Greetings from Ware, Massachusetts
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From the travels and adventures of the
“World’s #1 Trackchaser”
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Palmer Motorsports Park aka Whiskey Run Raceway
Asphalt road course
Lifetime Track #2,280
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. Or you can visit me on Facebook. Thanks! ON THE WAY TO THE RACES SUNDAY I’m going to tell you it was a challenge leaving Owen Sound, Ontario, Canada at 9 p.m. and arriving into Ware, Massachusetts at 9:04 a.m. the next morning. The driving distance was 927 km or about 570 miles. My Google Maps estimated the driving time to be nine hours and 20 minutes. This was definitely a 5-hour ENERGY drink night. I drove until about 1 a.m. Then I stopped for a 30-minute nap. From then on I drove 45-60 minutes with 30-minute naps interspersed. Throughout this trip I’ve been using the E-ZPass toll road transponder. I hate to think of the amount of tolls that I’ve been adding up. I’m sure I’ll find out when the credit card bill comes due. Editor’s note: The bill came in at a bit more than $65 U.S. I drove through a good deal of rain all night. During my nine hours of driving it probably rained for six or seven of them. THE RACING Palmer Motorsports Park aka Whiskey Run Raceway – Ware, Massachusetts When I arrived at the Palmer Motorsports Park they had a line of thunderstorms that was just approaching the road circuit. With the heavy rain on their doorstep there wasn’t any on track activity at 9:04 a.m. This was despite the fact that the program was supposed to begin 9 a.m. Just as I arrived the black clouds let loose. It started to rain. This was going to delay the start of racing at the Palmer Motorsports Park. I wasn’t looking for delays. I had hoped to watch the racing action from 9 a.m. until noon. When they went to lunch break I would then head out to the Logan International Airport in the greater Boston area. If all worked really well I could get on a flight and be back home later tonight. I love jet airplanes. There were four open-wheel open cockpit formula cars on the grid ready for their 9 AM race. When the heavy rain came the four formula cars sprinted away back toward their pits. We then went into a rain delay that would not have any racing beginning until 10:30 a.m. The original schedule for today called for six classes to race. Each class would run an 11-minute plus one lap race in the morning. Then they would do the same thing in the afternoon. After the rain delay they decided that each class would run only one race today. That race would be for 20 minutes plus one lap. Three classes would race in the morning and three in the afternoon. When the rain stopped and before they began racing I had a chance to tour the entire paddock area. This is one of the most unusual racing set ups that I have ever seen. The track is very scenic. It is also New England rural. What does all this mean for the spectator? Does it mean good things? No, I don’t think so. This has to be one of the worst spectating tracks since I last visited Nurburgring. Nevertheless, I have not come to expect much in spectator viewing at most permanent road courses I visit. I was able to get some very good photos of all aspects of the paddock. I spent some time talking to one of the racers who had come to race from Connecticut. John Raudat was an outgoing fellow who races his Miata all up and down the East Coast. He has taken his racer all the way south to Sebring. John seemed impressed with my trackchasing credentials. He’s a racing fan as well. One of his goals is to make it to a World F1 race in one of their more exotic racing locations such as Singapore. I hope he makes it. If he does I hope he’s ready for heavy-duty heat and humidity as well! The official name of this race facility is a little confusing. Lots of signage says it’s the Palmer Motorsports Park. Just about as many signs say it’s the Whiskey Run Raceway. I asked a couple of officials about the name of the track. They both pretty much said the track went by EACH name. I don’t think I’ve encountered a situation like that before. I spoke with one person at the track who told me that the facility was having some problems with the local town government. He also said they had “run out of money”. Another person I talked to told me that this racetrack was not supposed to allow any spectators. On that particular point I had experienced something similar in Arizona. At that track, as I recall, they were not allowed to have any more than 100 spectators on the property at one time. When they reached that goal no one else could come in until someone left! Yes, local governments can be problematic for racetracks. The formula open-wheeled cars returned for their 20-lap race at about 10:30 a.m. With just four cars on the 2.3-mile long road course, where not much can be seen in the first place, this race wasn’t very interesting. However, the next race on the grid was going to be the Mazda Miata class. From what I’ve seen this is the most popular class of any, in terms of participation, when it comes to road racing. Today about 20 of those little cars lined up to race. The Miata class is similar to the legends stock-car class in that they almost always bring brightly colored paint jobs. Today’s race looked like a