In a flash, Gary Goodwin witnessed his trailer engulfed in flames while on his way to his first time racing at Nashville Fairgrounds Speedway in Tennessee. He said he had most of his shop packed into his trailer. Goodwin lost everything except his outlaw late model and truck.
“We were on I-65, 30 miles south of Huntsville, [Alabama,] when we noticed the trailer was on fire,” said Goodwin, of Pensacola, Florida. “Something electrical [was] burning near the front of the trailer, where a 12-volt wire entered the trailer. We emptied two fire extinguishers, but we could not put the fire out.”
Goodwin and his team quickly disconnected the truck and then got his late model out of the trailer.
“Inside, fuel jugs were burning, as was a nitrogen tank,” Goodwin said. “We had 10 gallons of racing fuel that burst into flames.”
As with Goodwin, Bubba Winslow also headed from Florida to race at Nashville. He and his team stopped to help Goodwin. Then, Goodwin borrowed an open trailer from a friend in Birmingham, Alabama.
“Bubba and his crew helped us out tremendously,” said Goodwin. “While I headed back to Birmingham and got the trailer, the crews drove my late model down the interstate to the next exit. A tow truck took the burned trailer after the fire department finished extinguishing it.”
Gary Goodwin made it in time to race at Nashville. It was his first time at the storied track.
“The worst thing was getting to the track and standing there, with the car on an open trailer, and then realizing we had no tools or spare parts,” Goodwin said. “Along with Bubba, other racers helped us, offering tools, nitrogen, and parts.”
Despite the hurdles, Goodwin placed third in the first practice, fifth in the second. Then the event rained out. The track rescheduled it to October.
“It’s a weekend that I will never forget,” said Goodwin. “The fire. All that driving back and forth. Having lost nearly everything. Then, not getting to race because of the weather.”
Goodwin lost a myriad of items in the fire, including his four-wheeler, all his tools, spare parts, radio equipment, and personal safety gear.
Despite that, Gary Goodwin did not want handouts from the racing community. However, if you want to offer a good deal on an enclosed trailer, tools, two-way radios, gears or springs, you can reach Goodwin at 251-942-2020.
Mike Adaskaveg has written hundreds of stories since the website’s inception. This year marks his 54th year of covering auto racing. Adaskaveg got his start working for track photographer Lloyd Burnham at Connecticut’s Stafford Motor Speedway in 1970. Since then, he’s been a columnist, writer, and photographer, in racing and in mainstream media, for several outlets, including the Journal Inquirer, Boston Herald, Stock Car Racing, and Speedway Illustrated. Among Adaskaveg’s many awards are the 1992 Eastern Motorsport Press Association (EMPA) Ace Lane Photographer of the Year and the 2019 National Motorsports Press Association (NMPA) George Cunningham Writer of the Year.
