Jeepers, I've abandoned so many RPs! Looks like I'll continue this one. (Nothing related to the Precision one, this one is in another world)
Firstly, my apologies for it being so long.
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I was getting used to the life of a Formula One driver, but at times, I sorely missed my family and friends. Eventually, I promised to myself that when the opportunity presented itself, I would return to the 'real world'. As I positioned myself in the cockpit of my Lola, I knew it would be an uphill challenge to not stay at the back. My aim was to finish ahead of Vincenzo, but to do that, I had to make it past Jarno and Pedro in the Minardi and Arrows respectively. It wasn't impossible, but my biggest hope was that I would have a good start and they would mess up theirs. Strangely enough, the U2 song 'Zoo Station' began ringing in my head. It was my favourite song, but the sudden sound of it made my experience all the more awkward. Burt walked over to me and asked me how I was feeling. Embarrassingly, I was still grooving to U2, and when Burt finally got me out of my 'trance', he gave me an awkward look, and a few lines of 'encouragement'. "I don't know what the hell you were doing, but I hope you don't do it again because it makes you look like a fu**ing lunatic". I knew I was blushing, and was grateful that my helmet was on. Burt gave me the race plan, and soon after he left me, the tyre covers came off. In a jiffy, we were off on the formation lap. Brazil was far more challenging than I thought. I aced it on computer games, but being in a real F1 car, with no driver aids, was something else. As I approached my grid position, I could see a puff of smoke come out of Pedro's car. It was oil, but not too much for him to retire, at least, that was the guess. The problem for me was that he was directly ahead of me, and so I would have to drive over the slippery stuff. The last thing I wanted was to slam into the wall before the end of lap 1, so I decided that I would start slowly and turn away from it. Soon after I stopped on the grid, the 1997 Brazilian Grand Prix was go.
I turned a hard right to avoid running over the oil, but at the same time, I spun the wheels a bit too much, and nearly ended up slamming myself out of the race. I felt like a complete idiot, and with my car now facing the other side, I spun into the correct direction, and continued the race. At that moment, I was muttering swear words at myself, and was only thinking of how I had embarrassed myself. Back in front, Damon had made the jump on Olivier, and was now in the lead, while Alexander maintained third. Vincenzo maintained his position, but nearly edged past Luca. Now around 14 seconds behind the rest of the pack, one would think that my race was over. I refused to believe that, and started pushing extremely hard. I knew that at the current rate, I would ruin my tyres way before my scheduled pitstops, but I didn't care, people would laugh at me anyway for finishing last, so I might as well put up a short-lived show. By lap 5, I had closed the gap between Jarno and I to 8 seconds, and I was pushing harder than ever when I saw the yellow flags being waved. Then, to my shock and disbelief, I saw the 'SC' boards being held up. The safety car was out! And this meant we would all be together again. I felt that my efforts were all for nothing however, as I had tried so hard only for the job to be done for me. I radioed in to ask for new tyres, but the team was intent that I keep on pushing on my current set. As we reached
Curva do Sol, I saw the victim. Jan Magnussen's Stewart lay stationary with just three wheels attached to the body. It seemed like a terrible accident at first, but as I surveyed the area for debris, the only thing I saw was Jan's front wing and a few shards of metal off the racing line. I later found out that Jan's brakes had failed, causing him to fly off at the
S do Senna, spinning several times before his front hit the tyre barriers.
It didn't take too long for the marshals to clear up the mess, and we were off by lap 9. I attempted to slipstream myself past Jarno coming into the
S do Senna, but perhaps my inexperience caused me to overshoot the braking point and nearly slam into Pedro who was ahead of Jarno. I now found myself in Jan's position, and to be honest, it felt extremely frightful. Watching it on television was one thing, but as a driver, you never wanted it to happen. I flew across the
S do Senna and landed back on the track relatively unscathed, though I feared there was some floor or suspension damage that I could not see. I was pretty sure I had done something because the car wouldn't stay in a straight line without the need to nudge the steering wheel slightly to the left. Needless to say, I had taken two steps backward, and Jarno was once again pretty much out of sight. I was angry at myself, simply because I had totally messed up to the point I couldn't be considered even amateurish. I began fearing for the job. I brought no money, and had no experience whatsoever. There was no need for me to be in the car, and Eric could easily plump for Ricardo Rosset, who was still lingering somewhere in the shadowy background, with millions of sponsorship dollars. I shrugged off the doubt, embarrassment and anger, and got on with the job, intent on
at least passing Jarno. The gap was now 9 seconds, and by lap 14, I was able to reduce it to less than 2 seconds. To my delight, Pedro's car stopped right on track, perhaps due to the lack of oil, and I was promoted to 22nd. By lap 16, I was right on the tail of Jarno, and coming into the
Senna do S, he slowed down noticeably, perhaps thinking I would be making the same mistake. Unfortunately for him, I didn't, and I kept it clean and tidy to come out of the corner in 21st. On the next lap, Rubens Barrichello's Ford engine gave way, promoting me to 20th. Just in front of me was Vincenzo, who was driving a cautious race, to say the least. Perhaps the team had made him aware of my mistakes, and didn't want him to make the same. There was no chance of him making an error, however, at least, that was my thought.
