Samsung 500 Apr 5

First of all I had to get up at 5;15am. You don't know difficult that is when my normal time is 7am. I need all my 8 hours... But I didn't feel too bad at all.

People it was what 80 degrees Saturday and now on Sunday we have a high of maybe 65...but the wind is probably going to make it feel 50 degrees. I layered up. 2 shirts and 2 pairs of socks.
Was at the meeting spot by 6:30am. We arrived at WBAP in Arlington in plenty of time.

WBAP just started this last year according to Tonie, who invited me. Tonie and I met at work last year. One day I wore my Daytona 500 tee to work on a Friday. She said last April there were 7 buses, but since then only 4. We got a boxed lunch from Buca di Beppo (either turkey or Italian sandwich with bag of chips, apple, and bit size candy bar. I got my fav - Dark Snickers). Two soft drinks or water. I chose water because I can drink it room temp better.

Buses left WBAP parking lot at 8:45am and we arrived at the Texas Motor Speedway (TMS) track at 9:45am. They said to be back at the bus 30 minutes after the race ends. We went in Gate 7, closes gate to our seats and the bus parking. Tonie and I headed straight to the Pits to get that done while Pam and Diane went to our seats.

Tonie and I did not see anyone famous in the Pits. BUT, I thought I saw Kurt Busch inside the ropes of his pit box area. I did a double-take. This guy must be a cousin, he looks more like Kurt than Kyle does. I should have taken a pic of him, but I didn't. He had on some white rimmed sun glasses, too. Maybe he's Kurt's decoy, heehee.

Funny, in Daytona our passes only allowed us on pit road. So you could only see the pit box from the front side. At TMS we couldn't get to pit road. We were on the inside and could only see the backside of the pit boxes.

After our self-guided pit tour we headed back to the grandstands. Since I bought a tee at my first cup race which happened to be at Daytona 500 last year, I splurged and bought me a Texas Motor Speedway tee this race. Denise says a track tee is a nice conversation starter, and she's right. While in Daytona some guys behind us on the bus started talking to us. They were from Dallas. So I bought a TMS shirt, then we went to the next booth just looking. Saw one I like better.
"Peace
Love
Texas Motor Speedway"
It was more my style and a Ladies tee. So I exchanged it. Hope it fits, looked kind of small for a large.

So we headed off to our seats. And just let me say it was two years ago this month I went to a Nationwide race at TMS, my first NASCAR race ever. Talana and I thought we would freeze to death. I swear the high was like 40 degrees, with winds like we've been having here lately, AND our seats were in the shade. OMG! So yesterday was cold, but not that cold. You'll see picture of me at my seat with my coat off. But about 44 laps later we lost the sun and coats had to come back on.

Tonie and I just so happened to have the same am/fm radio headset. She bought hers about 10 years ago at a race, I got mine off ebay last year. Damn it, neither one of us could keep the station 105.3fm tuned in. Eventually we couldn't even pick it up. Guess it was the wind? That station must have other stations on either side of it with strong signals. Usually at the track I can get 105.3 in, but if I bend over to get something out of my bag I need to reset the station. I thought it was just my unit, but Tonie says she had to do the same thing. I need to get a digital headset, I guess. Because near the end when Carl was leading then he wasn't I didn't know why until I got home and watched Victory Lane. He had a bad pit stop. Lucky for Jeff Gordon.

Tonie roots for Jeff Burton, and Diane and Pam root for Dale Jr. Diane and Pam started heading back to the bus with 5 laps to go. Me, I like to watched until the end. Tonie stuck with me when she probably wanted to leave, too. Hey, I would rather see Jeff Gordon win than JJ. Not that I don't like JJ, but sheesh would be nice to see someone else win. Sorry, Ricky.

After we saw the last lap we headed back to our bus with in 30 mins. A WBAP lady came on our bus and said the one guy we're missing called and was making his way over. "We don't leave anyone behind." Huh, what?? We waited an extra 20 minutes then we left with everyone cheering and clapping that we were finally leaving. That guy never showed at our bus. at 5:35pm the bus got onto 114 from the bus parking lot. nice. He took 114 to 360 to Arlington with no problems in maybe 40 minutes. Made it back to our original meeting spot at 7pm.

Gosh I was wiped out. Got up 2 hours early AND fighting that wind all day! MADE myself stay up until 10pm before going to bed.

http://picasaweb.google.com/thomtxt/Samsung500Apr52009?authkey=Gv1sRgCNq535vEqo7Dfw#slideshow

http://www.wbap.com/Article.asp?id=1257711&spid=26397