Greetings from Kalamazoo, Michigan
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From the travels and adventures of the
“World’s #1 Trackchaser”
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Kalamazoo Speedway
Asphalt oval
Lifetime Track #562
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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! Kalamazoo – 2002. I made it over to the Kalamazoo Speedway all the way back on Saturday, May 18, 2002. On that day I would be seeing nearly a complete show at the Kalamazoo Raceway. Kalamazoo was hosting the Auto Value Super Springs series. Later in the evening I made the super quick 9.2-mile drive over to the Galesburg Speedway to catch their racing. I would return to Galesburg in 2005 to see more racing on their oval track as well as their figure 8 show. Galesburg – 2002. I retired on June 30, 3002. I was just getting going, trackchasing wise, during my retirement year. I ended up seeing 76 new tracks in 2002. I would see just three Michigan tracks that year and two of them were on this special evening in the middle of May. Greetings from Kalamazoo, Michigan, Not sure if I mentioned this to you folks previously or not. I’ve purchased a Radio Shack digital recorder to aid in my trackchasing race summaries. Now when I’m tooling down the interstates and a thought comes to mind or I hear something on the radio I can record it easily without driving off the road trying to write something down. When I entered the store to buy this machine a young man came up to me to offer his help. I told him I wanted a dictating machine. His reply was, “I have no idea what you’re talking about”. A 50ish sales guy overheard our conversation and immediately directed me to a “dictating machine” which in today’s lingo is now called a “digital recorder”. I guess this is one of the few times the “old guy” was more techno savvy than the kid. It doesn’t happen often but this time it did. Today’s drive will be a pleasant 300 miler from near Madison, Wisconsin to Kalamazoo, Michigan. The route took me through Chicago and past the new Comisky Park where the Chicago White Sox play. This reminded me of my once each summer vacation trip to Chicago from Peoria with my grandfather. We normally went to Wrigley Field and ate White Castle hamburgers along the way. Comisky Park was in a “bad neighborhood” and they parked your car in a lot with cars immediately in front, in back and to each side of you. I also passed the exit for the Museum of Science and Industry which was the location of our annual school field trip. Skies are bright blue with white puffy clouds. The temps are cold in the low 50s. Although it’s May you would swear it’s clear day in October. I say the season is, “still winter” and not yet into “road construction” yet. Our daughter Kristy has just completed here second year of law school at the University of Michigan. I just heard today that the state of Illinois only admitted 600 lawyers to the bar this year which was down from 2,100 last year. The decrease is attributed too a tougher bar exam and prospective students going in to high tech careers. This is good news for the future lawyer in the family. Kalamazoo Speedway is my 562nd track. General admission was a steep $16 because of the addition of the Auto Value winged sprint cars. This is a professionally run racetrack. They have lots of seating which runs from the middle of turns 3 and 4 to the middle of turns 3 and 4. They also have about 20 VIP boxes. I sat in the 5th row of the grandstand right behind the flagman. It looked like the cars could drive directly into me before they turned further left and headed down the straight. The scoreboard was the most advanced I’ve ever seen for a short track. Each racecar has a transponder. This allows each car to have its race position scored electronically for each lap. The scoreboard listed the running order of the top 20 cars in each race. The sprint group had 30 cars. They ran three heat races with 6 cars inverted in each with the top 5 qualifying for the A feature. These cars were really quick and turned the three eights mile high banked asphalt track in just around 11 seconds. The Auto Value group brings their own announcer. He informed the crowd that the sprint cars did not have clutches or starters; I’ve heard that before. He also reminded the crowd that these cars were not started with keys. Any veteran trackchaser heard that line before? The setting sun was a real problem as it went down over turns three and four. The last 1 and ½ hours of sunshine made it very difficult to see anything in that area of the track. I’m surprised the drivers could see to race. The two regular classes joining the sprints were the limited late models (more than 50) and the super late models (40). Both of these classes had the same outward appearance. I stayed for almost three hours and left after the A main for the limited late models. I wanted to duck out at this stage so I could catch a double at Galesburg Speedway. TRACK FOOD: I saved my evening meal for the track. Probably a mistake. I had the chicken strips, fries and a soda for 6 bucks. The good thing is the serving wasn’t too large since the taste was marginal. They also had whole pizzas for $8, chips and cheese $2.50 (guess the Mexican food term nachos hasn’t reached this part of Michigan yet), dill pickles 75 cents and gum the cheapest item on the menu at a quarter. RENTAL CAR UPDATE: Although not my favorite traveling machine the Avis racing Chevy Monte Carlo is getting me down the road. TRACK RADIO FREQUENCY: Lots of good radio talk. The track’s folks voted several times to shorten the program so the crowd wouldn’t be out in the cold any longer than necessary. Galesburg Speedway, Galesburg, MI Toledo Speedway (figure 8), Toledo, OH Toledo Speedway (small oval), Toledo, OH Spartan Speedway (figure 8), Lansing, MI Irwindale Speedway (figure 8), Irwindale, CA Lafayette County Fairgrounds, Darlington, WI Greetings from Galesburg, Michigan, There has