F-1 driver scares his wife.

[LaPerouseBay]

Mama mia, I'm in love with Susie Patrese.

How cool is Ricardo?  Wow. 

[StuBro]

Classic!

[stoneaxe]

Mama Mia is right...

[PonoBill]

Yeah, she's gorgeous, and I love that video. I particularly like how she starts out yelling "Basta!" and graduates to "Va fungoo!" complete with the "all the way up" arm thing. I think most racing drivers have had that experience, the track feels a lot different to the driver--he wasn't anywhere near racing speed, just pushing it a tiny bit.

It's even worse when there's other cars on the track. I took my second wife for a ride in a H-production rabbit on a day when I had volunteered to teach new drivers at PIR. We got out on the track and did two laps with the other instructors. I slotted in the usual position for a Rabbit--five inches off the bumper of the car ahead. But we weren't anywhere near the usual 11/10ths, we all had passengers. She made a little noise at first, but we were both wearing helmets and she settled down. When I got back to the pits I discovered she hadn't calmed down at all--she was hysterical. Nearly catatonic. I had to get two other people to help me get her out of the car.

Diane won't have much to do with me and race tracks, though we did do two laps of Laguna Seca in Peyote in parade laps the year the "Specials" were the featured marque at the Monterey Historics. She was sitting on a pad on top of the fuel cell, hanging onto the roll cage, wearing a cowboy hat. The laps were slow, sort of, we weren't even wearing helmet or fire suits, but all the featured cars had racing drivers in them, so we picked it up a little. First time we did the drop over the corkscrew you could have heard Diane all the way to Carmel. I've never heard such a loud noise come out of a human. Wasn't much better the second time.

She's more or less forgiven me.

[PaddleCrazy]

Typical wifey thingy going on there.....

Gets in the car, starts messing with the dials (at least she obviously turned the A/C to "max cold"  ), doesn't say much when other people are looking into the car....but as soon as you start driving, she won't STFU!!! 

Fortunate I speak Italian (that is what she's speaking isn't it?  ) so I can translate...
"Turn here, turn there, slow down, you don't know where you're going, I gotta pee, I'm hungry, I said TURN LEFT!! (the arm thing)....oops, what's that?  I'm on camera??  Oh, hehehe, I was just kidding, it don't really bitch like that....I was just tellin' ya what my friends say they do....."  "Hey, is it cold in here??  I think I shoulda worn a warmer top"   

[Weasels wake]

Classic!  "Vomito".

[Boludo]

That was awesome.  She really voiced her opinion.  I love how calm he looked trying not to smurk and laugh out loud.  I can relate to that.  I took my wife on a practice track day.  Did around 5 laps and she was pale and getting ready to puke.  Turned out that the whole day she felt like puking.  Sad to admit it but I enjoyed every second of it.

[PonoBill]

It's nice when they understand that what looks like cars circulating slowly and safely from the grandstands is actually fast, furious, and on the edge in the cockpit. Scaring the pants off them is a very effective way of imparting that knowledge. You don't get anymore of the "it doesn't look that fast" comments.

[pdxmike]

Same thing is true with paddling.  I was in Seattle picking up a board, coincidentally at the same time as one of the Gasworks Park Naish races.  A guy on shore was watching the start with his girlfriend and said, "Huh.  Boring. Who'd want to do that?".  Some of the fastest racers in the NW were going by.  The thing is that they make it look easy and smooth.  But anyone on the water with them would have a completely different reaction. 

[PonoBill]

Jerez is a very cool-looking track, I'd love to drive it. And Suzy Patrese could ride with me anytime. She looks like a lot of fun.

[Cardiff Sweeper]

Copy Cats:

[pdxmike]

Wow.  They're going so fast both airbags deployed alrea---oops, never mind.  I didn't have my glasses on. 

[PonoBill]

Hmmm. Let's see, F1 driver, track with turns, amazing looking wife, tastefully dressed, screaming in Italian.

Bubba driving, going straight on a street, pneumatic bimbo, tank top, babbling in English.


F1 vs. NASCAR

[[MB] SUP]

Drift that supra



Todd

[ObviousSup]

It's not like the mustang is really doing much. Minimal gear rubber. The rear never steps sideways. On the whole pretty boring. I suspect she would make the same shrieks in my daily driver Volvo (it chirps second as much as the mustang was).
Straight line can be scarey with the "right" rig according to a few of my passengers but I think their terror is more of what the rig is doing than the actual speed.