Shelby Manning (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
shelbycobra) wrote in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
muserevival2015-12-05 11:54 am
shelbycobra) wrote in muserevival2015-12-05 11:54 am
Entry tags:
110.2.3 - quote
"The vision of a champion is bent over, drenched in sweat, at the point of exhaustion, when nobody else is looking."
The car pulls to a stop in its pit box. Her gloves come off, then aching hands slowly lift the helmet from her head. Her eyes are already burning with the threat of tears that she won't allow herself to cry until much later and somewhere else. She pushes herself up to climb out, but when she tries to make the move upward, she slips and it's only the quick arm of one of her crew members that keeps her from falling off and onto the asphalt. She is totally and completely exhausted, and she is the champion.
In those few fleeting beats, before she's swarmed by photographers wanting that first picture and league personnel ushering her to Victory Lane and well-wishers congratulating her on a job well done, Shelby is remembering every moment that led up to this.
She thinks about all the times that she was scared that she wouldn't make it here. Sitting up at three in the morning in the kitchen of her parents' house the night before the Rolex 24 with nothing but fear in her heart. Running away to the hauler the day of St. Petersburg, needing a moment to get her shit together. Seeing the Team Penske logo on the opposite wall and realizing that now the standards were so much higher than they'd ever been before and thinking, I'm not going to be good enough.
She thinks about how there were more fights this season than any other. Arguing with Shane on the pit stand at Long Beach and then getting dressed down by her team owner for the first time in her career. That time she took Terry's head off at Milwaukee even though it wasn't his fault the damn car wouldn't perform. Cross words exchanged in the heat of battle for a championship, when two years ago she'd never have raised her voice.
She thinks about all the close calls. The shifter snapping off in her hand mid-charity race, grabbing what was left and just hoping that would be enough. That stupid fucking crash at Avondale, just having to throw her hands up and wait for the pain of impact. Being backwards and on fire in Indianapolis. Feeling honestly afraid for her life in Fontana and knowing that there was nothing she could do but keep going too fast, too hard, too much. Then the moments that hurt more than anything that could happen to her, having to visit one friend in the hospital and attending another colleague's funeral.
She thinks about the night she'll never tell anyone about. Leaving the track at Fontana with her nerves and her faith utterly shaken, reconsidering her life choice for the first time in 29 years and then hating herself for reconsidering it. Wondering if she could ever do anything else other than this. Laying in bed at the hotel, unable to stop the uneasiness in her soul, and turning up at her strategist's room just needing him to hold her and say to her that she wasn't going to lose it all.
Shelby knows that while this has been the best year of her career, it has also been the most trying. She has never cried as much as she has this season. Never yelled as much or been yelled at like that before. Never really looked down the barrel of her life and confronted the fear of dying with just a trophy to her name. Never had a moment where she said, I don't want to do this anymore.
Most people will never know seventy-five percent of it. No interview ever asks about the hours spent in the gym until she can barely stand, or the nights she gave up so she could help in the garage or spend more time preparing for the next track. No one will write about how she lost touch with most of her family and only saw her husband three times in six months. There will be some mention tomorrow about how she has to be helped to her seat by her fellow drivers at the press conference and will be taken to the infield care center afterward and diagnosed with dehydration. But generally, many observers will never understand just what she and her loved ones have been through to get her to this point, standing here as the champion she always wanted to be.
She's fine with that. She doesn't need to be clapped on the shoulder or high-fived for those long nights or draining days. She appreciates that pushing herself to the edge is what it takes to do this thing that she has chosen. She knows that each of those moments is also a memory, and as she's escorted to the podium and through the crowd, that's what makes her blink back those tears and smile.
--
Shelby Manning Martin
Need for Speed OC
806 words
The car pulls to a stop in its pit box. Her gloves come off, then aching hands slowly lift the helmet from her head. Her eyes are already burning with the threat of tears that she won't allow herself to cry until much later and somewhere else. She pushes herself up to climb out, but when she tries to make the move upward, she slips and it's only the quick arm of one of her crew members that keeps her from falling off and onto the asphalt. She is totally and completely exhausted, and she is the champion.
In those few fleeting beats, before she's swarmed by photographers wanting that first picture and league personnel ushering her to Victory Lane and well-wishers congratulating her on a job well done, Shelby is remembering every moment that led up to this.
She thinks about all the times that she was scared that she wouldn't make it here. Sitting up at three in the morning in the kitchen of her parents' house the night before the Rolex 24 with nothing but fear in her heart. Running away to the hauler the day of St. Petersburg, needing a moment to get her shit together. Seeing the Team Penske logo on the opposite wall and realizing that now the standards were so much higher than they'd ever been before and thinking, I'm not going to be good enough.
She thinks about how there were more fights this season than any other. Arguing with Shane on the pit stand at Long Beach and then getting dressed down by her team owner for the first time in her career. That time she took Terry's head off at Milwaukee even though it wasn't his fault the damn car wouldn't perform. Cross words exchanged in the heat of battle for a championship, when two years ago she'd never have raised her voice.
She thinks about all the close calls. The shifter snapping off in her hand mid-charity race, grabbing what was left and just hoping that would be enough. That stupid fucking crash at Avondale, just having to throw her hands up and wait for the pain of impact. Being backwards and on fire in Indianapolis. Feeling honestly afraid for her life in Fontana and knowing that there was nothing she could do but keep going too fast, too hard, too much. Then the moments that hurt more than anything that could happen to her, having to visit one friend in the hospital and attending another colleague's funeral.
She thinks about the night she'll never tell anyone about. Leaving the track at Fontana with her nerves and her faith utterly shaken, reconsidering her life choice for the first time in 29 years and then hating herself for reconsidering it. Wondering if she could ever do anything else other than this. Laying in bed at the hotel, unable to stop the uneasiness in her soul, and turning up at her strategist's room just needing him to hold her and say to her that she wasn't going to lose it all.
Shelby knows that while this has been the best year of her career, it has also been the most trying. She has never cried as much as she has this season. Never yelled as much or been yelled at like that before. Never really looked down the barrel of her life and confronted the fear of dying with just a trophy to her name. Never had a moment where she said, I don't want to do this anymore.
Most people will never know seventy-five percent of it. No interview ever asks about the hours spent in the gym until she can barely stand, or the nights she gave up so she could help in the garage or spend more time preparing for the next track. No one will write about how she lost touch with most of her family and only saw her husband three times in six months. There will be some mention tomorrow about how she has to be helped to her seat by her fellow drivers at the press conference and will be taken to the infield care center afterward and diagnosed with dehydration. But generally, many observers will never understand just what she and her loved ones have been through to get her to this point, standing here as the champion she always wanted to be.
She's fine with that. She doesn't need to be clapped on the shoulder or high-fived for those long nights or draining days. She appreciates that pushing herself to the edge is what it takes to do this thing that she has chosen. She knows that each of those moments is also a memory, and as she's escorted to the podium and through the crowd, that's what makes her blink back those tears and smile.
--
Shelby Manning Martin
Need for Speed OC
806 words