Hmmm..... How many agree with this..
The night before, anticipation, second guessing if all has been done and hoping it all holds together and you dont make a mistake.
Early AM, you walk the paddock, check out you competition, say hi to your freinds you have made at previous races and sneer at the ones you didnt.
You go back and look at your car and go over every inch of it in your mind, "have I forgotten anything?"
Then the sounds start, you feel it in your chest, its a sound youve waited for, longed for and now its here as engines come to life, it excites you.
Time to go out and qualify, your not nervous, you want it and all your thoughts are on how you are going to approach every corner and an early exit to make the most of your qualifying time.
The smells, the sounds, the people who all share your experience are all in the same mode.
Race time, your still not nervous, again, you want it. You suit up and climb in, fire the engine, then the adrenaline starts pumping thru your viens like 110 octane gasoline, you drive to pre grid, heres where everyone has their own feeling. Some like to get out and socialize, some stay in their cars and enjoy the rush, and wait. Pace lap your just concentrated on building heat into your tires not really thinking about much else. The flag drops and the fierce competitor in you comes out and wrenches every ounce of horsepower out of your car while you try not to make any mistakes that would take you or anyone else out while the field settles into a rythym, you start to relax and enact the plan you stored away earlier, about midpoint in the race you may start getting tired or hot, but it soon passes to your concentration on the track and your surroundings. the one lap board comes out, you feel relieved and disapointed at the same time as you know in 2 minutes it will all be over. You crawl out of your car with smile and a sense of doing something very few will ever get to experience.
There is nothing, nor will there ever be, a greater experience than real racing.