 
Last Year

©2012 Merlin Dougas Larsen

Published by Merlin Douglas Larsen at Smashwords

This document is free. Do not obtain any remuneration from it but distribute it freely.

I went through emails that I sent to my son, in which I included a sort of on-going narrative of my increased, renewed interest in slot car racing. This was the hobby that kept me out of trouble in high school. It was the hobby that my longtime friend Rocky Russo and I shared in common.

I met Rocky in the summer of 1969, when my friend from high school, Don Dimmick, and I, entered our first-ever slot car racing series; it was for novice drivers, with "Formula One" cars. As we came into Hammond's Raceway (in the basement of the Cottonwood mall), I saw this stocky Italian-American-looking guy with the very first silver strands already starting in his long, black hair. He was dressed in a t-shirt and denim cutoffs and leaning against the glass counter, talking with Lee Hammond the proprietor's son. Rocky turned and introduced himself to me, and at once I saw something we had in common: his large eyes were made small by his glasses too. I thought that I would be teammates with Don Dimmick, but Lee separated us and put him with a Japanese-American kid named Gary Aoke (sp), and me with Rocky. I won that race. And afterward, Rocky offered to give me one of his motors, as mine had started to go soft on me near the end of the race. I followed Rocky up to his parents' house on Kensington Ave. His mom met us at the door and greeted me as if I were one of her son's old friends. His work bench, in a basement of vast clutter, was chaos incarnate; scaled mountains of parts and junk piled against the wall halfway to the ceiling and there was this little cleared work space maybe a foot in diameter. He rummaged through the piles and brought out a couple of hand-wound armatures and gave them to me. That was the beginning. The armatures did not work for me in the subsequent race a week later. But at the time, Rocky's cars also did not work as often as they caused him trouble. He was a lousy painter too. But, he was determined and increased his skills over the years until he was more than competent at painting, and his cars were often faster than mine. Rocky possessed the talent of "gear headedness": he knew how to make things work. We raced weekly, both at the commercial tracks and at my parents' house where I had a plastic, four-lane home set on my bedroom floor.

That first slot car stint, that Rocky appeared in the midst of, lasted for over three years; then I left to serve an LDS mission for two years. When I got back, slot car racing in the Salt Lake Valley was dead. But, I had picked up a new hobby: miniature war gaming. Rocky was good for that too: before I left, we had played board games as well, and we shared an interest in history, especially air combat. So we spent the bulk of the 70s co-designing war games rules. Even when he moved away, we continued to correspond; and when he visited the Valley, we nearly always managed to fit in a game or two. In 1978 slot cars returned to life. I was married and so was Rocky. But we dug out the cars, made/bought new ones, and had a spell of racing again. His slot car "career" continued unabated throughout the years; mine was off again and seldom "on". Rocky continued to live away from Utah but visited every year. Our lives remained connected, both through shared interests and because, mysteriously, we enjoyed being pals: I don't believe that Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser were more unlike than we two. When he moved back to Utah in the 90s, I was into "midlife crisis" mode; hobbies were ailing and failing to satisfy. Thus my feeling of connection to my friends was waning. I realized that the hobbies would keep the friendships alive. So I continued on with the hobbies in order to keep connected to the friends, especially to Rocky. Mike Kelly had been my closest friend through grade school and junior high, but we had not remained in touch since graduating from high school: because of slot car racing, Mike and Rocky had continued to be friends; this had grown into being pals as well and was a separate thing from Rocky and me. I would see Mike once in a while over the years, always when Rocky and slot cars brought us together. Except for a single blip (chance meeting in a mall), Don Dimmick had dropped off my radar altogether.

It was in 1995 that Rocky got an infection in his right leg which resulted in amputation below the knee. After recovering, with adaptation to a prosthetic, Rocky's wife got a job in Pittsburgh and they lived there for a number of years; he was hospitalized twice while there for infection related diseases in his left leg and I despaired at learning the news. But he recovered again and kept going. Returning to the Valley, he and Cathy bought a house on the east bench. But they had not been living there two years, when she died in an auto accident. We were playing an air war game on the day it happened; it was April 1, 2003. Rocky never got over that loss. But he also never quit coming out to games, and stayed "for coffee" afterward, chatting us all up from his great store of accumulated knowledge on a large array of subjects. He and Mike Kelly were into slot cars again up to that point; but I had lost interest for the most part.

I could tell that my friend Rocky was in even greater need of continuous friendships. So I began to go up to his house for Thursday night games. When these changed to Tuesday nights, somehow the group dynamic fell off, and the other guys stopped coming for games regularly, then seldom and finally not at all. On those nights that a game did not happen, Rocky and I would sit down to movies. He showed me all of his favorites; he had an increasingly large collection of DVDs. For the last half-dozen years of our friendship I hardly missed a Tuesday night: "Boys'/guys' night out", we would call it, when the girls at Millie's wanted to know what we were doing. "I'm just a lonely old man, living with his cats," Rocky would admit ironically. Sometimes there would be three of us, if one of our other friends from the gaming group happened to come by: Steve Bradfield, Chuck Hards; or Rocky's "good son", Chris; almost a foster son. But Chris got married and then became a daddy and that was the last we saw of him on Tuesdays. Sterling Price, Rocky's free flight modeling club buddy, started coming by, at Rocky's invitation, on Tuesday nights to share burgers and movies. We three, in the last two or three years, were the Millie's Regulars. Some of the girls even memorized what we would order; that's how regular and predictable we were.

The Tuesday night gaming group did not revive, but Thursday nights were faithfully participated in by Rocky, Steve Bradfield, Peter Vernon's clan, Chuck Hards and myself, at Hastur Hobbies, where our friend Bob Baker made his shop available for miniature gaming, especially the air war game. Toward the end of the decade, I grew weary of the constant challenge to adapt to Rocky's increasingly casual way of playing our war games rules: finally I just had to bow out. Chuck Hards had thrown in the towel a year earlier. So for the last c. two years of Rocky's life, I did not play any more war games with him. Without the regular association of our "guys' night out", I probably would not have been around for Rocky to influence me back into our original shared hobby.

A year and a half before Rocky died, a slot car track was made available in Salt Lake City: Don Haase's The Slot Shop put up a Kingleman. Rocky helped revive my interest in slot car racing by loaning me a "D3" to take to Buena Park Raceway on my next trip to LA. Never the collector, I had divested myself of nearly everything; but I still had five cars left: So I had gone over four of them and they ran okay. I started showing up on Friday afternoons at The Slot Shop to "dice" with Rocky; and Mike Kelly appeared. By the time fall arrived, I was starting to think of slot cars as my regular hobby again.

That was when I started sending email "reports" of the races to my son, Ricky, as he served his LDS mission in Brazil. I have gone through them and pulled out the slot car "reports" and arranged them here. This is a little memorial to my friendship with Rocky Russo. That last year, he encouraged me back into the hobby which began our friendship 41 years before. And I like to think that by getting me to liven up a little, my presence gave his last few months an added dimension which would not have been there: without the slot cars, and hoping that Rocky would be back to enjoy them, I probably wouldn't have been there for him during his final illness.

(the dates of these entries are the email dates and not those of the events as described)
11Oct10

I went slot car racing; to an actual race, not just tootling around the track like I do on Fridays. My car was slow; geared too low, so it "peaks out" on the straights and banking, and gets passed there by the properly geared cars. Also, they power past me in the "bowl" (the up-and-around section): but I think that there it is mostly driving: I am too afraid of miscalculating my speed and coming out. But in the dim past (as a kid and slightly older), when I was "vigorous and quick" (i.e. young), I used to drive a slower car too, and win from time to time: my modus operandi was to seldom if ever come out; and to use my superior "brakes" to catch up at the end of each straight: cars with lots of "horsepower" would blast past me coming out of the bowl and down the straights, then hit the "brakes" and I would scoot right up to them, and sometimes pass them going into the turn. I like my cars geared a little too low, because it gives me more control and better brakes (resulting from my high gear ratio - most cars run a 9 tooth pinion and 28 tooth crown; I'm geared 8-32: if that's confusing, look at it this way: "low" gearing is the highest ratio of motor rpm to wheels rotation; so obviously my 8-32 is a ratio of 4 to 1, motor revs per wheels rotation; so, I am geared "low", like gear one or two in a real car; whereas 9-28 is a ratio of 3.11 to 1: the motor only turns a tad over 3 times to rotate the wheels once: so my car picks up speed quicker and stops quicker, but is c. 22% less at the top end, if the other motor and mine have the same rpm: but I'm thinking that my 40 year-old motor is probably not as high in rpm either); which, as I said, I had timed to a nicety, back in the day. But so far, this time around (which is still very brief, yet) I don't have my eye and control finger retrained to take advantage of my better brakes. Maybe it will all come back.

Anyway, I finished 7th out of 11 drivers: I did beat out Rocky in sheer driving (his car was even slower than mine, and c. 40 years old - well, slower with him driving it anyway: I drove it earlier, just trying it out, and its power is better than mine, but the brakes not nearly as good; so, as I said, I catch him up at the end of the straights and even get into the turns a tad ahead - when I do it right, of course: which, as I also-also said, I don't do very consistently, yet; but when I do it right, it's really a satisfying feeling to catch up and nip on by: sometimes I can even nerf the outside car by sliding up and nipping by on the inside: but I get nerfed quite as often as I dish it out! - "He who lives by the nerf, dies by the nerf"). My other lifelong friend (Mike, since the 2nd grade; he's the one in the video I posted to my blog a couple weeks back - Rocky's the annoyed one whose car got broken), DNFed ("did not finish"): his motor mounts all broke! which sabotaged his gear mesh. It was a brand new car, too; one Rocky had bought just the day before, and was very fast till it broke down: he sat out the entire last heat (each heat is three minutes, and there are six heats - except when there are eight, but not this race), and I only beat him by eight laps, which shows you how much faster he was than me (we lap the track every c. 4.9 to 3.9 seconds: Mike was turning consistent 4.1's and 4.2's; yours truly was doing well to get below 4.8).

2Jan11

On New Year's Day I entered a slot car race at "the other track" (one set up in Douglas Models, on 33rd South, which originally was on 9400 South at MRS Hobby Shop \- that's an acronym for Model Railroad Stop hobby shop, not "Mrs."!): I hadn't driven that track for the better part of ten years: and even back then I disliked it because of the three square pillars in the way of watching the cars (each pillar was over 12" across). Well, the pillars are gone (the holes for them though are still there - but no cars went down the two open ones yet, and the lap counter sits over the third hole), so driving the track is actually pleasant now: but I never really learned this track before, and so it was like driving a new track for me; consequently I was slower and finished dead last. The field was small, only eight drivers; and "dead last" means among the six of us that finished the race: two drivers broke their cars in the first heat. There were only four heats, making a 16 minute race. I felt gyped, actually; the heats should have been at least five minutes long since there were only four of them. We only ran four racers at a time, which also felt lame; on the heats where one or both of the broken cars should have been running, we only had three or two racers going at it; bleh. The track has eight lanes, or is supposed to: only the [middle] six lanes have pickup braid on them?! The owner hasn't even bothered to put power and braid to the two outside lanes: yet he complains that "the other track" ([The Slot Shop] my usual haunt) gets all the racers and his racing programs only attract a handful. Well, DUH! You only offer three-quarters of a track, don't pay the heating bill so that your establishment is dark and cold (the track is in what should be the warehouse, aft section of the building); on top of this, you insist on restrictive racing classes with weird rules that are constantly changing, and then wonder why "the other track" gets all the participation. The owner of "the other track" actually cooperated to get some business going to the freezing, three-quarter track: the four-race series on New Year's Day was his idea, and he participated in that first race that I was in (he won it, iirc). He wants Douglas Models to do well, because a more healthy slot car fan base benefits his store as well. But at this juncture, my initial exposure to the Douglas Models track is less than encouraging. I wonder if I will return. Oh, and Rocky doesn't feel welcome there and didn't bother to participate, which was/is another personal negative for me: the conflict goes back years to when Rocky ran afoul of my other friend Wolf Detlef Scheering, who is a rules lawyer extraordinaire, and a handful of other rules lawyers, including the owner: whereas Rocky is casual about rules and has a "let's just put the cars down and race" attitude, which I mirror. Anytime Rocky showed up at the MRS - now Douglas Models - track, somebody would complain that his cars were "not legal" for some reason or other. Even when Rocky borrowed someone else's car he'd get flack about "I bet that car's not legal" (this would be opined before said-objector knew the car was in fact borrowed).

