On Assignment: HVM Racing's Simona De Silvestro 2011 IZOD IndyCar Series Press Event

For those of you who know me or have followed this blog, you know I love cars and competition. Putting these two things together, what I say next will make perfect sense; I love motorsports. I follow British and German Touring Car Championship racing, American LeMans Series racing, World Rally Championship racing and more importantly Formula 1. I also watch legendary endurance races like the 24 Hours of LeMans, Nurburgring and Daytona when they're televised. Of course then you can understand how I felt last year after hearing that Baltimore City would be playing host to an IndyCar Series race event over Labor Day weekend. By way of the Baltimore Race Development (BRD) Group, this festival of speed is called the Baltimore Grand Prix.

For my automotive site, I've covered and written articles for several shows from the U.S. German automotive enthusiast scene, but have yet to frequent road races since ROTL's inception; mainly due to glaring schedule conflicts. Rectifying last years errors, I've planned my schedule in advance ensuring my availability for the Baltimore Grand Prix. Accordingly, I've been in communication with BRD's Marketing Director concerning media access during the race weekend. A couple of weeks ago I was notified of a local press event being held by one of this years IndyCar Series Race Teams, HVM Racing. HVM's ace driver, Simona de Silvestro, was signed to return in 2011 for her sophomore year in IndyCar behind the wheel of the teams #78 race car. The catalyst behind this encore was last years major sponsor for Simona, Entergy Corporation, renewing her contract based upon the belief in the skills of this young (22) but accomplished driver; being 2010's IndyCar Series Rookie of the Year didn't hurt either.

I arrived an hour and a half in advance at the location where the demonstration is to be held; S. Howard & W. Camden at the tollgate entrance for Camden Yards. It was about 25 degrees in sun. The conditions weren't perfect for operating an IndyCar of course, but in order to make things a bit more manageable, the HVM Racing Team used tread laden rain tires rather than slicks.

Simona de Silvestro, the focal point of this gathering, arrived once the general media had swooped in on the prepped #78 car, changed into her firesuit, had a seat and then began her briefing with the team before getting started. The plan was a quick two figure '8's in the closed off area so the media could get as many angles as needed for coverage purposes.

The event went off without a hitch. Plenty of locals came outside of their jobs and lunch runs to watch everything going on, regardless of the cold, and the local city utility workers who were coincidentally on a job on W. Camden hung out with point and shoot cameras to capture the spectacle. It was a fun event; not only did it pump me up for the Baltimore Grand Prix, but it was interesting to see a young driver so early in her career going through this process of presenting herself publicly. From posing for pictures with fans and bigwigs (responsible for organizing the Baltimore GP), to signing autographs for kids; it was really cool to see. My entire set from this event can be seen here.

Beer of the Month - January

The beer of the month for January is St. Bernardus Christmas Ale {10% abv}. I know what some of you are thinking, "...it's too late for a Christmas Seasonal Beer to make BOTM." Fools! With the recent parading of Belgian inspired beers, we now have a genuine Belgian Family Brewers product. St. Bernardus Brewery was founded in 1946 in Watou, a Province of West Flanders in Belgium. What makes beers from this part of the world special is the brewing technique; once the finest ingredients and water are combined and brewed, the beer spends an additional three months time in tanks to mature before prep for bottling. This process results in a naturally produced carbonation, which is noticeable to the palette. The most important benefit of this carbonation technique is it allows you to age your bottled beer for up to 15 years. I know from personal experience, that bottle aging beer (that's capable of being aged) over a year or two's time smooths out the texture tremendously.

St. Bernardus Christmas Ale is dark and full bodied; flavorful is an understatement. Malty texture resides up front with hoppy tones singing backup. Familiar holiday spices finish the experience. This Abbey Ale is a brew to be sought out; accordingly, I give this authentic Belgian 4 stars. The tricky thing is if you want to try St. Bernardus Christmas Ale, you need to get your hands on a bottle or two now. Thankfully for me, I got it as a gift from my buddy Matt last month. Good news is you can age a few bottles in your home in case this ale is hard for you to get. Who said only wine aficionados can take advantage of affordable in home aging? And if you couldn't tell by the abv, this ale packs a left hook. Slow sipping is highly recommended...but when isn't it?

Playing with strobes.

After many years of ignoring my photography needs for automotive needs (ahem), I've been able to get some equipment together so I can take on more commercial projects. I'll still offer natural light portraiture of course, but controlled environments are a great thing. I'll update/link on here as I begin to advertise and take on new clientele, but in the meantime it's been fun dialing in my new setup for future work. I've had the privilege of assisting several young entrepreneurs I know personally get better images of themselves and products, for website, performance career and business promotion, and I'm very happy to now keep even more work in house.

Erin, a good friend of mine who runs a few blog-based websites like myself, was in need of some material. While the in-house studio space is still under construction, I got creative. A multiple hour evening shoot ensued, and a great start was established. I can't share samples from this set, but look for behind the scenes posts in the near future.

Change of scenery.

After this past weeks sleet storm, I finally got the motivation to wrap up this last trip of 2010. Something about a vista of evergreens slumped by frozen water weight makes you think about the Spring which is getting closer than ever. But not so fast, April isn't that close.

This past November we snuck a quick vacation in to finish out the years' festivities. We went to a familiar place, Myrtle Beach SC, but decided to stay a bit closer to the strip than the year before. I spent plenty of my extra doe this past year on hobbies so I was looking for a great off-season deal...and boy did I find it. Hotels.com came through this time around, putting us in a hotel claiming 40 bucks a night. It got decent reviews online so I jumped on it. Showing up at the entrance of the Palmetto Shores after driving 8 hours into the morning was quite interesting. There was no parking lot to speak of (temporary only), and the 'ocean view' was more of a 'side' ocean view, but it fit the bill in every other way; cost, location, cost, etc.

