The Champion (Racing on the Edge) (30 page)

We were hiring a private teacher for him next year.

“Sway, are you in here?” Emma called out as I heard her
come in the front door. Then I heard a loud crash followed by an “Oh shit.”

“You’re paying for that!” I yelled out to her making my
way into the living room to see her frantically cleaning up the glass from a
picture frame she’d knocked over with her suitcase she carried around as a
diaper bag for the twins.

Noah and Charlie began running around the house looking
for Arie. They’d be turning three next week and their temperaments showed it.
That’s not to say my two didn’t throw fits because, Christ almighty at times it
was as though the devil replaced my beautiful rusty haired babies.

“I’m sorry
...
I’m
running late.” Emma told me.

“For what?”

“Swim lessons—remember? We talked about this a few weeks
ago.”

“Right,” I nodded. “I just don’t see why we should put
them in swim lessons. I’m mean they’re not salmon. Why do they need to learn to
swim anyway?”

“Sway, what happens if they fall into the water? You live
on a lake.”

“That’s what floaties are for. Besides, they’re too young
for swim lessons. Arie wants nothing to do with the water. I have to bribe her
to get her to take baths. And Axel, well if it doesn’t involve a race car—good
luck getting him into the water.”

Emma sighed knowing damn well she’d never get my kids to
agree to this. Yet another trait they inherited from their father, extreme
stubbornness.

Catch Can – Jameson

For the first time in almost a year, the family and I
were on our way to Elma for Macy’s, Andrea and Van’s little girl, first
birthday party.

Returning to the Northwest always made me laugh. I was
offered a key to the City of Elma this last summer. Anyone that knew me found
this entertaining. The Sheriff was constantly sending me to traffic court for
various speeding or reckless driving infractions when I lived here. I was
hardly a model citizen.

Not long after this while I was driving home to Elma as I
entered the city I saw a sign on the side of the Highway 8 that read:
Home of NASCAR
Champion Jameson Riley.

Laughing at the irony of it all, I snapped a picture and
sent it to Sway with a text that read:
We used to steal this sign back in high
school.

Her response:
You better bring that shit home so we can hang it on
the wall!

Every time we stole the sign, they replaced it with
another and added the last date I stole it. Eventually we lost interest in
stealing the sign but it was still entertaining that my home town cared enough
about me to have a sign made.

When we entered the city today, the sign was still there.
Sway chuckled beside me when she saw it had been replaced yet again.

“Pretty soon they’ll have to add Axel’s name to it.”

I laughed. “Probably,”

I had just started Axel in the USAC quarter midget
Division. He turned four last week and was granted his USAC license so
naturally he got a brand new quarter midget all ready to go for his birthday.
Justin and Tyler helped me get everything set up in time for him to race in the
“Duel in the Desert” in Phoenix this coming March.

To say he was excited was an understatement. Axel had
been showing interest in racing since birth but now it was something similar to
the way I acted around racing. We started him out with a go-kart at one and now
he’d out grown it. I should rephrase that—the yard outgrew him.

Just like me when I was younger, he had a track in our
back yard at the Mooresville house; quarter mile clay oval track. And just like
me, he threw a fit when it was time to come in at night. I made a point that
every Tuesday morning, I went out there with him and we raced. It became hard
once winter came around so what did I do? I installed a covered roof over the
track. I couldn’t have a crying little boy, could I?

Once we arrived at the house on Summit Lake, I snuck over
to the track to test out the car we got for him. Sway knew it was only a matter
of time before I took him to the track. I had to make sure everything turned
out, right?

So Axel, Van, Tommy and I made our way over to the track
before heading out to the birthday party. Van and Tommy wouldn’t have missed
this either. Over the past few years, Axel had become like a son to him and for
good reason. He spent more time around my kids than I got to these days. I also
knew they were protected.

I would never regret the decisions and sacrifices I’ve
made now because financially it has secured our future but those decisions and
sacrifices has had drawbacks. I had missed Arie’s birth, which was extremely
hard on me, and I’d missed Sway’s birthday twice now.

