Friday was fairly low key, we did some puttering around the house and ran errands and did a bit of shopping.
Saturday we got up early as we wanted to visit with friends in Spokane and do some shopping before heading to Spokane County Raceway for the race. We've only seen stock car on TV, so we were seriously looking forward to it.
We met up with our friends for coffee and had an enjoyable visit, then it was time to shop. Hit Trader Joe's and picked up more of their 21 Seasoning Salute spice mix. So yummy and I love using it (in fact I grilled up chicken last night and was very liberal with the 21 Seasoning. The chicken turned out SOOOOOOO Yummy!).
Out North Division to Best China Buffet for lunch and then popped over to Beyond Beads Gallery in the shopping center across the way to pick up some findings to convert some of my earrings to posts. Picked up some really nice glass beads to use in future jewelry.
Then it was off to Northtown Mall to hit Torrid and JC Penney. Was looking for stockings in colors other then black, but that is all Torrid had. So it looks like I will have to see about stockings in colors from an online source. Found the hubby a new wallet at Penneys.
More shopping, Costco for a few things, then Big 5 to pick up some ear plugs for the race and popped into a few other stores just to see what they had. Finally it was time to head to the race track.
Arrived about 6pm, found a parking spot and grabbed our stuff. Picked up our tickets at the ticket stand (we'd ordered them a head of time, hubby also upgraded us so we could sit in the bleachers):
Found a spot and settled in:
Good view of turns 3 & 4. Had time to putter about and snap pics:
When things started they did the time trials to determine start positions for the various events:
It was neat to sit and people watch and just get the feel of being at a race. They started with the singing of the Canadian National Anthem as there weer a couple drivers from Canada, then the Star Spangled Banner. Then they had some trophy race offs, 4-5 cars each event. Was pretty cool watching the cars zoom around the track. There were 4 of these, then they awarded the winners of each with their trophies.
Then it was time for the hobby race, a few more cars on the track. I'm not sure who was who, we didn't get a program, should have. There was also no score/info board and I was having trouble hearing the annoucer at times. But it was fun to watch.
Sun started going down and the moon came out:
Now it was time for the main event, the 100 lap race:
ZOOM!
There were a few cautions, cars pulled into the pits to be worked on:
It got really neat when the sun finally went down and the lights came up:
Serious zoom zoom:
Can't wait to see how my video came out. We didn't get out of there until about midnight, they had to stop the action on several of the cautions to clean up the track and once to figure out which cars were leaking oil.
I will have to say, it was LOUD!!!!!! The earlier events weren't bad, but when 20+ cars got out on the track and went, boy! Luckily I had remembered a friend mentioning that it gets loud at races, so we picked up the ear plugs. I pulled them out for a while, just to really experience the race, but my ears started ringing like crazy, so back in they went.
I went thru two batteries on the camcorder, so finished up with my Lumix, but I missed getting the last few laps of the race when it stopped writing data to the card (not sure why I had a 16 gig card). I always seemed to have my cameras pointed the wrong way when the cautions happened, except for the last one that happened on turns 3 & 4 when 3 cars spun out and got together.
But, ooooooohhhhhhh! It was so much fun, I loved seeing a race in person. The only problem was the DVR has us spoiled. We kept wanting to pause and roll back so we could see what happened, esp when it happened where we weren't looking. I so want to go to another race, maybe the one on the 24th which is a 200 lap race.
As I mentioned, we didn't get out until around midnight. We were both too tired to even think of driving home. Luckily we prepared for that eventuality, we brought what we needed to stay over night. Scored a hotel room and crashed for the night (but not like they do in the races LOL!).
The rest of the tale later :)
Saturday we got up early as we wanted to visit with friends in Spokane and do some shopping before heading to Spokane County Raceway for the race. We've only seen stock car on TV, so we were seriously looking forward to it.
We met up with our friends for coffee and had an enjoyable visit, then it was time to shop. Hit Trader Joe's and picked up more of their 21 Seasoning Salute spice mix. So yummy and I love using it (in fact I grilled up chicken last night and was very liberal with the 21 Seasoning. The chicken turned out SOOOOOOO Yummy!).
Out North Division to Best China Buffet for lunch and then popped over to Beyond Beads Gallery in the shopping center across the way to pick up some findings to convert some of my earrings to posts. Picked up some really nice glass beads to use in future jewelry.
Then it was off to Northtown Mall to hit Torrid and JC Penney. Was looking for stockings in colors other then black, but that is all Torrid had. So it looks like I will have to see about stockings in colors from an online source. Found the hubby a new wallet at Penneys.
More shopping, Costco for a few things, then Big 5 to pick up some ear plugs for the race and popped into a few other stores just to see what they had. Finally it was time to head to the race track.
Arrived about 6pm, found a parking spot and grabbed our stuff. Picked up our tickets at the ticket stand (we'd ordered them a head of time, hubby also upgraded us so we could sit in the bleachers):
Found a spot and settled in:
Good view of turns 3 & 4. Had time to putter about and snap pics:
When things started they did the time trials to determine start positions for the various events:
It was neat to sit and people watch and just get the feel of being at a race. They started with the singing of the Canadian National Anthem as there weer a couple drivers from Canada, then the Star Spangled Banner. Then they had some trophy race offs, 4-5 cars each event. Was pretty cool watching the cars zoom around the track. There were 4 of these, then they awarded the winners of each with their trophies.
Then it was time for the hobby race, a few more cars on the track. I'm not sure who was who, we didn't get a program, should have. There was also no score/info board and I was having trouble hearing the annoucer at times. But it was fun to watch.
Sun started going down and the moon came out:
Now it was time for the main event, the 100 lap race:
ZOOM!
There were a few cautions, cars pulled into the pits to be worked on:
It got really neat when the sun finally went down and the lights came up:
Serious zoom zoom:
Can't wait to see how my video came out. We didn't get out of there until about midnight, they had to stop the action on several of the cautions to clean up the track and once to figure out which cars were leaking oil.
I will have to say, it was LOUD!!!!!! The earlier events weren't bad, but when 20+ cars got out on the track and went, boy! Luckily I had remembered a friend mentioning that it gets loud at races, so we picked up the ear plugs. I pulled them out for a while, just to really experience the race, but my ears started ringing like crazy, so back in they went.
I went thru two batteries on the camcorder, so finished up with my Lumix, but I missed getting the last few laps of the race when it stopped writing data to the card (not sure why I had a 16 gig card). I always seemed to have my cameras pointed the wrong way when the cautions happened, except for the last one that happened on turns 3 & 4 when 3 cars spun out and got together.
But, ooooooohhhhhhh! It was so much fun, I loved seeing a race in person. The only problem was the DVR has us spoiled. We kept wanting to pause and roll back so we could see what happened, esp when it happened where we weren't looking. I so want to go to another race, maybe the one on the 24th which is a 200 lap race.
As I mentioned, we didn't get out until around midnight. We were both too tired to even think of driving home. Luckily we prepared for that eventuality, we brought what we needed to stay over night. Scored a hotel room and crashed for the night (but not like they do in the races LOL!).
The rest of the tale later :)
Comments