Despite rough childhood, magic can happen

A lifelong goal fulfilled: How I got to live out my dream of riding in a race car with Mario Andretti

A lifelong goal fulfilled: How I got to live out my dream of riding in a race car with Mario Andretti
Courtesy photo

Ever since I was a young man, I have always had a major interest in car racing. I don't know what it was that drew me to the sport but I have always loved it. Back when I was younger, while other kids loved watching cartoons and animaes, I was different. What I watched was a VHS copy of ESPN's CART year in review from 1996. Every day, I sat next to the TV and memorized all of the finishes and the winners of the races. From that point on, I knew I was an Indycar fan for life. While I was watching the greats like Michael Andretti, Jimmy Vasser and Alex Zanardi, I promised myself that I would get to ride in an Indycar and now thanks to the great people at Sportsmap and Giant Noise, on Thursday March 21 I got to fulfill a dream of a lifetime.

For some of the people that don't know me, growing up I had a lot of trouble socially. While I didn't necessarily have a hard time talking to people, keeping them around was a whole different story. I struggled with paying attention to other people when talking to them because I could only think about one thing and usually that was racing,

This was especially difficult in my early years of elementary school. Due to my lack of attention span, my parents (especially my mom) did all they could to try and help me have a better time in school. They took me to psychiatrists and I was placed on multiple medications to no avail. In 2002 I was diagnosed with Asperger's Syndrome, a mild form of autism. This was very difficult for me because I was treated differently than anyone else by everyone at my schools due to my disorder. I was placed in smaller classes where the work I had to do seemed to be much less than anyone else. I felt horrible and I felt like I wasn't as smart or as normal as anyone else around me.

The one thing that helped me get through it though was my dream to hopefully ride in one of the indycar's that I watched so much of growing up. At a young age, I always told everyone I knew that one day, I was going to ride in a race-car and while there were many drivers that I told people I was going to ride with, one of the many names I mentioned was racing legend Mario Andretti. Flash forward many years later that time came. After getting into one of the fire suits and putting on one of their helmets I was summoned to which car I would ride in and guess who happened to be driving? Mario Andretti! When I strapped into the car while at that moment I couldn't believe that I had made it, I always knew that if I worked hard, met the right people and never gave up I would be able to achieve the dream I had hoped for and overall, riding in the car was one of the most incredible things to ever have happened to me!

As cliche as it sounds, life is a lot like racing in a way. No matter the obstacle, everyone has to keep going towards the checkered flag. Also like in racing It's essential to have a great team around you and I could not be more grateful for the people I met here at SportsMap, ESPN 97.5 and Giant noise. The people who did the most for me though where my mom,dad and my late grandmother. They did everything in their power to get me to where I am at today while they could have easily told me that there were other careers I should go into they always believed that I could cover motorsports. At the end of the day like in racing, there will always be minor setbacks but as long as you believe that you can win, you will find a way. Don't ever give up on the things you want to do.

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Jake Meyers is the latest Astro to be rushed back from injury too soon. Photo by Tim Warner/Getty Images.

Houston center fielder Jake Meyers was removed from Wednesday night’s game against Cleveland during pregame warmups because of right calf tightness.

Meyers, who had missed the last two games with a right calf injury, jogged onto the field before the game but soon summoned the training staff, who joined him on the field to tend to him. He remained on the field on one knee as manager Joe Espada joined the group. After a couple minutes, Meyers got up and was helped off the field and to the tunnel in right field by a trainer.

Mauricio Dubón moved from shortstop to center field and Zack Short entered the game to replace Dubón at shortstop.

Meyers is batting .308 with three homers and 21 RBIs this season.

After the game, Meyers met with the media and spoke about the injury. Meyers declined to answer when asked if the latest injury feels worse than the one he sustained Sunday. Wow, that is not a good sign.

 

Lack of imaging strikes again!

The Athletic's Chandler Rome reported on Thursday that the Astros didn't do any imaging on Meyers after the initial injury. You can't make this stuff up. This is exactly the kind of thing that has the Astros return-to-play policy under constant scrutiny.

The All-Star break is right around the corner, why take the risk in playing Meyers after missing just two games with calf discomfort? The guy literally fell to the ground running out to his position before the game started. The people that make these risk vs. reward assessments clearly are making some serious mistakes.

The question remains: will the Astros finally do something about it?


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