Well I’m back at home in my tortured little hovel ready to weave. It has been an interesting weekend to say the least. I’ll touch on the racing action as I give thanks to the many who deserve it and those who likely never will.

The first thanks have to go to the folks at the ferry. At least I didn’t have to climb out of the window to get out and back into my car this trip. Thanks to the loading crew for giving me enough room to open my door on both ends of my venture.

The folks at the Ferry had their own diversions to deal with this week. Apparently, Wednesday evening, a suspect that had been pursued by Southold Town Police from Mattituck to Orient Point, drove through the ferry terminal, on to one of the ferries and off of the back of that ferry to the water. I was made aware of that event by Eddie Partridge, owner of the #12 Tour Modified who happened to be waiting to put his hauler aboard that very ferry at the time of the incident.

According to News12.com, the suspect was a 42-year-old man from Connecticut. I am not aware of any of the details of why this person was being pursued. The suspect plunged to his demise. The body was recovered by the Coast Guard, which delayed the departure of the ferry for two hours.

Thanks to Rick Jarzombek. Rick came across on a ferry about two hours before that incident. He treated Chuck Leja and I to dinner at Makris Wednesday night. Rick and Chuck were up to prepare the BNS car of Ralph Solhem for Donny Lia. No word on whether the #0 team will be returning to compete on the WMT.

Thanks to Fred Neergaard and his staff in the Jack Ratta Media Center at NHIS. As always they were most accommodating and helpful. Amie and I tag teamed the Message Forum on Thursday getting the posts up as far as the entry list, qualifying order and practice times for the Tour competitors. It is amazing how fast the interruptions can come up when we are at Loudon.

Thanks to Mother Nature for the interruption on Thursday afternoon that forced officials to cancel qualifying. The rains came and some in the Media Center thought that we might just show the images from the storm back in July. Fortunately for the teams and everyone else concerned, this rainstorm wasn’t nearly as bad as the one we experienced back on July 14th.

I don’t know whom to thank for parking both the Busch North and the Whelen Modified teams in the infield Thursday. That decision made it quite difficult for competitors in either class to prepare their cars. Basically all of the teams were forced to work in the mud in very cramped conditions. Might I suggest that whichever of the two classes runs the latter Friday race be allowed to unload all of their equipment on pit road as has been the case with the Modifieds in the past? I hope there will be a return to that arrangement next season.

Thanks to Ken Tarara for securing my room for Thursday night. I stayed at the best-kept secret again. The high-speed Internet access allowed me to check the board before I left early Friday morning.

Shortly after my arrival at the Media Center, I went online to check the board again. It had been tampered with. In all of my rush to get to the shuttle van, I had forgotten to bring my cell phones. I dashed back to I-Lot to get them so that I could notify Amie.

Thanks to all of our visitors for accepting our apologies for the inappropriate language that was posted by the person or persons who chose to tamper with our site. Thanks to ctautoracing.com for allowing us to post where the Live Updates would be posted. Thanks to all of the folks who passed the word by email and IM to get the same message out.

Thanks to Amie, who worked feverishly from her hotel trying to secure the site. Thanks to ThE sHaDoW for helping us through all of those challenges. Thanks to Bill Ingle from MB2 for making my Friday bearable as my discussions with him led me to believe that there are a few real racers left in NASCAR’s premier series.

Thanks to the staff at the Infield Care Center and the Concord Hospital for taking care of Jackie’s mom Patty. Mom (as all of us have known her) had some dizzy spells and looked abnormally pale to Jackie. The NHIS ICC staff sent her to the hospital for further tests. Amie changed her plans and went to the hospital with Jackie and Patty. That was what I meant by ‘more important things’ Friday afternoon on the Classified Forum.

Thanks to Jolene for waiting on us hand and foot in the press box. Thanks to Polly and Amie for making things seem a little more normal up there. Thanks to the Bahre’s for providing our most beneficial venue.

Thanks to Ed Whelen for bringing Mike Ewanitsko back in style. Mike ran really well and brought home a great finish. I look for Mike to be very competitive and challenge for the championship next season. Let’s hope he stays healthy.

Thanks to Joe ‘Chickie’ Malave and Dave Rowe for bringing Jeff up for this race. Jeff’s Thompson car owner wasn’t in favor of his participation at NHIS as he thought it might detract from his chances of securing the track championship. Although Malave had filed an entry, he had planned on honoring the car owner’s request. I’m glad he chose to participate in the Tour race and I’m sure he had a good time racing up near the front for a while.

Thanks to all of the teams that brought out their backup cars to help try to produce a full field. We still came up a car short. Thanks to the Brady’s for giving Nevin a shot.

Thanks to NASCAR and NHIS for their electronic scoring systems. As the race came towards its’ conclusion, between it being late in the day and the overcast skies, it was quite difficult to see which car was which from up top. The spotters may say different but the glass in the press box is also tinted.

Thanks to all of the folks who looked us up on the classified page for the race. I was amazed how many people found their way to the temporary site. It was a little different posting in there.

Thanks to all of the drivers and teams of the WMT. Ted Christopher, Mike Stefanik and a number of others battled for the lead. Ted and Mike put on a clinic with Ted coming out on top and Mike looking like he was the notorious character. What a great show.

Thanks to Oswego Speedway for having live audio on their website. Thanks to TBax and ThE sHaDoW for calling in from Oswego, even after the classified board went down. Thanks to all of the fans at Oswego for waiting out the weather and sticking around for a finish around 2 AM.

The fans there had to deal with more wrecked cars than there were in the Blues Brother’s movie. At least I could take a nap at home. Chuck Hossfeld finally took down the ROC Modified feature win. The 200-lap event took about two hours.

Thanks to the folks at Oswego for keeping a fourth grader up until midnight to sing Oh Canada and the Star Spangled banner. She did a great job but I thought that keeping the singer around that long would have been cruel and unusual punishment for an adult. I hope she got a bonus.

Thanks in advance to the person or persons who defaced and rendered other damages to our Message Forum. The thanks in advance are that this person or these persons would introduce his, her or themselves to us in person. I would prefer that to be in a dark alley. I am pretty sure ThE sHaDoW would like to meet he, she or them too. If this person or these persons are hungry, we can feed them, there are well over six hundred pounds between the two of us, no waiting.

We look forward to the Fall Final in two weeks. Let’s hope that we have some more Whelen weather. It would be nice to have a full field there as well. We will see. Thanks for reading along.