LaGrange County Fairgrounds

 

 

 

THE EVENT

 

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!

 

 

 

ON THE WAY TO THE RACES

 

 

MONDAY

 

 

Yes, I COULD do this every day of the year.

Yesterday and today marked days number eight and nine on the “Long and Arduous Mega-Trackchasing Summer Tour of 2015”. Truthfully I could do this every day of the year!

 

 

Repositioning.

Yesterday was a repositioning day. I would move myself from Grand Forks. North Dakota to Janesville, Wisconsin a driving distance of about 650 miles.

 

There was no rush to get to Janesville. I had all day. That being the case I slept in to a reasonable hour. Then I was off on a one-hour power walk.  Fargo had a beautiful park near my hotel that was perfect for my exercising.

 

 

Efficient and effective.

Over the past several months I’ve been using my Pandora music app on my iPhone as my powerwalking exercise program. The “I want to exercise” Pandora channel is perfect motivational music for my walks.

 

 

As part of my AT&T cell phone package I get five GB of data each month. If I go over that amount I am charged an additional $10 per month per gig. When I’m on Wi-Fi at home or in a hotel or wherever there is Wi-Fi there is no phone carrier data usage charge.

 

 

Pandora doesn’t use a lot of data but it uses some. If I exercise 15-20 days per month for 45 minutes to an hour or more data usage can add up.

 

An edge a day….adds up.

If you have read these reports for very long you know that I’m always trying to gain an edge. My theory is simple. If you gain a number of “edges” you’ve got a pretty big advantage by the end of the day, the week, the month, the year and during your lifetime! Make sense?

 

 

I came up with the idea of buying songs from Apple’s iTunes to replace the songs I listen to on Pandora. For just $1.29 per song I can own permanently and have downloaded on my phone all of the songs from the “I want to exercise” channel that I like the most. I figure I’ll save a couple of pennies in the long run from data charges. I’ll also have the permanent ownership of the songs for my personal use.

 

 

Driving “OP” cars.

I very much enjoy driving. For some reason I seem to enjoy driving other people’s (OP) cars (National Car Rental) more than wearing out my own automobile on long drives. National is more than willing to accommodate with reasonable rates that include unlimited mileage. If National ever resorts to a mileage fee my trackchasing career might be over!

 

Trackchasing sponsorship/strategy.

I’ve been using Priceline.com to purchase most of my hotels so far on this trip. I use Motel 6 pricing as my “default” price target.

 

 

Let’s say the best rate for a Motel 6 in the area I want to stay is $45. With tax and the senior discount that might come to about $50 in total.

 

 

That means that my Priceline target will be in the range of $50 plus taxes and fees. With Priceline the taxes and fees on a $50 purchase might be about $12 or so.

 

 

I figure, at a minimum, if I can get a Priceline hotel for $50 it’s worth an additional $12 for Wi-Fi, often a complementary breakfast and just a general upgrade in my hotel accommodations. Remember that’s only the BREAKEVEN point. Often I do much better.

 

 

This morning I had checked out of a Fairfield Inn in Grand Forks, North Dakota. Although the Northeast has the most expensive hotels in general the Dakotas and surrounding areas can be high-priced during the summertime.

 

What’s my tip to most people? Stay in school! Educate yourself.

I have spent a lot of time learning the “Priceline system” and how to best use it. The folks at Bidding For Travel.com educated me on the “secret free bed” option that I used frequently with Priceline.

 

 

Recently Priceline came up with an additional purchasing option. The new program is called the “Express Deal”. With the Express Deal you know the price you’re going to pay and the “star” rating of the hotel before you commit. You won’t know the exact hotel you’re getting at the time you place your purchase but you will know it’s geographical location in whatever city you’re planning to visit.

 

 

The Express Deal will also tell you how much you are saving off the hotel’s best website price. As an example here’s how the Express Deal program works.

 

By example.

