Driving to the Light - Covid 19

[Tom Helvey]

Last year, sometime in late February or early March, I was becoming aware of the pending pandemic.
My colleagues and I regularly enjoyed lunch and each others company every day in the office lunch room.
One day, one of my friends had an uncontrollable cough at lunch, it wasn't Covid-19, but it was enough to freak me out.
The next day I contacted my manager and informed him that I would be working from home for the time being. Two weeks later, they sent everyone home.
All of the clubs cancelled all autocross and driving events, motorsportreg.com looked like a graveyard, literally everything was cancelled.
The only thing that was available was big track events run by speedVentures, Chuckwalla and other entities. So I started signing up for them whenever I could.
Interestingly enough, a lot of my PCA-SDR friends were doing the same thing. It was great to get to hang out and see them at the track.
After a while it settled into a routine, go to the track, hang out at a distance, monitor my vitals for a couple weeks, repeat.
I also signed up for a couple car control instruction seminars with in car instructors during that period with no issues.
My conclusion is that all of the above was safe and there is little risk for big track events or in car instruction. They are all outdoor activities with a low risk of transmission.
That being said, I still monitor my condition for a week or so after every event.
When the upcoming WSIR event happens, I will have been fully vaccinated and out of the waiting period of 2 weeks.
I'd like to think my previous work on bioinformatics software played some role in the rapid development of mRNA vaccines, but it's probably not the case.
Get vaccinated, get out to the track, have fun. Don't worry.