collection of Easter eggs rolling around the track. I was most interested in seeing how my friend from Madison, Connecticut was going to do. He was starting about 12th on the grid, pretty far back in the pack. However after a lap or two into the event he had made his way all the way up to fourth place. Before the race began some drivers switched back from rain tires to their normal racing rubber. Some stuck with their rain tires. During the race there appeared to be a crash of some sort out on the course that was not visible from the paddock area. That wasn’t too surprising since most of the track was not visible from the paddock area. The Miatas circled around the track slowly for a couple of laps. I wondered if this was going to eat into their 20-minute time limit. It appeared that it would. I did my best to get some racing video of the Miatas. There were only two areas where I could see them. Even at those points they were only in sight for 5-10 seconds. I did my best with videos and photos from all over the paddock area including the garage area. I think you’ll still get a good understanding of what this track was like. I hope so. AFTER THE RACES When the Miata race wrapped up it was time to head for Boston’s Logan International Airport. I would be standing by for a flight back to Los Angeles on a Sunday eve afternoon/evening. That was risky. However I had nothing to lose. I would give it a try. Along the way I received a call from son J.J. He is the family tech guru. The new iPhone 7 was being sold to the public for the first time this week. I didn’t have any intent or interest in buying/upgrading to this phone from my current iPhone 6. I didn’t see a huge difference in the two phones. However, J.J. has an ability to get me to spend more money on tech that I originally think I’m going too. When we finished our conversation I have given him authorization to order a new iPhone 7 for my use! Subsidies for new phones have gone away for most cell phone carrier phone programs. That meant that anyone who wanted to buy an iPhone 7 was going to be paying about $750. However with J.J.’s news we would be able to trade our iPhone sixes in for the new iPhone 7 for free! Of course the word “free” had a couple of asterisks attached. We would have to pay the sales tax on the new phone. That amounted to about $60. For another $100 I could double my phone’s memory from 64K to 128K. That would be a valuable option. I’ve run into storage problems caring around videos and pictures on my phone during some of my longer trackchasing trips. So for $160 I was now getting a $750 phone. I was doubling my phone memory, getting a better camera and the new phone would have a stronger battery. However, the biggest advantage was this. In a year I will want to upgrade to an iPhone 8. Having a one-year old iPhone 7 will provide a much stronger trade-in value than a three-year-old iPhone 6. Makes sense doesn’t it. Sometimes you have to spend money to save money! Soon I was back at the Boston Logan International Airport. I returned my car with 1,898 miles on the trip odometer. I covered that distance in four rental days. I calculated that the National Car Rental Racing Toyota Avalon gave me 33 miles per gallon. I will take that car every time. I was standing by for an available seat on four different airlines. I was most likely to grab the very last seat on the very first of my choices. That meant I would land in Los Angeles at about 7 p.m. Pacific time. I was home before 9 PM. It was Sunday night. I was still wearing the clothes that I put on Friday morning. How often do you do that? Despite being gone from California for four nights I only had a hotel for one of those evenings. I didn’t stay in my car for three nights out of four to save money. That was a secondary benefit. In order to get to where I was going, in the available time I had, there was no time to spend at a hotel. Yes, the tracks I am visiting are getting further and further apart from each other. Nevertheless I am strongly motivated to see all the tracks. Therefore, driving/sleeping overnight in my car is actually a fun challenge that helps me meet my goals. As this track wraps up I have had another productive trackchasing weekend. I saw five new tracks, and couple of fine Trackchasing Tourist Attractions in my four nights away from home. I have now seen 94 new tracks in the 2016 trackchasing season. That brings my lifetime total to 2,280 tracks in 72 countries. That’s good enough for now. However, I’m not finished for the year…..by a long shot. Good afternoon from Ware, Massachusetts. Massachusetts The Bay state This afternoon I saw my 11th lifetime track in the Bay state, yes the Bay state. I’ve seen 11 or more tracks in 41 separate states. No one can match that stat. 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 I’m still trackchasing out of a tiny three-car garage in the faraway but sunny seaside village of San Clemente, California. Massachusetts definitions: Regular. What it means everywhere else: Ordinary. What it means in Massachusetts: The only way to take your coffee: with Cream and sugar, of course. QUICK 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 550 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 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. The race day from the Palmer Motorsports Park 
