Blairsville Speedway

Editor’s note: On Saturday, May 23, 2015 my trackchasing day included visits to three different tracks in two states. This Trackchaser Report will cover the entirety of this busy day.

THE EVENT

ON THE WAY TO THE RACES

My summer trackchasing season has begun.

I consider Memorial Day weekend the beginning of my summer trackchasing season. For me my “summer” season begins on Memorial Day and ends on Labor Day.

Did you ever celebrate “Decoration Day”?

By the way my family always called “Memorial Day” “Decoration Day”. Our clan would drive down to Oakland, Illinois for a large reunion. The family cemetery was there. There was always a big “doins” at the city park featuring lots of food (Aunt Lucille’s sweet rolls were a favorite) along with my all-time most devoured childhood dessert of Jell-O, bananas and whipped cream.

There was always a visit to the “graveyard” where we decorated with flowers the gravesites of our departed loved ones. I would spend part of the day sitting inside one of the family Fords listening to Sid Collins anchor the Indy 500 radio broadcast.

Jumping forward to today.

I begin my Memorial Day weekend with a paltry 2,084 lifetime tracks. Yes this is nearly 500 tracks more than my closest fellow competitor. However it could have been many more.

A question I get a lot is, “When did you begin chasing tracks”?

I didn’t really begin chasing tracks until about 1998. Never in my life did I see as many as thirty new tracks until ’98. I was 49 years old by that time. That’s a very late start in the career of a wanna be world-class trackchaser. There are about 10 trackchasers credited with 1,000 or more tracks. Most of those people had seen hundreds of tracks by the age of 49.

Here’s an example to consider.

Let me give you an example. My closest fellow competitor currently is trackchasing commissioner Guy Smith. Back in 1998 I was 49 years old. Mr. Smith was 39 years old. 

At the end of the 1997 trackchaser season Mr. Smith had seen 577 tracks. How many did I have? I had been to only 323 tracks. That put me at a deficit of some 254 tracks when the 1997 season was finished. Mr. Smith was not even the #1 trackchaser back then. Others ahead of him were even further ahead of me!

However in the intervening years I have, somewhat miraculously, made up the deficit to Mr. Smith. Today I have nearly obliterated his once dominant total.

Not only did I trail Guy Smith by 254 tracks after the 1997 it would get even worse. I was starting to get into trackchasing by the ’98 season….if you call seeing 35 tracks in 1998 “trackchasing”. I would continue to fall further and further behind Mr. Smith and lots of other trackchasers too through the 1999 season. At the end of ’99 I was an astounding 266 tracks behind the trackchasing totals of Guy Smith.

The worm has turned….big time.

As this is written my lifetime trackchasing total is 2,084 tracks. Guy Smith lags behind at 1,605 tracks. That’s a current deficit of some 479 tracks for him.

Here’s the funny thing about all of the above numbers. Everyone who knows Guy Smith understands that if there is a track anywhere close (that’s a 10-20 hour or more round-trip driving distance) then Guy Smith will recruit someone to drive him there. How can someone keep up with a guy who thinks like that about trackchasing?

At the end of the 1999 season I was 266 tracks behind the totals of Mr. Smith. Today I am 479 tracks ahead of this total. That means since the end of the ’99 season I have seen 745 MORE tracks than Guy Smith over a period of about 16 years. Given his propensity to trackchase I would have thought it a good accomplishment to just stay EVEN with his totals. How in the world did I match every track he saw since the beginning of 2000 (that’s 934 tracks for him) and exceed his total by 745 tracks? Yes, that means I’ve seen 1,679 tracks since I “started” trackchasing on January 1, 2000. I guess anyone could understand if Mr. Smith and any other leading fellow competitors were just downright dejected about the entire affair.

A late bloomer.

Yes I started trackchasing late in life. In 1999 I had hardly cracked the top 25 in the lifetime world trackchasing rankings. During the ensuing 16 years or so I have clawed my way into the number one position within the world rankings of the trackchasing hobby.  What does that tell me?  It’s never to late to start something….anything.

I have said more than once if my overall lead reaches 500 tracks I may consider retirement if only to avoid trampling the self-esteem and morale of my fellow competitors. You can see where I’m coming from right?

Just the facts ma’am.

The above analysis is just as Dragnet star Joe Friday would say “Just the facts ma’am”. The data is available for anyone and everyone to examine publicly. The data is irrefutable.

So what’s up with Trackchasing’s First Mother?

Carol and I have had a lovely week. On most week nights I will take her out to dinner. I do that for a multitude of reasons. First I don’t like to see her taking the time to prepare and clean up a meal when it only takes us a few minutes or so to eat. I know what you’re thinking. Why don’t I help? She won’t let me!

