay we go again for one more year' I was more than happy.”

Grosjean’s openness about seeking help is a welcome change to professional sports in general, although the impact of his reveal may not change the face of racing.  Instead it’s a reminder of the human side of the sport that so many gloss over.

In F1 especially there is a mentality of placing blame quickly and accurately.  If an incident occurs, people want to know who the stewards will punish and how.  If cars careen off the track, whose fault is it?  Have they done it before?  If so, then punish them more!

That’s not to say this mentality is flawed, though.  In a sport where lives are frequently put in danger through dangerous or careless moves, drivers must be made to stay in line and race in a safe way.  But in Grosjean’s case, stewards’ decisions were not the tipping point, whether he admits this or not.

*  *  *

It was relatively cool for Bahrain standards, but the steamy race at the Sakhir circuit in late April of last year looked to be a defining one for Romain Grosjean.  Starting P7, the Frenchman made a brilliant start and began a slow and steady march through the field.

By the fourth lap he had disposed of Mark Webber in the champion Red Bull RB8.  Three laps later he was by Lewis Hamilton.  He needed to keep this up.

Using tyre strategy to his advantage, Grosjean ran P2 in the late stages of the race before his teammate, on better tyres, got by him.  Still, he stayed with the frontrunners in the closing laps and secured the first podium of his short career.

He was ecstatic, becoming the first Frenchman to stand on an F1 podium in 14 years, and he beamed with the promise of a long season ahead after such incredible early returns.  He followed that up with a fourth place finish, then a P2, sprinkling a “Fastest Lap” honor in there as well.  Another second place finish and podium ensued.  Good things were in store for Romain Grosjean.

*  *  *

“We had good results (last season),” Grosjean said at the Lotus car launch a while back.  “Quicker than I was expecting, but maybe I wanted a little too much.”

If there’s anything of which F1 drivers could be accused, it’s certainly not lack of want.  Any driver lacking passion to win would not have made it to Formula 1, and Grosjean is no exception (especially since this is his second go-around in the sport after a disastrous campaign alongside Fernando Alonso at Renault).  So yes, maybe Grosjean was a little overambitious in some of his moves and decisions, but I think his issue is a deeper one.

The picture that the media painted of Grosjean was not a pretty one.  Far from being hateful, everyone began to associate him with crashes.  Internet memes celebrated his failures.  Drivers laughed when being asked about starting a race near him.  If he and Maldonado were in the same sector, look out!

Whether Romain has acknowledged these characterizations of him, I have no idea.  One can be sure that it weighed on him every time he found himself in a tricky situation.  Every decision must now be reconsidered.  ‘If I mess this up, will I be giving everyone more fodder?  I have to stay clean.’

*  *  *

On the second day of September, the 2012 Belgian Grand Prix began at the might Spa-Francorchamps.  Romain Grosjean started P9 on the run to La Source hairpin, but few remember his starting position.  Even fewer remember the clutch slip by Pastor Maldonado that caused the field to splay, or the launch that Grosjean got to position himself on the inside line at the first corner.

In the blink of an eye, it happened.  Hairpins like La Source lend themselves to crashes on race starts, but this one was different.  Grosjean found Hamilton to his inside, and in a split second the two had touched wheels.  Everyone remembers the crash that ensued, seeing Grosjean punt Perez before becoming airborne.  Everyone remembers the scary onboard image from the cockpit of Alonso’s Ferrari, and everyone remembers the runoff littered with carbon fiber and steaming cars.

Grosjean would earn a one race ban for his involvement in the incident, and a short time later he sought the help of a sports psychologist.  His approach to racing and his handling of the pressure that came with his incidents needed rethinking.  Romain Grosjean knew that his career could be significantly shortened, but not because of his driving, but because of the space between his ears.

*  *  *

Regardless of how accurate the depictions of Grosjean’s accident-causing nature have been, his courage to seek help both in the interest of his career and for the safety of those around him is unprecedented in modern Grand Prix racing.  It is a situation in stark contrast with the cutthroat nature of F1 where a driver’s underachieving inevitably means his career will be over as soon as his contract allows.

For Romain to take a step back and try to better his career underlies the notion that drivers are human and are incredibly susceptible to issues of self-confidence and doubt.

As media and fans, we are quick to praise the drivers that find themselves in such beautiful flow in a racecar---a phenomenon that is centered in the mind.  But we are equally as quick to pin everything on the driver when he has a string of bad finishes, accidents or incidents.  We remove the mental aspect of the sport in these situations and just assume that there was a dumb decision, a momentary lapse of judgment.  Put two or three of those incidents near each other on the calendar and people label the driver as a “problem.”

