Last year Crown Royal sent me to Indy to participate in the Capture the Crown event at the Brickyard 400. It was a fun-filled weekend packed with music, purple cup parties, fast cars, a celebration of Curtiss Shaver, an elaborate scavenger hunt at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway, and of course, an ultimate victory for Team Win. With the help of David Dennis from TheSmokingSection.com and Nick Evans from StraightPinkie.com, we dominated the competition and took home some purple iPads and a trip to the 2013 NBA All Star Game. So yea, good times.

But this year is different. To make it fair for everyone, the Crown Royal folks decided to break up Team Win and distribute our talent to other teams competing in this year’s Capture the Crown scavenger hunt. Despite the loss of my quality teammates, I’m looking forward to defending last year’s title with my new squad.

And this year Crown Royal is honoring another hero at the Brickyard 400. Gunnery Sergeant Samuel Deeds was awarded the naming rights for this year’s Crown Royal “Your Hero’s Name Here” program. By all account, Deeds, a die-hard NASCAR fan from Erlanger, Kentucky, is more than deserving of the honor. While deployed in Iraq, Deeds put himself in harm’s way by exposing himself to an IED blast while other marines were approaching his position. After 30 surgeries and lots of rehab, Deeds saw fit to save the lives of three people caught in a rip tide off the coast of North Carolina. I don’t know too many people who make it a habit of saving lives on the regular, but I look forward to meeting Deeds and shaking his hand.

Should be another fun weekend with good people, plenty of action, of course, purple cups of Crown and Coke in hand at all times (responsibly). Can’t wait to get out there again!