There were three more races scheduled for the day; a second one at that "new" track and two more over at the track where I have been driving and entering races since last fall: but I didn't feel interested in any of them because they were driving cars in specific limited classes and with bodies in the last two races that sort of look like stock cars or pickup trucks (bleh). Even when offered cars to drive I declined: I really only enjoy running my own stuff.

On New Year's Eve, I had been over to the regular track and "diced" with my two old friends, Rocky and Mike. Rocky wasn't "in the groove" and quit and just watched Mike and I. We ran OLD cars, after a brief spell with the new/current kind; and we were pretty even-steven with everything we pitted against each other. Those "duels" are what slot car racing is all about: playing with favorite model race cars (modeled after REAL cars, not just stoopid looking "thingies" designed to go fast, but not bearing more than a superficial resemblance to real cars); and in addition to that, cars we have been playing together with for over 40 years! We are a rare breed, Rocky, Mike and I: there aren't any other racers at the shop who have cars from their childhood almost half a century ago! :)

31Jan11

Because of my toothache "adventures" I had not worked on my new slot car that I bought the parts for the previous Friday. But by Thursday I was feeling a definite interest. So all afternoon and clear till past midnight I worked on the car, and finished it, including spray painting the body. Next day I put the body on and went to the track; I broke in the motor on 5 volts as recommended; then broke in the car on the track. It worked! Very cute orange and white Ferrari CANAM P-4, number "33". It isn't quite as fast as Rocky's cars (the class is called "D3", and is a "retro" racing class of in-lines with vintage sports car bodies - no ugly "downforce" handling bodies, only "real" cars); and this other guy, Charlie Nelson's cars are really spiff, but my rendition won't be thoroughly shamed to race against them: I've "never" had the fastest car - I qualify "never" because I can remember once, maybe twice, MANY years ago, when I happened to have the fastest driver-car combo, for maybe part of one race, before the car got smashed up, and I never did regain that VERY temporary edge of being fastest. On Saturday I raced at The Slot Car Shop track (the one in the video I put together last September from the video clips that your Mom took). I didn't do any better than I usually do (10th out of 12 drivers), BUT I turned my first 40 lap heat! With a c. 41 year-old car too (I'm the only one running OLD equipment: because even Rocky seldom runs his old "wire" cars these days). If you can consistently turn 40 lap heats you'll be within 10-20 laps of first place; if you can turn in several 41 or 42 lap heats you'll be within a handful of laps of first place, or might even win with a little luck! The fastest heat was [by] one guy who turned ONE 43 lap heat: the fastest heat ever is a 44, very rare: we all agree that 45 is possible. SO, my "40" is encouraging. The way I pulled it off was by "stealing" one of the track owner's 2 OHM controllers off the wall without telling him, for the fourth heat (of eight): my first three heats had been 35, 34, 33 - I got so annoyed at the unresponsiveness of my 4 OHM controller (too soft for that motor, I thought I'd adjust eventually, but instead I am getting worse!), so therefore I did the "theft" and turned in an instant 40 lap heat. Quite a dramatic difference! For the last half of the race I borrowed one of Rocky's spiff adjustable ($200+!!!) controllers and did no worse than a 37, with LOTS of crashes taking me out. I did one 39 lap heat, which would have been a 41 or just shy of it, because although I was off only twice, one of those cost me a full lap and more, because there wasn't a corner marshal where I came off(!?) and the nearest one had to run and put my car on. Crap! Anyway, I have to get a new controller or at the very least a 2 OHM resistor (and swap resistors for the next anticipated race: the 4 OHM is perfect for my new car, and a 2 OHM would be too sensitive to handle - ::sigh:: ). After that race I found myself over at the "other" track, just around the corner on 33rd South east of State Street: this track used to be in the MRS Hobby Shop in Sandy on 94th South (maybe you remember?); but I never liked the setting with the three pillars in the way and a claustrophobic feel to the place. Well, the present location of the track is no better but for different reasons: too COLD (the owner doesn't pay the heating bill, or else the warehouse area is just unheated in the first place: the rest of the store up front doesn't feel particularly chilly to me), too dim (warehouse lighting, duh!), and you can't get out of the left-end driving positions to go get your car during practice if it comes off and other drivers are to your right: there isn't enough room to slide between their butts and the wall! Annoying! But worst of all is the two outside lanes are not powered, so this is really only a six-lane track: which tells me that the owner doesn't really care that much if he has a big racing program. I raced Saturday on his track; there were nine of us counting Rocky and me (Rocky doesn't go there because he feels unwelcome: I've told you this before, I'm thinking): so "they" would have had a grand total of seven racers without us. My new car performed well and I got used to the track by the end of the race, or was starting to get used to it a little bit more: I feel strange, surreal, driving it, because it's just so weird with its "two-storey" construction (the entire "back straight", and 180 turn onto it, runs UNDER the top, main-straight and bank): fun to drive actually, but it plays with my mind and I can't connect to the experience - at least not so far anyway. Anyway, I finished with 154 laps (Rocky did too, but I don't know which of us was ahead of the other), placing me either 7th or 8th out of the nine of us: but the neat thing was I turned a 41 lap heat, and the fastest heat was only a 42! First place turned in 170 laps, so I am not that far down even my first time out with this car and only my second time on that weird track in ten years. I CAN do much better: but do I want to? Like I said, the track just feels weird to me and not in a pleasant way. It's a bit like trying to enjoy driving inside a cave.

6Feb11

I didn't enter any races last week. Boring "NASTRUCKS". On Friday I was down at the track running my cars and trying out different hand controllers that Rocky has. My NEW Ferrari P4 CANAM went into the red lane, and I leaned over to the kid standing next to me (I was on white) and said, "That's okay, just bring me around". Next thing I knew my car hit the wall full speed. He didn't understand, at, all. That's the trouble with overestimating what a newbie knows. No real damage happened: my guide shoe went down about 45 degrees, which I simply bent back up straight; my body got a couple of tiny starting splits in front, which bookbinding tape arrests. But probably more was bent than meets the eye, because now on the inside four lanes around the bank my car won't stay in the slot without "blipping" the controller. ::sigh:: I guess I'll have to take it apart and set it flat on a block and check for bends. Heh, hobbies.

13Feb11

Yesterday's slot car race was stoopid: I couldn't seem to escape trouble no matter how hard I tried. Even on the INSIDE lane (Red) I still got collected - by the clumsy corner marshal "finger nerfing" me as he went to put on other cars. Then in the last heat I got nerfed on the bowl from my Green lane into Blue: my car made it around the bowl and the last turn and I could see it was going to go down the main straight at speed (trying to grab a car going fast is usually very bad for the car; gears suffer first, and even the alignment of the chassis and integrity of the body mounts can take a "hit"; not to mention that if you time the grab wrong your little slithy fingers can get hurt!). "One off Blue!" I yelled. I should have yelled, "HOLD BLUE!" or "RIDER ON BLUE!" What in the world possessed me to yell "One off Blue"? Anyway my car zipped through the lap counter and paused on the bank, and I thought, "Good, Brad is pausing to let Jim take my car off Blue and put it on Green". No such luck: the next instant, my car zipped the rest of the way around the banking, down the straight and full speed into the dead man and into the wall. I spent most of an hour after the race getting everything bent back into straightness. Brad was very sorry and said, "You'll have your car running better than it was because of this." And he was right! It does run better! But the race was a frustration. I finished 12th out of 16, two laps down from 11th place; and only 9 laps down from Rocky who finished 7th with 290 laps (five laps down from 6th): our buddy Mike Kelly won again (that's two in a row) with 336 laps. So that was quite a mob of six of us all within that 9 lap spread. After the race, Mike and I diced with the fast cars that Rocky has available; including the one that Mike had won with (and set a new total lap record). When I drove that car, Mike couldn't beat me either. We went at it, neck and neck with the two "slower" cars; or inching away with the race winner car. Then we switched to the D3 class (my new car is that kind) and repeated the neck and neck driving. "Too bad you can't drive that cleanly in the race", Rocky quipped at me. I could only agree. Well, my day will come; if I keep this up, that is. My enthusiasm, which is only mediocre as it is, is getting deflated by "rools" talk and the continued annoyance of 3 minute heats (they're too short!), with the track power being shut off for this, that and the other thing: why can't we just RACE ferpetesakes?

27Feb11

Yesterday I was in a pretty big race; twenty racers entered, 19 raced (the 20th guy's car let him down right before the race started). We had to start the race over! Stupid lap counter computer froze after two heats. I wish I could have had those two heats instead of my first two in the restarted race; my lap total would have been three higher and I would have finished 8th instead of 9th. Rocky was flying and beat this, my best race so far, by a good 14 laps; he had 313 and finished 7th; Mike won, again, with 326: the guy who would have won (Charlie Nelson, the best car builder in our present racing club) had his controller blow a fuse and it cost him 40 seconds, or roughly 10 laps; he still managed to finish 4th or 5th. My 9th place was with 299 laps, considerably better than I've done so far; this was the first race where I managed to finish in the top 50%. If enough guys show up tomorrow, we will have another D3 "retro" class race. But I am not very hopeful. I will go over to the track anyway, to show my intent, and maybe word of that will get around. We've got to push that racing class; it's the best one by far, imho, and needs to grow. In-line setups always look natural (and sexy) to me; angle-winders and side-winders look wrong somehow; but of course I've been used to seeing them for decades, as they are the most common setup. I worked on my car after last Monday's race; basically I rebuilt the whole car, improving the rear bearings, limiting the wiggle in the brass side pans, lowering the motor and repairing the main rail joints: after the race Monday I noticed that the right rail was just about to part company with the rest of the car: I barely finished without breaking down! (no wonder my handling was getting screwy). Anyway, the instant I started lapping the track on Friday with my rebuilt car, I could tell that it was like an entirely new machine: it was handling like a dream! Now, if I can just get the "brakes" back, I'll be lapping two or three tenths of a second faster and everybody had better watch out! I'd run this car even up against angle-winders, it's that slick to drive and that quick. I think it's my fastest car now, even without good "brakes". (Unfortunately, to get my "brakes" back, I think I have to replace the motor, and I'm a cheapskate: I won't replace it till it dies.)

7Mar11

I did no racing last week (the Saturday race was trucks; and as I explained when someone wanted to know - again - why I don't do trucks: "Trucks are for haulin', not haulin' ass". But then I allowed that "boys will race anything that moves"; no duh. The Monday D3 race was a non starter for lack of participants, but Rocky, Mike and I drove together and had fun. Also on Friday, Rocky brought the GE-powered Indianapolis 500 "offy" (diminutive for "Offenhauser", the kind of engine popular back in the early 60's), like the car I have had for over ten years. Back in the day, both Mike and I had GEs (this is, oh, 1967 or 68); so with Rocky resurrecting Mike's car we had fun dicing for a couple of hours or more. My car was slightly better, but Mike drives (usually) better than I do, so it was pretty even. (these motors and frames are originals from back then, but not the exact cars we had: Rocky is a collector and provided these duplicate cars c. ten years ago for Mike and I to drive; Mike's car has spent several years in the "to repair" pile)

27Mar11

Yesterday, I entered the "enduro" race: it was eight 15 minute heats, or two hours. I expected a lot of dropouts due to mechanical failure, but surprisingly we only had one of the ten teams have their car utterly fail with a burned up motor. By the halfway point, I had to replace my motor brushes, which was a surprise to me; otherwise the motor ran great and stayed cool. I also had to put one of my front "O" rings back on (they function as front "tires") and straighten my front axle twice: that wasn't too much repair work for a two hour race.

I didn't know when I left the house who (if anybody) would be my teammate: it could have been Rocky or Mike or BOTH, or nobody at all. I was prepared to pay the full $25 entry fee (split to $12.50 per driver per two-man team). Well, I got paired up with Luke - the guy with the reversed baseball cap in the video I put up Last September on my blog and YouTube, the one who "broke" Rocky's car, heheh. We weren't the fastest team yesterday, but we were the tallest! He ended up having to bail at the halfway point to go to his nephew's birthday party (the enduro took longer than Luke expected); so he only drove two of the eight heats. I drove the entire last hour by myself.

Except for the second to last heat I did just fine: but in that heat when I was on purple I had Jack Norman on my left on yellow. He and "Crash Carter" are two of the youngest drivers, c. 12 years old. Jack is usually so fast that he is a contender for first place and even wins occasionally: Don, the track owner, for some mysterious reason, builds Jack's cars (maybe as a favor for Mike Norman, Jack's dad, I don't know); anyway, the last few races Jack hasn't been "in form", or maybe he just hasn't had cars that he can adjust to (I think he only knows how to drive a particular type of setup and hasn't got the experience to adjust when the car doesn't have the "feel" he needs). ANYWAY! he and Carter were teamed up and already out of the running for the money (first through fourth place), and Jack was not driving at all well. In fact he was happy to come off if it meant also taking me with him!! I felt like kicking him in the ankle halfway through the 15 minutes of hell.

