Disclaimer:  If you have been mentioned or referred to in this blog I am not responsible for anything I write and what I do are only my opinion or interpretition so please wait for it’s conclusion before writing or calling. 

Well shame on me for not posting in such a long time but our recent trip to the Bristol Motor Speedway was a trip that was filled with emotion.  A few things first before I get into this escapade.  Thanks to all the help in the garage and out of the garage. Special thanks to my crew for sacraficing not just their time here but the lost time from work and the expense they encoured making our trip to Bristol a sucessful one.  Kadu’s to Eddie for the extra effort helping prep the race car and for his outstanding performance on the track.  It’s not often a driver wishes there were more laps in the race because he and the car were performing exceeding well.

As some of you know right up to Thompson including an interview with Dick Bergerin I was not making the trip with the team to Bristol.  Perhaps this day at Thompson was the first “black cloud” as it was rained out.  The “silver lining”?  It gave us some extra time to prep the car for Bristol.  It also gave an old friend and past sponsor a few day’s to think and on Saturday I got a call from Larry Leary.  He told me it wasn’t right for the car owner not to be with his car and team at Bristol and to meet him because we were heading to Bristol!  What a trip it was.  Only a video could do this story justice but I have to mention a few highlights.  I’m only sorry I don’t know the names of all of those involved.  Things were uneventfull until we got to the airport.  Got there early enough to make it on an earlier plane non-stop to Greensboro as we chose to drive to Bristol from there, about three hours and fifteen minutes.  Rather than the connecting flights etc we thought we would see some of the South.  So after a delay getting passes because three people didn’t know how to operate the computer, we boarded our plane with row six seat asignments.  As we were about to take our seats we were told we couldn’t sit there and Larry said “but these were our assignments”.  “I’m sorry sir but you’ll have to sit in the last row in the plane.”  So we wern’t happy but we complied.  That is until we got there and this terrible odor was escaping from the bathroom holding tank. Now you have to know Larry and with an Irish last name he was turning red in the face, brewing and made a comment to me when Sandy the flight attendant turned from three rows up let him have it.  Well, from my perspective, Sandy was having a bad hair day and her tone was that of woman dressed in leather with a whip in hand rather than one wearing a white blouse with wings.  I’m sure you get the picture.  Larry did move, Sandy did what she could about the odor and shortly after came to me to smooth things over.  You know me, It wasn’t my broom handle  so I stayed pretty calm over the whole ordeal.  Got to Greensboro safely, picked up our rental car and off to Bristol we headed.

Pleasent ride and decided to stop for lunch when we saw a sign for ”Atkins Diner” in Atkins Va. off of Interstate 81.  It wasn’t a diner as we know them here and we almost didn’t go in but what the heck, were here now so we did.  It was the cleanest establishment with the nicest people you could imagine.  Oh yeah, the food was good too!  Told them to watch us on SPEED Wednesday night because we needed some Southern fans and that we would be back on Thursday on our way home.  Good homade cooking, nice people and spotless restrooms.  What more can a traveler ask for! 

To Be Continued 

PART 2

Bristol Motor Speedway….AWSOME facility!  No pictures or discription can equal the experience of being their.  From it’s colorfull exterior illuminated with colored lights, sponsor sign and the like to the thirty degree banking of the track that you walk down as you enter to go into the infield.  Once in the level infield you stand trackside and look up to the top of the grandstands a certain feeling of dizziness and unbalance overcomes you as you peer at the steep incline of the thousands of seats waiting to be occupied.

Tuesday’s evening practice  was about to begin when the skies darkened, you know, that  ”black cloud” and the rain began.  It poured for a short period of time and when it stopped the track workers hit the pavement with four jet driers a couple of sweepers and other pieces of equipment.  I don’t think it was a half hour and we were ready to go onto the track.  Atleast that’s about all it seamed.  There was no doubt that this track crew did this drill before. 

The crew redied the car and Eddie took to the high banks of Bristol a fish swiimming around in a bowl.  A lot of trial and error testing this and that went on until the session was over.  When finished we assessed where we were and where we wanted to be so our game plan was in place for the morning practice session.

