This weekend I stepped out of the media centre and into a flag point for round one of the Winton Motor Racing Championship as a trainee flag marshal. I learned more (and knew more!) than I thought I would and have an even greater appreciation for track-side officials. Ten hours in a concrete box with a tin roof is no easy feat.
There is no denying that watching racing on TV or from the grandstand is an exciting experience. One small miss-step or one race winning move has the power to draw a collective “oh s***” from the audience, I would say more so than any other sport – think SVG’s recent Bathurst 12 Hour debacle in the dying laps of the race or Fabian Coulthard’s heart-stopping smash at the Gold Coast last year. But, I’m not much of a sports fan outside of things with four wheels or a pigskin so don’t quote me on that.
But there is something to be said for being right in the action, breathing in the smell of a bit of burning rubber after a wheel lock or the sound of a turbo 13b brap-brap-brapping its way passed or watching the water in your bottle vibrate as the cars zip by. Seeing, hearing, feeling – that’s how you learn and that’s how you grow. You can’t write about what you don’t know and there is plenty about motorsport that I don’t know. I’ve never been the type of person who enjoys just sitting behind a computer commenting on what’s going on around me. I want to live and breathe the things that I write about.
I’m looking forward to many more 10-hour days in a concrete box with a tin roof in the future.
