It really makes me wonder....

In light of Carl's accident in Omaha... correction.. Greenwood :) (which btw-Carl's accident is big news in Omaha, it's crazy lol I'm just glad he's okay!)
It's made me wonder if owners are going to start saying okay you can't go race here or there. Last year Tony Stewart injured his shoulder in the Chili Bowl. Carl dislocated his thumb. Jimmie.. Okay Jimmie fell off the top of a golf cart so that's not the same but really it makes me wonder if owners are going to start not letting their drivers go off and do extra things.

I love Dirt racing!!

It was hotter than h*ll yesterday but it could have been worst I guess LOL. There was a breeze. SO the gates opened at 4:00 and by 4:45 I had Carl and Kenny Edwards autograph. I've always had mixed feelings about Carl. Is he really that oh gosh golly gee person. He is. He's super nice and I was surprised he wasn't as tall in person as I thought he was going to be. I mean I'm 5'3" so everyone is way taller
than me but he just seems so tall on TV and maybe he was slouching a little bit but he just didn't seem as tall to me. He shook all the guys hands and thanked everyone for coming out to the track despite the heat. He totally signed my ESPN magazine! WHOOT! His little brother Kenny is hysterical they are so funny together. He said he had put a sign on the back of his car that read, "Carl who?!?!" I've seen Kenny race a couple times at I-80 Speedway and he's really becoming one of my favorite dirt racers! I asked Carl about his bike ride. He was going to ride his bike from Columbia to St. Louis, he said it was a nice ride, it took him two days.
So after I get both Kenny and Carl's signature I move off to the side so I can take some more pictures. I'm standing next to their mom and it doesn't really connect thats who she is until I walk back to my seat. My mom goes, "So does she look as pretty and nice as she does on the tv?" I laughed and said, "Uh no it's hotter than h*ll and her make up is running down her face just like everyone else's."
Carl and Kenny were supposed to participate in this race at the very end of the night that would pit them against their dad *who hadn't raced in like 8 years* and two sets of Brothers from the Omaha Metro who have raced. The Kosiski brothers (the Kosisiki family owns and operates I-80 Speedway) and another set of brothers, but that race got canceled because of storms moving into the area (and the races were running long because one of the main features ended up taking 45 minutes or better due to all the cautions. They'd go like a lap or two then wreck.) SO finally it was Carl and Kenny's feature. Things are going great, I mean super great, Carl started mid pack in a 25 lap shoot out and in three laps had moved up to 7th spot. Then there was a caution. No biggie a guy got into the wall. Green flag drops again, and we're off racing, then on the backstretch there was this big wreck, like 5 or 6 cars were involved it was big. Kenny ended up getting front end damage and had to go into the pits for repairs. Carl's night was done, (sad I wanted live pictures of him doing his back flip.) Well he got out of the car and he was upset. He could have won, he's a racer period and wanted to win (and I wanted to see the damn back flip lol!) He gets out waves to the crowd and walks down to the pits. Well then the EMS guys rush his brother's trailor. (Carl didn't have one he was running one of Ed Kosisiki's cars so he was just using Kenny and Ed's trailors as his base. One of the fun parts of the night was to guess where that Office Depot fire suit was gonna pop up next lol) So the EMS guys go check him out, My mom and I were like well it's because he's "NASCAR GUY" and if he weren't he'd probably be okay. Turns out Carl may have broken his thumb in the accident. As a precaution they sent him out to Lincoln (which is 20 miles from the track. Carl keeps saying that I-80 is in Omaha but it's really not it's in Greenwood which is a tiny town about 30-35 miles outside of Omaha and about 20 or so from Lincoln lol They wanted him to have his hand looked at. I never heard how it came about if it was broke or not, but I'll let you know if I find out anything.) My mom and I were talking about how the whole conversation went: "Carl-I'm fine, it's cool. Geepers mom I'm fine. Nancy-Carl get in the rescue squad so we can have your hand checked out. Carl-I'm fine gosh. How many times do I have to say that. Various track workers- Mr. Edwards please get into the rescue squad and go have your hand checked out. We don't want Jack Roush to come down on us like the Wrath of God for letting one of his drivers get hurt at our track. Please. Carl-No, I'm fine, I'll call Jack tomorrow and let him know things are good. Track Workers: Carl get in the squad now or we won't invite you back and you won't get to take any more fans around the track in that two seater late model." We obviously don't know if that's how it went but it was almost 11pm when that happened, my mom and I were hot and tired so that's how we thought the conversation went in our mind Plus if he did break his hand at least it was in a legit racing incident not like Jimmie Johnson who was golf cart surfing
I'm just glad I took today off!! LOL It was a fun night even if I didn't get to see the back flip



