CHARLOTTE'S SPRING CLEANING

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"I want to see myself in that Bud Pole Award!"

On Wednesday morning I witnessed the most massive spring cleaning effort seen since the morning after Woodstock. A full 48 hours before the start of Charlotte Speedweeks, the areas in and around the Lowe's Motor Speedway were being taken apart and scrubbed down in anticipation of more than 300,000 race fans rolling into town for the Nextel All-Star Challenge and the Coca-Cola 600.

From Welcome, NC to downtown Charlotte, those fans will also be stopping by raceshops, restaurants and any other building that might happen to house a racecar they can look at. Local businesses sell maps so fans can find their favorite teams and there's even a tour guide who will take fans to more than 50 shops in seven hours via bus á la "See The Homes of the Hollywood Stars".

Laugh all you want, but the State of North Carolina pegs NASCAR Tourism as a $150 million per year business. And there's your reason for all those shops getting the white glove treatment on Wednesday.

"When family comes to town, you want your house to look its best," says Humpy Wheeler, president of the Lowe's Motor Speedway, whose 1200 acres was the site of roughly one-hundred construction projects, from souvenir trailers to hospitality villages. "Your Grandma brings out her best china. We bring out blimps and half a million hot dogs."

At Hendrick Motorsports, visited by more than 200,000 fans annually, the "best china" is the seemingly endless supply of trophies. There are trophies tucked into every corner of all eleven buildings, from gaudy brass cups to weird Lucite cubes to grandfather clocks.

On this morning, the most impressive of those trophies—the six Winston, Nextel and Sprint Cups, as well as the four Daytona 500 trophies shared by Jeff Gordon and Jimmie Johnson—were out of their usual skybox-like housing in the lobby of the 24/48 shop and down on the floor getting the twice-over from the HMS staff.

"Once a year we bring 'em down and rub 'em down," said one employee as he descended a ladder with Johnson's 2006 Coca-Cola 600 trophy tucked under his arm. "We replace some of the older trophies with newer ones. But we're very careful about it. You don't want to be the guy who destroyed one of Jeff Gordon's Brickyard 400 trophies."

Of course, that's just one big golden brick out of his four. Two are in the newly-renovated HMS Museum and one sits on a counter in the Jeff Gordon, Inc. conference room, along with a couple of All-Star Challenge trophies, a half-dozen Bud Pole Awards and two Driver of the Year awards.

After all, Gordon's won 81 races, 65 poles, four championships and so many sponsor awards everyone has lost count (believe it or not, Gordon's 1998 MCI WorldCom Fast-Pace Award is not displayed alongside his Winston Cups).

However, there is one place where you won't find any of Gordon's keepsakes.

"There aren't any to be found at his home," says stepfather John Bickford. "There, it is all about family, not racing."

But if he ever needs something to prop open the door of his penthouse, I know where he can find it.

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