Families touched by NF... The reason for the fundraising

Dear loyal readers:

THANK YOU!

As of 5/13/11, with have about 322.00 in generous PayPal donations (from this blog page) and another 220.00 in thoughtful cash donations from co-workers, friends, and neighbors. We sincerely appreciate this generosity and at the same time we are still looking for more to reach our goal of over 5,000.00 dollars.  

Let me be clear that 100% of all proceeds collected with be submitted to the organization. I am only asking for your donations to come through me so I can make ours a mature and long term campaign for CTF.org 

I realize that leading up to the event, I was so wrapped up with the car, the tires and prep for One Lap that I didn't tell you all very much about NF and why the work of CTF.org is so important.

First, it is worth noting that my family is lucky that our kids seem to be healthy and not facing any known medical issues. We are very fortunate. For many children (and their families) dealing with NF, things are not so simple.

Click here for a real world case of the challenge of living with NF

For as long as I can remember (even from before becoming a parent), I have always felt that one of the most heartbreaking things in life is for an innocent child to face a life-threatening illness. Many of us know someone who has lost a child or perhaps a family that must soldier on through the toughest of circumstances. A local neighbor child with a tough battle has been a very close to home example of this.

As I was eager to find a lesser known charity and then learned more about NF, I wanted to find a way to help families facing this under-publiscized, yet rather common illness.

Special thanks to my friend Seth Thomas at http://bimmerworldracing.com for introducing me to
Jill Beck, Director of the Racing For Research arm of www.CTF.org

Direct link to Racing For Research

In short order, her extensive background in the enthusiast automotive community allowed her to recognize One Lap of America as a good venue for the message. She sent me the wristbands and die cut vinyl logos for the car. She also fielded my many various requests for additional logos and such.
 

The field carries on...

I'm home crying in my soup, and trying to get back to normal... Editing photos, updating the blog and de-lousing the car. But the field carries on, making more great stories and memories.

Here are some links to that great stuff...

Our friends Robin and Woody were on their way to Daytona after Carolina Motorsports Park and at highway speed, hit an Armadillo on the road near Savanna, Georgia!

Read Robin's great story about overcoming adversity at this link:
Part one: Pesky little creatures...
Tale of triumph: They made it to the second Daytona!

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At Daytona, the (currently leading the overall) winning Nissan GTR went over 181 mph on street tires, then proceeded to travel to Gainesville (home of the NHRA Gator Nationals) and went 10.6 @ 124 MPH.

See the Daytona run here: (Leh makes it look easy!)
181 on Street Tires @ Daytona

Read Leh and Doug's blog here:
TopSpeed GTR is incredible!

The Barber run is streaming LIVE as of 9:52 am Eastern here:
LIVE STREAMING!

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My Pals AC and Eric are doing really well in the Semi-Famous Axis of Oversteer Z3 M Coupe!
At Daytona, they went 158.76 up on the banking... Not bad for a 10 year old car!
Rad their blog here:  We're still alive!

Today at the gorgeous Barber Motorsports Park in Birmingham, it is apparently 71 and Sunny.
Nevermind that it is on eof the world's finest motorsport facilities.

Yep, I'm quite jealous... As you should be too.

David Lee Roth had it right...

"You've got to roll with the punches and get to what's real!"
Van Halen's Jump, 1983

The truth is always stranger than fiction.
We had a easy, incident free run from Summit Point WV down through beautiful North Carolina. We had some decent results and the whole week of fun ahead... We got to the hotel just a couple miles from the track just a tick before 9:00pm.

We thought we had a big problem before we arrived... Man if we only knew!
Our "so called problem" was that we couldn't buy a six pack in South Carolina on a Sunday night. We had actually been directed to go to an unlit wrong side of the tracks speakeasy to acquire some, but when we drove by it did not appear that we we be the "appropriate demographic" to shop there. We kept going.

So, we were actually a fair bit ahead of schedule while others stopped elsewhere for proper dinners near Charlotte. We squeaked our way into Kershaw SC and pulled into the "Executive Inn" under the registration car port. All 3 of us exited the car and went in to the office. Unfortunately, none of us knew the last driver did not completely engage the parking brake and the car was not in gear.

It was 2-3 minutes of standing around while another guy was fussing over a missing reservation with the desk clerk. It was a normal wasted moment where you are just waiting for your turn... We heard a really sickening thud and when I looked our the door, THE CAR WAS NOT THERE.

It rolled with a partially engaged parking brake down a pretty steep hill in the lot, crashing into a parked Honda Goldwing, past the tipped over bike and into the motel wall! Thankfully, nobody was outside and no people were injured. Unbelievably, it missed another competitor's car and two pickup trucks, all of which would have been insanely worse. The gentleman who owned the bike was as gracious as anyone could possibly be in the situation. He and his friend made a special trip to COME SEE One Lap at Kershaw.

I have almost never felt so sick with confusion and awe. The Kershaw Police handled the paperwork with dignity and respect. The motel owner literally said this was "the best thing" that had happened there recently. Mr. Bike owner (not naming to protect his privacy) must still be in shock. My insurance company was not alarmed... I guess they usually hear worse.

To keep it in perspective, this is an freak accident with no human casualties, and some repairable stuff is bent up, but I can still barely believe it. The "last driver" is one of the best friends I have ever had and we will simply move on from this.

Apologies to all of our friends, family, sponsors and supporters for the very disappointing news. After some additional repairs in SC, The car will make it home, but it is not safe to continue in competition this year.

Day 2: home field advantage cuts both ways...

After getting into Winchester VA at 12:45am after a properly long haul from Peru Indiana, we did get sleep. We were up and rarin to go and try to get some shelter in case the weather turned poor. We got one of the good spots and it did not rain while we were there.

Summit Point is the track where I first drove on a road course in 1994. In the early days we did 2-3 events annually at the good ole Main Circuit. It is a 2.1 mile course that has a devious blend of high speed, elevation change and techincal aspects like changing camber and uneven paved surfaces. The ruddy grounds and paddock have played host to some of he best moments of my driving life.

In recent years, I've only been geting to drive it about once annually. That said it still feel like home base. To boot, my dad "Bad Bob" and our friend Steve Fisher came down to watch and cheer us on.

The pesky part is that our most aggressive rival has Summit Point for his home track as well.
Brian Hair drives at Summit Point one heck of a lot more than I do these days. He was not taking prisoners on Sunday. He turned in killer performance in the morning with a 6th place against all the big guns!

I lined up to run early because I was anxious to go. Our other friendly rivals, the Schauts had their supercharged and more aggressively modified version of our car in front of me. I figured I would try to see how fast they could disappear with more power and grip.

It was dry but overcast and chilly and the track was not only covered with dust, but also had a lot of new pavement installed just since two weeks ago when I was there for practice! Knowing my tires and brakes are best COLD, I took off with aggression and squirmed around a fair bit with the car. The apex of 6 had some new curbing that was actually falling apart lap by lap!

Dan Schaut was cookin, but I was able to keep him in sight, so I didn't think we did so badly. The result was 15th out of the entire field for that run and going intok lunch we still had 10th overall. Dan took an excellent 10th. Another highlight was getting some good video with the cool "Harry's Lap timer" iPhone app, which was useful to help Mike.

Teammate Mike ran the second session and this was his first ever time to drive summit point. He took 27th with one slight bobble into stony exit of turn 3. He brought it back alive and had fun. Monday's tracks in South Carolina will offer another chance to shine.

We are 10 points out of the top 10 holding 15th as we drive to South Carolina. We just departed I81 with no Virginia enforcement issues and if we an find some on a Sunday night, we may just have time for a beer or two before bed!