A Summer of Hard Left Turns

A Summer of Hard Left Turns

 

            Crashing into the first turn wall at wide-open throttle was not how I anticipated beginning my stockcar-racing season.

            Shaken but stirring, I crawled out of my twisted and smashed stockcar. On its maiden shakedown run, my green and yellow pride and joy sat crookedly against the steel retaining guardrail with steam gurgling from its mangled radiator and header exhaust pipes cooling with a tick�"tick�"tick. Too distraught to look, I hung my head and slowly walked down the speedway’s steeply banked first turn, stepping over the rivulets of engine coolant that flowed down to muddy the dusty infield.

            Physically unhurt, I noticed the other cars lined up, stopped because of my wreck blocking the track adding to my emotional wound and embarrassment. Standing on the low infield, I chanced a glance at my number three stockcar. One glance was all it took as the track crew prepared to haul my broken car away. In a frustrated reaction, I launched my helmet across the track, over the guardrail, and into the weeds that lay beyond. I recalled the myth that green stockcars were bad luck.

This how my second year of racing began, and this was only the preseason warm-ups. This day on the track was meant workout the bugs and fine-tune the car for the races starting the following weekend. I abandoned all hope for a successful racing season.

 

My father bragged to friends and relatives that I drove tractors at age five. Some thought it was abusive, but I accepted it as growing up on a farm and a step up from my toy tractors. At age twelve, I had my first field car, a family cast off and no longer road worthy, but it ran and moved. I drove sitting on stacked cushions around the farm on fields and lanes making believe I was racing just like on television and in magazines. For hours on end, I’d slide through turns, accelerate down straights, and brake hard to turn again. My driving expertise improved on my improvised dirt tracks until I was old enough to drive.

My first year of racing had been dismal with no checkered flags at the finish lines due to my lack of money the basic ingredient to go fast, and because of that, the car was grossly underpowered and under-tired. I spent most of my track time at the back of the pack occasionally finishing second or third�"from last. I learned the rules of the track, and I vowed to make my car faster and fulfill my providence. Soon after the first season ended, I landed a well paying job with hopes of attaining my dream of racing and wining. My second season promised to be bright, exciting, and successful after completely rebuilding the car with a new powerful engine and wide tires. My brother-in-law Jim provided a hand and countered my youthful exuberance and mechanical expertise with mature patience and metal working expertise. We made a good team.

 

On the ride home, my bent and broken stockcar rode heavy on the trailer and my mind. My bright future had clouded over in an instant of a jammed wide-open throttle and forgotten ignition kill switch. I had no hope in a second season. Jim realized my attitude and responded in a wholly different manner.

            “You know the car was really running hard and the suspension was almost dialed in. It looked tight and fast out there, though I never thought of a throttle linkage malfunction.”

            I just drove on, eyes straight ahead, thinking about dropping the car in the garage, closing the doors and forgetting it at the end of a short career, but I had to agree with him, the car felt really good out there.

“What does it matter?” I muttered, but my attitude had already begun to turn.

“Come on,” he offered. “Its not all that bad. With some frame straightening, front suspension parts, and a tire, we could have it ready for next week’s first race.”

On the way home, he talked about heating up, bending, and repairing the bent frame and eventually, by the time we got home, he persuaded me to relent. All week long working well past midnight, we finally wielded a rolling stockcar once more. Though it was not as sleek and shiny with new primer over the repairs, the car retained most of its so-called unlucky green paint. The two things I learned right off the bat that season was the correct installation of a fifty-cent carburetor return spring, and to practice using the ignition kill switch. With some research and re-engineering, we ensured the throttle would never jam again. I repeatedly relived the shock of an impending crash so I’d remember to slap off the kill switch.

