The black, unmarked car sat in the median as the mile-long convoy passed. Once the final vehicle drove by, the Dodge Charger on the patch of asphalt eased into the fast lane of I-70 and quickly approached the rear of the pack. No flashing lights. No sirens. It just followed.

Less than two miles down the highway, a second car sat and watched. Same thing -- it let the group pass, then slowly pulled out to follow.

Speed limit was 70 and that's what the orange speedometer needle rested on. Still, the uneasiness of two highway patrol cars following just a few feet behind couldn't be avoided.

That's when a smooth voice came across the two-way radio.

“

Logistically, we all enjoy riding -- we just ride and stop at a hotel. Well, we don't just ride and stop at a hotel. This is planned out. Everything that happens is planned. None of this would be possible without Diane Hough.

”

KYLE PETTY

"Guys in the back, don't worry about those unmarked cars. They're local authorities and they're just shadowing as we approach the tolls," the voice said.

Not more than 30 minutes later, half a dozen police cars -- marked and unmarked -- were keeping regular traffic in the right lane from interfering with the Kyle Petty Charity Ride as it motored through the express lane of the toll between Topeka and Kansas City, Kan. All 150-plus motorcycles, Motor Marshals and support vehicles came out of the toll to a clear interstate as the state authorities blocked traffic to keep the participants intact.

As subtle as it was to watch unfold, it was anything but that for Diane Hough.

Hough, whose voice kept the convoy calm as unmarked cars tagged along, had it all planned out. She had been in communication with the Kansas Highway Patrol twice already that day, informing them of the Ride's location and when the troopers could expect it to hit their precinct. The groundwork for such assistance was laid months before.

The stretch of I-70 just outside of Kansas City was a needle in the 3,598-mile haystack that Hough coordinated for the 15th annual Kyle Petty Charity Ride. There were phone calls. There were permits to sign. There were fuel stations to examine. There were authorities to contact. There were two trips across the country months before the Ride even began. And when the Ride reached Victory Junction Gang Camp in Randleman, N.C., to conclude the 10-day cross-country venture, Hough wasn't finished. She had a growing pile of paperwork back at her office the next day to tie up loose ends on this trip and, well, do it all over again.

In addition to the 150 motorcycles that participated in the Ride, 12 support vehicles were utilized for a variety of reasons. Hough rode in the pace car, driven most of the way by official emcee Rutledge Wood from SPEED. There was a Coca-Cola dually truck that hauled soft drinks and snacks for every fuel stop. There was another Coke truck and trailer with backup supplies. There were two Ford Expeditions with light bars on top and Charity Ride decals that hauled minor equipment and support personnel, and one Ford Escape that traveled ahead of the Ride to prepare for each stop. There was a Chick-fil-a vehicle with merchandise from the Ride's title sponsor. There were three transporting vehicles to carry broken-down bikes -- two from Victory Junction and one supplied by Harley-Davidson. There was the Racing Electronics truck, a traveling home base where RE employee Ron Rater operated the two-way radio system that each official carried. And there was the luggage trailer with a team of four Charlotte firefighters that traveled about an hour ahead of the Ride each day, unloaded the 500-600 bags of luggage and delivered the loads to each hotel room.

With the exception of the RE truck and the Harley trailer, Hough had to coordinate the return of each support vehicle to its rightful owner upon return to North Carolina. That was priority one. Then came the math.

"There's a lot of accounting that has to be done, and I've been working on that non-stop since I got back in here after unloading the truck on Sunday when we got back," Hough said. "There's reconciliations of the hotels -- all 150-plus rooms every night, each portfolio has to be checked against our master hotel contract. There's invoicing to be done. People are wanting some of our merchandise, and it's filling those orders. There's a lot of thank-yous that go out. I want to make sure our database is correct with our new participants. And now's the time people are calling in because they've heard about it, seen it, read about it, seen the Virtual Ride and they're interested in next year. So they need to be added to the database. It's a constant upkeep of things here."