I asked him: "Why are you doing this"?

And his reply was: "All's fair in racing."

He was deliberately trying to position himself on the bowl so that he could nerf me as I came up on the outside - which he succeeded in doing three or four times. The rest of the time, I was driving so warily of him that I hung back until I could get by without being taken off. A few times I botched it and both of us went off together, which bothered me a lot and him not at all. Then he crashed his car a bit too hard and one of his "friends" took it and worked on it. But did that remove Jack from my presence? Not a chance: he was immediately driving a different car while his "official" entry car was being put back into driving fettle.

"Why are you driving that car"? I asked, feeling more vexed than ever.

"Why not?" he said.

"Because you are out of the running, and now you're just a moving obstacle and hazard."

He just grinned and kept driving it. A few minutes later his "real" car was put back on and the "fake" car taken off; but nobody bothered to notice that the laps he'd done shouldn't have counted (just because it ain't right; it's sloppy race management). Oh well.

Meanwhile, on my right, on black, was Charlie Nelson, the best car builder in the Valley. He and his partner (Kerstin Hardy) were somewhere behind me, having had a rough race altogether. I had a safe lead on them at the start of the heat. But Charlie kept whizzing past me every couple of minutes or less; except when he'd try and get by me on the bowl and I'd nerf him; this occurred several times; and we tangled elsewhere as well.

"I am starting to feel like Jack to you, Charlie," I said after I'd taken him out for the fourth or fifth time. "I'm sorry, I don't mean to; don't try and pass me on the bowl and we should be able to get through this".

You see, normally, without Jack as my nemesis, I would be able to concentrate on Charlie and let him by in a strategic place. But with Jack hounding me I was all focused on how to avoid him, and Charlie would come up on me and I'd nerf him on the bowl or we'd tangle; sometimes all three of us were off together. It was most frustrating.

But finally it was over and I moved to my last heat lane, blue. I thought: Sheesh! I bet I only turned a 189 or 190 that last heat. Hah! If only it could have been that good. In fact I turned a 183! Horrible!! Jackie had slowed me up far more than I had realized. My other heats had been 196, 195, 197 and 197 (Luke's two heats had been 193 and 195). That purple heat had put Charlie and Kirsten within striking distance of my fourth place; and totally ruined any chance I had had of catching Mike and Rocky: their team and Luke and I had been dicing all through the race for third place; first they and then we would be up a couple of laps on each other - at one point I had a seven lap lead in fact.

Going into the last heat, however, Mike was on purple and now 13 laps ahead. He got a second 207 (on orange he'd also done that well), and I turned a 200! Yay! That was more like it. If I'd only had at least my lowest so far of 195 on purple, instead of 183, he and Rocky would only have beaten Luke and I by eight laps instead of twenty. Oh WELL!

I got the four things out of the race that I wanted before it started, so although this turgid recital of an event interesting only to me sounds like a rant it really isn't: I wanted to turn at least one 200 lap heat (that would be equivalent of eight 3 minute heats of 40 laps, my current best), I wanted my car to finish the race in good shape, I wanted to drive my OWN car in the first place, and finally I wanted to go head to head with Mike and Rocky such that we finished close to each other. I consider a 20 lap difference to be almost nothing when you consider the totals: our team had 1,556, and Mike and Rocky had 1,576.

3Apr11

Yesterday I finished seventh out of c. a dozen racers. Well, Rocky had less than a half dozen laps more than I did, but he was DQed because his original car broke down. So did Mike's, so his lap total also did not count. But even if they had finished with the same cars I would have beat them both, had Don (the proprietor) not put my car back on the WRONG lane and I hit the wall: one of my pickup brushes got knocked out and Don put it back in, but I lost c. ten laps. The fastest heat was 70 laps by Brad (he also was DQed because his original car broke down); my fastest heat was 62. My car was hassling me; no brakes, and for some reason the handling was a bit "off". I think it was because my frame was touching on the outside in the corners. After the race I bent the front ends up a tad and that seemed to fix the handling annoyance. Charlie Nelson won again; he's taken first place in the two D3 races we've had so far: and first through sixth place were all chassis built by Charlie - I have said before that he's the best car builder in the Valley. Afterward I bought a new motor, hoping that this will give me brakes again; also I am going to try a lower gear ratio, to the same purpose, and to give me a bit more snap coming out of the turns.

11Apr11

On Saturday I entered the "open" slot car race: this meant that any chassis or motor under a "high downforce" body was allowed. Of course, I loathe the look of HD bodies, with their high sides, wedgy "butt-high" look, and withal not being models of any RL cars at all. So I always run a car that is at least a recognizable RL car: mine was the same Porsche that Luke and I ran in the 2 hour "enduro" a few weeks ago. I hadn't changed a thing. And naturally my car was slow compared to the cars that took first, second and third. Mike Kelly was gloomy throughout the race, because said-cars were "blasting by me" all during the race. He took fourth place, only c. 30 laps down from first (a guy named Jeff with 580 laps; I think second place, but it could have been third place, had 562 laps; Donny, the owner's son, had 548 laps for fifth place). I was a good 25-30 laps down from Mike with 526 laps. Rocky also had 526 laps! But he hadn't marked where his car finished so I got to have sixth place and Rocky was seventh: we both stopped on the bridge going into the last turn!! I ran the last heat so my car's stopping place was my mark; and anyone who has pulled his car off in the previous heat(s) must mark his place, which as I say Rocky had not done: "I couldn't find a safe place to put a marker", he said twice. I just stared at him, then said: "Well, you broke protocol, so they're going to give sixth to me". When they called out, "Who's ahead, Rocky or Doug?", Rocky said, "Doug is." And that was the end of that. I have lately been marking where my car stops with one of those heavy duty paper clip thingies that have the hinged handles - this kind http://myitchyfingers.files.wordpress.com/2008/05/clip1.jpg . Very convenient and secure; I can clip it to the track guard rails either on top or on the underneath edge. I even painted my name on both sides of it. There is NO excuse (but lame ones) for not marking where your car stops. I've decided to get my old "open" car built up again; the "Group 20" motor should still be in good shape and it's powerful. The chassis handled really well back in the day; it should be my best handling and fastest car when I am through. I'll need another hand controller though: the one I borrowed from Rocky isn't "buff" enough for that powerful of motor and will "blow" the circuitry of the controller if I try and run the Group 20 with it: so I have to find a "cheap" used controller (probably Don the track owner has one) and put a low resistor in it, probably a 1.5 or even a 1 ohm will be necessary to give me the right responsiveness. Enough of that gear head talk...

18Apr11

I did indeed resurrect my c. 33 year-old car. Tuesday I picked up the parts and bought a used 2 ohm hand controller (a 1 ohm allowed too much power, enough so that I knew a 1.5 ohm would also be too much) for only $25 from Don the track owner. Wednesday I painted up a McLaren M8B CANAM body, in orange of course. So now the car closely resembles the incarnation of c. 1978-79, when I won the "semi-pro" class and finished 2nd over-all in a big race (iirc, there were at least 20 entrants): back then the "air dams" were all the latest rage, to create down-force and thus higher cornering speeds, i.e. faster lap times and better handling.

(But the air dams are UGLY! At least they're now relegated to an "only air dams" class which so far is the least popular class, may it remain so, Amen! Picture sheets of Lexan stapled and taped to the sides and rear of the body, waggling inches high, and bending down under the air pressure \- such that the side pieces actually flatten out over the adjacent lanes?! Hideous abominations that they were, I could not stomach the thought of putting them on MY car. So mine was the only car sans air dams. Mine was the only car that looked like a model car. And I took 2nd place over-all to boot. Yet my "legendary" drive did not inspire even one other driver to remove the unsightly dammed things. Instead they flourished and grew taller yet and racing became ridiculous. I quit. And the car - minus its cannibalized parts - has languished in the box ever since. I guess that I have sort of imagined it as my "secret weapon".)

The race two Saturdays ago finally convinced me that without more "horsepower" I was not going to go faster. The time had arrived: my driving efficiency had been regained enough to warrant the upgrade to a faster setup. So out comes the old beastie. And she is FAST alright. Wednesday I was driving routinely, right off the bat, in the 4.0 to 3.9 second range. I finally have a car that breaks the 4.0 second lap! I got it as low as 3.8 on the Black lane which is rather impressive. The single-most important aspect about a great car setup is handling: if you can get a car to stick like glue then you don't have to work hard to go fast enough to be competitive: and not working so hard to go fast enough and stay in the slot means you have more concentration freed up to watch out for accidents ("events") occurring in your way, i.e. you avoid being taken out by other drivers coming out of their slots and causing wrecks. That's what this old car is like: swift enough to keep the leaders in sight, yet easy to drive, such that I can "see" the rest of the track and traffic as I am driving.

Anyway, Don allowed on Wednesday that "any 16D" could include my motor; the whole setup could be "grandfathered" in, heheh. So on Saturday I brought out the old beastie, and Rocky, inspired by my silliness, also brought an old car he'd resurrected. I tested it before the race and found it quite as fast and easy to drive as mine.

But during the race, Rocky did not "bond" with his setup as well as I did. And Mike Kelly was having difficulties with his car(s), even the one he finally selected - while being the prettiest, a Ferrari 612 CANAM in appropriate red - frustrated him with how hard he had to work to try and keep up. His race lap total was 530; I don't know what Rocky's was, and I don't know who finished in what places below me: I finished 3rd with 545, 19 laps faster than my best up till then; Charlie (the best car builder, imho) finished 2nd with 550, and Jeff won with 558: last race, the "open" that convinced me to pull out my 33 year-old car, Jeff won with 580 and Charlie had 562 for 2nd (the higher lap totals being almost entirely due to "high downforce" bodies - that is to say, hideous abominations for bodies instead of cars that exist in real life). So the race last Saturday showed me in my "natural" form, heheh: right up there with the leaders - of which I was one - and ready to take them out if they slipped up for even a little bit. Neither Charlie nor Jeff slipped up and both their cars worked to perfection the entire forty minutes. Rocky's car crapped out in the last heat (broken motor lead wire). Mike's remained with him the whole race, but as I said, he had to work very hard to keep up and got into rather more difficulties with traffic as a result. I was very able to keep an eye open ahead of myself for trouble and consequently had a minimum of off-time: I only fell out due to my own mistakes five times, and only once on my own in the last three heats; that's more like it! For most of the race I was either just a tad slower than Jeff or Charlie, or they and I were effectively equal. I actually won the heat when I drove Yellow and beat Jeff by one lap when I turned a 71. My lowest heat was a 66, and I had one other heat where I had 70, and the rest were two heats with 67 and three heats with 68 laps. Not bad! I can do better still, IF I care.

The trouble I saw - again and yet again, this attitude manifests when racing programs go long enough - was a desire to go faster at the expense of all other pleasures. Mike's comment at the end of the race is indicative: "If I had a car like [Jeff's] I would bid all of you 'good-bye.'" There isn't enough joy in driving the car, it's all about winning and beating everyone else. I truly enjoy the old cars I have; I'm antagonistic toward HD bodies (they being the bastard children of the old air dams); ugly mass-produced, stamped steel and aluminum chassis are BORING cars, almost as boring as plastic ready-to-race 1/32nd scale club racing cars. What I would always like to see is more people enjoying their scale looking cars for their aesthetically pleasing appearance.

1May11

I went to the track Friday afternoon as planned, and as I walked through the door I was met by this big, empty space. The track, was gone! Before I could react, Don the proprietor announced that it would be back Sunday night and put back together early in the week. He rented it to the Scout-O-Rama for something over $4000. I reckon the hassle of dismantling, transporting, assembling, dismantling again, transporting again and reassembling, again, is all going to be worth it for that price. I hope so. Because it sure shocked me. Mike Kelly and I drove my two open-wheeled slot cars on the small, six lane 1/32 scale track; with an empty lane between us because the lanes are spaced narrower on a 1/32 scale track than on an eight lane 1/24 scale track. We diced fairly evenly and had a fun time anyway. We had the shop to ourselves for c. two hours. Rocky did not show up.

