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Me
and Richard Petty
By Holden
Lewis • Bankrate.com  You're
sitting in a Monte Carlo stock car, pressing the stiff clutch down and letting
up while in neutral, wondering if you're about to make a fool of yourself.
What if you stall out when you get the "go"
sign? What if you forget one of the rules? There
are lots of rules: Don't peel out. Follow
your driving instructor one car length behind while on the access road inside
the track. Make sure you're in third gear by the time you're
out of pit row. Shift to fourth on the backstretch and keep it in fourth the entire
time. Whatever you do, don't downshift.
When you start doing your eight timed laps, stay three car
lengths behind the instructor.
In the turns, let up on the throttle when you pass one orange
cone near the wall.
Accelerate when you pass two orange cones near the infield.
Let your left tires kiss the white line at the bottom in the
turns.
Stay three car lengths behind your instructor. ("That's
two Cadillac car lengths or three Yugo lengths," your instructor, Steve,
had said earlier, as he casually looked back at his passengers while piloting
a van 85 mph around the track.)
Trust the car. ("It will stick to the track like Super
glue," Steve had said. "You will not spin out.")
In the straightaway, look up at the flagman. A green flag means
speed up -- you're too far behind your instructor. A blue flag with an orange
stripe means you are driving too far to the left or right. Yellow flag means
you're following too close. A red flag with a white 4 means you're still in
third gear, dummy -- shift to fourth.
And stay three car lengths behind the instructor.
You hear that edict -- stay three car lengths behind -- 40 or
50 times during the orientation session. You need reminding because when you're
sitting low in a race car, driving 125 mph, three car lengths looks like half
a car length. Your instinct is to hang back a dozen lengths.
You've never been in a stock car before, but you're accustomed
to riding a bicycle in a pace line, pedaling 6 nervy inches behind another rider
at 22 mph. Keep that in mind and you'll stay close enough to the instructor,
you tell yourself as you sit in the car, waiting to go. You smell exhaust and
fuel. The engine's deep rumble seems to come from all around. The steering wheel
feels high. The right side of the seat has a flange that extends halfway to
the steering wheel, to prevent the G-forces from throwing you into the passenger
side.
You fondle the white knob at the end of the Hurst shifter, pressing
down on the clutch. But you don't shift into first yet because the starter guy
is standing in front of you and what if your foot slipped off the clutch? Why
isn't he standing to the side? Oh, yeah, because he has to make room for your
instructor, who is driving up pit row behind you and will pass and stop in front
of you, then wait for your starter to give you the signal to go.
You hope you don't stall out.
A green light on the dashboard will tell you when you're in first
gear, so you don't accidentally try to start out in third. You learned this
during the orientation, when the instructor taught how to get in and out of
the car through the window, how to remove the steering wheel in an emergency,
how to release the five-point safety harness and the window webbing, how to
work the fire extinguisher.
No student has crashed or had an engine fire at the Richard Petty
Driving Experience, you're told, but there's a first time for everything. The
first time you ever went to a baseball game, your team lost, and you were certain
that it was because you were in the stands. You hope the car doesn't burst into
flames just because you're driving, sort of like that scene in "The Omen"
where the baboons go nuts when Damien rides past in a car. That doesn't quite
make sense, but you know what you mean: Maybe the car knows that you're bad
luck and will punish you for it, is what you're thinking, and you know the thought
is absurd. Anyway, how bad could a crash be? You're wearing a racing suit and
a helmet with a head and neck restraint. If you crash, maybe you'll climb out
and walk away, laughing from terror and exhilaration.
Which are exactly the emotions you feel now. Your stomach feels
like you swallowed a Slinky. Your mouth is dry and your palms are wet. The starter
steps to the side and holds a red paddle in front of your face. When he flips
the paddle over to green it's time to follow your instructor. One car length
behind while on the access road, then three car lengths behind as you get onto
the banked track and gradually speed up, faster and faster on each lap.
He flips it green.
You're already in first and you press the accelerator and let
up on the clutch and the rear tires squeal a bit. The car bucks more than you
expected. You glance at the tachometer and decide that you can't stare at it,
you'll have to shift by engine tone, and you do, to second, and then to third
as you approach the turn that marks the end of pit row -- shifted too late,
you think, gotta close the gap with my instructor -- and the engine whines as
you go around the second turn, so you shift to fourth in the backstretch and
hit the gas and tailgate your instructor in the Craftsman Series Dodge truck,
and he veers right, onto the race track itself, and ohmigosh another instructor
and driver flash past.
Later, reconstructing it in your mind, you can't remember if they
passed on your right or left. You floor the accelerator to get up right behind
the instructor, and you don't back off the gas through the next two turns because
you're not up to speed yet -- you're probably going only 90 or 100 mph -- and
then comes the straightaway and the flagman isn't signaling, so you're not too
far behind your instructor, and now comes the first turn and one orange cone
and you roll your foot off the gas pedal, maybe three-quarters of the way, and
you follow as the instructor dives to the bottom of the turn, where the G-force
presses you into the side of the seat while you marvel that the car indeed sticks
to the road like glue, and you pass two orange cones there at the bottom of
the turn, so you press the accelerator -- don't floor it, you were told, but
you floor it anyway -- and down the backstretch you're driving faster than you've
ever driven before and you yell, "Woo hoo!," which you easily hear
over the roar of the engine, and already there's another orange cone, so you
let up on the throttle and follow the truck to the bottom of the turn and mash
the accelerator again as you feel the grin on your face and you look up again
at the flagman -- no signal.
It doesn't seem like three car lengths. Feels like you're tailgating.
Then, around lap five or six, the instructor gives you a chopping hand motion
-- you're too close, you really are tailgating. At more than 120 mph. Yeah,
you kinda realized you were too close because coming out of that last turn you
were really flying, like, wow, really fast, and you tap the brake.
You're whooping with joy on every backstretch, going 125.08 mph
on your last lap, according to the time sheet you get afterward, and then the
flagman waves the checkered flag. You go around one more time, get on the access
road, shift into neutral, coast down pit row and stop.
-- Updated: June 3, 2005
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