Jimmy Vasser and Takuma Sato wail on the Corkscrew

                   You forget pain.  You think hey real racing car, this is gonna be fun. You forget banging your helmet against the roll cage and the origami squeeze of your tangled feet and knees to compress your body into the squirrel-sizel space allowed for a passenger in a race car.  The Lotus Evora GT 4 is a 400 horsepower hard core race car and Jimmy Vasser had never driven it before.  So by his lights he was just kinda pussyfooting around Laguna Seca, feeling it out.  Vasser has that winning, aw shucks, innocent good boy look, that gotta shake my head to get the hair outta my eyes look. That's off the track.  On  the track the '96 Champ Car champ is total ferocity. 

                   It's a steep uphill to the top of the Corkscrew. Nothing but blue sky through the windshield. The car lifts at the top of the hill and there’s that small quiet time like the end off the click click click of a roller coaster before plummet.

              This is the corner where Gonzalo Rodiguez, in the days of 900 hp CARTmissed a shift, speared a concrete barrier and died. Where Alex Zanardi, trailing Brian Herta for lap after lap, on the last lap, suddenly, unexpectedly, while Herta was looking downhill, jumped over the curbs, shortcut the curve and won the race.

                So it's a corner with a lot of history and all you can see is sky.  The plummit of the corkscrew is waiting, twisting, off camber, needful of delicacy and respect. Vasser mashes it. Full whack and for a little while there, while that part of you that wants to live is moaning no, no, no, you hear yourself saying "Go Go Go." Who knew Vasser had a Satanic grin? This is the way a tiger pussyfoots.  I've got one arm stuck out, pointing at the windshield holding my camera to get the godawful video which should be above but blogspot keeps rejecting.  Maybe for obscene speed. Here's a link to the video on Facebook: //www.facebook.com/video/video.php?v=495800408760#!/profile.php?id=762498760 

It will give you some idea of that helmet and shin rattling plunge down the corkscrew at Laguna Seca with Jimmy Vasser.  

            Next ride is with former Formula One driver, Takuma Sato in the stock Lotus Evora.  And it's a gentler smoother ride until Vasser passes us coming out of turn four in the infield. 


            If there's one thing a race driver hates more than gravel in his sandwich it's being passed on the race track.  And OK, it's his boss, and the GT-4 is a whole different level of Evora, 400 horsepower to our 276, 400 lbs lighter, racing slicks.  Doesn't matter. Sato goes nuts.  We do a long broadslide through 5, all four wheels drifting like Fangio used to do, and Takuma never lifts so we come into 6 way too hot, get off into the dirt.  I think we are going to go all the way to the wall as I have seen so many race cars crump here.  But I am wrong and we do not crump the wall but skitter back onto the track.


          Taku never lifts, maybe even catching Vasser a little.  Oh fuck, we are way too hot coming into the top of corkscrew, and we are screwed, sideways.  Taku is on the pedal hard, and I am thinking this is how it ends.  A couple of screw ups in ascending order leading up to the big one.  


          And I am not wrong.  The big one is at the bottom of the hill and Sato just looses it.  Gone.  Over corrects, I think we are gonna back off the track, no we're going off nose first, hard to be sure with your helmet bounding off the roll cage, and I mildly wonder what we are going to hit.  Amazing, incredible, he hasn't lost it.  He's laughing as we bound across the dirt and get back on the track.  "Not enough power," he says.

For Sale: Lotus nearly F1 car for about 1/300th what Ferrari spends. Maybe 1/400th.

 Always wanted to drive a Formula One car?  You  got a million dollars to spare you can own your own, or at least something very close to it; a user friendly, turn key, 640 hp almost Formula One car.  Lotus plans on building 25 Lotus 125s  with delivery beginning next March.  You'll join an exclusive club of like minded folks who always wanted a Formula One car but not necessarily the 300 + technicians it takes to keep one going. Unlike the Formula One cars of yesteryear, you can get parts for this one from Lotus and there's a hand workshop manual.