It’s strange but something happens when you become a
NASCAR Champion and people stop seeing you for you and instead some sort of a
rock star who isn’t bothered by fame. That’s not entirely true. I hated fame
and more importantly, I hated that fame for my family. Growing up, Axel would
constantly be considered Jameson Riley’s son just as I was always Jimi Riley’s
son. It’s an endless cycle in the racing community. Knowing all this, I shouldn’t
have been surprised to see fans waiting outside the gates at Grays Harbor
raceway when we pulled in.

I have no problem with fans. They’re the reason my career
has really taken off but when I’m with my family, I want to be with them and
give them the attention they deserve. Yeah that one fan only wants a few
seconds of my time but what happens when I give just that one fan a few
seconds? Well then the next fan wants a few seconds and then the next, before
you know it, you’ve spent the last 30-minutes giving each fan just a few
seconds while my 4-year old son patiently waits inside his race car for his dad
to show him how to drive it.

“I’m sorry, but my son is waiting for me.” I told the
last fan that wanted an autograph.

“Just one second of your time.” He pleaded handing me the
die cast car.

“I really am sorry but I need to get going.” I began to
walk away when I heard the guy lean over to his friend and mutter,
“What a
jerk.”

That type of snide comment irritated me to no end. I
wanted to turn around and say, “Fuck you!” but didn’t. I had just stood there
signing autograph after autograph for these fans and when I finally need to
draw a line to the madness they act as though I blew them off. You can’t win
with it and I began to realize I shouldn’t care.

These fans blow us up to be these heroes. We’re people,
we’re racers where nothing else matters but the noise and I think at times,
they forget we’re actual people with lives outside of the tracks too. Some fall
victim to the fame and become the image created for them, no longer knowing
themselves because god forbid they should be disappointingly normal. We’re
people though and the fans and media forget that from time to time.

“Daddy, what I do?” Axel asked me putting his helmet over
his untidy mess of rusty curls.

I smiled watching his excited eyes.

I still remember the first time I sat in one of those
cars and my first race, which was at this very track. I was so amped up I
hardly listened to my dad’s advice but thought I should give Axel the same.

“All right this is similar to what you see Grandpa and
daddy do in sprint cars. Tommy is going to push start you, okay?”

Axel nodded with enthusiasm, his helmet visor flipping
shut. He knew race talk.

I had to chuckle. “Get comfortable with the speed before you
go throwing it into the corners okay?” he nodded again. It wasn’t that these
cars exceeded twenty but still, he was four. “This weighs slightly more than
the go-kart you had so get use to that first. Once you’re in that spinning
drift, that’s not the time to second-guess the speed. You drive it in too hard
and you’ll end up in the wall. What happens then?”

“Momma yells at you.” He grinned.

“Exactly,” I patted his helmet and pulled on his belts
before Tommy pushed him off. As I expected, he knew exactly what do to and the
little red Honda fired to life.

 “It’s hard to believe he’s big enough to be doing
this.” Van said linking his fingers in the chain link fence we leaned against.

“I know. It’s seems like just yesterday Sway gave birth
to him.”

Van laughed when Axel, who’d been pushing up the track
with each lap, bounced the right rear off the outside cushions like I always
did, as did my dad. It’s a feeling every dirt-tracker knows and is comfortable
with but once that right rear hits the outside cushions, it jolts your car
forward giving you that added boost needed to pass when slower cars get bunched
down on the rails.

Axel made another five laps before I walked back down
onto the front stretch where he stopped when he saw me. Like I told him, he
pulled it out of gear before flipping his visor up. I watched him rub his eyes
just as I always did. I’m still amazed at how much he picks up from me just by
watching.

“I do good?” his eyes held hesitation.

“You did great little man.” I told him. “That last lap was
faster than mine when I was your age.

The hesitation vanished. “Mama will be proud of me.”

