saw them at the trailer in 4 and the one behind the grandstand where we bought two??????

We usually sit in Section D, Row 1, but hesitated to get tickets because of the uncertain weather. We wound up in Section K, Row 6, aisle seats and it wasn't a bad area at all. In spite of all the dust on the track, we did not have a problem with it entering our seating area.
Earlene was simply ecstatic at seeing Dave Darland win the Silver Crown race. We stayed around for the victory ceremony, walked to the car, and drove right out.
I drove in fairly heavy rain most of the way back to Evansville. Arrived home a little after 5:00AM(CDT). Eldora is a long haul for me.
Danny Burton, I enjoyed talking with you at the track and the Flying J. I made it home safely, but got a little sleepy as I neared home.

Looks like the wrong f stop to me!
Rizzo

I bought two just before the Silver Crown race. One has a winged car & all 3 USAC classes, the other has just the 3 USAC classes. One by Indy Screen Print & one by Arizona Sport Shirts. It seemed that each trailer had a different selection. Call Arizona @ 1-800-922-9918, I'll bet they have some left.

steiny

They knew the track was going be dusty. my unle bought a eldora coolie with a dust cover on it. who likes beer with dust in it.

Marv,

I cannot wait to read your posts. I love your reporting. We said, well done. We had a good time too except for the fact that Driver 14's car was in the hauler in the parking lot. No way was he going to make his return at the Big E (much to his dismay).

Love the reports Marv. Keep'em coming....

pg

I was there the night before for The WoO show and the track was in great shape. I do not know if it was because it rained most of Friday or track prep, but the track was good. I was hoping for the same thing on Sat., but no such luck.

I hope next year some USAC people attend The WoO show and learn how to run a program.
Hot laps at 8:00 finished by 10:30. Included qualies, 4 heats, c main,bmain, dash and the feature.

At Terre Haute with one class it took almost 4 hours.

I remember going to Eldora in the 80's and it frequently was a dust bowl.

I certainly can't argue with Chris Pedersen's (racephoto1) perspective. We've all seen Chris's photos here, so we know how high his standards are. And he's about as optimistic of a person as you're going to find, at the track. It had to have been frustrating for these guys who bring us the action through a camera lens. Because it was very dusty. And dusty, with very little wind. So, the dust was just recirculating, instead of really going anywhere. It was bizarre in the way it was swirling and then returning to the racing area. We were sitting up from the entrance to turn four and the grit was rising to just above the light fixtures, forming into distinct whirlpools while the racing was going on and then slowly coming to a stop, when the racing was halted and settling back to where it had all came from. And while this may have been a fascinating phenomenon to watch take place, it had to play hell with the track crew. Because normally, even though it's at the expense of the people sitting in a particular area of the stands, the prevailing wind will allow the race cars to blow off the part of the racing surface that is the problem. Saturday night, the problem would fall right back in their lap, each time the checker would wave and the dust would settle. To me, it looked like they were just caught in a loop. A vicious cycle, if you will. It was a "damned if you do, damned if you don't" situation. If they would have left it alone and done nothing, then more people would have been mad (even more than the ones who usually complain), because it would have still been dusty and there would have been no effort put forth to remedy it. Instead, they ran out, put a little band-aid on it and it looked better for a few laps, until the inevitable returned.

And while all this was happening, if you looked through the haze, there was some pretty damn good racing going on. Even though visibility had to have been be reduced, it surely didn't stop Brad Sweet from standing the gas with both feet and carving up a loaded midget field. Nor did it stop Jerry Coons, Jr. from charging through the particulate matter to lap more than half the field, in the sprint feature. Or Tracy Hines from actually chasing the very fast leader down. Or keep Robert Ballou from putting his dust goggles on and going to work. Or keep Dave Darland from getting in the Foxco Silver Crown car and putting on a clinic, in how you run the wall at Eldora. That was a work of art. Or keep RWB teammates Shane Hmiel and the aforementioned Coons, Jr. from putting in a tremendous effort, to try to catch him. Dusty as it was, it was still a racy track.

I've seen better 4-Crowns and I've seen worse. As far as the racing goes, this one was somewhere in the middle. One thing that is a constant, as far as this event is concerned, is the vast array of people that you get to share the "4-Crown Experience" with. From the time we always spend in the pits, during hot laps and qualifications, talking to friends that are writers, photographers, drivers and race team members, to the racing portion of the show, that I look forward to watching with my fellow race chasers, there isn't an event that I leave with more of a sense of "I know more than I did when I came here" than the 4-Crown. Dust or no dust, that's one thing I always see clearly.

Jerry

Chris
Next time at Eldora I will loan you my Nikon FED Dust Filter. The first pic below was taken without the FED, the second one was moments later with the FED.

Dave

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