The Glamorous World Of Race Team Travel

I get asked all the time by family and friends about the constant travel that is necessary to be apart of the sport we call NASCAR.  People always want to know where I’m going and how we get there.  It’s a topic I explored in a post I wrote last summer here at TNI called Flying the Friendly Skies… Racing Style.  If you get a chance, check it out and then when you are done, click over and take a look at this cool video I found online tonight.  It’s a segment DJ Copp did for his ”Over The Wall” feature on NASCAR Now in which he discusses travel and shows off a couple of MWR’s planes.  (By the way, in case you don’t know about DJ’s work, hit up ESPN.com and do a search.  His segments do a great job exposing our world to fans.)

What you will notice from the video, is that the teams’ planes don’t look a whole lot different on the inside then your typical commercial jet does.  The seats aren’t really any nicer or roomier and we have the standard amenities like a closet sized bathroom and your friendly neighborhood flight attendants.  But where the planes lack in the luxury department, they make for with the convenience they offer.  Depending on the race, we can often be back home in Charlotte within a matter of hours of the fall of the checkered flag.

Besides being home quickly from races, we also don’t have to deal with the usual hassles of commercial air travel.  There is no standing in long lines waiting to go through the security screening and no long waits to collect bags once the flight is over.  And since most teams fly in and out of two smaller airports in the Charlotte area, there is no airport traffic to deal with; save for the mad dash out of the parking lots.  We simply grab our bags, walk down the stairs, and head straight for our cars.

So now that you’ve gotten a glimpse into what it’s like to travel the circuit on private aircraft, know that it’s not exactly “Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous.”  But, it isn’t all bad either.

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