Mayfield's Map to ... a weekend off

Each week throughout the season, Jeremy Mayfield and his wife, Shana, share their memories of that weekend's racetrack -- and the happenings around it.

This week: Off-weekend between Pocono and Indy

How much do you anticipate this week off? Do you plan for weeks or does it spring up on you?

Shana: Oh man -- I really look forward to it. I think Jeremy's been doing this grind a lot longer than I have and it's still hard.

	Shana and Jeremy Mayfield
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The traveling and not sleeping in your own bed and missing the dogs -- it's just hard. So I really look forward to just being able to do the mundane things of getting up and saying "Hey, I want to go get my hair done."

Even just paying bills -- just being at home and being in one place for a week feels pretty good.

If we do decide to go somewhere for a couple days that's cool, but Jeremy and I usually feel like we go so much that it feels great to be home and just chill a little bit.

Jeremy: Yeah -- and it's nice, like we say, to just be normal. To just wake up in the morning and you're home -- nowhere to go and nothing to do, right?

And not having to worry about, "I'm leaving on Thursday," which makes you feel like you've got to rush everything (at home) into a day or two.

You have a whole week to kind of gradually do what you want to do.

Shana: It's bad when you wake up Monday morning after a race on Sunday, and you've got to think, "All right, I'm leaving Thursday so what do I have to press into three days to get it all done?"

And Jeremy usually has to go to the shop and to his appearances. So it's hard, because you never have a chance to rest -- or you're always thinking ahead and saying, "I gotta go, I gotta go."

Jeremy: So we're just going to try to relax. Our vacation any more is just going home.

Do you plan to get as far away from racing as you possibly can?

Jeremy: Well, I say that, but I'll probably be racing a lot at home, on the track we have there, because that's what I like doing. Racing's kind of been my life and I don't want anything other than that.

But when we do have time off it's just fun racing -- we go out and get into the little Mini Sprints that we've got, or one of the little Late Model cars and just go out there and run, no pressure, on the dirt track.

I won't do it every day but I'll definitely do it once or twice in the next week.

You actually have a track on your property -- and how big is it?

Jeremy: We got two of 'em, actually -- two racetracks. I've got one of them that's pretty small, it's about a tenth of a mile -- maybe a little smaller than that.

That's the one that started out being for my R/C cars. I turned it into a quarter-scale track, and now it's a half-scale track for the Late Model cars we're running on it.

Now, we've moved up a little bit and built a good, solid eighth of a mile track, high-banked D-shaped oval -- dirt. It's just bad to the bone -- it's cool.

We're expecting for our first race anywhere from between 14-18 people with their cars.

Shana: We're paying $175 to win.

So you got the concession rights going on there?

Shana: No, I'm going to call Turn 4 Pizza and have them deliver -- I don't cook.

Jeremy: We've got an infield care center -- it's a short bus, black -- one of those short little school buses. We've painted it flat black and it's got "night train" painted on the top of it.

That's going to be our infield care center, hot dog stand, souvenirs -- everything will be sold out of that one bus.

We've got a watering truck to water it down real good. It should be a good turnout.

I was gonna ask if you were gonna turn Buster loose for the week, but it sounds like he might be driving the water truck?

Jeremy: He's pretty good on a 'dozer, so just about all his off-weekends he's come out there and done some 'dozer work for us. He kind of pushed some dirt around and stuff.

But he's high maintenance, though -- because when he's out there he's always needing gas or needing some diesel fuel -- or needing to know where this or that is.

But other than that, he's pretty good on the 'dozer. He'll do free 'dozer work for anybody, if they just call him.

Do you turn everything off -- or does Ray or Slugger or anyone try to call you?

Mayfield's MapJeremy and Shana talk about their off-week plans Sign up for TrackPass now BUY YOUR NEXTEL DRIVER PHONE

Jeremy: No, because they pretty much like their weekends off, too. I'm sure Ray will be out there as one of the participants in the Izzy-Belle 200 -- the race that we're having out there.

Ray's got a couple cars and I'm sure he'll have them out there. But they pretty much don't bother us -- they kind of like their weekends off and so do we.

Shana: But we enjoy them coming down. Slugger (Labbe, crew chief) has brought his son out before and it's kind of fun to hang out with these guys away from the racetrack -- and really get to see how they are.

We look forward to having them come out because it's kinda cool.

Jeremy: When they all come out we might race a little bit and maybe even fly some R/C airplanes and get them back out. Shana might even race a little bit.

Shana: No, Shana won't.

Jeremy: The cool thing about our deal back there, is that when you come out there -- she doesn't enjoy all this out here, all the time -- but when you're home you can do whatever you want to do.