Let’s say you plan to stay in Denver, Colorado. Denver may have 8-10 or more Priceline geographical locations. With an Express Deal you can specify what general area you wanted to stay at in Denver. Let’s say you wanted to stay at the Denver airport area.

 

 

Priceline provides “star” ratings of 1-5 stars based upon the quality of the hotel. An upscale resort might have a 5-star rating. Hyatt and Marriott hotels could be 4-star properties. A Holiday Inn might be three stars. Extended Stay America hotels are often two stars. Older or more downscale but clean motels would likely get a one-star rating.

 

 

An Express Deal would provide this type of information. As an example the listing would show a three-star hotel in Denver’s airport area selling for $50. They would also tell you how much you were saving over the hotel’s best rate. The savings normally range from 15 to 50%. Additionally in any geographical area there might be 3-5 or more Express Deal offerings. 

 

Trying to extend the edge.

When I check into a hotel that I have purchased on Priceline I will do my best to use my previous hotel frequent stay status to get upgrades and freebies. I’m a platinum member of the Marriott program and a gold member of the Sheraton program. I have a platinum status with Hyatt as well. I also have basic memberships in most other hotel frequent stay programs.

 

 

At the hotel I just checked out of in North Dakota I used my platinum status to get a free upgrade to a king suite room. I was also given a welcome gift of food and drink upon arrival. 

 

 

The hotel in North Dakota (Fairfield Inn – Grand Forks) offered a best rate on their website of $149 plus tax per night. I paid $70 per night including taxes and fees. As you can see there are all kinds of savings and quality upgrades I can get by shopping a little smarter with Priceline.

 

 

I figure if I’m going to be out on the road as much as I am I need to create some advantages. I’m pretty much like everyone else. I want to get a little more and pay a little less. I’m hoping that as I share these travel tips you’ll be able to benefit from the research I’ve done.

 

Hog heaven.

I made it to Janesville, Wisconsin and my Microtel hotel by about midnight. It had been a most pleasant 613-mile drive done at my own pace. Stops at Wendy’s and Subway along the way provided low-carb fuel for the trip. A convenience store stop allowed for the purchase of some snacks. Included items were Duke’s original Shorty smoke sausages and a couple of packages of pork skins. I was in hog heaven!

 

NASCAR the most popular auto racing in the country.

I am a major NASCAR fan. I probably listen to the NASCAR channel more on Sirius satellite radio than anything else. However business and NPR channels rate highly as well.

 

 

I only wish that short track racing promoters could run a program as efficiently as NASCAR does. I see some short track fans “hating” NASCAR. They make the comment that NASCAR isn’t as popular as it once was. That’s one way to look at it.

 

A million but with a B!

However NASCAR just signed an 8 billion (with a B!) dollar TV contract. The smallest crowd you will see at any NASCAR track is probably about 40,000 people. Their largest crowds will exceed 100,000 people for a single race.

 

 

Other than the Indy 500 in the U.S. are there any other racing events in our country that draw a crowd of 40,000 people or more? I don’t think so. How many short tracks draw just 10% of one of NASCAR smallest crowds?

 

 

I have seen a baseball game in all 30 of the currently active major league baseball parks. I would guess that most of those parks were less than half full on the day I visited. Is that a big problem for major-league baseball owners? I don’t think so. The money they get from their TV packages and other sponsorship deals dwarf what they gain from the live gate.

 

Follow the money…then do the math.

That is the case with NASCAR. Do you know how many zeros $8 billion has? Do you know how many zeros are generated with a crowd of 80,000 versus 40,000? When you’re uncertain as to what the answer to a particular problem might be…. follow the money… then do the math.

 

 

Sooner or later I watch every NASCAR race from the moment the telecast begins until they show the final signoff credits. I’m a NASCAR fan. Being a NASCAR fan does not preclude me from being a short track fan.

