My last blog entry was all about Sunday’s race.  I had to do a special blog entry for the above picture.  It was taken Sunday night after Penni & I finished eating supper in Grapevine, TX.  Your eyes are not deceiving you.  There are Red Bull Racing cars & haulers in the parking lot of the Grapevine Mills Mall.  When Penni & I got to Steak ‘N Shake there was 1 unmarked hauler and 2 83′s & 84′s sitting out and crew members moving parts around the lot.  We had a hunch of what was going on but weren’t 100% sure until we saw the 83 & 84 haulers.  The unmarked hauler brought the Phoenix (this weekend’s race) cars to meet the 83 & 84 haulers who would give the unmarked hauler the Texas cars to take back to Charlotte and take the Phoenix cars on westward.  It was neat getting to witness this.  We always hear about haulers trading cars but never have witnessed it ourselves.

One final bonus…Here is a slideshow of all of the pictures I took in Texas for the NASCAR race last weekend.  Enjoy!

Andi mentioned to me back in Michigan that she noticed a special black seat on Dale Earnhardt Jr’s pit box for car owner Rick Hendrick.  I, unfortunately, wasn’t able to see it…until Sunday.  The above picture is of the seats on the Hendrick Motorsports 88 (Junior’s) pit box.  Each of the Hendrick Motorsports pit boxes have a seat labeled for Rick to sit on when he visits during the race.

I title the above picture…”Where are you going, TJ?”  For those that do not know the guy above in black, his name is TJ Majors.  He is Dale Earnhardt Jr’s spotter.  We saw TJ walk upstairs to the spotter’s stand high above the track.  A while later (and pictured above), he walks back by us toward pit road.  He disappeared back behind and reappeared a few minutes later with what, I swear, looked like a radio.  Crazy guy.

Brad Keselowski made his Sprint Cup series debut on Sunday.  He made me a tad nervous during qualifying but made the race on time.  He ended up finishing 19th in the race on Sunday.  I thought he did great.  He wasn’t just making laps (as another rookie appeared to be doing).  He was fighting for every spot and fought very successfully.  I’m looking forward to him getting to drive in more Cup races.

Speaking of Brad…He drove a 5th entry for Hendrick Motorsports on Sunday.  He drove the #25 GoDaddy.com Chevy.  Because it isn’t a normal entry for HMS, there were some oddities with regard to his team.  First, you’ll notice the pit box above is really the JR Motorsports 88 pit box from Brad’s Nationwide team.  (Funny side note…There were some “fans” in the pit very confused about this pit box.  They couldn’t figure out when Junior started being sponsored by the Navy.  I guess they missed Junior’s 88 National Guard/Amp pit box at the beginning of pit road.)  The other different thing is that Haas CNC Racing crew members were the crew for the team.  You can see the guy in the photo above has a Haas CNC shirt on.  Lance McGrew (from Hendrick Motorsports) was the crew chief, though, in case you were wondering.

Carl Edwards won his 8th race of the season on Sunday.  I was hoping to see a different winner than I’ve witnessed before (maybe Dale Earnhardt Jr…hehe).  Unfortunately, the gas mileage gamble Junior’s team made didn’t pay off and he finished 20th instead of 1st.

Click here to see the pictures I took on Sunday.

Kyle Busch won his 10th Nationwide series race on Saturday night.  The win was Kyle 10th in the series this season, which tied a record held by Sam Ard.  Following the race, Kyle announced that he was donating $100,000 to Sam Ard.

Saturday ended with Kyle winning.  It began with us watching Sprint Cup series practice from the pits, more specifically back by the garage area.

Robby Gordon crashed during the first of two practices on Saturday.  The tow truck happened to bring the car near us where we saw Robby & crew checking out the damage.

On Saturday, they let us into Victory Lane to take pictures.  Besides the picture together, which a track employee was nice enough to take of us, we also each posed with our respective drivers’ names on the wall of champions.

The Fitz Motorsports #28 entry is sponsored by the US Border Patrol.  Instead of Fitz crew members pitting the car on Saturday, they had actual US Border Patrol members.  I thought that was pretty cool.