This is the spiral that Grosjean entered.  The ban forced him to rethink his role in the team and his approach to the races.  Even so there were still incidents in the next Grands Prix:  He ran into Webber in the very next race at Suzuka, he was part of a first lap incident in Abu Dhabi, and he hit the HRT of Pedro de la Rosa in Brazil.  The end-of-season break was extremely welcomed by Romain if not only for the fact of getting the bad taste out of his mouth.  He would have work to do in the offseason, though.

*  *  *

Tom Kristensen is a racing legend.  His eight victories in Le Mans and his stellar track record in endurance racing and DTM will attest to this.  How could a maligned, laughing stock of a racer compare to this, much less beat him head-to-head on an international stage?

This was the situation facing Romain Grosjean in Bangkok, Thailand last December.  After a dream finish of second in the Nations Cup of the Race of Champions, Grosjean had improbably worked his way through the Champion of Champions bracket and found himself in the final against Kristensen---a man who has been there before.

The story would be too fantastic to write if the Frenchman won, but what a better way to usher in the new season than by beating one of the best?

Two races and two victories later, though, and Romain Grosjean was the 2012 Champion of Champions.  He had won the honor that has evaded Kristensen to this day, and the media began to see a changed driver.  He was smiling more; he was excited for the future again.  He was thrilled to hoist the trophy that few believed he would ever win.

One day later he received news that he would be driving for the Lotus F1 Team in 2013.

*  *  *

“He’s a different guy now,” Lotus chairman Gerard Lopez said.  “He knows what he has to do.  He doesn’t have that pressure, stress. … We essentially have told him he's got a long-term future with us so now he can literally take it race by race, practice by practice."

And it’s that freedom from pressure that should propel Grosjean to bigger and better things.  Having been a champion in every series in which he’s run, the Frenchman is well aware of what it will take to find success in Formula 1.  He also knows that the key to that success lies not in the engineering of a carbon fiber and titanium, four-wheeled rocket.  It lies within his mind.

On Friday Grosjean ran a successful program for Lotus in testing at Barcelona, and at the end of the day he sat at the top of the timesheets.  Granted, times don’t mean much in testing, but tell that to Romain Grosjean’s confidence.

My interview with American GP3 driver Conor Daly: Barcelona, Force India and Hares!

American Conor Daly has been working his way up the racing ladder steadily for the past few years, but many more Americans took notice when the 20 year-old won the second of two GP3 races in Barcelona earlier this season.  Following that with a straight-line test for the Force India F1 team before heading to Monaco, Daly’s first full year in GP3 has proved to be a busy one, but I caught up with Conor for a candid interview about this whirlwind of a year shortly before the Monaco round of the GP3 championship.

Daly, the son of former CART and Formula 1 racer Derek Daly, is a former World Karting Association champion and multiple winner in Skip Barber and Formula Ford.  Originally entering the Road to Indy, which aims to aid racers in ascending to the IndyCar series, Daly won the Star Mazda Championship in record-setting fashion in 2010 (nine poles and seven wins) before moving on to Indy Lights the following year with Sam Schmidt Motorsports.  After capturing victory in Long Beach, Daly competed in GP3 with Carlin Motorsports (splitting his season between Europe and the United States).

But throughout all of these accomplishments, Daly has perhaps garnered the most attention in just four races in GP3.  Currently fifth in the championship standings with 23 points, Daly won the Barcelona sprint race on the opening weekend of the GP3 season, but it wasn’t easy.

What many people didn’t realize was that Daly had already been offered a spot testing the Force India before the opening weekend of the GP3 season---something he called “a nice little incentive” for those first two races.  However, that didn’t make things simpler for him in the feature race.

After a great qualifying, Daly dropped several spots at the start, from which he was never able to recover.

“I saw the pole sitter, [António Félix] da Costa jump and I released the brake just slightly which made me pull in the clutch paddle so when the lights actually went out I was slipping the clutch way too much,” Daly said.  As a result the car stayed relatively stationary before creeping away slowly.  Despite the disastrous start, the clutch had only been slipping for a total of 2.4 seconds.  “It was definitely my fault, and it was sad because I was in a good position to try and win but unfortunately I wasn't able to do so,” he lamented.

