09/10/2024
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TURN 2 FOR TATAS was conceived on the infield at Talladega in early October before the NASCAR race Sunday morning. TURN 2 to be exact. My mom had just kicked breast cancers butt a few months earlier, and her and my daughter were heading from our home town about 30 minutes east of Michigan State University's campus to Detroit to attend a breast cancer walk. As I sat on the top of our newly acquired school bus in the hot Alabama sun patiently awaiting the start of the YellaWood 500 playoff race I had an epiphany. Staring out at the 2.66 mile, 33° banked tri-oval race track it occurred to me that a 5k is almost the same length as 1 lap around the track; 3.1 miles. My mom and daughter were about to walk the equivalent of 1 lap at Talladega. Then I said to myself... 'I wonder if I could get NASCAR to let us have a breast cancer walk around the track?' October is breast cancer awareness month so it only made sense. The fall race at Talladega kicks off the NASCAR playoff season and is one of racings biggest stages. So I ran the idea by my TURN 2 family and was met with thumbs up, and how great of an idea it was. So now I was motivated. We watched a great race, and then packed up the bus. We said our goodbyes to all the family and friends we have made over the years in TURN 2 and started our 12 hour adventure home aboard "The Delilah". As previously mentioned, The Delilah bus was just purchased and pretty bare. Gutted actually. And very loud. So it was a long, long ride home thinking to yourself because conversation was not an option. Creative juices were flowing in the absence of silence and heat. 6-7 hours north of Talladega, AL gets mighty cold in the middle of the night during the month of October. But the ideas churning out in my brain distracted me from the cold and the hours flew by, and we were home. The next day I made some phone calls, and generated some emails to figure out what I needed to do to make this happen. I was given a website to visit, and started an application process. The application could be submitted as a business, individual, or non-profit organization. I quit my application as an individual and wanted NASCAR to take me seriously and have no reason to tell me no so I started TURN 2 FOR TATAS, a non-profit organization. Everything was coming together swimmingly. The TURN 2 family is made up of really awesome people from all over the country that gather at Talladega to camp for about a week in October, and have an amazing racing experience. I had contacted all of them to share the great news of the non-profit, just general progress updates, and to see if anyone would be interested in going to the April race at Talladega. The plan was to go to Talladega for the Geico 500 race in late April and try to generate interest among the thousands and thousands of race fans. I wanted to develop a backing from the entire NASCAR family before formally approaching NASCAR about the walk. Not everyone from the October TURN 2 family was able to attend the April race, but we reserved a few sites and kept pushing forward with our plans. Everything was going great and the April race was rapidly approaching. Then tragedy struck and my dad suddenly passed away at the age of 62 in early April. Everything pretty much came to a screeching halt. We still made it to Talladega. The experience was still amazing, but it just wasn't the same. We did manage to get out and talk to a lot of people on the infield, and every response we received was positive and started to light the fire again. Everyone we spoke to had a story, and had been touched in one way or another by breast cancer. Everyone had their own opinions on certain drivers, some willing to almost fight over, but the one thing we all agreed upon was CANCER SUCKS! I was given some good advice and motivation talking to everyone that we did. The race ended and we came back home; where my dad had still just passed away. So I was dealing with that and still trying to push forward to get this great opportunity off the ground. It's springtime now and my warrior mother was invited to the Detroit Tigers game to "Pink Out the Park" and do a survivor walk before the game. My family and I wore pink and stood in the crowd in support of her, and millions of other men and women who have fought that battle. The entire MLB stadium was pink with other friends and family members that were there to stand in solidarity against this nasty disase. That experience helped solidify my ambition to make my idea a reality. But it also helped to evolve the idea from just a breast cancer walk at the October race at Talladega into an entire season of kicking cancers butt! "Pink Out the Pits" was born. I've seen NFL teams do pink out games. I think I've even seen NBA and MLS games do pink out events, but nothing with racing. Women are becoming more and more involved with racing. So, again, it only made sense. My nephew races kart, and my sister and my mom are his pit crew. My sister races too, when she can. I don't mean to boast, but my nephew is a pretty good racer and I go watch him and help when I can. In the year since getting The Delilah a lot of customization has happened and I started taking it to his kart races and park it in the pits. The customization of The Delilah garners quite a bit of attention. Which has given me the opportunity to talk to a great deal of people from all over the country. Every conversation is a positive experience and motivates the next step. But as I have come to learn, setting up a non-profit organization and organizing events takes a lot of time, energy, and money. As for taking the fight to cancer for the entire season, the idea has evolved into traveling with The Delilah bus to local short tracks, kart racing tracks, and really any racing venue we can park the bus at and host a fundraising event to help in the battle against cancer. Maybe have a survivor walk around the track for any warriors that are racers, or moms, or girlfriends? All survivors invited. Lets "PINK OUT THE PITS" all the way to Talladega with the end goal of making a big enough splash that we can have an annual breast cancer walk around the track at Talladega to kick off the playoff season. Fans, drivers, crews, team owners...everyone has one thing in common and that is they have been affected in one way or another by breast cancer. We already have a great deal of TURN 2 family and we could go anywhere in the country for events like these, but if you are a track owner/promoter and would like to collaborate we are more than open to discussions. Sponsorship is also available. Right now The Delilah is in her natural color that we obtained her in; a stale blue. She would like to be wrapped in pink camo. We are working on getting some merchandise produced. A website is in the works right now. We own turn2charities.org and talladega5k.com. We are working on the socials. End goal we would like to have a yearly tour of events and have a survivor sign up for each event on the website. Everything takes time. The spirit is real. This is going to happen. Anything donated is greatly appreciated and will be put to good use getting this thing going. And we can't wait to see you in the pits.
If you read all the way to here you are a champ. But it's something a lot of people are passionate about and we need to do more to spread awareness, education, testing, treatment options and recovery/coping.
Thank you.
Talladega Style.
