Fireball Day Six – Home Court Advantage

Albuquerque to Henderson

This weekend kicks off the Albuquerque Hot Air Balloon Festival and as we were leaving the hotel we saw dozens of balloons already in today’s morning sky. Breakfast and starting line was at Saint Pius High School on Coors Blvd and Saint Joseph’s way. The morning school schedule was arranged to allow the students time to come out to see cars and crew.

The official count of entries for this years rally was at seventy five the evening of the pre-race. However eight cars, including my sponsored TransCon Ambulance dropped out from the starting line because of mechanical difficulties. Starting this morning leg we had forty eight cars left in the rally.

After we pulled into the parking lot, a group of students escorted us to their cafeteria where they served us a hot scrambled egg and bacon breakfast. After eating we came out to the lot just as the students were being released from their classes.

Once they laid eyes on the Bat Mobile, students twenty deep circled. Neil the owner and driver of the Bat Mobile fired up the rear jet engine (a large propane burner) and a four foot blue and yellow flame blew out of the rear. Neil then loaded up the rocket launcher and shot a projectile across the parking lot. All the students applauded and cheered.

The Albuquerque police department began mobilizing for their escort of our group while the Arch Bishop led the drivers and crew in prayer. The mayor of Albuquerque then gave a short speech and then started the race by waving the green flag.

The Albuquerque police had shut down northbound traffic on Coors Blvd. and all west bound traffic on I-40 (during morning rush hour) and we had clear sailing to the outskirts of town.

Being from Arizona I was very familiar with today’s route and even had a pretty good idea what today’s challenges laid ahead. At the New Mexico and Arizona state line I knew of several Indian souvenir shops that included the Chief Sitting Bull’s store and the Tee Pee Cigar store. I had commented to Bob and to the Blinder Xtreme team the evening before that I would expected one clue would be to find the chief and have a seat next to him.

I also figured that about lunch time we would be pulling into Winslow Arizona and commented that we would be standing on a corner in Winslow Arizona eating lunch.

As I was the designated driver for today’s leg, Bob as my navigator had the privilege to open the sealed envelope with today’s clues;

Clue One: find the big tee pee, put on a head dress and strip down to your skivvies and sit Indian style in front of the doorway.

Clue Two’s clue was on a prerecorded CD. Bob stuck the CD into his player and the Eagles song “Take It Easy” began playing.

We made a beeline for the state line while other Fireballers were trying to obtain clues on their laptops before they got out of range of the Albuquerque cell network.

I had hoped to do a comparison test of the 9500i during this trip; however my only Escort 9500i radar detector was sitting on the dash of the TransCon Ambulance that had broken down outside of Orlando.

Also over the past several days, other Fireballers that were using some of those “cheaper brands” were impressed with our arsenal of the high end units and begged us to borrow them as over one third of the group during yesterday’s run were pulled over and cited.

So today our arsenal was whittled down to our old trusty Bel STi and the Cobra remote. We plugged in the STi hoping that we wouldn’t have another 33.8 encounter as we had the evening earlier, pledging that we would send the unit in after our return for the firmware upgrade.

It wasn’t far outside of Albuquerque when we received our first hit on 24.1 K band. A half mile later we observed a white Sheriff’s car east bound on I-40 moving in our direction.

At mp 48 on I-40 we received our first laser hit during the rally when the Blinder laser jammer and the STi went full alert as we approached an overpass. We slowed down and looked over, under and around the overpass and never saw a trooper, false alert?

At 11:40 MST we arrived at the Arizona New Mexico border pulled off the exit and drove to the Tee Pee Cigar store. Bob stripped down to his under ware, put on his cowboy boots and head dress and sat at the front door for his picture.

We then drove next door and picked up the Navaho Times published in Window Rock Arizona and took off for the Arizona welcome sign on the highway.

After snapping the welcome sign we headed for the corner in Winslow Arizona.

A few minutes after arriving into my home state, we received a text message that an Arizona DPS officer was sitting in the median at mp 305 running 35.5 Ka. At mp 307 the Bel STi gave a short alert of 35.5 and then again as we neared mp 306. The detector then remained silent as we approached, giving us a good indication that the trooper was using radar in instant on mode.

