Greetings from Barnum, Minnesota
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From the travels and adventures of the “World’s #1 Trackchaser”
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Carlton County Fairgrounds
Dirt oval
Lifetime Track #1,787
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Carlton County Fairgrounds
Dirt figure 8
Lifetime Track #2,152
THE EVENT Today’s undertaking was just one of more than 2,000 trips that have taken me up, down and around the long and dusty trackchasing trail. If you would like to see where I’ve been and experience those adventures here’s the link: If you’ve got a question, comment or whatever please leave it at the bottom of this report. It’s very easy to do. I’ll try my best to respond. Thanks! Reprinted with permission from my August 17, 2012 Trackchaser Report. . . . . THE 2012 SEASON IS WINDING DOWN! . . . . . Update on the “Great iPhone 5” travel odyssey As you know son J.J. ordered our iPhones last Friday (at 12 a.m. midnight). He had to be on the ball to make that happened as the entire nation’s supply sold out in one hour! . . Since then he’s been giving me updates on “where my phone” is. This is what I have received so far: Location Date Local time Activity China 9/15/12 9:51 p.m. Order processed; Ready for UPS Zhengzhou, China 9/16/12 8:01 a.m. Origin scan 9/16/12 5:45 p.m. Departure scan 9/16/12 6:00 p.m. Arrival scan Chek Lap Kok, 9/17/12 9:34 p.m. Departure scan Hong Kong Anchorage, AK 9/17/12 3:06 p.m. Arrival scan United States Anchorage, AK 9/18/12 12:58 a.m. Departure scan United States ‘THE ROAD TO 1800′ CONTEST (as a reminder) . I certainly appreciate everyone who takes the time to read about my trackchasing adventures. I hope you have nearly as much fun reading about these experiences as I do just doing them! . . Most long-time readers know that I offer contests from time to time for my readers. That being the case, I’ve got a new contest coming your way. You can win! I hope you do. . . . THE ROAD TO 1,800! You may have noticed that with today’s track report I am just 13 tracks short of the somewhat unheard of number of 1,800 tracks. “But Randy, exactly how BIG is 1,800 tracks. Has anybody else seen that many or more?” the most interested reader might ask. Nope! Nobody has seen more than 1,800 tracks. As far as I know the next leading trackchasers have totals in the 1,400s. . . How does the contest work? So how is this contest going to work? It’s pretty simple really. All you need to do is guess where my 1,800th lifetime track visit will be. You don’t have to guess EXACTLY where the track will be. You just have to be CLOSE. . . Who can enter the contest? Who is eligible to win the contest? Everyone who receives my reports via my email distribution lists is eligible. This includes everyone but Carol, “Trackchasing’s First Mother”. Yes, it includes all of my international readers as well. That’s why folks on my international distribution list are receiving this report today. The deadline to enter is anytime before I report on my 1,800th track. How many times can each reader enter the contest? Once. . . Your entry should include the “City/Country” nearest where you think track #1,800 is located. If the “City/Country” combination you submit is the most accurate to where I did see this milestone track compared to all other entries you win. Google Maps will be used determine the distance between your guess and track #1,800’s location. . . Contest prizes! So what will the prizes for this contest be? How many people will win? First of all, there will be three prizewinners. Grand Prizewinner: $18 (to commemorate my 1,800th track) Wal-Mart Gift Card plus a Randy Lewis racing t-shirt! Second and third runner-up winners: Randy Lewis Racing t-shirt . . Good luck! Good luck. Get your guesses in. If two people pick the same “City/Country” location the first submission gets priority. If you don’t enter you can’t win. Heck, even if you do enter you might not win! . . . . . THE KEYS TO THE TRIP What’s one of the most fun parts of trackchasing for me?……………more in “The Plan”. . . What happens less than 10% of the time when I plan these trips?