It was going to be a great weekend.
Firstly, my brother and I had a Putty ride planned on Saturday, but a number of very valid reasons saw it not get off the ground.
So, it was rescheduled for Sunday, a sort of Father’s Day present. But, overnight the gales blew in with Wollongong recording winds of over 120km/h in the early hours of the morning. Ride canned.
Never mind, it was Father’s Day. My son made us all great breakfast and even made some home-made chocolate eclairs for us to enjoy during the day. Watch the IndyCar race in the morning, then a short ride to the Pie Shop and Kiama was achieved in the afternoon, but roads covered with litter are a put-off and it a nice, quiet cruise as a result.
Oh well, there’s always the races. MotoGP AND WSBK on the one night. Rev-head heaven, really.
Except that, like everything else that was planned for the weekend, it didn’t really happen, not like it should have, anyway. Thankfully the horrific accident that took Shoya Tomizawa’s life happened while the channel was away at an ad break, so only one replay was shown, and even the normally sensationalist commentators had the gravity and decorum to realise that something awful had just happened. There WERE some races held but, in the overall scheme of things, they didn’t matter a damn. I was left with the same empty feeling that I remember so well from a couple of years ago at Brands Hatch, and the same sense of futility.
I’m not a superstitious man, not at all, but Dean Adams pointed out today that it was at Misano, the same track, on September 5th, the same date, that the great Wayne Rainey crashed his Yamaha 500 and was paralyzed from the waist down. Spooky.
For the second weekend in a row we mourn the loss of a young life that might have been filled with such joy, such success, such fulfilment.
RIP, Shoya, and condolences again to your family and friends.