            At the preseason runs, I was a bit overconfident, but admittedly, I was nervous the following weekend. With the car unloaded at the track, I took a deep breath and pulled on my firesuit. There was only one-way to get into the car and that was through the side window with a bit of Houdini contortionism. I stepped up onto the side crashbar and gripped the car’s roof edge. I lifted my right knee close to my chin and hooked it through the window and then ducking my head, I stuck my head and shoulders through and grabbing the seat frame inside, I squeezed my body through the window by dragging my left leg inside.

Sitting quietly, I donned my helmet and secured my safety harness; I anxiously double-checked my harness, the helmet strap’s tightness and worked the throttle three times to convince myself it operated properly. With a click of the ignition kill switch and stab of the starter button, I fired off the engine�"it sounded loud, crisp, and powerful�" stimulating. Even though I was nervous, I drove well, and finished the heats. Again, no checkered flag at the finish line, and I didn’t even qualify for the feature, but I recovered from my nerves. It took a few races to adjust the suspension for optimum handling on the track, but in not too many weekends, I scored my first checkered flag�"one of many flags that year.

One of the good times I remember is my small fan club made mostly of friends and relatives. I remember fans coming into the pits after the races asking for Uncle Neal’s autograph (my racing nickname) wearing my picture button. My girlfriend was a practicing nurse and bravely attended every race even though she was well aware of the danger and potential for injury�"my injury. She was not the typical racer/gear head’s girlfriend. She accepted my obsessive hobby with a calm reserve, acting relieved after the races were over, and we could reunite in the pits.

During the week, I often relived races in the quietness of my garage recalling the acceleration, braking, and hard left turns, and hearing the rising and falling of screaming racing engines. The car retained the strong, masculine bouquet of fuel-rich exhaust, rubber oil, and hot metal. All these prompted memories as I concentrated on driving techniques and calculated mechanical improvements. I knew how the car functioned, and how it functioned as a whole machine for I had tightened every nut, inserted every bolt and applied hundreds of inches of molten weld to mate thousands of pieces into one solid racing machine. I touched its every square inch, cleaned and painted every nook and cranny, likening the intimate familiarity as carnal knowledge.   

            As I sat in my car, the dark sheet metal and the roll cage’s tubing curved around me like I were swallowed inside the dark ribs of a sleeping primordial beast. In a stockcar’s cockpit, everything is important, but with simplicity and functionality necessities the interior holds no chrome, plastic or upholstery for decoration, nor heater, air condition or radio for comfort. The thinly padded, rib hugging, lateral g-force compensating seat holds me tightly so the five-strap shoulder harness retains my body in position no matter the fate of the car as witnessed by my preseason crash.

            Scavenged clutch and brake pedals from an unidentified donor car hung from the dashboard alongside the accelerator pedal, a large aluminum treaded footprint seeming stepped in by Paul Bunyan when cast. A tachometer and two simple analog gauges, oil pressure and coolant temperature, stared me in the face as I sat directly behind, my position in the car equal-distant front to rear and side to side. The push-pull ignition switch, its compulsory function as a kill switch, is nearby under my right arm, and finally, a simple pushbutton starter switch. A racing steering wheel and shifter complete the controls.

            Halfway through that second season, I became a consistent finisher, always in the top five and always showing up to race despite the likelihood of rain that would force us home without racing. I learned to make skillful recoveries from spinouts, minor bumps or taps to finish in front contributing to a healthy point standing. The car ran reliably and strong with the car’s single mechanical breakdown almost keeping me from making a feature race.

            Racing in the first heat of two that night, my engine died after two laps. I coasted to the infield, and as the race continued, I determined the problem to be a broken ignition distributor. The efficient track crew pushed my car to the pits as the heat’s winner coasted around the track with the checkered.

            Back in the pits, Jim and I pulled the distributor out. We found the distributor drive gear had sheared off, and we didn’t have a spare. Meanwhile, the second heat began and Jim and I went separate ways to find a replacement gear. A fellow racer had one and informed me that brass gears were absolutely necessary for longevity in these racing engines and… I didn’t have time to chit-chat. I thanked him for the loan and running to the car, I waved Jim back. We quickly replaced the gear as the second heat finished and that winner coasted around the track. I turned the engine over by hand, lined up timing marks and dropped the distributor back into place. We quickly hooked up the wires and tightened the distributor down. Hoping for the best, I started the engine, but it ran rough. The timing was off.