……………..more in “The Plan”. . . Good luck Betty and Bob! …………..details in “Observations”. . . . . . THINGS YOU MIGHT HAVE NOTICED HAD YOU BEEN PAYING MORE ATTENTION IN SCHOOL THE BEST READERS IN RACING TAKE TIME TO CONTRIBUTE . . From the race organizer at the Oregon Raceway Park regarding my racing video of Carol’s and my visit there recently. . “Love the videos. Do you mind if we put them in our video gallery on our web page? Thank you, Brenda” . . From a long-time Procter & Gamble friend regarding the “Road to 1,800 Contest”. . “Can I ask a few questions before I give my answer to your “Road to 1800 Contest”? . Just trying to do a little analysis before I give you my answer.” . . . EDITOR’S NOTE Of course, I cannot answer any questions such as those submitted above. I want to give everyone an equal chance of winning. Since P&G employees are trained to operate only on objective unbiased data I can understand why the above questions were asked. It’s been ingrained in our DNA….data, data, data. . . Just a reminder you do NOT have to pick the exact location of my 1,800th track. You just need to be closer (geographically) than the next guy/gal. . . . . . GREETINGS FROM BARNUM, MINNESOTA . . PHOTOS! VIDEOS! SEE WHAT I SAW TODAY! IT’S JUST LIKE BEING THERE! It’s simple. There are three different ways for you to see what I saw today at the races. You can watch a YouTube movie. Secondly, you can see my still photos via YouTube.com. Finally, you can see my still photos by using Picasa or Fanfare. You can view the pictures at your own pace or watch them in a slide show. Pick the method you like best from below. . . . . WHO, WHAT, WHY AND WHERE . . . The Plan . . I was headed toward my boyhood home. My original plan was simple. I was headed back to my hometown airport in Peoria, Illinois. The Peoria area (I grew up across the river in East Peoria) brings back all kinds of fond memories from my Midwestern upbringing. . . One thing I do not miss is the weather. I once left Southern California when the temperature was 87 degrees. I landed in Peoria when it was -14 degrees. That was a 101-degree swing in one four-hour flight! . . Developing the plan is where most of the fun is. I put a good deal of time in planning each one of these trips. I don’t know the exact number of hours as each trip varies. If I had to guess I would say anywhere from 10-20 hours is needed to plan just about any weekend domestic trip. . . During that time I will first scan my proprietary list of race dates from every track location that I have yet to visit. This covers my unseen tracks in both the U.S. and Canada. Towards the beginning to the year that will include well over 1,000 special event dates. Of course, there are tracks that race every week as well. Usually, I’ll try to find a track racing on either a Friday and a Sunday. . . That is sometimes easier said than done. I have now seen all but about ten tracks in all of the U.S. and Canada that race weekly on Fridays and Sundays. For statistical generalizations there are no tracks that race weekly on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday or Thursday that I have not already seen. Almost all of the weekly scheduled tracks that I still need to see race on Saturdays. . . That’s why, when I schedule what is known as a “classic” trackchasing trip, (where tracks are seen on Friday, Saturday and Sunday) I search first for a Friday and Sunday opportunity. I can still fill in the Saturday track from over 100 choices. . . Will the sun be shining? Then I will check the weather. I have not been rained out a single day in 2012. I’m beginning to think I could accomplish something that no U.S. based major trackchaser has ever done. What is that? I might be able to go an ENTIRE calendar year without being rained out. I’ve come close in the past but have never had an entire year of rainout free trackchasing. . . During July and August I trackchase mainly in the Midwest and East. That’s where all of the county fairs are located. Of course, the weather is often very unpredictable (read that rainy) during this time. I’ll wear out my Weather.com iPhone app checking on rain probabilities. . . Can I get there? Once I have the race locations penciled in and know that none of those areas is expecting a hurricane, or even a slight shower, I will begin working on a plan to get there. . . Well over 80% of the track locations are located between the rough rectangle defined by Boston, Minneapolis, San Antonio and Tampa. Living in San Clemente, California (just 74 miles from Tijuana, Mexico) puts me a LONG way from just about anywhere in that triangle. . . Historically, almost all of the leading trackchasers come from Pennsylvania and New York with a very few located in the upper Midwest. There are some 8-10 trackchasers who have seen more than 1,000 tracks. None of them comes from west of the Mississippi. As a matter of fact, the leading trackchaser west of the Mississippi, other than Carol and me has far less than 400 tracks. That would show you just how difficult it is to trackchase from where we are based. . . The friendly skies is where it’s at. In order to be successful in the trackchasing hobby I must fly to the races. Therefore, after selecting some race locations and trying to confirm the weather will be acceptable it is time to figure out a way to get there. Getting there, for me, comes with constraints. . . First, believe it or not I want to spend as little time away from home as possible. If my first track of the trip races on a Friday night then I want to leave Friday morning. You can do the math with