Boone and I were hanging out in our pit area, watching Aaron cleaning up the rest of the Gremlin engine, and begging Rachael to track us down some food, when it hit me.
"Where did we leave the Spirit of Drag Week Award"?
Boone paused for a second, "You left it in the cab of your 1 ton, in impound right?"
"Yeah, I think so...we better go get it and drop it off at the tent where the awards ceremony is being set up."
"What should we drive down there, Darren and Dale are still gone, and the Belvedere is out of action..."
"Let's just walk", Boone decided, the exercise won't kill us".

We had to walk directly by the large commercial tent which had been erected for the awards ceremony, so we took a peek inside. They weren't even remotely ready, so we decided there was plenty of time to walk the length of the circle track to where our impound pit was located.

"Should we load everything and take the truck to our pits?" I questioned Boone, "I'm just not sure about leaving everything out here tonight with all these drifter clowns, and the local crowd".
"Lets just take the plaque, and we'll worry about all that after the awards are done", Boone decided.

When we returned to the tent, with the large plaque in hand, the raised platform was still in disarray as all the awards and giveaways were being staged at the same time they were trying to plug in the sound equipment and rig lights. We walked up to Hot Rod Editor David Kennedy, and handed the Spirit Award up to him.
"What's this?" He asked with a puzzled look on his face.
Boone and I looked at each other in amazement.
"Uh, it's the Spirit of Drag Week Award...it's the traveling trophy that's handed out every year, then returned for the next winner..." Boone explained.
One of the girls that help out every year came up behind him, and motioned for him to set it down next to the boxes of other awards. "That's the last one you will hand out", she explained to him, then turned to thank us for bringing it back.
"This event might be in trouble if he's in charge of it next year", Boone shook his head as we made our way to the exit.

Elana Scherr caught us at the exit, and took the time to introduce us to the new Hot Rod guys whom we had provided all the stats to online. They were both young, intelligent, enthusiastic, and well spoken, so our faith in the future of our hobby was instantly restored.