Race car drivers deal with a lot of the same challenges as regular people behind the wheel. During races, they can get hungry, they might have to go to the bathroom (and occasionally solve that problem in an unpleasant manner) and, sometimes, they have to sneeze.
All those issues are more easily addressed when you’re not driving 200 miles per hour. But amazingly drivers manage, as IndyCar star Alexander Rossi recently explained.
Ahead of the start to the 2021 IndyCar season this weekend, Rossi took interview questions from kids. And 7-year-old Logan asked a very important one: “How do you pick your nose during the race without getting seen?”
Rossi simply said: “You just do it. Like, no one’s going to see you.”
"It came out of nowhere."@AlexanderRossi took questions from kids, and went into detail on the time he had a sneezing fit while racing 200+ MPH around @IMS. #INDYCAR pic.twitter.com/E1dFxJiWkq
— IndyCar on NBC (@IndyCaronNBC) April 13, 2021
The Andretti Autosport driver explained that it’s not too challenging to get his hand inside his helmet, but it’s more to scratch his nose than pick it. And it’s even easier when the race is under caution, as opposed to going full speed.
Nose picking aside, Rossi went on to share a story of sneezing while racing at Indianapolis Motor Speedway when he was comfortably driving faster than 200 miles an hour. And he had no choice but to close his eyes for a split-second.
He explained:
“I did sneeze once at Indianapolis, and that was a wild experience. Like, I sneezed going down the front straightaway. … It came out of nowhere because I would have tried to hold it in otherwise. I don’t know if it was allergy season, but yeah, I was just driving along, and it was just this massive sneeze. And that was fine, but then when you open your eyes again, it’s, like, weird. It was a weird — it took a half-second to refocus.”
Just… terrifying. But, of course, the 2016 Indianapolis 500 champ handled it like a pro.
The 2021 IndyCar Series season begins Sunday with the Honda Indy Grand Prix of Alabama at Barber Motorsports Park (3 p.m. ET, NBC).
Listen to the new season of our true crime podcast, The Sneak: The Disappearance of Mario Rossi
