Rookie Driver Marty McFly New Favorite To Win Indy 500

The buzz at Indianapolis Motor Speedway tonight isn’t just coming from the motors of the finely tuned cars out on the track.  This Modern Philosopher has just learned that there has been a last minute entry into tomorrow’s annual running of the Indianapolis 500, and I have decided that the rookie driver is the new favorite to win the race.

Marty McFly, who has been added to the field with a heretofore unheard of Special Sponsor’s Exemption, will be representing Team Clocktower in a very unusual car.  Apparently, the exemption also allows McFly to race in a 1981 DeLorean DMC-12, rather than the usual Indy Car.

While veteran drivers were clearly miffed when informed of the eleventh hour entry, none of them seemed to care after they got a look at the car the new kid on the track plans to race.  “I doubt that thing could do the speed limit, let alone get up to 145 mph,” said one anonymous driver in reference to the average speed seen on the track for the big race.  “Hell, I bet that thing won’t make it five laps without breaking down.”

Dr. Emmett “Doc” Brown, McFly’s crew chief laughed when I told him about the comments made by the other drivers.  “This car doesn’t need to go 145 mph to win the race,” Doc explained to me as he slipped out of his unique yellow protective suit, which looked a lot like the outfit people wore when dealing with radioactive materials.  “All we’ve got to do is get this baby up to 88 mph and the rest is history.”

I asked him if he could further explain his comment, but Brown was too distracted looking for someone named Einstein, who I assumed was the team mechanic since the DeLorean was leaking all sorts of fluids.

McFly made a brief appearance, but told me he wasn’t really allowed to talk about what made the car tick.  He would only say that I should bet everything I had on his winning the race tomorrow.  When he was sure no one else was around, McFly showed me a mock up of tomorrow’s newspaper, which had a photo of him on the cover, kissing the famed Borg-Warner Trophy, and a headline declaring him the race’s winner.

I have to say that I admire such confidence in a driver, and found it oddly quaint that he would go to the effort to have a fake newspaper printed to give him a little more incentive to win.  Before McFly left, I made one more attempt at finding out the significance of 88 mph and why he was so sure he was going to win.

All he gave me was a wink, a charming smile, and the words “flux capacitor”.  Doc Brown never returned to finish the interview, so I have decided to be the crazy writer who takes the word of the brazen driver and his oddball crew chief, and I will declare Marty McFly the favorite to win tomorrow’s Indianapolis 500.

When you are done laughing, please remember that I don’t usually cover car racing.  I took this gig because I needed to get away from all the rain in Maine.  Why not believe in the cocky underdog?  If this were a movie, wouldn’t the Cinderella story in the strange car be everyone’s sentimental favorite to pull off the huge upset?

I’m rooting for Marty McFly, Doc Brown, and their bizarre looking DeLorean.  Stranger things have happened, right?