 

 

However, I would NEVER watch a NASCAR race live on TV. There are way too many commercials and many of them are repetitive. Additionally if I want to watch a Sunday NASCAR race on Tuesday that’s what I do.

 

 

Sorry. I just couldn’t imagine doing this.

I couldn’t imagine ever wanting to watch a TV program at the exact time it is airing live. The one exception to that would be a commercial free program. About the only commercial free programs are 24/7 news coverage of major disasters.

 

 

I can watch a normal 60-minute TV program in a bit less than 45 minutes from my DVR (digital video recorder). I can watch a recorded TV program ANYTIME I want. I can begin to watch it two minutes after the show starts to two months or two years after it begins. I catch watch some of the program now and the rest later. I like my life to have as many options as possible. HAVING to be somewhere on a Thursday night at 8 p.m. to see a specific show is way too much structure for my lifestyle.

 

 

NASCAR meets daily life.

I use the strategies employed by NASCAR in my daily life. Yes, you heard that right. NASCAR drivers will drive their racecar until there are only a few drops of fuel left in the tank before they make a pit stop. Then when they do make a pit stop they don’t leave until the fuel overflows from the refueling process.

 

 

That’s how I do it with my rental cars. That way I’ll spend less time in the gas station and more time moving up and down the long and dusty trackchasing trail. 

 

I use the same NASCAR optimization strategy when it comes to doing my laundry on the long and dusty trackchasing trail. That doesn’t surprise you does it?

 

 

So how do I manage my clothing needs when I go out and one of these mega trackchasing trips? I’m currently out on a 40 or 50 or maybe more than 60-day trip. I didn’t check any clothing bags on the airplane? How do I do it? It’s really rather simple.

 

 

Who doesn’t like clean underwear?

I’m like just about anybody you know including your brother-in-law I hope. I like clean socks, shorts and shirts. However you will commonly see me wearing deck shoes and in those cases I don’t even need socks. It’s all part of the simplification plan.

 

I pack a 9 day supply of clothing for a trip like this. That means 9 shirts, 9 pairs of underwear and 9 pairs of socks in my carry-on rolling airplane bag. At the end of the 9th day I’ll plan on doing my laundry preferably in one of the hotels I’m staying in.

 

 

However last night I was only ending up my eighth day of this trip. I still had another day’s worth of clean clothes so why wash the dirty stuff now?

 

 

Why doesn’t a NASCAR driver pit early for gas? If he did that he might end up having to make an extra stop at the end of the race. O.K., I understand “short pitting”. But most folks reading this are not die-hard racing fans. There is absolutely no reason to get into short pitting right now.

 

 

I had eight days of dirty clothes. That was my situation with laundry. I passed on washing at the end of the eighth day and would wait until all nine days of clothing had been exhausted. If you want to be successful I suggest that you have a disciplined approach that is flexible when warranted. Last night’s washer/dryer opportunity was not the flexibility I needed to maximize my plan.

 

 

 

 

TUESDAY

 

No! Don’t make me drive through downtown Chicago.

I had another morning where I could sleep in late. I have to take advantage of these opportunities. Later on in the trip I’ll likely have to spend some nights in my car. I might even have to sleep overnight in an airport.

 

 

Granted today I would lose an hour in time zone changes by moving from the central to the eastern time zone. Additionally I would have a four hour drive over to tonight’s destination in LaGrange, Indiana. My drive would take me through the heart of the city of Chicago. Driving through Chicago is one of the worst, if not the worst, urban driving experiences.

 

 

Toll roads dominate Chicago driving. This summer the roads are torn up much more than normal.

 

 

Tricky!

The state of Illinois has come up with a unique method for charging their tolls. Drivers who don’t have a electronic toll pass pay TWICE the toll when their transaction happens with cash. I’ve got to believe this is a not so hidden tax on primarily out-of-state drivers.

 

 

To add insult to injury the toll booths are located very near to each other. It seems like sometimes I don’t drive more than a couple of miles and I’m pulling over to pay another toll. Although I am an Illinois native son I don’t really see much of interest in the state compared to so many other places I visit.

