[Schumi]

I met Dave once. It was at the 100 Acre Wood rally in Salem MO one year. They were pulling the cars out of Parc Ferme and everyone was getting ready to head out of town on the first transit stage of the event. I was crewing for a team and had some time to walk up and down the paddock. I was doing so in order to try and catch the eye of this cute woman co-driver of another one of the big name drivers... well, that didn't work and so I'm standing there in the middle of the lineup and there is some sort of usual shenanigans regarding someone's time card. Dave is in his car next to me, and gets word it will be a while before they will be taking off, so he decides to get out and stretch a bit. At first it didn't quite hit me who he was, I wasn't paying much attention. It was damn cold, I think there was snow on the ground... Dave and I start talking about the road conditions; I think this was his first year there, and maybe his first year rallying. I had co-driven those stages before and so we start talking about some of it... he seemed kinda nervous. he asked me what I do and who I'm working with and so on, and one of his crew offered me some of their hot chocolate or coffee while we were chatting; I honestly can't remember what all we talked about but we just kinda hung there for about 15 minutes until it looked like everyone was rolling out. I shook his hand and said good luck and to have fun at it, he said likewise. A huge smile on his face the entire time... he was just really really happy to be doing the event. Again I wish I remembered more of what we talked about; but I went away thinking how sincere, nice, and down to earth he was and couldn't wait to tell all my friends back at the service area how I had hung out in the paddock with Dave Mirra.

Seeing the news today... got me down a bit. Sad to think he decided it was time to go already.