NAPLES, Fla. -- When it comes to handling an emergency, Todd Coulter of Naples, Fla. understands the significance of hustle.

So it only makes sense that in an environment where speed and peril coexist with human drive and a lack of fear, he's a natural.

As if the 38-year-old Collier County EMS flight medic doesn't have enough of a challenge on his "regular" job, he takes matters to a different extreme 14 to 17 weekends each year as a member of the CART Simple Green Safety Team.

Oh, sure, the job can be gobs of fun.

But it is anything but monkey business.

For when it comes to the well being of the world-class drivers and influential team members he serves -- and reveres, there can no substitute for safety.

To think that up until seven years ago, he'd never even been to an automobile race. His CART co-workers joke that he'd never even been to the dog track.

"I guess I always thought racing was just a bunch of Bubbas from Texaco,'' Coulter said. "You know, the tire changer, spittin' and chewin'? But when I met these guys, they had Ph.D.s. Even the tire guys bachelor's degrees in rubber engineering. It's high technology. I just fell in love with the whole thing."

It was by happenstance that Coulter was exposed to the sport.

He had been doing EMS duty in Naples for about a year when he was asked to work some overtime at the nearby Ford test track, where CART regular Jimmy Vasser was testing his high-speed machinery.

The director of CART's safety team happened to be there that day.

"He told me he gets 1,200 resumes a year,'' Coulter said.

"But kind of on a whim, I sent my stuff in and as it turned out, I was one of two who were picked.''

It wasn't until he received a fax asking for his fireproof safety suit size, though, that he knew he was off to the races.

This weekend, he and wife, Amy, are off to Australia, where on Sunday, the CART FedEx Championship Series stages its Honda Indy 300 at Surfers Paradise.

During all of the practice sessions, qualifying and the race itself, Coulter will patrol the pit area, keeping the local firefighters and safety workers on their toes.

Coulter admits that he, Amy and their two children, 8-year-old Jordan and 5-year-old Zach, have adapted their lifestyles to meet the demands of his moonlighting.

"It's different that my regular job,'' he says. "I've never worked on a friend or a family member in 16 years as a medic.

"But CART is like a big family. Everybody travels together. You get to know the drivers. We depend on each other in little different areas. You hear the drivers say all the time that it's just nice to look up and see us guys in yellow."

In Miami, Coulter was happy to see last weekend end without major incident. His worst enemy during the Grand Prix Americas was the sweltering South Florida heat, in which, a man zipped up for hours on end in a multi-layered fireproof suit, can sweat off more than a few pounds.

Early in the race, he helped push the car of Patrick Carpentier out of the tight racing groove after Carpentier lost control near the entrance to the pits.

Later in the afternoon, Coulter was making his rounds a fair distance from the pit entrance when Japanese driver Shinji Nakano rolled his racer up to the wall and quickly unbuckled his belts even before the car came to a stop.

Coulter sprinted to the scene, but CART officials already had helped douse the invisible fire that results from the methanol fuel.

"It feels like you're on a barbecue,'' says Coulter, who has experienced the phantom flames before. "You can't see it, but you when you put your hand out there to get that last pork chop and you go, 'Gaaawleee'? That's exactly what it feels like. It just kind of cooks you."

A man who enjoys piloting small airplanes, Coulter says he's always been lured to speed.

Hanging around the exotic world of major league racing helps quench his thirst for thrills.

He's never been behind the wheel of one of the CART cars, though.

"I probably think about that once every five minutes. It was probably more than that when I first got into it," he laughs. "Because I'm a speed freak anyway.

I'm one of those guys who thinks 'I was born to race. I know I can do it.' But I probably couldn't. I'd probably get in there and smack that thing into the wall.''

On the weekends that Amy, Todd's wife of 12 years, doesn't accompany him to the track, she said she's at peace even though he sometimes must put himself in precarious positions in the line of

"I don't worry about him,'' she says. "If I sat here and worried what he was doing every day, I'd probably go nuts. I know his personality. He knows what he's doing."