Hearing a car’s engine moaning from upstairs had me interested. The simple one-note song, changing gears. I was quite young, three maybe four. I was supposed to be sleeping, my parents were downstairs watching T.V. I crept downstairs and put on the fake look, so that they would think I had a bad dream. I came into their view and stopped. I sat with them, watching different shots of a train, a black car, and a motorcycle on the T.V. Watching three english-men racing to get to an airport. Each with a different vehicle of transportation. One with a train, one with a car, and one with a motorcycle. Eventually the man on motorcycle reached the airport first. He could go in between the cars to avoid traffic. I was like a magnet to the show the show.

Most nights, I would do the same thing, come downstairs and watch the new episode. I slowly learned the names of the people. The three people were James, Richard, and Jeremy, always arguing about something in their british accents. After a while, I could memorize the intro song of the show. I would start to memorize a few cars every time I saw them. Every show, they would preview a new car, and let “The Stig” drive the car around a track as fast as possible. Then, they would reveal the time and slap the paper on a board with lists of times. In one episode, the Stig was revealed to be Michael Schumacher, a Formula 1 driver for multiple different teams.
Seeing a small preview of what Schumacher does made me drop my jaw. I was in awe seeing the lightweight bare red car racing at super speeds around a turn. The short thin car with the driver peeping above a small pocket. The sides of the car were like wings with big cavities in the front of them. My favorite part was the rear based engine. Its intake was located was on top of the driver going back a long snake like tube down into the engine. A 10 cylinder beast roaring from behind where you sat. After seeing the intro, I searched for the show Formula One racing. To my luck, my dad watched that and I didn’t know about it. Every other weekend, I would jump two steps at a time to get downstairs and watch F1 as it was called.

Every night, watching those cars zoom around, tear the rubber off the tires, had me interested. When I grew up, hell yeah I wanted to be like those guys, feeling the car rocket down the road, the excitement. My dream is to be like them, driving cars around, feeling the power of the engine. Slowly, I learned different things about racing. Apexes, oversteer, understeer, everything.

The designs of the cars is what interested me most. I didn’t want to be good at driving an ugly car. I wanted to design my own car, or modify a car out of a factory, rather than just driving stock. Stock was square one. To keep progressing up the ladder, you would add spoilers, change bumpers, add flares. Not only that, you had to feel the rush while driving, a more efficient engine was the only upgrade for the feel.

I really wanted to grow up to 18. I would work hard in school and make money in my free time to support buying the car. This kept me motivated be the best, because only the best is what people want. Nobody wants a worker who wouldn’t work.

Every time my family made their annual trip to Greece over the summer, I would enjoy my relatives and all. My grandpa knew a friend who has a private race track. He owned lots and lots of racing go-karts. Every time I stepped in the short machines, I would ask someone to time me each lap. I started at 50 seconds, decreasing my time each lap.

One day, while driving to soccer practice, I saw a navy blue Mclaren MP4 12C fly past us 30 miles per hour faster than us. I recognized the car the second it passed, the curved tail lights, the huge intake scoops for the rear mounted engine. I pointed it out to my dad right before he honked his horn. I saw the car’s license plate, it read: 2SLOW. I never wanted to be the slowest. Then I started thinking to myself. One day, I would be able to race people in different cars. Mine would be the fastest.

When I was about 6 or 7, my dad took me to a car show in New York. As I got out of the car, I heard my dad talking with someone holding 2 tickets in his hand.

“I was just told our relatives could not make it to the show, would you like these tickets?” the man claimed. My dad didn’t expect this, we had plans to go eat somewhere.

“Of course, are you sure you don’t want these tickets?” my dad remarked.

Quickly the man replied, “No sir”. Plan B was initiated, and we aborted going to the restaurant. We thanked the man lots of times before rushing to get in. I looked up at my dad’s face, he looked just as excited and happy as I did.

People crowded the doors by the hundreds. Thankfully, most of the people were pushing each other to get tickets. We already had tickets. The doors blocked everything of the show from the outside. I didn’t even step inside before my jaw literally dropped. Cars littered the floor, all polished and shiny.

Seeing cars I saw on Top Gear in front of my eyes made me feel very special. These cars costed hundreds of thousands of dollars. At one point in the show, my dad pointed to a british car. Getting in a Aston Martin One 77.

This was one of the fastest cars in the world with a top speed of 220 miles per hour. The price tag on this machine was $1.4 million. My mind went nuts. My heart raced so fast, my palms were sweaty. My dad took lots and lots of photos. This was seriously cool.

At one point while wandering the show, I found a Formula One simulator. Only people above 18 were allowed to try it and it costed a lot. I saw people struggling to control the car, sliding everywhere. The fastest time around the track was 15 seconds more than the Formula One drivers.

Since then, cars have been my favorite passion, not a hobby, beyond a hobby. I can trace it all back to that one night. Watching Top Gear for the first time. At the car show, I reached Nirvana, everything I dreamed of, right in front of me.