GREEN COVE SPRINGS – Logan Battig crawled from his severely crumpled car and examined the damage. It was hissing loudly, and every wheel was pointed in a different direction. There wasn’t a …
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GREEN COVE SPRINGS – Logan Battig crawled from his severely crumpled car and examined the damage. It was hissing loudly, and every wheel was pointed in a different direction. There wasn’t a two-inch piece of sheet metal that wasn’t crushed, mangled or had a hole punched in it.
And of all the cars remaining at the Demolition Derby at last month’s Clay County Agricultural Fair, his car was the best looking and the only one that was still running. Barely.
With a $500 first-place check in his pocket, he returned the next night with his River County Cousins band and performed on the Clay County Community Stage. Instead of being behind the wheel of a car, he was playing guitar.
The next morning, he attended New Student Day at Jacksonville University, where he will attend next fall to become a commercial flight pilot.
On Sunday, he was on stage at River Christian Church on Fleming Island, this time on drums, performing in four different services.
A crash-driving, guitar-playing, airplane-flying drummer who is about to graduate from Fleming Island High?
“Sounds about right,” he said.
Logan and his father decided to join the Demo Derby, and they picked “Days of Thunder” as a theme. Dad painted his car like “City Chevrolet,” and the son went with “Mello Yello.” But Logan’s tooth-rattling adventure almost never happened.
Logan couldn’t get his car started, but a team from the second heat came over and found the electrical problem and got him going just as organizers were closing the gates. After that, it was a matter of survival.
“The first (hit) wasn’t bad,” he said. “I mean, it was like, whoa. Then I got one that caught me off guard. That third hit was really hard. I just kept running in reverse, trying to find somebody to hit. The secret was initiating trouble.”
It won’t be like that when he gets his pilot’s license.
But even then, he will still be playing music. His father played the drums. His mother was in the high school marching band. His brother recently graduated from Florida State with a music degree.
“Music kind of runs in my family,” he said. “I’m just following suit. I love the drums; I love the guitar. But I probably prefer the guitar.”
Since he will be at JU next year, Logan said his family will be back at the Demolition Derby with two cars and a new theme.
He will have a lot of opportunities in aviation or music following graduation, although there’s not much future in being a crash test dummy, especially since there are no fender-benders at 30,000 feet.
