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| 09 What's Up Archive |
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| 03.05.10 |
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| CONGRATS! |
 |
Congrats
to Iowa's newest grandparents Dick & Joyce Eisele.
Chad and Angie welcomed Brycen into the world on March 2, 2010,
their first child.
The proud grandparents were quick at getting out a few shots of the
family with their newest member. The only issue
will be how often he's wearing Iowa colors and how often he's
wearing Nebraska colors as the families love both
colleges.
Hopefully I'm not being pretentious in thinking he might end up
being a "Dan Fan" as well!
:) |
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| FAMOUS
PHOTOGRAPHER! |
 |
My website
has paid for itself many times over in the form of great friendships
I've made over the years because of it. One of those
friendships is with photographer Jack Hedstrom who came from the
east coast shooting the big block modifieds and such. He
made trips out here and shared shots of my car every now and
then. I caught back up with him last Friday night
at the World of Outlaw race and he sent me the beautiful shot of my
car (at left). I'm proud to say he's FAMOUS! He
had one of his photos from the CUP race used on ESPN.com!
Congrats on making it to the bigtime Jack! http://www.jacksracephotos.net
.
http://sports.espn.go.com/rpm/nascar/cup/news/story?id=4957602 |
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| 02.28.10 |
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| CLEAN
SOCK? |
 |
Carly
& Brett arrived in the pits just after we packed the track and
were cleaning the car. Brett jumped right in and began
helping us wash it up. In the heat of battle it's interesting
how much a head sock looks like a rag! LOLOL!
After a few minutes Brett has the 'oops' look on his face as he
hands me the soggy head sock. Nothing 20 minutes in
front of the heater in the trailer didn't fix. I
used to have a 'spare' head sock but I think it was in my other
bag. No worries, fun story!
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|
| RACING, A
LUXURY! |
| In talking with a few people about racing
vs the economy a few things come to mind. Racing used to be my
hobby. I could skip on eating out, going to the movies and
taking vacations and would then be able to afford to race on the weekends
and keep up. At this point, with prices rising and pay being
cut it has become apparent that racing is now a luxury. The
modified is almost similar to having a Lexus or BMW in the
garage. I may not be able to drive every weekend
like in previous years, but hopefully I can continue to go out and have
some fun. |
|
| BOX
RACING! |
| I am looking for someone
to take over the running of the Box Racing for the kids at Mohave Valley
Raceway. Originally I wanted to get it started and have
someone else (other drivers) take turns running it.
Lately I have been hearing rumblings of people thinking my intentions are
to 'get attention.' So I think it's time for others to
step up! Email dfr87n@yahoo.com
if you are interested in taking over. |
|
| UPCOMING RACES! |
My
next three events appear to be all Mohave Valley Raceway events, March 6,
March 20, and April 3, 2010. I'm waiting to see what's going
on with Aztec Speedway to see if I hit the Wild West Northern Tour opener
there or if I race close to home that weekend.
I'm also looking into putting some money aside to make a 'bucket list'
trip to Iowa this summer to compete at the Marshalltown
Speedway. Maybe I can swing a M'Town, Boone, Vinton weekend
sometime this summer. However the penny jugs may need quarters
instead. haha. |
|
| SOMETHING'S RIGHT? |
| I'm starting to think
that some of the changes to the car over the winter must be
right. I'm finally starting to see some tire wire out of the
rear tires. Last season it seemed that the tires just stayed
the same most of the time, but this year they are being wiped fairly
clean. The car is running better and so far has been more
competitive, so let's hope it's a sign we are headed in the right
direction. |
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| 2.21.10 |
|
| OUTLAW
RACING! |
| Returned
to my classroom on Friday afternoon to find a message from LVMS on my cell
phone. They wanted help getting the word out that they needed
IMCA Modifieds to fill some time during the Outlaw races this coming
Friday night of CUP weekend. They wanted at least
16. So starting about 2:30, I made some calls, sent some
emails, and posted some messages. By 7:00pm they already had
20 cars signed up. I hear it is over that now. So
we will be running on Friday night (motor situation contingent) as a side
show for the Outlaws. Rumor has it the mods may outnumber the
Outlaws. Look for us out there if you are there. |
|
| BUSY
SUNDAY! |
| Will
be heading out to wash the car here in a bit. Letting it warm
up, it's chilly this morning. Then will probably change
engines and by the time that's done I will have to update the Mohave
Valley site with results, points, photos, the works. In
another couple of months some of the other sites I do will pick
up. Better get used to managing my time a whole lot
better. |
|
| SUNDAY,
FUNDAY! |
| Besides
watching the NHRA and NASCAR on Sunday, I also really enjoy watching The
Amazing Race on Sunday evenings. That show allows me to travel
without having to leave my living room. It's
great. However I know already that I would be the worst
teammate on that show. I would get frazzled and be the one
freaked out being lost in a foreign country unable to communicate in English.
