I pulled up my socks and fastened my shoes. Well I didn’t really fasten them I was just checking them again. I always did this now before every race. Just superstition really. They’d never once come undone.
I put my feet back into the blocks and crouched back down into the starting position and put my hands on the asphalt. It was almost impossible to touch. The sun had been on it for hours now. It felt sticky and I had, as I always did, a moment of panic about what would happen if some of the searing hot red goo got stuck on my hands. I looked down at them just to check and the reflected heat baked into my face. I couldn’t keep looking so I looked further back to check my feet position. The glittering of the metal was almost dazzling. The colours always seemed so much brighter at the track.
I could feel the people around me were looking up and forward and I just as though I had decided it for myself I did the same.
Bang
