When people talk about sports, especially in a country like India it’s foreseeable that the
agenda of discussion will be Cricket, Football, or maybe Hockey and royalty sports like F1
are not even considered a sport but a mere entertainment source for the masses. Unlike other
sports, F1 has unusually gained popularity in recent years through a Netflix documentary
“Drive to Survive” which gives insights into each team and the behind-the-scenes dramas of
our favourite drives and teams. This has paved the way for a lot of budding fans including me
to get accustomed to the sport.
Over the past few years, my interactions and involvement in the sport have just been
elevated. By now I have tracked each and every race in the past few years, traced each and
every team’s performance and strategies over their race weekends, followed each and every
podcast and fun episode with the drivers and obviously binge-watched each and every
episode of “Drive to Survive”. My passion and devotion to the sport have slowly turned into
an addiction to such an extent that my usual icebreakers in my interaction with people are- “
Do you watch F1?”.
F1 as many people would think is not just about the cars taking laps around the circuit, the
real sport begins much earlier at the factories when the teams create the super engines, find
the perfect weight balance for the cars and design the cars the aerodynamics of the cars to the
perfection maintaining the required downforce and airflow ducts. All of this time and
devotion goes just into developing the car. Now at each race, all the teams create strategies
looking at the track temperatures, the weather forecasts, backup plans if a car crashes the type
of tyre that might be suitable, the number of pitstops required for each driver or maybe a
sudden change in plans. The F1 pilots driving the car also have to go through rigorous
training and regular practices in the car simulator learning every corner of the track. The sport
involves the inputs of so many all of which can simply be ruined if the driver in the car
makes one single mistake or loses the concentration even for a second.
I guess people all around the world tend to seek comfort in certain varied things to divert
themselves and feel connected to something in some way or the other. There is a similar
relation between me and this sport that I so dearly love that it has been a major part of my life
but on the other hand, I am and will always be just another fan along with billions of others
who admire the sport. This relationship between us is sort of funny but never unsettling
because though my love for F1 is unrequited, it is never shared giving me the right to display
all sorts of emotions expecting nothing in return