Over the course of the race a difficult battle with Marussia Manor Racing’s Tio Ellinas developed until a late safety car bunched the field together.  In the ensuing sprint to the end, Daly’s main focus was finishing the race in one piece and setting himself up for the sprint race, which would invert the top eight finishers from the feature.  He would go on to finish P6, which meant he would start P3 on the inverted grid for the sprint finale.

More jump starts saw penalties befall those in front of him, and the sprint race quickly became a one-man show with Daly pulling away.  He later revealed that in the final few laps he had to keep himself from thinking too much about what would happen if he won.  Instead he made himself concentrate more.

“The car was so good that I was able to focus on hitting my marks and just finishing out the race,” he said.  “I had to manage the tires towards the end and was able to finish with a good gap behind me so I was quite happy.”

 One of the best moments of the weekend for American fans was seeing Daly holding the American flag as he celebrated in parc ferme after the race.  Where did the flag come from, though?

 “I made sure to have my Dad bring the American flag from home because I knew I would get to use it at some point this year, I just didn't honestly think it would be this soon!  I was so thrilled to hear the American national anthem.   It was a very emotional moment and I can't really describe the feeling I had.  I was relieved because I knew that I was starting to prove myself in Europe.  I was extremely happy but it’s just the beginning and I can't wait to get to the next race in Monaco!”

For the rest of the weekend the young American was approached by numerous luminaries of the GP3, GP2 and F1 worlds.  At one point he was even congratulated by Ferrari F1 team principal Stefano Domenicali---the importance of which was not lost on the Indiana native.

“It is always nice to know people are watching,” Daly smiled.  “I don't want to get too caught up in it, though, because it’s a long season and I just want to focus on keeping the good finishes coming and scoring points to be there for the championship at the end.”

I have to ask, then, are any future deals coming out of some of those important conversations?

Daly laughed.  “Not that I know of at the moment!”

Fast forward to the Force India test a few days later. This was Conor’s first taste of a Formula 1 car.  Obviously he had grown up hearing about the machines, but the jump between GP3 and F1 technology had to be a great one.

 “They are indeed massively different cars.  The F1 car was absolutely incredible.  I was pretty much living every childhood dream I ever had!  There are just so many different settings on the steering wheel and it is a far more technically advanced race car than anything else in the world,” he explained.

But the coolest thing, if he had to choose something?

“Ultimately, though, the coolest thing had to be the sound under hard acceleration; just absolutely beautiful.”

Since the test was a straight-line test---one of the few types of testing that has been allowed by the FIA over the past few years---Daly had plenty of opportunities to accelerate and decelerate, sometimes being told to accelerate as hard as he possibly could (which he described as being “the best part” of the session).  There was a brief moment, however, when he got to test out the handling as well.

Somewhere around 150 mph a hare ran out onto the Cotswold Airport runway where Daly was testing (located in Gloucestershire, England).  Although it wasn’t as much of a near-miss as some would like to think, Daly said he ‘did have to make his way around [the hare] as it sprinted away.’

Surprisingly, having worked with the Lotus GP3 team and now Vijay Mallya’s F1 team, Daly says that the two squads are extremely different, but only because the Lotus GP3 team is really ART GP.

“It's funny because everyone thinks because we have the same name that we are heavily affiliated with the Lotus F1 team but really we aren't,” he explained.  “Lotus GP is really ART GP which has been one of the best teams in the world competing in junior formula car racing.  Fortunately, though, the [ART GP] team has aligned themselves with the Lotus F1 team which gives us the cool color scheme and a great historic name.”

 Even so, Daly says with a chuckle that he is yet to meet anyone from the Lotus F1 team.

From there Conor was going to be heading to Monaco---somewhere he had never raced but had always dreamed about experiencing.

“I have been looking forward to this race since it was announced on our schedule.  I love street courses,” he said.  “I have raced on many street courses in America, and I've thoroughly enjoyed every single one.  Now I get to race on what is arguably the best street course in the world!”

Citing the 27 cars that will be taking part in the race, Daly noted that he may need a little luck when it comes to avoiding the inevitable traffic jams, but through simulator work and studying the track, he felt very comfortable leading up to the race.  He even mentioned that he was most looking forward to “pushing the limit in qualifying and using every inch of the track to try and get the pole.”

So, with one victory in the first two races, Daly would head to the French Riviera to the legendary and dangerous streets of Monte Carlo, where few could have predicted the outcomes of that weekend’s races.  We’ll catch up with Conor and get his thoughts on Monaco and the following round of the GP3 championship (Valencia, Spain) next time.

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.