DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. (AP) — The real peril of dumping your body in the belly of a “redneck wheelchair” for a wheelbarrow race comes when you fail to grip both sides of the vehicle. Leave one hand dangling, as one Daytona 500 fan foolishly did last year, and the tip of a finger may get sliced off and lost in the infield muck.
The afterparty morphed into a search party for the missing digit, iPhone lights on, people on knees scouring the ground in what proved to be a futile hunt. The finger never got restitched, though the fan did make a triumphant return to racing, only next time with gloves.
“The more they drink,” wheelbarrow race founder Cush Revette said, “the stupider they get.”
When the sun goes down at Daytona International Speedway, the green flag drops on the infield bash that annually celebrates the over-the-top campy nature of race week.
Wheel out the wheelbarrows. Bust out the karaoke machines and crank the volume to 11. Belly up to the homemade bars built with enough lumber to thin out a Home Depot.
At Daytona after dark, the good times never stop, even when the racing does at a track where, in both speed and celebrations, there are no limits.
The later it gets, the crazier it gets, and revelers compete in the booze-fueled races at their own risk. Though, the organizer noted, paramedics are stationed nearby.
“No liability whatsoever,” Revette said, laughing. “Just a whole lot of fun after the race.”
Line ’em up!
The No. 9 wheelbarrow rests next to one with the General Lee paint scheme, which is next to one nicknamed “Ross Crashtain” and on they go, the fastest cart on one wheel, where competitors sprint and stumble around a makeshift path to the finish — just keep an eye on the checkered flag stuck in the orange cone.
“Just rednecks coming through,” Revette said. “Couldn’t pass a sobriety test in the a.m., much less at night.”
Take a bleary-eyed look around, and the biggest party on a Daytona property so massive it houses its own lake is surely raging somewhere.
In the midst of a row of flashy RVs where flags for Earnhardt and Elliott fly, the baddest bar inside the speedway emerges. Named in honor of its designated spot and color destination, the joint dubbed Red 38 operates like your local neighborhood pub has been picked up and plopped inside the track.
Shots are freely passed around to Daytona regulars — keep an eye out for the Toxic Twins — and passersby. Bottles of booze line the shelves behind the bar and beer flows like at any other watering hole. The louder the music, the better chance some of the men will strip off their shirts and dance the night away. Two-time Daytona 500 champion Michael Waltrip and scores of NASCAR drivers have popped in for a nightcap and more over the last 17 years.
Cocktail attire required? Please. Try American flag overalls if you want to grab a seat at the bar and catch a game on the big screen.
“Seriously, where else can I go and I get to participate in some beverages, we can play music pretty much as loud as we want, we can smoke cigars, we can tell bad jokes for 10 straight days,” Red 38 founder Bill Fenton said.
Only at Daytona is tailgating as much of a sport as anything happening on the track.
Strong of heart, strong of foot, stronger of liver.
Step inside Red 38 and the roar of the stock cars is about the only sign its location is a racetrack. A banner displays the Speedweeks specials: red beans, rice and gumbo were served at the Super Bowl party, bartender Carmine mixed up old fashioneds at a Bourbon & Cigars night, and put on your neon and “whatever glows” for Saturday’s blacklight party.
Red 38 has last call around midnight (or two hours after track activity ends), but the carousing never really slows down.
“If you’ve got enough gas left in you, you can go two hours after that,” Fenton said. “You usually don’t.”
Hitch a ride on a tricked-out golf cart with under-glow lighting and rap music pulsating, zip past the neon palm trees and the scores of fans playing cornhole and stop when you hear JR Richards belt out “Friends in Low Places.”
Richards, of Mound, Minnesota, and his camping setup double as the hot spot for karaoke night, and everyone is invited. He made friends with other campers, and they have teamed up for years to provide the best in pre-recorded music. No guarantees on the quality of singers.
Last year, on a rainy night, more than 70 campers crammed under the tent for a rousing rendition of John Denver’s “Take Me Home, Country Roads.”
“It was probably the best experience I’ve ever been part of,” Richards said. “It’s more of a culture. Everyone’s looking out for each other. It’s a family environment. We’ve known people for 12 years here. We love to see them every time we come. We hang out with them pretty much all day and all night. It’s what we love to do.”
Plus, to the best of Richards’ knowledge, no camper has ever been injured belting out Garth Brooks. He can’t say the same about the time he went around the bend to watch wheelbarrow racing.
“I got ran over by the wheelbarrow a couple of years ago,” he said. “They kind of ran over my ankle.”
Climb up one ladder, then one more, over a few cardboard cutouts of NASCAR drivers and beer girls, and the 15-foot-high observation deck offers nearly a 360-degree view of the track — and comes with wafting whiffs of the Boston butt smoking on the grill.
