Who'd have thought after setting off to such a bad start... a fall out about where to park, blisters appearing sooner than expected, a change of top; that this day would have turned into something very magical.
One of our bes-test friends of which there are few (you know who you are) has a job which most males would kill for. Hes a race engineer for Formula 1. He gets to play with a full size scaletrixs every day if he wants and some days when he doesnt want. Back in class 6, when I, yes I was better at Maths than he and we were kinda childhood sweethearts who got married on the school field but then divorced soon after because he tripped me up during a rather vicious game of British Bull-dogs and i did a rolly-polly in mid air (much to the whole schools amusement) I am, like I am all my best-friends - very proud of what has been achieved.Enough of the formalities - look how close knowing him got us!
We couldn't believe it. I even slurped the champagne off my arm! And so close to my all time hero - JOHN TRAVOLTA or as Mr TC and I like to call him - Jip. (dont know why?) I have two framed pictures of Jip in my house - one in my bedroom and one in my laundry. They keep me going.
So, who else did you see I hear you ask - well, we saw THAT many F1 drivers it wasn't funny, Mr TC got a picture with Ms Danni Minogue, a Brian McFadden and oh, a Holly Vallance - who had a fat back. Her backless dress showed off a bit too much flesh in the way her ripples cascaded down her sides. Not a good look Holly - it brought me nicely to a chuckle when I remembered the advert she did in the UK for reverse charges - shame she hadn't seen her R.E.V.E.R.S.E sooner than the rest of us.
So this is where the driver sits. Looked pretty uncomfortable to me. Good job they are tiny. Our friend is the main communication for the driver. He has to make sure the car goes as fast as it can, as safely as possible and get the driver to finish super fast - in a nut shell. He did such a good job for this Melbourne race that his driver finished 2nd. Thats our friends first podium finish since he has taken up this prestigious role and WE were there to see it and share the excitement. And boy, what excitement.
After sitting very comfortably in the paddock area, and being looked after extremely well by the Renault team we watched most of the race on a screen with them, and with 2 laps to go we were ushered with them to run into the pits where we waited with all the engineers to hear the final result. We knew anything could happen and although our friend was in 2nd place when we left the comfort of the paddock, anything could happen. As there was no screen in the vasinity everyone had their heads tilted down and their ears - literally 'pricked' up. Then, without much warning everyone RAN. And we ran, and we didn't know where we were running to. We stopped. There we were....at the edge of the pit lane - no fence, no barrier, and along came Jensen Button on his winning car, closely followed by our guy - Kubica. Then we ran again. I stopped, wanting to get a glimpse of our friends face. I really didnt know where to go, as it felt like - what am I doing here?! Un-be-known to me all this was being watched from above by one of my bosses at my new job. Seeing him the next day he told me he was watching all the engineers running after the cars and then remarked 'THATS TC!" on seeing me trotting down the pit lane in high heels, stopping, looking back and then capturing my thoughts brilliantly by telling me " you looked like you were thinking "shit, where do I go now!!!" haha.
We gave our friend the biggest hug. He looked in shock for the rest of the time we saw him. People were hugging him, shaking his hand - there were high-fives galore. We were, are, always were/are SO proud of our Rennie.
So then the rest is like a dream. Well, it is now anyway. We left after sharing a paper cup of bubbly with him, we gave the passes back to him at the gate and off we floated into the mass of general admission.
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