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| Guest Blog / Sasha Trosch: EPIPHANY | | Date Created: Feb 02, 2007, 12:43 PM |
I met Sasha Trosch at the North Carolina Motorsports Association banquet and awards ceremony earlier this week. She was still energized and enthralled by her first visit to a NASCAR race a few months ago. It's always good to hear from someone brand new to the sport to reaffirm the elements of racing that offer an irresistible allure to the fans. She has even invited suggestions on how to further her NASCAR fan experience. Sasha, be careful what you wish for, as I'm sure the readers will be happy to oblige. (That's her son, Carl Lee, dressed as Dale Jr, for Halloween in 2006.) Enjoy! --- j.g.
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 EPIPHANY
On Saturday, October 14, standing on top of an 18-wheeler in the infield of Lowe’s Motor Speedway in Charlotte, I had an epiphany. Not exactly a religious experience, but a mind blowing, sensory-overload moment of personal discovery nonetheless. “NASCAR,” I thought. “Okay. I get it. And I love it.”
Granted, I had always leaned towards the accepting side of indifference when it came to car racing, but I never expected to become a fan. I read Tom Wolfe’s famous Esquire essay on Junior Johnson in high school, although as a preppy girl in suburban Chicago I may as well have been reading about a creature from Mars. I managed to live in Charlotte for more than 10 years before I even drove past the speedway. My universe is bordered by Borders, Starbucks, Talbots and the YMCA. My friends are all highly educated women, and none of us would ever think of wearing a “Haulin’ Ass” t-shirt under our cardigan twinsets. “People like me don’t like racing,” I thought.
But on Sunday afternoons I couldn’t help pausing when the remote control landed on a race, although I never watched for very long because racing made me nervous. All those cars, so close together, going so fast – my heart couldn’t take it, yet I couldn’t look away. And while I couldn’t tell you who won which race or what championship, I knew the big names and enough trivia to nod knowingly when the conversation occasionally turned to racing.
Still, I wasn’t ready to commit. My nightmare is being stuck somewhere, having a miserable time. (Actually, that’s my husband’s nightmare: being stuck with me somewhere while I’m having a miserable time.) The idea of leaving the house at noon for a twelve-hour adventure at the speedway was still hard to wrap my brain around.
That is, until I read a story in the Charlotte Observer about Bank of America’s new corporate hospitality setup in the infield at the Speedway: ultra-luxe accommodations designed to lure the wine-and-cheese set to the track. My husband glanced over my shoulder at the paper that Friday morning and said, “Oh, those are the tickets J--- got us.”
“Are you kidding? With the open bar, and the steaks, and the truck with the couches inside?”
“Yeah, we’re pretty psyched.”
He was pretty psyched, and I was suddenly pretty jealous. “Hey… um… do you want to see if you can get a ticket for me?”
Fourteen hours and an extra ticket later, he was on the phone with his father (to see if we could wrangle a day of babysitting) and I was on the phone with my girlfriends (to figure out what the hell one wears to a “golf casual” corporate event at a stock car race). Fourteen hours after that, our chartered bus arrived by police escort onto the infield at Lowe’s.
(Okay. I need to pause here and acknowledge that this is hardly the typical NASCAR fan experience. I know. But it got me there, and that’s the most important thing.)
The day was a blur and an absolute blast. The garage tour, pit road, the open bar, the Nextel scanners, a catered lunch, VIP swag, a steak dinner and the nicest porta-potties I’ve ever seen. Meeting the very entertaining Kenny Wallace and the very yummy Kasey Kahne. (Even the men were mesmerized by Kasey. My husband’s best friend – a big, bald, beefy plumber from Pittsburgh – said, “I don’t know, there’s something about that guy. You just want to hug him.”) The colors, the people, the hustle, the smells, the palpable nervous energy: it was intoxicating, overwhelming at times.
“You should see your face,” my husband said. “You’re beaming.” And that was before the race even started.
Then, the roar of 43 engines. The sound shakes the ground, rattles your bones, spreads through the grandstands, sends the collective energy and anxiety level off the charts. It’s the sound of 150,000 hearts pounding – just amazing. They gave us earplugs, but I didn’t want them. My husband says he saw me standing on tiptoe to try to see the cars on the far side of the track. When they came around Turn Four, I closed my eyes and let that rush –wind, sound, energy – surround me. And I finally knew why people say, “You won’t love racing until you’ve been to a race.”
Later, we left the white-picket fenced bankers’ compound and walked down through the RV campground to the infield fence that protects the fans from flying wreckage. I felt more than a little out of place in my golf casual attire, yet everyone we met was very friendly. Turns out I’m a populist at heart; always have been. I don’t know if “people like me” like racing or not. I know I like racing. And I know that good people are good people, no matter what zip code they live in.
My new passion caught people off-guard. My husband was in awe; my friends were perplexed: “We’ve never seen you this excited before.” “I KNOW!” I think they worried that I had inhaled too many exhaust fumes, and probably hoped I’d come out of the fog in a week or so.
Instead, I’ve jumped into the fog with both feet. During the off-season, I watched a lot of Speed Network; read two great books – Sunday Money by Jeff MacGregor and Saint Dale by Sharyn McCrumb. (Jade says there’s another book I should read, but I can’t remember the title...) I even took a few laps around LMS in the #8 car – but with a far less debonair driver than the real deal – at the Richard Petty Driving Experience.
With the start of the season a week away, I’m pretty excited. We hope to get to Bristol this year; the extremely intoxicated couple who sat in front of me on the bus ride home in October told me - several times and quite emphatically - that it should be our next stop. And I’ve tried to be extra nice to the guy who gave us the tickets in October, just to better our odds for May.
Anyone got an extra ticket – for anything? Give me a call. I’m in, cardigan twinset and all. |
Sasha Trosch lives in Charlotte with her husband Carl and their children, Molly and Carl Lee. In between loads of laundry and online sudoku games, she occasionally shows up for her job at UNC Charlotte. Her goals in life are to finish reading the pile of books next to her bed and to write a perfect pop song and live off the royalties. As a NASCAR newbie, she is looking for ideas of where to go, what to do and who to meet; send her your suggestions at SashaPT@gmail.com. |
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