My First Race
See that thing on the left? I learned tonight that’s it’s called the ‘Pit Box’. I learned that after we were invited to sit on it during the beginning of the race with the owner of the ‘Menards’ team, Paul Menard. Now I almost feel bad for making fun of his name for years. Turns out he’s a super nice, and far more super rich guy. Not only that but his son drives the car. So for the first ten or fifteen laps Billy and I sat up there watching the cars fly past us covering our ears.
We stuck around for one pit stop and watched them change all the tires, and whatever else they do, all in about 13 seconds and they were off again. All in all it was a great day. I don’t know if I’d consider myself a Nascar fan now, but I do have a little more respect for what goes on here. That and I’m blown away by the hospitality of the sport, if you can call it that.
Now we are leaving a little early to beat the post race traffic and get home to celebrate Mother’s Day tomorrow. We had a great time today but I’m ready to get home.
Darlington Raceway
I woke up this morning to the sound of really loud cars driving around in a circle right behind the bus. I got up, looked out the windows and saw that we were backed up against the track and cars were ‘warming up’. Turns out even when they ‘warm up’ they are pretty loud. So far today I have watched a little of the ‘warm ups’, rode a stage hooked to a semi truck around the track, and eaten two tacos and some pineapple.
Right now the bus is an air conditioned oasis, and “No Country For Old Men” is on, so I’m pretty happy. I think the show tonight is at 5:30 or something and then the race is after. There’s also a rumor that it’s going to be on TV tonight so I’m curious if anyone is watching.
So far it’s been a pretty cool experience. I think I’m still bout a one, but I am in the process of looking for some earplugs. Anyone watching the race tonight?
I’m About A One
So, if you follow my Twitter, you already know that Saturday I will be attending my first ever Nascar event. Now, from what I understand Billy is playing a ‘Pre-Race Concert’ and also singing the National Anthem before the race. It is also to my understanding that we will be parking the bus in the middle of the field or whatever and everyone else on this bus is super excited about it.
Now, the other day Aaron, Billy’s road manager, sent out an email saying there were different things that we would be able to do, but there were limited spaces for each ‘event’. He asked on a scale of one to ten how big of Nascar fans we were to make sure that the big fans were able to be involved as much as possible. It took me a while to figure out my response, because I was going between a zero and a one. It’s not that I hate it, just I’ve never been into it, but I have heard that once you go you love it. We’ll see I guess.
Any Nascar fans out there? Scale of one to ten?
Anything else I should know before going into an environment of 80,000 people and cars going over 200 miles an hour?
