This weekend is expected to be my last trackchasing weekend of 2022. This trip was an example of my “trackchasing prototype” adventure. What’s that? I see some racing to go along with the chance to meet up with more people, places, and things! Like virtually every year for the past 25 years or so, this has been an excellent year of trackchasing for me.

And of course, I have a video from today’s UTV wood racing action which includes an interview with Texas UTV driver, Mike Kowis. Here’s the link.

TX4 Cross Country Series UTV racing!

It looks like I will finish the year having seen racing at 89 new tracks. How significant is the number 89 in this circumstance? That’s really only an important statistic for me. That means that I personally have seen racing at 89 tracks for the first time.
 
How does that compare to other trackchasers? I will put it this way. If every one of the 89 tracks that I saw this year was a track that someone else had already seen then that’s not a very big deal when comparing my results to someone else’s. That means they got to that track before I did. All I would be doing is imitating their accomplishments.
 

I could envision, hypothetically, a circumstance where I have seen 89 new tracks and someone else has already seen all of those 89 new tracks. If I were to compare myself to that trackchaser, I would give myself a personal score of zero.
 
On the other hand, if another trackchaser had seen racing at just ten new tracks this year, but I had not seen any of those race tracks I would give that person a score of 10. Yes, in this hypothetical example I would have seen 89 tracks and another person had seen ten. My score would be zero and their score would be ten. They would have done a better trackchasing job, compared to me, than I did compared to them!
 

This year I will have flown about 180,000 miles chasing tracks. That might seem like a lot to some folks. Yes, 180,000 miles of flying is a large number even for me. My record for flying in one year to see tracks is 244,000 miles. So, this year, although it was a good one, was not anywhere close to record-breaking.
 

I thought you might be interested in seeing a list of the airports that I have used in finding these 89 tracks in 2022.
 
Amsterdam, Netherlands
Atlanta, Georgia
Austin, Texas
Baltimore, Maryland
Billings, Montana
Boston, Massachusetts
Charlotte, North Carolina
Chicago, Illinois (Midway)
Chicago, Illinois (O’Hare)
Cincinnati, Ohio
Columbus, Ohio
Dallas, Texas (Dallas-Ft. Worth)
Dallas, Texas (Love)
Denver, Colorado
Detroit, Michigan
Edinburgh, United Kingdom
Frankfurt, Germany
Indianapolis, Indiana
London, United Kingdom (Heathrow)
Los Angeles, California
Memphis, Tennessee
Mexico City, Mexico
Milwaukee, Wisconsin
Minneapolis, Minnesota
Montreal, Quebec, Canada
Munich, Germany
Nashville, Tennessee
New York, New York (JFK)
New York, New York (LaGuardia)
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
Sacramento, California
Salt Lake City, Utah
Seattle, Washington
Stockholm, Sweden
Tokyo, Japan (Haneda)
Tokyo, Japan (Narita)
Toronto, Ontario, Canada
Tucson, Arizona
Tulsa, Oklahoma
Washington, D.C. (Dulles)
Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada
 
 
Saturday, November 19, 2022.
Last night I stayed overnight at J.J. and Dustin’s house near the LAX airport. We spent the evening watching the UCLA – Illinois basketball game. For the first three-quarters of the game, UCLA had the lead. Then they had an epic collapse in the last 10 minutes to lose the game. That was disappointing.
 

I was up at 4 a.m. this morning to get ready to fly from Los Angeles to Austin, Texas. As noted above, this was going to be my last trackchasing trip of the year.
 
As you know when I go to a racetrack, I’m only there for three hours or so. The rest of the trip is going to be spent getting there and moving to the next location and seeing as much and doing as much as I possibly can when I’m in the area. I’m good at that.
 
One of the very best benefits of trackchasing is I get to visit family and friends when I am coming and going to these racetracks. I live in a remote location in the continental U.S. Southern California is a long way from most major cities. Los Angeles is even 6-7 hours driving time from San Francisco!
 