LOL! Anyone else enjoy the show? |
|
| FUNNY
FREAK-OUTS! |
| Was talking with some
fans after the races at MVR on Saturday night and one of them shared their
issue with balloons. She hates them and doesn't even
like to be around them, they scare her. Then Blake shared his
'issue' with clowns. My issue is with snowmen. I
do not like the cloth ones they have during the holidays, the lifesized
ones. They really creep me out. There is one at an
annual holiday display in town that I have to turn away from because it
just gives me the willies. Funny what we end up having
'issues' with! haha |
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| 02.14.10 |
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| HAPPY
VALENTINE'S DAY! |
 |
Happy
Valentine's Day! V'day 2010 coincides with the Daytona
500 this year, so it's going to be a GREAT day. I cannot
wait for the NASCAR season to get underway. It's always
an exciting way to begin the season. Hope you and
yours enjoy the day. I always enjoy the candy hearts, those
things are bite sized and addicting! haha, I feel a
tummy ache coming on already. Oh well, they're good,
what can I say? |
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|
| POSTPONED! |
| Death
Valley Raceway (110 miles away) has decided to not open as originally
planned. Their opener has been postponed with no date given
for an actual opening. Given the situation going on with other
local tracks, I cannot blame them for not opening.
However, it does stink to know another local place is off limits when
trying to schedule races. |
|
| SPRING
LIKE! |
| The
weather these last few days has been incredible, almost spring
like. It has been in the mid to upper 60's during the days
with the sun shining and birds chirping. Last night I had the
door open and the cool air was flowing in. My heat
hasn't come on at all and my house actually gets a little warm during the
day, so I need to open the doors and windows at night.
Awesome. |
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| 2.06.10 |
|
| NICE
SHOTS, courtesy Gary Griffiths Jr. |
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| RECORD FIELD! |
| The NASCAR fantasy game,
Survivor, has a record number of entries this year. As of
2.06.10, there are 38 players signed up! WOW!
There's still two more days to enter if interested. SURVIVOR
SIGN UP! >> |
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| 1.31.10 |
|
| TWO
YEARS! |
| Tuesday will mark
two years since my father's passing and it's really hard to
believe. So much has changed since that day in February of
'08. If you allow yourself to get caught up in your thoughts
and emotions like I have, it really can take it's toll. While
things are tough without him, I think we have all done a good job of
continuing to live as he would have wanted us to. Maybe
I had a little extra push from above on Saturday. Rest in peace dad,
we love & miss you. |
|
| LIKE
IT'S THE LAST! |
| With
the economy getting worse and the school district looking at pay cuts from
10-25% of our salaries, I've reserved myself to thinking that this might
be my last season of racing modifieds. Losing anywhere from
$5,000 to $12,000 in pay per year will make it tough to just pay the
bills. So I'm hoping to enjoy the season as if it's my
last. Not saying it is over, but the writing is on the
wall. The ink just hasn't dried yet. We'll see
what happens during this legislative special session in
Nevada. Fingers crossed. |
|
| DECISIONS,
DECISIONS, cont.... |
| While
thinking how this might be my last modified season, I have been thinking
seriously about what I should do scheduling wise. I had
thoughts of following the entire Wild West Modified Tour schedule with
trips to many different tracks. The downside, my mom probably
wouldn't get to go very often and would be forced to sit home listening to
webcasts or waiting for cell phone updates. I thought of a
'local' season, but there aren't very large fields around here and it
isn't incredibly exciting. So I'm really stuck with what to
do. Pretty sad, sort of stressful. Not sure what
to do. I do know I'm off to Mohave Valley Raceway next
weekend. That's a start. |
|
| ENTRIES
NEEDED BY February 8, 2010 |
| The 2010 edition of
Survivor, a NASCAR fantasy game, has attracted a total of 32
entries to
date. However, there is plenty of room for more.
