In 1947, the Martinsville Speedway was “carved… out of the red clay of Henry County” in the middle of nowhere, down near the bottom of Virginia.
Sixty years later, the Male and Female Halves of the Staff were seated in the dining room of the Holiday Inn Express in Clemmons, NC, one hour south of Martinsville, when a kindly stranger asked them if they’d like two tickets to the race that afternoon. For free. No charge. Row 39, Section H of the Blue Ridge Tower, just a couple feet to the left of the Finish Line. We initially declined his offer. About 45 seconds later, we came to our senses.
What were we thinking? Turn down NASCAR TICKETS? How often does one get to go to a NASCAR race? For free? And there were two passes to the Fan Zone Hospitality Chalet (“Appearance by Dale Earnhardt, JR., TBD!”) So, not only were we going to see a real, live stock car race, we were also going to have a chance to get up close and personal with Junior!
We don’t know all that much about NASCAR, but we do know that you don’t pass up free tickets and you don’t ever (ever!) pass on a chance to get near No. 8!
What we most definitely did not know about NASCAR is that there is traffic of gargantuan proportions for three miles approaching the track from the south. (We speculated that there must be an old joke about travelling three miles an hour in order to witness fifty men driving 85 miles an hour for three hours.) Route 220 north is the primary funnel into the area from North Carolina and it took us two hours to go the last 11,000 feet. So much for getting a photo op with Junior.
We parked the Cobalt in a muddy lot packed with tour buses. We walked the quarter mile to the track. We could hear the pre-race introductions (with the attendant booing and cheering from the crowd of 65,000), and we found our seats in plenty of time to see the Pledge of Allegiance, the convocation, the National Anthem, the flyover by the jets and Richard Petty say, “Gentlemen, start your engines!” (The Female Half spotted him first. She nudged the Male Half and said, pointing at the man clad in black, “Hey, look who it is!” The Male Half, dazzled by the spectacle and unable to think clearly guessed– Johnny Cash? Gary Muledeer? Fortunately the lame guesses were muttered, otherwise, we would have been pummelled.)
And start their engines they did!
The fans to our left, two gentlemen from New York, were full of information and interesting factoids. One thing, they told us, that folks who have never witnessed a race in person are not prepared for, is the smell. They were right. The acrid scent of fuel and burning rubber wafts up into the stands, even reaching our Row 39, almost as soon as the cars take their first few paced laps.
Then they asked us if we had brought our earplugs.
Earplugs?
There is the matter of the sound. As the pace quickened and the tension mounted and the crowd anticipated the waving of the green flag to start the race in earnest, it built and then it built some more. At first, it was equivalent to, say, the noisiest machine you’ve ever had the misfortune of walking past– a jack hammer, or a large generator, maybe. Then it ratchets up and up and up and, just when you think it can’t get any louder, it quadruples. And then… well, then it gets louder.
When all 48 vehicles rounded Turn 2, on the opposite side of the track from us, they all came out of the turn and headed for their first straightaway and the noise was so horrific that it struck fear in our hearts. The Male Half turned to the Female Half somewhere during Lap 4 and shouted, “IT’S THE END OF THE WORLD!”
Indeed it seemed so. The smell, the colors, the motion, the cigarette smoke, the roar of 48 Cars of the Future– it made the heart race, it caused the manufacture of adrenalin in unprecedented amounts, it triggered the flight response. In spite of the beauty and the wonder and the spectacle, it engendered a bizarre, simultaneous feeling of exhilaration and doom– a certain feeling that someone, quite possibly one or both of us, or all of us– was going to die! And in spectacular fashion! With lucrative corporate sponsorship! Brought to you by Fox!
Roundabout Lap 10, the Male Half was tearing apart a plastic bag and stuffing small clods of polypropylene into his ears. The Female Half managed to find a tissue in her purse, which was pressed into service immediately. After that, we were able to relax somewhat and enjoy the carnival that is NASCAR.
It is amazing that someone isn’t killed every five minutes or so. And, we’re told, Martinsville is the smallest track on the circuit. On such a small oval, it’s said, the speeds are relatively tame! It’s still ridiculous, though, that nearly 50 automobiles are doing 80 or 90 on the straightaways with not more than and inch or two between them.
The small track also means that we weren’t very far from the action. And from our vantage point, we were practically looking over the shoulders of the race crews as the racers came in to the pits under the yellow flag.
How anyone makes it out alive is a mystery. The Female Half is surprised that NASCAR doens’t have some sort of Zamboni-like machine that, instead of smoothing out the ice, scoops up all the dead drivers, pit crew members and spectators. A Zam-Body, perhaps.
Ah, the advantages of being a standup comic– free for an afternoon, tix to a major sporting event dropped into our laps, able to catch a life-altering event on the way home from a gig.