Greetings from Bellevue, Illinois
From the travels and adventures of the
“World’s #1 Trackchaser”
Belle-Claire Speedway – Dirt Oval
Lifetime Track #718
No Trackchasing Agenda. This weekend had no trackchasing on the agenda. It was early May with perfect weather all over the country. Why no trackchasing? We had a family event to attend. Family is one of the few things that trumps trackchasing on my “time agenda”. Way to go Carley! Our niece Carley was celebrating her Masters degree graduation from Tiffin University (Ohio). We would be attending the graduation party held in the small town of Robinson, Illinois. Relatives from all over Illinois as well as Phoenix and Denver would be showing up. Above Carley shares the day with her mother (my sister) Lynn. Our plan was to fly into the St. Louis airport from Los Angeles. Of course we were flying standby but our options looked good. We would connect in Seattle, Washington not exactly the most direct route to St. Louis. However, when you’re not sure why people do things….follow the money. Maybe some racechasing? If we made our earlier flight I had an option for some “racechasing” near St. Louis. We made the earlier flight! This gave us the chance to have a wonderful steak dinner in downtown St. Louis. If you like steak and you are in St. Louis I can highly recommend “Tucker’s Place”. It’s an old-time steakhouse in one of the local neighborhoods not far from the famous “Hill” home to several outstanding Italian restaurants. The National Rental Car bus driver turned us on to this place. We had other “civilian” options. We also had an option to take in a baseball game at Busch Stadium. The Cardinals were playing the Pittsburgh Pirates. However, I’ve wrapped up my goal of seeing a game at every active major league baseball park. Carol and I will stick to going to Angels’ games until Atlanta opens their new stadium in 2017. This is called “racechasing”. Since our plane had arrived on time and we had eaten a quality meal why not go back to a track I’ve enjoyed in the past? That’s called “racechasing”. I’m talking about the Belle Clair Speedway in Belleville, Illinois. Belle Claire is only about 20 miles from downtown St. Louis. For the first time ever we drove on a street called “Barack Obama Boulevard”. I suspect there will be more of those popping up over the next few years. New for Carol; A re-visit for me. The Belle Clair Speedway would be a new track for Carol. I first went there back in June 2004 (track #718). Belle Clair is a very racy little 1/5-mile oval. The track is at the local fairgrounds. The grandstands are right out of the 40s and 50s. The cars race up by the wall. The fans in the front row aren’t more than 10 feet from the racers. Actually it looks a little dangerous for the spectators. This was not what you might think. By the way we did not visit the Belle Clair Speedway so that Carol could see a new track. We don’t do that. As a matter of fact, we didn’t even know if she had been there until we checked on the drive out to the track. Carol is not a competitive trackchaser. This all changed when trackchasing commissioner Guy Smith effectively banned poor Carol from the hobby. Today she is not at all concerned about getting a new track. Importantly, I am not concerned about her adding a new track. Of course if she adds one that’s great but it is not a priority. My trackchasing alone can keep us listed as the “World’s #1 Trackchasing Couple”. Whatever Carol adds is just icing on the cake. We arrived during the heat races at Belle Clair. There was no rush to get there. We wanted to enjoy our nice restaurant meal at Tucker’s Place. I figured if we saw 2-3 feature events for the evening it would satisfy my need to “reconnect” to this track. A famous little place in its own right. Belle Clair is famous for racing open-wheeled midget racecars. However, they were not on the program tonight. The mini-sprints were. The modified stock cars were the main attraction. Modifieds are fast becoming one of my favorites, and maybe most favorite racing class. Don’t miss the photos and videos from our outing to Belleville. Fun! The graduation celebration party was excellent. We’re very lucky to live nearly 2,000 miles from our native area, Illinois, and still get back 1-3 times a year to see family. Following the party we all headed out for a nice Italian dinner at a local restaurant in Robinson called Monicals. Carol says a salesman will buy anything. Carol and I were not simply coming to the Midwest for the graduation party. We figured we might as well “kill two birds with one stone” or more. During our recent trip to Maui we bought a “sampler” package of “vacation ownership” from Diamond Resorts. We very much enjoy our “timeshares” aka “vacation ownership” vacation properties. We’ve owned timeshares in Maui for more than 20 years. At one time we had three separate weeks of ownership. Now we have two. The sampler program would cost about as much as the annual maintenance fees for the two Maui units we currently own. I figured I could rent the Maui units for about what our maintenance fees are for the year. That rent money could then be applied to the purchase of the “sampler” program. 