So age does not disqualify a prospective racing driver – but it certainly does not help! Right?
Ah, a second part on the subject of age. Suppose it is not exactly a twist for this collection of digital word vomit – there is even a third and final part coming next week! Hopefully you read last week’s entry on age, somewhat of a widely accepted detriment nowadays. I never accepted those status quo ideas and this is already more time than I care to spend on the subject. It is not the case that I am sensitive about it, but simply because age as an obstacle is largely irrelevant here.
Though, how about as an advantage? Yes, you read that correctly. What of a somewhat advanced age as an asset rather than a detriment?
Could there really be any advantage to entering the racing game at the ripe old age of thirty-three years? I suppose this depends on your situation but a good place to start is looking at that old familiar triangle diagram. No worries. I will not re-post it here as, if you are still around by the tenth post of this humble blogsite, you are already well familiar.
The typical racing driver is making himself at home in Professional racing or other ultra competitive series by approximately the age of eighteen to twenty-two or so. Amazing strokes of luck have been flashed by lady fortune and this individual has been placed in a professional setting after the most efficient and intensive motorsport upbringing, arriving there with fifteen years of wheel to wheel experience complete with a gigantic suitcase full of money. Wonderful.
Or.. is it? How much can this lad really know about life upon his arrival? About heartbreak? About life in any other context? How exactly can this person be prepared for anything other than racing?
The unpopular truth is the driver maybe is not. Everything he (or she – equal rights, equal rights) knows is simply within too narrow a context. Can this person rebound from deep personal challenges and bounce back? Yes, of course! They are all well accustomed to being tested and suffering setbacks – but really mostly within a racing context.
I have often heard the phrase, “racing is life, everything else is just waiting.” I have similar sentiments…now.
Before now? Well, while they were waiting – I was living. Written another way, I was super busy repeatedly failing at everything – and I do mean everything. I was hard at work, scooping up buckets of much needed experience and logical ability. I have built up an incredibly high resistance to the symptoms associated with and resulting from failure.
In the past I have occasionally wondered why it is that some racing drivers go on post-career to have what can suitably be described as an identity crisis. It certainly cannot be the result of all the waiting they do once racing ends..
Right. Watch that first video and keep a straight face – I am just as confused as you are.
Look, I hate to overly generalize like this, but if the shoe fits.. these guys have only known racing for the better part of thirty-five years on Earth.
I am thirty-three years old.
I am thirty three years old at the time of writing and completely on the opposite end of the racing experience spectrum from them.
On the other hand while I was not able to use any of those years to build racing experience, the same cannot be said of experience in general. Safe to say I have lived through a great many challenges, suffered numerous heartbreaks, and had my mettle tested beyond its limits. Repeatedly.
I came out the other side of it all, arriving with the benefit of at least some appreciable maturity. I have thick skin. Like you, dear passenger, I have already managed to survive the cruelest environment of them all – the real world. Can we say that about most racing drivers these days? Especially when considering that getting started in Karting alone indicates they enjoyed the perks of immense privilege from day one?
Take a closer look at the time investment and dedication required whilst traversing up the pyramid I drew in previous posts. Only a sheltered few make it in that world, and not just at monetary expense – they did so at the expense of any real world experience. They have lived a hyper-focused and therefore cocooned existence. Yes, racing drivers are starting earlier and therefore hitting their peak earlier. Though, they are also ending their careers earlier. Why could this be, when the prime of one’s athletic career is longer in modern times due to all we have learned about proper recovery and sports nutrition?
I question if these lads even know who they are outside of a competitive sporting context. Sure, many are leaving their racing careers with enough fortune to well insulate themselves from exposure to the challenges of being a normal human being. Could racing drivers benefit from a touch of real world experience before traversing up the motorsport ladder? Or is releasing an album or creating a Youtube Vlog the typical fare for former champions?
I can really only speak for myself, but I have spent the last thirty-three years building the person that might actually succeed at his goals, racing or otherwise, and testing that person against everything life has thrown at me so far.
In other words, I am keenly aware of how to handle a disappointment and keep moving forward. I am warmly acquainted with all of life’s asperities. Pushing forward, advancing in the face of failure is natural by now. Forging onward with dogged determination is a mundane standard operating procedure. I have not had an easy go in life; frankly there is not much racing could throw at me that I could not deal with and pivot from. I am from one of the roughest, most dangerous places in the world, complete with one of the harshest climates known to man. I have clawed my way through life’s many trenches so I know how to bob and weave. I waltzed with misfortune over and and over again yet I am still here, rolling with the punches.
Look, let me put it this way, in really simple terms. Check out a bit of this compilation video below.
While they nearly made the grave misstep of imprudently going with a young actor, there exists a sound, logical reason the marketing team at Dos Equis cast an unfairly handsome, sixty-eight year old actor in their hilarious but wildly successful “Most Interesting Man in the World” ad campaign.
How can the most interesting man in the world be young?
He cannot be.
Why? The most interesting man in the world has been around and consequently..
..the most interesting man in the world has seen some sh*t.
Today is my birthday. It is time to hop off here and go celebrate being a little bit more interesting.