Here’s the scene: It’s the 2000 Rolex 24 at Daytona. I’m driving a Ferrari 333SP for Doran Racing. Max Papis is driving a Riley & Scott-Ford for Dyson Racing. It’s about four hours into the race, and I’m standing at the pit wall, geared up and ready to hop in the car for a double stint. I look up pit lane and see our red number 27 pop into view, with the number 16 Dyson car right behind it.
Less than a minute later, I’m revving the Ferrari V12, dumping the clutch, and heading towards pit out, with the 16 car on my tail as if he’s drafting me at slow speed. I recognize the helmet, and know that Mad Max will not give me any room on track. Time to switch on and perform.
Crossing the Start-Finish line on my out lap, I’m told over the radio that we’re P1, with the 16 car P2.
For the next 45 minutes, Max and I are never separated by more than a second, and usually less than half a second. Then, we both pit for fuel on the same lap, and blast back out for another full fuel stint, nose to tail.
Ninety minutes of flat-out racing, cutting our way through traffic, cars in slower classes, and cars in our own class. A real ding-dong battle.
Braking, downshifting, turning, easing off the brakes, clipping apexes, squirting the throttle, leaning on the exit curbs. Using every inch of track… and sometimes a bit more. Using every one of the glorious V12’s 12,000 RPM. Using every ounce of skill and talent I have in my body… or, should I say, in my head.
Just driving. Just racing.
The scream of my V12 mixed with the deep roar of Max’s V8. Quick glances in the mirrors, sensing when Max would dive down the inside in a brake zone. Decisions to let him by and play chaser, or ease to the inside to maintain the lead, seemed to be made by someone else, what felt like minutes earlier. Playing chess with the slower cars, reading their positioning and predicting what their drivers were planning, strategizing passes several corners in advance.
Just driving. Just racing.
As I flashed past the pits at nearly 190 MPH on the banking, micro-seconds before attacking the brake pedal for Turn One, I noticed Ron, our engineer, wasn’t at the timing stand, so I got on the radio and asked where he was. He had left for a bio break. I was hyper-aware, feeling, seeing, hearing, and even smelling everything. Through Daytona’s infield turns, I could sense my brake points by the smell of spectators’ campfires. Each lap, the sun got fractions of an inch closer to the wall surrounding the outside of the banked NASCAR turns.
Just doing. Not thinking.
Aware of Max at all times. He’d lunge and I was ready. I’d lunge and he was ready. Strategizing without thinking. Making decisions without thinking. On the edge without thinking. Just doing. Car dancing.
Max and I trading the lead for ninety minutes. Some of the most intense, enjoyable, and memorable racing I’ve ever had in my nearly fifty years of driving race cars.
Just driving. Just racing.
“Pit this lap.”
Max still right there in my mirrors, it’s maximum push until the last second, the final instant to brake hard and bring the Ferrari down to pit lane speed, on the limit. Sight my pit board while loosening the belts, listening for “3, 2, 1,” turn into the box, and pop out of the seat like I’m being shot from a Pez dispenser.
Stint over.
Emotions, which had been put aside for the past ninety minutes, begin to bubble up. I want to stay in the car all day. Let down. Feeling drained. Ecstatic fun. Joy. Accomplishment. Confidence. Anticipation for my next stint.