Don't Go to Bristol
Please stay away from Bristol, TN, in April and August. Let me tell you why...
I attended the Food City 500 at Bristol Motor Speedway this weekend and the place is just not suited for the 170,000 folks that show up twice a year for the NASCAR Nextel and Busch Series races. Why? Too many people and not enough land to put them in. Bruton Smith has created a monster of a situation because he has the best race track in the world...and he's a greedy human being (just kidding, Bruton...).
Bristol Motor Speedway is small. It's a half-mile track and gives the world the best racing on the planet. As long as Mr. Smith offered tickets and seats, he could sell every one of them. So, he built a lot of seats. Some are so high you can actually see the race better on TV. Yet, they come.
They come into an area that is smaller than you can imagine. That's not the problem. The problem is the space around the track for parking and just people moving around. You should be there when 170,000 people decide to leave (like after a race) or try to get there before it starts. Wall-to-wall people. The track sits on a steep hill, so they offer carts pulled by tractors which are continuously full to climb the steep hill up to the track. Lots of fun.
After the race, you are on your own and sometimes the crowd moves less than two steps in a minute. There is basically one way out and it is complicated by a narrow bridge which fords a small stream that everyone has to cross to get out.
Still, they come. There are very few motel rooms in Bristol, so everyone (well, almost) camps. On hillsides and in lots miles away (one couple told me they walked three miles to get to the track) and if it rains, it really gets rough.
This Saturday, a cold front came through Bristol, wiping out the Busch race on Saturday. Those poor souls camped in tents and RV's on the grassy hills around the track lived in a sea of mud. Still, they smiled. If the government required us to do that to , say, go to a high school football game, we'd protest. But, not here.
I'll never understand. Of course, I was camped on the pavement near the drag strip, so I guess I shouldn't talk.
But, we don't need any more people in Bristol on race weekends, so stay away.
Bloody chance you will, I know. It's a great show. Just be warned...
I attended the Food City 500 at Bristol Motor Speedway this weekend and the place is just not suited for the 170,000 folks that show up twice a year for the NASCAR Nextel and Busch Series races. Why? Too many people and not enough land to put them in. Bruton Smith has created a monster of a situation because he has the best race track in the world...and he's a greedy human being (just kidding, Bruton...).
Bristol Motor Speedway is small. It's a half-mile track and gives the world the best racing on the planet. As long as Mr. Smith offered tickets and seats, he could sell every one of them. So, he built a lot of seats. Some are so high you can actually see the race better on TV. Yet, they come.
They come into an area that is smaller than you can imagine. That's not the problem. The problem is the space around the track for parking and just people moving around. You should be there when 170,000 people decide to leave (like after a race) or try to get there before it starts. Wall-to-wall people. The track sits on a steep hill, so they offer carts pulled by tractors which are continuously full to climb the steep hill up to the track. Lots of fun.
After the race, you are on your own and sometimes the crowd moves less than two steps in a minute. There is basically one way out and it is complicated by a narrow bridge which fords a small stream that everyone has to cross to get out.
Still, they come. There are very few motel rooms in Bristol, so everyone (well, almost) camps. On hillsides and in lots miles away (one couple told me they walked three miles to get to the track) and if it rains, it really gets rough.
This Saturday, a cold front came through Bristol, wiping out the Busch race on Saturday. Those poor souls camped in tents and RV's on the grassy hills around the track lived in a sea of mud. Still, they smiled. If the government required us to do that to , say, go to a high school football game, we'd protest. But, not here.
I'll never understand. Of course, I was camped on the pavement near the drag strip, so I guess I shouldn't talk.
But, we don't need any more people in Bristol on race weekends, so stay away.
Bloody chance you will, I know. It's a great show. Just be warned...
posted by Ronnie Flamingo at 4:37 PM
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