This past weekend was Formula 1 Grand Prix in the streets of my little village, where 30,000 inhabitants were terrorized by 300,000 tourists and the incredible noise that the cars themselves make. It coincided with the Cannes Film Festival, for the first time at least since I have been here. The race, the parties, the very strange crowd that F1 brings to town every year (think old men in ferraris and oldish women full of silicon in red lace).
ROFLMAO....
tscht, tscht...
While I can appreciate your dilemma as a resident of a small country who thrives on excellence, the crowds can be overwhelming and I for one would try to avoid them at all costs... evidently you are either mixing with, or observing the wrong crowd... while it is undeniable that the F-1 circuit does carry some very strange characters, the above statement is a tad unfair.
You must remember it is Monaco, so we begin with not necessarily a complete image of what F-1 really is about, the venue modifies and influences heavily the surroundings and yes, the crowd...
Monaco is the glamour side of the sport, hence indeed there are some REALLY weird ones in THAT particular event, not to mention all the bored rich trolls that decide to make Monaco their star appearance in the world of motor sports. It is about showmanship and of course one-upmanship, showing up in yachts and... well, but I am preaching to the priest, you know full well the show... you live there...
However, there is another side completely different. In short, you have the absolute best of the sport, obviously in driving, but there is more. There is no other level of competition that brings the absolute best in every aspect that forms the world of F-1. Automobile engineering, aerodynamics, motors, suspension, tire design, sticky compounds, marketing, sponsorship, driver fitness... then there is the concentration these drivers are capable of in order to drive these machines at their absolute limit and don't forget, these are the regular streets you drive on every day... there is no embankments, no slide off areas with sand-traps, in case you make an error.
Jarno Trulli won the race this year, his first ever after 117 starts, he drove a perfect race, this means he made NO mistake, driving he car at an AVERAGE of over 100 mph (that's 160 kph) around a circuit that has some of the slowest corners in the F-1 circuits, (as in 50 mph). There is simply no room for error... even the 6 times world champion Michael Schumacher made an unexplainable mistake destroying the front of his car... This while driving behind the emergency vehicle that had to come in because the track workers had to clean up the debris of the destroyed Renault of Jarno's team-mate Fernando Alonso, who hit the wall at the exit of the tunnel -courtesy of Schumacher's brother Ralf's 'assistance' at about 160 mph (that's about 260 kph)
...did I mentioned the track workers, marshals, organizers and those gigantic crane operators that can whisk a totally destroyed F-1 off the track and clean it in a matter of minutes so the race continues as soon as it is possible?
It is also about the history and tradition behind this race that makes it so especial the memories of drivers like Tazio Nuvolari, Alberto Ascari, Juan Manuel Fangio, Rudolf Caracciola, Ludovico Scarfiotti, Lorenzo Bandini and many many more... drivers that not necessarily they had the most sophisticated machines, but it was their sheer passion and skill that won them the race
Here is a brief but compelling history of the humble beginnings of the Monaco Grand Prix
acm.mc
It is also about the passion, the drive, the skill and above all the challenge of winning the most coveted race of the entire F-1 circuit in a place where because of its history and tradition, it is still held in the regular streets, in no other place could this happen, where modern-ultra-fast-machines still hurl around these streets at incredible speeds forcing both man and machine to give their absolute best to win the Monaco Grand Prix...
It is the color, the smell, the speed, the strategies, the sound... and yes, it is also about the pretty girls in scant clad that love to show-off their nicely shaped chassis, leaving hundreds (if not thousands) of spectators wondering... how is it that their motors purr and roar and their round and firm... er pneumatics (!?) roll, turn, and screech... when driven at their limits.... -ggg
So on behalf of the entire F-1 world I present to you a small apology for the nuisance that crowds and brigades of obnoxious nouveau riche bring to your home town...
...but we all, motor sports aficionados, are eternally grateful because the Monaco Grand Prix and all it represents, continues to yield incredible satisfaction to us all, and a superb challenge to those lucky few that get to drive around the streets of your town at the absolute full blast maximum, in control of a marvel of modern engineering... I can assure you, in good knowledge of facts, there is little if any, that can equate to such an extreme adrenaline rush and emotion... |
