Mike Skinner takes ESPN.com users inside the garage and behind the wheel of the Lowe's No. 31 Chevrolet with his weekly diary along the Winston Cup circuit.

Last week was an "off" week for the NASCAR Winston Cup Series, but as I mentioned in last week's column, I was scheduled to race not once, but twice in special Race of Champions features.

The first race was Friday night at Louisville Motor Speedway -- a tight little seven-sixteenths-of-a-mile oval in Louisville, Ky. The race was set up as a two-segment, 20-lap feature, with the field being inverted after 10 laps.

My competition that night included a couple of Winston Cup legends, three-time champion Cale Yarborough and Harry Gant, and current drivers Geoffrey Bodine, Wally Dallenbach, and Michael Waltrip. We all signed autographs for about and hour and a half before the race and got a chance to spend some time with the fans in a relaxed atmosphere.

I guess I may have had a track advantage over the rest of the guys because I raced at Louisville twice during my NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series days, winning the race in 1995 and finishing second the next year. I also won a Race of Champions event there in 1995.

But racing is racing and it wasn't like I was going up against a bunch of slouches.

I ended up winning both segments, despite having to start from the back for the 10-lap dash to the checkered flag. But that was almost secondary to all the fun we had.

Racing against Cale Yarborough was one of the most exciting things I've ever done. We almost spun each other out a couple of times and just had a great time. We all were presented with Lousiville Slugger baseball bats after the race and we all made sure to get each other's signatures.

We then hung out together after the race and continued the good time. It was just like the old short-track racing days. Saturday's race wasn't until that night so we decided to spend the night in Louisville.

Jennerstown Speedway is a great half-mile track about 45 miles southeast of Pittsburgh. I had never had the chance to race there before Saturday night but had a lot of fun.

The competition that night was Gant, Waltrip and Hut Stricklin. The race was the same two-segment, 20-lap format as the night before. We again spent time with the fans at a pre-race autograph session and did a bunch of interviews with the local media before hitting the track.

And just like the night before, I was able to win both segments.

We got back to the farm in North Carolina at about midnight Saturday. Sunday was just a bum day. No phones. No schedules. Just a day to relax before a two-day test at Indianapolis Motor Speedway and this week's Pennsylvania 500 at Pocono Raceway.