Page 65 of The Champion
We said our goodbyes, I wished him good luck, and then Iheaded up to the tower with Emma.
On the way up to the private suites, I ran into PaulLeighty’s girlfriend, Elaina. She was new this year and had some things tolearn about tact. She flat out asked me if Jameson had signed a prenup.
Who asked that?
Up until that moment, the thought of a prenup had nevereven crossed my mind. Jameson never mentioned it. No one in our families evermentioned so why did this girl I’d only met five minutes ago?
That got me thinking the majority of the race aboutprenups and if Jameson had wanted one. It was a little late now but he wasworth a lot of money these days and had cars, houses, all kinds of stuff Iwould consider his but if something happened—I had to mentally stop myselfthere. I couldn’t focus on the race and prenups so I instead focused on therace.
“Your fuel window is sixty laps bud.” Kyle told him oncehe was making the pace laps prior to the start.
“10-4.” Jameson said and then asked, “I need a coupleGatorades at each stop.”
“Will do. Just make sure you try to keep cool and keepdrinking fluids.”
Being NASCAR’s longest night, none of the drivers were thrilledwith the heat today. I was worried about him and by lap three hundred, when thesun had finally set, the temperature hadn’t dropped and my fears of him gettingdehydrated were starting to grow.
“How do these auxiliary switches work?” Jameson asked.His voice was completely drained.
“If you turn on the one for your seat, you’ll have toturn the one for your helmet up.”
“Oh,” he began to fade in the field creating a distancebetween him and Paul Leighty in turn four. “No wonder.”
“How’s your temps?”
It took another lap before he replied to Kyle’s question.
“Me? Or the car?”
“Both I guess.” Kyle let out a nervous chuckle that wasrare for him. “You hangin’ in there bud?”
He was silent for another lap as he battled with a lapcar to stay in his twelfth place running order and my heart leapt into mythroat.
“Yeah, just tired,” He let out a whoosh of air andcontinued with a dull voice. “When I get close to other cars, my temps shootup.”
It didn’t help that he was running mid-pack after a pitaltercation when Spencer dropped the jack too soon.
On the final stop, water was spewing from the radiatorfrom the vent on the right side of the hood and got Spencer and Gentry in theface. Whenever the temps in the car went up, the vent on the right side of thecar near the windshield spewed hot water.
It seemed every stop, and there were many from the tiresshredding about every twenty laps, something went wrong. The guys were droppingair tools, tires were getting away and Jameson kept getting in the pit at the wrongangle. He had the pit in between Colin and Paul and every time, Colin got intohis pit sideways so that meant Jameson got into his at the wrong angle.
“Damn it, we need to get this together!” Jameson shoutedafter the last stop. “I need another Gatorade. My feet are burning through theheat shields. Oh, and not the grape one. That was gross.”
I laughed beside Nancy who was holding Axel up near thewindow to see the cars pass by. His wide green eyes fixated on the track below.
Jameson didn’t want to make a big deal out of it but hewas, in fact, feeling the heat and making comments, like the heat shields andthat he was tired. That was his way of letting us know without complaining.
“How many more laps?” I asked mostly to myself andworrying about Jameson.
Nancy looked over her shoulder at me shifting Axel to herhip. He latched on to her necklace with his hands and then quickly turned tosucking on it. “I think there’s about a hundred.”
Those hundred laps were way longer than I, or Jameson,would have liked.
At one point Kyle and Jimi contemplated taking Jamesonout of the car and putting in a back-up driver from the Nationwide series.
He managed to hang onto a ninth place finish but as soonas he was out of the car and walking away from the car he collapsed.
The media, huddled around, caught wind of the situationand started in about the drivers doing too much each week and the possible heatexhaustion results.
