Cale Yarborough, NASCAR Champion
I took a train to Richmond to visit my daughter and
son-in-law. I took a cab to their house from the station. The driver was a
local guy in his early 70s with six-year-old Chrysler 200 cab. He had the
gravely voice of an ex-smoker and was very friendly. In a couple of minutes it was clear we were
both veterans. He was drafted and served in the late 60s, getting out just
before I enlisted.
The other thing we had in common was being NASCAR fans from
the 60s through the early 2000s when we both drifted away from being fans. In between the directions announced by GPS,
we talked about being fans in the 60s. Ed drove slowly so we had a lot of time
to talk on the 9-mile trip.
Ed had followed the many drivers who drove for JuniorJohnson, one of the NASCAR originals. Ed met Cale Yarborough when Cale drove
for Junior. We also talked about Darrell Waltrip a three-time champion who is
now an announcer.
Then I mentioned seeing a couple of races at the Richmond
track and wishing I could have ridden my bike at the annual bicycle race on the
Richmond NASCAR track. This led us to
talking about in NASCAR and bicycle racing. So we talked about Lance Armstrong
and Waltrip and how different cheating is in motorsports and endurance sports.
He knew Armstrong cheated, but he didn’t know how. I
explained blood doping. I told Ed after Armstrong and Floyd Landis I never
watched the Tour de France again. We
talked about how in motorsports the cheating is done in the car, not in the driver’s
body, so when the cheater gets caught, the offending part is removed and the
driver can race the following week.
We also talked about the death of Dale Earnhardt at Daytona
in 2001. Both of us stopped being fans soon after because NASCAR made all the
cars identical and both of us had become fans when it was actually modified
street cars that raced on short tracks and the high banks at Daytona and
Talledega.
Always interesting to meet up with a Cold War veteran.
-->
