A Religious Experience?

I have found, over the years, that during the off-season I tend to do things that are not only totally removed from F1, but are also totally removed from my usual routine.

Oh, I'm not talking about weird, kinky sexual practices or anything like that... get those ideas out of your heads, please... or (what I call) silly activities like bungy-jumping or sky-diving - neither of which appeal to me in the slightest as I have a terrible fear of heights - but not when I'm in a plane for some strange reason.

Nor am I talking about more mundane, solitary things like walking along a storm-swept beach, with the sea crashing onto the rocks and the wind howling through my hair, much as I enjoy that.

No, somewhere in the middle, I think, would be about right.

This year, I went to a full-on Roman Catholic Mass. And it was fascinating. Before we go any further, I will say that I might well have got the whole thing WRONG... in which case, this whole Ramble is going to fall into a deep, dark hole.

It was my daughter's school's Graduation Mass and while she was not graduating, she was in the choir, and being the devoted father that I am, I was there to support her.

It was the first time that I had been to a Catholic Mass and I had no idea what to expect. (I might point out here that our family is pretty well areligious, and she attends a Catholic school solely because we believe that she gets a better education.) Apart from weddings, christenings and funerals, I haven't really been to a Christian church for a service since I was at primary school.

In those days, we used to have a short service every evening and a full service every Sunday morning, with hymns, lessons and psalms. But it was middle-of-the-road Anglican, and I didn't take it terribly seriously. The one thing that I have found that it did give me was an sense of when to stand and when to sit in church, even when I have not the faintest idea of the structure of the service. And so it proved on this particular evening - but that's beside the point.

What fascinated me was the whole, silly routine and, to me, futileness of it all. There were a couple of hymns and some carols (since it was nearing Christmas), some readings from the Bible, and it seemed like a lot of prayers. And all the way through there were these standards phrases and standard responses - things like "the Lord be with you" and "with you too".

Then there was the Holy Communion with the munching of the biscuits and the slurping on the wine.

As I was driving home, I was thinking - there's no chance of getting a word in when you've got two teenage girls in a car with you, yakking and giggling away non-stop (do they ever stop to breathe?) - some more about the service.

Then, we had to stop at some traffic lights and a car of young "men" pulled up alongside. As the lights turned to green, their car shot off up the road with a roar and a squeal of tyre-rubber. Well, green still means "GO" to me, despite whatever it does or doesn't mean in F1 these days, and that thought got me to thinking about F1.

More to the point, about religion with its little quirks and foibles, and F1 with its quirks and foibles - the religious side of F1, if you like. Many of us take literally the statement, "F1 is the pinnacle of world motorsport", and if that's not a religious statement, I don't know what is.

And then, look at the silly routine of F1, with the sirens sounding at regular intervals, counting down to the start. And F1 has its own calls and responses: if a car goes off the circuit, there's going to be flag-waving.

I suppose that, in addition, there's a more direct connection between that Catholic mass and an F1 race. As I understand it, one of the purposes of Holy Communion is to refresh the soul. Where then, does that put a pit-stop in F1? The taking on of fuel could be seen as partaking of wine, and the bolting on of new tyres could be seen as the partaking of the biscuit. Certainly a case of refreshing the car's soul - if not its tyres' soles (apologies for a terrible pun, but I just couldn't resist).

The futileness of F1 almost goes without saying. What useful purpose DOES F1 fulfil, honestly? None really, anymore, as more and more technology that might possibly be used in our road cars gets banned and the technology that is used is, in many cases, highly unlikely to ever be used in F1 (a subject that may be looked at in another Ramble).

And if you wanted to take it all a step further, you could not only compare F1 with the Roman Catholic church, but the whole of motor racing with the Christian church as a whole - all the same but all different.

(Here's a really evil thought for you. If the Pope is the head of the Catholic church, and the Archbishop of Canterbury the head of the Anglican church ... where do Max Mosely, Bernie Ecclestone, Bill France, Andrew Craig and so on, fit in?)

While I may have sneered at the devout in the church, shouldn't I have been sneering at myself too? After all, much as they place great belief in their Church and their religion, don't I place as much faith in my F1 and my motor-racing? Much as I may think that they need their religion to help them get through their lives, don't I too need F1 to help me get through my life?

F1 takes me away from the humdrum of my day-to-day life and transports me to a different place. Much as the devout wish to take their place in their heaven, don't I wish to take my place in my heaven (the cockpit of an F1 car)?

But that's just me.