“Rocky Top, you'll always be,
Home sweet home to me.
Good ol' Rocky Top.
Rocky Top, Tennessee.
Rocky Top, Tennessee.”
The familiar tune echoed so loud, it could be heard over the roar of 117,743 University of Tennessee fans. He looked up into the sky just in time to see and hear the fireworks that immediately surrounded the speedway when the clock hit zero. A sea of orange rushed onto the ant-sized field in front of him. His legs shook and heart raced from the rumbling of the screams of overly excited Vol fans that surrounded him. He thought for a split second, “What would they do if this entire bleacher just fell?” It seemed unfathomable that such tiny metal rods could hold so many jumping people.
45-24 win. Despite The Tennessee’s faulty start, Virginia Tech’s embarrassing five fumbles made it almost too easy for the Volunteers to come back and win the game.
Three years… he waited three years for this moment. At the age of 10, Jayden Ward hadn’t had too many moments he could pinpoint to be memorable. But this moment, this football game, would be something to tell his grandchildren about. When he becomes a sports announcer for ESPN, Jayden will select being a part of the record-breaking 156,990 crowd at the legendary Battle at Bristol as the reason he followed that dream through to the very end.
He got one last good look at the football field centered in the middle of the world’s fastest half mile before his dad grabbed him firmly by the arm and pulled him into the crowd of people toward the exit ramp.
Earlier that day, Jayden, his mother Nicky, and his father Gregg sat in what seemed to be endless traffic. In front of them laid miles and miles of cars. Jayden was extremely frustrated. In his mind, at this point, they wouldn’t even make it in the stadium before kick off, even though it was only one o’clock and the game didn’t start until eight-thirty.
“Dad, why can’t we just get out and walk from here? Anything will be faster than this! We are going to miss the game! Are we going to the right gate? Where’s the Vol walk?”
Jayden’s mom, who sat in the passenger seat in front of him, whipped her short; bleach blonde hair around showing the deep scorn on her tan face.
“I swear, if you say one more word, I will go to the game with your dad and you can wait in the car while we go have fun. Why do you have to be so ungrateful? Do you know how much these tickets cost? “
To avoid listening to his mother scream anymore, Jayden kept his mouth shut and eyes out the window. At this point, he could only see the Tennessee Mountains that surrounded the highway. In front and behind his parent’s small, white Nissan Versa, were rows and rows of vehicles. Some waved small Tennessee Volunteer orange flags out their windows. Others were chalked up with “Go Vols” and “Beat the Hokies”. There were even a few sporting maroon Virginia Tech stickers and flags. Many people were blaring music so loud that Jayden could hear every word with the car windows rolled up.
Gregg eventually parked the car in the middle of traffic next to a very large green sign with an arrow pointing right that read “Bristol Motor Speedway”. As he and Jayden jumped out and ran to the side of the road, Nicky slid over in the driver’s seat. Because her and Jayden’s sister were unable to get tickets, they decided to watch the game from Jayden’s grandparent’s home about 15 minutes from the racetrack.
Nicky waved her arms large in the air screaming orders at Jayden’s dad.
“Do not let him out of your sight!”
“Do you see all these people?”
“Don’t let him go anywhere by himself!”
Gregg shook his glossy, bald head as he gave Nicky an assuring hand gesture before him and Jayden set off to the game.
That’s when he saw it for the first time. The Bristol Motor Speedway towered over top, what seemed like, millions of people wearing a variety of oranges and maroons swarming all around like honeybees on a beehive.
Draped perfectly down the side of the colossal structure was a beautiful banner that read, “Battle at Bristol” in a large red and black lettering that resembled the typical NASCAR racetrack logo. Under the logo were two large figures. One was Virginia Techs new head coach, Justin Fuente holding a football. Jayden couldn’t help but think that Coach Fuente resembled a llama. But on the other side, even bigger, was University of Tennessee’s head coach Butch Jones wearing his usual orange Nike jogging suit and his red yelling face.
Jayden and Gregg made their way toward the entrance of the game. At security, they were told to put all their belongings into what resembled a pee cup they give patients at the doctor's office in order for them to go through the metal detectors. Once they scanned their tickets, the guys were informed that they must keep the lanyards attached to their tickets around their necks at all times or they will be asked to leave the stadium.
After desperately searching an hour for the Orange Bridge where the VolWalk was to take place (come to find out, the bridge wasn’t actually orange), Gregg found him and his son the perfect spot to watch all the players walk through towards the stadium.
At first, Gregg was worried that they had arrived too early noticing the lack of fans surrounding the orange tap and small metal fences guarding the walkway. Almost as soon as the thought cross his mind, thousands of people began to flock.
