My interest in sports has been a very strange one. As a youngster I was an avid collector of hockey cards. For a short period of time I had a vast knowledge of every player in the NHL and was an active participant in the neighbourhood road hockey league, but I never, ever watched a game on television. I played ten long unsuccessful years of house league soccer, but couldn't recognize a single professional player if they kicked a ball at my face. I sustained numerous injuries playing pick up games of football but did not watch an entire Super Bowl game until I had attained legal drinking age. Touchdown! Yay! Way to go ummm…blue team! Who needs another cold one? Burp! I was raised in a family of non-sports fans. Watching sports on television in our household was never even considered an option. There could be a World Series game on where the New York Yankees were facing evil baseball playing aliens from another galaxy to decide the fate of the planet, but if there happened to be a Clint Eastwood western on another channel we would most likely be watching that and 'possibly' flicking back to check out the score. Even though I never dedicated that much time watching sports I made it my personal quest to at least make an effort to see each of the popular professional sports live. Just to see what I've been missing. Thus far, all of my experiences with watching sports live have been extremely positive. Watching sports live is definitely more interesting than watching them on the boob tube. Pretty much every sport I've seen I would prefer seeing live than at home on the couch, until yesterday. Never did I think that a particular professional sporting event could actually be even more boring live than in front of the television.

One of the main reasons I think that I enjoy sports more live is essentially due to the fans. When you're standing shoulder to shoulder with a stadium filled with sports fans you can't help but have their feverous energy transferred to you. You may not totally understand what exactly has just happened, but if suddenly 10 thousand people jump up and start screaming you would be a fool not to join in. The sounds and sights are equally as interesting. Hockey is great. Players crashing against the boards, the echoing smack of a slapshot and the grinding of skates. Basketball was also extremely different. The court seems much smaller live and the players are enormously taller. Baseball is just bigger. All of these little players on this gigantic playing field. This is interesting for say, about four innings, which is longer than I would watch it on television. Football is a madhouse. The fans are nuts and copious amounts of alcohol only seem to enrich the experience. Yesterday, I had the privilege of adding another live sports event to my list. Professional Auto Racing.

Good grief! I've never been a fan of auto racing. What little minutes I've watched of it has been extremely boring. I would never even consider investing any of my precious time watching a bunch of cars valiantly attempt to finish a race that apparently takes hours to complete. No thank you. But recently I was offered free tickets to see the Molson Indy. Realizing that this was one of the few professional sports I had not witnessed live I thought, what the hell. Needless to say I'm never going to another race ever again. This is probably the only sport that is more boring live than it is on television. Initially I was quite interested in the opening minutes of the first race. These cars were extremely loud and unbelievably fast. Then after the first few laps the tedium began to set in. One of the main problems with watching Indy racing live is that you don't have a view of the entire track. You are sitting up in the bleachers in your static position anxiously waiting for these sportsmen to zoom by your vantage point. In the distance you can hear the din of their engines getting closer and then suddenly a large group of cars whizzes by you at lightning speed and then in the blink of an eye they're gone. Fans stand up, clap and cheer as they race by and quickly sit down. I try to listen to the garbled commentary of the commentators over the loudspeakers and try to get some comprehension of who the participants are and more importantly who's winning. Then suddenly the cars come racing by again, hooray, hooray and they're gone. Was that guy in first the last time they came around or was it that other guy? Oh wait here they come again! Yahoo! Yahoo! Goodbye. After 22 laps of this monotony my mind begins to wander and think about other more exciting things like what I'm going to have for lunch tomorrow or why my one shoe looks bigger than the other.

My whole experience was definitely a positive one whether you like to believe it or not. I was privileged to see something I had never seen before and I got to cross another sport off my list. Plus I got to drink beer, eat beer nuts and get an article topic out of it. But would I ever go again? Probably not. I'm sure the main reason I didn't enjoy this as much as I should was due to my complete lack of knowledge of the sport and it's participants. It's not like I don't get the gist of the sport. Bunch of cars are 'racing' to be first one to pass the finish line. Taa daa! But if I knew more about the cars and the history of the sport my mind wouldn't have wandered so quickly. Kudos to all of you racing fans, whether you're in the stands or watching at home. I admire your unbelievable monk like dedication to this world class sport. To able to sit there and watch these cars zoom by repeatedly for hours at a time is definitely an unbelievable achievement. Myself, I think I'll keep my future motor sports endeavors to the go-kart tracks or maybe dabble in a little blood thirsty bumper car action.

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