Breaking News

Sport Columns

Wall of Fame nominees announced

First of all I want to thank everyone for their prayers and thoughts during the last week. On Tuesday of last week I got the call that most people dread. My little brother called and said that our mom had died. She had been in bad health for a while but this was totally unexpected. I missed the first issue of this column since we have started it. There is a lot of racing news even though most tracks have fallen into winter sleep. Each year for the past 40 years the best racers in the country visit Five Flag Speedway in Pensacola, Florida, for the Snowball Derby. This race brings ...

Statewide buck harvest is down

This past Tuesday, the West Virginia Division of Natural Resources released the preliminary harvest figures for this year’s two-week deer-buck gun season. In 2017, hunters harvested 44,455 bucks statewide. This is down from the 2016 harvest of 46,071, or 3.5 percent. Like it has been for the past 40 years, 51 counties were open for the traditional two-week deer gun season. The top five counties were: Preston (1,957), Randolph (1,647), Greenbrier (1,631), Hampshire (1,394), and Ritchie (1,347). Braxton County finished seventh with 1,234, and Lewis County finished eighth at ...

No doubt that blaze orange saves lives

No person in their right mind can dispute the fact that the “blaze orange” hunting regulation has dramatically reduced the number of hunting shooting accidents during the deer firearms season. When I was a teenager and learning how to hunt, the buck gun season (then only one week or six days) was considered to be the most dangerous hunting season for the entire year. This year, there have only been four fatalities involving sport hunting, as of Nov. 30. Two of them have been heart attacks. On the opening day of the buck-gun season, there was a fatal hunting accident in Wetzel ...

NASCAR mourns loss of two great ones

I hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving, and remember, Christmas is just a few weeks away. I keep hoping Santa will bring that shiny new Modified for next season, or actually I’d settle for a slightly used newer model. I think that is the type of wish each racer has this time of year. I’m just truly thankful to be able to still participate in this awesome sport after 40-plus years. This is NASCAR Championship week in Las Vegas and on tonight at 9 p.m. on NBCSN you can watch as Martin Truex Jr. takes home the first Monster Energy NASCAR Cup trophy and the huge check that goes ...

The gold and blue’s golden arm goes down

There is no doubt that the Mountaineer fan base will still care about, and take part in festive duties to root for WVU to get a win no matter what bowl game we end up in. Our spirits are down, however, as frustration has reared its ugly head once more over the course of the past two weeks in Division I football for us. Successful recruiting efforts landed Will Grier, with a whole offseason to prep and get ready to back up the hype about his potential. The Mounties lost a close one while opening the season with a real game against Virginia Tech. Grier gave the Hokies a battle in his ...

Treat it right and it may last

People who have several guns often wonder about all of the ammunition they have had on their shelves for years. From my own experience, I have learned that ammunition that has been kept in a cool, dry environment is almost non-perishable. It was back in the 1990s when I fired some 30/40 Krag ammunition that was manufactured prior to World War II. I had just got an old Krag-Jorgensen rifle restored that my uncle (mother’s brother) gave me about five years before his death. Naturally, I wanted to try it out. All of the half-dozen factory-loaded rounds performed perfectly. It was in ...