time zone changes from California and the miles needed to travel to the Midwest and beyond. . . I find this part somewhat amazing. Here is something to note about this planning process. I would guess that I actually pull off the exact trackchasing plan, by seeing the tracks that were part of the original plan, less than 10% of the time. Something will change. A better race date may surface at the last minute. The weather can change on a dime in these unstable climates. Finally, I will be flying standby most of the time. You can imagine trying to find “an extra seat” during the heavily tourist traveled summer months. . . “But Randy, you paint a pretty trying picture on pulling off one of these trips. Why do you put so much effort into planning the trip when more than 90% of your plans change”, the nearly astounded reader might be heard to ask. . . Has this been overlooked? That’s an excellent question. It brings up a point that some people might overlook. When I develop the initial plan I also establish multiple backup plans. Knowing that the first plan changes so much motivates me to have as many backup plans as possible. It’s never a waste of time to have a backup when I know it’s going to be used more than 90% of the time! . . With the above preamble you might surmise that this plan did not go exactly as it was drawn out. If you have that feeling you are correct. Don’t miss “The Plan” to see what happened as planned and what did not. . . . The Trip . . When too much is too much. I woke up this morning in San Clemente, California. I went to bed in Richfield, Minnesota.. This is what today looked like. . . Carol and I were first full-season season ticket holders (82 games) of the Los Angeles Angles of Anaheim (LAA) back in 1979. Those were the days of Wally Joyner and others. Since then we’ve cut back on our baseball attendance. . . Nowadays we’ll go to about fifteen Angels games each year. We buy most of our tickets before the season even starts. We like to go on the “Freebie” nights as well as Friday when they feature fireworks after each game. . . When I was trackchasing heavily (that sounds like ‘when I was drinking heavily’) I would trackchase about 115 days each year. Of course, that doesn’t even count the days it took to get to the tracks or to get home. I did that amount of trackchasing for 4-5 years. Although other trackchasers go trackchasing virtually every weekend when they can find a race, no other trackchaser has ever trackchased at that level for as long as I did. . . There’s just too many things to do out there! However, I soon recognized this was too much trackchasing. Why? There’s just too much to do outside of trackchasing both at home and on the road. This year will find me trackchasing “only” about 70 days. Even at that reduced amount of chasing I will still be in the top two trackchasers in annual totals. I’ve been in the top three for the last dozen years and am the only trackchaser who can make that claim. . . Often times I don’t care for neighbors. This trip featured a full day of activity the day before I left on this trip. It started out with a round of golf. In the afternoon I learned that Carol would need arthroscopic knee surgery. Then our neighbors, who we never hear from unless they have a complaint, came over to tell us that our air-conditioning unit (which sits right under their bedroom window) was keeping them up at night. Just to stay busy we went to an Angels game that evening. We rode the train up and back and didn’t get home after the game until midnight. My Friday morning flight was leaving at 6:01 a.m. We live 65 miles from LAX. How much sleep did I get? Plug the above parameters into your calculator and you’ll get a pretty small whole number. . . Where I was headed was not where I ended up. I would be flying from LAX to Minneapolis and then onto Peoria. I was headed to a county fair figure 8 race near my hometown. The best thing about flying into Peoria? I would get the chance to have what is arguably the best pizza in the world at Davis Bros. Pizza (Davis Bros.). Yes, lots of immediate family members will argue that point. However when I arrived into LAX I soon learned the flight to Minneapolis was too full for me to get a seat. I needed a new plan. . . Soon I was boarding a flight to Denver, Colorado. The connection time in Denver to Peoria (PIA) was tight, just 43 minutes. As luck (bad luck) would have it my flight into Denver was delayed by about 18 minutes. Then the “rookie” vacationers took forever to get off the plane. When they DID get off I had just 14 minutes to get to my next flight. I don’t know if you’ve ever used the Denver airport or not but it is huge. There’s an overweight comedian on XM satellite radio who does an entire routine on his moving from one end of the Denver airport to the other. . . This was not good. Today I landed at gate B19. My flight