‘Life.Style.Live!’ host George Mallet gets INDYCAR experience at Indianapolis Motor Speedway

I had been warned.

“The braking is going to be like you are getting kicked in the chest,” 2022 Indianapolis 500 winner Marcus Ericsson said with a smile as we stood beside 1969 winner Mario Andretti at the top of the Indianapolis Motor Speedway straightaway on a hot, summer evening.

“Just try to enjoy it,” Andretti said confidently. “Hang on and we’ll give you a good ride. I promise you that.”

Moments later, clad in a firesuit, gloves, and helmet, I was climbing into the sleek, Dallara-built INDYCAR two-seater behind 2015 Indy Lights Champion Driver Spencer Pigot. The driver and I made momentary eye contact through the right-hand rearview mirror as I squeezed my 6′ 4″, 180-pound frame into the tiny cockpit. Pigot nodded to me, reassuringly.

Just then, two men appeared behind our spaceship-like race car and pushed us forward. Within a second I was thrust back against the neck brace beneath my full-face helmet as Pigot wound out the gears. The acceleration was shocking. Within seconds we were at full speed and veering off of the straightaway toward the infield road course. If the acceleration was formidable, Pigot’s sudden deceleration was abrupt. The “kick in the chest” Ericsson described was stunning. I feared the two-seater in front of us had crashed and that Pigot was standing on the brakes in a desperate attempt to save our lives. The jolting deceleration, though, was followed immediately by an explosive, g-force-inducing surge forward. As we whipped through the hairpin road course turns, I could see the car in front of us hugging the curves.

The ride was over so quickly, that I wasn’t immediately able to process the velocity of what I’d experienced. As I unfolded my frame and emerged from the car, my body shook. A crew member handed me the GoPro camera that had rolled throughout my ride and I was barely able to hang on to it.

The ride had a similar impact on Rebecca Vanmeter-Brown who was practically screaming as she climbed from the car. She’d had the added thrill of riding with Andretti. “I didn’t know it was him until I got to the very front and they were like ‘it’s Mario’ and I was like oh my god this is crazy. Then we went really fast and I felt the brakes more than anything and I was like oh my god,” she yelled excitedly.

“It was amazing,” Jeremiah Brown said with a more reserved demeanor than that of his wife. “The amount of force when that car took off and around the turns was outstanding. I got to ride with Mario Andretti too and that was amazing!”

Like Jeremiah and Rebecca, this reporter can now checkmark the fulfillment of a molten, speedway dream on his bucket list.

You can try the INDYCAR Experience too. Here is a link: https://www.indyracingexperience.com/experiences/cars/indycar