"Then you try to carve out a little time to think about 2010."

But how did she get to this point?

DETERMINING THE PIECES
Hough got her degree in chemistry and worked in economic development in rural North Carolina when she and her father attended a government breakfast in Charlotte in the early 1990s. The meeting focused on plans to bring NFL to the city, and it had another guest speaker: Humpy Wheeler. The former president of Lowe's Motor Speedway was presenting a plan to help the track expand and do a better job of reaching the NASCAR community in alternative ways. Hough was sold. She wanted to work in motorsports.

She helped piece together Kyle Petty's first motorcycle ride across America back in 1995. The goal: raise money for children's charities. Coordinating it was more than unfolding a map and dropping a finger on a starting point, although that first Ride was more akin to that than it was the most recent version, Hough admits.

"As far as this Ride, I can tell you in 1995 we did this Charity Ride because of Kyle's love for motorcycles and his desire to help charities," Hough said. "So it was maybe with about 32 people. We came across the United States with a lick and a promise."

That first ride began in San Francisco with participants basically riding until they decided to stop. First day they went to Los Angeles -- a 381-mile trip. Pack leader Don Tilley got separated from the group, and rider Len Sherrill took the wrong turn and headed east. There was no food, nor were food stops planned. And fuel stops weren't easy.

"We left and went down the Pacific Coast highway and stopped for gas and there was this one lady working there," Petty said. "She locked the doors and cut off the power and would not give us any gas. That's a true story. She was scared to death of us. She would not give us any fuel."

Added motorsports journalist Al Pearce, veteran of all 15 Charity Rides: "This poor old lady was running the place by herself and she looked around and saw 32 motorcycles out there and pulled the blinds shut, locked the door and cut the pumps off. She spoke to us through the blinds saying, 'No, I'm not doing this. Leave. Get outta here.'"

Second day they went to Las Vegas (278 miles), where Sherrill was waiting on the group. Third day they went to Phoenix (366 miles).

The trip began on Monday since Petty was racing full time; riders left following the race in Sonoma. "Then you wake up Thursday morning in Phoenix," said Sherrill, who has been going ever since. "Think about how many miles we had to go to be back on Saturday."

So the group pushed it on Day 4 -- what became the famous Phoenix to Odessa, Texas, ride -- and covered some 717 miles.

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"We rode from Phoenix across Arizona, through New Mexico and got to Odessa at midnight and there were people out waiting for us," Pearce said. "TV stations were still there. Fans were still there. They knew we were coming, they just didn't know when. And we didn't either. It was so disorganized that it was kind of fun."

In the 8 million motorcycle miles since that Odessa ride, Hough has turned a free-for-all jaunt across the nation into a template of preparations any cross-country excursion would welcome. Instead of muskrat and baby beaver barbecue for lunch (an actual meal on the Odessa ride), there are sponsors that cater food under tents with a live band, and locals who offer their services on the grill outside of a gas station. No matter the location, when the Ride pulls in, the food's ready.

Two years ago, the tour went from Maine to Miami. Last year, it went from Traverse City, Mich., to Savannah, Ga. They were both in July, centered around an off weekend in racing. But with Petty out of the car, this year's Ride was planned for May for one basic reason: cooler weather. With dates in hand, Hough examined the map.

"First thing is to determine a basic route, where we think we might want to go," said Hough, who noteed that the Ride has now been through every state in the Lower 48 with the exception of North Dakota. Determining what states to include on the route comes from participant input through surveys and conversations. "Then I start researching the ideal spot for headquarters. Headquarters to us has now become an event to our participants."

This year's headquarters: Stevenson, Wash. -- population 1,400. The Ride had gone through Portland, Ore., before, and many of the participants enjoyed traveling through the Pacific Northwest.

