We'll make this note into a quiz. I am predicting that most of you will not do well. Ready?
Here are a few clues. The highest paid athlete does not spell his name Shoemaker. While he is competing, he is sitting down. The largest audience is not for the Super Bowl.
The man is Michael Schumacher, and he earns about $81,000,000 dollars a year, before the endorsement money rolls in. The sport is Formula One auto racing.
Before he retires, he is expected to set new records in all categories of Formula One racing. At the start of the 2002 season, Schumacher had won 53 Grand Prix races, the most of any driver ever. He is wildly acclaimed by German citizens who have had a drought of Formula One winning drivers. They say it doesn't matter what the capabilities of the car are. When he gets into a car, his sheer force of will propels the car.
The sport events which draw the largest crowds are the Olympics and World Soccer, but they are not held annually. The Super Bowl, it is said, draws an audience of about 135 million. Formula One racing draws an average TV audience of 300 million per race. There are now fourteen Grand Prix races per year. At an earlier time this year, Schumacher had won nine of these races for the year, with some races yet to be run.
Formula One refers to the specifications for the cars entered in the race. It is the top, or fastest, class of car, if you want to call them cars. At least they have four wheels and an engine.
Schumacher got his start in Go-Kart racing at the age of 4. That was in 1973, so he has been racing for almost twenty years. His relaxation? He still loves to race Go-Karts.
His favorite dessert? Kaiserschmarrn which is made with fried plums.
[For a recipe for Kaiserschmarrn, in German, go here ; for a recipe in English, go here . Both these recipes use rum-raisens (raisens soaked in Rum) instead of plums. Another good recipe, in English, is here . By the way, "Kaiserschmarrn" means "Emperor's Trash" or "King's Trash" in English, and the dish supposedly originated in Vienna, Austria. A nice page for German recipes, and other German food and drink links, is located here . GWD Web Manager]
I bet you did not know all of this unless you have read the October/November issue of "
German Life
".
(21 Nov 02)
We gratefully acknowledge the work of John Blankenbaker who published over 2,500 Germanna History Notes via the Germanna-L@rootsweb.com email list from 1997 to 2008. We are equally thankful to George Durman (Sgt. George) for hosting the list and republishing the notes via rootsweb.com.