The first of my three scheduled pitstops was marked around lap 23, with Vincenzo's set for 21. By lap 20, I was all over his gearbox, and perhaps intentionally, he let me through. He came in for fresh tyres on the next lap, while I had 3 laps to go on my set. Now the aim was to pass Luca Badoer's Minardi, which was not too far in front of me. There wasn't time to make a move on him, but I decided I would try and close the gap to a second from the 1.3 seconds it was at that moment. When Burt called me in for my pitstop, the gap had closed to just under 1.1 seconds, not exactly what I wanted, but good enough. I didn't want to earn an unnecessary penalty for speeding in the pits, so I activated the limiter perhaps a bit too early. The crew was excellent, though the lollipop was raised a tad too late as I could feel, and hear, a slight scratch on the top of my helmet. I expected to see Vincenzo ahead of me by some margin when I exited the pitlane, but to my surprise, he had only just passed me. He was on warmer tyres, so the advantage was his. I didn't want to try too hard and destroy my rubber, so I tailed Vincenzo into the next lap. Once again, an opportunity arose quite quickly, and I was able to pass him with relative ease. I figured that there was something wrong with his vehicle, as the team weren't really a fan of team orders. I didn't think of radioing in to ask, however, as I had a race of my own. Luca made his pitstop on that lap, but as I predicted, he came out ahead of me by just about 2 seconds. I don't know if it was his fault, but just as he negotiated
Subida do Lago, his rear wheels spun ferociously, and a big puff of smoke became visible. I thought he had spun, and did my best to keep in the centre of the track to avoid being hit from either side. To my surprise, Luca was still in front when I passed the smoke, but he must have injured his tyres pretty badly, as he continued sliding all over the place.
By lap 26, I had gained just about enough time to make a pass. I had to thank Luca, as if he didn't move out of the way, we would have both retired from the race. Meanwhile, Olivier had retaken the lead thanks to good strategy, while Gerhard in the Ferrari had spun off and stalled his engine. I had really lost count as to where on the field I was, and all I knew was that there were 53 laps left. I was feeling physically and mentally tired, and it was perhaps to my relief that my MCD V10 blew up on lap 34. It happened at the least ideal place however, when I was accelerating at
Subida dos Boxes. The engine exploded with such suddenness that I could not control the car a single bit. I ended up spinning around 7 times, but when it stopped, I found myself at the pit entry. At least the team wouldn't have to recover the car from some gravel trap. I was in shock however, and nearly had a heart attack as I spun round and round and round. As I stumbled out of the cockpit, I shook my head in disappointment, and while I wasn't looking at him directly, I knew Eric was glaring at me. None of it was my fault, or at least, that was what I thought. I had overworked it in those early laps, and now, the team had to spend another few hundred thousand quid getting another engine. Australia was now just a dream, 'reality', had hit...
Olivier ended up winning his third race and his second of the season, while Damon managed to edge out Alexander to second after experiencing gear selection problems. Michael, Jacques and Jean made up the last scoring positions. As for Vincenzo, he ended up retiring after his gearbox became stuck in sixth gear. I must say, I hope that Argentina is way better than this.
Race Finishers
1. Olivier Panis Prost-Mugen 1:36:06.990
2. Damon Hill Arrows-Yamaha +24.859
3. Alexander Wurz Benetton-Renault +24.901
4. Michael Schumacher Ferrari +1:08.352
5. Jacques Villeneuve Williams-Renault +1:12.425
6. Jean Alesi Benetton-Renault +1 LAP
7. Eddie Irvine Jordan-Peugeot +1 LAP
8. Mika Hakkinen McLaren-Mercedes +1 LAP
9. Heinz-Harald Frentzen Williams-Renault +2 LAPS
10. Johnny Herbert Sauber-Petronas +2 LAPS
11. Ralf Schumacher Jordan-Peugeot +2 LAPS
12. Andrea Montermini Sauber-Petronas +3 LAPS
13. Shinji Nakano Prost-Mugen +4 LAPS
14. Mika Salo Tyrrell-Ilmor +4 LAPS
15. Jos Verstappen Tyrrell-Ilmor +4 LAPS
16. Luca Badoer Minardi-Ford +6 LAPS
17. Jarno Trulli Minardi-Ford +7 LAPS
Drivers Championship
Olivier Panis- 20
Damon Hill- 10
Gerhard Berger- 6
Alexander Wurz- 4
Jeroen Krautmeir- 3
Michael Schumacher- 3
David Coulthard- 2
Jacques Villeneuve- 2
Jean Alesi- 2
Constructors Championship
Prost Mugen- 20
Arrows Yamaha- 10
Ferrari- 9
Benetton-Renault- 6
Lola MCD- 3
McLaren Mercedes- 2
Williams Renault- 2
