Round and round and round they go--The Austin F1

For Irv's 60th birthday this year I wanted to give him something special so I surprised him with premium tickets to the Formula 1 United States Grand Prix in Austin, Texas.  Jillian and Brian were kind enough to let us join them for the three day event.

You may have heard about recent flooding in Texas.  We had heard about it before we left, but didn't bother to take notice of where it was flooding.  We just assumed the coastline.  But no, it was Central Texas and it had been raining for days and days.  On the first day we couldn't enter our assigned parking lot because it was flooded and was apparently a big mud pot.  Luckily for us they diverted us over to the main parking lot which is paved.

I tried to get Irv to take a trip up this tower that overlooks the track, but if you know Irv and heights then you know that this wasn't about to happen.

With the premium seat package we got seats in three different locations for the three days.  Day one was on Turn 1.

 We were kind of early so we decided to go in search of food and drink which turned out to be a very timely decision.  We found a nice quiet spot under a tent.

Within minutes it started down pouring and hundreds of our closest friend joined us under the tent. 

It rained for a couple hours and then practice finally started.

If you don't like porta potties then the track is not the place for you.  There are some flush toilets, but it's mostly porta potties.  I don't know if you can see it in the picture above, but they are in a pool of mud.  No keeping the shoes clean here.

The people watching is always good. 

Afterwards we decided to head downtown for a delicious dinner at the Moonshine.

 I had the plank salmon and it was fantastic!

The next morning we headed down to Lockhart, Texas to eat lunch at a place recommended by a co-worker.

It was amazing!  We had brisket, turkey and the best sausages I'd ever tasted.

The next day was qualifying for poll position.  We had seats in the main grandstand which was awesome.  I spent a good deal of time trying to take photos as they sped by at 200 MPH.  Most of my shots were just an empty track because it's hard to capture them at that speed.

The Mercedes team with Lewis Hamilton got the poll position followed by the two Ferraris.

That night was the Bruno Mars concert.  Now, I mentioned how it had been raining for a couple weeks.  The concert was in a huge, muddy field.  We watched from the sidelines for a while and then decided to leave which was a good choice.  The mud was just getting deeper and deeper and we were all lucky to get out of their with our shoes.

The next morning we decided to get to the track early.  Jillian was the only smart one who decided to go buy boots.

Brian cooked us a very delicious breakfast out of the tailgate of their car--eggs, sausage and hash browns.  Yum!

The sun was shining on Day 3 which was race day.  It started with an F4 race which includes kids as young as 14.  Apparently you progress through the ranks until you reach the F1 level.

We had a little mishap right in front of us.  We were on Turn 15 for the final day.

Here comes the parade of drivers.

Much to Jillian and Brian's delight, Daniel Ricciardo (the Red Bull driver) stopped right in front of us for an interview.

Mine and Irv's driver also stopped to shoot some t-shirts into the crowd.  Our team is the Haas team which is the American team.  Our driver is Kevin Magnussen.  (I will soon be switching to another team.  I only chose Haas because before this race I didn't know which team I wanted to support.)

There goes Team Haas!

Here is Daniel Ricciardo  and the Red Bull team.  This was my best shot of the weekend.

There goes one of the Ferraris--my soon to be team.  Dana tells me I'll be excommunicated from the family if I choose to go with Ferrari.  Hopefully one of these days she'll tell me why she has such a dislike for them.

The winners of the day were Raikkonen (Ferrari), Verstappen (Red Bull) and Hamilton (Mercedes).

Afterwards we headed back downtown for something to eat.  We chose this little food truck court.  Jillian spotted someone a couple tables away who had also been at the race--Daniel Ricciardo and his Aussie friends were enjoying some tacos.  He had a rough day with his car breaking down.  The urge was great to ask for a photo, but we all agreed to let the man have some peace and quiet.  Irv took some extra convincing and begging since he is always eager to enter someone else's personal space. 

It was a fun weekend even though it was cold and wet.  Next year I'm trying to talk the family into one of the $8,000 camping spots that is track side.