INTO THE SUMMER… a busy time (Part 173z)
In spite of all the
turmoil about the law suits I was anxious to get to the the garage and
to unload the race car. On the way home from the races we’d figured it
to be an easy week as far as extra maintenance was concerned… being out
in front had a definite advantage when it came to that. Other than the
front bumper there wasn’t a mark on the car, anywhere. We, or I should
say, I, still had to change the connecting rod bearings but that was
getting easier with each new week. When I arrived there were about four
or five cars there. Winning had a profound effect on who came to visit.
I was reminded of the saying about “fair weather friends”… One of those
who’d showed up was Fairlane John, he of the hardtop Ford convertible.
He was a good friend of Cliffy’s father and would appear every so often.
He didn’t actually go to the races but had subscriptions to any number
of racing publications and could talk to you about all kinds of
motorsports. He would also come up with money for tires when the mood
hit him. Another ‘visitor’ was Davo. He was usually there on Monday
evenings, sometimes with Leigh, his girlfriend. I always liked it when
she showed up because on many occasions she either arrived a little
’tipsy’ or would end up that way because Davo always showed up with
beer. In that state she would sometimes end up wetting herself and, as
you know, that was a big turn-on for me.
But the attention was
on Cliffy. Some of the people who’d showed up hadn’t known about us
running a fuel injection set up so most of the questions centered on it.
While Cliffy was holding 'court’ on that, “Fairlane John’ called Dick
and Alan over to his car. I trailed along but he was really only
interested in talking with the two of them. I watched him pull a
newspaper from the front seat and point to something. For John, he was
quite animated. Cliffy put an end to the questions from the visitors saying we had to get
the car unloaded from the hauler and to get to work on the car. When we headed in that direction I
asked Alan what John had been talking about. He kind of sloughed it off
telling me that he’d seen an announcement about a new “open competition”
race for our class of cars and showed it to them. I’d seen a poster on
the bulletin board at the track but hadn’t really paid much attention to
it. It was to be held at a new one mile racetrack in Delaware that had
been expressly built for the NASCAR Grand National division cars. They
were the full bodied cars that looked like cars people drove on the
highways. I remembered reading that Richard Petty had won the inaugural
race just a week prior. The guys in the crew talked very little about it
other than to say it was the fastest one mile track in the country and
that when you crashed there, you REALLY crashed. I did ask Alan why John
had shown him the ad and he shrugged his shoulders and said something
along the lines of it just was just John being John. More people kept stopping by which meant we didn’t really get much done. I’d hoped to get the
bearings done but there were just too many distractions. That meant I’d
probably have to do it Wednesday night.
One surprise was a
phone call from Neil, the guy that Linda (from the stock brokerage) had
connected me with and had been so helpful ($$$) in getting us started
running a Chevrolet motor. It was to congratulate Cliffy on the win.
But, he also had some ’news’ for us. I’d mentioned that he sponsored
another car but that car raced at the track in the same town that the
bank was located in and where I'd raced. He’d not been happy with the arrangement with the
driver and had been hoping to break the contract he had with him and
that was the reason for getting involved with us. However, it was going to
cost him more to break it than to leave it as it was. BUT… and this was
big… the driver had decided to start racing where we were racing. That
meant we wouldn’t be getting any more monetary help from Neil. And as
Cliffy noted, another car that would be trying to qualify.
My
first stop the next day was at “Gee’s” office with the paperwork on the law suits. He came in a little early
to accommodate me. Initially, he was just going to take the materials
and get back to me later in the day. But, curiosity got to him and he
opened the folder. He didn’t read for long before I saw a smile
appear on his face. I didn’t want to ask why and my patience paid
off when he said it was a “nuisance” matter. I had no idea what he meant
by that and, again, my patience got me the result I wanted. What he
explained to me was that the guy who’d written all the stuff up was just
looking for an offer to “go away”. He added that it was obvious the guy
wasn’t a lawyer. He then told me not to worry about any of it and that
he’d take care of it. I shook his hand, smiled and headed off to work
feeling the best I had since arriving home after the races and saw the note for me to call Rex.
My
DayTimer has no entries for the rest of the week. If something
‘exciting’ happened I can’t remember what it was. I’m positive I did my
chore of replacing the bearings in the motor of the race car but, since
it had become somewhat routine, there is no specific memory of doing it
that week. The next ‘happening’ was getting a call from Rex at the
sailing club on Saturday morning. He told me the guy who’d served us
with the law suits had gone to see him and, without telling him why,
told Rex he was withdrawing all the claims he made against us. Even
though I wanted more proof than that I still felt good about where the
situation was. I remember telling Elle and she said she’d probably go
and race on Sunday.
By winning the feature race on the previous Saturday we’d won
enough money that, after qualifying, we started the main event eleventh
out of the 24 cars in the race. It’s probably the worst position to be
in for the start of a race and it took but two laps for our night to
come to an end. With few exceptions (our the previous Saturday being one) the
slower cars started in the front and the faster cars (who had qualified
straight up in the preliminary races) near the back. The last six
positions were usually slower cars who qualified (survived) through the
last chance race. So it was one of those accordion type situations where
the fast cars in the back pushed those in front of them with the slower
cars in front acting like a road block. From no damage the week before
we ended up being towed off the track knowing we had more than a night’s
worth of work ahead of us. Like the week before, we had many of the
fans stopping by after the races but for a different reason.
Sunday,
at the sailing club, Rex filled me in on the visit he’d received from
the guy who had tried to sue the club. He’d mentioned that he’d been
contacted by the club’s lawyer (“Gee”) and had decided to drop all
actions. That made me curious as to just what the content of that letter
was. I immediately remembered that “Gee”, after perusing the things I’d
given him, kind of passed the whole thing off with a comment about it
being a “nuisance” case. Whatever he’d written seemed to have worked. In
discussing it with Rex we both came up with a similar thought… we
hooped it was strong enough to keep the guy and his family away so we
could concentrate on sailing (and racing) once again.
To be continued…
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