There was something special about traveling down to Austin for this trip. I would get the chance to visit our daughter Kristy and her husband James and our grandchildren, Astrid and Mitch. Can you believe the twins are now 14 years old? That was truly going to be the highlight of the trip.
 
I made it down to Austin in good shape. The Thanksgiving holiday is next week. People are starting to travel long distances to visit family members to celebrate the holiday.
 
The Austin airport was jammed. What was notable was there were so many kids in the airport. I haven’t seen this many kids and families since pre-Covid times. Good for them.
 

In my traveling experience, there is one airport in the U.S. that always has a lot of kids traveling. This airport has far more kids in it than all others by a factor of several. Any guesses? It’s Salt Lake City! It’s funny thinking about the unusual things I notice when traveling.
 
Recently, I noticed an airport vending machine that sells cupcakes. According to the prices, these are upscale cupcakes. I thought this would be the perfect housewarming gift when I arrived at Kristy and James’ home in Austin.
 

From the looks of things, the product was selling like hot cakes…er cupcakes. There were three Sprinkles machines in the airport. I even saw them being restocked while I was there.

These vending machines sell a four-pack of cupcakes that come in a single box. However, the contents of the four-pack are fixed according to what the vending machine operator wants to include in that particular box. I didn’t like that, so I ordered four individual cupcakes that I thought everyone would enjoy.
 
When ordered each cupcake is selected with a touch screen. Then a conveyor belt operation moves it from the vending machine to a door that opens in the vending machine. That’s where guys like me grab ‘em.
 
Today I saw my sprinkles cupcake selection, struggling and struggling to make it onto the conveyor belt. It didn’t make it! The machine continued with its normal set of movements, and the poor sprinkles cupcake fell to the bottom of the machine and was later crushed by the machine. Oh my. This was sad. Wouldn’t you know it? I was videoing the entire thing! You can see this damning experience by clicking on the link below.

That cupcake was sooooo close!
 
This prompted me to call the 800 number listed on the vending machine to explain my predicament. I was told I would get a credit. I’m not gonna hold my breath. I won’t do that for two reasons. First, I can’t imagine holding your breath is good for anyone. Secondly, I don’t know that I will get that credit even though the guy told me I would. I did order a fourth cupcake as a replacement because I had four hungry mouths waiting for me in Austin and three cupcakes weren’t going to cut it!
 

When I got over to Kristy’s house, she had a great accommodation arrangement for me. They have a special little “house” at the back of their property. It’s upscale and sort of like staying in an Airbnb. I had the entire space to myself which was fantastic. To top it off Kristy had appointed the room with several snacks, including a large plastic container of chocolate chip cookies. I had a very difficult time not eating them all in the first 30 minutes I was in the room.
 
We spent the evening watching the UCLA-usc rivalry football game. These two schools are bitter rivals. UCLA was a slight underdog. Nevertheless, my team, UCLA, jumped out to a 14-0 lead. Then the game got wild and unfortunately, UCLA ended up losing 48-45. Bummer. No! You don’t understand. This is a major bummer!
 
 
Sunday, November 20, 2022.
Today was going to be a busy and fun day. Our grandchildren, Mitch and Astrid, both 14 years old, were going to accompany me to the TX4 Cross Country Series event at the Diamond Willow Ranch in Bastrop, Texas.
 

The kids have some experience going to the races with me. We’ve probably been to six or eight racing events together or maybe more over time. As I recall most of those races have been in Texas, California, Arizona, and Michigan at a minimum.
 
We were lucky we didn’t see the races yesterday when the TX4 racing organization held their ATV races. By the way, as you know by now, ATV races do not count as a hobby of trackchasing. Why? Don’t ask me. I didn’t make the rules!
 
Yesterday’s weather came with rain, wind, and temperatures in the mid-40s. That not only would have been an uncomfortable day for the racers but an uncomfortable day for the spectators. I am certain of that.
 
Today the weather was still going to be cool with temperatures in the 40s but there was no rain. There wasn’t much wind today either. Temperatures in the 40s with no rain or wind aren’t all that bad.
 