8May11

Yesterday the slot car track held a thinly attended "open motor, high downforce body" race. I got to race my steel beastie again: I was the only guy using a scale (real car) body. There were nine of us. Mike Kelly would have made ten, but he opted to not race since he was unhappy with each of the cars Rocky provided. I thought all of them were fine; but I do not have the same narrow discrimination prepping for a race that Mike has: he must "bond" with a car, and it must break the 4 second lap handily, not have to work at it, etc. He corner marshaled for the rest of us. We had three corner marshals only - the bare minimum; the straightaway was unmarshaled; but at least we got to race all eight lanes. Turned out that the heats had been programmed for only four minutes instead of five. GRRR! So a 32 minute race instead of a 40. GRRRR!!!

Rocky and I tied, AGAIN; with 430 laps, but I was ahead and took 5th place. He said, "They should have added in two laps that I lost earlier, when my car was out crossing the lap counter."

"I lost more than two laps just putting other peoples' cars back in (the straight) in front of me." (Rocky never puts anybody back in, but that's because he can't move fast enough to do it with his leg missing.)

"Well, your motor is a lot more powerful than all of ours, he said."

"My car is also a lot heavier than any other car."

"That doesn't stop you from pulling me down the straights and in the banking."

"I saw us as equal speed-wise," said I: "I didn't overhaul you going around the bank."

"Yes you did."

"No I didn't."

"Yeah right, you were getting two feet on me there each lap, which my car would gain back in the bowl; your car is faster, mine handles better."

"I didn't see it that way at all, Rocky. I caught up to you in the dead man because I brake later than you do."

We had this interchange at least twice. (I have driven BOTH cars and his is at least as fast as mine and handles very well indeed, possibly even better than mine. He hasn't driven my car, but if he did, while I drove his, I'd skunk him for certain: maybe next Friday during practice, if I can persuade him to try.)

Anyway, the racing was very even. None of the nine drivers and cars were significantly slower. I found myself dicing with sometimes two other cars at once. The guy who won is named Steve; he's "Crash Carter's" dad: CC finished second to last because although he's fast he is not consistent and comes off quite a lot, thus his moniker, because he causes crashes (he's only c. 12). The highest lap total for a heat was 58. I turned one 57 and a couple 56s, but my last heat was only 47 (that was the heat where I put four cars back in when they ended up in front of me; and of course, I have to stop each time I do that). From Rocky and I to third place there was only a seven lap spread: fourth place had 433 (a guy named Coby), third place had 437 (a guy named Rick), second place (Charlie Nelson again, second place, third week in a row) had 444, and Steve had 451. The separation was entirely Steve's success in staying out of trouble better than everybody else. There were some heats during the race where Steve and I were racing head to head, sometimes equal, other times with either he or I having a slight edge. It was a fun race. But I don't like finishing 5th after returning with a 3rd place. (grouse grouse grouse.....)

I won't be racing next week, as it is an IROC race ("International Race of Champions", heheh, the slot car version), the first of an eight race series: the bodies are NASCAR (which I loathe), and worst of all: the shop supplies the cars , i.e. Don built them all - thus the IROC appellation. Each car is tied to a single lane, so you race EIGHT individual cars during a race. I couldn't be less enthused unless the cars also came with air dams. But two weeks from yesterday is another "open" race - well, sort of open; "any 16D motor" is the same as the last race when I finished 3rd. And so far nobody has complained. Even if somebody does, Don said that he doesn't care; "A 33 year-old car isn't a threat to anybody". A sensible attitude that I wholly agree with, of course. And the week after that is a "D3" race; hopefully that will not be cancelled for lack of participation.

15May11

On Friday I went to the slot car track for a couple of hours. At first Rocky and I diced with fairly even cars; ones that we could drive almost automatically and talk at the same time. I didn't put my steel beastie on, but spent most of the time driving one of Rocky's cars against the other. Then Mike Kelly showed up and we drove the open-wheeled (Formula One) cars a bit; mine is outclassed by Rocky's wider, lower (not scale) cars; and even his scale cars are a tad quicker than my Eagle. Oh well, both he and Mike fell out a lot and I hardly fell out at all; so I "win" by staying in I guess. Then Charlie Nelson showed up, and Kerstin, and the kid running the shop that afternoon for Don put his D3 car on and we all drove around crazy for a bit. The kid's car was the quickest D3 and it was even just a squeak quicker than my second fastest car (the one I drove in the 2 hour enduro a while ago). Charlie's Formula One car was the quickest of that class, but not by much: I could drive Rocky's Cooper Maserati almost as fast, and Mike driving the Ferrari was no faster than I with the Cooper, but I fell out a lot less than Mike did, so that means I "win" again, haha.

23May11

In the afternoon I tootled over to the slot car track and diced evenly with Rocky (I was not, however, driving my steel beastie, other than a few laps to make sure she was still going great guns). Mike Kelly showed up and was very silent. it was because he was keeping a secret: and soon, in through the door walked his secret: our old high school chum, Don Dimmick, who raced slot cars with us. I recognized him instantly; not difficult; he's got the kind of heavy skin that doesn't wrinkle! He only looked a few years older than high school, and not older than the last time I saw him, which was probably 15 or 20 years ago in the Fashion Place mall, a chance meeting. I heard from Mike that Don had gotten back into slot cars briefly at the MRS track in Sandy; this would be some 10 years ago, I'm thinking, either predating or postdating my brief reentry at the time. Anyway, he looks very youthful for a large guy; he weighs more than he did in high school, I can see that, but he carries it well. He's one of those big framed men who happens to be fat, rather than a fat man who only looks big because he's overweight. The years between high school and today seemed to have amounted to almost nothing as we showed each other our cars, and as Don started to drive the Kingleman. He watched Mike Kelly and I dicing evenly at great speed and I could tell he was having doubts about being able to do that again.

"I have a ways to go", he said.

"Well, I've got a whole year's head-start on you, Don", I replied.

He bought a one month pass and said he'd be back next week. Cool.

The race was very satisfying. Charlie Nelson finished second, again: but this time, TOOOO MEEEEEE!! I turned a 566 in a forty minute race (the full-length eight, five minute heats); I believe that is the new record with a scale "vintage" body (as opposed to a "high downforce" - fake car - body, which was what Jeff was running a couple months back when he set the record for a 40 minute race with his scorching 580 laps). If you've been following my tedious race reports at all, you'll have seen that my steel beastie's "return" was a third place with 545 laps. Before that my best 40 minute race total was 526 laps, with my then-fastest car (which race, an "open", caused me to resurrect my steel beastie). So to leap to a record finish 21 laps faster than my previous best is very gratifying. And it was all due to cleaner driving. I fell or was nerfed out only 13 times in forty minutes, which is pretty clean! My driving was FASTER this race, and I had a clear track before me: almost nobody got in my way, and even Luke, on my right, helped me get by without having to battle around him - and then he broke down and quit, which gave me half a race with nobody in the lane to my right to worry about: that kind of help makes for a much faster race alrighty. So, I guess it was finally "my turn to be in the groove". (But Charlie Nelson must be getting a bit frustrated with his continuing run of second place finishes.) I kept track of my laps heat by heat; and half of them I turned 73; my lowest was two 67s; and I had two perfect heats, and two when I only came out once. The funniest moment was when Rocky, Mike and I were all together coming into the dead man and I was on the inside on Purple, then Mike on Yellow, then Rocky on Blue. I was a lot faster than Rocky and was catching right up to Mike, and trying to nip by while I was on the inside, but I blew it and fell out and took both of them with me. Then the power went off and the fifth heat was over: until that moment I had run a perfect heat too, and that would have been three perfect heats. Oh WELL! It was kind of cool to see the beginning of the sixth heat, with all three of our cars lined up at the end of the dead man side by side, on Black, Purple and Yellow.

This was the only race all year (in fact, from my memory of all our slot car racing together) where Rocky, Mike and I ran side by side, that is to say in adjacent lanes, for the entire race. Too bad that Rocky's car was not up to snuff this time; a three-way dice would have made "my" race even more fun. This occurred because of yet another rotation system (this makes three we've experienced so far), where you are on one heat and off the next, all the way through the race. And you have the same guys on either side of you all through the race. I kind of like it. But the obvious drawback is for the guys stuck between lousy drivers who are constantly harassing with their coming out in front of you (which I did not experience this time, as I have explained already).

(Charlie had 562 laps; Brad was third with 559; Mike Kelly was fourth with 547; Jeff 5th with 541; Steve - who won two weeks ago - 6th with 522; Rocky finished 9th with 499.)

After the race we debated, Brad mainly, and I, over the ethics of running disparate car designs in a race that is announced to be, "16Ds, vintage bodies and flexi chassis". I repeated what Don (the owner) had said to me the day after I resurrected my car, and again on the day before the first race with it:

"I am grandfathering your car. If anyone is afraid of a 33 year-old car they have a problem, and, I, don't, care."

Don has not been present at either of the two previous races I've had with the steel beastie; he wasn't there this time either, opting to go do something else instead, or harassed by RL concerns, I don't know which. It will be interesting to see if he changes his mind and UNgrandfathers my car. Meh, I built it to run in the "open class" races anyway, that class being my favorite.

Brad opined that my car is a fine open class setup, i.e. he doesn't have any beef with it running "legally" there: but in races like this last one?

"I don't care what anyone runs for fun, but the race results are only between the legal cars for the class."

In other words, in his mind, he finished second to Charlie's first place. I won't be surprised if I learn later that Brad has referred to the race results that way.

Anyway, I've now satisfied myself that the old scratch-built cars are not inferior to the modern, mass-produced ones with their stamped ("flexi") chassis. The approach is entirely different, of course - thus Brad's objection to their being considered "equal".

But it was Brad, back in February, opining after my less than stellar race finishes with the ONLY old cars running against a score of modern entrants, who said:

"Doug, you really ought to try this new stuff. It's so much better than the old cars were, and the new cars are simply faster."

I didn't disagree then, but simply said, "I like my old cars, Brad. They're fun to work on. And besides, I am cheap."

He was amused but unimpressed. NOW, he's no longer amused, and he's still unimpressed! But not for the same reason, heheh.

30May11

I ran my new motor in my flexi on Friday afternoon and found it going nicely: this car, which before would only turn c. 4.4 to 4.3 second lap times, now turns 4.0 to 3.9 lap times. A dramatic improvement. Almost as easy to drive and as fast as the steel beastie.

The race was quite punctuated by crashes. I could wax on about details for paragraphs, but I won't bore you this week any further than to say that I finished 5th among the eight D3 cars and 6th over all: Four of the twelve cars were not even D3 in-lines, but instead flexi angle-winders. And in fact the guy that finished first was Luke with a flexi, with 523 laps. So Brad (he of the objection to my 1st place counting last week) verbally objected to the inclusion of non D3 cars getting counted in the finishing results. Brad had also had some bad luck in the first heat when a corner marshal put his car back on the wrong lane and it got slammed into the wall, costing him almost the whole heat; to make up for it, Jim Young, the race official, counted Brad's first heat as 64 laps, making a three-way tie for second place (or, first place among the D3 cars) with 522 laps, which went Brad's way because he was about to cross the lap counter ahead of Rick and Coby and right behind Luke: this annoyed Don, who objected to the arbitrary way Jim had arrived at "64" as a reward for Brad's "whining". Don and Brad had words; Brad left angry, Don continued to vent and threatened to tell Brad to not come back anymore. *sigh!* But I had fun. My lap total was 504, one lap behind Don, and 21 ahead of Jeff and 22 ahead of Mike Kelly. Rocky broke his D3 early in the race and was DQd (disqualified) when he kept driving other cars just for the heck and fun of it.

After the blowup between Brad and Don, I talked with Don briefly: about the unwise combining of flexis with D3s; the D3 in-lines can be harder to drive and tend to be just a skosh slower in the corners, so why would anyone bother to disadvantage themselves by doing it? Might as well just drive a flexi then. We are trying to get the D3 class going. This race had eight cars, the previous race had seven. If Charlie Nelson and Steve [Lovingood] had showed up - both enthusiastic D3 supporters, but both waylaid by other RL obligations - we would have had the bare bones of a "full field". There are some five other D3s built out there that I know of; but most of the drivers are infrequent attendees at the races. If Don doesn't put some kind of distinction between flexis and D3s this class is going to remain stillborn. The drivers of the D3s in this race (especially Brad) created our own distinction: we separated out the four flexis and so they had their own finish results; that made Luke the winner of the flexi class, but Brad (sort of) won the D3 class (if I had had my way, Brad would have taken his lumps, and Rick would have won the D3 race with Coby finishing second, and ME fourth). I wouldn't mind running two close classes at the same time if there are not enough of the D3s to field a full race. That would encourage participation as the top priority, while at the same time encouraging the D3 class.

