Galletta's Karting Club - '10 Season, Event #19 - Sunday, Oct. 10th, 2010

2010 Season, Event #19 - Sunday, October 10th, 2010 - Matt Stevens (via the Galletta's #3, which was an unused kart in last weekend's Klassic, although it was qualified and claimed as Matt's backup if he needed it) and Randy Platt (via the Galletta's #5, which was also qualified, open for anybody with at least a little bit of driving experience t drive it, but went 100% unused in the Klassic) took the two initial Fall Fury Bonus Point Twin-30 Features on October 10th, 2010. See how close our karts are? But still there are doubters who think we rig it. Oh well. Pictures are up, points up soon &  videos forthcoming within the next few days and weeks. (I'll get caught up. Eventually.) Also, the previous weekend's Klassic page is near complete (only missing the finalized points and vides. Check it out and check it out again after it's done). Ogie would not let either competitor hold the belt, as he considers himself the true master and ruler, and that we are all his puppets in his grand scheme of making a fixed racing organization. Man, Ogie is imaginative, isn't he?

The first of two 30-lap features was led by AJ Nason early, although his #35's motor has been slowing (and AJ has a new motor lined up for next season). 2nd place Melissa Stevens spent most of the race effectively holding off Randy Platt, Tim Galletta, Chris and Matt Stevens who battled bumper-to-bumper behind her.

However, when 2nd place Melissa Stevens got sideways in turn 3 late, Randy and Chris got stuck high behind her, and Matt Stevens had perfect timing on a slingshot to blow by them all. A few laps later, Matt was able to get under AJ, who then lost control, did a 360, and Tim Galletta had nowhere to go and smashed AJ's #35, taking both the #35 and Tim's #54 out for the night. Matt took the win, and Chris was starting to get disgruntled at getting blocked but other people being allowed room to pass (as it happened several times during the year, including the prior two weekend's races on 9/24/2010, and 10/2/2010's Klassic 200), and vowed to himself to race closer to avoid such an occurrence from happening again.

On the 2nd of two 30-Lap Features at Galletta's on 10/10/2010, controversy occurred when Matt and Chris were in a torrid 2-kart battle behind Melissa. Huh? The brothers always battle it out in karts, have done so for almost 20 years, and in the last four of those years, Matt's wife Melissa has been in those battles. So what could have happened that was so controversial?

It all started with a rather mundane and inconspicuous incident. As this animated picture clearly shows, we see Melissa losing control and going off the track with nobody within a kart length around her. The above shot is a smaller-scale thumbnail, but you can click on this picture to view a larger animated picture of the accident. Considering Melissa was driving her own #80, which is a loose kart in which she has flown off the track by herself a handful of times before (including in the exact same spot on 8/8/2010), this does not seem at all controversial now, does it?

What was so controversial about that you ask? Not much, other than when a spectator angrily stormed onto the track to yell at a competitor, which is not allowed. That's right, yours truly Chris Stevens was accused of pushing his own sister-in-law Melissa off of the track by her mother, Monica Gable. However, as you can see in the above animation, the evidence does not align with the accusation. This does not stop Monica, who proceeded to verbally abuse her son-in-law's brother in front of everybody, drivers and spectators alike. This was all simply stunning. Chris' only response was, "No, I didn't even touch her, she drove off the track. But nobody yelled at her when she clearly put me off the track earlier this year and said that, 'It's not may fault'." What was worse yet is that Chris' wife Rungnapha AKA Au (the camera woman in the tower) came down to ask what was going on, try to calm her down and to support the truth in the scenario (which was that nobody pushed Melissa off the track, and that she fell off just like she had before). Monica did not care, as she told Au to "go to hell", and when Au asked, "what if you're wrong?", to which Monica again replied, "You go to hell, Au!" She also said more behind our backs, and two separate people reported that she also said that Au should, "shut up and go wash the dishes." Later, she was quoted by a second person calling Au, who is Thai, a "chink." Proving her ignorance, Thai's aren't even Chinese, they're Thai. It would be like calling (for example) a Polish person a slang for Italian or even African, but racism and racists never makes sense anyways, it's just irrational, mindless, stubborn, baseless and illogical hatred. Monica is supposed to be a Christian, but her actions are an embarrassment to the teachings of Christ, fellow Christians, and each and every person in her own family, including the daughter that she was supposedly defending in her baseless tirade. They are only documented here to illustrate what happened during the following few days.

Now, none of this would not have been made public if it weren't for the fact that Au was so upset that she couldn't sleep, and to ease her mind, the animated picture was put online -- first without her name -- for Monica and any others to see the truth in hopes that rationality will return things to normal. I love the truth and abhor unapologetic liars. However, apparently some people do not like the truth, and will lie even in the face of contradictory evidence and throw temper tantrums rather than admit that they were wrong. How is this, you say?

