Three cars scream into the final turn. They’re neck and neck and it’s anybody’s guess which one will pull ahead to become a NASCAR race winner.Except for the decals from sponsors plastered over what seems like every square centimetre of the bright exteriors, the cars out on the track look literally like the family sedans that can be found in any parking lot throughout the United States. Nonetheless, NASCAR, which stands for the National Association of Stock Car Automobile Racing, has grown into the most popular form of racing in North America.
      On any given weekend from early February through mid-November, NASCAR races draw crowds of 150,000 to 200,000 to tracks in traditional stock-car venues such as Daytona Beach, Florida; Rockingham, North Carolina; and Talladega, Alabama, as well as to newer tracks in Pennsylvania, Nevada and California. NASCAR has even invaded the fabled precincts of the Indianapolis Speedway, the traditional home of U.S. open-wheel racing, which features specially designed low-slung, fenderless cars. Meanwhile, the Winston Cup, the trophy awarded annually to the most successful driver on the NASCAR tour, has become one of the most famous and avidly sought prizes in motor sports today.
      The Goodyear tyre company, which tracks attendance at motor sports events, estimates that more than 6.1 million fans attended NASCAR races in 1997 – a 9 percent rise over 1996. The huge crowds, sunshine (NASCAR seems to have a pact with the weatherman that the sun is always out for a Winston Cup race), the big oval tracks with their steeped, banked turns, roaring engines, multicar scrapes and pileups – all this plus often close finishes make for a spectacle that brings in the crowds. But unlike other motor sports such as Formula One racing with its aura of international glamour and sophistication, NASCAR has resolutely retained a distinctly American accent. “They use American cars driven by American heroes,” NASCAR’s enthusiastic supporters like to crow.

Southern beginnings
Despite NASCAR’s growing popularity throughout the rest of the U.S., it is still saturated with the distinctive accent of the American South where the Winston Cup circuit was born a half century ago. Over the years, the NASCAR series also has been a major showcase and marketing tool for U.S. automobile manufacturers. Chrysler dropped out of NASCAR racing in the late 1970s, although the talk around Detroit and Atlanta where NASCAR is based is that the racing organisation would love to take Chrysler back into the fold.
      For now, however, the circuit is dominated by Ford and General Motors Corp. Both companies consider it an important part of their overall marketing effort. In fact, NASCAR’s popularity began to soar starting in the mid-1980s when Ford pulled back from Formula One racing and General Motors ended its self-imposed ban on any kind of corporate sponsorship or association with motor sports. Today both companies are big-time supporters of NASCAR and major beneficiaries of its popularity. “We really believe in `race on Sunday, sell on Monday,’” says Gary Claudio, manager of the Chevrolet Race Shop.
      The value of the involvement is multiplied by NASCAR’s growing appeal to television audiences not only in the U.S. but now also overseas, says Claudio. In fact, there is even talk of a bidding war among the major television networks for the rights to broadcast NASCAR races when the racing organisation’s current contract with CBS expires in a couple of years. NASCAR’s roots go back to the 1920s when young southern farmers and mill hands started racing their personal machines against one another first on country roads or on the flat dirt tracks used for horse racing at rural fair grounds. According to NASCAR lore, many of the original machines were built literally from scrap by ambitious drivers who became crack mechanics, improvising repairs and tuning their machines for maximum performance.
      One of the most popular racing venues in the Southeast in the early days was the broad, hard-packed beach facing the Atlantic Ocean near Daytona Beach. Semon Knudsen, a former General Motors and Ford executive whose father was one of the industry’s pioneers, recalls racing on the sands at Daytona Beach as a car-crazy college student in the early 1930s.
      NASCAR grew out of the racers’ desire to codify a set of rules governing races for cars that you could buy at any car dealership in any town in the United States. The name stock car racing, in fact, implies that the car comes right from the manufacturer’s stock and is not the product of some special engineering shop or laboratory. Starting in the late 1940s, NASCAR held races on Florida’s Atlantic beaches until 1959 when the Daytona track was built inland. The Daytona track is still NASCAR’s spiritual home, and it annually serves as the site for the Winston Cup circuit’s first and most famous race – the Daytona 500.

Different stock
Since the 1940s, the stock-only rule has been modified, but NASCAR is still decidedly “low tech” compared with other forms of racing. The cars themselves, while modified to protect the driver, retain the actual exterior appearance and shape of cars sold by General Motors and Ford, which still account for almost 60 percent of all vehicles sold in the U.S. For the 1998 season, the drivers involved in the quest for the Winston Cup are racing Chevrolet Monte Carlos, Pontiac Grand Prixes or Ford Tauruses. The Tauruses replaced the Ford Thunderbirds, which had won more races than any other model in NASCAR history. The Thunderbirds were pulled from the circuit in the wake of Ford’s decision last year to suspend production of the Thunderbird.
      The inside of a NASCAR racer is equipped with an elaborate roll-cage that protects the driver who is sealed into an area right behind the steering wheel. The rest of the car looks like the inside of a family sedan that is still waiting for the interior trim such as carpeting, seats and door panels. NASCAR’s rear-wheel-drive racers are powered by 358-cubic-inch (5.9-litre) V-8 engines that are tuned and bored so they can produce up to 700 horsepower at full throttle.
      NASCAR carefully polices any kind of innovation that might give one car an edge over the other. Instead of electronic engine controls, the NASCAR racers still use old-fashioned carburettors, which have been virtually eliminated from use in production cars around the world.
      The emphasis on uniform competition is one of the key elements of NASCAR’s appeal, according to observers of the motor sports scene. “It’s not a series for real gearheads,” says an official from a major sponsor of auto racing. “If you look at Formula One, it’s more of a battle between the engineers than between the drivers.”
      Top speeds in NASCAR races are about 340 kph, but open-wheeled races can reach speeds of 384 kph. “NASCAR’s idea of a perfect race is to have three racers coming into the final turn with a chance to win,” says Kevin Kennedy, a spokesman for Ford Motor Sports. “And that happens. That’s why it’s so popular and why it’s a good TV show.”

Joseph R. Szczesny  
a Detroit writer specialising in automotive issues