Cap City, Can Am, B.O.S and St Marcel rain-out ( 22 to 26 July 2009)

RICK @ the RACES ( 22 to 26 July 2009)

22 Jul Capital City Speedway (Ottawa, Ont)

24 Jul Can Am Speedway (Lafargeville NY)

25 Jul Brockville Ontario Speedway.

26 Jul Motordrome St Marcel (Que) RAINED OUT

This past week has been another hectic one with plenty of things happening for me.

As many of you will know, last October I sold my house in Maxville , Ontario and moved to rented accommodation in Long Sault. I was in no hurry to buy another house and instead, was happy to wait until the right place at the right price came along. I recently put in an offer on a house in Cornwall (Ont) and this past Friday (24 Jul) I took possession.

On Wednesday morning my diary was full up with appointments at the bank and lawyers, and in the afternoon my car was due for an oil change. These were all taking place in Cornwall but my evening was spent in Ottawa at the Capital City Speedway.

This week the Late Models were missing from the program with Go Karts and and Enduro taking their place.

Top of the bill were the Legends, where Kevin Foisy took another win, while Ken Fisher, freshly back from his vacation won in the Thunder Cars.

Friday was the completion date for my house purchase, so I’d arranged for the day off from work. My original idea, if the deal went through before lunchtime, was to make the 5 hour trip to the Albany-Saratoga Speedway at Malta NY.

It poured with rain most of the day in the Cornwall area it wasn’t until after 3-30pm that I picked up the keys from the lawyer. I payed a quick visit to my new home, before deciding where to go racing.

By now Albany Saratoga was out of the question, Autodrome Edelweiss had canceled early in the morning, and the Mohawk International Raceway followed in the afternoon.

During the day, I’d been in constant touch with my friend and Can Am Speedway photographer Rebecca Eisele from her work base in Watertown NY. The weather was good in Lafargeville, and Can Am was still set too go. So, from the City of Cornwall I made a quick dash down Hwy 401 and into the USA at Ogdensburg. From here I made the cross country trek to the speedway. The skies were clear, the place was dry and the pits were full of cars. It wasn’t long before I was out on the center taking pictures along side Rebecca.

There were a lot of divisions racing that night and in addition to my personal preference of Mods and Sportsman , the Mid State Antique Club were there too.

The show moved along quickly and it was Justin Hears who took the Modified Feature. Josh Van Brocklyn won the Sportsman event.

It was bright and sunny on Saturday, and during the day I spent some time at my new place.

In the evening I traveled to the Brockville Ontario Speedway for a night of double Feature Races as a result of the rain out two weeks ago. Before the rain that night, I’d chatted in the pits to Ralph Murphy and his daughter Tabatha who races the # 66 DIRT SPORTSMAN.

They told me that they liked what Craig Revelle and myself were doing with www.rickattheraces.com and offered to give it a ‘plug’ on the side of the car. Of course, I quickly accepted their kind offer and at this weeks races the ‘logo’ was in place. So, it’s a BIG THANK YOU to Tabatha and Ralph !

After my usual pit walk about I stationed myself on the center to take some photos with my buddy Jim Clarke. Just as the races started Jim, said to me, “did you hear that ?, they just announced a grey Cavalier is in the parking lot with it’s lights on, that’s not yours is it ?”.

“Of course not” I replied its only other people that do silly things like that, not me ! ” . Then I began to think about it, I wonder, maybe it is mine, maybe I did do something silly.

Lucky for me, promoter Paul Kirkland was buzzing about the center on his ATV so I told him of my predicament. No problem, he said and took off to the parking lot to check it out. He soon returned with the news that indeed it was mine. He offered me a ride on the ATV, so I jumped aboard and while he ferried me back to the car. Thanks Paul ! , I bet the fans wondered why you escorted me from the center.

The back dated features, got the show going with Danny O’Brien taking the Modified checkers. Danny managed to pass long time leader Ryan Poole who spun it round under the pressure on the last turn. It must have been very frustrating for the young driver.

The Sportsman Feature was won by Sheldon Hoogwerf after a late race challenge from Luke Whittaker had failed. The regular nights heats then began, and with the three Modified qualifiers in the bag, and the Sportsman warming up, the first drops of rain were felt.

I made a run for my car ( to protect my camera) and within minutes it was ‘bucketing’ down. That was the end of the night.

The forecast for Sunday was for more rain and sure enough that’s what we got. A heavy mid morning shower was enough for the Cornwall Motor Speedway to become waterlogged and soon after mid day a cancellation was announced.

Once more an early cancellation decision allowed me to make alternative plans. I made a phone call to Motordrome St Marcel in Quebec, and got the good news that they were still running.

This is a small Dirt track that I’ve never been to before and runs Mini Sprints, Mini Mods and ATV’s. This would be another track for my TRACKCHASING totals.

I was told that the first race would be at 5-00pm so after making a couple of journeys to my new home in the morning, set off from Cornwall in the mid afternoon. By now it was warm, the sun was shining and I drove most of the way up to St Marcel De Richelieu with the sun roof open. It was only when I’d passed Montreal that the skies got blacker.

It was raining by the time I got on to Autoroute 20 and it was pouring down when I reached my exit.

It was then that I realized this was going to be wasted trip, but I’d got this far, so thought , I might as well go the last few miles to the track.