Secondly at a restaurant meal we can linger over dinner and just catch up with the events of the day. That normally takes about an hour.

Often times, as we did this week, we will grab some food to go and take it down to the beach. There we will eat dinner with the soft ocean breezes blowing and the sun setting over Catalina Island. Yes, it’s a difficult lifestyle but that’s what the residents of San Clemente are faced with on a nightly basis.

We are eagerly anticipating the two-week visit in June of our Texas-based grandbabies and their parents. We have lots of special plans for this time.

More fun coming soon.

Last week when Carol and I were trackchasing in Ephrata, Washington we stopped at a Dollar Tree store. There we picked up about a dozen small toys that six-year-olds might enjoy.

Today we began a series of mailings to Astrid and Mitch at their home in Texas. Each letter details the fun plans we have for their California visit and included a toy or two from the Dollar Tree. We hope this will build up the excitement and suspense for their impending Golden State vacation.

THURSDAY

About time to leave.

Soon it was time for me to head out on my Memorial Day trackchasing trip. Carol will stay behind to tend to the home fires. I think it is these short separations during the year, which keep our 43-year-old marriage fresh. We’ve been doing it this way since day one, first with my business travel and most recently with my trackchasing travel.

We have several “big” trips scheduled together as the year progresses. I still expect Carol to travel with me somewhere around 100 nights for the year. If you are lucky enough to get your spouse to do that….you are lucky enough.

This party is officially started.

My trackchasing trip would begin with an afternoon movie date with Carol. We go to the movies frequently. Today we saw a movie called “Five Flights Up “. The movie starred Morgan Freeman and Diane Keaton. It wouldn’t have been too much of a stretch to consider the movie star’s lifestyles in this film as similar too ours. If you like romantic comedies and that’s my favorite genre I recommend this movie.

It’s a jungle out there.

Do you know the busiest day of the year for airline travel? It’s the Sunday after Thanksgiving. I was surprised to learn that the Friday before Memorial Day is a third busiest airline travel day of the year. That’s when I would be landing in Pittsburgh.

A big racing weekend!

Memorial day weekend is big for auto racing. The Indy 500, the World Formula One race in Monaco and the Charlotte 600 NASCAR race all run over the weekend. Of course I have seen racing at every one of those venues.

Where would my trackchasing weekend begin? First I would stop at a remote county fair “bump n run” race in northern Michigan.

So how would I get there?

Getting there on a standby basis with my sponsors would be difficult during such a heavy travel weekend. That being the case I decided to purchase ticket.  I use Kayak.com as my go to airline schedule and pricing source. They do a good job of letting me comparison-shop.

As you might imagine a one-way ticket purchased a day in advance of the Memorial Day weekend was not going to be inexpensive. However I was hoping to negate the cost of my overall airline expense by using my sponsors on the way back.

I was willing to fly into any major city in the Midwest or east. If I flew overnight I would land early in the morning locally. That way I could drive to wherever I needed to be.

That city turned out to be Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. I would leave Los Angeles and fly to San Francisco (SFO). There I would connect to an overnight flight from SFO to Pittsburgh.

That plan worked out just fine. Any time one flies overnight it considered a “redeye” flight. I left San Francisco at 11:30 p.m. and landed in Pittsburgh at about 7:30 a.m. Eastern time.

I knew that with very little sleep on the plane I would have to nap during the day today. That’s not a problem. I like taking short naps and they are very effective for me.

 

 

FRIDAY

The entire Pittsburgh airport experience is a good one.

I like the fact that the Pittsburgh rental car location is within a few steps of the airline terminal. At the National Car Rental “executive selection” counter I picked up an upscale Hyundai Azera. This car is a class or two up from the Hyundai Sonata that I usually prefer. I’m going to start asking for Azeras in the future.

The weather was going to be very good over the entire Memorial Day weekend. That was certainly a plus for my planning.

Tonight Michigan and not New York.

In the three days I was scheduled to have my rental car in Pittsburgh I expected to drive more than 1,500 miles. I had two workable Friday night track choices, one in Michigan and one in New York.

The track in Michigan would add three hours of driving to my overall weekend total. It would’ve been easier to go to New York but I chose Michigan. Why?

It was really rather simple. I’ve been using this trackchasing strategy all my life. It’s really one of the reasons I have so many choices this late into my trackchasing career.

The strategy.

So what is the strategy? I prefer to knock off tracks that race just one or two times per year. I’ll see those before I will try to see a track that runs weekly for 4-5 months during year.

The small Michigan county fair track on tonight’s plan races one or two times this year. The track I was considering in New York races weekly from May through September. By the way I don’t mention the name of the New York track for competitive reasons.