The Slot Shop emptied rather quickly after the race and subsequent acrimony. Right after Rocky and gloomy Mike left, in walks Don Dimmick, my high school slot racing chum. He had his D3 all ready to test. And so I got my D3 out and we ran together for a spell. His car is very cleanly put together, as was to be expected. He was starting to dial into the braking points and to fall off less. In no time, at this rate, he will be competing in the dicing on fairly even terms. But the actual races are a whole 'nuther matter, as I well know! That will take rather longer for him to get used to again, if my experience is any gauge.

5Jun11

In the afternoon I left to go drive "Indy" cars at The Slot Shop. Rocky showed up right after I walked through the door. He brought three cars to my one. But various things plagued each of his cars; the Dynamic ,that is the "sister" to my own Indy car, had a bad gear mesh, then the motor lead broke, twice, and the motor got loose; we fixed all those things and for a while that car went great guns and Mike Kelly and I diced, with me having a slight edge because my car was better. Of the other two cars Rocky brought, one fried its old motor rather quickly, and the other car's motor required breaking in before it started to get any kind of speed up. Before the evening was done, the Dynamic's G.E. motor also fried: I think the bad gear mesh had caused it to overheat and Mike had driven it to "death". Oh WELL! The "anti-mechanic" (as Rocky refers to Mike) killed another car, but it wasn't his fault. It was fun while it lasted, though.

Friday I went early to the track to change a pinion gear on my old "wire" car (I made this chassis back in 1970, and it was the car I won my first "pro" race with at The Slot Spot; which was located across State Street from the west entrance to Murray park). It was geared too low, and I took the eleven tooth pinion off and put a thirteen tooth on. The car is noticeably quicker now but doesn't have very good brakes: however it coasts very nicely and swiftly into the turns, so it is a good quick car - probably a middle of the pack car, though, if I run it against flexis with 16Ds. With its "Falcon 7" motor (the same as the D3 retro in-lines use), it is a legal D3 retro angle-winder; but I already know that Charlie Nelson's THREE retro angle-winders are faster than mine. So what.

Almost nobody came into The Slot Shop all afternoon. And by the time I left, only Mike Kelly and Rocky and a guy named Kerstin had showed up (aside from the usual trio of kids that come on Friday evenings with their pa and grandpa, but both pa and grandpa were absent this week). Rocky had not brought any of his stuff. And when I asked about that he said, "Real life intervened, again." And I got no more out of him than that. We talked instead of testing cars and dicing. I do hope that the lack of racers Friday isn't a sign of things to come this summer! I remember that back in the early 70's summer time took a rather heavy toll on slot car race attendance.

Saturday I did not race because the scheduled race was stock car bodies. But next week is a "vintage body, any 16D, flexi" race: I will use the same car that I drove with Luke in the 2 hour enduro a couple months ago, except that now it has a high quality motor. The week after that is another icky body race with trucks or stockers again. But the 25th is a three-race-day; in the morning is a 1/32nd scale race, which I won't attend. But the next two races are for D3 in-lines and "open" cars; the steel beastie will return in that last event.

13Jun11

On Friday I got to the track a tiny bit late and barely caught Rocky; he was about to leave because I hadn't showed up. We drove cars a bit, and he was very feckless, packed up his stuff and said, "Well now I remember what I didn't like about that car. I came to get Mike's cars the way he wants them and he isn't here. So I guess I'll go."

"He sometimes comes late, why don't you give him a few more minutes?" I said. Rocky hung around for maybe ten more minutes then left.

And not five minutes later in walks Mike Kelly. He was miffed that Rocky was gone.

"He usually stays until six or seven o'clock," Mike said.

I could only shrug. Mike then left and I was virtually by myself for most of half an hour, then in walks Don Dimmick. We played with the D3 cars together for a bit. Another guy named Chris, who lives in Heber (that's quite a drive to get to a slot car track!), was testing his car for tomorrow's race. My D3 was faster than his flexi so I don't think that he's going to be very competitive. Dimmick would fall out rather often because I could out-break him and pull him into the turns.

"You didn't used to be able to do that to me," he said with a little smile.

"I've been practicing for a whole year, and you've been back for, what, two weeks? I had better have something on you for a while yet," I said.

Dimmick raced in the NASCAR race last Saturday. He said he finished fifth out of seven, only because two guys broke. The winner beat him by 80 laps. Yeah, that's a lot. But, as I said, "Heck, just enter the races because you enjoy racing. Getting faster is what will happen, until you are close enough to win, like I did a few weeks ago, finally."

Saturday's race was TOO SHORT!!! Donnie (Don Jr, son of the proprietor) set the race computer for 3 minute heats - why? I have no idea. But when I objected, I heard several guys say, "Five minute heats are too loooonngg". Whiners. We travel to the track from as far away as Heber city, and a 24 minute race is better than a 40 minute race? Less time having fun is better than more time having fun? How is that possible? Luke said, "I have places to be. Three minute heats are long enough." I bit my tongue, but my retort would have gone something like this: "An extra SIXTEEN MINUTES puts you in a bind? Then you ought to put more time between things you plan to do." That added 16 minutes is what makes the racing time feel like more than the sitting time between heats.

Jason grinned at me and said, "Where I came from we did two minute heats and ninety seconds between heats. The owner wouldn't bend that ninety seconds for anybody, and if you weren't ready, then too bad for you." (Two minute heats? Inconceivable.) "We also had so many racers that we had to limit it to twenty per race, and we had qualifying trials to pick the fields."

Well, I guess if you have ONE track (and we do), and you have a bunch of entrants (and sometimes we have had twenty), and you're going to accommodate all of them somehow, you've got to shorten up the heats. But I will never like it. And I will holler for 40 minute races as a minimum whenever we have 16 or less cars. I asked Don afterward if this return to three minute heats was going to be "business as usual from now on". And he said, "No. I don't know why Donnie set it up that way." So maybe I'll get my way after all, at least most of the time.

Anyway, my flexi's new motor ran very well and I had a fairly clean race: I only fell out twice on my own and six times getting nerfed and collected in accidents. But Mike Kelly and Steve Lovingood (father of "Crash Carter", who wasn't there today because he chose a movie with his mom instead, in an air conditioned theater after a morning of baseball practice) got into just a tad less trouble than I did: Steve won with 325 laps; Mike was second with 324; I was third with 323; and Rocky was fourth with 310: he's consistently doing about what he was a few months ago, when I couldn't seem to break 300 laps, but I am now quicker and cleaner than I was back then. This race was 24 laps faster for me than my previous best in 24 minutes. There were eleven entrants. Jeff probably would have won, since his car was the quickest, but he got tangled and also had some minor car trouble.

After the race, I was dicing with him, with my slowest car (my old wire chassis from 1970 with the tired Falcon 7 motor), and he tried to pass me on the outside on the bank and I put him in the wall. "Dang! I did it again!" was all he said. (Maybe that was what happened to him in the race.) He put his car away and departed. I felt chagrined. Putting anyone in the wall, even when it's their own fault, is disagreeable.

19Jun11

Friday was normal, which is to say unremarkable. The dicing at the slot car track was satisfying. Rocky, Mike Kelly and I stayed with it for well over an hour straight. Mike and I were pretty even. When we traded cars we had about the same advantage over each other with the faster car. Rocky was really close to how fast Mike and I were driving. But then all at once his concentration went away. He excused himself by explaining that he was thinking about the work he was going to do on the cars when he got home.

When I got back home I worked on my wire car, the oldest I have that I built, back in 1970, as I've said before. It had the tired Falcon 7 motor in it (an experiment I was pleased with - I plan to put a fresh Falcon 7 in it someday); I took the Falcon out and put back the Group 15 motor that I had in it before, sitting in my box for the last ten or so years.

4Jul11

I worked on my steel beastie this afternoon and got everything back into running order (at least I can't think of any reason why it shouldn't work as well as ever): I bought half a dozen bronze spur gears from Don yesterday on my way to Rocky's house. Don was very accommodating to find them for me and sell them for a bargain, only $30 for the six of them, which is only a fraction of what they went for back in the day. I should be set for a good while. IF we have a track to play on, that is: Don said his wife might get cut from her job, and he's having great difficulties getting enough jobs (he lays stonework and builds fireplaces). If things don't pick up he might have to close the shop altogether. I don't even have to say this, but that would suck.

I then drove to the slot car track. Rocky was just getting out of his van as I flipped a "U" turn and pulled up behind him. "Nobody's here," he said. Within a couple of minutes, Mike Kelly pulled up behind my van. We stood in the shade of the building and talked for over half an hour. During that time, Scott (another racer) drove up and we chatted then he went away. We continued for a while yet; then Charlie came walking around the corner. He told us that Don was busy on a stone work job (in Park city, I seem to recall); anyway, the short of it was that the job was taking far longer than he had expected. Donnie was nowhere to be seen, because he was at a bar getting drunk (he must be mad at his dad again, and used closing up the shop and disappearing to get back at him, something like that). Charlie had keys to the shop, because he had been making Don's other warehouse across the street available to the M.R.S. guys, to store their excess merchandise and a 1/32 scale slot car track in while they move to a new (much smaller) location. Charlie's arrival was serendipity to me; as all I wanted was just five minutes to test the steel beastie and make sure everything is ready to go. I got in over half an hour of track time in fact. And during it, Don Dimmick showed up for a few minutes and we diced a bit. And Charlie tested a few cars that he is going to race in Cali next weekend. Rocky did not bring in his box until just before we left, and I drove one of his D3 cars for a very few laps. He didn't hook up and drive at all. That was it. Mike Kelly just left silently, not wanting to put Charlie out by getting started and then keeping Charlie pinned to the shop while we indulged ourselves.

17Jul11

The afternoon of racing was very checkered enjoyment-wise. First of all, I bought an I-32 for $35, ready to run, and it did okay for me. I finished the 30 minute race with 363 laps, tying with a guy named John, but he was ahead of me by most of that lap, so he took 5th place and I got 6th. (the winner, Brad, had 401) Then in the "open" race, my steel beastie blew the pinion gear in the sixth heat. I do not recall touching the pinion gear since 1978, so I guess that solder joint was a little bit old! Anyway, I went and grabbed my 40 year-old wire car, again, and finished the race 30 laps behind first place (Steve, again, with 448); I tied with Don the track proprietor: and he was ahead of me! I don't seem to get the breaks lately (although a few months back, when I tied twice with Rocky, I was in front of him, so I am really just grousing over the odds being completely even up to this point). And what's with TWO ties in one day anyway? Over all it was a somewhat dirty race with lots of people off in front of me; but - and this is the important thing - I did not crash into anybody! My racing "radar" was fully functional, which means that my cars did not take a beating. Until the steel beastie broke down, I was dicing with a lot of guys battling it out for the lead positions. I probably would have finished 3rd or a very close 4th the way I was going, a few laps down from Steve. Jason, whose car was really fast, was not able to stay on, even though he turned the fastest single lap times of practically every heat: until he tried to pass me on the bank and I put him in the wall and broke his car. His fault, we were both okay with that. Then I tapped his replacement car into the wall a tad later; reminding him "gently" NOT to pass on the bank. Rocky was slow today. And Mike's fast car broke before the race even started. He drove the last two heats with Rocky's car and we were even-steven speed-wise. But altogether it was a rather unsatisfactory racing day for all three of us.

24Jul11

On Friday I stayed at the slot car track till closing, late, as it turned out; and during the time I put together a "new" car for the race on Saturday. Usually this does not work out: a car "thrown together" nearly always has a bad habit or two that require working out through testing. But I had none of that occur. The chassis was an old one from 1985 that has sat in my box all these years. The motor and other hardware, including a pre-painted body (the first pre-painted body I've ever bought!), I got on location and assembled at the workbench. Then I took the car to the track and found it very drivable; well, until the motor threw a wind and fried - a glorious rooster tail of smoke halfway around the track and the final denouement in the bowl. Don replaced the stupid motor with a fresh one which worked just dandy. On Saturday, I took my old "Eagle" F-1 car (the one featured in the "Race Car Driver" video I put up on my blog and YouTube last September) back into a real race for the first time in forty years. "We" finished 3rd (after the handicap was figured in - in the actual race everyone was faster than "Eagle", even Mike Kelly's even older '66 Ferrari F-1); Mike won the race, Don finished second. In the second race (the one I had built the new car for), I finished 3rd again; Steve won again - he's winning quite a lot lately, and does so by remaining calm and staying out of trouble: I coulda-woulda won, since I was slightly faster than Steve, but instead I got flustered in the middle of the race and my concentration suffered. As it was, I ended up 13 laps down and 13 ahead of Rocky (Mike did not enter the second race because he was unhappy with the condition of Rocky's cars). There were ten entrants in each race, which is pretty good for high summer!

