Greetings from North Vernon, Indiana
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From the travels and adventures of the
“World’s #1 Trackchaser”
Jennings County Fairgrounds Dirt oval Lifetime Track #2,656 THE EVENT Editor’s note: After you read what I will share with you today I have just one question. If you lived in Southern California would you have come to the Jennings County Fairgrounds in Indiana for the express purpose of seeing five senior champ karts race? You can keep your answer to yourself. I AM A TRACKCHASER. My name is Randy Lewis (some trips are so long, like this one in Newfoundland and Labrador, that I have to do laundry). I live out in San Clemente, California. We’re only 74 miles north of the Mexican border. I’m not sure a person could pick a more inconvenient location in the continental United States if they wanted to be a world-class trackchaser. My residential location virtually assures the idea that I must fly to virtually every track I visit. I am a “trackchaser”. I trackchase. Have you ever in your life heard of “trackchasing”? I didn’t think so. Trackchasing for me is all about three things. First, I enjoy auto racing. Secondly, my hobby requires a good deal of overnight travel. When I venture out to see a race at a track I’ve never seen before I do not want my trip limited to racing only. The very last thing I want when I’m done trackchasing is to have memories of only racing. I want to take some time to see the local attractions of wherever I might be visiting. Those visits in many cases will provide more long-lasting memories than whatever I saw on the track. Finally, I want to create a logistical plan that allows me to accomplish the two points mentioned above without depleting my retirement account. That’s trackchasing for me. Hundreds of trackchasers have stopped for a moment to create their own personal trackchasing list. I think that is great. However, I will tell you that no one has ever taken trackchasing more seriously than I have. Do I have any data to back up that assertion? I do. To date, I have seen auto racing in 85 countries at more than 2,670 different tracks. Does that sound serious to you? I’ve been able to see the world doing this. If you’re interested in exactly what I’ve been able to experience all around the U.S. and the world I recommend you click on this link. Trackchasing Tourist Attractions After each and every event that I attend I post a YouTube video, a SmugMug photo album and a very detailed Trackchaser Report about the experience on my website at www.randylewis.org. My trackchasing contributions generate a good deal of interest in what I am doing. My YouTube channel (ranlay) has more than 1.3 million views. My website gets more than 20,000 views every month. Because I have seen racing in 85 countries at this point I am considered the World’s #1 Trackchaser. That’s good enough for me. Now I encourage you to drop down a few spaces and read about today’s trackchasing adventure. As you discover what went on at this track just think about the idea that I’ve done this nearly 2,700 times. I don’t mind admitting I am addicted to the hobby of trackchasing. It’s just fun! If you’re interested in looking back and seeing where I’ve been the following link is for you. If you’ve got a question, comment or whatever please leave it at the bottom of this report. It’s very easy to do. Or you can visit me on Facebook. Thanks! FOREWORD Friday, October 2, 2020. On Thursday evening Carol and I were just sitting around the dinner table chatting about the events of the day as we are wont to do. Later in the evening, I was going to take an all-night flight from Los Angeles to Boston. I was planning to see some racing up in southern Maine on Friday night. Landing in Boston on Friday morning would give me all the time in the world to get to that race. I have an excellent smartphone weather app. It’s called Weather Underground. I am absolutely amazed at how accurate their forecasts are. For the past week, they have been telling me there would be no rain in Lyman, Maine other than late Friday afternoon just before that evening’s racing was scheduled at the Bartlett Bridge Raceway. This general area of Maine had virtually no precipitation in their 10-day forecast in advance of that predicted storm on Friday afternoon. I wondered how WU could make this projection so far in advance. As the days passed they stuck with the rain forecast for early on Friday. However, the latest forecast showed a little bit less chance of precipitation on Friday which is why I decided to make the trip. Then just as I was helping Carol clear the dishes from our dinner table I checked the forecast one more time. At that point, the rain forecast for Maine looked just a little