But outside that and the fact it has one of the most rocking theme songs of all-time – of course I mean Danger Zone, one of Kenny Loggins’ finest – it also provides me with a perfect quote to lead into this column.

“Take me to bed or lose me forever”.

Wait, that’s not it.

“I feel the need, the need for speed”.

While Goose and Maverick were obviously talking about planes, I’m relating it to cars. Sprintcars in particular.

Earlier in the week Nick McGrath spoke pretty heavily about getting outside his comfort zone as a writer, which he did with last weekend’s MTBA XCO National Series at Kinross State Forest.

Coincidentally I was doing the same, but it was all about speedway for me, not mountain biking.

My comfort zone is cricket and rugby union, that’s no secret, but I’m pretty confident writing about most sports and I’ll also back myself to get around anything new without any issues – by that I mean bluffing my way through stories with heavy use of Wikipedia, the most reliable source on the intrawebs.

But speedway?

Well, I’m happy to admit I knew absolutely nothing about it – zilch, nada, zero, zip, nought.

Actually to be completely fair, I still don’t, but after Saturday night I sure as hell have a new appreciation for the sport and, in particular, what the drivers do.

I was offered the fairly unique opportunity of heading down to Valvoline Raceway in Parramatta for the sixth round of the Ultimate Sprintcar Championship last weekend, and jumping in the back of a two-seater sprintcar for a few hot laps with Sydney-based driver Paul Freeman.

I’d never been near a speedway track before and I’m not ashamed to admit I’ve churned out something along the lines of “it’s just people driving pretty quickly in a circle”, although that’s sometimes been in the company of motorsport fans I feel like triggering.

News flash Findlay you idiot – there is a touch more to it than that.

Firstly, they don’t drive “pretty quickly”, they go terrifyingly fast, which I found out as the sprintcars hit the track for their first hot laps.

I, naturally, ignored the sign telling me to stay clear of the fence during racing and was promptly peppered with flying bits of clay from the track, as a handful of drivers got well and truly sideways at god knows what speed – for the record, Google tells me on the straights at Valvoline those sprintcars can hit almost 200km/h.

Cue Findlay deteriorating into a nervous, terrified wreck. 

I’ve bungee jumped, cliff dived and done several other things usually attributed with adrenaline junkies, all of which I felt no nerves before at all, but this absolutely petrified me.

Suddenly I started wishing I’d actually read the waiver I penned the old John Hancock on earlier that day.

Those nerves weren’t helped when, after getting kitted up and strapped in, I admitted to Freeman I knew nothing about the sport, had no clue what to expect and was largely there to try and develop an appreciation.

He responded with, “we’ll sort you out pretty quickly”.

Of course, then the absolute worst thing that could’ve happened, did.

While sitting on the dummy grid – yep, I’ve picked up the jargon – waiting for the green light, I popped my head out of the side of the car to have one last look at the heat that was finishing.

About 10 seconds later, one of the cars flipped, with seemingly no catalyst.

Needed that like a hole in the head.

Then, of course, about 10 seconds after the heat resumed, another one rolled.

I’d been told complete rollovers weren’t that common, and I’d just seen two in the space of as many minutes. Perfect.

I’d just figured out why everyone who asked if I was looking forward to the ride broke into a huge grin – some actually burst out laughing – when I told them I was, because this was basically a completely new sport to me.

With me doing everything I could not to soil my race suit in the back seat, we were pushed onto the track and Freeman kicked the car into gear.

He ambled around as the car warmed up, I didn’t realise that of course, I’d begun thinking it was quite a nice little ride.

Then he smashed the accelerator, we got sideways, I screamed like an 11-year-old girl and started clinging onto the roll cage for dear life.

And then it was over. Wait, no it wasn’t.

We were on the track for a little over a minute, but it felt like an hour.

The best way I can think to describe it is to compare it to a biscuit being towed behind a boat, when you hit the point where you know it’s going to flip at any moment and you know you can do absolutely nothing about it.

You’re there, constantly.

But for all my patheticness in the lead-up and my sheer terror during – which unfortunately you can’t witness because I forgot to charge the GoPro I took down specifically for that, my bad – it was absolutely outstanding.

Terrifying, but outstanding. 

It’s pretty darn exciting to watch too.

In terms of power to weight ratio sprintcars compare to Formula 1 cars and when there’s 20 on the track at the same time it just seems like an accident waiting to happen.

They often do too, particularly when the no-holds-barred main events roll around later in the night.

Then there’s the other categories, the one I most enjoyed was the fender benders. They’re allowed to crash into each other in what, to me, seems like a watered down demolition derby… it’s a race too, although I couldn’t keep up with that. 

I assume they all channel Marge Simpson out there too – “catch ya later, radiator! oh my God. I hit someone... then I taunted him. I've never felt so alive!”

Simpsons reference – tick. I hope you weren’t thinking I’d go through a whole column this size without making one.

All in all, I won’t sit here and tell you speedway is my new favourite sport, because it’s not, but it is something I’ll pay a lot more attention to. 

If you’re not a speedway or motorsport enthusiast, I’d definitely recommend checking it out too, especially if – like I used to – you just think it’s people driving in circles.