Drag racing is a big part of my life. All of my spare time is
spent working on my 1996 Honda Accord. With an important drag race
approaching quickly, I spent most of my waking hours for a week tuning my
car. Sweat and hours of hard work finally prepared my car for racing. The
interior was stripped down to the sheet metal and contained only the
driver's seat to reduce weight. The whole exhaust system was removed to
gain that little edge in power, which is essential for racing. My car was
finally race ready, waiting to tear up the track.
The following day, our race team met up at the track. In the pit
area, we changed out our street tires for high performance drag slicks.
After a few more last minute adjustments, I pulled into the staging lane
and waited for my turn to race. Little did I know that my first race would
end up in disaster, a blown engine. All of the hard work and dedication
towards my car seemed to be a futile effort because of the bad results.
After we pushed my car back to the pit area, we took apart the
engine, looking for the problem. I immediately found it to be a bent cam
sprocket. The situation seemed hopeless because I had a specially tuned sprocket. We scrambled around the track asking people if they had any spares, yet our efforts seemed fruitless. With the nest race approaching quickly, we ran into a little luck. It wasn't the best
sprocket, but it would have to do. We barely put the engine together in
time to make the next rounds of racing. Once again I pulled back into the
staging lanes and resumed the wait for my second run.
Half an hour later, I was back at the starting line. Just like my
previous run I concentrated on the lights.
However, this time, my concentration was overshadowed by the
outcome of my earlier race. As the light turned green, I left the line
with a perfect start. I shifted into second and punched my nitrous once
again. The car steadily picked up speed and as soon as the race had
started I was passing the finish line going over a hundred miles an hour.
A sigh of relief escaped from me as I glanced over at my opponent's lane...
victory.
Even though I made it to the final rounds of elimination I lost the
final and most important race. However, I didn't care about the loss
because I knew that instead of making it this far, I could have been
standing on the sideline with a broken car instead of racing. I realized
that any obstacle would be overcome if you pursued it hard enough.