1Aug11

Saturday's two races were both satisfying fun. Neither of my cars got busted. I stayed out of trouble as much as can be expected when caution is my priority; in other words, I did a good job staying aware of what was happening in front of me.

The first race was D3 in-lines; nine entrants; six lanes, five minutes each, or a 30 minute race. I don't have one of the faster cars, so I was gratified to finish third (that made three "third place" finishes in a row), and ONE lap ahead of Don who beat me in the tie last time. The winner was Rick (he of the dangerous, car-stopping gut, heheh), with 405 laps; Kerstin was second with 396, and I had 380: so there was quite a spread out finish in that one. Our old chum, Don Dimmick, had a faster car than mine, and several times he and I were even-steven; he's getting "it" back again, as I knew he would. He finished fifth, his best so far. (A Bday party prevented him from entering the second race.)

The second race used all eight lanes, so a 40 minute (full-length) race, with Vintage bodies and "any 16D". I ran my flexi, which is specifically the car I have for that class; the same one that had hit the floor and popped the magnets loose last time. Coincidentally, I started on Red, as last time. But this race I ran all eight heats back to back without trouble, finishing on White with a 72. Not bad! But Mike Kelly's last heat, on Red, turned a 74! That was the record heat for the race. With these cars that is a very, very fast heat. He did not fall out, and had an empty White lane next to him (the driver had dropped out); ideal conditions for a five minute charge at 9/10ths to 10/10ths. (The very fastest five minute heat on that track to date is a 75.) Anyway, twelve of us entered and eleven raced (John for some reason did not stick around after getting entered). Brad won with 558; Mike Kelly had 556; Steve was third with 553; I was fourth with 546; and Kerstin was fifth with 541. That is what slot car racing is like at its best; all the top finishers are competing most of the race for first place; each of us won heats; and the difference isn't driving and cars: it's the little accumulations of attrition - getting held up by "incidents" - that separate the finishing places. Mike, though he did not win, was completely happy with his race: he had broken out of his recent bad luck (cars breaking down, and him getting into more than the usual share of "incidents"): so he had three victories: he was close enough to first place to know for certain that it could just as easily have gone to him instead; he beat his invisible gremlins; and he had fun. Rocky, on the other hand, went through THREE cars in the D3 race, and had his 16D just drop dead in the second race, one heat from the finish; otherwise, he too had been a contender and was driving quite well (although I was faster than him, and Mike just a crack faster than me).

8Aug11

On Friday's slot car practice, I turned a 3.73 second lap time with the steel beastie! On Red no less. The outside and inside lane (Black) are considered the most challenging to drive. But my till-now fastest times have been on Black (3.85). The 3.73 is very impressive since the car is c. 33 years old and does not have a "high downforce" (HD) body, but instead a scale ("vintage") body. Mike Kelly was dicing with me and that feat made him very quiet. I also turned a 3.80 on Black later. The track got cleaned a couple of weeks ago. And some cars got hurt by the new surface and some got benefited. The only car of mine that actually, noticeably, improved is the steel beastie.

On Saturday morning, Lens Crafters called and said my glasses were ready. That was quick! On my way to the race I stopped in and picked them up. Then I wondered if I'd experience getting used to them during the race and how would that go? As soon as I arrived at the slot car track, I put my car on and started practicing. Very soon I was used to the new spectacles.

The "open" race was fun, funny and frustrating. There were eleven entrants. The issue of heat length came up. And for some reason Don (the proprietor) put it to a vote(?). He voted for five minute heats, but less than half of us wanted five minutes heats, preferring four minute heats instead: all manner of silly reasons were advanced: the main one being variants of, "I have other places to be." EIGHT minutes extra is going to make a difference? EIGHT extra minutes is going to make someone late? Puh-LEEZ!

So, since the race protocol is now decided by a democracy, I am guessing that if I don't advocate strongly for alternating heat lengths, the namby-pamby whiners are going to vote to make heats shorter and shorter, until Don either wises up or we are running for two minutes per heat. I won't waste my time. Three minute heats are too short by half as it is. But four minute heats are no permanent compromise in my estimation.

Anyway, the race got off to a good start with nobody crashing and I almost won the first lap. Then I took the lead and won the first heat. Jason (he of the "four minute heats" group) and his blisteringly quick car, then took the lead. Nevertheless I won a couple heats before I got to Red in my second-to-last heat and broke off my right pickup braid clip in a minor accident. I was out with just one more heat to go. Crap!

The funny thing was, Jason finished all his heats and then let Donnie drive his car, just because; and within a couple minutes the pinion gear spun loose! If we had had five minute heats, Jason would have DNFed ("did not finish") too, instead of winning (he almost never finishes his races for one reason or another). As it was, only five out of the eleven racers finished with their original cars. That is called attrition. (Compare that, ironically, with our two-hour enduro half a year ago, where ALL nine cars finished.) Included in the DNF category was Mike Kelly and Charlie Nelson and Don and Donnie and a kid named Christian, who had to leave early and turned his car over to Kerstin (funny coincidence, that); and Kerstin broke down almost immediately, and finished the race with two or three of his own cars, just alternating for the heck of it. (Might as well get your money's worth!) I finished the race with my newest car - the "half-car" that I built two weeks ago and finished third with.

I bought the "fixin's" for a new slot car: a low, wide, F-1; a "Matra" (it's a 1967 or 68 body style, so really "vintage"): and before I went to bed I had the chassis well along to being finished.

14Aug11

On Friday, I did the usual routine of Internet time, sustaining life, and exercise. Then I took Amy to work on my way to the slot car track. I was the only customer until Rocky showed up. Then Kerstin came in, then Mike Kelly. Then Rocky left, rather early. But Mike stuck around to talk and reminisce. I let him drive my new F-1 car and he got distracted while talking and put it over the wall! No harm done, thankfully. (I was very calm.) Don Dimmick came in and the three of us talked about people we knew in high school. Some details were quite revealing to me, and to Mike. Don has some stories, alright. I helped him get his NASCAR ready for Saturday's race; it was not handling well at all and was bumpy. I took a close look at it and opined that the chassis was bent, here and there. He tweaked everything back into line and voila! it was like a new car again.

Saturday's two races continued to frustrate me even more. We had nine entrants in the NASCAR race, and eight in the D3 race. I entered the NASCAR with a borrowed car from Rick. It wasn't too bad. I finished 5th just behind fourth place. On Red I turned a 4.1something, which was the high for that heat, and I only missed winning that heat by half a lap because I fell out once in the bowl and Don (the proprietor) got by me. The heats were four minutes long, just because Don took a vote, AGAIN?! But it made no sense: with only nine racers we only ran six of the eight lanes, i.e. six heats, so a short 24 minute race, just like in the bad/stoopid old days of eight 3 minute heats. Then, THEN, it got even stoopider: with only eight drivers for the D3 race, we only ran FIVE lanes/heats, and the total race length was now down to 20 minutes?! What's with these guys? Why do they think that driving for five minutes at a time is so bad? And why would anyone who puts $80 into a car, and hours of prep, and half an hour or more commuting to get to the track, and paying out the same $5 entry fee, think it's more fun and worthwhile by having shorter and shorter races?? At some point, I am going to call it quits unless or until we get enough drivers to run all eight lanes again. I've got to have it out with Don over this, this week, before the F-1 race this coming Saturday. Oh, yeah; I finished fifth in the D3 race too, aced out of fourth place by Rocky by two laps - but he wasn't driving one of his own cars, but instead a borrowed car of Kerstin's. Kerstin won the race by one lap over Charlie Nelson. (It was funny that Kerstin's car and the one he loaned to Rocky were identical Ti-22's, both painted gold; when they were next to each other, Rocky and Kerstin found themselves driving the other's car for brief moments; but without mishap, thankfully.) The total separation between first and eighth place was only 34 laps (which would equate to 68 in a "real" race of forty minutes duration). So my high school chum, Don Dimmick is getting faster. While he stays on he's now very quick (again), but he still falls out too much. That will get better soon at this rate. His car was faster than mine. But then, everyone's cars were faster than mine. I stayed in and had a pretty clean race over all.

Mike Kelly wasn't there; opting to attend our class reunion instead (at least Don Dimmick and I have our priorities in the right place, heheh).

29Aug11

Today's races were okeedokee. The first was a "vintage, any 16D", with 13 entrants (Steve and "Crash Carter" are back); and that was sans Mike Kelly, who was working. I finished 16 laps behind Steve; Brad took second one lap behind Steve; Charlie was third; and Rocky was fourth, winning the tie with me. (win some lose some): we had 410 laps. The second race was smaller, but it could have been one racer bigger: Jim, setting up the heats on the 'puter, left Scott out. We didn't know this till the race was over and he informed us that he had intended to race too; not just corner marshal out of the kindness of his heart: but he had been waiting to come on till he finally realized that he wasn't in the race at all. Oh well! So we had eight entrants instead of nine. It was an IROC, slot car style ("international race of champions", in the real world). Each lane had its assigned and color-coded car. But for some reason Jim left out Black, so the race was only seven heats and 28 minutes long. (man! that bugs me) Each of us raced all seven cars. (should have been all eight, poop) Anyway, I am a champ, alright. Rick and I tied for first place with 363 laps - and of course, since I won a race last week, I lost this tie too. (My philosophy when I don't win, and I coulda, is: "Well, it is time for somebody else to have a turn at winning since I won a little while ago".) Charlie and Jason had 360; and now I can't remember whose car was 12 feet ahead, but I think it was Jason's. There were only six laps between first and sixth place. That is very close racing. If Rick had fallen out one more time, or I had one time less, I would have won. And that's the way it goes.

Don (the proprietor) was not there today. And Donnie must not have taken his meds this morning, because he was acting outrageous; teasing, threatening to do silly things just to bug us. Man, he is 35, after all. His daddy will hear about this, I don't doubt. Anyway, Don has been tearing out walls in his shop all week, to make room for the M.R.S. track (since they sold it to him when they went out of business). He said he'll have it up in a month. We'll see. The resulting dust has made a mess of the track surface all week long. Yesterday, Rocky and I glued the track in order to get it sticky enough to practice on. And this morning, Jason and company cleaned and sprayed it again. This will be an ongoing battle all through September, I am thinking. But the end result will be TWO tracks. That will certainly look cool and will increase the level of interest in racing, as it increases the variety of racing conditions we get to experience.

11Sep11

Wednesday morning (on c. four hours of actual, though still somewhat light, sleep): Yesterday afternoon I left early in order to stop by the slot car track to get parts for yet a another car. :)

Early on, I called Rocky's house from the track phone (which I have begun to make a habit of doing lately). I was a bit surprised when his gravelly voice said, "Hello." I was anticipating him being either in the hospital or dead. As last Tuesday, he had looked, acted and sounded "wobbly"; and since he did not show up for Friday practice or Saturday races; and since a check on The Miniatures Page showed that his last visit was on Friday, I was beginning to get really worried. But I don't want to hover. He has three sons all living nearby. So I had decided to call from the slot car track before going up.

If he didn't answer, I was going to go knock on his door (if his car was in the driveway, that is); if that didn't summon him, I was going to try his door: if I could get in, I was going to go looking for him. If I found him, I was going to call the police, because he'd likely as not be dead (and I would wonder why I, rather than one of his boys, found him first). If I couldn't get in, I was going to go to the Kensington Ave house where his oldest son, John, lives with his wife. And I would ask what had happened to his dad; if I couldn't raise anybody there, I was going to leave a post-it note requesting John to either email or call me and tell me what is going on.

BUT, instead, Rocky's ragged voice answered on the third or fourth ring. I asked him how he was feeling: because his absence last week, and his lack of presence on the Net, made me concerned.

"I have blood poisoning," he said.

I had forgotten about the cut wrist he had been nursing last week: all I remembered was the "sour stomach"! Now I recalled that he had showed me this not-so-serious looking, yet weepy, set of cat scratches on his wrist. He'd gotten in between a couple of angry cats! But he told me that on a "hike" (when? with who? that Mormon girlfriend? I didn't ask any questions) he had gotten something in the wound, and thus the infection.

I asked him if he's feeling any better; he said:

"Yes, better than I have been, but not as well as last Tuesday. I'm going in tomorrow for antibiotics"

"I assume that you won't be leaving the house tonight," I said.

"That is correct."

"I don't want people around when I am feeling sick," I said; "So I will assume the same for you, unless you say otherwise."

"I sleep a lot," he said tersely.

"Okay, I will leave you to it, then," I concluded. He rang off.

