Talent Behind the Wheel a Harvard Summa Aims for NASCAR
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ALUM NI ken of his commitment to honesty and should be taken as Shakespeare’s last ers seeking more should consult Vendler’s beauty, and well versed in suspicion and word on love, truth, beauty, or poetry. As commentary or poet Don Paterson’s chatty duplicity. in so many of the plays, the fatalistic and Reading Shakespeare’s Sonnets. But Ideas of Order This view of the sonnets should give doubt-wracked conclusion of the son- is an ideal introductory companion to the us pause. It implies that the most famous nets tears apart the repertoire of concepts sonnets—more detailed than the Arden or poems—“Shall I compare,” “When in the that advanced us to the ending in the first Norton introductions and footnotes, but sessions,” “That time of year,” “Let me not place. less overwhelming than the line-by-line to the marriage”—have by the end of the For those who have the time, the best commentaries. And it also has more than a sequence been repudiated by the poet as manner of proceeding is probably to read few sharp observations and arguments for expressions of a less mature optimism. the sonnets once in full; then to read any veteran of the sonnets to consider. That makes them no less potent distilla- Rudenstine’s essay, referring to the poems tions of powerful emotions, of course. But as needed; and finally to read the sonnets Spencer Lenfield ’12, a former Ledecky Undergrad- it should make us doubt whether any one once more straight through, with the bene- uate Fellow at this magazine, is a Rhodes Scholar sonnet—particularly any early sonnet— fit of his structural insights in mind. Read- studying classics and philosophy at Oxford. ALUMN I Talent Behind the Wheel A Harvard summa aims for NASCAR. by steve potter n 2008, amateur racer Patrick Staropoli ’12 was blasting down the straightaway at Florida’s New I Smyrna Speedway, strapped into a stock car. Even on the tight track, he was traveling close to 100 miles per hour. A cacophonous roar filled the cockpit and the car shook from pure velocity, yet Staropoli stared down an approaching turn that required bal- ancing the 1.5-ton car on the knife- edge of traction. Near the end of the corner, just as all seemed fine, the car’s steering wheel popped of and fell in his lap. “I glanced up,” he recalls, “and an in- stant later I hit the wall.” Staropoli limped away from the wreckage with minor bruises. His main concern was the mechanical damage: “It destroyed the whole front half of the car.” The third- generation racer later learned that the steering wheel had been improperly the car in time for him to run a few more A grinning Staropoli celebrates after installed when he and his crew worked races that summer before heading north winning the NAPA Auto Parts 150 in Irwindale, California, last year. on the car only a few minutes before the for his freshman year at Harvard. crash. Undeterred—even by the fact that The South Florida native is the first in ated summa cum laude, was elected to Phi a crash at the legendary Hialeah Speedway his family to attend college. During four Beta Kappa, and went straight to medical seven years earlier had nearly killed his fa- years in Cambridge, he developed an inter- school at the University of Miami. In the ther—Staropoli and some friends repaired est in neurobiology and ultimately gradu- spring of 2013, he was contemplating a ca- Photograph by Victor Decolongon/NASCAR/Getty Images Harvard Magazine 71 Reprinted from Harvard Magazine. For more information, contact Harvard Magazine, Inc. at 617-495-5746 ALUM NI reer in ophthalmology, which would en- teams, sponsors, and fans, who would also sports where equipment and participation able him to race as an amateur in his spare see a video production of the event. fees are relatively low, and talent alone is time. While studying for final exams, he To enter the contest, Staropoli had often sufcient to attract attention from got a call that changed everything. submitted his racing résumé and the re- the professional leagues. On his smartphone screen was Michael quired self-produced video. But he was Racing runs deep in Staropoli’s family. Waltrip, a two-time winner of NASCAR’s aware that the Dream Challenge was as Both his father and grandfather competed Daytona 500 and owner of a team in the much a public-relations exercise for its on weekends in cars they built and main- Sprint Cup (NASCAR’s highest level of sponsor (Peak makes antifreeze and oth- tained themselves. Staropoli’s first trip racing, akin to organized baseball’s major er auto products) as a serious attempt to to the track was at six weeks: he mostly