Well, this is all something new to me. I've never really blogged before. I like to talk racing and life and such, so I think this should come pretty easy to me.
I suppose it would probably be in my best interest to give a synopsis of my life and how racing has affected it with my first post, so here it goes:
My name is Josh Bayko, and I'm 31 years old. I live in Pittsburgh, PA with my wonderful fiance Marcia. We have a fairly small apartment in the Squirrel Hill neighborhood of the city. I work as an auto parts counterman in a call center for a group of Main Auto parts stores. It's a wholesale based group of stores, so most of the calls we receive are from garages and then we ship the parts out of whichever store is closest to the customer that has called. The pay isn't what I'd like, but in all honesty, who's job does pay them what they feel is fair?
I have three sisters, two that live in New Jersey, and one that lives about four blocks away from me with her fiance. My parents also live not far from me. I don't see my sisters as much as I'd like, but you know, as life goes on, folks get busy and the little things you appreciate get lost in the shuffle sometimes. I completely understand that, so it makes the times I do get to see them even better.
Now, on to the more pertinent stuff that this blog should be about. I grew up in lovely Morristown, NJ. It's a pretty large town in Northern NJ off of rt. 287, about a half hour away from where Modified Country USA used to sit. My dad had grown up going to the races, so when he felt I was old enough, he started taking me. My first trip to the races was at Nazareth National when it was still dirt in about '82 or '83. It was for a USAC Silver Crown show (I think) I didn't like it at all. It was hot, loud, and too dusty for me. My dad was kind of disappointed, so, later that summer he took me to the half mile down the hill, and that would change my life. I saw modifieds for the first time, and I was absolutely hooked. The next year, we made Flemington our weekly haunt. That's where the love affair really began. There was nothing like that square. The racing, the fun, the folks we rolled with. They were some of the greatest times I've ever had. As time went on, we became involved with some teams, first Freddy Orchard, then later, Jimmy Romeo. I saw racing from an entirely different angle. I saw a lot of tracks along the way, too, pretty much all the places that raced modifieds at the time.
Later on, when I became a teenager, I kind of drifted away from it. Part of it was the paving of Flemington (although I did fall in love with Grandview over that), the other was wanting to fit in with my snobby NJ classmates (don't get it twisted, I have some great friends in NJ, but if you have lived there, you understand). I got into some less than savory things, and I became an asshole. I was in desperate need for change, so when my parents announced they were moving to Pittsburgh, where my dad had grown up, I was into the idea. So I moved here with them. Then, I got here and hated it, so I saved all my cash and moved back to Morristown and got a place for myself (and continued being an asshole). I was able to make it last three years before I had to throw in the towel and learn to grow up. I moved back to the 'burgh with my folks. This time, I was humbled, and willing to calm way down and become a man.
Two great things about moving back became pretty evident to me. I met the woman who will become my wife next year, and I fell in love with racing all over again. My dad suggested we hit Lernerville for a WoO sprint car show. I was down, I hadn't been to a race in a few years. Literally one lap into time trials, I was absolutely hooked all over again. I haven't missed but 10 or so races there in the six years since then. The track is second to none. They run the top three divisions on dirt weekly, lates, 410 sprints and big block mods. The facilities are great, and the racing is unbelievable. With all of that, though, a strange thing happened, I became less into modifieds, and more into late models. I had only seen late models at Hagerstown when I was younger, and I liked them then, but at Lernerville, I was like "Wow!" They were faster, they handled better, the fields were deeper, and they could race closer.
These days, I go to all the big late model races I can. All over the place. I've seen some of the most famous tracks in America, some of the most famous races in America, and some of the best racers in America. It's a whole different kind of atmosphere than anything I have ever seen at a modified race, even Syracuse. I will regale you with tails of these late model adventures with future blogs, and my thoughts on the debates of modifieds vs. late models will become evident in a future post as well.
I hope my story didn't bore you too much. I will say though, It was certainly cool to get it out.
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