TISDALE — Two thousand, four hundred, fifty-three.
That’s how many tracks Randy Lewis had visited by the time he attended the opening races at the Tisdale Motor Speedway June 17.
Lewis is a trackchaser. He travels all around the world to see as many racetracks as he can. Of course, for it to count, there must be a race when he visits. He’s the number one trackchaser in the world, with the next person having seen around 1,700 tracks.
“I grew up in Illinois and on my block there were 10 houses,” said Lewis, who now lives in San Clemente, Calif. “Three of the houses had racing teams, so as a 10-year-old I could walk around the block and see everybody work on their race cars.”
He worked with Richardson-Vicks, makers of the Vicks cough candies, as a salesperson. When that was bought out by Procter & Gamble, he worked in product supply and logistics. When he’d travel for a meeting, he’d stay an extra day or two to see local races.
“At some point in time I said, ‘this travel’s a lot of fun.’”
By the time Lewis retired 16 years ago, he had seen between 600 and 800 tracks. Since he’s retired, he sees an average of 125 tracks per year. Last year, he travelled 49,000 miles in a rental car and flew around 200,000 miles. This year, he’s been to Belarus, Maldives and Bolivia.
While he saved up and invested his money while he worked, getting from point A to B to C is an exercise in making sure he sees all of the sights he wants to see while not spending every dime he has. That means he’ll sometimes sleep in his car.
For this trip he went from California to a race in Indiana June 15, flew into Winnipeg and saw a race in Swan River June 16 before coming into Tisdale. He left Tisdale driving towards Edmonton, expecting to fly back to Los Angeles June 17.
Lewis does have the support of his wife on these trips.
“I’ve had to ask my wife 2,400 times if it would be okay if I go to the races tonight and 2,400 times she said yes, so I think that’s a good thing.”
She’ll join him on some of the trips where there’s more time to see the sights.
The trackchaser said there’s three basic types of track: a figure-eight, a road course and an oval. Tisdale is an oval.
“My all-time favourite track is exactly like this: a quarter-mile dirt oval. I’ve been to Monaco, Indianapolis, Daytona and I would much rather be at a place like this to watch the race and enjoy everything than to be in one of those famous places,” he said.
Lewis said he likes the amateur racing scene better than the professional and that he’d prefer to revisit a track like Tisdale compared to some of the more famous tracks he’s visited.
“The access is better. You can get up close and personal with the cars and drivers. If I were at a Formula 1 event or Monaco or Singapore, you couldn’t get within 100 yards of the drivers.”
Lewis said he considers himself living the American dream: doing what he wants to do during his retirement.
