Reading · The Southern Punk Project

Well, gentlemen, start your engines because The Grift 500 has rolled into D.C., and you know the Man in Charge is behind all of this nonsense. And y’all, when I say rolled into D.C., I don't mean they found an empty parking lot somewhere outside the city, put up some bleachers and called it a race. Oh No. These fools actually turned the streets around the National Mall into a goddamn IndyCar track. I am not kidding.

The actual name of this sh*tshow is the Freedom 250 Grand Prix of Washington, D.C., because apparently this is how we’re celebrating America’s 250th birthday now. And y’all, this isn’t some little exhibition where a couple of cars drive around the block and everybody goes home. Oh no. This is the first-ever IndyCar race around the National Mall. They put 25 drivers on a roughly 1.7-mile track with seven turns and told these wankers to go around it 147 damn times. Nearly 250 miles. And these cars can get up around 180 miles an hour. Y’all, they are hauling ass through D.C. past the National Archives and the Smithsonian and all this shit we normally spend a small fortune making sure nobody so much as sneezes on. Because apparently America couldn’t just turn 250. Oh no we had to celebrate with Mario Kart: Founding Fathers Edition.

And here's what I need y'all to understand. This whole damn thing didn’t just magically show up on the IndyCar schedule. Nope… Grandpa wanted it. So back in January, the Man in Charge signed an executive order basically telling everybody to get their engines running because HE wanted race cars in Washington for America’s 250th birthday. And although this idea is crazy as hell his first idea was even crazier because they wanted to use the Capitol grounds. That is until somebody remembered Congress might have something to say about turning their front yard into a damn racetrack. So they had to work around that and change the course. But it didn’t matter. Hot Wheels Hannigan got his ass involved, and here we are.

And once Hot Wheels Hannigan got his way, D.C. had to figure out how the hell you turn the National Mall into an actual racetrack. And y’all, apparently you can’t just throw down some orange cones, slap a START sign on Pennsylvania Avenue and tell everybody to stay the hell out of the road. Oh no. They had to shut down streets, haul in concrete barriers, put up fencing and grandstands, screw with access to the museums, reroute traffic and turn half of downtown into a security zone. And THEN somebody apparently looked down at the street and went, “Uh oh. What happens if one of these things hits a manhole doing 180?”

Which brings us to the greatest supporting characters in this entire story: THE MANHOLES. More than 200 of these things had to be welded down as part of preparing the streets for racing.

Now before somebody comes running into my comments screaming, YES, I KNOW WHY THEY WELDED THE DAMN MANHOLES SHUT. Apparently when one of these cars comes hauling ass over a manhole at 180 miles an hour, all that air and pressure underneath it can turn the cover into a goddamn flying weapon. So obviously you gotta secure the things. I get it. But y’all, that doesn’t make this crap any less ridiculous because somebody in D.C. still had to look at more than 200 manholes and say, “Weld ‘em shut. Grandpa wants to play hot wheels.” And some poor bastard grabbed his welding helmet and went to work. Two hundred times.

And listen, they got to test this whole ridiculous setup yesterday because Saturday was practice and qualifying. So basically, before they turned 25 IndyCars loose on D.C. for 147 laps today, the drivers had to get out there and figure out what the hell they were dealing with.

And y’all, it didn’t take long for this to become the statement of the day. THE ROADS ARE BUMPY AS HELL. Because apparently nobody thought about the fact that regular-ass D.C. streets don’t magically turn into a professional racetrack just because Hot Wheels Hannigan signed an executive order. Y’all, these wankers are out there hitting bumps, patched-up pavement and brick f*cking crosswalks with concrete walls sitting there waiting for somebody to screw up. Which at 30 miles an hour, you barely notice any of that. But at 180, apparently it’ll put your ass on notice and into a concrete wall.

And listen the streets started collecting race cars pretty quickly. Graham Rahal got into trouble. Louis Foster spun straight into a wall, and y’all, they weren’t even the only ones having problems during qualifying. Because out there, you make one wrong move and there’s a concrete wall waiting on your ass. But somehow they got through all of that, Alex Palou grabbed the pole, and today they lined up 25 of these wankers and said, alright fellas, now I'm gonna need you to do it 147 times.

But before they could even get started? Y'all know Grandpa needed his moment. Because of course he did.

So picture it. Before the race even gets started, here comes the Man in Charge and Melania rolling onto the track in the Beast to take themselves a little lap around D.C. And because apparently Grandpa riding around in the presidential limo wasn’t enough of a production, Air Force One comes flying overhead with fighter jets, the Marine Corps band is playing, and they temporarily stopped flights at Reagan National for hours around all of this. Y’all, what the hell are we doing? Is this an IndyCar race or are we invading Talladega?

And this thing is no small affair, y’all. IT’S BIG. They got more than 288,000 ticket requests for this thing, they’re expecting crowds well into the six figures, and while general admission was free, some of those fancy trackside seats were going for thousands. And of course the corporations came rolling in too. Boeing, Starlink, Delta, Shell, Verizon and Lord knows who else all got their names attached to Grandpa’s big day at the races.

Penske Corporation is the one putting most of this shindig together, and y’all, this isn't pocket change. These folks already forked out around $21 million putting on the Detroit Grand Prix. And Penske well they are saying this thing costs way more than that. Penske also claims they’re the ones picking up the vast majority of the bill. But just look at everything it took to pull this thing off. This is one hell of a production for somebody who woke up and decided he wanted race cars in D.C.

