On the Soapbox

photo by gesika22 of Flickr Free License Pool

Oswego, NY 01.18.10…..It’s the first post of a new year and the first ‘column’ of 2010.  It’s taken me a while to get the bio rhythms back in sync after my extended Midwestern stay, and frankly, I’ve been enjoying the slacker mentality a little more than I probably should have.

I thought maybe I should pull the bootstraps tight, (hypothetically speaking because quite literally they’ve been pulled tight a whole lot since I got back to the O owing to the fact that the snow machine has kicked in here), and get back at keeping this blog and the website content fresh for all of you folks.

I have to say, even though I’ve been off duty or somewhat behind the curve, the supermodified division has been producing it’s fair share of scuttlebutt and there’s plenty of juicy rumors floating around.  Frankly, I’ve been left out of the loop on a few of them and I’ve been scooped by several other writers.  Continue reading →

Popularity: 16% [?]

It was only supposed to be a short overnight stop on the way back to Oswego, but it has turned into another extended stay with friends from the world of supermodified racing.

“Hey, we’re going to be rolling through Sandusky around 3pm the day after Christmas and I thought maybe we could hang out for a while on the way home,” was how I began the conversation with Gene Lee Gibson on Christmas Eve.

“Yeah, come on over, I’ll let Cindy know, you can stay as long as you want,” he replied.

And so I left my family in Goshen, IN, one more time and began a leisurely drive across US 20 to Toledo where I planned to pick up RT 2.  I’ve become very familiar with the back routes to a destination, this owed in large part to the fact that it’s a heck of a lot cheaper to stay off of the Turnpike, Throughway, Toll Road or any of the other main thoroughfares that you have to pay to use.  It maybe a little risky this time of the year to attempt taking a two lane highway but I don’t often shy away from adventure and I figure that at the very least that I may very well find some interesting things to see. Continue reading →

Popularity: 25% [?]

I’ve been doing a whole lot of soul searching lately and the things I am finding as I dig deeper, are beginning to push me towards the consumption of larger amounts of PBR . This sort of thing generally happens as I approach my birthday, celebrate it, then come to the realization that I have chalked up another year of debt, missed goals, aches, pains, and irritations, (including those which bring forth the use of Anti-Monkey Butt Powder), only to find myself just as uncertain of my future as I was the year before.

This most recent head first dive into the depths of post birthday depression actually got into full swing on the day of my birth a few weeks back.  I was given the news that, effective immediately, my producer and program director would no longer be interested in continuing their involvement with Wailing with Wing Side Up.  There’s a lot of different reasons for this, some of which are justified on their part, some of which I believe were motivated by the desire for something more than I could give them at this time-namely cash.

Either way, what’s done is done, and even though it wasn’t a very nice way to celebrate, I attempted to do damage control the best way I know how-call Annamarie.  It certainly isn’t the first time we’ve been faced with this issue of having what I would call growing pains.  Several times now, (and many more times in the future I’m sure), there have been some pretty big roadblocks thrown up for which a long, tedious, and treacherous detour was required.  With all the road miles I rack up in a year chasing supermodifieds, I encounter many detours, but let me tell you, this latest one, (and I hate to admit it for fear of giving some people a chance to gloat over my distress), was one of the bumpiest, twisted, and longest yet.

I’ve always prided myself on digging in and getting to the task of ‘fixing’ things.  The more people tell me it can’t be done, or attempt to derail my plans and dreams, the more I set my sites on proving them wrong.  I’m not sure if that’s a  good cause for motivation or not, but at the very least, it moves me to action. Continue reading →

Popularity: 29% [?]

I’m going to let you all in on a little secret: this website is a lot more than just a weekly internet radio show called Wailing with Wing Side Up.

If you read the about me section of the site or this blog, you will soon find out that the website all began as an extension of my weekly column called “Wing Side Up” that got it’s start in Dick Beebe’s award winning MARC Times Racing News back in 1989.

Wing Side Up, the website has become, (maybe more by chance than design), a sort of media clearing house for the entire supermodified division.  Sometimes it’s hard to define what purpose each part has, especially lately with all the stuff going on that is keeping the show from being live, but I’ve come to understand that the audio is probably just as important as the writing now and that it too,  has become an extension of the original column as well.

So, I started thinking that even though we may not have a “LIVE” audio webcast, maybe I could dig back into the whole podcasting thing and have some sort of audio up on site and people would still be interested enough to come hang out.   Trouble is, I’d pretty much forgotten how to podcast. Continue reading →

Popularity: 29% [?]

Wing Side Up

by Bob Gangwer

Oswego, NY 11/16/09…In the waning days of this year, I’ve done a lot of thinking about the things that make this DIVISION great and what brings it fame. Now I’m not going to get into the definitions of the word ‘great’ or ‘fame’ because I think that even if I did, we’d all have our own way of describing what they mean.

What I’ve thought about while on the road or in the air, is the people that I have been exposed to this season.  Some I’ve known for a long time, but I never really ‘knew’ them. Some I’ve be introduced to for the first time, and I feel like I have known them forever.

I am one of the crowd that often says, “It’s the people of this sport that make it great.” And while that may be true, how do we really define what that means? It seems obvious enough, yet I think if you ask 10 different people they will give you ten different reasons why that statement is factual.

Continue reading →

Popularity: 25% [?]