USG Sheetrock 400 - NASCAR

1. Taylor Swift on the Best Buy stage

2. Matt, Jamie and I with the Trace Adkins look-a-like

3. Jamie and I as we headed into the infield of the track via golf cart

4. The infield at the race

5. The race

6. Jamie and I chatting with the folks at the radio station

7. Tim and Faith

8. Tim

9. Faith singing from her cheat sheet

10. Jim Belushi

We spent July 13-15 in Joliet, Illinois for the USG Sheetrock 400 NASCAR race. When we arrived to the event we realized what a big deal the races are for mobile marketing. We were miniscule compared to all of the other mobile marketing teams at the race. Companies of all kind were at the races from Dollar General to Nextel to Tums to Best Buy. Speaking of Best Buy, we were set up right next to them and made friends with them over the weekend. They were super nice and fun to hang out with.

The folks at the radio station that we worked with were also super nice. They let Jamie and I chat with the crew back at their station in Chicago and we had fun with that. Also, Drew Walker, one of their on-air talents, let the three of us do a quick radio promo for CMT which was cool.

Later that afternoon we found out about a radio promotion that was going on to get $20 tickets for a special Tim and Faith charity concert that was going to take place at the House of Blues in downtown Chicago after their pre-scheduled Soul 2 Soul concert tour which was going on at the United Center. The radio station couldn't pull any strings for us to get us tickets (there were only 1,000 tickets available) so Jamie called her friend Ashley who then headed to the House of Blues to get in line for tickets. Because each person could only purchase 2 tickets, Ashley asked a random guy to stand in line with her to buy 4 tickets. After Matt, Jamie and I were finished with work we headed back to our hotel in Naperville, which was an hour away from Joliet and a good half hour from Chicago. The plan was to get ready quick and then head downtown and jump in line with Ashley at The House of Blues. While getting ready, I had a slight mishap with the toilet in my room. The toilet wouldn't stop running so I pulled the manual flush plug in the tank of the toilet...bad move. Apparently when I pulled that, something else got knocked loose and water sprayed EVERYWHERE in my bathroom! It wasn't stopping and the bathroom was flooding quickly. I called the front desk and they rushed upstairs to stop the water and fix the toilet. Although they fixed the toilet, I still had a flood in my bathroom which then began to leak to the floor below my room, which just so happened to be directly over the front desk. Eventually we got everything soaked up and I had to rush out because we were in a hurry to get downtown for the show.

Once we got downtown we jumped in line with Ashley and waited for them to open the doors. Once they opened the doors we headed in and ended up only a few rows from the stage. Halfway to Hazard and Lance Miller opened up for Tim and Faith and they all did a full set. After the opening acts, Tim came on stage. After Tim performed, Faith sang back-up vocals for one of Tim's songs and then performed solely. Later Tim came back on, followed by Faith and Tim one last time. Not to mention that Jim Belushi showed up and played the harmonica and sang "Sweet Home Chicago" which was pretty much amazing. As for Tim and Faith....their performance was very bizzare to say the least. Neither of them sang their own songs and Faith sang her songs from cheat sheets with the lyrics in front of her. Tim forgot the verse to two songs he was singing on separate occassions and had to ask his band as well as the audience where he was at in the song. It was strange to say the very least...ask me sometime and I will give you more detail.

Needless to say, the concert was still continuing on at 4 in the morning, but we decided to leave as we had to be at work early in the morning. By the time we dropped off Ashley and drove back to Naperville, we only had about one hour to get some sleep before being at work the next day. It was a very exhausting day, but I was glad we went to the concert regardless. The day definitely started slow and we managed to muster up enough energy to entertain the crowd all day. Later in the afternoon, Taylor Swift performed a few songs on the Best Buy stage, which was next door to us. One of the Best Buy employees let Jamie and I stand on the side of the stage to listen to Taylor. She's so impressive...and writes her own songs;-)

Later that night we pretty much just crashed. We needed to catch up on sleep desperately. After getting some much needed rest we headed to downtown Naperville, grabbed dinner, and went back to sleep again for the rest of the evening.

Sunday at the races was an exciting day for us. We conducted our work as normal, but after we closed down the trailer for the day, the radio station gave us tickets to go in the infield while the race was going on. Apparently it was a pretty crucial race...the Nextel race. As we drove into the infield on the golf cart it was pretty amazing to see the huge crowd as the cars went whizzing around the track. The radio station had their own little camper set up in the infield and supplied us with drinks and food. Jamie, Matt and I walked over the fence to watch the race at the fence. It was pretty amazing and extremely loud. We hung in the infield for the remainder of the race and actually got to go up ontop of the RV next to us to watch the finale. The race was pretty much as I expected...lots of race fanatics, beer, partying and cheering. It was a pretty cool experience.

After the race we hung around the area where everyone parks and tailgates for a bit until traffic cleared enough for us to get out. We headed back to our hotel for the evening and made plans to move the trailer out in the morning to head to Lake Geneva, WI for Country Thunder.