Authors: Alexander Roy
The Driver (27 page)
The down-to-earth, forty-going-on-fifteen Monegasque entrepreneur with messy graying hair and a furtive grinâone-half of the black Mercedes CLK team Ross warned ofâhad invited us to his table to watch the cars arrive. Based on the beehives I'd kicked up along the A1 and A24, we prepared for a lengthy predinner dinner.
Little did we know the honor we were being paid, greater even than Ross's convoy invitation. Greg and his tall, goateed co-driver, Remy “Kalbas” Gelas, were the most secretive of Gumball legends, having achieved the highest-ever recorded speed by a team
not
arrested for the feat (224 mph), in Morocco, in Greg's $1 million yellow Ferrari Enzo, subsequently disabled by a defective brake caliper that exploded through the top of the front fender. Greg, well known among manufacturers of such cars, had the car recovered by plane at Ferrari's expense, after which the brake system was redesigned, as per his suggestions, in the world's most expensive vehicular recall. Allegedly. Kalbas was Greg's Nine, and they were accompanied by a Peugeot support van driven by Anna, Greg's olive-skinned, sky-blue-eyed Russian girlfriend of such beauty she resembled Kira Morgan seen through a prism, and Chris, his “sister” of equivalent beauty yet diametrically opposed Nordic appearance.
Greg stretched his arm around Anna's long neck and raised his glass. “We drink to the crazy Polizei. Amazing what you did today, Alex. Kalbas also like the big pass you make in Bosnia, very aggressive. We watch all your moves since London, last year also. Tomorrow we make the big push to Monaco, because the Gumball is finished next to my house. Maybe you drive with us, but I do not think the M5 is fast enough.”
“Come, Alex,” said Kalbas, “I show you what
we
bring inside the car.” Greg's Mercedes was not the $70,000, special-order, 362-horsepower CLK55 AMG I'd suspected, but a CLK-DTMâone of one hundred ever made, a $300,000, 582-horsepower, street-legal race carâthe interior fitted with several items even
I
didn't recognize. “Alex, look how nice, these gyrostabilizer binoculars. They attach to the windshield like so, then I spot police at several kilometers. We are going 260 kilometers per hour, and I can see police, cool, we pass at 90! For next time we consider putting night vision also⦔
The DTM was parked in third position, beside Spencer's Porsche. Kalbas saw my eyes dart inside the 911's interior and scan its bare dash. “Spencer”âhe noddedâ“he is good, no? Yesterday he race us very hard from Bari to Taormina, almost 500 kilometers! We come in first, but we beat him by five minutes only. Amazing how you beat him, really, Alex Roy, in this BMW. Greg and I could not believe it.”
“It was very close.”
“Ten or 15 minutes, still! You push your car to the limit, no?”
“The M5
definitely
had more,” said Nine.
“Maybe a little,” I said.
“Aliray, don't get me wrong, you were incredible, but I think you coulda gotten five percent more out of the old girl.”
“Even so,” said Kalbas, “Spencer did not look so happy when he arrived.”
“Do you know him?”
“This Spencer? Not so much, only the face, but he is a good driver. We respect him, he respects us. We don't need to know more, yes? Now we know you and Jon, you are okay with us. When we get to Monaco, Greg and I take you out with the girls. You will enjoy this time.”
Nine elbowed me on the way back to the table, giving me a sly smile as we sat downâthe smile of
we've made it
. Ant and Pete arrived soon thereafter, then Grimaldi and Hagen, Muss and Seamus, and a gray Aston lentâby the factory, allegedlyâto The Drivers of the burgundy DB9 I'd predicted wouldn't make it to Prague. While my back was turned, the black SLRâthe third and final car Ross had warned ofâparked directly in front of the M5. A Mercedes mechanic knelt beside the $500,000-plus car, cables dangling from the dashboard to a laptop propped against his knee. The owner, a tall, redheaded Englishman, stood beside the open engine bay yelling into his phone.