"It's a great opportunity to showcase our part of the world. There's a reason us locals live here -- it's a beautiful place," said Stevenson mayor Dave McKenzie, who traveled the first leg of the Ride on his motorcycle along with three of his buddies and presented a check to Victory Junction for $1,000. "Just like any other area right now, you get an infusion of people in here who use the restaurants, the gas stations, the grocery stories. It just helps out. It's just great to be able to host an organization and an event like this."

Petty laughed.

"If you go 15 years ago, the mayor would have put up roadblocks and wouldn't allow us in the city," he said. "Now, we go places where the mayors ride with us or city councilmen, and they want to be a part of it. The reputation the Ride has built through the years is it's doing good. We're not a bunch of hellions coming to town. We come in and we're raising funds and raising awareness for children's illnesses and the Victory Junction Gang Camp."

LAYING THE BRICKS
To lay out the rest of this year's Ride, participants were polled on where they liked and disliked. Much of this Ride, to celebrate 15 years of the event, revisited popular locations. The Ride had been through Idaho, Utah, Colorado and Kansas, but they were all places people liked. With the logical ending point being Randleman, it made sense to go back to those states only in a different capacity.

A map displayed a clear journey from Washington through Kansas and on to North Carolina. Easy. At least on a map it appeared easy.

"We look at a map and look at leaving Point A and going to Point B," Hough said. "It looks good on the map, but it might not be feasible time-wise for us to get there."

That's where Hough's job gets difficult. It's when she lays her bricks. "It's taking all the data that takes months to gather," she said, "and then laying it all out and working this puzzle."

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In November of last year, with the skeleton of the Ride on paper, she flew to Spokane, Wash., to begin her site inspection -- her own ride through the proposed route to determine what's feasible and what's not, where's a good stop and where's not, and more importantly how long each day should be. Her first goal: get to Stevenson, her ideal location for headquarters. Her previous research took her to the Skamania Lodge, a mountain resort on the Columbia River Gorge that divides Washington from Oregon.

"On the first site inspection, I'm determining if Stevenson, Wash., might be the headquarters and I'm going to jump over to Skamania Lodge," Hough said. "I set a meeting up -- I call it my five-star partnership meeting -- with the hotels and the police jurisdictions in that area, the chamber of commerce, the city officials, everybody I can get. I usually have about 10 to 15 people at that meeting."

Hough shows the community what the Kyle Petty Charity Ride offers. A video outlining the way the Ride raises money and awareness for the Victory Junction Gang Camp is shown, highlighting how the camp provides a NASCAR-themed retreat for chronically ill children to attend free of charge. To date, the Ride has garnered more than $12 million for Victory Junction.

"What I do is I try to let them know that we're interested in their area and we want them to be interested in us," Hough said. "I generate their enthusiasm with that meeting. That doesn't say that we're going to stay there. What it says is that we have this to offer you guys. We're going to bring this Charity Ride to you."

If the circumstances are right, the negotiations begin on bringing 190 people to the community for a night's stay -- longer if it's headquarters.

From there, the journey begins. On the Charity Ride, most legs of the trip are two-hour stints, typically ranging from 90 to 140 miles in distance. But on the site inspection, Hough may make five fuel stops within 100 miles. On the first site inspection for this Ride, it took her a week to drive from Stevenson to Denver (on the Charity Ride itself, it took four and a half days). She was on the road 12 to 14 hours each day, sun up until dark.

Every toll, she documented. Every turn was written down. Every intersection logged. "I can tell you every stop sign, how many traffic lights are in what county and what city -- about anything you need to know," Hough said. She also had her eye out examining whether a station can host 150 motorcycles on the trip. It all goes in her notes.

"I physically go in there, but I'm more concerned about the islands and number of pumps and ingress and egress of each fuel stop," Hough said. "I do not let them know what I'm doing. I'll either buy gas or a Coke and get the physical address and do my documentation. I have two big binders full of notes that I take going across. I don't let them know that until I come back."

