One of those 'other vehicles' I mentioned, was a late-model Sportsman-class stock car, owned by a friend who needed money for his business. With the co-operation of my bank, I became the owner of a home-built, 85 Firebird-bodied short-track car, one that had been racing on the small oval tracks in central British Columbia for a number of years. This was not a purpose-built racing chassis, but a street-driven chassis that had been modified to fit the rules of the local racing sanction. The Firebird body was a fiberglass replica , replacing an older, steel body that had seen better days. The engine was a 'spec' Chev 350, built by my friend's father, estimated to produce about 450 horsepower on a blend of aviation gas, octane booster and unleaded regular gas. (No fuel checks being conducted at these tracks!) The tires were used and mismatched, the suspension was crude and the car was probably several hundred pounds overweight, compared to the competition. It didn't matter to me! Never mind that I had never raced on an oval before in my life.... I was going racing in my own car! Well, perhaps predictably, I didn't do very well with that car. In my first race -- on a 3/8ths-mile track, I finished last in the preliminary heat; during the feature race, I was tapped from behind by a faster car and spun into the outside wall, breaking a tie rod and putting me out of the race. It wasn't as easy as it had looked from the bleachers and, although I had help from a volunteer pit crew, my racing skills were not well-enough developed for the class of cars I had chosen. Due to a job transfer, I never competed in another race with that car and ended up selling the entire package -- car, trailer and spare parts -- to another racer, for the cost of storage at his towing compound. Not a very glorious racing career, to be sure; but I had some fun along with the frustration, and gained some valuable experience along the way.
So, although it wasn't my destiny to become a short-track legend, my level of interest in stock-car racing has continued to grow. I've kept up with the sport through the improving TV coverage, the print media and lately, on the internet. I've been fortunate to attend a couple of NASCAR Winston Cup races -- one at the inaugural running of the California 500 at Fontana's California Speedway; the other, at Phoenix International Raceway, which has become one of my personal favourite tracks. For the California race, my son and I flew into Los Angeles from Vancouver, marking the beginning of a great, two-week holiday together and, coincidentally, sparking his interest in racing. While in Phoenix for the NASCAR race, I drove across town to Manzanita Speedway, to catch a World of Outlaws event -- an experience not to be missed! Although we live in different communities now, my son and I still try to get to races together whenever we can. There's a great new short track we go to, about an hour's driving time from where I live, Sun Valley Motor Speedway -- a CASCAR-sanctioned track that hosts two major CASCAR West events each season, as well as promoting other great events featuring Legends, Baby Grand, sprint cars and other late-model competition tours. Yakima Speedway, not too far away in eastern Washington, hosts events in the NASCAR Raybestos Northwest Series -- where Greg Biffle was honing his skills before being noticed by Jack Roush.
So, it was when I picked up a computer magazine, one day in the mid-'90s, and read that a new racing game was soon to be released, called NASCAR Racing and featuring a realistic racing experience against names of the NASCAR Winston Cup and Busch Series, I immediately knew that I would have to try out this new form of entertainment, computer gaming. I'd been playing racing video games on various console gaming systems, such as Atari, Nintendo and Intellivision, but I was pretty sure that using a minicomputer, with its large storage capacity and more sophisticated input controls, would be a more engrossing experience. Boy, was I ever right!! Once I had purchased my first IBM-based computer and that original NASCAR Racing game, my feet were on the path to a new hobby that now consumes a large part of my free time, as well as the bulk of my discretionary spending. I've gone through several computer upgrades and purchased all the major releases of NASCAR Racing in the Sierra/Papyrus franchise, which brings me to the finish line of this personal history. Being a real-world racing fan (and one-time racer!) has broadened my enthusiasm for sim racing of various types -- stock cars, sports cars, vintage Formula One racers, GT road racers, dirt track sprint cars and drag machines -- just as my increasing immersion into the sim racing world has enhanced my enjoyment of racing competition in almost all its forms. Forty years ago, as a teenager hitchhiking to the local short track, riding around the track in the cleanup truck, I never imagined that my youthful interest would develop to the extent and depth that it has. It's been a long and convoluted route from there to here and I've enjoyed every mile of it! The future of sim racing is looking brighter and.... if I can just drive a little deeper into that next corner, maybe there's a championship waiting to be claimed. I've been working on it.... for the last 35 or 40 years!
