Dover Nationwide Race...

Last month I took a day off work so my family and I could go to Dover, Delaware for the Nationwide Dover 200 race. We always have fun but we may never go again. It seems every time we go to Dover it rains and this race was no different. They did get the race in but it drizzled the last 25 or so laps and was pouring by the time we got out of the parking lot.

The top photo shows the four cars that dominated most of the race, #29 Clint Boyer, #18 Kyle Busch, #88 Brad Keselowski and #11 Mike Bliss. The second photograph shows Clint Boyer doing burn outs at the start finish line after winning the race. The last photo is of my best friend and son Shane and a self portrait. This was the first photograph I got of Shane since he got his braces a couple of months ago. He went with Miami Dolphins colors of teal and orange. Back to Elk photos in the morning.

Battle At The Grove Continues...

The top photo is Kyle Busch and Kasey Kahne followed by the sprint car Kasey drove and the modified driven by Kyle. Both did well in the heat races and led the first part of the features before fading late. We live in Sprint car country but Shane and I prefer the modified cars better.

Sorry for the short post but I am a little short on time these days. My days always get longer in the winter when the days get shorter but I am in no hurry for the cold weather to come.

Battle At The Grove...

Last Wednesday my family and I went to Williams Grove Speedway for some dirt track racing. The special Wednesday event was an annual event that features Kasey Kahne and another Nascar driver racing for charity. This year Kyle Busch was Kasey's guest driving a modified while Kasey drove a sprint car. We are lucky to have one of the more famous dirt tracks within five minutes of our house. Racing at the Grove is every Friday and Saturday with the World of Outlaws making frequent visits. More on the race later.

Camping World 300...

These photographs were taken at the Camping World 300 at Daytona International Speedway on February 14. The first photo is Dale Earnhardt Jr. waving to the fans during driver introduction, the second photo is Dale leaving the pits during the race and the last photo is of Carl Edwards getting his car serviced during one of the caution flags. The race was won by Tony "Smoke" Stewart. We had a great time, now Shane keeps asking when we are going to go to another race.

Where Am I?

I picked these two photographs for today because I thought they would be the best clue as to my location for the last week. I will give you two more hints, one, it is warn here and two, I had the chance to photograph many birds one day with Klaus.

I need to catch up on a few things from the last week and that is thanks to those that commented on my WW 2 photos last week. I really enjoyed photographing the living historians for those posts. All of those were scheduled post and I finally got the chance to get a few more photos ready yesterday and uploaded to the site. Net time and wireless connections have been few and far between.

I received a phone call last week informing me that Yellowstone's famous Elk number 6 died in an accident last week. I wanted to publish a tribute to him but all his photos are at home on a different hard drive so that will have to wait for later in the week. I will also post more from this event later also.

I want to remind everyone that most of my photos get larger when they are clicked on.

Bristol Motor Speedway, Sharpie 500...

The regulars on here know that we went to Bristol Motor Speedway in August for the Nascar races. I had post a few photos previously from Bristol including the Friday night Nationwide series race. I have been asked a few times recently if I was going to post any from the Cup race Saturday night and if I got any of the big crash, so here are a few.

The first photograph shows Dale Earnhardt Jr. (88 car for the non race fans), my favorite driver, the second photograph shows Kasey Kahne blowing flames out the exhaust pipes after a crash on lap 216 between turns 1 and 2. In the third photograph Bill Elliott (21) gets his car serviced in the pits and of course race fans know when Carl Edwards wins a race he always does his back flip at the start finish line.

All of the photograph were shot at a focal length of 200 mm with the ISO ranging from 2400 to 3200 in the last photograph. You never know a few more photos from the weekend may show up in the future.

NASCAR Nationwide Series Food City 250

Today's photographs were taken last Friday night at Bristol Motor Speedway I almost referred to this as the Busch Grand National Series but then I thought (yes I do think, sometimes) no lets get it right and call it by it's new name, the NASCAR Nationwide Series Food City 250.