leagues). Staropoli, he announced, was one identify the next Jimmie Johnson or Dale slept, nestled in his mother’s arms, while of nine finalists, chosen from 700 entrants, Earnhardt Jr. An exceptional performance his father, Nick Staropoli Jr., raced. Fol- to compete in the Peak Stock Car Dream would win him the opportunity to com- lowing a four-month recuperation from Challenge. “It was the single moment I’d pete in a single professional race. It was a that 2001 accident at Hialeah, the elder been praying for my entire life,” Staropoli very long shot. A four-car NASCAR team Staropoli, who owns an auto repair shop, says. It was a one-time opportunity to can employ 200 people and require an $80 returned for three more races, winning one showcase his driving in front of NASCAR million budget—a stark contrast to other before hanging up his helmet. pre-function space for Harvard Hall, and (Club) House Renewal accommodate small private lunches and dinners. The front service desk will be relocated to that side of the lobby as The construction in the parking lot be- General manager Steven P. Cummings, well—the better to welcome guests. All hind the Harvard Club of Boston (HCB)— who came to the club in late 2012 and will be served with new heating, ventilat- facing the Mass Pike, rather than Com- must now juggle operations during major ing, and other systems, brought up to monwealth Avenue—is a harbinger of rebuilding, said that, at a minimum, the code, and refnished historic interiors. improvements to come. Ordinary though goal was to address the overall fow of This work, expected to be done from it may seem, the current work underpins club members and staff “so they meet in February through next fall, is funded in a new back entry that will eliminate the the service experience,” rather than col- part from the $8-million proceeds of the maze of ramps and intersecting corridors liding as they vie for the elevator. The new sale of the upper foors of the annex that now confound members and guests rear entry is only one element of an inte- (above the Boston Room), which are be- proceeding to functions in Harvard Hall rior overhaul that will effect more sub- ing converted to private condominiums. and elsewhere upstairs. The entry, in turn, stantial changes: constructing a new eleva- Assuming all goes as expected, Cummings is part of a larger transformation that will tor for guests (dedicating the existing one, said, the master plan envisions future renew the club’s basic systems (the sole updated, to service use); separating kitch- work: a new tavern and cyber café in the ARVARD CLUB OF BOSTON OF CLUB ARVARD elevator is of World War II vintage), ratio- ens to serve the Boston Room and, for current athletic space, with an open kitch- H nalize traffc patterns (so that guests do plating and serving, Harvard Hall; and re- en and seating for 100 casual-dining pa- not collide with servers rolling carts of confguring much of the frst foor, where trons; the existing grill reprogrammed food), and update facilities for twenty- people enter from Commonwealth. into a business center/library, childcare OURTESY OF THE THE OF OURTESY C frst-century use. The Boston Room will become an up- facility, and central reception area for us- dated restaurant (with ers of athletic facilities and the squash the adjoining Back Bay courts. The 25 guest rooms (down from Room emerging as a 42, after the annex conversion) will grad- wine-themed dining ually be redone as well. space), preceded by a Maintaining calm in the face of the im- cocktail lounge sup- pending construction, Cummings said the planting the current frst phase of the work, this year, is “a little front desk, lobby ter- jolt to keep the existing members and race, and offce space. bring in new ones”—now including MIT The current cocktail affliates, given that campus’s location just lounge, on the left of across the Charles River. Thus, the project the lobby, will become is both a physical updating and an attempt to make the HCB “more family-centric.” Plan for the new As a club, he emphasized, it has an obliga- rear entry—a key to rationalizing the tion to know its customers and “a unique club’s interior opportunity to provide a very high level of spaces and use service,” in quarters to match. 72 January - February 2015 www.alumni.harvard.edu Reprinted from Harvard Magazine. For more information, contact Harvard Magazine, Inc. at 617-495-5746 ALUM NI At 13, Staropoli told his parents he wanted to join in the family hobby. “They said they’d let me race go-karts and help Crimson on Capitol Hill: 114th me do it, but only if I kept my grades up,” he says, noting that the work ethic and The republican resurgence of 2014 af- F.