Wow, what an interesting discovery I have made this week, yesterday in fact! Gotta love the power of the world wide web as invented by Al Gore all those years ago. (That statement made to maintain political correctness as to both major parties after the Palin comment). I received an e-mail yesterday from NASCAR.com reminding me that I was a member there and should pay a visit. I had frankly forgotten that after I was kicked off the advisory board when NASCAR learned I was an on-air personality for this show. I did not have an appeal board to address the issue, I just received an e-mail a year or so ago telling me that my opinions were no longer needed by the NASCAR Fan Board. Not a problem, I just quit going to the site and there was one less e-mail survey every week.

So, yesterday I decided to explore the NASCAR.com page. Noticed that there is now both a “Forum” and a “Blog” section. I went through reading the blogs and many kept pace with what our members post here, especially as to the disgust with the Waltrip brothers and calling out FOX for allowing such obviously biased big-mouths to take up television time spouting off their obvious support for the Toyota teams, and especially for the MWR Toyotas. I made no response to those posts. I read on about how the race from Fontana, for lack of a better word, “sucked”. Couple of good opinions expressed there, I thought.

Then, I decided to discover whether or not I was still considered a member of NASCAR.com although I had been kicked off the fan council. I knew my sign in name but could not remember the password. I sent in the request for a password update and awaited a confirmation e-mail. After rejecting five passwords, and I’m absolutely serious, one was finally accepted and I decided to post my opinion of the Fontana race in a much short form that I usually use when posting on RacersReunion. Knowing that all posts are subject to approval by NASCAR, I was very vague in my criticism although some of the post before me were blistering. After several re-writes, I submitted the Blog Post. I kept checking back several times during the morning to see if my post had made the cut. Finally, about 4 hours after I submitted the post, it appeared on the NASCAR Blog page. Within a few minutes, I was being called out by another fan for my use of the word “real race fan” and “true race fan”. Ok, I get his point. To his way of thinking, I was wrong to accuse anyone who may be a member of NASCAR.com of not being a true or real race fan. In my way of thinking, which I am still considering explaining to the party who wrote the first response, but I’m thinking that would be an exercise in futility, much like trying to explain to NASCAR why we older fans feel so disenfranchised these days. It has been repeated ad infinitem on our site since the beginning of RacersReunion that NASCAR has chosen to write off anyone over the age of 35, maybe 36 on a good day. Having said that, it only makes me wonder more why they keep someone like D.W. in the booth and then add Mikey in the Hollywood Hotel. That does not even compute.

So, am I angry with NASCAR again? Not really. After all, they approved my post there and I’m not even the “favored child” over there, as I am perceived by some to be here on RacersReunion. Reading several of the other posts leads me to believe most will be approved so someone at the NASCAR site is reading them. I’m not sure whether or not Turner Sports still owns those rights or not but regardless, adverse posts to NASCAR.com do not appear to be arbitrarily disapproved because of negative comments. I was tempted to go back and post a real opinion of the Fontana event and certain other comments just to see if I could get it approved, but I have chosen, instead, to do that here where Jeff has allowed me total freedom to say whatever I want, usually without highjacking the segment. So, hold on folks, here is my opinion of the Fontana weekend.

I missed the Nationwide race and I’m still debating the reason why. My newspaper did not post the channel on which the race would be shown and I wasn’t really interested enough to check our website to find out. PattyKay is always so good about posting that information, and I appreciate that PattyKay but I was simply not interested. After all, it was Fontana and I have more dislike for that racetrack than I do for certain politicians I hope will get one-way tickets out of Washington his November. First, that track took away the Southern 500 from Darlington on Labor Day weekend and that was the announcement from NASCAR that put the nail in the coffin of my opinion about any conception I may have had that all my years of being such a devoted fan counted for anything. Then, over the years of racing there, the overall consensus, not just from me but from many, is that the track stinks, the promotions stink, and generally racing in that fairy tale world of Hollywood stinks. Most of the prerace shows consists of Hollywood insiders who further fake up the world that NASCAR is trying to present there.

I did sit down in front of the tv when the race came on Sunday. I would like to express my sincere appreciation to NASCAR and to FOX Sports for the absolutely wonderful service provided me Sunday afternoon. I usually have a problem sleeping. Lunesta, Tylenol PM, Melatonin, special mattresses and special pillows have all failed to provide me a truly restful sleep in years. My doctor has offered me the option of undergoing a sleep study but my response to that is why pay someone to tell me why I can’t sleep when I wouldn’t be able to sleep for the study so they would have to call it an “awake” study and that would truly play with those doctors’ minds trying to discover what keeps me awake. However, thanks to NASCAR, FOX Sports and the Auto Club Raceway, I was sound asleep within 10 minutes of unmuting the tv after D.W.’s BBB. I know, I had said I wasn’t going to mute that this year but it grates on my ears and my nerves so badly I have to do it.

As I drifted in and out of dreamland, I did see Smoke pull off two really good passes even if the passes did make Kevin and Kyle somewhat unhappy. At least “Rowdy” didn’t try to put Smoke in the wall. Rowdy is showing some restraint this year and I do applaud him for that.

Rain, mercifully, ended the race short. I would have been upset if I had paid the money for tickets to the race to be cheated out of the full distance, but it was pretty obvious the rain was there for at least the rest of the day and one of the FOX experts stated that it was snowing just a few miles from the speedway. I’ll let pass the obvious comment about the “snow job” NASCAR is putting on the fans by racing at Fontana to begin with.

Just a couple of opinions and comments now:

What is it with those strips on the speedway that cause handling problems? Is it not possible for engineers in California to pave a track smoothly as most of our redneck Southeastern engineers have managed to do? I guess redneck engineers beats the computer chip mentality at something like track paving.

What is it with D.W. trying to explain how the weather changes the characteristics of the strips on the speedway? So far this year I’ve heard D.W. explain how debris on his brother’s tires coming out of the pits at Daytona caused Mickey to spinout, explain the vortex theory which has about as much basis in fact, obviously, as the statement “I’m from the government and I’m here to help you”.

I wonder how much NASCAR is paying these Hollywood celebrities to come out to the track and priss around like they know what the hell is going on? I find it really hard to believe some of these folks show up just because they think Jeff Gordon is cute or that Jimmie Johnson is a hometown boy. I have an imagination worthy of Hollywood, but even my imagination doesn’t cope with the thought that these stars come to watch a race. Maybe their P.R. people think it’s good exposure.

Oh well, I’m back to the same old curmudgeon I was before I tried to change. I still care about the sport very much. I still care about NASCAR very much. Too bad NASCAR thinks I am, along with most of you listening, not good for the sport. We are either too old, too redneck, too poor, or too something else that doesn’t fit the demographic they seek. Christopher Krul (pronounced that right I hope), wrote a blog about trying to keep watching on our site last week. Check out his Blog. It is excellent! Wish I had written that.

E-mail me at: legendtim83@yahoo.com and follow me on twitter at legendtim83