In addition to covering national NHRA events and local tracks, boat races, off-road events, and lots more, Racers For Christ was invited this year to offer chaplaincy support to The World of Outlaws racing series. This has the potential to be the largest and most prestigious sprint car series in the country. There are many top drivers and several NASCAR drivers involved in this series. RFC is currently covering the races with local chaplains or, in a few instances, with a chaplain who will cover several races in an area.
Along with this new series, RFC chaplains are again covering the Funny Car Chaos andNitro Chaos series, with Chaplain Michael Norris attending most of those events and using local chaplains where needed. The Midwest Drag Racing Association will also continue to be covered by our local chaplains.
RFC has many high-profile events beyond the NHRA. Earlier in the year, we had four chaplains covering the Spring Fling in Las Vegas, a week-long drag race with over 800 entries culminating in a million-dollar-to-win race. The promoter welcomes us to his events and includes the promotion of our chapel services in their flyer. We are also covering several of the Holley LS events again this year. These events are brand-specific (General Motors) and draw enormous crowds…think well over a thousand participants at each.
In non-racing action, Region 1 staff were involved in the Carlisle (PA) Spring Collector Car Flea Market and Car Corral. This multi-day event draws a crowd of around 100,000 people to see 8,100 vendor spaces. It’s truly an amazing show! Our Rodders chaplains cover many local car shows and, at times, major regional shows that attract many thousands of spectators.
As for NHRA, we cover all of the national and regional/divisional events. Beyond that, there are many NHRA-sponsored events. Region 7 has the junior dragster series that Chaplain Lee Styer covers. Region 3 has a Super Quick series that Chaplains Hugh & Jill Goodale manage. The two premier junior dragster events are held each year: the Eastern and Western Conference Finals. Chaplain Tom Ratliff covers the Eastern event in Bristol, TN, where the car count can be as high as 700! The Western Conference Finals were held at the Texas Motorplex this year. Each event is over a week long, providing time and space for RFC to conduct a VBS-type event for kids. What a fantastic blessing!
This year, there are eight NHRA Heritage Series events held around the country; this is the vintage event for drag racing. RFC has coverage for all eight events! The upper-echelon cars at these events are similar to the professional teams at NHRA national events.
Chaplain Steve Hanson covers the high-profile events in off-roading: the Baja 500 and 1,000, King of the Hammers (KOH), and other large events. KOH has roughly 400 teams and 80,000 spectators. Chaplains Mark & Clifva Budke cover the off-road series in the Midwest that features the top-flight drivers in the country for off-road trucks. This is the series that RFC board member Dave Mason’s son runs in.
As you can see, RFC volunteers are very busy with all kinds of racing and rodding events spread around the U.S. We feel tremendously privileged to represent our Savior and have opportunities to bring the Good News to “the multitudes” in such a wide array of activities!
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