My Reason for Legacy Albums: A photographer’s desire to offer more than simple photos

My favorite part of being involved with racing is when I get to connect with a team and shoot a Legacy Album for them. I can’t emphasize enough how important these albums are.

Being a photographer at a race track, I began to see the only thing photographers offered were repetitive photos of the cars on the track. Race after race, the same photos, over and over again. I even had drivers confide in me that they only buy the photos because they’re so cheap, and it helps the photographers do what they like to do.

That’s a horrible business model, and I never want to be part of that, so I dug deeper.

I have been part of race teams. I’ve burned the midnight oil, several nights in a row, just to make it to the race, many times. I know the stampede of race haulers hits the local track at 11am, then scrambles to be ready for the first fire-off at 12:30. Then practice and tuning sessions. Then qualifying. Then heats. Then the main event. Then the crowds of fans that come down afterward. Then the packing up. If you’re out of there before midnight, you’re doing well. Then the Sunday-After-Raceday fatigue.

The time spent at the track alone is a minimum of 12 hours. If you added up all the time actually turning laps on the track, many classes would be hard pressed to accumulate one full hour. So where’s all that time going? It’s spent pulling your hair out in frustration, trying to nail the setup, measuring, calculating, and hopefully celebrating victories. It’s also spent laughing, joking with friends, sitting in the hauler eating pre-prepped food out of ice chests, wandering into competitors’ pits to banter with them, and signing autographs for the kids while they ask for picture while sitting in your driver seat.

All of this… ALL OF THIS… is why I want every team to have a Legacy Album. Because your race day is so much more than a few minutes turning around in circles. Document it. Archive it. Save the memories.

This weekend, I had the privilege of connecting with Junior Late Model driver Austin Edwards, and his team. Here’s a selection of some of the racing action. Please see Austin’s Legacy Album gallery for several more of my favorites.

Austin “First Place Ace” Edwards in preparation for qualifying his Junior Late Model race car.

Austin Edwards rounds turn 2 on to the back straight during practice sessions at Madera Speedway, Junior Late Models event.

Racing into the setting sun down the back straight at Madera Speedway.

The Madera Speedway Junior Late Models under green during their 50 lap main event.

Junior Late Model driver Austin Edwards leads the field at Madera Speedway.