The highlight of my racing day was the opportunity to meet a fellow by the name of Mike Kowis. Somewhere along the line in my asking questions of people about UTV racing in Texas, I got in touch with Mike. Ever since that time he’s been very helpful in giving me information about UTV racing in the Lone Star State. Mike races an ATV and a UTC with TX4.
   
For some unknown reason to me, probably an insurance issue, several UTV racing groups all over the country have stopped racing UTVs. This came about at the beginning of the 2022 racing season. When everyone else in the country was running OUT of the UTV racing building, TX4 sprang into action to fill that void. I’m glad they did. This year they raced at a handful of new track locations around Austin, Texas. Next year they plan to have 10-12 races. They always race UTVs on Sundays. That’s good if I can find a way to get from wherever I might be on Saturdays by noon or so on an Austin area Sunday.

The TX4 website explains what kind of racing they will offer.

“The organizers of TX4 have been involved in dirt bike racing series in Texas for many years and our passion for UTVs has led us to set up TX4. We see this opportunity to involve those in the area with a competitive spirit but may not be interested in racing dirt bikes. We will offer classes from youth to pro in both UTV and ATV divisions so we can involve the most people possible and enhance their love of racing and help promote the sport.”
 

Astrid, Mitch, and I pulled into the Diamond Willow Ranch in the Randy Lewis Racing National Car Rental Toyota Camry with plenty of time to meet up with Mike Kowis and talk about his racing adventures. Today’s admission was $10 per person. I forgot to ask if they had any kid’s pricing or “experienced” person’s pricing. I’m getting soft in my old age.
 

Mike was an outgoing and friendly guy. He even let the kids sit in his UTV to get the feel of things. As noted, Mike races with this group on Saturdays with his ATV and Sundays with his UTV. Amazingly, most of the TX4 races are around the Austin area and Mike lives down in Conroe, Texas. Conroe is a suburb of Houston and a 2 ½ hour drive from home to the tracks. That’s a very strong commitment for Mike to make to this organization.
 
We spent several minutes talking to Mike and learning about his racing. His UTV is part of the turbo division and brings along about 180 horsepower. For a machine that weighs about 700 pounds, that’s a lot of power.
 

Originally, TX4 had scheduled two separate one-hour races for their UTVs. With a car count of only 11 UTVs spread over three classes the plan changed. They decided to combine everyone into just one time frame. Each of the three classes was still having its own race within the race. Everyone in each class left the starting line at one time. Some of the cars would race for 60 minutes. One of the classes would race for 90 minutes. This was all good for us as spectators. I suspect it was good for competitors as well.
 

I recently watched an in-depth interview with dirt late model legend Scott Bloomquist. He said that the majority of the rulebook included rules that were put in place to prevent him from exploiting a previous rule!
 
Most people are surprised to learn that the hobby of trackchasing has rules. Heck, most people I meet don’t even know that others trackchase besides me. The purpose of the trackchasing rules is to allow each trackchaser to compare his or her results with other trackchasers using a common track counting format.
 
Few people know this about the rules…even most fellow trackchasers. There are four or five rules in the trackchasing rulebook (most of them!) that were put there to prevent me from exploiting a gray area in the rulebook. You will commonly hear about UTV racing needing to start all of their racers with one green flag. That’s a “Randy Rule” as are many others!
 

Astrid, Mitch, and I went about exploring today’s 5.8-mile woods road course here in Bastrop, Texas. We walked all over the place. We walked back into the woods, where no other spectators were to be seen.

Mitch was finding all kinds of skeletal remains of probably Texas livestock but maybe Texas kidnapping victims. Who knows?

We watched the competitors speed past us for eight or ten seconds deep into the woods. I’m sure the drivers were surprised to see us lurking behind a tree. This was exciting for me and I think it must’ve been exciting for the kids as well. We were making memories!
 

