Hi blog fans from soggy Seattle! Right now we’re hoping that today’s final eliminations can dodge the rain drops, so I have a couple of extra minutes to share with you what I am calling “the Chee blog”
My great friend Lachelle “Chee” Seymour, NHRA Media Relations Manager extraordinaire, and I were chatting before the Denver event about the trip out west. I relayed to her that I was not going to do my usual drive from Denver to Seattle this year. Then, she told me that she was going to make that trip with our good friends from the NHRA Safety Safari, John and Robin Crosby. After a little prodding, I convinced Chee that she should write a blog about it, and that I would graciously post it on our Team Kalitta blog space.
So, without further fanfare, I present to you, the Chee blog…“We got a mighty convoy, rocking through the night …”
My buddy Todd “el Toddo” Myers decided not to make this northern leg of the “East-to-West-Coast Swing” so you get an update from me instead – and let me tell you, being a roadie (even half of one) is a lot harder than I thought. Especially if you don’t know how to change a tire.
Because I’m a “fly-in,” I never get to see much of the country other than Terminal D of the Dallas/Fort Worth airport. I arranged to make the trip from Denver to Seattle with John and Robin Crosby, of the NHRA Safety Safari presented by AAA.
We started our adventure in Wheatland, Wyo., at a little restaurant called the Timberhaus, where you can get Rocky Mountain Oysters for $5.95 and sing karaoke on Wednesday and Saturday. Luckily, since I can’t sing and will never, ever eat the oysters no matter who dares me to, we missed out on both of those.
Instead, we said goodbye to the rest of the guys staying at the same hotel who are also on the Series and started the big race out west. I sat shotgun in one of the dualies while Robin drove. I have to say she was very gracious about it. She didn’t even throw me out of the truck for saying “Is THAT an antelope?” at every passing animal. I eventually did see a few, about five hours into the trip. This was a big moment for me. I didn’t see many antelope growing up on the “range” of Ohio.
She also pointed out some of the tourist stops along the way, like the only two Cracker Barrel restaurants in the whole state of Montana. I have the kind of bond with Cracker Barrel that Hillary Will has with gas station coffee. It’s the same no matter where you go – total comfort food. Nomads need that kind of regularity sometimes. We also checked out the lake in Coeur d’Alene, saw a sign for Ennis, Mont., (where Dave Grubnic lives) and played around with the walky-talkies in our trucks. John played Ozzy Osbourne to us and I gave him a little Beach Boys and “Convoy” back.
We were trucking right along, making pretty good time until we had a flat somewhere in Montana. The only tool I know how to use is a hammer, so I figured out pretty quickly that I would be of no use to them. Instead I hung out and waved as team rigs drove by us on the highway. That was frustrating, but one of the cool things about driving is that you never feel like you’re alone. No matter where we stopped at least one rig I recognized was stopped there, too. The only time this is a bad thing is at weigh stations, when you hope that every POWERade Series truck gets through without going through what I hear is a lengthy inspection process that seriously derails any hope of being the first rig to arrive at the next track. We spent most of the trip leapfrogging with the crews of Kurt Johnson, Del Worsham, J.R. Todd, and our buddies like Uncle from Fram.
I learned a lot from Robin and John along the way. I probably won’t be able to make many trips by truck since my job requires me to be at races a week or two in advance, but I hope I get to soon. I have a lot of respect for our men and women who drive to every race -- and seeing the countryside was pretty amazing, too.