Here’s how the strategy works. If I were to see the New York track race today I would have one or two remaining dates in which to see the Michigan track race for the rest of the year. However if I see the Michigan track race today I have 10-15 more racing dates just this year to see the New York track race. Make sense?

At the top of the ‘difficult’ chart.

Possibly the most difficult aspect of my trackchasing, and it’s not really that difficult, is doing the driving. I am an independent trackchaser. I do not have to “harvest” a friend to share the driving duties and pay for my fuel expense. I strongly prefer it this way. I am cut out of the mold of the legendary trackchasers such as Andy Sivi, Rick Schneider and Ed Esser. They did/do the hobby on their timing and on their plan. However, even those trackchasers had an advantage, for trackchasing anyway. They were not married with kids.

Let’s get going.

It would be a 6-8 hour drive from Pittsburgh up to Gaylord, Michigan. I would be using my Waze GPS system. I have a default setting of “no tolls” when I use Waze.

However I was curious today. With such a long drive what would be driving time using toll roads? I flipped the tolls option on and found the drive would be nearly an hour less in time. I had no idea what the total toll expense would be. I figured it was worth it to save an hour even if I didn’t know how much that was going to cost me. I went with the toll roads. This decision ended up costing about $14 in tolls.

I had about three hours of “flex time” which I planned on using for napping. I had driven just 80 miles and it was time to pull over.

Normally I take a 12 minute power nap. However after taking a redeye flight my nap today called for 20 minutes. That 20 minutes went by in about two minutes! Then I had two more 10 minute naps. Those went by in a flash as well. I finished up with two more five minute naps. That was good but probably not as good as getting eight hours of sleep on a Tempurpedic mattress.

Well done. Above average.

The rest areas on the Pennsylvania and Ohio Turnpike’s are well above average. They remind me of what I consider to be the world standard for welcome centers of the United Kingdom.

My current “go to” sandwich at McDonald’s is the “McDouble”. Properly structured it can fit a low-carb diet very well.

What does “properly structured” mean? I toss away the buns and avoid the ketchup. The remaining “sandwich” consists of just three carbohydrate grams.

One of the things I like about eating at McDonald’s in this fashion that I can use my iPhone and it’s Apple Pay capabilities to pay for my meal. I simply tap my phone on their scanner and in a second the meal is paid for.

Getting America involved in technology one person at a time.

When I first started using Apple Pay the servers had a very difficult time understanding and implementing the concept. This is probably not an area (fast food restaurants) where you will find the most tech savvy Americans.

Nevertheless as time passes the employees seem to be a little bit more familiar with the technology. Each time I use Apple Pay I ask if very many people are using your it. I asked that question today. The response was “not very many”.

Here’s my take.

What do I take from that? Is Apple Pay a failure? Is Apple Pay not being used? Here’s how I’m thinking about it.

Younger high-tech millennials don’t think of McDonald’s as a place to eat. They are the most tech savvy within our American population. So yes Apple Pay is being used by those folks but not at McDonald’s. The folks who do shop at McDonald’s generally don’t have iPhones, Apple Pay and/or the skills to navigate the technology world in many cases.

Just a reminder.

Yes, just a reminder to my readers of you as you navigate yourselves through my Trackchaser Reports. When I make a generalization like I have in the above paragraph I do not mean for a second the situation applies to everyone.

What I am saying is a situation applies to more people than one might normally expect. How many people are good with technology? How many of those people who are good with technology eat at McDonalds?

I was busy calculating my arrival time into Gaylord Michigan to make sure I was on time for the 7 p.m. start. I was managing bathroom breaks food stops and naps.

This was special real special.

However there was one special stop I wanted to make. This would be the highlight of my entire day. I’m talking about Bronner’s the largest Christmas store in the world. Bronner’s is located in Frankenmuth, Michigan.

I have now been to Bronner’s a few times. However the best visit was last summer with Carol. It was fantastic to see the joy on her face when she had a chance to see Bronner’s for the first time.

The traffic traveling on I-75 northbound towards the upper Peninsula of Michigan was heavy as might be expected on the Friday night before Memorial Day weekend. I guess I shouldn’t have been surprised at the amount of state police hiding in the trees.

Right on time.

I was pretty much right on schedule for the 7 p.m. racing start. I made one last stop for gas, bathroom and a change from short pants and a long pants. The temperature had dropped to 55°. It was expected to go into the 40s in a couple of hours. Waze directed me perfectly into the Otsego County Fairgrounds in Gaylord, Michigan. However things didn’t look right.

This was a bad sign….a real bad sign.

There didn’t seem to be much activity. Nevertheless the gate to the fairgrounds was open. I took that as a good sign. When I got closer to the grandstand I saw there was not a single soul in and around the entire fairgrounds. It was 7:03 p.m. This looked like a bad sign and it was.

