Class drivers recognize other class drivers. There’s a respect between them that unites them. But very rarely, outside of the legends that dominate the racing tracks, do drivers come across someone who has never entered a competition, yet could probably set the motorsports world spinning if they ever strapped into a real race car. Jesse Love appeared to cross paths with one of those hidden talents during a birthday dinner outing in New York.
Advertisement
Love revealed recently that when he and his girlfriend were en route to the venue, they were running about 15 minutes behind schedule and, based on the distance and traffic, expected to arrive roughly 10 minutes late. They caught an Uber, a classic yellow cab, driven by a man who didn’t say a single word to either of them.
That silence, however, didn’t prevent the driver from putting on a show. Love described the experience by saying, “When I leave the No. 2 car and go to the Cup Series, I think he probably needs to drive my car. He was probably the best driver I’ve ever seen in my life.”
The remark wasn’t hyperbole because the cab driver shaved time off the route in a way Love couldn’t believe.
“He got us there five minutes before our reservation. And I don’t think we hit anybody, but we might have. And he was probably the best driver I’ve ever seen in my life,” Love said. The Richard Childress Racing driver joked that these are exactly the kinds of drivers teams can never seem to find when they actually need one.
Love admitted he felt a combination of relief and shock, grateful they lucked into a fast driver while running late, even if the ride left them both wide-eyed. And the thrill didn’t end when their dinner rush did. On the way to the studio later on, Love found himself analyzing the Uber driver’s habits and comparing them to his own.
He said he kept thinking that if he ever had to navigate New York traffic in a rental car, he would probably irritate half the city. He imagined himself hesitating at the wrong moments, drawing honks from every direction, and generally turning the street grid against him.
The 20-year-old summed up his thoughts with a laugh, saying he believes he would make a terrible New York City driver because, to him, the job would require him to swap paint. Meanwhile, the anonymous cabbie, however, left him convinced that some of the best wheelmen in the world never see a starting grid at all.