After the races, we headed over to Mike Kowis’ number 77 racing pit. He was just loading up his UTV. During the race, he suffered damage to his right front tire causing it to go flat. Luckily, his competition faded from the scene before he did. Even with a flat tire and the fact that he couldn’t complete the entire race, he still ended up first in his class.
 
Way to go, Mike!
 
We bid our farewells to Mike, having made another friend on the trackchasing trail. The TX4 Cross Country Series is scheduling quite a few races next year in and around the Austin area. I’m sure that I’ll get a chance to meet up with Mike again in 2023.
 
On the way home I suggested to Mitch and Astrid that we stop at a “hole in the wall” Mexican restaurant. Texas has a lot of those.
 

Before we knew it Yelp was recommending a place with a 4.5-star rating called Las Cocinas in Bastrop. What a find!
 

Soon, we’re dining on chips and maybe one of the best guacamole servings I’ve ever seen, and three different forms of salsa. We supplemented that with enchiladas and tamales.

Then we wrapped up the whole thing with Mexican fried ice cream, flan, and sopapillas. The twins both agreed they thought this might have been the best Mexican restaurant they had ever eaten in. It certainly was near or at the top of my list. I love Yelp. I love finding places that you would never stop at unless you had a recommendation from someone in this case today that someone was Yelp.
 

From there the three of us went over to a lot of local shopping mall. There I could get the last of my 4-mile required daily steps in without being affected by the cold weather. The twins did a little bit of shopping. We had a big day!
 
Once back home we had plenty of time to relax around the living room “fireplace”. James served some really tasty and “stimulating” alcoholic drinks loosely based on a mai tai recipe or maybe along the Texas margarita vibe. Whatever. It was good.
 
Everyone in the Peters’ clan was heading to Chicago tomorrow for a Thanksgiving holiday. They will visit family in Wisconsin and northern Illinois. I’ll head back to SoCal where our son Jim, also from Austin, and granddaughter Ceci will join Carol, J.J., Dustin, and me. We Lewis’ are a travelin’ family!

It was pretty amazing to see gasoline selling for just $2.69/gallon. Prices in California are nearly twice that amount and sometimes more. Oh my.
 
This was a short trip but it was a fun trip. I got to meet and stay with family. The accommodations and hospitality were outstanding. I had the chance to spend some one-on-one time with my grandkids, which I love. I was able to meet a new racing friend and add track number 2849. We ate some great food. The weather was iffy but, in the end, I saw racing at my 89^th new track in 2022 with absolutely ZERO rainouts all year. I’ll take it!
 
The family wanted to know when I thought I might see track #3,000. Up until today, I don’t think I’ve ever commented on that in my life. If I stay healthy and the tracks keep racing and we don’t have any more Covid like events, maybe someday I will get to 3,000. Everyone in the family wants to be part of that celebration so we’ll just have to wait and see if and when that ever happens.
 
After a full and fulfilling day, I headed back to my Airbnb arrangement in the small house in the backyard behind the pool. There’s no doubt about it. I’m very lucky to have the lifestyle I do and the family I do and the friends that I do. Very lucky. Very appreciative. I’m happy.
 
 
Monday, November 21, 2022
Today I’m trying to get back from Austin to Los Angeles. I’m flying on standby today. Flights are tight as you might expect with the excitement of the upcoming Thanksgiving holiday. However, I will make it back sooner or later.
 

Of course, I missed Carol. She’s been traveling seemingly nonstop with multiple trips to Europe in the past six or eight weeks. She has done her part over the decades helping us maintain our position as the World’s #1 Trackchasing Couple with a lead of nearly 500 tracks.
 

Today I acted as the chauffeur to get the Peters’ and their luggage off to Chicago. They were greeted by quite a bit of holiday traffic with other families heading off in all directions. After I dropped them off, I couldn’t resist stopping at the Whataburger location within a mile of the airport. I love Whataburger.
 
I hope that everyone reading this had a wonderful Thanksgiving holiday whether or not you happen to see this message before or after you’ve eaten all of the turkey that you want.
 

 
Randy Lewis,
San Clemente, California.