The Valley of the Sun

For those of you who don't have the pleasure of living here, this is the time of the year that makes Phoenix, Scottsdale, and the surrounding area so special. I'm waiting on a business dinner at the Valley Ho resort in downtown Scottsdale and the weather is incredible. 85 degrees, no wind, no humidity, sunshine and skies as clear as you can possibly imagine. This is the Scottsdale that I fell in love with while attending horse shows here 20 some years ago. I vowed then, that someday I would live here. I've also attended conventions here in the heat of August and still find it just about the best place on earth. The valley has changed dramatically over the past 20 years but the weather and most of the things that make Scottsdale special are still here, along with some new and better reasons to come for a visit. Notice I didn't say come and live here. I'd like some of the people to just visit and not come here to stay. Pure selfishness. The 90 days a year that we have that are in the extreme heat range are easily worth the price to pay to enjoy the rest of the year. Top off the car, sunglasses and one of my favorite Tommy Bahama shirts on and I'm set for a great evening.

Now to be a bummer. The last weekend I attended an event at Firebird International Raceway that I found out about merely by chance. It was the Redline time attack challenge. Nationally know race car drivers dueling it out on the fast main track at Firebird. Sports cars from BMW, Corvette, Lotus, Porsche, and Nissan, and Street tuner cars from several manufacturers. The sad part is the only people in attendance it seems were the contestants and their crews. It is such a shame.

There are many more sports car events in this country besides Nascar. Just last weekend alone besides Nascar, we had the IRL, and Rolex and Continental Tire series racing at Barber Motorsports Park. Not to mention all of the club racing events that happen on any given weekend around the U.S. This Saturday is the American LeMans series Races at Long Beach. Part of what makes this country great is our love of the automobile. WE are a mobile society. We purchase the majority of the cars in the world. Most of the foreign car companies are so in tune with the American car buying public that they have proving grounds and design studio right here in Arizona and Southern California. They use our roads, mountains, deserts, commuter rush hours, and wide open spaces to test their cars before they reach production. Weekly we are lucky enough to see camouflaged engineering mules driving around the valley of the sun. I've personally saw both the new Porsche Panamera and the Lincoln MKX here all camoed up at least a year before they went into production.

We need to take back the auto industry. WE make GREAT cars here in America. I am highly competitive in my mostly stock. I have removed weight and changed my shocks and added aero body parts, but my car is pretty much the same basic C5 Corvette that you can go and buy at any Chevrolet dealer in the country. Just today I had the privilege of spanking a Ferrari 360 convertible while making calls in Scottsdale. Don't pick on the Vette unless you have the balls to back it up. Mustangs are beating BMW's in the Grand Am series, and Chevy and Ford powered Rolex LMP cars are beating the best of Europe and Japan every weekend. Mercedes doesn't even bother to race here and except for the F1 series, they stick mainly to the German Touring Car series in Europe, where only Mercedes and Audi are allowed to play. Club racers all over the globe are buying small block GM V8's to install in their BMW's because they are light, powerful, cheap and reliable as hell. If you want to see some fantastic road racing. Stay up late and watch Australian Supercars compete on SpeedTV. They are basically Ford and Chevy sedans all dressed up to race and competing on road courses throughout Australia and provide some great racing entertainment.

Not too mention the millions of car exhibition clubs all across the country.

We need to promote our car industry, our racing industry, our automotive engineering and our automotive heritage before the government and the liberal tree huggers beat it into a position that it can't recover from.!!!