 

The toll taker survey.

Today I asked one of the female toll takers a simple question. I asked her “Are people pretty happy to pay your tolls?”

 

 

She immediately came back with “I get cussed out every day. People bitch and moan and threaten to try to get me fired!” Wow! That was an honest response. I told her to hang in there and have a great day. She told me she would.

 

An oasis in Illinois?

The Illinois Tollway system offers a series of rest areas they call “Oasis”. They been around for 50 years since I went to college in the greater Chicagoland area.

 

 

An oasis is similar to a Welcome Center in the United Kingdom. I consider the “Welcome Centers” of the U.K. to be the gold standard for highway rest areas. The rest stops along interstate 80 in Ohio and Pennsylvania do a nice job too.

 

 

I was surprised to see today that the Hinsdale oasis had just recently been totally leveled. I’ll look forward to seeing what they replace it with. Several of the “Oasis” locations in the Chicagoland area have been upgraded over the past few years. They are now most pleasant places to stop.

 

Observe. Judge. Conclude.

I am observer of people. I am also a judger her. I watch people and then I judge their actions. I have my own set of values. Don’t most people? I like to see if people meet my expectations or not. I’m perfectly willing to let a judge in a court of law rule on the validity of my expectations.

 

 

Let’s examine one of my judgments and see what you think. At the Belvedere oasis I stopped in for a bathroom break and a low-carb lunch and snack at McDonald’s.

 

 

There were a couple of people ahead of me waiting for their orders to be served. There was one gentleman in particular, a young man in his early 20s with a reasonably nice appearance.

 

 

He chewed on a straw that he picked up at the nearby counter. He was waiting for his food and drink. By mistake the fellow’s straw fell from his mouth to the ground. He immediately went back to get a new straw without ever picking up the straw he had just dropped on the floor.

 

 

This told me much more than I wanted to know about this young man. Why would he leave the straw on the floor when it didn’t take much effort to pick it up? When people behave like they were raised in a barn I don’t blame them, I blame their parents. Most young people who behave poorly never had the proper role models in my opinion. Without a good upbringing in order to teach them what type of behavior is the right way to do things they are just screwed up.

 

 

I will tell you this. If I were interviewing a person who did something similar to what I saw today and I knew about it I wouldn’t hire them in a million minutes. A person’s true character comes out when nobody is watching. Today I was watching.

 

I go to Mickey Ds for a different reason than many.

One of the things I most like about eating at McDonald’s is that I can pay my bill electronically with my iPhone. That’s seems like an unusual eatery benefit doesn’t it? Today I asked the clerk if very many people were using their iPhone to pay for their food and drink. He told me I was about the third person to do so today and it was nearly noon.

 

 

I said, “So not many people are using it” and he said that no they weren’t. That is exactly the answer I wanted to hear. At the age of 66 I pride myself in being at the top of the technology curve for people in my age bracket and likely in the upper half for people in just about any age group.

 

Why technology?

Technology exists to make your life easier. Who doesn’t want an easy life when given the choice? One of the reasons I’ve done so well in the trackchasing hobby is that I’ve been able to use technology to my advantage from day one. I am somewhat saddened to see so many people in my age bracket so scared of the benefits of tech.

 

 

Many think tech is expensive. That’s such wrong thinking. In reality tech SAVES money. Why is it that wealthier people, in general, do more with tech? Could it be that way of thinking is what got them into a wealthier position?

 

 

As machines like cellphones, GPS units and the like have become more mainstream some of my fellow competitors have done better with technology. They still have a long way to go. I have always had J.J. as well as the Apple customer service team and my corporate background to thank for my understanding and capabilities with tech.

 

 

 

 

THE RACING

 

LaGrange County Fairgrounds – LaGrange, Indiana

 

 

It rains in the Midwest a good deal during the summertime.

