First NASCAR Race (Because 'Merica)

Also, the (non I-81) roads through WV and western VA are pretty awesome. US 220 is a good one.

Well this weekend certainly turned into an adventure!

Thursday we got on the road around 10 am and booked it down I-81 to VA, where we took I-66 into Front Royal and picked up Skyline Drive at the northern terminus. Ended up doing the entire length of it through Shenandoah National Park, cruising at a leisurely pace and taking plenty of advantage of the numerous overlooks for photo opportunities.

About halfway down, we stopped to do a short hike out to an overlook (I'm forgetting the name of the trail at the moment). Maybe 1/4 mile down the trail, we round a bend to find a large, dark figure looming on top of a ridge, maybe 40-50 yards ahead. Holy E36 M3, it's a black bear! The bear took off into the woods once it noticed us, but not before giving us a hell of a scare. We warned a middle aged couple of our sighting as we passed them a short ways down the trail. The wife, with obvious concern in her voice, wanted to know how big the bear was. Um, big enough lady!

We continued down Skyline to the southern terminus (wouldn't that road be awesome with a 55 mph speed limit?), at which point we jumped back to I-81 and continued on to Roanoke. Stopped in Natural Bridge, VA around dusk to see the natural bridge for which the town is named. Cool, but not sure it was worth paying $20.

Day 2 we got a leisurely start before hitting the super slab to Asheville, NC to visit our buddy, Athen. Awesome views on the way down, despite some cloud cover obscuring the highest peaks in the mountains. Asheville sure was interesting, super nice town with a distinctly, shall we say "artsy" flair. Athen is quite the character himself, definitely fits right into Asheville, and proved to be quite a fitting host. While we had anticipated maybe spending the night sampling some local craft brews at a pub or something, we instead watched the massive drum circle occurring in the middle of town for a while, before dining at a Mediterranean restaurant that featured a belly dancer, and finally capping the night off at a tea room. Not exactly what we were expecting, but it felt like a fitting way to experience Asheville. Definitely a place worth visiting if you haven't been there.

Saturday we awoke to rain, despite the weatherman's promise that it would clear out the night before. While the weather didn't look ideal for racing at the moment, we charged ahead to Charlotte anyways, figuring it had all day to clear up. Well, it didn't. The rain was still steady when we pulled into the camp ground early in the afternoon, but we set up our tent and partook in pre-race festivities regardless. As the afternoon turned to evening, things were starting to look pretty bleak. Every time the rain would appear to be letting up, it would pick up again with even greater intensity. We had also realized about this time that the propane grill was missing the regulator, leaving us no means by which to cook our burgers.

We held out hope that the rain might stop and the race would go on right until the bitter end, but finally sometime around dusk the word came through that the race was postponed until Sunday. We hightailed it over to the track in hopes of finding food before everything shut down and fortunately managed to just catch the last vendor closing up shop. We returned to the campsite soaked to the bone and freezing and spent the rest of the night downing beverages in the car, until our beer jackets became heavy enough to sleep in. Still, that was not exactly the best night of sleep I've ever had.

Sunday morning we awoke to sunshine and the sound of the jet dryers on the track, which instantly gave a much needed boost to our spirits. The change in timing of the race complicated things for us, because I absolutely had to be at work today and didn't want to get home at 3 am. The plan, as decided the previous night, would be to stay for half the race and book it out before the traffic. So we packed up camp and headed to the track plenty early to check out the attractions and vendors still present after the deluge the night before, as well as to grab some "barbeque sundaes" for breakfast.

Finally, we took our seats as the green flag drew near. The experiences of the previous night made it all the more awesome to hear all 43 engines come to life on the starting grid. What a sound! Totally worth the wait. And it only got better after the green flag dropped, the first run up to speed down the front stretch is quite a spectacle to behold. We were sitting in the upper level of the Ford grandstand, right around the pit exit and the entry to turn one (good spot to hear everyone run through the gears after a pit stop.)

We didn't rent a scanner because of our plan to leave early, but I followed some of the advice on this thread and tried to pick a few guys to watch. Early on, I followed Kasey Kahne who appeared to be moving up through the pack pretty well by taking a higher line through turns 1 and 2 than everyone else and carrying more speed onto the back stretch. No sooner did I make this observation to Chris when Kahne finally got a little too high coming out of 1 and smacked the wall for the first of two times, effectively ending his run and ultimately his race as well. Watched Jeff Gordon then for a while after that, who seemed to be putting a good run together. Much fanfare was made about this being his last trip to Charlotte and I've always kind of liked him anyways, so he was easy to root for. I think he had started 20-somethingth and made it up to about 13th by the time we left, ultimately finishing 8th.

Not much action up front, as Matt Kenseth and Joey Logano would more or less run away from everyone within a few laps of each restart. I guess Kenseth must have hit the wall a couple times right after we left and messed his car up badly enough to effectively end his day. Logano went on to win. There were a fair amount of cautions in the time we were there, the first of which starting on lap 2, although most were for guys just lightly getting into the wall, no big wrecks. "Junior" was one such victim, leading to some pretty priceless reactions from those around us.