3 on 3 on 3. However, with the sampler program we could get THREE weeks of Hawaii timeshare on THREE different Hawaiian Islands plus THREE more nights in Branson, Missouri. Net, I was trading 14 nights of vacation rentals for 24 nights. I’m always trying to get an edge. The sampler program had one more major advantage as well. What was that? It’s a Diamond Resorts program called “Club Select”. With Club Select Carol and I can rent timeshare properties all over the world at greatly discounted prices. We can get one or two bedroom condos at major resorts all over for $250-$500 for a week. Normal prices for these properties would be 2-3 times that. The Sweet Spot… How was your trip? Not that long ago Carol and I returned from yet another of our little vacation trips. We had a good time. We always have a good time. When I see people around town they are likely to ask, “How was your trip?” That’s a hard question for me to answer. Why? I never know WHICH trip they are asking about! Another common question is, “Where’s your NEXT trip? That’s another hard question to answer. Why? I never know WHICH trip they are asking about! The above got me to thinking. Yes, Carol and I vacation a little bit more than the normal couple. That’s unusual for a couple of reasons. First, we live in one of the best spots in the world, if not the best, just a few steps from the Pacific Ocean. When you’re already in the best place why go anywhere else I’ve been asked many times. What’s the other reason we seem to vacation so much? We’re in the “sweet spot” and we know it. The sweet spot doesn’t last forever. What’s the sweet spot? I’ll tell you as you read along. We’re in the sweet spot and we’re curious enough to wonder what it’s like on the “other side of the mountain”. Some folks want to get up and go just to see what IS on the other side of the mountain. Others are content to know there is stuff on the other side of the mountain but they aren’t interested in seeing it. Still others would ask, “What mountain?” I recognize that everyone is a little different. Most people can’t agree what the best car is, what the best dessert is and the like. However, if you’ve never tried a series of “bests” in whatever category is being considered your opinion is going to be less educated. Take a read at what follows. Are you in the “sweet spot?” Are you approaching the sweet spot? Have you passed the sweet spot? Please don’t kid yourself. The sweet spot is temporary. It’s the time in your life when you have good health, the time and the money to see what’s on the other side of the mountain. If you think your life passes quickly the “sweet spot” passes even more quickly. Don’t miss it! Don’t knock it from the La-Z-Boy. This brings me to the idea of vacation travel. In order to enjoy a lot of vacation travel you have to have a curiosity and adventuresome spirit. If your idea of a “great time” is to sit on the La-Z-Boy and watch TV you are not likely to be much of a world traveler. You’ll have a difficult time seeing the other time of that proverbial mountain sitting on your butt. By the way today’s theme is vacation travel. However seeing what’s on the other side of the mountain is NOT limited to vacation travel. Take a “mind trip” with me if you don’t mind. I have thought about this a good deal. First of all, everybody looks at life a little differently. Yes, the folks who call Iraq and Syria home are not looking at life in quite the same way as folks who call Lincoln, Nebraska home. Makes sense huh? In order to be a “vacationer” you have to have good health, time and money. Right now Carol and I are in the “sweet spot” for being a vacationer. We have those three things. Let me share some more thoughts about this. GOOD HEALTH. They say you don’t miss your good health until you don’t have it any more. No one knows how long his or her good health will last. Carol and I have been very fortunate. We take good care of ourselves and don’t have any physical limitations. That won’t last forever for anyone. However, I don’t want to miss out on anything while I’m healthy. I would never want to think that I didn’t have some experience, and then when the health isn’t there anymore, would never have a chance at that experience. TIME. If you’re going to travel the world you will need time. If you’re “working for the man” you are not likely to have enough time to take that many trips. Of course “the man” will have time because he is benefitting from your labor. However it is not uncommon for “the man” (I could just as easily have used the word “woman” in place of “man”) to be so intent on pocketing another shekle or two from the worker bees that even “the man” can’t get away and really has no time. Just imagine. I retired at age 53. That’s pretty young to leave the work force. I have no idea how old you are. However, if you are older than 53 can you imagine not having had a paycheck SINCE you were 53? If you