United States Grand Prix

November 18, 2012

Circuit of the Americas, Austin, Tx, USA

 

The Grand Prix weekend, for me, was legendary. It was ‘once in a lifetime’ stuff.  Formula 1 has always been the ultimate in racing in my book. Several years ago I had the opportunity to race go karts competitively, and it was the closest to this very hard to reach sport I’d come: Formula Automobile Racing.

Formula

In auto racing there are many different types of racing series because there are many different types of cars. In racing, the power-to-weight ratio is key and nowhere is there more power and lighter cars than Formula, or open wheel racing. These cars are the lightest, most agile cars with aerodynamic wings front and rear to increase grip. Formula cars are open wheel, designed to meet the specifications of the sanctioning body they race under. Formula 1 is the pinnacle.

GP Weekend

 

This was a special weekend and I managed to buy the tickets as soon as they went on sale. I was to attend Friday, Saturday and Sunday as all three days would have racing action, with several support series as well as Formula 1. To actually attend a Grand Prix is to me the most thrilling activity I can imagine. An F1 Championship has been ongoing since the early 1900’s. The traditions and customs of the racing elite and the F1 Championship are the stuff of legend. To witness it all in person would really be hard to envision. Yet, I was to go.

Friday

 

 

 

 

Jeff Norem and I drove from Houston Friday morning, later than I’d wanted but at least we were on the way. We arrived at the circuit at almost 11am just in time to see Historic GP. These are the cars of yesteryear, with some from the 80’s, 70’s and even a 60’s era Ferrari. The other makes were the Tyrell 6-wheeler who broke on Friday and didn’t make the Saturday race, Brabham, Lotus and others. Seeing these racing machines so close up was fantastic! Every one is an incredible machine, impeccably maintained for these races, and they are racing hard! Jeff and I walked the entire track on Friday watching the action from differing general admission viewing areas. The Tower and amphitheatre are impressive with areas to view Turns 15, 16, 17 and 18. And the run out of the Tower turn to 19 is an excellent action packed spot. We waited in one food line and it was horrible (45mins),while standing in line a man with a strong British accent said, “Enjoying the chips are you then?”. He’d been standing in front of me for quite some time and had turned and spoken to me. I was at first embarrassed as I thought I was flooding his nostrils with an unwanted odor of our American chips and started to face away when he said, “No, it was the smacking in my ear, its all I could hear!”- or something equally cheeky. I apologized out loud finally after finishing the bag of chips (I was really hungry) while waiting on the sandwiches which were being cooked. We chatted for a second or two when I mistakenly asked where his accent come from- England or Australia. He was mock-offended and remarked not to feel bad most Canadians couldn’t recognize a Scottish accent. Blindsided, I apologized again for suggesting he could be Australian, and he laughed and apologized for calling me Canadian and we were cool!  Regardless of the energetic conversations, I decided not to wait in the more-than-an-hour lines for merchandise. We watched F1’s second practice on Friday from Turn 11 and the views of the track are spectacular. Walking around the top of the viewing area at Turn 1 and seeing the track laid out below for the first time is a lifelong memory …it was so stunning! Unforgettable.

 

Saturday

 

 

I drove to Austin on Saturday morning with my girlfriend Heidii. We went a new route and it worked out better. We didn’t arrive any earlier though, but considering it was a 3 ½ hour drive and I’d gigged the night before we did well. We arrived again at 11am. The crowds were much larger and after looking at the hill we’d have to climb to return before qualifying, we decided to park our chairs at the top of the hill at Turn 1. There was a tight but friendly crowd with us, it was great. It was remarkable how several strange languages could be heard at any given time. We hear Spanish frequently, but there were others, I heard  MidEast, Japanese, as well as Portugese from a group who were Brazilian. We watched Qualifying from Turn 1, then walked down and around the main grandstands to turns 20, 19 and the Tower turns of 16, 17, and 18. We had a great time watching the Historic GP race from our vantage points between 18 and 19. The Brabham won the race over a field of 15-20 cars, although there were only a few who could compete for the win. All raced hard and clean, as these cars compete in this series accompanying Formula1 on certain weekends. All cars are maintained with factory or custom made parts and pieces from the original makers and some are maintained and fielded by the same team of engineers and mechanics that operated it when it was actually competing in Formula 1. There were several well esteemed drivers as well including Arie Luyendyk. Much to our surprise, a free concert was scheduled for after the Historic race, and since we were next to the amphitheatre, we stayed another hour and enjoyed Collective Soul and a few expensive beers. It truly was a great day of festivity, celebration, freedom and the passion everyone wore for auto racing. The walk back up the hill was not as bad as we thought, and Heidii snagged a free USGP poster on the way out!!

 

 

 

 

Sunday

 

 

The dawn of the Grand Prix morning is like any other sunup- except for the butterflies! There were butterflies in my stomach as I walked to the truck. I was determined to get there early. I picked up my son Chris at his house and we sped away in his Honda. We had good pace, though we saw a lot of traffic speeding well past the posted limit. Having traveled the same path yesterday and Friday, I told him not to speed as we will see many cops as we get closer. The Texas Highway Patrol had decended on this area and were determined to pre-empt anyone thinking they could drive fast to this speedway! They were EVERYWHERE!! After we passed the first one issuing a ticket to a speeder, I told Chris, “Watch, there will be 8 more before we get to the track”. There weren’t 8 more, there were 12 more before I lost count! Traffic was light all three days, and was not jammed at all except one instance in the shuttle on Sunday when we had to wait 5-10 minutes for traffic to clear, and leaving on Sunday evening there was an accident that caused delays. Given the total number of people who attended the weekend, exceeding 250,000- traffic went extremely well. I have to tell you about the helicopter landing station at the track. There was a line of covered shelter areas with lighted landing spots for at least 6 aircraft at a time, and there was a steady stream of private helicopters dropping off and picking up their executive clients. It was crazy how many helicopters were present, as two to three approached the track from the south-west, four or five were landing, taking off or sitting. Then, in the distance to the east, the receding forms of several helicopters leaving the area. This was a seemingly never-ending stream! It was in itself incredible! That’s a lot of $$ people!

 

 

We had a great drive in, and got there an hour earlier, 10am, but the crowd was already huge, and we decided to catch our spots just below turn 1 in full view of the starting grid and pit lane. Though it was some distance away, we had the action at turn 1 just to our right, a large TV screen to our front across the track, and with binoculars an excellent view of the proceedings at the grid. Both Chris and I got excellent pic’s of the start and crucial action, though Hamilton’s pass of Vettle for the win was at turn 12, we saw it coming and were watching the battle on the screens. The crowd absolutely erupted when he made the pass. Vettle had many fans in the stands, but it was Hamilton’s day and he won the race. Alonso had a good race, but not good enough to make a serious dent in Vettle’s championship points advantage. Jensen Button had perhaps the best race coming from far back in the field to finish 5^th behind the Ferraris of Alonso and Massa.

 

-katykarter