Letter: His Cup has runneth over

Friday, July 23, 1999 | 10:08 a.m.

My wife and I have been supporters of Las Vegas Motor Speedway from the outset, even though your "computer" changed our original Section Two, Row 48 seats to Row 28 and changed our seat ID number from 2,704 to a not-very-special-feeling 67,843.

We have felt the same support for the Indy Racing League, and thus were happy to have been one of the first in line to purchase tickets for the inaugural IRL 500K in September, 1996.

We have finally reached a decision after three years to not renew our season tickets but instead order IRL tickets as the event approaches. With the popularity of your NASCAR Winston Cup series, I'm sure you have quite a few people waiting in line to take our place as season ticket holders.

We'll be there supporting your IRL, sprint car and other short track events, but no longer are up to the grueling Cup regimen; i.e., getting to and from the track.

I took the wife to the 1996 IRL inaugural. It took two hours to get out of the parking lot and she declined to return, unless I washed the dishes for a whole year.

I took a business associate to the inaugural Winston Cup race in 1998 -- three hours to get out of the lot. We never discussed racing after this experience.

I took my best friend (an IRL and NASCAR fanatic) to the second Cup race earlier this year. It took four hours to get out of the lot, and we left the race (I had to drag him) a half-hour early. We avoided discussing the experience and he signed up for DirecTV.

Frankly, I've run out of race fans to take with me and don't have the energy to go through another Winston Cup ordeal by myself.

I wish you the best of luck in your new business venture with Mr. Smith. I'm sure you'll have no shortage of younger fans that can take the Cup traffic in stride.

See you in September for the IRL 500K.

CARL & SUSAN SCHULZ

Indio, Calif.