Our form of racing has a way of skewing our perception of time. Disagree? Ask any driver, in any category, about his or her 9-second (or less) run down the race track. Almost without fail, you’ll get a five minute dissertation explaining all of the things that driver was thinking, feeling, hearing, and doing in those precious moments!
It’s funny, the way that works. Initially, whether it’s strapping into a race car for the first time, or making the first pass in a car that’s faster than anything we’d previously driven, we get the full grasp of just how fast our race car truly is. Things happen in a hurry! It can be pretty overwhelming. And yet, inevitably, after a few runs, things begin to slow down. Our perception of time gets distorted. We’re able to think, react, and decipher information (and feelings, sounds, sights) in a manner that, watching the race from the sidelines, we’d never have expected. In short, the race “slows down,” or maybe our brain catches up. Either way, it rarely feels like things are happening nearly as quickly.
As racers, we have this unique ability to slow time; or at least it can feel that way for the brief moments that we’re on the track.
This is in direct opposition to the way that many of us, myself included, often feel off the track. The old saying is something to the effect of “The days go slow, but the years go fast.” I don’t know who to attribute that quote to, but I definitely feel it. I just celebrated my 44th birthday. Whether that’s old or young is a direct result of perspective and comparison, but I’ll tell you this much: I still think of myself as the “young kid” at the race track… Even though the slew of people half my age that are kicking my butt constantly remind me otherwise! I often wonder what happened to the last twenty-five years!
Our two boys are twelve and almost seven. I look at pictures of their younger years and I realize how much they’ve changed and grown. Like any parent, it’s hard to recognize in the day-to-day.
So while time can slow down for me in those brief seconds inside the helmet, it seems all to often to speed up in other forms of life. I guess that’s natural; the more responsibility we take on, the more plates we attempt to spin, the quicker time seems to go by. And perhaps that’s the explanation: when I’m in the race car, it demands my full attention. I feel completely present, perhaps for the only dependable time in my life. And maybe it’s that presence that allows time to move more slowly. Perhaps that level of awareness, that level of focus is the only way to slow things down – to make time feel more manageable. But I’ll digress.
In his book titled When, best selling author Daniel Pink describes “temporal landmarks” – a term that was new to me. In essence, temporal landmarks are moments that stand out, or will stand out, relative to surrounding days or moments. Pink’s explanation is that “Temporal landmarks (like a new month, quarter, year, birthday, etc.) slow our thinking, allowing us to deliberate at a higher level and make better decisions.” For us as racers, it’s often not New Year’s Day or a birthday as much as it is Indy, or the Hot Rod Reunion, or the ET Finals, or the opening day of a new season.
It doesn’t need to be an annual event either. Many of us converge on the same facility on a weekly basis. We park in the same place, see the same people, and do a lot of the same things. This string of weekends has a regular starting point – early in the eason – and ending point.
Over the years, some of the faces come and go, but the feeling is often the same. The temporal landmarks give us a chance, not only to revisit the memory of years past, but also to compare the feelings, sights, and sounds of today with those that we remember. It’s a chance to reconnect with old friends, many of whom we’ve come to associate with that event or facility (oftentimes because it’s the only time that we get to connect with them).
Racing provides us with that. And all too often, we take that for granted. It gets hammered home when we lose a beloved member of our racing family. I think of my friends like Kyle Seipel, John Dibartolomeo, George Rupert and Scotty Richardson: iconic racers that we’ve lost in recent years who touched so many of us. And whether you had the pleasure to know those gentlemen like I did or not, you’ve almost inevitably lost a member of your racing family. Life goes on for those of us lucky enough to still be here, but if you’re anything like me you sometimes find yourself glancing over at the parking spot that you’ll always associate with them. Or something about a certain race track will trigger a memory that takes us back in time.
Time is a funny thing. And as racers, I think it’s fair to say that we have a unique relationship with time; the way that it passes, and the way that we make use of it. I won’t pretend to understand the passing of time, or the “meaning” of life, much less to try to distill it into words. But perhaps the art of being alive is just that. For me, much like you I assume, this sport makes me feel alive – more so than just about anything I’ve ever done. And it’s worth reminding myself – and maybe it’s a reminder you need to hear as well – to take a deep breath occasionally, and soak it in. To take a few seconds and try to replicate that focus, that presence that I feel for a few fleeting seconds as I’m charging down the dragstrip, but rooted in the serenity of this much more average moment. To breathe in the sights, the sounds, the vibes of the race track… And to appreciate the people enjoying that moment in time alongside me.