are younger than 53 can you imagine stopping those paychecks at age 53 and living happily ever after? Folks can have all the TIME they need when they no longer have to work for MONEY. Have you ever thought about it like that? Some folks don’t think they have the time to vacation. Sometimes that is “code” for a person who thinks (sometimes rightly so) they don’t have the money. Most folks don’t want to tell you they don’t have the money for something. They don’t mind telling you they don’t have the time. MONEY It takes money to travel. If you want to travel while you are the healthiest and while you have the time you had better figure out a way to get the MONEY. Getting the money is not normally an overnight activity….unless you inherit your aunt’s estate. Carol and I both came from families with no money. That was O.K. It just made us work harder for the money we could come up with. Most people don’t manage money well. Here’s the funny thing about money especially in retirement. Most (more than 80%?) people do not manage their money well. However more than 80% of people THINK they manage their money well! What does that mean? It doesn’t mean they don’t have ENOUGH money to last them until the funeral director is paid. It means they might not understand how to enjoy it. I know….some people enjoy their money just knowing it’s in the bank! Money is good for one thing. You can trade it for things. That’s the real purpose of money. To trade for stuff! I contend there are lots of ways to enjoy your financial success other than simply having the satisfaction that you have it. You can’t take it with you….but of course you want enough to get there on (or so goes the country song). Track with me for a moment. If you had a million dollars and spent $100,000 a year and lived for 20 years you would have a money problem. How about if you had a million dollars, spent $100,000 a year but were only going to live for two more years? There’s a difference in those two stories isn’t there? I will never be able to convince the conservative FISCAL folks to change. Some folks, when they retire, get very conservative with their money. Why? They are afraid of running out of the green stuff. What does “conservative” mean? They might invest only in the most conservative investments, which earn very low but guaranteed returns. I’m talking about bank CDs, annuities and the like. A person who retires at age 60 has a life expectancy of 20-30 more years. That’s a LONG time to invest your money at low returns. Clueless in Casper. Others have all the money they need to enjoy a comfortable retirement lifestyle but don’t know it! That’s right. Some folks will never ever come remotely close to running out of funds in their lifetime. Nevertheless, they scrimp and save on things and never get to enjoy their retirement life when they have HEALTH, TIME AND MONEY. As one of my buddies always says, “Travel first class or your kids will”. Here’s how I look at it. I figure I earned the money I have. We paid to educate our children through college (UCLA) and even made contributions for education beyond that point. That gave our kids a giant head start over their “fellow competitors”. Now it’s time for Carol and me to enjoy the fruits of our labor for the rest of our lives. HEATLH, TIME AND MONEY….what are you going to do with it for the rest of your life? Where do YOU stand with regards to HEATLH, TIME AND MONEY? Do you see yourself in any of the above examples? If you do can you change? Probably not! You see, as a business manager for 30 years at one of the biggest companies in the world I discovered a few things. One of those is that very few people can change very few things about themselves. They just can’t. It’s a human failing. Please let go of just a few pennies and enjoy yourself. I hope more people can get out and see the world. If you want to do that you will have to do it while you still have your health. If you want to do that you will have to find the time. If you’re still working your time is going to be limited. If you have good health and have some free time you will have to come up with the money. That will likely require a good long-term financial plan. If you already HAVE the money but don’t know you can actually spend it you will likely run out of good health before you discover the fact that you could have afforded to travel all along. If it were easy and a no brainer everybody could do it. I know much of the above sounds “easy” and a “no brainer”. If it was easy and a no brainer then Carol and I would see a lot more Americans when we travel abroad. We don’t. We can go days without hearing another American. Anyway “Randy said that”. Good luck. Even if you decide to just hangout on the couch and watch TV for the rest of your life you will still need to be prepared. That remote control is going to need batteries from time to time! PRACTICING WHAT I PREACH Off to enjoy ourselves. Following our family reunion Carol and I were off to the Suites at Fall Creek resort in Branson, Missouri. Do you know much about Branson? If