Checkered Past: Racing Is Resilient
The World of Outlaws has paused many times. It has been rained out from Florida to Seattle and hammered by hurricanes in Houston and Santa Cruz. It was too windy in Oklahoma City, too...
Checkered Past: Lone Star Lullaby
There are 47 of these United States in our Lower 48. Then there’s Texas. It has its own language, attitude and longest stretch: 825 miles from the Rio Grande to Sabine Rivers. In between...
Checkered Past: Reindeer on Rails
Christmas is a time for family. Religious affiliation does not matter nearly as much as hugging mothers and fathers, laughing with brothers and sisters, and seeing pure joy on the faces of their children....
Checkered Past: Slick 50
It sounded too good to be true. Ten weeks of World of Outlaws Sprint Cars from legendary Manzanita Speedway during the dead of winter all on live television had to be a pipedream. Yet...
Checkered Past: Outlaws Hunt Turkey
Outlaws can be grumpy bears. Three months between World Finals and Florida Speedweeks make them miserable. Some bears refuse to hibernate. They board flights to Australia or New Zealand to race all 12 months...
Checkered Past: Cool Hand Luke
Auto racing has never seen a career quite like that authored by Jimmy Sills, co-author of the new autobiography “Life With Luke” with Dave Argabright. Sills was an outlaw before the World of Outlaws....
Checkered Past: Final Bend
They’re going down to the wire. Like two thoroughbred horses rounding the clubhouse corner neck-and-neck, dominant Donny Schatz and never-been-champ Brad Sweet are taking the 2019 World of Outlaws title fight to a Can-Am...
Checkered Past: Cricket, a profile of Craig Keel
Craig Keel was outlaw by nature. Non-conformist to his core, Keel unconventionally converted a late model to a modified then went sprint car racing when there was no place to race them within 200...
Checkered Past: Super DIRT Week
Syracuse 1974 was the biggest road trip in my eleven-year life. Dad dispatched us to bed to rise before dawn for the four-hour pilgrimage up I-81. Bob was happy at Reading, but his brother...
Checkered Past: Rail Tale
We who have seen these World of Outlaws in each of their 41 seasons are a dying lot. Melodramatic maybe but stone dead reality. Maintaining perfect attendance however, warranted only a passing thought. Adventure...
Checkered Past: Pastures of Plenty
“Welcome to the Hotel California,” crooned Don Henley in 1976. “Such a lovely place. Such a lovely face. Plenty of room at the Hotel California. Any time of year, you can find it here."...
Checkered Past: Dakota Wind
“Dakota” was first defined as the Sioux language of the Santee tribe. In 1889 it named the newest of the then-40 United States. In its ensuing 130 years, North and South Dakota remained Top...