The man shaking my hand in this photo was the top Federally in all of Mexico and clearly very well respected by everyone everywhere we went. As he shook my hand at the start of the last high speed stage of the final day he told us what a pleasure it was to have us racing in his country. WHAT? A pleasure to have us racing in his country??? Here was a man who for 7 days had helped us break every single motor vehicle known to man kind and then he made us promise we come and do it all over again.
Have you ever taken a wrong turn on the freeway and then realize not only is it the wrong way but you don't have a clue how far into the wrong direction it will take you before you will be able to find a place to get turned around? Well that's exactly what happened one day to Jon and I during the 2007 La Carrera Panamericana. After realizing we had taken a turn onto a different freeway which Jon assumed was the wrong one I just pulled off to the side of the freeway. As soon as we saw one of the Federallys who was traveling with the LCP cars we flagged him down. To make matters worse the Federally didn't know either but he knew how to find out and within a few seconds he pulled over a local police officer and told him we were in a hurry and needed directions. As bad luck would have it we were now on the wrong freeway and it was a LONG way to turn around but as good luck would have it the Federally smiled and said, "FOLLOW ME!" With that he turned on his flashing lights and we began backing up on the freeway and kept on backing right on up the on ramp in oncoming traffic until we got back to the freeway which would take us the right direction. If that wasn't cool enough then the Federally kept his lights on stopping traffic until there was an opening for us to pull out into traffic. As soon as were were back on the freeway the Federally gave us an escort thru traffic flashing lights and all that got faster and faster as we went on our merry way. VIVA MEXICO!