I put the National Car Rental Racing Hyundai Azeras transmission in park. I studied things for a moment. Wait for it. It was coming to me. I had made a mistake a huge mistake.

Although my database correctly listed the race as being tomorrow night Saturday, May 23 somewhere along the line I had mistakenly planned for the event to be tonight Friday, May 22. I recall doing that once many years but on that occasion in Illinois I was off by a month not a day!.

Was there anything I could do? I consulted my new track finding app, Tracktivity, to see if anybody else might be racing in the area. There was the Norway Speedway but they were four hours away. I could never make it there. The app listed a go kart track I had never heard of. They were racing tonight! I gave them a call. It was bad news. All they raced were flat karts.

If you’re not early you’re late…but if you’re too early you are screwed.

I was resigned to the fact that I had flown from California to Pittsburgh over night on the redeye flight and then driven exactly 500 miles to the Otsego County Fairgrounds only to be a day early. They say if you’re not early you’re late. However if you are too early you are screwed.

I remember one time in the eighth grade showing up at a girl’s house for a Saturday night party. There were about 25 kids invited. Somehow I got things messed up and knocked on the door an hour early. I was quickly escorted to the basement where the party would take place. She didn’t say a word about me being early. However, when nobody joined me in the basement for about an hour my mistake became apparent.

Please make a U-turn.

All I could do was turn my rental car around and head for West Virginia. West Virginia ain’t that close to Northern Michigan. This meant I was going to drive nearly 800 miles from 8 a.m. when I picked up my rental car until about midnight today.

Just plain weird.

This episode was weird on several levels. I could’ve easily gotten a Friday night track in New York. The first two tracks I plan to see tomorrow, Saturday, may or may not offer countable racing. I won’t get to the FIRST track that I hope counts until I will have driven about 1,100 miles!

On the drive back I came upon a rest area where I was able to get an Internet connection to contact Priceline.com. They provided me with a snazzy Hampton Inn at 44% off their best online price. At least I haven’t lost that skill.

What did my mistake really cost me?

I had started driving today, Friday, in Pittsburgh. I need to be in Masontown, West Virginia tomorrow, Saturday, by 4:30 p.m. By mistakenly driving to Northern Michigan what had my mistake really cost me?

Surprisingly not all that much. I had only driven three additional hours compared to if I had trackchased in upstate New York tonight. That wasn’t too bad.

However what was much more important to me was the idea that I had missed the opportunity to get a track in the eastern time zone. Those are difficult to get on a Friday night. Additionally the weather was fantastic which I probably can’t count on the next time I attempt a trackchasing weekend like this in the east.

Let’s be perfectly clear. I was bummed.

There’s no doubt about it I was bummed. However I play golf. In golf I am most accustomed to having a crushing disappointment that I have to shake off as if it never happened. It I don’t my attitude from the previous shot will affect the next one. That’s how I do it in trackchasing as well.

SATURDAY

Still bummed but trying to look ahead.

Clearly I was disappointed in the mistake I made yesterday by driving up to Michigan. I was a bit surprised that my lost opportunity was limited to just three hours of extra driving and one missed track. However I do not come out on the trackchasing trail to get skunked. Nevertheless it was time to move on.

Uncertainty ruled.

My next two trackchasing days are fraught with uncertainty. Although the weather was good it was a question of whether or not the tracks I would visit would have the right type of race and racers in order to be trackchasing countable. I was soon going to find out about all of that.

This morning I woke up in Rossford, Ohio (Toledo area) at the Hampton Inn and Suites. With just six hours of hotel sleep following a night of overnight airplane flying from coast-to-coast I was not well rested.

I had picked this hotel location because it allowed me to drive a few hours late last night. That put me within driving distance of today’s first trackchasing location in West Virginia.

At about 9 a.m. I sauntered down for the complementary breakfast being served by the hotel. Hampton does a nice job with their breakfast compared to most other hotels that offer a complementary morning meal.

The breakfast room was crowded. It looked to be made up of two kinds of travelers. First there was the sports crowd who were following their kids to softball, soccer and such. There was also a crowd that looked like they were just in the area to visit relatives over Memorial Day weekend.

Trying to compete with limited financial resources.

We all know that I do not have the financial resources of the Dreaded East Coast Trackchasers. However as I looked around the room this morning I made an educated guess that most people in the hotel did not have the financial resources I am blessed with.

Last night I had done some searching and Priceline came up with a $50 rate plus taxes and fees for my stay at the Hampton. The best rate the hotel was offering on their website was $109 per night plus tax.

This wasn’t right but it was real.

