Circuit Racing: David Summerbell’s near miss – Part 2 of 3

The starter demanded two attempts before he sanctioned the event and when he released the green flag Doug’s Audi DTM TT-R went scalp-hunting. Doug won the battle to turn 1, taunting TA1 as he sped towards turn 2.

Somewhere in a trained cellar of my mind, after 2-3 laps, I surmised that despite David’s best efforts, Goliath would claim victory. TA1, in my view, didn’t have enough for the TT-R, so I did something I cannot recall doing during a ‘big race’. I went for a leisurely stroll. I wandered into the pits. My eyes were not prepared for what I saw and in that moment my brain’s hard-drive crashed! I was on unfamiliar ground, scenes from Sigourney Weaver’s, Aliens and Will Smith’s, I am Legend, flashed by repeatedly.

I was in a nuclear wasteland of abandoned cars, only this time, they were decked out in colorful livery.  The pit area was completely deserted! There was no one in the pit-bays. The pit area was a desolate place! It was eerie, uncanny and awkwardly silent.

Audi TT-R

Where was everyone? Everyone was elsewhere, claiming their own vantage point from which to see a galloping Audi TT-R, or hear a functioning wastegate, barking the desperate notes of a threatened Mitsubishi Evo VIII – TA1. No one wanted to be told about the race. Their eyes knew nothing about the vicarious existence, they wanted to see for themselves and their blind commitment to a view of their own, meant that, for 7 laps, the pit area, at ground level, was a ghost town!

Audi TT-R preparing for battle

As I stood there in the pits, experiencing the unfathomable, I saw Stephen Gunter leaning on the wall at TA1’s pit area. I do not know why he was there. Did he decide like I did that the writing was on the wall? Was this his usual routine? The answers all escaped my grasp.

Stephen Gunter is leaning on the wall. The final lap is coming to a close. He raises his head, as if he is listening, but more like he knew that his driver would not finish P1 and so he was employing cognitive measures to decide what is required to improve his driver’s prospects for the final race.

Doug Gore

The inexplicable continues, but, from this point, everything is happening in super-slow motion.  Stephen Gunter is in my line of sight, the announcer’s voice, in a World War II-like excerpt, crackled through the speakers, confirming Doug ‘Hollywood’ Gore’s victory and in the same electronically amplified breath, he (the announcer) was seeking a reaction from the ‘gully side’ and the grandstand.

I am still looking in Stephen Gunter’s direction. I am no longer hearing the announcer. Stephen Gunter snaps to attention and into motion. His transformation was immediate. His response spoke volumes. It wasn’t the behaviour of a crew chief. It was the attitude of a friend, a dear friend. His reaction was abrupt, it was urgent.

I neither heard nor saw something of significance. I wasn’t looking at the on-track happenings, so I was clueless. Displaying fleet of foot with rather long strides, Stephen ran to a white pick up truck, hit it repeatedly and shouted instructions. The truck sped off.

When I spun, I summoned my wits and claimed my bearings. A thousand voices suddenly became audible and rushing bodies became visible as fans streamed along the start-finish straight, heading towards turn 1.

Buried in confusion, I grabbed some information from Peter Moodie Jr. and transported by a frightened, curiosity-filled vehicle, I joined the panic-stricken throng. As we ran in unison, the voices gained faces and from persons in the crowd and some who we passed with consternation etched deep in their expressions, the information came in unfiltered and unedited. Still in the sprint mode, I got to Troy Riley’s Honda CRX. The windscreen was shattered and a pronounced, gaping hole, spoke an awful tale. The story about a child being hit began to make sense.

Cecil Munroe Gleaner On-Line Writer