He tried so hard to make everyone proud of him, when
really, just having him around was enough for us. I don’t know where he ever
got that he needed to make us proud of him but it didn’t stop him from trying.

“Can I go again?”

“Sure buddy. This is for you. Let me know when you’re
done.” I leaned in closer. “Do you want me to track your lap times?”

He nodded. “Yeah,”

I kept track of everything I could for him; from lap
times to tire pressure and technique. It wasn’t like I needed to do that with a
quarter midget but it made him feel special and that’s what today was about.

Growing up around the track, Axel already knew the basics
in dirt track racing. He spent countless hours asking questions of me, Justin,
Tyler, and my dad on how to race on dirt.

I managed to get him buckled in the car on the way to the
birthday party before he started with his questions.

“How come,” this was how all his questions began, “when I
hit toes holey things
...
I not steer very
good.” His adorable voice had me smiling. He reminded me of Lane at this age
when he frequently missed words when talking.

“Those are called ruts buddy.” I started telling him more
about the ruts and didn’t leave anything out. I also talked to him as though he
was another adult. My dad always did that to me and I always felt that helped
my career more than the opportunities he provided me did. “The ruts are caused
from wheelspin. You’d think the track would be nice and smooth but it’s rough,
huh?” He nodded, listening closely as we pulled out of the pits. “Tracks with a
lot of moisture, like Elma, can form ruts and if your car isn’t set up to roll
over the ruts, the consequence is often a crash. Normally when your car hits
the ruts you want it to ride over it but if the tire catches the rut, all the
car’s weight is then transferred to the right rear causing the car to roll
over. It’s worse in sprint cars because of the staggered tires.”

“Why are they stammered?”

“Staggered,” I corrected him. “They’re staggered for a
number of reasons. For one, it helps the car turn left. Essentially this will
work in your favor but sometimes it won’t. The rear tires are the only ones
staggered meaning the left rear is smaller than the right rear.”

“Why?”

He never waited for your answer before he dove into the
next question, much like me. “Sprint cars have a one-piece rear axle connecting
the left and right rear wheel and don’t have differentials. So if you have both
tires the same size and with the high compression ratios, the car would end up
in the fence as soon as you hit turn one.” He seemed to understand so I
continued. “Do you remember when we went to Knoxville Nationals this last summer
and Grandpa Jimi was adjusting the stagger on his car?”

“Yeah,” his brow furrowed together while he listened
intently. His head tipped to one side slightly contemplating everything I’d
just told him.

“At Knoxville they’re known for a dryer slick track meaning
you don’t need as much stagger as you’d need at Elma or Cottage Grove where the
clay is thicker and resembles almost a mud consistency.”

Once we made it back to the house for the birthday party,
Axel had asked every question he could think of when it came to stagger and
ruts.

I remember being the exact same way. At his age, I
dreamed of racing non-stop so I understood.

“How’d it go?” Sway asked once she found me in the family
room of our Summit Lake home.

We offered to hold the party here since Charlie’s old
house that Andrea and Van were living in was nowhere near big enough for our
expanding families.

Wrapping my arms around her swollen belly, I breathed in
a deep breath. I enjoyed the time away from racing during the winter months for
moments just like this, knowing I’d be able to wake up beside my wife and not
have to leave for another track. Instead, tomorrow we’d be going on a small
vacation, just the two of us.

“It went good,” I finally answered when she slapped my
hand that I had placed on her ass away.

“Behave.” She told me tapping her index finger to my
nose. “We have kids
and
people everywhere.”

“There are kids and people everywhere.” I had to remind
her before pulling her into the bathroom just off our kitchen. “That’s never
stopped us before.”

“At some point, I’d like to have my body back from having
your kids.”

Smirking, I took a firm grasp on her ass. “You’re really
to blame for that.”

Her right hand rose quickly and punched my left shoulder,
the one I’d just had surgery on a few weeks back when I separated it in a crash
at Talladega early in the year.