Cazual Conversation

UPDATED AT www.newsherald.com UNDER OUR LEAD STORIES for comments and updates. 

(Managing Editor Mike Cazalas will send periodic updates from Talladega through the weekend, including pictures.) 

If everything goes according to plan, sometime in the next 72 hours, the following will be fact in Talladega, Ala.:

* My entourage arrives via a sparkling silver Saturn Sky, a 2.4-liter, 173 hp, 0-60 mph in five seconds machine that is the very definition of mid-life crisis. There’s enough room for me, a guest, two pairs of pants, four shirts, seven bottled waters, a laptop and a camera.

There is no backseat, no trunk. We find those things unnecessary for this journey.

* I catch up with the elusive Bay County Finch, James, and break down the barriers long enough to let folks know what our own Phoenix Racing Inc. team is up to, how Sterling Marlin is doing, and whether they make the big race.

I’m not telling Finch I’m going and am hoping for the element of surprise since I’m 1,000-percent convinced he is not reading The News Herald online. I’m sending a blonde intermediary to pave the way.

* I am captured on National TV in the pits, calmly, yet assertively, saying, “Now Jeff, Little Dale, we’ve got to run as a team, boys!” after pulling the two apart from a testosterone-fueled scuffle.

Grateful team owner Rick Hendricks rewards me with a spot on the team’s pit next to crew chief Steve Latarte for the remainder of the decade.

* On lap 33, Gordon, still dizzy from donating a kidney to a needy child, crawls out of his No. 24 and whispers toward the pit tower, “Caz, take over, I’m done,” before handing me his helmet and steering wheel.

* I run 22 laps without causing a wreck, before I realize I am merely circling pit row.

* On the track, I’ve just cracked 130 mph when fate calls and I am pulled over by a Florida Highway Patrol trooper and issued a ticket for illegal window tint on the front windshield.

* I find myself in victory lane, but upon reflection realize that is where I was thrown after being bump-drafted by ill-tempered Kyle Busch, who does not realize I’ve spelled Gordon.

I’m told anything can happen  in ‘Dega. I intend to find out.

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