The Troubles of Growing Up

Chapter 10

When we got near the track, the place was packed. There was a reserve lot which was where we parked. We got out of the car and Paige grabbed the cooler. Haylee was in awe. She turned and looked at me.
"This is the best experience of my entire life." She grabbed me and hugged me.
"Thank you. So much."

"For what?" I asked her.

"Inviting me." she let go of me and stared into my eyes. I thought she was going to kiss me. But then she turned to my mom and hugged her. She did the same with Paige. We started walking towards the track. As with every other event there were guys standing around selling tickets. Paige walked up to one of them.

"Do you have four right next to each other?" She asked him.

"uhhhh. Let me check I think I may." He started looking through them.

"Here we go. Four, correct?" He asked.

"Yes." She responded.

"You guys got a great view. You're up around there." He pointed toward the stands high above the start finish line. Paige handed him some money and he looked at her with a surprised face.

"Not enough?" she asked him with a smile.

"No it's more than I needed." he responded with a chuckle. She smiled and he handed her four tickets and some money back. She smiled and we walked away. He was right our tickets were right in front of the start finish line. We were about halfway up in the stands. I could see the cars in the pits, only half of them were there the others were on their way out of the garage. We sat down and waited for about an hour before we heard over the speakers the opening ceremony of the Daytona 500. The national anthem was performed, and a little bit after that we heard; "And now... the most famous words in motorsports!" Paige's face was brighter than ever. "DRIVERS! START. YOUR. ENGINES!"The cars roared to life. You could feel the rumble of all 40 cars shaking the stands. I didn't even realize that I was smiling. Haylee was smiling even brighter than I was. The cars left pit road, pacing around the 2.5 mile tri-oval at a steady 60 miles per hour, every once in a while shooting up to 70 to warm and clean the tires. Kyle Busch was in the pole position. For those who don't know that means he starts in first. They came around the track three times before the pace car shut its lights off. That signaled that the next time the cars hit the tri-oval the green flag waved. They were coming out of turn 3 when I decided to take out my phone. I grabbed headphones and handed one to Hayl, which she immediately put in her ear. I pulled up nascar mobile and switched to the announcer channel just in time to hear Darrell Waltrip say his line; "Boogedy Boogedy Boogedy, Let's go racing at the Daytona 500!" The engines roared louder and louder as they blew past. The crowd was roaring. The cars were gone around the track. Just as fast as they came. They soon returned. Roaring past. We were there for another ten minutes before we heard over the intercom; "And a crash in turn three!" The first caution was out on lap 22. A car spun off the apron (the bottom of the track that isn't banked) and shot up towards the wall. Only one car was involved and there was a low amount of damage to her car but she still had to spend a caution lap in the pits, putting her a lap down. I felt bad, she was a rookie, only sixteen years old. Two laps later they went green again. It was a good hour before the second caution came out for debris. Once again they went green. Kyle Busch was still in front. But not for long because Dale Earnhardt Jr was coming up to him fast. He got a run on the outside and when Kyle went to block Dale shot to the inside and got under him. There was nothing Kyle could do. He had no run, no help and slowly drifted back into the field. Dale took the lead shortly before Paige grabbed my attention and pointed to a big cloud of smoke. Everyone nearby stood up. The first thing I see is a white car shoot towards the inside wall hitting it head on at around 110 mph. The car hit the the wall and the back end flew up into the air as the car turned backwards and spun around again before coming to a stop, only to be hit by another car sliding more backwards than forwards. Two other cars had slid to the bottom of the track."And the big one at Daytona happens on the front straight at lap 155." Thirteen cars were involved. Seven of them too damaged to move. In the midst of them was Chase Elliott, Hayl's favorite driver. She looked at me with the saddest eyes I've ever seen. Nascar pulled the red flag, the cars stopped completely on the backstretch. There were a bunch of trucks on the track cleaning up the debris. Chase was sitting in his pit box, his crew was allowed to survey the damage but not allowed to work on the car during a red flag. After they cleaned the track they went back yellow and Chase's crew started to work on his car. The car wasn't actually damaged that badly. There