Could this be Wally and the Beaver(The two on the right) it is really Brad Kaplan and Bob Oglive (I hope I got his name right) They look just like Wally and the Beaver I told them that more than once. Fernando on the left was driving when they went off the road on Mil Cumbres I have included the video link right after they went off . Brad was always upbeat no matter what happened. While they were waiting to get towed back, Brad pulled 2 baseball gloves out of the trunk and him and Fernando played catch to kill time. The car was repaired the next day and as you can see in the next picture a pretty good job for less than a day. Brad had to be one of the most positive people I have ever met.
We all signed the hood I of course wished Wally and the Beaver my best. At the time Brad was talking about replacing the the hood and hanging the old one in his garage . I would have kept the old one on just for the war stories. It would be a Badge of Courage. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ut2-Yyybs7cWe lost our alternator just before Mil Cumbre so we decided not to run make the repairs and run the next day. We still think this was the best option as we found out later there were more than a few teams who missed speed sections to make the necessary repairs so they could race the next day. We did drive the Mil Cumbre section just after everyone had left and it was getting dark. On the way back we found a Porsche with a British team which lost an engine so our crew happened to arrive so we loaded them up in our trailer and pulled them back. Their crew finally showed up and we caravaned the wounded soldiers back toward the hotel. Tom might have gotten a little testy during this trip because the Brits got us lost and it was raining and dark and we were running on battery power only. Tom is normally a very calm logical person and this day was not a good one I remember the "F" might have been spoken more than once and F^&%^g Btitish C)@^$&":#$'s might have been mentioned once or twice also. When we got back I might have had a slight temper tantrum after being left in the mountains we did get our time card in and Gerie Bledsoe helped us find an alternator from Sam Berg to get us back running. When all seem hopeless someone is always there to help. Steve Walters helped us rebuild the alternator while his wife Janet went to the drivers meeting. We had a prayer meeting in the lot and our car was blessed by Stanley Gold ,he told us that our car was good for the rest of the race and he was right. This whole event is about the people they all seem to help each other in some way. I really believe in the term now "Paying Forward"
1 comment:
George, your post said volumes. Recently the media made a big whoop-t-do over Dale Earnhardt Jr driving a competitor's car after he crashed in his. The response from all of the Nascar drivers was, "What's wrong with that? We are a small community and we all look out for each other." I also learned recently that some years ago after Darrell Waltrip had crashed a car not only did he get in someone else's car when they asked for help but in fact he won the race. In doing so, he beat himself! LOL.
Some of my best racing memories related to good sportsmanship were from my drag racing days. Not just once but many times I saw guys like Don Garlits loan a spare motor to a competitor and even help install it so the guy could get back to the start on time. They did this knowing full well that same guy they helped could eliminate them. Simply amazing. It made the hair stand up on the back of my neck back then and it still does today.
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