Because she does come back.

CEMENTING THE BRICKS
Hough always makes two site inspections. The second trip for this year's Ride was in January, and some changes were made. For example, a sponsor wanted to provide lunch in Memphis. All lunch stops are combined with a fuel stop at the same location, so Hough had to change the fuel stop location to accommodate for a request to provide lunch. One town had seven intersections but not enough manpower from local authorities to provide assistance, so the route was altered.

Once back at her desk, Hough spreads out all of her information and starts piecing together the details -- where overnight stays will be, what hotels will host the Ride, the distance motorcycles can go until they must fuel up. It's cementing her bricks.

Negotiations proceed with hotels to secure rooms and parking for the participants, and a deposit is made. Fuel stations are contacted and arrangements made, for all purposes, to shut down the station for 45 minutes on a specific day so the Ride's participants can take over the place.

Harrison Christian, owner of a station in Morton, Wash., where the Ride made its first fuel stop this year, was eager to supply his store as a fueling station for the motorcycles. His station is one of two in the entire town.

"It's going to make all the newspapers and everything," Christian said. "This is a logging town with three different mills. And of course with the economy, things are very slow right now. Even being a small town to get this much excitement is happy for everybody. I've heard people talking about it for a couple weeks with anticipation and excitement."

From there, toll authorities located along the route are contacted. This year's Ride had multiple toll stops -- two in Colorado, one in Kansas -- through which the participants had to navigate. To keep every rider from having to deposit money individually, Hough contacts the toll authorities, informs them of the dates and predicts a time of arrival. She then opens an account with the authorities and submits a deposit for the entire group.

"We have such a defined, strong reputation that it's not just a pack of motorcycles that just wants to take the far-left lane and go through," she said. "I've got a system that over the years I've built. The first thing I tell them is, 'This has worked for us with the toll authorities in such-and-such state, and it really works well.' They work really well with us."

For example, in Aurora, Colo., Hough provided the authorities with driver's license and tag numbers for each participant and set up an account with a deposit. A camera documented each vehicle when the Ride passed through the express lane that Monday afternoon. Two weeks after the Ride was over, the authorities sent Hough an invoice for the balance.

CLEANING THE BRICKS
With the details ironed out, the route for the 15th annual Kyle Petty Charity Ride was confirmed. The last item: contact all local police jurisdictions along the entire Ride.

"I never go to any police jurisdiction until I've completely tied up this package," Hough said, noting that this year's planning was more difficult due to department cutbacks. "The worst thing you can do is call them and say, 'We're not coming after all,' after working with them. The police jurisdiction is one of the last parts of the puzzle that I can get connected."

Not all stretches of highway required assistance from authorities. During the beginning days of the trip, through the rural roads of Washington, Idaho, Utah and Colorado, the six Motor Marshals that traveled with the Ride were plenty of help. The Motor Marshals -- North Carolina State Troopers who volunteer for the Ride each year -- coordinated the safety of the Ride, from managing stray riders who tried to blend in with the pack to negotiating intersections where local authorities turned over to the Ride.

"You have to be very careful when you're offering them up to let any other police jurisdiction know that we don't have jurisdiction in their area," Hough said. "However, we have highly skilled Motor Marshals that can assist if they need that. But I have to respect each and every one of these departments."

Four times Hough sent four Motor Marshals ahead to help direct traffic, like in Steamboat Springs, which had 11 intersections.

How involved the local police authorities are is up to them, Hough said. Two years ago, when the Ride came through Kansas, a police helicopter followed from state line to state line. Not this year. Budget cuts eliminated that as a possibility.

Still, Kansas offered up the most support in assisting the Ride, placing marked and unmarked cars strategically on Interstate-70 to pick up the pack as it approached heavier traffic in the state's capital. By the time the Ride hit the toll between Topeka and Kansas City, the force of six troopers and two lieutenants had blocked the far-left lane just for the motorcycles and allowed for a seamless transition through the toll and on to Kansas City.

