We left church a little early today to go to the Long Beach Grand Prix. (My parents took care of k for the afternoon). We rode the Metro Blue Line into downtown LB and it dropped us off right at the entrance.
D went last year, but this was my first. Since it was the last Champ Car race, we were able to watch a bit of history in the making. (D tells me the IRL is taking over, but this whole racing world is totally foreign to me).
We came prepapred, with earplugs, water and chips. And 55 spf sunscreen that we had just bought at Costco yesterday. Turns out other people weren’t so prepared and we ended up letting the couple in front of us use some of the sunscreen, as it was already apparent that they were burning. Too bad it was really meant for the face, and not much comes out at one time. Oh well, a little is better than nothing, I guess.
The race lasted two hours. We had grandstand seats right before the start/finish line thanks to Mazda. One lap was a little over a minute, so there wasn’t too much time between cars whizzing by, but they go so fast it all just becomes a blur. Plus, we had earplugs on, so it was hard to talk with D. Also, we didn’t really care who won, so it wasn’t the most exciting thing, but it was interesting to see it live.
Before the race began, there were a couple of skydivers that jumped from an airplane over the crowd. One landed right in front of us. Good thing he had good aim.
This was the car with pole position, but he didn’t finish because of a stall.
I like watching pit crews. They’re amazingly fast, and they get so excited when they’re done, giving high fives, etc. I wonder what they say to each other? Dude, good tire changing!
People were having roof/balcony parties on the buildings around downtown LB.
I took a really short video clip with my camera to give you a better feel for the action. It was really difficult to take a still picture of the cars going by since they were so fast!
We didn’t stay for the drifting competition after the race, but here is one of the guys lining up.
Overall, it was a nice day to spend in the LBC with D.