Food City Family Race Night A Fan Favorite On State Street

BRISTOL, Tenn. – On a sticky Thursday, the Food City Family Race Night 2009 took command of State Street, bringing its usual lively mix of colorful people, notable celebrities, interesting images and long lines of folks waiting for ... well ... free food.
Here, then, is a scrapbook of those memorable folks, figures and sights as they unfolded up, down and across downtown Bristol on a glorious “gettin’ ready for racin’ ” day.

Nothing says love like a $20 used car
Gabe Plunkert of Gettysburg, Pa., admitted he never imagined he’d ever spend a muggy 80-degree day rolling a used NASCAR tire down a jammed street straddling two southern states – in a quest to get signatures from athletes in a sport he never used to follow.
Nor pay $20 for said used tire.
But there Plunkert was Thursday, doing all of the above. And all for the love of a woman: his girlfriend and rabid NASCAR fan, Kristin Pinda, who convinced Plunkert to make the trip from their native Gettysburg to attend both the Family Race Night and Saturday’s Sharpie 500 at Bristol Motor Speedway.
“I guess you can tell who’s the boss in our relationship,” Plunkert said, laughing as he gently pushed his tire down the street, seeking autographs from appearing NASCAR drivers Clint Bowyer and Kevin Harvick. “But I’m actually starting to become a real NASCAR fan now.”
Said a proud Pinda: “I think I’m converting him. I’ve wanted to see the race [in Bristol] for a long time, but now he’s just as excited about being here as I am.”

“The” man
There he was, standing outside the Paramount Theater, signing autographs, posing for pictures with giddy bystanders and just about seeing others throw themselves at his feet in worshipful fashion.
It was towering NASCAR president Mike Helton, and a slight smirk crept across his face when a reporter asked him to describe just how important Bristol, and the annual Sharpie 500 race, was to NASCAR.
“Come here,” Helton said, grabbing the reporter by the front of his shirt and leading him from the sidewalk into the middle of State Street.
“See that?,” Helton said, pointing towards the seemingly endless sea of people, elbow-to-elbow, walking towards him and the reporter. “That’s your answer.”
Well played, Mr. Helton. Well played.

Pimp my ... Humvee?
U.S. Marine Sgt. Derek Cotton, a public affairs NCO working in the Marines’ Harrisburg, Va. office, conceded that, no, you probably wouldn’t ever see a USMC military Humvee in actual battle with its rear seat pulled out and replaced by a huge sound system with throbbing, pulsating speakers pumping out hard rock tunes. Oh, and a flat screen beaming a Marines recruiting video.
But here was that Humvee, bright red and gleaming, outside the Marines’ booth at the Family Race Night. And drawing a nice crowd of admirers, most of them teens.
“It definitely draws a little attention,” Cotton said.

If you gotta go, think of something else
NASCAR driver Clint Bowyer sat at a table, pleasantly autographing the vast array of items placed before him, one after another, by fans filing through his tent.
Bowyer broke into a smile, his teeth as white as a freshly bleached T-shirt, when asked about one of the less-glamorous moments of being a NASCAR racer:
Realizing halfway through a race – while bound up in a clingy fire suit and tightly strapped in a car – that you might have drunk a tad too many fluids before it started.
And that you really, badly, desperately could stand for another type of pit stop.
“Well, if you really have to go, sometimes you have no choice but to just go, uh, right then,” Bowyer said.
(Yes, we know. But it’s reality, folks. Get over the image.)
Added Bowyer, quickly: “But, most of the time during a race, your mind is so pre-occupied with so many other things. If you focus on them, it usually takes your mind off the other thing. And you’re fine.”

Fill ‘er up
Sam Alverson of Jacksonville, Fla., walked from his car towards State Street, lugging one of his prized possessions of 20 years collecting NASCAR items: a 12-gallon Sunoco gasoline can, identical to the ones used during actual races.
The red can was covered with autographs from drivers. But it had plenty of open space left to add more signatures during Family Race Night.
“I went through a pretty bad divorce,” Alverson said. “But one of the things that made me happy when it was over is I got to keep things like this. It wasn’t easy, either.”

“Hey, like your hat!”
Jeffrey Tyner of Pikeville, N.C., heard that more than once as he and his wife, Suzanne, strolled up and down State Street.
And why not?
Wearing a bright yellow hard hat bearing the No. 6 number of NASCAR driver Dave Ragan would draw some attention.
Along with the toy model UPS truck on top of THAT - to honor Ragan’s main sponsor. And the Dave Ragan tank-top covering Tyner’s King Henry VII-style belly.
“Yep, we’re pretty hardcore fans,” Tyner said, adding that Saturday will mark the 12th Bristol race for him and his wife.
Suzanne Tyner smiled at her hubby.
“And it’s pretty hard living with him,” she said. “Every race we attend, it’s like he’s some returning celebrity. You know, the ‘Hat Guy.’ ”
Both Jeffrey Tyner and his hat looked comfortably at home on State Street on Thursday.

rbrown@bristolnews.com | (276) 645-2512