Tag Archives: Watkins Glen

Coming down the backstretch of the Heluva Good! Sour Cream Dips at The Glen (yawwwwn)

Posted on August 11, 2010 by unfinishedrambler | 3 Comments

On Sunday, Aug. 8, 2010, my father, sister and I went to the Heluva Good! Sour Cream Dips at The Glen in Watkins Glen, N.Y. What follows is the third part of my impressions of going to our first NASCAR race, focusing on the post-race, with the first part about the pre-race and a second part about the race itself. My sister also wrote on her blog about my dad, who looks like driver Mark Martin, talking to Martin before the race, and my wife, who wasn’t at the race, wrote about not going to the race.

Part III: Post-Race

As I’ve mentioned, while we enjoyed being able to visit pit road and see Mark Martin and Joey “Sliced Bread” Logano up close, the race itself was boring, partially thanks to the race being on a road course and partially thanks to this driver:

My name is Juan Pablo Montoya, you killed my father, prepare to die.

Montoya led 74 of 90 laps, which no matter how you spin it, something both ESPN and Speed tried their best to do so, it’s boring to watch one driver dominate a race like that…

…unless, of course, your driver is the one dominating, which with my driver being Jeff Gordon, the driver of the No. 24 car, that (uh, obviously) wasn’t the case.

What also didn’t help my enjoying the race was that I’m not particularly a fan of the No. 42 driver, Montoya. In fact, for the most part, I think he’s a jerk, which has nothing to do with his nationality or ethnicity. It’s just that I don’t like his pushy and arrogant attitude.

And just to prove to you that I don’t discriminate based on nationality or ethnicity, for the record, I do like this Colombian, who –at least to my heterosexual way of thinking and maybe to your homosexual, or even bisexual, way of thinking, depending on your own sexual orientation– is easy on the eyes:

Photo by Joakinen from Flickr

Anyway, as I was returning from dropping off our Sprint FanView and was heading toward the exit, I overheard a father, who was walking behind me, say to his 9- or 10-year-old son:

“Huh. That was something how far ahead he was of everybody else, wasn’t it? I wonder how he did that.”

Without skipping a beat, I turned around and said:

“Cheating.”

I just couldn’t resist.

Then suddenly without warning, except a large crowd of people in front of me, I was stuck in the middle of this:

(yep, a large crowd of people).

Being that I am my father’s son, I struck up a conversation with the person next to me.

“Well, that wasn’t much of a race, was it?”

“Well, my driver won, so it was pretty good.”

Instead of saying what I really thought of the cock-sure (well, to put it politely) Colombian, I said the next most stupid thing:

“So you’re a fan of Montoya? How long have you been a fan?”

“Ever since he started NASCAR. I just like the way he handles himself on the track…”

Er, like an arrogant bastard? I thought but didn’t say and then just allowed him to ramble on about how Montoya had a bad couple of months and how this was redemption for him.

At the end of all that, the only thing I said was this:

Hmmmm….

And there the conversation ended.

I wish I had told him I was a Kevin Harvick fan, then maybe we could have gotten into a fight like this too:

THAT would have made my NASCAR experience complete.

Have you ever been in a situation like the above where you were a hypocrite to what you really believed?

→ 3 Comments

Posted in Unfinished rambling

Tagged Heluva Good! Sour Cream Dips at The Glen, Juan Pablo Montoya, Kevin Harvick, NASCAR, Watkins Glen

A Heluva Good race? Eh, not really, but Jimmie Johnson wrecked! Woo hoo!

Posted on August 10, 2010 by unfinishedrambler | 12 Comments

On Sunday, Aug. 8, 2010, my father, sister and I went to the Heluva Good! Sour Cream Dips at The Glen in Watkins Glen, N.Y. What follows is the second part of my impressions of going to our first NASCAR race, focusing on the race itself, with the first part about the pre-race and a third part to come about the post-race, most likely tomorrow. My sister also wrote on her blog about my dad, who looks like driver Mark Martin, talking to Martin before the race, and my wife, who wasn’t at the race, wrote about not going to the race.

Part II: The Race

Every NASCAR race begins the same way: The invocation, the national anthem and those four famous words, which according to this Yahoo Answers contributor is his favorite part of the “hole race”.

It was no different this past Sunday with the Rev. Dan Fife of Bentley Creek Wesleyan Church giving the invocation during which he uttered the following words:

“We ask your blessing upon this year’s running of the Heluva Good! Sour Cream Dips at The Glen.”

at which point half of the crowd got up and walked out (okay, not really, but I like to imagine that they did, for a pastor using the word “Heluva” in an invocation).

Then Bo Bice, former runner-up on American Idol, sang the National Anthem and finally Scott Blake, senior vice president of Heluva Good!, said:

“Gentlemen, start your engines.”

Shortly after that, F-15s from the Massachusetts Air National Guard, 104th Fighter Wing, Barnes Air National Guard Base from Westfield, Massachusetts did a flyover so low that it almost ripped the top off the tents in The Bog from where we were watching the race.

Then, according to NASCAR.com, the next thing to happen was at 1:21 p.m. when Kyle Busch was “having problems” as they (whoever they were) were putting “a spacer in his right rear.” Maybe it was aliens with an anal probe, although, I don’t know, he’s seemed to have something up his butt since he’s been in NASCAR.

The green flag was dropped four minutes later and then…

…ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ…

…the Snoozefest began. Okay, to be fair, it didn’t start right away, but at Lap 20, Juan Pablo Montoya took the lead and then led 74 of the 90 laps.

Only one driver got close and unfortunately, it wasn’t this guy:

In his defense, his head probably really wasn't in "The Game," with his wife expecting (click photo for those results).