I strongly suspected that people with far less financial means than me had paid twice the amount I was charged for my room. If you have less money than the next guy and spend it twice as fast how do you expect to get ahead?

Here’s the thing about money. It’s good for only one thing. You can trade it for stuff. However you can’t trade it for as much stuff if you don’t have the right amount of money.

I suspected that a good amount of people in the breakfast room today worked for an hourly wage. I’m also guessing that virtually all of them paid $130 or more including tax for their room for the night. That was about $60 more than I paid. How many hours do you think it took them to work in order to clear $60 cash.

I couldn’t fix the problem I could only comment on it.

Nevertheless I was not going to fix America’s consumer problems on one bright and sunny Saturday morning. I had my own fish to fry and it was time to fry them.

Still more problems needed to be fixed.

While I am discussing the shortcomings of others when are people in America going to learn what “keep right except to pass” means? I wish each of these drivers could spend a weekend on European highways. If they attempted to “park” in the fast lane there they would be booted out of the way in a matter of moments.

I’m just going to scream.

If I have to follow just one more driver who drives 65 miles an hour in the 70 MPH fast lane and then finally moves over due to tailgating or bright lights from people like me and THEN speeds up to 75 or 80 in the slower lane I’m going to scream. I’m sure they are saying to their spouse, “Look Martha I pulled over and this guy still can’t pass me”.

Good times were on the horizon.

Yesterday was not my best trackchasing effort when I drove all the way to northern Michigan and got no results. However today was going to be better… much better.

What should I conclude from this?

I was headed to West Virginia. I can never count on racetracks to offer edible food so I stopped at a Subway store along the way in Morgantown, West Virginia. Morganton is home to the University of West Virginia that produced NBA great Jerry West.

When I eat in a Subway store I always use my iPhone and it’s Apple Pay feature to pay the bill. I will tell you that many fast food employees from both subway and McDonald’s appear somewhat flabbergasted when I use Apple Pay. This is doubly amazing considering they’re running the cash register and I’m 66 years old and they’re probably 18. However I think both the employee and the demographic of the consumer at McDonald’s is not part of the high-tech movement.

However when I explained to the young cashier that I really could pay for my Subway salad with my iPhone she couldn’t wait to share the news with her other colleagues. To hear them tell it you would’ve thought I was Neil Armstrong just landing on the moon!  And yes, they wanted their photo on my website.

It was a five hour drive from last night’s hotel near Toledo, Ohio down to Masontown, West Virginia. When I pulled into the Marvin’s Mountaintop racing venue the odometer on my rental car showed I had driven nearly 1,100 miles. Up to this point I had zero to show for it.

The benefits of being first.

When I became the first trackchaser to discover side-by-side racing I had no idea it was going to be this big. Today I’ve seen more side-by-side racing than any of my fellow competitors. I expect over the next season or two that advantage is going to be quite significant. I’m sure the political hierarchy that runs the trackchasing hobby is having severe heartburn over the thought of this.

I have discovered well over 25 side-by-side sanctioning organizations. I’m pretty sure if I look a little harder I can find another twenty-five. Each one of these groups races at an average of five different locations. An additional bonus to side-by-side racing is that most events happen during the day. This creates lots of day/night trackchasing double opportunities. I wouldn’t be surprised if my side-by-side track list someday rivals what I’ve seen at figure 8 tracks.

THE RACING

Marvin’s Mountaintop – Masonville, West Virginia

Everybody sees the world a little differently.

Marvin’s Mountaintop sits off the “main highway” about 3 miles. It isn’t marked all that well. I did stop to ask a couple, gardening in their front yard, if I was on the right track.

The woman looked up and told me, “just stay on the main drag” and follow the signs. This was West Virginia. Her idea of the “main drag” was not exactly what mine was. The road was filled with heavy duty potholes as I got closer to where the racing would take place. Then the road turned to a pure white dust.

Pre-work.

I had talked to today’s race organizers over the past few days. The real key to side-by-side racing in terms of its being a countable offering within the trackchasing hobby is the starting procedure.

Sometimes the side-by-side racing starts all of the competitors at the same time. That’s what trackchaser’s forefathers want to happen. However sometimes the track is so narrow that the competitors must go off in “flights”.

I was told by the race organizers earlier this week they expected 60-90 side-by-side racing machines. They would be racing in five classes. During the races today the announcer told everyone that 62 side-by-side machines had signed in.

I paid my $20 spectator admission and received a wristband. Then I drove my car on a crowded winding dirt road through the hordes of people and machines. This type of event is it’s own niche hobby. I am just beginning to dip my toe into the proverbial SXS water.

I found a spot to park that wasn’t too far from the starting line. When I walk around an event like this I have to be aware as there are all kinds of motorcycles ATVs and UTVs being driven about.

