Loyd McIntosh

RSS
Jul 23
IndyCar In The Heart Of Dixie July was a big month for me with two HUGE magazine pieces. This one is a feature story for Tailgater Monthly magazine, a comprehensive look at a weekend at Barber Motorsports Park during the 2012 Honda Indy Grand Prix of Alabama and the Rolex Grand Am 250 March 31-April 1.If you’re a road racing fan you must put a trip to Barber on your to-do list. The track, located just 10-15 minutes from downtown Birmingham, opened in 2003 and has quickly gained a reputation as one of the finest road-racing facilities not only in North America, but throughout the world. Many of the drivers I spoke to over the weekend, including Charlie Kimball and Joao Barbosa, compared the track to the Cicuit de Spa, the legendary Formula I road-course in Belgium, even if it was originally designed for motorcycles, a fact that can make passing in a four-wheeler a wee-bit difficult. However, a trip to Barber Motorsports Park doesn’t require you to bone up on your French and it’s located just 30 minutes down I-20 from another landmark Alabama racetrack you may have heard of - Talladega Superspeedway. That’s right, one of the new bright sports on the Izod IndyCar schedule is just a stone’s throw from arguably the most famous NASCAR track in the land. Sunday’s main event was won by the driver with the best name in motorsports - Will Power - but for many women in attendance, the real main event was an appearance by Dr. McDreamy himself, Patrick Dempsey, a team-owner and driver in Saturday’s Rolex Grand Am 250. I wasn’t able to score an interview with him, but fret not ladies, I did get a few photos of him while signing autographs. Here’s a sample. All of the photos in the story were shot by Yours Truly as well. Click the links for photo albums from the action on Saturday and Sunday.

IndyCar In The Heart Of Dixie

July was a big month for me with two HUGE magazine pieces. This one is a feature story for Tailgater Monthly magazine, a comprehensive look at a weekend at Barber Motorsports Park during the 2012 Honda Indy Grand Prix of Alabama and the Rolex Grand Am 250 March 31-April 1.

If you’re a road racing fan you must put a trip to Barber on your to-do list. The track, located just 10-15 minutes from downtown Birmingham, opened in 2003 and has quickly gained a reputation as one of the finest road-racing facilities not only in North America, but throughout the world. Many of the drivers I spoke to over the weekend, including Charlie Kimball and Joao Barbosa, compared the track to the Cicuit de Spa, the legendary Formula I road-course in Belgium, even if it was originally designed for motorcycles, a fact that can make passing in a four-wheeler a wee-bit difficult.

However, a trip to Barber Motorsports Park doesn’t require you to bone up on your French and it’s located just 30 minutes down I-20 from another landmark Alabama racetrack you may have heard of - Talladega Superspeedway. That’s right, one of the new bright sports on the Izod IndyCar schedule is just a stone’s throw from arguably the most famous NASCAR track in the land.

Sunday’s main event was won by the driver with the best name in motorsports - Will Power - but for many women in attendance, the real main event was an appearance by Dr. McDreamy himself, Patrick Dempsey, a team-owner and driver in Saturday’s Rolex Grand Am 250. I wasn’t able to score an interview with him, but fret not ladies, I did get a few photos of him while signing autographs. Here’s a sample.

All of the photos in the story were shot by Yours Truly as well. Click the links for photo albums from the action on Saturday and Sunday.

Enhanced by Zemanta

Posted 10 months ago

1 note

sports, auto racing, IndyCar, Izod IndyCar Series, Rolex Grand Am, Patrick Dempsey, Joao Barbosa, Charlie Kimball, Tailgater Monthly, road racing, Barber Motorsports Park,