{"id":2677,"date":"2019-06-26T22:12:31","date_gmt":"2019-06-27T05:12:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/erikdolson.com\/?p=2677"},"modified":"2019-06-26T22:36:16","modified_gmt":"2019-06-27T05:36:16","slug":"and-so-it-begins","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/erikdolson.com\/?p=2677","title":{"rendered":"And So It Begins"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Erik Dolson<\/em><\/p>\n

Cowboy was already at the garage when I got there.\u00a0\"\"Mule was finishing up his car, I call her \u201cRuby\u201d because of the fantastic paint job, she\u2019s a jewel.<\/p>\n

\u201cHey, do you know anybody who works on transmissions?\u201d I asked Cowboy. The automatic in the Ford I use to tow Yellowjacket to races had been acting up, making a spinning noise with maybe a metal on metal screech.<\/p>\n

\u201cCall Gitterdone,\u201d he said. \u201cHe\u2019s having the transmission done on his Dodge. He researched all of them, and says the shop he found is the best.\u201d<\/p>\n

That\u2019s the thing about gear head Big Bore Bad Boys, and probably all the others too, in different cars, Porsches and BMWs and Lotuses and such. They\u2019ll all be in Seattle over Fourth of July weekend, running in what may be still the premier vintage road race in the Pacific Northwest. We race against each other out on the track, but help each other get there, too.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s the people, as much or even more than the racing,\u201d Cowboy said to me once. He\u2019s right, but then, he usually is.<\/p>\n

But it\u2019s the racing that has had me researching brake compounds for three weeks, trying to find a brake package that will stop a 3,000 pound car doing 160 miles an hour in time to make a 90 degree right turn, followed by a 130 degree hairpin left.<\/p>\n

Oh, you can always stop, if you put the brakes on soon enough. But a good portion of racing, or at least winning, is in putting the brakes on as late as you possibly can, just at the moment when you know it\u2019s too late and are about to spin the car into the fence or into another car or just bust through the turn and sit there waiting for a chance to get back on the track and finish behind those you wanted to beat.<\/p>\n

We\u2019ve all done it. Cowboy more than most, but that\u2019s just a matter of style. \u201cThe crowd loves it,\u201d he says. It\u2019s also because he has crammed more motor under the hood than the tires can stand, but that\u2019s another story.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s the racing that has had many building new engines over the winter, new transmissions, finding something lighter to replace something heavier. Because we want to beat those other racers. But we want to beat them out on the track. If somebody breaks something they don\u2019t have a spare for in the trailer, someone else is likely to give them what they need for the weekend.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s the racing that has me trying to find brakes that don\u2019t fade away at the end of a race when I need them the most. I call others to see what they\u2019re using. This time, the answers are not so easy to come by. This has to do with being out there on the track, and we all have our secrets. We all want to win.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s weird, in a way. The guys who are toughest to beat are the ones I trust the most. Let\u2019s face it, it takes trust to drive through a kink in the track at 160 mph, concrete dividers on either side, with another car so close you could open his door if you dared take your hand off the wheel. I trust who they are, trust their ability.<\/p>\n

For sure, I won\u2019t do that with every driver out there, and not even with every front runner, because for some, how they win isn\u2019t as important as winning. But I will with most, because I trust them.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s one of the things I love most about this sport. That contradiction right there. That we\u2019ll do what we can to beat everyone out there who wants to beat us just as bad, but we\u2019ll do what we can so that\u00a0 <\/span>they can be out there, too.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s why at this time of year my heart beats a little faster, my priorities change, why I spend more time thinking about how to spend money on chunks of screaming steel than I do on how to make that money in the first place.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s not about prize money, there isn\u2019t any. It\u2019s not about bragging rights, those fade too fast. I suppose it might be about proving ourselves, but only to ourselves, because we don\u2019t care that much about what others think.<\/p>\n

We do it because it\u2019s not just what we do, it\u2019s part of who we are. It\u2019s all of it. Finding the parts, making hard decisions, being with friends, spending the money, competing to be the best. It\u2019s stupid fast speeds in cars 50 years old that were never designed for this level of performance, painting them glorious colors, making them more than they ever were.<\/p>\n

And, we\u2019ll do it long past the time when we probably should have stopped.<\/p>\n

Because it\u2019s never enough.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Erik Dolson<\/em><\/p>\n

Cowboy was already at the garage when I got there.\u00a0\"\"Mule was finishing up his car, I call her \u201cRuby\u201d because of the fantastic paint job, she\u2019s a jewel.<\/p>\n

\u201cHey, do you know anybody who works on transmissions?\u201d I asked Cowboy. The automatic in the Ford I use to tow Yellowjacket to races had been acting up, making a spinning noise with maybe a metal on metal screech.<\/p>\n

\u201cCall Gitterdone,\u201d he said. \u201cHe\u2019s \u2026 Read more\u2026 → <\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"advanced_seo_description":"","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2677","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3mcOb-Hb","jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/erikdolson.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2677","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/erikdolson.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/erikdolson.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/erikdolson.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/erikdolson.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2677"}],"version-history":[{"count":15,"href":"https:\/\/erikdolson.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2677\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2694,"href":"https:\/\/erikdolson.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2677\/revisions\/2694"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/erikdolson.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2677"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/erikdolson.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2677"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/erikdolson.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2677"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}