On Friday, at the slot car track, Jason and Don had words, lots of angry ones. It turns out that while Don has been mostly absent from his establishment (with a sick, hospitalized wife and his regular construction job demands), Jason has overstepped his bounds and done some things around the shop that Don did not want: even some that he specifically told Jason not to do. Anyway, Jason has lots of ideas about how Don's shop can be run better. He implemented some of them. And Don mostly let it go, because despite Jason's inserting himself, the outcome has been mostly positive. Until Don took the assembled "as is" cars to the track and started to test drive them. "These are dogs," he practically snarled. "Why would anyone buy one of these, when for the same kind of money they can get brand new?" Etc. Jason tried to justify his creations, and criticized Don's opinion. Don got steamed. Don left to walk around the block and cool off. Jason collected his gear and said good bye to me. And that was that. Don returned and expressed apologies for the outburst to Charlie, Kirsten and me.

That feels as bad as family fighting, now that I know these guys this well and like all of them. :(

[Note: Later they made up; Don admitted that he had spoken in anger, and that Jason's idea of making "as-is" cars out of Don's wealth of used car parts is a good idea; and Jason apologized too.]

Saturday night now: I will describe the events of the day in order of occurrence, even though I have thoughts weighed down by news of my friend Rocky Russo.

Even though I do not have NASTRUCK or NASCAR slot cars, I entered both races with borrowed cars; ones Don built for himself and Donnie. I won the NASTRUCK race: 424 laps to Charlie's 417 and Rick's 398; there were seven of us. In the NASCAR race there were eight of us. I was one lap down from Steve going into the last heat. But his "secret weapon", Crash Carter (his son), took me out three times and generally got in my way. While I was dicing with Steve without interruption, we were pretty even. I might have been just a tad quicker; but not enough, I think, to catch him in four minutes, and make up that lap (all other factors being considered equal); CC made sure that I wouldn't even have a chance to do that. I was okay with it. Carter is a good kid, and I didn't really care how the race went, since I was up there fighting for the win; that's good enough for me. And now I win sometimes. This time, Steve won with 427, I had 422 (with plus one or plus two for stopping to put people back on the straightaway), and Luke had 421; Charlie was fourth with 401. Donnie opined that if I had not had Crash Carter to contend with that I would have won; he was convinced that CC cost me no less than five laps all told.

After the races, I worked on my new car for a little over an hour. I had put in a new motor last night, because yesterday evening the one I built the car with FRIED! Yep, yet another complete meltdown. It just happens when it does. One minute everything is going great guns; the next, the car slows down, you pick it up and it's HOT. You look for anything, usually see nothing, put it back on the track when it cools down a bit: and it goes great guns again for a few laps, till it gets hot, then it slows again. Repeating this several times only proves that something internal is going very wrong. Suddenly, between one slow lap and the next, WHOOSH! out comes the smoke, and half a lap later the car crawls to a halt and smoke emerges from all the wheel wells and up through the interior, etc. This motor fried so thoroughly that I could hardly turn it; the epoxy had melted and coated the inside of the magnets. I bought a new armature to replace the melted down one; this is cheaper than replacing the whole motor, and if I do my "blueprinting" work right it should be a very quick motor indeed. It took me the better part of fifteen minutes to get the guck off the magnets. Maybe I won't let the next one fry quite so long or so thoroughly! But then I won't get to enjoy the pretty smoke. :)

After I left the track I drove up to Rocky's house, intent on carrying out my Tuesday resolution: because since talking with him briefly at that time, I nor anyone else have been able to raise him by phone. His van was in the driveway and his door was locked. So I went over to the Kensington Ave place, and all three of his sons and two daughters-in-law were there. David, the youngest son, gave me the bad news: as bad as this kind of news can get: Rocky is now missing his right arm above the elbow, and he's not "out of the woods" yet. Monday night, his girlfriend (her name is Gail, I found out tonight) did not like the way Rocky looked, and she strongly recommended that he go to the hospital right away. Being the stubborn cuss, he said "No". But she couldn't take that for an answer, and on Tuesday night she dropped by his place and immediately called 911. They took him up to the UofU hospital and did exploratory surgery, and determined that infection had spread very far and very deep. On Thursday they had stabilized him enough to operate: this delay was necessary because his heart was about to give out, and his kidneys had already. After taking his hand off above the wrist, they discovered that the elbow was also thoroughly compromised by the infection, so to be absolutely safe, they took his arm off above the elbow.

His present condition is: as of this morning, he was cognizant enough to speak to his family and knows what has happened. His kidneys appear to be out of danger. And his heart, although very stressed, looks as if it will continue to do its job: they discovered that it only pumps c. 25% of normal capacity, a condition that he has apparently had for some time. But his heart, instead of quitting (as most often happens in these cases), has compensated by growing bigger?! (David said, "He has a Grinch's heart, heheh.") Sounds odd but encouraging, if survival is what you want. I am conflicted over that question.

I can't begin to describe emotions that I don't even fully realize. I am numb, alternately close to tears and very, very angry. I hate seeing people that I care for taken away from me a piece at a time! Selfish reaction? So what. It can only be that much more horrible for them. I'm angry at Rocky for being such a stubborn, arrogant ass: what was he thinking? He's been down this road before and lost his leg over it. And I am mad at myself for letting him talk me into believing that he "knows the symptoms" of this or that health threat. If I could go back in time, I would remonstrate with him over the cat scratches, and not taking any chances. But he was certain that they were no big deal, yet, and he was keeping close tabs on his own condition. Heh, to hell with even that: David said his dad was severely dehydrated when he got checked into the hospital: he wasn't even drinking properly the whole time!

What will Rocky do? If he digs in and resolves to keep on living, then he will most likely overcome this amputation as much as possible by finding out the full extent of what he can do. But how would he be able to build slot cars, or model airplanes anymore? I just can't see it. About all we could do then is watch movies together and talk. I can see him still driving: with one of those steering wheel knobs.

And he could of course drive slot cars easily enough. But what pleasure is there in driving cars that you don't ever build? Mike Kelly does it, of course, but he's never been a builder. Rocky is a gear head; building is his chief pleasure. The building is far more enjoyable for me at this point than it ever was when I was younger: enough so that if I could not build my own cars I would not enjoy the hobby for the driving-only part. I only enjoy driving other people's cars because I know that soon enough I'll be able to enter the next race with my own cars: and by participating in the races that I don't really care for that much (as today), I do still enjoy the competition for its intrinsic fun: but as I said, only because I will get to use my own cars next time: I support the other classes because that helps slot car racing thrive. Would Rocky even care much or at all after this latest catastrophe? I can't imagine myself even wanting to try if that happened to me....

18Sep11

All week I put off going to see Rocky. I heard that he was disoriented, confused, crabby, not helped or comforted by visitors, etc. All of this played upon my dread.

Saturday morning: I saw Rocky last night. He's got a warm, firm left-handed grip: I know, because I offered my hand in parting and he took it. He's eating solid food and they removed the feeding tube Monday or Tuesday at his request. He said that his kidneys are working fine. I think he'll pull through physically, if he wants to. That's the part I am unsure about: if he will want to live with his arm gone. I know I wouldn't; but given enough time, I might change my mind, at least somewhat. Right now, though, Rocky is just disoriented and very blown away by all of this. My loquacious, even garrulous friend is virtually silenced. Compounded grief, that's what it is. Overkill tribulation, that's what it is. It's too much on top of everything else he's gone through. I am feeling angry again, writing this. But I didn't let it show tonight. I intend to see him again soon. Maybe tomorrow after the slot car races are over.

Our friend, Mike Kelly, went up to the hospital with me tonight. He said, "I don't know what to say."

And Rocky said, "What? I can't hear you. I have a sinus infection."

Mike said it again louder, and Rocky said: "I came that close to dying." He held his thumb and index finger about a half inch apart. We were there less than ten minutes and I saw his eyes start to roll, as he drifted away. It was time to go.

Rocky said his cat attacked him. He didn't get in between two fighting cats. His most mild-mannered cat ("the striped one" – _Hawkins_ ), just attacked him for no apparent reason.

So Rocky has been brought within a _skosh_ of Death, by cat. The irony of this is inexpressible.

As long as I have known Rocky (over 42 years), there have always been cats. He is the cat authority in my experience. His stories about cats are too numerous to remember. Most weeks when I have gone over to his house, he has had some cat anecdote to tell; many of them are stories about cats being annoying or aggravating; many of them are stories showing his fondness and respect for cats.

These four cats ( _Princess, Bolo, Drake, Hawkins_ ), have lived 24/7 inside the house their whole lives with Rocky. Princess and Bolo he picked up at the animal shelter when he and his wife moved into the house about ten years ago. Drake and Hawkins are brothers who arrived maybe three years ago as little kittens. None of the three males are fixed. And they are the most feral inside cats I have ever seen.

I don't know if _Hawkins_ just was in a "bad mood" or got sick or what: but I simply can't picture him "attacking" Rocky.

This whole developing chapter is surreal to me....

Also, Rocky is now in the "Burn Trauma" ICU, fourth floor, room 25, of the University of Utah hospital.

Saturday night:

Because we got started late, the first race (the "M.R.S. class"?) was cut to three minute heats; or a _stoopidly_ short race of 24 minutes. Crud. What logic or rationality is there in assuming that all of this will take a significantly shorter amount of time, by trimming eight measly minutes from the race time itself? The key to shorter races is to get the time in between heats down to two or two and a half minutes; sometimes the time between is almost ten minutes for one cause or another. Man! Frustrating!

Anyway, the first race was with my new car; the red Ferrari 612 with the orange stripes. There were seven of us, and Charlie won with 325 laps; Wolf was sixth with 313. So you can see that the whole thing was fairly close. I finished fourth with 316 and Jason was fifth with 314. Donnie got another third place with 319, and Rick was second with 320. It was a good race, other than the shortness of it all. (Brad was DQed because he used more than one car, otherwise he tied with me, but I would have won the tie.)

A Formula One / Indy mixed class was our second race. There would have been eight of us; but Jason had to pull out because he had to be somewhere by 5 o'clock. Rick had to go too, but he let Wolf use his car. We had a couple of wide (that is to say modern) cars that are angle-winder chassis. And other than Mike Kelly's ancient Ferrari (a 1966 type like in the movie _Grand Prix_ ), the other four cars were all built for the class. After the first heat I was in first place. But Wolf's borrowed car didn't even complete a lap: something stopped working. But he managed to fix it and so we restarted the race for him. We got two heats into it and the darned 'puter program locked up. I was in first place again; so you could say that I "won" the two sprint races before the full-length (32 minute) race. Mike's car, being slower, got the usual handicap: this time based on average fastest lap times, plus a comparison of average laps for all the heats. It was more complicated than just taking the theoretical "perfect heat" as the basis for the handicap. Don said that 80% of that ought to apply, not the whole difference. Mike demurred, but could not really offer a rational objection to the 80%. Either way, he got c. 44 laps added on to his actual total of 353. The final results were: Moi 409; Charlie 405; Mike 397; Wolf 354. The other three drivers (Don, Donnie and John) used more than one car apiece; and John even hauled out a sports car and an I-32 at one point, just because: I twitted him by saying, "Hey John, don't you know that the _pace car_ is supposed to go into the pits after the race starts?" My race was very clean; my best yet. I fell off so few times that I had five or six perfect heats. (I am surprised how I could win last time with 387 and this time with 409; I did turn several 52 heat laps, and must have just really been flying: I know that I tied Kerstin's fastest lap record of 4.36, once; but so did Charlie, once.) Mike Kelly was off a lot more than that; his actual total was 11 less than last time (he had 364, in the last F-1 race a month ago); so the 80% of "perfect heat" handicap would reflect this accurately: if we had given him his way, he would have beat Charlie and only missed tying with me by one lap, because he would have had 55 laps added onto his 353 actual laps: that would certainly not have reflected driving quality, as Charlie was also having a very clean race until the last three heats, when he choked and I reeled him in, then passed him and won ("I tend to hit nap o'clock this time of the day", he said).

After the races, I went up to the UofU hospital to see Rocky:

He is better than he was yesterday. I had a long conversation with him. The first thing I asked was: "Are you glad you didn't die?"

He said that he values our friendship too much to assume that he should not be here. "Why would I give that up? God knows what I cannot know. I am here. To question why isn't something I am smart enough to do." (I wish I could remember exactly how he said it, but that's the gist.)

He surprised me by reminiscing a bit about my late father, and how he always admired him. I already knew this, but to have Rocky expressing gratitude for having known my father was a welcome surprise and a blessing to me. The visit was everything that last night's attempt was not.

In short: he's already talking about how he's thinking of his work bench, projects and how he could attach tools he has to it so that he could work. My anger, my grieving, has been greatly diminished by Rocky's positive, proactive attitude. He's a survivor. And an inspiration to me.

