My Neck Turns A Shade Of Red

One thing in my life that constantly amazes my wife is that I seem to know a lot of people.  It seems that no matter where we go I seem to run into someone I know either as a friend or an acquaintance.  One of these people is a race car driver.   And a pretty good one at that.

Eric Rhead drives the ITT sponsored #66 late model race car in the Rocky Mountain Challenge Series.  His team  races a car over a few state lines and on Aug 21st they raced at Rocky Mountain Raceway(the same place Tamara and I went to the drag races) in the Napa 125. 
Tamara and I got to attend the races that day and we had a great time.  Photographically speaking it wasn't the best for me.  I don't have an access pass so all of my images have some sort of the fence in them.  Please try to enjoy them anyway.

Its still Salt Lake City, so the pits aren't the fabulous ones you seen on TV.

Off we go...

Eric Takes the lead after only two laps.  He holds it for over 60 laps.

Some cars didn't fair to well.  This car and another collided in a heat taking both cars out and leaving them watching the main from the grandstand.

Due to brake fade earlier in the race, Eric was running third with a handful of laps left when the cars in first and second had an incident leaving Eric in the pole position with 5 laps to go.  And as you can see by the image above, he won the race.  He is performing the obligatory burn out for his fans.  That's racing for you.

Here Eric is giving a speech and accepting the trophy.

There were a few other classes running races that night.  These are the trucks that ran.  There were mini sprint cups that look like the full fledged Nascar vehicles but are 1/2 scale.  Also they ran the track in a figure eight for two other classes. Stock cars and the very famous "trains."  This class consists of three vehicles chained together.  The front car has a driver and an engine but no brakes.  The middle car has no driver, no engine, and no brakes.  It is just a shell.  The last car or "caboose" has a driver that is the brake man, trying to slow the whole thing in time not to slam into another train in the intersection of the race track.

There is a huge amount of carnage during these train races. Cars sliding sideways, tires squealing continually, and the crunching noises of sheet metal being abused turns into a constant serenade during the race.  As you can see from above, some times they end up with the tires pointing up. The winner of the race finished the last few laps with the hood plastered to the windshield.

Sorry about the fence in the photos, but sometimes its better just to have the pictures than not taking them at all.