bit more significant to me. It was so significant that it scared me from going to the Pine Tree State. Now with 30 minutes’ notice, I had to change my plan. I would still be taking an overnight flight from Los Angeles to Boston. Given the flight loads and my flying on standby traveling to Boston on a wide-open plane was the best way for me to get eastward. Then I noticed I could wait a couple of hours on Friday morning at Boston’s Logan airport and catch a flight back westward to Cincinnati. Yes, this was the LONG way to get to Cincinnati from Los Angeles. Most people don’t take 7 1/2 hours to do that. Why did flying to Cincinnati look attractive other than the fact that there were quite a few open seats getting into this southern Ohio city? The folks over the Jennings County Fairgrounds in North Vernon, Indiana were holding a go-kart race. That was my attraction. So if I went to the Los Angeles International Airport (LAX). Traffic has been much lighter than usual during COVID-19 in Southern California. Tonight I left at 8 p.m. There was no traffic. There wasn’t much activity in the airport either. My flight was departing at 10:45 p.m. I even had enough time to stop at the Redondo Beach Tesla supercharger location and grab about 40 miles of extra driving charge. For my flight to Boston, I was upgraded to an economy plus type seat. I had a row of three seats all to myself for the five-hour overnight flight. I am 6’3” tall. If I was 5’5” tall like some of my fellow competitors I could lie across three seats and be most comfortable. However, with my height, I just can’t make it work lying prone over three coach seats. When I landed in Boston I noticed that the passenger traffic in the terminal was lighter than normal. Currently, airlines are only operating at about 35% of the capacity they enjoyed a year ago. That number has pretty much pegged itself at 35% for the past three months. With lower demand for flights, even though fewer planes are flying, flying on a standby basis is a little bit easier than normal. I had a nearly four-hour layover in Boston before I would be taking my flight back to Cincinnati. I used that time to walk at a leisurely 3 mph pace all over the terminal. By the end of the day, I had covered 6 miles in the 24-hour timeframe ending at midnight Eastern Time. When I landed in Cincinnati, the chili capital of the world, I definitely had to stop at the Goldstar Chili location in the airport. I love eating Cincinnati chili from either Gold Star or Skyline Chili. By the way, did you know that the Cincinnati airport is not located in Ohio. It’s in Kentucky! I was able to grab a National Car Rental Racing Toyota Camry for this trip. This is my favorite rental car by far. It gives a comfortable ride and the car offers an outstanding fuel mileage of more than 40 miles per gallon. Additionally, it’s easy to set up the car’s audio system to play from my smartphone so I can listen to all of my podcasts seamlessly. I only needed to drive 90 miles from my Fairfield Marriott Hotel and Suites property in Sharonville, Ohio over to North Vernon, Indiana. I had made a reservation via Priceline at the Fairfield property. I paid a price so low that I’m not permitted to share it with you in this format. I got there early enough on Friday afternoon to take an hour’s nap which was definitely needed after flying overnight to Boston. Oh! One more thing. Did you know that Carol and I lived in Fairfield, Ohio for one year beginning in 1974? We moved into a brand new apartment complex. We were the very first occupants in our unit. Years later I would read a news story that a woman was beheaded in our complex. Tonight was going to be my third trackchasing adventure in the tiny town of North Vernon, Indiana. North Vernon is a small Hoosier town of only about 7,000 people. Pat O’Connor, the Indy car driver, was from North Vernon. Pat died in a 15-car pileup on the first lap of the 1958 Indianapolis 500. All the way back in 2002 I made the trek to the Twin Cities Raceway in North Vernon to see a Monday night stock car special. Billy Moyer won the feature. At the time that was my 577th-lifetime track where I had seen racing. Billy is one of my all-time favorite drivers. In June 2005 I was back at the fairgrounds, with Ed Esser and Roger and Brenda Ferrell, to see figure 8 racing at the Jennings County Fairgrounds. That figure 8 track turned out to be my 885th-lifetime track. In June 2018 I returned to North Vernon at the Jennings County Fairgrounds to see a Top Dog Promotions temporary inner oval race on the front stretch of the permanent fairgrounds oval. That was a hoot and my 2,451st-lifetime track. Now tonight I was returning to North Vernon for the fourth time and the Jennings County Fairgrounds for