not think of it as the “Las Vegas of country music”. I like country music very much. However, there isn’t a big country following in SoCal. Carol is not much of a C&W music fan. This would be my third visit to Branson. However, it would be Carol’s first. I passed through Branson on previous trackchasing trips and had the good sense to stop and see some shows. I was a little concerned Carol might not like the “country” approach that Branson promotes. I was wrong. She loved it! Branson has about 75 theatres that produce live shows all years. The little town has just 10,520 residents but the town’s theatres seat more than 50,000 people! I was surprised to learn their Christmas shows draw the biggest crowds. However, I am sure that summer is not far behind in popularity. We were getting into Branson at 5 p.m. on Sunday night. We would be leaving at 6 a.m. on Wednesday morning. We were going to be busy in Branson during the less than three days we were in town. How busy? Pretty busy! Yes. Pretty busy. We ended up seeing six different shows. They included: Clay Cooper Country Express Acrobats of China Shoji Tabuchi (second time for me) Mel Tillis Preview show at the Suites at Fall Creek resort Baldknobbers (second time for me) We liked ‘em all. Carol and I each gave Clay Cooper, Shoji Tabuchi and Mel Tillis an “A” grade. Frankly I liked each of the shows. I’m a fan of the now 82-year old Mel Tillis. Clay Cooper rapport with the crowd rivaled that of Garth Brooks. Shoji Tabuchi (my second visit) is always a class act. I had seen the Baldknobbers some 35 years ago. They were not as good as I remember them. By the way in addition to the six shows we also attended two timeshare presentations! I like to go “one on one” with those guys! Carol enjoys watching the wrestlin’ match. Overall, our visit to Branson was excellent. We are even planning on returning next year with a possible tie-in to the Kentucky Derby (a bucket list item). We wished we had been able to stay longer on this trip but we are busy folks. We had MORE trips to get ready for. Reprinted with permission from my June 13, 2004 Trackchaser Report You know there’s a good deal of very poor customer service going on as company’s cut back on services, and employees realize they’re locked into dead end jobs. However, not all customer service is bad. Many times the service you receive can be quite good. I will give you an example of some great service I had on this trip. I entered a Terre Haute, Indiana McDonalds. I placed my order for a large Diet Coke, chicken Caesar salad and ice cream sundae with strawberry sauce. Nothing too unusual about that order. Here is where the good service started to come my way. First, the young female counterperson handed me a coupon for a free drink. She made eye contact and spoke in a clear voice that could be understood by any English-speaking person. Since I had already ordered the soft drink she didn’t have to provide the coupon that would give me my drink for free. Her able male assistant counterperson informed me pleasantly that they didn’t carry any strawberry sauce for the sundaes. He did make this offer, “How about if I give you a double chocolate sundae with hot fudge on both the bottom and the top?” That would be fine. Then to see if he could top himself, he asked, “Can I make it a triple chocolate sundae at no extra charge for you?” Was I in an American fast food restaurant? I surmised that a triple hot fudge sundae wouldn’t leave much room for the ice cream. I verbalized this thought to the young ice cream man. No problem, he said. “I can just put everything is a bigger cup!” Was this a vicious dream that I would soon wake from? The counterwoman then made sure I had all of the proper eating utensils for my salad and wished me a good day. Now it was my turn to give it back. Being a sales manager for most of my life, I tried to learn that giving people sincere thanks and recognition for a job well done was very much appreciated. I stepped up. Here’s what I told this dynamic duo. “Do you have a minute? I travel about 300 days a year and eat in a McDonalds almost every day (a little embellishment is more than OK as long as the thought is sincere and specifically recognizes the action). You two have provided the best customer service at a McDonalds I’ve had this year!” They were pleased to hear this and thanked me for recognizing their work. As I was walking out the door, I heard the girl exclaim, “Wow” to her workmate. I wouldn’t be surprised if they didn’t tell their parents and/or friends about this customer encounter. It’s always fun to catch someone doing something right. Especially for my Richardson-Vicks homeboys and golfing friends: Monday was getaway day from the St. Louis airport. My flight wasn’t leaving until about 5 p.m. This allowed me to schedule a golf outing with former Vicks buddy, Ron Otto. Ron and his family are doing well in St. Louis. He owns his own health and beauty aid brokerage company. In fact, he’s headed out to San Diego this weekend for the NACDS Marketplace Conference. This