We should all enjoy our friends and greathero'sof racing while we can. The new tomorrow may bejust around the next curve .. Remember hear all you can of yesteryear and write it down for tomorrows news.
Happy Birthday Rex. Have a joyful party but be careful of running up on the high side.....
YOU CAN REBUILD A RACECAR
His tires keep wearing out. The turns are tighter on dirt because the track is smaller (the straightaways are only 400 feet vs. about 4,000 at the Superspeedway). Cars whip around them, drifting or sliding in a way thats more violent than it is on asphalt. The cars screech and the tires get hot, which helps them connect with the track, until, eventually, they get torn up. The key is finding a tire thatll get hot without wearing out, and then hoping the caution flag doesn't come out, because when a car slows down, its tires cool off, messing up its rhythm. A fast-going race car never wants to stop.
When Red decides on the tires to use, the crew cut grids in them so they can better grip the track. Then they put them on and get the cars ready to race: checking the oil, monitoring tire pressure, refueling. The cars are clean because Red has them wiped down at the end of the day. The crew clean off the red clay and the oily grease, and it gets on them, their hands and clothes getting dirtier and blacker.
Red always works with them, a driver and his crew. But today, hes on the same side, preparing the car for someone else, because after his time trials and his preparation, he has decided he cant race, and the reason is a reminder that mortality is unflinching and unsentimental: His stomach is acting up, and he worries the bumps of a dirt track might make him shit his pants, making dirty the car he likes to keep unsoiled.
I aint cleanin the seat, his crew chief says.
Reds grandson, Lee Burdett, is going to run in his place, as he has before. All Red can do is watch and hope that the tires run well and run fast and hook up to the track, and that when they do, they dont give up before the race is over.
Maybe one day Lee will replace Red in this car permanently, or some other driver will, giving new life to an old car. Today, it was his stomach. Five years ago it was pneumonia. Humans arent race cars. They get old. They cant be wiped clean or put back together or rebuilt. They cant be made better or faster, and with each race that passes Red by, the old man hes become grows a little farther from the young man he used to be.
Copied from the Bitter Southerner
Rest in Peace my friend . Now you and your dad will forever be together
I could talk all nite about him but he was actually on the goat rodeo about 3 or 4 years ago talking about the good ole days. He will surely be missed by the Ga Gang and many others.this is part of the ga gang. Charlie is in the checker shirt.
this coupe was known all over Ga
As you can see that coupe behind me was dead on me --I won it but Charlie did his best to pass me
http://www.msn.com/en-us/autos/research/inside-the-gates-of-americas-not-so-secret-private-racetracks/ar-BBhOiiI
yup thats a link but open it up and wow read and drool 
Well you got to give him credit, he is doing something others said wouldnt happen. And I dont see how any favoritism could have helped him Sunday.
Others around him just used different tactics that didnt pay off. Even the twoballoons that caused a cautioncouldnt have been planned. I found where Harvey Tollison wrote that he could have won it in a Studebaker.
So as the show goes on will he continue to collect enough points to make the chase? Or will that girl in the M&Ms commercial come back and steal his red M&M?
photo from Lionel Racing
