February '24 Grand Prix
Contact was made.
Good news about this GP, Kimi showed up. The bad news, I t-boned the shit out of him.
So, February 2024. I waited for Kimi in the parking lot to avoid the silence inside. We walk in together and the first face I see is the crazy old goat who I battled in my first GP. He spots me and raises both his arms and yells, “Yeah! You’re back!.” A big grin falls over my face and I respond with “Despite you being a fucking animal!” He just responds with a loud roar. Kimi looks at me skeptically, “I thought you didn’t make any friends.” I narrowed my eyes and gave him my classic “shut up.”
We hang out with the goat. Turns out he used to be a pro drag racer. He tells a couple wild stories and wins us over. I realized I might end up being a crazy old goat on the track one day, and I was good with that.
Kimi and I qualified in the B group. Him in 4th and me in 8th. I was happy to have him in the mix. At least I could count on one driver not to use their kart like a battering ram.
Kimi and I avoid contact like the plague. We tolerate some bump drafting, that’s unavoidable. Maybe some side clipping as you shoot through a gap, but it’s not how we like to negotiate overtakes. We’ve never found it necessary. Kimi always encouraged the high road. To my mind, he’s right and I take pride in doing my best to be a clean racer.
The final comes for our group. I’m not keen on 8th, I have designs on moving up the ranks if I can. The green flag drops and in the first lap and there is a huge pack of fuckery flooding the first pin. I take the outside and jump ahead of two drivers. Feeling good. As the first half of the race goes on I am on my super tight line in 6th. Kimi is within sight in 4th and holding on but I could feel me and 5th place gaining on him fast. His kart was dying, but still, he kept that pedal to the floor.
On the last lap Kimi no longer had the power to maintain a tight line on the final corner. He took it wide and the guy behind him got by no problem. I intended to do the same as I hit the apex but suddenly got slammed from behind. It was a speed boost I didn’t want. I blinked and then found myself in a proper “T” formation with Kimi. This is the worst way to get hit. Bruises for both you and the kart. It also kills power making recovery damn near impossible. Even worse, I knocked him so hard I had room to keep accelerating and ended up taking 5th.
As we pulled into the pit I was gutted. I felt like I betrayed him. I fought against the current of racers exiting to find Kimi and explain. A hand grabs my arm and I whip around to see a face I didn’t know looking terrified. “I am so sorry” he said, “I haven’t figured out that corner yet and screwed up my braking.” I did my best to soften my face. “No worries, I’m not perfect out there.” I shook his hand and gave him a smile. I was so fixated on blaming myself, I forgot there was another party involved in this fuck up.
I turned back around and there’s Kimi. He begins talking to me as I walk toward him. “I know you’re mad I missed the last GP but t-boning me while my kart is dying just to get 5th in the SLOWEST group seems a bit excessive.” I hug him and quickly blurt out “someone slammed me from behind and I couldn’t steer fast enough. I didn't wanna do it I swear!” I release him from the death grip hug. He responded with “Oh… did he apologize?” I say “yes.” To which Kimi said “Good. Well, this was fun.” We start walking out of the pit. “So you’re not gonna friend dump me?” I ask. He laughs, “For that? Nah, shit happens.”
Shit does happen. It’s something I thought about that night when I got home. Racing fans love to villainize drivers for their fuck ups. I’m not saying there aren’t dickhead pro drivers out there. But the way people seem so confident in labeling people they don't know who are driving at a level they probably never will is bullshit. No racer wants the race to stop due to incident, and no racer is innocent when it comes to letting emotions or ego get to them. This GP reminded me to give all racers, myself included, a little more grace.