The weather down in SC was sweet. I mean, we got there on the best week of November ever. It was about 70+ degrees all week, but in typical Fall non-daylight savings time fashion, it cooled off quickly at night; a 20-30 degree swing in a matter of minutes. Given days were an extended Summer, we took advantage of the beach as much as possible. Apparently consuming beverages on Myrtle Beach(es) is 'frowned upon', but we were still able to enjoy some afternoon watercooler time with a few old friends of mine (albeit after Casey led a short southern conversation with the beach patrol) that moved back down to NC when work pulled them from Maryland. It was great seeing Renee and Casey down there.

I didn't shoot a ton, on purpose, but here's my set from Myrtle Beach. I think the biggest tease of the whole trip was that New Belgium Brewery beer is sold in SC, but not in MD (or PA for that matter). Accordingly, we bought them out of their stash of 2* Below and Fat Tire, then hit the road. We're now down to about a six pack in real time. It'll be sad to see them go. Delicious, but sad.

Beer of the Month - December

The Beer of the Month for December is New Belgium Brewery's (NBB) 2 Below {6.6% abv}. As I started getting into last month, NBB has a great story of origin; a brewery started by a married professional couple living the American dream. An artistic neighbor handling all beer label art from 1991 to current. Even better, every employee of this Colorado based company becomes a part-owner after a years employment! Outstanding.

2 Below is one of NBB's great line-up of seasonal brews. It's taste is a result of dry-hopping during the fermentation process and using roasted malts. The flavor profile is in the neighborhood of a stout, but finishes much crisper and cleaner than you'd expect.

If you haven't already snagged a sixer, do so during this lovely holiday season. 3 stars of course. Stay safe during your New Years celebrations everyone.

Falling over.

...I guess that week or two turned into a week or four! The search for the perfect tree and Fall foliage shots got complicated once I got after it. I found myself pulling over randomly to shoot things; my eyes wandering to catch trees turning with great light and composition only to keep driving...to get to work on time. I missed out on capturing quite a bit of what I window shopped, but was able to find some cool locations in my area I'll keep in mind going forward. These are a few of my mid-fall stash.

This post couldn't have been timed better given the Winter Solstice is less than 24 hours away. We'll see what the next season has in store soon enough.

Green Thumb - Wrap-up

If you remember where I left off last time, you'll know we were heading into early Fall evening frosts and there were plenty of young maters' on the vine looking to ripen before it was too late. Both Bart and Lisa grew even larger and spread out further, with many new clusters of tiny fruit appearing week after week. Unfortunately as weeks passed, our plants were getting pretty fed up with the limited sun behind the house as the seasons shifted and it got harder to get quality vine-ripening as more days past. At a certain point in we just took off all the tomatoes that were of reasonable size and brought them inside. Before all that happened though...

Week 15:

Week 16:

Week 17:

Week 19:

Week 20:

Right before Halloween we started getting frost warnings. A few of the tomatoes I took off early to salvage are seen in Week 17. At first we thought,'hey we can make fried green tomatoes', but that never happened ha; those tomatoes are on the same stool and have turned red. We worked some of the already ripe maters into some dinner dishes here and there, but the quality of the off-vine-ripened tomatoes was much lower in texture. I think we're ready for the next challenge having done so well with little experience this past year, but I definitely want some peppers in the mix. Hopefully we can get started a few weeks earlier.

All this years green thumb pics are here.

Take two sports and call me in the morning.

I know I'm only a few ticks over thirty but damn I'm gettin' old. Years go by faster, memories blend, I can't go out like I used to (without paying for it dearly), I'm constantly feeling new aches & pains and if I don't exercise regularly...double the previous order. And don't get me started on getting up from sitting on the floor for a couple hours...I used to not hear so many joints crackling just a couple years ago. Exercise is really tolerable exercise; if you don't want to run because you can't tolerate running, you need to do something you can put up with. Exercise comes in many forms for many people, mainly depending on what you did athletically in college, high school and even as a five or six year old. I've been playing various sports and running around outside as far back as I can remember. Unfortunately desk-jobs and becoming an adult threw a giant wrench into my previous routine of waiting tables (don't miss it), classes and pickup basketball. I found ways to retrieve and fortify my conditioning and strength of old, but I'd eventually get bored and just stick to diet/moderation which isn't enough to satisfy my need to compete.

A couple years ago my buddy Justin, who I played plenty of intramural sports with long ago as we both attended the same college, asked me to join a coed football league with him. These are the stories from those games. BLUNG BLUNNNG (Law and Order reference, check). Here in Baltimore there are two major coed leagues, SOBO and BSSC; which league is better is a toss up depending on what part of the city you live in or more importantly what leagues more of your friends play in. Back to the point though, knowing I had a Spring football season ahead of me helped the exercise go down easier. I had a goal. I knew I wanted to be faster and quicker than my opponents as well as have the energy to compete until the buzzer as I did in multiple sports during my teens and early twenties. I worked harder than I would've so I could not only live up to my lofty expectations, but contribute to our teams strength.

Fast forward to a couple months ago we started our Fall season in BSSC. Our team, Back Dat Pass Up, made the playoffs with a late season run, but lost in the first round. The team we would've played if we won that first game was the winner of the match-up in these shots. It's ok though, we'll be better next year and hopefully team attendance will be better as well. We hung out afterwards around the cooler, leaving it on the field. After some great success in 2010 with our crew of vagabonds, we plan on reloading for Spring via free-agency. Looks like I have another excuse to keep my body feeling young...ish.