“Guess I owe you Taco Bell,” said Nine. “Who's the SLR guy?”
“He's the prick who got us all kicked off the Paul Ricard track last yearâ¦the last checkpoint before Cannes. We're all doing laps, he shows up in his Bentley, breaks the rule about not passing the pace car, and security-boots
everyone
.”
“Mais oui,”
said Kalbas, “this is Oliver Morley. Someone say he races in the Ferrari Challenge Series, and is quite good.” Kalbas shook his fist. “He drives hard, he is a professional.”
“Not that day,” I said. “He pissed off a lot of people.” I waited until Morley finished his call, then walked over and introduced myself with a forced smile. He looked me up and down with contempt before turning back to his car. I hesitated, shocked at this unexpectedly vicious welcome. “Hey, Oliverâ¦I'd really like to go refuel. I don't suppose you might considerâ¦moving your car when you're done? With your repairs?”
“Riiiiight”âhe snickered over his shoulderâ“so you can leave early again?”
Up until that moment I'd only ever had opponents. The instant Rawlings dismounted his Avalanche, we were friends. Kenworthy and I had laughed over beers. Torquenstein and I had shaken hands. Ant and Pete, my technical peers, had always been gentlemen, as had other veterans. Even Spencer and his codriver had waved. Oliver Morley was no mere opponent. Morley, whose experience was of an order of magnitude greater than mine, his SLR 20 percent faster and ten times costlier than my M5, had just uttered the single most offensive accusation possible between veterans. He could easily have verified I hadn't left early. He knew he could probably beat me in a head-to-head duel, and yet he was denying me the checkpoint refuel I might desperately need to keep up, if not win. Team Polizei, the longtime underdog, had acquired a fearsome new enemy at precisely the wrong time.
I returned to the table to discuss stage rankings with Nine. Two checkpoints remained for the final day. Gumball driver psychology guaranteed that whoever took Florence would immediately leave for the Monaco finish. We had taken Vienna and Rome. Greg and Kalbas had taken Taormina. Rumors suggested Spencer had taken Prague. Michele and Ivan had taken KRKA Park in Croatia. Muss and Seamus had taken the Hungaroring and Budapest. To win, we needed to take one or both final checkpoints, or pray none of those in contention took either. Nine looked at my notes and shook his head.
“Nine, bad news first.”
“Well, the good news is, if it rains, the SLR is screwedâ”
“If it makes it out of Rome.”
“Let's hope it does, Aliray, otherwise
we're
screwed tomorrow morning.”
“On the flip side, that CLK-DTM's a death trap if it's wet out.”
“While you were pissing off Oliver, Kalbas was telling me”âNine's eyes widened in admirationâ“about he and Greg doing Paris-Dakar a coupla times, and the Baja 1000, and about a hundred other races.”
Dakar. Baja. These made Gumball look like go-karts at the amusement park.
“Aliray, rain may slow them down, but it won't stop them, and it won't stop Spencer.”
“All right”âI pausedâ“but it will slow down the GT3000 guys, their GT2's rear-wheel drive just like Kenworthy's. Spencer can't improve his navigation overnight, and I know the south of France better than anyone except Greg. He and Kalbas probably know every cop from Ventimiglia to Monaco, so our only hope's that Morley doesn't get in the way of our taking Florence.”