to Peoria was leaving from gate B95. Folks, that’s not much shorter than traveling from Los Angeles to San Francisco! I had no choice. I had to put my power walking skills to good use. However, with a full bladder the walk was more of a challenge than normal. . . Just as I came screeching/splashing into gate B95 I noticed the door was closed to the tarmac. Nobody else was getting on the plane to Peoria. Ouch! It was at this point that first I grabbed a bathroom and then I began to run through my backup plans. . . I considered flying into Moline, Cedar Rapids, Bloomington and Des Moines. None of those departure times and drive times upon landing would work for me. I just couldn’t get to central Illinois in time. . . It was getting to be Friday afternoon. Time was running out. What could I do? My LAST fallback plan would have me flying into Minneapolis. Remember I had already failed to fly from LAX to Minneapolis. However, Denver to Minneapolis was a whole new ballgame. I would try that. First, I tried for and missed a UA flight to MSP. Then I changed terminals (no easy task) in the Denver airport only to miss a DL flight to MSP. I had one last choice. I changed terminals (again) for a UA flight to MSP. I made it! . . All the while I was walking from one end of DEN to the other I was on the phone. I had to make and cancel rental car reservations, hotel reservations and the like. . . The flying part was over. Now it was time to drive. When I DID land in MSP I had a 122-mile drive up to Barnum, Minnesota to make. Of course, when the race was finished I had that same 122-mile drive to get back to Minneapolis. The plan for tomorrow called for an early morning flight to Grand Rapids, Michigan. . . Folks, if you want to live in the most beautiful climate in the world (San Clemente, California) and trackchase week after week in the Midwest and East while being at home for as much as possible you’re pretty much going to have to do it the way it’s described above. If you’ve got a better way to get all of this done I’m all ears. . . By the way, I fully expect in the future to be missing flights to the point that I won’t even make it to the races on some nights. If you’ve read these reports for very long you know that I almost always make it by the skin of my teeth. That won’t last forever. I’ve been lucky in the past. Understanding each of my options controls much of my luck. There will be days where I won’t make it at all despite knowing what alternatives exist. . . . Observations . . Smoothing the learning curve. The more of the “learning curve” that can be smoothed out on each of these trips the better. If you listed the top 50 cities (What are the top 50 cities in the U.S.?) in America I’ve been to all of them and many of them tens of times. Heck I probably go to forty of them in any give year. I visit Minneapolis about as often as any city. . . That’s true for two reasons. They have a lot of racing in Minnesota and Delta Airlines has a hub at MSP. Therefore, I can rent a car and get a hotel with my eyes closed. . . Where do the most difficult “travel learning curves exist”? Foreign countries. That’s what makes it so much fun to travel outside of the U.S. and Canada. . . County fairs never fail to provide a good time. When one goes to the county fair you can expect to see all kinds of unhealthy foods and lots of farm livestock. Tonight’s fair did not disappoint. . . For dinner I had a “Johnny on the bun”. I have no idea when they came up with that name. This concoction featured a sausage on a bun, covered in nacho cheese and then smothered in French fries. I seem to have a cast iron stomach for this type of thing. I feel I can eat this stuff as long as I don’t consume too many calories. . . Good luck Betty and Bob! For dessert I dined at the “teeny weeny donut” trailer. A couple named “Betty and Bob” had been running this business for 50 years. The sign at their place signaled they were retiring after this year. Can you imagine all they have seen in 50 years of hanging around county fairs. I can just imagine the muddy rainstorms they’ve fought through in their time. How could I not give them my business? . . The livestock barns were well stocked. It’s always fun to see what the farm kid lifestyle is like. Many of the “4-Hers” sleep overnight in the barns with their animals. Often times they raise their animal (sheep, pig and/or cows) all year just to sell at the fair. That’s got to be tough for a 12-year old to see their “pet” sold for meat. However, that is capitalism and what makes the world go round. Our niece, Lee Ann used to do that in Wyoming. . . Fall is in the air. It’s been hot everywhere. However, tonight when I left the fairgrounds it was just 55 degrees. With shorts on, like I always have, that was cold. It’s funny to think that in about 100 days, I’ll likely be back here for ice racing! . . . RACE