I always get a chuckle when one of my dirt racing colleagues regales me with the best feature race he ever witnessed.

When this trackside veteran first began to tell me one of his favorite racing memories, I expected a thrilling World 100, a last-lap pass at Hagerstown Speedway or perhaps a Florida Speedweeks race with Scott Bloomquist and Billy Moyer dueling in the final laps.

Instead, he waxed poetic about a 20-lap, three-car street stock race at a popular Tennessee track where the third-place MORE

I love dates.

No, not the dried fruit, but the four-digit numbers that mark important years in history. I love remembering them. I love guessing the year of a song or a movie. I love knowing the years of Kentucky Derby winners and presidential elections and 100-meter champions at the Olympics. I simply love dates.

I know, I know, a million educational studies have shown that rote memory — like recalling names and dates — isn’t the best way to learn something. But dates are important in MORE

Everyone has a passion for something, and if you’re reading this blog, your passion is most likely Dirt Late Model racing.

But in settling on our full-time occupations, not everyone is blessed enough to see their passion turn into a successful career. I count myself among those fortunate people, and I can remember being a twentysomething trying to find my way while living in western Kentucky many years ago.

Stick with a less-than-satisfying career trajectory? Or take a gamble — ignoring advice MORE