Invincible Schumi

It was dream come true. I always wanted to watch Schumi in action. What better race than the Formula One US Grand Prix 2006 at Indianapolis with Schumi winning the race comfortably leaving others far behind.

It was Sunday July 2nd, two days before US Independence Day. It was race day at Speedway, Indianapolis, located at about 300 miles southeast to our place. Schumi had grabbed the pole position in the qualifiers with his teammate, Felipe Massa in 2nd and Renault's Fisichella in 3rd position. Speed maniacs, Shiva and myself slept for couple of hours on sat night and were all set to go to Indianapolis race. There were apprehensions that we might get stuck in traffic jam and parking problem as anyone would expect in such an international event. We were running two hours behind schedule(well intitially we thought that we would leave at 3am Sunday morning). But, we finally made a start from Milwaukee at exactly 5'0 clock before the sunrise. I was the only driver and Shiva, the only navigator in our car.

Blitzkrieg - Hail Indianapolis:

With clock ticking fast, and heart beat racing to watch the once in a lifetime dream event, my foot was firm set on the gas pedal to the limits...well there were no limits to our spirit but we had to limit our speed to how much our fourlegged vehicle could take before flying...wish i had a ferrari...
Sure, one would expect records to tumble with Schumi in pole position, but destiny had other thoughts in mind...the first record to be broken was my travel time to chicago which was under 1hr. Thanks to shiva who inspired me to drive at my will, indianapolis seemed just a place next door. Without missing any exits in chicago, we were on our way to Indianapolis. The roads were newly laid out and maximum allowed speed limit reaching 70, my will power to respect the rules had to make way for the wild wild driving instincts of me.. And with speedometer reluctant to come below 100, we were cruising along in our time machine.




Give me a break:
With gas burning out at faster pace, and tummy begging to be filled with stuff, we had to make our first pit stop. The pit stop was for 15mins unlike F1 pit stop. The pitstop could have been much faster, but thanks to Shiva who spilled Coffee on himself, the pitstop was bit prolonged one.. It was 7:15 in them morning and we were on some located on some gas station off I65.
With our appetite being satiated, gas filled to the brim, we were on the road again.....This break at gas station was well deserved as we set out with beautiful aroma of coffee invigorating our senses.,...

Final Corner:
It took us another close to 1:15 mins to reach Indianapolis, thanks to our disciplined driving we had beaten the traffic jam to death as were clearly well ahead of all traffic. As some of our friends had suggested, we safely parked our four legged beauty in front of house after paying 20 bucks..During these race time, local residents here turn there backyard into parking space to mint money..Capitalism at its best..We were six blocks away from our final destination and we headed our walk towards it. With the venue getting closer and closer, the decibel level was heading northwards...

Here we are:
Within no time, Shiva and myself were all dressed up in Ferrari red...thanks to Ferrari merchandise shop at the venue. We headed towards our seat which was in J Stand, supposedly the best stand to view all the interesting stuff for F1 maniacs. After few initial parade, musical show, speeches, the extreme machines in the pits were brought out to the starting grid with each engine showing its prowess with its amazing sound and speed.

Get set go:
After a initial practice lap, cars made their way back up to their appropriate position in starting grid formation. Schumi was of course leading the pack of extreme engines here. Well, race started with all the red lights going out, and.oh man! the amount of noise these machines make, can bring a weak hearted person to a dizzy state. As all the cars headed towards the first corner, where we were sitting, it was no way that all the cars escape unscathed. Massa lead the race, with Schumi close to massa and Fisichella fdangerous challenge to Schumi going in vain at the first corner. With Montoya intiating the crash, 8 cars were immediately eliminated from the race as soon as the first corner itself. With 14 cars in the race and later other cars losing its steam, there were only nine cars that finished the race. For the first half of the race, teammate Massa was the race leader with Schumi being close second. After first pit stop, it was all Schumi. Schumi was truly on fire , raising the gap by almost 2 seconds a lap with his teammate.

Worth the visit:
Schumi finally made it to the podium comfortably and his trademark podium histrionics treated his fans to make their each penny worth it. After a gruesome hot weather outing, Shiva and I decided to get back home. But there was a twist in the story. We lost our way and within minute we were searching for our fourlegged beauty all around in the blistering heat. With Ferrari's(synonymn for god) grace, we finally found our Chevy and after hibernating for few moments, we headed back towards Milwaukee.

Endless return journey:
With cars piling up, I was wondering if I really had such patience to drive car at less than 20mph with traffic crawling at snail's pace. The traffic was all screwed up throughout our journey back upto Chicago with me gettting a chance in between to repeat Schumi's feat. After picking up one of my other friend, Vinay and his wife in Chicago, we safely returned back home with our hearts treated to some awesome, truly a once in a lifetime event F1

Hail Schumi Hail Ferrari.......................................