Greg and Kalbas would take Monaco. It was inevitable, and they deserved it, just as Muss had deserved Budapest. We'd earned second no matter how we placed that day. We might even have earned first overall, but more importantly, we'd gained the trust and respect of the legends who wanted nothing but an exchange of phone numbers and a spare seat if they broke down. Ross had already suggested we team up if Nine didn't return in 2006. Grimaldi invited me to Miami, Muss and Seamus demanded I see the real Budapest, and Schtaven, Frankl, and The Weis called upon our arrival in Monaco, their inability to congratulate me without a prerehearsed, counterbalancing insult
almost
as predictable as our having spotted Morley on the Autostrada shoulder several hours earlier, yelling into his phone, standing beside his black Mercedes-MacLaren SLR with its orange-striped hood open, its black paint gleaming in the sun somewhere between Florence and Monaco. There was no way to be sure exactly where, because although I took it easy on the final 250 miles, we were going too fast to stop, and as Nine pointed out, his phone
did
seem to be working. Besides, Nine and I had after-party plans with Greg and Kalbas, and it was rude to be late.
It was the Golden Age.
Little did we know it was the tail end.
TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER
20, 2005
NEW YORK CITY
I was lost. The call I'd awaited after Gumball never came, and the victory I so cravedâRawlings's defeat on that summer's Bullrunâhad proven Pyrrhic. He broke down and fell behind, I grew complacent, and meticulous newcomer Marek Harrison slipped past me to take first place. And everyone at the finish party knew it.
There was nothing to do but wait. If Cory didn't have the answers, there probably was no Driver, and never had been.
Â
“Don't get all shy on me!” he said in his signature Southern cackle. “I know where y'all live, so get your ass ready! I'll be there in fifteen!” He was never late.
“Aw yeaaaahhhhh!” Rawlings hollered before I fully opened the door. “Alex Roy! Mr. Polizei himself! Wassup!!??”
“Wowâ¦Iâ¦what a surprise!” We both grinned, he at my most un-Polizei sweatpants and T-shirt, I at howâif I hadn't known betterâthe man before me appeared on his way to a country-western S&M party in the West Village. Frenemies far from past fields of battle, we hugged in the foyer.
“Aw”âhe turned to someone just out of sight in the hallâ“isn't Alex just a sweetheart when he ain't Mr. Polizei?” The man stepped forward and offered his hand. I recalled meeting him briefly at the Bullrun Lingerie Party in Vegas.
“Rory,” he said, introducing himself, “how you doing?”
“Damn!” Rawlings said as he surveyed my Japanese-style loft's living room, “I sure hope you got some cold beers somewhere in this place!”
“Saving them up just for you.”
“Nice sword collection!” He placed a hand on my chrome-plated antique .30-caliber machine gun. “But
this
! You're an interesting guy, Alex. You might need to bring this along next time,
if
you wanna stop me from kicking your ass after what happened this year!”
“I don't think I'll need itâ¦you know I play fair.”
He turned to me and raised his bottle. “Cheers to that, Roy, but you
will
need it when you see what I got planned for ya!”
“So,” I said, “what's the special occasion?”
“Weeeelllll,” said Rawlings, “Rory here's with Spike TV, and they've been talking with Andy and Dave about doin' something with Bullrun for '06, then we all got talkin' about me doin' my own show, then I started thinkin' about this 32:07 movie you're doin' with Cory.”
“How's that going?” Rory asked, then took a conspicuously long swig of his beer.
“It's going, but Cory's in charge, I'm just an investor.”
“C'mon,” said Rawlings, “is it true? Somebody did New York to L.A. in 32:07?”
“Sure is,” I said. Rory shook his head in disbelief.
“And”âRawlings thrust his bottle toward meâ“
you've
got proof?”
“Hells, yeah.”
“And you've seen it with your own eyes?! Pictures? Video?”
“Not the finished movie, but a lot of footage, and The Driver interviews.”
“Riiiiiiiiight.” He and Rory glanced at each other.
“So what's up, guys?”
“Here's the deal, Mr.
Pol-eez-eye
â¦I'll bet you twenty-five grand I can beat you cross-country, mano a mano. Straight up, no bullshit. Just you and me.”
“You're kidding.”
“Tell you what. I'll betcha fifty grand I'll beat you
and
do it in 25 hours.”
“Richard,” I said for the first time, “you can't be serious.”
“Fuck yeah, I'm serious.”
