short tracks

"You've got to start somewhere....."

or was it

"The world is run by those who show up"

For me it was always the first six and a half minutes of the 1991 movie "Days of Thunder." Where the sun rises over Daytona International Raceway followed by the drop of the green flag then the beatin and bangin that only Jerry Brockhiemer could pull off in the early ninety's.

Before that it was weekly trips to Beech Ridge Motor Speedway to watch our local mechanic run in the Late Model Division. Frequently attending a local short track is a lot like being a member of a church flock.

From our house we could hear our friend Jay tack up his race car after work in a side bay added to the family garage.  We would sometimes all pile into our brown family station wagon to see just what those Johnson boys were up to.  At the end of Mary Jane Road my father would put his right blinker on, the opposite direction of the garage, heading to Plumber's Store.  He'd come out with a case of Bud Light, never come empty handed.  

As a kid it was a treat to see, hear and smell a race car up close.  Jay was under the hood with his father, the business owner and defacto race car owner, Jerry.  They both wore the same blue Johnson's Garage Dicky shirts.  They both looked up at the same time, both smoking both had the same reaction, a simple "Buddieeeee" which is what everyone called my father.  They knew that he didn't understand the adjustments on the valve train, or how to time an electronically advanced 355 cubic inch Chevy engine, and that's why they liked him.  

It was people that dad understood, ice that he broke.  

Sometimes I would venture to the back of the garage where the carcases of last years entry and the years before laid to rest.  Last year it was halfway through the season when the local rich boy punted Jay into the wall ending his season early.  I would wonder and dream about putting the different pieces together and being the only 12 year old racer.  

On the track Jay was an absolute wild man.  He had innate car control, often liking a loose and fast setup.  He would wreck or win, and either way was big.  When Jay got tired of the politics and financial obligation of a competitive race car he turned the ride over to his younger brother.  Unlike his older brother Rusty finished a high percentage of races but lacked the spark which truly got my family interested in motor sports.