[Wachearex]

It'll never, ever, ever happen, but here's an article anyway:

http://www.nascar.com/2008/news/opin...aii/index.html

KAHULUI, Hawaii -- The first admonishment comes almost immediately after the Boeing 767 touches down, and flight attendants announce that cell phone use is one again permitted. The response is almost unconscious -- you reach down, switch on the BlackBerry, and begin scanning the e-mails you've missed while spending the last five hours in the air. That is, until this seemingly innocuous action evokes a shrill exclamation from the next seat.
"Hey!" she says upon sight of the silver-colored, work-related device that she's come to loathe. "Put that away. No NASCAR, remember? You promised."
Your Turn

• Send David your thoughts
• David's Community page

Did I promise? I guess I did. After all, getting married makes a guy do strange things. But then again, there's no better place in America to get away from NASCAR than Hawaii, a state with no asphalt oval tracks and no stock-car racing on the radio, even in a rental car with MRN on the license plate. Over eight days, the Missus and I drove every inch of paved coastal road the island of Maui had to offer. We covered the place from Kapalua to Hana to Wailea to Lahaina. We climbed mountains and dove under water. And I can count the times I saw anything remotely NASCAR-related on one poi-covered hand.
Things seemed promising enough. Passing through the town of Kihei on the way to our hotel on Maui's south coast, we spotted a NHRA-sanctioned drag strip. Like Southern California, there are a lot of kids buzzing around in souped-up imports, Nissans and Scions with added rear wings or oversized exhaust pipes. Judging from the way the locals drive, people here like to go fast, even on a winding one-lane mountain road with no guardrail. But when it comes to NASCAR, this is the final frontier. Rear windshields here bear not 88 decals, but stickers saying "Save Honolua Bay." Forget Mexico and Canada. Brian France needs to work on Hawaii.
Most of the signs we did see were on items worn by tourists like ourselves. There was the kid on the snorkel trip to Molokini crater wearing a Jeff Gordon T-shirt, the gentleman on the catamaran to Lanai wearing socks with Dale Jarrett's signature superimposed over an 88 -- clearly remnants from the bottom of the drawer. Most everything else was a stretch, like the racecar-style crash helmet they make you wear on the 26-mile bicycle ride from near the summit of the Haleakala volcano. We find out later that a few people have been killed doing this, inattentive riders who have run into oncoming traffic or fallen over the edge. No HANS device is available.
The Maui newspaper makes no mention of the Nationwide race, just as it made no mention of Humpy Wheeler's forced exit from Lowe's Motor Speedway or Bruton Smith's purchase of Kentucky Speedway. Those things might as well have happened on the moon.





At one point we stop so Lori, our affable local guide, can ask us how our bicycles are handling. "A little tight in the center," I tell her, knowing there's no chance she'll get the joke. She stares at me blankly for a few seconds, and begins to recommend an adjustment before I stop her mid-sentence. Don't worry, I say. Just kidding.
In this far-flung part of the United States, they don't know Smoke, but they do know vog. That's what they're calling the "volcanic smog" that settles over the islands every once in a while, the result of a recently opened vent on the Kilauea volcano that's spewing more sulfur dioxide into the atmosphere. Talk about a major burnout. And Hawaiians would be right at home in race traffic, given that one fender bender can gridlock these two-lane roads for miles, turning the usual 40-minute trip from Lahina to Wailea into a two-hour ordeal. When they see the long line of taillights in front of them, locals just turn off their cars and wait. Sometimes they take a walk over to the shoreline, which is never very far away. Try doing that on the way to Martinsville.
Things are tricky sometimes. Leaving the splendid little beach at Kapalua, we spot a pickup truck with a bumper sticker sporting a longhorn silhouette and the phrase "Earnhardt's -- No Bull Since 1951." Wait, wasn't the Intimidator born in 1951? Did he have some business out here in the islands nobody was aware of? But alas, it's from an Arizona car dealership. Touring the only town on the old pineapple plantation island of Lanai, a place with a population of only 3,300, you see a white-haired man wearing a blue and gold Michael Waltrip cap. Is this the only NASCAR fan in Hawaii? No, he just got it from the tiny NAPA store a block away. Even the real thing is off-limits. Sitting on the seawall in Lahaina, you spot the Nationwide race replay airing on a television inside the Hard Rock Café.
That's when the wife sternly reminds you of the no-NASCAR rule. "There's no damn way you're going over there to watch that race," she says sternly.
That's all right, I tell myself. I'll read about it tomorrow morning. Only I can't. The Maui newspaper makes no mention of the Nationwide race, just as it made no mention of Humpy Wheeler's forced exit from Lowe's Motor Speedway or Bruton Smith's purchase of Kentucky Speedway. Those things might as well have happened on the moon. There aren't even any results from the Nationwide race, or even a lineup for that day's Coca-Cola 600. To find those things, you have to buy the Honolulu paper, which includes them along with a six-paragraph wrapup of Kyle Busch's victory the night before. That's your NASCAR news, folks. Now, for more baseball, surfing and golf.
But then again, you get the impression that people don't watch a lot of sports on television out here. The six-hour time difference from the East Coast means afternoon baseball starts at 7 a.m., and prime-time events are over before most people get home from work. And why would you waste daylight in such a glorious place anyway? When Kasey Kahne wrapped up his Charlotte victory, we were trekking along the rocky streams and lush mountainsides of the Iao Valley State Park. The BlackBerry was hidden away in the glove box of the rental car. Who won the 600? At the moment, I didn't really care. I'd be back at the racetrack soon enough.