Fun book about a woman taking up car racing later in life after she becomes a professor mother and wife I learned about race car driving along the way Fast Girl Don t Brake Until You See the Face of God and Other Good Advice from the Racetrack This book was an ok read Meeting the author was far fascinating She is a bundle of energy some of which came out in the book Fast Girl Don t Brake Until You See the Face of God and Other Good Advice from the Racetrack Pretty good Not quite as technical as I was hoping but very entertaining Well worth the read and the late fines at the library Fast Girl Don t Brake Until You See the Face of God and Other Good Advice from the Racetrack Ingrid Steffensen is a New Jersey mom an art history professor a banker s wife and a race car driver Her memoir Fast Girl explains how she left the norms of suburban life in the dust and learned to love the race track. Read Literary Mama s full review here Fast Girl Don t Brake Until You See the Face of God and Other Good Advice from the Racetrack The author took up running and then bicycling because of her husband When she turned 40 she took up her husband s sport of racetrack driving A little detail than I would have wanted racetrack driving is not high on my agenda of things I might like to do Fast Girl Don t Brake Until You See the Face of God and Other Good Advice from the Racetrack I was given this book to read by my sister in law a fast car enthusiast I found it a pleasant read The author has a good sense of humor as she describes her family life career and new love driving fast in her yellow Lotus It might resonate most with people in their forties wondering what is out there to spice up their nice but unexciting life Fast Girl Don t Brake Until You See the Face of God and Other Good Advice from the Racetrack This book could be about mountain climbing or whitewater kayaking or any activity that requires intense focus and advanced physical skills. Unlike the average book about racing it s not about cars and winning though both those areas are covered Rather it s about one woman s midlife discovery of her ability to exceed her own and others expectations and have a ball while doing it. Ingrid s literate sassy style describes her transition from suburban career mom to track tigress so for guys and gals who know the scene but plenty entertaining for minivan driving mommies and other non racers More important Ingrid makes sense of a passion utterly bewildering or offensive to people outside autosports So even if they have zero interest they can now at least understand why other people love it And find the road to their own expansion and excitement Fast Girl Don t Brake Until You See the Face of God and Other Good Advice from the Racetrack Most of this poor review has to do with the book not living up to the catalog description So if you re looking for a book about a suburban mom who becomes a racer this isn t for you Why Well for one she doesn t RACE She s done several Driver s Education events at major tracks nothing to sneeze at but she doesn t go beyond the intermediate level and uses a stock car Granted she goes from a Mini Cooper to a Lotus Elise but it s not an ACTUAL race car My other MAJOR problem with this book is that it s 80 90% fluff You get a little of her journey how she got into it what she thinks about when she s driving the rush of clearing out her Mommy Mind with the focus of high speed driving but not much else In fact she spends the majority of the book covering such asinine topics as what kind of underwear to wear to the track lacy boy shorts apparently though I d side with the comfortable cotton bikini bottoms what sort of food to expect fried everything duh what sort of swag people bring and what that indicates about their racing commitment level and lastly whether the rush of the sport is worth the environmental damage it causes Ok that last one was sorta interesting but she doesn t provide much beyond basic calculations and then the general defense that everyone needs to kick back somehow Overall VERY chick lit If you re a middle class suburban mom intrigued by racing by all means read it But if you re looking for a real book about an actual female racer and her struggles in the sport find something else Maybe the Grey Wolf she mentions meeting has written something Guilty for enjoying the one chapter where she mentions her brief contacts with other women at the track Fast Girl Don t Brake Until You See the Face of God and Other Good Advice from the Racetrack Life in Ingrid Steffensen s New Jersey suburb was safe comfortable and predictable A college professor wife and mother of a preadolescent daughter her carefully cultivated world was comprised of the usual family work book clubs yoga classes and date nights Then one day thinking she d be a good sport and maybe learn something about what made her car crazed husband tick she put a helmet on her head took her Mini Cooper to the racetrack and learned how to drive it really really fast Soon what began as a whim became a full blown obsession and a freeing journey of self discovery In the eventful exhilarating year that followed her first lesson Steffenson dove head first into high performance driving In the process she discovered the terrifying and addictive thrill of pushing her limits learning an entirely new set of skills and tackling danger head on and found that doing so liberated her in a way that she hadn t even known she needed Fast paced and fun Fast Girl is the quirky real life chronicle of how one woman stepped outside her comfort zone shrugged off the shackles of suburban conformity and changed her entire perspective on life through the unlikeliest of racecar driving Fast Girl Don t Brake Until You See the Face of God and Other Good Advice from the Racetrack.
And how these opposite worlds mix and match to create a fuller life: It happens to be about club level performance sportscar driving accessible to anyone who can afford a car a helmet and several hundred dollars for a weekend away from home, In that regard it s an Everywoman book For those of us involved in the same sport it s also the best description of the female driving experience ever penned