Join us for the fun. Sign up today. Tell a friend, in
fact, challenge a friend! Check it out,
SURVIVOR >>> Already
signed up? See the field!
THE FIELD >>> |
|
| 1.23.10 |
|
| TORTURE! |
| These
last couple of weeks have been pure torture! Having to wait to
get back on the track has been really tough. Especially after
running so well and having a great shot at winning the first race
out. While certainly not a gimme, we certainly had a great
chance of picking up the win were it not for our mechanical
woes. All of us are looking forward to getting back on the
track next weekend. Once we go back to racing next weekend, we
don't have a weekend off for a while. I love
it! |
|
| TWO
IN ONE? |
| After
looking at the schedules I was contemplating trying the two races in one
day thing again. However I'm not 100% sure that could
happen. One option is Death Valley @1 and Mohave Valley
@7. But I lose an hour because of the time difference, so
that's probably not going to happen. I also thought about
Canyon and Mohave Valley, which I have done before, but I'm not sure how
early that show gets over with these days. Back in the day you
could count on Canyon's show lasting just under 2 hours. Not
sure if that's still the case. The last time I did it I
finished 5th at Canyon before tagging the main at MVR and winning
it. Good times. |
|
| NEED
A NEW TRACK |
| I
really want to try out a different track in 2010. Wondering if
that might involve a venture up to Idaho so I can also take in a new state
at the same time. Hmmm. |
|
| SCHOOL'S
COOL! |
| Turns
out a cool 98.7% of my 161 Algebra students passed the district final exam
last week. Just two students missed the passing cut off, one
of them by 2 questions and the other by 3 questions. It
was great to see all their hard work pay off. Just ><
close to 100%. Maybe next semester right?! |
|
| WEATHER! |
The
weather this last week was odd, but great. Rain, rain, and
more rain. In fact we received 1.70 inches of rain this week,
compared to 1.59 inches of rain the entire year of 2009! Our
average rainfall in Vegas is about 4.49 inches. It was so nice
to see moisture falling from the clouds in the valley.
The same storm also dusted the nearby mountains leaving some neat
backdrops for the casinos. Here are a few photos I was able to
snap from a higher location in the valley.
 |
|
| STRONG
FIELD, ROOM FOR MORE! |
| The 2010 edition of
Survivor, a NASCAR fantasy game, has attracted a total of 25 entries to
date. However, there is plenty of room for more.
Join us for the fun. Sign up today. Tell a friend, in
fact, challenge a friend! Check it out,
SURVIVOR >>> Already
signed up? See the field!