REVIEW . . CARLTON COUNTY FAIRGROUNDS – BARNUM, MINNESOTA . . This was a most pleasant surprise. I go to a lot of county fairs every year to see auto racing. Much of what I see can hardly be called “auto racing”. I go there as a trackchaser. Tonight I was expecting to see another enduro junk car race with dirt berms and jumps. Yes, I was expecting novelty racing. . . I was pleasantly surprised to find a real quarter-mile dirt track that was situated inside a half-mile county fair horse track. The whole set up reminded me of the 1960s at the Mississippi Valley Fairgrounds in Davenport, Iowa. MVF was my first ever out of state racing show. It was the first out of state track I ever took Carol too. All of my boyhood heroes race there. . . Another outstanding surprise with tonight’s program was seeing a really good vintage race group running. Vintage racing is becoming more and more popular. Tonight there were two classes of vintage cars. . . Now what I would give to have seen Uncle Ernie race. The first was the super-modifieds. My uncle, Ernie Gilkerson, drove super-mods (#K-8) at the Macon Speedway in Illinois among other places. Although I have an 8’ by 10” of him in his car after a race win I never got to see him race in person. In today’s world that seems odd. He raced just 90 miles from our home. However, back in those days, and especially given our economic situation at the time, “Uncle Ernie” could have lived 9,000 miles away! I don’t ever remember a conversation about actually driving ninety miles to see him race. What were we thinking?! . . In addition to the super mods there was a stock car class of old coupes (1930s models) and late models from the 1960s. The late models actually replaced the coupes in the 60s. Tracks slowly moved away from the 1930s body styles to the 1950s (the ’57 Chevy was the premier stock car where I watched races) and then to the 1960s body style. Several years later late models evolved into “purpose built” body styles that didn’t really resemble ANY passenger cars. . . Overall, it was a good night of racing. If you like vintage racing don’t miss the videos. STATE COMPARISONS . . . Minnesota . . The North Star State This evening I saw my 63rd lifetime track in the North Star state, yes the North Star state. Sixty-three tracks in one state seems like a lot. However, Minnesota ranks only ninth of the list of states for trackchasing productivity. There’s still lots of county fair racing to see up in Minnesota. I enjoy going there. 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 Minnesota sayings: Not Sweden but we act like it. . . . . . TRAVEL DETAILS . AIRPLANE Los Angeles, CA (LAX) – Denver, CO (DEN) – 861 miles Denver, CO (DEN) – Minneapolis, MN – 679 miles RENTAL CAR #1 Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport – trip begins Barnum, MN – 123 miles . . . . TRACK ADMISSION PRICES: Carlton County Fairgrounds – $17 (includes $7 fair admission) . . . 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 300 tracks of my lifetime total. Don’t blame me. Total Trackchasing Countries There are no trackchasers currently within 10 countries of my lifetime total. . . . Current lifetime National Geographic Diversity results . . . . That’s all folks! Official end of the RLR – Randy Lewis Racing Trackchaser Report . . You might have remembrances of the Carlton County Fairgrounds. If so, please feel free to share in the comments section below. If you have any photos from back in the day, send them to me at Ranlay@yahoo.com. I’ll try to include them here. Reprinted with permission from my August 16, 2015 Trackchaser Report. . . . . ON THE WAY TO THE RACES . . A life full of surprises. Each one of my trackchasing days offers a series of surprises. Often times those surprises are in my favor and sometimes they are not. I try to control as much as I can to get a positive result. However I certainly can’t control everything I encounter during the day. . . Who does this? No. Who DOES this? This morning I woke up at 4:30 a.m. in the parking area of a shell gas station somewhere in St. Louis, Missouri. Last night after getting a tank full of gas I thought to ask the young woman working at the Shell gas station if she would mind if I slept in her parking lot for a few hours. That was fine with her. . . With a wake up call at 4:30 a.m. I could be at the airport by 5 a.m. I would need to return my rental car, check my bags and clear airport security. I thought I would have plenty of time to make all of that happen in anticipation of a 6:40 a.m. flight from St. Louis to Minneapolis. . . Of course I was driving to the airport from the gas station in the dark. I encountered several deer grazing along a lonely two-lane highway. There was no traffic. I made it easily to the National Car Rental lot in St. Louis. . . Push and shove time. However, on this morning, the National Car Rental group