We've been to Lucas Oil Dragway in Indianapolis four times on Drag Week, and we also attended the Mopar Nationals there in '94 and '95, so we are far from locals, but you begin to get the lay of the land somewhat. The one thing we know for sure is that US-136/Crawfordsville Rd., the little two lane that runs past the entrance to the track, turns into a nightmare in evening rush hour traffic.
Armed with that knowledge, when I led our group left turn out of the track, I jumped the Valiant out into street with no concern to whether anyone would be able to follow me. I also knew I wouldn't be stopping at either of the two close gas stations on US-136, because it's nearly impossible to get out of them, once you're at the pumps. We made a right turn onto Northfield Dr., which took us into a warehouse area that features the shops of Schumacher Racing and others, but more importantly, got us away from the main flow of the locals.
We had only covered about three miles when I spotted a Casey's station with an O'Reilly's parts store across the street, always a consideration when looking for a good pit stop, so I pulled up to a pump, and texted Boone and Rachael to let them know. I was done fueling the Valiant when they pulled in, so I parked away from the pumps to make room for them.
As he had suspected, the radiator was leaking water when Dale pulled the Gremlin up, and shut it off.
"I'm going to run over to O'Reilly's, and grab several different kinds of radiator sealant, you need anything?" Boone asked me, as Rachael was pouring ice in my cooler.
"No...I'm thinking about going ahead, maybe scouting things out. I'm afraid the Valiant is going to overheat again, and I'd rather be pulled over, cooling it off than sitting here waiting for you guys to get the Gremlin fixed."
"This is definitely the hottest evening we've had on this trip", Boone agreed with a nod, "probably not a bad idea".
"You can also find us a nice place to eat", Rachael added.
"Bingo", Boone smiled, gave me thumbs up, and sprinted across the street.
"Where is Darren and Shari?" I asked Rachael, as I loaded my cooler back into the passenger's seat.
"They were staying at the track to help a guy with his alternator, I think Darren is taking it someplace to get it rebuilt?"
"See ya around, kid", I smiled and fired up the Valiant. I looked at my receipt, 6:16pm, another long night ahead!