So my brother and I attended the Petit LeMans this weekend and as we had to pass through Charlotte I figured we could take a quick side trip and see if we could locate the HQ/Factory for the new USF1 Formula 1 team.
About a week before, I had dug around and found what I thought “might” be the physical address, but wasn’t sure. So on the drive down we meet up about a block away and then drive up in my brother’s car to the address. There is zero to indicate that a racing team is based out of the location. However the parking lot has a few cars that don’t fit the profile of the industrial park including a Lotus Elise. We walk up to the door and in very small print is “USF1”. There is a big “No Soliciting” sign on the door that is larger than the team logo/name. That is all there is to indicate who is at that address.
As we are trying to look through the mirrored door to see if anyone is home someone opens the door and says “come on in”. We walk in as he walks out. There is nobody at the reception desk right at that moment. We are in the lobby, but it’s not right to just start walking the hallways uninvited, so we just walk back out.
We quickly realize that it would make a greate photo if we could pull his plate of his car and pose next to the logo on the front door. But we don’t have any tools in his car to remove the plate, so we quickly drive back to mine and then pull the plate off his. My brother’s license plates of recent years have been F1 themed. His last one was “HONDA F1” or something like that. But with Honda no longer in F1, he just received his new plate which says “GO USF1”.
We drive back and just as we are starting to pose and take photos at the front door a few guys pull up and head past us into the building. They see what we are doing and they get a real kick out of my brother’s license plate. We chat with them and within a few minutes a small crowd of guys come out of the building to see what is going on and one of them is Ken Anderson who is one of the two team principles.
Ken is just about as quiet in person as he is in his TV interviews, but he is very friendly and he also gets a kick out of the license plate. I feel no reason to grill him with questions like “Have you picked drivers yet?” So we chat for a few minutes, pose for a picture with Ken and some of the USF1 guys also snap photos with cell phones. Someone from USF1 comes out with a digital camera and gets a few photos of us and the license plate as well.
It was kind of surreal. If I was them, I would have politely told us “Thanks for the support, but you have to leave the premises”. I totally expect that it’s going to be harder and harder for someone to pull off something like this again in the future. That well meaning fans like us are going to be a headache.
Left to right is me, Ken Anderson and my brother Jon. Note the small USF1 logo just over my brothers shoulder...
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Richard Casto
1972 Porsche 914
2013 Honda Fit Sport
2015 Honda Fit EX
http://motorsport.zyyz.comMoney can't buy happiness, but somehow it's more comfortable to cry in a Porsche than a Kia.
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I like watching the F1 races, especially now that its gotten competitive. But I like watching any road racing for the most part. I miss the winter season when Speed back when it wasn't NASCRAP/Reality Show channel when the would show Australian Supercars, DTM, BTCC, WRC. Now its just reruns of PINKS, Wrecked, Jacked, PINKS, some other reality show, Barrett Jackson, PINKS etc.