You will also join a club called EXOS which means the cars can be flown around at your will to the track of your choice and if you and the other billionaires agree, you might, say, rent Clermont Ferrand in the south of France for a day. http://www.grouplotus.com/ should have all the details.  Soon.  


In the meantime it really is very beautiful.  And with a 3.5 liter Cosworth V8 behind your neck it won't be quite as fast as a current F1 car, but it will be much much faster than your other choice in that price range, a Bugatti Veyron.


             Or, for around double the cost of a stock $75,000 Lotus Evora,  you can buy a track ready Evora GT-4 which, unless you are a pro or at least a very talented amateur, will also be faster than you are.  Lotus flew in Champ Car Champion Jimmy Vasser, and former Formula 1 driver Takuma Sato who now drives for Jimmy Vassar's Indycar Team.  Yesterday they drove laps around Laguna Seca and I sat alongside.  (video tomorrow)

Chris Payne's 60th Birthday Party with Talbo (Talbot Lago) Ford GT 40, Corvette, Harley Davidson, Acura NSX, Aston Martin, Porsche, and Kathryn's '59 Pontiac Star Chief among the invited guests

(click on image to enlarge)

Revenge

Years ago, when I published my first novel, FORMULA ONE, THE TIMES of London offered up a review. It quoted the first half of a paragraph to demonstrate that my book was the typical wooo haaa juvenile crap you'd expect from a novel about motor racing.

"Here's to all the bright and hopeful boys and girls who cling to the racetrack fences, their fingers gripping the steel mesh. They dream that one day t hey too will be strapped into the wild beasts with wheels, put their foot down, pedal to the metal, and accelerate into the winner's circle, where the pop stars are and the private jet waits patiently on the tarmac, and the beautiful people beg to come near, to touch the brave heros and give them wealth and fame and glory and all the soft open thighs that they can stand."

If that were all there was in that paragraph then the disdain of THE TIMES would be understandable. Deserved, even. But that was only the first half of the paragraph, the set up.

Here's the second half, the half they didn't quote:

"And here's to all those same hopeful, tense and tight lipped children, pushing their broken second hand Formula Fords back to the pits, on their way to the glorious prizes of Formula One. For they shall be scattered like the leaves at the side of the road."

I rest my case. I no longer subscribe to THE TIMES.

In any case FORMULA ONE sold out in two weeks. And it took the publisher six months to print another copy. Which, of course, was too late.

So here's to all the bright and hopeful boys and girls who dream of being novelists, etc.

We bought a truck on eBay.

Like you buy a farm in Africa. Dangerous.

The truck was reminiscent of the pickup trucks in Bozeman when Kathryn was a pre-teener kickass cowgirl.

Could be almost useful on the ranch. Part of the lure was that it was in Paradise Valley, Arizona. And that we would drive through Death Valley (yea though I drive through the Valley of Death I shall fear no evil for my Truck is a Ford F250, 1969 Camper Special with the 390 V8, cherry, zero rust, 77,000 miles) to bring it home.

Ominous signs in the sky were totally ignored

Wait a minute!!

Where's Barkley?

It also carried the risk of collapse, explosion and general feeble wobblies you expect from an old truck that sat under a car port in Arizona for twenty years with a camper on its back. Like nice lookin but could be heavy crap ready to ooze cripple over almost anything.

The owner was cool. Jim Howe made his millions selling native American crafts at the duty free in JFK. He sold us a good truck that his wife said, had to go. He was reluctant because he had been after it for twenty years. Loaded it with a case of water and a goody bag of treats to eat. Had his guy take out the tanks, have the 2 barrel rebuilt, a lot of stuff. Filled up the tanks. Plus an Indian hand made leather backed medalion made from porcupine quills.

The old red truck looked at home in Paradise Valley; a dry, high haven in the foothills above Phoenix. We loaded our suitcases in the back and left Paradise Valley. There were a few stumbles, a gas line notched by a fan belt, a nail in a back tire. But with so much spectacular country up ahead, you pause, fix it, and keep going.

