EEEK EEEK EEEK EEEK.......

    Red splattered on the floor of the turn two grandstand as the
ravenous beast quickly devoured its hapless victim.
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA
That ketchup covered hot dog didn't stand a chance against me. Since
Halloween is quickly descending upon us, I thought I would find some
stories from the darker side of the speedway. Here are some I dug up in
the internet graveyard.....

    Halloween seems to be synonymous with superstitions. Everybody knows
the bad luck superstitions, black cat crossing your path, don't walk
under a ladder, break a mirror and get seven years bad luck. But how
many of you know of NASCAR superstitions? I remembered a couple and
looked them up to make sure I was accurate. So here they are:

    1. Peanuts. If you want to truly freak a driver out, just bring
peanuts in the shell into the garage area. For alot of drivers and
teams, peanuts are forbidden anywhere near them or their equipment,
especially on raceday. But apparently, peanut M&M's are acceptable on
the car since Kyle Busch has them on his car. Maybe they figure the
candy coating holds in the black magic? I think Elliott Sadler said
something to that effect a few years ago anyway when he drove the
M&M's car. I looked around and tried to find the origin of this
taboo. The most common theory I came across was that the phobia
started in the 1930's. At a race, one rival team decided to throw
peanut shells on five of their adversaries' cars. Apparently, during
the course of the race, all five of those cars crashed. One version
of the story had one of the drivers actually die from the crash. Now
how accurate that is, I don't know. But I know that having peanuts at
the track can get a teams dander up. Junior Johnson was known to hate
the cursed nuts. Once, a team member of his was enjoying the nutty
snack in the garage and a few moments later, the engine blew up. No
more peanuts for that guy after Johnson got hold of him. I also came
across another story that said that the late Dale Earnhardt Senior
hated the horrid nuts and would have nothing to do with them at the
track. That Mr. Peanut guy from Planters better never show up at a
race. He'd probably get mauled.

    2.  Green cars. This one too has its origins in the early 1900's. As
the story goes, in 1920, defending Indianapolis 500 champion Gaston
Chevrolet was racing in Beverly Hills when he died in a crash. The
story goes that this was one of the first fatal racing accidents in
the United States. He apparently was driving a green car. And so,
driving a green car became bad luck. Joe Weatherly, a two-time Cup
champion in the 1960's, was apparently terrified of the color green.
He once drove an entire race with no socks on because it had rained,
his socks got wet, and they turned green. He refused to wear them.
But as you know, Bobby Labonte drove the green Interstate Battery car
for years and he's still around. Harry Gant won races driving a green
car. I think that's one superstition that's losing a little bit of
its scare factor.

    3.  $50 bills. Some drivers will refuse to accept a $50 bill. The
story I found behind this also was about Joe Weatherly. Story goes
that Weatherly had two $50 bills in his pocket when he had his fatal
crash at the Riverside Road Course in California. Sterling Marlin was
known to refuse to carry $50 bills.

    4.  The number 13. Alot of people regard the number 13 to be bad
luck, not just in the racing world, but everywhere else. But in
NASCAR, some drivers won't have anything to do with the unlucky
number. So here comes another story about Joe Weatherly. If you
haven't noticed by now, Weatherly was one of the most superstitious
guys the racing world has ever seen. As the tale goes, when it came
to the number 13, Weatherly was terrified of it. One story was that
he once qualified 13th for a race at Bristol. But he wouldn't have
it. He had to be listed not as starting 13th, but starting as 12a.
Another story was that he refused to run in the 13th annual Southern
500 at Darlington. Apparently the story goes that they had to rename
the race, "the 12th Renewal of the Southern 500" before he would
enter it.

    Now as I said, I had heard of some of these, but didn't know the
entire story behind the madness. These reasons I found were in other
stories on the internet. Whether they are true or not, I can't say
with certainty. But, bad luck does seem to follow certain people. I
think there may be a bad luck monkey hiding in my driver's shop
somewhere wearing a green diaper and eating peanuts every stinking
day of its wretched life.
    Anyway, I hope you've enjoyed some tales from the speedway darkside.
As for me, I'm going to gather the crumby remains of my hot dog
corpse and descend into the darkening stairs to go home and watch
cartoons.

Happy Halloween from the view of turn two. And remember, don't eat peanuts
and drive.