wasn’t up to their normal high standards. When I arrived there were a good dozen or more people waiting for the van to take them to the airport terminal. Might you the sun had not come up yet. . . I was carrying four separate bags including my large golf bag. I got in the back of the line. Soon I was joined by another 25 people as we waited for a shuttle bus. . . A big crowd all of a sudden. There were now 40 people waiting in the dark and not a single National Car Rental shuttle bus in sight. Finally one showed up. I had to “push and shove” but I made it on the first bus! . . I don’t normally travel with checked baggage. However on this trip I had been convinced to bring along my golf bag. When Carol joined me in Washington, D.C. she brought along our “Snoopy” expandable bag. This was now being used for the majority of my laundry and dirty clothes. I would check the golf bag and the Snoopy bag. . . I hate lines. I have systems in place to avoid lines. Of course there was a line of 25 people to check bags. I was starting to think that airport workers didn’t want to come to work at 5 a.m. on a Sunday morning. Can you blame them? . . What was going on this morning? It was now time to clear airport security. I have TSA pre-check privileges. This allows me to bypass all the long lines that you see in so many airports. I followed a sign that said “To all gates”. . . Random screening? Really? Even though I have TSA pre-check capability that doesn’t mean I can’t be selected for “random screening”. That was the case this morning. The TSA agent checked out my SHOES to make sure they hadn’t come in contact with any explosive material! They had not been. I was allowed to pass. . . Just past security I looked up to see a sign that read, “Admirals Club”. Yesterday was the official date that I could begin using my Alaska Airlines Board Room membership for admission to any and all of the 58 worldwide American Airlines Admirals Clubs. . . My biggest travels news of 2015 This is probably the biggest travel news I’ve had this year. Having access to these airport lounges is a tremendous benefit to a traveler like myself. Although I had only 15 minutes I stopped in just because I could. . . When I left the Admirals Club I had just 30 minutes before my flight was to depart. That’s when I discovered I was in the C terminal. My flight was leaving from the other end of the airport in the A terminal! You’re kidding right? . . Oh my goodness gracious. This meant I would have to leave airline security in terminal C, walk a half-mile and then clear security in terminal A. When I got to the terminal A security checkpoint I noticed a line of some 75 people. With my flight leaving soon that was going to work. . . However I simply walked through special TSA pre-check line, where there was nobody in line, and cleared security in 30 seconds. If you’re going to travel like I do you had better have systems in place to maximize your efficiency and effectiveness. . . Continual re-positioning. I boarded my one hour and 10 minute flight from St. Louis to Minneapolis. This was another repositioning day. I had been trackchasing in Kansas and Missouri over the past few days. Now I would be concentrating on Minnesota and South Dakota before taking a trip down to Texas to visit those grandkids and their parents. . . Following my time in Texas I would return to Illinois and Missouri before departing for the east as my trip begins to wind down. . . The ups and downs of trackchasing. Last night I slept overnight in a Shell gas station. Today I would be checking into one of the nicer Marriott hotel properties in all of Minnesota. Easy come easy go I guess. No, no other trackchaser does it the way I do. . . Timing is everything. By using Priceline.com I had paid $50 plus tax for my room at the Marriott Minneapolis West. This is primarily a business hotel located next door to the world headquarters of General Mills. They don’t do a lot of business on Sunday nights, which is why I got such a good rate on Priceline. Sunday night is the slowest night of the week for almost all hotels. The very best rate for the NEXT night, Monday night, was $260! Timing is everything. . . Speaking of timing I wanted to check in early. I called from the airport and confirmed I could check in at 10 a.m. That was nice of them to do for me. . . Even though I am traveling today on a Priceline.com hotel rate I always try to use my platinum frequent stay status when I check in. Normally that works pretty well and it did today too. . . Perks. It’s good to have perks. Not only was I getting to check in several hours early and pay only $50 for my room I got additional perks as well. They gave me a $10 gift certificate for use in their gift shop. They also gave me access to the concierge lounge where cocktails are served in the evening. Breakfast will be complementary for me tomorrow. . . How