the third time to see racing on their permanent 1/5-mile or so relatively flat oval. The program was going to be featuring go-karts, mainly flat go-karts. However, they did have a senior champ division which was the attraction for me. When I pulled into the fairgrounds at 6:30 p.m. I parked right across from the restrooms near the track’s concession stand. I figured that was a very convenient parking location on a cool night. Tonight there was no charge for spectators to watch from the grandstands. That is common amongst go-kart racing venues. I saddled up to the concession stand and plunked down four dollars for a bottle of water and the three-dollar “loaded” nachos. That was supper. Today is October 2, 2020. Fall is in the air in the Midwest. As a matter of fact, the low temperature projected for North Vernon tonight is 39°. One of the track’s people on Facebook said they really needed to run an efficient program so people could get back into their beds at home at a reasonable hour and avoid as much of the nighttime cold as possible. That was a nice thing to say. However, in real life running an efficient auto racing program seems a nearly impossible thing to actually do. The Jennings County Fairgrounds outlaw kart Facebook page gives a lot of detailed information about their race program and the classes they run. I was told the drivers’ meeting would take place at 7:15 p.m. with hot laps at 7:30 and racing to follow immediately. Overall, they had some really good go-kart racing tonight. They did have a lot of classes, too many classes for my taste. They also had a large car count. I would say that several of the individual classes had 6-9 competitors. That’s more than usual for kart racing. I watched the drivers’ meeting from afar. Then I sat in the top row of the covered grandstand and watched nearly 20 classes of go-kart classes hot lap. For those new to racing “hot lapping” is practice. As each class came onto the track for a few laps of practice I kept watching for signs that the senior champ class would be racing tonight. I had been told a couple of weeks ago that the track commonly gets about four champ karts. The person giving me the information wondered aloud as to why I would come from California to see just four champ karts. I sensed this person didn’t know me. Almost every class racing tonight was a flat kart without a cage. However, when any caged karts did come onto the track I eagerly compared the car numbers to the point standings offered on FB for the senior champ division at Jennings. I was only seeing caged classes for kids. It was getting late. I still hadn’t seen the senior champs hot lap. I’ve got to be honest. It did cross my mind that no senior champs had shown up tonight. That was a terrible thought! When hot lapping had almost ended five senior champs did make it out on the track. I was “golden” as the boys back in the factory at the Caterpillar Tractor Company, where I worked during college, used to say. Now I sat… and waited. Each class was going to run a heat race and a main event tonight. There was an announcer with a PA system but he didn’t say much. I had no real idea which flat kart class was out of the track at any one time. I also didn’t know if there were more karts than one heat race could handle for each class. There were several spins. There was one accident so severe that the program was delayed by 20-25 minutes while the ambulance came out to rescue the disabled driver. Another class had just one competitor. That one kart, driven by a child, took the green flag, drove into turn number one and spun out. They couldn’t get the car restarted. Just that one incident caused a delay of 5-10 minutes. OMG. I’m going to ask that you take a look at my video to see what the racing action looked like tonight. The karts were powerful, raced closely and did their share of bumping and banging. It was 10 p.m. before the senior champ heat race came to the track. By now the class has grown to six racers. Their heat race like all of the other heat races was being run for eight laps. Feature events tonight were scheduled for 12 laps. Folks, I had sat through nearly 20 classes of hot lapping and 20 classes of heat racing before I saw the one and only countable class race at the Jennings County Fairgrounds tonight. I had arrived at 6:30 p.m. I had eaten some nachos. I sat in the grandstands with the temperature now sitting at 51°. It was starting to get coolish but not horrendously cold. I watched the senior champs run their race and looked at my new Apple Watch. It was a little past 10 p.m. I wondered about the person who had said that everyone should be on their toes to run an efficient program so folks could get out of the track and home in their beds early? It was 