Stopped with our great friends Bill and Mallory in Prescott: John Wayne and Joan Didion. We set off in the morning for the fish hatchery, and route 66. The sleek, cool, almost invisible explosion of the trout at the hatchery, spooked by some shadow, and the dank, dark scent of trout in fresh water brought me back to the streams in Chappaqua when I was a kid, full of trout that only my brother could see.

We headed out of Prescott, and what we remember, even more than the awesome valleys and high Sierras are the deep and craggy souls you meet.

Like the retired Army Colonel; call him Colonel Ballbreaker-Page, silver crew cut, steely blue eyes, a face that was losing the battle with time. Impatient with civilians. He saw I was about to wrap duct tape around a cut fuel hose. "For christs sake don’t do that. Gas’ll have that off in ten seconds." I told him I suspected he was right but what else to do out here in the middle of the desert. "You got any electrical tape?" I did. He wrapped it as carefully as a surgeon around the wounded rubber hose.

"OK, now gimme the duct tape." More wrapping and it held for thirty miles until we got to a town with a Ford dealer and 3/8s fuel hose.

A couple of days down the road, there was our breakfast waitress in Lone Pine. She was tall, maybe 35, had that tall, long legged curvy improbable elegance of a showgirl. Blonde ponytail, blue eyes. Nice smile. We asked directions to a local lake and she confessed she just got off the bus from Reno three days ago. "I started this end of the street and was going to knock on every door, but they hired me and here I am." Reno was a good town to get out of. She was living with her brother in Lone Pine. Which would explain why she was wearing men’s jeans way too big, and a man’s white shirt, also way too big. You imagined a hard life in Reno. Her getting off the bus without a suitcase. Kathryn left her a ten bucks tip and a nice note wishing her a good new life.

Out on Route 66 in Seligman, Arizona we ate steaks at the Roadkill Steakhouse.

Motel Parking Only

Route 66

In the morning the truck was drooling so we met Randy, ran a truck towing business and a garage. A block of a man with 50 years experience fixing trucks and a fondness for old F250s. "That sag in the right rear is a weak spring. Probably comes from sittin’ under a camper for twenty year. A helper spring’ll fix it. I got that lower radiator hose sorted out, filled up all the fluids. You’re set to go."

And Charley, built like a linebacker, light on his feet, with the grace of an athlete. Moved out to Truxton "four kids ago" from south LA. "Everything in that shop came out here in that (1969 Ford F250 sitting in the back lot) truck. Musta took sixty trips."

Charley & Kathryn with a '69 F250 brochure

Plumbing problems solved

Any regrets?

He looked out over that flat Arizona horizon for a while and grinned. "None at all."

He dove under the truck and emerged holding a long thin snake of a speedo cable. Wiped it clean, gave it a slick of lithium grease and slipped it back in. "You got a great truck."

---

We mozied home through Death Valley.

On up the backside of the High Sierra. Lone Pine, the waitress/showgirl’s new home town, was Kathryn’s favorite. Where Kathryn met two fine old ranchers, their hands knarled as old oak branches at the boot store. One had a big red bull named Clifford, so big and strong his calves had a hard time making it out into the world. Calf weighs over a hundred pounds it's hard for his momma to give it up. Kathryn volunteered to help with the calf pulling. Walked out with a new pair of glove soft calfskin boots instead. Thinking maybe she'll name the truck Clifford.

On up to Mono Lake, and up and over several passes.

Luggage adjustment at Mono Lake

Kathryn at the Summit

Bob looking for the pass through the mountains

"There’s a three day blizzard coming," the clerk at the hotel said.

Turned back at one pass we headed over to Reno armed with chains. Into the open howl of the blizzard and the later, high up in the mountains at dusk, the great quiet beauty of a mountain forest under snow.

Stopped on the sunny side in Placerville, Ca ("it never snows in Placerville") and had a fine Kathryn's birthday dinner at a classy joint where we were the last and only diners and they acted like they wanted us to stay.

Rolled home in the morning, the old truck with an engine the size of a locomotive saying what else you got?