Labonte

OK, let's see ... since my last diary, I've gotten spun out at Indianapolis, driven 80 laps on the road course at Watkins Glen without power steering in my Kellogg's / got milk? Chevy and somehow missed all those cautions (eight) at Michigan to finish 13th.

Perfect preparation, if you ask me, for the next two races on the schedule. Bristol (Tenn.) and Darlington (S.C.) are famous for throwing everything at you from all directions. They're two of the toughest tracks we race on, but they're also two tracks rich in NASCAR tradition.

If I were a fan and could attend just one race a year, it would be the night race at Bristol. It's the toughest ticket to get in our sport. The race is always sold out and the waiting list is probably at least as long as the 265 miles we'll drive Saturday night.

Bristol is Rusty (Wallace) winning nine times. It's the sparks flying out from underneath our cars when they bottom out, or that old red barn back there on the hill. Most of us started our careers racing Saturday nights on short tracks, which is what we'll be doing this week at Bristol Motor Speedway.

Things happen so fast there that you barely have time to think. It's all you can do to keep your hands on the wheel and your foot on the gas. But even then, that's no guarantee you'll be able to keep your car on the track and off the walls.

They light that place up like a football stadium and when it gets dark, you have the same feel you get at a big college game. Bristol comes complete with tailgate parties in the parking lots and fans doing "the wave" in the grandstands.

For me, it also comes with a lot of memories -- most of them good.

	Labonte has two Winston Cup wins at Bristol.

I won a race there in 1995 while sliding across the finish line. When we got to Victory Lane, it looked like the No. 5 Chevrolet belonged in a salvage yard instead. But if you've got all four fenders left on the car and no dents in the door panel after 500 laps at Bristol, then you probably haven't been racing as hard as you should have.

This will be my 50th start at Bristol and my 350th race with Kellogg's. I'd also like to make it my third Bristol victory. I feel like we were cheated out of a good finish in the first race this year. We were running in second place just about halfway through when we got spun out by a lapped car and spent the next 150 laps making repairs in the garage. We finished the race but not where we wanted to, in 39th place.

And even after surviving 500 laps at Bristol on Saturday night, you're not out of the woods yet. It's on to Darlington for what will be our final Labor Day weekend Southern 500. They're moving the race to California in 2004, which may be a topic for another diary another day.

At Darlington, 367 laps on that track usually yield the same results as 500 laps at Bristol ... fenders knocked off, door panels dented and egos wounded. The difference is that while Bristol hammers you into submission with body blows, Darlington kind of sneaks up on us and delivers a knockout punch when you least expect it.

One's a sledgehammer, the other's a rubber mallet. But they both hurt when they hit you.

Darlington is NASCAR's oldest superspeedway. They've been running the Southern 500 there since 1950. I wasn't even born when Johnny Mantz won the first one. Thirty years later, it was a young Terry Labonte in Victory Lane -- my first NASCAR win.

Not much has changed about racing at Darlington through the years. It's not the most glamorous speedway on the circuit. It's not the fastest track we race on and it doesn't draw the biggest crowd.

But, like Bristol, it does provide us with perspective on how our sport started, where it's gone and -- for better or worse -- where we need to take it in the future. Sure, it's 2003. But when we pass through the gates at Bristol and Darlington, all that history pulls you in and you can't help but think back ... to 1980, to 1995, or even 1999 ... and remember.

Terry Labonte drives the No. 5 Kellogg's/got milk? Chevrolet for Hendrick Motorsports. He is providing a diary to ESPN.com throughout the 2003 NASCAR season. Labonte's personal Web site can be found at www.terrylabonte.net. Go to www.hendrickmotorsports.com or www.kelloggsracing.com for team information.