Singers, fans should show anthem respect
Last week, sports editor Rob Nunley wrote about the Star-Spangled Banner in his ‘Robservations.’ I’d like to expand on his observations.
As a veteran, I am most proud when I hear our National Anthem sung or played. People my age can probably remember that the National Anthem was played in movie theaters prior to the movie starting.
Today it seems that singers of the Anthem feel it is all about them and they have to add a little creativity to the rendition. Now I like a little creativity in most things, but singing our National Anthem is not one of them. Keep it pure and perform it the way it was written.
It seems that as time goes by, some do not even pay the proper respect when it is played. It could be that we do not educate people in proper etiquette. Today we have to remind people to stand and remove their hats. Every race track I have ever been to, including NASCAR, performs our National Anthem prior to every program and the best performances are done by Military groups and choirs.
‘ I said I would keep you up to date on the progress of my Grandson (in-law) Justin Allgaier and his progress in the ARCA series, good or bad. This week it is all good.
After his second-place finish at Daytona last February, ARCA took nine weeks off before continuing its season. This past week at Salem Speedway, Justin beat out NASCAR Cup Series veteran Kenny Schrader to win the Kentuckiana Ford Dealers ARCA 200.
‘Wow that was fun,’ said Allgaier. ‘Kenny battled us all night. It felt like I followed him forever. We were out of tires with 20 to go. He (Schrader) pitted to get his last set with 15 to go. He was right on my bumper; he was fast but he just couldn’t get a run on us.
‘I can’t tell you how much this means to me. To win this race, holding off Kenny Schrader; I mean, the guy’s my hero. I can’t tell you how much I look up to him. He helped get me my start in racing.’
Justin was 17 years old when he made his first start at Salem Speedway, and he evidently likes the .555-mile track as he has two wins, four top five finishes and five top 10’s in eight starts there. After the first two races of a 23 race season, Justin leads the points chase by 35 points. Perennial champion Frank Kimmel is second. ARCA races next at Iowa Speedway Saturday afternoon, April 19th and can be seen live on Speed TV.
‘ It’s time to pick on the TV broadcasts again.
This past week, Fox TV found a way to irritate both baseball fans and NASCAR fans. Because of a rain delay in the Yankee-Red Sox baseball game, Fox found that the end of the baseball game and the start of the Cup race would overlap. Saying that they would catch the start of the race, Fox informed the baseball fans that the game could be watched on a sister channel and that they would switch to the race.
Instead of switching at an appropriate time, like between innings, Fox kept showing the baseball game until the last possible second, then cut away from it with a batter facing a three-ball, two-strike count with two outs in the ninth inning. This must have really irritated the baseball fans, but no more than the racing fans when Fox joined the race at the end of the first lap. This may have been a good thing, though, as we were spared the boogity, boogity, boogity spewing from the lips of Darrell Waltrip.
‘ There is no Cup race this week, so drivers have two week to contemplate their standings. The same 12 drivers fill the top 12 positions although some of them switched places. In the race for the final guaranteed spot, David Reutimann made the biggest move by finishing 18th last week. This moved him up from 38th to 34th. J.J. Yeley fell out of the top 35 due to his 39th-place finish.