Later in High School I loved the TV show Movin’ On and wanted
to become a Truck Driver. I’ve been there and done that for 30 years.
At middle age I had a dream of becoming a long distant
runner and a Police Officer. I did both for as long as I could.
If I were able, my dream today would be to become a professional
race car driver. Some may say I’m a little old for that but hey; Paul Newman
didn’t start his racing career until he was 48 and was still racing in his 80’s.
Recently I watched a documentary that was made about his racing career called “Winning: The Racing Life of Paul Newman”
and it really inspired me. I highly recommend it even if you’re not a race fan.
Here’s the movie trailer:
Since I’ve taken up the Forza racing games as a hobby on
Xbox I’ve become obsessed with racing. I never was a race fan before, it bored
me, especially NASCAR. This is no slam to NASCAR Fans but driving fast in a
circle and turning left just doesn’t do it for me. I’d love to see a NASCAR
race in person some day but to watch it on TV just doesn’t do it for me.
Instead I like Formula 1, Indy Car Racing, Grand Touring
Races, and Rally Racing they all fascinate me but what I’ve come to love is Le Mans
Prototype Racing (LMP Racing) the best.
Last night I rented the 2015 24 Hours of Le Mans movie and watched it on the Xbox. Below is movie trailer:
It was 83rd annual race at Le Mans, for over 3 hours plus I was glued to the TV. In my opinion nothing can match the kind of racing that goes on at the Le Mans race track. It puts race car drivers to the ultimate test, with sharp turns and the most awesome straight away in all of racing, the Mulsanne Straight. The Mulsanne Straight can produce speeds of up to 250 MPH in LMP 1 cars.
It was 83rd annual race at Le Mans, for over 3 hours plus I was glued to the TV. In my opinion nothing can match the kind of racing that goes on at the Le Mans race track. It puts race car drivers to the ultimate test, with sharp turns and the most awesome straight away in all of racing, the Mulsanne Straight. The Mulsanne Straight can produce speeds of up to 250 MPH in LMP 1 cars.
They have 4 classes of cars at the 24 hours of Le
Mans, LMP 1 which are the fastest races cars in the
world, then LMP 2, LMPGTE Pro (The GTE stands for Grand Touring Endurance) and
lastly the LMPGTE AM which is the amateur division. The cool story from this
year’s race was Corvette Racing won the LMPGTE Pro division for the 1st
time in 4 years. The winning Corvette ran a fantastic race.
Living the dream of my bucket list would be racing in one of
the LMP 1 race cars. Even if I had the opportunity to go around the Circuit de
la Sarthe at Le Mans in the lowest division which is LMPGTE AM class for
a couple of laps I’d die a happy man.
Don’t get me wrong I’d love to take a spin around Sebring, Laguna
Seca, Sonoma, Silverstone, Indianapolis, Mount Panorama, Spa-Francorchamps, Suzuka,
Interlagos, Monza, Nurburging, Yas Marina, Road Atlanta, Road America, Lime
Rock, Watkins Glenn and Brands Hatch or any race track for that matter if someone
were idiotic enough to loan me a race car but the Circuit de la Sarthe race
track at Le Mans would be the ultimate rush.
If money were no object I’d love to be able to go one of the
professional race car driving schools and learn to race but that dream is not
likely to become reality so I’ll just have to escape into my imaginary world of
the Forza 6 racing game on the Xbox. I’ve won some races at Le
Mans in the video game world and the upside is I can
be involved in the most epic car wreck a human being could ever be subjected to
and live to race another day.
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