much better can I really do? They were giving me nearly as much in freebies as I had paid for the room. I love the Marriott chain and very much value being a lifetime platinum member in their frequent stay program. . . All of the above for a simple county fair figure 8 race. I had come to Minnesota today to see a figure 8 race at a county fair several miles north of Minneapolis. By reading the above you can see what it took to get there. . . Winning. If you look at the above you might see why I think it’s so challenging and important to try to “win” every decision point you encounter every day of your life. The more “wins” the easier and more fun life can be. . . These may seem like small things and maybe they are. However a successful life is the culmination of “winning” one small decision after another until lots of little things add up to big things. . . Wins and losses. I don’t want to wait for a rental car bus. I don’t want to wait in line to check bags. I want to clear airline security quickly. I want to get one of the very best hotels for one of the cheapest prices and on and on and on. To the degree that I can do that I will consider my day a success. Now let’s go trackchasing! . . . . THE RACING . . Carlton County Fairgrounds – Barnum, Minnesota . . A return trip to Barnum. I was coming back to the Carlton County Fairgrounds for the second time. I first made an appearance for their oval track racing back on August 17, 2012. That was my 1,787th lifetime track to see. . . Tonight I was in town to see the figure 8 racing. Last night they raced on the oval and, surprisingly to me, they raced on the oval tonight as well. . . Minnesota vintage stock car racing. Minnesota has a rather active vintage car stock car and modified stock-car group. I’ve seen them race at a few Minnesota county fairs. They bring about 15 cars and put on a nice show with some unique body styles from as far back as 1931. . . It was what it was. It was a cloudy humid overcast day. I paid seven dollars for admission to the fair and another eight dollars for admission to the grandstand to see the racing. That seems a little pricey but it was what it was. . . There was spectator seating in a relatively large covered grandstand. There were also bleachers on either side for an open-air view of the racing action. Initially I sat in the bleachers. There weren’t any support poles to block my view. It was a little quieter without the reverberation from the rooftop of the covered grandstand. . . Water seeks it’s own level. Soon a light sprinkle of rain got a little heavier. It seemed as if it might be a good idea to seek shelter just in case the rain got any worse. I grabbed a seat high up in the stands. It was dry there. The rain didn’t amount to much for the rest of the evening so I probably could have stayed outside in the bleachers. . . Sorry. Disappointed. I would have to tell you I’m a little disappointed in what I saw with the figure 8 racing tonight. I would describe the fairgrounds oval track as about a quarter-mile in length maybe just a little bit less. . . The figure 8 track used the turns of the oval track in what I would call a “traditional” figure 8 configuration. This meant the inside of the turns of the figure 8 track were a good 100 yards apart. By figure 8 racing standards that’s a big track. . . There were three classes of figure 8 racers according to the program. Those classes were uniquely named as small, intermediate and big! Each of the races ran 5-6 cars. With such a big figure 8 layout having that amount of cars didn’t create much “action” at the “X” or anywhere else for that matter. . . Come on. We’re trying to entertain people. Whenever a car stalled the officials threw a yellow or red flag. The race was stopped or at a minimum delayed. After the disabled vehicle was pushed away the race continued. It seemed as if each figure 8 race had 2-3 stoppages or more. That’s very unusual. . . With the light rain occurring the officials elected to go with a couple of oval track races for the vintage cars first. I think they feared losing the oval track to the rain. . . Following about seven figure 8 heat races the track went to intermission. At that point I left the grandstand to explore the fair. It wasn’t a large fair but there were several food choices and animal barns to see. . . . AFTER THE RACES . . No shows. Notably the poultry barn was entirely vacant. That has been the case with every county fair I visited the summer. The situation is caused by the bird flu epidemic and related actions from that. No chickens at the fair in 2015! . . A unique encounter. On the way out of the fair another fellow leaving at the same time struck up a conversation about Christianity. We talked about that subject for a few minutes and bade each other farewell. . . I don’t come away from a county fair figure 8 show disappointed very