Jesus said to them, “Have you never read in the Scriptures: ‘The stone which the builders rejected Has become the chief cornerstone. This was the Lord’s doing ,And it is marvelous in our eyes’? Matthew 21:42
Started New Job at Hendrick Motorsports October 1993
Hendrick Motorsports Charlotte, North Carolina
Recently retired but with all the changes soon coming to NASCAR it now appears maybe not for long! I began my racing career in the mid to late seventies after being completely smitten, captivated, and ruined for life by experiencing my first Daytona 500 on the inside as a spectator in 1973. I say began in the mid to late seventies because it was actually a paying job. The pay was $100 per week which was good for a beginner racing job in those days though far below what you could earn at any regular job on the outside back then. The only job I could land in the very early days before that was as a volunteer helper on one of the smaller Independent teams for no pay. Your pay was you got to be there and watch the race. You kept that job if you were a hard worker and didn’t complain about the long hours.
I had to live out of my car and sleep at night on a side street for many a night back then. Soon after I got my first paying job I moved into a rundown motel room with broken windows where you could stay by paying by the week. My first room was pretty decrepit, an old TV with rabbit ears that didn’t work right, dingy furniture and stopped up plumbing that you had to be careful running the water much or it would overflow onto the floor. Life got a lot better when you were at the track because you could take a shower in the restroom-dressing room in the NASCAR garage area which everybody used including the drivers back then.
The race cars traveled with thick canvas covers over them towed on an open trailer usually pulled by a small box truck which was packed tight with pit equipment, spare parts and occasionally some clever innovative thing which might gain you a small advantage if you could get it past NASCAR inspectors. The first stop was NASCAR registration at the entrance, then next on to NASCAR Garage Registration where everyone on the team stood and waited in an orderly fashion to present a current NASCAR license and pass Oscar’s scrutiny to get your zero tolerance NASCAR Garage Credential which you could not gain entrance without. We then pulled on into the garage area where NASCAR had already written in crayon all the team car numbers at the entrance to each stall and we would slowly drive through looking out for our number. The very first thing we did is pull the cover off and push the car on in to our assigned stall space where we would find the usual rickety looking but sturdy wooden work benches that always looked 50 years old. Then the trailers would be moved out of the way but the truck always stayed right across from your garage stall on the other side of the driveway.
If it was one of the early races on the schedule it would always be freezing cold early in the morning so we all built fires in nearby 55 gallon trash barrels. Every team had the requisite plug-in kerosene rocket heater but its priority was for pointing at the car to help warm up the engine before you started it. It was then you would discover your first challenge of the day was to troubleshoot why you had no electricity in the beat up socket at your stall. NASCAR and the track owner’s lowest priority was always garage electricity so we usually had to go looking for the problem or steal it by unplugging one of the other teams on either side of us and tap into theirs if they were lucky enough to have it.
By the time we had our cars on four jack stands with the hoods up, wheels off and rocket heaters blazing away air hoses from nitrogen bottles and extension cords would be all over the place and the air was thick with the scent of spent kerosene smoke. Every member on your team would be hustling as fast as he could to get ready for the first round of NASCAR inspectors to come by and scrutinize each car. This always included an inspector underneath on a creeper with a flashlight. One of the ways you could sometimes gain an early advantage in those days was by taping a couple of hundred dollar bills to the bottom of your bell housing or oil pan. Stuff you might be worried about under there could sometimes pass inspection a lot faster that way.
Greg Gore 