Jay Colburn, of Greensboro, North Carolina, and seven childhood friends — Colburn reunited the group following a near-death experience and has spent thousands to make this happen — have camped at Daytona for eight years. They add to the spot annually, with the latest upgrade being a car hauler that Colburn converted into a five-bedroom suite with air conditioning; they grew tired of doubling up in a four-bed camper.
Colburn’s favorite memory? A NASCAR driver he declined to name that wrecked his golf cart by a nearby bar.
“He had about eight people hanging off his cart and he drove into somebody down there,” Colburn said. “And he got cussed out by a girl. They had to get him out of there. Just people being people.”
Let the guessing game begin.
Colburn believes there’s at least one infield rookie who would enjoy himself at his camping space: He’s counting on President Donald Trump returning to the Daytona 500 for the second time in five years. He gleefully recalled Trump’s pace lap in the armored presidential limo called “The Beast” in 2020.
There’s a chance a passenger car leaving the track might get shouted down by a kid and challenged to race a remote-control car. The beers, try four bucks for a 25-ounce can! Good luck scoring that deal at an NFL stadium or NBA arena. The flags, they promise it’s a “Bad Day To Be A Beer.” Dozens and dozens of crushed cans near each tent prove that slogan true.
Eventually it’s time to park the wheelbarrows, mute the microphones and chug that last beer.
No need to set an alarm for when the sun rises. The U.S. Air Force Thunderbirds will soon boom overhead to wake up everybody — and start the clock ticking toward the next party.
AP auto racing: https://apnews.com/hub/auto-racing
FILE - Fans fill the infield during activities before the NASCAR Daytona 500 auto race at Daytona International Speedway, Feb. 19, 2023, in Daytona Beach, Fla. (AP Photo/David Graham, File)
Chase Briscoe(19) leads the field at the start during the first of two NASCAR Daytona 500 qualifying auto races Thursday, Feb. 13, 2025, at Daytona International Speedway in Daytona Beach, Fla. (AP Photo/Chris O'Meara)
OKLAHOMA CITY (AP) — A sprawling storm system crossing the U.S. on Friday overturned semitrucks on highways and fanned wildfires in Texas, Oklahoma, Missouri and Kansas, prompting evacuation warnings in some communities. Tornado threats loomed for the Mississippi Valley into the night and the Deep South on Saturday.
The National Weather Service predicted extreme weather across a vast swath of the country that is home to more than 100 million people. Powerful winds gusting up to 80 mph (130 kph) were forecast from the Canadian border to Texas.
An approaching wildfire fueled by dry grasses and spread by strong winds prompted emergency officials to urge residents to evacuate Leedey, Oklahoma, a town of about 400 people. Meanwhile the Oklahoma State Patrol said on the social platform X that dusty winds toppled several tractor-trailers.
“This is terrible out here,” Charles Daniel, a truck driver hauling a 48-foot trailer along Interstate 40 in western Oklahoma, said of the high winds whipping up dust. “There’s a lot of sand and dirt in the air. I’m not pushing it over 55 mph. I’m scared it will blow over if I do.”
Forecasters said the severe storm threat would continue into the weekend with a high chance of tornadoes and damaging winds Saturday in Mississippi and Alabama. Heavy rain could bring flash flooding to some parts of the East Coast on Sunday.
Experts say it's not unusual to see such weather extremes in March.
“What’s unique about this one is its large size and intensity,” said Bill Bunting of the weather service's Storm Prediction Center in Norman, Oklahoma. “And so what that is doing is producing really substantial impacts over a very large area.”
The Storm Prediction Center said fast-moving storms could spawn tornadoes and hail as large as baseballs Friday. But the greatest threat would come from straight-line winds near or exceeding hurricane force, with some gusts possibly reaching 100 mph (160 kph).
A tornado watch was issued until 11 p.m. for central and eastern Missouri, including St. Louis, as well as parts of Illinois and Arkansas.
Forecasters said areas also at risk included parts of Iowa, Kentucky, Tennessee and Mississippi. About 47 million people faced an enhanced to moderate severe storm threat from Madison, Wisconsin, to Birmingham, Alabama.
Forecasters grew increasingly worried that intense thunderstorms farther south will likely bring an even greater tornado threat Saturday.
The Storm Prediction Center said parts of Mississippi including Jackson and Hattiesburg and areas of Alabama including Birmingham and Tuscaloosa will be at a high risk of damaging winds and tornadoes. Severe storms and tornadoes are also possible across eastern Louisiana, western Georgia, central Tennessee and the western Florida Panhandle.
“We have a lot of confidence that we most likely will have a tornado outbreak tomorrow,” Storm Prediction Center meteorologist Evan Bentley said in an online briefing Friday.
Wildfires in the Southern Plains threatened to spread rapidly amid warm, dry weather and strong winds.
