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RoC: Tanner Foust’s Tuesday Blog
Written by: SPEED Staff
SPEEDtv.com   
11/03/2009
Beijing (CHN)
 
(SPEED's Supercars Exposed host Tanner Foust is in China taking part in his second Race of Champions event, representing the United States. The open-wheel, endurance racing, rallying and drifting ace will be filing daily blogs from the RoC exclusively for SPEEDtv.com.)

Hello from Beijing!

If you’re a fan of seeing drivers from different series and disciplines pitted against each other to race inside a stadium, and while representing their country, the Race of Champions is as good as it gets. Between my rallying and drifting commitments, I’ve been fortunate enough to find myself asked back to participate in the RoC for the second time.
Tanner mugs for the camera with Tom 'Mr. Le Mans' Kristensen on a tour of the Great Wall prior to the 2009 Race of Champions getting underway. (Tanner Foust) » More Photos

I’ve been asked how a driver gets selected for the RoC, and to be honest, I don’t really know how we’re chosen! I received a call from the organizers about three weeks ago, asking if I’d like to return this year, and it didn’t take long to ponder...

Considering that this year’s RoC is earlier than usual, held the same week as SEMA, it would take some shuffling of commitments on my part. Last year I partnered with NASCAR’s Carl Edwards, but with their season still going strong, it meant the RoC organizers would have to find someone else. Once they said Travis Pastrana would be my partner in representing the USA, flights were booked and the countdown began.

I got in to China a couple of days early – I’ve never been here before. Everyone I’ve spoken to said it’s a great place to visit and see, so I wanted to be sure to give myself enough time to see as much as possible and to adjust to the time difference.

I just finished walking through the Forbidden City and the amazing palace, its 9999 rooms, and I also got to see the Great Wall. So after all of the touring around, now we’re ready to get underway tonight.

Teaming up with Travis was a great opportunity; we’ve already drawn our positions in the Nations Cup and we have one of the strongest teams to face, Scandinavia, so we have our work cut out for us right off the bat.

For the Wednesday competition we’ll be fighting for Team USA. Travis works great under pressure – putting down laps with no mistakes when the pressure is on. Then on Thursday we’ll go into the individual competition, battling for our own honors up against the champions from all the other series. At that point, it’s every man for himself and Travis and I become rivals once again.
Tanner represented the USA in 2008 with Roush Fenway's Carl Edwards. For 2009, Foust is joined by fellow Rally America driver Travis Pastrana. (LAT) » More Photos

There’s one thing that’s hard to escape when you’re a part of the RoC. I could do this event a hundred times and I’ll still say it’s incredible to meet all of the drivers you grow up watching – to get to know the Michael Schumachers and Marcus Gronholms of the world. Just getting to know them – about their normal lives, their families, what it was like for them to grow up in racing in their own countries and what we all have in common as racers; that’s the best part of the experience for me behind the scenes.

When it comes to the driving aspect of the RoC, my favorite part of the event is driving the WRC Ford. That car…it’s awesome. I got to do three practice laps in it yesterday and it is an animal to drive. For a rally guy like me, it was certainly a real treat.

Another great part of the event for me has been tracking how things have gone for the guys I met at last year’s event. I’d always followed just about every kind of racing, but now that I have a rapport with some of them, it made following a Tom Kristensen or Jenson Button a little bit different – a little bit more personal – now that we’ve gotten to know each other.


From a my perspective, it was nice to see that they follow what’s going on in the States – it’s made a lot easier with the internet, for sure – so they keep tabs on how I’ve been doing, and I’ve certainly done the same with them. Everybody is pretty switched on to what each other has been up to…Jenson certainly hasn’t had the worst of seasons since I last saw him…

But to be honest, most of the conversations between the drivers here have little to do with motorsports. We’ve got lots of side bets going on – Travis is the ring leader there. He’s always trying to psych people out by betting them money on the different runs, on who’ll eat the craziest foods, and so on.

After competing with Travis for the past four of five years, I’m used to the side bets with him, so I know to steer clear of the wild ones he comes up with but I’m sure someone will fall for them this week!

Another part of the fun for me at this event is that I don’t come from a single racing discipline like most of the drivers do. I guess it adds up to a form of curiosity – between my Rally America endeavors and drifting a Toyota NASCAR V8-powered Scion in the Formula Drift series, maybe not everyone knows how to relate for similar experiences.
When he's not going sideways on dirt in the Rally America series, Foust is drifting, earning the 2007 and 2008 Formula Drift championships. His NASCAR V8-powered Scion is a mystery to the other RoC drivers. (Scion) » More Photos

It’s fun asking Jenson what techniques are needed to drive his Brawn F1 car, or asking Tom what it’s like racing at Le Mans in his Audi, and I can obviously join in on the rallying discussions, but you might not be surprised to learn that Schumacher or Sebastian Vettel have yet asked me to teach them how to drift a 650hp Scion!

Even describing the car to some of the guys here is hard enough. Most of them struggle to wrap their heads around the sport, much less the insanity of the car. Maybe I can invite some of the guys over for lessons at Christmas…

The venue here at the Bird’s Nest is simply incredible. The facility really hasn’t been used since the Olympics in 2008, but they’ve kept the building spotless. Every single window pane is clean, the floor is immaculate; it’s clear to everyone one involved how much pride they take in the facility. The Chinese officials should be proud of what they’ve done. It’s beyond anyone’s expectations.

The speeds on the straights inside the stadium have us hitting over 90mph, which is incredible. If you’ve seen the past RoC track configurations you know there’s been a lot of turning and not a lot of acceleration, but that’s not the case this year.

We’re all addicted to speed, so bringing together a bunch of drivers from throughout the world to battle each other on a fast course inside the Bird’s Nest should make for spectacular results. I can’t wait to get the action underway!

Thanks for reading my SPEEDtv.com blog, and I’ll talk to you tomorrow!

Follow Tanner over the holidays on SPEED's Dream Ride, and on his show Supercars Exposed.

Learn more about Tanner at http://tannerfoust.com, his drifting program at ScionRacing.com, and follow his progress online at the Race of Champions on Radio Le Mans.
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