THE FIELD >>> |
|
| WHAT
DO YOU THINK? FEEDBACK! |
| Are
you still enjoying the site? Is there something
missing? Let us know! dfr87n@yahoo.com
. |
|
| 1.17.2010 |
|
| TOP
SECRET TEST! |
| Just
kidding! However I did manage to trace the problem to the back
half of the carburetor last night. So after fighting it and
not being able to figure it out I loaded up and headed over to Pahrump to
meet up with Jerry Sr. this morning. We tore into
the carb and after about 45 minutes we found the issue. A
small crack in the float which was allowing it to fill up with
fuel. That was it, a hairline crack caused all
that. It actually took squeezing the float to find it, it was
that small. Installed a new float and bang, back to
normal. The funny thing is I wasn't in town long before
my phone rang a couple of times wondering what the heck I was doing in
town. Many thought they had missed a test and
tune. Too funny! After fixing the car I loaded it
back up and we headed over for a bite to eat before making the trek
home. |
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| 1.16.2010 |
|
| STILL
FOR SALE! |
| Still
have some things for sale for those interested! FOR
SALE >>> |
|
| STILL
RULING IT OUT! |
| It
has been busy around the house lately so I haven't been able to spend a
whole lot of time working on the car, however in the time I have had, I
haven't fixed the fuel problem just yet. I started by ruling
out that I didn't run out of gas like everyone thought. Not
that, I had about 7 gallons left. Then took out the fuel
filter to see if it was clogged, wasn't that. Then took off
the fuel pressure regulator and cleaned it up. Not
that. Then took off the fuel lines and blew them out with the
air hose, not that. Took off the top of the fuel cell and
checked out the pick up tube, roll over valve, and vent tube, nothing
there either. So it's now time to go through the
carburetor and see what the heck is going on. The saga
continues, stay tuned.... |
|
| NOISY NEIGHBORS! |
 |
At
this time of year in Las Vegas it's pretty normal to see huge flocks
of birds soaring across the sky in the mornings and
evenings. The park by my school has been home to a flock
of Canadian geese for a couple of months now. Well the
other morning I went out to put something in my car and heard some
serious chirping going on. I soon found the source, a
flock of birds on the power lines nearby. Here is a pic
of the noisy neighbors. |
|
|
| CROSSED
FLAGS! |
| The
crossed flags were displayed to both teachers and students at school this
week signaling the end of the first half of the year. Students
completed their semester exams on Thursday and teachers had a meeting / in-service
day on Friday. We are off Monday for the holiday before
heading back for part 2 on Tuesday. It's all down hill from
here, right? |
|
| HOW MUCH? |
| Weather forecasters are calling for up to
3 inches of rain on the valley floor this coming week. Rain is
anticipated to fall Monday through Friday of this coming week.
If that happens I'll be amazed as they always predict rain and then
nothing falls. The only weather we get here in Vegas is sun
and wind. Yes it's nice, but it too gets old.
Bring on the downpour. |
|
| WELL
DARN IT! |
| After peering over the
local schedules (tracks within 250 miles), it seems they have all
scheduled on top of one another. DVR conflicts with MVR, both
conflict with Victorville, and Pahrump is in between. So I'm
not sure what will happen now. A little bummed that I can't
race close to home, but there's not much I can do about it. |
|
| COLORFUL EVENINGS! |
The last few evenings
have had some really great sunsets with amazing colors. I
finally managed to get the camera out and snapped off a few
shots. It's neat how the colors change in the last 20 minutes
or so before darkness. Check out the shots!