was just a bit of sheet metal bent and a fender was missing. They replaced the fender and worked on fixing the bend and he got out before the field came back around. He stayed on the lead lap. Hayl didn't realize that he was back out. He started at the back of the field. The pace car turned its lights off signaling one to go for the caution. After it came out of turn four it started to duck down toward the pit but then it's lights came back on and it shot back onto the track. The green flag was delayed, Nascar officials spotted a small piece of debris still on the track. After the cars left the area a truck came out and picked up a little piece of rubber from a tire. On the backstretch the pace car's lights went off again. Approaching the tri-oval the pace car shot down to pit road. The green flag waved only to be replaced by the yellow moments later. Danica Patrick broke her shifter and couldn't find fourth gear. Her car slowed and a car hit the back of her and pushed her around towards the infield. Both of them spun around and the yellow was out. Neither of them were out of the race. Danica's shifter was fixed and they went green again. Dale Jr was still out in front until lap 178."And around goes the 88 of Dale Earnhardt Jr!" Dale blew a tire and made contact with another car sending them both around and towards the wall. Only Dale hit it. The other driver got about a foot away from hitting it before stopping halfway down the track. A few cars spun trying to avoid the two of them. Chase Elliott was back up front in 5th. Hayl was still unaware of him being on the lead lap. When they went green again it was lap 182. Kyle Busch was back out front. At lap 195 Chase caught up to Kyle. They were 1 and 2 for 3 laps. "And the caution comes out again! Car in the wall its Kyle Larson." He blew the right front tire and his car went straight up to the outside wall. The race length went from 200 laps to 202 laps. They went green and before they could get to the 'overtime line' Brad Keselowski made contact with Clint Bowyer sending Bowyer around. The caution came out once again. The race length was now 205 laps. Once again the green flag waved. Kyle pushed out in front. It was this moment that Hayl realized that Chase was still in the race. She was so confused. They hit the overtime line. The next flag other than the white ended the race. Yellow or checkered. As they came out of turn four Chase ducked to the inside. They crossed the line to get the white flag, one to go. Chase and Kyle were side by side down the backstretch, as they entered the turn Kyle pulled ahead. But it wasn't over yet. As they exited turn 4 Chase Elliott got a big shove from behind by Carl Edwards. Sending him forward side by side with Kyle. We were on our feet screaming for Chase to win. They crossed the line. Nobody knew who won. "The winner of this years Daytona 500 is......The 9 of Chase Elliott!" Hayl was so happy that she screamed so loud I couldn't hear for a few seconds. She grabbed me and hugged me out of excitement, still screaming. The cars came around again and headed for pit road. Chase stayed on track. He got to the line and his car spun around in a cloud of smoke coming from the rear tires. Smoke bellowed into the air, the smell of burnt rubber filled the atmosphere. Chase blew a tire while he was celebrating. It destroyed the rear of his car but it didn't matter. He had already won. We stayed for a bit before we decided to leave. We got back to the car and we decided that we would go visit the infield. The streets were a parking lot and there was still a ton of cars in the actual parking lots. We tried to get into the infield but they wouldn't let us, we needed special passes that we didn't have so we decided to just get dinner at a nearby restaurant. Apparently a lot of other people had the same idea. The place was packed, I looked around and saw a group of five with hendrick motorsport t-shirts cheering and clanking beers together. One of the guys looked at Hayl and raised his glass and cheered before slamming it. We sat in a booth by the window so we could see when the traffic cleared up. We were there for a few hours before we got tired. When we left the streets were empty. We had been there so long that a tow truck was rounding the corner towards our car. Paige ran over and got him not to take our car. We got back to the hotel and we were all tired. I fell asleep almost instantly after I closed my eyes. Apparently Hayl did the same because when I woke up she was face down right next to me on top of the covers. I looked at my phone and it was 2:57am. I got up and I heard the worst sound in the world. Tires screeching outside. Then the room basically went purple. It looked like a light show. I looked out the window and there were about ten police cars outside surrounding a car with cops everywhere and a helicopter shining a spotlight on them.