MARK MARTIN & ME!

I drove down to Fontana from the Silicon Valley on Thursday morning. After checking into my nearby motel in Ontario, I picked up the local newspapers looking for any info on driver autograph appearances. In the Ontario paper I found one sentence mentioning that Rickey Craven & Randy LaJoie would be at a karting place in San Bernadino, and Mark Martin and Jeff Burton would be at the Malibu Speedzone karting facility in the City of Industry. Naturally, I chose to see Mark & Jeff. I got there around 4pm. They were scheduled from 5-8pm. I had some time to kill, so I raced some laps on the various courses they had. At 5pm, I wandered up to the front entrance. A limo pulled up and out came Mark Martin and Jeff Burton. I was the ONLY fan there to meet them at the door. I took off my Ford Racing hat that I bought at a K-Mart on the way over, and had Mark and Jeff autograph it. Then I asked one of the Speedzone workers to snap my picture with Mark, the MAN. I chatted with him for a few minutes, before he went into the VIP lounge.

The highlight of my California 500 weekend was being able to race head-to-head with Mark Martin & Jeff Burton on the kart tracks. I wasn't able to get any 35mm photos, but I did leave my video camera running and pointed it toward the track when I got a chance to race. Mark even takes driving karts as seriously as his cup car. He was passing people left and right. Finally he got to me. I guess I was holding him up. He kept bumping my rear as we raced around the track. Finally, he bumped me one more time going into a turn, which I took too fast and had to swing wide. And there went Mark, with that silly grin, cutting his kart to the inside to make the pass. Not much I could do - but that was cool - I was bumped and passed by Mark Martin... and loved it!. That's one race I'll never forget.

That's me in the white kart at the left, IN FRONT OF (but not for long) Mark Martin in the white car on the right. He has the red shirt on. Sorry the picture quality isn't that good. It's a video capture from my 8mm video camera.