Greetings, blog readers! LP here in beautiful Indy with a quick update from the biggest event in drag racing, and what a busy day and a half it has been so far!

I got to the track on Thursday afternoon, and lucky for me, that’s the day the heat finally went away. From what I understand, the combination of the heat and the humidity here the first part of the week was almost unbearable. As I sit here on Saturday afternoon, however, the sun is shining, the breeze is pleasant, and forgive the cheesiness, but life is good.

On Thursday evening, Fletch and his wife Joani had a little shindig at their place. They live here in Indianapolis, and were nice enough to invite us all over for an evening of food and fun. By the time I got there, the party was in full swing. The pool table was busy all evening, there were card games going on the in the corner, but probably the funniest part of the evening was hearing Doug and Ray tell old racing stories from back in the day, even when Doug was a boat racer. I couldn’t begin to retell any of them, but I know my face hurt from laughing so much.

Of course, we relived the winning moment by watching the finals on Fletch’s big screen. (A little side note, but isn’t DVR or TiVo, whichever one you might have, simply fabulous?) There were lots of laughs at the expense of pretty much everyone on the team. Look at him! Did Ed just elbow Doug in the face? Is Brad crying?

Friday brought lots of appointments for Doug. The morning started off with an interview with John Schwarb, a writer for espn.com. He wrote a great article on the win at Reading, which you can check out at http://sports.espn.go.com/rpm/seriesIndex?seriesId=99. Then it was off to a photo shoot that will be used at the awards banquet at the end of the season. Next he had a meeting to attend at the circle track here on site, then an interview with ESPN2 for their coverage of “The Big Go.” Next thing I know, Dave Rieff shows up and whisks him away for an interview for NHRA Raceday. Whew! Then off to the starting line for an introduction of all 32 drivers in each of the professional classes and another photo shot. Finally, the time came to head to the staging lanes and go racing!!

We are sitting in the No. 9 spot right now, with a 4.56 at 315 mph, with four more qualifying runs yet to go. As I type, we are about to head up for our first run of the day. In fact, it looks like they are getting ready to pull the car out. Better wrap it up!

I will have more for you soon!

Until then, be good,

LP