Inside Look From the Infield

Lap One.

As 43 stock cars begin what is a typical afternoon commute in the Inland Empire, John Snykers is doing a different sort of lap.

Around a bathroom, around a picnic table, finally stopping in the middle of the most unusual sports seat in town, the California Speedway infield.

As the colorful specks roar past in the distance, he is asked, why aren’t you watching the race?

He smiles, looks around at people drinking, cooking, biking, sleeping, living.

“The race has started?” he says.

The California 500 on Sunday was a wondrous spectacle in front what will probably be the largest crowd to watch a sports event in southern California this year.

Someday, somebody will have to tell a whole bunch of them about it.

In the still-shiny stands were 87,000 fans who got good views of Mark Martin winning unchallenged.

This is about the rest of them, 28,000 or so others who paid at least $30 apiece for a ticket but were forced to either hear the finish on radio or watch it on television.

This is about a group, with their campers and grills and howls, that didn’t exactly come for the race.

They came for something different, something even more rare in these parts than a bunch of good ol’ boys with politically incorrect accents.

They came for the neighborhood.

They came for what the California Speedway infield has become in only two years, something warm and grassy and real.

They came to hang out without being hassled, to party without being threatened, to share without being afraid.

They came and they conquered. Even if hardly any of them actually saw.

LAP 30

The sun streams through the clouds, the smell of fuel hangs in the air, the race is in all its sweaty glory.

Hmmm. Seems like a good time for a shower.

So thought two Marines, who had been volunteering their security services and decided to take advantage of the infield’s shower truck.

It’s free, there are curtains over each shower, soap is included.

And no waiting.

Many interviewed for this story decided that part of the fun of spending a weekend here is not bathing.

“Not once all weekend,” brags Dave Heine, a painter from Palm Desert.

“Really?” asks friend Brad Merrill.

LAP 50

The only thing stranger than a pay telephone located near the roaring second turn is somebody trying to use it.

Bobby Murray of Castaic looks glumly into the receiver as she tried to answer a page from her son.

“I heard the operator, but she didn’t hear me,” she says, sighing. “I guess I’ll just have to wait until somebody crashes.”

Crashes?

“Yeah, they stop the race, and that’s the only time it gets quiet around here,” she says.

LAP 75

Brad Merrill is also waiting for a crash, only it’s a bit more obvious.

He leans against the a fence between the second and third turns, fingers locked into the metal, knuckles white, eyes focused on skid marks running into a broken bit of fence.

He will remain here for nearly four hours today. Hundreds will remain with him.

“This is junk corner,” he says. “This is where all the crashes happen. This is why everybody is here, no matter what they say.”

And when they happen?

“You can feel it,” Merrill says, slapping his hands together. “You can feel the crunch, the crash.”

Around him, everyone is nods and smiles.

LAP 100

From where auto technician Steve Olson of San Bernardino is laying, propped up on blankets on the flatbed of his truck in the middle of the infield, he sees as much of the race as many here see.

He sees only colors, and only in flashes.

Red/Green/Yellow/Blue . . . White/Red/Blue/Orange.

“That’s OK, that’s not why I’m here,” he says, looking at his son Josh.

That’s why he’s here. It is Josh’s 20th birthday. He’s here, to spend the weekend eating cold cuts and cookies and talking to his boy.

They spent last night walking around the massive area meeting people, sharing stories. When it rained early Sunday morning, he ordered Josh to sleep in the cab, while he remained in the bed under a tarp.

“You can see the race better at home on TV,” Olson says. “But Josh is like, my buddy.”

LAP 150

Not every reality of the infield is so pleasant.

Wander out past the fourth turn and there it is, in all its suburban blight:

A giant play structure with tubes and slides and everything but the colored plastic balls. This claustrophobic instrument of parental torture is surrounded by dozens of mothers. They are turned away from the track, oblivious to the thundering race, watching not Mark Martin but their children.

“The noise doesn’t bother my daughter,” said Jenny Nyman, a Rialto mother who brought 3-year-old Ariel. “We live on a block with a lot of kids.”

LAP 200

As the race moves into its last phase, Jacob Paulson, a Glendora construction worker, is concerned with more important things.

Like, his competition.

He and buddies have set up a miniature car race in front of their camper. The colors and numbers of their NASCAR heroes are painted and pasted on to Hot Wheels.

The guys make bets, the tiny autos screech around a black plastic track, skidding, bumping, flying off the table and into the grass.

“Now this is racing,” Paulson says.

LAP 250

As Mark Martin steers across the finish line, even many of the hundreds with better views from atop campers have turned to their radios or television for the results.

When the roar of the cars finally ceases, the infield is filled with laughter and hand-slaps and farewells for another year.

Richard Barbao, a personal trainer from Walnut Creek, is sitting on a bench looking particularly satisfied.

“I love the races, this is a great experience,” he says.

Especially for the winner, huh?

“The winner?” he says. “This race?”

He pauses. Shrugs.

“Don’t know.”

He doesn’t seem the least bit bothered to acknowledged it.