The Great Racing Weekemd

Memorial Day weekend revolves around auto racing for me.  Sunday is the greatest single day of the year with Monaco, the Indy 500 and the Nascar race rounding out the weekend.  Here are some of my favorite racing cards that represent all of these series.

1992 Grid Formula One - A rookie card of the most successful F1 driver ever.

2008 Press Pass insert - Montoya was successful in all 3 series.

2006 Topps A&G mini - The only woman to win a race in F1, Indy Racing or NASCAR.

Star Wars Day

I'm happy to say that I am old enough to have seen Star Wars when it came out in 1977.  If only I had kept my Star Wars toys in their original packaging.....

I passively collect Star Wars cards.  Here are a few of my favorites.

And now I will play Star Wars online.  Good night!

I Feel A Draft

I watched very little of the NFL draft this year.  It's not because I wasn't interested but I have regular shows that I watch on Thursday and Friday evenings.  Back in the old days I would watch all day Saturday but the primetime draft eludes my interest.

As far as I know, only one player was ever drafted that went to my high school (Clarkston):

Robert O'Neal was an All-ACC player at Clemson and was drafted by the Dolphins in the 6th round in 1993. He only played 2 regular season NFL games, for the Colts in 1994.  He was 4 years behind me in school but, if I remember correctly, he lived in my neighborhood and we played nerf football with the other kids.  I know there was a kid named Robert that I could heave the ball as far as I c.ould and he would run under it 

Probably the most famous person that went to Clarkston was Sean Mullins, who had a couple of hits in the 1990's.  He was a year behind me.  I remember him singing in the chorus.

The Spirit of '76

I've never really been in to trying to complete a full set.  I usually collect a player or team instead of needing everything from a particular year.  The exception is 1976 Topps Baseball.  The first pack of baseball cards I bought was from this set on the night after I went to my first Braves games in 1976.

I'm about 80-100 cards short of complete right now but will finish this at some point.  I love this design and the player selection can't be beat with the All-Time All-Stars cards making an affordable way to get some of the all-time greats.  That is Aaron's last card and Eckersley's first.  I love the stylized player in the corner of each card, with the exception being on the all-star cards (Bench).

It's hard for me to believe that this set came out 41 years ago.  Make's me feel older than I actually am (50).

Der Herre Der Ringe

Several years ago a guy I worked with went to Europe for a week.  I asked him to buy me a pack or two of cards or stickers.  What he brought me was chocolate candy with this in it:

I can't read the German on the back but I think this is cool.  I have 2 more stickers from this set that he gave me.  It is from Kinder Riegel Schokolade.

The True Masters

One of my favorite annual viewing pleasures starts tomorrow: The Masters.  My entire weekend plan will revolve around it.  After a day of storms today the weather for the weekend should allow the tournament to play out over the four days.  I have many golf cards but here are three that represent 21 victories and 13 runner-up finishes:

 
13 wins from these 3 greats.  This is simply my best memorabilia card from any sport.

4 Wins.  After buying many gold boxes I finally got a Tiger swatch out of this catch-all set.

 4 more wins from Faldo and Couples.  Duval finished second twice.



It will be bittersweet with no Arnie teeing off tomorrow but I hope it will be a great tournament.

I'll set my Tigers Woods golf to the tournament settings and see how I score.  I'll let you know if I win.

Tennis Masters

With the golf Masters starting this week I decided to highlight a couple of tennis masters.  They met in the final of the Miami Open this weekend in another match-up of 2 of the top athletes of the 21st century.

 These are from the 2003 Netpro set and are rookie cards of both players.  I got a box of this a few years ago on clearance at a Wal-mart, which is why I have these.  Neither of them had won a major yet.