Notes from the Kansas Speedway

Scott gets in touch with his roots

As many of you know, I spent the last weekend up to my armpits in auto racing at the new NASCAR track in Kansas City. For those who don't know, NASCAR stands for the National Association of Stock Car Auto Racing (Official Cheer: WOOOOOO NASCAR!!!, Offical Beer: Coors, Official Dip: Kodiak, Official Detergent: None). I went at the urging of my friend John, a rabid racing fan, who, whenever he even thinks about NASCAR, whips out a Coors and yells, "WOOOO NASCAR!" It's really rather scary...

Anyhoo, with all of the area abuzz with the talk of racing, I dug into my pocket and forked over the necessary cash for this little adventure. All $150 of it. Pricey, but as it was a four day pass, somebody somewhere probably thought it was worth it. Did I mention, that this was for the *ahem* "right" to sit on top off an RV out in the infield about "a beer can throw away from the track" (That's what it said in the brochure!). Yes, I was in the corner penthouse RV of White Trash central. My parents are so proud...

I do want to say that I did try to go in with an open mind. After all, NASCAR is the new darling of the sports world along with Cricket and Sychronized Swimming, so I thought I'd go see what all the hub-bub was about and give NASCAR a chance to worm its way into my life. I was also informed by several close friends that, according to Playboy (I know, I know, you read it for the articles...), of all the racing circuits out there, NASCAR was the one where women were most likely to flash the drivers, and, more importantly (Their words, not mine!), innocent bystanders as well!

Having said that, neither, fortunately or unfortunately, occurred. For those of you who've never been to a race, saying that it's loud really doesn't begin to cover how REALLY FRIGGIN' LOUD the WHOLE damn race is! My God! Jet engines wish they were that loud! Thankfully I had been warned before hand and did have ear protection on, but Jesus! LOUD; and that volume of noise brought about an unfortunate side effect: couldn't talk. Between the ear protection and the engine noise, we were reduced to playing charades for the simple necessities: food, water, beer... and if there was an accident, I'm sure we looked absolutely goofy trying to explain via sign language that driver Jeff so and so hit high on the wall, blew his right front, torqued his rearend and slammed into driver Jeff whatshisbutt, who skidded into the infield. Did I also mention that you can't be a NASCAR driver unless your name is Jeff? I'm serious, it's a bylaw! Look it up.

Well the first day I went (Saturday) was the Busch series... Imagine going to watch the Minors before ever witnessing a Major League game... On that note, Sunday was the Winston Cup (Aren't they a cigarette co.?) Race and, wow, let me tell you how underwhelmed I was. The pre-race started with the pace car leading the pack around the track a few times. There are fireworks and beer cans being thrown... mass hysteria. Then they hit full throttle and away they went. There were some wrecks (One in front of us, but they wouldn't give us any debris. Boo...), which managed to make the race GO SLOWER!!! Some more passing, on the inside and outside, which caused more wrecks which made the damn thing go even slower. Then at lap 267, Jeff Gordon (TM) won. I won't bore all of you with description of what happened in between, but I think I felt my brain ooze out my ear somewhere inbetween laps 100 and 150...

WOOOO NASCAR!

--Scott Kemme (2001.10.03)