Greetings from Shelton, Washington
From the travels and adventures of the
“World’s #1 Trackchaser”
Lifetime Track #1,965
Who would want to do this? What a ‘night’ in the “Night Hotel”. Seattle, a very beautiful city…on a sunny day. How can this happen? Now the guy was about ready to wet his pants. I was with the ‘wine and cheese’ set today. I never turn down an offer to ride around the track. Can’t people just get along? Now I was about ready to wet MY pants. All of a sudden we were IN the race! Oh, no. We’re losing power. Emergency bypass. Do other trackchasers have these experiences? Who would want to do this? I woke up this morning in Dallas, Texas. After a stop in Seattle to add one more track to the list I ended up back home for the night in San Clemente, California. This is how the day turned out. How many folks get to go to Europe for 20 days, then come back home for just 36 hours….then head out to Texas for three nights and finally stop over in the Seattle area for five hours before heading home for several days? Maybe the better question is who would want too? I would. I am one of those few people that enjoys the heck out of this type of itinerary. Why? Two reasons come to mind. First, I have a passion for my hobby. Secondly, I enjoy doing things that are difficult for others to do. What a ‘night’ in the “Night Hotel”. I was out the door of the infamous “Night Hotel” in Dallas at 5:40 a.m. (3:40 a.m. San Clemente time). Normally I gas my rental car the night before I plan to return it. However, the construction was so heavy around the hotel that would not be easy to do. This morning when I stopped for gas it took 40 seconds to add each gallon. THAT’S why I always (99% of the time) do it the night before. I made it! I was standing by for a flight from DFW (Dallas) to SEA (Seattle). If I made it I would go trackchasing in the beautiful Northwest. If I didn’t I would find a way to get back to Los Angeles before bedtime. In the mean time I hung out at the private Delta Airlines Sky Miles Club. I made the flight! I changed my strategy based upon the driving distance. When it came time to rent a car I picked out a Hyundai Tucson SUV. Why not my normal Hyundai Sonata? I was only going to be driving about 150 miles round-trip. With that distance gas mileage wasn’t a big deal. The Race. Ridge Motorsports Park – Shelton, Washington Not many of these left. I would be seeing racing on a permanent asphalt road course. I don’t know how many of those there are in the U.S. and Canada but I’ve seen racing at all but a handful or less of them. The “Ridge” has been on my radar since the day they began to build it. That’s not unusual. That’s the case with most tracks. A newly built track doesn’t stay on my radar screen for long. Seattle, a very beautiful city…on a sunny day. It was a cloudy day in Seattle. That’s not unusual. They get a lot of clouds and light rain in the Northwest. However, on a nice day you will be hard pressed to find a city any more beautiful than Seattle. It pays to bond with people. It was an easy 80 miles or so up to Shelton. When I drove into the track I struck up a conversation with the man selling “wrist bands” aka tickets. How can this happen? I frequently, as in nearly every time I visit a track, tell you that despite seeing nearly 2,000 tracks each new one I visit has something I have never seen or experienced. How can than happen? I have no idea but it does! Today I would be required to wear TWO wristbands. I forgot the reason why but it seemed to make sense to the wristband seller at the time. I told him how unusual this was. To back up my “street cred” I mentioned that in nearly 2,000 track appearances I had NEVER seen such a thing. One thing let to another, it was a slow news day for each of us, and I was telling him about my trackchasing hobby. When I told him I would be preparing a review of my day at the Ridge Motorsports Park his interest was piqued. Now the guy was about ready to wet his pants. He asked if I had ever seen any Rallycross racing. Yes, I told him I had seen the “X” game racing in Austin just yesterday. He replied that he had watched it on TV too. “Nope” I told him. “I was THERE in Austin yesterday afternoon!” Now the guy was about ready to wet his pants. “You were in Austin yesterday and less than 24 hours later you’re up here to see our racing in the great Northwest,” he exclaimed. “With your website and all of the contacts you have you must be ‘press’. We don’t charge the press to attend” he told me. With that he handed me back my ten dollar bill and told me to have a good time at the races. Wow! What a nice gesture. Once inside the paddock area I took a look around. I knew there would be three races today. I had plenty of time to scope things out before that got underway. I was with the ‘wine and cheese’ set today. What I noticed that was different is there were 18 legends cars in the paddock. By the way the pit area at a road course is normally called a “paddock”. Whereas a pit area at an oval track is normally called, what else, “The pits”. Road racers drink wine and eat cheese. Oval racers favor beer and pretzels. There are other differences like road racing sticks to a strict time schedule and oval racers don’t know if “time schedule” is one word or two. The girls are much better looking at a road course race. Where could I find Andrew? I wanted to take a moment to look up “Andrew”. He runs the show with these Northwestern NASA races. Andrew had been nice enough to leave a message after I had called looking for more race day information. I soon found him. I never turn down an offer to ride around the track. One thing led to another and I was soon being