Talladega Diary, Day 4

(8:10 am) I’ve been at the track since
around 7:00 am, but I’m just now getting set up in the press box. Got up early
to avoid the traffic (which was for the most part successful) and sat out in the
car until 8:00 am.  Need to post a "greeting" message to the Motorsports
Forum here in a few minutes, and will probably go down to the garage area
afterwards to see what’s going on.

Sitting in the car watching all the people
come and go I thought it was interesting to see that there were probably twice
as many people with "Earnhardt" (both Jr. and Sr.) paraphernalia than
any other driver. 

(11:00 am) Just back from the garage area
where I went to the drivers’ meeting at 10 and the chapel service at 10:10. I’ve
been to drivers’ meetings before, and this one was shorter than usual. The
NASCAR official basically just gave the teams the times the drivers needed to at
driver intros, the pit road speed, the caution car speed, and told them to use
common sense.

This was the first chapel service I’d
attended. It was pretty crowded. A lot of teams and drivers were there. Jeff
Gordon gave the opening prayer, and the preacher’s message was very good.

(6:00 pm) The race has been over almost 2
and a half hours, and I’m nearly finished with the stuff I have to do. I don’t
think TV did the race justice. There were 49 official lead changes, but if you
could count the number of times someone ran in front, it’d probably be closer
to100.

I’ve got a few more loose ends to tie up
and then I’ll be heading back to the hotel. Normally I’d head back to Nashville
after finishing up, but I’m staying tomorrow for the Dodge test here.  Not
sure if I’ll be able to hook up the laptop and do a diary on day five, but I
will if I can. I also hope to get a few pictures of the cars on the track.

I think that’s gonna wrap up today’s
stuff. I’ve got to finish some work that I brought with me for a meeting on
Tuesday.