A blaze in Roberts County, Texas, northeast of Amarillo, quickly blew up from less than a square mile (about 2 square kilometers) to an estimated 17.1 square miles (44 square kilometers), the Texas A&M University Forest Service said on X.
About 60 miles (90 kilometers) to the south, another fire grew to about 3.9 square miles (10 square kilometers), but crews stopped its advance by the afternoon.
The Oklahoma Department of Emergency Management activated its emergency operations center after several fast-moving fires that prompted evacuations of the town of Leedey in the western part of the state and in a rural area east of Norman.
Police ordered mandatory evacuations for Mannford, a town of about 3,300 west of Tulsa.
Jennifer Thompson, a National Weather Service meteorologist in Norman, described the fire conditions in the central and northern parts of the state as historic and highly anomalous.
Evacuation notices were issued for an area that is home to about 30 people in Cowley County in southeastern Kansas as a wildfire neared homes. There were no reported injuries directly caused by fires, County Administrator Lucas Goff said, but low visibility due to smoky conditions led to car accidents.
Roughly 120 miles (190 kilometers) of Interstate 70 in western Kansas shut down due to blowing dust and limited visibility, and roads in the state's east were closed amid wildfires and smoke.
Officials urged people in some areas of central Missouri’s Camden County to evacuate due to wildfires, and the State Highway Patrol warned via social media that they were nearing homes and businesses.
High winds also knocked out power to more than 220,000 homes and businesses in Texas, Oklahoma, Kansas and Missouri, according the website poweroutage.us.
The National Weather Service issued blizzard warnings for parts of far western Minnesota and far eastern South Dakota starting early Saturday. Snow accumulations of 3 to 6 inches (7.6 to 15.2 centimeters) were expected, with up to a foot (30 centimeters) possible.
Winds gusting to 60 mph into Saturday afternoon were expected to cause whiteout conditions. Combined with a light glaze of ice that could fall in some places before the temperature drops, travel conditions in the area could be treacherous that day, the weather service said.
The winter blast continued after snowfall of up to 3 feet (90 centimeters) blanketed the Sierra Nevada earlier in the week.
Bynum reported from Savannah, Georgia. AP journalists Susan Montoya Bryan in Albuquerque, New Mexico; Jim Vertuno in Austin, Texas; Steve Karnowski in Minneapolis; Kim Chandler in Montgomery, Alabama; Mike Hempen in Washington; Summer Ballentine in Columbia, Missouri; Jaimie Ding in Los Angeles; and Lisa Baumann in Bellingham, Washington, contributed.
The Oklahoma Memorial Stadium on the campus of the University of Oklahoma is seen covered by dusk and smoke as wildfires spread across Oklahoma on Friday, March 14, 2025. (AP Photo/Alonzo Adams)
Families evacuated from wildfires near Norman, Okla. talk and watch the latest news information on tv at CrossPoint Church in Norman on Friday, March 14, 2025. (AP Photo/Alonzo Adams)
Norman Oklahoma fire crews put out hot spots following a wildfire SE of Norman on Friday, March 14, 2025. (AP Photo/Alonzo Adams)
A wildfire spread through the country side SE of Norman, Okla. on Friday, March 14, 2025. (AP Photo/Alonzo Adams)
This photo provided by the Oklahoma Highway Patrol shows a tractor-trailer overturned on highway US 183 just south of Hobart, Oklahoma on Thursday, March 13, 2025. (Oklahoma Highway Patrol via AP)
Beach goers trudge through the sand in a windy day south of the pier in Huntington Beach, Calif., Thursday, March 13, 2025, after strong storms moved through the region overnight. (Jeff Gritchen/The Orange County Register via AP)
Hudson Kammarcal, 8, runs in the wind as his mother, Heidi Kammarcal, of Coeur d'Alene, Idaho, tries to keep up on the pier in Huntington Beach, Calif., Thursday, March 13, 2025, after strong storms moved through the region overnight. (Jeff Gritchen/The Orange County Register via AP)
Melissa Jones and her husband, Jeff Jones, visiting from Lincoln, Neb., walk through the wind on the pier in Huntington Beach, Calif., Thursday, March 13, 2025, after strong storms moved through the region overnight. (Jeff Gritchen/The Orange County Register via AP)
A woman walks the trails at Civic Center Park in Newport Beach, Calif., Thursday, March 13, 2025, after strong storms moved through the region overnight. (Paul Bersebach/The Orange County Register via AP)
Crews work to remove a large pine tree from Glencannon Drive after severe weather hit in Pico Rivera, Calif., Thursday, March 13, 2025. (David Crane/The Orange County Register via AP)
This satellite image from NOAA shows a March megastorm building across the United States, Thursday, March 13, 2025. (NOAA via AP)
