Greetings from Graham, Texas
From the travels and adventures of the
“World’s #1 Trackchaser”
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Young County Arena
Dirt oval
Lifetime Track #2,049
I went to sleep in an undisclosed location. It never rains in Southern California. I had commitments to my sponsors. Flaming A$^#$&! Whataburger! Cheap gas? Did you grow up on Vienna sausage? Craig’s List a very valuable resource. Rodeo buildings mean indoor racing. They were missing the most important track employee. Women and children dominated the grandstand demographic. 66 in Texas. THE EVENT I went to sleep in an undisclosed location. Iwoke up this morning at home in San Clemente, California. I went to sleep in my rental car at an undisclosed location in Dallas, Texas. This is how the day turned out. Today I would make a quick trip down to Texas. I figured about 27 hours would do it. I’m a bit surprised at how active I can be in the trackchasing hobby during December, the slowest month of the year. It never rains in Southern California. It never rains in Southern California. They made a song about that didn’t they? However this morning it was raining heavily throughout the Golden State. We’re lucky to get 10 raining days during an entire year. I had commitments to my sponsors. I left the house at 6 a.m. for a 9:20 a.m. flight. It’s only a 65-mile drive. Normally I wouldn’t leave that early. However this morning I had a sponsorship appearance with the LAX World Parking group. These fine folks have agreed to sponsor me for another season of trackchasing into 2015. Just like the drivers in NASCAR I am committed to making sponsorship appearances in return for their financial support. Once I arrived at the airport terminal it would be a three-hour one-way flight from Los Angeles to Dallas Fort Worth. I would pass the time on the plane watching iTunes movies. Dallas I hopped the shuttle bus to the DFW rental car center. There I picked up my old reliable Hyundai Sonata, a 2015 model, with XM satellite radio. Flaming A$^#$&! However, I did make a stop in the airport bathroom. I was wearing my yellow UCLA shirt. I make a quick pit stop in one of the bathroom’s stalls. On the way to that destination a fellow traveler remarked, “UCLA! You’ve got a UCLA shirt on. I like usc.” Then for the next two minutes in front of a bathroom full of strangers he began to sing the usc Trojan fight song! Wow. NOW do you believe that folks associated with usc truly are flaming A$^#$&*! Whataburger! I was looking at a two-hour one-way drive from the DFW airport to Graham Texas. My only stop along the way was for a quick Whataburger double meat hamburger. I have fallen in love with that burger chain when I visit Texas. After the races….. I would be getting back into the Dallas area at about midnight following the races. On Saturday I had a 6:50 a.m. flight returning me to the Los Angeles International Airport. That schedule made getting an overnight hotel room a less than viable financial idea. I have a secret place in the Dallas metroplex where I can “hang out” overnight. That’s exactly what I did. How many people do you know who have this capability is a large foreign city? Cheap gas? I set my iPhone alarm for 5 a.m. I had already gotten gas the night before at a price of $2.34 per gallon. Later I did see gas prices as low as $2.19. That’s about $.50 cheaper than what gasoline sells for in California now. Did you grow up on Vienna sausage? At the gas station I picked up a couple of cans of Vienna sausages. This was a childhood staple. The first can provided a nice midnight snack. However the second can would create some problems for me. No, not gastronomical problems. Apparently the airport TSA checkpoint doesn’t care for cans of Vienna sausages. I was told “it’s the liquid”. I had a chance to either eat those little delicacies in the security area or forfeit them. I certainly wasn’t going to throw a $1.45 away so I ate them right there in front of God and everybody! Attention to detail. I returned my rental car without incident. When I picked up my car I noticed the gas gauge showed just a tad below full. I mentioned this at checkout. The agent made a note. I also made a note to fill up the car about 40 miles away from the airport so I could return the car with the same amount of gas that I had picked it up with. That strategy worked out just fine. With this “adjustment” I ended up getting more than 44 miles per gallon. TSA Pre-Check the only way to go. I was flying standby with one of my airline partners. However on this particular reservation I was not able to use my TSA pre-check capability on the outbound flight. I had to travel like commoners do. That was a bummer! However, on the return back to LAX I was given pre-check privileges which made a big difference in my wait time and was much more convenient. Craig’s List a very valuable resource. Soon I was back in Los Angeles after this brief 27-hour Texas fling. From there I met up with a Craig’s List buyer of my iPhone 5S. Just last week I had replaced it with the most current iPhone 6 model. I’ve used Craig’s List several times now to sell computers and phones primarily. Yesterday I had figured out how to “unlock” my phone. This will allow the buyer to use any carrier they want. That move added $100 to its sale price. Can you believe I could see a one-year old cellphone for $425? When everything was said and done I paid just $35 to upgrade from an iPhone 5S to an iPhone 6. That was after waiting only one year on my AT&T contract. The normal customer must wait two years and then pay $200 for the upgrade. Of course I’m always trying to beat the system just for the heck of it. ONE CANNOT LIVE WELL OR SLEEP WELL IF ONE HAS NOT DINED WELL Whataburger – Texas and beyond From Wikipedia: “Whataburgeris a privately held, American regional fast food restaurant chain, based in San Antonio, Texas, that specializes in hamburgers. The company, founded by Harmon