Because that’s where The Grift 500 came from.

And listen, this isn’t about us hating IndyCar. Because we don’t. Those drivers are out there doing some pretty incredible stuff. And I already told y’all, I understand why they had to weld the damn manholes shut. That’s not the point. The point is LOOK AT ALL OF THIS. The cameras. The flags. The Beast rolling around D.C. Fighter jets flying overhead. Corporate sponsors everywhere. You have security out the wazoo. And half of Washington turned upside down. All because Hot Wheels Hannigan wanted himself a race.

And y’all, this is where it really pissed me off. Because while these fools were busy getting all of this ready, we’ve spent days on this Porch talking about what the hell is happening in Indiana. People have been sitting without power. Homes have flooded. Families have been scrambling around trying to find generators, hotel rooms, food, water, whatever they can get their hands on. Gary got put under a boil-water advisory while some folks still don’t have electricity and I’m sitting here thinking, HOW THE HELL ARE THEY SUPPOSED TO BOIL THE WATER?

We’ve been sitting here asking WHERE THE HELL IS EVERYBODY? Well now we know. They are in DC. Because apparently when the Man in Charge comes up with some ridiculous idea, everybody can move heaven and earth to make that sh*t happen. But when Americans are sitting in devastated communities without power, dealing with flooded homes and trying to find food and water, suddenly everybody moves at a damn crawl.

So after watching this whole ridiculous thing come together, my wife and I started calling it The Grift 500, because come on. What the hell else were we supposed to call it? But then we found out they had welded more than 200 damn manholes shut and y’all, that was it. We were done. My wife looked at me, I looked at her, and we both knew exactly what was about to happen. There was absolutely no way the Southern Punk Project was letting this one go. So she started writing, and a few hours later we had somehow turned Grandpa’s big day at the races into our next Southern Punk Musical.

Then we had to make the video and of course the welders were going in there because come on, they welded more than 200 manholes shut. How the hell do I leave THAT out? So we got the welders and the race cars and Grandpa rolling around in the Beast, and then I started thinking about all the animals that live around the National Mall because those poor things had to be wondering what the hell was happening.

Now anybody who has ever had a dog during fireworks knows what that kind of noise does to animals, but it wasn’t just the noise I was thinking about.

You see years ago my ex-husband and my grandfather went to the Daytona 500 and y’all, when they came home they REEKED of fuel. And when I say reeked I mean everything they had with them smelled like fuel. It was so strong that I made them leave all of it in my garage to air out because I wasn’t having that smell in my house.

So now I’m thinking about how bad the air quality is going to be with 25 of these cars going around the National Mall 147 times. And about all the animals living around there, and well, they had to be in the video too.

And somehow those poor animals went from trying to get away from the race to us having giant birds over Washington.

And then we got to the raccoons and I completely lost it because LOOK AT THEM. Why are they having a meeting? Who called it? What are they talking about? And why do they look like they have more important things to discuss than half the people actually working in Washington?

I swear those little fools may be my favorite part.

So by then we’ve got animals running everywhere and giant birds over D.C. and the raccoons are apparently holding a meeting while the race keeps right on going.

And those damn manholes?

Still secure.

Which is why when my wife gets to “The President is guarded. The monuments are secured. The manholes are welded down. The wildlife?” all I can think about are those poor animals we just sent running all over Washington.

Well...

Y’all saw them.

But thank the Lord.

THOSE DAMN MANHOLES ARE SECURE.

Before you go, if you laughed at The Grift 500, learned something from the write-up or found yourself way too invested in a table full of raccoons, this is the kind of stuff your support lets us keep doing.

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And before you go, if you haven't seen what we released yesterday, don't miss our newest Porch anthem, There Goes America.

That one is very different from The Grift 500.

My wife wrote it, and there's a reason we called it a Porch anthem. It's about the country we're watching change right in front of us and what the hell we're going to leave behind when all of this is over.

If The Grift 500 made you laugh today, go listen to There Goes America next.

That one might make you cry.

Then come back to the Porch.

We've got work to do.

This IS the People's Porch.
The Porch is where we gather...
The RESISTANCE is what we've become. 🥊

So come join us on the Porch and let's “Leave the Noise in the Street Tonight!”

Y’all know the deal.

If I’m gonna tell you they welded more than 200 damn manholes shut, turned the National Mall into an IndyCar track and sent Grandpa around it in the Beast, I’m bringing the receipts.

So if you wanna dig through The Grift 500 for yourself, here ya go.

How The Grift 500 Happened

The White House | Celebrating American Greatness with American Motor Racing — Executive Order 14381

The White House | Fact Sheet: President Donald J. Trump Celebrates American Greatness with the Freedom 250 Grand Prix of Washington, D.C.

Those Damn Manholes & The D.C. Racetrack

Associated Press | Trump’s IndyCar race: Doing 200 in a 25 mph zone with manhole cover-displacing torque

Grandpa's Big Day at the Races

Associated Press | Trump waves the green flag to start the IndyCar race as drivers zoom through Washington’s streets

Reuters | Trump caps summer of US 250th birthday at IndyCar race through Washington

The Money, Sponsors & Size of This Thing

Reuters | Washington IndyCar race touted by Trump draws Boeing, Starlink, Delta as new sponsors

The Wall Street Journal | 147 Laps Around the Mall: Washington Hosts Freedom 250 Street Race