 |
|
| 1.11.10 |
|
| SURVIVOR GAME SIGN
UPS! |
| 87racing.com's NASCAR
fantasy game sign ups went up today! Read the rules, choose
your team, and join in on the action. Tell a friend, in
fact, challenge a friend! Check it out,
SURVIVOR >>> |
|
| BUSY SUNDAY! |
| With
the season underway, it's time to get back into the usual
routines. The car was in the driveway and pressure washed
early Sunday morning before heading back into the garage to be put up on
jack stands. Once up and in the air, the body damage was fixed
before we began to search for the fuel system issue. While we
haven't found the problem yet, we are going piece by piece to chase it
from the fuel cell to the carburetor. Here are some photos
from Sunday. |
|
|
|
| 1.10.10 |
| SICK! |
| When I get sick, I get
REALLY sick. The good news is I don't get sick very often at
all. (Knocks on wood). So when I started getting a
terrible headache on Thursday mid-day, I tried taking something to make it
go away. It only angered it as I then began turning my
stomache inside out. A bunch of restless hours of sleep and a
few hours of vomiting landed my butt in the emergency room hooked up to an
IV with fluids and medication. They no sooner hooked up
the IV and I was knocked out. 36 hours later I was
racing! The wonders of modern medicine. |
|
| SOME
MENTAL MATH! |
| So I did the math on
Saturday and figured I might just make some cash without racing
much. It was $300 to win, however that would require fuel,
etc. So last place paid $40, with a $50 bonus kicked in from
Lovelock Speedway. Then best appearing car paid
$50. So I felt that if the car was spiffy enough and I could
come in last, I would walk away with $140 without turning a lap, plus I'd
get a front row start next race. I, of course, didn't go for
it, but I did weigh the option. I do believe I got the
$50 bonus for leading at 1/2 way though as I did see the crossed flags
from in front of the field. We'll see. |
|
| SO
YOUNG, SO OLD! |
| When the car scheduled to
start on the pole didn't make the call, the second row moved up and that
dropped the age total of the front row drivers to 52 years,
combined. Too bad I made up 70% of that age total with my 36
years. A 16 year old was alongside and did lead several laps
before I was able to slip by. Score one for the old
dudes! :) |
|
| NO WINNER, :( |
| Of all the entries into
the first finish of the year contest, no one correctly picked 9th place as
our finish. So the contest will roll over into something else
here very soon. Stay tuned. |
|
| 01.03.10 |
| SIX
TO GO! |
| By
this time next weekend, the first race of the 2010 season will be in the
books. The IMCA sanction returns to the Pahrump Valley
Speedway as local racing makes another push to survive. Sounds
like a lot of cars will be on-hand for the event which should make for
some great racing and some good competition. See you
there! http://www.pahrumpvalleyspeedway.com
. |
|
| PIECE
BY PIECE! |
| Have
spent the last few days going over each section of the car piece by
piece. Taking off, checking, measuring, etc, etc.
Most of what I was doing is normal off-season checking, however some of it
was me trying to turn things around handling wise. This car
isn't responding like my other one did so I'm doing things a little
differently to start of '10. Moved some weight around, and am
trying a different combination of springs, etc. I have found
some great reading material lately which has opened my eyes to some new
ideas. Here's hoping they work! haha. |
|
| UFO?! |
 |
While
driving back from Havasu on Saturday the sky was lit up by the full
moon. However as I clicked off a picture I got a little
more than I bargained for. Three blue lights made their
way into the picture!
Click the photo to see for yourself!
Interesting! |
|
|
| TRACKS
& STATES! |
| It's
the time of year that I have to make sure I have my travel expenses, race
winnings, etc all accounted for so I can be prepared for filing
taxes. In doing so I have to log some things into my racing
records and I came across a couple of interesting facts.
Looks like I have competed in 9 different states while racing, which
accounts for 34 different tracks. I've competed at one track
in Iowa, Nebraska, New Mexico, and Wyoming; 2 tracks in Utah; 3 tracks in
Colorado; 6 tracks in both Arizona and California; and 12 different tracks
in Nevada. Of the 13 tracks in Nevada, 4 are at LVMS.
While at LVMS I have competed at the 1/2 mile dirt, the 3/8 paved track,
the now gone 1/3 mile dirt (inside the 1/2 mile), and the old road course
back in the 90's. So will I reach 10 states in '10? What
states are around? Any suggestions? |
|
| SCHEDULING
CONTINUES! |
| Schedules
are slowly coming out around these parts. With our racing
stopping so briefly it seems like the car is in the trailer and ready to
go long before many tracks even put their schedules in print.
I will be trying to stay closer to home this year as it's cheaper and just
easier on everyone. However I do want to hit the tour race in
Battle Mountain and possibly a race in Price, Utah.
Other than that, things are still up in the air. But there is
plenty of time to get that all taken care of. Can't plan
for the next race until the first one is in the books. |
|
| TURNS OUT... |
| the "UFO" from
above was just a reflection of the AC adapter chargers in the car window
as I took the photo of the moon. Had us all thinking for a
while, but we quickly figured it out. Good for a laugh
at least! |
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