I enjoy all different kinds of photography. Primarily, I dig concert photography. If I had to choose, it's the one kind of photography I would probably do above all others. But, as luck would have it, I don't have to choose. Aside from concerts, wildlife, landscapes, portraits, and macro are some other areas I enjoy.
One area I don't shoot a lot of is motorsports. I've done a couple shoots here and there, but I don't really focus on it.
Get it? I don't "focus" on it?
Hehehe... I kill me.
Anyway, my first foray into motorsports shooting was at the Barona Dragstrip just east of San Diego. It's a short, 1/8 mile track where mostly locals come out with their dreams of asphalt glory. It's a good time, it's cheap and, as a photographer, you can pretty much go anywhere you want. I came away with some nice enough shots, and was generally happy with the outing:
Not my best work, but certainly acceptable. I can't say I got the motorsports "bug" after that, but it did convince me that, given the opportunity, I'd like to shoot motorsports again.
My next chance to shoot racing was at Mosport International Raceway in Bowmanville, Ontario Canada. A friend of mine is a Flagman in the F2000 Series which races there, and he got me a trackside pass. I jumped at the chance and, once again, found myself shooting motorsports:
It was after this outing to Mosport that I'd decided I really liked this kind of shooting. It's certainly fast-paced (hey, they're race cars), and anything can happen, anytime.
Like I said, I really enjoy concert photography, but the opportunities to shoot concerts are usually pretty few and far between. Well, the sad reality is that the chances to shoot motorsports are even more scarce. In San Diego, there's only the Barona Speeway. The Cajon Speedway, which used to be just down the street from my house (and, thus, ridiculously convenient) was torn down and paved over long before I really got into photography. So, I have to accept the fact that unless I travel, I probably won't get to shoot auto racing too often.
C'est la vie, huh?
Well, not long ago, a passing comment my brother made during a phone call opened up another opportunity.
Greg is big into photography; probably more than me. He's always been "the photographer" of the family. He was the one who borrowed $460.00 from our Grandfather back in the 70's to buy a Canon F-1 which, at the time, was the epitome of a professional camera. He set up a darkroom in our basement. He works on photo equipment for a living. You could say he's kinda' into it.
Anyway, we were talking on the phone a couple weeks ago, and he mentioned something about going to Daytona International Speedway at the end of January, to shoot the Rolex 24 at Daytona.
My brain went into overdrive.
How cool would that be? While I've been to Daytona, Florida, I've never been to the Speedway (I think I drove past it once). I'd love to go to a race there, and shooting there would be, I surmised, epic. I checked my miles account and, whaddya' know? Plenty of miles for a round-trip, coast to coast flight from San Diego to Jacksonville (my brother lives just south of there, in St. Augustine).
So, on Wednesday night, I'll board a red-eye out of San Diego and, with any luck and good weather (I have a layover at Dulles), Greg will pick me up in Jacksonville Thursday morning. We'll probably spend the day just hanging out and telling war stories, and then it'll be "baked-ziti time" at Mom's that night. Then, Friday morning, it'll be off to Daytona.
I don't expect that we're going to shoot an entire 24 hours. frankly, that would be insane. I need my sleep. But we're going to spend the vast majority of Friday and Saturday shooting in one of the most storied racing venues on the planet, and I simply can't wait. I always enjoy seeing my brother, and I really dig whenever we can get together and go out shooting.
But I'm pretty sure this is going to be on an entirely different level...
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