Well, the following day, Monica apparently called our friends and fellow Galletta's Club competitors George, Shadoe and Doe's mom Mary Russell on the phone and gossiped lies saying that Chris and Matt's mother (property owner Mary Stevens) called the Russell's horrible names, which were wildly and inaccurately spun from a private family conversation between Mary Stevens and Melissa weeks earlier. What was said? Now, we must go back to 8/29/2010, when Matt passed Shadoe on the last lap for the win. After the win, Melissa was angry, yelled at Matt and threw some karts post-race because she felt that Matt passed him rough, which the tape showed that he did not, and even Shadoe said Matt passed him clean. Mary then heard multiple rumors that the Russell's were telling everybody they knew that we were racing unsafely (untrue if you view any and all of the videos - whether it be the complete race DVDs or YouTube highlight reels, and George, who many reported as having alcohol on his breath before races, was involved in more accidents that any other driver this season bar none) and that they planning on not racing at Galletta's anymore and had planned to race primarily on other tracks, recruiting friends away from our club to join them. This has happened before (we existed fifteen years before the prominent local dirt karting track, its operator raced here the season before it was built, and he has privately campaigned against us and recruited our club drivers to leave us and race on his track) and has been hurtful to both the club's numbers and to Matt, who builds and repairs these karts for just gas and part money simply for people to race with. It's a formula that works 98% of the time, but occasionally some become disgruntled and nothing can be done no matter how much you do to try and keep everyone happy and competitive. If people leave, then Matt's hard work and friendship was offered all for naught. After knowing this, Mary felt as if the Russell's were going to use and betray Matt, which nobody else believed, as we always have fun racing with them and get a long so well with them. Then, on 9/24/2010, Shadoe Russell got his first feature win, although after the race, in a private family discussion, Mary Stevens let Melissa know that she was unhappy over the fact that she felt that Melissa was purposefully blocking everyone from passing Shadoe and felt that it was unfair to everybody including Shadoe to give him a win that he did not earn on his own, especially considering that according to rumors, the Russell's were going quit racing at Galletta's after the Klassic. Somehow, Mary's argument that Shadoe wasn't as great of a driver as he bragged that he was (on Facebook to everybody he knew) yet, was still learning, and that the Russell's shouldn't slap Matt in the face by not racing with us anymore got twisted into insults, which was not their intention. Somehow this falsely got turned by Mad Monica into the "R" word, which nobody at Galletta's ever called Shadoe. Monica also told Mrs. Russell that Mary Stevens called her fat, again untrue, as she simply stated that she herself was overweight and won't pose in the victory pictures. The comments were both so highly exaggerated and so twisted by the gossip that they became profoundly untrue and extremely hurtful to the Russell's family. This has then caused a rift and caused Mary Russell to write libelous slander of our club's integrity on facebook, allow people to slander us without defense, and where we did defend ourselves, that defense thereafter was deleted, which was fully documented on this large webpage here.

ENOUGH of the drama! We simply will not tolerate it anymore. We allow people -- sometimes strangers -- on our property for a friendly friends-and-family race, and some people take advantage of our hospitality and get mad at us over nothing. If you have an accusation, back it up with solid evidence.  If you fight and/or argue on the property, you will not be asked back. Matt and myself are very fair, forgiving, open, and understanding people, but the fighting and bickering must stop. This is the end of it, so please take note. Monica Gable and Mary Russell have -- joining another woman from 2006 as the only banned persons from Galletta's -- been barred from the club for arguing, fighting, gossiping, backbiting, hurting all in the club. All three would be allowed back with apologies, which, unfortunately, we predict will never come. Gary Miller Sr. was also banned (for continuously badmouthing and lying about us to everyone he knows in addition to not paying for his kart's work, gas, parts and storage and being the only person who repeatedly stormed off the track like a child for 5 years), but after his apology, he is forgiven as long as he stops all of the negativity and acts like a mature adult and not a snotty child. Let it be a lesson - NO MORE FIGHTING OR GOSSIPING WILL BE TOLERATED, ALONG WITH NO MORE DRUNKS NEAR THE TRACK. PERIOD. Now, back to the race, which is what we are here for:

The remainder of the show was Chris in the Galletta's #4 chasing down his former kart the Galletta's #5 driven by Randy Platt. Chris did show him a wheel a couple times, but Randy held off Chris for his 3rd win of 2010 in is 3rd different kart (Galletta's #2, his own Murder #187 being the other two). The #5, a multi-time feature winning kart which Chris won two Klassics and two track championships in, sat unused in the previous weekend's Klassic 200. Think.. it could have been you. Then again, are you good enough? Well, if you think you can race karts, you live locally and aren't here, it already answers the question. Probably not.

Again, all post-Klassic races do NOT count as season point races. However, they do count as both a Fall Series and the All-Time Galletta's Karting Track points listings. We also do not count laps in the Fall series, but rather just the straight up point system with no lap-led bonus points like Summer and Klassic races have.

1st Twin 30: 1st. Matt Stevens - Galletta's #3 2nd. Melissa Stevens - Scissors N' Fur #19 3rd. Chris Stevens - Galletta's #8 4th.  Randy Platt - Galletta's #5 5th.  AJ Nason - Nason #35 (DNF) 6th. Tim Galletta - Sid Harvey #54 (DNF)

2nd Twin 30: 1st. Randy Platt - Galletta's #5 2nd. Chris Stevens - Galletta's #4 3rd. Melissa Stevens - Scissors N' Fur #80 4th. Matt Stevens - Galletta's #33 (DNF) 5th. AJ Nason - Galletta's #9 (DNF) 6th. Tim Galletta - Sid Harvey #54  (DNS)