Speaking of whom, I was rather disappointed to not be totally blown away by the redneck factor there. Granted, I did ride the elevator with a rather prime, shirtless specimen but the crowd was really no different than what you see at an average Sheetz around here. I guess living in central PA the vast majority of my life has just desensitized me .

We left right around the halfway point during a caution period. As we made our way out, we made sure to stop at a spot as close to the track as possible to catch the restart. Its one thing seeing it and hearing it from 63 rows above the track, but ten rows back you can just feel the violence of those things! Incredible!

We were out of there just before 3, catching the radio broadcast for the rest of the race, and I'm glad we didn't stay any later than that. Caught some hellacious traffic somewhere around Luray, VA, where we were stuck for about 2 hours. Didn't get back until well after midnight and I'm paying the price big time today, but even through the wind and cold and rain the trip was well worth it.

Nascar really puts on a great event and seeing it live adds so many dimensions to it that the tv broadcast can't even begin to capture, its a whole different way to watch it. I also have to say that was probably the best stadium experience I've ever had. The staff was super polite, despite the fact they were probably stuck out there in the cold and rain the night before and likely hadn't planned to work that Sunday. You also don't feel like you're getting bent over and berkeleyed around every corner with the kind of price gouging that goes on in other major sports, as everything is fairly reasonably priced and you can bring your own food anyways. The BYOB aspect is also phenomenal, even though we didn't get to take full advantage. While I don't think I'll be watching "the race" every weekend as a result, we're already talking about plans to make it to another race next year, although likely at one of the more local venues.

So to anyone who hasn't been, I would absolutely recommend going

Note to self: If I can't write a complete post within my lunch hour, its probably way too long. Holy wall of text, Batman!

Glad you had a good time. For your next one I would pick Dover. Not too far from you and the action is more intense being a high banked one mile track(lap record is 21.82 seconds). Try to get seats up fairly high to be able to see the whole track and avoid the worst of the noise. And definitely get a scanner this time.

Streetwiseguy wrote:

Furious_E wrote: What in the hell is chicken bone alley?

Cheap seats right down at the bottom, at the exit of turn 4.

People in the upper seats would throw their eaten chicken bones into the lower seats. Or so I heard.

Furious, you may want to edit to clarify the use of "Sheetz" for some. I know that they have a far and wide reach, but not everyone has them ingrained into their psyche like we do.

Where are you from, by the way? I'm in Altoona.

I'd recommend Pocono too.

Dover and Richmond are both good places to see a race, I wouldn't go to Pocono again for free. The grandstands are on the wrong side of the track and it has rained every time I've gone.

snailmont5oh wrote: Furious, you may want to edit to clarify the use of "Sheetz" for some. I know that they have a far and wide reach, but not everyone has them ingrained into their psyche like we do. Where are you from, by the way? I'm in Altoona.

Yea good thought, although I'm surprised any of my sleep deprived ramblings further up the page are remotely intelligible.

For those of you not in the know, Sheetz is basically a gas station and convenience store that also sells a wide variety of fast food through touch screen kiosks that is then prepared on a made to order basis. Their stores are generally relatively clean and well run and the food is much better than your typical gas station microwave burrito/moldy sandwich. Some comparable (but inferior) stores would be WaWa, Royal Farms, Rutters (I think this is even more of a local PA thing though), ect.

This is relevant because Sheetz stations tend to be congregating places for rednecks, for whatever reason. Some things one might typically see outside one include confederate flags (because apparently PA is now south of the Mason-Dixon), wads of chewing tobacco on the ground, camouflage, and jacked up trucks.

And I'm from Carlisle. Isn't Altoona home base for Sheetz? I hear you guys even have one with beer!

Sheetz gas stations are what i miss the most from Maryland! No input on nascar but damn do i miss cheap chilli dogs!

Yep. The first Sheetz Brothers store was in Altoona in the early 60s, I think.

I try to avoid them since one of their car washes destroyed the paint job on my Fairmont a few years ago. They were like, "Sorry. Your car's a piece of E36 M3, so go away. ". Of course, they failed to realize that my car wasn't a piece of E36 M3 until their car wash got a hold of it. Douchebags.

But I digress.

In reply to Furious_E:better than WAWA??? Heaven on earth it must he Amish!

In reply to snailmont5oh:

I would be curious to hear how that happened, since the Sheets up the road is pretty much my go-to when I'm too lazy to wash the Camaro myself. Which is always...

@Furious: My suspicion is that the solenoid valve that was supposed to turn on the water was stuck off, allowing it to deliver a fully concentrated dose of cleaning solution. I noticed during the cycle that there wasn't much rinse water, but I didn't think anything of it until later, when I got out of my show-prepped car at the car show, and it looked plasti-dipped. E36 M3's still berkeleyed up, until I gather the funds for a full repaint.