I had a birthday a few months ago, and thought it would be fun to share a very special present that my kindergarten-aged son David made for me. David conceived, illustrated, and authored the following story about IndyCar racing (our favorite kind) all by himself. “Yeah, without even Mommy helping me AT ALL” he adds. With David’s assistance, I’ve scanned the pages and “translated” the captions below. As you can imagine, I was very impressed and very proud of his hard work, and David is very excited about putting his story on “our racing web site”.   read more »

Fantastic news… the 2008 AMA Flat Track Championship schedule has been announced and it includes an event to be held September 13th at the Indianapolis State Fairgrounds. That will be the same weekend as the Red Bull Indianapolis GP being run at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway on September 14th. It’s shaping up to be a great weekend for motorcycle racing fans of all kinds. I’ve been fascinated by flat track racing since seeing the classic movie “On Any Sunday” by Bruce Brown but just haven’t gotten around to getting my butt and my camera to a race. I will really be looking forward to this event. See you there!

Indiana-based motorsports artist Tom Butters is now represented by the well-known motorsports gallery, Freck’s Auto Art.

Butters is a former SCCA racer and adman who was ORP public relations director before he went to Madison Avenue. There he worked on ad campaigns for Fiat-Lancia-Ferrari, Alfa Romeo, Lotus, Ford, Pirelli and other motorsports clients.   read more »

Outstanding! Amazing! Magnificent! Bravo Helio!

Two-time Indy 500 Champion and IndyCar Series star Helio Castroneves and his partner Julianne Hough were crowned the Champions of ABC’s mega-hit television show “Dancing With the Stars” last night, Tuesday November 27.

Most of us out here in “race fan land” don’t typically spend our Monday and Tuesday nights glued to our televisions to watch ballroom dancing. But roughly 20 million other Americans do, and it was absolutely fabulous to see Helio serve as the ambassador of the IndyCar Series to the masses. There couldn’t possibly have been a better choice.

So congratulations Helio! Thank you for all of your hard work, and for sharing your ebullient personality and joy of life with all of us. It was truly a delight! We all look forward to your return to the Speedway in May.

Mark Bennett of the Terre Haute Tribune-Star is reporting that filmmakers planning a movie about the first Indy 500 are considering filming in Terre Haute. The Terre Haute Action Track would be used to recreate scenes that originally took place at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway. Too bad they didn’t make plans earlier… they could have been filming throughout all of 2007!

Landmark could be setting for movie about first Indy 500