“Sure, its about going fast…but what you’ll realize, eventually- winning races- its also about going slow.”
Aulis was full of insights like these, Elleriuv found. Sometimes he found the old man infuriating, sometimes he found him full of monk-like wisdom. He was an anomaly, for sure.
For years, the younger driver had followed the older on radio, television, then the internet as he raced around the world, first in rally cars and eventually in the incredible beasts of the great endurance rally raids. Aulis was a legend, in any capacity. To still be winning international races with all those gray hairs, with a legacy reaching back to younger than he was now…it was incredible. It would, in all likelihood, never be repeated.
“Look, I can see you have an affinity for this. You’ve got the drive. What you need is some maturity, some racecraft, some peace. You’re never going to win these races just by going fast. Sure, late braking into the apex, counter-steer through the loose surface, use your pedals to steer once your sliding…you can build the skills- your competitors are building them too. What you need to build, is your mind.”
‘Sure, easy for you to say’, Elleriuv thought to himself. ‘You came from a different time…the cars were different, the sport was different.’
“Sure, I came from a different time. The cars were different, the sport was different. But when Macco Bundsen taught me…yes, he showed me like I’m showing you- of course he was much better than I’ll ever be, and you are much worse than I was then- the lessons are the same. The race is in you. You need to be present. When a painter paints a painting, who can say what is the best painting? When a musician plays a song, what is the best song? Well, you have a different chance- you can literally be the best of all the other people in the world. You can take a track, and lay down a time that is literally, qualitatively, just better than anyone else. You have it in you. You can control your body to such an extent that it controls this unfeeling heap of metal into a ballet across the dirt and the finish line. For once, the world can unravel to your own mind- just pull it in, feel it, let it flow, BE – it.”
Despite wise words like these, it took weeks, then months, to mold Elleriuv into anything close to the person he’d wanted to be. At one point he came to a revelation- he’d been aiming to be a midfielder, and that was why he was failing. The midfield was already full of drivers good enough for the podium but never quite standing there. Luck, and some engineering, would make the difference; along with his own extra effort as the final ingredient. He either gave it his absolute all, or he would find himself crossing the finish line dead last, ages after the victor had sped through; and that was just to compete- winning was still a world away.
