Morgan Shepherd is da Man

Morgan Shepherd is an evangelist and a 69 year old NASCAR driver.

His shoe-string budget racing team is  famous for its paint scheme featuring a "Racing for Jesus" logo. He also operates a charitable organization.

Oh, he is also well-known for his hobby of rollerblading around the track and on pit lane.

The other day Morgan Shepherd acquired a new title: crime-fighter. As reported on Racing News Digest:

As Shepherd was getting out of his car at a Wal-Mart in Las Vegas Monday three young people came running out of the Wal-Mart with security in hot pursuit. Shepherd grabbed one of the kids (he estimated the kid was 18-19 years old) and got him down to the ground.

“I caught one of them just as they were getting ready to hop a little wall at the end of the parking lot,” Shepherd told WMGT, an NBC affiilate in Macon, Ga. “I yanked him down and got on top of him.”

Shepherd said that, in a matter of seconds, a Las Vegas police officer tossed him handcuffs and chased the other two suspects.

“I cuffed him and sat on top of him,” Shepherd told WGMT. “The police department officers showed up and asked if I could hold him a while longer while they ran down the others. I told them he wasn’t going anywhere.”

While Morgan Shepherd was holding the suspect he took the opportunity to talk to him. The suspect was expressing fears of going to jail while asking Shepherd to let him go.

“I didn’t tell him a 69-year-old man chased him down,” Shepherd joked. “He was probably 18 or 19. I told him he shouldn’t be stealing stuff. There is just too much of this stuff going on.”

“So many people these days would just sit and watch those guys run away,” Shepherd said. “People need to get up and help stop this type of stuff.”

I also paid tribute to Morgan on my NASCAR Comix site. For completeness I'll post that comic here, too. (Click to enlarge.)

OK, if you have to explain jokes then you've lost--but these comics require NASCAR knowledge. In the first panel, the Daly Planet is not a misspelling--there is a very popular NASCAR blog by that name. The last panel refers to a current, big story in NASCAR Nation: some of press was severely criticized as unprofessional for breaking out in cheers when Trevor Bayne won the Daytona 500. One was even fired.

The bottom line is, I want to be like Morgan Shepherd when I grow up.