Another Christmas has passed in the vast wilderness of the great state of Wisconsin as I look out of the snow covered, guitar shaped window (donated from the Presley Estate) located on the second floor of the KO Research and Development building.
Another Christmas has passed in the vast wilderness of the great state of Wisconsin as I look out of the snow covered, guitar shaped window (donated from the Presley Estate) located on the second floor of the KO Research and Development building.
While my loyal employees Ryan Newman, Kyle Larson, Jerry Spencer and Honest Jack Olson take some vacation time, I am hard at work desperately trying to finish up the prototype we have been working on over the past months — our new state-of-the-art cordless extension cord. We are planning to introduce this great invention at the Chili Bowl in a couple of weeks, hoping it will revolutionize the way race teams supply power to their pit area without having the hassle of tripping over the cord.
As I get older and closer to those Golden Years when you need to have someone wipe the drool and food from your face, I find that the only two things anyone over 65 talks about when you see them is the weather and good places to eat.
With Christmas just ending I find myself feeling like I have been in a non-stop marathon of eating during the holidays. I feel so grateful to have been able to enjoy my favorite Christmas foods and it made me reflect back to the memories of all the great food stops we always made when we were racing at different tracks around the country.
When you are on the road, you get in a habit of stopping to eat at the same places you did the last time you visited a certain race track. I will try to recommend a few of my favorites from running across the country over the past 50-some years. These are places that I feel have the best tasting and healthiest foods that fit all age groups and financial classes from the extremely poor to the filthy rich.
If we were going to Phoenix and heading down Route 66 from St. Louis, we always stopped at the famous Big Texan Steak House in Amarillo, Texas. They offer a free 72-ounce steak if you can eat it and the potatoes and salad within one hour without leaving the table.
I remember stopping there one night when I saw some beautiful, USAC sprint cars and midgets parked outside the restaurant on open trailers. When I got inside, I saw Gary and Merle Bettenhausen sitting at a table with one of those big 72-ounce steaks. I sat down next to them waiting to see one of them bolt for the bathroom.
However, Gary explained that they were planning to split it instead of pursuing the free option.
When you had one of the great steaks at Big Texan Steak House, it was mandatory that you have a Coors beer presented in a cowboy boot glass. And, of course, when you left you stopped a mile down the road to walk off your dinner while you observed the 10 Cadillacs from the 1950s buried in the ground standing on end.
The next mandatory food stop was in Phoenix, but you would fill in all the other miles with delicious foods that Stan Fox, Buster Linne, Doctor Tyler and I would purchase at discount gas stations. These consisted of Slim Jims, cashew nuts, knock-off Cheetos that turned your fingers completely orange, gut bomb hot dogs and burritos. We washed these items down with original gold cans of Coors beer and tried to hit road signs with the empties. We finished these meals with the family- size bottle of TUMS.
But if you were a racer and you just ran at Manzanita Speedway or during the Copper World Classic at Phoenix Raceway, it was mandatory to eat at the greatest steak house in the country after the races — The South Mountain Steak House.
Wayne Weiler took us there for the first time and I will never forget riding up the South Mountain gravel road on 19th Ave. in the back of Wayne‘s pickup truck with the dust from the gravel road flying all around us. Once there we would walk by horses tied to a post outside as real cowboys would sometimes ride up from the back side of the restaurant on the mountain and hitch up.
A lady named Edie owned the place and always wore a belt and gun. Over the years, I saw so many race team members in there. Steve Lewis often had his entire team there and would invite me to their victory dinner after winning the Copper World. I think Steve felt sorry for me when I looked like one of those starving kids on the commercials and would feed me.
Another racing city I always loved going to for food was Indianapolis, which has so many high-quality places to eat. For breakfast, it is a must to go to Charlie Brown‘s by the speedway and even if you didn‘t eat, it worth looking at the incredible pictures on the wall from the golden eras of racing.
I was always thrilled to see guys such as A.J. Watson and sitting at one of the tables. It was common to see anyone from A.J. Foyt to Parnelli Jones, Johnny Rutherford or Robin Miller taking their turn in line to eat some of Indy‘s finest food.
From there, one could stumble down the road for lunch at the Mug and Bun, where Robin Miller took me for the first time. I fell in love with that place. Very healthy cheeseburgers, fries, onion rings and a glass mug of root beer awaited you there, and it was difficult to pick a favorite.
Downtown Indy also had some great places to eat as long as you could go with someone who you knew was buying. I always enjoyed going to St. Elmo‘s where the food, although a little short on the required amount of grease for me, was excellent and the drinks were even better. It was possible to run into virtually any racer or big-time sponsor there. I bet many 500 deals were made in that restaurant. Unfortunately, I was never able to land one.
I don‘t think it affected anything, but one night I had a few drinks to calm my nerves and decided to do the old toilet paper trick to impress possible investors. The trick involves going into the bathroom and tucking approximately 25 feet of toilet paper into the back of your pants and walking around acting like you didn‘t know it was there.
I roamed to a few tables and a tuxedo-clad waiter, much to my dismay and disbelief, escorted me out of the building. I returned to the bar shortly after but never used the restroom after that.
I have to say, though, that my all-time favorite, all-around restaurant (before it was torn down) was located across the street from Indianapolis Motor Speedway.
The White Castle in Speedway, Ind., was such a convenient and great place to eat for over the years and it supplied me with many great memories. I guess it was torn down to make way for new landscaping.
The first time I visited Indy during the 1960s, I ate at the Castle at least twice a day. They had 15-cent Castleburgers on a greasy bun and 10-cent orders of fries. You could have five or six burgers, fries and a coke for around a dollar. In the later years, when I would have a few beers, we would eat there before passing out at our hotel. I‘m sure that many Indy 500 drivers stopped there after the big race.
Eating before and after the races has always been a big deal for racers and a big part of the life a successful racer. There are so many more great places. Everyone has their favorite place at their home track. For me, a must-stop after the races at Angell Park Speedway in Sun Prairie, Wis., was Doris‘ Last Chance Bar.
Doris was the owner and she was so good to us racers, making us steak sandwiches and looking the other way when we got up on the roof and mooned the people in the parking lot after closing time.
Another stop I made during the early 1970s was a popular spot downtown called McGoverns, a bar and motel where most of the old-time Prairie racers went after the races. We stayed overnight there if it was a two-day race or special event and they always put all our rooms close together in case the non-racers made too much noise and kept us up.
They recently demolished McGoverns and it‘s only a memory. Unfortunately, like most of my all-time favorite race tracks that have been turned into Home Depots or other unnecessary businesses, many of my favorite eating joints are gone as well.
Gone are the Speedway White Castle, Babe and Jim‘s across the street from Little Springfield and the Mountain Steak House now has a paved road and houses built around it.
As a connoisseur of fine food and drink, I always say that they can take away the restaurants and diners, but they can never take away our memories of the taste of that great, healthy food.
Writing this has made me so hungry that I think I will drive down to the Kwik Trip and get me one of those record four-foot Slim Jims. KO