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Friday November 5th, 1999

Mark Collie and Gibson racing toward Diabetes cure
Story and photos by: David Schenk

The night of racing started with a driver's meeting, during which the celebrities were explained the rules of racing and encouraged to not cause accidents.

All of the drivers were introduced, and assembled into their teams in front of the grandstands. The participants were divided into heats based on their experience and affiliation with the event. There was a captain's race for the most experience drivers including Mark Collie, Larry Stewart, Kix Brooks and winner Matthew Nelson of the Nelsons. A legends of NASCAR race had "Red" Farmer beating out old rivals Donnie Allison, Coo Coo Marlin and Mike Alexander.

The longest race of the night was the "Women of Country" event. It took at least four tries to get through the first lap as the ladies continued to run into each other. Mindy McCready was involved in two incidents and Irlene Mandrell and Kippi Brannon got together in a hard collision.

The sponsors race pitted dignitaries from the event sponsors together. Gibson's CEO Henry Juszkiewicz drew the worst starting spot and started shotgun on the field. After a few laps, he went to pass Dr. Jay Smith from the Vanderbilt University Medical Center. The two cars came together and Henry ripped the fender off Dr. Smith's car. After the race resumed, Henry raced strongly with the eventual race winner Donald Howell, the senior tax manager with Arthur Andersen.

See below for highlights from the races.

Click on each photo to see a larger image.

All of the participants gathered for a group photograph.

The "Yellow Team" consisted of Matthew Nelson, Mindy McCready, Busch racer Casey Atwood, Storme Warren from Access Hollywood, Brad Warren of the Warren Brothers, Heath Wright of Ricochet, Henry Juszkiewicz, and Nascar legend Charlie Glotzbach.

The "Women of Country" race heats up as Kippi Brannon runs into the side of Mindy McCready in the first turn.

The car's hoods were given to the drivers as souvenirs after the race.

Henry posing with his car prior to the race.

Henry tries to make the pass...

but gets cutoff and crashed.

Racing to stay ahead of race winner Donald Howell.