A Bridesmaid

Our racing season is finished, it was a short one due to the late start of summer here in the Pacific Northwest.  We are also already getting ready for next year. We shut down early to sell the engine and build another one.

It wasn't a bad season, even with the cane and braces.  Kevin runner-upped so that's good.  Our friend Scotty (the one that had the little bout with cancer) won his first ever race and our friend Henry won the other races so that's all good.  

Kevin runner-upped every race so he was the bridesmaid all season.



As always, our friend Paul got some very cool shots of us. 

That's me in front of the car.  A trust exercise that happens at 25 mpg.

I am always a little nervous being up on the line with Kevin but my nephew is almost always up there with me.  We're a team.  The photo above is one of the first times that I've done it alone. 

It's important that Kevin is sitting squared when he begins.  It's equally important that he's "in the groove", which is exactly what it sounds like.  What I am doing in the picture is ensuring that the burnout (the smoke from the tires) is exactly right.  As he pulls out of the smoke is when we make sure he is square and in the groove.
That's the trust part as he's headed toward us at a good rate of speed.

To put it in perspective, in a quarter-mile length, he goes 154 mph and it takes him 8.75 seconds from beginning to end.  He travels sixty feet in 1.25 seconds.
This is all car-nerd stuff, I realize.

I never think of what can go wrong. I usually get nervous that I am going to do the job correctly.  The pressure is always on me, never on Kevin.

I've only been truly nervous once before and it was at Las Vegas Motor Speedway, when we raced with the big boys in 2009.  I could have easily hurled in the staging lanes.

I never, ever pay attention to the crowd.  Except for one time.  The one time that there was a delay and John the announcer mentioned the spectators and I was DUMB enough to look up at the stands.  Dumb, dumb, dumb move.  Our friend Paul took a picture of the stands at the last race.

This is a portion of the crowd.  There are longer stands on the other side. Yeah.

So, now it's time to relax.  Time for a long winter's nap.  Maybe next year Kevin will be the bride.  We'll see.