Wednesday, game plan in order the crew worked hard to make the changes to the car and it was ready for the start of practice.  You didn’t want to miss any chance to gain more seat time on this race track.  Practice went pretty much as planned although we would of liked to have been a bit faster.  With a NASCAR alotment of tires we were the best we were going to be with the amount of laps on them.  Yes, there was a “black cloud” over Edward once again as he was penalized and parked for a portion of the practice session and this NASCAR Official claims there are no ill feelings against him.  An explaination to the Series Director that Edward did as he was instructed to do by a NASCAR Official prompted his investigation into the incident and Edward’s penalty was lifted and he was permitted to resume practice.  A second “black cloud” grew over the race track as qualifying inspection started and the rain came again in buckets.  This forced the cancelling of qualifying.  This is not what we wanted.  Because this was a North South event it meant that the starting order would be staggered and instead of starting ninth we would be starting the race eighteenth.  We had a much better car than eighteenth.  Excitement was building, the crowds of people were beginning to fill the empty seats and the announcer was getting the people into this”happenning” that was about to begin.  Hopefully you got to watch the race on television if you wern’t there.  Edward was pleased with the race car and was able to advance during the first segment of the race.  At the manditory caution the car was just about where Eddie wanted it to be.  Four tires and fuel and onto the track for the completition of the race.  Good and smart racing by everyone made for a good race and as the laps counted down Eddie continued to pick up spots.  With twenty laps to go, yes, “black cloud” and the caution came out for rain.  Just enough caution laps to reduce Eddie’s chances for another spot or two so he had to settle for a very respectable eighth place finish.  Great job by Eddie, superb job by “Spotter Jon” and the crew.  Hopefully, we’ll be asked to come back next year and with a realistic purse.

To be continued 

PART 3

It’s only right that the Grand Ol Opry is live on the XM Roadhouse channel as I begin to write this the final part of our round trip to Bristol.  Got in the car at 7 am in the hotel parking lot in Kingsport TN, turned on the GPS hit Greensboro airport and headed out on the Interstate 26.   We traveled a distance and she told me to get off some unknown route number and we figured it was some kind of mistake so we keep driving thinking we were going to reach Rt 81 but that didn’t happen so we said we better listen to her now.  I had an idea what might be going on so I kept the faith and drove on.   Well before we knew it, you know those “black clouds”?  We were so high in the mountains we were in them clouds!  I kept listening to that GPS and she told me to turn left on a two lane that looked like it was going in to a town.  As I began to accellerate  I looked to the side of the road and saw the nose of a sherriffs car and flashing 20 MPH sign above it, I looked at the speedometer and “S…” I was doing 40!  I looked in the rear view mirror and damn, he was driving out and I knew he wasn’t going for coffee.  He put the white lights on and all I said to larry is what else could go wrong on the trip.  Now I know you have all seen this scene in the movies or television.  I put my window down and this BIG man with his right hand on his gun belt approached slowly and stayed to the back side of my door and with that southern draw said ” I got you on radar speeding in my school zone” I don’t know what made me say what I did but I said ” I don’t know, but I have to beleive you because you said it, but I’m freeken lost and looking for Greensboro”  His reply was “you don’t want to go this way it will take you forty miles out of the way.  Now turn around and go slow ” and he gave me directions.  I thanked him for the break and turned back.  Never asked for my license or anything.  After driving a bit I stopped in a roadside establishment for some breakfast because I knew we weren’t going to see the Atkins Diner on this trip.  Larry asked a gent at the counter for directions to Greensboro and he didn’t know so he asked another gent sitting in a booth and he didn’t know.  Holy crap! you can’t get there from here I said and a lady in the booth next to us smiled so we asked her and she knew, but made it sound like we were going cross country. Said she was there three weeks ago.  She wrote the directions down and while she did that, Larry was getting directions from a delivery man.  As for the food, ordered hot tea with milk, got hot tea with lemon, the eggs were barely soft and the home fries came smoothered in garlic powder.  So much for leaving a bad taste in in your mouth.  We were on a mountain top in Tenn surrounded by the spirit of Davy Crocket armed with directions to Boone!  Two lane road with 25 and 35 MPH speed zones and a hold up for single lane traffic while the workers got ready to work on a bridge over a creek.  All we could do now was laugh and joke to hide the concern about the possibiliy of missing our 12:30 flight.  We talked about everything that happened since we left home and joked that all we needed was to have Sandy the flight attendant on our flight home.  We reached Boone and was soon on Rt 421, a four lane highway that made for some fast traveling.  After a short time we passed the North Wilkesboro Speedway which is right along the highway.  Wish we had more time, I would have gotten off to visit that track.  Got to the airport, returned the rental car and proceeded to get our passes and seat assignments.  Front row bulkhead  seats.  11:10 and the 12:30 flight is on time.  Looking good, well almost.  Got to the screening and needed to have our carry on inspected after it went through the x-ray machine.  Criminal?  Terrorists?  Larry bought us some barbque sauce and it was on the no go list so that was that.  Of course we had the option to pay twenty-five dollars and check the bags.  Well time to board.  Larry is first after the babies and I’m right behind.  He gets to the planes door and stops and throws his hand up in the air.  I looked around him and OH MY GOD!!! there she was, Sandy!!!!  What are the chances of that.  Larry told her with authority that we had seats in row three and that’s where we were sitting.  We sat down as the others boarded when she came to us and asked us to move!  We laughed thinking she was joking but she was serious. “Please, just move one row back”  So we did and she asked the three people in front of us to move to the rear.  Well she left her whip back on the other plane and was very polite and actually spent a bit of time talking with us.  Sandy really is a nice person and was just having a bad day when we first met.  End of the black clouds?  No!  Waiting to take off it starts to rain, thunder lightening and the Captains voice” The storm is right over us and we will wait for it to move off”  Well that was OK with me.  I’m no hurricane hunter!  Good flight to New York and a safe ride home.  Thanks for reading, wish you were there with us so you’all plan on it the next time.   