Carl signed my ESPN Magazine cover!! :)

One of the really cool points of the day was meeting my "Line buddies" They were HMS fans (Jimmie fans!) and we talked about how cool it was going to be to have Jimmie and Junior one the same team and how innovative The Chad is and he just needs to stop getting caught being innovative :)


Edit... Carl is okay his hand is okay his thumb is dislocated, he was treated and released from an Omaha hospital (that two of my uncles are doctors at just a little side note. One delivers babies the other is a peds. doctor. but I just thought it was kind of a cool little side note.)

Junior to make announcement tomorrow...

Well folks it looks like tomorrow is going to be the day we find out where Dale Jr is going to go. It sounds like Junior will be going to HMS next year. According to Claire B Lang (Dialed In XM Radio, and Jim Utter (The Charlotte Observer) they have said that in order for Dale Jr to be able to make his announcement to go to HMS that someone from HMS has to announce that Kyle (We can all assume it's going to be Kyle, he's been complaining about not being happy and all this other stuff.) is leaving HMS. This could be done tonight via press release, or it can be done by an HMS PR rep tomorrow before Junior makes his announcement. And for the record.....I look just as good in blue as I do in red :) I will follow him wherever.

Close my eyes and leap........

If I could close my eyes and be anywhere other than where I live, it would have to be in Rossburg Ohio at Eldora. Tonight is the Prelude to the Dream race. I was at Eldora for a race 2 summers ago and I have to say it's a beautiful beautiful track. It's well taken care of and it's a wonderful track full of history. When I saw the Eldora track I stood one a bleacher, called my mom in tears and said, "Guess where I'm at? I'm at Eldora and in a few hours we'll be back to watch the race" My mom being the same die-hard NASCAR fan that I am thought it was great that I got to see Eldora. My dad and I were told that we missed meeting Tony Stewart by a day that was a bummer but still, this is one memory of a thousand that I will treasure forever. My dad and I take camping trips every summer. I'm now 26 years old and yes, I'm a daddy's girl. We take a big camping trip every year and this memory of seeing Eldora and seeing a race there is one of the best memories I will have of camping with my dad.
If I close my eyes I can remember every detail of that day. What I wore, what my dad wore. I of course wore my favorite Dale Jr t-shirt. Dad wore his BMW motorcycle shirt, it was a warm July day and the sky was so blue with just a few fluffy clouds in the sky.

My dad is a great guy who really encourages my NASCAR obsession. Well he doesn't do anything to hinder it LOL :) While camping in Pennsylvania he drove past the Poccono Track in a thunderstorm just so I could see it. He also on that same trip drove through Indianapolis just so I could see the Brickyard and take pictures of the hallowed racing place. It's great and since it's nearing Father's Day and the race at Eldora tonight I thought I'd share a special father/daughter moment that we had. My dad worked on dirt cars when he was in the Air Force. One of his buddies he had met through a couple guys that were on the base with him raced and so my dad and a couple of the guys would work on the pit crew over the weeknds if they were available to. So I guess I get my love of dirt racing and racing in general naturally. :)



And just to prove that my dad really thinks like me... He told me to go stand by the Coke machine with Tony's picture on it. I don't have a copy of that picture my dad has it but it was a fun day :) A little insight into my mind... I posed with the Matt Kenseth cut-out at Arby's two weeks ago LOL :) So when my dad said "hey Nik, go stand by the pop machine." I had no problem doing that! :)

Well it's been awhile....