The racetrack and the racing format. 

There was a huge farm field where all the racers would start the race. There were about 11 rows that were marked as starting lanes. A couple of the classes had 15-25 competitors.

Those classes would go off five at a time until everyone in the class was racing on the track. That type of start would not count as a trackchasing countable race for that class.

However the “legal loophole” for this type of racing to count in the trackchasing hobby is to find a class with a low number of competitors. Today the starting line was wide enough for about seven racers to start at a time. I soon found a class or two that had seven or fewer competitors. When the green flag dropped they would all go off at the same time. That was workable within the trackchasing hobby’s framework.

I watched all 62 racers begin their race over the 5-mile course. One of the competitors told me this was not a good track for spectating. He was absolutely right.

I was able to see about the first 30 seconds or so of the racing until the side-by-side machines disappeared into the woods. They would reappear from time to time from my vantage point but only for a few seconds at a time.

Done.

Nevertheless I was confident I had seen a countable start for the XC3 light division. They had just three racers. Therefore track number 2,085 was in the books when the green flag dropped on those three machines.

These races only run for about four laps. Nevertheless that is still 20 miles a much longer distance than any local stock car track would likely attempt. After I’d seen this race it was time to leave for my next new track of the day.

THE RACING

Blairsville Speedway – Blairsville, Pennsylvania

Track #2 for the day….but not my first visit.

Back in 2012 I showed up at the Blairsville Speedway in Blairsville, Pennsylvania on a rainy Saturday night. I had a very enjoyable time chatting with the promoter Stan Caroline and his wife. They were new to the race promotion business. I never did get to see any racing a Blairsville that night. The off and on rain ended up raining out the program.

This year Blairsville has a new promoter, Pete Miller. He’s not really “new” but is returning to the Blairsville promotional leadership position. I called Pete earlier in the week. I asked if there would be any senior champ kart racing tonight.

I had noticed over the past three weeks there were 1-4 senior champ kart racers competing at Blairsville. I needed at least two to show up to contest a race for this track to count in my lifetime totals. The Blairsville Speedway would go into the books as track # 2,086.

Pete and I had agreed over the phone that I would call him after I left the West Virginia track to see what the senior champ kart situation was. I did just that and Pete told me three racers were on hand. That was great news. I was on the way.

It would be an hour and a half drive up to Blairsville. I expected to arrive by about 7:30 p.m. If I caught the “sweet spot” of the racing program I would be able to see the senior champs race quickly. Then my plan was to head on out to get an additional track later in the evening.

Yesterday not so good. Today much better.

As poorly as things turned out with last night’s situation in Michigan today was greatly improved. I arrived at 7:25 p.m. into the Blairsville speedway parking lot. This is a beautiful little track nestled in some rustic and gorgeous farm scenery where everything is as neat as a pin.

I was expected.

The folks at the Blairsville Speedway were expecting a California visitor. The five dollar spectating fee and $25 pit pass fee was waived for me. Thank you promoter Pete Miller.

Back in 2012 my timing with the Blairsville speedway was not good. The on-again off-again rain ended up canceling the program without me seeing any racing there at all.

However tonight the weather was perfect. My timing was perfect as well. I arrived at the track with the heat in progress.

A caged kart event was on the track and in the middle of their race. However I didn’t think this could be the senior champs because there were too many racers.

I parked along with a few other cars in the recently mown and beautifully manicured green grass parking lot. I walked in and watched from just beyond turns one and two. From that vantage point the sun was setting over turns three and four. This made seeing the racing and taking photographs a challenge.

I spent a few minutes chatting with the woman at the pit shack. It wasn’t really a “shack” but that’s what they call these buildings. I later found out she is the wife of the track’s owner. Their dairy farm sits just above the Blairsville Speedway.

Lots of caged karts.

They were probably more caged carts in the pit area than flat carts. That’s unusual. However all but three of those racers were in the junior classes.

It is virtually impossible to tell the difference between a junior champ kart and a senior champ kart. Sometimes the only difference is the age of the driver and the rules governing each class. The karts themselves are identical.

I asked a couple of guys in the pits if the senior champs had run their heat race yet. They had not. They were up next! I couldn’t believe my good timing.

At most go kart tracks I attend there are 15-20 classes competing. Often times the senior champ kart group is the only trackchasing countable class. Most of the time the senior champs run at the end of the program. I have no idea why that is.

I’ve been at the track for only 10-15 minutes. I was going to get to see the senior champs race right NOW. That was good for a couple of reasons.

I felt I had put my time in with the Blairsville Speedway during that 2-3 hour rain delay back in 2012. I felt if I could simply drop in and see a quick senior champ cart race I would be “even” with the Blairsville Speedway.

