A little levity from today's Charlotte paper. I'm sure a lot of dads would have loved to have gotten by so cheap on their daughter's wedding!! I noted that the groom is from my hometown - Richmond.
CONCORD
Fans jokingly called it the "Royal Race Wedding" because of all the camera-toting, microphone-waving reporters who showed up at Charlotte Motor Speedway to cover the ceremony. The track even sent a security guard for crowd control. And when it was all done - after race fans Linda Ward and Greg Waters had exchanged vows at the track's Peninsula Campground - they were whisked around on a decorated golf cart to wave at well-wishers. That was royal enough for a truck driver from Virginia and a nurse at the Iredell County Jail, who met 12 months ago to the very day while camping opposite each other at the track. "It's everything I imagined," said the gushing bride, who wore an embroidered sundress purchased at a Cherokee, N.C., souvenir shop. "I tried not to cry," added the groom, who wore shorts and a tan shirt. "But I teared up because she's such a special woman." It was with the blessing of the speedway that the couple married at the campsite, and the track even threw in pit passes to the Coca-Cola 600 as a wedding present. Speedway spokesman Scott Cooper says many weddings have been held at the track's Speedway Club, but very few have been staged in the campgrounds. That's where you'll typically find the die-hard NASCAR fans, who'll bring a tent or camper and stay for the entirety of Race Week, weathering the heat, the rain and the occasional mud. Linda and Greg were among them last year. But they were strangers until the day he offered to help her carry some jugs of water back to her campsite. "I told him: 'I can carry my own damn water and I don't need no man's help.' Then I walked off," she recalled. Yes, it was love at first sight, NASCAR style. One date led to a long-distance relationship, then he proposed and one of them suggested getting married at the campground. "It made sense," said Linda, "because all our friends and family were already going to be there for the race." The wedding took place at the campground's hospitality tent, operated by Full Life Foursquare Church in Concord. (Sign at the tent: "Loving God. Loving Racing. Loving People.") Members of the congregation transformed the tent into a chapel, bringing in chairs and greenery, draping streamers and even baking a chocolate groom's cake in the shape of the No. 18 NASCAR. (That's Kyle Busch's car, his favorite driver and her least favorite.) Somebody else ran over to Wal-Mart and got the bride a veil. "This is a community here at the campground, a family," says church member Tracy Rhodes. "The same people come from all across the country, year after year, and the relationships are long-term." Coincidentally, she's the one who started calling it the "Royal Race Wedding." "It's getting so much publicity. And let's face it; it's in a hospitality tent at the racetrack." The ceremony itself lasted only nine minutes, starting with Linda being escorted through the campground to the sound of Waylon Jennings' singing "Mamas, Don't Let Your Babies Grow Up to be Cowboys." Track etiquette requires men to take off their ball caps during prayers and so they did, including the ones not wearing shirts. Greg tried not to cry. Linda cried like a baby. The pastor pronounced them man and wife, and a pickup loaded with girls in bikinis drove by and they waved like they were in a parade. At that point, fellow camper Chad Parrett of Virginia dubbed the ceremony "perfect" and popped open the second of two beers he brought along. "I think it's awesome that they had their wedding here. It makes it easier, since everybody was already here," he said. As for the happy couple, they intend to spend their honeymoon at the track this weekend with family and friends. After that, she'll go back to work as a nurse at the jail and he'll go back to truck driving from his home in Richmond, until they can work out the long-distance details. "Getting married at the campground kind of felt weird at first," said Greg. "But we kind of feel famous." For a brief time Friday, everyone they know - and many they didn't know - showered them with support, love and attention. At least until that truckload of girls drove by and waved.
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"Any Day is Good for Stock Car Racing"
updated by @dave-fulton: 12/05/16 04:02:07PM