past winter Ron hosted me at the Bridges Golf Club in Rancho Santa Fe. He again paid for our golf at the Tapowingo Golf Club just south of St. Louis. We had a fine outing although the weather was on the hot and humid side. I’m very fortunate to have such good friends spread out all across the country that I can see from time to time. I’m also appreciative for all of my “non-racing” friends who support my racing hobby in one way of the other. Thank you. Editor’s note: My policy on sending out track reports is not to burden you with more than one per day. Sometimes that means I’m back home before I can get all of the reports sent down the line. That being the case, I want to brag on the Tour Tempo golfing system and my teacher, Les Taylor. I’ve had some time to practice with Tour Tempo and the program is giving great results. Three of my last four rounds at Pacific have been 76, 75 and 72! The even par round of 72 is only the second time I’ve shot par in my life. Friends Bob Vorel and George Robertson tell me they’ve really learned a lot from this program. If you’re a golfer, you might want to get involved with Tour Tempo and Les Taylor. Call me for details. Especially for family and friends: I’m happy to be back in the little city by the sea, San Clemente. Oldest son, J.J., will be graduating from UCLA’s MBA program on Friday and Carol and I are really looking forward to that. The Lewis family likes to travel. J.J. will be returning from Belgium a day after I get back from this race trip. While he’s in Belgium, he’ll meet up with our youngest son, Jim, who’s on a two and one-half month tour of Europe. The really cool thing about all of their travel is that THEY PAY FOR IT! When Jim left for Europe, I gave his my standing racing reward offer. If he goes to any countable track and sees racing action, I will give him $100. Our daughter, Kristy, is the only Lewis child to actually take me up on this offer. She scored with a visit to Parramatta City Speedway in Sydney, Australia. She said her Aussie friends who attended got a real kick out of visiting a sprint car track. St. Louis, Missouri Airport – trip begins Highland, Illinois – 47 miles Fredericktown, Missouri – 434 miles Doe Run, Missouri – 463 miles Charleston, Illinois – 1,389 miles Belleville, Illinois – 1,487 miles St. Louis, Missouri Airport – 1,537 miles – trip ends TRACK ADMISSION PRICES (U.S. Dollars): Highland Speedway – $20 Fredericktown Raceway – $10 Doe Run Raceway – $7 Eldora Speedway – $43 (includes pit pass) Charleston Speedway Road Course – $8 Belle-Clair Speedway – $12 Total race admissions – $100 RACING NEWS: Every trackchaser has a track or two they’ve tried to get on more than one occasion without success. The Belle-Clair Speedway, my 718th, is one of those elusive tracks for me. I suspect I’ve had this track on my schedule four or five times or more over the past several seasons. As a matter of fact, I was rained out of here as recently as last Wednesday night! Weather and logistics changes have kept me away from this popular and old-style racing venue until today. Belle-Clair normally races on Friday nights. Tonight’s special Sunday night show featured the M.A.R.A. midgets and 600cc micro-sprints. Lincoln Speedway was also racing just a few miles up the road. Lincoln is a regular Sunday night track. I figured it would be better to save a Sunday night track for the future rather than Belle-Clair, a Friday night track. The program was scheduled to start at 6:30 p.m. It was hot, about 90 and humid. They took a few extra minutes to “farm” the track like they do at Boone. This probably helped the racing surface throughout the night. The small one-fifth mile dirt oval was just right for the mini-sprints. It might have been a tad small for the midgets although not by much. There were about 28 midgets at the track and around 45 mini-sprints. The speedway is an old fairgrounds track. They have classic covered wooden grandstands on BOTH sides of the track. This racetrack is located in the midst of some highly developed commercial areas. There’s even a McDonalds across the street. Although the track is at the fairgrounds, one might think the grounds will be commercially developed sometime in the future. I spent the evening talking to an older gentleman about the local racing. I’ve found that when you see a man sitting by himself in the stands that probably means he’s an avid racing fan. That turned out to be the case tonight. Coincidentally, this fellow had worked in the aerospace industry in Lancaster, California for almost 30 years. He was very familiar with the California racing scene. He moved back to Illinois to care for his aging mother. He said he likes the racing back in the Midwest but can’t stand the weather. Those are my feelings exactly. I enjoyed every minute of talking too him except when he told me who won the NASCAR race at Pocono which I was planning to watch on a recorded basis at home. Oh, well! I always enjoy talking to the folks in the stands. You can learn so much from listening to other people. The