Plan To Drink One Beer For Each Lap Of Daytona 500 Falls Far Short

An ambitious plan to consume one beer for all 500 laps of the Daytona 500 fell far short of expectations yesterday as both participants lost consciousness after lap 20. The two men, Jimmy Hillsboro of Little Rock, AK, and Hal Kniptick of Macon, GA, started off with a bang but ended prematurely, sleeping through the last 480 laps of the famed car race.

"Hoo boy, we almost made it," said Hillsboro. "I hit my stride right around the tenth lap, but then I started to get a little tipsy, and the last thing I remember is finishing beer 18 and peeing my pants. I didn’t wake up till the race was over. Great race, though"

Kniptick didn’t last much longer. He lost consciousness minutes after Hillsboro, and the two spent the rest of the race sprawled out in on the metal bleachers amidst a crowd of enthusiastic fans NASCAR fan Karl Veazie, 38, who was sitting behind the two men, described the scene:

"These two fellas, they just kept drinkin and drinkin. Real fast, too. Every lap they’d get up to go get more beer. Then they started urinating and puking all over the place. And finally they passed out. I was pretty disgusted with their behavior until around lap 40, when I passed out myself. Great race, though."

According to sources close to the two men, the idea was hatched by Hillsboro, an avid NASACR fan and alcoholic. He’s known as a chronic binge drinker, and once consumed an entire 30-pack of Old Milwaukee by himself during a tractor pull. The challenge of drinking one beer for every lap of the Daytona 500 was too tempting to pass up.

His pal Kniptick is not the drinker that Hillsboro is, but he was determined to keep pace with his friend and rival.

"Me and Jimmy, we’re real competitive about everything. If he gets a rear spoiler on his car, I’ve got to get a rear spoiler on my car. If he knocks up his girlfriend, I gotta knock mine up. And if he drinks himself to a state of catatonia, well, I’ll be right behind him. And I held my own, too. But now my liver hurts. It’s actually aching. Is that normal?"

NASCAR and alcoholism have gone hand in hand for years. Studies show that close to 8 percent of all NASCAR fans say they have inhaled 30 beers or more in one sitting, and a large number of those have peed on themselves or others.

"NASCAR and getting drunk are forever linked," says NASCAR president Mike Helton. "Just like baseball and hot dogs and America and apple pie. NASCAR and being a disgusting slobbering, vomit covered wretch go together like a horse and carriage. Do you know how boring it is to sit through 500 laps of cars driving around I circles? Passing out is the best way to zip right to the end. Then you just read the paper and find out who won."

According to officials at the Daytona 500, Hillsboro and Kniptick weren’t the only people to drink themselves nearly to death that day. In fact, the majority of people in the area were either dead asleep or ill. By the end of the race, the bleachers where Kniptick and Hillsboro embarked on their historic quest were littered with bodies sprawled out across each other, as well as puddles of urine and vomit.

"Yea, they were all pretty much done," says Walt Gunderson, head of security for the event. "It looked like one of those mass suicides or something. But that’s NASCAR for ya. It’s all part of the fun. I hope they enjoyed themselves and come back next year, I really do. Only, I hope they control themselves a little next time. 500 laps is a lot of laps, and a lot of beer. My suggestion would be to drink a beer every other lap. That works out to only 250."

But Hillsboro and Kniptick are undeterred. The two have vowed to continue to push the boundaries of common sense and human endurance at NASACR events in the future.

Says Hillsboro: "I failed, and I’m ashamed of myself. If I can’t drink 500 beers, then I need to build my tolerance. My daddy always said I was a lightweight. A sissy. And maybe he was right. But hell, that can change. I've just got to build up my resistance that’s all. Maybe I was shooting a little too high with the Daytona 500. I should’ve started with Brickyard 400. That might’ve been a little more reasonable."