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Page 3 of 6 All the way back home I was beside myself with delight, feeling tremendous and elated, even though the skies were threatening rain again. Then I remembered, I was wearing a Ferrari shirt. I didn’t want to risk taking my Dad’s car across the Detroit/Windsor border, so I took the tunnel bus and rented a Toyota Echo. It would have been a boring drive had I not stopped and purchased a Motorhead CD, then I was set for tunes for the whole weekend. Indianapolis was interesting, but not in the same way that Montreal was. For instance, motel rooms in Montreal are $400 Canadian upwards a night on race weekend, and they are all downtown, so you have to take the subway to the track. At Indy, the motel rooms are $30 U.S. a night, less than a half a mile from the track. For my ticket and camping, right across the street from the Speedway, it was $110.00 U.S. I was pretty stoked. The people at Indy were friendly, but seriously less visually appealing. Making my way through the crowd Thursday at the pit-day walkthrough I tried to find the autograph booth. I wanted to say hi to Bobby Varsha but ran into Mario Andretti, who was busy singing things for people. I then found the pavilion where Derek Daly and Stephen Johanson were talking, and taking questions from a fairly large crowd. Having had a few beers at this point, I decided to ask a question when the guy with the microphone came by. “Ahem, gentlemen, as you both well know, the Formula 1 rumor mill is always grinding, any truth to the rumor that Jacques Villeneuve might be picking up a drive sometime soon?” They both thought it over for a few seconds and then Stephen answered, “you know I doubt that will happen, but it would sure be great for Jacques if it did”. And then it happened, he did drive a couple races for Renault in 2004, and got signed with Sauber for 2005. For the whole weekend at Indy I had my run of the place, I sat all over, at the start-finish line, on the grassy knoll, I looked out from the bridge that goes over the track. That was really cool to see the cars going underneath you. In the process of leaving the track Saturday, after practice, I met up with a few local Tifosi (Ferrari fans), and one of them showed me a picture on the back of his digital camera of a slender man dressed in silver, driving a brand new Harley Davidson. “That’s Michael”, he said. “What…no way, Michael wouldn’t be seen in Mclaren-type colors, and do you think they would let him drive a bike around in the States?” I said. “Yep, he came in yesterday with a police escort, we may get a glimpse of him if we are in the right place, he hasn’t left yet”. I had no reason not to believe him, he didn’t seem like a nut case, and his camera looked expensive. The three of us, him, his Mexican looking friend and me, were waiting to see Michael Schumacher leave, and the Speedway was getting quite empty at this point.
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