“I'll ignore the fifty grand, since 25 hours is totally impossibleâ”
“If you
know
I can't do it, then take the bet! You scared, Mr. Police-man?”
“It's not
you
I'm scared of. I might consider doing it, on
one
condition, because there's only one way to get away with it.”
“Bring it on!”
“Just the two of us, all stealth, no press, no TV, nobody knows.”
Rory shook his head. Rawlings looked at me like
I
was crazy. “Alex, the Bullrun boys are all pumped to shoot it for Spike TV, it'll be sweet! We'll get choppers, a party at both endsâ”
I raised my hand to cut him off. “That's the worst idea of all time.”
“You
are
scared!”
“Yeah, scared of having guns pulled on me, scared of being arrested at the finish, scared of going to jail! Are you nuts?”
“Come on,” said Rory. “Andy and Handsome Dave are ready to do it.”
“Of course they are,” I said. “Their asses aren't on the line.”
“All right, then,” said Rawlings, “you think about it and let me know.”
“Oh, I'll do it, on my conditions.
You
think about
that
.”
“Ain't got nothing to think about.”
Â
I lay down and watched the shadows of the overhead fan blades' slow rotation across the ceiling. Twenty-five hours. Rawlings couldn't have read
Cannonball!,
and he obviously knew nothing of what I'd already learned about the Express from Cory. This would give me a huge advantage,
if
I accepted. He also believed I was the second best illegal endurance driver in the United States, after him, of course. I was flattered. I was terrified. His offer was the only alternative to the gradual, seemingly inevitable end of my quest, but it wasn't quite fear that made me hesitate. We'd long been inextricably bound by our costly and public rivalry, but however parallel our paths, I now realized we were very far apart. I had become, in every way but one, the man I soughtâa man whose very existence was based solely on faith. All I had to do was lift the phone, call those on my list, and set a date and time, yet still I hesitated. I was scared. I wanted someone else to lead me up the mountain.
Rawlings didn't want a guide. He wanted someone to go with him.
I had to call Cory immediately, and not merely because a Rawlings solo run might affect the film's prospects. There was no one else to call. She stopped me the instant I uttered his name. “Alex, there's no such thing as coincidence. He and Rory have been fishing for info on the movie, and I'm not talking. What'd they want?” She remained silent after I told her.
“Cory, are you thinking what I am?”
“There's a lot to think about. You first.”
“We're in a catch-22. I can't do the show, but if he goes on his own and breaks it, no matter how good our movie is, America's gonna be watching our boy from Texas instead.”
“Relax,” she said. “Rawlings doesn't
want
you to go with him. Rawlings
needs
you to go with him. He
can't
go without you.”
America loved a winner. Rawlings needed a loser, and every red-blooded citizen would cheer the Texan's triumph over the fake German cop with a shaved head.
But not one of them grasped my true inner calculus. I wasn't interested solely in notoriety, as was everyone's first guess, nor in money. Breaking the record wasn't another checkpoint en route to my goal. In the absence of The Driver, it alone had become
the
goal. Rawlings would go even if it couldn't be broken. I'd only go if it could. Spike and Bullrun were willing to risk others' livesâand Rawlings even his ownâfor entertainment. I would not.
Rawlings had an excuse to go. I'd been waiting for one. And he'd just given it to me.
Although I couldn't go with him, he couldn't go without
me,
and the first public attempt to break 32:07 in twenty years would bring down a draconian curtain of civil and criminal charges on the participants. The final step on my path, so inconceivably dangerous that I had never considered the one option now forced upon me, now lay beyond a closing door.
I had to see. I had to know.
I had to go. Alone. Without a guide. As soon as possible. Before Rawlings.
“Alex, are you there?”
“Sorry, just thinkingâ¦Cory, if Rawlings
did
go, could he break it?”
“I'll send more on Diem and Turner, show you the rough cut, then
you
tell
me
.”