8th Place!  Can you beleive it!!!!  After the season that we have been having it’s almost as good as a win.  The 10 Team, Eddie and the 10 car were ready for action when practice began.  Eddie and the 10 car were fast out of the box so that left time to experiement with some different set-ups to see if anything worked better.  Since this was an impound race we had to be carefull with our time trial set-up since we would have to start the race without any changes to the car except air pressures.  A loose condition during time resulted in a 28th starting spot.  Not exactly where we hoped to be.  Hard racing by Eddie, sharp spotting, hard work by the crew and a bit of luck missing some big wrecks resulted in our top 10 finish.  YEA TEAM!!!

See you at Stafford.

The forecast for Martinsville in the wake of Hanna and Ike calls for sunny skies.  I’ll let you know a week from today. 

RESULTS:  POOR FINISHES, WRECKED RACE CARS, DROP IN POINT STANDINGS, A TON OF MAN HOURS AND A BIG MONITARY EXPENSE

That sums up the last two races.  What does the future hold?  Thompson, and a RACE to the finish.  We will not be beaten down by anyone or ourselves.  See you in Victory Lane! 

Hope to see you tomorrow at Thompson.

 Now for the 10 car, this best sums up the night after starting the race with what we thought was going to be a pretty good race car. 

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That say’s it all.

See you at Stafford

It’s interesting how many of the problems that exist in our NASCAR Whelen Modified Tour also exist in the Brakettes organization and I’m sure with other teams as well. Let me give you a few examples. Sponsorship for one is very hard to come by in both sports. Because of the shortage of dollars the Brakettes chose to host over fifty home games and not travel except to defend their championship. Modifieds can race a SK home track or limited True Value Traveling series. Attendance for both are down but get this: An average ticket to our race is about $35 and concession prices are high. Go to a Brakettes game and the ticket price for adults is $6 for bleachers behind the baselines or $8 for seats behind home plate. Yes, you read it right $6 & $8 for double header games. Concession prices, how about $1 for a bottle of water or $1 for popcorn. The sad thing is there are less than a hundred people in the stands. We are the best racing Tour in NASCAR and can’t fill the stands like we used to. Some people blame the high ticket prices and now the gas prices. What is it with the Brakettes? World famous history, exciting games, a 40 win and zero loss season and ridiculously cheap tickets and food. There must be a Ben Dodge of Softball somewhere?

I just want to acknowledge the powers that be for giving me the privilege to attend and photograph the soldout USA Olympic Team vs the Brakettes game this past Sunday. It was an awesome experience that has engraved a lifetime of memories. Please check the Photo Gallery page and I will have some player pictures posted shortly. So, on your raceless weekends get out and experience a FAST Pitch womans softball game. You just might like it and you won’t break the bank.

 As for the 10 car we were doing just ok, nothing great but not a bomb.  Early in the race a car came from the infield that was involved in an incident and hit our left front knocking the toe out.  After a few pit stops the toe was corrected and we had a car that could race again.  Ten laps to go while in eighth place the right front got hit from behind bent the tie rod.  Thus, the 10 car limped to the finish the last car on the lead lap for a 16 place finish.

 Congrats to Matt on his first Tour win.

Some time off and it’s off to Spencer Speedway in New York State, hope to see you there.