He said that the hospital is preparing to move him to a therapy clinic of some sort in the next couple of days.

Hawkins is now an outside feral cat. But that is too late!

25Sep11

I saw Rocky last night, at the Federal Heights Rehabilitation Center; where he's been since being moved Sunday night. It's better than the hospital. But he's still (almost irrationally) _angsting_ to come home; and can't get to sleep for more than c. half-hour snippets at a time.

We three (Mike Kelly was there too) made an unfortunate miscalculation. Rocky said: "I haven't been beyond that door yet. Is there anything worth seeing out there?"

And Mike Kelly said: "Do you want to check it out?"

Rocky said: "Sure, why not. Don't have anything better to do."

So Mike Kelly opened the wheelchair, and we held it really close to the bed, while Rocky stood (he had his prosthesis on), turned and sat down heavily in it. Mike pushed him out into the hall, down to the soda machine; we got him a Coke. Then we went back to the dining room, where we talked for a while, until Rocky was nodding off almost as much as he was staying awake.

Back at his room, we three couldn't get him into bed. We tried both sides, and using the headboard as a grabbing point, all to no avail. Even then, I didn't realize how weak he was, or else I would have called for help from the staff. But I got this "brilliant" idea: I would help pull him out of the chair by his hand and forearm, and once he was standing, he could turn and sit on the bed. It ended badly. His knees did not extend to a standing position, and he ended up first on the edge of the bed, then slipping inexorably to the floor until he was kneeling. He was in GREAT pain. A man and woman from the staff finally arrived.

"So, what's happening here," one of them asked rhetorically.

"I got in over my head, again," Rocky said from the floor, his head bowed and eyes closed.

They put a strap around his chest and hauled him up with difficulty, and GREAT pain, until he was on the bed, finally. Mike and I left them to it, as Rocky required further assistance before he could finally get under the covers and hopefully to sleep.

Crap! If I had only known. Oh well.

His son John and his wife, Dija, came while Mike and I were talking outside Rocky's door. I said:

"We were talking earlier, and we all agree that Rocky should get to enjoy movie night next Tuesday in front of his own big screen and with his own DVD collection."

(I said that as fulfillment of a promise I had earlier made to Rocky, to pressure his boys into letting him come home as early as possible. He is of the opinion that they are not listening to him; nor do they understand how angry he is, to be kept at the rehab center instead of in his own rooms, etc. To listen to Rocky cogently and unemotionally explain it, he made it all sound reasonable. But after seeing how immobile he currently is, I had doubts.)

John replied: "Well, sure. As soon as he's mobile, he ought to come home. There isn't anything they are doing for him here that they can't do for him there."

So his boys want Dad to get home as soon as possible too. Rocky will realize that soon enough. Next time I see him (probably Friday evening), I will tell him what John said: by way of reinforcement, to encourage him to do all he can to cooperate with his body's need to recover, so that he can get strong enough to walk again without assistance, etc.

Saturday night: Rocky is home. His family got him out of the rehab center Wednesday. The staff was not doing a job that satisfied the Russos. So now the three boys and two wives are taking turns keeping an eye on Rocky and ministering to his constant care. Friday he watched a movie with his girlfriend. I came in on the last c. ten minutes, offered my few words of encouragement, introduced myself to Gail, then left. Rocky was looking very tired.

This afternoon, after the slot car races, I went up to Rocky's house to check on him. He was resting in his bedroom ("not really awake", said John, after looking in on him). I talked to John and Dija; they were acting positive and gave me encouraging answers to my questions about how Rocky is doing. He's starting to eat more, and he's getting lots of rest. Right now, the only thing I am concerned about is some sort of relapse or languishing state, where he doesn't improve or seems to get worse, etc. But the news tonight was counter to that.

The two races this afternoon were both good ones; no crap from the 'puter race program, and mainly efficient conduct, which kept the in-between-heats time down for the most part.

The first race had 13 entrants, including my old friends Wolf Detlef Scheering and Don Dimmick. If Wolf could have combined the last half of last week's "M.R.S. class" race, with the last half of this week's race, he would have had one _heckuva_ race! Don, on the other hand, languished amidst wreckage and many _deslottings_. While he was on the track he was quite fast; but he hasn't found his _groove_ yet.

Brad won the LMP race (that stands for "Le Mans Prototype", I think) with 437 laps; Charlie had 433, Steve 432, and Moi 418. Then there was quite another noticeable space between me and the next guy, who didn't even break 400. It was a race notable for its number of crashes - we've gotten used to several months of four, five and six cars on the track at a time; and having all eight lanes used threw some racers for a loop. Despite the clutter, I believe everyone but Wolf kept their original cars going. I managed to keep my "half car" out of any serious collisions, even though a prohibitively high number of people kept getting in front of me (thus my rather lackluster finishing total).

The second race was with our "I-32" cars; well, seven of us anyway: Luke ran a 1/32 scale steel chassis: which pissed Brad off, because he opined that the lighter cars corner faster. Probably. Anyway, Luke "won" with 423 laps (funny, he beat my LMP car, if they had been racing together, that is); I had 410 and Brad had 409: going into the last heat, Brad was one up on me; but he choked. He seemed pleased that I had beat him. Then I admitted that my motor was not the "legal" one:

"Oh Doug, you ran a _cheater_ motor? Then I won", he said.

"Fine with me," I said. "But your car is lighter than mine, even though I am not using a 16D."

"Not it's not, my car is a lot heavier than yours," he said.

We weighed them, and mine weighed c. 147 grams, his was under 100. So by his assertion, I should have beaten him BECAUSE I had a lighter car (running a lighter, smaller motor). But actually his car, being lighter, should have been cornering faster than mine.

Actually, Luke did have a slight edge; but his driving was also very, very good and he had a cleaner race. He was sure out-driving me and Brad. If Luke had been driving my car, and I had been driving his, I still think he would have won, or I would have only barely won. So when the vote came up, "Who thinks Luke won the race?", I voted, "yes." Brad of course voted, "no." But Luke got a majority of votes.

And I don't care. I won't use a heavy, big 16D in a 1/32 scale or I-32 car: back in the day, we didn't have a choice: the smaller motors had not been invented yet. Now we have these cute little spiff motors (all the Hawks and Falcons are small and light weight: notice that both my cars in these races used Hawk 6 motors: the "half car" shows how small this motor is; perfect for I-32 or 1/32 scale cars; although, as here, we use them in 1/24 scale cars that are light enough: most _flexis_ for instance, work very well with Falcons and Hawks; but my Steel Beastie probably would be sluggish with one, because the old style chassis is heavy, being thick spring steel and brass), and I am not going to change my Hawk 6 just to comply with some weird motor stipulation. Don (the proprietor) has some of these weird ideas for establishing classes. But we already have a small enough field of I-32 or 1/32 scale cars: this was about as big a race as we have gotten together for I-32s. I don't see why we need to break it down into several, separate motor classes: just run I-32s and let the drivers worry about the motors. And the only other class should be 1/32 Scale Open: any chassis or motor under a scale body. (sorry for the ramble, but tonight it felt therapeutic)

After the races, Jason started twitting me: "I think Doug Larsen is getting too competitive; he needs to have a Saturday where something breaks down, or he doesn't drive well." Charlie and a couple others joined in. It was their way of acknowledging that I have "arrived", and am now considered one of the guys to beat. That's what steady preparation, practice and consistency will do for you. Nothing flashy, just lots of practice and time (and money it has to be allowed) setting up your cars, etc. If you're any good at all, then the reward is, most of your races are battling for [ _podium_ ]. As you may not have noticed: I have been finishing in the [ _podium_ ] rather a lot lately ([ _podium_ ] is first through third place - or so Jason tells me; I had never heard the term until a couple of weeks ago)....

Aftermath and outcome:

Rocky's _high tide_ point was in fact that single evening at the rehab center when I managed to drop him to the floor! His conversation had been fulsome and interesting. He had shared the story of the "French arms dealer" who scared the crap out of him back in the 80s when Rocky was hired by the Feds to advise on surface to air missiles for the Taliban, then fighting the Russians in Afghanistan: Rocky had _dissed_ the man's merchandise as impractical (requiring too much training time and expense); only to be warned by those who had hired Rocky that he had just pissed off a psychopath. Rocky felt that if it came down to a gunfight he had a good chance; but what hope did he have of protecting his family, me, and his other friends? The psycho was known to take out entire families if he felt angry or threatened enough.

So in the hospital, Rocky had been pumped full of drugs that made him hallucinate the French arms dealer in his room: the man would just come right out of the wall and be as real as Mike and I were at that moment. It terrified Rocky, because in his drugged state he could not tell what was real. He finished by saying:

"Then things worked themselves out," and he paused for words, looking at the floor: "as they did. And time passed and then I got put into the hospital three times before this; and each time they put that shit into my system. They don't listen to me. They say, 'You are mistaken, sir, this drug for your heart condition does not cause hallucinations.' And I practically scream at them to not put it in but _they know better_ and go ahead, and this is the fourth damned time."

I knew then, that he was still keeping back information that could be classified. Right up to the end.

"Maybe the guy is dead," I said, referring to the arms dealer.

"It is to be hoped," Rocky said. "But that doesn't matter when he's in my room, talking to a customer, and I am lying in bed helpless, just waiting for him to look over and notice it's me."

So I was glad to learn that Rocky came home to his own rooms after only a few days at the rehab.

But it didn't help. In a week, when I saw him the following Tuesday, he had developed what sure as heck seemed like pneumonia to me. His mouth sagged open like a stroke victim, and his breathing was very bad. He hardly said two words all evening.

When I went back up that Saturday to check on him, John said that he was sleeping. He was better two days after I had seen him, and actually started to eat solid food in hopeful amounts. It seemed like a "miraculous" turnaround.

In a couple more weeks Rocky encouraged me with a description of his progress:

"On Saturday I walked around the house for about five minutes. Then on Sunday I walked out to the van and they drove me around town a little while. I walked into the house and sat down to a large Sunday dinner. Then I slept for a day and a half." He grinned. That meant that he had just woken up before I got there.

Everyone hoped that his rally was a sign of things to come. But he never regained the angry energy I had seen that evening at the rehab. I never did see him even once make a move to get out of his wheel chair.

We never again talked about interesting things. I tried several times to engage him with slot car news and stories. He would look at me over the top of his glasses and either not answer or only respond with monosyllables. It was most discouraging and I despaired of the outcome.

Each week I went up and we watched TV or a movie; Sterling Price missed a few times, and the last two weeks he was busy with other things. My family went down to Tucson to visit my oldest son and his family; his wife is battling ovarian cancer and was into the third month of chemo. I had not felt right about going; it was complicated. I dislike travel anyway. My daughter-in-law needed to not be a hostess or feel the slightest need to "be there" for guests. I did not miss them, yet, because we had just seen them in October. And I felt that visiting later, when she is _out of the woods_ , would be a better memory for everyone: so I stayed home by myself between Christmas and New Year's. And by doing that I saw Rocky one last time.

On that last Tuesday, I brought Rocky his Millie's chicken fried sandwich. He dropped it on the floor and cussed a blue streak. I cleaned up, and allowed that the FUBAR was worth at least that much phraseology. He was only the slightest bit amused. His fries and drink went largely untouched and he slept through the movie. John came back to the house and I prepared to leave. I paused before going out and said:

"Have you done anything with that speech recognition software yet?"

"No."

"I guess you have to have more of a lack, _of a lack_ , of interest," I said.

"Yes," he said with just the hint of a smile.

My family returned early Saturday evening. I went to bed and hardly noticed the fireworks celebrating the New Year. In the morning my first conscious thoughts were of Rocky. Before I got out of bed I said aloud: "Dear God, either fix him, or take him. Enough of this!" A few hours later, Dija called to tell us that Rocky had died that night of heart failure in his sleep.

His viewing was very informal and well attended by lots of his friends. He was dressed in one of his t-shirts: it was black and had, "Have Gun, Will Travel", on it. His one hand was draped across his tummy and looked to my imagination as if someone had come in ahead of us and taken his handgun away. My wife and I were the first ones there, which felt odd and right at the same time. And we were the last non family to leave; along with Mike Kelly. My wife took a picture of Mike and me outside; she's always snapping pictures on every occasion. I have not looked at any of the viewing pictures yet.

Last week, I went up to Rocky's house, and John gave me his slot car box with "Professor Fate" stenciled on the lid. I called Mike Kelly and told him that I have the box that Rocky tried to give him a few weeks before he died. And so through a few of his earthly things, things that evoke his personality, we will remember Rocky until we join him....
