My Decision to Buy a Bike
And my personal favorite:
A Fisher-Price Car, Owned by a Discontinued Muppet
I’m scanning the cheat sheet Chloe and the team have pulled together for me, which lists all the tips for my first race.Watch pace management turn 4.Watch rear instability snowballing through the lap.Don’t check fuel unless instructed.Two hot laps.
I hand the printed pages to one of the pit crew, then I slide my feet down the chassis and settle into its imperfect grooves.It’s too small and tight, as I knew it would be, but I can make it work.I fix the steering wheel into its slot and stretch my neck side to side.Across the garage, Noah slides into his car.He salutes me, grinning, and I salute him back.Then I glance up at the clock.
Time to go out.
“Good luck, Matt,” says one of the team, his eyes full of hope, as he removes the last of the tire blankets.I feel a creeping dread as I gingerly drive the car into the pit lane.
And then I hear Chloe’s voice over the radio.
“I’m on comms for today,” she says, her voice crackling into my ears.“Just until we get your team reassembled.”
“One way to finally talk, I guess,” I shoot back.
The radio is open for the whole world to hear—the FIA loves it that way—and I’ve been caught out saying the most unholy shit on the open radio.But if this is the only way I can talk with Chloe, so be it.
“We’ll debriefafter,” she says coolly.
If Chloe is simply stressed, she doesn’t sound it.Instead, she sounds scathing.
Well, two can play at that.
“Your place or mine?”I shoot back, baiting her.
There is a long pause as I start to crawl down the pit lane toward my out lap, and I find myself grinning as I imagine her squirming in her seat.
“Let’s focus on the lap,Matthew.”
I exit the pit, picking up the pace a little, swinging the car side to side, getting a feel for the steering, the tires.In front of me is Ferrari, then farther up, Red Bull, and behind me my teammate Noah.Farther back in my rearview, I can just make out the silver-and-bloodred flash of Rossini and feel a surge of bullish anger.I breathe in deeply and glance at the sky, trying to calm myself.Just fucking focus.Try not to let the thoughts penetrate.I can do this.
“How’s she feel, Matt?”Chloe’s voice crackles in my ears.
“Like a tin can on training wheels.”
I just catch the click of Chloe’s tongue on the roof of her mouth as the radio is cut.
I look up at the stands and spot Rossini shirts and flags from France, the Netherlands, and Mexico.Orange rises from a stand in the distance.Arden Racing support is sparse up there, yet I can feel everyone’s eyes on me.I can almost hear the commentary: “And here comes Matt Warner, his shocking transfer to Arden Racing announced just hours ago, and the talk of the pits here in Singapore today.One thing for sure, if he lacked pace in a Rossini this year, he’s going to struggle in the Arden.”
“Ready?”Chloe says.
“It seems to have started raining,” I say coolly.
Chloe sighs.“I can see that.Let’s try for one lap on the soft tires, then we can change.”
Her instincts were right and she looked weak in front ofthat strategist.If she’s going to be the boss here, she’s going to need to assert herself.
I put my foot on the gas and push her a little more, round the hairpin, the g-force light, the car moving better than I expected, and as the out lap draws to a close and I see the starting line ahead, I ready myself just as the first light droplets hit my windscreen.
The adrenaline surges, and my heart rate kicks up as I hit the throttle.
People wonder what it feels like to drive one of these fifteen-million-dollar machines, and you can’t even begin to imagine, honestly.It’s as different and as hard as flying a fighter jet.Hundreds, sometimes thousands of people work to get us to this point.It feels nothing like a normal car.Everything is built for 220-mile-per-hour speed.So, when your foot hits the floor, your heart is in your mouth, you pray to the racing gods that everything works as promised.
Let’s fucking do this.I cross the starting line and head into turn one.
