Friday, July 8, 2011

Houston, We Have Fan

COL. DOUG HURLEY IS PILOTING THE SPACE SHUTTLE ATLANTIS, WHICH LIFTED OFF THIS MORNING EN ROUTE TO THE INTERNATIONAL SPACE STATION. DOUG WAS ALSO AT THE CONTROLS FOR THE ENDEAVOUR FLIGHT. TODAY'S LAUNCH MARKS THE FINAL MISSION OF THE 30-YEAR U.S. SPACE SHUTTLE PROGRAM. HERE IS DOUG'S CHAPTER IN THE WEEKEND STARTS ON WEDNESDAY:

It’s not unusual for a NASCAR fan unable to tune to a race – maybe he’s on the job or waiting to get root canal – to sneak a quick online update. One fan, Doug Hurley, a Colonel in the Marine Corps, got his NASCAR fix at work on a laptop computer in a unique place – 250 miles above the earth moving at 17,500 mph in zero gravity.

Hurley, the pilot of Space Shuttle Endeavor, hadn’t missed a race in eight years since being introduced to NASCAR at Watkins Glen and feeling a rush of excitement he could only call “indescribable.” He wasn’t going to let a small thing like manning the controls of the most complex machine ever built get in the way of finding out how Joey Logano did at Indianapolis Motor Speedway.

“It’s not a very well-kept secret at NASA that I’m a pretty big NASCAR fan,” Hurley says. The second line of his official NASA biography states, “Recreational interests include hunting, cycling and attending as many NASCAR races as possible.”

While training in Star City, Russia with cosmonauts preparing to work on the International Space Station, the Marine Corps Lieutenant Colonel watched NASCAR Sprint Cup Series races on the Armed Forces television network deep into the night. On board the Endeavor, he took DVD copies to two of the most notable races in the history of stock car racing – the 1979 and 1998 Daytona 500s. He’s lobbying to have these classic races included in the permanent library on board the International Space Station.

Hurley grew up in Apalachin, NY, a town so small it had no stoplight. On cloudless nights, he’d gaze at the wide sky, densely speckled with the twinkling lights of stars from galaxies billions of miles away. Doug was only two years old when Neil Armstrong set foot on the moon, but remembers news clips of Sky Lab missions sandwiched between the Saturday morning cartoons.

“As a young boy, you think, ‘Wow, that would be pretty neat to go there and do that,’” he said.

He liked what the military stood for and to help pay for college enrolled in the Navy ROTC, program at Tulane University. During college, he spent a week at a Navy jet base in Jacksonville and got to ride in a fighter plane.

“That was the defining moment. I knew what I wanted to do.” Hurley excelled as a Naval Aviator and a test pilot. He was the first Marine pilot to fly the F/A-18 E/F Super Hornet.

Despite his fondness for speed, Hurley never paid much attention to NASCAR, even though he’d lived 45 minutes south of the road course at Watkins Glen. That changed when his cousin Nanette began dating Greg Zipadelli, then Tony Stewart’s crew chief for Joe Gibbs Racing. Nan and Doug had spent many holidays and summers together as kids and remained close as adults. He jumped at her invitation to watch the race from Zippy’s pit stall at the Glen.

“From the moment I heard the first engine roar to life, I was unequivocally, unbelievably, completely and totally hooked on the sport,” Hurley said. Since then, he’s attended more than 20 races and holds season tickets at Texas Motor Speedway.
Nanette and Zipadelli are now married with three kids, but Tony and the crew chief he called “the big brother I never had” have parted ways. After a stellar decade with the No. 20 Home Depot car, including two NASCAR Sprint Cup Series championships, Stewart left Joe Gibbs Racing following the 2008 season to form his own team, becoming the most successful driver-owner in NASCAR since Alan Kulwicki won the title in 1992. The separation was a tough, emotional time for Zippy.

“Loyalty is a big thing with Zippy, and he decided to stay with Joe Gibbs, who gave him a huge opportunity. That’s where his heart was.”

Most No. 20 fans also guided by their loyalty simply followed Stewart to this new No. 14 ride. Hurley stuck with Zippy and his new driver, teenage phenom Joey Logano, nicknamed “Sliced Bread,” as in “the greatest thing since…”

“Joey is amazingly grounded for a person his age facing tremendous challenges and responsibility,” Hurley said. “If you compare him to Zippy or me, we were selected for our jobs – Greg as crew chief and me into the astronaut program – in our early ‘30s. Joey is 19 and handling the pressure of big-time auto racing very well. At the outset, there was skepticism about his abilities in a Cup ride, but his true talent quickly became apparent. NASCAR banned testing for 2009, which was the right move to save costs, but it hurt newer guys like Joey. And then you have him going into a new car much different than the NASCAR Nationwide Series cars he was driving. Considering all that, he’s figuring out a lot of things pretty quickly. Joey’s been blessed with tremendous talent and the help of a core group of guys who have been with Zippy from the beginning. He and Zippy have been a great team, which they proved when Joey became the youngest driver ever to win a Sprint Cup Series race at New Hampshire in 2009. Joey battled hard all day and Zippy made a great call to win the race. I’m predicting Joey is going to do very well in the ears to come. Plus, he is just a super nice guy. He’s got solid support from his parents, and it shows.”