Another benefit to seeing the senior champs race almost immediately was I could get on up the road toward my third track of the day. That would be the Hummingbird Speedway in Reynoldsville, Pennsylvania.

It’s always interesting to meet the race promoter.

After the senior champs finished their three car heat race I watched some flat cart racing. I also took the time to introduce myself to Pete Miller the promoter. Pete started out promoting the track back in 2003 when it first opened. Then he took a break for a few years from around 2012-2014. Now he’s back promoting.

He was happy to have a California visitor. I was happy to be here. We talked for a few minutes and he gave me some background on the track. Then we bade each other farewell. I was off to track number three for the day.

THE RACING

Hummingbird Speedway – Reynoldsville, Pennsylvania

Track #3 for the day.

It would be an hour and a half drive up to Reynoldsville, Pennsylvania home to the Hummingbird Speedway. I expected to arrive at about 9:30 p.m. I knew they started racing at 7 p.m. I just hoped they wouldn’t have a super efficient program and be finished by the time I got there.

Tell me about Hummingbird.

The Hummingbird Speedway is located in most rural location. Okay let’s be honest here. Reynoldsville the town is just a little bitty place. The track itself is located way out in the boonies. It’s especially hard to find after dark.

Nevertheless when I did find the place I could see they were still racing. They were also still charging admission at 9:30 p.m. That surprised me.

Little did I know that I was going to see some very good racing at this track. I would estimate it’s a quarter-mile to maybe three eights mile in length. The track is a dirt oval and a little bit dusty.

One of the most unique features of the Hummingbird layout is the grandstand seating area. Tonight they had a very large crowd for a track of this genre.

What a spectator seating area.

The “grandstand” is built on the side of the hill. The hill runs at about a 45° angle! Most of the ground is covered with gravel. The spectator seating consist of boards nailed to short poles. These poles are about 2 feet high and anchored into the ground. There’s plenty of room for spectators to bring their own lawn chairs or stand behind the fixed seating area.

I arrived at the beginning of the late model feature event. I had only missed one feature race. That was for the winged micro sprints.

I was impressed with a 20 car late-model feature race. I was told the track attracted 27 late-models tonight. It’s a huge field for this class of car in today’s short track racing world.

I would also see three more feature races following the late models. These classes were for lower dollar stock cars. Car counts were 6-14. The racing was good and aggressive with these events as well.

What could the “difference” be?

I’m always telling you that no matter how many tracks I’ve seen I always have an experience that is different from anything I’ve seen before. That was the case tonight as well. What could that be?

I decided to watch the races from near the top of the hill and settled in next to another gentleman who was enjoying the racing action. I used my Jerry Seinfeld approach to conversation. That’s starting a conversation by asking a question where the answer is a number. I simply asked, “how many races are left?”

This started up a very engaging conversation with a man who I would come to learn was the chaplain for the track. As in a good conversation each of us was interested in what the other brought to the party. I had lots of questions regarding what his responsibilities as chaplain were. He wanted to know all about my trackchasing, i.e. where I had been, how I went about doing it etc.

Scott my new chaplain friend worked in the local area for a large grocery wholesaler in his civilian job. However his hobby avocation was ministering the Lord to people in the racing community.

Pennsylvania is just a little bit “different” in these rural areas.

I’m not sure I have a good take on the people of Pennsylvania. I’ve heard it said that the state of Pennsylvania is simply Alabama in between Pittsburgh and Philadelphia. There seems to be some truth to that in the appearance of the people.

I don’t know that there is any other state where racing is more inbred than in Pennsylvania. Racing seems to be in the DNA of rural Pennsylvanians. Since I didn’t grow up with that I’m not sure I understand it but I think it is the case.

Scott told me of the many family backgrounds including his where religion and believing in God was not even presented to youngsters. He told of a seven-year-old boy he had met who had never heard of the Bible. This boy has grown up in a rural Pennsylvania family. Scott had lots of other interesting stories to relate as well. I gave him my business card and suggested he look me up on the “net”.

Good eats.

At the concession stand I settled on a cheeseburger, slice of pepperoni pizza and a can of diet Pepsi. The prices were reasonable with my total coming to seven dollars U.S.

Nice folks.

The track announcer sat at ground level where he could be approached easily. When it was time to leave I laid my business card on the table in front of the track announcer. I simply said quickly, “You’ve got a nice track here” and walked on.

Long drive.

I watched the remainder of the last race from down by turn four. In the middle of the race I got a tap on the shoulder. It was one of the track announcers. He handed me a shirt and hat as complements of the speedway and thanked me for coming. That put the final touch on a nice evening of feature racing from the Hummingbird Speedway.

