[Note: This article was written when the Thunder Valley Racing web site was organized like a virtual race track.)

Don't worry about it. Thunder Valley Racing is all in your head. We don't 'really' have a race track with a Drivers' Trailer, a Press Box, a Pits area, and a VIP Tent. We don't 'really' feature hundreds of women race car drivers competing daily in a full complement of races and in all racing series. This newsletter, Distant Thunder, isn't 'really' stacked up at the viewing areas around the track.

It's just a little idea, a little thing that brings together many thousands of women and men across the English-speaking world. We get together every now and then and talk about our victories and defeats, scheme about the upcoming racing season, and know that we are among friends.

I got a kick out of seeing the headline, 'Thunder Valley Featured Drivers Finish Strong at Petit Le Mans' in the nov00 issue of Distant Thunder. Sure, Divina, Cindi, and Belinda have all been featured on the Thunder Valley Racing web site and all participate, in one way or another, in the ongoing dialogue. But the community of women drivers is only one of the groups to which they belong, and, perhaps, not the most important group.

And yet, when you read Roni McCann's Race Notes and think of this sixteen year old school girl from Western Australia sharing with us her first experience among the leading ranks of professional race car drivers, you must come away with the idea that something is going on here.

Roni has her own version of Thunder Valley that she carries around with her.It's a place, in her head to be sure, where she is fully accepted as a race car driver. It's a place where her passion, determination, and skills are understood and appreciated for exactly what they are, no more and no less.

We all need such a place, a place where we find unconditional acceptance. Women race car drivers go forth each weekend to do battle, sometimes against other women, more often as the only female on the grid. For many of them, Thunder Valley is a place, a place only in their heads, but a place where they can be truly who they are.

So, don't worry about it. Thunder Valley Racing is just in your head. At least I hope it is.