been some controversy brewing among trackchasers regarding the counting of tracks. The official rules say you can count a track if you’ve seen at least one race at the track. Most tracks run 3-5 races for each class they have and usually have 4-6 classes of cars. This means an average track might have 15-20 races during a night. Most trackchasers don’t think it’s good form to leave without seeing at least one feature event. On the other hand, a trackchaser or two thinks it’s OK to see just one or two preliminary races (they are usually called heat races) and then drive on to see a race or two at another track. I don’t think much of that approach but it is an easy way to pad your totals. Think of that strategy if it were used to see how many baseball parks you could see in one day. You could watch an inning or two at one park, go to another park and see an inning or two and maybe even go to a third park to see an inning. Like I said most trackchasers hardly ever employ the see one heat race and leave theory. On the other hand, the current rules do not prohibit someone from doing this. I don’t agree with the strategy although it is not a violation of the written rules but might be violating the spirit of the rule. Since I saw all of the trophy dashes, heat races, B features and one A feature at Kalamazoo I felt OK about driving 20 minutes to Galesburg Speedway. I arrived at about 10 p.m. and it was freezing! To my pleasant surprise I learned there were still four feature races to run following the race that was in progress. When you travel the interstates late at night you hear some real strange stuff on the radio. A large amount of this nocturnal discussion centers on UFOs. It sounds even more ominous late at night, sort of like telling ghost stories when you were a kid. A lady tonight claims that UFOs are responsible for farmland animal mutilations. She even has a web site www.earthlinks.com which covers the subject matter. You can see her coverage of a 2,400-pound bull mutilation which allegedly occurred in Christmas Valley, Oregon at http://www.earthfiles.com/earth347.htm. I see my job as bringing you information in this medium you don’t see in the myriad of emails you get. If you’ve gotten any bull mutilation emails this month please notify me immediately as I don’t want you on my email distribution list! Galesburg Speedway is my 563rd track. It’s located just 20 minutes west of Kalamazoo and allowed me to get a nighttime double. It’s unusual for two tracks to be running on the same night that are so close together. It’s even more unusual to see two almost identical tracks in layout, i.e. both short asphalt ovals running at the same time. Galesburg has a traditional figure 8 course in addition to their one-quarter mile oval. It was not in use tonight. Galesburg Speedway is the poor cousin to Kalamazoo Speedway. The facility reminded me of some of the run down tracks I saw in the United Kingdom. As in the U.K. the state of the facilities did not have an impact on the quality of the program. The racing was entertaining. When I arrived they were not charging to get in. That was a plus. The negative to arriving late was that the concession stand was not “doing”, as I was told, hamburgers anymore. I settled for a hot chocolate. No their hot chocolate did not look like the cup pictured. I learned over my racing radio headset a few things. First of all, the headset keeps my ears warm in this Alaskan weather pattern we’re enjoying. Secondly, it provides great noise protection which is important when you go to as many racing events as I do. Finally, it gives you lots of insider information. I learned the track has an 11 p.m. curfew and must stop racing by then. Their last race checkered at exactly 11 p.m. As they say, “Work expands to fill the time”. They had 5 or 6 classes. The legends and late models were over by the time I got there. But I did see four features (Bs and then As) of the street stocks and mini stocks. Galesburg Speedway has a rule I’ve seen at a few asphalt tracks. If you run faster laps during a race than you did during your qualifying you are given the black flag and told to go to the pit area. I saw this happen a few times. During the street stock A main Carlos Solario took the lead in car #9. I thought it was great that a Hispanic driver was in the field and doing well. As soon as he took the lead a voice came over the track radio and said, “Watch out for that f@%$&ing number 9 car”. That comment didn’t sound very diverse! It turned out that Carlos would speed away from his competition down the straights and just about stop his car in the turns while the competition caught up. It was obvious he was “sandbagging”. He was driving just fast enough to stay out front but not so fast as to be disqualified. This driving style allowed one driver to catch Carlos on the last lap forcing Carlos to go all out on the last lap for the win. Over the radio they said he drove .23 seconds faster on the last lap than his fastest lap for the entire night. On a small track that’s a big difference. Yes, Carlos was sandbagging but he did get credit for the win! TRACK FOOD: The pickings were slim when I arrived at 10 p.m. Settled for a hot chocolate. RENTAL CAR UPDATE: Similar to my Bridgeport small track entrance I drove the Avis Racing Chevy Monte Carlo directly from the street into the pit area. I parked next to the #07 mini stock and made my way to the grandstands! TRACK RADIO FREQUENCY: There was a little bit of swearin’ going on from the track personnel. Almost the entire frozen crowd was oblivious to this. Toledo Speedway (figure 8), Toledo, OH Toledo Speedway (small oval), Toledo, OH Spartan Speedway (figure 8), Lansing, MI Irwindale Speedway (figure 8), Irwindale, CA Lafayette County Fairgrounds, Darlington, WI 
PEOPLE/TRAVEL NEWS
RACING NEWS
New racetracks visited in 2002
Upcoming events for May, 2002
PEOPLE/TRAVEL NEWS
RACING NEWS
New racetracks visited in 2002
563. Galesburg Speedway, Galesburg, MI
Upcoming events for May, 2002