CK’s story: A wild cat who became a house cat

In the spring of 2011, I spotted an unfamiliar cat in my backyard late one evening. The sun was setting, and I could not tell in the fading light just what color the cat was. I saw the cat a few evenings and nights after that. It always ran away as soon as I would step outside. I would call to it, and tried to approach it when I would see it in the yard at night while coming home from class, but it always ran away. A week had passed and I still had no idea if the cat was male or female. The cat was hanging around because my parents and I had been taking our table scraps from dinner outside and putting them where it could find them.

Then one morning, I spotted the cat in the driveway. One look at it in the morning sunlight told me it was female. The tortoiseshell coloring proved it. She watched me as I walked toward my car. Still, she ran away before I could get remotely close to her. I noticed she had an odd gait as she ran. When she stopped momentarily to look back, I realized why. Her right-front forepaw was obviously broken and had not properly healed, causing the leg to be bent at an odd angle. Instantly, I felt even more sympathy for the frightened cat.

I became determined to find a way to make the cat understand she could trust me.

Cherish Every Moment: I'll Miss You, Jason Leffler

Jason Leffler and I. May 25, 2011

Hanging on my bedroom wall are numerous pictures of me with various NASCAR drivers that I have met over the last few years. The pictures signify moments in my life when I got to meet some of the greatest people I have ever had the pleasure of meeting. Sure, some of those meetings lasted less than a minute, but those precious seconds will always mean a lot to me. I have my favorite drivers, but I enjoy meeting any driver I can. Why? Because you just never know what could happen to them on down the road. Then you’ll be left wishing you had taken the time to meet that driver you thought you would get a chance to meet next time.

I look at one particular photo hanging on my wall, and I can’t help but fight back the tears. Amongst the multiple photos of me with the same drivers is one that I will forever cherish.

Hanging on my wall is one single photo of me with Jason Leffler.

Cheers for the Underdog: David Gilliland

David Gilliland during driver introductions at Bristol in August 2011

He is a driver that, up until a few years ago, I never paid much attention to. In fact, I never paid any real attention to him until he started racing for Front Row Motorsports. I could go into detail about his NASCAR career, but only if I did some research. I may not know a whole lot about David Gilliland, but what I can tell you is that as long as he is racing, I’m more than happy to cheer him on.

The only reason I even started noticing Gilliland was because of my cousin Kayla. She became a fan of him in 2008, and I eventually started watching him because she always pointed him out and cheered for him on race weekends. It didn’t matter what position he was in, if he even gained one single position more, she cheered.

Bristol Motor Speedway: I Call It Home

Ten years ago, I got up early one Saturday morning, hopped into a car with a friend, her family, and two of their family friends. We drove off toward Bristol Motor Speedway. I was only twelve-years-old at the time, and I barely knew anything about NASCAR. In fact, I had never even been to Bristol for a race until that day. When we arrived, my first thought was "It looks so much bigger on television". I looked at the thousands of people walking the speedway grounds, almost all of them decked out in some sort of driver's gear to proudly display who they cheered for on race day. I had no favorite driver at the time, and I could barely name any driver whose last name wasn't Johnson, Gordon, or Earnhardt. 

Why the No. 6 Team Means So Much To Me

The No. 6 team during a pit stop during the History 300
at Charlotte Motor Speedway (May 26, 2012)

Since 2007, one team in NASCAR has been my favorite above all others. I have seen two of my favorite drivers both get their first wins with this team and also earn top rookie honors with the team during their respective rookie years. This team has been the reason I have made every attempt at not missing a Nationwide Series race since 2007, and they continue to be the primary reason I enjoy the series so much. This team really made a name for themselves the last two seasons as they went on to become two-time champions with Ricky Stenhouse, Jr. behind the wheel of the No. 6 Ford. I have followed this team since 2007 when David Ragan won Nationwide Series Rookie of the Year, through the ups and downs they had with Stenhouse in 2010 to coming out on top not once, but twice in a row with Stenhouse in 2011 and 2012. The No. 6 Roush Fenway Racing team has never ceased to amaze me, and every season, I’ve watched them accomplish things that so many others said they never would. 

When Ricky Stenhouse, Jr. joined the team in 2010, he had only run a handful of Nationwide Series races prior to that. His rookie year started off rocky, to say the least, but I was immediately drawn to the driver that everyone had begun to say would never amount to anything after he crashed numerous times that year. I’ve watched Stenhouse go from underdog to top dog during his three seasons in the series. The No. 6 team never backed down when things went wrong. They dug themselves out of holes that I’m not sure other teams could have found ways out of to win back-to-back championships.

Doors have opened, but I've let them close

In October 2009, I started writing for Skirts and Scuffs. I never started  with any intent to become a NASCAR media member. At first, I wasn't comfortable with my writing, but it gradually gained recognition. I received high praises for the articles I wrote. Even some veteran media members commended me on my writing. I was surprised by all the positive feedback because I had never formally written anything at all about NASCAR until I joined the Skirts and Scuffs team. 

Just before the 2010 season started, I established my own weekly column. It was just a simple race recap, known as the Roush Rewind, that covered Roush Fenway Racing after every race. It was the main thing I wrote for the site. Occasionally, I wrote opinion pieces, but I always backed up my opinions with facts or, if there were no facts to back up what I was saying, I did my best to explain the logic behind my reasoning. If I wrote an opinion piece, I made sure to write it in a way that it would not offend anyone (or at least make it offend the least amount of people possible). Skirts and Scuffs gradually gained recognition, and soon, the site became part of the NASCAR Citizen's Journalist Media Corps. I could have asked for the site admin, Katy, to send in a request for me to get media credentials for a race I attended that year, but I never did. As I said before... Writing was something I was doing for fun. I had no intention to work in the media center.

Cheers for the Underdog: David Ragan

David Ragan and his team prepare for Coca Cola 600 qualifying
at Charlotte Motor Speedway on May 24, 2012.

In 2006, a young driver made his first Sprint Cup Series start at Dover International Speedway for Roush Fenway Racing and just 46 laps in, he was done for the day after being involved in a crash. A few weeks later, he traveled to Martinsville Speedway with a plan of just turning laps and finishing the race to gain experience. But that would be easier said than done. He caused a lot of crashes that race and angered many drivers, including Ken Schrader. Despite it all, he managed to finish 25^th that day at Martinsville. He even finished on the lead lap after getting the free pass not once, but three times throughout the race.

His next Cup Series race in 2006 was supposed to be the following weekend at Atlanta Motor Speedway, but NASCAR saw to it that he would not run that race after causing so much trouble at Martinsville.

But that never deterred David Ragan from trying to earn his place among NASCAR’s elite in the Sprint Cup Series. Nor did it stop me from becoming a fan of him.

It was actually the race at Martinsville Speedway that caused me to become a fan of Ragan. Even after all the trouble he had somehow found himself in, he owned up to his mistakes and wanted to learn from them. That perseverance in the face of so much scrutiny is what drew me in. You just don't see that in many young drivers when they first start.

Ragan still traveled to Atlanta Motor Speedway the following weekend because he was scheduled to run the Truck Series race. His disastrous Martinsville weekend still loomed over him though. Tony Stewart had called Ragan a “dart without feathers” after that race, and the media wouldn't let it go. Did Ragan take offense to it? Maybe. But he did something in response to it that truly speaks for the kind of person he is.