            My last chance to make the point-making feature was by competing in the consolation race that consisted of all the losing cars from the other two heats. Lined up and idling, the cars waited to go on the track. Standing next to my running car, I reached over revved the engine and while holding the speed up, I twisted the distributor back and forth until the engine sounded right. The cars were filing onto the track, and I told Jim to retighten the distributor as I squeezed into the car, and put my helmet and harness on. Jim picked up the hood to remount it, but stood there dumbstruck as I spun out of our parking slot. I roared down the dusty pit road risking disqualification for breaking the speed limit and racing without a hood. I was convinced I was watching my last chance to race slip away as the pit official closed the gate. As I roared up to the gate, I blipped the throttle to get his attention. He spoke into his radio, hesitated, nodded, and reopened the gate. I pulled onto the track.

The pit gate opens on the third turn, and the pack of cars were already on the first and second turns, gaining speed to take the green in half a lap. I realized I was almost a lap behind before even starting. I eased the throttle open wide and went through the gears risking a fast lap on cool, slippery tires as the other cars bore down behind me.

 Amazingly, my quick timing adjustment worked perfectly because the car seemed faster than ever. The consolation race is a sprint, really, only eight laps and only the top two finishers got to the feature. I knew what I had to do. For my first two laps, I had a wide-open track in front of me, which gave me wide-open throttle and maneuvering space. I quickly caught the stragglers in the back of the pack. One straggler actually spewed blue oil smoke as I blew past. I drove recklessly high along the wall on the straights and dove deep and hard into the turns. I passed cars on the right and left cockily thinking my car would stick on the track no matter where I drove. By four laps, I was in mid pack. While going wide around the fourth place car with my wheels high on the bank in the loose rubber, dirt and dust, I pushed the tires past their adhesion point and went sideways. I steered hard into the skid, let up on the throttle for a second, recovered, straightened up, and charged ahead. Just like back on the farm. I took over fourth position.   

            Five laps down, I passed the third place car. The last two cars were battling it out for first as I closed the two car lengths on a single straight, braking later every turn. Driving hard left into a turn, my left front tire touched the dust on the infield’s edge sending up a cloud. The two drivers must have seen me coming in their rear views, and they pushed a little harder. I snuck my front wheels past the second car on the low side of a turn as he slid just a bit and tapped the other car, which in turn made the second car spin out. I saw him slide away out my side window.

I don’t know if the first place driver saw this other car spin out and forgot about me or suddenly lost his nerve or concentration because he left an opening on the inside for me to sneak by on the third turn. I took it and charged through the fourth to take the checkered flag. After a cool down lap, I ran my victory lap with the hard-fought checkered flag whipping in the breeze. Racing without a hood is bad publicity, so no picture was taken of that victory. After the excitement of that race, the night’s feature race is long forgotten, but at least I made it to the feature to keep up the point chase. Afterwards, my girlfriend who usually didn’t have much to say about the races said the announcer really got caught up with my fast mechanical repair and comeback to fly by all the other cars in eight short fast laps. She told me that the announcer hadn’t ever seen a more exciting consolation race and had everyone sitting on the edge of their seats. She hung onto me especially close that night in the pits.

            After the season ended, she and I attended the season’s racing banquet. I received third place points at one track, fourth at the other, and third overall in my class, which went nicely with my number three unlucky green car. Better than that though, I won Rookie of the Year. I enjoyed the end of the racing season much better than the beginning!

 

 

Reviews

[wondering]

Good content, makes me feel like I am there at the track watching on the edge of my seat. Always wondered how you did in racing, never got to see it in person, but atleast now I can feel the excitement you must have felt. Thanks for turning me on to racing back in the day. Still love to go to the track although I don't get to anymore