I didn't get the 14th off as requested, but asked for it off after the schedule was posted and got it. My girlfriend scoffed when I told her the Daytona 500 was on.
Women have no sense of humor!
Si Vis Pacem Parabellum
1967 Starlight black PMD Engineering 400 Auto 1968 Alpine Blue 400 4 speed 1968 Verdoro Green 400 HO 4 speed 2013 1LE 2SS/RS Inferno Orange Camaro.
Danica is hot, but totally loses me when she opens that sewer of a mouth. But hey, she has more money, drives a faster car than I and better looking than me so I have no right to judge.
But I wouldn't mind her taking me out to dinner just once to clarify my opinion of her.
Si Vis Pacem Parabellum
1967 Starlight black PMD Engineering 400 Auto 1968 Alpine Blue 400 4 speed 1968 Verdoro Green 400 HO 4 speed 2013 1LE 2SS/RS Inferno Orange Camaro.
Just got back form the Gatorade Duel. For those of you who don't know, they are the qualifying races for the Daytona 500. They are both 60 laps with 27 drivers in each. Jimmie Johnson Kasey Kahne won their races.
creekbob, I didn't know you went today. I had tickets and didn't even go. A former contractor of mine offers them every year for the past three years and I've never gone. As much as I like cars just not into the whole NASCAR thing...
PS is your motor done yet? Mine will be done tomorrow. You didn't accidently pick up my 62 heads did you? LOL
We are all heading up to Gainesville Raceway on Saturday for the BOP stock appearing drags and Pontiac car show. I guess you will be at the Daytona track huh?
Try driving one of those cars, it'll change how you look at them.
I looked down on the stock car guys when I first started racing, as I was convinced that real racing only happened on the road courses. After a few seasons running ovals as a cheaper way to get my "fix", I really got to liking it. The long high speed corners on the bigger ovals require more skill than the short lower speed corners that you get on the typical road course, and the "rubbing is racing" mentality is fun once you get over messing up the paint a bit.
It's nice to have a clear track to put in some clean laps on the road course but a lot more fun running the traffic on the oval. For the best of both, watch the NASCAR boys on the road courses.
For me it's not that I think badly of the people who drive them, I just have zero interest in racing in general. Just seems like such a waste of time to sit and watch them on tv. To me, it's almost as boring as watching golf on tv. I'd much prefer to spend that time going for a ride in the car or working on the car...
I listen to the races on MRN radio while working of the FB. Restrictor plate races i'll go in and watch the last 50 laps for the "big one". And the several more after that on restarts.
Earlybird- I go with a buddy of mine. His dad buys four tickets to every race. They're really good seats, too. Right next to the finish line. And nope, motor isn't done yet. Shouldn't be too much longer.... I hope!
TOHCan- Not that this counts, but I did do the Richard Petty driving experience once. Man did I love it!
One of our friends from MD who owns an engine shop did the Richard Petty experience this past Monday. They used to let you take the car up to 149mph, now they have limited top speed to 145. You get 8 laps for $550, you are in the car alone but MUST stay behind the pace car. The person in the pace car decides how well you are doing and how fast you can go. If you buy the photos, DVD, T-shirt etc. the complete package ends up right around $800. Then, once you have completed the "rookie" class, you can go back and take the next class and you get 16 laps but still limited to 145mph, I think the second class is $1500. Then, there is a third class where you run 25 laps and I think maybe they allow you to run with a few other cars as well. I think that last class is $2500. There are 5 of us signed up for the next time there is a NASCAR race here at the Daytona Speedway in a few months. This follows the NASCAR schedule and moves from track to track with each race. I think tracks other than Daytona and Indy are less expensive per class etc.
I did the track at Disney. Once we got to the Disney track they told us if we waited a week we could do Daytona, but we couldn't because my brother was on leave from the army and was goign back in two days. The car was only supposed to go 118, but somehow I got it up to 124.6. My brother, dad and I did it. They both only got up to 115. And we didn't pay full price, either. We bought the tickets at a silent auction at my church for $100 each.
I did it in '91 at Charlotte. There were about 500 people vying for a chance to go to Australia as one of the 25 people who scored the highest. After a week in Oz, the person clocking the fastest lap time won a five race package down under.
The format was a 15 lap check ride/warm-up, followed by two scored five lap sessions in two different cars. Turns one and two had markers painted (I think you can still see them!) that were the width of the tire track plus an extra six inches on each side. The scoring was fairly simple: the average lap speed was multiplied by the number of paired markers that the driver stayed between (total of twenty possible per lap). They then multiplied that by some other number to get the final score.
For all the session, we followed a pace car that kept an eye on us for safety. I had Barry Graham as pace driver and by the end I could see that he was pushing his car pretty hard to stay ahead of me, leaving light gray lines as we went through the corners. Quite a thrill! He had a grin that almost matched mine!
I was one of eleven drivers out of the 500 that completed all my scored laps above 145 mph average. Easy to tell, as they used 145 mph as a cutoff; no bonus for going faster than that! My lap speeds were all right around the 150 mark with my best at 150.544 mph and a lap time of 35.92 seconds. That was about 2 1/2 seconds off qualifying for a Cup race at the time; not too bad considering the car had a rev limiter set at 6800 rpm (about 170mph top speed), the tires were old and hard and the track was cold.
It's too bad they didn't use lap times as the criterium for going to Australia, as my best time was the second fastest for that year. Oh well, still a lot of fun even if the world missed out on another driving great. No, I didn't make the cut.
Flash forward twenty years: last summer my former boss at the old race shop invited me out to sample his latest obsession, a winged alcohol Sprint car - 3 lbs per hp! I did about ten laps on a 1/2 mile dirt oval for $50! Now that's cheap racing!
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