What once was a calm place to take a seat after walking around all day, became just another crowded area filled with eager, wild fans. Unfortunately, the more people that came, the more Jayden and Gregg had to move out of the shade and into the blazing hot sun. Normally, this would be the perfect day for college football. There wasn’t a cloud in the sky and the sun was shining as bright as ever. However, when you are stuck in that heat for five hours, it becomes exhausting.
Now, pressed up against once of the metal fences, Jayden could see the Pride of the Southland Band make their way down the crowds of orange. The drum line stopped right in front of where they were standing. Further down the line, he could see cheerleaders shaking their shiny, white pom-poms in the air towards fans as if they could make this crowd anymore excited than they already were.
Right on cue, the band began to play “Rocky Top” loud and proud right in Jayden’s ears. Normally the loud thumps and booms of the drums would bother him being so close. Not now, not in this moment. He was too distracted by the crowd of smoky gray and orange warm-ups making their way up the center of the crowd.
Gregg smiled and pulled his son up over the fence.
“Look who it is, Jayden!”
First, coming down the line was animated Volunteer mascot, Smokey, waving and hugging children. On his arm was the leash leading the even more animated Blue Tick Hound wearing his checkerboard outfit running up to anyone and everyone that would give him even a little attention.
While distracted by the adorable dog wagging his tale, Jayden looked up at the exact moment a large hand reach out to touch his. To his surprise, standing less than a foot in front of him was Tennessee’s quarterback, Josh Dobbs. Dobbs stood at 6’3, a little taller than Gregg. When he walked away Jayden couldn’t help but laugh.
“What’s so funny? Was that not the coolest thing, ever?” Gregg asked a little confused.
“He really doesn’t have eyebrows, Dad.”
Before he knew it, Jayden was staring directly at the hipbone of his Tennessee football hero, running back Jalen Hurd. Towering at 6’4, weighing 240 pounds of pure muscle, Jayden had to look up at almost an 180-degree angle just to see his face. He wore a serious look on his face with Beats headphones straddled over his neck. Jayden couldn’t believe that the best Tennessee football player since Peyton Manning shook his hand. His hand. Jayden made a vow to himself that he would never wash that hand again, no matter how hard his mom tried to make him.
After the defensive players plowed down the VolWalk like a herd of elephants jumping their 300-pound bodies up and down in excitement, Jayden and Gregg couldn’t wait any longer to go into the stadium and see how they managed to turn a NASCAR racetrack into a football stadium.
To their dismay, the seats were right on the edge of the Virginia Tech fan seating. Jayden grumbled and complained about how the Hokie fans were going to ruin their fun up the 52 flights of stairs they had to climb.
But once Jayden reached the top and sat down to look over the racetrack he was left speechless. He had never seen anything like it before in his short life.
Their seats looked out over the Virginia Tech in zone. The 100-yard field nestled in the center of the Speedways steep half mile track. The Virginia Tech in zone read “Virginia Tech” replicated from Lane Stadium in Blacksburg, Virginia. On the Tennessee’s in zone was the beautifully, acquainted white and orange checkerboard design replicated from Neyland Stadium in Knoxville, Tennessee.
“Dad, how are we going to see the game from up here? It’s so far away! We won’t even see Tennessee’s touchdowns.”
Gregg pointed up at the 30-foot tall, 63-foot wide video display that hung effortlessly over the 50-yard line of the field.
“I heard on the news today that they named it Colossus TV.”
The more fans that field the stadium the more blunt the line between Vol fans and Hokie fans began to form.
About an hour after settling into their seats the sun began to set and both teams bands began to take the field. In the center of the bands, this itty bitty blonde woman took the field with a microphone.
On the back of each seat was a different colored poster.
"Ladies and gentleman, please rise, remove your hats and hold up your signs for the singing of our National Anthem lead by country music artist, Jennifer Nettles." yelled the man over the loud speakers that boomed out of Colossus.
Jayden held up his red poster which had two little peepholes so he could still see what was going on around the field.
All around the field, other fans held up posters like Jayden: some red, some blue and some white. The different colored posters formed two beautiful designs going down both long sides of the half mile. In the middle on the other side read "USA" in big, bold letters.
As the small lady belted out the words to our National Anthem, planes shot over our heads. They were so close to the ground, Jayden could feel the wind pull his poster almost out of his hands.
Directly after the national anthem both bands almost ran to their sides of the field and lined up.
Jayden watched on Colossus as The University of Tennessee Volunteers took the field. Rocky Top blared from the band below as over half the fans in the crowd jumped to their feet. Fire exploded from the canon right under the goal. The cheerleaders ran out with the giant Tennessee flag followed by a mountain of orange. In the center of this orange was their evident leader, Coach Butch Jones.
Jayden looked at his dad who was wearing a mixture of excitement and nervousness on his face.
After a rough opening game against Appalachian State, Jayden knew exactly what his dad was thinking.
He poked Gregg on the should and said, "If they play bad, I'm out of here."