Hurley, who is 42 and favors the flat-top hair style reminiscent of the flight directors and fly boys chronicled in Tom Wolfe’s book The Right Stuff, sees many parallels between the sport he loves to watch from the pit stall and his own job strapped into a rocket soaring toward the wide blue yonder. “My background is as a fighter pilot, so the speed, the adrenaline rush, the eye-hand coordination is somewhat similar. A big part of the excitement for me is getting so close to the action. Fans can feel a bit of that, sitting off the turn with the cars coming right at you. They can get some of that speed adrenaline rush a fighter pilot feels.”

In some ways, NASCAR drivers face tougher challenges than astronauts, Hurley says. It’s a surprising perspective from a decorated Navy test pilot snapped up by the astronaut development program as soon as he was eligible, a four-time recipient of the NASA Superior Accomplishment Award who helped orchestrate the mind-boggling tasks of an upside down rendezvous with the International Space station, five space walks, the replacement of half dozen 250-pound batteries in the unforgiving blackness of space, and the transfer home of a Japanese astronaut.

“The biggest difference is NASCAR is much more in the public eye than what we do as astronauts and what I did as a fighter pilot,” he said. “When we launch shuttles into space, of course that’s highly publicized, but months of training are largely done without constant scrutiny. NASCAR drivers live in the limelight virtually year-round. Being in a dangerous, high-pressure environment, it’s not easy to manage outside eyes prying in.”

There are obviously many differences between astronauts and race car drivers. Flirting with danger – the lurking, unpredictable set of unseen circumstances that can snuff a life out in a blink – is not one of them.

Hurley was avidly following NASCAR when drivers Adam Petty, Kenny Irwin, and Dale Earnhardt Sr. were killed over a nine month period from 2000 to 2001. He personally strapped the STS 107 crew into the Space Shuttle Columbia, which disintegrated upon re-entry over the southwestern United States in 2003.

“Nothing prepares you for losing seven friends in an instant on a national scale,” he said. “NASA had a tough decision after the loss of the Columbia just as NASCAR had a tough decision after losing its most famous and maybe greatest driver. Where do you go? What do you do? The right answer is you fly again, and you race next week. You just make sure you’ve learned from the previous events so it won’t happen again.

“The danger of what we do is always in the back of my mind. But I think human space flight is better from the Columbia accident, despite losing seven people who can never be replaced. It’s the same with NASCAR. We lost Dale Earnhardt Sr., and will never get him back. But some very positive things came from that tragedy. The sport made significant improvements to the cars and tracks and has never been safer.

“What happened with Dale and the Columbia are eerily similar. We’d seen foam fall off the Shuttle for years. We tolerated it. NASCAR had some bad accidents that seemed like freak occurrences. It took a huge event in both cases to bring about productive change – losing the most famous driver in what looked like an innocuous crash and the Shuttle burning up over Texas after a piece of foam dislodged. But some pretty smart people worked hard to fix the problems. And we’re much safer as a result.”

Just as NASCAR is seeking expansion opportunities, so is NASA. Missions are being planned for the U.S. to return to the moon and possibly beyond to Mars. Perhaps one of our own remarkable fans will be at the controls. Whatever is next for Doug Hurley, all of NASCAR Nation wishes him “Godspeed.”

Thursday, July 7, 2011

Why Is Kenny Gregory Wearing a Shit-Eating Grin?

When the Joy Mining Machinery Toyota Tundra makes its debut tonight in the NASCAR Camping World Truck Series race at Kentucky Speedway, one fan in attendance will wear an extra wide grin.

Kenny Gregory, known in the infield at "The Fathead Guy" will be wearing that shit- eating smile (even though, he points out, no one has ever been known to have exibited any form of happiness immediately after swallowing human feces).

Kenny names Kyle Busch, who owns the ruck, as his favorite NASCAR driver.

But tonight, even more important, is the Joy Mining logo on the Kyle Busch Motorsports truck's hood. Gregory spent 35 years working for the Franklin Pa.-based Tool and Die Maker. He retired in 2003, and saved up enough to now travel the NASCAR circuit, taking his life-size Fathead driver stand-ups to up to 25 NASCAR races a year.

(Either Gregory saved a ton of bread, or it will come out in a few years he's the next Bernie Madoff. Whatever the case, mazel tov, Kenny, you love the racing, the fans love you, and you deserve to be at each and every race.)

Many fans know Gregory as a gregarious and tireless networker in the campgrounds, using the Fatheads to stimulate conversation, debate and new friendships. Kenny was the same at work, receiving several awards for cost saving for the company of 8,000, which is a leader in developing equipment to extract underground coal and other bedded materials.

Tonight, 2009 and 2010 World of Outlaws Late Model Series (WoO LMS) champion Richards will be at the helm of the Joy Mining Machinery Toyota Tundra Gregory will be pulling for.

"We look forward to providing Josh Richards and Joy Mining Machinery with all the tools necessary to develop from NASCAR rookies into household names,” team owner Kyle Busch said in a statement.

There has always been a strong connection between the men and women who work in the mining industry and racing, especially uber-fans like Gregory, so the association makes sense. (Many fans know the story of The Lucky Penny Girl, Wessa Miller; her dad Booker is a retired coal miner.)

"When Josh starts winning races, you can bet his Fathead will be right there at my camper along with Kyle, Jeff, Jimmie, Tony, Junior, Danica and the others," Gregory said.

Known as "The Fathead Guy," Gregory's full story is documented in the NASCAR Library Collection book, THE WEEKEND STARTS ON WEDNESDAY, which is the perhaps the best book none of you have read, and will make for excellent source of heat when the Chinese finally take over.