29.11.2006, 01:54
Chapter 1
[SIZE="5"]
NASCAR Racing:
The Best Sport Around
[/SIZE]The Best Sport Around
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
In This Chapter
* Getting the lowdown on NASCAR past and present
* Scooping the best driver
* Looking into racing techniques
* Following NASCAR races
* Going big time with sponsors and television
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Most people don’t know what it’s like to dunk a basketball or hit a 100 mph fastball 500 feet for a home run, but almost everyone knows how to drive a car – and that familiarity is the appeal of NASCAR and stock-car racing. Whether they admit it or not, lots of people speed down the highway and daydream about winning the Daytona 500. That daydreamer could be a 17-year-old high school student who just got a driver’s license, a 35-year-old orthodontist, or a 70-year-old retired teacher. Driving is nearly universal.
NASCAR’s allure has grown in recent years because of its tremendous television exposure; the drivers’ accessibility to their fans; and close, competitive racing. In 2003, nearly 7 million fans went to see the NASCAR Cup Series races, which is quadruple the attendance in 1980. And more than 280 million viewers tuned into NASCAR Cup Series events on television in 2003, making NASCAR one of the most popular sports to watch on TV, second only to the NFL.
Here are a few more stats that show how NASCAR has grown from an originally Southern-based sport to a truly national phenomenon:
*#1 sport in brand loyalty of fans
*#2 rated sport on television
*Over $2 billion in licensed sales
*75 million fans
[COLOR="Navy"]The first NASCAR race[/COLOR]
[SIZE="1"][COLOR="#0000ff"][COLOR="#000080"]In February 1948, two months after NASCAR was founded, more than 14,000 people showed up at a race course just south of Daytona Beach. The 150-mile event was held on a unique track that was half on the beach and half on the highway behind the sand, making it interesting for drivers and spectators alike, particularly when the tide came in and the beach narrowed. Red Byron, a driver from Anniston, Alabama, whose left leg was injured when his bomber was shot down in World War II, won that first NASCAR-sanctioned race, enhancing his reputation as one of NASCAR’s greatest early drivers. It also made him the answer to a common NASCAR trivia question: “Who won the first NASCAR race?”
Red Byron also won NASCAR’s first Strictly Stock championship. This series – the forerunner of today’s NASCAR NEXTEL Cup Series, debuted in 1949 and was limited to full-sized American production, or “stock” cars. The first Strictly Stock race was held in June 1949, and anyone with a car was eligible to race. And I mean anyone – people who had never raced before made trip to the .75-mile dirt track in Charlotte, North Carolina, to see how they could do. All they needed was a car and a fair amount of guts.
The cars were plain vehicles like Buicks, Fords, and Lincolns, not like today’s race cars, which are built from the ground up by multi-million-dollar teams and tuned specifically for racing. If drivers wanted to race back then, they could drive family car right onto the track! Of course, if driver crashed and destroyed his car, he could be stranded. Hitchhiking home was not out of the realm of possibility.[/COLOR][/COLOR][/SIZE]
If you’re one of the sport’s new fans, this chapter gives you NASCAR in a nutshell, including enough details about its history, cars, drivers, teams, races, and statistic to make you sound like a veteran. If you’re an old hand, you can brush up on what’s new, as the sport is constantly evolving.