invited to ride around the track in the emergency track vehicle. This was a combination fire truck, push vehicle and general jack of all trades. How could I turn that down. Before I lapped the track Andrew told me the only place to watch the races would be from the paddock area. That would be difficult considering the track had significant elevation changes. The track is 2.47-miles long with 16 turns. From the paddock I could see less than 25% of the racing activity. Can’t people just get along? He went on to tell me that the partners who built the track are having a major legal squabble. I don’t know the details but they have apparently removed much of the hardware needed to run a race on a circuit like this. This problem also caused them to eliminate spectator viewing from a hill some 100 feet above the main grade level. Not exactly what I expected. With that I was ushered into the shotgun seat of the NASA Northwest official emergency vehicle. My driver, introduced himself and away we went. I was thinking a pace lap around the track at 30-40 M.P.H. would be lovely. However my driver had something else in mind. Now I was about ready to wet MY pants. When he got this dump truck up to about 80 it was time to take on a hard 90-degree left turn. I thought we were going to turn over right there. Being in the passenger seat it looked like I could reach out and touch the ground! I don’t know if my chauffer had left his race car at home or knew they would be trading this emergency truck in real soon but he proceeded to take every turn on the track as if it were our last. Going 60-80 M.P.H. in a race car on a track like this is no big deal. However traveling at those speeds in THIS thing was an “E-ticket” ride. All of a sudden we were IN the race! Just when we had survived not one but two laps I figured I could breathe again. We were not finished. About this time a group of sports car racers came out onto the track for their “High Performance Driving” school. There must have been about seven of them. Maybe the school required us to be on the track in the emergency truck while they raced at high speeds so they would learn to avoid obstacles! When you see the video you will know exactly what I’m talking about. Now you might agree with me that the aforementioned stuff doesn’t happen at every race I attend. We weren’t done with “first time” stuff! Oh, no. We’re losing power. Just as a big black Porsche stormed past us at speed the driver screamed “We’re losing power”. In point of fact we were. It’s a pretty big deal when the emergency vehicle conks out…..on the track…..with race cars whizzing past! Emergency bypass. Soon we were “dead in the water” near where one of the corner workers was stationed. A quick radio call was made to Andrew who was back getting the next race organized in the paddock. Andrew couldn’t believe our situation. He soon arrived on the scene and, just like a NASCAR pit crew, diagnosed the problem as a “fried auxiliary battery wire”. He did a “bypass” and the truck was up and running. I was soon dumped off in the paddock and ready for the real race to begin. Do other trackchasers have these experiences? I have a question for long time Randy Lewis Racing readers. You’ve certainly heard your share of tales from me like the one above. Do other trackchasers have these experiences? I’m sad to say they do not. In order to have these situations crop up you have to know people at the track, have them treat you with special loving care AND be pretty adventuresome. I stayed for two of the three races. The first was a feature event for full-sized sports cars. The second was for the large field of legends. It was too bad I could see so little of the actual racing. Sorry. There just weren’t many good viewing points. There was a series of turns where the cars came down off the hill, which hid most of the racing to ground level. Much of my video coverage comes from there. I think you’ll like this video especially the clips that come from me riding (and screaming) from the interior of the NASA emergency truck! Washington The Evergreen state This afternoon I saw my 26th lifetime track in Washington. No one has seen more. I haven’t done much trackchasing in this state lately. My last visit was in 2011. On a sunny day you can’t beat the scenery up this way. They just don’t get enough sunny days. 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 Washington sayings: Outside of the killings Washington has one of the lowest crime rates in the country QUICK FACTS AIRPLANE Los Angeles, CA (LAX) – Houston, TX (HOU) – 1,390 miles RENTAL CAR #1 Houston Hobby – trip begins Houston, TX George Bush (Houston) Intercontinental Airport – trip ends – 71 miles RENTAL CAR #2 George Bush (Houston) Intercontinental Airport – trip begins Arlington, TX Dallas-Ft. Worth Intercontinental Airport – trip ends – 258 miles RENTAL CAR #3 George Bush (Houston) Intercontinental Airport – trip begins Austin, TX Rhome, TX Dallas-Ft. Worth International Airport – trip ends – 805 miles AIRPLANE Dallas-Ft. Worth, TX (DFW) – Seattle, WA (SEA) – 1,660 miles RENTAL CAR #4 SeaTac Intercontinental Airport – trip begins Shelton, WA SeaTac Intercontinental Airport – trip ends – 176 miles AIRPLANE Seattle, WA (SEA) – Los Angeles, CA (LAX) – 958 miles Total air miles – 4,221 (4 flights) Total rental car miles – 1,310 (4 cars) Total miles traveled on this trip – 5,531 miles TRACK ADMISSION PRICES: Circuit of the Americas – $59 Kam Kartway – No charge Ridge Motorsports Park – Complimentary admission Total racetrack admissions for the trip – $59 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 400 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 