"The toll gates are where we wanted to make sure everything went OK because there's a lot of lane changes and other people there, so that's why we wanted to make sure everything went smoothly," said Lt. Kenny Woods, who was in charge of assisting the Ride for the Kansas Highway Patrol. "We don't do a lot of escorts. Our goal is to not do any. But when they're specialty events, fundraising and big events, like the Kyle Petty thing -- we have interest in the race track and everything else -- we want to make sure it's smooth when it comes through."

Of course, that doesn't mean all things go as planned.

Two weeks before the Ride, with everything in place from hotels to fuel stops to mileage to catering arrangements, one of the exits along the route from Sun Valley, Idaho, to Park City, Utah, was shut down. The sudden change was minor, but it's an example of how an ironed-out plan isn't always wrinkle-free.

"It's hard to believe that this is a week-long event but it takes a year to plan it because so many things change," Petty said. "You plan everything and two weeks before you get there they shut down an exit on you. Two weeks before you get there, the police chief you've been dealing with to get an escort through the city, there's an election and he gets voted out, somebody else gets voted in and they don't want to deal with you any more."

'WHAT I ENJOY DOING'
A day before the Charity Ride was scheduled to kick off, Kyle Petty was laughing and joking with anyone who saw him in the Skamania Lodge lobby. The kickoff dinner was about to begin, an elaborate buffet for all riders and support personnel. It was a casual atmosphere -- jeans and Harley T-shirts dotted the ballroom. But Petty had a hitch in his voice.

More than 100 of the motorcycles that went on the Charity Ride were shipped across the country in four trailers. Others were either already on the West Coast or were driven to Stevenson by the participants who were eagerly ready to drive them right back to North Carolina.

But for those bikes that were shipped, Petty and four others unloaded them in Washington's chilly rain for six hours. His voice was plastered with signs of congestion. By then, however, the rain had stopped. It wouldn't return again until the final legs of the entire trip across the country. Weather is one thing Hough can't predict in her crystal ball. The rest, however, is prophetically written in her two binders.

Fifteen years ago, Hough didn't predict the Charity Ride to become a 10-day march across the country. But she didn't eliminate that, either.

"I knew we had something special because of why we wanted to do this and our commitment," Hough said. "This is what I've done for 15 years. I just try to make it better. I don't ever stop trying to improve on things. Even on the route, if I can improve something at that moment I will."

She has. The free-for-all days of riding 32 motorcycles across the country are gone. Today, it's 150-plus bikes. It's police assistance through major towns. It's crowds of 50 awaiting the Ride to arrive a gas station in Arco, Idaho. And it's a man standing on the side of a Colorado two-lane waving a bill as the Ride motors by.

"There wouldn't be a ride without this man," Pattie Petty said as she pointed to her husband, Kyle, during a night in which 13 participants were honored for being on all 15 Charity Rides. "He gives all of us a lot of praise and a lot of glory, and he's there for all of us whenever we need it. Whenever some man is standing on the side of the road like we saw and says, 'I've got some money,' Well, he does a U and goes back because that $5 means that much to the camp. Or a child sitting on the side of the road and says, 'I remember Adam,' and he has a jar of pennies. There wouldn't be a Ride without Kyle Petty."

She's right. But Kyle defers to Diane Hough.

"Logistically, we all enjoy riding -- we just ride and stop at a hotel," Petty said during the same ceremony right before he presented a 15-year patch to Hough. "Well, we don't just ride and stop at a hotel. This is planned out. Everything that happens is planned. It's all because of Diane and the hours of time she puts into it. None of this would be possible without Diane Hough."

Hough smiled. She knew it was nearly time to plan another one.

"I call it probably the most stellar entertainment tool in the country because we're serious about raising serious money for seriously ill children," she said. "It's my job, and yet it's also what I enjoy doing."