This weekend we attended the UMP Awards Banquet that was held at the Crowne Plaza Hotel in Springfield, Illinois. The banquet had a great turnout of drivers, crews and their families. We attended a promoter’s luncheon earlier in the day and then made a trip to the fairgrounds for the Expo that was going on over there. The Expo also had a great turn out this year. While at the Expo we talked to a lot of people and of course I purchased die cast racecars for my grandson.

We did have some excitement before the banquet, it seems our hotel room got rented out twice. We checked in on Saturday morning and while I was doing a quick repair on my hair another racer and his wife used a key to access our room. We made a quick call downstairs and the problem was taken care of and we were issued a new set of keys and they were issued a different room. I was just glad I was dressed and Bob was there. It could have been a little embarrassing had Bob been out of the room and I was still in the shower. OOPS!!!!

The banquet was very orderly this year and the awards were done quite efficiently as there were a lot of classes to get through. The track of the year went to Fairbury Speedway again this year and Oakshade Speedway was presented promoter’s of the year. To say the least I was somewhat disappointed but I am not going to cry over spilt milk. I will say this though what Jerrad Krick and Jim Ransom said in their speech meant more to me than any award; because even though we didn’t get the award those two drivers recognized Bob and I as being the best track and promoters. No other drivers said that about their home tracks. We really appreciated those words. As I have always said Kamp Motor Speedway does have the best drivers and fans of any other speedway.

I would also again like to congratulate all the champions of UMP this year as well as the KMS champions and drivers who received awards at the banquet. They all did a great job. I would especially like to congratulate Heather Lyne who is the crew chief for Dennis Erb Jr. on her award of Crew Chief of the Year. She works very hard and she was most deserving of the award.

After the banquet we headed to the party upstairs for a few cocktails and dancing. Yours truly here had a few cocktails to many but I still had a good time. I really don’t care if I ever see another Chocolate Martini again. Don’t ask just be careful of the the chocolate milk tasting cocktail, it has a powerful kick to it.

We had a lot of drivers who suffered flooding this past week especially in the town of Watseka, Illinois. I know a few who lost a lot of things and some that jacked their racecars as far in the air as possible to save them from the flood waters. I read on the message board that the Vaughn’s had their car jacked up on beer kegs to get them up out of the water. It was a good thing they have had a few parties along the way and those empty kegs were in the shop.These drivers are going to have a lot of clean up to do before the racing season starts. If you have the time you might want to lend a helping hand to them.

We are very close on the schedule a hopefully we will be able to post it either by the end of this week or the first of next week.

In closing I would again ask you to please continue to keep our armed forces in your thoughts and prayers as they wage the war against terrorism. They do their job to keep you free to do yours. I would also continue to ask you to keep the flood victims in this area in your thoughts and prayers as they battle to save their belongings. With all that said until next time be happy and be safe.

Gayle

This entry was posted on Tuesday, January 15th, 2008 at 3:16 pm and is filed under The Desk. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.