Click here to see the rest of the pictures I took on Saturday.

Friday was the longest day of my vacation.  We were at the track for 12 hours or so.  Friday included two Nationwide series practices, a Sprint Cup practice, qualifying for both the Nationwide & Sprint Cup series, and finally the Craftsman Truck series race.  Plus, SPEED TV was filming Trackside Live and we watched that for a while.

The photo above is of the tunnel we walked through many times over the course of the weekend to get to the track infield from the grandstand and back.  It is really weird walking through that when cars are driving at full speed overhead.

Jeff Gordon won the pole for the Sprint Cup series race.  The above photos is of his crew pushing the pole winning car into Victory Lane for the Coors Pole Award ceremony.

I couldn’t resist snapping a picture of Junior’s winning banner.  I pass it each time I’m at the track and have, thus far, resisted.

Brad Keselowski qualified on time for his first Sprint Cup race.  He was driving the Hendrick Motorsports 25 GoDaddy.com Chevy.  I’m glad that I was there to witness his first Cup race (more on his finish on Day 6).

Driver introductions for the Craftsman Truck race were a bit unorthodox at Texas Motor Speedway.  Instead of coming out onto a stage to wave to the crowd, the drivers actually came down out of the crowd and onto the track.  As you can see in this picture, track workers led 3 drivers at a time down the stands and then out onto the track into their respective Chevy truck for their ride-around.

Click here to see all of the photos I took on Friday.

Thursday was our first visit to Texas Motor Speedway of the weekend.  We went in time for the Craftsman Truck series qualifying and to see the Sprint Cup series haulers come into the track.

This was the first time Penni had ever been to Texas Motor Speedway.  I’ll let you read what she has to say about it on her blog but I hope she enjoyed herself as much as I did.

This was the first time I had pit passes at this track.  As you’ll see in these photos and in the photos from the other days, the pit passes were great and got us really close to the action.

The first event of the weekend that we saw was the Craftsman Truck series qualifying.  The above picture is a view into the truck “garage” at TMS.

During qualifying, the Sprint Cup series haulers entered the track.  We saw them all sitting outside the track in a parking lot before we went into the track at the beginning of the evening.  The above is a shot of the haulers waiting their turn to park in the garage area.

Click here to see all of my photos from our first day at TMS.

The New Kids on the Block concert was AMAZING!  I’m sitting here listening to their music as I’m working and writing this entry.  I’ve got several pictures and a full review coming later.

Penni & I had a great time at Texas Motor Speedway this weekend.  Ron Hornaday won the Craftsman Truck series race Friday night.  Kyle Busch won the Nationwide series race Saturday afternoon.  Carl Edwards won the Sprint Cup series race last night.  I have lots of pictures and stories from TMS to share in the upcoming week.

Stay tuned!

Oh yeah…I got gas for $2.05 before leaving Springdale and found gas for $2.09 in Durant at one of Oklahoma’s gas station slash casino slash Burger King places.  I haven’t looked at the gas prices here in the Dallas/Fort Worth area yet but I would assume they are at least a little more than the two prices I paid yesterday.

I’m at the Dallas/Fort Worth airport right now waiting on my flight to Atlanta, GA.  It leaves at 11:55 am.  I’ll arrive in Atlanta on 3:15 pm EST.

1. Leave Northwest Arkansas around noon Tuesday and drive to Dallas/Ft Worth, TX.
2. Fly from Dallas to Atlanta, GA Wednesday at 11 am.
3. Go to the New Kids on the Block concert in Atlanta Wednesday night.
4. Fly from Atlanta to Dallas on Thursday morning.
5. Spend practically 24/7 at Texas Motor Speedway for the NASCAR events/races.
6. Leave Dallas/Fort Worth bound for Northwest Arkansas Tuesday morning.

So far (and I don’t want to jinx myself), the weather is looking pretty good for this week.  Atlanta appears to be very similar to the weather here right now.  Dallas will be much warmer but it will be just perfect for the race.