When I arrived at Crossville Raceway for their opening night of the 2007 season, I was not there to take pictures, but rather to do a story on the reopening of the track for the Crossville Chronicle. I had with me a rather cheap digital camera with the intention of getting a couple of general shots to be submitted with the story. As I watched the racing from the scoring tower, I was asked by Al if I had a digital camera and would I mind taking some pictures of the winners, as the regular photographer was not there. When I returned the second week, the story repeated, and then I had some drivers asking about getting copies.
The rest of the story most of the drivers and fans know, a few weeks later I became the track photographer. Doing the pictures gave me the opportunity to meet a lot of drivers and crew members and this ‘job’ became a lot more personal. A few weeks later I watched as some folks were planning to reopen Baxter on Friday nights. I had considered heading down there, but Wartburg had just switched to Friday nights and that track was only 15 miles from home. There were a lot of post on MRM and the Wartburg site looking for a photographer, so I decided to give it a try. Wartburg Speedway became my ‘other’ home track where I found a whole other family of friends.
When Crossville closed suddenly in August, it shocked a lot of folks and was the cause of a lot of frustration, hurt feelings and anger. The racing season never had a chance to come to a close, no final points race, no banquet, no celebration. Little did I know that when I headed to Bristol for race week that my local tracks were soon to be closed. The Labor Day Thunder race scheduled for Crossville was moved to Wartburg and then rained out. That race was later rescheduled for the end of September and was a big success. In the interim, I headed down to Spring City raceway for a three week run ending with their $1000 Limited Late Model race. The regular season at Wartburg Speedway was scheduled to end the night of the Thunder race with trophy presentations, but the plan changed that night. Wartburg crowned their champions on October 6th while I was in Talladega covering that race for the newspaper.
Through late September the rumors were flying all over regarding the future of Crossville Raceway and I decided that some one needed to dig in and get the ‘facts’. I managed to contact the owners through one of their partners and scheduled a meeting.
I won’t repeat what I learned as I have posted it on the MRM board, but I am looking forward to seeing a lot of race fans on October 25th.
On Pit Road will be at Crossville on the 25th with a blowout sale of 2007 photos from Crossville Raceway, Wartburg Speedway and Spring City Raceway. We will also have a few preview copies of the 2008 Crossville Raceway Calendar for sale and will be taking orders for the final copies once the 2008 schedule is ready. Each calendar contains over 70 racing photos from the 2007 season.
For those wishing to do their shopping online, we have lowered the prices on all Crossville, Wartburg and Spring City photos on our SmugMug site to help offset the shipping cost. Photos may still be ordered via email, telephone or US mail at the regular prices with FREE shipping included. Those may be paid by checks or money order through the mail or online through PayPal.