Weather could be a potential problem with today’s trackchasing in northern Indiana. Yesterday the city of LaGrange, Indiana got 1.6 inches of rain. That’s a lot.

 

 

Today’s weather forecast called for mostly a 40% chance of rain from 3- 8 p.m. Racing was scheduled to begin at 7:30 p.m. Both the fairgrounds and the race promoter had told me,, that the track drains well. That was good to hear.

 

Terry Eaglin!

Actually the race promoter, Terry Eaglin, a fellow I have met several times over the years, told me the track had a very sandy surface. The track has been used mainly for horseracing. He said as long as it wasn’t raining at race time the track would drain in 20 minutes to accommodate for any earlier rainfall.

 

Oh. One more thing about technology.

One more thing about technology as I’m thinking about it. I have now gone exclusively to using the Evernote app on my iPhone for dictating my Trackchaser Reports. I love to multitask. I can now drive and tell you about my trackchasing experiences on a real-time basis. Then when I get done about 70% of the entire report is finished. I’ll need to work on grammar, spelling and some context but for the most part the job is moved along to an advanced degree.

 

 

I now use my iPhone exclusively to create my YouTube videos and photo albums. I’m doing as much as I can to streamline and mechanize the entire sharing process as possible. 

 

 

Wait! One more thing about those pesky Chicagoland tolls.

Just to have a little more fun during my drive through Chicago I’ve gone to asking a standard question of the toll takers. The question is “Do people enjoy paying your tolls?”.

 

 

I just paid my toll to a 6’5″ black man. I asked my question. A huge smile came across this face and he laughed all the way from the pit of his stomach. “Most of the time!” he said. Then he gave me that big hearty laugh again. I smiled and then he pointed his finger at me as if to say you know what I’m talking about.

 

 

Missed.

Tonight I would be trackchasing at the LaGrange County fair in LaGrange, Indiana. The advance forecast called for rain tonight but luckily that didn’t happen. It was pretty amazing to see the series of dark black and blue clouds that surrounded the track earlier in the evening. Despite the ominous looking clouds the weather radar shows no rain in the area.

 

 

I have been to more than 300 county fairs. I can never recall getting rained out or missing a trackchasing day from a canceled county fair.  I think that is one of the most unusual trackchasing statistics to come out of my hobby.

 

Tonight’s fair was on the smaller side. Heck, LaGrange, Indiana was on the smaller side.  I drove through town and noticed several horse and buggies parked in the town square.  The Amish population is big in these parts.  At the fair I paid five dollars to enter the fairgrounds and another $10 to see the races in the grandstand area.

 

The fairgrounds had a nice covered grandstand. They also had bleachers on either side of the main grandstand coming out of the fourth turn and going into the first turn.

 

 

I wanted to get some fresh air by sitting in the smaller open-air fourth turn grandstands. Luckily the wind blew at my back all night. Another benefit to not sitting in a covered grandstand is that the noise from the race cars isn’t as loud.

 

 

Track promoter and announcer Terry Eaglin told the crowd that this was the most unusual spring and summer weather he had ever seen. Indiana has been inundated with rain.

 

 

The track.

Tonight’s dirt oval might’ve been a biggish one quarter mile in length track. It had very long straights and narrow turns.

 

 

Safe?

I was a bit concerned about safety at tonight’s track. When you look at the photos I provide you’ll know why.

 

There was a very small “catch” fence separating the track all the way down the front straight from the grandstand area. There was absolutely no way this small fence would have held a flipping TQ midget from getting into the stands. I’m really surprised the insurance company allows this situation.

 

The backstretch of the track was lined by a string of residential homes. Some folks were watching the races behind their chain-link fences in their backyards. It looked to me like they were sitting less than 10 feet from the racing surface. There was only a chain-link fence between them and the race cars. This was just a high-speed accident waiting to happen.

