GREG MOORE: FIVE GO MAD IN FLORIDA -By Andy Hallbery (Apologies in advance for the length of this – but its worth it!) October 31 is a day to remember Greg Moore, and to remember him with fun and a smile. Some of you will have read this when I first wrote it for motorportretro, for the rest of you, simply enjoy a simple drive in the country with a wonderful guy… Dario Franchitti summed it up when we sat back and remembered this one particular day. “Brilliant. Fun. A laugh. And a brilliant memory.” I will admit straight up that this story is one from personal experience – and is about one of the most enjoyable days I’ve had. I have been laughing while writing it, but it’s a nice insight to why Greg Moore was so popular. So here is the scene: It’s February 1998. I, with my Autosport colleague Gordon Henderson, flew to Miami for CART Spring Training. We went a few days early to have some time chilling out on the beach as guests of Dario in his apartment in Pompano Beach before the real stuff got going down in Homestead. Dario’s brother Marino, now a successful sportscar racer, was there, and the following night Greg arrived too. When it was time to take on the drive down to the track, we split duties. Gordon went with Greg in his rental Mitsubishi Eclipse, I went with Dario and Marino in his Honda Legend. It’s always a bit of a nightmare when you have two talented racing drivers running in convoy, because you know that at some point one will want to beat the other… Greg, leading the way, spotted an amusement park with a go-kart track. A quick cell call later, and we were parked up and ready for action. RACE TIME Gordon remembers it well: “It was a vast room full of games machines and slots. We spent an absolute fortune. We bought a stack of tokens and played every driving or riding machine and ’shoot ’em up’ games known to mankind.” But outside was the “NASCAR” go-kart track, and it was only a matter of time. Carnage was never going to be far away. “I remember Greg and I hitting each other,” laughs Marino. “We ended up in these 2ft barriers and we managed to clear them, I don’t know how we did it. We ended up sitting in the middle of the grass laughing our heads off – and the guys there thought we’d bashed ourselves up.” It’s safe to say the owners of the track had no idea who was ‘playing’ that day – and we ‘played’ for a long time. Gordon again: “I remember the utter hilarity of these things going at what felt like 5mph max! There were all these rules, ‘no bumping’ and so on as if it was all at death-defying speeds – but there were no helmets! There was sand blowing onto the track off the beach, and you’d get a face-full when the wind blew. Then there was the realisation that you paid per lap. At the end of each lap you went into the parking bay. It wasn’t possible to do a second lap without going through start finish, paying, and starting again.” ON THE ROAD AGAIN From there we continued on to Homestead. As I said, two racing drivers in convoy on the road is not a good idea. Marino: “They weren’t really racing, but were trying to get in front of each other away from the toll booths. It ended up as to who was going to get to the off-ramp first. Dario got ahead, and we thought ‘yeah!! We’ve done it.’ As we came off the freeway, we were there.” Here’s the view from Gordon in the passenger seat of Greg’s car… “The exit on the freeway was a drop down, then a loop over, and I said to Greg, ‘that’s our turn’, and he said, ‘yeah yeah, we’ll take it at the last minute…’ We were now going at a hell of a pace ignoring the turn off, and we just made the turn off with big fat grins on our faces thinking Dario will never make that – and then he took it even later than us and got ahead!” From my point of view in the back seat of Dario’s car, it was becoming insane, but as the exit became a single lane we were ahead, Dario was laughing at getting one over on Greg – game over… You’d think! Marino: “We thought we’d done it. Next thing, Greg comes flying down the grass past us, sideways, facing up at us with Gordon in the passenger seat basically screaming for his mummy… I’ve never seen such terror on someone’s face! It was one of those moments where you had to go ‘that was fantastic’.” “I just remember Greg being utterly relaxed and saying to me, ‘what’s the problem man?’ recalls Gordon. “I was holding the top of the windscreen with both hands, white knuckles – that’s why I took no photos! I was absolutely terrified.” Final word to Dario: “I’ve been down that Homestead exit ramp loads of times since, and it will always make me smile and laugh. It will also make me think ‘how on earth did Greg pull that move off?” By Andy Hallbery Special thanks to @MFranchitti, @dariofranchitti, @elgordonius. motorsportretro. Photos: Gordon Henderson
Posted on: Thu, 31 Oct 2013 08:52:30 +0000
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