I was now looking at nearly a four hour drive up toward the Scranton, Pennsylvania area. Of course you know that Scranton was the mythical home to one of my all-time favorite TV shows, the “Office”.

AFTER THE RACES

Pricey.

The Northeast is one of the most expensive places for hotels of anywhere in the country. The best rate I could get for a late night hotel seemed to be about $90. I would only be in my room for 6-7 hours. For such a short stay I didn’t want to pay that much.

What were my options?

I had a couple of other overnight options as I saw it. First I could attempt to drive all the way up to the Hidden Hills Sports Center, site of tomorrow morning’s racing, near Scranton. I could probably sleep in their parking lot/campground. I knew several of the competitors would be camping overnight on the grounds.

Alternatively, if I didn’t want to drive that far, I could sleep overnight in an interstate highway rest stop. I do that about five nights a year.

I also considered overnighting in a Wal-Mart parking lot. Wal-Mart is very friendly toward campers who want to stay the night in their lot. They feel it improves their overall security. Carol doesn’t care much for Wal-Mart and thinks their “camping” policy is stupid. I’m not judging only reporting.

I pulled into one I-80 highway rest area for a bathroom break. This place looked a little remote and creepy. There were only one or two cars parked in the car side of the rest area. I decided to move on down the road.

At the next rest area, along I-81 there must have been 20 cars in the parking lot at about 1 a.m. Those people were taking a “nap” for the night. I was going to join them.

In about 36 hours I had driven nearly 1,500 miles. Friday was a disaster but Saturday yielded three new tracks. I was back on pace where I needed to be.

Night. Night.

Once in the rest area I simply leaned my seat back, lock the doors and pulled out a few pieces of clothing to use as a blanket and a pillow. Tonight’s hotel expense would be zero.

Despite it being about 75° at this afternoon’s track in West Virginia tonight the temperatures got down into the high 30s. I did have to turn on the engine of the car a time or two to warm myself up. Nevertheless it was one of my better “in car” sleeps. If it weren’t for the safety issue and warm summer temperatures I might sleep in my car more often. At the very least it’s good practice if I ever become homeless.

West Virginia

 

 

The Mountain state

This evening I saw my 8th lifetime track in the Mountain state, yes the Mountain state. I have only seen less that eight tracks in five different states and the District of Columbia. Those five states are: Delaware, Hawaii, Maryland, Rhode Island and Vermont.

Pennsylvania

 

 

The Keystone state

This evening I saw my 89th lifetime track in the Keystone state, yes the Keystone state. Despite seeing nearly 100 tracks in Pennsylvania I’m nowhere close to cracking the top ten. I’m just logging laps in Pennsy.

Thanks for reading about my trackchasing,

 

Randy Lewis

World’s #1 Trackchaser

Peoria Old Timers Racing Club (P.O.R.C.) Hall of Fame Member 

Pennsylvania sayings: Yes, I am from Pennsylvania; No I am not Amish

Tennessee sayings: If you love southern women raise your glass; if not raise your standards

QUICK FACTS

AIRPLANE

Los Angeles, CA (LAX) – San Francisco, CA (SFO) – 338 miles

San Francisco, CA (SFO) – Pittsburgh, PA (PIT) – 2,251 miles

 

RENTAL CAR #1

Pittsburgh International Airport – trip begins

Masonville, WV

Blairsville, PA

Reynoldsville, PA

TRACK ADMISSION PRICES:

Marvin’s Mountaintop – $20

Blairsville Speedway – complimentary admission

Hummingbird Speedway – $10

 

 

LIFETIME TRACKCHASER COMPARISONS 

The three most important trackchasing comparisons to me are:

Total lifetime tracks seen

Total “trackchasing countries” seen

Lifetime National Geographic Diversity results

Total Lifetime Tracks

There are no trackchasers currently within 450 tracks of my lifetime total. Don’t blame me.

1. Randy Lewis, San Clemente, California – 2,087

Total Trackchasing Countries

There are no trackchasers currently within 10 countries of my lifetime total.

1. Randy Lewis, San Clemente, California – 70

Current lifetime National Geographic Diversity results

1. Randy Lewis, San Clemente, California – 4.88

That’s all folks! Official end of the RLR – Randy Lewis Racing Trackchaser Report

Side by side racing from Marvin’s Mountaintop

Senior champ kart racing from the Blairsville Speedway

Saturday night stock car racing from the Hummingbird Speedway

Click on the link below for a photo album from today’s trackchasing day: 

 

Marvin’s Mountaintop…getting there…the racing….leaving there

Blairsville Speedway …. the little track built by a dairy farmer

The lay of the land from the Hummingbird Speedway