It's Worlds time again. Winning last year at the Buenos Aires race had been easy for me although it was very close the year before in Moscow. I have high hopes of turning a three-in-a-row hat trick with this years Enid, Oklahoma, $15,000.000 Championship.
[Editors note: The writer is already six months past her 16th birthday. Last years Championship win was the first in over ten years by a driver past the normal retirement age of fourteen.]
Landing, at the new Enid International Airport I caught a glimpse of my Ferrari Aero Testa Rossa parked by the taxi-way. The Ferrari was sporting my sponsors new black and yellow paint covering the original pink and red of the European company which awarded the car last year in Buenos Aires as part of the contingency prize package for turning 2000+ laps in the forty minute Pro Main. Only a thin strip of pink and red remained across the back near the turbine outlet.
Model racing had grown tremendously since the 1990's to become by far the worlds most popular sport. The Chicago U.S.A.. area and most of southern Illinois had been overrun by factories cranking out plane loads of black and yellow shrink wrapped model racing goodies and the now-standard molded graphite Neo-King tracks. Some aerospace components have also been produced in the same factories for the last five years since NASA has been bought from the U.S. government by Chicago Slot and run as a service agency. Chicago Slot still manages both of the space stations and two of the three moon bases as part of this contract. The original graphite molded king, with neodymium surface magnetic inserts, is still one of my favorite tracks and was just brought back to Chicago and set up in the Chicago slot dome by my sponsor, Chicago Slot.
In Europe Belgium, France, Italy, and Luxembourg, governments and financial systems are all run by the Benelux Slot Company from a bank in Switzerland. Benelux had converted all of the military bases in Europe to parts plants to keep up with Eastern European model racing demand since democratization happened late last century. Benelux also invented the laser-tech system which checked the 2,000 tech points on each model racer to be sure that the 1% maximum deviation is met with 1/24 scale actual production car dimensions stored in the computer master files. Perfection of the new body production process for Lexan laser stereo lithography was also patented by the same company.
Firing up the big turbine in the Ferrari I was ready to drop the clutch and lay down some rubber when a high pitched roar drowned out even the turbine rumble. It was the outrageous pink and red Concord SST coming into Enid from the Benelux Slot Company. The new pulsed-ion SST engines had shortened the Brussels to Enid route to only a one hour and forty five minute hop. Rumour had it that Benelux was to be represented by a new crop of drivers that had been cloned by genetic engineering from past years Italian champions. This seemed far fetched to me although photos of the drivers practicing at the recent European championships did show a striking resemblance to a certain Mr. Capra that was well known in the last century.
Rolling into Enids kevlar covered domed slot racing arena for the first time it was staggering to see how immense the place was. Eight of the latest style Neo-Kings were set up with the center track elevated from the rest on what appeared to be a deep blue velvet pedestal. Above this center track was a trapeze type affair that was. I think, the roost for the legendary bald eagle mascot that was said to have his run of the domed stadium.
A whisper of wind noise whine could be heard as the glossy black laser tracking dome hung in the center of the arena spun down to a stop. Bright multi-colored beams could be seen streaking from the polished optics as the device slowed down bouncing off the graphite track surface. This technology was the latest type of system tracking the cars around the 155 feet even as the now sub 1 second qualifying laps were run.
(Next issue, chapter II be there !)
MODEL RACING INTERNATIONAL VOLUME 2 #1 SPRING 1990
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