It's been since the Allstar race that I've posted something... a lot of interesting things have happened to me since then... One of which was a very interesting email debate on myspace on if I was a Teresa Hater (Teresa Earnhardt) or not. I'm trying for the life of me to remember ever posting in a public venue my thoughts on her and the entire Dale Jr contract thing and I've got nothing. Hmmm....http://fricknfrackracing.blogspot.com/2007/05/junior-is-leaving.html
Yup checked that out nothing bad about here there... So yeah this person emailed me via myspace and asked me if I was a Teresa Hater... He was obviously a Teresa Earnhardt fan and kudos to him for that. I'm not I'm a Dale Jr fan period end of discussion. So that was a very interesting few days of emails. It was interesting to hear someone else's opinion. I love opinion debates I do. Bottom line though on this topic of Teresa Earnhardt versus Dale Jr people are going to have to agree to disagree over things because there are Dale Jr fans that are DIE hard Dale Jr fans and will follow him wherever he'll go and cheer for him. There are other fans that are D.E.I fans and will support whoever drives for Teresa at D.E.I does that make the people that are D.E.I fans any less of NASCAR fans than that of someone that follows a specific driver nope not at all . It's simply what makes the sport of NASCAR great! NASCAR is great because there are going to be debates over this driver being better than that driver. Or this team being better than that team. It's what makes the sport fun and interesting and I for one can't wait until next season to see how things shake up.

Do I think D.E.I will turn to a expensive museum like Tony Stewart said? Maybe, I certainly hope not because I think D.E.I is important to NASCAR.

Now on to racing.... The race is this weekend at Dover. And sadly it will be run tomorrow because of rain. Guess it's a good thing I'm already on vacation for tomorrow :) Happy Racing Monday to all racing fans out there. Who knows. Maybe Dale Jr will follow up his great 2001 win with a win tomorrow :) He's got a great starting spot. Starting 2nd. He was on the pole until Ryan Newman knocked him off the pole.

Let's go Allstar Racing!!!

I love the Allstar race! It's just great old school beating and banging racing. This year the Crew Chiefs got to jump in cars and race also. That was a fun race, lots of beating and banging in that race too. Andy Petre won the race with Chad Knaus finishing second. Not without effort mind you, Chad really tried and nearly got Andy a couple of times.

Martin Truex Jr got his first cup win in the Nextel Open. It's just a matter of time before he gets his first win during a points paying race. He's just on the cusp of getting it. D.E.I is getting their ducks in a row and it's not going to be to much longer before they are winning again.

Kevin Harvick won the Allstar race. Perhaps the most exciting part was when Kyle and Kurt Busch got into each other. Everyone wondered what would happen if the two of them wrecked into each other. Kurt really showed how mature he's become by taking the higher road and while he did comment on saying it would be a while before he'd eat Kellog's again, he was very cool and collected with the incident. All in all it was a good Allstar Race.

Junior is leaving...

It's official Dale Jr is leaving D.E.I at the end of this season. I can't say I'm surprised but yet at the same time I am.

However, I'm very proud at him for standing up and doing what is right for him. I'm a Dale Jr fan and I'm very proud to say that I'm a Dale Jr fan and I wish him a ton of luck wherever he decides to go next year.
He hasn't decided where he's going to go yet, he wants to talk to everyone who wants to talk to him. I think that is great! Here is the transcript, podcast and further down the page you can read Budweiser's statement

I can only imagine how hard it was for him to make this decision but he made it and in my opinion his father would be proud of him for standing up for what he feels is right. I wish him nothing but the best for the rest of this season and next season.

The Internet has been swirling with rumors of where he was going to go for the last couple of days. My personal favorite was that he was going to Hendrick Motorsports. Nothing against HMS, I happen to like Jimmie Johnson too but I just can't see him driving for HMS. The other one was he's going to start his own Cup team and run it out of JR Motorsports and lease HMS engines. PLUS he was taking Martin Truex Jr with him. Truex is still under contract until after the 2008 season.

So from this Junior fan.... Good luck buddy I think next year is going to be a very exciting year!