Oh my delicate ears!
05/01/2008
Of Course I went to the track! Who was I kidding, myself?
I headed out to the track after packing the car up for the ride home and checking out of the hotel. I was looking at the campers and the soggy red clay as I pulled into the route to the track. I called my friend and told him thank you, thank you for the hotel room. There were soggy race fans and wet tents and campers surrounding the track. The camp fires were going, my eyes were watering and I was glad I had a roof over my head during the storm the night before. The weather was still quite overcast, I was watching hoping the race would get going on time.
I found a parking spot, near the exit of the track: I was counting the hours backwards. I had a 13.5 hour drive, 15 hours in the car ahead of me, but I didn’t want to miss the race. I was Talladega for goodness sakes! I would have to miss part of the race, the finish, just to make sure I got out of the lot before the traffic. I would never have made it in time for work Monday morning if I hadn’t ducked out 20 laps early. I took a little nap in the car: some fans were laughing at me, but I was going to need it later on.
I was on my feet for the start: the go or go home cars were scattered in the pack. They were in qualifying trim, the rest of the cars were in race set up. There were some experienced drivers in those go or go home cars. I heard Robby on the scanner; he was actually at the track: P J Jones had qualified his car for him so it was off to the back of the pack for him. That’s not a big deal at a super speedway with drafting. When I heard Robby say the car was driving like a dream, I was hopeful for a good day of racing.
The draft is something I hear about all the time but to see the cars actually link up and wiz past the start/finish line, that’s a whole different view. With the new surface, it was amazing to see that two cars could hook up and be so much faster than the pack. There were times when the spotters had their hands full. There were cars going here, there and everywhere. The radios were full of chatter. I looked up about 20 rows and could see them all on the spotter stands: hands waiving, radios chattering and drivers bitching about this and that. Robby, we need to have a talk: I know you were mad, but that potty mouth of yours! You offended my delicate ears a time or two. I had to turn a couple of the drivers I had programmed off, they were constantly on the radio and I couldn’t hear the other drivers. I have 11 channels and I dropped 2 or 3 as the race progressed. Of course Robby Gordon is programmed in the primary spot, so I could hear him most of the time.
Some of the favorite drivers had problems all day, Carl Edwards kept hitting things, Tony Stewart got a bit sideways when his tire let go and Jr. was lurking and leading but just didn’t get it done. Kyle Bush and Juan (Pablo) Montoya took the win on the last lap crash. Robby landed 11th after a lucky dog and some great driving.
I headed to the car, disappointed with leaving before the end of the race: the nice thing, I could listen on the scanner and listen on the radio in the car on the way out of the track. What took me an hour plus on Saturday afternoon took me 15 minuets on Sunday getting back to the highway.
I was all smiles the way home. It sure was a long drive. I took a bit of a chance pushing the last couple of hours from Dallas to Austin. I took the interstates, it added a couple of miles to the trip, but I didn’t want to find a stray deer or that heard of grasshoppers on the way home. I was a very tired but satisfied race fan.
I got a couple hours sleep and was at my desk at the appointed time Monday morning. Yah, I went to Talladega, and had a GREAT weekend! Thanks to my friend I was able to make my ‘Dega dream come true. I don’t think I would have been brave enough to it on my own. I don’t think I would have tired to camp by myself in the middle of a filed in the middle of no where Alabama to see a race. Thank you my friend!
