Yeah, yeah. I know; Stealing a line from a classic '80's movie is lame, but as you can see by the photo, it is very fitting. It was either that or "A Whale of a Tail..."

Photo: John S. Gossett

Early one chilly 1980-something weekend morning at Moroso Motorsports park in Palm Beach Gardens, FL the track workers were arriving in various states of bleary-eyed-why-the-hell-are-we-out-here-in-the-cold-and-not-home-in-bed? We were just finishing our breakfast in the paddock area when a gorgeous Bayside 935 rolls out of the paddock for an early morning track familiarization tour for a friend of the car's owner. Nobody thinks too much about it. Then someone says "Was that a splash?" Then it dawns on pretty much everyone at the same time that there is no engine noise coming from, well, anywhere. My car was close by, so I jump in, and head out at a rapid clip to see if everything is ok. I round turn three and come upon a dripping wet, shivering guy in a driver's suit standing on the side of the track looking to the inside where there is a small drainage pond. I skid to a stop with a parade of cars behind me doing the exact same thing and jump to see the gorgeous 935 in the state you see it above, only with the owner sitting on the roof in waste deep water on the roof with his head in his hands. (Yeah, yeah. I know; THAT would have been the shot... but I was more concerned with injuries at that point.)

Anyway, we got him out of the drink, and later the car rode by us on a flat bed dripping with goo. The track had just been repaved and it had a good 4" drop on either side from the new asphalt. Apparently, the driver dropped a wheel off on the outside, was struggling with getting the car back on track, and when it finally grabbed, it shot the car across the track and they were swimming before they could say "BaySIDE!" They did get it running that afternoon, so all was not lost. Thank goodness nobody was hurt.