We entered Winslow at and I drove to the corner of 2nd and Kinsley and located the Fireball Staff tent. Before we could receive our stamp, we were told that someone from our car had to sing the tune that put Winslow on the map. I started signing and a member of the Winslow Chamber asked me to stop because if anyone heard me, they would take the town off the map, she then gave us our sticker.

We had a quick lunch and were then handed an envelope containing the location of the finish line of today’s leg, the MonteLago Resort in Henderson Nevada.

The evening prior my daughter Erin called me saying that she had broken her leg and was in the emergency room. She expected to be released later that night, but the doctor told her she would have to remain in bed until she could be looked at by a specialist on Monday. She now lives in Flagstaff, so I thought that I would quickly stop in for a visit.

Also while in Flagstaff I figured that we could stop by the DPS Northern Command Center to get our trooper scooper photo.

Just after leaving Winslow, at mp 130 our Beltronics STi alerted to 34.1 and a short time later observed a white Sheriff’s Office vehicle parked in the median. Then at mp 148 we received our second 34.1 and a mile later observed an Arizona Trooper parked in the median.

After arriving in Flagstaff we got on Old Route 66 and drove to the Arizona DPS center. A few minutes after arriving we spotted a trooper. I badged him requesting a photo and he obliged.

We then drove to the west end of Flagstaff to my daughter’s townhouse and paid a visit. She was glad to see us and we spent a few precious minutes relating the events of the past several days.

Heading back onto the freeway and Bob and I began discussing plans on how we could make up lost time, as now we were at the rear of the pack. As we were going to cross into Nevada at Boulder Dam, I knew that there were no stores in the area of the dam to purchase a Nevada newspaper for our state sign assignment. I called Bill, a friend of mine in Kingman and asked him to call around the area to find a store that sold any Nevada newspapers. He called back in a few minutes relating that the Flying J Truck Stop in Kingman had a pile of Nevada newspapers. I asked if he could call back and ask the clerk to put one on hold for me, as I knew that any Fireballer ahead would take the entire stack.

We had clear sailing on I-40 leaving Flagstaff. We did get a text message after leaving the town limits that there was a DPS trooper at mp 65, but we figured that he would be long gone before we closed the 100 mile gap. However at mp 66 the STi alerted 35.4 and there at mp 65 we spotted the officer.

We flew into the Flying J for our newspaper and surprised the clerk when we gave her a five dollar tip as we had the last Nevada newspaper left in the store.

At this point in the today’s run I commented to Bob that my legs were beginning to cramp from sitting behind the wheel the last five hours and asked if he would drive the remainder of the trip. He jumped behind the wheel and I took over navigation.

I knew the location of the report from prior trips into Vegas, but I was interested in seeing what our GPS would estimate our arrival time at based upon our location. I was surprised to see that my recently updated Garmin was giving a route on the Boulder Highway as the fastest route as I knew a much faster one using Lake Mead Hwy.

Traffic was unusually light crossing the Bolder Dam and we stopped at the Nevada welcoming sign to take our state sign photo.

Bob and I had made up some valuable time while on 93 from Kingman and we had passed a third of the group up prior to our arrival at the Dam. I knew that these Fireballers didn’t think of getting their newspaper in Kingman so they would be forgoing today’s state sign bonus points. However this would give them an opportunity to catch up with us.

Sure enough as we drove into Boulder City we saw five Fireballers behind us. I commented to Bob if our GPS showed Bolder Highway as the route to the resort, I would suspect that theirs did too. So we tried to figure out a plan to ditch them so they would take the longer route.

We attempted several times to slow down to allow them to pass, but they knew I was from the area and we suspected that they wanted follow behind.

As we approached the Boulder Highway exit, Bob sped up and began merging into the turning lane. All the Fireballers behind us followed suit. Then at the last second, Bob turned left back onto the highway, while the remaining group remained on the exit.

We continued on to Lake Mead Highway and turned off to head to the resort.

We pulled into the resort seeing that at least half of the other contestants had been us on today’s leg. However family first, my daughter was glad that I took a few precious minutes away from this rally to spend it with her.

Tomorrow is track day number two, and then we are off to Hollywood!