CarlFest 2009

There's nothing like a good surprise party. A few years ago we had a blast with Jim for his 40th birthday, a story I've told many times. I'll tell it here later: Jim's Excellent Vegas Adventure. But this weekend it was Carl's turn for his 40th, so we took him to Joliet, "the Las Vegas of Will County, Illinois."

Cast of characters for CarlFest 2009:

• Carl, the birthday boy
• Jim, Ameen, Shane, and myself -- the Evanston guys
• Jay, an old friend
• Tom, an even older friend and former college roommate at Georgia Tech

Co-conspirators included Carl's wife Evan, his son Jackson, and Jim's wife Leslie.

Although stock-car racing is hugely popular, Carl is one of the few NASCAR fans I personally know -- it's obviously not nearly as popular up north, and his North Carolina upbringing comes into play. (A measure of his authenticity is that he's been to Bristol.) So as we looked around a few months ago for some fun event to surprise him with for his birthday, we saw that a big NASCAR race was being held right here in Chicagoland, and got tickets.

The plan came together slowly but surely via email, barely complicated by the fact that a few of us had never met. As we were almost all Northerner NASCAR neophytes there were a lot of redneck jokes mixed in; a few probably crossed over the line, but Tom was too much the Southern gentleman to say anything. We did recognize we'd be in something of a foreign culture, and our general goal was "Have a lot of fun, but don't do anything that will get our asses kicked." Evan did most of the work, including preparing the tailgating feast for Race Day.

On Saturday Jim enlisted Carl to help him pick up some piece of furniture out in the western burbs; it was a flimsy story, but it still worked. I packed my vehicle with the tailgaiting supplies, collected Shane and Ameen, and then picked up Jay and Tom at O'Hare and headed to our hotel in Naperville (as close as we could get to the track). Jim showed up with Carl, we did the big "Surprise!" thing, dropped our bags in the rooms, and headed down to the Chicagoland Speedway in Joliet.

The Speedway was packed with 75,000 people for the "LifeLock 400" race, part of the "Sprint Cup" series. It was a spectacle, in the best and worst senses of the word. Some pre-race observations:

• A lot of people have a lot of tattoos.
• A lot of people own pickup trucks.
• There seems to be a code of politeness among NASCAR fans -- it was a family-friendly event all the way, more than a Cubs game (and way more than a Bears game.)
• People are really loyal to their favorite drivers. Many tailgaiters flew flags way up high with their drivers' numbers on them; everyone was wearing a shirt with racing team info, and often a hat, too. I'm sure I'll remember for a while that Jimmie Johnson is #48, Tony Stewart #14, Jeff Gordon #24, Dale Earnhardt Jr. #88, etc.
• Anticipating this, Evan made t-shirts up for us with #40, with a cool "Carl Jr." logo and a slogan from the Blues Brothers: "Our Lady of Blessed Acceleration, Don't Fail Us Now..." The sponsor logos on the sleeve included Geritol, Levitra, Life Alert ("I've fallen and I can't get up"), AARP, and Fixodent. Since there's currently no driver #40, we were asked at least a half-dozen times: "Who's 40?" We got to say "He is!", and got a lot of laughs from folks.

It was a beautiful summer afternoon for a cookout, we had plenty of food and beer, and a great time. At around 6:30pm we headed to the track for the 7:00pm race start.

The stands were nothing special -- just aluminum benches, and port-a-potties below instead of real bathrooms. Apparently the big NASCAR bucks haven't extended to the Chicagoland Speedway.

The race itself was fun. It was painfully loud -- we came prepared with earplugs, as did many (but not all) folks. Others had radio headsets they could use to talk to each other, which you could rent just for the race. The inability to communicate during the race was a bit of a downer for our group, but we managed through with some good pantomimes. (The hand-tipping gesture for "Want another beer?" is universal.)

The lean young guy in a tank top in front of us looked about 20, had a buzz cut, and an Arabic tattoo on the back of his neck -- I'd have bet he hadn't been back from Iraq for long. In fact, I'm sure you'd find a lot more young veterans at a stock-car race than another sporting event. A generational thing, and a regional one.

400 miles on the 1-1/2 mile track is 267 laps; each lap took about 30 seconds, so the whole race was just over a couple of hours. (Do the math: about 180 MPH.) You can see the whole track from the stands, and the pit row is right in front of you. Most pit stops were the 10-second variety you'd expect; when you saw someone taking a lot longer you knew there was something wrong.

The old man (50!) Mark Martin led most of the race and won in the end. The woman next to us in the #5 t-shirt was beside herself with joy, and bubbled to one of us, "I've been a Mark Martin fan since 1994!" Good for her!

We avoided the giant traffic jam afterwards by tailgaiting some more until it cleared, as there were still ribs and brats left to cook. We finally packed up and left, got back to the hotel about 1am and crashed, exhausted but satisfied.

The next day started slowly, but was still fun and relaxing, with lots of retelling of the previous day's events -- no more details necessary. We were happy to have given Carl a special 40th birthday, and to have made some memories together we'll have for a long time.

I guess my closing thought is that a NASCAR race is a fun, interesting experience, and should be on everyone's "Do it once" list, although maybe not on your "Do it twice" list. And for goodness' sake, throw a surprise party for someone every now and then...

Pat