Before I say anything about the photos or the race I wanted to talk a little about the people. This event was attended by 110,000 people and Saturday's race by almost 170,000 so you get to see all types. I will be the first to admit that allot of these people are rednecks (heck I used to be one), some are that drunk I don't know how they walk or talk. But like firefighters, bikers and other groups you meet most of these people are just really nice. We went on a bus trip since tickets are so hard to get and it just makes life so much easier. On the bus there was allot of nice people, some season ticket holders for the Hershey Bears, just like us. But a few that stood out were a couple (maybe a little older than us) and the woman's father. Linda, her father Tom and her husband, I am sorry but I don't remember his name (old timers decease setting in) traveled from Miami, Florida and met us at a hotel. Like us they are Dolphins fans and like us Tom is a Earnhardt fan. We sat next to them at both races and on the bus, allowing us the chance to talk and get to know them a little better. It was nice getting to meet them and I know Shane really enjoyed their company.

On Saturday the announcer had all the Veterans stand to honor them, Tom stood at the urging of his daughter. It was very evident that he was touched by this and still very proud to have served his country. Linda and I were also very touched by his reaction to the whole thing. For some reason I failed to thank him for his service to the country then so I am doing so now. I can only hope that this thank you reaches him. While I am at it I would like to thank all our vets for keeping this great country safe.

Now back to the race, the top photo is the green flag to start the event. Picture two is the number 6 car of David Ragan spinning on the front stretch to bring out the yellow flag, followed by action on pit road. And finally the last photograph is of Brad Keselowski after doing a few donuts at the start finish line moments after winning the race. Brad drives for Dale Earnhardt Jr. so a few of us were happy with the win.

More from the cup series and some random shots will follow sometime in the future.

Bristol Motor Speedway...

Sorry for the late post this morning, we were away all weekend and at the last minute I decided to post from that event, so I needed to download, find the right pictures and then post process them for today. I had wildlife photos ready for today and will return to them on Tuesday while I get more ready from Bristol.

By now I think you guessed that we went to Bristol Motor Speedway for the Nascar race, if you didn't I will write it off as a Monday brain fart. This was our first trip to Bristol and I guess the best way describe it would be "AWESOME". Both of these photos were taken Friday night while the Cup cars were practicing before the Busch race. I know they don't call it that anymore, but I do and I don't like change, so I still and will keep calling it Cup and Busch.

I didn't take the big lens along so for the most part they were shot at 200 mm and once the sun went down the ISO increased to 3200 to keep the shutter speed up. I assumed it with the lights it would be lit up more, I guess the TV is deceiving. More Bristol photos to come in the future, sometime. And just in case you don't know who the guy is in the second photo, it is Dale Earnhardt, Jr.

A Couple More From Dover...

With nothing else ready, today's two photographs come from Dover last Saturday. The top photo was taken during the National anthem and the other was of the first caution. The pictures were taken from the end of turn four.

Now I need to find time to prepare photos for next week and beyond. I still have plenty from Armed Forces Day including a good weeks worth of posting on the photographer that was there. Tomorrow I will be shooting allot as Engine Company 17 in Washington D.C. is renamed in honor of the late Jackson Gerhart. I should also get some photos from child's dream weekend at WEFR also.

Dover International Speedway...

I was going to post these photographs later in the week but Woody said he was looking forward to them so I moved them up a few days. This past Saturday my family and the Holtzman's went to Dover to take in the Nationwide race and enjoy a day out. Well that statement pretty much held up. The Cup cars came out and did a few laps of practice and then the skies opened up. Yep we got soaked. But we stuck it out, a trip to Walmart for new clothes for everyone and back to the race track to see the three plus hour delayed race, 1:35 a.m. and we are finally home and back in bed.

The day was being used as a learning experience for me. With a new camera body that incorporates different focusing techniques, I found it to be the perfect opportunity to shoot the cars on the track with the big lens and the different focus settings. Did I learn anything? Yes, that at the focal length I was using in totally overcast skies and night fall approaching it is not that easy to photograph cars traveling 130 plus mph. It was still successful and I got a few shots. These are the only two I have worked up so far and they are also a learning experience, both went through multiple layers in Photoshop, the monster was purposely made darker to reflect the dark day in Dover.

Over the next couple of days I want to give a few plugs to blogs I look at daily that you may be interested in. Brian's is linked to my site so I won't put his link in here also. The first one is a friend from Shippensburg http://outskirtsofsuburbia.blogspot.com/ he has been at the blogging longer than me. The next one is from Lancaster County, I have never met Woody but we have exchanged messages numerous times and I am sure we will be meeting soon. He is new to the DSLR community but is already on the right track shooting Nikon's (that makes him a fellow Nikonian) his site can be found at http://woodysphotography.blogspot.com/