nascar racing experience

for love's birthday this year, i got him a nascar racing experience. 5 minutes in the driver's seat... of a real nascar race car... on a real racetrack! unfortunately, his birthday was in july... and the next available scheduled event in SoCal wasn't until october... in fontana at the auto club speedway. it was worth the wait! we woke up super early that sunday morning... 5am... to make the drive from torrance to fonatana. i'm not a morning person... i swore i would sleep in the car on the way there, but i was too excited for him!! we arrived 30min early... managed to take a nap before they let everyone in. if anyone ever does this... plan ahead and prepare food, drinks, and snacks... bring a small cooler of goodies... b'coz you'll be there for a couple hours. i've never been to the speedway... it was pretty awesome to be walking into the pit... to set foot on the same concrete real racers and pit crews set foot on.

first step was to check in... mike turned over his ID for a jumpsuit, in-ear headphones, and pager. once everyone had checked in and suited up... we headed over to a room for a 30min crash course in how to drive a nascar race car safely. you should know how to drive stick... surprisingly, if you don't, they'll give you a crash course in that as well. there was one person in the group who didn't know... i honestly don't know if she drove or ended up exchanging her drive experience for a ride experience.

following the 30min how to video, it's basically a waiting game. they ordered drivers by height... drivers were paged based on what car was available that best suited their height. i think mike waited a lil less than an hour to be paged. mike stood in line to get prepped for his drive... in-ear headphones were secured with electrical tape so there isn't a chance of them falling out during his ride... helmet check... radio check to assure he could hear the instructor through his headphones... once you're all good... you wait in the line to the left for a car... it was probably a 20min process.

i was so excited for mike. i brought the nice camera out that day and figured i'd be a good girlfriend and take document his entire experience! i event bought a new lens! 5 minutes went by in a flash. as soon as he took off i ran to the other side of the pit to snap some shots of him coming back full circle, then ran upstairs to take some shots from a different view... and ran back downstairs to catch him coming back for his last lap! it was a d-oval track about 2 miles around. he managed to get in 4 laps! aahhhh... exciting!!! mike had theee most genuine smile on his face after he came back from his race. i was so happy and excited for him. and yes, he LOVED it. he loved it so much he wants to do it again! mike's average speed was clocked at 144.5mph! he's determined to hit 200mph and guarantees he can if he signs up for the 8 minute ride. so, i guess we'll be back again... if not for that, for the andretti racing experience in a formula 1.

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