10 p.m. There were still two or three classes to race after the senior champs. All of this track activity was just the heat races. There is absolutely no way they could get this program over by midnight with 20 classes or so racing 12-lap features. I’m going to guess they finished at 1 a.m. I’m going to guess the temperature was in the low 40s by that time. I knew this for sure. When the senior champs took the checkered flag on their heat race I was outta there. It had been a good night of trackchasing. I know that to some that sounds like a demented statement. One of the cool things about trackchasing is that I am exposed to the four seasons that run through most of our country. Where I live in Southern California the weather is virtually the same every day of the year. I love starting my trackchasing season each year in January and February on the ice in the northern part of the country. Then in March and April, I’ll usually trackchase somewhere in the south where spring comes early. From May through September I can be found chasing tracks all over the country in summer-like conditions. By October, like it was tonight, temperatures are getting cooler. From October through November I’ll catch those fall specials. I typically won’t see much racing in December although I can catch a few tracks in the early part of the month. I sort of had my heart set on stopping at a Dairy Queen about 20 miles from the track on the way home. When I pulled into the parking lot their road sign was lit up but by the time I got to the drive-through they had shut it off. No blizzard for me tonight. On the way back to the hotel I stopped at a BP gas station/convenience store. There I picked up a couple of huge bottles of Gatorade Zero and a package of cheddar/ranch ruffled chips. After missing out on my ice cream blizzard those chips were quite tasty. I was wearing my mask inside the store because I like to think I care about others. However, nobody else was wearing a mask including the clerk. I asked about that. She told me somewhat sheepishly that the clerks in the store were not required to wear a mask if they didn’t want to. I wanted to tell her that I didn’t really want to be wearing a mask either but I thought it was a good idea for others. I decided to let sleeping dogs lie. I was back in my hotel just a couple of minutes before midnight. It had been a long travel day. I suspected that not too many of the 30 fans in the stands tonight were from Southern California. If they were I suspected they had not flown from Los Angeles to Boston to Cincinnati to come to the go-kart racing tonight. Those were just my own personal suspicions. Tomorrow night I plan to see some more kart racing up in Ohio. I had initially planned to sleep in my car after those races. I figured I could get four or five hours of sleep before catching a 6:45 a.m. Eastern time flight back to California on Sunday morning. After having sat out in the cold for that amount of time tonight I went about reassessing my sleeping in the car idea for tomorrow night. That being the case…using my smartphone, I clicked on the Priceline.com app and secured another night at the Fairfield Inn in Sharonville, Ohio. The price for a Marriott property was less than a Motel 6! On Saturday night I would only have about five hours of sleep in the hotel but that seemed prudent given the falling fall temperatures in the Midwest. Good evening from the Jennings County Fairgrounds in North Vernon, Indiana. Randy Lewis – 85 countries – 2,656 tracks. Indiana The Hoosier State This evening I saw racing at my 120th-lifetime track in the Hoosier, yes, the Hoosier State. I hold the #2 trackchasing ranking in Indiana. Indiana ranks #3, amongst all the states, in tracks seen for me in the U.S. Here’s a link to my all-time Indiana state trackchasing list. I have made 81 separate trips to Indiana seeing these tracks. 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 Hoosier sayings: 50 Million Years Tidal Wave Free JUST THE FACTS 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 780 tracks of my lifetime total. Don’t blame me. Total Trackchasing Countries My nearest trackchasing competitor, a native of Belgium, has seen racing in more than 30 fewer countries compared to my lifetime total. Current lifetime National Geographic Diversity results That’s all folks! Official end of the RLR – Randy Lewis Racing Trackchaser Report Click on the link below to see the video production from the racing action today. Click on the link below for a photo album from today’s trackchasing day. You can view the album slide by slide or click on the “slide show” icon for a self-guided tour of today’s trackchasing adventure. I took the LONG way but the FUN way to get to North Vernon, Indiana 
