Jake

 Now that the 2024 racing season has slowed down to a crawl, I have been having some time to check on speedway face book pages and websites about off season news and schedule announcements for 2025. 

In doing so on the Clay County Fairgrounds Speedway face book page, I made the sad discovery that Jerene "Jake" Long from Spencer had passed away on September 8th and I was totally unaware of it. 

It is ironic that I was in Spencer that following week for the Fair race but did not think anything about the fact that she was not at the pit gate like normal during the season as I recall that she wasn't working the pit gate when I was at the Fair race the previous your. 

For those that did not know her, Jake Long always worked the pit gate at Spencer and Algona every week and previously also worked at places like Alta, Britt, Jackson and Fairmont before promotional changes and her health started to cut down on her travels. 

She was about the most friendly and pleasant person I had ever ran into at the pit booth at almost any track I can ever think of. The first time I met her, I was trying to explain how I had contacted the track promoter and that I should be on the media list and she was so patient and understanding as we worked through that miscommunication issue. After that, she always remembered me and we would spend time, depending on how busy she was, just talking racing and anything in general. I have a penchant for arriving early at race tracks and often times she wasn't too busy then and we would talk about lots of things and I learned from her how deep her roots were in racing and how much she loved the sport. She lived for dirt track racing and she knew everyone at the track, and they knew her. And even though she didn't know me that well, she would go out of her way to be helpful, even offering to save me a parking spot for my vehicle during the Fair so I didn't have to walk so far. That's the kind of person she was. 

One night early this Summer she talked about some of her health issues which were considerable, but she didn't complain about them and continued to work here tracks, even though the last time I saw her at Spencer she needed help just getting from her car to the ticket window. 

Regulars at her tracks will certainly miss seeing her face when the 2025 racing season rolls around and I for one will certainly miss her greeting every time I walked up to the pit booth at Spencer and Algona. Jerene "Jake" Long was sixty one years old.