 

 

Just beyond the third turn was a large oak tree that must have been 75 years or more old. It looked to me that a car flipping down the backstretch into the third turn could easily run into this huge tree. I’m sure they have people much more knowledgeable than me that evaluate these safety concerns. Maybe they don’t? Nevertheless this track looked to be very dangerous for the drivers and fans alike. Luckily, there were no major wrecks.

 

Open-wheeled racing.

Two different classes were racing tonight. The main attraction was the TQ midgets. They brought 17 competitors to the program. The TQ midget winner would take home $600 for a feature win. The secondary class was the 600 mini-sprints. They had just four starters racing for $300 to win in their main event.

 

 

The race track wasn’t all that wide. This limited the amount of passing. With 17 TQ midgets I was happy to see they went with two heat races rather than three.

 

Tonight I was meeting a trackchasing “native son”. There are not many of them.

Earlier in the program who should come by my seating location but Indiana’s #1 trackchaser Roger Ferrell. With tonight’s track Roger has now seen, in Indiana alone, more than 160 tracks. Indiana is Roger’s home state. Nice job Roger.  By the way, if I work at it, I CAN get Roger to smile….but not on camera.

 

 

I currently hold a number one trackchasing state ranking in 17 states. Just this year I’ve moved into the lead in Iowa, Nebraska and Minnesota.

 

There are a series of “native son” Trackchasers. These people lead the state they grew up in and currently reside within. Names like Ed Esser – Wisconsin, Gary Jacob – California, Allan Brown – Michigan, Butch Knouse – South Dakota, Guy Smith – Pennsylvania and Roger come to mind as native sons.

 

 

Trackchasing on a budget….without having to drag anybody else along to pay the bills.

Roger owns and operates a company that lays tile in farm fields to help with drainage. He was telling me they got so much rain in Indiana this spring they were only able to work in the fields three days during June. July has not been much better.

 

 

At this point in time Roger is just as much of a racechaser as he is a trackchaser. Roger allocates a certain amount of funds to spend on the trackchasing hobby.

 

I would classify Roger as an “independent trackchaser”. He doesn’t need anyone to haul around in order to offset his trackchasing expenses. I think Roger’s ability to budget and then manage trackchasing expenses is a very astute financial move on his part.

 

This was a nice race promotion idea.

I liked one aspect of tonight’s race promotion a good deal. At intermission they had a “meet and greet” between the spectators and the drivers. During this time the drivers brought their racing machines out onto the front stretch. Fans could go down and mingle with the drivers. That meant they could get up close and personal with the race cars.

 

 

During the meet and greet I took the opportunity to seek out promoter Terry Eaglin and say hello. He remembered me from our contacts several years ago.

 

Terry was pretty impressed that tonight’s track was my lifetime number 2,121. He made a nice mention over the PA system. He also invited me to come down and present the championship trophy to the feature winter. That was fun to do. Then Terry invited me up to the announcing tower for a brief interview.

 

 

Roger and I spent a few minutes after the races were finished in the parking lot discussing the events of the day. It’s always nice to run into Roger Ferrell. I hope I do again this season.

 

 

I will tell you this. Talking with Roger after the races reminded me of the many times fellow competitor and friend Ed Esser and I did the same thing. Ed and I met up at the races more than 30 times. That’s pretty good considering we lived nearly 2,000 miles from each other. On almost every occasion we stayed long after the races were finished talking about our hobby.

 

 

 

AFTER THE RACES

 

 

Just four hours up the road.

Tomorrow night I will be trackchasing over in Iowa. Tonight I would stay in Rockford, Illinois. I chose Rockford for tonight’s lodging so that I could get through Chicago tonight when their traffic was extra light. If you’re going to drive through downtown Chicago I recommend it be done after 9 p.m. and before 5 a.m.

 

 

I’ve been doing pretty well with my objective of exposing the trackchasing hobby to as many people as possible. I have had some really good interviews during the past four nights with the race track announcers. I believe I’ve been able to expose thousands of people to exactly what trackchasing is. That’s got to be a good thing.

