Driving ambition
When racing giant Emerson Fittipaldi came to town to compete in the Molson Indy, he had his family in tow. Jessica Dee Humphreys hears from his daughter Joana
Emerson Fittipaldi’s two passions are cars and family. So when the Brazilian racing legend set a Molson Indy record in 1989, he made sure to include his daughter Joana in the celebrations.
“(My father) really liked the family to always be together,” says Joana, who was two at the time. “It was important for him that we go to all the races.”
Speed was in Emerson’s blood: both his mother and father raced cars, and he and his brother, Wilson, began racing motorcycles and hydroplanes, as well as cars, in their early teens. When this picture was taken by Star photographer John Mahler in 1989, the 43-year-old Emerson had set a Molson Indy record of 59.499 seconds for one lap — driving through Exhibition Place and on Lakeshore Blvd. — in the qualifying round, beating his own record, set the previous day.
Fittipaldi was in town with Joana, wife Therese, son Jayson and two other daughters, Juliana and Tatiana. “The whole family would travel to races,” Joana says. “For Indianapolis, we even lived there for two months because the race was so important.” Despite having been very young, she clearly recalls the excitement of the crowd: “I remember people calling out for him, ‘Emmo! Emmo!’”
All the Fittipaldi children would be pulled from school to follow their father around the world. That intense schedule was the reason Emerson Fittipaldi wanted his family to join him, so he could spend quality time with them while pursuing his beloved and lucrative passion (he earned more than $4 million over five Indy seasons alone).
“Because we had to go from one motorhome to another,” Joana says, “I would ride on a little motorcycle with him.” The family also had a tradition right before each race: “We would tell my father when he entered his car, ‘Pisa na barata,’ which translates as ‘step on the cockroach!’ ”
Joana — who works in children’s mental health in New York as a play therapist — admits she doesn’t have her father’s competitive gene. “He tried to have me race go-carts,” she says. “I liked to go in them, but I didn’t like to compete.” However, she is proud to say her 13-year-old half-brother (also named Emerson) is one to watch; the senior Fittipaldi currently devotes his time to coaching his son. “My father lives in Italy now and is no longer racing,” she says. “But he is still in the same world.”