Unfortunately, it was this guy, who Saturday had won the Zippo 200 NASCAR Nationwide Series race for the third consecutive year :

Two fans from Australia, who came all the way from The Land Down Under (yep, click the picture to be taken to the video) with a third friend (not pictured), watch their fellow Aussie as he gets ready to finish the race. Ambrose would finish third.

The only real excitement in the race happened on Turn 11, right in front of where we were sitting when Gordon’s teammate Jimmie Johnson (four-time NASCAR champion blah blah blah) wrecked (start at 2:10 and you can see where we were – where the white tents and the redcatwine.com signs are in the video):

I think I was going in to one of the tents to grab a drink (yes, I think it was Red Cat, thanks for asking) when it happened so I missed the actual wreck, but turned around to see almost everyone in The Bog tossing their hands up the air and cheering at Johnson’s misfortune. I don’t know why, but later I saw Johnson on SportsCenter talking about the wreck and I almost felt bad for him. He looked like he had heard all those fans. Then I thought about his four championships and didn’t feel so bad.

My sister (who also took the photos in this post) didn’t see the wreck either– well, at least, not live. She was watching it on a Sprint FanView, which we had purchased so we could see all the race (one of the — many– disadvantages of watching a road course race), and I think my dad was looking over her shoulder, probably still trying to figure out how the contraption worked.

As boring as the race was, I did enjoy going there, if nothing else to go into the pits and seeing that yes, there really are fans who paint their faces like this (it’s not just on TV):

I’ll let Bo Bice take us out with his performance in The Bog, which yes, I was there (ooh ah, I know, don’t you wish you could touch me? sound of sizzling):

→ 12 Comments

Posted in Unfinished rambling

Tagged humor, Jeff Gordon, Jimmie Johnson, Juan Pablo Montoya, NASCAR, The Heluva Good! Sour Cream Dips at The Glen, Watkins Glen

Up jumped the boogity, boogity, boogity

Posted on August 9, 2010 by unfinishedrambler | 11 Comments

On Sunday, Aug. 8, 2010, my father, sister and I went to the Heluva Good! Sour Cream Dips at The Glen in Watkins Glen, N.Y. What follows is the first part of my impressions of going to our first NASCAR race, with the second and third parts to follow later in the week. My sister also will chronicle her own impressions of the race on her blog, Boondock Ramblings, specifically how my father looks like Mark Martin and his encounter with the driver of the No. 5 car. My impressions will focus on pre-race, the race itself and post-race.

Part I: The Pre-Race

While waiting in the Wally World line to pay for my new Jeff Gordon hat, a Jeff Gordon fan in front of me AND another Jeff Gordon fan behind me, and then actually seeing two more Jeff Gordon fans while touring the pits before the race:

Before this, I thought that I and one of my friends on Facebook were the only two Jeff Gordon fans in the world, but now I know better than that, even though before the race, one redneck behind me and to my right booed loudly when Gordon was introduced. A table of Jeff Gordon fans (yep, now up to 10 of us, counting Kristine and me) directly behind me promptly went over and kicked his ass (okay, not really, but I wish they had; being Jeff Gordon fans, of course, they were too polite and just let his comment slide. I think they went over and prayed for him).

Now you might be asking me: Wait, a minute, you said “table of Jeff Gordon fans”? Weren’t you sitting in the grass with your beach chairs with the rest of the Redneck Nation? Nope, we weren’t.

We were in The Bog, on Turn 11 of the 2.3-mile road course (more about Turn 11 and also the term “road course” in the second and third parts). Originally, The Bog was just that a mudpit, but in the 1970s, it became the scene of an infamous incident where a mob of drunken spectators burned a bus belonging to fans of Formula 1 driver Emerson Fittipaldi. As a result, The Bog was subsequently closed down. Last year the area was reopened, but as “a special hospitality area where fans can watch the race, enjoy complimentary lunch and snack food, play games and meet their favorite drivers during question and answer appearances,” or in other words, sans the burning bus. The package now also includes exclusive parking at Gate 5 and Cold Pit Access, meaning when the pits aren’t running, you can tour them – and free Pepsi products throughout the day. Yee haw.

Along with the lunch, snack food also came six tickets for free Budweiser beer and/or mini-Red Cat (and White Cat) wine bottles from Hazlitt Vineyards, who sponsored the bog, for each person. My father and sister, being teetotalers didn’t use their tickets. My dad’s tickets went to a woman behind us, who said, “If he doesn’t want them, I’ll take them,” and my sister’s tickets went to me (more on that later too).

Each person also received a free souvenir. Now, before you become too excited, let me show you a picture of the souvenir:

Yep, we got our very own can cozies and not only that, but in an awful orange.

Yessirree Bob, the fun was just beginning for my father, sister (who took the photos above) and me at the Heluva Good! Sour Cream Dips at the Glen. Tune in tomorrow when I’ll give you a run down of the race and then Wednesday when I conclude with the post-race mayhem.

Oh, my wife also wrote a blog post about being abandoned at home and how awful she felt not being able to go to the race with us. Okay, not really, but it’s still a humorous post — with apologies to her for co-opting her title, well, sort of.

→ 11 Comments

Posted in Unfinished rambling

Tagged Heluva Good! Sour Cream Dips at The Glen, humor, Jeff Gordon, NASCAR, The Glen, Watkins Glen

Pick a what?!#$*@!?

Posted on June 29, 2010 by unfinishedrambler | 27 Comments

As we were going camping this weekend on Seneca Lake, one of the Finger Lakes in New York this past weekend, we passed this store in Watkins Glen. From a distance, I didn’t quite read it right and did a double take. Methinks, they should have been more careful when choosing the name of their store.

More on the trip later this week, including more photos.