If you want to ride four-wheelers we got four-wheelers. If you want to get in the Rhino we can ride around in it. If you want to go fishing, we can go fishing.

If you want to race we can go racing. So you can do whatever you want to do. If you want to stay there late at night and go coyote hunting, we can hunt coyotes.

Shana: We can swim in the pool or sit in the hot tub.

Jeremy: We've made it to where it's kind of like you just go out there and you feel good and it's like a vacation.

I was thinking a few days off might give you a good window to do some monkey shopping, but maybe not?

Jeremy: Well, I tell you what, we've been really wanting to get on that monkey deal quite a bit.

Shana: That's the week we're flying down to pick up Zoë, so maybe we can run in and look at the monkey.

Jeremy: We're definitely going down there, so what I maybe thought of, too, was maybe a gorilla, because they've got a huge gorilla down there.

Shana: How is a gorilla used?

Jeremy: Well, I don't know -- but he's hanging around a lot. He's been around there two or three years.

Somebody would need to get you a trailer to haul him around, no?

Jeremy: Well, he's not that big. He's about 5-foot-9.

Shana: Maybe a mini gorilla, like a mini Bulldog?

Jeremy: He's about the size of Buster. He's about as tall as Buster -- maybe a little bit bigger.

Shana: But hairier.

Jeremy: A little bit hairier. But we might have Buster shack up with the gorilla for a little while, here.

Shana: Maybe we better lay off Buster for a little while -- the poor thing (laughing).

Seriously, though, this sounds like some serious doggie time.

Shana: Yeah, it is.

Jeremy: That's what I'm looking forward to.

Shana: That's what we look forward to, because we love our dogs.

It's funny, because we come into the motorhome and I'm like, "Gosh, it feels so good to sleep through the night -- not having dogs in our bed."

But then I get home and it's just so much fun when they all three get in the bed with us.

Jeremy: Yeah.

Shana: I'll bitch and complain about it, but I love it (laughing).

Jeremy: That's what I'm looking forward to, too. I spend a lot of time with the dogs.

Shana: Jeremy really does.

Jeremy: It doesn't matter if it's a regular week, or we're off -- just about everywhere I go, they go.

They like to run the property with you?

Shana: Yeah. They ride in the Rhino and go back when he's racing. When he's fishing they go in the boat.

Jeremy: They know their deal. When I get on the Rhino, each one knows where to sit. They do it all by themselves and jump up in there, so it's pretty cool.

And it's funny, if you take their seat -- like, if you were there with me, say, Shana or anybody, and you get in Izzy's seat or Maxie's seat, it screws the whole routine up.

You'll know about it (laughing).

Shana: You have to ride on the back (laughing). I've ridden on the back of the Rhino a lot.

Jeremy: They're funny.

I understand you got some real estate dealings going on -- is this week off going to be big as far as that goes?

Jeremy: I'm hoping so. Actually, we've got an offer on our land now.

How much property do you have, there?

Jeremy: We now own 134 acres in Mooresville -- actually right outside of Mooresville, on the edge of Mooresville -- off of Route 152.

And I haven't purchased it yet, but we're in the process of purchasing some land in Catawba (County), which is almost right between Hickory and Statesville, when we sell ours.

It's not very far from the interstate, and it's real close to the race shop and the airport, so it's a lot more convenient. And it's a lot more land.

It's a house that we've kind of been wanting, and it's perfect. The house is just perfect and it's got 468 acres.

And it's already got a dirt track in the making, that's got lights around it.

Shana: We have an offer (on our property), but we're still open (for bids).

A week off is great, but how big of an adjustment is it for both of you to get back to the grind -- at Indy of all places?

Shana: You know, it's funny but even in the off-season we don't have that much time. I find myself getting exciting because we're going back (on the road) because this is cool.

And Indy is a fun place to go anyway, so to go back to Indy is fine. And Jeremy actually has a test coming up, that I don't know if he's too excited about.

He goes to Watkins Glen for two days, and then he goes to Indy. But if we had to go anyplace, Indy is fine -- I don't know.

Jeremy: What I'm thinking is that Shana doesn't really mind going to Indy, because there's a huge mall there, right downtown.

So you can hear it in her voice, that she's excited, saying, "I love Indy. Indy's great." She's talking a big game, but she just wants to go shopping.

Shana: I think it's a great race, too.

Jeremy: It is, and we have a great place where we always park, in the grass.

Shana: And we can bring our dogs and they can run around, so I think it's fine.

Word Association: Off-week

The beach

Jeremy: Surfing.

Shana: My favorite.

The mountains

Jeremy: Camping.

Shana: Not my favorite.

The dogs

Jeremy: Awesome.

Shana: Our babies.