M.A.R.A. midgets reminded me of watching CRA sprint cars at Ascot only on about a three-quarter scale for both the cars and the track. Both classes put on a good show, one of the best I’ve seen this season. I highly recommend the Belle-Clair Speedway. ONE CANNOT LIVE WELL OR SLEEP WELL IF ONE HAS NOT DINED WELL RACE TRACK FOOD: I didn’t eat anything at the track because of the great restaurant I stumbled across on the way to Belle-Clair. This prompts another RANDY’S SPECIAL MONEY BACK GUARANTEE. Yes, these money back guarantees just keep coming. I was attracted to the Blue Springs Café (618-654-5788) by their roadside billboard that advertised “Foot-Hi Pies” (Roger, is this the eatery you were telling me about?). Anyway, wouldn’t you have to stop at a place that advertised foot-hi pies? This is a true ‘family-style’ restaurant. I had the ham steak that pretty much covered up a 9” by 13” platter. It was supplemented by side dishes of real mashed potatoes, green beans, gravy, applesauce, cole slaw and beets. On top of that, they provided the most delicious baking powder biscuits with home made apple butter you can imagine. The Blue Springs Café was much better than the Amana Colonies restaurant I took George Robertson to last month. You’ll find the Blue Springs Café just east of St. Louis on Interstate 70, exit 30 in Highland, Illinois. St. Louis has many good short tracks so if you’re in the area I highly recommend the Blue Springs Café. Oh yes, the pie, the pie. I wanted to go with one of their foot-hi, meringue pies but I also wanted vanilla ice cream. That being the case I went with the raspberry pie, heated and alamode. Imagine a full sized plate of warm, gooey raspberry pie with vanilla ice cream swimming in the middle. It makes me hungry just to write about it. RENTAL CAR UPDATE: I was very pleased with my Avis Rental Car Racing Chevy Classic. The car only got about 300-325 miles per tank. Gas prices were around $1.90 everywhere I went. I still can’t get over being able to rent cars for about $20 per day. ED ESSER UPDATE: Ed Esser is a world-class trackchaser. Ed was #1 in the world last year and leads the 2004 world standings again this year. To date, he has seen 44 races for 2004. As many of you know, Ed is right behind me in the LIFETIME world standings. He’s 10th and I’m 9th. Ed started the season 54 tracks behind me. I’m not having a bad trackchasing season myself. I rank third in the 2004 world standings with 36 tracks. I’m just one track behind second place Roland Vanden Eynde of Vilvoorde, Belgium in the 2004 world standings. No one can count out Andy Sivi of Clairton, Pennsylvania. He’ll likely be #2 or #3 in the ’04 standings, maybe even #1. I will predict that Andy will go over the 1,000 track mark late this year. He’s on his way to becoming the #1 lifetime trackchaser sometime in 2005. Andy, I hope you do just that. The next 60 days will be critical in my quest to stay ahead of Ed. Right now, I have a 46-track lead. Ed will really be picking up the pace from now until Labor Day. I don’t plan to roll over for him. I’ve even had Carol schedule her rotator cuff surgery so that it won’t conflict with my trackchasing efforts. There’s a good chance I will also require rotator cuff surgery (I should know more on Monday). If so, I’ll do it sometime after mid-September when the trackchasing season winds down for me. Ed, please don’t feel too bad that our surgeries must be strategically planned so as to fend you off. Does Ed’s trackchasing effect the Lewis family planning (no not that type of family planning)? I just hope we can get too our planned UCLA football games and meet our medical needs in a timely fashion. Randy Lewis #1 Trackchaser living west of the Mississippi That’s all the news that’s fit to print from San Clemente where the women are strong, the men are good-looking, and all of the children are above average. **Eldora Speedway, Rossburg, Ohio, June 12 **Charleston Speedway, Charleston, Illinois, May 22 **Sunshine Speedway (oval), Pinellas Park, Florida, April 3 **Central Arizona Raceway, Casa Grande, Arizona, January 20 22-Jun USMTS Junction City Speedway McCool Junction, NE 23-Jun USMTS Speed Bowl Red Cloud, NE 24-Jun Small Oval U.S. 30 Speedway Columbus, NE 24-Jun Large Oval U.S. 30 Speedway Columbus, NE 25-Jun Regular Program Butler County Spdwy Rising City, NE 25-Jun Regular Program Boone County Raceway Albion, NE 26-Jun Figure 8s Dallas Cty Fairgrounds Adel, IA 26-Jun Oval track Dallas Cty Fairgrounds Adel, IA 27-Jun Regular Program Thayer Cty Speedway Deshler, NE Click on the link below for a photo album from today’s trackchasing day: St. Louis and our night at the Belle Clair Speedway – 2015 Don’t miss our visit to Branson, Missouri. They’ve got lots of fun for your down there. Here’s the link: Branson, Missouri…a whole lot of fun 
PEOPLE/TRAVEL NEWS
CUMULATIVE DRIVING DISTANCES:
Racetracks visited in 2004 (** not the first time to visit this track)
Planned new racetracks (on the last day of each racing trip I will post my tentative plans for my next trip)
