Here’s a bit of fun from the reigning Indycar champ, who shows that although most of us dream that we could be pretty fast in one of those fancy race cars, well, there’s a reason we’re sitting here on the internet instead of racing right now.
The recap: Simon Pagenaud was challenged to a 10-lap go kart race by the entire editorial staff of The Drive, and in the interest of fairness was forced to start last. Within 2 laps he was in the lead. Within 5 laps he was lapping the field. And these are like 30 second laps. Penske perfect! No word on if he was sipping champagne and driving with his knees for the final lap.
On the one hand, this looks like a good time was had by all, and Pagenaud was certainly a good sport about it. On the other hand, it speaks volumes about the vast disparity in driving abilities of professional drivers versus us working joes. Pagenaud, who probably has logged more go kart hours in his life than the many of us have spent driving actual cars, makes it look easy by just showing up lapping people. Imagine if he was actually trying.
The video indicates this was recorded last fall, which means someone has been sitting on this for a while. Maybe it was because the editorial crew were waiting for the 2017 season to start to hit “publish”, or maybe it was because they were just so profoundly embarrassed at the beat down. Eh, it’s probably the former. I mean, if you had been on a podium with Pagenaud or any other regular driver, no matter how many laps down you finished, you’d still want to share that image with everyone, right?