 

 

Good night

 

 

 

So what were the chances of this happening?

P.S. Some things go well in the early morning hours and others do not. Yes it was a four-hour drive from LaGrange, Indiana to Rockford, Illinois. However there was a silver lining in that minor cloud. I would gain an hour traveling from Indiana to Illinois. That had me arriving into my hotel at 1:30 a.m. rather than 2:30 a.m. That was the good news.

 

 

A couple of blocks from my Extended Stay America hotel their sign came into sight. I turned off my GPS and glided into the parking lot. Of course at this time in the morning all of the prime parking spots were taken.

 

 

I had to park in the back of the hotel, organize all of my stuff and walk around the entire property to get to the front door. I wondered what this might have been like if it were the middle of January and a raging snowstorm was in progress.

 

 

Of course at nearly 2 a.m. it took a while to rouse the desk clerk. Then he gave me the bad news. He didn’t have a reservation for me at the Extended America property. However the Extended Stay America hotel a block and a half away did!

 

 

With that outstanding news I had to walk all around the property AGAIN, put all of my stuff back in my rental car and drive a block and a half. Yes if this trackchasing business was easy wouldn’t everybody be doing it? O.K. maybe not.

 

3 a.m. What time is that? Laundry time!

I figured that despite the hour I was already “up” so I might as well do my laundry. I carry a change purse with enough quarters to handle parking meters. This comes in handy for laundry as well.

 

 

It would cost me two dollars in quarters to wash my clothes and another two dollars in quarters to dry my clothes. I selected a washer, put my quarters in and nothing happened. Now I had to track down the desk clerk again. It was 3 a.m. in the friggin morning!

 

 

I was happy that it wasn’t me that caused the washer payment problem. Nevertheless I had already poured my detergent and put my clothes into the washer that was not going to work. The clerk made it all right and soon my clothes were washing away nicely.

 

 

I went up to my room to wait 30 minutes for the wash to finish. During this time I discovered that the hotel’s Internet was not working on my computer. It worked on my phone and apparently it worked at the front desk. But it didn’t work on my laptop. That was more than strange.

 

What was Roger doing now?

It was now 3:30 a.m., and 4:30 a.m. Roger Ferrell’s time in Indiana. It was time to go to bed. The laundry chore wasn’t so tough. I could do other things while my clothes were washing and drying. I was amazed that nine days worth of clothing didn’t take up more space in the washer.

 

 

Had I lost my Father’s Day present?

The next morning I was sorting my laundry like any good househusband should. I didn’t see my red Angels collared shirt. Carol had given it to me for Father’s Day. It was the only collared shirt I brought on the trip (I didn’t bring any long pants). This was important because some golf courses require collared shirts. I was more than curious as to where that red Angels shirt went. I sure hope I didn’t lose my Father’s Day gift.

 

 

When I returned from my 45 minute morning powerwalk I checked the car’s interior. No Angel shirt in there. Then it dawned on me. Earlier in the trip I had put about three or four days worth of dirty clothes in the trunk for safekeeping. No wonder that load of clothes last night was so light! What is my conclusion? I am not well-suited for domestic chores.

 

 

Good night….er….good morning.

 

 

 

Indiana

 

 

The Indiana state

This evening I saw my 83rd lifetime track in the Hoosier state, yes the Hoosier state. I’ve seen 100 or more tracks in four different states. I suspect I’m on track to see 100 tracks in Indiana in the not too distant future.

 

 

 

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

Indiana sayings: Two billion years. Tidal wave free.

 

 

 

 

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

 

 

 

 

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

 

 

 

 

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 – 2,121

 

 

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

 

 

Click on the link below to see the one-minute “Video Lite” production from the LaGrange County Fairgrounds.

 

 

 

 

 

Click on the link 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.

 

A two-day trip from Canada to LaGrange, Indiana