Dobson and Paul Burton, opened its first restaurant in Corpus Christi, Texas, in 1950. The chain is owned and operated by the Dobson family, along with 25 franchisers. As of September 2012, there are over 735 Whataburger stores across the Southern United States region. Whataburger was known for many years for its distinct A-framed orange-and-white stripe-roofed buildings. The first A-frame restaurant was built in Odessa, Texas, and is now a historical landmark.” Large and tasty. I find their burgers large and tasty. They are a bit on the expensive side especially compared to the McDonalds dollar menu. I was surprised that Whataburger doesn’t sell bottled water. However, they did give me a jumbo “regular” water, a jumbo Diet Coke and a “Whataburger Double Meat” sandwich for a few pennies more than seven dollars. I cherished it. THE RACE Young County Arena – Graham, Texas Rodeo buildings mean indoor racing. Racing was scheduled to begin at 6 p.m. at the Young County Arena in Graham Texas. Winter indoor racing is quite popular in the Lone Star State. They have so many large indoor rodeo buildings that are perfectly suited for small car racing. The Young County Arena has 6.2 acres under roof! Using the GPS from my brand-new iPhone six I easily found the place. Admission for spectators tonight was just five dollars. Contrasting that to the $25 pit pass fee I felt quite comfortable sitting in the stands. Temperatures in Texas tonight were in the mid 60s. Often times winter indoor shows can be chilly and downright cold. However tonight with a combination of warm temperatures outside and heat in the arena it was quite comfortable. A great Iittle high-banked speedway. I was surprised at what a quality dirt oval track they had constructed inside this arena. The truck was actually banked nicely in the turns and as smooth as a babies butt. They were missing the most important track employee. There was no track announcer tonight. There was no use of a PA system whatsoever. I didn’t like that at all as a spectator. This made it difficult to keep track of which classes were racing and what the race order would be this evening. This was a two-day racing program. Heat races were being run tonight, Friday. Feature racing would take place tomorrow morning and afternoon. I would later learn that about 20 different classes were racing tonight. That’s a lot. Most of them were caged carts. Most of those caged carts were for drivers younger than 18. There are also a few flat cart divisions. Women and children dominated the grandstand demographic. I moved around the arena taking photographs and videos of the action. A small crowd of about 100 people were in the stands. Women and children dominated the crowd. That was most unusual. More men than women attend most short track auto racing events. Did kart racing hold some special attention for the feminine gender and their offspring? Nope, not really. Those women and children were attached to the nearly all male racing contingent. I would love to know how many “plain” racing fans were there to watch like me. Racing started about 40 minutes later than scheduled. That’s not unusual in this business. Without an announcer or a printed racing program I pretty much had to evaluate the classes based upon engine size/sound and driver size! I’ve been doing this for a while so it wasn’t that difficult to determine what was a kids class and what was not. The flat carts put on a good show especially with the adult drivers. There were a couple of head on crashes into the steel plated front stretch wall. Don’t miss the video. Toward the end of tonight’s program there were 4-5 heat races for 500cc type outlaw carts. I had been watching racing for more than two hours before the first trackchasing countable race appeared on the track. These guys were loud, fast and put on a good show even though they were only racing in relatively short heat races. No problems with air quality. I’ve seen a large number of indoor racing shows. Often times the air-quality inside the building is not good. There was absolutely no problem with that tonight. Concessions were sold as well as souvenir T-shirts and the like. Having stopped at Whataburger and already having purchased my lifetime share of souvenirs I passed on those options. 66 in Texas. Tonight I was seeing my 66th lifetime Texas track. I was also seeing my 127th track for the 2014 season. That makes it my fourth best trackchasing season ever. I still have a couple of races up my sleeve before I wrap it up for the year. Young County Arena will go down as my 2,049th lifetime track to see. I had arrived for the show at 6 p.m. I left the track a little past 9:30 p.m. I figured for 3 1/2 hours of general racing entertainment I had certainly gotten my five dollars worth. I think you’ll enjoy the photographs and YouTube video from tonight’s racing. It will give you a good sense of what winter indoor cart racing is like. The good thing is that the shows are rarely weathered out! Texas The Lone Star state This evening I saw my 66th lifetime track in the Lone Star state, yes the Lone Star state. Those 66 tracks give me a #1 ranking in Texas. I’m proud of that. 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 Texas sayings: It’s a Texas thang, y’all wouldn’t understand QUICK FACTS AIRPLANE Los Angeles, CA (LAX) – Dallas-Ft. Worth, TX (DFW) – 1,235 miles RENTAL CAR #1 Dallas-Ft. Worth International Airport – trip begins Graham, TX Dallas-Ft. Worth International Airport – trip ends – 249 miles AIRPLANE Dallas-Ft. Worth, TX (DFW) – Los Angeles, CA (LAX) – 1,235 miles Total air miles – 2,470 (2 flights) Total rental car miles – 249 (1 car) Total miles traveled on this trip – 2,719 miles TRACK ADMISSION PRICES: Young County Arena – $5 Total racetrack admissions for the trip – $5 LIFETIME TRACKCHASER COMPARISONS The threemost 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. 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 