often. I’ve seen some really small low-speed affairs and even those were probably more entertaining than tonight’s action on such a big track. Nevertheless I added another track to my Minnesota state totals where I am currently the #1 ranked trackchaser. . . A day off! I’ll have a day off tomorrow before I head to South Dakota for a day of Tuesday night county fair racing. That race could be in jeopardy because they are expecting 1-2 inches of rain on Tuesday. However my race contact tells me they will run rain or shine. If someplace gets 2 inches of rain I find it difficult to believe they would race. We will see. . . Good night. . . . Minnesota . . . The Gopher state This evening I saw my 80th lifetime track in the Gopher state, yes the Gopher state. Minnesota is one of 19 states where I hope a state trackchasing lead. I have seen 80 or more tracks in eight different states. 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 Minnesota food terminology: Hot Dish: Basically a casserole, only better. Hot Dish is widely used in Minnesota to describe all casseroles. However, true Minnesotans know that a hot dish is a special kind of casserole that contains a starch (usually, if not always, tater tots) a protein (hamburger, or SPAM if you are feeling very Minnesotan), some sort of canned, or frozen, vegetable and some sort of “cream of something” soup. . . . . QUICK FACTS . AIRPLANE Los Angeles, CA (LAX) – Chicago, IL (ORD) – 1,745 miles RENTAL CAR #1 O’Hare International Airport – trip begins London, KY Indianapolis International Airport – trip ends – 766 miles RENTAL CAR #2 Indianapolis International Airport – trip begins Bedford, KY Indianapolis International Airport – trip ends – 603 miles RENTAL CAR #3 Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport – trip begins Aitken, MN Morten, Manitoba, Canada LaGrange, IN Manchester, IA Oskaloosa, IA Bowling Green, IN Buncombe, IL Ionia, MI Osgood, IN Hemlock, NY Taylorville, IL Cambridge, MN Mora, MN Urbana, IL Bedford, KY Owenton, KY LeMars, IA Belleville, KS Grayslake, IL Brazil, IN La Grange, KY Grayslake, IL Sturgis, SD Martinsburg, WV Tazewell, VA Henry, VA Belmar, NJ Berryville, VA Croton, OH Stockton, KS Bates City, MO Farmington, MO Barnum, MN . . . TRACK ADMISSION PRICES: Laurel County Fairgrounds – $10 (not a trackchasing expense) Trimble County Recreational Facility – $10 Aitken County Fairgrounds (oval) – complimentary admission Aitken County Fairgrounds (RC) – $8 ALH Motor Speedway – complimentary admission LaGrange County Fairgrounds – $10 Delaware County Fairgrounds – $10 Mahaska County Fairgrounds – $5 Sandstone – $15 (include pits) HBR Raceway – $10 (included pits) Ionia Free Fair – $13 Ripley County Fairgrounds – complimentary admission Hemlock County Fairgrounds – complimentary admission Christian County Fairgrounds – $8 Isanti County Fairgrounds – $12 Kanabec County Fairgrounds – $10 Champaign County Fairgrounds – $6 Dirty Turtle Off-Road Park – complimentary admission Owenton County Fairgrounds – $10 Plymouth County Fairgrounds – complimentary admission Belleville High Banks – $20 Lake County Fairgrounds – $8 Staunton MX – $15 Oldham County Fairgrounds – $10 Lake County Fairgrounds – $10 Buffalo Chip – $20 Berkeley County Youth Fairgrounds – $10 Tazewell County Fair Speedway – $10 Providence Raceway – $10 Wall Stadium Speedway – no charge Clarke County Fairgrounds – $7 Hartford County Fairgrounds – $7 Rooks County Speedway – $10 JSI Off-Road Park – No charge St. Francois County Raceway – $5 Carlton County Fairgrounds – $15 . . . 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 500 tracks of my lifetime total. Don’t blame me. . . . Total Trackchasing Countries There are no trackchasers currently within 10 countries of my lifetime total. . . . Current lifetime National Geographic Diversity results . . . That’s all folks! Official end of the RLR – Randy Lewis Racing Trackchaser Report . . . You might have remembrances of the Carlton County Fairgrounds. If so, please feel free to share in the comments section below. If you have any photos from back in the day, send them to me at Ranlay@yahoo.com. I’ll try to include them here. Click on the links below to see the “Video Plus” productions from my two visits to the Carlton County Fairgrounds. . . 2012 – Carlton County Fairgrounds…fun at the fair….oval racing .
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. . 2015 – Carlton County Fairgrounds…more fun at the fair….figure 8 racing . . Photos…easy to view. That’s right. Click on the links below for a photo album from today’s trackchasing day. Double click on a photo to begin the slide show or watch the photos at your own pace. Hover over a photo to read the caption. . . 2012 – Carlton County Fairgrounds – Oval track racing . . 2015 – Carlton County Fairgrounds – figure 8 racing
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