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I am a fancy girl. I wear dresses and lipstick and, when feeling whimsical, wigs. I drink from pretty glasses, except that one time when I slugged it from the bottle, but desperate times and all of that. And I had never been to a racetrack.
When Ray Cook invited me to Tri-County Racetrack in Brasstown “to experience it firsthand,” my upper lip gathered some unsightly sweat. Who was even racing? Dogs running from people wielding heavy chains? People running from serial killers or, worse, ex-husbands?
Ray explained that the racetrack owner, 94-year-old Jack Wimpy, was present at a pretty gruesome car accident from two kids drag racing on the main strip in 1968. Wimpy wanted to stop the kids from serious injury, so he built the local racetrack.
The only thing I knew about car races was that they sounded like a swarm of mosquitos when my father-in-law watched them on television. I accepted Ray’s invitation, stopped at The Crown for cup of courage, navigated a muddy parking lot and followed the crowds to the entrance. Yes, crowds. Racecar watching is a big dealio.
Ray graciously offered me a Pit ticket. The Pit, I learned, was for fancy people, and I was pleased Ray seemed to understand me on that level. I was a fool, of course. Racetrack fancy is very different from Abigail fancy.
Access to the Pit required snaking along a wire fence past the Grandstand plebeians. A bonus feature included access to the cars and their drivers.
I spoke with a friendly looking gal in hopes of meeting a real live racecar driver. Maggie laughed at the idea. She said, “I’m here because my husband loved racing and I love my husband.”
An oddly shaped car – a squattish looking thing, like a clunky metal box with a tiny space carved out for the driver – sat behind her. The steering wheel was lying beside the driver’s seat. Even I knew it wasn’t meant to sit there like a severed head.
The pit boss, Clinton, made the mistake of talking to me as if I understood his language. Terms like “carriage” and “hot laps” were bandied about, and I smiled my prettiest smile, but he saw the vacancy in my eyes.
He told me he could change a tire in 30 seconds and that the car’s name was “BMS Open Wheel Modified,” which I found disappointing. I asked him if I could name it “Betty,” but he said no.
I made it to the Pit, but not before visiting a man named Earl, who would watch the race from his air-conditioned box. He had two red leather sofas up there, which admittedly looked glamorous compared the dust-covered bleachers, but his box was all closed in with Plexiglass.
I felt a little sorry for him because he was sequestered from the live action. There would be times during the next two hours when I would stare hungrily at his cozy box that kept the growling engines and the grit clouds out of his ears and eyes, but I couldn’t know that then.
I sat near Encil, an amiable chap who accepted my question peppering with good cheer. I asked him for a brochure so I could see the drivers and their cars and he waved toward a wooden slat nailed into a telephone pole.
“They post the (unintelligible) over there.” I wandered over there during one of the “Heat Races” (don’t ask because I can’t explain) and found some ripped scraps of paper with numbers on them. What a strange and foreign land I had entered.
Eventually, cars rolled onto the track with their snarling engines, diesel fumes and aggressive attitudes. They rumbled and trembled with power. After some secret signal – it took me a long time to notice the flagman who, for the uninitiated, worked much like an orchestra conductor – the place turned wild. It was 1980s disco loud. It was frightening. It was thrilling.
The drivers sped around the curves with such force that one of them actually tipped onto his side. I jumped up, but noticed Encil – my sensei – sitting calmly, clearly unbothered.
“He’ll be all right,” he said softly.
I stared at the car lying on its side like a dead animal and questioned his indifference. The other drivers followed a courtesy code, waiting for the tow truck to do its job. The announcer editorialized the action as men and machines worked in tandem to tip the car back onto its donut-looking tires. “It’s easy,” he said jovially. “Just tip it back over and watch your toes.”
I learned a great deal from my raucous night of coarse adventure. Next time I’ll wear goggles for the spitting mud. Also, it’s bad fashion to wear a skirt with heels or your periwinkle wig.
Racecar drivers travel
like movie stars, complete with posh trailers and an entourage.
Races resemble synchronized swimmers if the swimmers were trying to drown each other. The language system is complex which is why a brochure with a lexicon would be handy. The racers, like life, go round and around until somebody crashes. When that happens, a team of professionals will come take care of you.
The guy sitting next to Encil summed it up succinctly, “The trick is to go really fast and turn left.”
Abigail Hickman is a staff correspondent for the Cherokee Scout. Email her at abigailhickman44@gmail.com.