We arrived early to our lunch meeting at BJ’s in Ontario so we went strolling around Ontario Mills Mall; some went to the coffee shop while others looked at Christmas themed shops; just having a good time.  The East Coast people could not believe the temperature during this time of year because at this time of year, the East Coast is in full winter mode while we were in the 90’s.  They kept on saying how beautiful California is and that they wished they were living out here.  I responded “It’s good to live everywhere; the idea is to have the option to live everywhere…that’s the purpose of having financial freedom!” 

We finally had a chance to go eat.  It was set up as buffet style and we had a private section of the restaurant allocated for our large group.  We had the chance to break bread with new California group.  I can see in their eyes that they were inspired to meet with the top producers of the Company.  At the same time I saw their shyness, which is normal at their early stage in the business.

After lunch, the Emerald Escape Qualifiers and the top 6 producers from California participated in go-kart racing at K1 Speed in Ontario.  It was a very beautiful indoor facility with electric go-karts.  We were split into five groups of eight and after the first group went and they all came back smiling from ear to ear.  They couldn’t stop cheering with excitement saying that they couldn’t believe how fast the cars were.  We all had a chance to drive the go-karts, but did not know the rules of how the contest went.  We thought the races were based on who crossed the finish line first, but came to find that it was based on fastest laps. 

There were a few people that stood out to me; Azya who I thought was not very athletic and would be docile instead impressed me with her smooth driving skills. Then you see Michael Mo, always so level headed and cool; underneath his helmet, I can see his aggression.  Michael was also doing quite well, looking smooth.  When Eddie Mentore passed him, you can see Michael’s competitiveness jumping out of his helmet.  With his head down, arms locked into the steering wheel he chased Eddie for a few laps and eventually passed him.  With Eddie’s competitive edge, of course, he didn’t like that.  Eddie chased Michael down and on one of the corners of the last lap he ran Michael off and pushed his way ahead of him.  In the last half of the lap, Michael was coming back and right when he was about to pass Eddie the time ran out.

It was funny to see our personalities out in the open.  Another Distributor that came to mind was Maria Mobil; we call her our crazy lucky tiger.  Very outspoken and outwardly aggressive, she became the most passive and docile of all.  During the first two laps everybody passed her.   Not surprising though, because on a previous Bahamas trip, she was the only one that didn’t go into the water.  Her bark was definitely bigger than her bite.  After a while she got comfortable with her driving and started passing the others.  All of a sudden, she took a corner too fast and ran right into the wall.  Her go-kart went under the barrier and it ended up landing in her arms.  Her car was buried underneath the barrier!  What did you expect?  That’s our crazy tiger!  

Something I’ve noticed about our group’s personality is that when we get over-confident we crash and become very fearful…how interesting.

Finally it was my turn…I was in the last group.  My group included Suzy Wan and Tita Suarez.  I speculated that we were put together because we were the oldest out of the group.  I thought that this was going to be so much fun for me because these ladies would definitely not be able to drive as fast as I would.  After all, I do race my motorcycle on the track.  However, they put me in the back of the group.  During our first lap there were a lot of traffic congestions because my lady friends moved too slow and slowed me down.  By the third lap I said to myself “To hell with this,” I saw the three ladies, I floored the car, and plowed right through them like bowling pins.  When I finished the race, I was left by myself, I thought I was doing so well.  Then we saw the final scores and surprisingly I came in second; Yeeleng Vang, one of the Northern California Distributors, was number one.

This sport put all of us on a level playing field and the competition was on.  Everyone that has this competitive nature wanted the top spot.  We had some extra time to spare so some groups went on for a second round.  Telicia had a chance to race with Johnny Ly.  Johnny passed Telicia right away and she spent the whole race trying to return the favor.  Johnny managed to elude Telicia’s efforts but she still ended up with better score than I did.  Everybody that went a second time said the cars seemed faster for their second session. 

Time began to run short and my group didn’t get to have a second session.  However, whoever had the top ten fastest lap times competed in a final race against each other.  Unlike the previous sessions, this was not based on lap time; it was based on who crossed the finish line first and the top three racers would be awarded a trophy.

Telicia decided to give me her position to race in the top ten.  I was in the last pole position with Johnny directly in front of me.  We were off; Johnny went pretty quick and passed a few people on the first lap.  I knew that eventually somebody would crash because they were too anxious.  Within the second lap Johnny crashed into 2 people in front of him.  I went from tenth place to sixth by the third lap.  Eventually I passed two more people.  I was now moving to fourth place.  Telicia told me she was so excited to see me move from tenth to fourth. Of course, me being a crazy tiger as well, I got too excited crashed into a wall and did exactly what Maria Mobil did.  I crashed into the barrier and they ended up landing on top of my car. How ironic, I knew better, but the moment got best of me. 

I finally got my go-kart back on the track, but I lost two positions after the crash; stuck at sixth place with only two laps to go.  Johnny finished last and he kept saying was that he was overly aggressive and as in the business, it caused him to fall back.  We all laughed and learned so much that day.  It was very funny to see everybody’s cars spinning out and crashing into each other.  It says so much about our personalities; the aggressive fall back, the shy ones fall all the way back, and the steady ones, careful and strategic, always stayed on top.  In this case, in go-kart racing, Mark Graskemper came in third, Robbie Hendricks came in second, and the big rat, Hector Flores came in first.  That was so much fun, I personally love this sport.  It was exciting to fly the cars sideways on each turn, drifting and coming close to wall just slow enough to be safe.  I’m sure everybody can agree with me, we had an incredible time.